News Corp. is still looking to buff up their five-year old $580 million investment in MySpace, and company officials say they're planning a relaunch of the most probably passé social network site this year.

Agence France Presse reports that in an effort not to slide into permanent irrelevancy vis-a-vis the Facebook juggernaut, MySpace will target a younger audience.

Facebook has 500 million members. MySpace has "a healthy user base," according to AFP's reporting of comments by News Corp. chief digital officer Jon Miller.

"It's still around," Miller said of MySpace at the Fortune Brainstorm Tech conference in Colorado, according to AFP, "adding that the site attracts around 65 million to 70 million unique users a month in the United States alone."

MySpace evidently has largely abandoned competing with Facebook as a lost cause, and is set to be the go-to "platform for musicians and their fans," according to Miller, who told AFP that it intends to "go younger, go youthful" and put a premium on "creativity and self-expression... A little more rock and roll."

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It appears Google's failure to meet a deadline to implement Google Apps into the city of Los Angeles' various departments will cost it about $135,000 in reimbursements to the city.

They can take it out of the $7.25 million the contract's worth.

As The Register reports, Google is upgrading LA's computer system from Novell tech to its email and collaboration software. MarketWatch revealed the delay in a report last Friday, using LA's tech boss Randi Levin as its source.

Google officials say all the concern is overblown. " It's not surprising that such a large government initiative would hit a few speed bumps along the way, and we're working closely with CSC and the City to meet their evolving requirements in a timely manner and ensure the project is a great success for Los Angeles," company officials said in a prepared statement.

Lalawag puts it a bit more trenchantly: "Google now claims that they didn't quite catch all the details in the requirements for the contract. "

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Is it constitutional for the government to require that mobile phones carry labels with radiation information?

We'll find out pretty soon -- according to The Register, the cellular trade body The CTIA is "challenging a San Francisco ordinance that requires radiation labels on every mobile phone sold, claiming that such a rule breaches the US constitution."

The ordinance passed last month requires buyers to be informed "at the point of sale" about the radioactive properties of different mobile phones, The Register explains, adding that "the CTIA reckons that requirement undermines the FCC's (national) rulings and is thus unconstitutional - states can't go around overruling federal bodies."

PCWorld's Jared Newman is a bit too subtle and undecided on his take on the law: "It's a good thing the CTIA is suing San Francisco over an inane law that will publicize cell phone radiation levels in stores, because this a rare case where more information is too much."

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Nothing like a good new product launch to goose the stock shares.

Reuters reported that the phenomenon worked fine for Research In Motion, whose stock jumped "on speculation that next week it would unveil a new touchscreen BlackBerry that could compete more effectively with other smartphones."

Good news, the Blackberry was looking rather dowdy next to all the iPhones and smartphones all the other guys at the health club pull out.

Industry observer Marguerite Reardon writes that, "while RIM has done well selling low-end BlackBerry devices throughout the world, it is starting to slip in the high end of the smartphone category, especially in North America, where new iPhones and Android devices get more attention from consumers."

She notes that RIM is also facing more competition from other smartphone makers in the enterprise market, "as more companies start letting employees swap BlackBerrys for other smartphones."

RIM should announce the launch of the BlackBerry 9800 at a joint event with AT&T Inc in New York this Tuesday, Reuters reported, adding that "AT&T is expected to get exclusive U.S. rights to sell the new device."

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