Box.net, the online file storage and sharing service, has just launched integration with Salesforce.com. Starting today businesses will be able to add a Box.net app to their Salesforce accounts, allowing them to quickly access their documents, media, and other files from directly within their CRM. The app also includes support for Box.net's OpenBox platform, giving you access to the services that have been integrated with the service (these include services like Zoho and eFax).To get started, businesses need to sign up for Box.net's enterprise plan, which includes free access to the Salesforce app. As an added bonus, any businesses using the new Salesforce integration will be eligible for unlimited storage on Box.net — something that the service's normal enterprise customers don't have. Box.net will also offer access to the Salesforce app to customers using the 'Business' level account (which is for smaller companies), though it won't come with unlimited storage.

  Microsoft has set up a Twitter account called @MicrosoftHelps and aims to provide Windows 7 customer support on the hot micro-sharing service, writes Sarah Perez over at Channel 10. The account has been around for a week or so but hasn't been met with much attention so far. That's a shame, because I honestly think it's really interesting to see Microsoft set up a customer service channel on Twitter, much like Best Buy recently amazed me with its @Twelpforce endeavors.

  Coinciding with the worldwide debut of Windows 7 and the launch of physical retail stores throughoutthe world, Microsoft has revamped its online store as well. The news comes from Trevin Chow, Senior Lead Program Manager for Microsoft Store. Big surprise: the revamped online storefront features some new categories (including 'Computers'!), so you can now go there to buy Windows 7 PCs as well as accessories and even third-party software like Adobe Photoshop and Nero 9.

  The French-born version of YouTube, DailyMotion - which has now grown into a global site with 60 million users - has officially confirmed its latest fundraising of €17 million, which was early reported as €15 million earlier this month. The new information is that there was an undisclosed €7.5 million investor in the round which turns out to be a French state-backed investment fund. According to Atlas VC Fred Destin on his blog today, Atlas Venture has participated "above pro-rata in this round and grows ownership".

  DotBlu, which we first covered in 2007 when it was called BluBet, had some of Silicon Valley's highest profile angel investors backing it. But it wasn't enough, and company hit the deadpool earlier this week.Investors in an early angel round included Jawed Karim (Co-Founder of YouTube), Kevin Hartz (Co-Founder of Xoom and Eventbrite), Joe Greenstein (Co-Founder and CEO of Flixster) and Keith Rabois (Former PayPal & LinkedIn Executive and Current Slide Executive). A later $2 million round was funded by Maples Investments and DE Shaw. The company first launched as an online betting service and then changed its name and focus to social gaming. But on October 16 the company shut everything down with a brief note to users: "Dear dotblu members: dotblu.com is down indefinitely. A big thanks to each of you for being part of our community for the past two and a half years." The note also asks users to stay in touch via their Facebook fan page.

  Last night we broke the news that location-based mobile social network Loopt had acquired GraffitiGeo, a fellow Y Combinator-backed startup that launched only a few months ago. Neither company was willing to comment on the acqusition last night, but earlier today they finally confirmed it and opened up to share some of the logic behind the deal.GraffitiGeo launched in August, when I described it as a 'Foursquare meets Yelp, with a dash of augmented reality'. The service invites users to review local restaurants and other venues in a manner that's similar to Yelp, but encourages them to leave very brief descriptions (or just thumbs up/thumbs down) instead of the longer reviews you'll find on other sites.

  After months of negotiations and holding both off at bay, Twitter now has agreements with both Bing and Google to give them access to its full feed of public Tweets. Both search engines have been yearning to drink directly from Twitter's the realtime firehose of micro-messages and all that they carry. A rudimentary version of Bing's Twitter search is already live, and it will soon add public Facebook updates to its search results as well.While financial terms of the deals were not disclosed, full access to Twitter's data stream is very valuable to both search engines. Depending on how much Twitter was able squeeze out of Google and Bing for these licensing deals, they are likely to provide its first major source of revenue. (Imagine, if they have to pay by the Tweet).

  Appsfire, the service for sharing iPhone Apps with anyone, has announced that they are doing a contest called App Star Awards, in partnership with SFR/AppliStore and LeWeb.The idea is very simple. Anyone that has a legit iPhone application that doesn't require jailbreaking, can submit a 30 second video to the contest, even if the app is not totally finished. 30 clips will be preselected, 10 in each category — games, entertainment, utility and other. Those clips will be reviewed and rated by a jury (full list below). Three winners, one in each category, will get a check of $1,500 and a free ad campaign with participating partners.The results will be announced on stage at LeWeb in Paris on December 9th. TechCrunch Europe is organizing the startup competition in partnership with LeWeb.

  Social gaming companies like Zynga and Playdom have proven that casual/social gaming can be an extremely lucrative business. But their success can't be solely attributed to the quality of their games — they're also finely tuned to maximize their virality. Users are often asked to invite their friends to join them, or publish stories to their accounts on Facebook, Twitter, and other services. Today HeyZap, the startup that helps Flash games get distribution and monetize effectively, is launching a new "Viral API" that helps developers integrate similar features into their own games.Co-founder Jude Gomila says that up until now, developers have had to figure out how to implement these syndication features on their own — now they'll be able to do it quickly using HeyZap's APIs. To put the API to the test, HeyZap built a game called Balloon Boy Game (in honor of last week's horror story-turned-scandal), which allows users to share the game with their friends via Facebook and Twitter.

  MySpace CEO Owen Van Natta is here at the Web 2.0 Summit in San Francisco. He sat down with Federated Media's John Battelle to answer some questions about his company.Van Natta clearly had a strategy for this Q&A: To say "the socialization of content" as much as possible. That's the direction he wants to lead the social network in as it attempts to prove it can exist in a world where Facebook has passed it as the dominant social network.So what does the catchphrase mean? Van Natta thinks MySpace has a unique position on the web because of its music deals with all the major labels and the independent ones. And because it's a much more open network than Facebook, he believes this will work to MySpace's advantage in helping people find content.

  At the Web 2.0 Summit today in San Francisco, Google's Marissa Mayer unexpectedly came on stage to unveil a new product. She first announced that Google has also reached a deal with Twitter, which she wrote a blog post about earlier in the day, following the announcement that Bing and Twitter had done the same thing.But Mayer had more to share. There's a new Google product called "Social Search" that is launching soon in Google Labs. This is a new feature that allows you to see results for queries from people in your social network. This works by using your Google Profile. If you fill it out with the other social networks you're a member of, such as FriendFeed, Google will scan who you are connected to and give your results from those people.

  MySpace CEO Owen Van Natta will make a number of announcements on stage at the Web 2.0 Summit in San Francisco this afternoon. Among them are two major changes to MySpace Music. The service will now have a full historical archive of music videos from the major labels and independents. And they are also launching an artist dashboard to give musicians deep analytics into profile views, music streams, and friend information.Details below:

  Following Google's announcement of its music product this morning, Facebook is officially enhancing its Gift Shop with a redesign and new categories of gifts and additional gifts for charity, music and sports from developers. The changes will be rolled out to users in the coming weeksOn Facebook's Gift Shop, you need to purchase credits on the site (via credit card), that cost 10 cents in U.S. currency are are available in 15 different countries. With the enhanced version of the gift shop, you will be able to purchase songs as gifts for your friends. Powered by Lala.com, the gift shop will offer over 8 million songs from a vast variety of artists ranging from Mozart to Beyonce. Web songs cost 1 credit (or 10 cents) each, while full, downloadable, and digital rights management-free (DRM) MP3s are 9 credits each. Some of this money goes to Facebook but Lala takes a cut of every transaction. But you don't have to have a Lala account to play or receive a song.

  Even though it is embroiled in a nasty legal battle with its founders over its future, Skype continues to rack up impressive numbers. In today's third quarter earnings from eBay (which still owns Skype, but is preparing to unload it), the company breaks out Skype's performance (see slide above).Skype's registered users grew 41 percent to 521 million people. That's a stunning 40 million new registered users in the past three months. Revenues grew 29 percent to $185 million. Free Skype-to-Skype minutes grew 74 percent to 27.7 billion minutes, whereas SkypeOut minutes (which is what members pay for) grew 44 percent to 3.1 billion minutes. All of those SkypeOut calls translated to a healthy $185 million in revenues, up 29 percent from a year ago.