In terms of popularity, Yahoo Groups and Google Groups rank as some of the most visited discussion groups on the web. They also score pretty high on the "stuck in the 90s" scale. But your group doesn't have to be stuck in the 90s. Grouply will give your Yahoo Group or Google Group a web makeover, bringing it into the new millenium with social features and a new appearance.

Grouply supports images and video, has a better interface with lists and graphs and behind-the-scenes optimization tools to allow for easier administration. Grouply also supports ads and can automate collecting fees from members.

It's a nice service, but I can't recommend the premium packages, one of which takes away the ads for the stiff price of $20 a month. You can also pay a more reasonable $5 a month to personalize the group with your own domain name.

With $100 million in marketing dollars behind it and an ad campaign that claims it as being a "decision engine" -- a boast that came partially true when Microsoft announced a deal with Wolfram!Alpha -- Bing is on the rise. It now holds a 10.3% share of the search market, which is more than it has owned in over two years.

Unfortunately, this has come at the expense of Yahoo, which has declined 1.8% compared to Bing's 1.4% rise. This means the Bing-Yahoos each deal announced in July is actually losing market share despite Bing's gain in the search market. But Yahoo-Bing still has a combined 28%, which will make Bing a real contender when the deal kicks into place over the next few months.

Bing is also marking its ground in mobile search, recently releasing an iPhone app. But with the iPhone overtaking Windows Mobile in popularity and each new Android-based smartphone being hailed as a possible iPhone killer, Microsoft definitely has its work cut out for it in the mobile market.

Bing is Microsoft's push to remain a force on the Internet. In the past few years, Microsoft has seen its control over the web browser market slip as Internet Explorer loses ground to Firefox and Chrome. Meanwhile, the iPhone and Android are gobbling up Windows Mobile in the smartphone market, and Google's Chrome OS looks like it could become a popular platform for netbooks.

It's becoming a common theme in the social media age: Celebrity freaks out on (Twitter, Facebook, etc.) and suddenly people are hitting their profile only to find the dreaded 404 File Not Found page. And after ranting on Twitter about his album's lack of availability in stores and the possible conspiracy to blackball him, Chris Brown became the latest celebrity to follow this theme.

One interesting effect of social media is how it holds up a big magnifying glass not just to our lives, but to our personalities. You can tell a lot about a person by what he writes on his Facebook profile, his Twitter updates and what type of links he shares. A funny person might always have some wittisms to offer about what he has witnessed or what he is doing. An interesting person might have a lot of great links to what tweaks her curiosity or makes her think.

And a self-absorbed person might rant about how Wal-Mart isn't carrying his album.

Chris Brown certainly isn't alone in freaking out then deleting his account. Miley Cyrus deleted her Twitter account in October saying she wanted to keep her private life private. Others who have left include Lily Allen, Lil Wayne, Trent Reznor and Courtney Love among others.

In addition to the star rants and celebrity exodus are Hollywood and sports leagues like the NFL and NBA, who are still trying to figure out how to deal with social media. The NFL has adopted a policy where players can't tweet during games, and players have seen fines thrown their way after rants on Twitter. Hollywood is also scrambling to keep things under wraps, with some new contract requiring stars to not mention anything about movies they are working on while they are in production.

As for Chris Brown, he shouldn't be worrying too much. Wal-Mart has stated that his album wasn't being blackballed. It was simply sold out.

With the changes to Facebook's privacy settings last week came a battering from Facebook users and privacy advocacy groups complaining that the new settings were leading users to reveal more information than they intended. And chief among the complaints was the decision to make the user's friends list open to the public.

But changes are on the horizon. Facebook has already tweaked the privacy settings, allowing users to hide their friends list, though the implementation is similar to hiding a needle in a haystack and proclaiming that you've provided a needle. Richard Alan, Facebook's director of policy for Europe, also left open the possibility that more tweaks to the privacy settings could happen in the future.

How to Hide Your Facebook Friends List