Briac

* Frederic Filloux: Why does digital advertising suck? * PE firms change their political contribution practices * Fred Wilson reiterates his support of carried interest being taxed as ordinary income. * Morning Call: U.S. futures point lower, London falls early, European shares stumble, the Nikkei slips and Hong Kong shares weaken. * MG Siegler: The arrival of Android fanboys * Andrew Ross Sorkin says answers are long overdue on how credit rating agencies gave "their triple-A blessings to subprime junk?" * May was the worst month for hedge funds since November 2008. Things also weren't too hot for leveraged loans.

* Rob Go: Good vs. bad VC diligence * Google's Susan Wojcicki: What we're going to do with AdMob * Katie Benner: Financial regulatory reform will turn private equity into shadow banking * Morning Call: U.S. futures are mixed, London rises early, Europe extends rally and the Nikkei gains 1.3%. * Christine Idzelis: Paper jam hits Cerberus * Yale's endowment returns: Manager skill or risk exposure? * Over before it began: Atlantic Media halts work on biz site * Felix Salmon: News consumers, paywalls and useless tourists * Ray Padgett: Why MySpace can still win as a music destination * Hey Chicago: Remember to get tix for the peHUB Shindig on June 16 * Tesla filed an amended S-1 yesterday, and we learned two things: (1) The Toyota deal is not a silver bullet, and (2) The company has a new PR defense for Elon Musk's private jet use.

* Top B-school = Top Pay * Duff McDonald: Does Warren Buffett deserve his outsider rep? * Leonard Goldberger: "Buy American" gets a whole new meaning * Morning Call: U.S. futures point (much) lower, London nears 9-month low, European shares keep falling, the Nikkei loses 3% and Hong Kong shares weaken. * AOL turns 25 years old * LDC comes under fire for its pay structure * Bain & Co: Expect a bounce-back in Middle Eastern M&A activity * Derek Thompson: Facebook doesn't adhere to its stated principles * John Doerr on the iPad: "I found I can take it to concerts. And church." * Jonathan Alter: Why Paul Volcker was frozen out of the Obama Administration

* Mark Zuckerberg: Answering privacy concerns * The best industries for launching a startup in 2010 * Bill Burnham has some ideas on how VCs will work around the new carried interest tax (be sure to read the comments -- some good back-and-forth about VC lobbying strategy mistakes). * John Carney points out that the revised financial reform bill exempts PE firms from fund registration (original version only excluded VC funds). Not sure I think it's as "big" a victory as does Carney, but a victory nonetheless. * Morning Call: U.S. futures point lower, London falls early, European shares retreat, the Nikkei keeps dropping and China shares slip. * Debt covenants keep getting weaker * Toni Schneider: In praise of continuous deployment * A Chinese mega-buyout fund? Fred Hu aims for $10 billion * Hey Chicago: Get your tickets to the peHUB Shindig on June 16 * The Feds approve Google-AdMob. Am I the only one who thinks that AdMob's VCs privately wish the deal had been scuttled? After all, a $700m breakup fee + AdMob (IPO candidate?) would have been more lucrative than $750m sale - AdMob. Right?

* Ryan Avent: Don't listen to "don't go to college" * Josh Lerner: Can public-funded entrepreneurship work? * Josie Garthwaite: Are electric vehicles at the heart of the next Google-Microsoft rivalry? * Morning Call: U.S. futures point slightly higher, London falls early, European shares slip, the Nikkei keeps dropping and China shares retreat. * A history of portable music players * Tesla and Toyota are working together * Fantasy cartography: How Europe's map should look * Could Eliot Spitzer replace Campbell Brown at CNN? * Hey Chicago: Get your tickets to the peHUB Shindig on June 16

* Mark MacLeod: Earn-outs (almost) never work * Dan Caplinger: Don't rush to buy Europe's "bargains" * Om Malik: Why a sudden surge of tech M&A? Because startups pay attention. * Morning Call: U.S. futures point lower, London falls early, European shares retreat, the Nikkei hits 11-week closing low and Shanghai shares slip. * FDIC "balancing act" offers new approach to bank deals * Glucose biofuel cell could revolutionize medical technology * BC Partners wins an investment period extension. The bigger question is whether it will "win" a new fund... * John Lilly, the former Mozilla boss who just moved over to Greylock Partners, believes that Firefox is on the decline.

* Can planes fly on coal? * Ben Horowitz: Stop asking if people will scale * Barry Ritholtz: How likely is a repeat of 1987? * Morning Call: U.S. futures point higher, London rises early, European shares climb and the Nikkei flattens. * Wilbur Ross sees more bank rollups on the horizon * TIAA-CREF gets into the endowment management biz * Congressional Dems may introduce their carried interest tax change bill today * "Mayors" of Starbucks now get discounts nationwide. Pretty sure "mayors" of Dunkin' Donuts just get stared at. * The Short List: The Boston Globe shaved its annual list of the 100 best-performing public companies in Massachusetts to just 82 companies.

* Tom Brakke: The cave and the flow * Dylan Ratigan: Bankster's Party vs People's Party * Todd Dagres wants help: "The bumper crop of consumer internet seeds and start-ups cropping up around the country (with concentrations in SF/SV and NYC) and binge hiring of engineering talent by companies such as Google and Facebook are creating a shortage of talent." * Morning Call: U.S. futures point lower, London rises on BP, European shares rebound, the Nikkei hits 10-week closing low and China shares slide. * DLJ alums will reuinite on May 20 at Cipriani * HP was the winner of a 5-way bidding war for Palm * Guy Sorman: Will California's woes infect Silicon Valley? * Charlie O'Donnell: Is Mark Zuckerberg the Howard Roark of the web? * David Kirkpatrick reports that Sean Parker was fired as Facebook's first president over a cocaine arrest. * New research: Club buyouts general produce better exits than non-club deals, but PE firms are better off doing mega-deals as single sponsors.

* S&P, Moody's, Fitch and... Bloomberg? * Steven Carpenter: Zynga's profits are at risk * Cuomo investigation into banks: Big deal or big PR move? * Morning Call: U.S. futures point lower, London falls early, European shares retreat, the Nikkei loses 1.5% and Hong Kong shares turn negative. * James West: The world according to gold * How group dynamics may be killing innovation * Matthew DeBord: Is it back to the future for electric cars? * Did Google agree to a $700 million kill fee on the AdMob deal? * Arrington defends Zuckerberg * On the other hand, an anti-Facebook project is piling up the donations * Andy Bernard Bait: Cornell University's endowment chief is stepping down to launch a hedge fund.

* Sarah Lacy: Brazil's slumdog entrepreneurs * Are family offices the new face of venture capital? * Breaking up (a buyout) has gotten much more expensive * Morning Call: U.S. futures point lower, London rises early, European shares retreat, the Nikkei hits 1-week closing high and Hong Kong shares climb. * Jon Corzine starts small in bid for redemption * Will Warburg Pincus play spoiler on the Fidelity National buyout? * Beverly Hills Austerity? California is now one of the world's top 10 government default risks * The winner of MIT's $100k business plan competition is an entrepreneur who's PhD is in concrete * John Carney joins CNBC, a network at which he's thrown more than a few rhetorical punches: "The folks at CNBC never seemed to hold a grudge about it. So I won’t hold one against them either."