According to our sources, Facebook distributed a request-for-proposal to a number of classified sites earlier this year (the same model they are using for Facebook Music).

The obvious partner is Oodle, which began powering Walmart Classifieds earlier this year. We’ve heard thin reports that they in fact have won the contract.

Whoever powers Facebook Classifieds (or Facebook Marketplace, as they call it) has a big hill to climb. Competing with Ebay (and their Kijiji) and Craigslist isn’t trivial. The original thought was that social networks were great for classifieds because you the buyers and sellers know each other. But Facebook’s current classifieds system shows anemic listings. The Silicon Valley network, for example, had a total of ten new listings added yesterday. San Francisco had twenty. New York City - zero. And for those who’ve forgotten, Microsoft launched their own classifieds site based on MSN friends and private networks (like businesses), and it went nowhere.

Part of the problem is the limited functionality of the existing classifieds system, which allows a short listing, a picture and communication via Facebook’s messaging system. Better software may mean more listings (although the bare-bones and massive Craigslist is a clear exception to that rule). Oodle, or whoever wins the contract, may also bring lots of listings from their other networks.

If Facebook gets this right there is a potential for lucrative advertising dollars - people looking to buy stuff are easy targets.

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Except for two particular times of year. The first is mid-summer, when everyone seems to be writing the exact same article about "Summer Sippers," white and pink wines that are as refreshing as they are delicious.

But ever so much more evil and mind-numbing than mid-summer fluff, are the wine columns that rain down like so many large flightless birds in the weeks preceding Thanksgiving. Around this time of year, if I see one more "What wine to drink with your turkey and stuffing" article, I think I'm going to puke.

Yes, I'm being dramatic. I certainly can't find fault with these wine writers all across the nation who churn out their well meaning lists year after year. Those who might not be inclined to write such boring articles are most certainly forced to do so by their editors, and if they are not, they are as likely to be entreated to do so by their readers.

The problem with crappy wine recommendation articles for Thanksgiving is not the wine writers, it's the wine drinkers who actually read them.

So listen up America. I'm proud of you -- those of you who have decided you want to drink wine with your Thanksgiving dinner. There's nothing better than enjoying wine amidst a celebration of food, family, and friends -- or whatever you choose to celebrate during this holiday. But you need to chill out about finding the right wine.

Why? Because there is no such thing.

Don't fall for all these wine writers who tell you that there is an art to pairing wine with Thanksgiving dinner. Don't believe all this talk about how difficult a meal it is to match with wine. It's all bullshit. Especially at Thanksgiving.

Most people's Thanksgiving meals, even the most modest of them, are a vast cornucopia of flavors so diverse, contrary, and strong, and people eat them in such different combinations at different times that the idea of finding "a" wine to match with the meal is a ridiculous proposition.

Yet it's amazing how people seem to believe that they need help picking a wine. Or at least that's what the tsunami of Thanksgiving wine recommendations would have you believe.

So I'm here to tell you that there are two simple choices when it comes to drinking wine at Thanksgiving. You can take one, or both approaches, and I guarantee that you will be just as happy as if you spent the time, energy, and money searching for "the perfect wines to pair with America's most diverse meal" or whatever all those articles suggest you need.

ONE: If you're having a bunch of people over, buy a few different whites, and a few different reds. Open them all, and let people choose which ones they want. Make sure one of the wines is something that YOU like to drink.

TWO: If you're going to be celebrating with people that you know and love, use the occasion to drink a really nice bottle of something that you've been saving for a "special occasion." The best pairing for wine is good company, and who cares if no one notices, or if Aunt Bertha insists on putting ice cubes in it? So what if cousin Andy takes a bite of candied yams, then a bite of collard greens, and polishes it off with a swig of Cabernet? And if the folks you're eating with have the knowledge or the palates to appreciate it, then so much the better.

That's it. Open a bunch of stuff, or drink something special or both. Life is too short to stress about drinking the right wine with the right food. There are no rules when it comes to food and wine pairing, no matter what anyone tells you. There are no perfect pairings for everyone, only perfect pairings for you.

So relax, experiment, but above all, enjoy your Thanksgiving and make sure it includes lots of wine.

This guest post is written by Matt Rutherford, Web Strategist and technology producer for Charlie Rose. Matt focuses on the macro themes affecting the internet and the wider world.

In an intimate interview with Charlie Rose on PBS tonight, and available here, Stanford professor Larry Lessig reveals some profound views on copyright, remix culture, and the new hybrid economy that is emerging.

In particular, Lessig speaks out against the abolitionist movement growing against copyright:

My real fear is that the last 10 years have unleashed a kind of revolutionary attitude among the generation that will take over in 10 years. And it will be hard for them to distinguish between sensible copyright legislation and the kind that we’ve got right now. So my real fear is we’re going to lose control of this animal… I just want to reform [copyright] to make it make sense.

A reform of copyright is clearly overdue. We require a new form of regulation that takes into account the ease and speed of digital distribution and appropriation. Every week, books cross my desk clamoring for this change - some of which are certainly worth reading. And as Lessig explains on the show, it’s counterproductive to continue to criminalize kids for file-sharing, remixing and recreating with content. Copyright was established to encourage creativity, not stifle it.

Cultural Roots

Lessig thinks on a macro time scale. For him, the emerging “read-write creativity” seen on YouTube and elsewhere is actually a return to our natural cultural roots. Historically, man has always absorbed and re-created culture – the symbolic retelling of stories and re-interpreting of songs on the front porch. It is only the emergence of mass media in the last century that caused us to accept a passive relationship with culture.

What’s so extraordinary about the last four years is that they’ve demonstrated that the technology of the internet is giving us a chance to go back to the way culture has been from the beginning…Only the 20th century was a deviation from this. But from the beginning of culture, it was a normal thing for people to be able to create and recreate the most important parts of culture that were around them.

As evidence of this, Lessig cites the numerous Charlie Rose remix videos that are floating around the web.

I’ve seen some of these Rose remixes, and they are enormous. They’re fantastic. But I would hope, you know, eventually you could be in a position to say I want to encourage this, please. Please do it.

A lot of these remixes also come across my desk. In the spirit of research, here are a few of the best so far: Beckett, Kung Fu, nuclear weapons. They’re all superb. And yes, we do encourage this. As Lessig says, Please do it.

Hybrid Economy

There remains the fundamental question of how a ‘new’ copyright can maintain revenue. After all, despite the ease of pointing out the flaws in the current system, it’s quite another matter to propose a viable alternative. Lessig sees the solution, in part, coming from a new hybrid economy, one that combines the traditional commercial economy with sharing economies seen in Wikipedia, YouTube and elsewhere:

Businesses have begun to realize that the world is in part divided between commercial economies like buying and selling books, and sharing economies like Wikipedia where enormous value is produced for nothing, people are doing it all for free. The most interesting thing I think we’ve seen though in the last five years is the development of a hybrid economy where commercial entities are trying to leverage value out of these sharing economies or vice versa, sharing economies trying to leverage value out of commercial entities. And this hybrid depends upon the commercial entity showing the proper respect for the creation in the sharing economy, and giving space to it, encouraging it so that the sharing economy can produce enormous value that is beneficial to the people inside, and also to the commercial business.

Lessig’s Big Idea

Lessig concludes the interview with his ‘big idea’. It is an inspiring, and elegant reminder that we are in the midst of an unprecedented social change. Just as the Gutenberg press facilitated the spread of the Protestant Reformation, fundamentally altering the course of Western civilization, so too is the internet beginning to spark tectonic changes, the breadth of which we don’t yet have the historical perspective to grasp. As Lessig explains:

I think the big idea, as every big idea is, is just one amazing step beyond where we are right now. And I think you think about the Obama campaign, something like Wikipedia, something like the stuff that’s going on on the Internet, the kind that I think of as read write culture. What it really is doing is reviving the sense that people can do something. Not the passive couch potato politics or couch potato culture, but that they can do something. We’re close to making it really effective. I think the next cycle, what you’re going to see in the way politics functions, will be unrecognizable, even from today. But when we’re there, it will be a revival of ideals, aspirations about democracy that will surprise us. The cynicism that we had in the 20th century will look very 20th century.

Larry Lessig’s interview on Charlie Rose was first broadcast on Friday 11/21/08 on PBS, and is available in full or in clips: Larry Lessig (full segment), Larry Lessig (clips). Matt Rutherford can be reached at matt@charlierose.com.

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When Apple started running the anti-Vista commercial (above) mocking Microsoft for spending $300 million on Vista’s own ad campaign instead of on fixing its problems, I called it hypocritical:

Apple’s advertising budget is also pretty massive. I mean, I see more Apple commercials on TV than ads for Barack Obama. Apple is on track to spend more than $3.5 billion on SG&A (selling, general, and administrative expenses) for its fiscal year that ended September 30. How much of that was spent on advertising? I don’t know, but 10 percent doesn’t seem unreasonable.

It turns out that I underestimated Apple’s advertising budget. Lindsay Blakely at Bnet (a former Business 2.0 reporter) found the actual numbers in a subsequent SEC filing. In its 2008 fiscal year that just ended last September, Apple spent a whopping $486 million on advertising. (In fiscal year 2007, it spent $467 million, and in fiscal year 2006 it spent $338 million).

Half a billion dollars on marketing. No wonder I think Apple products are so great.

Update: Microsoft spends more on advertising across all of its combined businesses than Apple does, but its Windows business is what competes most directly with Apple. Microsoft’s total advertising budget across all of its businesses, including Windows, Office, Xbox, and all the enterprise stuff, was the following (from the 10K): “Advertising expense was $1.2 billion, $1.3 billion, and $1.2 billion in fiscal years 2008, 2007, and 2006, respectively.”

Microsoft’s fiscal year ends in June, so these numbers do not reflect the $300 million Vista campaign. But that would have eaten up 25 percent of Microsoft’s entire ad budget for any of the previous three years.

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Tomorrow, YouTube will be showcasing its first live stream as it broadcasts its YouTube Live celebration, which will bring together a host of celebrities, musicians, and notable YouTubers for a massive event in San Francisco. The show will be streamed on YouTube beginning at 5 PM PST, and will include performances from Katy Perry, will.i.am, Joe Satriani, the Chocolate Rain guy (Tay Zonday), and a number of other musicians. I’m personally looking forward to a special appearance from the Mythbusters team.

YouTube hasn’t yet made any announcements regarding a livestreaming service for regular users (which would pit it directly against services like Ustream) but it won’t be surprising if we hear from them tomorrow about the company’s upcoming plans. We first heard about possible streaming functionality back in January, and later confirmed that it would be coming some time this year.

YouTube’s Chris Di Cesare says that the event may be the first of a series of annual live-streamed get-togethers celebrating the year in viral videos. We’ll have another post tomorrow with some of the highlights.

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A 17 year old named Eric Calisto is about to learn a valuable lesson in dealing with disappointment. He’s asking Google to use a logo that he created on their site on December 2, his birthday, and he’s urging people to call, email and fax Google with their support.

Not going to happen.

But he may make a few dollars on those ads.

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Longtime listeners will remember my interview with Judd back in Winecast 45 three years ago. His passion for the Humanitas vision has not changed since that interview and he is still a one-man operation. Like last weekend’s Twitter Taste Live 5, I will live blog the event for those who can’t attend or want to revisit the tasting later. 

Disclosure: I donate my time to help Humanitas with social media outreach.