Zune users can now download their friends’ nine most recently played songs, as well as nine tunes flagged as favorites. If you are amongst the 4% of Americans that own Zunes, this is awesome news!

The upgrade takes the community element a bit further by letting Zune users download each other’s nine most recently played songs, as well as nine tunes flagged as favorites. The playlists are updated each time a person connects their Zune to the PC.

In order for people to trade tunes, they have to subscribe to Microsoft’s mobile music service called Zune Pass. The service costs $14.99 a month and lets subscribers download onto their Zunes any of the 3.5 million songs in Microsoft’s library.
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In other Zune news, Microsoft on Tuesday added television shows from Comedy Central, NBC Universal, Turner Broadcasting, and others to the Zune online store. Microsoft added a total of 800 episodes, including those from the popular South Park and Heroes programs. Each show costs $1.99 each. [Information Week]

Related Story: And should you ever find another Zune owner, sharing is now even easier

Internet dinosaur AOL has bought social networking site Bebo for $850 millon. Now I suspect some of you who read this site may have even heard of Bebo, and that can only mean one thing, AOL is now a social networking playa! Personally, I find I just don’t get enough social networking through MySpace, Facebook and Virb, and in fact, a fourth social networking opportunity is just what I have been looking for. But, in all honesty, they say Bebo is big internationally, like Michael Jackson and Hello Kitty.

AOL has made it clear that buying Bebo is a move geared toward international growth, as the youth-oriented social network is wildly popular in the U.K., Ireland, and New Zealand. AOL reported that it has launched “17 international web sites over the last year and has plans to expand to 30 countries outside the U.S. by the end of 2008,” as well as international versions of its home page and some services. Bebo, meanwhile, plans to launch five localized versions of its service this year (France, Germany, Italy, Spain, and the Netherlands), and AOL will make it a major part of the company’s international expansion strategy. [CNET.com]

PS Remember MySpace sold for $580 million.