According to the American Dialect Society, the term Google (when used as a verb), is the top of word of the last decade, beating out "green," "blog," "text," "9/11," and "war on terror" for the honor.

"It's hard to imagine life before we were Googling," American Dialect Society executive council member Ben Zimmer says.

In 2002, "Google" was voted as "most useful" by the Society, and there aren't too many people out there who could have seen Google's raging successes coming.

During the decade, the suffix "-er" saw a boost, with terms such as "flip-flopper" and "birther" becoming commonplace, and the prefix "un-" saw a boost as well, with terms such as "unfollow" and "unfriend" becoming mainstays thanks to Twitter and Facebook.

A few of the notable words of the decade that have not "stood the test of time" despite being very popular at one point include "muggle" (from Harry Potter), "bushlips," and "plutoed."

CBS, via the Society has posted some of the most notable words for each year of the past decade:

2000:
Chad; Courtesy call; Civil union; Nader traitor

2001:
9/11; Shuicide bomber; Ground zero; Misunderestimate

2002:
WMD; Google (verb); Blog; Amber alert; Regime change

2003:
Metrosexual; Embed; SARS; Pre-emptive self defense

2004:
Red state, blue state, purple state; Flip-flopper; Phish; krunked

2005:
Truthiness; Katrina; Podcast; Sudoku

2006:
Plutoed; Macaca; YouTube; Lactard; waterboarding

2007:
Subprime; Facebook; Green- (prefix); Truther; Toe tapper

2008:
Bailout; Barack Obama; Change; maverick; Shovel ready; TWD (texting while driving); Bromance; Terrorist fist jab

2009:
Tweet; -er (suffix); Fail; Public option; H1N1; Death panel; Sexting

Here's to another ten years of ridiculous terms AD :)

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Sony president Kaz Hirai has said the company will be expanding the PlayStation Network across most of the Sony product range, not just the PS3 and PSP gaming consoles.

The new PSN will be unified across HDTVs, Blu-ray players, PCs and laptops.

To access the service, eventually users will have a "single user login and experience across all product lines."

Beginning next month, when the PSN video service arrives on Windows PCs, Bravia TVs, and Sony Blu-ray players, the company will launch a new studio, Sony Network Entertainment which will be in charge of content produced for distribution via PSN.

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LG has unveiled the GW990 smartphone at CES, the first to use Intel's Moorestown platform, alongside Intel's Moblin Linux OS.

The phone itself is gigantic, but includes a 4.8-inch screen that features a 1024x480 resolution. The device gets about 4 hours of talk time and 300 of standby for its 1850 mAh battery, and includes a now-standard 5MP camera.

The Moblin OS looks similar to Android but has much less developer support as of yet. LG uses an "S-Class" UI for the GW990, adding 3D effects and large, colorful icons.

The Atom CPU allows for flawless multitasking, says PCmag, and the editor says he watched a movie, while checking his calender and sending a text, all at the same time.

The device is not priced as of yet, and will hit Korea first in the Q3 of this year. No word on a North America release.

Pics:

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Dreamer has announced this week at the CES event that Oppo Blu-ray players will now include the BluTV IPTV service.

"The OPPO BDP-83 model is one of the few Blu-ray Disc players that can support nearly every type of traditional five-inch disc, so adding connectivity to the device through Dreamer and BluTV further strengthens its appeal as the central hub of the connected living room," adds Won Baek, CEO and president of Dreamer. "Dreamer transforms Blu-ray Disc players into a full-featured HD set-top box, making it easy for consumers to browse, search and watch interactive content on their TV screens."

Current owners can recieve the service by simply updating their firmware. BluTV has 20 casual games such as chess, and many different widgets.

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Sony has unveiled two new digital cameras at CES this week, both of which will record Full HD 1080p video in the AVCHD format.

The DSC-HX5V and DSC-TX7 have 10MP sensors, include Backlight Correction High Dynamic Range (HDR), and include TransferJet wireless technology. The HX5V also includes GSP + Compass for automatic geo-tagging of photos by location. Both have an HDMI output for easy connection to HDTVs.

The HX has a 3-inch LCD and 10x optical zoom and the TX has a 3.5-inch touchscreen display and a Carl Zeiss Vario-Tessar 4x optical wide angle lens.

Both cameras can accept SDHC memory cards, or Sony's own proprietary Memory Stick, although the latter is much more expensive.

The HX will cost you $350 when it ships in March and the TX will knock you back $400 when it launches next month.

Pic via Electronista:

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Nokia CEO Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo added during his keynote speech at CES that the mobile phone manufacturer is promising $1 million funding for a developer that can design a phone that "helps improve the life of the poorest citizens in the world."

The operation, dubbed the Growth Economy Venture Challenge, includes both software and hardware innovations and the million dollar idea will be judged by a panel of Nokia developers and private venture capitalists. The "poorest citizens" of the world, as described by Nokia, are those that make under $5 a day, such as people in Haiti, and many parts of Africa.

"We've seen what the tech community can do when it focuses on problems that are also opportunities", Kallasvuo added. "We want to channel that energy toward improving lives in the developing world."

Kallasvuo illustrated some of the problems that developers will encounter, such as the fact that many in developing nations are illiterate, or lack bank accounts.

"Business people often tend to lump all of the growing countries outside the West into one category," he noted. "They call them 'developing countries,' 'emerging countries' or 'emerging markets.' Each of these markets is uniquely different and complex. A one-size-fits-all approach just doesn't work."

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Microsoft has filed a second appeal in their XML patent case, claiming the original ruling could be dangerous for future patent cases.

Last month, the software giant lost to tiny Canadian company i4i, and removed all infringing custom XML editing abilities from its Office 2003 and 2007 suite. Microsoft also paid $290 million in damages.

Of the new appeal, Kevin Kutz, director of public affairs for Microsoft says: The latest appeal "details significant conflicts we believe the December 22 decision creates with established precedents governing trial procedure and the determination of damages, and we are concerned that the decision weakens judges' authority to apply appropriate safeguards in future patent trials."

New versions of Office go on sale the 11th, with all infringing XML editing removed.

Loudon Owen, chairman of i4i responded to the new appeal: "This next step of seeking a rehearing was anticipated. We continue to be confident that we will prevail. We look forward to continuing to build i4i's business now that Microsoft is obligated to comply with the terms of the injunction. i4i stands ready to work with the wide range of customers that require this custom XML functionality."

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According to a new materials cost teardown performed by iSuppli, the new Google Nexus One costs $174.15 to build, with the most expensive part being the extremely powerful Qualcomm SnapDragon processor, estimated at $30.50 USD.

The most interesting revelation is the fact that "Touchscreen Assembly (capacitive multitouch)" costs $17.50, about 10 percent of the entire bill of materials, even though Google has disabled multi-touch on the Nexus One.

Google is selling the phone unlocked for $530, or $180 with contract via T-Mobile.

The full teardown results:

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