Google has announced that they will launch Friend Connect, a new service that will allow any site to be turned into a social network. No charge. Basically, Google wants to turn the internet into one huge, universal social profile. Google wanted to tap into the hundreds of millions of users that participate in social networking sites like Facebook and MySpace.

But when you’re Google, you don’t make a competing site and then see what happens, you launch a service that turns the internet itself into one humongous social networking platform which can be used by anyone, with no charge.

For many fans of gadgets, games and electronics Best Buy is the place to go shopping when you need to scratch the gadget itch. What some don’t realize is that Best Buy owns and operates some other very popular retail locations around the world.

Best Buy announced today that it has agreed to buy 50% of Carphone Warehouse for a cash amount of $2.1 billion. The purchase will allow Best Buy to open retail stores in Europe and provide Carphone Warehouse with the funds to pay down debt and offer new services.

Unlikely to bring the fanfare that the Canadian iPhone launch did, or even Zune’s own U.S. launch over a year ago, but nevertheless the Zune is launching in Canada on June 13. We had heard that the Canadians were going to get the media player from Microsoft on their own store shelves sometime in the near future, but no one had put a date on it until now. Microsoft is going to launch the 4, 8 and 80 GB capacity players with prices from $140 to $250 Canadian dollars. The launch will be limited to models in red, black and pink colors, only.

via Engadget

Good news for more Apple fans around the world as Vodafone announced today that it has made an agreement with Apple to bring the iPhone to ten new markets sometime yet this year. Vodafone says it will offer the iPhone to its customers for purchase and use on the Vodafone network in Australia, the Czech Republic, Egypt, Greece, Italy, India, Portugal, New Zealand, South Africa and Turkey.

Vodafone

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer issued a letter to Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang over the weekend stating that the company withdrawing its offer to Yahoo. Microsoft had raised its bid to well over the $33 per share, upping it by nearly $5 billion which was still not enough to sway Yahoo board members.

“Despite our best efforts, including raising our bid by roughly $5 billion, Yahoo! has not moved toward accepting our offer. After careful consideration, we believe the economics demanded by Yahoo! do not make sense for us, and it is in the best interests of Microsoft stockholders, employees and other stakeholders to withdraw our proposal,” said Ballmer in the letter.

Microsoft issued another letter to the Yahoo board of directors on Saturday with a deadline of 3 weeks for the company to accept the previous $44.6 billion takeover offer that Microsoft proposed in the beginning of February. Despite some recent talks between the two companies, an agreement has not been made and Microsoft is starting to lean heavy on the search engine firm’s board by threatening to go straight to the shareholders if necessary.

“If we have not concluded an agreement within the next three weeks, we will be compelled to take our case directly to your shareholders, including the initiation of a proxy contest to elect an alternative slate of directors for the Yahoo! board,” the letter read. “The substantial premium reflected in our initial proposal anticipated a friendly transaction with you. If we are forced to take an offer directly to your shareholders, that action will have an undesirable impact on the value of your company from our perspective which will be reflected in the terms of our proposal.”, stated Steve Ballmer’s letter to Yahoo.

Looks like the Wii is still immensely popular. Don’t think so? Well, the Westin chain of hotels obviously does. They recently announced that they’ll be offering Wii rentals at their 150 locations. If Manhattan’s Le Parker Meridien is any indication of what they will charge, it will be expensive. They charge $50 to rent the $250 console for an hour.

If you have money to burn and want it projected onto a wall with a personal trainer in the gym, you’ll pay $120 an hour. If you have to pay that much to play Wii sports with someone, it might be time for you to get a new hobby. It’s not like you’ll be playing Wii golf with Tiger Woods after all. Don’t be a sucker. Take your damn Wii with you, people.

Chrysler, the third largest US automaker, will be the first car company to offer in-car Internet access. Web service will be via subscription from a wireless carrier and dealers will add the feature to existing cars this year. Upcoming fleets will come off the assembly line already Internet-ready.

Get ready to see a rise in accidents as drivers get distracted by their favorite blog and subsequently wake up in the hospital missing a testicle or two, smelling of chicken feathers and looking like they shaved with a bulldozer that morning, while some fat nurse picks the windshield out of their face one fragment at a time.

You no longer have to skulk in dark corners and whisper the secret password in order to trade in your HD-DVD for Blu-Ray. According to the AP, the electronics retailer is officially launching the promotion. Circuit City will be accepting returns of HD DVD players within 90 days of purchase, with a proof of purchase receipt.

Customers can receive store credit or use it toward the price of a Blu-Ray player. Circuit City will definitely be scoring some customer goodwill points with this promotion. Great move. Now, all you HD-DVD buyers have to do is find someone to buy your movies.

According to electronichouse, Circuit City has a secret they’re trying to keep on the down low. It’s a trade-in program where you can trade your HD-DVD player for a Blu-Ray player.

Apparently, Circuity City is not promoting it publicly, but if you ask, they will apply the refund toward a new Blu-ray player, but your original HD-DVD purchase has to be within 3 months. Yes, it’s only the hardware. You’re stuck with the movies. Maybe service really is state of the art. You better get to your local CC before they change their minds.

After removing video clips that were deemed as offensive to officials in Pakistan, the country decided to lift a country-wide ban on the YouTube website that it had imposed last week. The popular video sharing site had videos of cartoons originally published earlier in a Danish newspaper depicting the prophet Mohammad in which Pakistan lawmakers described as “blasphemous”.

Apple’s iTunes online music download service has moved into the number 2 position as the second largest U.S. music retailer, beaten out this time only by Wal-Mart. We had seen just last July that iTunes had moved into the number 3 spot, beating out Amazon and following both Best Buy and Wal-Mart, and the trend so far is continuing in Apple’s favor.

A group at Princeton University has found an exploit in common computer hardware that allows them to break codes and retrieve the encrypted data stored on the computers hard disks. The process at its most extreme involves direct access to the computer using a can of compressed air held upside down to freeze the DRAM chip(s) to access the encryption key stored in memory.

When stored data is encrypted, the software usually will use a key to encode and decode the data. That key is most often created and stored into a computer’s memory after a user logs into the computer with a password. According to the researchers, a common misconception is that once the computer is turned off, the DRAM memory disappears and so does the encryption key. In their studies, partially funded by the Dept. of Homeland Security, they found that data is actually retained in the computers memory for many seconds or sometimes even minutes after the computer is turned off. They also found that by freezing the memory chips with liquid nitrogen found in a common can of air for removing dust, they could get the data to remain in memory easily for as long as ten minutes, and often longer.

We’ve gotten another word about the Wii Fit availability, this time pushing its U.S. release up a day to May 19 instead of the 20th. The Wii Fit is a motion and weight sensitive balance board for use with Nintendo’s Wii game console which will provide new types of interactive games and exercises.

Along with this, Nintendo has also announced that the WiiWare service will also launch in the U.S. in May. This service allows third party game developers to create games for the Wii that take advantage of motion sensitive controllers. Once this launches we are sure to see some more very interesting uses for the Wii remote and Nunchuck. These games will then be available for download through the Wii Shop Channel.

Six American film studios have filed a lawsuit against the Chinese file-sharing firm Xunlei Networking Technology for copyright infringement. They were offering hundreds of movie downloads illegally. The firm is part owned by Google. The studios are seeking more than $1 million in damages and costs, according to the Motion Picture Association, though that seems a low number.

The MPA trade group said in a statement on Friday that in addition, the plaintiffs are seeking a public acknowledgement of the infringements and a pledge from Xunlei to stop them. The MPA said that Xunlei facilitated the unauthorised transmission of hundreds of Hollywood movies produced by its members, like “Spiderman 3,” “War of the Worlds” and “Miami Vice.”(Who the hell watches Miami Vice? Now that they have, I assume they have learned their lesson. Some movies aren’t worth the trouble.)