Facebook launched several new features that many say take a direct shot at Twitter, the microblogging site that Facebook tried to acquire late last year. Twitter is all about real-time communication, while Facebook has been focused on fueling communication through interactivity. With the launch of these new features, however, Facebook is now moving more towards more real-time communication, says GigaOm's Brendan Gahan. The social networking giant announced changes, reported in Online Media Daily, to its home page that would allow streaming "posts from your friends in real-time." Facebook also changed its status prompt from "What are you doing right …

Yahoo Updates, Yahoo's answer to Facebook Connect, is now available on more than 600,000 Web sites. And unlike Facebook, which is still wrapped up in a privacy debate over who controls its data, Yahoo is implementing open standards in its system, for which Read Write Web's Marshall Kirkpatrick applauds the Web giant. As part of the launch, Yahoo is also partnering with JS-Kit, a service that powers comments and ratings on a variety of sites, from AOL and Sun Microsystems to tiny little guys you would have never heard of. As Kirkpatrick says, the vision for Yahoo Updates is the …

Earlier this year at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, Facebook Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg told TechCrunch to expect "the evolution of the advertising products" at Facebook this year. TC writer Erick Schonfeld notes that already, Facebook has embarked on the path of creating its own AdSense-like social ad network by combining Facebook Connect and Facebook Ads. Schonfeld cites two unnamed sources that have direct knowledge of the product integration, who say that it's all part of the larger plan outlined by Sandberg earlier this year. Meanwhile, Facebook's expansion into third-party territory continues. Just last month, the social …

Online subscriptions, it seems, have emerged as the progressive business model of choice for flagging media and cable companies, whose shares have been depressed by the weak economy and by consumers increasingly spending their time online. While cable and satellite providers mull extending their subscription services to users online, some big content producers, like The Walt Disney Corp., are considering entering the subscription business on their own. Disney Chief Bob Iger on Tuesday said he could see the entertainment giant creating a kind of online subscription club for the company's movie and television shows as a way to leverage Disney's …

Just last month, Amazon said it planned to make its Kindle e-book titles available on other devices. Today, the Web retailing giant announced a partnership with Apple that allows Kindle owners to read their e-books on their iPhone or iPod Touch. The Kindle app is free, too, although it doesn't let you buy e-books from Amazon directly (like Apple's iTunes does). To do that, you have to use your Web browser to go to Amazon to buy Kindle titles. The app does allow you to sync the titles between your iPhone (or iTouch) and your Kindle. As MediaMemo writer Peter …

At a Deutsche Bank media and telecommunications conference on Monday, DirecTV Chief Executive Chase Carey argued that Web content should be an extension of a customer's satellite TV viewing experience, and that he was open to a partnership with content providers that would give subscribers exclusive online access to their shows. He suggested that the rising popularity of online video is something that should not be ignored by cable and satellite providers. "In the past, when a company tries to stop or block something from happening, it's usually failed," Carey said. As The Associated Press report notes, the list of …

Google CEO Eric Schmidt on Tuesday dismissed Twitter as a "poor man's email system." Speaking at a Morgan Stanley technology conference, Schmidt said the microblogging service has "aspects of an email system, but they don't have a full offering." In recent weeks, industry watchers suggested that Twitter poses a threat to Google because the search giant's crawlers can't keep up with the conversations generated there. Nevertheless, Schmidt appeared unconcerned. "To me, the question about companies like Twitter is: Do they fundamentally evolve as sort of a note phenomenon, or do they fundamentally evolve to have storage, revocation, identity, and all …