The internet arm of Microsoft corporation, MSN Search has made an offer to buy Yahoo Inc. for $44.6 billion dollars. Needless to say that this move has been discussed in the past, as the only way for Microsoft to really compete with Google in the online space.

Of course this also means that Mr Gates might be soon be owning parts of your life, such as your pictures (Flickr) as well as the majority of email globally, that is if you add Hotmail and the very popular Yahoo mail.

Overall all of this is moving towards a bitter monopoly of duopoly of the internet space, something that works against the very principles of the internet as a communication medium. For how long will Bill Gates able to survive in this space is debatable. Sure thing is, when money runs out eventually, people start thinking about adding value.

News that search giant Google is going to introduce social media elements, such as voting search results for specific queries and approving or disapproving them in order to modify their own search results.

The big question is:
I am continuously logged in to my Google account. If I disapprove of one site in a specific query and that site refreshes it’s content and provides something useful a few months later…will I then lose it forever? Read more

A real threat to newspapers has cropped up in Google news. A recent deal with Associated Press and the Press Association means that Google will pick news stories straight from the source without the need to display heavily duplicated content.

This has to be a good development as more people that invest their time in writing original articles will get more exposure. Newspapers are looking to lose out but they are already benefiting from large traffic numbers due to their status and trust element by Google. Read more

The professional networking site LinkedIn has launched profile pictures functionality for members. There is a huge division over the websites decision all over the web.

The main pro argument is that faces are often easier to remember than names. In particular for people with the same name.
The other side claims that this Facebook-style move will detract attention from professional experience and someone’s work and bring prominence to their appearance. Read more

Likeness is a very popular app in Facebook and key in the effort to turn Facebook into a dating service. The Likeness application has now developed an UNRATED version. However listen to this. The first quiz:

List crimes you are MOST likely to commit first:

• buy drugs
• drive drunk

Read more

Pay per click seems to have significantly changed in the last couple of weeks. If you perform a search for “service” + “location” e.g. “car hire London” and then after a couple of different combinations go back to a generic search such as “service” e.g. “van hire” you will see that the location entered before sticks with you. Works better with specific locations (rather than generic London) so you can have fun drilling down.

Of course this means that Google has made major advancements in the way it is targeting ads to consumers, by second guessing Read more

Social networking or rather socialising site Facebook is going to be encouraging users to make their profiles available in search engines. This is a no-brainer move for Facebook to get a lot more exposure in organic search listings and increase it’s traffic.

However information appearing on Facebook is in many ways a lot more sensitive and personal than on sites such as LinkedIn used to expose one’s resume and build professional connections. So if you don’t want competitors or future employers to be able to easily find you and your friends on Google or other search engines then you need to adjust your privacy settings. Go to Read more

News that Facebook use is spiralling out of control in the UK is of no surprise. It’s also fairly understandable that over 50% of UK employers banned Facebook in the office. So far so expected.

It is nonsensical however to hear that Siemens is leading a corporate relations plan for it’s 6,430 employees on Facebook, not only encouraging them to use the site but also linking Facebook with corporate and staff blogs. They must be insane, right?

Unless Siemens realised that a company’s employees are it’s best marketing ambassadors (as the old marketing saying goes) and giving them the right to use Facebook will boost the company brand image and spread it like a virus. Clever forward thinking or what?
They must be laughing.

With Facebook opening it’s doors to widget development there is one more reason to think of the widget war. The number of websites using widgets and the amount of users interacting with them is increasing rapidly. Companies are already gearing up to enter the social networking space with widgets leading to their products and services. However widgets are never a guaranteed success and even if so, difficult to prove their return for investment. Read more

Looking at the funny side of this is not easy, because there isn’t one. The technology powering video uploads for Hi5, Bebo and Dogster does not support Windows Vista. I am by no means an advocate of Bill Gate’s evil monster Microsoft but common sense says that most of the new PC’s will be shipping with Vista. Which also means that Vista users cannot upload any videos to their favourite networks currently.

If this is not a major disaster fro VideoEgg don’t know what is!