Look at all that spring-fed fiber in Provo. (Source: Flickr)

All it took for Google to buy Provo, Utah's fiber-optic network was a dollar. If only you had four quarters! [AP]

Yesterday, a federal judge ruled that YouTube did not violate Viacom’s copyright--despite the fact that several of the company’s shows were being illicitly uploaded onto the site. That's because the Google-owned service is protected by the Digital Millennium Copyright Act's “safe-harbor provision.” [Los Angeles Times]

Time's very important "100 Most Influential People List" is packed with techies with fake-sounding titles, like "Internet talent discoverer" Scooter Braun. [AllThingsD]

Twitter announced it has teamed up with BBC America to offer "in-tweet branded video synced to entertainment TV series." What does that mean? Your guess is as good as ours. [CNet]

Amazon, looking to expand its international operations, has opened an office in Russia. [TechCrunch]

Ms. Mayer with Team Stamped (Photo: Instagram)

This is about as close as Marissa Mayer has come to being featured in an episode of Entourage. Today, word leaked that the new Yahoo CEO made her first acquisition--or acqui-hire, depending on who you ask. Ms. Mayer has purchased Stamped, a New York City-based recommendations app cofounded by two fellow Xooglers. Stamped cofounder Robby Stein worked closely with Ms. Mayer when the two were both still employed by GOOG.

Mashable says Stamped's team, five of whom are former Google employees, will be joining "a new mobile product team to be established in New York under the leadership of Stamped’s three co-founders." In a blog post published to the Stamped site, the team confirmed that they will be "discontinuing the Stamped product" but are working on a solution for users to export their data from the app.

Business Insider reports that the deal was closed for a ''a nice size," but nothing too hefty. That should mean some extra spending money for a group of people who have no need for it: Stamped's celebrity investors.

Back in July, when Stamped decided to pivot from a ratings app into a recommendations app--the company brought on a slew of celebrity investors like Justin Bieber, his manager Scooter Braun, Ellen Degeneres, and Ryan Seacrest--alongside established players like Bain Capital Ventures, Google Ventures, Metamorphic Ventures. (Stamped wasn't the only startup to give up on trying to rate things: Kevin Rose's Oink shut down in March.)

Stamped is bright, sleek-looking, and easy-to-use, but around the time of the revamp, we wondered whether it would be able to get any traction in recommendations--even with Biebs filming videos about his favorite things. The gamble may not have worked as intended. Mashable notes both the iPhone and web app will be "discontinued by the end of the year," with the team's talents now geared toward helping Yahoo transform from a dotcom relic into a mobile company.

For some insight into how celebrity tech investments work, check out The New Yorker's profile of Scooter Braun, who had invested in ten startups, including Uber, Stamped, and Spotify, when the article was published in September.

"Cross-promotion is all part of the interdependent business culture that Braun has created. For instance, he cuts Bieber in on many of his tech investments. Sometimes he has Bieber put money into a start-up company directly; sometimes he offers to have him promote a product in return for equity. “If it makes sense for Justin’s brand, I show it to him,” Braun said. (He has a similar relationship with his other artists, and with Ellen DeGeneres, with whom he has shared tech-investing tips: “She put me onto something, and I put her onto something.”)"

(Photo: YouTube)

Psy's "Gangnam Style," that raucous electro synth party pop anthem even your grandmother knows by now, took America by storm with its beat and style. It was one of the first Korean pop singles to successfully cross over into the American media consciousness, and garnered so much interest that Psy is now signed with Scooter Braun, the man who plucked Justin Bieber out of YouTube obscurity and molded him into a star.

As of this writing, the "Gangnam Style" music video has garnered over 274 million views and close to 3 million likes. Metrics like that should land "Gangnam Style" squarely in the list of YouTube's most watched and most liked videos. And yet, it's mysteriously absent from that list, causing some Psy fans to cry conspiracy.

The site "What Happened to Gangnam Style?" cropped up a few days ago, where a very dedicated Psy fan is collecting evidence that YouTube is purposefully keeping "Gangnam Style" from its rightful place on the Top Liked chart.

According to the site:

On September 13, Gangnam Style MV became the most LIKED video in YouTube history worldwide with 2,234,180 likes, but 7 days later, on Sep 20, it was removed from Youtube’s Most Liked All Time Chart as you can see on the snapshots below.

If the "Most Liked" chart is aggregated solely based on like metrics, it does seem that "Gangnam Style" should be number one. It has received almost twice the likes as the #1 video on the chart, LMFAO's "Party Rock Anthem."

One YouTube user, named AgentofDoubt, recorded a 6-minute video walking the audience through the alleged snubbing. He believes that YouTube has grown ever more commercialized, bending over backwards to accommodate videos created by professional singers while disadvantaging lesser known YouTubers.

"It does seem like Google is filling this chart with celebrities who aren't necessarily YouTubers," he says in the video. "They're actually celebrities outside of YouTube and they're just basically cashing in by filling these charts with performers that actually don't deserve to be in these positions. Because 'Gangnam Style' deserves to be number one."

Of course, Psy himself could be considered part of that celebrity contingent. He's popular in Korea, and has signed on to work with Mr. Braun, whose other clients include Justin Bieber, who does make an appearance on the Top Likes chart.

Perhaps the "Top Liked" chart isn't actually organized by which videos received the most likes. We've reached out to YouTube and will update when we know more. In the meantime, Psy diehards (Psyhards?) are galvanizing, urging fellow fans to sign a petition to get the video back to its rightful #1 spot.

Mr. Braun did not wear a Mickey Mouse shirt.

Betabeat arrived at Google's Big Tent event at the Skylight West building just in time for the Trends and Transformations in Music panel. Moderated by Billboard editorial director Bill Werde, the topic du jour was how the Internet and social media have ushered in a new era of music production.

In attendance were Live Nation CEO Michael Rapino and none other than Scooter Braun, Justin Bieber's talent manager and the man credited with discovering America's favorite heartthrob. (Sadly, there appeared to be zero Beliebers in the audience, as no piercing screams rang out during the program.)

Mr. Werde kicked off the panel with a raucous slide deck, promising to only curse a few times during the panel after informing the audience that, "When the digital revolution happened, the music industry was the first one to shit the bed." Can't say he isn't honest.

After a conversation with Julia Nunes, a ukulele player who got her start on YouTube, Misters Braun and Rapino took the stage to discuss how their industries--record lable management and concert promotion, respectively--have shifted with the advent of social media.

Mr. Rapino argued that the Internet has actually been greatly beneficial to the concert promotion business, because it allows people to connect with music and bands in ways they couldn't before. "The Internet is the greatest thing to ever happen to live music," he said. "Social media is the greatest thing to ever happen to the concert business." Given his enthusiasm, perhaps Mr. Rapino should consider signing up for the Internet defense league.

"The way I look at the Internet is different than the way the media describes the social revolution," Mr. Braun chimed in. "The way I look at it is: it saved me a lot of time. I look at social media as a way to interact on an intimate, one-on-one basis."

Mr. Braun argued that creating that genuine connection between fan and artist is what makes artists successful, and without social media that connection wouldn't be possible.

"How many of you in the audience think Justin Bieber is manufactured?" he boldly asked. A bunch of hands timidly went into the air. "That is what I have to battle every day, because people assume success on a major scale is manufactured," he admitted. "But what I'm trying to make people understand with the Internet is if it is manufactured, you have no chance. [The fans] see everything."

Mr. Braun also didn't hold back when it came to his opinions on the old school industry bigwigs. "I think the only reason the music industry is slow is because you have people who are older who don’t wanna lose their jobs, who don’t what they’re doing," he confidently told the ground. "And I’m probably going to get into a lot of trouble for saying it, but I don’t give a fuck."

Say what you will about Mr. Braun, but his swag is pretty self-evident.

Aerial view. (Photo: Google Maps)

When Anonymous isn't claiming to have leaked Apple IDs, they occasionally publish personal info about people for the lulz. Case in point: they just tweeted the address of one world-famous teen heartthrob Justin Bieber, much to the delight of Beliebers everywhere.

"For the beliebers out there, your man lives at 25202 Del Prado Grand, Calabasas, CA 91302," @YourAnonNews, one of Anonymous's main Twitter handles, tweeted a little over an hour ago. Betabeat has confirmed that the address is indeed the correct residence for Mr. Bieber, though whether or not the news was already out there is yet to be determined. It seems the Beliebers were already in possession of this juicy piece of info last month.

@justinbieber 25202 Del Prado Grand, Calabasas, CA 91302, United States.we both know that address is hahaha

— MicaelaBieber (@MicaelaBieberM) August 21, 2012

Mr. Bieber, who--according to a New Yorker profile of his manager Scooter Braun--lives in the house with a roommate, recently purchased the over 9,200 square feet home back in the spring. X17 published photos of the Biebs' new digs, and the address number for the house--25202--is easily visible in one of them. According to the LA County Assessor's office, the 7-year-old 6 bedroom, 7 bathroom house was purchased on April 16, 2012 for $6,500,065 (down from its original listing price of $7.5 million.)

Good thing the house is safely situated in a gated community.

"Why was Justin Bieber's address dropped?" tweeted Anonymous. "For the lulz, you laughed right? ;)"

(twitter.com/cliffdailey)

Airtime, the Sean & Shawn bred startup that launched earlier this week, has slowly grown on us. Our initial reaction was in line with the majority of the Internet's: "Okay, it's Chatroulette without penises." But the more we've used the service, the more its benefits for networking, flirting and stymying boredom have revealed themselves.

But the thing is, since the site hasn't really hit critical mass yet, you tend to run into the same types of people over and over again. They're almost always very nice, but in our experience, they also almost always fall into one of the below five categories.

1. Journalists

Okay, this reporter is part of the problem, but few seem to be as in love with Airtime as the navel-gazing, network-savvy media elite. While the new app has been extensively reported on, few of our Facebook friends who aren't explicitly involved in media or tech seem to have caught on to the trend. We tend to wait to grant an app "phenomenon" status until it has been adopted by our Kardashian-obsessed, text-messages-in-her-sleep 20-year-old sister.

2. Startup Evangelizers

No where has the "everybody's a CEO" meme been more obvious than within the hallowed video chat grounds of Airtime. The vast majority of folks we've bumped into on the service are founder or executive-level startup employees. And, inevitably, when they ask us what we do, we are subjected to an impromptu pitch session on why their company is the Next Big Thing.

3. People You are Purposefully Not Facebook Friends With

Remember that dude you had a short but torrid Thing with back in college, and now sometimes you see each other in line for coffee and you make that unspoken "I'll pretend not to see you if you pretend not to see me" pact? Yeah, you're not Facebook friends with him for a reason, and you sure as hell don't want to run into him on Airtime.

4. The Lost, Lonely Men of the Internet

If this Businessweek piece is to be believed, a whole lot of dudes are looking at Airtime like it's a video chat version of OkCupid. We definitely had the experience of running into some flirty young men--one, in fact, who could barely bridle his joy as he blurted out: "You're a girl!"

5. Famous business leaders/investors/B-list celebrities

We all know Zuck uses it. So do Jessica Alba and Justin Bieber's manager, Scooter Braun, as well as Foursquare CEO Dennis Crowley and Zynga cofounder Mark Pincus, who users apparently confuse for each other. Assumedly Olivia Munn, Jim Carrey, Martha Stewart, Snoop Dogg and Joel McHale use it too, since they were present for its launch. Personally, we're still waiting for Ryan Gosling to catch on.

Mr. Parker (flickr.com/mager)

Airtime, the super stealth video startup from Napster cofounders Sean Parker and Shawn Fanning, is launching at a press event this morning at Milk Studios in NYC, and celebrities on Twitter are apparently really, really excited about it. It's perhaps unsurprising, though, considering the company that Shawn & Sean are used to keeping: Airtime's investors include Ashton Kutcher, will.i.am and Justin Bieber's manager Scooter Braun. But who knew Martha Stewart was so plugged in to the startup scene? Perhaps Nick Bilton was right about tech being the new Hollywood.

We, too, are looking forward to the launch of Airtime, but could Sean & Shawn maybe fix their website first?

UPDATE: Jimmy Fallon is apparently hosting this thing.

Venture Capitalist. (Twitter.com)

Every teen pop star eventually reaches a fork in the road, around the time of his/or her eighteenth birthday, when things must change. Is it time for more emotionally mature musical stylings? Perhaps a venture into feature filmmaking? Maybe it's the time for a few years of college? Then there's always the classic drug-fueled descent into the gutter and/or rehab and/or obscurity.

Obviously, the adults in Justin Bieber's life would prefer to avoid the latter. And since Drew Magery making a man out of him was out of the question, manager Scott "Scooter" Braun has another idea: venture capital.

According to Forbes, the Biebs is just the latest in a series of celebs investing their show-biz dollars in tech startups. Here's how it works:

In a typical Bieber deal he’ll put in about $250,000 at the favorable pricing generally reserved for smart money—the kind of strategic partners that help a company long term. Braun won’t disclose the size of Bieber’s portfolio but says it’s between 2% and 5% of the singer’s net worth. FORBES puts Bieber’s fortune at about $80 million, which translates to somewhere in the ballpark of $3 million in venture investments.

The article reports that he's got stakes in (among other things, not all of which they'll disclose) Tinychat, Stamped, and Spotify, and is working on Viddy. (As a matter of fact, that looks an awful lot like Ashton Kutcher's portfolio. By our count, @aplusk has stakes in Tinychat and Spotify, as well as Viddy competitor Socialcam.) Ellen Degeneres apparently sold him on the idea of Sojo Studios (in which the talk show host and Covergirl is already an investor), as well. Mr. Bieber explained to Forbes, “Scooter has a team that helps find investments... Usually we work together. If I find something, I bring it to the table.”

We suppose there are worse things to do with $80 million. As a matter of fact, here's an example from another profile that went live today, this one from GQ:

The [new Mercedes-Benz Sprinter van] is exactly the car that an 18-year-old with too much money would drive. The interior is lined with Alcantara. There are two reclining seats way in back, with bucket seats lining the driver's side of the main cabin, as in a stretch limo. There are three hi-def TVs, a computer dock, and a fully operational recording studio along the passenger side. All that's missing is a button that spews out an oil slick, Spy Hunter–style, to foil paparazzi.

That said, the failure risk is probably lower for Mercedes-Benz vans than it is for venture-backed startups.

Now, in the upcoming issue of Page Six magazine, the New York Post reports that Mr. Parker's friend Scooter Braun is also wondering about his pal's sleeping schedule and how it may effect his state of mind. And the 30-year-old talent agent, who manages Justin Bieber, should know from distractions.

“New York is the city that never sleeps. I think for a person like Sean, it’s good to be in a city that sleeps,” Braun told Page Six Magazine, out on Thursday. “Sean needs to be focused. He doesn’t need distractions. Sean’s at his best when he can collect his thoughts.”

Hey, it's not New York's fault! The fabulous parties Mr. Parker throws, par for the life of a Spotify music investor, seem to happen more often in far-flung locations like Coachella. Sources tell Betabeat that Mr. Parker and his fiancé, Alexandra Lenas, spend a lot of time away from the city and that when they're here, they tend to eschew the club circuit, where Mr. Parker's standing doesn't necessarily earn him a carte blanche, for their $20 million West Village abode.

On the other hand, living in a townhouse with a playboy past named after the Roman god of wine-making and ecstasy doesn't exactly scream heads down.