Archives: July 2008

What Not to Expect at Yahoo's Annual Meeting Friday

Posted by: Rob Hof on July 31, Categories: Icahn, Microsoft, Yahoo

Yahoo's long-delayed annual meeting is finally at hand, after a six-month deal ordeal that has left the Internet portal more or less where it was early this year, before Microsoft's...

Scrabulous Now Wordscraper, Hasbro Still Suing

Posted by: Catherine Holahan on July 31, Categories: Web 2.0

Call it bizarro Scrabble. The sibling duo behind Scrabulous, the online Scrabble knockoff that became a smash on Facebook during the past year, has reinvented their game as Wordscraper. Like...

Um, Hasn't Google Been Investing in Startups Already?

Posted by: Rob Hof on July 31, Categories: Google, Microsoft, startups, venture capital

Google is mulling the creation of a venture-capital investment arm, according to the Journal. But while I gather that is true as far as it goes, I don't get the...

Six Reasons Why People Flip Over the Flip

Posted by: Rob Hof on July 30, Categories: Flip, YouTube, video

Like more than 1 million other people, I'm a fan of the Flip, the little camcorder that, on paper, looks like it should suck. It has almost no advanced features...

BT Grabs Ribbit; Meanwhile, What's Up With GrandCentral?

Posted by: Arik Hesseldahl on July 29, Categories: Web 2.0

I'm catching up to the news, as reported on TechCrunch that BT has acquired the phone/software startup Ribitt for $105 million. I first ran across Ribbit at the DEMO 2008...

HP, Intel and Yahoo Team Up In The Clouds

Posted by: Arik Hesseldahl on July 29, Categories: Hewlett-Packard

Computing giant Hewlett-Packard, chipmaker Intel and Web concern Yahoo said today they have teamed up on cloud computing. If you’re unfamiliar with the phrase, perhaps you ought to go back...

Scrabulous Shuts Down on Facebook

Posted by: Catherine Holahan on July 29, Categories:

The game is officially over for Scrabulous fanatics. The popular Scrabble knockoff, which grabbed millions of fans after launching on social network Facebook late last year, was disabled July 29...

Cuil: Another Google Challenger Launches--to a Cool Reception

Posted by: Rob Hof on July 28, Categories: Cuil, Google, Microsoft, Search, Yahoo

Just weeks after the last highly touted Google challenger, Powerset, was snapped up by Microsoft, a new one is launching Sunday night. Cuil (pronounced "cool" and previously sporting an additional...

Further Travels with the iPhone

Posted by: Stephen Wildstrom on July 27, Categories: Apple

After my experience using an iPhone to navigate the calles of Venice, I took it on the road. The iPhone proved to be not of much help. Google Maps is...

High Gas Fueling E-Commerce

Posted by: Catherine Holahan on July 25, Categories: e-commerce

Research firm eMarketer has some good news for online retailers: high gas prices are fueling more Web shopping. In a July 25 report senior analyst Jeffrey Grau points to several...

Walking Venice with an iPhone

Posted by: Stephen Wildstrom on July 25, Categories: Apple

I'm vacationing in Italy and for the past couple of days, I've been using an iPhone 3G and Google Maps to navigate the world's most hopelessly confusing city. It's not...

F8: Facebook Is The Portal 2.0

Posted by: Catherine Holahan on July 23, Categories: Facebook

When Facebook announced plans to make their social network portable, I envisioned some sort of toolbar sitting in the corner of my browser, alerting me to friend updates. The...

Live From Facebook F8: Mark Zuckerberg

Posted by: Rob Hof on July 23, Categories: Facebook

I'll be doing my best to liveblog from the very crowded, very loud Facebook F8 developers conference in San Francisco. Mark Zuckerberg is due onstage shortly. You can also see...

Google Launches Knol for All (Just Don't Call It a Wikipedia Killer)

Posted by: Rob Hof on July 23, Categories: Google, Knol, Wikipedia

When I wrote about Google's announcement of Knol last December, I said it wasn't the Wikipedia killer many people were rushing to call it. One reason was that Knol, which...

AT&T;: iPhone 3G Sales Are Skyrocketing

Posted by: Olga Kharif on July 23, Categories: Apple

Apple's exclusive iPhone reseller in the U.S., AT&T;, just reported its second-quarter results this morning. And on the conference call with investors, CFO Rick Lidner said that the new iPhone 3G has sold double the number of units of the original iPhone in the last few days of the quarter.

Yahoo (YHOO) Second-Quarter Earnings Fall Short

Posted by: Rob Hof on July 22, Categories: Google, Icahn, Microsoft, Search, Yahoo, advertising

Most people had expected Yahoo to pull out all the stops to make its second quarter, but if it did, the pulling didn't work. In its just-released report, Yahoo said...

Nokia-Qualcomm Saga Continues

Posted by: Olga Kharif on July 22, Categories: Chips

Tomorrow, the Nokia-Qualcomm dispute over royalties will enter yet another courtroom. On July 23, a judge for the Delaware Court of Chancery will start hearings to determine whether previous contractual agreements require Nokia to pay certain royalties to Qualcomm or not.

Open Open Open

Posted by: Catherine Holahan on July 21, Categories: Web 2.0

First Facebook opened its gates to outside developers. Then MySpace and Yahoo turned over the keys to their kingdoms in hopes that third parties would build cool programs for their...

Trouble for TiVo?

Posted by: Cliff Edwards on July 21, Categories: Tivo

First, let me say there's no device in my home that can hold a candle to my TiVo. I'm addicted. With it's Season Pass, Swivel Search and video download service...

XM-Sirius Deal: Inching Closer, Or Falling Apart?

Posted by: Olga Kharif on July 21, Categories: satellite radio

Today's Motley Fool headline screams, "Just Walk Away, Sirius." The story suggests that Sirius should walk away from its merger deal with XM rather than accept additional concessions. Well, I disagree.

iLike: a model for the recording industry

Posted by: Catherine Holahan on July 21, Categories: Web 2.0

Ali and Hadi Partovi, the sibling duo behind iLike, know something about creating a successful Web company. The twin brothers both sold their startups, LinkExchange and TellMe, to Microsoft for...

Yahoo Settles Proxy Fight With Icahn; What's Next?

Posted by: Rob Hof on July 21, Categories: Google, Icahn, Microsoft, Search, Yahoo, advertising

After months of battle with activist shareholder Carl Icahn, Yahoo has finally settled the proxy battle that had roiled the company for months. (Full text of the release and the...

Yahoo Activist Shareholder Backs Four Dissident Directors

Posted by: Rob Hof on July 20, Categories: Icahn, Microsoft, Yahoo

Lately, it has looked like Yahoo, against all odds, might win the proxy fight that activist investor Carl Icahn is waging against it. The problem for Icahn is that, without...

Bolstered by Major Shareholder's Support, Yahoo Comes Out Swinging

Posted by: Rob Hof on July 18, Categories: Google, Icahn, Microsoft, Search, Yahoo, advertising

With its annual meeting looming in just two weeks, Yahoo is ratcheting up its defense against Carl Icahn's proxy fight with an energy critics wish they'd seen for the...

Ruiz Steps Down At AMD

Posted by: Arik Hesseldahl on July 17, Categories: Chips

All those wondering how much longer Hector Ruiz would remain CEO of Advanced Micro Devices got their answer on July 17, when the struggling chipmaker replaced him with COO Dirk...

A Rare Miss for Google (GOOG) on Second-Quarter Earnings

Posted by: Rob Hof on July 17, Categories: Google, Microsoft, Search, Yahoo, advertising

My quick take on Google's second-quarter earnings (full release after the jump and updates from conference call below): It's a miss, though not a huge one. My full story is...

Google Second-Quarter Earnings Coming Up

Posted by: Rob Hof on July 17, Categories: Google, Microsoft, Search, Yahoo, advertising

I'll have a quick take on Google's second quarter earnings as soon as they're released shortly after 1 p.m. Pacific time. I'll add key comments from the conference call and...

Wi-Fi Hotspot Explosion Continues -- in Europe

Posted by: Olga Kharif on July 17, Categories: wireless

This year, the number of hotspots globally will rise 40%, according to consultancy ABI Research, which notes that "the greatest growth and the largest number of hotspots continue to be found in Europe. While the UK has long led in European Wi-Fi hotspots, there is also marked growth in France, Germany, and Russia." Which begs the question: Why isn't the U.S. market growing as fast?

Yahoo Fires at Microsoft Again

Posted by: Rob Hof on July 17, Categories: Google, Microsoft, Search, Yahoo

As the days wind down to Yahoo's Aug. 1 annual meeting, you can expect an escalating war of words among Yahoo, would-be dealmaker Microsoft, and corporate activist Carl Icahn. The...

Microsoft Still Searching for Yahoo Search Deal

Posted by: Rob Hof on July 15, Categories: Google, Icahn, Microsoft, Search, Yahoo

Despite Yahoo’s rejection of a new search deal offer from Microsoft last week--one that went over like the proverbial turd in the punchbowl with some shareholders--the software giant this time...

App Store Activations: 100 Per Second

Posted by: Olga Kharif on July 15, Categories: Apple

Just how much downloading is happening through the new Apple App Store? One developer, uLocate, says users are activating its Where application at a rate of 100 per second at peak. And Where is not even the top-10 most popular free or paid applications in the store.

MTV isn't being evil.... Google, on the other hand.

Posted by: Catherine Holahan on July 15, Categories: YouTube

To hear Google tell it, MTV-owner Viacom is the epitome of evil media conglomerate and Google is the hero of user privacy. In a July 15 blog post, YouTube executives...

New June ComScore Numbers Show Facebook Still Has the Mojo

Posted by: Spencer Ante on July 15, Categories: Social Media

I just got a first look at the ComScore numbers for the top social networking Web sites in the U.S. The big story is that Facebook saw a nice jump...

iPhone 3G: Where's the Nav?

Posted by: Stephen Wildstrom on July 15, Categories: Apple

Among the 500+ applications available from the iTunes App Store, the glaring omission is a turn-by-turn navigation service. This seems odd, since the iPhone, with it's big display and beautiful...

Tit for Tat: Microsoft and Icahn "Set the Record Straight"

Posted by: Rob Hof on July 14, Categories: Google, Icahn, Motorola, Search, Yahoo

Yahoo came out swinging yesterday and today with an impassioned defense of its rejection of Microsoft's latest offer, an improved bid for Yahoo's search operations. Now, Microsoft has fired back...

eBay Claims Victory in the Tiffany Lawsuit

Posted by: Catherine Holahan on July 14, Categories: eBay

E-Commerce giant eBay claimed victory July 14 in its long legal battle with luxury brand manufacturer Tiffany Co. The renowned jewelry maker had sued eBay for trademark infringement in hopes...

Apple: Users Download 10 Million Apps

Posted by: Olga Kharif on July 14, Categories: Apple

Apple has just announced that its App Store topped 10 million application downloads in the three days since its launch. Today, the store that sells games, ringtones and organizers for the iPhone and iPod Touch offers some 800 applications, a quarter of them for free. These numbers are stunning. No other mobile applications store has ever come close to this kind of sales volume.

Intel Centrino 2 Launch--Powerful, but Late

Posted by: Cliff Edwards on July 14, Categories: Chips

Just ahead of Intel's second-quarter fiscal earnings release, the chipmaker is finally beginning to roll out its delayed new family of notebook processors, dubbed Centrino 2. The company was holding...

Fancy That: Yahoo's Actually Getting Some Support for a Change

Posted by: Rob Hof on July 14, Categories: Google, Motorola, Search, Yahoo

After months of getting reamed out by shareholders and assorted pundits for supposedly blowing the Microsoft deal, Yahoo finally has managed to get some sympathy. It may simply be that...

Yahoo Rejects Microsoft-Icahn Search Bid--But Was It a Serious Bid?

Posted by: Rob Hof on July 13, Categories: Google, Motorola, Search, Yahoo

Yahoo has rejected yet another bid to buy its search operations, this time a combined, take-it-or-leave-it offer from Microsoft and activist investor Carl Icahn. The embattled Internet pioneer said the...

A Great Silence from Cupertino

Posted by: Stephen Wildstrom on July 11, Categories: Apple

SECOND UPDATE--6:55 pm EDT The iTunes Store seems to be working fine now, though it's occasionally a bit slow. The only problem I've had is with updating an iPod Touch...

iPhone 3G: You Can Buy It But You Can't Use It

Posted by: Stephen Wildstrom on July 11, Categories: Apple

You would think that after six months of nearly nonstop iPhone hype, Apple would have been ready for the big day when it finally came. But soon after the iPhone...

eBay Told To Dump Dior

Posted by: Catherine Holahan on July 11, Categories: eBay

A French court ruled July 11 that eBay must remove listings for LVMH perfumes while it appeals a $61 million decision in favor of the luxury brand manufacturer. Last month,...

iPhone Crushing iTunes Store?

Posted by: Stephen Wildstrom on July 11, Categories: Apple

It looks like the first-day demand for the iPhone 3G may have brought down a critical part of the iTunes Store. After you get an activated iPhone, you still must...

Will You Switch for the 3G iPhone?

Posted by: Olga Kharif on July 10, Categories: Apple

Released a year ago, the first iPhone has lead a mass of people switching to AT&T;, the exclusive seller of the iPhone in the U.S. Would the new, 3G iPhone, due to debut on July 11, have the same effect?

Getting an Early Look at the App Store

Posted by: Stephen Wildstrom on July 10, Categories: Apple

The iTunes App Store isn't quite officially open for business, but you can get an advanced look with a small bit of effort. Here's how to do it: --Open iTunes...

Yahoo Debuts "Build Your Own Search Service"

Posted by: Rob Hof on July 10, Categories: Google, Motorola, Search, Yahoo

As Google keeps growing its share of search queries, it's hard not to wonder if anything's going to slow it down. Tonight, Yahoo is throwing up a long pass in...

Nokia: Only 3% of Cell Phones Get Recycled

Posted by: Olga Kharif on July 08, Categories: wireless

Clearly, handset makers and carriers aren't doing enough to encourage cell-phone recycling. World's largest cell-phone maker, Nokia, just released results of a survey that suggests that only 3% of people have ever recycled their old handsets. After years of industry efforts, "three out of every four people added that they don't even think about recycling their devices and nearly half were unaware that it is even possible to do so," according to the survey. Nokia interviewed 6,500 people in 13 countries, including the U.S.

Sprint Opens Developer Contest for Instinct

Posted by: Stephen Wildstrom on July 08, Categories: wireless

In a recent column, I noted that while the Instinct, Samsung's would-be iPhone slayer, was a very nice piece of hardware, the reason it doesn't pose a significant challenge to...

Press Releases I Didn't Finish Reading

Posted by: Stephen Wildstrom on July 07, Categories: Curmudgeonly

And didn't believe either. Newbury Park, CA (July 7, 2008) – During a recent customer survey, Minimus.biz asked its customers what unavailable travel-sized product they wanted the most. The response...

Wireless Industry's Staggering Impact on U.S. Economy

Posted by: Olga Kharif on July 07, Categories: wireless

I just read some staggering data: By 2016, U.S. wireless industry will help bring about more productivity gains -- $427 billion annually -- than auto and pharmaceutical industries combined, according to a recently released report.

Why You Can't Sell Your Vote

Posted by: Stephen Wildstrom on July 07, Categories: Curmudgeonly

You can sell just about anything on eBay, so why not your vote? That's apparently what University of Minnesota student Max Sanders was thinking when, according to the Minneapolis Star-Tribune,...

Microsoft: We Might Buy Yahoo If Shareholders Fire Board

Posted by: Rob Hof on July 07, Categories: Google, Motorola, Search, Yahoo, advertising

The pressure for Yahoo to knuckle under and do a deal with Microsoft just keeps rising. This morning, Microsoft said in a statement that it's willing to return to the...

Where the iPhone Failed

Posted by: Stephen Wildstrom on July 03, Categories: Apple

In one sense, next week's launch of the 3G iPhone marks a significant defeat for Apple. Of course, the original iPhone was a huge success in the U.S. and the...

Will New Laptop Bags Security Rules Improve Travel?

Posted by: Cliff Edwards on July 02, Categories: computers

A lot of business travelers out there are probably rejoicing over recent rules changes from the Transportation Security Administration that will relax policies mandating all laptops be taken out of...

Sprint's Airave Femtocells to Arrive July 15?

Posted by: Olga Kharif on July 02, Categories: wireless

Rumor has it that Sprint Nextel's Airave femtocell technology will go on sale nationwide this month. Airave, which has been available in a couple of markets since September, is similar to T-Mobile's Hotspot @Home service, which allows you to make calls from home via your mobile phone. And since the Hotspot service has been available for a year, a lot of experts have said recently that Sprint is offering too little, too late. I disagree.

Microsoft-Yahoo: Trapped in Groundhog Day

Posted by: Rob Hof on July 02, Categories: AOL, Microsoft, Yahoo

So, Microsoft hasn't given up on Yahoo after all? So it seems from a Journal story that just hit the wires, following on a melange of related possibilities raised...

Motorola Slips Further

Posted by: Olga Kharif on July 01, Categories: wireless

Today, AvianResearch released its latest monthly survey designed to gage which handsets are selling well -- or not -- at retail stores of AT&T;, Verizon Wireless, Sprint Nextel and T-Mobile. And Motorola isn't doing well.