ReadWriteWeb

Google just announced that it has started to integrate some of the research that makes Google Squared work into its core search engine. When you perform searches that have factual answers like [empire state height], Google will now highlight the answer to this question in the search results. If you are looking for the height of the Empire State Building, for example, the search engine will now display a snippet from the site that highlights the answer to this question.

Home and Garden TV just announced that it has signed Heather Armstrong, author of hyper-popular early blog Dooce.com, to collaborate on unspecified "convergence media" projects.

The millions of readers who have followed Armstrong on her nine-year journey as an ex-Mormon mom who got fired for the contents of her blog and then made that blog an international phenomenon will no doubt be excited to see what she does with the TV network. Armstrong is a designer by training.

As news of more aftershocks hitting the already devastated Haitian capital of Port-au-Prince keep coming in, YouTube and a laundry list of other web sites have announced that tonight's "Hope for Haiti Now" benefit concert will be broadcast live on the Internet.

According to an AFP report, the Google-owned company will be joined by Hulu, MySpace, Fancast, AOL, MSN, Yahoo!, Bing.com, BET.com, MTV.com, CNN.com, VH1.com and Rhapsody.

The Russian cop who went on YouTube and alleged rampant corruption throughout the police force has been arrested on fraud charges today, according to the Associated Press. We first reported on his story in November, when the videos first appears, and then again in December when the fraud charges were filed against him.

According to the AP report, Russian courts sanctioned his arrest today on charges of embezzling $800 while working as a narcotics officer.

While we recently reported that Google's Nexus One had a slow start coming out of the gate, the Android operating system, which is spread across a number of devices, is not having the same issues. A report by Myxer, a mobile entertainment company with over 30 million members, says that visits to its mobile site by Android users grew 350% in 2009, strongly outpacing the iPhone, which grew 170% during the same period.

Developer Tobias Schneider has created an interesting proof-of-concept Flash runtime that allows Flash to work on the iPhone. The project, a JavaScript with SVG called "Gordon," allows Flash files embedded in HTML to be viewed within the iPhone's web browser Safari. Although this workaround to Apple's restriction of Flash content on their ever-popular mobile device is a bit cumbersome and impractical for real-world use, it's a geeky and fun project for developers who want to run Flash on the iPhone...just so they can say that they did so.

Micello, one of the more exciting startups to debut at the most recent DEMO conference, is a mobile mapping solution that is basically "Google Maps for the indoors." Where traditional mapping services show everything in the world outside, Micello's goal is to map the world's inside spaces - places like shopping malls, convention centers, retail stores, airports, college campuses, and more. Today, the company is launching its service by way of a mobile application for the iPhone and iPod Touch.

Earlier this month IBM CEO Sam Palmisano gave a speech in London, in which he discussed IBM's products and services in the Internet of Things. He also outlined what IBM sees as emerging opportunities for "smart systems" over the coming decade. It was a significant speech, given that IBM has been probably the leading large tech company promoting the Internet of Things up till now.

When you consider that trillions of sensors will be deployed worldwide in the coming decade and the interest in Internet of Things from such high-ranking officials as China's Premier, IBM's use cases so far and its evolving strategy is definitely worth taking note of.

WordPress, the popular, open-source CMS/blogging software loved the world around, has just welcomed another addition to its homonymous family.

WordPress founder and Automattic founder Matt Mullenweg has just announced that his nonprofit, charitable foundation is officially an open shop. The WordPress Foundation is an organization dedicated to supporting and promoting the very mission of WordPress itself. Simply put, as on the Foundation website: "to democratize publishing through Open Source, GPL software." Everybody dance!

It's often said these days that Google and Facebook are major rivals, but how could that be if one is in search and the other, social networking? Traffic analyst firm Hitwise provided one very clear clue tonight when it published new numbers for web user activity in Australia. For perhaps the first time ever, social networking sites have surpassed the traffic search engines receive, Hitwise says. There is reason to question the company's categorization of web traffic, but the trend is worth examining none the less.

Social networking climbed fast this year, and Hitwise says it just peaked over search for a few days during the communication frenzy of Christmas. Take that, Larry and Sergey - Mark and Ev are right behind you.