Google using human power – and challenging Digg

There’s been rumors floating around out there that Google was interested in buying Digg. After all, Digg has people submitting links then ranking them – and Google’s all about finding links and – ranking them.

Looks like Google is going their own route with something called SearchWiki, that lets you rank search results, add yours in, and compare them to others. It’s not the social network commenting system that Digg is – but it’s an interesting idea.

Goohoo is no longer a reality

Google is going to drop the Yahoo partnership agreement that would have let Yahoo run Google ads with its search service.

With the Federal Government threatening possible anti-trust investigations into the deal, Google decided that it just wasn’t worth the hassle and backed off. So that now leaves Yahoo one less resource for revenue – and how long can the company hold on now?

Google settles book scanning lawsuit for $125 million

Google’s going to pay up $125 million to the Association of American Publishers for scanning their books into the Google books project. Here’s the important thing:

In a nutshell, Google gets to scan books as long as it offers the ability to purchase them, provide institutional subscriptions and give authors and publishers control over access to their works. Google will also fund a non-profit Books Rights Registry that will distribute payments, locate rights holders, maintain a database and keep track of whether publishers and authors want their works online or not.

OK – I’ll go for that. Google gets to have their book database, authors can get paid and have some say. Everybody wins.

The Google Phone has landed. Meh.

Engadget takes a look at the new Google Android based phone.

Color me “well, OK”. I’m not enthused yet. The system looks a bit clunky to me.

Google/Yahoo Ad deal soon? Goohoo?

Looks like the advertising deal between Yahoo and Google might have some hurdles from the US Department of Justice to get through first.

Basically, this would allow Yahoo to run Google ads and make money from it. Think about that for a second – Yahoo, which used to be the 800 pound gorilla of searching, would be earning money from ads created by their search rival.

Woah.