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Buzz Out Loud 776: The Dark Knight kills the Godfather

The wisdom of the crowds turns out to be simple mob rule, as Dark Knight fans not only mod up their new favorite movie but start modding down The Godfather on IMDB. Also, we do a probably wildly inaccurate (but, we think, hilarious) T. Boone Pickens impression because plain old financial stories are just not interesting enough. Oh, and Scrabulous is now gone from Facebook. So, you know, get back to work. Listen now: Download today's podcast Episode 776

Yahoo says DRM issue overblown by media, but will offer refunds http://www.betanews.com/article/Yahoo_says_DRM_issue_overblown_by_media_but_will_offer_refunds/1217287551

Microsoft goes … Read more

'Scrabulous' disappears from Facebook after Hasbro suit

Facebook users in the U.S. and Canada can no longer access Scrabulous, the faux-Scrabble game that quickly became one of the most popular applications on its developer platform.

This was done independently on behalf of the Scrabulous creators, a Facebook representative told CNET News in an e-mail Tuesday. "In response to a legal request from Hasbro, the copyright and trademark holder for Scrabble in the U.S. and Canada, the developers of Scrabulous have suspended their application in the U.S. and Canada until further notice," the e-mail explained.

The game's disappearance comes in the wake … Read more

Mozilla's head of engineering leaves for Facebook

Mike Schroepfer, Mozilla's vice president of Engineering, has left Mozilla to join Facebook as its director of Engineering. I only met Mike once but was hugely impressed by him. His loss, while it shouldn't significantly hurt Mozilla's continued momentum, is a loss to Mozilla.

That's the problem with being a non-profit. It will always be hard to retain people long-term since there's no possible pay-out at the end. Mozilla has done an exceptional job of hiring great people, but I worry that it (along with Eclipse, Linux Foundation, etc.) will be able to keep those … Read more

Facebook hires Mozilla engineer

Facebook has hired Mozilla technology veteran Mike Schroepfer as a director of engineering, as part of the social network's recent executive shuffle.

Schroepfer, who led the development of the Firefox browser as Mozilla's vice president of engineering, will be one of four directors of engineering at Facebook when he joins the company in the coming weeks. The Palo Alto, Calif.-based company created the position for Schroepfer to work on its social-network platform and Web site. Facebook is still looking to hire a vice president of engineering to replace former CTO Adam D'Angelo, 23, who left the … Read more

Video: Connecting with Facebook at the f8

Facebook banded together with hordes of programmers this week at the f8 developers' conference at San Francisco's Concourse Exhibition & Design Center, where company CEO Mark Zuckerberg introduced advancements to the Facebook Platform.

Take a look at some of the scenes from the show, including application developers hard at work, doughnut girls, and Zuckerberg's out-of-character footwear, set to the sounds of the exhibit hall and key speeches:

EIC Squared: Microsoft's plans, Icahn's seat, Facebook Connect and more

On this week's EIC Squared podcast, ZDNet Editor in Chief Larry Dignan and I discuss the news of the week. It was a big week for Microsoft, with several announcements and teases from its meeting in Seattle with financial analysts. Steve Ballmer is still bullish on the online space, but not on Yahoo. We also talk about Kevin Johnson's departure from Microsoft. (See coverage on the Microsoft financial analyst meeting from Ina Fried and Mary Jo Foley.)

We spend a few minutes debating the impact of Carl Icahn joining the Yahoo board and what it means for Jerry … Read more

Facebook's iPhone app: a bug that gives out magical iPhones (not really) to friends you never knew you had

This morning Facebook told me that 27 of my friends had downloaded the iPhone Facebook application. 27 out of 300+ is a good chunk of people and speaks to the fact that more and more people are getting iPhones. Of course, this is only if they can be patient to wait at least 2+ hours in line and if a given Apple/AT&T store actually has them in stock. It's hard to imagine that this has been going on for at least two weeks.

Anyway, I clicked the link to see who actually downloaded the Facebook iPhone … Read more

Facebook Connect's chances of world domination? Remote, I hope

I've been reading what all the wise people (they have beards) have to say about Facebook Connect.

This is, so I learned, Facebook's attempt to pile more and more information about you into their tall metal server boxes so that they can sell advertisers on their ability to target better than Google or Dick Cheney.

I think I'm beginning to understand all this.

But I find myself trying to translate everything into the real life I know.

I'm trying to imagine any area of existence in which people will trust just one brand or product with … Read more

Facebook and the end of sheep tossing as we know it?

Facebook has had at times--what's best way to put this?--a contentious relationship with its 400,000 or so developers. But now, Facebook wants what CEO Mark Zuckerberg describes as "meaningful" tools on the service. He's going to need to need that legion of developers if Facebook is going to substantially grow. On Wednesday, the company debuted Facebook Connect, a program designed to allow users to access and feed their Facebook profiles and friends on any Web site.

In theory, that's a big deal. As with everything, we'll need to see how it plays … Read more