Most search engines rely on publishers of Web video to provide terms that make their videos searchable. Publishers will usually apply "metatags" to videos, such as "olympics," "Jon Stewart," or "Dishwasher repair" so they can be found. But not all publishers take this step, while others intentionally mislabel their videos in order to maximize hits. So some search engines are now debuting new, better ways to search videos. For example, VideoSurf is using technology that can search the actual content of the video, and YouTube is developing speech-recognition technology that can be used to search the actual words spoken in …

Yahoo and Time Warner's AOL unit continue to discuss a possible merger, a person familiar with the talks told Reuters on Wednesday. The two companies are looking at each other's books to figure out how much money they could make together and where costs can be saved. While noting a deal was not imminent, the source said the two companies have engaged in "meaningful" due diligence about a possible combination for the past couple of weeks. Talks began several months ago, when Yahoo was looking for an alternative growth strategy to fend off a $47.5 billion takeover bid from Microsoft. …

Odds are you've already seen it: The "Whassup!" guys are back, this time in a viral video for Barack Obama. All the original actors have returned for the 2-minute video, but this time things have gotten bad. One is fighting in Iraq, another has lost his money and his health insurance, and another is trapped in a hurricane. So what's up? Change, in the form of Barack Obama. True, true. But the video is causing a ripple in industry circles, because Budweiser -- which clearly has no interest in backing a presidential candidate -- is powerless to stop it. …

With the boatloads of money funneled to search marketing in recent years, one might not think academic proof was required to convince advertisers that search is where they should put their dollars. But according to WPP Group and Google, you would be wrong. The two companies are teaming up to provide grants to academic research to show how search marketing benefits brands. The $4.6 million joint project, funded equally by the companies, will run three years, with about a dozen grants expected in the first year alone. "The aim is to make us smarter, our clients smarter and …

Anyone in the U.K. searching for music from Johnny Cash yesterday was in for a surprise. Ditto anyone looking for Jimi Hendrix's "Long Hot Summer Night," Queen's "Killer Queen" or any sing containing the word "lesbian," though none come to mind right now. A glitch in the U.K.'s iTunes censorship software yesterday caused perfectly inoffensive song titles and artist names to be partially replaced by asterisks. Affected words include "hot," "Johnny," "Killer," and "lesbian." And while files from The Pussycat Dolls were unaffected, good luck finding "I Thought I Saw a Pussy Cat," by Danny Kaye. An Apple …

Although they probably didn't like each other much when they first met, Kevin Bermeister, formerly of peer-to-peer file-sharing service Kazaa, and Michael Speck, once the head of the Australian Music Industry Piracy Investigation, have teamed up to help persuade would-be file pirates to become legitimate paying customers of the music industry. The two met as courtroom adversaries -- Speck was helping sue Bermeister for his involvement with Kazaa -- but are now partners in a joint venture, Brilliant Digital Entertainment, which is preparing a product that can intercept online piracy. The product will work at the ISP level, and …

The latest iteration of Microsoft's "I'm a PC" campaign has a new star: you. New ads featuring user-generated videos of people declaring "I'm a PC" have hit the airwaves, and more are to come. Anyone is invited to visit Microsoft.com and upload their videos for inclusion in future ads. The user-generated bid is the latest phase of a $300 million campaign from MDC's Crispin Porter & Bogusky, which is largely focused on responding to Apple's hugely popular spots featuring an uptight, nerdy John Hodgman declaring "I'm a PC." The campaign originally featured Jerry Seinfeld and Bill Gates in bizarre …