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Staff Writers, Monday, June 15, 2009, 2:15 PM
Does Bing Have Google Running Scared?
New York Post
Search competitors have come and gone during the years, but Microsoft's new Bing, which made its debut last week and quickly grabbed the spotlight thanks to an $80 million ad campaign, has reportedly grabbed the attention of Google. According to the Post, cofounder Sergey Brin has assembled a team to decode Bing and design immediate upgrades for Google's search engine.
A Google spokesman refused to comment on Bing specifically, but told the Post: "We always have a team working on improving search. We dedicate more time and energy to search than anything else in our company. Our algorithm is constantly evolving."
Bing has received high marks from analysts and consumers alike, so far. Early statistics show Bing increasing Microsoft's market share of the search market by two percentage points, to about 11 percent.
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Diller Apparently Unloads Very Short List on Kushner
Valleywag
According to insiders, Very Short List, IAC's answer to Daily Candy, has been sold to Jared Kushner, the young real estate tycoon and owner of The New York Observer. The deal evidently went down sometime last week, as many of the VSL staff was told to pack their things Thursday night, as the Observer staff -- or what's left of it after a recent round of painful layoffs -- will now be running the show.
IAC's Barry Diller started VSL after seeing the money being made by Daily Candy, the daily e-mail that provides daily shopping tips. VSL attempted to cover more ground-cultural, arts, etc.-but never became profitable. Observers wonder if Kushner wasn't somewhat bamboozled into taking the property, as they say it's unlikely he will be able to make it profitable if Diller and his deep resources couldn't.
In an e-mail that went out to VSL's 30 or so employees on Sunday, the editors wrote: "This has been an intensely bittersweet week. Last Monday we picked up our Webby, which was the sweetest part, and testament to how inspired your work has been. Tomorrow, The New York Observer is taking over majority control and day-to-day management of VSL from IAC. Unfortunately, as part of the transition, they will not be taking any of VSL's existing staff."
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Millions Around World Following Iran Events Via Web
BBC
As Iran attempts to block mainstream media from reporting on the unrest there following a disputed presidential election, millions are finding there is news still to be had via Twitter, YouTube, photo blogs and other social media that is not so easily blocked.
The BBC lists the various places people can find news about Iran on the Web. The Huffington Post is live blogging the situation; users are creating groups with updates on Facebook; Tehranlive.org is a photoblog that is updating hourly; and of course Twitter users are adding Iran hash tags to make updates easy to follow.
Not surprisingly, most of the people doing the updating seem to be of the opinion that the election was stolen by the incumbent. The opinions of the Iranians themselves can be found at the Web site of the National Iranian American Council, is live blogging and translating Twitter messages in Farsi.
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Facebook Users Rush to Grab Usernames
Bloomberg
More than 3 million Facebook users registered for usernames in the first 12 hours after the social network allowed them to create easy-to-find, personalized Web pages, the company said.
"It's rewarding to see so many people are interested in getting a user name," Facebook spokesman Larry Yu said yesterday in a telephone interview with Bloomberg. While traffic to the site was higher than usual, he said the introduction of the feature went smoothly.
The idea behind the new names and addresses is to simplify locating friends on the site. Previously the URL for one's Facebook page consisted of a long, cryptic combination of numbers and letter, but users who took advantage of the free feature were given pages with simple URLs, such as Facebook.com/mediapost.
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Village Voice Launches Niche Ad Network
Adweek
Village Voice Media is launching a niche ad network called Voice Local Network consisting of local blogs and content sites that share its indie sensibility. The company owns 15 alternative weeklies across the U.S.
The network is already under way, as ads for sites such as Eater.com, real-estate focused Curbed.com and shopping site Racked.com have been sold in recent weeks. Other sites such as Wolfgangsvault.com, which traffics in vintage music; checkoutmyink.com, a tattoo site; and LikeMe.net, which helps users find food and music options based on others' recommendations; are also part of the network.
"With this network, we can align ourselves with good quality sites with similar demographics by plugging in and becoming their sales force," said Village Voice Media president Scott Tobias. "This allows us to extend our coverage into certain verticals and maintain high CPMs."
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Video: Young Tom Brokaw, Eric Schmidt And Bill Gates On 'Something Called The Internet'
peHUB
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