The news includes:

FamilySearch has announced a new CEO, Dennis C. Brimhall, who will succeed Jay L. Verkler on 2 January 2012.
FamilySearch has added 2 million records to its U.S. collections.
A new monthly podcast, the Polish Genealogy Podcast, has begun. You can learn more about the podcast at the FaceBook page at http://www.facebook.com/PolishGenealogyPodcast. The first episode can be downloaded from http://forums.ancestry-world.com/forumdisplay.php?f=1862.
The U.S. National Archives and Records Administration has awarded Archives.com the hosting of the 1940 U.S. federal census images when they are released on 2 April 2012.
MyHeritage has announced that it has acquired FamilyLink.com, Inc., owner of FamilyLink.com and WorldVitalRecords.com.
Ancestry.com and the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum have announced that material from four museum collections containing information on more than 30,000 victims of Nazi persecution is now available at Ancestry.com and available at no cost.
Ancestry.com has added more than 50 million new U.S. birth, marriage, and death records to its U.S. Vital Records Collection.
Pennsylvania's new vital records bill (SB-361) would set at 50 years when death records and 105 years when birth records become open to the public.
Britain's Prince Charles has stated that his genealogy connects him to Vlad the Impaler, the 15th-century Romanian warlord.
"Who Do You Think You Are?," the popular genealogy television series, resumes on Friday, 3 February 2012.

Listener email includes:

Mac asks whether you need permission to publish screen shots taken at Internet websites.
Christine asks for suggesions for places to search for information about servants and laborers in Minnesota in the first decade of the 20th century.
Claire comments on using the iPad and popular genealogical software. She also discusses her participation in the Smith Surname Project.
Don had a grandfather who would not talk about his past, and the things he once talked about he later denied. Don is looking for suggestions to help him get past his brick wall.
Mary Ann reminds us that the Internet Archive (http://www.archive.org/) is another excellent place to search for digitized books online.
Beth is using a program called Bento on her iPad to organize and show off her photographs.
Judy asked for help in downloading a PDF book from her computer to her iPad and iPhone.

Drew discusses some of his recent research work.