Yahoo wants to buy Groupon for $4 billion
According to multiple sources, Yahoo has made it clear it is willing to purchase deal-of-the-day behemoth Groupon for up to $4 billion USD.
Groupon localizes multiple deals per day to major markets in the United States. Offers range from coupons off food, to discounts on major surgeries, like laser eye corrective surgery.
Once a certain amount of users purchase the Groupon, the deal is activated.
Small businesses use Groupon as a way to get new clients in the door.
Although many other smaller rival services have popped up in the last year, Groupon remains the top dog in the market.
Yahoo has almost $3 billion in cash, and little debt.
Via the MPAA: Say hello to the world’s most ‘notorious markets’ for pirated digital goods
Responding to a request from the Office of the US Trade Representative, the MPAA has posted a list of the most “notorious markets” for pirated digital goods outside of the U.S.
The list includes a number of torrent and warez sites that are well known, as well as file-hosting sites and newsgroups clients.
Bob Pisano, interim CEO and President of the MPAA, submitted the list in response to the Office of the US Trade Representative’s request for a list of “notorious markets” outside of the U.S.
Pisano noted that 46 percent of revenue brought in by MPAA-member companies is from overseas.
“MPAA has a strong interest in the health and sustainability of these international markets and appreciates USTR’s interest in identifying notorious markets that threaten legitimate commerce, impair legitimate markets’ viability and curb U.S. competitiveness and hurt our overall economic strength. It is critical that our trading partners protect and enforce intellectual property rights,” says Pisano.
Report: Leaving notebooks on your lap may reduce sperm quality
According to a new study published in Fertility and Sterility, using a notebook on your lap for extended periods of time can lead to reduced sperm quality, and there is really nothing we can do about it.
Yelim Sheynkin, a urologist that lead the study from the State University of New York at Stony Brook said: “Millions and millions of men are using laptops now, especially those in the reproductive age range. Within 10 or 15 minutes their scrotal temperature is already above what we consider safe, but they don’t feel it.”
For the study, 29 men had their scrotal temperature taken with thermometers as they balanced notebooks on their laps.
Even if you are using a lap pad, the temperatures were still dangerous.
Warming the scrotum just 2 degrees Fahrenheit can lead to damaged sperm, adds Sheynkin. After one hour of having a notebook on your lap, your scrotum can heat up as much as 5 degrees Fahrenheit.
One in every six couples in the U.S. has trouble conceiving a baby, with a main culprit being male infertility, says the American Urological Association.
What should you do? Every 15 minutes give your “boys” some time to cool down.
Samsung Continuum is official, launching on the 11th
Verizon has officially unveiled the Samsung Continuum today, with a release date of November 11th.
The new Samsung smartphone will be the first to include a secondary display, a small 400×96 AMOLED ticker that displays live news, weather, time and texts/emails/IMs.
A special sensor turns on the small ticker display when users grab the bottom of the phone.
The main hardware uses a 3.4-inch 800×480 Super AMOLED display while the phone runs on a 1GHz Hummingbird processor. The smartphone has 8GB of internal memory and a 5MP camera with HD recording.
Pricing starts at $199 with contract.
Hanvon unveils e-reader with color E-Ink display
Tomorrow at the FPD International 2010 trade show in Japan, the Chinese company Hanvon will unveil the first e-reader to include a color e-ink display, giving it a distinct advantage over rivals like the Amazon Kindle and B&N Nook.
Black-and-white e-ink displays are currently used in 90 percent of the world’s e-readers, says the NYTimes.
The Apple iPad and the recently launched Nook Color both use LCD color screens.
Jennifer K. Colegrove, director of display technologies at DisplaySearch, described the moment: “This is a very important development. It will bring e-readers to a higher level.”
While it is simple to make e-readers with LCD screens, the LCDs tend to take away many advantages of the devices. E-ink screens consume much less battery power and energy and are also readable no matter how bad glare is from sunlight.
Color e-ink screens do have their downsides, however, compared to LCDs. LCD screens will be much sharper, more colorful, and able to handle video. Color e-ink screens have “muted” colors and can only handle “simple animations,” notes the NYTimes.
Havon’s reader will begin sales this March in China at the equivalent of $440 USD. It will have a 9.68-inch screen and will include both Wi-Fi and 3G support.
The iPad sells for $600 in China.
Google giving three airlines free in-flight Wi-Fi for the holidays
Google has announced today that it has partnered with Delta, AirTran and Virgin America to offer holiday travelers free in-flight Wi-Fi for domestic flights in the U.S.
The promotion starts on the 20th and will end on January 2nd, 2011.
Google will offer the Wi-Fi through Gogo, which normally costs $11 per day for in-flight broadband.
The Google Chrome team is sponsoring the free Wi-Fi, but the company made sure to note you can access it with any browser.
Overall, the promotion is expected to affect 15 million travelers on 700 planes.
Google offered the same promotion last year for the same period.
Cameron has big tech plans for East London
Prime Minister of Great Britain, David Cameron, is set to announce big plans for establishing East London as one of the world’s great technology centers.
Looking to spur the creation of private sector jobs to make up for public sector losses due to state spending cuts, British Prime Minister David Cameron has identified the tech industries as a safe bet for government backing and investment in the UK.
Later today, he is expected to announce that the likes of Facebook and Google are set to invest in the East London Tech City plan. He wants the area, which include Olympic Park, to give Silicon Valley a run for its money over the coming years.
“Right now, Silicon Valley is the leading place in the world for hi-tech growth and innovation,” Cameron will say in a speech to businesses and entrepreneurs. “But there’s no reason why it has to be so predominant. Our ambition is to bring together the creativity and energy of Shoreditch and the incredible possibilities of the Olympic Park to help make east London one of the world’s great technology centres.”
He will report that the response from international technology firms and venture capitalists to the plan has been overwhelming, and announce several firms that have agreed to invest in the area, including Intel, Cisco and BT.
Verizon to announce iPhone launch on November 9th?
TUAW has posted a picture today that has lead to speculation that Verizon will announce the much-anticipated launch of the CDMA iPhone on November 9th.
Verizon has been adding service staff in the last month, with TUAW speculating that the carrier has doubled its service staff “assigned to handle number porting requests.”
There would be little reason for Verizon to add so much staff if not expecting a lot of users to port from other carriers.
The picture shows a training notice sent out to customer service staff describing an upcoming “iconic device” that will go on pre-order starting November 9th.
TUAW does note that the Motorola Droid Pro has been given the same “Iconic Device” tag, so the validity of the rumor is still up in the air.
Could make for an interesting Tuesday.
Microsoft acquires 3D chip maker Canesta
Microsoft has confirmed that it is purchasing Canesta, a small 3D chip making company that specializes in gesture-recognition tech.
Canesta is best known for chips that, when coupled with digital cameras, give many devices a 3D effect, and a sense of depth perception (as pictured).
The Redmond giant did not disclose how much it paid for the chip maker.
Notably, the 3D tech used in the newly-launched Kinect motion control system was created by Canesta’s rival PrimeSense.
“I’m excited to be way out in front and want to push the pedal on that,” added CEO Steve Ballmer, when he was asked about company plans to advance gesture technology outside of just Kinect.
Analysts speculate Microsoft will use the Canesta tech to begin equipping PCs, HDTVs and Windows Phone 7 devices with gesture-recognition tech.
Google has converted 80 percent of YouTube videos to WebM
Google has said today that it has converted 80 percent of all YouTube videos into the open-source WebM video format, while at the same time working with manufacturers to add more hardware support for the codec.
WebM is H.264’s largest rival in the video format world.
Product Manager John Luther noted that Google has been diligent in developments over the past months, but there is still a long road ahead for WebM.
For now, WebM is not widely supported, but it will be in Firefox 4, Opera 10.5+ and Chrome 6.
You can view the videos via Safari or Internet Explorer using third-party additions.
Google added that the first hardware chips with native WebM support will hit in the Q1 2011.
