(InfoWorld) - Google has acquired FeedBurner, a provider of publishing and advertising services for blogs and content syndication feed.

FeedBurner's technology will boost Google's ad network and Web publishing services, Google said. Terms of the deal, which has closed, weren't revealed.

FeedBurner will continue operating as it has until now, so existing customers shouldn't experience any interruptions in service. New customers will be able to continue signing up for FeedBurner services as well. Meanwhile, Google will work to integrate FeedBurner's technologies with a number of its own products.

The volume of Web content and advertising delivered via RSS and Atom feeds has increased significantly in recent years, and Google feels that by acquiring FeedBurner it will be able to capitalize on this growth and expand its advertising reach.

FeedBurner, which has more than 400,000 publishers on its network, will beef up Google's own AdSense publisher network, particularly among blogs, where FeedBurner is stronger than Google, said Susan Wojcicki, vice president of product management at Google, during a press conference.

Likewise, Google advertisers will benefit from an expanded ad inventory and ad distribution platform. Finally, FeedBurner shares Google's philosophy of helping end-users find information online with FeedBurner focused on blogs and feeds and Google on search.

"We think this will be a win for users, publishers, and advertisers on the Internet," she said.

FeedBurner, a privately-held company founded in 2003, helps publishers and advertisers with "the spiraling complexity" of online media distribution compounded by RSS feeds, widget applications, and mobile devices, said Dick Costolo, FeedBurner's CEO and co-founder.

"FeedBurner's focus on delivering the right media to the right end point and measuring all that for the publisher means we've got a great opportunity to combine our vision with Google's vision for organizing the world's information," he said.

Despite the executives' enthusiasm, they acknowledged that prior to the acquisition, neither Google nor FeedBurner blocked their respective publishers and advertisers from signing up for each other's services.

Because nothing has prevented publishers and advertisers from taking advantage of both companies' offerings, the real benefits will not materialize until concrete integration happens between the companies' services and operations.

"We're working on how the products will be integrated, but we want AdWords advertisers to very easily have access to the feeds, and we want the FeedBurner publishers to potentially have access to other Google services," Wojcicki said.

Google hasn't been as active as it should have been in the area of syndicated feed advertising, she said.

Beyond the obvious synergy with the Google ad network, FeedBurner services and products could be complementary to Google's syndicated feed manager Reader and Google's Analytics service for tracking sites' usage, she said.

FeedBurner, which has about 30 employees and raised about $10 million in venture capital funding, will keep its operations in Chicago, Costolo said.

This story was updated on June 1, 2007

(InfoWorld) - Just one day after a security researcher showed how Google's Firefox toolbar could be exploited in an online attack, a similar flaw has been discovered in the Google Desktop.

On Thursday, Google hacker Robert Hansen posted proof of concept details showing how attackers could use Google Desktop to launch software that had already been installed on the victim's computer.

The attack is hard to pull off and could not necessarily be used to install unauthorized software on the victim's PC, but it does illustrate the kind of security issues that arise with Web-based applications, said Hansen, the CEO of Web security consultancy Sectheory.com, and a contributor to the Ha.ckers.org Web site.

"When you have third parties writing code that interacts with your browser, it inherently breaks the browser security model," he said.

To exploit Hansen's Google Desktop vulnerability, an attacker would first have to launch a successful "man-in-the-middle" attack, somehow placing himself between the victim and Google's servers. This could by done by tricking the victim into logging onto a malicious wireless network, Hansen said.

Once this was done, the hacker could launch Hansen's attack by changing the Web pages being delivered to the victim's PC. By returning Web pages that have been doctored with new JavaScript code, the victim could be tricked into clicking onto a malicious link, Hansen said. "When they actually click that mouse button, they're not clicking on the Web page, they're clicking on a link to Google Desktop that actually runs code, " he said.

The steps Hansen took to pull off the attack are complex because of the security features that Google has built into its software, he added. "What I've done is combine a lot of different attacks that Google desperately tries to prevent."

On Wednesday researcher Christopher Soghoian showed how a man-in-the-middle attack could be used to install malicious software on computers that used a variety of popular Firefox add-ons, including the toolbars from Google, Yahoo, and AOL.

Hansen has posted a video showing how this attack could be used to launch Windows HyperTerminal. But it could be used to launch virtually any application that has already been installed on the PC, he said.

This is not the first bug in Google Desktop. In February, engineers at Watchfire showed how a flaw in the program's Advanced Search Feature could be used to gain access to data or even run unauthorized software on a victim's computer.

Two days after the Watchfire bug was disclosed, Hansen himself showed how attackers could steal information from Google Desktop users using what is called an anti-DNS (Domain Name System) pinning attack.

Google was not immediately available to comment for this story.

If you didn't get a chance to watch today's historic interview between Bill Gates and Steve Jobs, you should. Finally seeing these two computer industry giants on stage interacting with each other was fascinating and at times even a little touching.

• Steve Jobs and Bill Gates Prologue
• Steve Jobs and Bill Gates Part 1
• Steve Jobs and Bill Gates Part 2
• Steve Jobs and Bill Gates Part 3
• Steve Jobs and Bill Gates Part 4
• Steve Jobs and Bill Gates Part 5
• Steve Jobs and Bill Gates Part 6
• Steve Jobs and Bill Gates Part 7
• Steve Jobs and Bill Gates Highlight Reel
• Steve Jobs and Bill Gates Session Transcript

To put some context on today's meeting, watch this highlight reel of Steve Jobs and Bill Gates in 1983 and 1997. It's hard to believe, but the last time these two guys were on stage together was in 1983 for the "Macintosh Dating Game". That's why today's interview was so notable-- historic, even.

It's clear that these two long-term rivals have a lot of respect for each other. They might even be friends. They've certainly been through a lot together in the last thirty years.

Bill Gates: It’s been fun to work together. I actually kind of miss some of the people who aren’t around anymore. You know, people come and go in this industry. It’s nice when somebody sticks around and they have some context of all the things that have worked and not worked. The industry gets all crazy about some new thing, you know, like, there’s always this paradigm of the company that’s successful is going to go away and stuff like that. It’s nice to have people seeing the waves and waves of that and yet, when it counted, to take the risk to bring in something new.

Steve Jobs: You know, when Bill and I first met each other and worked together in the early days, generally, we were both the youngest guys in the room, right? Individually or together. I’m about six months older than he is, but roughly the same age. And now when we’re working at our respective companies, I don’t know about you, but I’m the oldest guy in the room most of the time. And that’s why I love being here. And, you know, I think of most things in life as either a Bob Dylan or a Beatles song, but there’s that one line in that one Beatles song, “you and I have memories longer than the road that stretches out ahead.” And that’s clearly true here.

In a way, I feel like I've been tagging along with Gates and Jobs throughout their storied history, through the ups and downs, through the ebb and flow of the computer industry. Their history feels like our history, my history. These two guys have been my role models since the day I first booted a computer. Everyone I know has owned an Apple computer, or run Microsoft software-- or both-- at some point in their lives. It's unavoidable. I grew up with the microcomputer, and the microcomputer as we know it today is largely due to the influence of both Jobs and Gates.

Respect.

Who's the pot? Microsoft. Enough with the craziness over Jamie Cansdale's excellent (read:must install now) addon for Visual Studio TestDriven.NET. I'm a huge fan of the tool (bought a copy to support Jamie and his excellent efforts, I recommend any good developer to do the same) and have supported Jamie in his efforts, especially after they booted him from the MVP program over some questionable tactics and reasoning. I followed him via emails and his blog posts discussing the matter and the sillyness of it all. Now it's come to a head.

The last few days it's been legal mayhem on his blog, posting the various letters and emails he's been getting and sending to MS lawyer-types. What really peeves me the most is the clause in the EULA that they are griping over:

"...you may use the software only as expressly permitted in this agreement. In doing so you must comply with any technical limitations in the software that only allow you to use it certain ways... You may not work around any technical limitations in the software."

What a load of crap. I'm sorry but let me rattle off two very big tools from Microsoft that voilate this EULA: Popfly Explorer and XNA Game Studio. Both are "add-ons" that *only* work with the Visual Studio Express SKU.

Since when does building a tool that simply automates running a unit test runner constitute working around a technical limitation? Is the technical limitation that VSExpress doesn't have support for unit test frameworks. If that's true, then any macro that shells out and runs nunit-console.exe could be considered in volation. If they're willing to stretch TestDriven.NET to fall into this category, then I call foul on Popfly Explorer and XNA Game Studio. They are "manipulating" how Visual Studio Express works and there's obviously a technical limitation in that Visual Studio Express, OOTB, does not support the XNA content pipeline or understand Popfly so again, someone is in voilation here.

Unfortunately for Jamie, he's between a rock and a hard place. EULA are just that. Agreements. IANAL but from what I know of past issues concerning EULAs, they're not legally binding. However with the Microsoft Man behind this nobody is going to be able to stand up (legally) against them.

So is Microsoft going to sue themselves? Might as well, since the lawyers are already doing a damn fine job at making an ass out of themselves.

My advice for Jamie, 1) pull the support for the Express SKU (again) if that will appease the Blue Monster and 2) contact the EFF. They have a good track record in these type of things and might be able to support you. I know I will so just yell if you need me.