Juan Carlos Perez

Google Inc. has enhanced its Google Maps mobile application by adding traffic information and the ability to save routes, the Mountain View, California, company plans to announce Tuesday.

An Arkansas judge is hearing arguments for and against the settlement of a click-fraud lawsuit that critics say lets Google Inc. off the hook too easily.

Yahoo Inc. is opening up its IM (instant messaging) network so that external developers can extend its functionality with new applications. Yahoo last month released a new beta version of Yahoo Messenger with Voice, along with software development tools for creating plugins for it. The IM beta version will have some plugins already installed by default, and allow users to choose others.

Ending more than a year of speculation and rumours, Google Inc. unveiled its much-awaited online payments system, likely surprising many because its reach will extend farther than previously thought.

AOL LLC has retooled its Netscape.com portal as a "social news" Web site where users and Netscape.com staffers can post, vote for, tag and review articles. With this move, AOL is following a model similar to the one popularized by the technology news-oriented Digg.com and by the politics-focused Memeorandum.com, but with some twists and with a broader and more mainstream audience in mind.

The controversy over Google Inc.'s censored Chinese search engine followed its top executives to the company's annual shareholder meeting when an Amnesty International representative took them to task over the issue.

America Online Inc. (AOL) introduced new and enhanced mobile services, including new mobile browsing that adapts regular Web pages to mobile screens, as the provider of online services and content competes for wireless Internet users.

Google Inc. plans to launch a financial news and information Web site called Google Finance that will be in direct competition with well-established ones such as Yahoo Inc.'s Yahoo Finance and Microsoft Corp.'s MSN Money.