Google's share price hits $400

CNET News.com: "Google's share price got a dose of high octane in the past four weeks, soaring from $300 a share to hitting in excess of $400 on Thursday.
Does zero to 60 come to mind?
And the messages boards that track the sentiment of Google investors have been a buzz, with some predicting a further run up to $500 a share.
But amid the hoopla, here's a factoid to chew on - Google's market cap is a hair away from being twice that of its arch-competitor Yahoo.
Google's market cap is $112.6 billion, based on early morning trading. Yahoo is a mere $57.7 billion. "

'Digg Just Might Bury Slashdot'

"A news-oriented bookmarking site called Digg is giving Slashdot a run for its money. Indeed, a good "Diggdotting" is melting down servers all over the net."

Link: Wired News

read more | digg story

U.S. Maintains Control of Net

Wired News: "TUNIS, Tunisia -- Negotiators working late into the night Tuesday shook hands on a deal that creates a new U.N.-sponsored global forum to explore problems like spam and cybercrime, while leaving the United States firmly in control of the internet's domain name system.
The last minute accord settled an issue that threatened to derail the U.N.'s World Summit on the Information Society, which began here Wednesday. The multilateral gathering -- conceived to bridge the 'digital divide' between rich nations and poor -- has drawn thousands of delegates and observers from around the globe to this port city in the North African desert. "

French party exploits Google Adwords

CNET News.com: "France's majority party has admitted to leading a marketing campaign using Google's Adwords system of sponsored links.
Keywords evoking the violent situation in the Parisian suburbs and elsewhere across the country point to a petition in support of Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy.
Over the weekend of Nov. 5 and 6, Web surfers who entered terms such as 'violence,' 'riots,' 'suburbs,' 'burned cars' or even 'scum' into the Google search site were presented with an advertisement linking directly to the official UMP ('Union for a Popular Movement') Web site.
More precisely, the link directed Internet users to a petition supporting party President and Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy's 'zero tolerance policy' in response to the confrontations rocking the suburbs of Paris."

Google Base service goes live

CNET News.com: "Google's mysterious Google Base service went live late on Tuesday, allowing people to post any kind of information they want for free and to provide labels to describe it so others can easily find it.
The new beta service allows people to post 'all types of online and offline information and images' that will be searchable on Google Base and, depending on their relevance, may be searchable on Google Search, Froogle and Google Local, the company said.
'If you have information you want to share with others, but aren't sure how to go about gaining an audience, Google Base is for you,' said the frequently asked questions section of the new service. "

Yahoo inks deal with blog purveyor

CNET News.com: "Yahoo on Wednesday will add content from the Gawker Media group of blogs to Yahoo News. Yahoo will post dozens of stories a day from five Gawker sites: Manhattan news and gossip blog Gawker, political site Wonkette, gadget site Gizmodo, Hollywood gossip and news site Defamer and Lifehacker, a site with reviews of downloads and Web sites. The agreement will be expanded to include more Gawker Media blogs that will be distributed on other areas of Yahoo. "

Sony accused of leading price-fix cartel to stop cheap deals on web

Scotsman.com News : "THE electrical giant Sony has been accused of price-fixing in an attempt to curb internet bargains and send online prices soaring, it emerged yesterday.
The firm is among up to five leading manufacturers which demand higher prices from internet retailers than they do from high street stores. "

Amazon shares jump as it joins S&P 500

CNET News.com: "Standard & Poor's on Monday said Amazon.com will join its flagship 500 stock index after the close of trading on Nov. 18, replacing AT&T.
The news sent the Internet retailer's shares up 6 percent in after-hours trading.
Share prices of companies joining the S&P 500 often rise because many portfolio managers try to track the index, and they are required by charter to buy stocks that enter it.
Seattle-based Amazon, which began as an online bookseller, has grown to become the second most popular Internet commerce site, after eBay. "

Start-up aims to join telephone, wireless calls | CNET News.com

CNET News.com: "A secretive start-up backed by two powerful Silicon Valley venture capital firms will on Monday outline its plans for bridging the gulf between mobile telephones and fixed-line phone networks.
Executives of Mountain View, Calif.-based Stoke say they are developing a way to offer so-called 'fixed mobile convergence' inside offices, at home and around town as well--a major stumbling block the communications industry is facing.
Stoke, which has been operating in 'stealth' mode since its founding, joins a dozen start-ups trying to solve the question of how to hook up mobile phone networks to fixed-line phone or cable networks to give phone users a single point of contact. "

Google gets analytical

CNET News.com: "Google is set to launch on Monday a free Web analytics service that will let companies see exactly how visitors interact with their Web site and how their advertising campaigns are faring.
The free hosted service, which will be available in English and 16 other languages, is based on technology from San Diego-based Urchin, which Google acquired in March.
Urchin's products previously cost $495 a month and were reduced to $199 a month by Google. The full-featured analytics applications based on Urchin's technology replace the simple tracking tool that's now available with Google AdWords.
Google Analytics will let Web site owners see exactly where visitors to their site are coming from, what links on the site are getting the most traffic, what pages visitors are viewing, how long people stay on the site, which products on merchant sites are being sold and where people give up in multistep checkout processes, said Paul Muret, an engineering director at Google and one of the founders of Urchin. "