As 2009 sneaks its way into the annals of history, many are taking this time of year to join for the holidays or reflect on the year that was.

As the most measurable, social year in human history, the tools of 2009 showed us how fast something can catch on, who is talking about what and how small the world has become.

In that spirit, we have created some data visualizations to show how Christmas buzz is taking shape and what products are being talked about on the web.

1. Christmas on Twitter

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Christmas, though confined to a day or two in December, is a buzz term all year long, with an escalation of thousands per day starting in the Fall and ratcheting up to a fever pitch as the holiday grows closer. Though we haven’t seen the full spike mature yet, tweets containing either the term “xmas” or “Christmas’ are now nearing 20,000 per hour or over 300 per minute.

Compare this to last year when we showed a very similar graph and tweets for “Christmas” were topping out at 40k per day and you’ll get a sense of how much Twitter has exploded in 2009.

2. Christmas in the News

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Since November 1, Google News is showing 111,493 new results and a massive 106 million new blog results for the term “Christmas”, driven in part by the indexing of tweets, as the search giant makes a meaningful move into the real-time future.

3. Christmas in Photos and Video

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As the social web matured this year, photo and video sharing has become second nature to many. With more smartphones and applications making this type of engagement possible, expect to see these sectors flourishing in 2010. Notice below, videos tagged “Christmas” on YouTube () pushed the video portal to its public API return max for a tag to 1 million by mid-December.

4. Obama Vs. Claus

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President Obama is one of the most talked about people on Twitter year round, but in this season, he and Santa duel for prominence in the public’s mind.

5. Love Vs. Hate

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In the epic battle of love vs. hate, there is a clear winner on Twitter this holiday season.

6. Location-Based Tweets in NYC

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An important trend for 2010, as recently described by Pete Cashmore, is location-based social networking. And in the spirit of special sharing, here is a new feature set we at Wiredset are rolling out with Trendrr for the very first time: Data surrounding “check-ins” on Foursquare (). Here’s a sample look at possible holiday activity in the Big Apple, as shown in “check-ins” per day.

7. Holiday Retail Wars

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And where are the “Twitterati” spending their shopping time? This graph, first shown by Jennifer Van Grove in a piece on Black Friday, shows how the rest of the heavy shopping season buzz panned out — with Amazon staying on top of giant retailers on Twitter.

8. Kindle Vs. iPhone

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Here is a look at Twitter buzz for two personal devices that captured America’s attention, harnessed imagination, and drove innovation in 2009. To put the buzz in perspective, most TV shows get less than 5,000 tweets per week. This shows the conversation levels per day.

9. Smartphone Blog Buzz

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With an average of over 100 million blog results returned for a typical Google () search, iPhone is clearly the hottest blog topic in the smartphone category. Here’s a look at some others in the blog space.

10. Video Games

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The multi-billion dollar gaming industry is here to stay and will be a staple this holiday season in many homes. You can see the peaks driven by a flurry of new game announcements this fall, followed by a look at how new games are fairing on Amazon.

11. Zhu Zhu Pets on Amazon

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Every year there is a product that comes out of nowhere to become a must-have for the kiddos. This year the Zhu Zhus — robotic hamsters — are the new entrant making waves in the children’s category. Even with a consumer group contending parts of the anatomy to be unsafe in early December, the fuzzy robots have made their mark on consumers this year.

12. The 12 Days of Christmas Tweets

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Most know the song, but few can remember all the words to “The 12 Days of Christmas.” The first five days of Christmas are the most talked about on Twitter. Here is a look at them all.

Image courtesy of iStockphoto , Osuleo ]]> http://www.bestchristmasdays.com/2009/12/the-12-graphs-of-christmas/feed/ 0 http://www.bestchristmasdays.com/2009/12/10-iphone-apps-to-help-you-survive-the-holidays/ http://www.bestchristmasdays.com/2009/12/10-iphone-apps-to-help-you-survive-the-holidays/#comments Mon, 07 Dec 2009 19:36:33 +0000 admin http://www.bestchristmasdays.com/?p=147 Sometimes going home for the holidays can be a case of collective insanity. I tend to fly on the big travel days when the airport security lines are ridiculously long, my flight is more expensive, and my family is more stressed than normal.

This year, I plan to use my iPhone as a problem solver for all my holiday woes. From traveling, to shopping, to entertaining the kiddies, these iPhone apps cover everything but those family fights (even the iPhone’s not that miraculous!).

1. Flightcaster

This app doesn’t just tell you your current flight status, it actually predicts the likelihood that your flight will be delayed. It takes into account factors such as weather, incoming aircraft, other delays, and historical data, and then gives you a percent chance that your plane will be on time, less than 1 hour delayed, and more than 1 hour delayed.

At $7.99 it’s a bit pricey, but its ability to forecast delays definitely makes it worthwhile (you can also access the same data on their site for free if you’d prefer). It worked like a charm for my flights, but obviously results may vary. Now, if only it could actually prevent delays.

Price: $7.99

2. GasBag

For those of you driving instead of flying, you’ll love this app. GasBag helps you find the cheapest gas station in any given area so you can fill up without breaking the bank. Simple and easy to use, although it doesn’t have data for every location and station. Another app to check out is GasBuddy ($2.99) which serves a similar purpose.

Price: Free

Save Money on Gifts

3. ShopSavvy

This great app allows you to scan the barcode of any item in a store and see prices online and from nearby retailers. With this app you can ensure you’ll get the best price for every gift, even when you’re shopping in a hurry. Warning: you may get so caught up with the coolness of this product that you scan way more products than necessary.

Price: Free

4. Yowza Mobile Coupons

With Heroes actor Greg Grunberg as the co-founder, this app has made quite a splash. At a time when everyone is looking for ways to save money, this app helps you do just that.

You won’t find a coupon for every store, and not all of them will be useful, but in my opinion, if you find even one great deal from this app then it has more than proved its worth.

Price: Free

Take Stress Out of the Holiday Meal

5. GroceryIQ

Around the holidays, grocery stores can be as crowded as the aiports. That why it’s important to know exactly what you need so you don’t have to make more than one trip. With GroceryIQ, you can create lists of items you need to get and even organize your lists by aisle or store so you can shop as efficiently as possible. If only this app could buy the groceries for you, then it really would be perfect.

Price: $0.99

6. Epicurious

With 25,000 recipes, this app should have everything you need to make your holiday meals happen. It even has holiday-specific recipes for Christmas cookies, edible gifts, and Christmas and Hanukkah dinners. My favorite category is the aptly-named “I can barely cook.” You can also email recipes and use its step-by-step mode.

Price: Free

Keep the Kids Entertained

7. Movies

Sometimes on hoildays everyone gets cooped up in the house for a bit too long. This can lead to stress, fights, and kids throwing footballs in the living room. Sometimes the best solution is simply finding an excuse to get out. The Movies app allows you to see what movies are currently playing near you, look up reviews, and find theaters and show times.

Price: Free

8. Goofy Mad Libs

The iPhone has a huge selection of apps for young kids, however, the one problem those apps don’t solve is the worry associated with actually handing your precious iPhone over to a child. Goofy Mad Libs has the perfect solution, where you can ask kids for the Mad Libs, read them the silly story, and never have the iPhone leave the comfort of your own hands. This app even has a free version called Mad Libs Lite if you’d like to try it out first. It’s also great for car trips.

Price: $3.99/Free

Throw the Perfect Holiday Party

9. Mixology

The perfect holiday party requires the right drinks, and Mixology will help you create them. Select drinks by category (including hot drinks which may be just right for a holiday-themed party), liquor type, or name. You can also use the liquor cabinet feature to select what you have on hand and have the app suggest what drinks you could make.

If almost 8,000 drinks sounds like too many options, you can also shake the phone to get a random drink selection and take the choice out of your hands. As a bonus, there are bartending tips and techniques if you want to impress your friends (or just not embarrass yourself).

Price: Free

10. Pandora()

The right selection of music requires a lot of time considering your guests, your song selections, and how each song fits your party’s mood. Or, you could just use the Pandora app instead.

Select a song or genre for Pandora to work from and you’ll have a whole party’s worth of music with one minute of prep. Pandora even has Christmas and holiday music, so it can truly accommodate any taste (good or bad).

Cost: Free

Gone are the days of yore when the person in charge of the said gift exchange had to keep meticulous records and notes carefully hidden from all the participants.  Just like Fantasy Football, Secret Santas can now be organized online, too.

Gift exchanges used to be purely for fun, but now those pinching their pennies are using the Secret Santa as a way to save money.  Rather than get a gift for everyone in your family, which for some people can be in the double digits, a gift exchange retains the spirit of giving on a much smaller scale.  An added bonus? If you only have one person to shop for and therefore spend less overall, you can spend more time and thought on the actual gift itself.

With so many in need around the world, another great way to leverage the Secret Santa concept while giving back is to donate money to a charity in the gift recipient’s name. But don’t just pick a random charity, think about the gift recipient’s interests and passions and let that guide your charity choice.

Charitable Secret Santa

Great tools to search different charities online are:

Charity Navigator – At this comprehensive site you can search for foundations by the charity’s name or keyword. Or you can browse by categories including Animals, Education, and Environment.  As you search, you can save the charities that look interesting to narrow down your choices for the ultimate gift. The gift that keeps on giving. Activists and good samaritans alike will appreciate the ease of use and information all in one place. Those who want to know exactly where their money is going will appreciate the pie charts that illustrate just that.

Just Give – Touts itself as THE destination for charitable online giving.  Like Charity Navigator, Just Give lets users search by category, key word, and charity name.  Just Give goes a step further though with its inspiring stories of both adults and kids that give back.  If you’re someone that is on the fence because you consider shopping half the fun of the holidays, Just Give offers what you’re craving. With a Just Give gift guide and holiday collections, any shopper will be satisfied.  For those who are notorious for giving gift cards, you can give the gift of charity with Just Give’s gift cards as well.

Organizing Your Secret Santa

Whether you’re giving something tangible or something charitable, the following tools will aid with planning, organizing and executing the gift exchange methods of your choice:

SecretSanta.com – A great tool for managing gift exchanges for both small and large groups.  Are you the lucky intern that’s been tasked with organizing your entire office’s gift exchange?  Not only does SecretSanta.com explain the nuts and bolts of what the Secret Santa, Yankee Swap, and White Elephant gift exchanges are, the site also offers step-by-step instructions for creating and managing the event, as well as creating the guest list.

Users can even save their gift exchanges year after year and set rules for the exchange so that if needed, certain people won’t draw each other’s names. (Handy if you were secretly dating that guy on the second floor and have since married the boss). SecretSanta.com is free to use.

Swap-Bot.com – A site not specifically designed for Secret Santa gift exchanges, however, it’s a handy tool that one can use to organize one. Swap-Bot.com is ideal for virtual groups or forums that would like to do a gift exchange since it’s set up to allow members of the “swap” to send items through the mail.

Other features include setting price limits on items and a rating system.  Don’t have a group, but want to be part of a gift exchange anyway?  At Swap-Bot.com you can sign up to participate in all kinds of swaps in different categories. Many of the open swaps are craft-related. Swap-Bot.com is also free.

Elfster.com – Probably the most sophisticated of the three, Elfster offers many ways to set up a gift exchange. Even those people who don’t have an email address can participate via Elfster.  In addition to setting up the Secret Santa gift exchange, Elfster also offers tips & tricks for managing the exchanges for online communities, offices, and even Facebook groups and friends list.  This is done via a simple sign-up link you can share with those you’d like to invite.  Elfster also offers the security of restricting who can view the participants’ emails and how the participant Q & A is handled.

Jessica Smith has successfully brought her 8 years of marketing and business development experience home with her, literally. She is Chief Mom Advisor and the woman behind the idea for MomForce.com, Chief Mom Officer for Wishpot.com, and works with big brands including Walmart and Ford. Jessica offers a personal glimpse into her life as a mom and virtual executive at JessicaKnows.com. Her specialties include creating buzz and community for companies that target moms through new media. She has also been recently tapped as one of the 50 Most Influential and Powerful Women in Social Media as #23. Jessica enjoys the best of both worlds, motherhood and career, at home in the DC Metro area with her husband and young son. You can find her on Twitter as @jessicaknows.

Image courtesy of iStockphoto, shapecharge