yahoo news

Links from Thursday's episode of Loaded:

Sony unveils a new handheld gaming device called the Next Generation Portable

Sony also announces that it will bring PlayStation games to Android devices as apps

Amazon.com launches Kindle Singles for short works of literature

Facebook lets you use the site with an extra layer of encryption

The Obama Administration takes to social networks to answer questions

Netflix states its intention to publish statistics about ISPs that are slowing down its streaming service

The New York Times is considering a WikiLeaks-type site of its own

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange will be on … Read more

Any Web publisher with a pulse knows that the best way to goose page views is to create a slideshow. Turns out it works in search as well.

Yahoo's search market share has been on a decline for several months, but the company has been promising a rebound over the last several weeks. And according to ComScore data released to financial analysts Monday, it delivered in April, gaining 0.8 percentage points of share to end the month at 17.7 percent of the market.

But several analysts pointed out that there's a catch: Yahoo's search gains … Read more

Yahoo is adding more context to news searches, bringing photos, videos, and even tweets into its search results page.

Searchers on Yahoo--who are dwindling--will find new results for newsy events Thursday, when Yahoo launches new tabs on the Yahoo News Shortcut. You've long been able to find links to news stories about a given search query through the shortcut, but you can now find other ways of telling the story with the new tabs, said Larry Cornett, vice president of consumer products for Yahoo Search.

Yahoo may be close to finalizing a deal to outsource the back end of its search business to Microsoft, … Read more

Yahoo News has realized that there's a lot of information out there on the Web and that people just don't have time for all of it. That's why the new opt-in beta of a revamped Yahoo News, which went live on Thursday, tries to cut to the chase.

"Essentially, we've found that news consumers want only the first few paragraphs of a news story, and then they move on," an e-mail from Yahoo representatives explained. "Given the short attention span of today's audience, we modified the site to present only the first … Read more

Yahoo has updated its search results to include recent headlines more quickly.

"Because we're better able to detect when a query is about a breaking-news topic, we're able to deliver fresher results when it matters most," Paul Yiu of Yahoo search product management and Jean-Francois Crespo of Yahoo search research and development said in a Friday blog posting.

In addition, Yahoo can better place the news in the results page, balancing news with less time-sensitive results, Yahoo said.

Google also has made a strong effort to mix breaking news into its search results.

Reading through this Wall Street Journal article, I'm increasingly worried about Zimbra. The article traces Microsoft's efforts to buy Yahoo!'s search business while leaving the rest of its business(es) to an AOL Time Warner or News Corp. This might be good for Microsoft, and it might be good for Yahoo!, but where would it leave Zimbra?

Zimbra doesn't fit any of these companies. Arguably, it could fit well inside Microsoft (if Microsoft wanted a serious upgrade to its web-based Outlook, something extensible that could attract a development community, contrary to Paula's well-reasoned opinion), and … Read more

Updated at 10 p.m. with details from the New York Times.

Are Microsoft and News Corp. locking arms for a joint bid for Yahoo?

That would be something.

According to a report Wednesday in the Wall Street Journal, the two industry titans are in "serious talks" over such a deal.

And a New York Times report lays out the type of mashup that is being considered by the software and media companies.

Under a deal, Microsoft's struggling MSN would be joined with News Corp.'s social-networking site MySpace, as well as Yahoo, according to the Times … Read more

Google News is getting an interesting feature this week, and by interesting I mean it's downright peculiar. Users of the U.S. version of Google News will now be able to comment on a story, that is assuming they're somehow involved in it. The process is not for everyone, and in fact requires a lengthy verification process of sending off your comment and credentials to a special Google e-mail address, and later verifying your identity via domain name and an e-mail follow-up from Google staff. If you pass the test, your comment will show up alongside the article.… Read more