Facebook, Twitter to Face More Sophisticated Attacks: McAfee

"Social networks will face increasingly sophisticated hacker attacks in 2010 but law enforcement is expected to make strides in fighting cybercrime, according to Web security firm McAfee Labs."

Best and Worst CEO Buzz of 2009

"Fortune commissioned a statistical analysis of blogosphere chatter to discover which chiefs of Fortune 500 companies garnered the most buzz this year, good and bad."

Online Sales Jump 5% To $27B For Holiday Season

"Online sales jumped 5% for the holiday season, according to comScore Inc. (SCOR), which attributed the growth to a continued increase in the number of people shopping online."

How Facebook Dominated in 2009

"To most observers, 2009 marked the year Twitter conquered the world. Yet it wasn’t the only social media company that grew like wildfire. There’s another that grew even more rapidly, adding over 200 million new users and raising $200 million dollars — double that of Twitter’s most recent round."

Cheating on Papers is a Booming Web Business

"According to the Center for Academic Integrity, in the last school year nearly a third of the faculty at its 360 college and high school member institutions reported students downloading term papers, reports or essays written by someone else from online sites known as paper mills."

E-books and Multisensory Experience--What About Reading?

"Is a hybrid book our future? Maybe. 'As discourse moves from printed pages to network screens, the dominant mode will be things that are multi-modal and multilayered,' says Bob Stein, founder of the Institute for the Future of the Book. 'The age of pure linear content is going to pass with the rise of digital network content.'"

E-Book Piracy: The Publishing Industry's Next Epic Saga?

"As e-readers such as the Amazon Kindle continue to rise, so follows the publishing industry's worst nightmare: e-book piracy."

UC San Diego Experts Calculate How Much Information Americans Consume

"Computer Games and TV Account for Bulk of Information Consumed in 2008. U.S. households consumed approximately 3.6 zettabytes of information in 2008, according to the “How Much Information? 2009 Report on American Consumers,” released today by the University of California, San Diego. One zettabyte is 1,000,000,000 trillion bytes, and total bytes consumed last year were the equivalent of the information in thick paperback novels stacked seven feet high over the entire United States, including Alaska."

Yahoo Losing Search Ground to Google, Bing

"Once the world's online search leader, Yahoo's share has sharply declined, putting it in danger of losing its relevance in a market increasingly dominated by Google. Yahoo's search market share in November fell to 17.5% from 18% in October, according to a monthly comScore report released late Wednesday. It's the lowest share ever recorded for Yahoo."

How Students Seek Information in the Digital Age

This is an information literacy report that just was published.

France Slaps Google Over Book-Scanning Plans

"A Paris court ruled that Google is breaking French law with its policy of digitizing books, handing the U.S. Internet giant a $14,300-a-day fine until it rids its search engine of the literary extracts."

Eye on Google

"Three major library associations sent a letter Thursday to the U.S. Justice Department asking it to keep a close eye on Google to make sure it does not exploit its position as the owner of the world’s largest digital book database to gouge libraries with exorbitant licensing fees."

When Brands Go Social

"Facebook and Twitter offer businesses both opportunities and challenges around the world: About 60% of users are outside the United States."

Dell's Tweets Bring $6.5M in Sales

"Twitter has proved to be a bit of a gold mine for Dell—the computer maker said promotions over the social-networking site directly resulted in more than $6.5 million in sales this year. The number of subscribers to Dell's Tweets has risen 23% over the last three months, to the point where 1.5 million people—as far-flung as China, Mexico, Japan, and Brazil—now follow along, reports Bloomberg."

Mobile Internet to Dominate Within 5 Years -- Study

"The mobile Internet is growing faster than its desktop counterpart ever did, and more users may go online via mobile devices than desktop PCs within five years, according to a new study by investment firm Morgan Stanley."

Texting More Popular Than Calling in the US, Despite Costs

"The popularity of text messaging is exploding while rates continue to go up. According to data from the US Census Bureau, 110 billion text messages were sent in the US in December of 2008—more than double the 48 billion sent in December of 2007. This is undoubtedly thanks to the growing popularity of smartphones and devices designed specifically to communicate via non-voice means, and yet we are still paying what many consider to be outrageous rates for the privilege of sending a few bytes of data."

Open Access Encyclopedias

". . .a number of academic institutions are quietly trying to do what Britannica and others say can’t be done: build online encyclopedias that are rigorous, scholarly, and free to access."

Brace Yourself for the Real-Time Web

"Google this week launched real-time search, bringing live updates from Twitter, Facebook, MySpace and more into a scrolling pane in your Google search results. How will the real-time trend evolve in 2010? Rapidly, no doubt. Why will it sweep the Web? Because it fuels our insatiable info-addiction."

Nook E-Reader Has Potential, but Needs Work

"Now, numerous companies are determined to challenge the Kindle with dedicated, mass-market gadgets for reading digital books and periodicals. The latest, and potentially most important, of these is a contender called the Nook, produced by the giant bookstore chain Barnes & Noble Inc., which started shipping it this week."

Google Launches Dictionary and Translated Web Search

"Amid all the hubbub over Google DNS on Thursday, the search giant also released two more helpful tools to help you get a richer search experience and improve your language skills. Google launched its dictionary project, offering a feature-rich resource that goes beyond simple definitions of words; and its new translated Web search makes it easier to find Web pages written in more than 40 languages."

Microsoft, Google in Battle to Win Over Students

"With the recession taking a bite out of university endowments and public school budgets alike, the competition between Google and Microsoft to convert the nation's colleges, universities and schools to the companies' free e-mail and other IT services that run on the Internet 'cloud' — outsourcing that can save a large university hundreds of thousands of dollars a year — has only grown more fierce. With the two companies fighting to baptize a future generation of computer users with their products, the stakes for both are significant."

Computer Labs Get Rebooted as Lounges

"Most students have their own computers now. But revamped labs can offer specialized technology and serve as gathering places."

Five Top Publishers Plan Rival to Kindle Format

"Five of the nation's largest publishers of newspapers and magazines plan to challenge Amazon.com Inc.'s Kindle electronic-book reader with their own digital format that would display in color and work on a variety of devices."

Amazon's Kindle to Get Audible Menus, Bigger Font

"Amazon.com will add two features to the Kindle e-book reader to make the gadget more accessible to blind and vision-impaired users."

3 Ways Facebook Is Improving Online Safety

"Facebook recently has made headlines for the ways in which it is calling attention to the challenges of online safety, particularly with respect to social networks. On Monday, Facebook launched a Safety Advisory Council -- one of a number of ways the social networking site is trying to batten down the hatches and provide a safer online environment."

Google Search Goes Real Time

"In a flurry of major announcements, Google has reinvented the nature and scope of Internet search, a move likely to leave competitors wondering what hit them. Google has added real-time results to its search results pages for desktop computers, iPhone, and Android devices."

Amazon.com Starts Textbook Trade-In Program

"Amazon.com today announced a new textbook trade-in program, which gives students Amazon gift cards if they mail in their used books. The move poses a major challenge to college bookstores, which have long been the main site of book trade-ins for many students."

One-Third of Online IT Support for Students Deals with Login Questions

"A third of all online questions posed online in an IT help desk environment in institutions of higher education deal with password and login information. Those are followed by e-mail, which consumes 26 percent of questions; inquiries about Blackboard or student portals, which encompass another 21 percent; and gaining remote or wireless access, which makes up another 11 percent. General administration questions make up the remaining nine percent."

Ancient Pompeii is on Google's Street View

"The application allows Internet users to view panoramic street-level pictures of more than 100 cities around the world."

No Increase in Brain Tumors Seen From Cell Phones

"Whether cell phones cause brain cancer has been a subject of ongoing debate, but a new study confirms previous evidence suggesting that they don't."

4 Ways Microsoft's Bing Could Challenge Google

"On Dec. 2, Microsoft introduced new features for Bing that included the beta version of the updated Bing Maps, as well as Visual Search integrated with Facebook and Twitter feeds. With a massive marketing campaign over the summer, and an ever-increasing number of new features, Bing's market-share has climbed to 9.6 percent of the U.S. search-engine market, still lagging far behind Google at 70.6 percent."

Facebook Personalities Pretty Accurate

"Facebook profiles actually capture a person's true personality, instead of an idealized virtual identity, U.S. http://www.upi.com/Health_News/2009/12/02/Facebook-personalities-pretty-accurate/UPI-55651259789900/ say."

10 Web Trends to Watch in 2010

"As 2009 draws to a close, the Web's attention turns to the year ahead. What can we expect of the online realm in 2010? While Web innovation is unpredictable, some clear trends are becoming apparent. Expect the following 10 themes to define the Web next year."

Yahoo Expands Integration With Facebook

"Yahoo Inc will let users of its email, photo-sharing and other online products link their content and activities directly into Facebook, the world's No. 1 Internet social network."

Google Strengthens News Content Walls

"In a nod to the growing debate on free access to news stories on the Web, Google has updated options to help news organizations limit access."

Amazon Says Kindle sales Hit Monthly Record in November

"Amazon.com said on Monday that its Kindle electronic book reader posted its best sales yet in the month of November, as rivals struggle with fulfilling their customer orders."

More Shoppers Use Smartphones to Study, Find, Buy

"Some 19% of Americans will use their mobile devices for shopping this holiday season, according to a Deloitte survey. The number is twice as high for young consumers: 39% of those 18 to 29 say they'll use their phones to find store locations, obtain coupons and sales information and research products and prices. One-quarter of all who plan to use their phones to shop say they will make purchases on the devices."