Facebook was onboard with Google's new Friend Connect - until they looked a little closer at how the technology works. Then they suspended Google's access to Facebook. On the Facebook Developer's blog post " Thoughts on Privacy " it says: We've found that it [ Google Friend Connect] redistributes user information from Facebook to other developers without users' knowledge,

Facebook was onboard with Google's new Friend Connect - until they looked a little closer at how the technology works. Then they suspended Google's access to Facebook. On the Facebook Developer's blog post "Thoughts on Privacy" it says: "We've found that it [ Google Friend Connect] redistributes user information from Facebook to other developers without users' knowledge,

Sanford Wallace, aka "Spam King," or "Spamford" - a notorious spam king - is finally paying for all that spam. Wallace is president of Cyber Promotions and now he and his partner have the distinction of getting one of largest anti-spam judgments. The court has ruled that they owe MySpace about $230 million in damages. U.S. District Judge Audrey B. Collins in Los Angeles ruled in MySpace's favor Monday.

First MySpace announced data portability , then Facebook announced Connect , and now Google has Friend Connect. Each is making it easier to share profile information from one social networking site to other web sites )and hoping to be place you go to do that(. Google's Friend Connect was announced today. To add social networking features to any web site, you can get code from Google )although, unfortunately,

Facebook is borrowing $100 million to accommodate growth on the site. The money, from venture loan firm TriplePoint, brings the amount raised to around $350 million. The site has grown quickly and needs around 50,000 more servers to handle the load. Facebook has over 70 million active users and around 109 million monthly visitors. According to Business Week, Google and Microsoft need a lot of server space. Google has at least a million servers and adds 500,000 per year.

Yesterday MySpace announced that you can use your MySpace profile on other sites . Not to be outdone, today Facebook announced their version. It's called Facebook Connect and it's a good sign that data portability is catching on. Especially because Facebook usually doesn't follow suit when it comes to sharing data )unless it's for advertising(. Facebook Connect was announced on the company's developer blog.

Each time you sign up for a new site you create a profile which is unique to that site. You've got to upload a picture and fill everything out. It's a pain to keep up with it all, which is why I haven't yet added my picture to my Digg or LinkedIn profile. MySpace has launched the Data Availability initiative which can make MySpace your home base for profiles.

Another Google exec has decided to leave Google to join Facebook . This time it's Elliot Schrage, vp of global communications and public affairs. He'll become the vp of communications and public policy at Facebook. He was at Google for two years. The funny part is how quickly he got on Facebook and started sharing the news. Like the COO hire, this is a strategic hire for Facebook as they try to follow in Google's stock price footsteps.

I feel like I'm trying to sell something, but it's true. Google is running a promotion to encourage people to try Google TV Ads. Details below' Google TV Ads is out of beta after almost a year. As part of Google AdWords, you can run and track the results of television ads . At first glance the two concepts seem incongruent - online advertising and tv ads. However, people watch tv and then go online to search, edit Wikipedia articles, go to web sites, and yes,

In recent interview with CNBC's Maria Bartiromo, Google's CEO Eric Schmidt spoke out about his biggest concerns. Most pressing issue is the possible merger of Microsoft and Yahoo - which could happen as early as next week. Then there's the problem of how to make money off YouTube - which is costing the company millions a year in hosting costs. First, the tale of good )Google( and evil )Microsoft( and the fight over struggling Yahoo. In the interview,

If you read Marketing Pilgrim, or if you read online marketing blogs, you've probably heard of Twitter. It's the rage at tech conferences and in certain communities. Outside of these circles, almost no one has heard of it. But while it may not have reached critical mass, the growth is pretty impressive. I've noticed that people either haven't heard of Twitter , have a mad crush on it, or HATE it. I asked a room full of paid search managers if they tweet, and one did.

An Google vanity search launched a movie idea for a filmmaker named Jim Killeen. He searched Google on his name to see what came up. This was two years ago and Killeen's life was feeling empty. He was 38 and single. So after taking interest in the other Jim Killeen's of the world, he decided to contact them and make a movie about what he learned. He put everything on the line to make documentary about his journey which is now showing on YouTube and called,

Google AdWords advertisers who want to show ads on mobile phones had just one choice - text ads. Now they can also run banner ads - or as Google calls them "mobile image ads." They are like regular banner ads but smaller. All of the mobile image ads are keyword-targeted. You pay only when someone clicks on the ad )unlike many others that charge per impression or how many times your ad is viewed(. There are four sizes of banners to choose from: )305 x 64(, )215 x 34(,

Yodle, a company that focuses on local internet advertising, has been accepted as an authorized reseller of Google AdWords )tm(. The program is to help companies focus on paid search for small businesses. According to a Nielsen survey, 74% of people said they use search engines to find local business. Yet, only 3% of local marketing budgets are spent online. When it comes to paid search, it's somewhat easy to start, but difficult to manage. If you don't manage it well,

Happy Earth Day everyone. It's time to plant some trees so you can unload any liberal guilt you may be carrying around. Here are some things you can do to show you're green: Earth Day For Google Fans Donate to a nonprofit that focuses on environmental issues and Google Checkout will put you on a Google Map. You'll get your own marker and they'll show that you're connected to friends who also donate.

Blog software company Six Apart acquired creative agency Apperceptive, a company that built blogs for sites such as The Washington Post, The Huffington Post, BoingBoing, and iVillage. Now they're launching an advertising network for blogs . They are also venturing into design, programming, and blog marketing services . As an ad network, Six Apart is competing with Federated Media Publishing, Glam, Blogads, and others. Here's how it will work - they will get advertisers,

Blockbuster is being sued over their Facebook advertising campaign . Texas resident Cathryn Elaine Harris says Blockbuster violated the federal Videotape Privacy Protection Act. The company used the Facebook Beacon that told what movies she rents. Harris says Facebook didn't get her written consent to share the information. She filed a class-action suit, and is asking for at least $2,500 for each violation of the statute.

Here's for an original name - SocialMedia Networks - which is a new ad network for - yes, social media sites. People spend a lot of time on social networks and they tend to be younger and quite Internet savvy. However, they are a fickle group who don't like overt marketing messages. SocialMedia Networks says they're the first ad network to focus 100 percent on social media. They have over three billion ad impressions to more than 15 million unique visitors per month.

It started with Rocketboom founder Andrew Baron putting his Twitter account up for auction on eBay . He had 1,500 followers then and at last check he's at 1,757. The auction was bid up to over $1200 before he ended the auction ) about as many followers as our own Andy Beal has (. eBay called him to ask him to delete the auction, but later said it wasn't against their terms of service. Didn't matter anyway - he deleted the auction before it ended.

Two years ago Google acquired Urchin web analytics and made it free. They renamed it Google Analytics and it's now the most popular hosted analytics. Google Analytics is hosted by Google and you access your account online. Today at ad:tech in San Francisco, Google Analytics announced a free download of Urchin software. The software is a standalone version that you can host on your own server )and if you're paranoid about Google having access to your data,