In 2009, the job market will be full of contrasts: some industries will be eviscerated while others face shortages of workers. The good news is that despite the recession, there are still real jobs to be had. The bad news is that you may have to change fields to find one.
The trick to job hunting in 2009 will be to figure out how your skill-set can translate across industries, says Elaine Varelas, a managing partner at Boston-based outplacement firm Keystone Partners, so that you’re not confined to searching one sector …

The Japanese car giant, after overtaking GM as the worldwide sales leader, says it will finish the fiscal year $3.9 billion in the red.

Add Toyota Motor Corp. to the pile of money-losing car companies.
The Japanese giant said today that it had swung to a $1.8 billion loss in the third quarter of the fiscal year, and warned that it would report a full-year net loss of about $3.9 billion — the first time since 1950.
It’s the latest piece of bad news for the company. Despite capturing the global sales lead …

Before you authors get upset, never fear: Google is making 1.5 million books available,
it announced today, that are in the public domain. There’s a lot of good stuff, including everything by Charles Dickens and (pre-zombified) Jane Austen. Google Says: 
 
“We envision a future where people across the globe can search, discover and access the world’s books from any device,” Google spokeswoman Jennie Jarvis said in an e-mail.
For all the classics you’ll be able to find, there is also a very, very, very, very, very long tail of out-of-print books you’ve never even thought …

Google’s Latitude application brings the future of location-based services one step closer, but does Latitude pose a threat to social networking sites like Facebook or MySapce? One analyst says no, but that’s not really the point.
 

 
Imagine a world where you mobile phone not only connects you to social networks and recognizes your location, but also is able to provide you with suggestions for contextual, location-based commercial interests. While Google’s Latitude application, announced on Wednesday, is just a baby step in that direction, one Forrester Research analyst says that will …

Mere days after Wikipedia put up its new and improved plea for donations, the company has already met its goal of raising $6 million. The campaign, headed up by Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales, asked users to dig deep into their pockets and couch cushions to help the Wikimedia Foundation keep the site running. Now that the organization has met its goal, Wales has posted an update saying that the lights will be kept on through the remainder of the fiscal year (until June 30, 2009).
 
In the letter, Wales says that …