There’s a popular theory that the steadily increasing assortment of Web-based video options is going to cause some people to cut the cord – and abandon their cable or satellite services. But so far, the evidence shows, that’s not really happening. Read More »

The European Commission has finally cleared Deutsche Telekom’s and France Telecom’s mobile joint venture in the U.K. – but only after the two companies agreed to divest a quarter of their combined spectrum in the 1800 MHz band and tweak a network-sharing agreement that might have threatened 3, the UK’s smallest mobile network. Read More »

Things have gotten less bad for the paper, but nothing dramatically good. So why are investors bidding up the publisher’s shares today? Shrug or make something up. Read More »

Here’s a whole lot of video on a panel on the future of online video that BoomTown moderated last week in San Francisco. It was organized by Andy Plesser, the kingpin of Beet.TV, the online video news site. Plesser moderated the second half of the two-hour (!!!) session and I did the first hour. One tweet of the event noted: “The Beet.TV just started and @karaswisher is already terrorizing the panelists.” I beg to differ! Read More »

Gaming sites were abuzz this morning with the news that Sony’s PlayStation 3 has a bug that is preventing users from being able to access PlayStation’s Internet network and in some cases blocking games from being played altogether. Read More »

Another marker in Tim Armstrong’s campaign to undo just about every part the old regime at AOL: The company has sold Buy.at, an affiliate marketing company it bought two years ago. Meanwhile, we’re still waiting to hear what happens to ICQ, among other assets. Read More »

Series Seed Documents, templated term sheets for entrepreneurs to use for seed-stage deals, will be launched today, part of an effort by Silicon Valley lawyer Ted Wang and pushed by venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz. The point: So new entrepreneurs don’t waste time and money negotiating often unnecessarily complex term sheets. BoomTown was alerted to the move by a tweet last week from Fenwick & West lawyer Wang that read, “Excited about launching Series Seed documents next week.” Read More »

Freescale Semiconductor, an ARM licensee and the company responsible for the chips used in the majority of e-book readers, has developed some new silicon that it claims could help drive prices of the devices below $150 before the end of this year. Read More »

Here’s an interesting piece you might want to take a gander at, from McKinsey & Co. and titled “The Internet of Things.” While embedded sensors in physical objects is not exactly a new topic, this is a nice synopsis of what will be the next great pile of data after people everywhere are done updating Foursquare to identify the bar where they’re “The Mayor” (why, oh, why, dear Lord?). Read More »

The Semiconductor Industry Association’s prediction of healthy growth for chip demand in 2010 seems to be panning out. Though January is typically a weak month, global semiconductor sales rose slightly thanks to solid demand for personal computers, cellphones and other consumer electronics. Read More »

Wunderlich Securities analyst Matthew Harrigan this morning downgraded Sirius XM to Hold from Buy, citing concerns about the weakness in the U.S. auto market. He keeps his $1 price target. Read More »

When Apple’s new iPad slate begins to arrive at market later this month, limited availability may leave some early adopters empty-handed–assuming it goes on sale this month at all. In a research note this morning, Canaccord Adams analyst Peter Misek says he has heard rumblings that production issues at Apple’s manufacturing partners may keep the company’s iPad in short supply when it first goes on sale. Read More »

Oh, there’s no question in the often paranoid mind of BoomTown that Google is one scary company, mostly due to its huge market share in search across the globe, and deserves boatloads of scrutiny by governments for that. But no matter how you slice the monopolistic pie, Google most certainly did not deserve, nor should anyone tolerate, the conviction by a judge in Italy of three of its execs on privacy violations. Read More »

Following the death of SeaWorld whale trainer Dawn Brancheau, the Twitter account of killer whale Shamu has been silenced. Yes, Shamu has a Twitter account, and boasts more than 10,000 followers. Read More »

QOTD

“The process Americans use to get news is based on foraging and opportunism. They seem to access news when the spirit moves them or they have a chance to check up on headlines. At the same time, gathering the news is not entirely an open-ended exploration for consumers, even online where there are limitless possibilities for exploring news.”

– The Pew Research Center’s Project for Excellence in Journalism finds that Americans are increasingly getting their news via cellphones and social networking sites.