Digital Media

You might suffer paralysis in several digits when I tell you that there is now a dating site exclusively for those deemed gorgeous.

BeautifulPeople.com exists to protect its members from having to espy the corpulent, the disproportioned, and the downright fugly-puglies.

On its home page, next to a photograph of a quite impossibly eugenic couple, the site presents its most famous media quote: "The sexiest Web site in the world today."

Entertainment Weekly? No, CNN.

Now, another august publication, the Telegraph, has reported some painful news from this online island of the beautiful: BeautifulPeople.com says British people are ugly.

Perhaps you might wish to blame the fish, chips, haggis, curry, and 14 pints of lager consumed by the average inhabitant of the Fragmented Kingdom. Perhaps you might indicate that such a lifestyle suggests an increasing amount of procreation between beings of indeterminate provenance in indeterminate places.

Some feel the British image problems begin with their teeth.

(Credit: MyBulldog/Flickr)

But BeautifulPeople.com revealed that only 12 percent of British men and 15 percent of their female cohorts were accepted by the prettiest online community in the world. This compares rather desperately with the 65 percent of Swedish males who enter this refined paradise and 76 percent of Norwegian women.

The site went live around the world just a couple of weeks ago and so far 83 percent of those who have attempted entry have failed to satisfy the bouncers.

Oh, did I mention that when you present yourself at BeautifulPeople.com's doors you have 48 hours to impress with your deeply ingrained pulchritude and your pulsating profile before you are voted in or out?

BeautifulPeople.com's managing director, Greg Hodge, told the Telegraph: "It hurts me. I'm British."

I am concerned, as I often am, for the Brits.

They donate so many pretty actors and actresses to the world--Hugh Grant, Sienna Miller, Ian McKellen, Judi Dench, Michael Gambon--that one wonders if they are using their theatrical greats to cover up for some serious national genetic deficiencies.

One can only appeal to the British government to launch an immediate campaign in all media. The government should spend some of its vast advertising resources in encouraging its most striking citizens to put their finest jaws and fingers forward and apply for membership to this site.

National pride is at stake. And if the British can substantially increase their presence on BeautifulPeople.com, it might be the start of yet another British cultural renaissance.

Facebook seems to have contributed to countless broken love affairs, divorces, and insane levels of jealousy. People pry into your friend lists and updates until they sometimes reach conclusions far beyond reality. How lovely, then, that a mere status update appears to have saved a Harlem man from jail.

According to The New York Times, Rodney Bradford decided to update his status with a call from the soul. "Where's my pancakes?" is the Times' translation of a status update it says was written in "indecipherable street slang." The fact that Bradford did this at 11:49 a.m. on October 17, using his father's computer, meant that he would not have to suffer pancakes of a more distasteful nature in the local penitentiary.

(Credit: CC Slushpup/Flickr)

Bradford, you see, was arrested the next day for robbery. However, after he was booked, his lawyer was intelligent enough to update the district attorney with news of Bradford's Facebooking.

A subpoena was swiftly flung the way of the Zuckerbergville crew so that they might reveal whether the timing and location of the update were correct. They were, meaning Bradford could update his criminal status to "cleared."

There are some, however, who are not entirely convinced the charges should have been dropped. Joseph Pollini, a teacher at the Department of Law, Police Science and Criminal Justice Administration at John Jay College of Criminal Justice told the Times: "With a username and password, anyone can input data in a Facebook page."

He also offered a dire warning of the infinite dastardliness of people Bradford's age: "Some of the brightest people on the Internet are teenagers. They know the Internet better than a lot of people. Why? Because they use it all the time."

Oh, why is it so hard to give young people the benefit of the doubt--especially on Facebook?

Maybe it hasn't worked so well to mesh the short-video-clip culture of the Web with traditional cable news: Current Media, the edgy cable company co-founded by former Vice President Al Gore, announced Wednesday it has laid off 80 employees in conjunction with a programming shakeup.

According to a release from the company, this shift involves canceling a number of programs, including "Current Tonight," "Current Takeover" and "Current Exposed." Most of the layoffs are in conjunction with those programs.

Additionally, per Wednesday's release: "Current will be shifting away from short-form programming and daily in-house production and towards proven 30-60 minute formats from a multitude of sources, including acquisitions, co-productions, outside studios, as well as Current developed and produced content." So it sounds like there will be a significant amount of new focus on outsourced material rather than more expensive in-house production--and perhaps less of an attempt to compete with well-established, live cable news networks.

Exactly one year ago, Current--headquartered in San Francisco but with many of its production operations in Los Angeles--laid off about 60 people but said that it was also creating about 30 new positions, which left its head count around 410 employees. Current chief operating officer Joanna Drake Earl told CNET News that this year's cuts leave its employee numbers at around 300.

The release said that the cuts were "not the result of a need to cut costs" and that the company would be hiring in areas like talent management, licensing, marketing, and ad sales. It'll also be consolidating its two L.A. facilities into a single new one.

"We've been an extremely innovative company doing lots and lots of different things," Earl said, "but (we've had to ask) what are we doing for our audience, and what shouldn't we be doing."

The company had filed for a $100 million IPO about two years ago but then retracted it amid concerns about the economy. It's repeatedly had to deflect rumors about its viability, like a report early this year that it would be closing its San Francisco headquarters to focus on L.A.

This post was updated at 2:10 p.m. PT with comment from Current's COO.

If you're looking for just the right gift for Aunt Sally, you may find yourself turning to social networks and your mobile phone this holiday-shopping season.

More consumers expect that these two aspects of technology will help lead the way this year, according to a recent survey from consulting firm Deloitte.

Deloitte, which surveyed more 10,000 consumers for its 24th annual holiday-shopping survey, drillled down on technology's effect on buying habits by releasing new statistics on Wednesday.

The survey found that 53 percent of consumers plan to use social media to research gift ideas, 52 percent intend to check the wish lists of relatives and friends on social networks, and 60 percent plan to hunt for discounts and sales using social networks.

Mobile phones are also becoming a tool for bargain-hungry shoppers. Among those surveyed, 55 percent plan to use their phones to find store locations, 45 percent will use them to research prices, 40 percent will look for product information, and 32 percent will hunt for discounts. In addition, 25 percent said they expect to buy a holiday gift using their phones.

The good, old Internet still rates as a top spot for holiday shoppers, with 22 percent saying they'll shop primarily online this year and 44 percent expecting to use a coupon they find online.

Online research is big for key purchases, with 39 percent saying they read reviews of stores or products written by other consumers and 34 percent indicating that such online reviews influence their buying decisions more than advertising.

The relationship between brick-and-mortar stores and their Web sites seems to be symbiotic. Among those questioned, 65 percent said they've purchased an item online after finding it in a store or catalog, while 78 percent said they've bought a product in a store after seeing it on the store's site.

"Consumers are turning to mobile, online and social media during their entire holiday shopping experience," Stacy Janiak, a Deloitte vice chairman, said in a statement. "Retailers should consider harnessing this activity to turn browsers into buyers with one-click access to coupons, promotions and purchasing tools. This year's leaner in-store inventories may also open the door for retailers to lure customers to their online channels where it is easier to access inventory, no matter where it is located."

Commissioned by Deloitte, the survey was conducted online by an independent research firm between September 24 and October 2 and included responses from 10,878 consumers.

Unlike when you stand over your coworker's desk, Microsoft's Bing search engine actually works better when you hover.

One of the key features of the would-be rival to Google is that when you hover to the right of a result, you can get a preview of what to expect. As part of an update this week, Bing's hover result will now feature more information including a thumbnail preview of the site in question.

Microsoft is using Wolfram Alpha to help power certain results, such as this search for the fat content of french fries.

(Credit: CNET News)

One of the ongoing challenges for Bing, besides just getting more people to use the site, is letting them know that the hover feature is there. Microsoft's research has shown it gets high usage from those who know about it, but also finds that lots of people don't know the feature is there. Microsoft has been experimenting with some different visual cues that might make it easier to stumble upon the previews.

The hover feature was developed by the San Francisco-based team that Microsoft acquired as part of last year's acquisition of Powerset. Powerset, which developed a semantic search technology, also powers Bing's index of Wikipedia.

Bing's fall update update also includes the first fruits of a deal with Wolfram Alpha. As part of that arrangement, certain health related searches, such as "how many calories in a hamburger" will now feature information from Alpha. Bing will also rely on Alpha for some math calculations, Microsoft said in a blog posting on Wednesday. Wolfram noted that Microsoft is one of the first customers for a commercial licensing program that was formally announced several weeks ago.

Other changes to Bing include improved local results for topics such as weather and events.

It's all part of a wave of updates Microsoft is making to Bing this week. On Tuesday, Microsoft said it is moving its MSN Video site under the Bing umbrella, with a new video page that can be used to watch videos from places like Hulu and elsewhere.

The company also announced some enhancements to Bing Maps, including the ability to use the mouse to alter a suggested route and have one's directions re-calculated.

The improvements come as Microsoft is looking for ways to stand out from Google as it tries to wrest share from its much larger rival. The software maker has seen a modest uptick but faces steep hurdles in trying to make more significant gains.

Experian Hitwise said Wednesday that Bing's share reached 9.57 percent in October. That's up from 8.96 percent in September, but still well behind Google, which had more than 70 percent and Yahoo, with 16 percent of the U.S. search query market.

While adding features is clearly important, trying to stay ahead in the search game can be quite a challenge. Just hours after Microsoft announced a deal last month to index real-time tweets from Twitter, Google announced plans to do the same.

Microsoft has also gotten some unwanted attention for one of its features--the Bing Cashback program--where users can get a portion of their online transactions rebated by starting off on Bing. A blog posting outlined a flaw in the mechanism that could allow people to get cash back without ever spending money via Bing.

That posting was pulled after a demand from Microsoft's lawyers.

Google's new SafeSearch page

(Credit: Google)

Google has long allowed parents a SafeSearch filtering setting that keeps kids from using the search engine to find inappropriate sites like those with explicit sexual images or text.

The problem was that kids could easily change those settings.

Starting Wednesday, however, the company is allowing parents to lock those settings to make it harder (though not impossible) for kids to bypass the settings.

To change the settings, the parent will have to log into his or her Google account and enter a password. Once the settings have been changed, the Google search engine will change in appearance to indicate that it's locked. The new page will have large balls in the upper right corner so that parents can see from across the room that their kids are on the safe search page.

The settings, which places a cookie on the machine, must be configured for each browser the child uses. If you set them only for Internet Explorer, for example, they won't restrict access from Firefox, Chrome, or other browsers. Also, according to a Google representative, the child can get around the settings by using the private browsing feature that is now built into the latest versions of Firefox, Internet Explorer, and Chrome. So, while this will keep kids from accidentally using Google for inappropriate searches, it will not deter tech-savvy kids who are determined to bypass the filters.

As I've said in other posts, filters are never a foolproof way to keep "tweens" and teenagers from inappropriate content. There are always ways to get around them, including using a different machine or mobile phone. Filters are effective for keeping young children from stumbling onto disturbing Web sites and they can be a deterrent to somewhat older kids who might have a momentary or casual interest in looking at material that their parents wish to block.

With all filters and controls, it's important for parents to think about how you use them to help teach your child to exercise self-control and critical thinking so that, eventually, they can safely use the Web without filters or adult supervision. Also, for very young children, say 5 and under, its remains a good idea to be with the child while he or she is online. Tools like Google's SafeSearch are helpful, but they are no substitute for close parental supervision, especially with young children.

Listen to Larry's interview about Google SafeSearch with Google's Scott Rubin

Qtrax missed another deadline.

The would-be ad-supported music service once again failed to meet a self-imposed launch date. The company said barely two weeks ago that it would roll out in Australia and New Zealand on November 5.

For most start-up services, launch delays are embarrassing, but not unexpected. For Qtrax, this is only the latest installment in a year-long run of embarrassing misfires, lawsuits, unpaid bills and broken promises.

Within the halls of the top recording companies, Qtrax's setbacks have begun to take a heavy toll on the company's already battered reputation. To make matters worse, the ad-supported model has lost a lot of credibility in the music industry after the collapse of Ruckus and SpiralFrog. Several of the other top competitors in the sector, including Spotify, Imeem, and iLike have begun gravitating towards other revenue sources.

"Qtrax is an absolute disaster," said one music industry executive who asked to remain anonymous. "It's an embarrassment."

What's noteworthy about the most recent Qtrax setback is that typically Allan Klepfisz, the company's founder, will do damage control with the media. This time, however, a music-sector heavyweight is out in front.

"It's a difficult environment to get capital in this industry," Jay Berman, a Qtrax adviser and former chairman of the Recording Industry Association of America told The Financial Times this week. Referring to Qtrax's claim that the company hopes to raise $50 million and Qtrax said last week that it has a deal with Baidu, one of China's top search engines, Berman said: "Is it ambitious? Yes, it is. Is it doable? Yes."

Klepfisz declined to comment. Berman could not be reached for comment.

Berman was once the recording industry's top lobbyist and according to my music source he used his clout to help Qtrax secure licensing deals with the top labels. A year ago, New York-based Qtrax announced that Berman, who has offered consulting services to several digital music companies including Project Playlist, was added to the Qtrax advisory board.

"Every time something happens with Qtrax, Jay has to get on the phone and calm everybody (at the labels) down," said the music exec.

But the source said Qtrax, at this point anyway, is in no danger of losing its access to the labels' music. He said it has paid and the labels will most certainly accept Qtrax's money. "Why wouldn't they?" he asked. "But they haven't exactly created a lot of good will in the business or enthusiasm for their product.

"Qtrax hasn't instilled a sense of confidence that they can actually make something of what they have," the exec continued. "The only reason the (recording) companies have given content to them is because of Jay. If Jay didn't get on the phone, Qtrax wouldn't have its deals."

What the exec is referring to, specifically, are things like Qtrax's history of failing to pay vendors. Oracle filed suit against the company earlier this year and several companies have won judgments in New York courts against Qtrax. The latest came two weeks ago when Monarch Capital Fund won an award of $133,000 against the company.

According to court documents, Qtrax agreed in March to pay off a $200,000 debt in installments. Monarch told the court that after paying $70,000, Qtrax stopped making payments in May.

Clarification: Earlier reports by a number of other publications indicated that Qtrax's deal with Baidu wasn't completed. Qtrax does indeed have a signed agreement with the Chinese search engine, Qtrax said Wednesday afternoon.

Ticket scalping has been a hot topic in the music industry for years, causing a lot of uproar and complaints among music fans.

The sad fact of the matter is that lots of parties in the music industry try to sell secondhand tickets for a markup. Ticketmaster owns a premium resale service called TicketsNow. It also owns a resale exchange, TicketExchange, which lets any individual (including scalpers) buy or sell a ticket. Even artists and managers frequently take their allotments and sell them on broker sites for a markup, as The Wall Street Journal has reported.

Worst of all is the fan club scam, where fans pay for the right to get in line for presale tickets--but joining the club doesn't necessarily get you a ticket before the scalpers have snapped them all up, as Keith Urban fans in Nashville recently discovered.

I can't get too angry, though. I haven't bought a ticket from a scalper in years, and I've never gone through a ticket broker. I get good seats well after they go on sale and can usually get into sold-out shows. And they almost never cost me more than the original retail price.

It's not magic: it's Craigslist. I wait until a few days before the show, then run a search for the band I want to see. Inevitably, I find a few people who bought a ticket then had an irresolvable conflict. These are normal people--not scalpers, just fans like you and me--and they almost always settle for what they paid, or even less. If I'm not happy with the price, I move on--there always seem to be more sellers, especially the on day of the show.

You can't get tickets to this Friday's Pixies show through the official site for the venue, STG Presents, but there are plenty of tickets at fair prices on Craigslist.

This month alone, I've scored floor seats to Steely Dan well after they were gone from Ticketmaster's site, and a pit ticket to Friday's Pixies show, which is entirely sold out. I've had such good luck that I'm considering abandoning Ticketmaster and other ticket sellers completely. The seats are better, they're the same price or cheaper, and I'm usually helping a fellow fan out of a jam.

There are ticket brokers and other professionals gumming up the ads on Craigslist, but you can scope them out pretty quickly--they often list ticket prices as $1 (because they're actually selling lots of tickets at different prices) or have some other giveaway like an overly generic headline ("Great seats") or obviously inflated prices. Regular fans tend to list the exact seat number in the ad and a price that's pretty close to what they paid.

There will always be some demand for professional ticket brokers; people who want to impress an important business client with great seats don't want to wait until the last minute and risk striking out. And for some shows, fans would rather sacrifice a body part than sell their tickets--I'm thinking of the early shows on the 2007 reunion tour by The Police, for instance. But for many shows, Craigslist is a far better deal than the professional sites. Which makes me wonder how long they'll last.

Microsoft said on Tuesday that it is merging its video search efforts with its MSN Video site into a new page that will bear the Bing moniker.

Bing Video, Microsoft said, will serve as a site for watching everything from viral videos to full-length TV shows and video, drawing on content deals with sites such as Hulu, CBS, MySpace, DailyMotion, and YouTube.

The new Bing Video page replaces MSN Video and includes both video search as well as content from sites such as Hulu and CBS.

(Credit: Microsoft)

Microsoft notes that video is now a mainstay of the redesigned MSN home page and says MSN will continue to create original programming, such as its "Last Night on TV" effort.

The branding remains a challenge though, as evidenced by a video from Microsoft's Rob Bennett talking about the changes. The video, embedded below, features a "view more on MSN Video" link that, when clicked on, takes a user to the new Bing Video site.

The new Bing Video page is part of a series of changes Microsoft is making as part of a fall refresh of its search site. Earlier on Tuesday, Microsoft made some enhancements to Bing Maps, including the ability to use the mouse to alter a suggested route and have one's directions re-calculated.

The company said to expect more announcements later this week.

Disclaimer: CNET News is published by CBS Interactive, a unit of CBS.