On the eve of the debut of the much anticipated “Watchmen” movie from Warner Bros., Cisco seems to be getting into the superhero game, with an unusual marketing effort that uses sophisticated comic book characters to highlight its line of security products.

More like Nerdmen! Except with more muscles and cooler outfits!

On a new Web site that is now up, for a series called “The Realm,” Cisco (CSCO) seems to have gotten some cool original work from well-known Marvel Comics illustrator Mike Mayhew.

The characters are all apparently linked to real-life Cisco engineers, as well as its products, but it is being pushed as entertainment.

The first “episode,” titled “Déjà Vu,” is now up, with more to come, the site promises, as freaky music plays in the background. It is done as a video version of a comic book.

The plot so far: “Botnet attacks in The Realm are on the rise, and Jux discovered they are after Synocorp employees. Trace, the defender brought to life in The Realm through solutions built by Engineer Roberts, fended off the bots in time to save the identity of the latest target. Can the defenders stop the threats from infiltrating Synocorp offices? Find out in episode 2.”

Not quite “The Dark Knight,” but not bad so far.

Then again, this is Google (GOOG), so you know they love to talk, because they are super-duper smart, I am told.

I will be posting video later, but thus far: A roomful of press in Building 43 at Google’s HQ in Mountain View, Calif. Tasty snacks, as expected, but unusually caloric (many tiny pastries, heavy cream, very small amounts of fruit).

First up: Sundar Pichal, Chrome honcho!

Google’s VP Product Management, who rode herd on this project to create the search giant’s own piece of software to navigate the Internet, apologizes for the snafu that resulted in this announcement being made a day early.

Google Fedexed a comic book it is using to talk about the technical aspects of Chrome to a Germany-based blogger too early.

Ooops, the Big Brains of Google jinxed by some mailing room goof and express mail! How deliciously ironic is that?

Now, Pichal talks about a bunch of info that has been previously released about Chrome being built on WebKit, being available in 100 countries and being open source (a new open-source project launching today is called Chromium).

As to why Google makes a browser? ‘”We live on the Web,” said Pichal.

Um, doesn’t Google actually own the Internet, and we are all just serfs on its vast lands?

Please see this disclosure related to me and Google.

BoomTown is back from a seasick cruise vacation in the wilds of Alaska–official sightings: lots of icebergs, 16 glaciers, a passel of jellyfish and starfish, four lumberjacks, three orcas, two seals, one otter, no moose or bears and, yep, one Republican Vice Presidential candidate’s lovely house in Juneau–just in time for school.

Or, more precisely, a little schooling for some of the tech companies that I cover in a mildly obsessive-compulsive manner.

All of them, I predict, are in for a news-filled fall.

That’s right, more Facebook employee hijinks! More BMOC-battling between Microsoft and Google! More Yahoo trying its hardest not to look like so much of a loser (Keep trying, Jerry–release your inner head cheerleader!).

Thus, here is a rundown of what to expect and also what some of those companies need to focus on over the next several months.

YAHOO: Simply put, time is running out for the languid stylings of Yahoo (YHOO) management, whom I hope have been ferreting away since the controversial annual meeting at the start of August on a plan to jack up revenues and profitability and pronto.

Unfortunately, many employees I have talked to recently still report a disturbing lack of urgency on the part of the company, whose stock has sat too close to $19 a share for too long now.

But, as many have previously observed, Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang has only a few months to prove he can light a fire under the company and be the leader he has so often promised he can be.

Job one: Cuts, cuts and more cuts is my guess to get Yahoo more focused on its core businesses–content aggregation and display advertising.

After that, it’s wishin’ and hopin’ the outsourcing online ad search deal with Google starts in October as expected and actually yields significant results.

If it does not, it’s bottoms up for the current regime.

MICROSOFT: Is it too much to ask that one of the most powerful tech companies on the planet, with tens of billions of dollars at its disposal at any one time, with enough innate aggressiveness to scare a hungry bear away, and with a legion of techies the size of the a small army, to settle on a truly successful Internet strategy after–oh, let’s count–more than a decade?

But, hey, I’m just asking.

Microsoft (MSFT) must, first of all, pick a digital chief, which it promised to do after the departure of longtime exec Kevin Johnson.

That was almost six weeks ago, but what with summer vacations, moving with due speed must be tough. (BoomTown’s bet is that Microsoft execs Brian McAndrews or Yusuf Mehdi are most likely to get the nod, as outsiders have had a harder time fitting in.)

Then the company has to decide its overall strategy to make big moves in the online ad and search space, where Microsoft is a very small player as a distant No. 3 to market leader Google.

Also, there is this annoying new parry by Google (GOOG) in the browser space, where Microsoft reigns, and the inroads being made by Apple (AAPL) in the personal computer (and, most critically, consumer mindshare) space.

Also, pick an online brand, once and for all, please. Live? MSN? MSN Live?

GOOGLE: Oh, aren’t those sprites over at the Googleplex so clever by releasing information about Google’s new browser, called Chrome, in comic book form?

Look, I am not a sourpuss, and I like the comic book.

But the company might be too clever by a half these days, I would say, if it does not show it can perform in other arenas with as much oomph as it does in its core online search ad business.

Of course, that’s kind of like saying five years ago that Microsoft better find a business as good as its lucrative Windows franchise.

But today the writing on the wall makes it more clear that the software giant is under siege, as never before, on multiple fronts.

While Google now mints money and has become scarily powerful in its grip over the entire Internet economy, I think it is only a matter of time before increased government scrutiny, worried competitors and partners, and a simple matter of corporate inertia and innovation exhaustion start to take some shine off of Google’s chrome (pun intended).

I still expect Google to keep on trying out its various schemes, from green tech to energy to–who knows?–space travel.

Nonetheless, Google must be careful as it grows not to step on too many things, including its own oversized feet.

Of course, the whole company will probably have blasted itself off to the planet it came from or will have replaced the human race with pods before any trouble starts.

But it is not so hard to imagine future life for Google will not be as side-splittingly hilarious as it is today.

FACEBOOK/MYSPACE: There are three basic issues for both companies, which are like the Goofus and Gallant of the social-networking world (and I am not saying which is which, either, because they are ever-changing).

First, there is the question of how much more they can grow their market share. While Facebook has been on the tear over the last year that MySpace was on the previous year, both desperately need to expand internationally and quickly to keep up those growth rates.

In addition, innovation of features and offerings remains paramount if the pair are to keep audiences currently using social networks interested and engaged.

(I know I am not as enamored with either as much as I previously was as a consumer, although I am, in Internet terms, 463 years old.)

Facebook just released a new platform and design and MySpace is about to unveil what looks like an interesting music service, but it’s an ongoing arms race to be sure.

More importantly, both must begin to turbocharge the social-advertising market in innovative ways and really start making some serious dollars.

While MySpace and Facebook are relying on guaranteed ad deals with Google and Microsoft, respectively, less and less, as they should, both must build substantial ad businesses for the long term.

That, of course, is the key issue. One distinct possibility for either or both is a sale or IPO (Facebook) or a spinoff (MySpace).

AMAZON: I have not studied the online retail powerhouse as closely as I used to (but I will be doing that this year, as promised).

Still, here is my thimble-sized take so far:

Love the Kindle e-book reader, think it is innovative and headline-grabbing, but it is simply not a huge or very profitable business at this juncture.

I am more interested in how deeply, quickly and profitably Amazon (AMZN) can push into the much larger business of digital distribution of all kinds of content.

Also, how it can even more efficiently sell more physical products. First and foremost, Amazon is a retailer, and how well it sells is what makes it successful.

WEB 2.0: Well, there are 3,265 Web 2.0 companies out there with valuations of $500 million.

Okay, I exaggerate. It’s 2,730.

All these cannot sell to the big boys. All cannot live by advertising revenues alone. And all these cannot become real, standalone businesses, although many can.

In other words, shakeout!

Thankfully, since few of these companies have been able to go public, as in the Web 1.0 era, it will be the venture investors who suffer (not the venture capitalists, of course, who always get paid).

It will be very interesting to see how it does shake out though, as there have been some really terrific and innovative ideas to bubble up from start-ups in this cycle.

Still, make no mistake, it is a cycle and the wheel always, always turns round.

But no matter the karma to come, let’s keep in mind the singing messages from one of the wisest movies ever made–which, it goes without saying, people, is the original “High School Musical”: We’re all in this together.

OK, this is not true of the blogosphere in any way whatsoever because we just love a good fight and carnage. But all you techies are just like one big rollicking high school.

To remind you, here is a video of the whole gang from “HSM,” including the pure genius of Ashley Tisdale as Sharpay, singing “We’re All in This Together.”

(And even better, the trailer of “HSM3: Senior Year,” which comes out–psyche–Oct. 24, below it.)

(And a big shout-out to Louie Swisher, who heads to the big time of first grade today. For my six-year-old start-up, I predict a thrilling year of reading, writing and ‘rithmetic.)

Please see this disclosure related to me and Google.

(Also, while there is only a 54 percent chance of being lectured to by the Big Brains of Google, there is a 100 percent chance of both free comic books and tasty organic snacks!)

And Chrome, the shiny code name of the project, which has stuck as the brand name, will also be going out to the world at large–100 countries, that is–right after that.

BoomTown is bringing the trusty Flip video camera to make some Silicon Valley memories, and will render a full report about what’s what.

But until then, I have decided to forgo writing the expected long, long, long, long what-the-new-Google-browser-represents-for-geekkind thumbsucker.

Instead, here is my three-part short version about Google’s new piece of open-source software to navigate the Internet, using my favored cultural references:

1.) Google=Red cape and and way too many picador lances. Microsoft=Really angry bull (not at all flower-sniffing Ferdinand-like).

2.) Remember “War Games” and the then-cute Matthew Broderick as teen nerd David Lightman, playing Global Thermonuclear War with the supercomputer called Joshua, and then being told the consequences of that by head government techie John McKittrick (Dabney Coleman)?

If not, here’s some dialog from the movie that is now apt, if you imagine Google (GOOG) as David and Microsoft (MSFT) as Joshua:

McKittrick: See that sign up here–up here. “Defcon.” That indicates our current defense condition. It should read “Defcon 5,” which means peace. It’s still on 4 because of that little stunt you pulled. Actually, if we hadn’t caught it in time, it might have gone to Defcon 1. You know what that means, David?
David Lightman: No. What does that mean?
McKittrick: World War Three.

3.) And, last, if Google’s Chrome browser does not take off on all the hot-air hype, isn’t outstanding as a product and does not make a substantial dent in Microsoft’s overwhelming market share in the browser market, I’d point to one of the best opening lines from “Sunset Boulevard”–the one with Joe Gillis (William Holden) narrating about himself post-mortem as a floating corpse:

“The poor dope–he always wanted a pool. Well, in the end, he got himself a pool.”

Well, Google has got itself an Olympic-sized pool now!

We kid! Google’s in no danger of foundering, given that its search business still dominates, and quite profitably, of course.

But for all the halo of that, Google has never had any other similar true home run with any of the other products it has released so far.

And to portray Chrome as a Windows killer–which some are quite incorrectly doing–is not the kind of image Google should encourage.

Nonetheless, with this move, the search giant has certainly stepped into the spotlight more than it ever has (and this is a company that–let’s be honest–never misses a chance to frolic and show off in that spotlight).

So, with these loftier ambitions, I think it is fair to say that this time Google had better be ready to actually perform better than Michael Phelps.

Please see this disclosure related to me and Google.

As was reported earlier this morning by BoomTown, Google has confirmed on its blog that it will launch its new Chrome browser tomorrow.

Google (GOOG) said it would be launching Chrome in 100 countries, but it will only be in beta in Windows (Google said Mac and Linux versions were coming soon).

The move by the search giant, although the blog does not say so, is clearly a direct shot over the bow of Microsoft (MSFT), which dominates the browser market with 74 percent share.

Here is the blog post in full:

A fresh take on the browser

Posted by Sundar Pichai, VP Product Management, and Linus Upson, Engineering Director

Also, here is the entire comic book Google is using to explain the technical aspects of Chrome, and here is Digital Daily’s John Paczkowski with a CliffNotes version of the comic (believe me, you’ll need it).

Please see this disclosure related to me and Google.

Sources told me definitively that Google (GOOG) will launch the browser–which is its most blatant attack on Microsoft (MSFT) yet–as early as tomorrow for download by consumers.

Until then, I got a copy of it and here is the entire comic book drawn by Scott McCloud (click on the images to make them larger, but wait until the page fully loads).

It explains the techie underpinnings of Chrome, especially its JavaScript engine, called V8, that the company says makes future complex Web applications render faster.

Or, for you kids out there, kind of like Superman but faster than a locomotive and a bullet train, too.

(By the way, the comic notes that Google has a Web site for Chrome here.)

Google Chrome Comic Book

Please see this disclosure related to me and Google.

In its most frontal and aggressive attack on Microsoft yet, sources with knowledge of the project said Google is preparing to unveil a new browser–ready for download to users as early as tomorrow–to try to loosen Microsoft’s iron grip on the most important piece of software for navigating the Internet.

In addition, Google Blogoscoped has published a comic book that Google is apparently using to explain the technical aspects of its open-source browser, which is called Chrome.

[UPDATE: Here is a post on Google's official confirmation of the browser launch in 100 countries tomorrow, which was released on its blog this afternoon. The beta version will be initially available only for Windows, but Google said Mac and Linux versions were coming soon.]

Until now, the Google-Microsoft battles felt more like a Cold War, mostly limited to Google (GOOG) poking at Microsoft (MSFT) via the development of small-scale Web-based software to compete with Microsoft’s dominant Word, PowerPoint and other such products, and Microsoft’s thus-far unsuccessful attempts to break Google’s lock on the search market.

But with this move, which has been rumored since 2004, the war most definitely has gone red-hot, as Google aims to grab a chunk of Microsoft’s huge browser market share, which various surveys put at about three-quarters of the market.

The efforts to do this have been well known within the company for a long time, although the timing of its launch has not.

But Google FedExed the comic too early to Blogoscoped–who is based in Germany–and possibly others, which makes BoomTown really appreciate express mail more than ever.

(I also obtained a copy and have posted the comic book here, and Digital Daily’s John Paczkowski has written a quick executive summary of it.)

Sources said Google has made the move to create and distribute a browser due to worry about what new features in IE8 could do to its search business.

These features include privacy changes that could prevent Google from collecting information related to the effectiveness of its ads, quick-linking to Microsoft mapping and other offerings, and a more robust search bar that is also more Microsoft-centric.

To combat Microsoft’s IE dominance in recent years, Google has been backing Mozilla’s Firefox browser, which grew out of the ashes of the once-powerful, now-irrelevant Netscape browser like a phoenix to claim an astonishing 18 percent of the market.

That market share has climbed from 11 percent just two years ago–even against Microsoft’s IE juggernaut with 74 percent and Apple’s Safari browser with six percent.

Mozilla’s recent launch of Firefox 3 had a record-setting debut day in mid-June, with 8.3 million downloads in 24 hours.

Google recently renewed a deal with Mozilla making its search engine the homepage and search bar default until 2011. In return, Google pays Mozilla royalties for Google ad clicks that come from searches originating in the Firefox browser.

(Here’s a recent post I did about a visit I made to Mozilla’s HQ, right around the corner from Google, as well as a video interview I did with its CEO John Lilly.)

But obviously, Mozilla’s efforts were not enough for Google, which clearly has decided it must own and distribute a browser, especially since the browser has become the most significant piece of software related to the Internet, and the fulcrum on which most of Google’s business lies.

In other words, Google is declaring the browser critical to its future and, in this regard, it is entirely right.

Please see this disclosure related to me and Google.