Okay, now I have no idea what to believe when it comes to Google's share price. Note in the above picture that both Yahoo Finance and Google Finance are reporting Google down to a 52-week low — after a sudden, forty-point drop right at the end of the day. But in after-hours trading, Google is back up over $400. Initially, Yahoo even had the stock all the way down to $200. Even MarketWatch got taken in by the wild swing. What's going on?

Folks watching the financial meltdown on Wall Street on Google Finance yesterday might not have freaked out as much as everyone else because Google was providing erroneous data, even about its own share price. Rather than a $50 drop, the site only showed a $40 drop for GOOG, though still well under $400. The numbers were fixed this morning just in time for the open of the trading day. No word from Google on what went wrong. The good news for Google shareholders is that the share price has climbed in after-hours trading — at least according to numbers from Yahoo Finance, which reported correct numbers the whole time.

Watch out, ESPN.com: Google's after your fans. Derrick Eckhardt, a writer at fantasy-sports news site RotoNation, noticed that Google's serving up sports scores to mobile users. Eckhardt's sources tell him that Google has been looking at the sports market for a year, and greenlit a secret project to enter the sports-information business last November. There's no Google Sports portal, and no sign of the effort on Google's regular Web search. Should the likes of ESPN and Yahoo Sports be worried? Google Finance has yet to make a dent in Yahoo Finance. But remember how Google used to point users who typed in street addresses to Yahoo Maps? After Google created its own maps site, the links to Yahoo Maps swiftly disappeared. (Photo by Derrick Eckhardt)

Now playing World of Warcraft can get you a job. Thrilling, really, to discover that a game played by destroying arbitrarily assigned enemies ad infinitum, rising up a ladder until reaching a disappointing top that isn't a top at all, commiserating with socially inept addicts with little life outside the computer, could prepare you for tech work. No, seriously, I am shocked at this news. [Wired]
It's funny 'cause it's petty: Just as Microsoft pushes Vista to 2007 and shuffles the whole Live department, MSN goes down for an hour. [Threadwatch]
AT&T doesn't really want to break your Internet. Sure, that's what it says while it's sober. [ZDNet]
Google Finance doesn't just disappoint Yahoo blogger (and "Expert Author") Jeremy Zawodny, it makes him sad. Jeremy comes this close to naming the folks who let Yahoo Finance rot, then praises the product manager in charge of Google Finance. "Not speaking for my employer" indeed. [WebProNews]
Idealab shareholders agree to pay founder Bill Gross's $50 million loan. And now he can't have that puppy he asked for, because that was the agreement about responsibility, Bill, and for now you can only keep your goldfish. [LA Times]
Songbird plays a good game of gotcha. Steve Jobs in 2002: "If you legally acquire music, you need to have the right to manage it on all other devices that you own." France fighting iTunes in 2006: "The consumer must be able to listen to the music they have bought on no matter what platform." Oh, they couldn't mean it the way he did, they're just the French. [Songbird]

John W. Thompson, CEO of Symantec, according to Symantec.com

Google Finance: It's sexy, it's dynamic, it's a new toy. Let's abuse it.

Ah, wait, maybe this is why Google Finance pussyfoots around Handheld Entertainment. Carl Page, Handheld co-founder and brother of Google co-founder Larry Page, took his little company public with a reverse merger (buying out the private Handheld with one of those shell companies).

Larry Page's brother Carl, already a mega-millionaire after selling eGroups to Yahoo in 2000, just went public with his latest company, Handheld Entertainment.

The beautiful new Google Finance finally saves Google from running Yahoo Finance for its stock quotes. Search Engine Watch blogs all the technical analysis, but the fun bit is how rocky last night's launch was.