LeapFish hopes for success in crowded field of metasearch – LeapFish hopes to break out as the best of metasearchers, a field of aggregators that also includes Search.com., Clusty, Dogpile and Zuula. LeapFish is a kind of one-stop mashup that pulls into one interface not only the search functions of Google, Yahoo and MSN, but also those of YouTube, Amazon, eBay.

Profitable Google cuts back as ad growth slows – Google disclosed plans to lay off 100 recruiters. Additionally, the company said it would shutter or stop development of several minor products including a search engine for catalogues and Dodgeball, a social networking service for mobile phones.

Get Ready for Inauguration Spam – As the nation prepares for tomorrow’s historic inauguration of President-elect Barack Obama, antivirus vendors are gearing up for a flood of spam and malware-laden Web sites that aim to capitalize on the event.