Microsofties who want to make money on the Web without the hassle of actually working at Microsoft have been jumping on board Yahoo's sinking ship. Today's best commenter, longtailwagsthevalley, talks about the game of musical chairs:

Hopefully, you'll be too busy hitting the streets to watch anything tonight, but with Oprah in primetime you'll have 30 minutes to rest before taking it to the man again. WATCH 30 Rock [9:30 PM, NBC] - Liz (Tina Fey) hassles divinity-star Oprah for personal advice on a trip back from Chicago. Jenna (Jane Krakowski) and Tracy (Tracy Morgan) trade places to see whose life is worse. Kenneth (Jack McBrayer) puts Jack's (Alec Baldwin) value system to the test. Our expectations for Obama are pretty high, but that's nothing compared to our dreams for this episode. Help us, Liz Lemon! You're Ben Silverman's only hope!

Everyone's favorite blowjobs-for-hire site has pledged to appease 40 state attorneys general by "curbing prostitution ads." You can read Melissa Gira Grant's in-progress response, but the kicker is CEO Jim Buckmaster's promise to start charging $10 a pop or so for Erotic Services ads. It's not pimping, it's protection — haha! I knew I couldn't say that with a straight face.

Why So Audacious? Perhaps we spoke too soon about the tenuous connection between The Dark Knight and The President-Elect, as we've just stumbled upon this Obama-evoking Joker design from artist James Lillis. It's no DJ AM, but it'll do. Click through for full-size. [/film]

On stage at the Web 2.0 Summit conference, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg sported sneakers instead of his once-trademark Adidas slides. Come to think of it, when's the last time anyone spotted him wearing mandals? It's just another sign that Facebook isn't the same company it was a year ago. Got a better caption? Leave it in the comments. The best one will become the post's new headline. Yesterday's winner: m0nty.au, for "Help me, Anderson Cooper, you're our only hope!" (Photo by Brian Solis/Bub.blicio.us)

We find ourselves absentmindedly doodling pictures of littlest karaoke soldier David Archuleta in the margins of our publishing software, wiling away these final days until his totally-going-to-blow-Cook-out-of-the-water debut LP drops. But listen, Archie—our little shaved koala, our 300-lb. gospel powerhouse in the body of a 17-year-old Mormon twink—the times, they are a-changin', but not a-quite fast enough. You've already begun to do your part, releasing a catchy single called "Crush" whose video remains titillatingly unspecific about which of the several boys splashing around in a lake you secretly want to take Christmas Tree shopping. But things are escalating.Your fanbase is bum rushing your houses of worship, hoisting placards demanding back their pillaged civil rights with the very hands that feverishly dialed in your 1-866-IDOLS number during your own moment of need. Only one child can bring these two sides together. The One. The Archie. Just leave your father at home, and remember what we always told you: song choice, song choice, song choice. Now what are you waiting for—a sign in some cornfield? Go save the world, kiddo! We're counting on you!

Reid Hoffman's heft regularly makes reporters turn to their thesauri for polite terms for "fat." BusinessWeek, to keep the tone of a new profile appropriately flattering, writes of his "expansive body." But the article is anything but expansive in its probing of LinkedIn's business. It focuses instead on how Hoffman is trying to figure out survival strategies for his portfolio of startups. Nowhere are LinkedIn's own layoffs mentioned. Instead, Hoffman implies that the employees he put out on the street should use the site to seek new careers: "Every individual is a small business." Not an expansive one.

An estimated 10,000 marchers descended on Westwood last hour to protest the passage of Proposition 8, leading to a bust of outrage large enough to encircle the Mormon Temple on Santa Monica Blvd. before overtaking the thoroughfare itself. Streaming live footage from KNBC features a mostly peaceful protest to date, with only minor incursions resulting in a driveway shout-down and a bit of get-the-homos-off-my-lawn resistance from cops nudging marchers off a sliver of LDS property. The crowd spilled onto Santa Monica around 3:15, shutting down westbound traffic en route to Westwood Blvd.A citizen operative sends word: "Shit is packed. ... There were a handful of Mormons out front early on, but they went inside. Peaceful so far. But PACKED." We'd love to hear from any others on or near the scene; you know where to find us.

Tony Hsieh, the CEO of Zappos, has a promising career as a cult leader. In a blog post, the online shoes-and-clothes retailer's boss acknowledges the layoffs his employees were Twittering about this morning, writing that the company had laid off 8 percent of its workforce. He all but admits the cuts were forced on him by investor Sequoia Capital. The severance packages are generous in comparison to most startups; two months or more of pay, and six months of health insurance. Sweet enough, perhaps, that people won't ask a key question about the layoffs."Tony cares about his company and his employees more than anyone else around," says an entrepreneur who knows Hsieh. His employees, even the former ones, seem to be returning the favor on Twitter. But if he loved his employees so much, why didn't he resist the pressure from Sequoia to make the cuts? We hear Sequoia is insisting that all of its portfolio companies cut payrolls by around 10 percent, regardless of the particulars of their businesses. Zappos seems to be doing well in its e-commerce niche — well enough, at least, to afford a generous severance. Hsieh's company offers free returns if the shoes its customers buy don't fit. Why didn't he just mark Sequoia's orders "return to sender"?

The Village Voice has gotten a good look at Disney's new straight-to-DVD Tinker Bell (now in 3-D with speaking capabilities!), and declares the 2008 version of the spritely heroine—the original of whom is wrongly rumored to be modeled on Marilyn Monroe—to be a platitudinous pixie snore. They also find her extremely "sexy/creepy...a chubby-cheeked, slightly infantilized adolescent with the body of a grown woman. She sports the skimpiest dress in the movie."Tinker Bell isn't traditionally the first Disney starlet one's mind wanders to when hoping to be aroused by hand-drawn family entertainment. She's not Ariel, glistening with salt water in a revealing oysterkini top. She's not the gorgeous Esmeralda—the Demi Moore-voiced Hunchback of Notre Dame gypsy enchantress who seduced the deformed gonger with one bat of her emerald eyes. She's not Pocahontas, Mulan, Jasmine, or Belle, either. What is she, anyway? Is she a child? A grown woman? Would she fly up your pants in a darkened theater? And—perhaps most of all—what is it that makes her first-ever broadcast interview with GMA's Chris Cuomo so deeply unsettling? Probably their sexy/creepy chemistry. Jeez, get a room or take it behind the Wishing Tree, will you guys, already?

The world's biggest IT services firm fed the New York Times a copy of a speech CEO Sam Palmisano was scheduled to make today in front of the Council of Foreign Relations in New York City. Sam's proposal is blatant: "A technology-fueled economic recovery plan that calls for public and private investment in more efficient systems for utility grids, traffic management, food distribution, water conservation and health care." Also, free Zipcars for gossip bloggers.

A 67-year-old fella in Bellingham, Washington named Thomas Baldwin spent $1,700 buying up 10,000 copies of the Bellingham Herald's November 5 "Obama Wins" edition. Baldwin has a friend "who sells copies of newspapers that are decades old at trade shows," and he reckoned that there might be a profit in those there papers a few decades down the road. Let's leave aside the spectacle of the garage full of rotting copies of the Bellingham Herald that will inevitably be the inheritance of Baldwin's children and just point out to Mr. Baldwin—hey, the entire newspaper industry is on the phone for you with a very attractive price on several thousand copies of the March 26, 2003 "Troops trudge ahead" issue of the Anniston Star. Think about it. [Bellingham Herald via Romenesko]

"Maybe you remember little Bobby Gibbs," a story in the Villager of Auburn, Alabama begins. "He and his brother John were born here, he went all the way through Auburn city schools, and he graduated from Auburn High in 1989." Now little Bobby Gibbs is President-elect Barack Obama's new press secretary! And to think, just a couple years ago he was persona non grata at the DNC and the netroots wing of the Democratic Party.Gibbs began his flack career on Capitol Hill, working in the press offices of 10 Congressmen and eventually graduating to the nice gig of press secretary to John Kerry as he began his presidential campaign. That didn't last long, and soon Gibbs found a role at with Americans for Job, Health Care, and Progressive Values, a 527 group. That happy, friendly, shiny-sounding group was, of course, nothing but a shop for vicious smears against upstate Democratic candidate Howard Dean, who, in 2004, was annoying the Democratic Establishment by babbling about The War and other liberal nonsense.

Gibbs, the group's spokesman defended even the grossest of their anti-Dean attacks, including an ad that just featured a photo of Osama bin Laden and a narrator saying Dean was unqualified. Ha! Democrats!

Gibbs continued his odd habit of borrowing vile right-wing attack lines when it suited him years later as Barack Obama's media guru. Responding to the Clinton campaign's meltdown over David Geffen's donation to Obama (coupled with an attack on Bill Clinton's womanizing), Gibbs dusted off the old "sold the Lincoln Bedroom" line, becoming the only person besides Rush Limbaugh in a decade to remember or care about that story.
Now, of course, everyone has fallen in line, because Gibbs was really, really good on TV. But we get the feeling he's even better suited for the miserable position of White House Press Secretary than liberals might hope. It truly will be a fun four years, guys!

A Russian company, Era Volodeya seeks $3 billion in damages for allegedly violating its patent on contextual advertisements, the keyword-matching technique which has made Google the largest company in online advertising. I'm waiting for some tipster to tell me that Era Volodeya is secretly a KGB front with ties to Vladimir Putin, and that this is just a follow-up to the government's move to block a Google acquisition in Russia on antitrust grounds.

Hollywood PrivacyWatch: Moguls Jogging Edition! 11/5 — As I was taking my 'shortcut' on Carmelita to bypass the traffic jam that is SMB in Beverly Hills on my way to Santa Monica, I saw a handsome but SHORT older guy in… ahem… gray shorts and gray shirt, running with a taller, younger bald man whose biceps and pecs let me know he was definitely a trainer. And who is in all of the neck to thigh gray but BRAD GREY. I've always thought of him as handsome in a baby-faced daddy way, and well, now I know he is. He was sweaty, sure, but that's a good thing! [Hollywood PrivacyWatch is written by and for Defamer readers; send your sightings to tips@defamer.com.]

An online-video panel at Web 2.0 Summit proved so free of insight that reporter Scott Raynovich took a turn playing Mr. Blackwell instead, savaging all of the panelists' outfits. Only moderator Xeni Jardin got off easy, winning praise for her "peach-colored suit." We would have dinged her for that: Jardin always looks best in intergalactic silver. [Contentinople]

Outgoing president Bush's dog, Scottish terrier Barney, bit a Reuters reporter today, according to the Washington Post! Oh, no: Barney knows about the election and doesn't want to leave the White House. He's gone Britney on us: acting out to stay in the spotlight and to demonstrate his relevance. Clearly, he's jealous of the new Obama puppy, who'll be all over the news as soon as they adopt him. What's going through his head right now? He may be worried that he'll end up like Socks. Remember Socks? Yeah, he's the cat that the Clintons gave away when they left the White House.

It's never too early in Oscar season to feast on half-baked pundit delicacies like those of Dave Karger, the Entertainment Weekly awards maven who earns a living composing items like today's "How Obama Helps Batman." But even despite its modest size and airy texture, this morsel is next to impossible to get down [spoilers follow]:

I'm from MIT, so I'm hardwired to hate on Harvard Law grad Julius Genachowski, the so-called technology guy newly named to our Internet President's transition team. His company, LaunchBox, helps Web and mobile entrepreneurs pitch their ideas to get seed funding. That makes him a Paul Graham wannabe to me. He spent eight years working for Barry Diller at IAC as general counsel. Is that a plus or a minus?To be fair, Genachowski is said to be a clear thinker, and he hasn't yet locked up Barry O's slot for America's CTO. Insider gossip says he's eyeing the FCC instead, where he previously served under Reed Hundt. Fine with me — Genachowski is a lawyer who I'm sure can grasp net neutrality. But if this turns out to be Obama's idea of a technologist, I'm going home to cling bitterly to my guns and religion.

A while back, Hillary Clinton supporter Lady Lynn Forester de Rothschild announced her support of John McCain. De Rothschild—whose title and name, keep in mind, is Lady Lynn Forester de Rothschild—said Barack Obama was too elitist. Then, the lifelong Democrat wrote a column about how Obama's plan to raise the top marginal tax rate 4% was American Dream-destroying Communazism. So, as an idiot with no understanding of policy or ideology beyond identity politics, it's understandable that de Rothschild is on the TV defending fellow idiot Sarah Palin. John McCain's hail mary attempt to woo women voters by selecting a disastrously unqualified and wrongheaded running mate with an all-important vagina worked on precisely one woman, Lady Lynn Forester de Rothschild.