A more detailed Blog post can be seen here.

People having y!360 accounts have been sent a mail quoting

Dear Yahoo! 360° customer,

We will be officially closing Yahoo! 360° on July 13, 2009, to focus our efforts on making your new profile on Yahoo! the place where you connect with the people who matter to you most. As a result, you will need to move your 360° information to your new profile before this date. After July 12, 2009, your content on Yahoo! 360° will no longer be accessible. Here are some details to guide you through this transition.

What you need to move to your new profile
Your 360° information will not be automatically transferred to your new profile on Yahoo!. To move your profile photo, nickname, and any personal status messages, you’ll need to first save or download them before July 13, 2009. Once you’ve saved this information, you can later upload it to your new profile. Be sure to head over to your new profile soon so you can make it look just the way you want.

What to do with your blog
Be sure to take your blog with you as part of this transition process. To help, we’ve built a blogging tool for you in your new profile on Yahoo!. We’ve made the move easy; it takes just one click to take your posts with you. If you’d prefer to take your blog to a different website instead, you can download an archive of your posts and transfer them to your new blog space. Click here to read more about your blogging options.

Some content will not be supported in your new profile
Please note that your new profile will not allow mature content. Also, you will not be able to take the following with you to your new profile: your 360° inbox, testimonials, friend categories, local reviews, RSS feeds, tags, or custom theme. If you want to retain any of this material, we strongly recommend that you return to your pages and download it before July 13, 2009.

Your privacy settings are retained
Your privacy is important to us. Both your new profile and your blog contents will be set to “private”. This means unless you change the setting, you will be the only one able to see your profile.

To help you through this transition, we’ve compiled a list of the most frequently asked questions and resources here.

Thank you for using Yahoo! 360°. We look forward to seeing you in your new profile on Yahoo!.

The Yahoo! Profile Team

Learn more

Yahoo! Messenger Pingbox™

Create your pingbox, style it, copy the code and paste it on your blog. Only you and person you are chatting with can see the IMs, even if there are multiple visitors viewing your web page. Sign into Yahoo! Messenger and receive private IMs from your visitors. It’s that simple. Read More>>

Under the deal, Google would supply Yahoo with advertising services (ads from adWords Clients) to run alongside Yahoo’s Web search.  Yahoo runs the Web’s second most popular search service, second to none other than Google. Google and Yahoo have sought to portray the partnership as a non-exclusive arrangement. But the contract is heavily redacted in an area that covers “other business opportunities” and both companies are  silent about how the sharing of user data between the partners could actually affect the privacy of Yahoo users!!

While the contract reveals details of previously disclosed plans to make Yahoo Messenger and Google Talk work together, it revisers four of the five other points in the “other business” section. Yahoo has said it expects to generate an additional $250 million to $450 million in additional cash flow in the first 12 months after the agreement goes into effect.

During the pilot, Google will be able to place ads alongside 3% of results of Searches on Yahoo’s website.

MS criticized Yahoo’s advertising trial with Google, saying any such deal would not be in the consumers’ interests.

“Any definitive agreement between Yahoo and Google would consolidate over 90% of the search advertising market in Google’s hands. This would make the market far less competitive,” Brad Smith, Microsoft’s General Counsel said.

But Yahoo said the testing did not necessarily mean that “any further commercial relationship with Google will result”. Investors reacted positively to the announcement, with Yahoo shares rising 7%.

“We can afford to make big investments in the engineering and marketing that needs to get done. We will do that with or without Yahoo,” said Gates in an interview with Reuters.

The two companies are at a stand-off in Microsoft’s $41.7 billion unsolicited bid to acquire Yahoo. Microsoft has offered to buy Yahoo for $31 a share in cash and stock, a bid which Yahoo’s board rejected, saying it undervalued the company.Microsoft countered by saying its offer was “full and fair,” but did not say what it planned to do next. Analysts expect Microsoft to sweeten its bid, possibly to $35 a share, to clinch a deal.

“Today this market is increasingly dominated by one player. Together, Microsoft and Yahoo! can offer a competitive choice while better fulfilling the needs of customers and partners,” Redmond’s press statement said today. Warning regulators that “if we don’t buy it, then Google will” is an interesting legal strategy, but is unlikely to win much support from competition regulators.

Steve Ballmer says that he sees the online advertising market doubling to $80 billion in two years, and he’d like a slice of that sweet, creamy pie. The less he has to share with Google, the better. Yahoo’s $7 billion in 2007 sales looks huge next to Microsoft’s online division producing $1.5 billion—but it’s less than half of Google’s $15 billion revenue take. If Yahoo! and Microsoft merge, their combined online ad operation still wouldn’t match the one headquartered in Mountain View. Google controls 60 per cent of the search market, and DoubleClick, which Google will buy as soon as regulators let it, is by far the dominant player in the display ad market.

If Yahoo! approves the proposed $44.6bn deal, the two regulators will sit down at the bargaining table to determine which one is better equipped to review it. Given Yahoo!’s recent performance – with both profits and share price on the slide – it seems a fair bet that plenty of shareholders will be tempted by Microsoft’s offer.

The Russian group’s notice, posted by one “John Wane,” is dated January 16. This site hosts a rapidshare link to what looks to be demonstration software for Windows, and quotes the Russian researchers: “It’s not necessary to achieve high degree of accuracy when designing automated recognition software. The accuracy of 15% is enough when attacker is able to run 100,000 tries per day, taking into the consideration the price of not automated recognition — one cent per one CAPTCHA

Yahoo! Movies trailer plug-in for Yahoo! Messenger (8.1 or 9.0 Beta) has been redesigned with some new features. To add the Movie Trailer plug-in to your Yahoo! Messenger, visit the above link and click “Install Now”. Or click here to install it right now (you must be running Yahoo! Messenger 8.1 or 9.0).

Microsoft, Yahoo!, and Google have agreed to pay a total amount of $31.5 million towards settlement of a case alleging that the companies are guilty of promoting online gambling.

Microsoft will pay a total of $21 million consisting of,
$7.5 million as a charitable donation for Missing and Exploited Children
$4.5 million to the US government
$9 million towards a 3 yr public service campaign to warn youngsters about illegal online gambling.

Yahoo! will pay $3million to the US government and $4.5 million towards the public service campaign.

Google will pay $3 million to the government

New Features include Scalable messenger friends’ list, a sidebar widget for Vista, Tabbed chat and some new skins.

Download Y!m 9 for Vista