Andrew Bourland, the co-founder of ClickZ passed away yesterday morning after battling cardiomyopathy, a form of heart disease. He died around 7:00 am in Reading, Massachusetts.
The Social Networking Landscape in India and Europe
comScore released a couple of interesting reports today. The first involves the social networking landscape in Europe. According to comScore, France in particular had a big year when it comes to social networking, growing by 45% with Facebook as the leading network.
Pull My Finger Suit Isn’t Pulling Your Leg
This is going to sound like a bunch of hot air, but it’s not. Air-O-Matic, Inc., the company behind the “Pull My Finger” iPhone app, threatened legal action against InfoMedia, the company blasting out iFart Mobile, for trademark infringement.
Norton Online Family Offers Parents Peace Of Mind
Symantec has released the public beta of Norton Online Family, an Internet safety service aimed at helping parents protect children online.
Norton Online Family is currently free and available in English only. It’s compatible with both Macs and PCs.
The service encourages discussions between parents and their children and provides customizable tools to manage online activity.
Tweet-a-Thon Pegged For Thursday
What do MC Hammer, the kid from Stand By Me (Will Wheaton), and that bald guy from “Heroes” (David Lawrence) have in common? If you took a wild guess from the headline that they’re involved in some kind of charity “tweet-a-thon” you’d be right.
Google.org-Backed Film In Tight Race For Oscar
Anyone who’s troubled by the idea of Google being omnipresent might be better off skipping this article. It seems, you see, that a film backed by Google.org has a rather good chance of winning an Oscar on Sunday.
The Final Inch, a 38-minute film about people trying to eradicate polio, is up against just three other movies in the "Documentary Short" category. It was directed and produced by Irene Taylor Brodsky, and filmed mostly in Afghanistan and India.
Google Stock Downgraded
So much for the "buy and hold" approach to investing, at least where Google and one analyst is concerned. It might be time to sell and get some cash, instead, as ThinkEquity’s William Morrison has downgraded the search giant’s stock from "accumulate" to "source of funds."
Skype Making Mobile Deals
Nokia and eBay-owned VoIP service Skype announced a deal today. Skype will be integrated into Nokia devices, starting with the N97 series.
Experts Predict Doom For New Walled Gardens
Wired.com loudly reminded everyone a little over a week ago about ESPN’s deal with specific ISPs to license ESPN360 content.
AOL
AOL’s publishing division MediaGlow said its sites saw record growth in January, with page views up 47 percent year-over-year to reach 7 billion and total minutes increasing 39 percent to 4.9 million.
AOL says its redesigned homepage grew 5 percent in page views, 12 percent in unique visitors, a record 33 percent in total minutes and 6 percent in total visits year-over-year.