The Tuesday Tech Round-Up!

Microsoft acquires Skype for 8.5 billion, Google's annual IO Tech conference is today in San Fran, Youtube's movie rental service, more Google news all over the internet today including Apple topping them as the world's most valuable company, Vogue launches Voguepedia and much more!

1. In its largest acquisition ever, Microsoft has announced its plans to purchase Skype for 8.5 billion! The deal has been the front runner in tech news lately and the buzz is all over the internets. The deal would ultimately place Microsoft at the forefront of online communications and in front of Google. “Google is way behind Skype, and getting ahead of Google in this market was certainly an incentive for Microsoft,” said Gartner Analyst, Leif-Olf Wallin. [NYTimes]

2. Today is Google's annual IO Tech conference in San Francisco. The good folks at Gizmodo have everything covered, from up-to-the minute news and presentations. You can expect there to be plenty of android app news, their new music service and much more. [Gizmodo]

3. Look out Netflix & Redbox, Youtube's renting movies! Customers may no longer have to wait for their favorite movies in the mail. The uber-addictive Youtube recently upped its film directory. What it'll cost you? About $2-$4 a movie. [HuffPost]

4. Apple topples above Google as the world's most valuable brand! Apple has an estimated value of more than $153 billion, compared to Google at $111.5 billion. [MSNBC]

5. Speaking of Google, they plan to announce the launch of their new music service. They plan to unveil Google Music Beta at their annual Google I/O developers conference in San Francisco. It will be similar to that of Amazon, people will be able to listen to their uploaded songs in a streaming fashion but will not be permitted to download it. Users can also wirelessly and automatically sync playlists from the web to connected devices and vice versa. [WSJ]

6. The Google news shows no signs of slowing down today. Recently announced was Ice Cream Sandwich, the company's new OS. Its the OS that runs everywhere, from small android devices to 10-inch tablets. Other new additions will be face-tracking and camera focus shifting based on voice recognition. Fancy. [Engadget]

7. Vogue.com launches Voguepedia! The magazine's new online search tool for 119 years of archived Vogue publication information. The site soft-launched earlier this week and is still budding in its search result functionality but once complete could birth into a trend for other fashion mags. [Voguepedia]

8. Facebook drives more traffic than Twitter. According a new Pew Research Center study, Facebook is more valuable than twitter as source of traffic to top news sites. Facebook referrals account for 8% of unique visitors for The Huffington Post and 6% of unique visitors for The New York Times. [Mashable]

9. In his defamation battle with Wikipedia, billionaire Louis Bacon won. The hedge-fund manager received permission to ask publishers behind Wikipedia, WordPress and the Denver Post to track down online commenters, who he claimed posted libellous content about him. Going after those sites and taking names, this may be the end of hateful online commenters. [HuffPost]

10. Your little brother may be able to reenact the US Navy Seal operation to capture Osama with this video game. Recently created as a new level in Counter Strike by an independent developer simply-named Fletch, Osama's hideout-mansion was recreated for the game. Several thousand people have already downloaded the new level and we can expect those numbers to grow rapidly. [HuffPost]