Bing has released the list of finalists from its Hometown Homepage Contest, narrowing down entries to the top ten photos that capture the beauty of cities across America. The engine wants users to vote for their favorite photo on Facebook. The winning photo will become the Oct. 1, Bing search engine landing page. Some of the prizes also include a Nokia Lumia 1020, a CanvasPop print of the photo and a one-year Awesome account membership.

There are many dos and don'ts when it comes to paid search engine marketing, but Rocco Baldassarre lists the top 10 Google AdWords tips for each to help marketers stay on track. Think of it as a checklist. He outlines topics like A/B testing, keyword planning, keyword research, bid adjustments, and optimizing landing pages, providing details on how to manage each.

David Mihm gives us some tips on the local search ecosystem that includes Acxiom, Neustar Localeze and others. He also serves up his thoughts on Foursquare as a data provider, as well as how traditional directories compete with sites like Yelp. The detailed post also explores these sites in other countries like Brazil and Germany. Read the article here.

Some 71% of college students responding to the Persona survey believe Facebook profiles are either influential or very influential when it comes to the hiring decisions of prospective employers, yet 69% of job recruiters have rejected candidates based on content found on Facebook and other social networks. Where's the disconnect?

The Google Analytics released features in the Content Experiments platform making the A/B testing engine more powerful, according to the company. Russell Ketchum tells us Analytics users who link accounts to AdSense can now select AdSense Revenue as an experiment objective to optimization algorithms. He explains how it works.

eBay has acquired price forecasting and shopping research company Decide, an analytics tool that can help consumers predict whether they should buy a product now or wait for it to drop in price. eBay will shutter the site Sept. 30, but will continue to provide its tools through the new parent company.

Google filed a petition Monday in the U.S. Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court. The requests reinstate the point of view made to Congress and the President by industry leaders and civil liberties groups earlier this year. The letter states that Google should be allowed to publish detailed statistics about the types of national security requests received under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. The company also asked the court to hold an open hearing, rather than behind closed doors. Read the article here.

Google Engineer Matt Cutts has asked small Web site owners to tell him why they think their Web site should rank higher in Google. He has asked them to submit the site via a Google Docs form that details why the Web site should outrank similar ones that appear higher in Google search results. In a string of Twitter tweets, Cutts explains that he's looking for feedback from "a wide circle of people" because it's better than getting ideas from a "bunch of us at Google sitting around thinking." Read the article here.

Duane Forrester provides a few tips on how not to build links. He explains that keyword density has become extinct, but links continue to provide useful signals. So he takes a look at some ways to build links that marketers should avoid, such as blind requests and dropping links in blog comments, which doesn't help with better ranking. Read the article here.

Mark Johnson takes us through best practices when setting up a blog. He suggests starting with a list of goals or objectives. Then determine where to put the blog, either using a sub-directory, a sub-domain, a separate domain, or either WordPress or Blogger. He lists the options, both pros and cons. Read the article here.