Is Google+ Planning to Support Pseudonyms? Battle over Names Continues within Google

Google appears to be working on allowing pseudonyms and pen names on Google+ that can be verified and would likely roll out this support at the same time as business names, according to a Google source in contact with a Dutch developer involved in the "nymwars."

In his Google+ post, Stephen R. van den Berg summarized the source, whom he is certain is a Google employee, as follows:

"One of the reasons it has not been rolled out yet is that there is a difference in rights between rights to carry a business name, or to carry a private name...

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S&P Explains Its GOOG Downgrade, James Altucher on Why S&P Is Wrong

Following Google's [NASDAQ: GOOG] $12.5B bid for Motorola Mobility [NYSE: MMI] on Monday, Standard & Poor's downgraded its opinion of Google from buy to sell on Tuesday and cut its 12-month target price to $500 from $700. S&P today released a 1000+-word explanation that boils down to its doubt that the patent acquisition will protect Google's Android.

"At best, we see a lot of uncertainties. At worst, we see many problems for Google and Android," wrote analyst Scott Kessler.

Google shares have dropped 13% since Monday compared to about 7% for the Nasdaq.

The acquisition is primarily about protecting Google's Android franchise with Motorola's patent portfolio, said to contain some 7,500 pending and 17K patents (and Motorola is known for aggressively defending its portfolio). Oracle is suing Google and its Android franchise for alleged patent infringement, and Apple has sued Samsung, targeting its Samsung Galaxy tablet, which runs on the Android platform and is...

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See in 30 Seconds How the Music Industry Changed over 30 Years (Awesome Infographic)

Who knew animated pie charts could kick ass? Digital Music News shows you how the LP/EP and cassette market (1980s) gave way to CDs (1990s) which gave way to digital formats (2000s) with 30 seconds of pie charts. As recently as 1999, CDs were 88% of the U.S. music market -- that figure dropped to 49% in 2010. In 1980, the pie was split between...

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Daily Signups for Second Life Grow 60% under New CEO; Tablet Version Planned

[ Rod Humble photo from video of Second Life Community Convention 2011. ]

After long-time video game executive Rodvik Humble joined Linden Labs as CEO in January, Second Life experienced its most financially successful quarter in Q1 2011 -- the company is not disclosing the amount -- and is currently averaging 16K new signups per day, compared to roughly 10K in December 2010, or 60% growth [ see our previous story on Second Life - Report: Second Life Making $100M a Year ].

"It's very rare that you get a service that has grown as long as Second Life has that enjoys continued interest in it," Rod told LAUNCH. He left Electronic Arts, where he headed the division that includes "The Sims," for the Second Life gig. Before EA he headed up development for the massively multiplayer online game (MMOG) "EverQuest."

He told the Second Life Community Convention last weekend that the company will launch a "light" version, separate from Second Life, designed for tablets. Surprisingly, Linden Labs has been slow to...

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Our Favorite Companies from 500 Startups Demo Day

We profiled the summer batch of 500 Startups companies, then we watched 30 pitches and live-blogged it all. We were impressed with the whole class [ see the complete list here ], but if we each had to pick just one...share your favorite in the comments below or tweet @LAUNCH.

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