Marking a key turning point for one of Google's most promising services, the mobile use of Google Maps is about to surpass its use on desktop computers. So said Marissa Mayer, Google's VP of location and local services, at a conference this week, reports Marketing Pilgrim. "This is a significant milestone as the search giant continues to make its play into the location based, social, 'whatever it is they want' space," Marketing Pilgrim writes. According to Mayer, Google Maps for mobile has now surpassed 200 million installs. Also of particular note, Mayer said that about 20% of the …

Steve Ballmer's got to go. That's according to respected hedge fund manager and Microsoft investor David Einhorn, who called for Ballmer's ouster. "His continued presence is the biggest overhang on Microsoft's stock," Einhorn said of Ballmer at a conference this week, Reuters reports. Since Ballmer took the company's reins in 2000, Microsoft's stock has remained stagnant, while it has failed to innovate in increasingly key areas like mobile software, hardware and tablets. Einhorn's Greenlight Capital hedge fund has been a recent buyer of Microsoft stock, "which," as Reuters points out, "at under 10 times expected earnings is regarded by …

Social ad-targeting specialist Buzzlogic has raised $7.8 million in a third round of funding. Founded in 2004, the company offers an ad-targeting tool that indexes millions of pieces of online content on partner blogs as well as the conversations around them to help advertisers place ads. "By identifying what consumers say and want in terms of products or services, Buzzlogic helps advertisers to deliver a relevant and specific offer to a ready-to-buy audience, increasing the return on investment," according to VentureBeat. The start-up faces tough competition from Google and Yahoo, both of which offer their own ad-targeting tool. …

Inspired by YouTube's sixth birthday, everyone's trying to wrap their heads around the video portal's ginormous size. "How big is YouTube?" asks ReadWriteWeb. "It's biiiiig. 3 billion views per day big," which just so happens to represent a 50% increase year-over-year. Not impressed yet? According to new data released by Google, YouTube users now upload more than 48 hours of videos every minute. As ReadWriteWeb notes, "This represents a 37% increase over the last six months and a 100% increase over last year." What can happen in two days, you ask? As Google points out, "You could drive …

How critical is email to the success of the Web's top email platforms, i.e., Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft? More than one might imagine, according to new research from Royal Pingdom. Citing what it concedes is imperfect Alexa data, Pingdom finds that Gmail drives 23% of traffic to Google.com; Yahoo Mail drives 20% of traffic to Yahoo.com; while Hotmail drives a whopping 39% of traffic to Microsoft's Live.com. That said, "the actual percentages aren't really all that important here," stresses Pingdom. "What's important to note is that the subdomains used for Webmail have a ranking near or at the …

It's never a good time to lose talent, but these days Microsoft can least afford it. Alas, Otto Berkes -- the last of the original Xbox founders who more recently worked on a prototype slate computing device and Bing -- is headed out the door. Berkes later was general manager for Microsoft's chief software architect Ray Ozzie until Ozzie left last year. "Berkes is leaving for another company outside of the Seattle area, but he wouldn't say which one," reports The Seattle Times. "He did say the departure isn't because of frustration over projects or strategic choices by …

Can't we all just get along? That, in effect, was French President Nicolas Sarkozy's message to Web giants at a Paris conference this week. According to Reuters, Sarkozy struck a "conciliatory tone" by urging caution in regulating the digital economy, although he firmly believes that governments have a role in helping to limit potential online abuses. "We don't want to make mistakes in regulating this powerful yet fragile ecosystem," Sarkozy said in response to a question from journalism professor Jeff Jarvis. "We have to act with pragmatism. It is better to do nothing than to do harm." More …

The New York Times' Stuart Elliot examines First Watch -- YouTube's latest ad offering, which lets brands buy a pre-roll spot on most people's first view of a YouTube video each day. "If the sponsorship of a commercial on the home page catches computer users when they are going in the YouTube front door, so to speak, First Watch is to intercept them when they are going in the YouTube side door," Elliot explains. "For instance, if they click on a link to YouTube video that a friend sends, or if they type youtube.com/theonion into their browser rather …

Highlighting another reason why advertisers might shy away from Facebook, about half of users' walls contain cuss words, according to a new report from social media monitoring service Reppler. "Oh, golly!" exclaims All Facebook. After scanning over 30,000 Facebook members' walls over the past two month, Reppler found that 47% of users have profanity on their Facebook wall. Specifically, 80% of users who have profanity on their Facebook wall have at least one post or comment with profanity from a friend, while 56% of the posts with profanity on a user's Facebook wall come from friends. According to …

Sorry, Android. It turns out the vast majority of video views that occur on mobile devices happen on Apple's iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch, according to a new report from video monetization start-up FreeWheel. "Mobile video is still a small part of overall online viewing, but it's a part that Apple dominates," GigaOm writes on the news. Four-fifths of all mobile video views happen on Apple iOS devices, according to FreeWheel. The iPhone and iPod touch each account for about 30% of all video views that happen on mobile devices, while the remaining 20% are attributed to Android …