Markus Renschler sent this in: “We bought a new external hard disk (WD MyBook). What I was completely fascinated by is the fact it’s not only compatible with Vista, XP, MacOS and USB2.0, but, according to the package, with Google as well.”

This holiday season, an unexpected gadget is high on the wish list, if a spate of searches in the United Kingdom is any indication. Searches for digital photo frames outpaced searches for digital cameras there last week.

According to a new study, eBusinesses that want to contact people through direct mail advertising might be best off trying to reach men between the ages of 55 and 64.  Compared to 2003, though, their odds of reaching just about everybody are significantly better.

Microsoft’s Mac Business Unit has announced that Microsoft Office 2008 for Mac OS will allow iPhone and iPod users to sync with PowerPoint.

You will be able to run PowerPoint slideshows on your iPhone, iPod Touch, iPod Classic and fatty iPod Nano (any iPod with picture support) if you have a Mac with PowerPoint 2008 and iPhoto (2006 or better).

The interns are taking over the Googleplex! Seriously, if you want to know why Google is so intent on reaching geniuses at an early age, you need look no further than today’s upgrades to Google Reader.

Growth in television viewing will increase more than time spent watching online video through 2012 and attracting a large audience for Internet video could take even longer according Bain & Co.

Google will bid in the upcoming 700MHz wireless spectrum auction, the company announced this morning. Run by the Federal Communications Commission, the auction is scheduled to begin on January 24, and could run until March.

Google Gadgets aren’t as exciting as they sound – there are, in other words, no brightly colored grappling hooks or belt-mounted free food dispensers.  Yet Google Gadgets can be handy, and they’ve now been tailored to work on Macs.

It might have been more reassuring if this had happened sooner, or if more than one person were behind the investment.  But as it stands now, Facebook certainly isn’t complaining – Li Ka-shing, a Hong Kong businessman, has endowed the social network with a fresh $60 million.

Internet users who read online reviews are willing to spend around 20 percent more for services receiving an "Excellent," or 5-star, rating than for the same service receiving a "Good," or 4-star, rating, according to a new study from comScore.

E-marketer delivered a Forester study today that showed that 92% of young mobile users in certain European countries report sending SMS text messages on their phone.

SEMPO, the Search Engine Marketing Professional Organization, wants people involved with SEM to take its 4th annual State of the Market survey.

New features from Google Reader include a process that recommends blogs potentially of interest to the user, based on subscribed feeds and one’s Web History.

The ringing outcry against Facebook Beacon, which posted people’s online purchases to their friends’ News Feeds, led to Facebook altering the program.

Action against eight people for various botnet-related criminal offenses capped off another round of investigations by federal law enforcement into over $20 million in losses and over a million compromised PCs.

Although Hearst Corp and MediaNews Group are linchpins in Yahoo’s newspaper/online classified alliance, the two publishers have made an investment in online classified ad provider Kaango.

Today’s a fun one for retail research.

First, I received an update from Compete’s blog deconstructing the myth of Cyber Monday:

Hearst-Argyle Television first became pals with Google in June, when it put dedicated channels on YouTube.  Now it’s expanding the relationship, as Hearst-Argyle becomes the first TV industry entity to (re)sell Google AdWords.

Sources say Facebook is near to announcing changes to its Beacon marketing platform after pressure from privacy advocates over the last week.

A new report form Nielsen Online examines the reasons shoppers turn to the Internet during the holiday season.

Google and Thailand haven’t always had the best relationship – a certain now-you’re-banned-and-now-you’re-not episode with YouTube was, at best, odd.  But the search giant’s setting those problems aside in pursuit of growth, and is offering AdSense for search in Thai.

Because Google has neglected to make certain links from its site nofollow, webmasters are wondering how, exactly, they differ from paid links.