Xerox is synonymous with copiers. But it urgently wants you to forget all that — and, as well, its brief, pointless stint as a "document management company." It has now joined hundreds of young, hip Internet companies with 3D glassy ball logos. Xerox hired Interbrand to spend 18 months conducting 5,000 interviews to rationalize the new logo: "friendlier" lowercase letters, a slick new typeface, and the obligatory ball, which is supposed to "suggest forward movement and 'a holistic company.'" I just think: kid's toy.

Illustrious egoblogger Robert Scoble, the Paris Hilton of Silicon Valley, has committed the geek equivalent of a DUI. He has, by his own admission, violated Facebook's terms of service, and had his account suspended — 5,000 friends and all. Scoble's sin? He used a script to export his Facebook address-book information to Plaxo, which runs a competing social network. Running such scripts has long been forbidden, though Scoble argues Facebook should open up its information. Unlikely, given Facebook's history.

Jason Calacanis's Mahalo has a problem: its business model is a Catch-22. Mahalo differentiates itself from Web search engines by using the paid services of humans, which Calacanis argues is a cheaper strategy than buying servers. And yet Mahalo seems to have trouble paying the rates it set for its human laborers. A blogger who works for Mahalo as a "mentor" — a fancy title for someone who basically works as a QA tester, reviewing pages of search results created by others, is complaining that Mahalo is refusing to pay the full amount he is owed.

Jim Clark is finding real estate a tougher game than the new new things he started at Silicon Graphics, Netscape and Healtheon. The New York Times reports that five years into a Miami real estate venture, Clark and partner Tom Jermoluk might not be able to repay a $110 million construction loan.

Cartoonist Hugh Macleod's Blue Monster — the beast urging Microsofties to "change the world or go home" — will get its own bus for the Consumer Electronic Show in Las Vegas on January 5. The blue guy with the big teeth is more cute than frightening, but there's another reason to run for safety if you see this sucker turn the corner. Guess who's driving it? Hint: the answer is NSFH — not safe for highways.

Yesterday, we told you about striking TV and film writers hitting up Silicon Valley VCs for cash. The plan is to copy WIll Ferrell's success with FunnyOrDie.com. But there is a reason Ferrell's "The Landlord" just passed 50 million views. It's funny. This clip, "THE G! True Tinseltown Tale: Dude, Where's My Car?", is not. But that's not stopping its creators from asking investors for money.

"Open source products are often high on innovation but low on user experience," self-proclaimed "Web strategist" Jeremiah Owyang notes on his blog. "They come across as geeky, not user friendly, and sometimes, just ugly." The solution? These guys! Who are so just the opposite. Oh the teeth, oh the hair, oh the neck beard and chin strap, too.

Google introduced Knol to the public yesterday. It's a sort-of About.com meets Wikipedia, and could smash all of Jason Calacanis's Mahalo dreams. Or at least, the sort-of introduced Knol could. If we ever hear about it again.

We wondered in April about venture capitalist Heidi Roizen's plans after her firm Moibus Venture finished closing up shop, and now it's been revealed. After topping her bathroom scale in May, Roizen turned her attention towards the music scales. This week, she launched SkinnySongs, a startup focused on creating upbeat, catchy music with the most thinspirational lyrics this side of a pro-ana LiveJournal ring. (Sample lyrics: "Thin! — not telling you lies. Thin! — I want smaller thighs.") Roizen is both the founder and "chief lyricist" for the startup. You can hold her fully responsible for such ditties as "I'm a Hottie Now," "Incredible Shrinking Woman," and the bizarrely titled "Blowing You Off at Eight."

Andrew Meyer, a student at the University of Florida who was tasered after trying to ask John Kerry questions at a forum, got his 15 minutes of fame when millions saw video of him saying, "Don't tase me, bro!" on YouTube. If you thought it was the funniest thing you've ever seen, and you're a Verizon Wireless customer, you're in luck! You can purchase "Don't Tase Me Bro!" as your ringback tone. (A ringback tone is a short song or audio clip that plays when someone calls you. So, instead of hearing a boring "ring ring," your debt collectors and babydaddies will hear "DON'T TASE ME, BRO! ARGHH!" repeatedly. Who doesn't want that?) OK, seriously, this must be a sign of the coming apocalypse. For those who missed it, the full video of the arrest and tasing is after the jump.

You remember Brett Petersel. He's the self-promoting Silicon Alley tech-meetup organizer who opened widened himself to public ridicule by posting a Facebook note offering $25 to anyone who'd set him up on a date. Maybe you felt bad for him. Don't. So far the Lodwickesque exhibitionism is paying off. Petersel says his Facebook inbox is jammed full and yes, gay-hating dating site eHarmony gave him a free membership. But then came Petersel's really bad idea.

Facebook's new ad products haven't exactly taken off. Last week MoveOn.org joined the FTC in expressing concern over the social network's ad targeting. A brand manager told us that, compared to using Google's search marketing, Facebook ads required a lot of work, for not much payoff. Coca-Cola's brand page, for example, has under 1,000 fans. And finally, there's evidence that Facebook's flyers don't earn many clicks (unless they're porn). Users don't seem too interested in playing along with Facebook's grand plans. So what's a $15 billion social network trying to take over the world to do?

Will Google come out with an operating system for television — something like Android, its Googlephone OS, but for set-top boxes? Erick Schonfeld at TechCrunch thinks so. It's likely that Google wants to do this — but unlikely that it will succeed. Why has TiVo struggled? Because consumers, by and large, don't pay for their set-top boxes. Instead, they rent them from cable companies, or get them free from satellite-TV providers in exchange for signing up for service. The cost of hardware is disguised in the monthly service fee. Google may come up with an Android for television, but will it matter? Unlikely. Cable and telephone companies saw Google profit massively off the Internet connections they sold. Would they be foolish enough to let Google sneak its way into the television business with set-top software as a Trojan horse? No. Microsoft, which is plotting to turn its Xbox videogame console into a set-top box, has a much better shot.

Even more worrisome than eBay's losing $900 million on Skype to Wall Street is the lack of money the auction runner has put into its own site. Financial analysts worry about the site's outdated design and feature set. Enter Best of eBay, a new site with weird little monster icons, Digg-like voting features, and a name ripped straight from Craigslist, the classifieds site in which eBay owns a minority stake. Best of eBay is in beta, which these days just means "don't blame us if it's broken."

Not even the thrill of purchasing the coffee shop's soundtrack on an iPhone is luring customers into Starbucks. Foot traffic to individual locales is declining. It could be that trendy new coffee bars are leeching away Starbucks brand loyalty. Or it's the simple fact that there's essentially one Starbucks per child in some neighborhoods. No one can drink that much coffee.

Former AOL CTO John McKinley has joined with IAC alumnus Sean Green to create LaunchBox Digital. It's an investment fund for digital media, with incubator services and oh-so-helpful advice, according to reports. To his credit, McKinley oversaw the success of TMZ.com, but seriously, if you've got an idea with legs, why take it to the guy who couldn't figure out how to turn millions of instant-messaging users into a social network?

Let this be a lesson for the youngsters. Hack into classified government emails and then post account logins and passwords for public consumption, and you might get your apartment trashed. That's what happened to Sweden's Dan Egerstad, so-called "hacker of the year."

You can't say nobody saw Pay By Touch's demise coming. Remember the recent college grad Pay By Touch CEO John Rogers said he would sic a former Israeli secret agent on? Here's an executive summary of the paper he wrote back in 2004 titled "Credit Card Fraud, Biometrics, and the Pay By Touch Method."

CNBC hosted Google's Marissa Mayer last night to discuss the online game show she'll be helping to judge, "You Be the VC." It's American Idol meets Silicon Valley, our host tells us. Which is ridiculous, since the winning startup gets exiled to Cambridge, Mass. But hey, the winner gets a bit of funding and possibly an aquisition offer from Google, Mayer confirms. It's great news for all contestants! Just ask Dodgeball founders Alex Rainert and Dennis Crowley, if they still exist.

You've seen the chart: Web email isn't necessarily going away, but social network messaging is on the rise. In the U.K., it's already as popular as email. So what's Yahoo's plan to compete with Facebook and other social networks? Email, of course. Seems that's Google's plan too, according to what both companies told Bits. The idea is that the connection between you and those in your address books and inboxes are just as much a part of your social graph as the people you "friend" on Facebook. But I'm skeptical. Who wants a friend request from Mr. George Annah of Senegal or opheliasbmv4 and other "chicks in your area" who "needu some luvin today" ?