Business

Google CEO Eric Schmidt announced that his company's top priority this year is to make the YouTube video-sharing site a more profitable enterprise through the introduction of new advertising strategies. In an interview that aired on CNBC on ... Wednesday, Schmidt said, "I don't think we've quite figured out the perfect solution of how to make money, and we're working on that. That's our highest priority this year." Google Inc.'s acquisition of YouTube in 2006 represented a $1.65 billion investment in the video-sharing site but internal earnings reports demonstrate that the purchase has yet to ... (view more)

Madonna is going online tonight and fans can catch all of her sexy moves for free. That's right, the Material Girl's concert at the Roseland Ballroom in New York City will be webcast live on music.msn.com/madonna starting at 10 PM ET for US viewers. ... (Source: microsoft.com ) International audiences will have to wait until May 15 when the concert will be available on-demand. However, select countries around the world will also be given the opportunity to view the live concert. Vodafone, one of the world's leading mobile carriers, will sponsor the webstream for their customers in Cyprus, Egypt, ... (view more)

Three major PC sellers have found a way to continue offering Windows XP after it's officially withdrawn from sale on June 30. Dell, HP, and Lenovo have all found loopholes in the terms of the Microsoft license which, in theory at least, imposes the ... deadline on supplying PCs with the system installed. Dell is using a clause in its license to supply Windows Vista, the successor to XP. The license means they have to sell machines with Vista installed as standard. However, they will be able to allow customers to downgrade their package. HP is going to operate a similar system until July 2009. In ... (view more)

Yahoo posted its first quarter earnings for 2008 on Tuesday, exceeding expectations by a small margin. The company posted a 9 percent increase in revenue for a total 1.81 billion dollars. This would seem to give strength to the Internet portal in ... its ongoing confrontation with Microsoft, which is hoping to buy Yahoo and become a stronger online competitor against Google. (Source: nytimes.com ) Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang made claims earlier in the month that Microsoft's current offer of $31 per share substantially undervalues the company, and refused to sell at that price. While Yang now has some ... (view more)

Rumors emerged earlier this week that Sony would begin offering a video download service for the Playstation 3 (PS3). The company is also reportedly in talks with the major studios and television networks, providing the third incarnation of the ... service after the abysmal failures of Movielink (sold to Blockbuster) and Sony Connect (recently discontinued). Has Sony already squandered its chances? Its main competitor, Microsoft's Xbox 360, already delivers movie and television shows with its Xbox Live service. Then there are the other set-top boxes such as Apple TV and Tivo. (Source: slashdot. ... (view more)

Microsoft is experimenting with the idea of renting its software rather than only having it available to buy out-right. The scheme, codenamed Albany, would allow US users to pay a monthly subscription for a package of software which would likely ... comprise Word, Excel, PowerPoint and anti-virus software. Users in some developing countries can already rent Office, and Microsoft's OneCare security package is already available for annual subscription in America. However, this would be the first time Office could be rented in a major market like the US. The company believes the biggest selling ... (view more)

Is "racial profiling" the best way to compete with Google? It would seem that InterActive Corp (Nasdaq: IACI), the owner of Ask.com, thinks so. The company has introduced a new search engine site called Rushmoredrive.com to provide more relevant ... search information for the African-American searcher. The new search engine was created using behavioral targeting techniques. Researchers analyzed the results of the most popular search terms used in geographic areas that have large black populations. The site then catalogues the 'click-throughs' from those results to determine the sites of most ... (view more)

People who want Mac technology without paying Apple prices finally have the machine of their dreams, at least until the lawyers have their way. A company named Psystar is offering a machine named OpenMac for just $399 which, to all intents and ... purposes, could run just like a real Apple Macintosh computer. The legality is questionable at best and the Psystar site disappeared a few hours after news of the offer broke, with many speculating that lawyers had become involved -- though the site later returned. (Source: news.com ) While Microsoft Windows can run on any PC, Apple's Leopard only works ... (view more)

As the official June 30, 2008 deadline for Windows XP sales for PC makers and retailers looms on the horizon, Business Week is reporting that a recent upgrade to the Mac operating system (OS) is moving Apple closer to challenging Microsoft for ... overall computing dominance, even in the corporate market. A new feature from Apple called 'Spaces' makes it easy to instantly switch between a Macintosh OS and a Microsoft Windows OS with two fingers. Easy toggling of OS' coupled with Apple's release of a tool kit for programmers to write applications for the iPhone will be followed by the June launch ... (view more)

Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation is reportedly poised to join Microsoft in its bid to takeover Yahoo. The talks between News Corporation and Microsoft are hush-hush, but insiders say an eventual deal might see Murdoch chip in some cash for the ... takeover and hand over his Interactive Media division, which owns MySpace. That could mean MySpace, the MSN network, and the Yahoo search engine would all be owned by the same group. Yahoo had already been talking with News Corporation themselves, but only in the hope of forming a partnership. They are trying to avoid the type of complete takeover ... (view more)