Ben Charny

Yahoo unveiled Monday the companys first-ever research facilities located outside the United States. The labs, in Santiago, Chile, and Barcelona, Spain, exemplify how Internet search interests are looking internationally for new talent and innovation. The new Yahoo centers are led by Web search expert Ricardo Baeza-Yates, who is based at the Yahoo Barcelona facility. Baeza-Yates […]

During the weekend, the price of Google’s stock dipped below $400 a share for the first time in at least two months, due to concerns about its new fight with the Bush administration, and rival Yahoo Inc.’s disappointing recent financial report. Share price was creeping back to more than $400.

Microsoft now acknowledges it complied with a controversial U.S. Department of Justice subpoena for a look at its MSN search customer activity. The Microsoft admission, in a recent blog by MSN Search Dev & Test General Manager Ken Moss, assures MSN search users that “absolutely no personal data” changed hands. Microsofts participation is not a […]

I’m pretty sure Patriot Search is a hoax. But the recent hubbub about search engines turning over user data to the feds makes it seem all-too-real.

In the name of science, Columbia University behavioral scientists recently dissected every e-mail sent by every Columbia student for a year. During the year it took to procure the e-mail and the ensuing months of research on the 14 million or so missives, the 43,000 correspondents never knew they were the subjects of such a […]

Thought no one was brave enough to take a stand against the prying eyes of the federal government? You’re wrong. Meet Google Boy, the teen-aged superhero in tights with a blue, red, yellow and green “G” stitched across the chest. He was more shaped by events than born into this world like you or me. […]

Internet search giant Google Inc. confirmed Thursday it’s fighting a Bush administration request to review Google customers’ search habits.The administration, via the U.S. Department of Justice, has asked Google for several days’ worth of activity at Google’s main search site. The million or so queries the government seeks will serve as the raw material for […]

Yahoo Inc. said that it recently turned over information about its users searching habits to federal investigators, a startling admission that has touched off a new round of privacy concerns. As previously reported, search inquiries may be evidence in an upcoming trial that the government hopes will revive a controversial 1998 Internet law to protect […]

According to his employment contract, Eric Schmidt is now sitting on stock options valued at $1.5 billion. Although his company offers Gmail brand e-mail, for the longest time Schmidt used his Yahoo email address, ericschmidt1@yahoo.com, on his home page. Blacklist me, Eric.

Internet search giant Google Inc. confirmed Thursday that it is resisting a Bush administration request to review Google customer search habits. The administration, via the U.S. Department of Justice, has asked Google for several days worth of activity at its main search site. The million or so queries the government seeks are to serve as […]

Suzanne Beecher lays claim to inventing the e-mail book club. Her “Chapter a Day” book club debuted in 1999 as a daily e-mail containing an entire book chapter from her to friends and family. The club consumed entire publications this way. The nonprofit venture and hobby has since morphed into Dear Reader, a virtual book […]

If you want a really, really accurate map, you got to get your information directly from the municipality you’re mapping. Anything else, and you risk look like you’re throwing darts with a blindfold on. Yet, Google and other online directions/mapping features providers usually get their goods from third parties who gather up this information themselves, […]