Washington - The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) on Thursday cleared Google's $3.1 billion acquisition of online advertising firm DoubleClick, which now only needs approval from the European Commission, which is still examining the transaction. [more..]

New York - The ongoing strike being waged by the Writers Guild of America, over DVD and Internet payments for their works from the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP), has not yet had an impact on the viewing habits of 74% of Americans, according to a new survey from market research firm TNS. [more..]

St. Louis - Microsoft, Google and Yahoo have paid a combined total of $31.5 million to settle claims brought by the Justice Department that the companies promoted illegal gambling by serving online ads for the operations between 1997-2007. [more..]

Los Angeles - Live Nation, a live concert producer and venue owner, announced on Thursday that it will abandon industry giant Ticketmaster and launch its own ticketing business for its venues and events, beginning in 2009. [more..]

Beijing - Yahoo China has lost its appeal of a Chinese court ruling that found the company's digital music service, which offers "deep links" to unauthorized music downloads, facilitates copyright infringement. [more..]

Malibu, Calif. - Toy and video game maker Jakks Pacific announced on Thursday that a federal judge has dismissed all federal claims brought against the company by World Wrestling Entertainment, over video games created for the company by Jakks. [more..]

Washington - The Electric Sheep Company, a creator of 3D virtual world content, has laid off 22 employees, or about one-third of its staff, Virtual Worlds News reports. [more..]

Seoul, South Korea - CDNetworks, a Korea-based provider of content delivery network services, announced that it has raised $96.5 million in new financing, led by Oak Investment Partners. [more..]

San Diego - Nirvanix, a provider of Web-based media storage services, announced that it has received an investment from Intel Capital. [more..]

The device may not have an Apple-esque level of sex appeal, but it does represent a huge shift in thinking that may just propel portable digital content and ebooks in particular to the kind of widespread adoption that digital music has already enjoyed, blogs Rohit Bhargava. [more..]

As print publishers confront the reality that their center of gravity needs to shift to digital (let’s leave aside for a moment the critical question of how long it will take), the overwhelming evidence is that the only way for the online business to become self-sufficient — and ultimately carry the whole business — is to free it from being the bastard stepchild of the print business, blogs Scott Karp. [more..]

Clinton is going web-crazy yet again, registering two domain names for sites with Obama solely in its crosshairs [more..]

To wrap up the 2007 Year in Games, and forecast trends for 2008, we sat down with one of the industry’s biggest authorities, Joseph Olin, President of the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences [more..]

New York - Viacom's MTV on Thursday announced that it has recruited 51 citizen journalists to cover the 2008 elections from a youth perspective, and tailor their reports for mobile devices. [more..]

Madrid, Spain - MP2P Technologies has announced the launch of Omemo, a peer-to-peer file-sharing service that stores files on a virtual hard drive online. [more..]

San Antonio, Texas - AT&T announced on Thursday that the ringtone for "Party Like a Rockstar," by Shop Boyz, was the top-selling ringtone on its network this year. [more..]

Santa Monica, Calif. - Jacked, a developer of Web-based interactive TV software for the sports market, this week extended its deal with NBC, and will now power NBCSports.com's Play Action for "Sunday Night Football" broadcasts. [more..]

Sunnyvale, Calif. - Yahoo announced that it has signed a deal with America Movil, a large wireless services provider in Latin America, to provide mobile search and other services for 143 million America Movil customers across 16 countries. [more..]

Basking Ridge, N.J. - Verizon Wireless on Thursday announced that it acquired exclusive rights to distribute the mobile version of Activision's "Guitar Hero III," developed by Hands-On Mobile, to its subscribers. [more..]

Moscow - European video game publisher 1C Company announced on Thursday that it has acquired Russian game developer Ino-Co. [more..]