Heroic Play launched with 15 games with characters from The Avengers and the larger Marvel universe. The company timed the launch to coincide with the DVD release of the hit film. That hit stores on Tuesday.

“We worked closely with Marvel to create a one-stop gaming destination for fans looking for fast and free access to their much-loved Marvel superheroes,” said Mike Primiani, Senior Vice President and General Manager, Mindspark Consumer Products. “With the website and toolbar platform, users are able to connect to the Marvel gaming experience however they choose.”

“Mindspark has been a terrific partner in helping us bring the gaming experience of The Avengers and many other Marvel characters to a wider audience,” said Andreea Enache-Thune, Senior Vice President, Marvel Games and Digital Distribution. “They have created an outlet for fans of all ages to interact with and connect to some of our most unforgettable games.”

The site also includes a feed of Twitter messages, aggregated using Marvel-related keywords. There’s also a Heroic Play Toolbar, which includes links to games and a gameplay widget that lets you play from the toolbar itself.

IAC has completed the acquisition of the ad-supported dating site for an undisclosed sum. DateHookup generated over $500 million in revenue in 2011.

“DateHookup has built a sizable and active community of online singles in the U.S., reaching demographics and markets that complement IAC’s existing online dating companies. We can leverage our expertise and initiatives from our other sites to drive incremental contribution, improving an already attractive acquisition multiple,” said Lance Barton, Vice President of M&A for IAC. “This aligns with our strategy of acquiring companies where we can add real value and create long-term growth.”

Other IAC dating properties include: Match.com, OKCupid, Chemistry, BlackPeopleMeet.com, SeniorPeopleMeet.com,SinglePeopleMeet.com, LoveAndSeek.com, BBPeopleMeet.com, and Singlesnet.com.

“The About.com acquisition is completely in line with IAC’s M&A strategy of acquiring, at disciplined valuations, companies that are complementary and synergistic with both our existing businesses and our areas of expertise,” said IAC CEO Greg Blatt. “We are extremely excited to bring these two businesses together; About.com’s content will differentiate and greatly increase the authority of Ask.com’s offerings, while Ask’s expertise in search technology and user experience will improve the discoverability of existing content on About.com.”

“The complementary nature of these two businesses will provide significant synergies going forward, and thus we expect that About.com will generate more profit as a part of Ask.com and IAC than it has been able to over the last few years,” added Blatt.

This could also be another way for Ask to get more content in front of Google users, as About.com content is often returned on the first page of results.

The About Group will join IAC’s Search And Applications reporting segment, where it will reside with Ask.com, Dictionary.com, Mindspark, Pronto and nRelate, which it acquired last month.

“This is a rare merger with true bilateral synergies,” said Joey Levin, CEO of IAC Search & Applications. “On the one hand, the Ask.com search and content business has generated exceptional revenue and profit growth by marketing and distributing a quality consumer search and Q&A experience, and About provides Ask with a tremendous amount of quality content to further enhance that experience and the credibility of the Ask brand.”

“On the other hand, About.com has created, and today continues to grow, a library of content which consumers love across a vast array of categories, and we can now market and distribute that content and the About brand through Ask and significantly increase traffic and profitability at About,” added Levin.

About CEO Darline Jean will report to Ask.com CEO Doug Leeds.

The original deal wasn’t set to expire until the end of 2012, so the timing of this development comes as a bit of a surprise.  Most people and organizations cut things a little closer, and a lot could change between now and then in terms of search technology or even the value of a dollar (economists seem to mention the word “inflation” a lot these days).

Today’s announcement signals that Google’s been an excellent partner for IAC, anyway, which is good news for both sides.

The announcement could even push other companies to give the idea of a search and advertising deal with Google a second look.

Greg Blatt, the CEO of IAC, stated, “Our Search business has grown meaningfully over the past five years, from $58 million in Operating Income Before Amortization in 2006 to $125 million last year, and generated pre-tax free cash flow in excess of $500 million over that period.  The industry continues to grow at attractive rates and we have every opportunity for continued growth and success.”

Unfortunately for investors, not all the news is so cheery, as both companies’ stocks are sinking today. Google’s stock is down 0.35 percent and IAC’s stock is down 1.29 percent at the moment, although there are sure to be many other factors at work.

CitySearch, a business of IAC, has launched Deals by Citysearch, a location-enabled local deals app that aggregates deals from advertisers from its CityGrid Media, as well as from third-parties like Groupon, TheDealMap, etc. 

"Consumers are tired of having their inbox flooded with daily deals. What our users need is not another daily email but a mobile offering serving up the most relevant offers so they can say, ‘These deals are about me,’" said JP Bedoya, Senior Director of Citysearch. "We have curated the best local deals and allow users to search based on their individual needs when they are on the go."

CitySearch also added a new Deals section to its website. 

For the Android app, CitySearch worked with Skyhook to integrate its location engine into the Deals product. 

CitySearch complemented the launch with a contest, allowing one person to win a month of free deals.

Diller, an industry legend, isn’t leaving the company, in any event; he’ll now act as "Chairman and Senior Executive."  Also, Diller intends to purchase enough stock over the next nine months to increase his voting share to more than 40 percent, so it’s not like he’ll be an important figure in name only.

Diller just explained in a statement, "It’s been clear to me for some time that this Company needs a full time aggressive and aspirational executive in the CEO role.  While I’m not going anywhere, IAC, with its operating businesses growing, large cash resources and virtually no debt, needs the kind of leadership that Greg Blatt can bring it in order to continue to grow and thrive many years into the future."

So back to Blatt.  Blatt became CEO of Match.com in early 2009, and the site experienced record growth under his supervision.  Before that, he served as executive vice president, general counsel, and a member of the Office of the Chairman at IAC, and put in some time at Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia, too.

Blatt said with regards to his promotion, "I couldn’t be more excited about the new position and the opportunities in front of IAC."

Much as Disney, NBC, and Warner Bros. (along with 11 other organizations) did several weeks ago, the four companies showed their support by filing an amicus curiae ("friend of the court") brief, so this isn’t just a matter of everyone trying to grab headlines in the hope a judge will be swayed by one.

Also, in the brief, eBay, Facebook, IAC, and Yahoo argued that much more than the fate of a single video-sharing site is at stake, stating, "Plaintiffs’ legal arguments, if accepted, would retard the development of the Internet and electronic commerce."

Of course, as we noted last time, judges aren’t supposed to put legal decisions to a vote, and a lot of lawyers have probably already made these points in court.

Still, the YouTube-Viacom lawsuit – which was a huge deal even before this month’s developments – is starting to turn into a legal showdown of epic proportions as more and more parties become involved.

Hat tip goes to Don Jeffrey and David Glovin.

The IAC owned property has introduced "Ask Deals," a proprietary database of more than 1 million savings offers from national and local retailers across hundreds of product categories.

The Ask homepage now features a new tab labeled "Deals" for users who only want to view the best offers online. The Ask Deals database is continuously updated to provide users with the most current savings offers.

Ask Deals is powered by the company’s proprietary "Deal Detector" technology, which uses Ask’s search technology to scan online promotions, store circulars, and around 40 coupon sites.

The Deal Detector also searches user-generated content on forums, message boards, and blogs to find popular deals people are sharing with each other. Ask Deals filters out low-value, invalid, and expired offers.

"In a tough economy and with the holidays approaching, Ask Deals arrives at just the right time for consumers as a one-stop shop for value. It’s the answer our users are looking for, too, since searches for coupons on Ask have shot up almost 50 percent in 2009," said Scott Garell, President, Ask Networks.

"Ask Deals saves consumers time and money through relevant, high-quality savings built right into our unique Ask search results page. By introducing our ‘search stimulus package’ with Ask Deals, we aim to lift a burden for consumers and make a meaningful impact in their lives."

NBC has named Jeff Gaspin, chief operating officer of Universal Television Group, as chairman of NBC Universal Television Entertainment.

Ben Silverman
NBC Entertainment

The new venture, which does not yet have a name, aims to bring producers, writers, advertisers and distributors under one roof and create all forms of content for distribution including television and online mediums.

"This new venture will take full advantage of all areas of Ben Silverman’s extensive media expertise – as an agent, producer and advertising innovator – to create a truly integrated and truly interactive new media production entity, a next generation enterprise that bridges the gap between traditional television and the internet," said Barry Diller, IAC Chairman & CEO.

IAC will provide initial capital to the venture, though it will not be consolidated with the company’s financial results.  Additional terms of the venture are not being disclosed.

NBC Universal will continue to work with Silverman via the new venture through platform partnerships and a possible investment in the enterprise.

"Media is being consumed across an increasing number of platforms, including TV, the internet, mobile, and DVR. The next generation of media will be defined by the players who can capitalize on those trends and deliver integrated, compelling content across all platforms," said Silverman.

"Uniting advertisers and content creators will fundamentally improve quality and enable a fluid production and distribution model."

Google makes money by charging advertisers every time a user clicks on a Google advertisement, but in the instances described and documented by Edelman, he makes it appear Google and partners are colluding to intercept traffic to websites that would be navigated directly (and for free) rather than by searching.

Edelman’s claims, presented as they are, seem damning at first glance, but at times the connections seem tenuous and would carry a certain amount of deniability on Google’s part for they all involve third party actions, even if they benefit Google end. Google would not comment on third party/affiliate actions or motivations, so the links and proffered proofs are left to us (via Edelman) to consider. Google also declined to comment about the autocomplete feature on Chrome and whether it is designed to encourage search and discourage direct navigtion.

WhenU

Though in 2004 Google apparently banned WhenU.com from its index for cloaking, the domain has since returned, and the company appears to have forged an affiliate relationship with Google. Also known as WhenU Save/SaveNow, WhenU is advertising software that delivers ads, comparison shopping results, and tracks browsing habits, installed by the user in conjunction with other applications.

With WhenU installed, Edelman’s test exhibits a popup screen covering 80% of a webpage he directly navigated to internet access provider RCN. The popup features Google text ads, one of which is for RCN, the rest for competitors. Edelman suspects many users who’ve installed WhenU simply click on the sponsored search result to arrive at the originally intended destination, thus costing RCN for the click and appearing to be a legitimate conversion.

Edelman cites this as a prime example of Google and a partner interceding in the case of direct navigation in order to boost PPC revenue and give RCN the impression of a high conversion rate.

However, it’s possible, as in all of these examples, that the evidence is circumstantial. WhenU has a history of shady behavior and is still unofficially considered by many as malware or “badware.” It is possible Google is unaware of WhenU’s pop-up practices and that this is a tactic designed to benefit WhenU. Google itself wouldn’t comment on WhenU’s practices.

Google Chrome’s Omnibox

Google’s combination of address and search bar, known as Omnibox, made waves in the browser market with fans cheering the efficiency and critics expressing concern about data collected from it. Edelman enters "Expedia" as an example. Before the entire entry is complete, Chrome suggests outcomes for the user, three of which are searches, one of which is the URL for expedia.com, and a third suggestion, "expedia/," which leads to an error page.

Edelman argues direct navigation is discouraged by placing the intended URL at the third suggestion, after a search result and the suggestion that leads to an error page. “By placing this nonfunctional result prominently in the autocomplete drop-down, above the one working direct link to Expedia, and in the same distinctive green font as the working direct link, Chrome discourages users from exploring direct links,” writes Edelman. “After all, if the prominently-listed "expedia/" link did not work, users are less likely to try the similar-looking link Google ranked lower.”

Because Google designed Chrome this way, this is the most convincing example of Google encouring searching over direct navigation. But proving that motivation is a hard case to make because it involves ignoring all other motivations/ design intentions and requires knowledge of internal engineering directives to which we don’t have access (to which Google won’t grant access, either). 

Any determination of motivation on our part involves significant conjecture, and Edelman may have been a bit selective. The argument assumes the user really wants “expedia” and not “expedition” or “expletive” for that matter, and it ignores other stages appearing in the type field, like the “exp” and earlier stage, or other variations of the query/navigation. Google could and would argue the autocomplete feature is intended to get users to their destinations faster. But Google declined to comment other than to note using the "control" key moves suggested queries to the top of the list.

Typosquatting and SmileyCentral

People who register domains a letter or two different from a legitimate domain in order to catch typo traffic when users make a mistake typing a URL directly are called “typosquatters.” Typosquatters often make money via Google AdSense ads, which appear on the page that is not the intended destination rather than an error page, via Google AdSense for Domains. With Google’s matching technology, often the intended destination is featured in the ads, which users click to continue to where they meant to go. In essence, it is another instance where an advertiser pays for traffic it otherwise would have gotten for free if the user had typed correctly.

Edelman also pegs SmileyCentral, a toolbar provided by IAC, which owns Google’s search rival Ask.com, as a way a Google partner manipulates users into clicking sponsored ads by discouraging direct navigation. The toolbar modifies the users’ web browser by pushing the URL bar to the right instead of its traditional position on the left. A forgetful or unsuspecting user typing a domain in that bar will bring up a search with sponsored ads and may click through to the originally intended destination.

“Google’s actions are even worse than opacity: By claiming to have delivered traffic advertisers would have received anyway, Google tricks advertisers into paying for that traffic — and even tricks advertisers into concluding, mistakenly, that the traffic is a good deal.”

Google wouldn’t comment on how IAC designed its toolbar nor what IAC intended by switching the URL and search fields around. But as far as typosquatting goes, where most often squatters target trademarks, a Google AdSense for Domains spokesperson did manage to reiterate the company’s trademark policy:

"We take trademark violations very seriously. When we are made aware of trademarked terms on sites within the AdSense for Domains program we take immediate action including disallowing ad serving. Trademark owners can find more information here: http://www.google.com/tm_complaint_afd.html."

Third Parties

In all but the Chrome example, Edelman’s arguments hinge upon the actions of partners rather than Google’s direct involvement. While it’s true third party abuse of the system may inflate conversion rates, and that Google may indirectly encourage it, Google retains the ability to disavow actions taken by WhenU, IAC, and typosquatters. But it might be argued Google could be more careful with whom the company associates.

Edelman’s bio lists Google rival Microsoft among his clients. In a world of tenuous links, would that count?