The new campaign — set to the tune of “Let’s Stay Together,” by Al Green — is much more tame than last year’s ad. The 30-second spot focuses on creating family memories around campfires, swimming holes and hiking trails; memories that often can be made in or near homes — not in hotels.

HomeAway, which operates vacation-rentals marketplaces, including HomeAway.com, VRBO.com and VacationRentals.com, went out on a limb for its Super Bowl commercial last year. If the point was to generate buzz before filing for its initial public offering, it was a success.

But the Austin, Texas-based company ended up having to yank the ad after drawing criticism over a particularly disturbing image: In the commercial, a doll — which was obviously not a child — was thrown against a wall to demonstrate how cramped hotel rooms can be, compared to more spacious rental houses.

The updated — and more subtle — campaign will air in select markets during NBC’s broadcast of the 69th Golden Globe Awards. Following its debut, the spot will air on the Travel Channel, the Food Network, HGTV and other special promotions, including the Grammy Awards on Feb. 12, the Academy Awards on Feb. 26 and the “Survivor” finale.

Second time’s the charm?

In the past seven months, Fab has grown rapidly, registering 1.65 million users, who have purchased 750,000 products.

It now plans to grow even faster, with the help of this acquisition.

Both companies have a similar mission: To bring independent artists and craftsmen, who make aesthetically appealing and sometimes out-of-the ordinary items, to a large marketplace.

Fab.com does this mostly for home decor, and New York-based FashionStake does it mostly for fashion and apparel. The sites have the flavor of a Gilt Groupe, which sells high-end fashion at a discount, except they offer more undiscovered brands, at more reasonable prices.

In a blog post, Fab CEO Jason Goldberg said FashionStake co-founders Vivian Weng and Daniel Gulati will join the Fab company.

Goldberg did not disclose terms of the deal, but it’s possible that he tapped into a large cash reserve, which includes a $40 million round of capital raised last month from Andreessen Horowitz and others.

FashionStake, which launched in September 2010, has received investments from a number of players, including Battery Ventures, Forerunner Ventures and Gilt Groupe co-founder Alexis Maybank.

Last year, FashionStake acquired Moxsie, another retailer of independent fashion.

Just as the annual Consumer Electronics Show kicks off this week, according to a report from the NPD Group: Consumer electronics sales during this past holiday period dropped six percent from last year.

That should be some not-so-welcome news for the vendors at the Las Vegas gadget confab, which is seeking to show off new wares to excite said consumers.

Those offerings had better step it up, from a look at the NPD Weekly Tracking Service, which noted that the decline was coming off another decline from a year ago.

While 2011′s drop was not as bad as 2010′s, it’s not the right direction, although the tally did not include some of the more explosive device categories being prominently featured at CES, such as tablets.

Said NPD: “Total consumer technology sales (excluding cell phones, tablets, e-readers, and video games) fell 5.9 percent to around $9.5 billion for the 5 weeks ending December 24, a slight improvement over the 6.2 percent decline in 2010.”

Sales of personal computers and televisions fell 4 percent, with flat unit volumes.

“2010 was the first year in quite awhile where the real drags on the core CE marketplace were not TVs and PCs,” said Stephen Baker, VP of industry analysis at NPD, in a press release. “Revenue for those two segments outperformed while the rest of the market dropped by more than 7 percent. The accelerated rate of decline in older technology categories such as DVD, GPS and MP3 players put a ceiling on how well the industry could perform during the holiday.”

Consumers did snap up flat-panel TVs, with screen sizes of 50 inches and higher rising by 32 percent in unit sales.

And the rocky 3-D TV business also grew by more than 100 percent, with TVs with “3D capability accounting for more than one in every five dollars spent on TVs during the holiday.”

Also up: Home theater systems (10 percent) and stand-alone streaming devices (65 percent).

But those increases did not stem the overall negative tide.

For other sectors, here’s the damage to holiday revenue in percentage change from 2011 dollars spent:

Blu-ray players: Down 17 percent.

Camcorders: Down 42.5 percent.

Digital picture frames: Down 37.5 percent.

GPS: Down 32.6 percent.

HDD: Down 25.1 percent.

Mice and keyboards: Down 7.1 percent.

MP3 players: Down 20.5 percent.

Multifunction printers: Down 9.9 percent.

Point-and-shoot cameras: Down 20.8 percent.

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Well-known online advertising exec Frank Weishaupt, who recently ran North American marketplaces for Yahoo, will join ad display performance firm Criteo to head up sales.

Weishaupt, who left Yahoo several months ago, will be based in Boston and will be hiring up to 100 salespeople. He’ll report to another former top Yahoo sales exec, Criteo President Greg Coleman.

Interestingly, one of the pair’s most pressing challenges going forward will be the recent move of Yahoo to block “retargeting” firms.

In a post last week, Peter Kafka wrote that Yahoo told Criteo and others that “it would stop selling them its ‘Class 2’ remnant inventory, which the companies used to purchase on behalf of clients and essentially resell at a premium. The idea, theoretically, is that Yahoo will sell more of those ads itself.”

Here’s the official press release:

CRITEO TAPS FRANK WEISHAUPT AND EXPANDS FOOTPRINT; OPENS BOSTON OFFICE

Leading online advertising performance platform expands US presence with Boston office and hires Former Yahoo! digital media veteran

PALO ALTO, CA — (NOVEMBER 14, 2011) – Criteo, the global leader in performance display today announced that Frank Weishaupt, former Vice President, North American Advertising Marketplaces at Yahoo!, will join the company as SVP of Sales. The company also announced the continued expansion into the US Market with the opening of an office in Boston, which will focus on sales and service to mid-market advertisers and publishers. With offices in over three continents, Criteo now employees over 400 employees while serving personalized ads on behalf of over 1200 e-commerce clients across 20 countries globally.

“Criteo is committed to bringing performance to the display advertising landscape,” said Greg Coleman, President of Criteo. “I am thrilled to have Frank, a true industry veteran with a very successful track record of scaling sales organizations, join the team to continue our momentum. Our goal at Criteo is to bring our solution to a wide variety of advertisers and publishers, and Frank will be focused on helping meet that objective.”

As a 15 year digital media veteran, one of Weishaupt’s key priorities will be to build a sales organization in Boston focused on mid-market advertisers and publishers. Weishaupt has been a key part of exponential growth for several of the world’s most influential digital media companies.

“Criteo has created a name for itself as the global leader in performance display advertising. I am excited to have joined a company that is committed to growth and a team with such passion to drive this industry forward,” said Frank Weishaupt, SVP of Sales at Criteo.

Prior to joining Criteo, Weishaupt held several key management at Yahoo! over a 10-year period. Most recently he had General Management responsibilities for the US Display, Search, and Ad Technology businesses. The focus of the role was overall monetization strategy, pricing and yield management, strategic direction of the Yahoo! Ad Network, and general management of the ad platforms and global exchange.

Weishaupt holds a bachelor’s degree in engineering from Northeastern University.

Criteo is hiring and looking for team members to join the global leader in performance online advertising marketing.

Coffee & Power, which was started by the founder of Second Life, is launching an online marketplace that allows people to buy and sell small tasks with one another — or even to meet up in person at a company-owned cafe in San Francisco.

The site is a little like Craigslist, but focuses on giving people a venue to sell things such as tutoring lessons, software development services, commissioned art or something as random as Hula Hoop lessons.

The concept draws from the latest trend in making small amounts of money from things you may already possess, through a designated community.

Others examples include Airbnb, which assists with renting out a room in your house; RelayRides, which lets you make money by leasing your car; and Zaarly, another online marketplace for people to sell used items or hire someone for their skills.

Coffee & Power was started by Philip Rosedale, the founder and former CEO of Second Life, a virtual world that flourished into a small economy, where players buy and sell items made within the game.

Rosedale explained to me how Second Life overlaps with what he’s doing at Coffee & Power:

“Second Life became more inspiring for me than anything else — not because it was an unbelievable Lego set, but because of what people did economically with the Legos. People were able to use it to create new jobs and inspire themselves to do new things with their skills they weren’t doing previously.”

For instance, Rosedale said, a person might be a software engineer in real life, but on Second Life, they might design women’s shoes and make $2,000 a month selling them to other players.

“We saw that in Second Life, and if we are right about Coffee & Power, we can affect even more people,” he said.

The site first went live in April, but is relaunching today. In that time, Rosedale said that 2,000 people have used it, completing 700 so-called “missions” — which are transactions — for a total of $10,000. The average value has been $15.

Some of the missions include offering to shop at Trader Joe’s for $25, or asking if someone could turn a suit into a zombie costume. Rosedale’s son will bake you brownies or teach you card tricks.

With all of these sites, there’s potential for fraud or deceptive practices. Airbnb had the most public example, when an apartment was ransacked by a renter and the owner’s identity was stolen.

Coffee & Power is employing some of the usual tools to help verify a person’s identity, such as allowing users to link their Facebook or LinkedIn profiles. But the most original part of the company’s concept is funding a coffee shop in downtown San Francisco, where members can meet up to exchange items and drink coffee for free. The cafe at 1825 Market Street is the first site, and Coffee & Power plans to open up additional spaces in other locations as it expands.

Another twist is that Coffee & Power does not let people transact in U.S. dollars. As with Second Life, all missions are conducted in a virtual currency.

Coffee & Power will charge people 15 percent to cash out whatever they earn, which in turn will encourage people to keep the money on the network and spend it on other items in the community.

The company raised $1 million in funding early this year from angel investors, including LinkedIn’s Reid Hoffman and Amazon’s Jeff Bezos, who also invested in Second Life. It has three founders and one full-time employee, and has gotten most of the development work accomplished through hiring software developers online.

The six-month-old San Francisco start-up says the funding will go toward developing a local marketplace that helps people find goods and services that people nearby are willing to sell.

Zaarly Co-Founders Ian Hunter, Bo Fishback and Eric Koester (from left to right).

For example, someone might post that they are willing to pay $100 for someone to fix their light switch; or $50 for someone to take them to the airport; or $20 for cowboy boots for a Halloween costume.

Consumers can look online or download an iPhone or Android app to alert them of new listings based on their location.

“It’s the opposite of every other marketplace,” said Bo Fishback, Zaarly’s CEO and co-founder.

The company’s first round was led by Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and Sands Capital Ventures with CMEA, Venture51, CrunchFund, Marc Ecko and Artists & Instigators also participating. The company had previously raised angel financing in March from Ashton Kutcher, Ron Conway and other prominent investors.

While the model is different from Craigslist and eBay, it shares similarities with such start-ups as Uber or Airbnb. Uber connects people looking for a ride with a private car service within five to 10 minutes, tapping into the glut of town cars at any given time during the day. Airbnb connects travelers with locals who are willing to rent out rooms in their homes.

Fishback said Zaarly’s goal is to host all kinds of deals, and that he could envision someday partnering with specialists such as Uber or Airbnb.

The company has 30 employees and plans to ramp up to 50 fairly quickly.

Fishback doesn’t have a clear sense of how the company will make money in the future; instead, the company is focused on signing up as many customers as possible. Right now, it’s free if you conduct the transaction in person by cash or check. If you opt to pay by credit card, Zaarly charges a convenience fee.

The platform, called X.commerce, was unveiled yesterday at the company’s developer conference in San Francisco and is designed to help any size retailer, ranging from family-owned stores to Toys “R” Us, keep up to date as shopping goes online and mobile.

In an interview, X.commerce’s VP and General Manager Matthew Mengerink explained that the basic package is free, and if a retailer elects to add extras, there could be a small flat fee paid to developers. Additionally, if the retailer wants to host its inventory on eBay’s servers, it would cost between $25 and $125 a month, depending on the amount of inventory in the system.

So, what’s the catch?

Mengerink says there isn’t one, although the company does have a plan for how to make money.

But first, here’s an explanation of what you get for free.

At the core is Magento, an open source e-commerce platform that helps retailers quickly create basic Web sites. Other features include Milo, which lets retailers list their in-store inventory on the eBay site; or Red Laser, which gives them access to mobile bar code scanning technology; or even third parties, like Kenshoo, which will manage online marketing campaigns (of course, retailers will have to pay for the ads).

He explained that it was in eBay’s best interest to make the tools free because retailers often said in the past that they don’t have the cash.

“Our innovations slowed down because they don’t have the money,” he said.

X.commerce is a big bet for eBay and will represent its fourth major division, joining the eBay Marketplace, PayPal and GSI Commerce. The platform has been stitched together through a variety of acquisitions over the past year, which are just now starting to jell and make sense.

During the keynote yesterday, eBay’s CEO John Donahoe said, “The whole entire company’s mission is to enable commerce. We want to enable merchants of all sizes to compete in this new environment and we will not compete with them.”

As for how it will help generate revenue, the plan is for the X.commerce platform to be one big lead-generation machine for eBay’s other services, namely PayPal and GSI Commerce.

For instance, if retailers first build a site based on X.commerce, there’s a chance they will pick PayPal, even though it is one of 500 payment gateways available on the platform.

Additionally, Mengerink said, if the retailers become successful, perhaps they’ll need more robust tools and graduate to GSI Commerce, which eBay acquired in March for $2.4 billion.

GSI powers online presences from such retailers as Calvin Klein, Levi’s, Sports Authority and Radio Shack, and will do everything from take pictures of products to fulfilling the orders. GSI takes a portion of sales from the increase in revenues to the site.

EBay will also have a more steady flow of revenue from applications sold on the X.commerce site through an upcoming app store that it will be launching. Developers will be able to create applications or widgets for e-commerce Web sites and sell them in the store. Each time a retailer buys one, eBay will take a 20 percent cut.

“If eBay and PayPal and GSI show that they can be valuable, they will come to you,” Mengerink said.

At eBay’s developer conference, kicking off Wednesday in San Francisco, more than 4,000 developers and merchants will receive a preview of X.commerce, the company’s new technology platform aimed at developers.

The nonconsumer-focused platform will enable developers to use the tools to build applications for retailers who are looking to have a larger presence on social networks, online and on mobile phones.

Also on stage will be some of eBay’s new partners, including Omniture, Adobe’s marketing and advertising unit, and Katie Mitic, the director of platform and mobile marketing at Facebook.

Mitic, who recently joined eBay’s board, is expected to announce a partnership between the social network and eBay.

The X.commerce division will draw from many of eBay’s existing technologies, including PayPal, but will also tie together several other acquisitions, including Milo, which has created an online database of offline inventory in physical stores; Red Laser, which is a barcode scanning technology; and Magento, which assists in the creation of online storefronts.

In essence, eBay is looking to partner with physical retailers to generate more sales online or by driving more foot traffic to their stores.

That’s in steep contrast to Amazon, which has increasingly focused on driving more and more spending online. It also has focused on the digital distribution of content, such as books, music and video, and is placing a huge bet on hardware, like the upcoming Kindle Fire, hoping to rival Apple’s iPad.

The opportunity still exists for many to grab even just a small percentage of local commerce — regardless of whether it’s through third-party developers or driving more spending online. That’s because e-commerce today makes up only a small fraction of spending, with the bulk of purchases continuing to occur at physical retail locations.

The X.commerce group in eBay joins three other major groups, including the eBay marketplace, PayPal and GSI, which it acquired earlier this year.

X.commerce is eBay’s biggest move to date in becoming a back-end technology provider rather than a consumer-facing brand. The service it builds will be aimed at developers, who will in turn own the relationship with the merchants.

Take eBay’s Red Laser technology as an example. If a merchant creates an application using the technology, a consumer will be able to scan a barcode in the store, and then find out if the item is in stock. The consumer will then have the option of buying it using PayPal directly on the phone without ever leaving the application.

The most consumer-facing element being unveiled tomorrow is what eBay is calling PayPal Access, which will enable online shoppers to log in to a Web site to buy something using their PayPal account, rather than having to create a brand-new account. By using PayPal, the consumer’s shipping address and billing information will automatically populate the store, saving a few tedious steps. PayPal Access will become available to consumers as online merchants adopt it.

Will recent device buyers have a refund option or are they stuck with a dead platform?

Will the Pre3 ever come to market? And what of that cute little Veer? (AT&T notes it continues to sell the Veer in its stores, at least for now.)

So, will there ever be HP printers and PCs with webOS? It no longer seems to be a big part of the strategy, but could there be some products already in the pipeline?

Just what is the future of webOS, if in fact it has one? HP seems to be insisting that the software could have some future, but even they seem to have little idea what that might be.

HP’s CEO said on Thursday the company is open to all possible business models, including licensing, but it is not clear just how many options it really has.

I had a chance to talk about some of these topics and more in a chat with public radio’s Marketplace.

In the ongoing talent drain at Yahoo, longtime Yahoo search veteran Chi-Chao Chang (pictured right) is the next to swirl away from the Internet giant.

Chang was VP and GM of the global search business at Yahoo and has been at the company since 1999.

More importantly, he has been a key exec in Yahoo’s troubled search alliance with Microsoft, so there’s another plus for Yahoo (and by plus, I mean minus). It is not clear where Chang is headed.

On his LinkedIn profile, Chang described his job thus:

“I am responsible for Yahoo’s global search operations and marketplace, and am the executive manager of the Microsoft Search Alliance for the US/CA marketplace. My team runs in-region operations and marketplace analysis for Americas, Asia and Europe.”

But that’s not all today!

Also departing Yahoo is a top PR exec, May Petry (pictured left). She has held a number of different communications jobs at Yahoo over the years, including for its Connected Life unit, corporate and, most recently, for its Americas unit. Petry, who has previously worked at BEA Systems and Sun Microsystems, will head to Hewlett-Packard to run PR for its webOs unit.

(Note to May: I am just as interested in that action-packed business, so get ready!)

I contacted Yahoo for a comment (but let’s just assume I am right, because I am).