In an interesting pivot, YouTube’ advertising model is about to see a significant change toward more options for ad viewing. The Wall Street Journal reports that Google is beta testing a button that will let you stop a YouTube video ad from playing a few seconds after it begins. The site will eventually let you choose which ads you want to view when you’re about to watch a longer video, too, similar to Hulu’s current “tailored ad” experience.

The ability of iPhone apps to generate insane revenue is pretty well-documented. It's not limited to Apple's App Store, either; the Android Market is capable of making some serious cash as well. But the App Store's greater popularity and much larger userbase make it a unique case.

Twitter on Thursday announced that it had acquired Smallthought Systems, the company behind an analytics service called Trendly that tracks real-time changes and user trends for Web site owners.

It all started with a little spring cleaning and quickly turned into a construction project. Early last month, Google, the search engine, decided it was time to spruce things up a little and rolled out a re-design of its Web site search pages. A rare event, it was only the eighth time the homepage design had changed since the company started in 1998.

The latest developments in iAds, announced during the Apple Worldwide Developer's Conference earlier this week, included an updated ad policy that might just ban any iAds competitor. The wording is opaque, but it specifically states that only "independent" ad companies are allowed to advertise on iOS alongside iAds.

The war of words between Google and Apple over mobile ads sharpened on Wednesday. AdMob, the mobile advertising start-up that Google recently acquired, said Apple’s new terms of service for the iPhone 4 and iPad, if enforced, would prevent it from putting ads inside mobile apps. That could be crippling for AdMob, which is the No. 1 seller of ads in iPhone apps. Omar Hamoui, the chief executive of AdMob, said the policy could hurt developers too.

Apple's adjusted its iPhone developers agreement concerning how third-party ad apps can collect user data--it's now allowed. But Apple's language dances carefully around the matter, and specifically excludes Google and its recent acquisition AdMob (which Apple had wanted to buy). This is war.

Sugar Inc., the blog network for women, updates its readers on the latest in celebrity gossip, fashion, beauty, parenting and cooking. Now it will update them about the best places to go in their towns for discounted services.