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The last few months were probably long and hard ones for members of the Google Books team; it had started to seem like the whole world objected to their proposed scanning and sharing settlement.  But it turns out that Stanford is on Google’s side, as a new deal was announced this afternoon.

Stanford and Google first sealed a book-related deal in late 2004.  In fact, Stanford was one of five organizations that, on December 14th of 2004, joined what was then known as an expansion of the Google Print program.

Now, a post on the Google Public Policy Blog has stated, "Stanford University . . . has expanded our original partnership to take advantage of our settlement agreement to make millions of works from its library collection accessible to readers, researchers, and book lovers across the United States."

The post continued, "That means that if the settlement agreement is approved by the court, anyone in the US will be able to find, preview and buy online access to books from Stanford’s library."

So obviously, this could be a significant agreement.  We’ll just need to find out how the settlement agreement fares before we can be sure that the terms will stick.

Related Articles:

> Google Bows To Chinese Authors On Book Scanning

> Three More Groups Rally Against Google Books Settlement

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"We’ve raised all this money. We’ve created this global brand…Now we have to go build the business that lives up to that valuation."

Twitter COO, Dick Costolo, January 20, 2010

And that, my friend, is why we won’t see a Twitter IPO this year. That, and this really obscure New Yorker reference:

“My view of our financial future is like that old New Yorker cover where the New Yorker looks at the view of the United States and the IPO is way out west somewhere,” Costolo said yesterday during a panel discussion at Bloomberg’s San Francisco bureau. “Bronx and Queens are our 2010 financial plan, and that’s what we’re focused on right now.”

You could argue, that Twitter needs to be closer to Madison Avenue than the Bronx, but I think we all get his point–Twitter’s just not ready to head west and make its fortunes in an IPO.

Aside from figuring out how exactly it plans to generate revenue, the other monkey on its back isn’t actually a monkey at all–it’s a whale!

The company really needs to figure out how to avoid such random outages. A few of these immediately prior to an IPO, and it won’t be just whales that are sinking–Twitter’s opening-day valuation won’t be able to tread-water either!

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Microsoft is not the only one with some new offerings in the way of health search today. Google has added a slew of new cities to its Flu Trends product. The move is timed well, as the company acknowledges that it is National Influenza Vaccination Week.

"Since the strain of influenza that is active (H1N1) is novel, no one knows exactly what will happen next. However, the CDC is warning that one possibility is a second spike of flu activity, which is what occurred in 1957 when another novel strain of influenza spread in the United States," says Google Software Engineer Matt Mohebbi. "We’ve been chatting with public health officials about new ways we can help people understand the spread of flu during this unusual time and today we’re excited to bring city level flu estimates to 121 cities in the United States."

"By tracking the popularity of certain Google search queries, we’re able to estimate the level of flu in near real-time," says Mohebbi. "Google Flu Trends is updated daily and may provide early detection of flu activity, since traditional flu surveillance systems often take days or weeks to collect and release data."

The city-level estimates provided by Google Flu Trends are considered "experimental" because they have not been validated with official data, but Google says that the estimates are made in a similar manner to its national estimates, which have been validated.

A complete list of the cities Google tracks can be found here.

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> Bing Gets New Health Search Features

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While most of us in the Internet marketing “industry” were all aghast at the Facebook privacy problem of ’09, the rest of the world could have cared less. You know those people, right? The ones who don’t live and breathe this stuff to the point that all perspective is lost? These are the ‘everyday’ Facebook users who don’t give a rip about Mark Zuckerberg and the continued search for 7,000 people who care enough to impact any policy changes with the social media giant.

So those regular folks pushed Facebook to a point where it had never been before: the number one site during the Christmas holiday. ReadWriteWeb tells us

Christmas is a holiday that brings people together, so perhaps it should be no surprise that Facebook has become a part of millions of peoples’ Christmas experiences. For the first time in its history, Facebook was the #1 most visited website in the United States on both Christmas Eve and Christmas Day this year, according to traffic analyst firm Hitwise today.

Makes sense doesn’t it? Personally I was more prone to using Skype rather than updating everyone but that is certainly a personal preference.

So while the site finished third for the year behind Google and Yahoo Mail it was certainly a milestone to be seen as the Christmas site of choice. Last year Facebook finished second in this contest to Google but was able to flip positions this year.

See what a year of gigantic growth can do for you? Wonder if Santa will be as nice to Facebook next year after the rest of the world catches on that their “goings on” at Facebook aren’t as private as they used to be?

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While most of us in the Internet marketing “industry” were all aghast at the Facebook privacy problem of ’09, the rest of the world could have cared less. You know those people, right? The ones who don’t live and breathe this stuff to the point that all perspective is lost? These are the ‘everyday’ Facebook users who don’t give a rip about Mark Zuckerberg and the continued search for 7,000 people who care enough to impact any policy changes with the social media giant.

So those regular folks pushed Facebook to a point where it had never been before: the number one site during the Christmas holiday. ReadWriteWeb tells us

Christmas is a holiday that brings people together, so perhaps it should be no surprise that Facebook has become a part of millions of peoples’ Christmas experiences. For the first time in its history, Facebook was the #1 most visited website in the United States on both Christmas Eve and Christmas Day this year, according to traffic analyst firm Hitwise today.

Makes sense doesn’t it? Personally I was more prone to using Skype rather than updating everyone but that is certainly a personal preference.

So while the site finished third for the year behind Google and Yahoo Mail it was certainly a milestone to be seen as the Christmas site of choice. Last year Facebook finished second in this contest to Google but was able to flip positions this year.

See what a year of gigantic growth can do for you? Wonder if Santa will be as nice to Facebook next year after the rest of the world catches on that their “goings on” at Facebook aren’t as private as they used to be?

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According to Opera, Facebook is the most popular site on the mobile web in Africa. In addition, a report from the company shows a 5% jump in global mobile Internet users.

Opera Mini has garnered more than 41.7 million users worldwide showing a 5.3 percent jump compared to the previous month, according to the report. The number of page views in November went up 9.5% and data consumption increased 8.3% compared to October.

In Africa, Facebook has taken a strong lead and ranks as the most popular site in six out of the top 10 countries, Opera says. The company highlights the following global trends:

- In November 2009, more than 41.7 million people used Opera Mini, a 5.3% increase from October 2009 and more than 154% compared to November 2008.

- The top 10 countries for Opera Mini usage (in order): Russia, Indonesia, India, China, Ukraine, South Africa, United States, United Kingdom, Vietnam and Poland.

Opera also highlights the following trends for Africa:

- The top 10 countries using Opera Mini in Africa are (in order): South Africa, Nigeria, Kenya, Egypt, Ghana, Libya, Ivory Coast, Zambia, Tanzania and Namibia.

- Nokia and Sony Ericsson handsets are extremely popular in Africa, but Samsung is a significant exception, boasting the most popular phone used by Opera Mini users in South Africa, Zambia and Namibia.

"It is heartening to know that Opera Mini continues to grow consistently in all regions and categories — specially in continents like Africa where mobile phones are more likely the only way for people to access the Web," said Opera CEO Jon von Tetzchner. "At Opera, we are striving to bring the most innovative and affordable way for people to access the mobile Web and expect 2010 will prove just as successful for us as the case has been in previous years."

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> Opera Turbo Sees 60% User Growth in One Month

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Facebook users are a pretty important group of people; after all, in recent months, it’s been established that there are more of them than there are individuals in the United States.  So to wrap up 2009, Facebook’s provided a list that helps spell out what its users have been thinking about all year.

You can view the list of top status trends below.  It was made possible thanks to something termed "Facebook Memology," and as you can see, has been a bit simplified (condensing Farmville, Farm Town, and Social Living into "Facebook Applications," for example).

We’ll respect your intelligence by just hitting some of the items that might not be completely obvious.  Here’s a quick one: at number two, "FML" stands for "f*ck my life."  Which makes sense given the economy’s nosedive.

Then, at number eleven, "years" is nothing more than a reference to dates like 2008, 2009, and 2010.  Apparently a lot of folks thought about life on something other than a day-to-day basis.

Finally, "yard" is simply a reference to the green things that surround houses.  To explain this word’s presence, data scientist Lars Backstrom theorized on the Facebook Blog, "[H]ipsters’ moms and dads are also on Facebook, and these folks have yards that require some tending."  Or it might have something to do with the housing stimulus and a fair number of young people getting yards for the first time.

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> Facebook Releases User Diversity Data

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Opera announced that five million people are using Opera Turbo, its compression technology, which is present in both Opera 10 and Opera Mobile. Opera Turbo reduces the size of Web pages by up to 80%, according to the company, dramatically improving browsing speeds over slow networks and saving money on "pay as you go" connections.

Opera Turbo saw an increase of 60% in user growth in a single month, from October to November. "This rapidly increasing usage rate denotes a distinct market need for Opera‚s turbo-charged technology, and reflects the universal burden of slow surfing speeds," Opera says.

"The numbers have spoken. Opera Turbo is resolving the universal discontent with slow browsing. This is not an issue particular to one country or one type of device; it is an issue that affects us all at one time or another," says Opera CEO Jon von Tetzchner. "Now, no matter where in the world Opera 10 users find themselves, they know that Opera Turbo is available to assure quick and efficient Web surfing."

The five million Opera Turbo users viewed about 1.5 billion compressed pages in November. That’s a 36.6% increase in page views since October. Opera Turbo served more than 72 terabytes of data to users in November.

In November 2009, Opera Turbo served more than 72 terabytes of data to users. The average compression rate for Opera Turbo in November was 63.6 percent, meaning that those users would have received 199 terabytes of uncompressed data if they were not using Opera Turbo. Since October 2009, data traffic has increased by 38 percent.

"The average compression rate for Opera Turbo in November was 63.6 percent, meaning that those users would have received 199 terabytes of uncompressed data if they were not using Opera Turbo. Since October 2009, data traffic has increased by 38 percent," the company says. The top five countries in terms of unique users of Opera Turbo were: Russia, Ukraine, Germany, Poland, and the United States.

Users can activate Opera Turbo by clicking the Opera Turbo icon in the lower, left-hand corner of the Opera 10 browser.
 

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Amazon has released an iPhone app for the Kindle to over 60 countries. Now users in a total of 64 countries can read Kindle books on their iPhones and iPod Touch devices.

"We are excited to make the Kindle for iPhone App available to iPhone and iPod touch users in more than 60 countries, allowing them to access the vast selection of the most popular books, all available wirelessly from the Kindle Store," said Ian Freed, vice president, Amazon Kindle. "The Kindle for iPhone App is the perfect companion for customers who own a Kindle or Kindle DX, and a great way for customers around the world to download and read books even if they don’t yet have a Kindle."

Amazon says that with the app, customers in over 60 countries will be able to: 

- Purchase, download and read hundreds of thousands of books available in the Kindle Store.

- Read the beginning of books for free before they buy them.

- Add and automatically synchronize bookmarks and last page read.

- Access their library of previously purchased Kindle books stored on Amazon’s servers for free.

- Choose from six different font sizes and adjust words per line.

- Add and view notes and highlights marked on Kindle and Kindle DX.

- Read books in full color including children’s books, cookbooks, travel books, textbooks and graphic novels.

Countries where the app is available include: The United States, Argentina, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Estonia, Finaland, France, Greece, Guatemala, Germany, Honduras, Hong Kong, Hungary, India, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Jamaica, Japan, Korea, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Mexico, Netherlands, Norway, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Republic of Malta, Republic of Moldova, Romania, Russia, Spain, Switzerland, Slovakia, Slovenia, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Sweden, Taiwan, Thailand, United Kingdom, Uruguay, Venezuela, and Vietnam.

Amazon says that in the coming months, they will be releasing Kindle for Mac and Kindle for Blackberry. Amazon’s Kindle reached record sales in the month of November.
 

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> Amazon Working on Accessibility Features for Kindle

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Mozilla’s director of community development is not at all happy with Google.  Following an eyebrow-raising comment from CEO Eric Schmidt on the subject of privacy, Asa Dotzler has, in fact, pretty much suggested that everyone use Bing instead.

Here’s what set Dotzler (along with a whole lot of other people) off: on the subject of whether or not folks can trust Google, Schmidt told Maria Bartiromo, "If you have something that you don’t want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn’t be doing it in the first place."

Schmidt also said, "We are all subject in the United States to the Patriot Act and it is possible that all that information could be made available to the authorities."

That represents a fairly significant departure from the spirit of past statements (and new tools) out of Mountain View.  It may (or may not) indicate that Google’s becoming more likely to turn over users’ search histories upon request.

So Dotzler wrote, "That was Eric Schmidt, the CEO of Google, telling you exactly what he thinks about your privacy.  There is no ambiguity, no ‘out of context’ here. . . .  And here’s how you can easily switch Firefox’s search from Google to Bing.  (Yes, Bing does have a better privacy policy than Google.)"

Firefox controls a 24.72 percent share of the browser market, by the way, according to Net Applications.

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