But, in running it now for the second half of January, the keyword that popped to the top was: Layoffs And this is definitely a sign of the times. When I drill down on that term, you can see why with posts like: Hollis-Eden Pharmaceuticals Lops A Third Of Company THQ Lays Off 100 Employees, Closes San Diego Office Citrix Cuts 10 Percent; Santa Barbara Hit And it's also interesting to see what geographies are being associated with "Layoffs" more often than others: Layoffs Woodland Hills Layoffs San Diego Layoffs Santa Monica Layoffs Los Angeles I guess

Santa Monica-based Mahalo, the search and news site run by Jason Calacanis, has cut 10 percent of the firm's staff, Calacanis said in a post on his blog Wednesday. Mahalo is venture backed by Burda Digital Ventures, CBS, News Corp., Calacanis said that the moves were due to a "challenging economic environment." According to Calacanis, the firm is "fairly certain" that advertising for the next two years will be "severely depressed."