Steve Bryant

So yesterday was the rapture. Google acquired YouTube and ascended into heaven. The search giant no longer files SEC reports, it just sends manna from the godhead. Or, if you’re given to episodes of sci-fi catharsis, maybe you think Google has just become SkyNet. That’s almost like becoming God, but then finding out God looks […]

Google announced today that it would acquire YouTube for $1.65 billion in stock compensation. YouTube will continue to operate independently. Google Video will continue to operate separately. The acquisition combines the largest and fastest-growing video-sharing community online with the largest search engine. YouTube, which was founded in December 2005, serves over 100 million videos per […]

Google has almost closed a deal to acquire YouTube for $1.6 billion in stock and the deal could happen as soon as this afternoon, according to both the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times’ Dealbook blog. The details: Deal could be announced after the closing bell today, but the deal could still fall […]

Adding to its reputation for cherry-picking the best and the brightest, Google has snagged longtime AOL IM developer Justin Uberti and assimilated him into the Googleplex. Justin posted the news on his popular Tales of a Running Man blog on Saturday. The news is interesting given that Google and AOL plan to allow their instant […]

Screenshots from North Korea’s nuclear test site and related facilities. I took a spin through Google Earth and grabbed some screen caps. Check out the slideshow here. The coordinates of the testing site buildings are: 41°16’40.29″N 129°05’06.06″E It doesn’t look like much, but there ya go. There’s some good information about Korea’s nuke testing over […]

Like YouTube before it, Google will develop technology that allows Warner to approve or deny video content that contains copyrighted content. Google announced today that it signed content deals with Sony BMG Music and Warner Music Group to show music videos on Google’s video site. Google will also syndicate the video content to its publisher […]

Several publishers are speaking up to say that Google Book Search has actually helped increase book sales. Despite fears from the publishing community that Google’s book scanning projects will hurt sales and lead to exploitation of their content, small publishers Oxford University Press, Springer Science and Business, German publisher Walter de Gruyter/Mouton-De Gruyter, and historical […]

One day after YouTube’s Chad Hurley attended the secret Google Think Tank meeting in Mountain View, rumors are swirling that the search giant is acquiring YouTube for $1.6 billion. The rumor (also “reported” in the WSJ and now apparently on CNBC) is based on an e-mail Mike Arrington received last night, and there’s no more […]

The search giant invited executives from major networks, media companies, NASA, the top librarian from the U.S. Library of Congress and former Vice President Al Gore to a think thank summit at its Mountain View headquarters this week. The event was the second annual Google Partner Forum, according to TVWeek, and other attendees included CBS […]

After watching sites like Koders and Krugle grab some headlines for code search, Google has rolled its own code-specific engine, which is now available as a beta from Google Labs. Code Search is the latest in Google’s efforts to embrace the developer community and give it useful tools. The search engine launched a repository for […]

Rock band The Knack has sued several online music distributors, including Yahoo, Amazon and Apple, for distributing copies of Run DMC’s song “It’s Tricky,” which contains an unauthorized sample of The Knack’s “My Sharona.” In a 49-page complaint filed last month, The Knack’s front man Doug Fieger and lead guitarist Berton Averre claim that Run […]

Google released yesterday a new service that allows Web publishers to insert small, JavaScript-based widgets into their blog or Web site. There are 1,220 Google Gadgets for your Web page, most of which were already available for inclusion in Google homepage and Google Desktop. Example gadgets include Google Video, maps, weather and time.Google follows several […]