Combined with Web sales on Thanksgiving the previous day, the figure rose 2 percent, but sales are down 4 percent to date in November from a year ago, comScore said. The firm has forecast total web holiday sales to be flat this year at $29.2 billion, compared with a 19 percent rise in 2007.

Retailers and their investors are closely watching results from the weekend's sales as consumers cut spending in a shrinking U.S. economy.

Store sales rose 3 percent on Black Friday, according to ShopperTrak, which measures customer traffic.

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Web holiday sales are still expected to see their heaviest day on Monday, when consumers make purchases online at the office to take advantage of better Internet connections, comScore said.

According to a new study, human nature prevails when it comes to searching for health-related information, with users often jumping to conclusions and assuming the worst.

Microsoft researchers Ryen White and Eric Horvitz said their investigation of online medical search behavior found that it can often lead to "cyberchondria," an eight-year-old term describing the online equivalent of hypochondria, a psychological ailment in which people view minor medical symptoms as evidence of a serious illness.

"We use the term 'cyberchondria' to refer to the unfounded escalation of concerns about common symptoms based on the review of search results," the researchers wrote. "The Web has the potential to increase the anxieties of people who have little or no medical training, especially when Web search is employed as a diagnostic procedure."

With the Internet already a daily tool used at home and at work, both on PCs and on mobile smartphone devices, it's not surprising that consumers are relying on it for their even most private research needs. A recent study revealed over 50 percent of mobile workers surveyed said it would be easier to go without a car for a week than relinquish Internet access.

In their report, White and Horvitz said the Web is "fertile ground" for those suffering from hypochondria, since it enables surfers to conduct detailed investigations into perceived conditions.

As a result, hypochondria-prone users' concerns about common health symptoms -- think "headache" and "heartburn" -- quickly ramp up to Web queries on serious illnesses -- think "brain tumor" and "heart attack".

"We found that escalation is potentially related to the amount and distribution of medical content viewed by users, the presence of escalatory terminology in pages visited and a user’s predisposition to escalate or seek more reasonable explanations for ailments," White and Eric Horvitz wrote.

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According to the report, information gleamed in healthcare-related searches can also affect a person's decision on when to reach out to a medical expert, as well as a person's approach to maintaining health.

"Information drawn from the Web can influence how people reflect and make decisions about their health and wellbeing, including the attention they seek from healthcare professionals, and behaviors with regard to diet, exercise, and preventative, proactive health activities," the authors wrote.

The study was conducted as part of an ongoing project to enhance Microsoft's search engine, the company said.

Despite the findings, searchers shouldn't dismiss using the Internet at all for their medical questions, the researchers said.

"Our findings suggest that there is inappropriate escalatory risk associated with using general Web search to support differential diagnosis, and that more valuable information may come via search within expert medical sites," White and Eric Horvitz wrote.

Print publications are dying left and right. The latest examples are US News & World Report and The Christian Science Monitor, which have thrown in the towel on their print editions. Forbes magazine just merged its print and online divisions, resulting in 43 more journalists looking for work. Happy holidays.

Likewise, the tech industry is working through some wrenching change, some more than others in the difficult economy.

Take Sun Microsystems (NASDAQ: JAVA), which recently announced that it would cut its workforce by 6,000 people, or 15 to 18 percent. The company hopes its restructuring plan will save $700 million to $800 million annually. Is it enough to stay the course or does Sun need a buyer?

The Problem With its Parts

One of the problems with Sun's continued slide is that its UltraSPARC line of chips is falling out of favor and there's little the company can do to reverse this. The competing x86 architecture (define) has found new life with the successful jump to 64-bit computing systems, and enterprises tend to stay with a commodity platform such as x86 over one built by a single vendor.

Think about this: Intel is crowing about its new chip that does two threads per each of its four cores, while Sun has a chip that does eight threads per core and has eight cores. The benchmarks for its new T5440 are incredible. Intel can't come close.

But perception is everything. Sun may make good hardware but it's an x86 world, even if x86 servers can't match UltraSPARC for performance. Meanwhile, IBM is holding onto a nice piece of the high-end server pie with its Power line, and HP has its Itanium products; there is just only so much room for non-x86 platforms. Quarter after quarter, Gartner and IDC report server stats that show that Sun is selling hardware to a shrinking customer base, which is migrating to IBM or HP.

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Since Sun's most recent quarterly loss $1.7 billion, speculation is ramping up about whether parts of the company may be sold off to save it.

Industry watchers doubt that board members of Sun would let the company be carved up like a Thanksgiving day turkey. They may have no choice.

Reuters reported that Southeastern Asset Management, which holds 20 percent of Sun's shares, might go around Sun's board of directors and talk to "third parties" about alternatives.

Sizing up the prospects

Fujitsu's name gets thrown around the most as a potential buyer because of the lengthy partnership between the two firms.

IBM? It really doesn't need Sun and is doing fine converting Sun customers to its hardware as fast as it can. Buying Sun would net it Java, but IBM has nearly taken it over already.

As for HP, that firm is transitioning off its RISC chip, the PA-RISC. All those engineers are now with Intel, working on the Itanium server lines and competing with UltraSPARC. Dell doesn't appear suited for big acquisitions right now, unless the betting is on an SGI purchase.

So how about EMC (NYSE: EMC)? The company, considered the first name in storage with an aggressive acquisition history, appears to be a partial match.

EMC specializes in network-attached storage (NAS) and storage area networks (SAN), while Sun's StorageTek line specializes in tape-based storage. Granted, EMC doesn't like tape storage, but it can't ignore the market for tape storage, either.

Also, Sun possess plenty of other technologies that have been brought to bear in the storage market. The Sun Fire X4500 server, a.k.a. Thumper, combines a Sun server running Opteron chips, the Solaris operating system and ZFS file system.

Server performance is becoming an issue, as Oracle pointed out with its HP-built Exadata database servers. A plain old server just doesn't work any more. Servers need a little software and hardware assistance to move data at a faster rate. So vendors are now building accelerated servers to improve throughput. This could be a compelling combination for EMC to ponder in Sun.

With its own technologies combined with the Niagara 2 chip, Solaris and ZFS, EMC could come back with a product line that could challenge the HP's systems. Sun technologies could also augment the new EMC line of cloud storage systems called Atmos, as those clearly could use some kind of intelligence and computing power.

Then there's the software side. The potential of EMC and Java is huge, given EMC's efforts to move into a more software-oriented strategy -- from RSA security to database replication, content management, backup and recovery. Java's server-side strengths could fit this strategy well.

Then there is the potential match with VMware, such as putting the Java Virtual Machine (define) in the same layer as the virtual machine layer, which leads to the possibility of controlling Java apps across all the virtualized systems from a single layer and single VM; thus, the virtual server knows what all of the apps are up to.

Databases are rarely virtualized, but with MySQL in-house, EMC could find a way to make at least one database much more suitable to virtualization. The competitive advantage there would again put EMC in a unique position.

There is one big snag to this EMC/Sun theory. EMC has displayed no interest in the open source movement, while Sun has embraced it in a big way.

This could prove a no-win situation if EMC picks up Sun and open source advocates demand that it open source other products -- especially if GPL-licensed (define) products start mixing with EMC software. If EMC balks, it could wreck the goodwill Sun has built over the last few years. Then again, goodwill doesn't pay the bills.

Plus, the cultures between the two could lead to some real problems. Joe Tucci is as no-nonsense as they come, and his gruff nature permeates the staff of EMC. That's led to clashes with VMware, and could cause problems with the laid back culture of Sun.

But looking up and down the EMC product lines, it's clear they offer the best chance for Sun's products to not only live on, but to thrive and offer customers more innovative choices.

Andy Patrizio is a senior editor for InternetNews.com based in the San Francisco bureau.

Some, including a blogger named Vinu, were furiously uploading photos of damage from the attacks that killed at least 101 people and injured 287, with scores of foreigners, including Westerners trapped in luxury hotels.

Images of the attacks also surfaced on photo-sharing website Flickr.

Some bloggers provided running descriptions and commentaries from near the action, while others vented emotions.

"I've been tweeting almost all night, too, from Mumbai. Upset and angry and bereft," said businesswoman Dina Mehta on her blog, www.dinamehta.com/blog .

Twitter, the wildly popular "micro-blogging" site where users communicate with short "tweets" of 140 characters or less, saw intense activity on Thursday.

Within five seconds at 0748 GMT, 80 messages were posted. Posts included offers of help for the media and updates on the situation.

"One terrorist has jumped from Nariman house building to Chabad house - group of police commandos have arrived on scene," one tweeter wrote.

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Twitter came in for some criticism as well in the blogosphere for divulging too many details that could prove helpful to the gunmen holed up in the hotels with their hostages and who may have been monitoring blog sites.

"It's a terrorist strike. Not entertainment. So tweeters, please be responsible with your tweets," said one blogger identified as primaveron@mumbai.

Several local Indian news channels were reported to have carried a live feed of the twitter updates on the Mumbai attacks.

Trying to aid India's weak public services, Mumbai Met Blog, http://www.mumbai.metblogs.com posted the telephone numbers of hospitals on its site, encouraging readers to donate blood.

Blogs such as Mumbai Help mumbaihelp.blogspot.com, offered advice to those with friends and family in the city. "Suggest you avoid calling. Lines are bound to be screwed."

New media analyst Cherian George said events such as the Mumbai attacks and the London bombings have spotlighted the emergence of citizen journalism and user-generated content.

"If the event is highly dispersed and affects very large numbers of people, it would be physically impossible for a very large news organization to keep track of every development," George said.

"Those kind of events show the great potential for all these user accounts to be valuable to the mainstream media," he said.

For those of you that aren't celebrating Thanksgiving, or have had enough quality time with your family, here are a few things you might find interesting:

* If you haven't checked it out lately, I suggest looking over the articles in our Search 101 section. It's been updated with articles covering the basics of search engine optimization, search advertising, and several other topics. Keep an eye on that section, as it will continue to be updated on a regular basis.

* We've been collecting quite the archive of Search Engine Marketing Webcasts. We've got one-hour presentations with Q&A available on demand on topics from Holiday PPC campaigns to search trends, to Profitable PPC fundamentals. You can also sign up for upcoming webcasts, including one next week on Advanced Keyword Research.

* Catch up with other Thanksgiving refugees on the Search Engine Watch Forums, or browse the archives to find the best advice on a range of search marketing topics.

* Head on over to Facebook to join the SearchEngineWatch Facebook Group or the Search Engine Strategies Facebook Group. Or check out our LinkedIn Groups for Search Engine Watch, SearchEngineWatch.com Forums, or Search Engine Strategies Conference & Expo.

We'll be back on Monday with plenty of new Experts columns, blog posts, and more. Have a happy Thanksgiving!

Bell Canada Enterprise (BCE) has revealed that its plans to be acquired may not pass muster on a key provision after its auditing firm KPMG said it does not believe that BCE will pass a required solvency test for the deal to be completed.

The deal, valued at US $48.5 billion when it was announced in July of 2007, was set to close on December 11th. The acquisition would take the company private and off the Toronto and New York Stock Exchanges.

BCE was set to be acquired by a consortium of investment firms led by the Ontario Teachers Pension Plan, Providence Equity Partners, Madison Dearborn Partners, LLC and Merrill Lynch Global Private Equity.

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"We are disappointed with KPMG's preliminary view of post-transaction solvency, which is based on numerous assumptions and methodologies that we are currently reviewing," Siim Vanaselja, BCE's CFO, said in a statement. "The company disagrees that the addition of the LBO [leveraged buyout] debt would result in BCE not meeting the technical solvency definition."

BCE is a Canadian Telecom giant, with phone, internet, wireless, Satellite TV and media holdings, including CTV and The Globe and Mail newspaper.

KPMG's concern is that the indebtedness involved in the LBO financing agreement, based on current market conditions, would violate terms of the privatization agreement that call for financial solvency.

The investor group that is acquiring BCE, now called BCE Acquisition, issued its own statement on the solvency issue.

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"The delivery of the solvency opinion is a condition to the completion of the acquisition of BCE," according to BCE Acquisition. "The purchaser has been working closely with BCE to take the actions required by the definitive agreement in connection with the transaction and will continue to fulfill its obligations under the terms of the agreement."

For its part, Bell noted in a release that it is still working with KPMG and its investors to try and satisfy the closing conditions for the deal. However Bell is clear that if KMPG does not revise its opinion by December 11 then the deal will not likely proceed.

Andrew Willis, in a blog post for the Globe and Mail, speculated that, if the deal falls through, BCE is likely to engage in a share buyback program to placate shareholders.

"If the KPMG decision stands, and it likely will, Mr. Cope and his crew will quickly move to life without a buyout," Willis wrote." The team, and the board, have prudently prepared for this day. BCE is flush with cash after selling divisions such as Telesat and suspending quarterly dividends"

Bell's CEO also touted the financial resources of his company, despite the KPMG audit.

In a statement, George Cope, president and CEO of BCE, said "BCE today enjoys solid investment grade credit ratings, has $2.8 billion of cash on hand, a low level of mid-term debt maturities, and continues to deliver solid operating results."

Answer: They are both fighting crime. Up until now, Walsh, who is also co-founder of the Center for Missing and Exploited Children, focused on criminals in the physical world. Now, by teaming up with CA, (NASDAQ: CA) he is going after cybercriminals.

Walsh will become the public face for CA's Internet Security products and education program, which earlier this week unveiled the latest version of CA's consumer anti-malware product, the Internet Security Suite Plus 2009.

"CA looks forward to working with John Walsh to promote consumer awareness and keep predators and fraudsters away from our children and families," Brian Grayek, vice president of product management for CA's Internet Security Business Unit, told InternetNews.com by e-mail.

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The move is not as odd as it appears. "CA targets this primarily to consumers, not businesses, and in that context, using John Walsh as a spokesperson isn't so odd," noted Jonathan Penn, vice president at analyst firm Forrester Research. "He's well recognized by the public as a trusty individual."

CA Internet Security Suite Plus 2009 covers up to five PCs with one license, and Grayek said it has better parental controls than offerings from the two giants in consumer anti-malware – Symantec and McAfee.

It includes a personal firewall, antivirus, anti-spyware, anti-spam and anti-phishing capabilities. It also helps users back up and restore data and PC settings or transfer them to a new PC.

CA's suite also has an automatic full screen gaming/movie mode, which prevents pop-ups and notifications when the computer is viewing anything in full screen mode, Grayek said. He also claimed CA is the only major consumer security product to include support for the new Domain Key Internet Mail (DKIM) standard.

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DKIM uses cryptographic authentication to validate the domain from which a message is being received, thus keeping out spam and helping prevent phishing attacks.

Silent running

In addition, CA has added what it calls silent protection, a feature that automatically analyzes a program's behavior and determines whether that program should be allowed or denied access to the user's computer.

CA Internet Security Suite Plus 2009 automatically detects updates and alerts users, and customers will get free upgrades, daily protection updates and 24 x 7 online technical support.

Finally, CA offers buyers of the Internet Security Suite Plus 2009 a total of up to $10,000 in identity theft coverage and coverage against damage to their computers caused by a computer virus.

The identity theft coverage safeguards data on one PC with Mobile Lifeline software, with identity theft protection worth up to $5,000 if the customer's identity is compromised.

If a virus infection takes out up to five PCs after CA Internet Security Suite Plus 2009 is properly installed, the customer is eligible for a total of up to $5,000 in technical service and/or hardware or replacement.

CA Internet Security Suite Plus 2009 runs on Windows 2000 Professional with SP4+Update Rollup 1, Windows XP and Windows XP Media Center Edition with SP2, and Windows Vista. The product is priced at $79.99 for one year's subscription to cover up to five PCs.

Millions of miles above us, a new networking technology is taking shape that could one day help improve how applications are networked on Earth.

NASA is testing a network layer technology that can withstand the rigorous demands of space communication better than the standard TCP/IP (define) protocol, which dominates terrestrial (non-space) networking technologies.

Officially called Disruption Tolerant Networking (DTN), the technology went through testing earlier this month with a space probe that is currently more than 20 million miles from Earth.

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DTN uses a different kind of approach than TCP/IP for packet delivery that is less cumbersome and more resilient to disruption than TCP/IP.

"In fact, far more research has been done to date on the application of DTN to terrestrial communication problems than on its use in space flight missions," said Scott Burleigh, a senior engineer for the Deep Impact Networking Experiment of NASA's JPL (Jet Propulsion Lab). "DTN has potential benefits in providing connectivity to parts of the world that are under-served by existing network infrastructure, in supporting oceanographic research, in tactical military communications, and more," he told InternetNews.com. "It's a pretty active field."

The basic idea behind DTN network endpoints aren't always continuously connected. In order to facilitate data transfer, DTN uses a store-and-forward approach across routers that is more disruption-tolerant than TCP/IP. However, the DTN approach doesn't necessarily mean that all DTN routers on a network would require large storage capacity in order to maintain end-to-end data integrity.

"It's always possible to have a DTN router that happens to be in constant communication with all of its neighbors over links on which round-trip times are very short, in which case very little storage would be needed," Burleigh explained. "All the bundles it received would immediately be forwarded, much as in an Internet router."

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If a DTN router is required to hold onto data for some length of time, then it would need some place to park that data. The amount of storage needed would depend on the difference between the incoming and outgoing data rates and the maximum length of time that the former may exceed the latter.

In terms of network addressing for DTN, NASA is using an overlay technology that could include IPv4 or IPv6 address spaces. Burleigh explained that DTN is based on a new protocol named Bundle Protocol (BP; RFC 5050). Bundle protocol operates as an overlay protocol that links together multiple subnets (such as Ethernet-based LANs) into a single network.

"BP is an overlay protocol that can link together multiple networks, some of which might be IPv4-based or IPv6-based, but some of which might be much less familiar networks such as sets of deep space links," Burleigh said.

The regular Internet uses DNS (domain name servers) (define) to connect domain names to IP addresses. For now there is no similar DNS system for space-based traffic. Burleigh noted that DNS is not an issue for NASA right now since the number of different devices isn't yet so large that referring to them by number rather than by name is a problem. For potential non-space DTN applications Burleigh claimed the current Internet DNS could be used.

"Eventually there may additionally be a requirement for some sort of native DTN endpoint ID directory service, but we don't yet know exactly what that service would have to do or how it would have to function," Burleigh said.

NASA already has its own Deep Space Network for communicating with its fleet of spacecraft spread across our solar system. With DTN, the core technologies that NASA is currently using at the lower levels of the communications stack will remain the same.

Burleigh noted that at the physical data link layer NASA is still using radio transmission and reception via the big tracking stations of the Deep Space Network. The difference with DTN is at higher layers.

"This is the first time we've operated a network-layer protocol on a deep-space spacecraft, so it's the first time we've been able to use the spacecraft as an automated router in deep space," Burleigh said. "The Mars Exploration Rovers send data to Earth by relay through the Odyssey orbiter, but that relay operation is all manually commanded. The DTN software would do the same thing automatically and would at the same time be more flexible and efficient."

Next page: An End to Chatty, Earthbound Networks?

A good example is Google's newly updated Mobile App for Apple's iPhone, which has been generating a lot of buzz for one main reason: voice search.

Want to find the nearest pizza place, showtimes for the James Bond movie "Quantum of Solace," or the latest Bruce Springsteen video? Google (NASDAQ: GOOG) voice search is uncannily accurate.

But it has obvious limitations, particularly with names. Say "Barack Obama" and you get a full page of data. Try "Emile Zatopek," the famed Czech distance runner? Forget about it.

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Of course, there are many applications available for download on all sorts of mobile phones, but touchscreen devices have emerged as consumer favorites.

While the mobile app race is still in its infancy, the iPhone is already well ahead of rivals such as Research in Motion's BlackBerry and T-Mobile's G1, which features Google's Android operating system.

But competition is going to get more intense. RIM's touch-screen Storm was launched last week, although its app store won't open until next year. The Android app store opened for business last month but so far hasn't generated nearly the momentum of the iPhone app store, which went live in July.

In the first two months, iPhone users downloaded 100 million apps, choosing from among thousands of options. The programs, the vast majority offered by third-party developers under the watchful eye of Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL), run the gamut from utterly frivolous time-wasters to the surprisingly useful.

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In addition, many handy iPhone apps are available for free, not a small consideration in these troubled economic times.

For foodies, eco-conscious, music lovers

The free Shazam mobile app is now available on the Android platform, following its successful debut on the iPhone. The program has developed a devoted following among music lovers as it seeks to solve the age-old question: "What is the name of that song?"

If you hear a song playing -- on the radio, or blasting from a car stereo -- and want to know more, launch Shazam and the program will capture the song, check it against its database and display the song information.

Another popular free app for the iPhone is offered by UrbanSpoon, which features user-generated restaurant reviews, but with a twist. If you feel like trying something new, just punch in your criteria, shake your iPhone, and UrbanSpoon will pick a restaurant for you.

The clever interface looks like a slot machine, and is a good way to break out of a food rut.

Ever been at the supermarket and found yourself wondering how safe or green a certain product might be? The free GoodGuide app -- still an iPhone-only offering -- features ratings on more than 60,000 household and personal use products.

Just punch in the product name and GoodGuide gives you a ranking based on environmental safety, impact and labor policy.

Consumers can expect to see many more mobile apps in the coming months, as the sheer creativity of small, third-party software developers should keep the market buzzing for some time.

Matt Poepsel, vice president of Gomez, Inc., whose services test and monitor the performance of websites says that the increase of non-Internet Explorer browsers could cause some e-tailers grief.

"This year more than ever, websites can look and function differently from one browser to another. Online retailers can no longer assume that all shoppers are using Internet Explorer. They must ensure their sites look good and work well across a wide range of browsers - or risk frustrating customers and losing the sale."