Social Media, Search Engine | featured news

The search giant says it inadvertently removed Digg, in its entirety, from its search engine... Digg, which bears little to no resemblance to the site it once was, is still alive and kicking as a curated collection of top news stories from around the Web -- just not in Google's world. If you queried Google for Digg links earlier this morning, you found that the search giant had no recollection that Digg ever existed. Seriously. As Martin MacDonald, an online marketing specialist, observed in a blog post, Digg disappeared altogether from Google's index.

Social networking giant Facebook unveils tools that lets users search through all the information their friends have shared.

Facebook is expected to announce something big on January 15 and here's at look at what it could be.

Facebook Inc CEO Mark Zuckerberg soothed investors in his first major public appearance since the No. 1 social network's rocky May IPO, breathing life into its struggling shares after hinting at new growth areas from mobile to search.

A report in the tech blog AllThingsD says Facebook and Yahoo have reached a deal that settles their patent squabbles and expands their licensing and advertising partnership.

Google+ has been called a "ghost town," a "little version of Facebook" and "dead" since its launch last year. Users have continually questioned what it is and why they would want to use it. Google's senior vice president of social business, Vic Gundotra, attempted to rebut critics' claims during a panel at South by Southwest on Friday and defended Google+ against allegations that users are fleeing a stagnant service. Traffic has declined more than 30 percent in the past four months, according to one estimate.

For Google, it's personal. The Internet search giant is no longer going to roll out the same search results to everyone... It's doing this in three ways. First, it's expanding search beyond public Web pages to the photos and posts you and others have shared privately. Second, as you type a person's name into Google, it will automatically suggest people you are close to or may be interested in. Third, Google is guiding users to profiles and Google+ pages related to the topic of interest.

Google+ is being opened up for anyone to join after two-and-a-half months is closed testing.

Google said it will discontinue several products, as the Internet giant narrows its focus and doubles down on new efforts, including its Google+ social networking service, under CEO Larry Page.

This was an enormous week for Google, and everyone who watches them. Just thinking about Google+, Google’s (re)entry into social media, is not thinking big enough. What we saw this week was the first big move of Google in the Larry Page era, bringing forth the first changes and efficiencies he seems to have been seeking when named chief executive last January. And the upshot is an effort to make even the Internet a subset of a Google product. Which may not be a bad thing.