Online spending grew 5% this holiday season

Though total online spending was up, the average amount spent per person actually declined. Credit: fosforix via Flickr.

Blame it on Mother Nature.

Holiday shoppers, perhaps thwarted by snowstorms in the Northeast, went on an online spree this holiday, spending $27.1 billion between Nov. 1 and Christmas Eve, according to a report released today from ComScore.

The amount is a 5% uptick from 2008, when buyers spent $26.8 billion online during the same time period. Of course, last year represented a low bar, with sales down 3% from 2007.

This year's increase should not be taken as a sign of broader economic revival, cautioned ComScore Chairman Gian Fulgoni. For one thing, online sales continue to be less than 10% of overall retail spending.

Secondly, part of the sales uptick came from an increase in the number of people turning to online stores, perhaps because of the bad weather that plagued parts of the country in the days prior to Christmas. In fact, the average amount spent online per person actually declined as shoppers remain wary.

"Online sales growth this year was driven by a continued increase in the number of people buying online," Fulgoni said, "but consumers’ economic challenges resulted in a slight decline versus last year in the amount spent per buyer."

It wasn't just the convenience of shopping without having to shovel their cars out of a snowdrift that attracted buyers. Also luring folks online this year: more free shipping offers and aggressive deals on Black Friday and Cyber Monday (the Monday after Thanksgiving).

Categories that sold well: jewelry and consumer electronics such as iPods, Kindles and Flip video cameras.

-- Alex Pham

Follow my random thoughts on games, gear and technology on Twitter @AlexPham.

Digg looking to aggregate what's hot on Twitter and Facebook

Digg founder Kevin Rose dropped a morsel of information about a major overhaul to the social news website that's been a long time coming (at least seven months, which is like four years in Internet time).

The 5-year-old site (that's in people years) currently aggregates a list of interesting links around the Web as voted on by its users.

But it may take aggregation one step further. Instead of limiting the pool to input from its own users, Rose indicated that Digg may also begin taking into account link-sharing data from other social networks.

"We have to take a look at all the different sources of information and kind of just act as Switzerland," Rose said in the most recent This Week in Tech podcast. "If we're seeing a trend on Twitter, we can map that to the best stories on Digg. And if there's other things happening on Facebook and other networks, we want to be able to pull all that in."

TechCrunch has been speculating about what a "real-time Digg" might look like since May. It could resemble something like Techmeme or Tweetmeme, which both ping sites or pull from RSS feed data in addition to Twitter buzz. Add Facebook to the mix, and you could have an even grander idea of what's hot at any given time on the Web.

Rose added that the renovation was being helped by Digg's acquisition of the entrepreneur's other start-up, WeFollow -- a directory of Twitter users.

"We see ourselves as like a neutral Switzerland where we'll be able to sit there and pull in all different types of data and information from all around the Web," Rose said.

Rose said the changes could start appearing within the next few months.

The site has transformed in small ways over the last year, adding things like Trends for surfacing more timely news and an ad platform that could be a crucial revenue source. But the real-time aggregator couldn't come at a better time, as ComScore reports that traffic to Digg is beginning to wane.

-- Mark Milian
twitter.com/markmilian

Photo: Digg founder Kevin Rose. Credit: Joi via Flickr

Top 10 moments in social media in 2009

This year was certainly significant in the world of online social media. Facebook surpassed 350 million users -- more than the U.S. population -- and Twitter's short blogging service skyrocketed in popularity, led by celebs, tech lovers and top companies.

Here's a look back at 2009's biggest events in which social media played a major role.

10. "Word of Web." As people spent more time chatting online and in public spaces like Twitter, buzz surrounding product and entertainment releases became instantly quantifiable. The elusive word-of-mouth promotion could now be measured, and "word of Web" became that new currency. (Marketers love to use the word "viral.")

The movie "District 9" played the game rather well. The low-budget sci-fi flick started the buzz train early with cryptic alien decals around major cities before its release. Despite relatively low advertising spending, the movie did extremely well. The fact that it was actually a good film certainly didn't hurt.

9. Whopper Sacrifice. Facebook was quick to kill this marketing ploy, but Burger King had a picnic with this one. The Whopper Sacrifice game asked Facebook users to delete 10 friends in exchange for a free burger. In just a couple of weeks, 233,906 friends were dropped like a bad habit.

It proved to be a hilariously successful way to promote a brand that seemed to get only more controversial and creepy over the course of the year.

8. Google Wave. In Gmail-like fashion, the exclusive nature of Google's newest product (people vied for a limited number of invitations from friends) made it the must-have free service of 2009. Of course, once people finally got hold of Wave, their lust died down.

The interface is still pretty confusing, and the team continues to struggle with growing pains in its mission to create a stable collaboration platform. However, it packs some intriguing technologies that could very well transform journalism in addition to a number of industries. But right now, e-mail replacement it is not.

Facebook and Seppukoo get lawyered up

Credit: Russel A. Daniels/Associated Press

The battle between social networking giant Facebook and Seppukoo.com may spill into the courtroom over privacy violations, according to a letter written by a Facebook lawyer.

The letter contended that Seppukoo violated Facebook’s statement of rights and responsibilities, which governs the website’s relationship with its users, and that it must “cease and desist” from breaching the terms.

If Seppukoo continues with business as usual, Facebook said it would take "whatever measures it believes are necessary to enforce its rights, maintain the quality of its site, and protect its users’ privacy and information.”

As the Tech blog reported earlier this month, Seppukoo is a website that offers "virtual suicide" of Facebook profiles for those who are dissatisfied with their accounts and want to have a little fun. Seppukoo is named after ancient Japanese samurai act of "seppuku,” in which disgraced samurai commit suicide rather than fall by the hands of their enemies.

Facebook users willing to commit "seppukoo" simply type in the same information they would to log onto their Facebook accounts, including e-mail address and password. Seppukoo says it does not save the information. Then users would choose one of six templates for a memorial page and compose a “last words” statement. After that: It's curtains. The profile is deactivated. (If you want back on Facebook, just log in, and your account is reactivated.)

The site also features a RIP memorial page on its site and sends the page to former Facebook friends.

As Tech also reported here, Facebook began to block the site early this month. On Dec. 16,  Leota L. Bates of the law firm Perkins Coie wrote a letter on behalf of Facebook, saying that Seppukoo is violating five of its rights and responsibilities:

• Soliciting users' Facebook login information.
• Accessing a Facebook account that belongs to someone else.
• Collecting users’ content or information using automated means.
• Sending commercial communications.
• Using Facebook’s intellectual property.

In a Dec. 22 reply, a Seppukoo legal representative denied the accusations and said that the website is solely for artistic purposes. It’s one of the many net-art projects created by the Italian art group Les Liens Invisibles (translated from French: The Invisible Links) and is a nonprofit website.

Seppukoo’s lawyer points out that there are no commercial advertisements or banners on the site and that users are not requested to pay any money.

Members of Les Liens Invisibles, Clemente Pestelli and Gionatan Quintini, also created a Google maps parody and a Flickr parody. This is their latest spoof.

When asked whether Seppukoo had any intention on tearing down the site, Guy McMusker, art director of the group, replied in an e-mail: “Absolutely not.”

Stay tuned.

--W.J. Hennigan

Women play harder than men in online games, study finds

One in five players of EverQuest II, the online role-playing game above, is female. Credit: Sony Online Entertainment.

The words "You play like a girl" could turn out to be the ultimate compliment.

When it comes to online role playing games, women spent more time playing than men, according to a University of Southern California study of gender differences among gamers. Among those who played EverQuest II, a game developed by Sony Online Entertainment, women spent 29 hours a week in the game, compared with 25 hours for men.

"The women play more intensely than the guys," said USC economist Dmitri Williams, who co-authored the study with Mia Consalvo of Ohio University, Nick Yee of the Palo Alto Research Center and Scott Caplan of the University of Delaware. "They're less likely to quit, and they're happier playing."

The discovery is one of several stereotypes refuted by the study. Contrary to the image of the overweight nerd glued to his computer, gamers in the study were no less fit than the general population. In fact, women who played EverQuest II tended to exercise more and weigh less than the average American. 

Another shattered stereotype: The pimply teenage gamer. The average age of the 7,000 players in the USC survey was 31, and gamers in their 30s outnumbered those in their 20s.

But the study also affirmed many gender tropes. For example, women ...

Video: Tips for using an antenna to watch digital TV

Many readers may be surprised at the quality of viewing experience they can get using old-fashioned rabbit ears -- a technology that's been around for the better part of a century. Thanks to 2009's digital TV switch-over, the number of channels and clarity of signal have both increased dramatically. Most shocking of all is that many channels are now broadcasting over the air in high definition, and the picture quality is as good as -- if not better than -- HD over cable.

Here's the longer story about rabbit ears making a comeback. And here are a few tips to help you decide if it's the right choice for your home. In the meantime, watch the video below to see some of the tips in action.

-- David Sarno

A clear but limited win for Hollywood over isoHunt

A U.S. District Court judge has ruled against another BitTorrent index site, and this time the case wasn't clouded by the defendant's misconduct. Instead, the site, isoHunt, appears to be a victim of its own bad facts (or incredibly ineffective lawyering). But the court narrowed its ruling against isoHunt in ways that could limit its application to other torrent search sites. In fact, the ruling ducks the fundamental question of whether such sites are by their nature infringing. (Hat tips to Ars Technica and Michael Geist for the links to the ruling.)

The judge in the case was none other than Stephen V. Wilson, who went out on a legal limb in 2003 to declare Grokster and Morpheus legal before the Supreme Court discovered a previously overlooked form of secondary liability for copyright infringement ("inducing" people to infringe). Both companies are now in the dustbin of history, and that appears to be isoHunt's destination too.

That's not to say Hollywood's victory over isoHunt will reduce online piracy. Instead, it's yet another blow to companies and investors that try to monetize the public's insatiable appetite for illegal downloads. And that's an important part of the Motion Picture Assn. of America's strategy: stopping commercial capital from flowing into businesses that encourage bootlegging.

Like TorrentSpy and the Pirate Bay, isoHunt argued that it was no different from Google: It provided a generic search tool, one that was indifferent to the nature of the files people were searching for. Under the Supreme Court's Grokster decision, truly neutral search technologies, business models and companies should be immune to infringement claims because they don't promote piracy. But Wilson ruled that the MPAA had presented credible evidence that isoHunt and its owner, Gary Fung, had encouraged illegal downloads, and that the defense had presented little or no evidence in rebuttal. "Generally, defendants rest their case on legal arguments and meritless evidentiary objections, and offer little of their own evidence that directly addressed Plaintiffs’ factual assertions," Wilson wrote. In that light, he declared, there was no reason to go to trial. 

Significantly, Wilson found isoHunt to be an evolved version of Grokster, not Google. He also concluded that Fung encouraged users, directly or indirectly, to upload and download copyrighted content. It wasn't a close call: "[T]he Court determines that evidence of Defendants’ intent to induce infringement is overwhelming and beyond reasonable dispute." In addition to the overt messages encouraging infringement, Wilson wrote, the site's search capabilities were optimized for finding material that was obviously bootlegged. That's an important difference between isoHunt and Google, which also enables users to find torrent files. 

Equally significant was Wilson's decision not to address the MPAA's argument that isoHunt was liable because it either (a) knew about specific infringing files that were available and refused to take simple steps to prevent them from being copied, or (b) profited from infringements that it had the authority to limit. The MPAA's arguments against isoHunt on those issues could be applied to any torrent site, so a ruling on them by Wilson could lay the foundation for an important precedent. Similarly, Wilson found that isoHunt did not qualify for the infringement defense that the Digital Millennium Copyright Act created for search engines, but based that decision largely on the inducements to infringe and Fung's activities as a downloader. Still, Wilson suggested that any torrent site that offers a list of most popular downloads -- as these sites routinely do -- would have a tough time qualifying for the DMCA safe harbor because the list would alert them to users' infringements.

-- Jon Healey

Healey writes editorials for The Times' Opinion Manufacturing Division. Follow him on Twitter: @jcahealey

BlackBerry outages give company a black eye, analyst says

Credit: Russel A. Daniels / Associated Press

BlackBerry users were left without e-mail on their handsets for more than nine hours late Tuesday -- the second time the service has been interrupted in a week -- leading some analysts to question whether customers might begin canceling.

During the interruption, message delivery was delayed or intermittent in North and South America. But phone and text services were unaffected. 

The root cause for why the popular wireless e-mail service went under is “currently under review,” according to a statement by Research in Motion, the Canadian company that makes the BlackBerry. The company, known as RIM, believes the issue stemmed from a flaw in two recently released versions of BlackBerry Messenger.

“RIM has taken corrective action to restore service,” the company said. “RIM has also provided a new version of BlackBerry Messenger (version 5.0.0.57) and is encouraging anyone who downloaded or upgraded BlackBerry Messenger since December 14th to upgrade to this latest version which resolves the issue. “

The company said it is continuing to monitor its systems to maintain normal service levels, and apologized to its customers.

Although RIM promised to keep a close eye on things, it didn't stop BlackBerry users from blasting the company on social networking sites like Twitter.

“Oh @blackberry how I loathe thee... My internet is still not working so... BOO!” read one tweet. Another suggested a change of service altogether: “I might just have to switch from a blackberry to iphone. I hate to say it.”

This is heresy to many BlackBerry users, said Jeff Kagan, a telecommunications analyst. RIM has developed a “cult-like following” with its customers. After all, many customers refer to their phones as CrackBerrys.

“I don't see customers canceling service yet, but if outages continue that may start to happen,” Kagan said. “Every year or two RIM suffers an outage. So far it hasn’t hurt them too bad. But each time the company gets a black eye, but it has a chance to heal before the next black eye."

RIM experienced major outages in April 2007 and February 2008. And just last Thursday, BlackBerry customers in North America experienced e-mail delays.

“This is the second outage in a few weeks,” Kagan said. “Customers listened to reports of the first and put a notch in their mind. Now there is a second outage and customers put another notch in the mind and pay more attention.”

-- W.J. Hennigan

High school YouTube video gets famous by going backward

The YouTube video from Shorewood High School in Washington state looks normal when it starts. It's a lip dub -- a lip sync of a song done in a single take with numerous students taking part -- of the infectious Hall & Oates tune, "You Make My Dreams Come True."

There are numerous lip dubs online, and this one is pretty much like any other, beginning with an enthusiastic girl running through the halls of the school, mouthing the words. But there are some odd things going on. Some students around her are doing impossible-looking acrobatics as the camera passes by. Objects fly up from the floor. 

That's because the Shorewood lip dub, which has become a big hit on YouTube, was filmed backward. The kids in the video (it's a cast of hundreds, including cheerleaders and the swim team) did everything in reverse, including the lip syncing. That meant they had to painstakingly learn all the words phonetically, backward, like in the old days when we played records backwards to get devil messages.

A local television station did a story about the kids, and they demonstrated the technique.

The lip dub video isn't perfect, but it's wonderfully inventive, ambitious and joyous. It was done in answer to a challenge by a rival high school that did a regular lip dub to the OutKast song, "Hey Ya!" We'll do that other school the favor of not mentioning its name, because the Shorewood effort was overwhelmingly sick (in a good way).

!tuo ti kcehC

-- David Colker

Photo: The lip dub created by students at Shorewood High School in Shoreline, Wash. Credit: YouTube

Yahoo to shut down for a week to cut costs

A worker walks into Yahoo headquarters in Sunnyvale, Calif. Except for "essential functions," Yahoo said it was shutting down for a week starting Dec. 25. Credit: Paul Sakuima/Associated Press

Yahoo Inc. is closing down for a week over the holidays to save money, but experts said the shutdown is par for the course in Silicon Valley. 

The Internet company is mandating that most of its employees worldwide, except for those responsible for “essential functions” such as customer service, take off work from Dec. 25 through Jan. 1.

In the U.S., employees can either use vacation time for nonholiday dates or take unpaid leave. Workers outside the country will be paid according to local standards, said spokeswoman Dana Lengkeek.

Sunnyvale, Calif.-based Yahoo told its staff about the break in April, and has recommended employees to take the week off in the past, Lengkeek said. 

“This is nothing new, just formalized a little more,” she said. “It’s fairly standard in the industry, closing down during a traditionally slow week and giving employees time to recharge. A lot of employees tend to take that week off anyway.”

In addition to reducing operations, Yahoo will be turning lights and computers off in all its facilities, though the company would not disclose how much it expects to save. Consumers will not see any difference on the website, which will continue to feature news, Lengkeek said.

Yahoo has been struggling to keep costs in check, laying off nearly 700 employees in the spring.

But several other Silicon Valley firms, including Adobe Systems Inc., Apple Inc. and Hewlett-Packard Co. also go the thrifty route during the holidays, shutting down for a week or more.

“It’s something that a lot of companies do in the tech world to control costs and to have more influence over when people are out of the office,” said Steve Weinstein, vice president and senior research analyst at Pacific Crest Securities in Portland, Ore. “Yahoo’s done something similar to this in the past.”

--Tiffany Hsu

Yelp reportedly gives Google a thumbs-down

Jeremy Stoppelman. Credit: Yelp.

TechCrunch, which reported last week that a deal for Google to acquire Yelp was 80% certain, now says the deal is off-- and that Yelp CEO and co-founder Jeremy Stoppelman "has walked away from more than half a billion dollars."

Michael Arrington of TechCrunch wrote that he's not sure what "something happened that made Yelp reconsider the deal. Over the weekend they notified Google that they were not going to sell, say multiple sources."

A Yelp spokeswoman had declined to comment on the rumored talks -- although she did say, "as a fast-growing, local business review site with more than 8 million user reviews and more than 26 million unique monthly visitors, Yelp is approached frequently by numerous entities to discuss partnerships, investments and more, and the company does not comment on private discussions that may occur." She declined to comment further today.

We noted, after the original report, that Google was looking to train its big guns on the local advertising market, a field in which Yelp has had great success. Arrington speculates that Yelp may have had a partnership offer that lets it stay independent.

Certainly Yelp has some precedents in the move. Facebook and Twitter have famously spurned overtures for acquisition for even more money. And we've already noted that Arrington has been wrong about buyout rumors before.  (OK, and he's been right, too.)

The online punditocracy theorizes that Yelp feels it may not need Google. Jared Newman at PC World says Yelp already gets great Google love in search rankings, so what's to gain by going in-house? Caroline McCarthy at Cnet speculates that Yelp, which is so proud of its community, feared that the almighty Google's track record in this arena is, surprisingly, less than stellar. Yelpers, she noted, hated the idea, and "YouTube's commenters seem to come from a very special place somewhere between the sixth and seventh circles of hell."

--Dan Fost

SuperAgent Ari -- sound familiar?

Ari Emanuel with client Michael Moore at the September premiere of Moore's film "Capitalism: A Love Story." Credit: Kevin Winter / Getty Images

One of Hollywood's most powerful agents is Ari Emanuel, one of the leaders of William Morris Endeavor Entertainment. It's hard to say if he's more famous for being the acknowledged model for the fictional character Ari Gold, the foul-mouthed agent on HBO's "Entourage" played by Jeremy Piven, or for his brother, White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel.

Either way, Emanuel and his attorneys find it hard to believe that the real-life super agent is not the model for a new game, SuperAgent, from Irish iPhone-app development house FactorySix. In the game, which sells for $1.99 in the iTunes App store, players pretend to be "Ari," a leading Hollywood agent, with a movie-star client named Vince -- also the name of the movie-star character on "Entourage."

Citing a story from the online site TechNews that said the game's Ari was clearly based on both Ari Emanuel and Ari Gold, attorney Patricia Glaser wrote in a letter to FactorySix that the company "cannot deny that it intended to capitalize on using Mr. Emanuel's and WME's names for the Game, and possibly mislead the public into believing that Mr. Emanuel and/or WME endorse the Game."  The letter tells FactorySix to "immediately cease and desist using those names in conjunction with the Game."

Ari Gold fans, don't start fretting. Emanuel has reportedly signed a waiver saying he won't sue HBO or the producers over that character, even though he's said in interviews he gets scared watching the show. That deal, though, predates SuperAgent and would not apply to FactorySix's Ari.

In an e-mail, FactorySix co-founder Oisin Hanrahan said, "The character's name is not derived from Ari Emanuel or Ari Gold." He said he is seeking a partnership with HBO and that he's offered to drop WME from the game.

Given that FactorySix has issued press releases announcing the legal threat, it's hard to believe the company is too distraught. Instead, Hanrahan says in the release, "This game is based on Hollywood, not one very important person in Hollywood, and simply because Mr. Emanuel identifies with the lead character does not mean it is based on him. We are taking it as compliment that we got the game so close to being real."

Maybe the two sides should, as Ari Gold would say, "hug it out."

-- Dan Fost

Google ready to buy Yelp?

In what could be a sign that Google is ready to train its computing power on the local advertising market, the search giant was reported today to be in talks to buy Yelp, a San Francisco company that enables users to review all sorts of businesses.

The website TechCrunch, citing anonymous sources, reported that the two companies are very close to an acquisition and that the price could be in the neighborhood of $500 million. Representatives of both companies declined to comment, according to Bloomberg News.

Analysts immediately noted that Google -- which acquired AdMob last month for $750 million -- is probably particularly interested in Yelp's sales force, which operates in 30 markets and knows how to sell to local advertisers. "This would be the closest Google has gotten to buying a 'sales force' with a meaningful 'on the ground' presence in the form of local editorial people in market and telephone salespeople," Greg Sterling wrote on Search Engine Land's website.

Though Yelp has occasionally incurred the wrath of local business owners -- over negative reviews posted on the site or aggressive sales tactics -- most of the company's revenue comes from selling ads to those businesses. The company disputes the main complaints and says it works hard to serve businesses fairly. The company has also empowered thousands of average people -- it calls them "Yelpers" -- to review restaurants, dentists, retail shops and scores of other businesses.

Yelp was founded in 2004 by former PayPal employees Jeremy Stoppelman and Russel Simmons, who started with a $1-million investment from PayPal co-founder Max Levchin. It has since received an additional $30 million from venture firms DAG Ventures, Bessemer Venture Partners and Benchmark Capital, Bloomberg reported. The company says it hosts more than 8 million reviews, and more than 26 million people visited the site in November.

-- Dan Fost

A look at the newest digital reader: A pro's take on the Barnes & Noble Nook

Barnes & Noble recently began shipping its Nook digital book reader. It was promptly trounced by reviewers, who have savaged it as "extremely sluggish" and "half-baked."

With no dearth of media reviews for the Nook, we instead turned to Garth Conboy, president of eBook Technologies, a La Jolla, Calif., consulting firm that specializes in digital readers.

Conboy has worked with e-readers for more than decade, having been vice president of software engineering in the late 1990s for SoftBook Press, the creator of one of the first dedicated e-book devices. He even co-owns several patents for e-book inventions.

Asking a grizzled veteran for his opinion risks several outcomes. For instance, they may be tough to impress, because they've "seen it all before." Or they understand how difficult the task is and may be more willing to forgive faults than the average gadget reviewer.

How does Conboy treat the Nook? You can watch his take on the device in the video above to find out.

-- Alex Pham

Follow my random thoughts on games, gear and technology on Twitter @AlexPham.

A fight is breaking out among software developers: Web apps or native apps?

There's an ideological war being raged on the desktop and in your cellphone. You may not realize it, but you're actively taking sides ...

... every time you log into Gmail or fire up Outlook, when you launch LATimes.com in your mobile browser versus using our app, when you listen to music on Pandora's website instead of iTunes.

On one side is Loren Brichter, the maker of a wildly popular Twitter application for the iPhone called Tweetie.

Brichter builds dedicated apps that are designed for and catered to specific platforms. Tweetie takes advantage of iPhone-centric features and adheres to Apple-like design.

In the other corner is David Kaneda, a champion of up-and-coming Web technologies heavily reliant on the Javascript framework. In a public spat recently, Kaneda squawked at Brichter on Twitter and pledged to replicate Tweetie inside of a browser.

"I dare you," Brichter shot back from his Atebits Twitter profile. "PROVE ME WRONG BABY! NATIVE APPS 4EVA!"

OK, that's just about as geeky as it can get. But the underlying idea has profound effects on the way we interact with our computers.

3D TV at home gets more real, but still needs those glasses

3D television took a big step forward today with the finalization of a standard for Blu-ray disc machines.

The Blu-ray Disc Assn. announced it had reached agreement on the long-awaited standard that allows for full 1080p viewing of 3D movies on home TVs. Blu-ray disc players that use the standard will actually be delivering two images, each in full resolution, to create the effect.

The first Blu-ray machines equipped for full-on 3D are expected to be announced at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas in January, and then be available later in the year. It's also expected that recent 3D movies such as "Avatar," which opens later this week, will be coming out in formats that can play on the new disc machines. The new players will also be able to show regular 2D disks.

Current Blu-ray players aren't able to handle the new 3D format, but some analysts expect that adapters could be made available for them.

3D TV is nothing new -- there have been several attempts at distributing 3D movies and other entertainment for home use. But the relatively low-resolution of the images made for results that were far less than satisfactory. The industry is hoping that with the new standard, 3D at home might finally take off.

But there's one thing the new standard can't solve -- it still requires the use of special glasses to see the images in 3D. Otherwise, if you take off the glasses to grab a drink or get the phone, the 3D movie on the TV becomes just a blur.

-- David Colker

Photo: 3D movies could get a boost from a new Blu-ray standard, but you'll still need special glasses to view them. Credit: Ben Stansall / AFP / Getty Images

Santa gets OnStar -- and a commercial pitch -- for the season

A none-too-jolly Santa checks out his new OnStar gadgets. Credit: YouTube.

It sounds like such a nice idea: The OnStar car communications company owned by General Motors announced that users of the service will be able to track the global journey of Santa Claus on Christmas Eve.

Just push the OnStar button on Dec. 24 and kids can get an update on where jolly St. Nick is, as provided by the U.S./Canadian NORAD aerospace system (which has been providing Santa updates to children by phone for more than 50 years). 

But this nice gesture was not to be done without hype. OnStar has placed on YouTube a video showing Santa visiting the company and getting a description of all the technological wonders it can put on his sleigh, including GPS, diagnostic devices and hands-free calling "while taking a call from Mrs. Claus."

The little video production is not helped by acting that would embarrass a community theater troupe and a Santa who looks incredibly bored with the presentation.

Yes, Virginia, there is a new General Motors. Not too different from the old General Motors.

-- David Colker

Google News adds 55 more newspapers and publications to its Fast Flip lineup

Google Inc. announced today that it was adding 55 publications to its Fast Flip feature, which allows readers a glimpse of articles and images from nearly 100 newspapers, magazines, blogs and other sources without the need to leave Google's site.

With Fast Flip, Google shares some advertising revenue with publishers whose content features ads inserted by the search company. Google has said this arrangement is one way it is trying to help an industry whose bottom line has been sorely affected by the rise of the Internet and digital media.

Additions to Fast Flip include the Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune, Miami Herald, Kansas City Star, Huffington Post, Popular Science, Reuters, Politico and U.S. News & World Report. 

"Readers of the Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune, Baltimore Sun and the rest of our newspaper brands operate in a multimedia universe, and our goal is to ensure our content is available on the platforms they choose," said Marc Chase, president of Tribune Co.'s interactive division. "We’re always looking for new technologies to help us reach an even wider audience."

Chase did not respond to a request for details about how much revenue Tribune stood to gain through Fast Flip. Google said the program was largely experimental at this point, but that "the majority" of revenue generated through the feature would go to the publishers.

Google has been under attack by many in the newspaper industry who see the instant, free access Google grants users to news articles as undermining newspapers' profitability. Even after years of improvements and added features, newspaper websites have not generated significant revenue.

Earlier this month, media mogul and News Corp. Chairman Rupert Murdoch continued to rail against Google, accusing the company and other online aggregators of stealing news content, which can be expensive to produce.

Google maintains that it sends more than a billion clicks every month back to newspaper sites -- and that each click is a business opportunity from which newspapers could potentially profit. 

-- David Sarno

Movie studios are going to hate this: How to save money on already inexpensive Redbox rentals

While movie studios slam Redbox, the $1-per-night movie rental kiosks, for cannibalizing more lucrative markets and Redbox returns fire with lawsuits about unfair competition, an unexpected third party is starting to gain traction.

As if a buck wasn't cheap enough for a movie rental, some services aggregate discount codes that can score you a ton of free flicks.

Similar to coupon sites like Retail Me Not, Redbox Codes shows discounts specifically for Redbox rentals. Users chime in periodically about whether each code is still working.

If you're on the go, you can download an application to your iPhone or iPod Touch called Red Box FREE Rental Promo Codes. The app is available in Apple's App Store and is getting pretty positive reviews.

Blowing all your cash on presents for the holidays? It's hard to turn down a free night of entertainment.

-- Mark Milian
twitter.com/markmilian

Photo: A Redbox kiosk outside of a 7-Eleven store in Silver Lake. Credit: Mark Milian / Los Angeles Times

Bing continues to gain search market share ... from Yahoo

Bing, the nearly 6-month-old search engine from Microsoft Corp., has steadily been capturing more of the Web search market.  But instead of stealing users from market leader Google Inc., Bing is still siphoning them from ally Yahoo Inc. 

Bing captured 10.3% of the search pie in November, according to the latest numbers released by ComScore Inc and reported today by the Associated Press.  That's up from 9.9% the month before.  But Yahoo's share decreased by about the same margin, dropping from 18.0% to 17.5% during the same period.  

Yahoo and Microsoft, which signed a deal in late July to allow Microsoft to operate the search engines for both companies, have not been able to boost their combined market share much past 28%, where it's been hovering at least since the debut of Bing.

Meanwhile, market leader Google has been slowly but surely gaining share, rising from 65% in June, when Bing launched, to 65.6% in November.

-- David Sarno