Google Inc.’s methods for recommending websites are being reviewed by Texas’ attorney general in an investigation spurred by complaints that the company has abused its power as the Internet’s dominant search engine.

The antitrust inquiry disclosed by Google late Friday is just the latest sign of the intensifying scrutiny facing the company as it enters its adolescence. Since its inception in a Silicon Valley garage 12 years ago, Google has gone from a quirky startup to one of the world’s most influential businesses with annual revenue approaching $30 billion.

A spokesman for Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott confirmed the investigation, but declined further comment.

The review appears to be focused on whether Google is manipulating its search results to stifle competition.

The pecking order of those results can make or break websites because Google’s search engine processes about two-thirds of the search requests in the U.S. and handles even more volume in some parts of the world.

That dominance means a website ranking high on the first page of Google’s results will likely attract more traffic and generate more revenue, either from ads or merchandise sales.

On the flip side, being buried in the back pages of the results, or even at the bottom of the first page, can be financially devastating and, in extreme cases, has been blamed for ruining some Internet companies.

European regulators already have been investigating complaints alleging that Google has been favoring its own services in its results instead of rival websites.

Several lawsuits filed in the U.S. also have alleged Google’s search formula is biased. Google believes Abbott is the first state attorney general to open an antitrust review into the issue.

“We look forward to answering (Abbott’s) questions because we’re confident that Google operates in the best interests of our users,” Don Harrison, Google’s deputy general counsel, wrote in a Friday blog post.

Harrison said that Abbott has asked Google for information about several companies, including: Foundem, an online shopping comparison site in Britain; SourceTool, which runs an e-commerce site catering to businesses; and MyTriggers, another shopping comparison site.

All of those companies offer features that Google includes in its search engine or in other parts of its website. Foundem, SourceTool and MyTriggers have previously filed lawsuits or regulatory complaints against Google.

“Given that not every website can be at the top of the results, or even appear on the first page of our results, it’s unsurprising that some less relevant, lower quality websites will be unhappy with their ranking,” Harrison wrote.

Google says its closely guarded search formula strives to recommend websites that are most likely to satisfy the needs of each user’s request. If it didn’t keep its users happy, Google argues that people would become disgruntled and switch to other search engines offered by Yahoo Inc., Microsoft Corp. and IAC/InterActiveCorp’s Ask.com.

Regulators and lawmakers in the U.S. and Europe also have been looking into Google’s privacy practices and its acquisitions as the company tries to fortify its power.
From:Associated Press

Microsoft’s Silverlight media player has, with version 4 due next month, gone from being closed source but able to work on other platforms – the Mac – to being increasingly tied to Windows.

An up-coming feature called COM Automation has been introduced that potential lets content in Silverlight and Silverlight applications work with documents in Microsoft’s Office stored on a PC. Also, COM Automation could access other system capabilities like a USB security card reader.

COM is a Microsoft architecture, not found on the Mac, so this means Silverlight is beginning to be built by Microsoft to give Windows a leg up over the competition.

Brian Goldfarb, lead product manager for web platform tools, defended the decision last year.

“[Mac and Windows Silverlight] are on a par in every other respect. It’s important to give developers choice. We also want to have the option to light up the platform,” he told Reg reviewer Tim Anderson.

Now, though, it seems things are changing and Microsoft might actually want Silverlight to run equally well on the Mac, either through its own engineering efforts or by working with others.

Goldfarb, fresh from Microsoft’s recent Mix 2010 conference where the HTML 5 news was announced, told The Reg that Microsoft is “looking at other ways to extend Silverlight to other platforms”. Microsoft is looking at features that are specific to those particular platforms and that could mean support in Silverlight for AppleScript or shell extensions.

“We are waiting for customers to give us some use cases,” Goldfarb said.

For the Linux and Unix crowd, we already have Moonlight – the Novell-sponsored project led by Miguel de Icaza. Moonlight spun up when Microsoft made it clear it didn’t have the “resources” to target platforms other than Windows. Moonlight is now on version 2.0 but does not implement all features of the main Silverlight. Also, it’s only just catching up to the current Silverlight 3.0, as Microsoft prepares to drop version 4.0.

Microsoft has supported Moonlight because it potentially seeds the market and creates interest in Silverlight. If Goldfarb is right, then it looks like Microsoft believes Silverlight on Mac can also play a part in this. While that will suit Microsoft’s goals it should also mean that Silverlight on Mac avoids the kind of second-class status Office for Mac has endured. ®
From:http://www.theregister.co.uk

1. Facebook
2. Amazon
3. Apple
4. Google
5. Huawei
6. First Solar
7. PG&E
8. Novartis
9. Walmart
10. HP
11. Hulu
12. Netflix
13. Nike
14. Intel
15. Spotify
16. BYD
17. Cisco Systems
18. IBM
19. GE
20. Disney
21. Gilt Groupe
22. Indian Premier League
23. PatientsLikeMe
24. Grey New York
25. BMW DesignworksUSA
26. Synthetic Genomics
27. FiLife
28. Frito-Lay
29. Alibaba
30. MITRE
31. HTC
32. Diller Scofidio + Renfro
33. Firstborn
34. Sportvision
35. Ideo
36. Samsung
37. Glam Media
38. Ngmoco
39. VNL
40. Aldi Süd
41. Fast Retailing
42.Huayi Brothers
43. Athenahealth
44. MVRDV
45. Alstom
46. Quantcast
47. Good Guide
48. Microsoft
49. Politico
50. Twitter

Stanford was founded in 1885 by former California governor and senator Leland Stanford and his wife, Jane Lathrop Stanford, as a memorial to their son Leland Stanford Jr., who died of typhoid in Europe a few weeks before his 16th birthday. The Stanfords used their farm lands to establish the university hoping to create a large institution in California.

Stanford enrolls about 6,700 undergraduate and about 8,000 graduate students from the United States and around the world every year. The university is divided into a number of schools such as the Stanford Business School, Stanford Law School, Stanford School of Medicine, Stanford School of Engineering, etc.

The university is in Silicon Valley, and its alumni have founded companies like Nike, Hewlett-Packard, Sun Microsystems, Nvidia, Yahoo!, Cisco Systems, Silicon Graphics and Google.

Stanford University
Motto: Die Luft der Freiheit weht
(German)
Motto in English: The wind of freedom blows
Established: 1885
Type: Private
Endowment: $17.2 billion
President: John L. Hennessy
Provost: John Etchemendy
Faculty: 1,807
Students: 14,945
Undergraduates: 6,759
Postgraduates: 8,186
Location: Stanford, CA, U.S.
Campus: Suburban, 8,180 acres (33.1 km2)[6]
Athletic nickname: Stanford Cardinal
Colors: Cardinal red and white
Mascot: The color Cardinal red (official), Stanford Tree (unofficial)
Athletics: NCAA Division I (FBS) Pac-10
Website: www.stanford.edu

The design overall is very similar to Google, even down to the preferences page. Like iGoogle, this one offers the option to link up with your e-mail, assuming it is provided by Microsoft. Though it doesn’t boast themes and gadgets like the former service, we would anticipate this to come once the beta is complete.

Impressions so far are good, and neat features like related searches (i.e. walkthroughs pop up if you search for a game), pop-up text (mouse over a search result and the page text appears, something Firefox plugins offer with Google), and a cashback program for shopping results are all welcome.

In terms of actual search quality, it’s more or less the same as Google. In any case, there’s plenty of depth to explore which may make it the superior choice for some in the end, especially as more functionality and improvements are brought to the table.