Screaming Penguin - Source Does Matter

Google Uses Blog to Spin Court Decision
Google says they won the Geico case, more or less. Judge says use of trademarked terms in "ads" is indeed illegal, but use of same trademarked terms as keywords to trigger ads is not.

Laura Quilter on Google Print: Don't Embrace Limits to Fair Use

Libraries should push fair use in the service and interests of their users, history, and humanity. But libraries are not the sole beneficiaries of fair use, nor should they be. For-profit corporations, not-for-profit corporations, heck, even tax-exempt religions — all should be able to exercise fair use broadly.

Well, Siva [Vaidhyanathan] says Google is not a library. It's true that Google is not the mom-and-apple-pie ALA version of a downtown library, complete with modern atrium and skylights for Mayoral gatherings. But I think we have to push on "library" for a bit. The Internet Archive is certainly a library. My home collection is certainly a library. (It even circulates, and I have remote storage, and I recently began a belated investment in DVDs.) Libraries may be private, semi-private, public; for- or not-for-profit; paper or digital. Why is Google not a library?

Google Raises Cash — and Speculation

Analysts said Google may wish to increase its stake in Baidu.com (Quote, Chart), billed as the "Google of China," following Yahoo's (Quote, Chart) $1 billion investment in Alibaba. Indeed, Google cited "significant competition from Microsoft and Yahoo" in its SEC filing. Other analysts said Google may be interested in making a play for VoIP provider Skype or planning telecom or broadband moves.

Where Does Google Plan to Spend $4 Billion?
Not really directly related to the cash but interesting (and from the same article):

On Monday, Google is planning to introduce a second-generation version of its downloadable computer search tool, Google Desktop. It will come with both personalization and software "agent" features - learning capabilities - plus an invitation for independent programmers to develop small programs to extend the capability of the system.

Both capabilities are likely to be seen as further competitive threats by Microsoft, which is focusing on similar information retrieval and organization advances in its long-delayed next-generation operating system, Windows Vista.

"We're really trying to make this into a platform," said Nikhil Bhatla, product manager for Google Desktop. As with Apple Computer's popular Dashboard feature, the idea is that it will be simple for programmers to extend the reach of Google Desktop by adding custom applications, known as live content panels.

Google Techs, Webmasters Mingle
Ok, no quote here, just a good ole rant. The term "webmaster" is asinine. The term webmaster is even more so asinine if it is used to mean "cunning internet entrepreneurs who constantly try to manipulate Google's search engine results for a competitive edge". Those "cunning enterpeneurs" are otherwise know as "e-marketing strategists" or assclowns that have no real content on any of their sites and thus spend all day either dicking with the search results order themselves, or selling such services to dumbasses. I understand why Google has this little "dance", its a PR stunt on several levels that works to their advantage, but all the coverage of this has been just plain stupid. And do not ever pay anyone for "search engine marketing" or "search engine optimization" and so on, just make a usable, standardized, search engine compliant (easy stuff you can read for FREE on the search engines websites) website with content people want and it will climb in the ranks. And if you are trying to sell something, use this thing called "advertising" rather than make believe "SEO" bullshit.