A Delaware Court on Monday denied a fast-track schedule to the lawsuit waged by two Detroit pension funds against Yahoo for its handling of the failed Microsoft negotiations, which means the suit will not go to trial before the company's annual shareholder meeting on Aug 1. The pension funds launched the suit with the intent of invalidating a controversial severance plan, dubbed a "poison pill" by many, that the shareholders claim would have made any change in control of ownership a costly endeavor. The severance plan offers generous compensation to Yahoo employees who are either let go or forced to …

Two years ago, many Web critics thought that Joost would be what Hulu is turning into: the go-to distribution platform for professionally produced content. It didn't really happen, of course. To hear Joost executives tell it, TV networks were reticent about distributing their content. To hear others tell it, Joost failure to gain traction came down to an "unwieldy" download and a poor user interface. Indeed, Web sites-and not desktop software-have turned into the preferred means of distribution for the major TV networks. As such, Joost has decided to reinvent itself via a new service that launches inside a …

Silicon Alley Insider contributor Sean Ryan says it's clear that social networks won't be able to pay for themselves through advertising alone, "at least not at the rate their owners would prefer." Yesterday, The New York Times had a piece about MySpace's struggle for monetization, concluding that better targeted advertising has to be the solution, but Ryan says that history shows that the most successful media models offer premium services/subscriptions in addition to advertising. Unsurprisingly, Ryan, whose company Meez sells virtual items on social networks, thinks the secondary revenue streams for social networks should be the sale of virtual …

Firefox 3 is slated for a Tuesday launch, which CNet says marks the "opening (of) a new front in the browser wars." The Web browser is ripe for an overhaul, author Stephen Shankland says, ready to transform from "a static repository of content into a foundation for applications such as word processors and graphics editors." Indeed, the idea of an "open" Web browser, one that supports a wide variety of plug-ins from third-party software developers, could displace the movement toward "open" Web sites. Not only that, the new Firefox, with its "Awesome Bar", allows users to type search-like terms as …

Online auctioneer eBay has officially entered the "open" movement, by unveiling a plan on Monday that lets outside software programs work inside the world's largest ecommerce site. The move, eBay executives said, is designed to help both developers and sellers make more money, by allowing third-party software programs to work inside eBay's Selling Manager. "Rather than having eBay try to build every feature, we should open up the platform and integrate others' work," Max Mancini, senior director of platforms and disruptive innovation told Reuters. "We have realized that we need to allow sellers and developers to get together a …

Should those who use more bandwidth pay more per month for Internet service? The New York Times points out that Internet service providers are currently exploring the idea; Time Warner Cable is conducting an "Internet metering" test in one Texas market, while Comcast has said it would expand its strategy to slow down the Web traffic of so-called bandwidth hogs at peak consumption times. AT&T, meanwhile, said it was considering consumption-based pricing last week: "Based on current trends, total bandwidth in the AT&T network will increase by four times over the next three years," the company said. The three companies …