Blackhacker

BetaNews | iTunes may finally get The Beatles
United Press International posted a report on Saturday stating that a $400 million agreement had been reached between ex-Beatle Paul McCartney and Apple’s iTunes over the distribution of The Beatles’ back catalog.

Profits made from the deal and subsequent sales will be split between McCartney, Ringo Starr, the estates of George Harrison and John Lennon, Sony, EMI, and pop star Michael Jackson, each of whom owns some form of rights to the songs, be it in publishing, recording, or reproduction.

The battle between “Apple Computers” now called Apple Inc. and Paul McCartney’s Apple Corps Ltd., of the trademark “Apple” was the STUPIDEST feuds in the history of Intellectual Property. At the time, the two Apples where no where NEAR each other core businesses, and and all it did was cause bad blood between the two organizations that delayed the largest distributor of digital music from providing to the public one of the most recognizable and sough after collection of music.

I’m not much of a Beatles fan, I just hate stupidity. I’m sure there are many people who want to buy their music. I’m also sure iTunes wants to sell it to them and it would make Paul, Ringo and the Estates of the John, and George a a lot of money. That’s why its stupid. It’s an obvious win for everybody, so why can’t they just get together to make a few million dollars. I guess when you are a billionaire, you don’t bother stoop down to pick a few million dollars, when you don’t have too.

BetaNews | EC clears Google + DoubleClick merger
The two largest players in the Internet advertising industry are now officially one this morning, as the final hurdle to their merger has been cleared, and the final lines on the papers have officially been signed, according to Google’s CEO.

In the meantime, we do have a statement from the EC, which includes the following: “The Commission’s in-depth market investigation found that Google and DoubleClick were not exerting major competitive constraints on each other’s activities and could, therefore, not be considered as competitors at the moment. Even if DoubleClick could become an effective competitor in online intermediation services, it is likely that other competitors would continue to exert sufficient competitive pressure after the merger. The Commission therefore concluded that the elimination of DoubleClick as a potential competitor would not have an adverse impact on competition in the online intermediation advertising services market.”

emphasis mine
All I can say that Google must have GREAT lobbyists.

eBay sellers start weeklong boycott | Tech news blog - CNET News.com
You might see fewer items on eBay this week. Sellers angry over higher fees and other policy changes are launching a weeklong boycott of the auction site in protest.

EBay recently announced plans to raise the commission sellers have to pay for items they sell, which goes into effect on Wednesday. The company also is banning sellers from offering any feedback on buyers, good or bad.

The problem the way I see it is that there is no accountability for what you say, in the feedback system. What really are the penalties if malicious feedback is left? Or what is the standard of malicious feedback? I think Ebay is being kind of lazy because what they really need to do is set forth these guide lines review feedback that is left and proactively enforce those guidelines. But the solution they have chosen is easier to code.

 This was on Apple insider yesterday

AppleInsider | Amazon to acquire Audible for $300 million
In a bid to bolster its status as a premier distributor of digital content, online mega-retailer Amazon.com said Thursday it has reached an agreement to acquire spoken content provider and Apple iTunes partner Audible.com.

Related AppleInsider articles:
* High-quality unboxing photos of Amazon’s…
* Amazon’s new Kindle dubbed the ‘iPod of reading’
* Amazon rallies associates to battle Apple’s…
* Acer to acquire Gateway for $710 million
* iTunes passes Amazon to become third largest…

Under the terms of the agreement, Amazon.com will commence a cash tender offer to purchase all of the outstanding shares of Audible.com for $11.50 per share, or a 23 percent premium from their closing price of $9.33 on Wednesday.

Microsoft offers $44.6 bln for Yahoo; targets ‘dominant player’ - MarketWatch
WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) — Microsoft Corp. on Friday offered to buy search-engine operator Yahoo Inc. for $31 a share, or $44.6 billion, in an effort to better compete with online-advertising juggernaut Google Inc.

The article goes on to say that the point of the offer is so the MSFT can compete with Google.  Which makes sense, Yahoo! has been losing share price, just posted a quarterly loss, a announced layoffs, making it vulnerable to a take over bid.

Lots of times these deals are more trouble than they are worth, thins AOL(link) and Time Warner, HP and Compaq. Time will tell.

BetaNews | Sun to spend $1B to acquire MySQL, will compete with Oracle, Microsoft
One of the principal products in the LAMP open source arsenal will become a Sun Microsystems product, possibly by the end of this quarter.When discussing enterprise database installations worldwide, as of today, it will be impossible not to consider Sun Microsystems along with Microsoft and Oracle. This morning, Sun announced it has reached an agreement with MySQL — which by some accounts may have become the producer of the most widely installed database, under everyone’s noses — in a deal expected to be closed as soon as this March.

This can be either very good or very bad. Anytime a major firm like Sun, is willing to invest in an OSS project its great for the project, but now they will be able to run it as well. That could be disastrous. From reading the article, Sun has big plans to use MySQL to shake up their product line. There also seems to be a disconnect between MySQL and Sun over what changes will take place for MySQL after the acquisition. It is never good when the acquired seems to be in the dark about the nature there organization after the acquisition is done. That smells like a lot of people leaving to me. I’ve been wrong before, and I hope I am again about this.

Common sense wisdom: There are only two reason why any nation want to import workers

1. It is actually having trouble filling positions.
2. It want to push down labor costs by important cheap labor.

After seeing this video what do you think is happening here in the US with H1B?

Read the story at computerworld

Dap: Darkstar

1. Batteries that ignite
2. rootkit CDs
3. Blue-Ray Falling behind HD-DVD.
4. The delay of PS3
5. Add to that the Nintendo Wii, is handing them their hind quarters, after removing it from their sneaker, in their own back yard

BetaNews | PS3 Falls Further Behind in Japan
apanese gaming magazine company Enterbrain said that the PS3 had only managed to sell 45,321 units in May, far less than the Wii’s 251,794 units during the month of May, a five-to-one margin. In April, the Wii was outselling the PS3 by a four-to-one ratio.

emphases mine

WARNING: rant mode is in FULL tilt.

There is no other way to describe it. Apparently, even if My iPod filled with ONLY legal downloaded I am thief just because somebody out their is “gankin’” their stuff off the internet.

Red Hot Chili Peppers, QOTSA, T.I. Rock For Zune
Microsoft is working with all major and independent labels to establish similar revenue-sharing agreements. According to published reports, UMG is expected to receive more than $1 for each $250 device and sources at UMG have confirmed that half of all the proceeds from the device’s sales will be shared equally among all its artists.

This is YET ANOTHER example of why Music sales are so low. They treat customers like idiots by putting out formulaic crap, and we are expected to think it is hot because they shake some flesh in a video and pay the radio stations to spin a gazillion times. Then they treat us like criminals, with statements like this. So what do people do? They steal the stuff. Don’t get it twisted. Theft is theft. And all theft is wrong. And the industry has a right to protect itself from thieves, but I am not thief. And people who are like me are not thieves. And I am sure most of the people currently being sued by the RIAA, are not thieves.

QUESTION: How much of the Zune “kickback” is going to back to the artists?

ANSWER: Not a red cent. Actually 50 red cents. Sometimes a I get a head of myself

They know they are not going to be able to sue their way to stopping file sharing. So they now want a “piece of the action.” But if one of their legal questionable “witch hunters” discover that the name of a file on my hard drive that might happen to match the name of one of their artists, or the title of a song and BAM!!!

“You have been served.”
The big thieves hang the little ones. — Czech Proverb

Dap: Boing Boing

NTP: A Taste of Its Own Medicine
Oren Tavory, a 43-year-old software developer living in West Palm Beach, Fla., says he got there first. Tavory says he did much of the work developing the technology behind NTP’s patents. And since NTP has spun those patents into a big payday with hopes of another, Savory says he deserves part of the credit for the patents, and some of the payouts, too.In September, Tavory filed a lawsuit against NTP in U.S. District Court in Richmond, Va., demanding that a judge issue a court order naming him as co-inventor on seven NTP patents, and accusing NTP of copyright infringement and unjust enrichment.