Startups have unique challenges. Microsoft has been known to nurture many. Through inspiration from RocketSpace and a partnership with BizSpark, Microsoft has launched a program called Bing Booster designed to accelerate the success of startups by offering at no cost a variety of tools and resources. What companies slot into the RocketSpace alumni? The list starts with Coffee Table and doesn't end with Zappos.

Google initiated a search caption challenge asking folks to write a cartoon caption. Evidently, this type of contest holds a long history, dating back at least to the 1930s. Google worked with artists like Matthew Diffee, Emily Flake, Christoph Niemann, Danny Shanahan and Jim Woodring, who created cartoons that place characters in unusual and interesting, yet funny, situations. Each cartoon shows the character doing a Google search. The task is to imagine what they'd be searching for at that moment, and describe it in a caption.

Data becomes the value in SEO spreadsheets, but marketers also need to start with valuable SEO resources. Alek Adekola tells us about five tools at a variety of companies that marketers can tap to pull in data and automate key tasks like keyword and competitive research, backlink analysis, and rank monitoring. He names the tools, but also provides descriptions for each, such as tools from Distilled, SEO Gadget, and AutomateAnalytics. 

I betcha lots of marketers are asking that same question. Michelle Hammond tells us that Eric Schmidt, speaking at this year's LeWeb conference in Paris, told attendees that Google acquired about one company per week in 2011. Mind you, that includes one-person companies with technology to build into Google applications that most of us wouldn't normally hear about. Hammond writes that the actual figures show Google acquired 57 companies in 2011, for an approximate total of $14 billion. 

Miranda Miller tells us about Mark Zuckerberg -- formerly known as Rotem Guez -- who was sued by Facebook for selling Likes. You see, he was selling Fans -- apparently a service that only Facebook can do. Guez changed his name to Mark Zuckerberg, so when Facebook sues him for a violating terms and conditions, the company will sue, yes, Mark Zuckerberg. 

Google provides a recap of trends that the tech company identified as being things to watch on YouTube. The post rewinds through clips and channels that commanded the attention of viewers this year. Compiling the list meant looking at global view counts of popular videos uploaded throughout this year, and in some instances, aggregating views across multiple versions of the same video.

Panda Updates have stopped for 2011, but will resume after the New Year. Todd Bailey tells us that Google made the announcement via Twitter. The last update came in November. Most have been considered minor updates, each time affecting less than 1% of all searches. He writes that it's more important for marketers to understand that with more than 12 billion searches each month, that is still 100,000. Bailey points to keyword density, relevancy and the need to fix broken links. 

Online classrooms aren't new -- and neither are social networks. In fact, Microsoft Research's latest project may seem a little like Facebook with a twist. The research lab at the Redmond, Wash. company launched a site that allows students to network with peers, share information, and build their own pages collecting information from inside and outside the classroom. Researchers collaborated with students to design it. The online destination is designed to help students learn more. The site was born after researchers at FUSE Labs examined Facebook and Twitter data and how it is used in Bing. They tracked URLs that …

Searches on Twitter by NATO officials reveal two accounts linked to the Taliban's media arm that have become an open line of communication between the organization and Americans. Ernesto Londono points to these two Twitter accounts, which have "swelled from 736 to nearly 18,000" in the past year. Londono tells us that apparently, many terrorist organizations have sophisticated Web sites and social media strategies. 

It appears that Google and Microsoft have won the victory over the war against content farms after New Scientist asked computer scientist Richard McCreadie took a look "at the issue." Testing Google's and Microsoft's success, McCreadie ran 50 search queries known as targets of content farmers. Then he paid people to examine the results for links to low-quality sites, defined as "uninformative sites whose primary function appears to be displaying adverts." Jim Giles and Ferris Jabr detail the findings.