The New York Times reported yesterday that Google, working with an alliance of companies including; Linkedin, Plaxo, Friendster and Hi5 to write standards for social networking applications including Google's Orkut. The big question, can a collection of social networks tied together with a standard for application development challenge the fastest growing social network - Facebook?

Santa Monica, Calif. - Universal/Interscope Records artist Nine Inch Nails (aka Trent Reznor) on Wednesday announced plans to release a remix album version of his recent offering, "Year Zero," that will include a DVD-ROM containing all multi-track recordings -- allowing fans create their own remixes. The new release features remixes of "Year Zero" tracks from artists including New Order's Stephen Morris, Kronos Quartet, Bill Laswell, The Knife's Olof Dreijer and The Faint, as well as one remix track created by a fan. The DVD-ROM tracks are pre-formatted for use with popular mixing applications like Apple GarageBand and Ableton Live. A site for posting fan remixes, remix.nin.com, will debut on Nov. 20 alongside the album.

Basking Ridge, N.J. - Verizon Wireless said on Wednesday that it will offer more than 70 live, ESPN-produced NBA basketball games on its V CAST Mobile TV service for mobile phones this season. The service will be powered by FLO TV, from Qualcomm's MediaFLO USA unit. The first games available on the service include tonight's match-ups between the Dallas Mavericks and Cleveland Cavaliers, and Seattle Supersonics and Denver Nuggets.

Tokyo - Sony Corp.'s (NYSE: SNE) Computer Entertainment unit announced on Wednesday that Folding@home, a joint project that allows PlayStation 3 computing power to be harnesses by Stanford University researchers, has been recognized by Guinness World Records as "the most powerful distributed computing network in the world." On Sept. 23, PlayStation 3 users' machines working in tandem surpassed one petaflop, or the ability of a computer to do one quadrillion floating point operations per second (FLOPS). Over 670,000 PlayStation 3 users have now registered to participate in Folding@home, which is studying diseases including Alzheimer's, Parkinson's and certain forms of cancer.

Redwood City, Calif. - Zazzle, an on-demand retail platform, announced on Wednesday that it has signed a deal with Warner Music Group (NYSE: WMG), which will allow artists to create Zazzle Galleries offering fans customized products based on their images, photos and artwork. The fans themselves will also be able to create their own customized band merchandise and sell it through their fan sites, MySpace profiles or blogs. Redwood City, Calif.-based Zazzle earlier this week announced a deal to feature its services on MySpace, and also has partnerships with Disney, Lucasfilm, Warner Bros., Neopets and the Library of Congress for custom, on-demand merchandise.

New York - Viacom's (NYSE: VIA) MTV Networks  announced on Wednesday that it has partnered with video-sharing site Metacafe on a contest that will challenge users to create their own virtual music video. Contestants are charged with creating a music video for one of several emerging artists that is set inside one of MTV Networks' seven virtual worlds, with fans then voting for their favorites on Metacafe or MTV's Virtual Worlds channel.

New York - The Orchard, a digital distributor of independent music, on Wednesday announced that it has signed new distribution deals with labels including Reader's Digest Music, MC Records and Gigantic Music. The additions include many jazz recordings from Reader's Digest Music, in addition to albums from O'Death, Devo and Bill Laswell's Ohm Resistance label.

Burlingame, Calif. - AOL said on Wednesday that it has launched its Truveo video search engine in eight countries, including France, Germany, India, Japan, Korea, Spain, Taiwan and the U.K. The company also announced plans to launch additional sites for Australia, Brazil, Italy, Mexico, The Netherlands, Russia and Turkey over the next two month. AOL acquired Burlingame, Calif.-based Truveo in January 2006.

North Hollywood, Calif. - Disney Online (NYSE: DIS) on Wednesday announced the launch of its massively multiplayer online game for PC and Mac, "Pirates of the Caribbean Online." The game allows users create and customize their own pirate and captain their own ship, encountering characters from the Disney films such as Jack Sparrow, Will Turner and Elizabeth Swann along the way. Unlimited access to the game will cost $9.95 per month, after a first-month fee of $4.95 for new subscribers.

Dulles, Va. - AOL (NYSE: TWX) on Wednesday launched a new program designed to better inform online consumers about behaviorally targeted advertising, a technology increasingly being used by AOL and other companies to serve the most relevant ads to Internet users.

National Lampoon, Inc. today announced that David Kane, its former Chief Financial Officer, separated from service on September 30, 2007. Mr. Kane had joined the company in January of this year as interim CFO. Mr. Kane decided to leave the company for personal reasons. The Company is currently undertaking a search for Mr. Kane’s replacement.

http://www.nationallampoon.com

Washington - Nine consumer privacy organizations on Wednesday asked the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to create a list of consumers who do not want their online behavior tracked for advertising and other purposes, similar to the national "Do Not Call" list the FTC operates to prevent calls from telemarketers.

London - News Corp.'s (NYSE: NWS) MySpace is among the sponsors putting up $2 million to fund production of a feature-length film, "Faintheart," which was chosen among MySpace submissions, and for which MySpace users are providing input on choices such as the director, cast, soundtrack and marketing initiatives, Reuters reported.