Rule No. 1: Convince the video's participants that the end product will be less embarrassing if they don't worry about being embarrassed while they make it. Get your people to either commit themselves fully to the project, or stay out of the way. Vimeo's companywide lip synch of Harvey Danger's "Flagpole Sitta" wouldn't work nearly so well if the girl listening to her iPod at the beginning didn't keep such a straight face. Know what else doesn't hurt? Actually memorizing the lyrics.

Rule No. 2: Get the heavies involved. Digg's "Groove Is In The Heart" from Mark Trammell wouldn't be nearly so worth watching if CEO Jay Adelson didn't start rapping two minutes in. Tocquigny's video featured only interns, making it seem like the real executives didn't take the PR project seriously. What kind of example does that set for the monkey-see-monkey-do younguns?

Rule No. 3: Plan meticulously and practice. Here's "L'amour a la française" from AOL France. Note how precisely the performers hit their marks. Note how cleverly new singers appear on the screen. That's dedication, people! (It probably didn't hurt that the most of these people knew they were about to be laid off and probably spent most of their remaining time working on this video.)

Rule No. 4: Learn to edit. Facebook code monkeys — here dressed as White Ninjas for the company's annual games day festivities — aren't actually supersneaky ninjas; that they appear as such comes from careful editing. A hint: Editing usually takes longer than filming.

Rule No. 5: Feature the most attractive coworkers prominently. Sure, a companywide video will probably include everyone from the company. But give the longest shots to the most attractive office-workers, like the girl listening to the iPod at the beginning of the Vimeo video or the swirling blonde in the middle of the video below made by Leonardo Dalessandri's production company, "Tambureddu." Also, be a little cynical and use a frame from one of those shots for the clips' still frame, which will appear in searches and embedded placements in blogs.

The terms of service for Google's popular email product Gmail contains the same language as the Chrome TOS mentioned above, but it's also got this Orwellian gem tucked in it:

Google reserves the right (but shall have no obligation) to pre-screen, review, flag, filter, modify, refuse or remove any or all Content from any Service.

Not that Google is actually going to stop you from sending that dirty email about sex and drugs to your dirty friends, but they could.

Facebook is the Internet's most popular photo-sharing site. Which, according to Facebook's terms of service, means Facebook could be a very profitable stock photo firm if it wanted to be.

By posting User Content to any part of the Site, you automatically grant, and you represent and warrant that you have the right to grant, to the Company an irrevocable, perpetual, non-exclusive, transferable, fully paid, worldwide license (with the right to sublicense) to use, copy, publicly perform, publicly display, reformat, translate, excerpt (in whole or in part) and distribute such User Content for any purpose, commercial, advertising, or otherwise, on or in connection with the Site or the promotion thereof, to prepare derivative works of, or incorporate into other works, such User Content, and to grant and authorize sublicenses of the foregoing.

The terms of service for YouTube also say that uploading anything onto the site gives them license to do whatever with it. More obnoxiously, YouTube also says that even after you delete content from the site, they're allowed to keep it forever:

You understand and agree, however, that YouTube may retain, but not display, distribute, or perform, server copies of User Submissions that have been removed or deleted. The above licenses granted by you in User Comments are perpetual and irrevocable

My favorite obnoxious terms-of-service clause is in the license for AOL's instant messenger client. You're only allowed to use AIM for lawful purposes, so no pinging your friends about smoking up or scalping tickets. Also, turns out you can't say dirty words or obscene things over the service, which probably means most people can't talk about their bosses, last night's overtime loss, or that girl in fourth period:

You May Use the AIM Products for Lawful Purposes Only. You may use AIM Products for lawful purposes only. You may not post on or transmit through community areas (e.g., message boards, chat, e-mail, calendars, instant messaging products) or other means any material that (1) violates or infringes in any way upon the rights of others, (2) is unlawful, threatening, abusive, defamatory, invasive of privacy or publicity rights, vulgar, obscene, profane, indecent or otherwise objectionable, (3) encourages conduct that would constitute a criminal offense, (4) gives rise to civil liability, (5) violates any policies posted in any community areas or (6) otherwise violates any law. You also may not undertake any conduct that, in AOL's judgment, restricts or inhibits any other user from using or enjoying the AIM Products, including without limitation the community areas.

Both Mozilla's terms of service for Firefox and Microsoft's EULA for Internet Explorer 7 don't have these weird clauses.

To [cut] costs, AOL will turn all their websites off for 23 hours per day.

AOL is getting ready to have major layoffs again. After a so so report card rumor has it that they are selling their MTC & DTC data centers and will be contracting all of the services out to Emcor. There are way too many managers and a lot of them are expected to get laid off. After attending meetings it appears that upper management has finally realized they are way too many managers in technologies and that it would be better to contract central config, asset management, IPE's and SI.Operations is going to take a big hit.

MTC and DTC are datacenters based in Manassas, Va., and the vicinity of Dulles Airport, respectively, near AOL's former Northern Virginia headquarters. Emcor is, as best we can tell, a facilities and construction manager better known for doing the wiring on datacenters than running a network operations center. It's not clear how AOL's websites will fare during a transition to a new, inexperienced Web host. AOL employees: You've got layoffs. AOL users; You've got fail!

(Photo of AOL server farm via KK)

Platform-A is offering advertisers the opportunity to purchase a 300x600 ad unit for AOL homepages: AOL.com, the AOL client and co-branded sites. AOL is the only portal that offers advertisers this ad unit size, which is double the size of the largest ad unit – 150x300 – that advertisers typically purchase on the other portal sites.

Samsung ad buyers at Mediaveest already took the plunge, running a 600x300 ad on AOL.com today that when "expanded," goes beyond the margins of my browser window. Annoying? Yes, but — at least long as AOL's revenue growth stays so slow — AOL's belly-buster ads are here to stay. Studies show that larger ads can lead to 4 times as many conversions as smaller button ads.

The company raked in $111 million last quarter, a 50 percent increase year over year — though the company's bookkeeping is notoriously unreliable, the share price is down to an all-time low, and a fifth sexual harassment suit is still pending against visionary pervert Dov Charney, founder and CEO. That explains why American Apparel is so happy to advertise on the social networks that frighten more staid brands: The rates are cheap, and the company doesn't have to worry about tarnishing its reputation.

But Microsoft and Yahoo, both looking ofr more heft, are still in talks to buy AOL. Once the separation — mostly "a bookkeeping exercise," reports the Wall Street Journal — is complete, selling off the advertising business should prove easier. Discussions with Yahoo are "the more advanced of the two," says a source who describes the deal as one that would combine AOL and Yahoo and give Time Warner a $10 billion stake in the company. It's a proposal AOL and Yahoo began discussing in April. Whether or not a deal is consummated, the fact that Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang is still considering it just shows how much pressure he's under from shareholders, even after last week's subdued shareholder meeting.

Some observers say Time Warner executives did a bait-and-switch, tacitly encouraging Yahoo and Miller to proceed with the appointment, and then publicly denying that they ever approved a deal. Backstabbing and double-dealing at the world's most famous agglomeration of corporate infighters? We are not shocked. But we don't think Miller, who saw their work firsthand at Time Warner, ought to be, either. (Photo by Lou Reed/Los Angeles Times)

He would earn a fee from an unnamed third-party company based out of Houston based on the number of emails he sent out. In the years that he was active, between 2003 and 2006, the DOJ claims he had over $3.5 million deposited into his bank accounts. Davidson plead guilty to falsifying header information to send spam; tax evasion; and criminal forfeiture. He'd been sentenced to spend 21 months in the minimum-security prison, as well as ordered to pay $714,139 in restitution. Happy with the payback?

[Reuters]

Aside from keeping it out of Yahoo's hands, we remain confused as to why Microsoft would want AOL. Yes, Time Warner's online division has an impressive advertising reach across the Internet, thanks to its Advertising.com network. But it doesn't actually own most of the websites which carry the ads it sells. And of those it does own, how much of their traffic is from people who haven't figured out how to change their homepage? (Photo by AP/Paul Sakuma)

Unsurprisingly, there's already signs of trouble. MainStreet has lost its launch editor, Caroline Waxler, amid a change of editorial direction. FiLife has ratcheted back its once-lofty ambitions. And WalletPop? One of a bevy of websites launched by AOL, which is desperate to find readers who are not turned off by that once-magical, now-deadly three-letter brand. With few prospects for attracting an audience or advertisers, will they not soon need financial advice of their own?

When Business 2.0, published by Time Inc., another arm of Time Warner, was on the rocks, its editor talked up a deal to save the magazine by merging it with TechCrunch. Those talks went nowhere. All of which makes us feel bad for TechCrunch coeditor Erick Schonfeld, who previously worked at Business 2.0; wasn't the whole idea of joining TechCrunch to escape Time Warner?

Any California customer of the five ISPs already signed on in New York is included in the restrictions. For customers, the initiative's inability to target porn-serving newsgroups means the loss of access to many innocent newsgroups. But there are countless workarounds for Usenet users, a demographic dominated by technical types, to get access. For Cuomo et al., the initiative sounds so good on paper that they don't have to even bother making it work.

Sure, my Sanyo phone has an AOL Instant Messanger app. But it takes two and half minutes to send a message and then another two and a half to see if I got one back. Here's a new version for the iPhone, which could put an end to expensive text messaging. An alternative: Facebook's new iPhone app integrates the site's new chat feature.

Remember radio? That place where you could listen to and discover music without paying for it? It's back.

FileMagnet lets you load and view PDFs and Office documents from you desktop. Such a nice convenient way to keep you working all the time.

This app, a guitar tuner that uses the iPhone's microphone, obviously targets a niche audience. We're betting the Edge asked Jobs for it

This Major League Baseball app would be better if it streamed MLB.tv straight to your iPhone. It doesn't. But it does show game highlights not too long after they actually happen — which won't be a bad way to get through graduations, weddings and PowerPoint presentations.

DutchTab takes the pain out of splitting a tab so you don't have to ask the server to do it. Only problem: greasy fingers on your iPhone.

After using DutchTab to figure out how much you owe, send your friend the cash via PayPal. Seriously, in 2000, the folks at PayPal thought this was how people would use the service rather than to settle eBay auctions. The future is here!

Always be closing, right? Keeping your leads' contact info in your pocket at all times will at least get you the steak knives.

Muxtape founder Justin Ouellette showed us what can go wrong when you have to email blog posts from your iPhone instead of being able to use an app like TypePad. (If you upload the wrong file, you still might end up blogging your deal memos by mistake, though.)

The oversharing generation's perfect app. Opt in and your friends will know where you are at all times.

Yahoo employees don't relish a Yahoo-AOL merger, mostly because they and the rest of the Valley view AOL as a relic of the 1990s, still somewhat popular only because old people in flyover country aren't comfortable with change, even if it's just changing their homepages in Internet Explorer for the first time since 1997. We're skeptical Yahoo can close the deal. Cash-rich Microsoft is also said to be considering buying AOL in order to boost its brand-advertising inventory, and Time Warner CEO Jeff Bewkes just wants to offload the embarrassment. Don't expect CEO Steve Ballmer to let Yahoo embarrass him twice.

Vallewag: What would you think of Jon Miller going to Yahoo?

Calacanis:

Jon Miller would be amazing for Yahoo because he is extremely good at building display advertising businesses and buying young startups. Remember, when they let him go he was coming off back to back 40%+ gain quarters in advertising revenue—second only to Google (and well ahead of Yahoo). His biggest strength at AOL—in my mind—was buying promising startups and giving them tons of support, no red tape, and breathing room. Yahoo needs new blood and a focus on display advertising, with Ross [Levinsohn, former CEO of Fox Interactive and Miller's partner at VC firm Velocity Interactive] at his side you would have a very potent operator and M&A team.

Yahoo's best strategy right now is probably to build display advertising while buying and growing promising startups. Yahoo needs growth, Jon and Ross are growth guys (i.e. MySpace, Advertising.com, Weblogs, Inc, etc). As a bonus you have hundreds of VP/SVP/EVP level executives out there who are loyal to Jon and Ross, so you might see a talent influx with them at the helm, and talent wins.

Valleywag: You think he'd take the job?

Calacanis:

• Pro: It is the most challenging job in the space second to AOL
• Pro: Having reinvented AOL this would be cake walk/much more pleasant.
• Push: It would require a move from East to West coast—which is both a + and -
• Pro: It would be a great way to show the folks at [Time Warner] who's the man

I'd say if he gets the call he would most likely take it... big opps like this come along once every 5-10 years.

• Former Fox Interactive boss Ross Levinsohn and AOL CEO Jon Miller, now partners at Velocity Interactive, seem to come as a pair. Levinsohn is best known for acquiring MySpace for Fox Interactive and quitting the company after it wouldn't buy Digg. But Levinsohn is also known for bullying entrepreneurs — once, so badly that renowned angel investor Ron Conway reportedly "flew off the handle" at him. In some quarters and in Jason Calacanis's heart, Miller gets credit turning around AOL. But like any exec, Miller has his detractors at AOL and they came out of the woodwork when he was fired last year. One described him as
  

  An executive over 4 years that put more incompetent people in high-places (e.g., McKinley) while firing (Govern) and letting reams of talented folks (e.g., Kotay, list-o-long) leave that were passionate and—at least—somewhat competent, and were actually trying to foster some core innovation and synergy.

• OpenTable’s CEO Jeff Jordan is on Yahoo shareholders and board members' wishlist, just like he was on Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg's list to become COO of that company before it settled on Sheryl Sandberg. An eBay veteran, Jordan was thought to be in line for Meg Whitman's job until he took over as OpenTable's CEO in 2007. His reputation as a "product Nazi" led Valleywag to endorse him for Yahoo's top job way back in November 2006.
• Tim Armstrong heads up Google's ad sales force and the unit is perhaps respectably profitable enough for Yahoo shareholders and board members to include him on their list. We wonder, however, if the board knows about Armstrong's involvement with sketchy search engine spam company Associated Content.
• Why wouldn't Yahoo's board and shareholders want Microsoft’s Kevin Johnson for the company's top job? Ever since Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer announced a bid to acquire the company on February 1, no one's given more thought to running Yahoo. Johnson's even written several memos on the topic — showing great ability to include exclamation marks after the company's name while still respecting the need for capital letters.

Basically, you've got a lot of guys in their 30s and older who are not really contributing that much in terms of innovation. They should clear out and let the 25 year-olds get going again. If you look back at AOL, it had many purges in the post-bubble period, but by and large, it flushed out the people who had been occupying senior management posts for a long time and they didn't make much of a difference to the business.

AOL has its challenges, but no other available Internet asset possess its breadth or scale. An acquisition of AOL would modestly increase MSFT’s search share, boost its page views and give it the dominant third-party ad network in Platform A.

Marangi recommends Microsoft pay $12 billion. We do not. BoomTown's Kara Swisher says if Microsoft is serious about search, it needs to buy more market share. But AOL's corner of the search market is not the corner Microsoft wants to own.

"Sometimes I tell my clients, if they're looking to target the over-65 crowd on the Web, not to worry about demographics — just go buy AOL," one agency exec tells us.

Microsoft's money would be much better put toward making an offer for a company that at least kind of, sort of owns a platform that maybe somebody could be as powerful as Google — Facebook. Microsoft should make Mark Zuckerberg a $12 billion-plus offer he can't refuse — even if his investors' lawyers have to prove it to him. (Photo by Michi W...)

the success of campaigns on our popular products, such as SuperPoke!, Top Friends and FunWall, has attracted the attention of not only top brands, but also top talent like Jason.

If only attention were as good as cash. Then Slide might be more than the online version of the musicians in every corner of New York's subway system — amusing, nice to have around while waiting for a train or a page to load, but hardly worth $550 million. U.S. marketers spent a paltry $600 million on social media advertising in 2007 — the same amount Procter & Gamble will spend over two months on its entire marketing budget and a tiny fraction of the $18 billion spent on interactive advertising last year. Somehow, we don't think a bunch more SuperPoke inventory flooding the market is going to fix the problem.(Photo by bk . ninja)

Hot air balloon rides and circus performers. But then it would be difficult to fit either into 1015 Folsom, where the party is being held tomorrow night. As for the rest of Bebo's original employees? They've all left already.

Bewkes has been trying, on and off, to swap AOL and a fistful of cash for a 20 percent stake in Yahoo, which would help CEO Jerry Yang fend off both Microsoft and Carl Icahn. Yahoo executives aren't particularly interested in having AOL's aging Internet assets dumped on them to manage — but they were eager to buy Bebo, particularly Yahoo Europe head Toby Coppel. Yahoo has a deal to sell ads on Bebo in Europe, a deal that most expect AOL to do away with after it expires. Buying Bebo serves to makes AOL more attractive to Yahoo — and if that gets AOL off Time Warner's back, then it may be $850 million well spent.

AOL subscribers continue to visit its websites in droves; the placement of a link on its welcome page drives highly profitable traffic. Why shouldn't the Internet-access business get a cut?

There's a simple answer: AOL should put its traffic up for bid. If online ads can be sold at auction, why not pageviews, too? AOL's infrastructure, too, can charge a market rate; Amazon.com's storage and computing rental operations offer an easy proxy for these costs.

One suspects the reason why there's a holdup in splitting up costs and revenues between the businesses is not that AOL's number-crunchers haven't come up with figures similar to what market mechanisms would dictate. Rather, it's that the numbers aren't to Time Warner management's liking. Dial-up is still quite profitable; Web publishing, not to the same degree. For Time Warner, which wants to shed the former and keep the latter, that result is quite awkward.

(Screenshot by Dave Taylor)