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Playdom, a Mountain View, Calif.-based social gaming company, is raising up to $70 million in VC funding at around a $300 million valuation, according to Eric Eldon. New Enterprise Associates reportedly is among the investors. Eldon also reports that Rick Thompson, Playdom’s co-founder and chairman, has raised around $50 million for a VC fund of his own.

Update: TechCrunch puts the round a $43m, with a $260m pre-money valuation ($406m post). Says NEA was joined by Norwest Venture Partners and Lightspeed Venture Partners.

Update II: The company has issued the following press release:

Playdom, a leading social gaming company, announced today that it has closed $43 million of financial investments as part of its Series A financing. The investment, led by New Enterprise Associates (NEA), along with Playdom chairman Rick Thompson, Lightspeed Venture Partners and Norwest Venture Partners (NVP), will be used to finance strategic acquisitions and expand the company’s pipeline of market-leading games.

“We are focused on growing Playdom into a world-class gaming company. A number of compelling games are in development for 2010, and we’re bullish about our future and the potential to bring people together through social gaming,” said John Pleasants, CEO of Playdom. “Social games appeal to everyone, everywhere. Our players range from ages 13 to 80 and come from more than 150 countries, so the opportunity for growth is tremendous.”

In conjunction with this financing, Playdom has added Scott Sandell, general partner at NEA, to its Board of Directors. Sandell joins Playdom’s existing board members CEO John Pleasants and founders Rick Thompson, Dan Yue and Chris Wang.

“We are thrilled to partner with such an exciting company and strong leadership team,” said Sandell. “We believe social gaming is a transformative industry and Playdom is playing a critical role in shaping its future and the future of online social entertainment.”

Playdom currently runs 13 games on leading social networking platforms including Facebook, MySpace and iPhone. The company is the largest game developer on MySpace and has two of the top five role-playing games on Facebook, including its popular titles Sorority Life and Mobsters 2: Vendetta.

Playdom has over 190 employees in offices in Mountain View and San Francisco, CA, as well as a game studio in Eugene, OR.

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On Veterans Day, Vice President Joe Biden joins all Americans in honoring those who have fought and died for our country. Yesterday, in recognition of the seven soldiers killed by a roadside bomb in Afghanistan last month, the Vice President visited Fort Lewis military base in Washington, where he spoke to a crowd of 500 people, recognizing the bravery and sacrifices of the fallen soldiers:

It’s that valiance that we remember here today at Fort Lewis.  It’s that valiance that we honor today at Fort Hood.  And it’s that valiance that we’ll celebrate tomorrow, our nation’s 91st Veterans Day.

Today, these seven men take their place on the rolls of the greatest American heroes.  And the rest of us — all the rest of America — should once again be reminded and rededicate ourselves to a simple proposition:  The only sacred responsibility we have as a nation — the only sacred responsibility we have as a nation — is to give all those we send all they need, and care for them and their families when they come home.  That’s the only truly sacred obligation our government has.  

Meriwether Lewis — soldier, explorer, a leader of men — when speaking of his historic expedition, said of those under his command, "With such men I have everything to hope, but little to fear."

Well, I say to all Americans today:  Knowing these seven men are watching over us now, and that our military is filled with thousands upon thousands of women and men like them — I think we can believe that, even as we struggle with tragedy, even as we grapple with the profound loss and devastating grief, we can look up at the heavens, think of those heroes, and know with certainty that we have everything to hope, but little to fear, thanks to them.

Today, the Vice President and Dr. Jill Biden hosted a luncheon at the Naval Observatory for Veterans and active duty servicemembers along with their families. The Bidens, whose son Beau recently returned from Iraq, were joined by Secretary of Veterans Affairs Eric K. Shinseki.

I know something about MMA, but I know next to nothing about boxing. Yet even I can laugh about the latest EA Sports prediction, via Fight Night Round 4, that says that Manny Pacquiao will beat Miguel Cotto this weekend. I laugh because saying Pacquiao will win the fight is like saying the sun will rise in the morning. (Now watch Cotto knock out Pacquiao in the first.)

This is just the latest simulation that EA Sports has run with its games. The most recent one, that the Philadelphia Phillies would beat the New York Yankees in seven games didn’t exactly pan out.

EA Sports has also predicted that the Cleveland Cavaliers will win the NBA Finals this year, and that the Pittsburgh Penguins will win the Stanley Cup.

Did EA Sports already do a UEFA Champions League prediction yet? (I imagine after the seeding we’ll see a FIFA World Cup prediction.)

And now we play the waiting game.

The UK would hand over almost half of its sovereign land in Cyprus if the country is reunified, the Prime Minister has said.

Gordon Brown urged Cypriots to be “bold” and “courageous” in their efforts to reach a deal between the divided Turkish and Greek populations.

Following talks with President Dimitris Christofias at Number 10, the Prime Minister praised his work to progress discussions and encouraged him to resolve the issue.

The PM said:

“It is important that the solution to the Cyprus Problem is a Cypriot one – a solution by Cypriots for Cypriots. Nevertheless, as a sign of support for the negotiations, I can confirm today that an offer has been made to the United Nations to make available just under 50 per cent of the territory of the UK’s Sovereign Base Areas to a unified Cyprus in the event of a solution.

“It will be up to the two leaders to negotiate what happens with this land. The Sovereign Base Areas would be able to function as normal within a reduced land area. Today, my message to Cyprus’ leaders and to their people is: you can make history. Be bold, be courageous. The UK will support you.”

The two sovereign base areas – Akrotiri and Dhekelia – were retained under UK jurisdiction when Cyprus was granted independence in 1960 and cover 98 square miles.

For this upcoming TV spot for Assassin’s Creed II, you’ll find yourself staring into the eyes of Ezio’s victims. It’s a little creepy and morbid seein…

In case you’re one for hard lines and plastic over soft and cuddly, head over to the Chumby store and order yourself the new Chumby One. It’s way more advanced than the original model with a faster CPU, a lot more storage, FM tuner, and is half the price at only $99. But like I said before, I still want the older model.

The original Chumby was fun and whimsical; the One is up-tight. Just look at the two next to each other. The Classic is like the over weight and funny looking party boy that can always score with the ladies. But the One on the other hand, looks more like the straight-laced, classically handsome church boy. I mean, if you’re actually going to own one of these things, don’t you want one that’s fun?

[Chumby via Engdaget]

After months of discussion and debate, the House has passed its version of health care reform. But as many observers, including me, have already noted, health care reform has primarily become health insurance reform over the course of the year.

The focus on health insurance reform, at least in part, reflects polling data that shows the public is much more responsive to issues like guaranteeing coverage to people without regard to pre-existing conditions or health status and providing subsidized insurance or access to Medicaid to people who need help. There is far less interest in slowing spending or controlling costs, especially in ways that could be viewed as making access to whatever health care patients or their physicians want more difficult. Not surprisingly, this lesser interest is reflected in the legislation just passed.

To be fair, the House bill, as well as the bill voted out by the Senate Finance Committee, contains a variety of changes that focus on quality and health system performance improvements. These include proposals that encourage the development of more primary care providers as well as requirements to improve the coordination of care for people who are jointly on Medicare and Medicaid and other high users of services.

There are also promising pilots that would bundle payments for post-acute care and that test incentive models that encourage accountable care organizations—groups of providers that are responsible for managing the cost and quality of care for a group of patients–and other payment and service delivery models. Based on past experience, however, the Secretary of Health and Human Services needs to be able to fully implement successful pilots without new authorizing legislation from the Congress. Otherwise the likelihood of even promising pilots becoming a part of Medicare is small.

As we move to the endgame of what will at best be health care reform 1.0, it is also important to remember that if we want to improve health—presumably health care reform is a means to improving health—we need to focus on more than just health care and reform of the health care system.

We probably all know that health care is only one means of improving health. It became especially clear to me after spending three years as a commissioner on the World Health Organization Commission on the Social Determinants of Health, which focused on the relationship of poverty, education, early childhood education, the treatment of women and individual empowerment to health and life expectancy. While the importance of clean water and sanitation to health is obvious for developing countries, focusing on the environment where people live and work is also important for developed countries—especially if we want to make progress reducing the disparities in health outcomes observed in minorities and disadvantaged populations.

The rationale for considering the role of these social determinants of health is relevant for all age groups, but it is especially important for children. Improving the conditions surrounding a child’s early development will improve opportunities for better health throughout the child’s life span. Many of the biggest challenges the country now faces begin in childhood. Obesity, cardiovascular disease, cancer and mental health problems—conditions that account for more than 75% of health care spending today—all can have roots in the early years of life.

Improving nutrition during gestation and delivery is critical to the health development of a child. It also plays a role in the likelihood of a child’s developing obesity, type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure and heart disease later in life. This means that making sure pregnant women with low incomes have stable access to nutritional food is thought of as an important strategy for improving future health.

Making sure that pregnant women have access to substance abuse programs is another strategy that would markedly improve children’s health. As it is, too many children are born with serious medical challenges because their mothers had substance abuse problems. Not aggressively intervening to make sure such care is available and easily accessible imposes large financial burdens on the system and incalculable human costs on the children born to substance-abusing women.

Similarly, investments in early childhood education, especially for the poor, should be regarded as an important tool for preventing disease, improving quality of life and increasing later productivity. Recognizing the social determinants of health means that programs like Head Start, Title I of the Education Act of 1965 that funded schools with high concentrations of poor children and is now part of No Child Left Behind, and ensuring that school lunches provide basic nutrition, including fresh fruits and vegetables, may be as important to improving health as any of the changes now under consideration even if they are not regarded as a traditional part of health care reform.

The Congress and the country are finding reforming the health care system a major challenge—one that is likely to take many rounds of legislation. As we struggle through this first round of health care reform, it is important that we remember that the ultimate goal is to provide for a healthier America. Improving the conditions in which people are born and live, age and die may be at least as important as reforming health care in achieving this goal.

Gail Wilensky is a Senior Fellow at Project HOPE, an international education foundation. She was the Administrator of the Health Care Financing Administration (now the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services) from 1990-1992 and the chair of the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission from 1997-2001.

For years, Hollywood has pushed a totally ridiculous claim that Canada is somehow a den of copyright thieves, and it needs to make its copyright laws much more strict. This fantasy has worked on journalists and politicians, who insist that the movie industry is dying in Canada due to rampant piracy. Except someone forgot to inform the real world. An anonymous reader sends over the news that the owners of Cineplex in Canada are reporting record box office sales and revenue, even with the current economic downturn. Once again (and yes, we’ve been pointing this out for a decade), it appears that it’s the actual experience that gets people to go to the movies. The folks at Cineplex note that a growing number of highly experiential films — such as those using IMAX or 3D technology — has really helped in getting more people into the theater and in getting them to pay more.

Oh, and as a special note to NBC Universal’s General Counsel, Rick Cotton, who seemed so worried about those poor corn farmers who would be decimated by piracy, you can rest easy:

Concession revenues did well due to a film slate that catered to family audiences, who tend to be higher concession spenders.

Phew. Now Rick can go back to working on ways to stop people from watching the Olympics and figuring out ways to avoid paying copyright royalties to songwriters.

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NEW YORK (Reuters) – Motorola Inc (MOT.N) is in the early stages of looking into a potential sale of its $4.5 billion television set-top box and network equipment business, two sources said on Wednesday.

Motorola is in the early stages of seeking buyers for the unit, whose suitors include private equity firms and other communications equipment makers, said one source familiar with the situation.

Motorola may decide to keep the unit in the end, said the source, who was not authorized to speak with the media.

J.P. Morgan Chase & Co and Goldman Sachs Group Inc are advising Motorola on the possible sale, the source said.

J.P. Morgan and Goldman Sachs declined to comment.

Motorola, which has been losing market share in its cellphone business for years, declined to comment, but said it was still focused on its previously stated plan to separate its handset business from the rest of the company.

Analysts said there could be a lot of interest in the home and networks unit, particularly because Motorola has a strong market share in the set-top box segment, where it is bigger than Scientific Atlanta, owned by Cisco Systems Inc (CSCO.O).

But RBC analyst Mark Sue said that a divestiture of any of Motorola’s other business units could hurt Motorola’s money- losing handset business.

“The mobile devices business still needs the rest of the businesses to fund it operations. It hasn’t really recovered fully yet so it would be a little too early to cut off the lifeline,” Sue said.

While growth in the mobile network equipment market has slowed dramatically in recent years, rival gear makers could see Motorola as a way to increase their market share, particularly in the United States.

Avian Securities analyst Matthew Thornton said a $4.5 billion price tag would represent an 18 percent premium over his estimated valuation of $3.8 billion for the home and networks unit, based on operating earnings.

Potential suitors could include Ericsson (ERICb.ST), Samsung Electronics Co Ltd (005930.KS), Alcatel Lucent SA (ALUA.PA) or Nokia Siemens, a venture of Nokia (NOK1V.HE) and Siemens AG (SIEGn.DE), analysts said.

The Wall Street Journal cited China’s Huawei Technologies Co Ltd [HWT.UL] and UK based Pace Plc (PIC.L) as other potential buyers.

Private equity firms, including TPG, also have taken a look at the unit, a source briefed on the process said. The source could not be identified by name because they were not authorized to speak to the media.

The Wall Street Journal cited Silver Lake Partners as another potential bidder.

TPG declined comment and Silver Lake Partners was not immediately available for comment.

Motorola spokeswoman Jennifer Erickson said the company does not comment on rumor or speculation.

“Separation into two independent, publicly traded companies (Mobile Devices and Broadband Mobility Solutions, which comprises Enterprise Mobility Solutions and Home and Networks Mobility Solutions) is the publicly stated long-term goal of Motorola,” Erickson said. “We remain committed to the separation goal and continue to believe that it is the right strategy to position Motorola for long-term success.”

Motorola shares were down 15 cents, or 1.7 percent, at $8.70 in afternoon trading on New York Stock Exchange. (Reporting by Sinead Carew, Megan Davies and Jessica Hall in New York; editing by Andre Grenon and Tim Dobbyn)

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Short Version: As the owner of an iPod touch (2G), I was happy to give this case/stand a spin on my recent trip over to Ireland. Generally speaking, the case provided adequate protection of the touch (albeit leaving the top and bottom slightly exposed), was very handy for watching videos on the plane, and worked great for transforming the touch into a bedside alarm clock. With a MSRP of $34.95, I’d love to see the price come down a touch (zing!), but overall, the idox Traveler Series is a respectable case/stand combo choice.

Longer Version: As anyone who regularly flies the not-so-friendly-skies knows, airplanes seem to be caught in some sort of infinite “shrinking” vortex. I swear. Every time I get to my assigned seat, it’s smaller than the last flight…

Anyways, we’re here to talk about something more important than the failing flailing airline industry – a new iPod case from idox. Known as the Traveler Series, the case/stand is available for the iPhone (3G / 3GS – $34.95), iPod nano (4G – $24.95), and the iPod touch (2G / 3G – $34.95).

Construction: Think of the case as a hard plastic portfolio, of sorts, for your iThing. The construction of the case/stand is very solid, providing more than adequate protection for the screen and device in general when traveling inside a pocket/briefcase/backpack/etc. The touch sorta snaps into place and stays there thanks to the embedded rubber design. When transformed into a stand, there are some nice rubber stoppers on the bottom to prevent the whole thing from sliding off your tray table (or other flat surface).

Cons: The idox Traveler Series is definitely not perfect. For starters, the snug-fitting case is rather difficult to pry open. Yes, PRY. The lid snaps into place very securely, but is challenging to open without torquing the bottom (or top) corner. (In the grand scheme, this isn’t a deal breaker since it errs on the side of over protection.)

Another downside is the exposed top and bottom of the iPod touch. The way the case is designed (above) allows for easy access to the iPod dock connector, headphone jack, and the top power switch. However, because of the nature of the design, the exposed areas could potentially be damaged.

It is also important to note that the physical volume controls on the side of the Pod are rendered useless while in the case. Although, this is not that big a deal since there are onscreen touch volume controls, but still can be annoying in certain situations.

Finally, it would be really nice if future generations could include multiple angle options for better and more adaptable stand use. While on the plane, when the guy in front of me put his seat back, I would have loved to be able to change the angle on the stand to compensate for my new viewing situation.

Pros: With all that said, the idox Traveler Series does have some nice things going for it. For one thing, it is actually made pretty well. The case’s solid construction provides adequate protection for the screen, sides, and back of touch. Also, the touch stays securely in place once you “snap” it in.

Although I complained about “the snug-fitting” case above, there is a definite plus side to this attribute as well – the touch inside the case fits in my jeans pocket with no trouble. And finally, the fact that it is an all-in-one case/stand, which offers both protection AND more comfortable video viewing, is clearly the biggest selling point here.

Conclusion: After all is said and done, the Traveler Series case/stand definitely has its utility and some redeeming qualities. At $34.95 it’s definitely not priced very attractively, but I have to say, having any kind of stand for the iPod touch on a long flight really makes all the difference in the world. If it happens to protect the screen and still fit in my pocket as this idox case does, then that’s not such a bad thing either.

PS3 users have had access to Facebook and other social networking sites like Twitter for a while now thanks to the console’s web browser. It looks lik…

The paper reviewed here is  ’A Comparison of Psychiatric Consultation-Liaison Services Between Hospitals in the United States and Japan’ by Kishi and colleagues and freely available here. As the title suggest, the researchers make a comparison of consultation-liaison services in Japan and the United States and in the abstract there are a number of conclusions drawn. They begin with an introduction to their study. The researchers briefly describe some of their expectations of a comparison between the services in the two countries in this section.

The researchers describe their method in the next section. The researchers selected hospitals in Minnesota, USA and Kanagawa, Japan for the study. They write that cultural differences between the two countries might be reflected by the patterns of referrals to liaison services. They also state that the period of study was related to a change in the reimbursement fees for consultations although I wasn’t sure of the temporal relationship between the study period and this change. The catchment area of the Minnesota hospital was 3 million and in the Kanagawa hospital was 1 million. The researchers describe the data that was recorded during the study period. The researchers justify their use of an adjusted Length of Stay (LOS) figure which incorporates the timing of the consultation.

In the results section, there were significantly more men in the Minnesota sample (p=0.040), significantly more of the subjects were married in the Kanagawa sample – indeed almost twice as many proportionally (p<0.001) and significantly more employed in the latter sample (p=0.001). Surgical referrals seemed to be proportionally much higher in the Kanagawa sample than the Minnesota sample while the reverse was true for intensive care referrals although chi-squared and p-values weren’t displayed in the table for these figures. Interestingly almost twice as many referrals (proportionally) in the Minnesota sample had a past psychiatric history and this was highly significant (p<0.001). ‘Chemical dependency’ was the most common cause of referral in the Minnesota sample and ‘evaluation’ in the Kanagawa sample and both were significantly different from their counterpart values (i.e. in the other cities). Delirium was the most common diagnosis in the Kanagawa sample and depression in the Minnesota sample and again both proportions were significantly higher than those in the counterpart populations.

In the discussion, the authors suggest that cultural factors might not play a role in the differences in prevalence of depression between East Asian countries and western countries (however an interesting study is reviewed here). They then suggest that in Japanese culture there is a focus on the collective rather than the individual and that this may influence interactions with mental health services. They also comment on referrals from physicians to psychiatrists for ‘psychosocial issues’ which was a frequent finding in referrals. In their discussion the authors note a number of limitations to the study including the lack of controls which would be helpful in better understanding the cultural differences. Additionally they note that the selected hospitals may not be representative of other teaching hospitals in the respective countries.

As this was a comparison of retrospective data and they were interested in characteristics, the absence of primary outcome measures meant that in effect this was an exploratory analysis and adjustments may help to clarify which are the most interesting findings. It would be interesting to explore the findings with regards to referrers and diagnoses using a different paradigm e.g. case-controlled registry-based studies.

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The comments made here represent the opinions of the author and do not represent the profession or any body/organisation. The comments made here are not meant as a source of medical advice and those seeking medical advice are advised to consult with their own doctor. The author is not responsible for the contents of any external sites that are linked to in this blog.

You know your proprietary mobile OS isn’t all that great when we go ahead and say: thank heavens for Windows Mobile. Garmin/ASUS have announced that their M20 “GPS that can make phone calls” will now ship with Windows Mobile 6.5, and “all” current M20 owners are eligible for the free upgrade. Sweet. The two companies claim 6.5 will be available in Taiwan, Hong Kong, Thailand, Singapore, Malaysia, India, Russia, Ukraine, Poland, Czech, Turkey and elsewhere on the M20 by the close of 2009. No love for Western Europe and the US? Oh well. WinMo 6.5 for the M20 is nice and all, but what about all those fellas who purchased a G60?

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When the Japanese gaming mag, Famitsu broke the news on a Final Fantasy XIV (PS3, PC) code coming with the purchase of Final Fantasy XIII (Xbox 360, P…

By Tim Conneally, Betanews

Two universities running Kindle DX pilot programs have rejected the device as a potential textbook replacement, citing a poor feature set and the controversial accessibility issues. Primary among these is the text-to-speech capability.

This capability came under fire shortly after the Kindle 2 debuted, as the Author’s Guild wanted writers to be compensated for the spoken “performance” of books, or otherwise have the text-to-speech function disabled.

Meanwhile, equal rights groups like the American Council for the Blind, the International Dyslexia Association, and the National Center for Learning Disabilities wanted the feature to be kept free and available as an aid to the visually or cognitively impaired.

The Author’s Guild ultimately won and the text to speech feature became optional, an issue for the authors to decide individually.

Since the large screen Kindle DX debuted in the spring, a number of schools — secondary and beyond — ran pilot programs which tested the device’s viability as a textbook replacement.

The University of Wisconsin-Madison and Syracuse University were two establishments running these pilot programs which recently decided not to adopt the device until its features are improved, including access to visually impaired students.

“The big disappointment was learning that the Kindle DX is not accessible to the blind. Advancements in text-to-speech technology have created a market opportunity for an e-book reading device that is fully accessible for everyone,”
Ken Frazier, the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s director of libraries said. “This version of the Kindle e-book reader missed the mark. It is relatively easy to envision an improved e-book reading device that meets the needs of the entire university community. Such a device would include universal design for accessibility, higher-quality graphics, and improved navigation and note-taking. I think that there will be a huge payoff for the company that creates a truly universal e-book reader.”

The National Federation of the Blind considers this a victory.

Dr. Marc Maurer, President of the National Federation of the Blind, said in a statement that the Federation “commends the University of Wisconsin-Madison and Syracuse University for rejecting broad deployment of the Kindle DX in its current form because it cannot be used by blind students and therefore denies the blind equal access to electronic textbooks. We do not oppose electronic textbooks; in fact, they hold great promise for blind students if they are accessible. But as long as the interface of the Kindle DX is inaccessible to the blind — denying blind students access to electronic textbooks or the advanced features available to read and annotate them — it is our position that no university should consider this device to be a viable e-book solution for its students.”

This announcement comes just a day after Intel announced an e-reader designed especially for the visually impaired.

Copyright Betanews, Inc. 2009

Just a friendly remind to all my fellow World of Warcraft players. You need to migrate your account to a Battle.net account by the end of the day today, lest you’re unable to login.

Why is Blizzard doing this? Probably to make things easier on its end, but you’ll also see some benefits. One day, Battle.net will be, and I hate to use the phrase, a type of “social network” for Blizzard gamers. You’ll be able to message your friends across different games while in the game and all that jazz.

For your troubles, Blizzard will send you an in-game pet, Mr. Chilly.

I converted my account about a month ago and have had zero problems.

Roll Call reports on the changing House calendar. “‘As action on health insurance reform legislation moves to the Senate, the House is updating its schedule for November and December to reflect that, and to ensure there is time to complete our work on other important issues,’ [House Majority Leader Steny] Hoyer said in a statement.” Meanwhile, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has kept open “the possibility of working on Saturday, Nov. 21, the weekend before the Thanksgiving recess. Both chambers are scheduled to be in recess the following week for the Thanksgiving holiday, observed Nov. 26” (Brady, 11/11).

Politico: “The House will be in session for 21 more days in 2009, putting in a couple of five-day workweeks as Democrats rush to finish their heavy legislative agenda before the Christmas holiday.” And the Senate? Majority Leader Reid “has said he wants to get the bill to the president by the end of the year, but that would require working on Saturdays, something the body is hardly anxious to do” (Sherman, 11/11).

Hoyer today said “he is prepared to extend the House healthcare schedule into late December in order to pass healthcare reform,” The Hill reports. “Hoyer’s move follows Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s (D-Nev.) decision late Tuesday night to file a motion that could allow the Senate to begin debate on healthcare next week.” The actions by both leaders are likely part of the effort to meet the White House’s year-end deadline for a health care bill.

Reid is currently waiting for the Congressional Budget Office’s cost estimates of the bill, which are expected by the end of the week. But he has also signaled a willingness to begin the process before he has this analysis in hand. In terms of the procedural vote on the motion to bring the bill to the floor, success will require 60 votes, which will be an early test to Democratic unity. And “Senate GOP Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) and National Republican Senatorial Campaign Committee Chairman John Cornyn (Texas) have both warned Democrats that they will target any senators who support procedural votes on the bill, and McConnell has indicated he’ll do everything possible to slow the healthcare bill’s movement” (Fabian and Swanson, 11/11).

By Joe Wilcox, Betanews

More and more people are using the M word — that is “monopoly” — to describe Google. Certainly there is an argument that, globally, Google has a monopoly on search. According to combined analyst reports, Google’s worldwide search share is about 60 percent, even 70 or 80 percent in some geographies — and that’s just from the desktop or portable PC. Google also is rapidly gaining search share on mobile phones as well; 60 percent, or even more, in many countries.

Google’s influence is a hot topic this week because of media mogul Rupert Murdoch’s threat to put most, if not all, his content behind a paywall and remove that content from crawling by Google search bots. Is Google doing evil to traditional media publishers like Murdoch, by making their content easily available for free? In August, over at my Oddly Together Website I tackled this topic in post: “Can You Charge for News? Ask Google.”

As Google’s might increases, it’s reasonable to ask how the company’s business practices are changing and whether or not it can stick to corporate philosophy “Ten things we know to be true.” Perhaps the best known is No. 6: “You can make money without doing evil.” But can Google does this? That’s the question I pose to Betanews readers.

I’ll go further and ask: How would you rewrite Google’s “10 Things” to more appropriately fit how the company conducts its business? I offer my list below but ask for your adaptations in comments. By the way, my revision is a bit hard-ass with a purpose: To generate discussion. The revised 10 Things don’t necessarily reflect how I personally feel about Google, which otherwise gets knocked around in my revised 10 Things.

I got the idea to rewrite the 10 Things from a Twitter exchange, late yesterday. I tweeted: “Q: Does YouTube diminish if Bing Videos easily collects videos from many sources? If Microsoft taps in social sharing/networking?” Windows developer Mugunth Kumar responded: “I wish it would. Google videos is like too much inclined toward YouTube 🙁 “don’t be evil, no non-google videos for you”!” I shot back a revised No. 6, which you can read below. With that introdcution…

Google’s 10 Things — As revised by Joe Wilcox

1. “Focus on the user and all else will follow” should be: Focus on the algorithm and all else will follow.

Google’s core business is really about ranking the relevance of Websites. If keywords are any indication, the focus is not on the user. Keyword search is hugely inexact, and it’s unnatural to how people look for things (e.g., they ask questions). But keywords are important to how Google makes money from search.

2. “It’s best to do one thing really, really well” should be: Don’t put all your eggs in one basket.

While cliché, the saying is appropriate to Google. In the early 2000s, Google did search “really, really well” — better than any competitor. But end users and even keyword customers could still easily switch to another search engine (just type a different URL into the browser’s address bar). Google extended its search technology and brand success by releasing many products with cross-integration benefits. Today, Google search is sticky, because of supporting products or services. Few of them are another thing done “really, really well,” however.

3. “Fast is better than slow” should be: Slow is better than fast.

With the exception of perhaps Chrome, most Google products or services stay in perpetual states of beta before release. The development process is anything but fast. Gmail spent five years in beta. Exactly what is fast about that? The slow process allows Google to get something to market, while it’s refined to reach a “good enough” threshold (see #10).

4. “Democracy on the web works” should be: Monopoly on the Web works.

Microsoft showed the power of monopoly when Internet Explorer tied to Windows ruled the Web. Contrary to democratic concepts about the Web, a minority of Websites account for the majority of traffic. Increasingly, the means for getting to these majors, and most of the minors, is search: Google search. And there’s nothing really democratic about one company, or its algorithm, controlling access to most information.

5. “You don’t need to be at your desk to need an answer” should be: You don’t need another search engine to find the answer. Google is king of the search hill. Early on, this was because of its technology and keyword business practices. Google has extended its reach through its own services and by way of partnerships, such as being default search engine in every major Web browser but one — Internet Explorer.

6. “You can make money without doing evil” should be: You can do evil without making money.

Other than search, most Google services don’t directly make money. But they do take money from someone else — what other businesses might call “evil.” Google gives away for free something someone else charges for. For example, last month, shares of turn-by-turn mapping manufacturers plummeted after it was revealed that Google would include turn-by-turn mapping features with Android 2 for free.

7. “There’s always more information out there” should be: There’s always more information that Google can cannibalize for free.

The core dispute Robert Murdoch has with Google: He pays talented people to produce valuable content, which Google profits from through keyword search. Google doesn’t produce content, but like a human parasite leeches nourishment (e.g. revenue) from the host.

8. “The need for information crosses all borders” should be: The need to index information crosses all boundaries.

Google wants to catalog everything. The practice has generated some corporate — and even government — backlash about privacy and security. Google produces none of this information, owns none of it, but looks to profit from it.

9. “You can be serious without a suit” should be: You can’t be taken seriously without a suit.

Sure, regular Googlers dress however they want. But how does Google chairman and CEO Eric Schmidt dress? In a suit!

10. “Great just isn’t good enough” should be: Good enough is good enough.

Few Google products or services are great, nor does the company strive to make them so. The majority, especially those competing with something already available, strive to cross the “good enough” threshold. When something is good enough for less or free, people will adopt it and even give up some more valuable that costs more. Microsoft has repeatedly demonstrated the “good enough” principle with its products, such as Internet Explorer in the late 1990s.

Copyright Betanews, Inc. 2009