The rise of video streaming is dramatically affecting the Internet, according to a two-year study of Internet traffic trends that Arbor Networks recently presented to the North American Network Operators Group. Two years ago, Internet traffic was distributed evenly among a dozen Tier-1 network providers, but today the majority of traffic flows through direct peering agreements among large content providers, content delivery networks and ISPs.

Consequently, Tier-1 networks have shifted their business models from simple packet delivery to richer cloud computing and content hosting services, and new players Google (GOOG) and Comcast (CMCSA) have joined the top 10 list of Internet traffic producers–and the more traffic they put on the Internet, the more control it gives them over your online experience.

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For those who thought its email-only device targeted too broad a market, Peek Inc. has gone even more niche–and more absurd–with the first mobile device dedicated entirely to Twitter. TwitterPeek, as the gadget is branded, enables users to read and send tweets, reply, retweet and send direct messages on the go. The device sells for $99 plus an $8 monthly fee or $200 for a lifetime of service.

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We’ve gone back and forth on the existence of a Google (GOOG) phone for a long time now. In the beginning, there was a talk of a Google Phone that turned out to be Android, Google’s mobile operating system targeting handset makers such as HTC (HTC), Motorola (MOT) and Samsung. Now there is word that Google might actually be looking to make its own handset.

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Ultra-low prices on portable computers are nothing new, and in fact have increasingly become the norm since the debut of netbooks–small and light ultraportables that are virtually defined by their low cost. However, there are some strong reasons to believe that Microsoft’s (MSFT) upcoming Windows 7 operating system, in addition to new types of Linux-based portables, could help drive profit margins for hardware manufacturers to surprising new bottoms.

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Suddenly, it’s mating season in the tech sector. Xerox (XRX) is paying $6.4 billion for a piece of the cloud, Adobe (ADBE) is hooking up with Omniture (OMTR) and Intuit (INTU) with Mint, and that may just be the start. As Om pointed out, this is good news for startups and entrepreneurs, especially those with money tied up in late-stage investments that aren’t likely to go public soon.

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If I were to tell you that Apple’s (AAPL) app economy was worth more than $2.5 $2.4 billion a year, you would laugh hysterically, shake your head and walk out of the room, yes? Surf on over to some other web site? But here I am telling you exactly that!

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Over the past year, I’ve wished more of my friends “Happy Birthday” than I had my entire life prior to that. This summer, I’ve checked in daily with numerous friends while they were on their vacations. And last week I accidentally ignited a debate among 16 of my friends over the article “Why Exercise Won’t Make You Thin.”

Of course, none of this happened in person, but via Facebook and Twitter.

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Dave Winer’s ability to peer into the future is uncanny. He was talking about a river of news long before the current activity streams became popular. He was evangelizing RSS long before there were blogs. I could go on and on about his prescient observations, but it’s his warnings that are especially prophetic.

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Late last week, a day before the Federal Communications Commission started to investigate the Google (GOOG) Voice App fiasco, I spoke with the new FCC chairman, Julius Genachowski. He managed to carve out a few minutes from what has been a very busy first month on the job.

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We all know that in a few years, Long Term Evolution (LTE), the 4G wireless broadband technology being embraced by mobile carriers across the world, is going to rule the airwaves, becoming an important way for us to connect to the Internet. But for now, it seems HSPA, aka High Speed Packet Access, the 3G wireless broadband technology, rules the planet. HSPA is a common term used to embrace all acronyms for HSDPA and HSUPA as well as HSPA+.

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Brooke Hammerling (publicist) and Erin McKean (entrepreneur) are in a Sand Hill Road conference room, hashing out plans to unveil Ms. McKean’s new Web site, Wordnik.

Ms. Hammerling, while popping green apple Jolly Ranchers into her mouth, suggests a press tour that includes briefing bloggers at influential geek sites like TechCrunch, All Things Digital and GigaOM.

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For much of this decade, Mozilla and its Firefox browser were the upstarts, out to beat the big, bad Microsoft (MSFT) and its Internet Explorer browser. Firefox, the descendant of Netscape, the browser that helped jump-start the web revolution, was nimble and it was secure–something Microsoft’s IE wasn’t.

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If the growing number of games being played on it are any indication, then San Francisco-based micro-messaging service Twitter has the potential to become the next major casual gaming hub. The thought first came to me a few weeks ago, when I discovered Spymaster, a game that allows you to run your own spy ring.

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Ever since Netscape started storing cookies in its browsers, there has been a Jekyll-and-Hyde nature to the web. The Jekyll web promised a more personalized experience, with sites serving ads for products and services that you would actually be interested in–ads that are more like useful information and less like glaring interruptions. The Hyde web wanted sites to stalk you, recording little bits of data about your online life until they knew more than you’d be comfortable sharing even with some friends.

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Prime View International, a Taiwanese company that makes an e-readers display part, said today it would purchase E-Ink, a company that provides the digital ink technology in the Amazon Kindle and Sony Reader, for $215 million. The two companies have been partners in developing the Sony and Amazon e-reader products, and the deal highlights PVI’s attempt to own the top provider of an essential technology for the growing e-reader market.

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