UPDATE: Autoplaying video tossed after the jump. Sorry about that.

[cracked]

We asked Beth, his mom, what happened, exactly, and here's what she had to say about what went down.

My 13 year old managed to break the vacuum....thinking it would release him from that duty. He also has a list of other chores that were TYPED up for him to do Friday afternoon....one thing on the list was done...mind you these are simple things...empty the trash, clean your room, etc. Then I go thru the cookies on his computer and find out he has been checking out porn sites. Now there is a password so he can't even get on and his my-space page has a picture of snoopy on it now. Apparently I'm the meanest mom in the world, were his words.

I'm a single mom. I can't let them walk over me or I might never get up.

The score is now Beth - 1, her kid - 0. If you want to increase that score for Beth, go ahead and pick up a slightly used Xbox 360 for $250 and all of his games for $15 each, with bitterness from a 13-year-old coming along with them free of charge. [UPDATE: You guys killed Craigslist! Check out the new auction on eBay]

Sure, there have always been the badge-wearing nerds at the back of the forensics lab who knew how to "Google" things and check the "e-mail" of bigger, dumber cops. But now other officers are wising up, according to an AP story. Homicide detectives and beat cops are going online and just poking around, and the dumbasses who think they won't get caught by blabbing on their public pages are, well, getting totally nailed.

In one recent example, a detective in Newark, N.J., tracked the alleged killers of three college students by mining MySpace pages maintained by the suspects and their friends. In another, pictures and prose posted online by the killer of Taylor Behl, a 17-year-old Virginia college freshman, connected him to the victim and ended up revealing where her body was stashed.

Considering that content is still limited to an artist's page, this content sharing isn't completely open ended, even within the smallish confines of the MySpace network. Nonetheless, it's a progressive move by Sony, a company that is usually tighter with their media than a [fill in perverted orifice of choice belonging to religious position of preference]. How deals like this will tie in with rumors of Sony's upcoming distribution plan, however, are unknown. [japantoday]

According to the unconfirmed rumblings, Facebook is working on expanding their interface. Musical artists will now have special pages with integrated widgets for promoting band events. The upcoming iTunes widget will allow users to sample and even eventually buy music through Facebook (in support beyond the current iLike software). iPod owners who use Facebook will surely take glee in this new integration, but honestly, many of us avoid MySpace like the plague because it's full of a bunch of losers with crappy bands. Now all those losers with crappy bands are going to set up pages on Facebook, find their way into our networks and infiltrate our clean social networking. Not that we're paranoid or anything. [paidContent via macworld]

T-MOBILE USA AND DANGER INTRODUCE MYSPACE MOBILE FOR T-MOBILE SIDEKICK

Always-On MySpace Mobile Platform Enables Real-Time Updates and a Custom
User Interface for the T-Mobile Sidekick

BELLEVUE, WASH./ PALO ALTO, CALIF./ LOS ANGELES—Sept. 20, 2007—T-Mobile USA, Inc., Danger, Inc., and MySpace, the country's most trafficked Web site, today announced a highly integrated MySpace Mobile experience for the T-Mobile® Sidekick®. The announcement marks the first partnership between MySpace with T-Mobile and Danger.

"Sidekick users are often the hub of their circle of friends, and MySpace is the No. 1 Web site our users visit on their device," said Jeff Hopper, vice president of marketing at T-Mobile USA. "We've worked closely with MySpace and Danger to create a powerful MySpace Mobile experience that is uniquely tailored for the T-Mobile Sidekick. We think MySpace and Sidekick users are going to love having complete control over their MySpace universe right from the palm of their hand."

The MySpace Mobile software is tightly integrated with the T-Mobile Sidekick hardware, user interface, and all the applications on the device. The new MySpace Mobile for the T-Mobile Sidekick is designed to optimize the delivery of data to each user and preserve the features that MySpace users love on the PC. All aspects of the MySpace Mobile experience are tailored so users can simply navigate on the T-Mobile Sidekick screen and enjoy fast access to T-Mobile's robust wireless network.

"Innovating on our mobile platform is one of the most important initiatives for us," said Amit Kapur, vice president of business development for MySpace. "Given the high degree of MySpace and Sidekick usage overlap, we know our users will be thrilled to have this optimized experience."

MySpace Mobile for the T-Mobile Sidekick features include:

Customized User Interface (UI)
The new service has pertinent information including new messages, friend requests and comments located in one easy-to-navigate home screen. To use other aspects of the service, users simply navigate through the four main sections of the application: Home, MyMail, Blog, and Search. The Sidekick's directional pad allows users to jump easily from each activity without waiting for a page to load.

Real-time Updates
MySpace Mobile users can stay signed in to MySpace even when they are on the go with their T-Mobile Sidekick. Real-time features include:
Profile editing, which allows users to edit their MySpace profile directly from the MySpace application, quickly and easily, wherever they are. Profile updates are immediately reflected on the MySpace Web site.
Optimized photo management, which empowers users to — with the click of a button — upload photos with captions from their T-Mobile Sidekick photo galleries, directly to MySpace.
Full-featured MySpace messaging, including push content and notifications powered by the Danger service. The service automatically pushes content, such as new friend requests or new messages, to the end user, meaning that users are notified of new MySpace activity even when they are using other T-Mobile Sidekick applications. This changes the interaction paradigm from request/ response (as it is via the browser today) to real-time, push messaging.
The application will provide "Online Now" status for a user's friends who are online, further advancing the "always-on" model.
Users can read, reply to or post comments to the profiles and photos of friends, as well as read and reply to comments on their own profiles.

Iconic Sidekick design
Customers consider the T-Mobile Sidekick a social lifeline and a messaging powerhouse thanks to intuitive features such as a large color screen, full QWERTY keyboard, and a host of communications capabilities including instant messaging and Web browsing.

The MySpace Mobile service is made possible on the T-Mobile Sidekick through two components. The first component is the client software, being made available for download in a staged rollout to the T-Mobile Sidekick user base throughout the next several weeks. The second component is the service that powers the application. Danger has created a private interconnection to MySpace, whereby each user can access all of his or her account data and interact with friends in real time.

"The first phase of Danger's product evolution focused on providing a rich mobile messaging experience, as part of the overall Internet offering," said Henry R. (Hank) Nothhaft, CEO and Chairman of Danger, Inc. "The new MySpace Mobile for Sidekick showcases the next stage of our evolution, tapping directly into compelling Web-based content and real-time information services and delivering them in an uncompromised fashion to mobile consumers."

This week, T-Mobile will begin a multi-week rollout of the new application to T-Mobile Sidekick users. T-Mobile customers can access and subscribe to the service through the Download Catalog. The new service will be available to all Sidekick iD and Sidekick 3 users by the end of October. For more information about the T-Mobile Sidekick, please visit HYPERLINK "http://www.sidekick.com"www.sidekick.com.

A-Space is a social community ala Facebook that includes blogs, searchable databases and collectively editable content. Except it's classified. Because just as if the government's information on the real whereabouts of the world's terrorists was leaked to the public, it would be equally damning to know which agents were "at work," who was interested in "random play," and just how many members of our CIA have Dawson's Creek listed as a favorite TV show. It's all for our own protection, trust me. [yahoonews]

In non–YouTube news, the new MySpace Mobile 2 app is available on the Ocean now. It's much better than the old app, and actually lets you Photocast by publishing pics to your bulletin so your MySpace buddies can see. Great for up-to-date vacation pics for your co-workers to get jealous at.

Helio

Sidekick 3 and Sidekick iD users will be able to grab it, and the Sidekick Slide (a.k.a. Zante) will get this installed by default. – Jason Chen

T-Mobile FAQ Page [T-Mobile via Boy Genius Report via Crunchgear]

Good riddance, I say. I'm sure the types of people who would dick around on MySpace for two hours in a store aren't the types of people who would actually, you know, buy anything, and Apple has no responsibility to provide free Web access to the general mouth-breathing population. Just don't block Gmail, OK guys? I'll be quick, I promise. –Adam Frucci

Think Secret [via Crave]

According to Reuters, the service will be a combination of Google News and Digg, both aggregating the most popular news stories around the Web and adding "a social element to traditional news consumption by giving readers the ability to determine what becomes the top news on MySpace." In other words, in spite of there being 25 categories and 300 subcategories, it still might end up "all K-Fed, all the time." If it does, you have only the kids to blame.

Something is definitely going on. Follow the jump to see what happened when visited news.myspace.com.

By a not terribly wild guess, we determined that the URL of the new site will be news.myspace.com. This morning, the following dialog box confirmed our guess:

Keep checking that URL, because the MySpace News beta may start today. Just remember, News Corp. didn't make its name by giving people the news; it made it by selling ads. The more you participate in MySpace, the more exciting you will be to advertisers. That, according to the story, is Murdoch's main motivation. If you don't think you're being targeted, pay attention to the word "target" in the following quote:

"Many advertisers have expressed interest in the service, which allows them to target the MySpace community in a more direct way," Brian Norgard, co-founder of Newroo, a company purchased by News Corp. last year, which created MySpace News' technology, said in an interview.

Go ahead, it's okay to sell your soul. All we ask is that you vote for a Gizmodo story or three each and every time you're on MySpace News. Thanks in advance. – Wilson Rothman

MySpace to test news service to boost ad revenue [Reuters]

The content? Well, it's going to have TV clips from NBC and Fox, plus films from their respective movie studios. You'll be able to watch ad-supported shows like 24 and Heroes for free, and they're working on more deals with Sony and Time Warner to supply shows and clips. Sounds like we've finally got someone to stand up with GooTube in a non-theoretical way. – Jason Chen

Squawk on the Street [CNBC]

Thanks Ray!

Will this be a strong competitor to Digg, or will MySpace News provide content for a sperate demographic? After all, I'm sure the MySpace population won't go crazy over the same Apple/HDR Photo/Self-referential/Consumer advocacy stuff that Digg does. One would expect the content to be much less tech-based and more pop culture centric. It should be interesting to see how this affects the online media scene and if Digg sees a drop in users. –Adam Frucci

Mashable.com [via Digg, of course]

The director will be chosen through a contest with the prize being the directing job on the $2 million project. Then the brilliant minds of the general MySpace populous will be included in every step of the production, from acting and writing to marketing and development. Yes, this sounds like the premise of a mediocre video sketch that you'd see advertised on the MySpace main page and wouldn't click on, but it's terrifyingly real. Prepare yourself.–Adam Frucci

MySpace offers £1m directing job [BBC]

One part standard router and one part parent-that-you-aren't, it's "equipped with proprietary algorithms and databases enabling it to monitor paedophile grooming languages." Should it detect a conversation with some naughty no-no talk, it sends you an email or text message, allowing you to eavesdrop, kick your kid from the chatroom, or turn the whole computer off. The $196 price point includes a year's worth of upgrades.

Since none of these things are foolproof—and the crappy copy-editing on the site doesn't bode well—we imagine we'll be reporting on a lawsuit from some angry parent in oh, about a month, give or take. – Matt Buchanan

Product Page [via Slash Gear]

Be ready to part with $3 per month for the dedicated MySpace app, in addition to data usage costs, just to be able to post on your buddy's account, "dude, I can't believe how drunk we got last night." A big deal? Meh, so the two companies would like us to believe. – Nicholas Deleon

Cingular to offer MySpace on cellphones [Reuters/Yahoo!]

Since MySpace is free to sign up, this offer pretty much applies to everybody, as long as you take the time to go register for MySpace before you sign up for Helio.– Jason Chen

MySpace Mobile on Helio [Helio via Mobile Tracker]

Napster announced yet another iteration today, allowing users to stream over two million tracks on their ad-supported website and to share links to artists, albums and even specific songs through email or on other websites. Sounds good, but in practice it's not so wonderful.

Catch #1: you can only play each track a maximum of five times before you have to buy it for $0.99. You can pay Napster $9.95 a month to listen to unlimited music both offline and off, except that you can't listen to the music you download after you stop paying, or join Napster To Go for $14.95, which lets you transfer your music to compatible mp3 players. How does this suck?

Letting you play a track all the way through (albeit not in the greatest sound quality) five times + the 99 cent price is a nice touch as it makes you more likely to get addicted to a song they have on offer than the short clips the iTunes store provides. The subscription services are still as ludicrous as they were when first launched, especially Napster To Go, and we'd still much rather just buy a few tracks and own them for good, supplemented with listening to Last.fm's personalized radio stations.

Catch #2: Sharing a link is just that, passing along a text link to Napster's page to whatever it is. Here are two examples, the first url is the format you're supposed to pass by the email and the second the format for adding to sites: Basement Jaxx's Oh My Gosh(Radio Edit) and Sia's Breathe Me (Four Tet Remix). We can see how this would be useful for when you just want a friend to hear a song once or twice, but for linking on a website it's just ridiculous that you can't place a Napster-branded audio player for a particular song on your blog or MySpace, the way you can with video from YouTube, Google Video or Vimeo.

Napster, c'mon now, you've got to learn from the success of the video sites: if you want people to link to your media, you have to let them do it without making their users have to 1) immediately leave their site and 2) register with yours. A little less greed upfront will make using your site so much more useful and therefore more appealing.

Napster [via Alpha Blog]

We told you two months ago about HELIO, the new mobile carrier aimed at young people starting up service sometime this spring, and the two snazzy phones they're launching with. Today they're announcing the deal they've made with Yahoo!, which will be providing HELIO's users with easy access to Yahoo!'s mobile web offerings over 3G with just one click from the main menu of a HELIO device.

It's not surprising that Yahoo! Messenger and Mail are part of the offerings, since HELIO's target market has grown up with IM and email, but we're very interested in the fact that users will be able to start searches just by typing in the home screen like they were dialing a number—none of the mobile carrier web services we've used thus far have ever encouraged search before whereas HELIO is making a point and placing it front and center.

They've also got a previously-announced deal with MySpace to let you post photos straight into your messages from your HELIO device, as well as update your profiles with events while you're at them and add new friends right when you meet them; their site doesn't currently talk about how exactly the interaction will take place, but we'll guess that since MySpace is potentially a killer feature for their service that it'll be one-click from the HELIO home screen as well.

HELIO