Wednesday 8am Silicon Valley news report:

What if the new name for Microsoft Live Search is ... Yahoo? -ZDNet

Microsoft quietly registered a limited liability company (LLC) last week, which points to the company being poised to make an acquisition or joint venture.

Online news fees: financial salvation or suicide? -AP

A recent study that the Newspaper Association of America conducted with media consultants supported the idea that online newspaper fees threaten to do more harm than good. The reason: The subscriptions probably won't generate enough additional revenue to justify driving away the majority of Internet readers who won't be willing to ante up.

Twitter eyes foray into TV -Reuters

The social-networking and micro-blogging service is developing the first TV series that incorporates Twitter into the action of the show.

Apple iTunes may hit more markets with French moves -Reuters

Acknowledging the difficulties faced by online stores, the executive European Commission said music licensing practices and the current copyright framework limited what consumers could buy on the Internet.

Music industry pushed to open up online rights across Europe -SiliconValley.com

Part of the problem in Europe is that music rights are sold separately in each country, which has prevented Apple's iTunes from setting up a single store to service all of Europe. Instead, it has to seek licenses from each EU member state where it wishes to sell and to set up separate national stores with different music selections.

Yahoo Image Search: Now With Creative Commons -ReadWriteWeb

Yahoo Image Search got a nice update today that allows users to filter search results by Creative Commons (CC) license.
For now, this search only includes CC-licensed images from Flickr, Yahoo's own photo sharing service.

Apple Softens Replacement Policy for Moisture-Damaged iPhones -GigaOm

...according to a recent report by a local Houston news station, many users are finding that even just the moisture from their hands are causing iPhones to malfunction, and the immersion sensors in the devices to trip, which means Apple wouldn’t replace the devices, even if they’re under warranty.

Intel’s Odd Role as a Lead Linux Promoter -NYTimes

“Our current desktop didn’t have the right design principles for mobile computing,” said Ron Hovsepian, the chief executive of Novell. “Moblin is a bottoms-up, fresh approach at trying to do something completely different.”

Obama Set to Create A Cybersecurity Czar With Broad Mandate -WashingtonPost

The report suggests that although it is a key government responsibility to help secure private-sector networks, regulation should be the last resort, the sources said.

Hints of a Tech Gold Mine in the Stimulus Package -NYTimes

The demand for project tracking technology, fueled by the stimulus package, extends beyond the companies cited in the CivicUS research note. A startup in San Francisco, Innotas, which offers Web-based technology-project software, has seen the effect.

Last.fm Denies Data-Sharing Accusations, Again -WSJ

TechCrunch is reporting that Last.fm is going beyond sharing aggregated statistics and into the realm of sharing individual user information. Earlier this year, a tipster claimed to TechCrunch that Last.fm had given the RIAA a list of its users and their IP addresses. Last.fm denied the allegations.

Facebook's $200M investment values co. at $10B -SFGate

The latest investment, in preferred stock, does not necessarily compare with what the company's common shares would be worth on the open market. That would be determined if the company were to go public, which is likely a ways off.

Garage's hybrid approach to fixing 'green' cars -SFGate

While there are other independent garages in the area that specialize in servicing hybrids along with regular cars, such as Art's Automotive in Berkeley and Pat's Garage in San Francisco, Luscious was the first to be designed from the ground up to concentrate on just hybrids.

Texting May Be Taking a Toll -NYTimes

“Based on our experiences with computer users, we know intensive repetitive use of the upper extremities can lead to musculoskeletal disorders, so we have some reason to be concerned that too much texting could lead to temporary or permanent damage to the thumbs.”