A forecast of doom and economic gloom encompassing the tech world may be more reality than nightmare this year.

Our economy isn’t in such rough shape that food has become unobtainable.  Internet ad revenues may be in short supply, however, and a lot of people and companies could encounter problems as a result.

Last Wednesday, Microsoft acquired a 1.6% stake in social network site Facebook for $240 million, outbidding Google (which is stock-priced at $674 today). You probably heard of this, and it got more chatter started asking… is this a bubble? Here are some related quotes.

In some companies, the tech professionals work in dimly lit rooms for 50 hours a week.  But then, with any luck, they stride out into the parking lot and drive home their Porsches; new data indicates that tech wages are almost higher than they’ve ever been before.

It wasn’t long ago a couple of analysts pulled a few blogs to the air hose and blew up their valuations. Michael Arrington’s TechCrunch was among them with an MSRP of $100 million and CNet the prime candidate to buy. Then, this morning Arrington said something very curious.

Maybe it’s not best to ask online players if online properties are overvalued. But the general consensus, save for an occasional cautious voice, seems to be that the market is bullish, not bubbled. Rational, on the other hand, is an entirely different matter.

Put your coffee down, you’ll spit it. Facebook cheerleaders, from within what must be a social networking tunnel (or cave?), have transformed themselves into prostrate worshipers, transubstantiating reason to whatever the digital equivalent is of 72 virgins.

A $750 billion Google? A $15 billion Facebook? $100 million for TechCrunch? Valuations like these are inspiring one of three reactions: laughter; elation; and déjà vu all over again. Even as that word is at the back of everyone’s (well, at least the skeptic’s) mind, some analysts say fat times are ahead in e-commerce.

“Yahoo!Xtra Bubble” – sounds like a kind of gum, doesn’t it?  But it’s actually a new service that should soon become available to customers of Telecom New Zealand, and it’ll “offer a suite of premium services accessed through a personalised homepage – all at no extra cost.”

Ad revenue dropped for every major Internet player but Google in the second quarter of this year.

Whispers of the last dot-com crash have begun to surface again.

God, I love it when the blogosphere blows up. It keeps my job entertaining. This time, a well-known columnist set some bait, and let the traffic flow. PC Magazine can’t be paying for the insightful commentary, but cranky old men that know how to fire up the A-listers are definitely worth something.

Well it never just rains. It has to pour. I made an offer of some free SEO reviews a while back and a nasty confluence of happenings has upset my apple cart.

But I’m going to try and get some advice out to a few more people now. And this is going to be the toughest task I’ve had in a while. You see it never dawned on me that so many folk would be on hosted blogs. Let’s just say that optimising Blogspot is not a straight forward task.

Dave Winer says we’ll know Web 2.0′s bubble is popped when Google’s stock crashes.

Barry Diller, the head of IAC/InterActiveCorp, thinks the market for Internet companies is priced well above what they are truly worth.

Hmmm, Bill Gates is reported to have said “we’re back kind of in Internet-bubble era in terms of people thinking: OK, traffic. We want traffic. We want traffic. There are still some areas where it is unclear what’s going to come out of that.”

The traditional venture capital invests disruptive technologies that provide a 10 fold improvement and generate 10x return.

Despite denying that online video phenom YouTube could be priced or bought for a bubbly $1 billion, founder Chad Hurley is warm to the idea of an initial public offering.

Sources say that unnamed people at the two tech companies have reportedly been discussing a potential merger. Allegedly.

Replete with Tivo and other time-shifting technologies, consumers want control of what matters most-their time. Perhaps Hollywood is waking up to their needs?

Here’s a neat idea – post the chapters of your book to your blog (sound familiar?) and record each chapter as a podcast.

Here’s yet another shining example of how the blogosphere helps drive the news agenda.

“This is the second time the bubble bursts.” The austere warning from AIT CEO Clarence Briggs seemed like an alarmist’s rendition of reality. But then he said, “It’s easier to join it than it is to stand up and fight it.” And he was right.