Mountain View, Calif. - Google on Thursday introduced a new service, Google Voice, that will transcribe a user's voicemail messages into text, and email or text message the transcript to a Gmail account. [more..]

New York - A number of top music artists, including Neil Diamond, Britney Spears, Bon Jovi, Celine Dion, Billy Joel and Elton John, are partnering with Ticketmaster to sell some premium tickets to their concerts on a secondary ticket exchange for hundreds of dollars more than face value, The Wall Street Journal reported. [more..]

New York - Despite losing $18 billion in the plunging stock market, Microsoft founder Bill Gates leapfrogged financier Warren Buffett to claim the top spot in Forbes' newly released list of the richest people in the world. [more..]

New York - Worlds.com, a developer of virtual worlds and holder of various patents on related technologies, said it plans to filed patent claims against "World of Warcraft" publisher Activision Blizzard and "Second Life" creator Linden Labs, should it succeed in a current case against NCsoft, Silicon Alley Insider reported. [more..]

Auckland, New Zealand - The New Zealand government's request that ISPs and copyright holders negotiate a "three-strikes" policy to disconnect repeat file-swappers has run into trouble, as TelstraClear now says the practice is unfair and will not participate, Ars Technica reported. [more..]

Washington - Days after narrowly averting bankruptcy, satellite radio provider Sirius XM said on Thursday that it will try to boost its subscriber base by offering its services to owners of Apple's iPhone and iPod touch devices beginning this spring. [more..]

Sunnyvale, Calif. - Harmonic, a provider of broadcast and on-demand video delivery technology, said on Thursday that it has acquired Israel's Scopus Video Networks, a maker of digital video networking products, in a deal valued at $50 million. [more..]

Heather Hopkins: What can clickstream data tell us about how people are using Twitter and how does that compare to email, Facebook and search engines? [more..]

Los Angeles - In letters to Congress expressing their support for the proposed merger of concert promoter Live Nation and Ticketmaster, several high-profile artists neglected to mention that they are represented or co-managed by Irving Azoff, the founder of Front Line Management who also recently became CEO of Ticketmaster, Hypebot reported. [more..]

Cupertino, Calif. - Apple has introduced version 8.1 of its iTunes jukebox application, and an update to its complementary Remote application for the iPhone and iPod touch includes a new feature that lets anyone with an iPhone make requests for songs they would like to hear on "Party Shuffle," now dubbed "iTunes DJ." [more..]

Los Angeles - Hulu, the online video joint venture between News Corp. and NBC Universal that is celebrating its one-year anniversary, has introduced a number of social networking features to the site. [more..]

Ft. Lauderdale, Fla. - CBSSports.com on Thursday announced the release of an application for Apple's iPhone and iPod touch that will offer live streaming video and audio of the 2009 NCAA Men's Basketball Championship. [more..]

Utrecht, the Netherlands - Mininova, a BitTorrent file-sharing search engine that claims 17 million daily page views, earned nearly $1.3 million in 2007, Ars Technica reported, citing a filing with the Netherlands Chamber of Commerce. [more..]

Tokyo - Nintendo has now sold more than 100 million DS handheld game systems since launching the device in November 2004. [more..]