Internet & Media

Amazon criticized for deranking 'adult' books

Updated at 7:15 p.m. PDT with comment from Amazon.com.

Amazon.com recently delisted from its sales ranking system gay and lesbian book titles that it deemed "adult," raising the ire of some who characterize the move as online censorship.

Author Mark R. Probst wrote on his blog Sunday that he noticed the change a few days ago:

On Amazon.com two days ago, mysteriously, the sales rankings disappeared from two newly-released high profile gay romance books: "Transgressions" by Erastes and "False Colors" by Alex Beecroft. Everybody was perplexed. Was it a … Read more

NASA's next node will be named...

Chalk one up for Steven Colbert, kind of.

NASA announced Friday afternoon that astronaut Sunita Williams will appear Tuesday on "The Colbert Report" to unveil the name of the newest node for the International Space Station.

From everything NASA has indicated, the node probably won't be named for the comedian. It likely will be dubbed "Serenity," based on the official voting results on NASA's site.

NASA ran an online contest earlier this year to name the node. The agency's official suggestions: Earthrise, Serenity, Venture, and Legacy. But NASA also (naively, perhaps) stated that … Read more

March search share: Google up, rivals down

Google's share of the U.S. search market increased as its growth outpaced that of the market overall, according to new statistics from Nielsen Online.

The overall search market grew 16.7 percent to 9.5 billion searches from March 2008 to March 2009. Google's share of that grew 27.6 percent to 6.1 billion, Nielsen said Friday.

Yahoo, in second place, saw growth of 1.7 percent to 1.5 billion. Microsoft's grew 0.3 percent to about 982 million.

Overall, Google held 64.2 percent share to Yahoo's 15.8 percent and Microsoft'… Read more

Sony Pictures confirms feature-film talks with YouTube

Sony Pictures has acknowledged that it is discussing a deal to license feature films to Google's YouTube.

On Monday, CNET reported the two companies were discussing a deal that could help YouTube become an outlet for premium full-length content. Right now, YouTube offers mostly independent films and a handful of titles from Metro Goldwyn Mayer.

Sony Pictures wants to boost the profile of Crackle.com, the studio's own online video site, and a YouTube partnership could help promote the offering. Judging from other feature-film deals that Sony Pictures has cut with Hulu and others, Sony Pictures will likely … Read more

Google, Universal Music partner on new music video site

Universal Music Group and Google are now partners in the music-video business.

The largest of the four top recording companies and YouTube's parent company announced on Thursday that they are working together on Vevo, a new music and video entertainment service set to launch later this year. YouTube will handle the technology while Universal Music supplies the content. The two companies will share ad revenue.

The companies said and at this point it appears that Universal's content and artists will be the only label represented on the site. However, Doug Morris, Universal Music's chief executive, said in … Read more

Did MLB.com's video player strike out on opening day?

Some subscribers of Major League Baseball's streaming-video service are complaining that the new player, powered by Adobe Flash, isn't ready for the big leagues.

After receiving plenty of favorable reviews from technology blogs, some MLB.com subscribers have complained about stuttering and stalling video while watching on Monday, opening day for baseball. Some of the same problems continued on Tuesday, according to reports. Subscribers of MLB.com's GameDay Audio service also reported that archived games haven't been accessible since Monday.

The irony is that Major League Baseball Advanced Media (MLBAM), the unit that oversees the streaming … Read more

Does AP know how its YouTube channel works?

Updated April 9 at 10:55 a.m. PDT with AP comment.

Maybe the Associated Press can file this one under "That's news to me."

At least one representative of the venerable news agency, which recently declared that it was tired of the Internet riding on its coattails, was apparently unaware the agency had an official YouTube video channel.

The AP recently sent a letter to WTNQ-FM in Tennessee--an affiliate of the Associated Press, by the way--accusing the country music radio station of copyright violation for embedding videos from the AP's official YouTube channel on its … Read more

RIAA gives thumbs up to France's three-strike law

France has passed a law that requires Internet service providers to cut off Web access of customers accused of illegally downloading copyright material multiple times.

Last Thursday, the French National Assembly passed the "Creation and Internet" law, which implements a graduated response program similar to one the recording industry is asking ISPs in the United States to adopt.

According to a story in BusinessWeek, the accused are first e-mailed a warning that they have been flagged as a copyright violator. If the person is accused a second time, the pressure is increased. Another warning is sent but this … Read more

Techmeme founder: WSJ, NYT are aggregators

Updated at 3:40 p.m. PDT to include Wall Street Journal's deals for some of the news that it aggregates.

Techmeme is one of the sites that Robert Thomson, managing editor of the The Wall Street Journal, presumably thinks is a "parasite" or "tech tapeworm in the intestines of the Internet."

The Web site aggregates links to stories. Along with the links is a short description of the news. Thomson and others in the newspaper industry say it's unfair and unlawful for Web sites to profit from their content without compensating them. On … Read more