Webware

Telefonica Europe on Wednesday announced that it has acquired voice over Internet Protocol and telephony service Jajah for $207 million in cash.

Reports of the sale and its price had begun to circulate several days ahead of the official announcement. There were also rumors of an ongoing bidding war between Cisco Systems and Microsoft, which were competing with Telefonica for the sale.

Telefonica is a business division of a company most consumers know as O2. It counts some 48.6 million customers as part of its communications business. Jajah, which has several services for consumers, also has business offerings for small business and enterprise users. Jajah says these services will continue to operate as they did before, remaining unaffected by the acquisition.

Despite a bleak economic outlook, 2009 saw the release of some incredible new Web services. But every year--recession or no recession--there are always a few sites that close their doors.

We've highlighted 15 sites that ceased operations over the course of the year. A number of them came from big companies like Google and Yahoo--the latter of which did some major restructuring in 2008 that left it with new leadership and a leaner, meaner mentality towards cutting things that just weren't working. Others were simply ideas that needed a little more time and money, but couldn't get it in time.

Click on the slideshow link below to get started.

15 sites that went kaput in 2009 (images)

Lately Google seems to have put forth most of the little niceties that turn forgetful, or otherwise inept, people into functional members of society. Late Wednesday Facebook rolled out one of its own features that falls within that category. Now those who are lucky enough to be in a relationship can plug in when their love affair began. Facebook will then send both of those users a reminder (in the form of an event) when it's coming up.

Facebook users in a relationship can now add in their anniversary dates in order to get Facebook to send yearly reminders.

(Credit: CNET)

Right now the feature has the same privacy level as a relationship, so if your friends can see it, they can also see the date. Although they will not be alerted to it the same way they are for something like a birthday--something Facebook says could eventually change.

Maybe this is the first step in Facebook creating something similar to its now-removed friends timeline feature, but for relationships, so that users will be able to get a chronological view of every relationship other users have had. Though in truth, this is likely just another way to make it easier to sell advertising for things like chocolates, flowers, jewelry and "sorry I missed our anniversary" cards.

Gmail's new merge tool can get rid of all your dupes at once.

(Credit: CNET)

Gmail on Tuesday introduced a new feature that lets users remove every single duplicate contact entry at once. Previously, users had to go through their address book one at a time--a process that could be both tedious and time-consuming.

The new system runs a simple scan on your contacts, and provides a one-button solution that will merge the information for each contact. This is a non-destructive method, and the same that's carried out each time you run the normal duplicate checker. Contacts with multiple e-mail addresses just show up as the same contact in Gmail's auto-complete suggestions.

Google is promoting the new tool as a way to take contact lists that have been imported from elsewhere, including mobile phones or other e-mail services, and shrink them down into something more manageable. The company also says it was one of the top-requested features by its users.

The bulk de-duper comes some 10 months since the release of the original de-duper, a feature we were the first to report on in our six upcoming Gmail features story from January. Still missing from that list is HD video chat. However, those that made it include larger attachment sizes (which were quietly bumped up to 25MB in June), and a custom theme creator.

Twitter-centric photo sharing service Yfrog released its top 10 searches of 2009 on Monday, and the results are not all that shocking; It appears most of its users are hunting for tween-heartthrob vampires, and/or famous singers. Below is the full list. I've linked each query with a search on Yfrog:

1. New Moon / Twilight
2. Jonas Brothers
3. Tiger Woods
4. Michael Jackson
5. Halloween / costume
6. iPhone
7. Adam Lambert
8. Kanye West / RIP Kanye West
9. Iran election
10. Miley Cyrus

To put this in perspective, Yfrog's list shares only the terms "new moon" and "Michael Jackson" with Google image's top 10 results of 2009, at least according to the recently-released zeitgeist. Also worth noting, is that Imageshack launched Yfrog in late February of 2009, meaning this list is more like the top 10 search results during the last 10 months.

Honestly, I'm just happy that image searches for the Iran elections beat out those for Miley Cyrus.

Previously: Yfrog gets Webcam recording for photos and video

Google ventured into new territory on Monday with the launch of a new URL-shortening service it's calling Goo.gl.

Unlike some existing and high-profile shorteners such as TinyURL and Bit.ly, Goo.gl is not a general-purpose link shrinker that users can access by going to a standalone site. Instead, it's been built into Google products, beginning with Google's browser toolbar and its Feedburner RSS service. Both of those services can now create shortened Goo.gl URLs that link to the source content while using fewer characters. This is especially important for sharing on places like Twitter, where there are size limits.

The feature goes hand in hand with the launch of a share button for the Google toolbar that lets users share whatever page they're on with a number of social services. As for its integration with FeedBurner, Google now provides feed owners with a way to automatically publish certain posts directly to Twitter, which will again help keep the number of characters to a minimum.

Google says the shortening service is both fast and stable. The company has also placed the same security measures that go into its search index to block pages that may contain malware or phishing schemes.

In an introductory post on its official blog, Google said that it may eventually roll out the service as a standalone site, but that for now it's being built into Google products. Such a feature would likely allow third party sites to build Goo.gl link shortening into their own products. In the meantime, other Google properties that could certainly benefit from having link shortening built-in include YouTube, Maps, Reader, and Blogger--many of which have integrated sharing features.

Update 2 p.m. PST: As we should have mentioned before, .gl is the top-level domain for Greenland. Also, Google's launch comes on the heels of Facebook having quietly launched its own URL-shortening service called FB.me. Heading there in your browser simply takes you to Facebook's home page, whereas sharing links through Facebook's mobile site will shorten them for you using a shortened FB.me URL. More on that as soon as Facebook publicly acknowledges its existence.

Visitors of Goo.gl get this page, which tells them what the service does, although will not let just anyone create shortened URLs. Instead, Google is allowing use of its service through its own products.

(Credit: CNET)

TwitVid, a free video host for Twitter, is launching two new, useful features on Monday. The first is a real-time search engine that will let users sort through videos both on TwitVid and YouTube. The other is an analytics engine that lets video owners know more about who is watching their uploaded clips, and where they're from.

Between the two, TwitVid and Twitter users are likely to get more utility out of the new search engine. Similar to what OneRiot has done with its own real-time search engine, TwitVid's approach takes into account how fresh the video is, along with whether it's been popular on social sites. Recently popular videos then get better real estate on the results pages. It's a big step up for TwitVid users, who up until Monday had no way to search through videos other users had uploaded on the site.

As for the new analytics tools, TwitVid breaks down some very basic information, including when people were watching your video. This is charted out down to the hour, day, week, month, and the total lifetime of that video. The service also shows where your viewers are coming from--or at least the top 10 locations. Included as part of that list are links to the top referrers, which can show you if your video got picked up somewhere.

TwitVid made its debut in March and competes with TwitVid.io (not .com), TwitLens, Twiddeo, Twitc, Posterous, and Tweetube--just to name a few.

Previously: TwitVid app lets you send iPhone videos to Twitter

The new analytics features let video owners see where their videos are being played as well as information on the people watching them.

(Credit: TwitVid / CNET)

Image identification company PicScout is expanding its efforts to help people identify the rights holders of images they find online.

On Tuesday the company is set to add microstock site Dreamstime's more than 7 million images to its Image Exchange catalog. What this means is that users who have the company's Image Exchange Firefox add-on installed will be able to identify when one of those images (or the other 40 million or so that are in the catalog) winds up on Web sites and in places like Google's image search.

PicScout cross-references images on the Web with its Image Exchange library to find matches of photos and stock imagery that is in its catalog.

(Credit: CNET)

The add-on, which was introduced in October and remains in private beta, displays a little blue "i" on top of images that are within PicScout's image catalog, and that can be linked back to the rights holder or stock image site. This includes images from Flickr, as long as they've been marked by their uploader with a Creative Commons, attribution-only and noncommercial license.

Either way the end user will see whose image it is without having to do the legwork. PicScout goes one step further to link people directly to where they can then buy it, or get in contact with the image owner to secure the rights to reuse it.

The company says it plans to expand to Internet Explorer next, but chose Firefox first since it offered cross-compatibility with both PC and Mac users. The two platforms will offer identical functionality since they'll be working off the same master index.

Along with the addition of Dreamstime, PicScout is also announcing that it has picked up Joichi Ito as one of its advisers. Among some of his other gigs, Ito sits on the board of the Mozilla Foundation, is the founder and CEO of venture capital firm Neoteny, and is also the CEO of Creative Commons.

Previously: PicApp offers ad-sponsored stock photos (Note: this company has since been spun out by PicScout.)

Gmail has long had keyboard shortcuts, though learning them can be difficult. Enter the Gboard, a specialized mini-keyboard for Google's e-mail service. It debuts this Friday at an asking price of $19.99.

The Gboard consists of 19 colored keys set in a standard size numpad-only keyboard. Clicking on any one of these performs that particular keyboard shortcut. Included are Gmail-specific features such as starring messages, starting a search, and jumping between message threads. Outside of Gmail they simply act as normal keyboard buttons, and will type in whatever letter or number corresponds with that shortcut.

The device is powered by USB and requires no special software or drivers, however users need to first enable keyboard shortcuts within Gmail's settings before using it. Also worth noting is that it was created not by Google, but by Charlie Mason, a film producer from Venice, Calif. This is his first foray into the computer hardware business.

The Gboard consists of 19 keys, all of which act as shortcuts within Google's Gmail Web mail service.

(Credit: James Martin / CNET)

This really is a product that users will either love or hate. Those who have mastered Gmail's shortcuts will see little need to buy special hardware and find a spare USB port to plug it into. Meanwhile, newbie users may be unwilling to take the plunge on such a specific peripheral for a program that works only within another program (the browser). The Gboard runs the risk of being an unappealing prospect to both parties.

It's also not the first attempt at easing the process of learning and remembering shortcuts. This time last year Google offered users a free pack of color-coded shortcut stickers that could be tacked onto any keyboard. There have also long been specialized keyboards for video and audio editing as well as graphical design--all of which provide similar, color-coded keys. Users who don't want to commit, or tack stickers on their keyboard, also have the option of buying a silicone keyboard mat, though no such thing has been created for Gmail.

Considering there are a total of 69 Gmail shortcuts (with more on the way if Google graduates some of its experimental features from its labs section) the Gboard could just be the first step toward creating a full-size (100 plus key) version. In the meantime, its early December release and low price tag make for a good stocking stuffer if you've got a Gmail lover in your family.

The good:
• No setup required
• Color coding is logical and makes it easy to learn the keys
• Good build quality and feel; keys are flat like on a laptop
• At $19.99 it's not that expensive. Most numeric-only keyboards cost about the same.

The bad:
• Does not come close to including all of Gmail's shortcuts
• Could be rendered less useful if Gmail's shortcuts change
• Only comes in one color (black)