Youtube and CNN had teamed up in the past for presidential debates but there were problems with the format. The problem was that CNN producers hand-picked many of the questions for the debate and were criticized widely for their choices.

Some of the choices were silly questions posed to Hillary Clinton or a talking snowman named Billiam on Youtube asking questions which took away from the gravity and credibility of the format. This time around things will be a bit different but could be just as interesting.

Through the Fox Youtube channel, people will be able to vote up questions that they want to be asked during the debate. This democratic and social process may be more palatable to not only the candidates who had done their fair share of complaining but the audience in general, since this an audience participation format without the interference (presumably) from the staff at Fox News.

So, if you want to produce a video question that has the potential to go viral if shown during the debates, now is the time to start planning.

Microsoft announced several months back that this would be happening and to their credit they are giving us until the end of October to make the switch, which is plenty of time.

According to the email I received:

• If you already have a Yahoo! Search Marketing account: Sign in to your Yahoo! Search Marketing account, and click the adCenter tab to begin transitioning your campaigns into adCenter.
• If you don’t have a Yahoo! Search Marketing account: Prepare your campaigns for Yahoo! Search and Bing. Use Microsoft Advertising Intelligence to update your keyword list based on the actual queries that searchers are using on Bing, and tailor your bidding strategies by looking at performance indicators like clicks, impressions, position, click-through rate, and cost per click.

Now, however if you don’t currently have any ads running in Yahoo and already have a Microsoft Adcenter account setup, you’re in business. Microsoft is doing this before the holiday season which is a bonus as advertisers won’t want the headache (and potential lost revenue) of making a move during the holidays.

As a backup (or back out) plan Microsoft says that if the transition does not go as planned they will delay full integration until January 2011.

According to Google, however, this update is not an algorithm change. Caffeine is able to find, index and rank newsworthy pages plus other new pages more quickly than before. Non-competitive pages that a person had to wait weeks to show up in the rankings before are now fast-tracked through the system at a much faster pace.

The Mountain View, CA search giant says that this architectural change is basically in the crawling and handling of data. There is not as much “page chewing” as before as the new “decision engine” (sorry Bing) has decided on fast digestion of data and delivery of results.

Google Caffeine will not only be a wakeup call to website owners but to the other search engines (you know who you are) that are struggling to deliver results in a timely manner.

According to the Official Google Blog, “This incident highlights just how publicly accessible open, non-password-protected WiFi networks are today. Earlier this year, we encrypted Gmail for all our users, and next week we will start offering an encrypted version of Google Search. For other services users can check that pages are encrypted by looking to see whether the URL begins with “https”, rather than just “http”; browsers will generally show a lock icon when the connection is secure.”

Google has been encrypting all sorts of data for a while now, including Gmail, Google Calendar and Google Talk to name a few. This privacy and security breach in Ireland was due to a little snippet of code that a programmer put in back in 2006, when Street View was first being tested.

At least now there is a solution and the world’s largest search engine is moving quickly not only to correct this problem but to offer a more private experience in search in general.

Do you trust antitrust? In this case, yes. Not, that Google is some giant “do no evil” monster stumbling around like the Incredible Hunk in a China closet, but when one gets that big, then serious competition is needed in order to give people in general, choices.

Neither Yahoo nor Bing (MSN) has been serious contenders in the past couple of years, which have limited choices for searchers and online advertisers. Google can see the Microsoft Yahoo search alliance as a positive as well.

No more whining about how Google is being unfair by being too good at what they do. Now Microsoft will have access to Yahoo’s vast databases, search technology and brilliant minds that should speed up the competitive process.

But, the problem for Microsoft may in the end, not be technological, but marketing. Surveys have shown that searchers prefer the Google logo and brand to that of either of the other two companies.

Here is some more info about the search alliance between Microsoft and Yahoo that will explain the goals and benefits of such collaboration.

But, websites can also have security breaches and this can be aided by the info on your PC. Storing cookies, history, IP addresses, logons and passwords in your email software and FTP software can also open a door for these breaches.

So, as an experiment I decided to use Internet Explorer’s InPrivate Browsing feature. It can be found under the Safety tab on the toolbar. But, when I started using this feature I noticed something. That something is that Google would like to access your location.

In fact, sometimes during private browsing, which doesn’t store cookies, history, logons and passwords, a message will pop up on the Google Toolbar that states, “Google would like to access your location. The Google Toolbar will periodically use the network to keep your location up to date.” Of course on the toolbar you can allow or disallow the Google toolbar to have your IP address.

According to Google, “When My Location is active, Toolbar will automatically send local network information (including, but not limited to, visible WiFi access points) to Google Location Services in order to determine your location. This information is not tied to your Google Account, and you can disable the My Location feature at any time by clicking the My Location icon.”

The benefits of letting Google and other websites know your location are several. First, Google Maps can serve up businesses in your area and second, location specific ads can also be served up. Localize results are also a benefit of knowing the IP location.

As for other websites knowing your location, they can track statistics used to enhance their websites and your experience on their site. The downside is that not all websites are friendly and can use your geo location, cookies, history, stored logons and passwords against you.

You’ll have to decide for yourself whether or not private browsing is for you. For me, I bounce back and forth between the two and let my best judgment decide whether I would like to keep my info private or not on a website by website basis.

This is why Google Click-to-Call service is now being employed across the Adwords network for mobile devices. A person in a certain location can do a Google search and business ads will pop up in the usual Adwords spaces.

The person with the mobile phone simply has to click and their phone will dial into that business. Pretty slick, huh? The advertiser will pay the same for the call as they will for clicks on the ads from people on PC’s and laptops.

The advantage to this type of advertising is that people on cell phones, roaming around their communities or traveling to different communities can find restaurants, hotels, hardware stores, and you name it quickly and easily on the move.

Google piloted this Click-to-Call program back in 2006 in the Maps section. Recently the search giant has also rolled out Goog-411 where people can call toll free for information locally about businesses in their location.

The Google Click to Call program gives local advertisers one more method in which to reach out to potential customers who are roaming in their community right now.

Simplification and personal relevance are the keywords that Yahoo is using to describe its new offering. More relevant search, simpler photo sharing, high quality video calling for Yahoo Messenger and a new mobile Yahoo homepage are what will be leading the marketing campaign.

According to comScore Yahoo properties took second place behind Google properties in regard to unique visitors in August 2009. But, Yahoo search has dropped dramatically and Microsoft Bing has come on strong since the end of July to surpass it as the number 2 search engine.

One wonders whether Y!OU And Yahoo will be enough to keep the company growing and keep another Microsoft deal at bay? You or Y!ou’ll find out in just a few days whether the hype is all about you or not.

After the two month honeymoon phase is over, Bing search has gained a percentage point in the market from 8.23 in June to 9.41 this month. Now, this may not sound like a lot but it makes a Bing / Yahoo partnership more understandable.

Consider that last year Yahoo search was over 20-percent in market share and now its numbers are half of that. Also, consider that Google is around 77.5, so with Bing and Yahoo combining forces, there will once again be some semblance of competition.

Bing has also made significant strides in another area as well. Bing Shopping has increased 169-percent since its debut in June. Bing Shopping is now the 4th largest shopping comparison site (with Yahoo Shopping in 1st place).

And, just this week, Microsoft has announced Bing Shopping’s Double Cashback promotion. By purchasing from merchants enrolled in the Cashback promotion, Microsoft will send you a direct check.

In the Bing interface, you sign up under the Extras pull down in the top right corner and then any store that displays the Cashback logo will qualify you for a Microsoft check. Now, for years Microsoft has been lackadaisical about search.

Bill Gates a couple of years ago even commented about how Microsoft underestimated the value of search from the very beginning. But, in 2 months time, Bing has made some serious headway as a tool to search for both information and products.

It may take a while before Bing takes a ding out of Google and gives us a bang for our buck. Google followers are a loyal bunch. But, building a better mousetrap will always turn people in your direction and so let’s see in the weeks and months to come if Bing becomes such a mousetrap.

It’s so attractive in fact that Larry King is a tweeting fool as well as Barbara Wa-Wa (Walters to you and me). In fact, Twitter is now so popular that neither could get their own names on the social media site and had to opt for something less brandable.

But, the big news perhaps is that AOL is rumored to have an interest in acquiring Twitter. Now the Wall Street Journal has pooh-poohed this idea but its really not that far-fetched. Right now Twitter doesn’t monetize itself through ads, so it makes sense that someone will want a payday with this large Internet property.

Google, where are you? If anything one would think the Big G would want to spread its domination to one of the hottest social media sites for now and sometime to come.