american

Dave Desvousges has skills. Not nunchuk skills or bow hunting skills (he might, I don’t know) but mad SEO skills and a ton of entrepreneurial spirit. Turns out, he’s also the manager and agent for “international superstar” Renaldo Lapuz. Who?

If you haven’t heard of Katrina Darrell yet, she’s probably incredibly disappointed, and so are her, ahem, handlers. After all, her name is currently at the top of Google Hot Trends’ top search gainer list. She’s also known as “bikini girl,” in case you didn’t catch her name for all the, well, distraction.

Poor Yahoo.  As we all know, the company's facing quite a few problems - a shrinking stock price, a skeptical Department of Justice, and so on - and now it's been made the defendant in a trademark infringement case filed by American Airlines.

A group called the American Antitrust Institute is probably the last thing Google or Yahoo wanted sticking its nose into their search deal.  Now the AAI has done so, though, and surprisingly, it doesn't see the partnership as a completely objectionable proposal.

The use of competitor keywords had American flying into the courtroom, but both sides taxied out with a quiet and confidential settlement.

Seems like everybody in the States is wound up pretty tight these days thanks to impending economic troubles and continuing denial at the upper crust. The bad news gets worse: A wound-up America won't be unwinding this summer.

If Internet buzz is any indication of the future—and it's not, mind you, unless Ron Paul really will get the Republican nomination—David Cook is your next American Idol. According to search metrics and questionable phone measurements, Cook edged out David Archuleta by the slimmest margin in Idol history.

Search engine optimization received no love from the credit card issuer's small business guide, which published some oddly contradictory advice about being found in places like Google or Yahoo.