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Over the years, we've worked hard to cover products and services as they've launched and well into their successes and failures. And like any business venture, there's risk involved.

The Web is no different, leaving many sites to close up shop--sometimes just a few months after what their creators had hoped would be a successful launch. In other cases, it's a slow death march, stretched out with the occasional change in strategy, or a last-ditch re-branding effort.

2010 brought the closure of quite a few sites. Some names on this list you'll recognize right away. … Read more

It's our last episode of 2010 today on preGame and we end a great year of gaming by wrapping up some of the debut trailers from this weekend's Video Game Awards show. Tune in for some high-quality cinematics from Uncharted 3, Batman: Arkham City, Mass Effect 3, and SSX Deadly Descents.

Next we'll talk a bit about a new iPhone and Android app from the ESRB that allows customers to take a photo of a game box with their smartphones and retrieve valuable ratings information within a matter of seconds. It makes a great holiday-buying companion and … Read more

The Golden Globe nominations were released this morning, and though "The King's Speech" received the most nominations, "The Social Network" was also honored for Best Picture--Drama, Best Actor (Jesse Eisenberg), Best Supporting Actor (Andrew Garfield), Best Director (David Fincher), Best Screenplay (Aaron Sorkin), and Best Original Score (Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross). We saw the movie when it first came out, but CNET's social-media reporter Caroline McCarthy knows much more about the film, so we're psyched to have her on the show today!

Caroline and Jeff are both addicted to TV shows like "Boardwalk Empire," "30 Rock," and "Mad Men," which share Best TV nominations for a drama, musical, or comedy, but the three of us are confused about the appearance of "The Walking Dead," a show that the Internet seems to collectively hate for its departure from the original graphic-novel storyline.

Along with the rest of the discoveries in Zeitgeist 2010, Google has also shared the "fastest-falling" list of searches in 2010. In other words, these are the search terms that enjoyed popularity in 2009 but failed to keep up the momentum this year.

The list includes swine flu, Circuit City, Myspace Layouts, and Michael Jackson, despite the release of a new album in December.

Check out this graphic of the world according to Facebook. Facebook intern Paul Butler wondered how to show an accurate representation of Facebook's popularity across the globe, and his idea to visualize Facebook "Internet" friendships on a map actually shows the extent of real human relationships.

Interestingly enough, the picture reveals that even Argentina, Southeast Asia, and South Africa have a strong Facebook presence, while a significant portion of China and Russia are missing due to Web censorship.

Girls geeks are uniting in support of a young Star Wars fan who was bullied by classmates after choosing a Star Wars water bottle and matching backpack for school. Her mom wrote a heartfelt blog asking female Star Wars fans to send messages and comments to show Katie that plenty of women appreciate Star Wars, and within days the post received more than 1,000 messages of support.

With all the attention on bullying these days, both online and in person, it's important to remind young people that it's great to be different...and that nerds make more money.

Like any other business venture, gadgets fail--some quietly and others spectacularly.

For Microsoft's Kin though, its return this week marks a rarity in the tech world: a product that, despite a strong push from its maker, simply didn't get off the ground, but is then brought back from the dead. No, it's not being touted as the hottest, newest phone by carrier Verizon, which a Microsoft exec once told The New York Times played a part in the device's sales woes the first time around. Rather, it's being offered up for sale alongside phones that … Read more

Boy Genius Report has uncovered documents containing Apple's policies regarding dead pixels, including replacement requirements for iPhones, iPads, and various-size Macs.

The document suggests that Apple employees have leeway when dealing with customers that have dead pixels on their screen, but should abide by the grid (see below) when determining if a unit should be replaced.

iPhones, for example, should have no dead pixels, whereas an iPad can have as many as two before it would be replaced. Screens on bigger Macs could have as many as 16 dead pixels before an Apple employee might replace it.

Of course, … Read more

Sometimes it feels like sharing a flash drive around an office is dangerous enough. The question is, do you feel lucky enough to trust one stuck in a public wall?

Aram Bartholl has begun installing USB "dead drops" throughout New York City as a living experiment in public data networks. Bartholl's an exhibiting German artist in residence at Eyebeam in New York City with numerous installation art projects under his belt. Currently, these dead drops are in five locations, with more to come.

"Dead drop" refers to a spy term for physical locations where information … Read more

If anybody could be forgiven for missing the deadline to opt out of the Google Books settlement, it's probably the authors of the Dead Sea Scrolls.

The Israel Antiquities Authority has tapped Google to digitize the famous texts, one of the earliest documents ever discovered chronicling the early years of Christianity. CNN reports that Google will be responsible for scanning the 900 manuscripts, which are actually comprised of more than 30,000 fragments discovered in caves around Israel in the 1940s and 1950s.

Israeli researchers had come to worry about the ability of the scrolls to endure further photography, … Read more

Jeff and I are a little intimidated by today's guest, Blair Butler, because she not only loves video games and comic books, but also knows a ton about martial arts moves like the rear naked choke, which makes her one of the coolest guests we've had on the show! Blair joins us after a busy weekend at New York Comic Con 2010 to chat about all the news from the show, as well as her Fresh Ink segment on G4's "Attack of the Show."

The Javitz Convention Center here in New York once again opened its doors to the New York Comic Convention, and Blair tells us the East Coast chapter has been quickly catching up to San Diego over the past five years.

Among the many announcements from the show, we're especially excited about AMC's television adaptation of Robert Kirkman's monthly black and white comic series "The Walking Dead." The story is about a small-town police officer (played by Andrew Lincoln) from Kentucky struggling to survive in a world taken over by flesh-craving zombies. Blair is super psyched to watch the series when it debuts on Sunday, October 31, but in the meantime you should definitely check out her review of the comic in this list of the best graphic novels for comic novices on G4TV.

Remember Konami's classic X-Men beat-'em-up arcade game from the early '90s? Marvel revealed plans for an update on Xbox Live Arcade and the PlayStation Network that will feature six-player "drop-in" online multiplay, custom matchups, and various difficulty settings. Fans of the original game will enjoy the classic look of the game, and players can use all the original characters including Wolverine, Cyclops, Storm, Colossus, Nightcrawler, and Dazzler. Konami plans to release the update later this year.

Tune in for lots more video game and comic news with Blair, including the best and worst costumes, a Pedobear dancing to Michael Jackson, Stan Lee's hockey/superhero mashup "The Guardian Project," and much more from the front lines. Thanks to Blair for an awesome show, and thanks to you for listening!

When Google Street View launched in Brazil last week, it seemed as if it revealed so much about life in one of the world's most vibrant and fastest-growing countries.

Images of four dead bodies, in Rio and Belo Horizonte, were, for some, stunning and, for others, sadly normal.

A Tumblr feed called Street Viu was set up so Brazilians could offer their most interesting images from the new service. In just a few days this feed has offered quite a fascinating look at what the Google cameras captured.

Tumblr contributors have sent in shots of more bodies, lying in … Read more