Google will experiment with becoming an Internet Service Provider by building out a super-fast fiber optic network to cover between 50,000 and 500,000 people, the company announced today.

Why is it doing this?

In part, no doubt, because Google would benefit if Americans have much faster Internet access. Faster pipes would make it so that more people are capable of doing more Google-revenue-generating things on the Web, such as watching hi-def YouTube video, using Google Apps and Google Docs, and searching more.

In part, no doubt, because Google has the money and because it can. Broadpoint AmTech analyst Ben Schachter estimates Google's initial build-out for 20,000 to 200,000 households could cost anywhere from $60 million to $1.6 billion. Probably closer to $500 million. “While these are not small numbers, they will hardly dent GOOG's cash reserves of ~$25bil,” Schachter says in a note today.

But the biggest reason, we think, that Google is making this move is to finally put some pressure on cable and phone companies — America's biggest ISPs — to upgrade their own networks faster.

In most places in America, consumers have one or two options for high-speed Internet: Cable modem from their cable provider or DSL/fiber from their phone company. Eventually, wireless could get there, but for now, pretty much no one is forcing the cable and phone companies to make their networks faster. But with Google in their rear-view mirrors, maybe they'll pick up the pace.

Yes, Comcast, Verizon, AT&T, and other broadband companies are already pouring tens of billions of dollars in aggregate into upgrading their networks. But the download speeds they're aiming for are not nearly as fast as what Google is proposing. So the threat of having to keep up with Google — if Google ever goes beyond the initial test phase — could put some fear into the incumbents. (Not that most people will have the immediate capability or need to use all that bandwidth.)

If it did inspire ISPs to speed their upgrades, without broadly having to enter the market, this would be the strongest outcome for Google: It would still get all the benefits of having more Americans on faster pipes. But it wouldn't have to invest tens of billions of dollars into a nationwide rollout; it wouldn't have to hire thousands of people to bury pipes in the ground; it wouldn't have to get into a crappy, low-margin business; and it wouldn't have to start staffing call centers when people can't get their laptop to connect to Bing.

This is a similar trick that Google pulled a few years ago in the FCC's wireless spectrum auction. Google used its beloved branding to convince the FCC and wireless companies that it was considering becoming a wireless carrier. It used this momentum to push a Google-friendly agenda — including getting the FCC to force one of the spectrum auction winners to run an “open” network — without ever becoming a carrier or spending billions on spectrum licenses or wireless towers.

Instead, Verizon Wireless wound up spending big bucks on the spectrum Google forced “open” and will use it for its forthcoming 4G network. Consumers will love dialing up Google Maps on that 4G network, which will benefit “happy loser” Google — without Google having to become a wireless carrier.

Same trick here, in an ideal situation: Google makes noise about getting into the telecom business, telcos freak out and spend more money, fast networks get built either way, and Google wins.

Earlier: Crazy Google Building Super-High-Speed Internet Network

Major League Soccer is still in its off season, but based on all the soccer activity going on this early into the new year, it is a pretty safe bet that 2010 will be a busy one.

The U.S. Men's National Team came into town a handful of days past New Year's Eve to prepare for last Saturday's match against Honduras, initiating the final phase of preparations for World Cup South Africa 2010 in June. Next up for the Nats is El Salvador, on February 24th in Florida. In the meantime, the team is on break and will reconvene on February 10th at the Home Depot Center with a squad that will likely include all the players based in Europe.

Coincidentally, on the night on which the Nats take on El Salvador, the Algarve Cup kicks off in Portugal with the U.S. Women's National Team participating as the top seed. The Women's Nats will be working out at the Home Depot Center through February 4th as Head Coach Pia Sundhage looks to finalize her roster for the tournament.

But not all the action at the Home Depot Center relates to the Nats. Both Chivas USA and the Galaxy dusted off the boots and opened up their respective preseason camps in preparation for the 2010 MLS season set to kick off March 26th and March 27th, respectively.

It is a bit early to asses what the final roster will look like once the first home match is upon us, but both teams have already made some personnel moves. Chivas USA waived Bojan Stepanovic and Jim Curtin, although it is unlikely both are out of MLS for good. Former Chivas USA Head Coach Preki Radosavljevic tended to hold Stepanovic in high regard, thus it is likely he will reappear with Toronto FC at some point.

Another important note for the Red-and-White is the loss of Paulo Nagamura on a free transfer to Tigres of the Mexican First Division. Check in tomorrow for some comments from Chivas USA Head Coach Martin Vasquez regarding the loss of Nagamura and his thoughts on how camp is going.

For the Galaxy, the personnel moves up to this point have been less disruptive to team chemistry in contrast to the Nagamura case.

Veteran defender Tony Sanneh was waived after a very quiet 2009 season in which he only made three appearances. Leonard Griffin was also waived by the Blue-and-Gold. Chances are that General Manager and Head Coach Bruce Arena is making room for one or more of the Brazilians currently on loan from Sao Paulo FC. All of that, however, is a footnote to the big story: Is Landon Donovan coming back?

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John Edwards Tormented Man-Servant with Sex Tape, Hated 'Fat Rednecks,' Wanted Abortion

Someone finally read John Edwards aide Andrew Young's forthcoming tell-all, putting a cherry on top of months of crazy Edwards rumors. He's a wellspring of scandal—but is it all John's fault? A guide to the Edwards blame game.

Though The Politician doesn't hit shelves until Feb. 2, Wall Street Journal blog Washington Wire apparently “purchased a copy” and read it. (Maybe the bookstore jumped the gun because John Edwards' forcefield of irrational behavior infected them.) Let's go through the new leaks.

• Claim: “Fat rednecks” sicken John Edwards.
  

  Young says Edwards is an Atkins-dieter who hated making appearances at state fairs where “fat rednecks try to shove food down my face. I know I'm the people's senator, but do I have to hang out with them?”

  Blame: 90/10 split between Edwards and Andrew Young. The attitude tracks with the artifice depicted in election book Game Change, but the wording of that last sentence may be a bit too perfect.

• Claim: John wanted Andrew to “handle” Rielle's pregnancy and persuade her to abort.
  

  According to Young, Hunter called him in May 2007 to say she was pregnant. Young says that when he informed Edwards, the senator told him to “handle it,” to which he replied: “I can't handle this one.” Young writes that Edward unloaded on Hunter as a “crazy slut,” said they had an “open relationship,” and put his paternity chances at “one in three.” Young says that Edwards asked him for help persuading Hunter to have an abortion.

  Blame: All John. He convinced Andrew and Rielle to fake a relationship; it's no big leap to imagine he considered a few other strategies first.

• Claim: John was busy banging Rielle when Elizabeth realized her cancer was back, and incurable.
  

  Elizabeth Edwards said publicly that she discovered her cancer had returned shortly after a rib broke from a strong hug from her husband. Young writes that she broke her rib while she was moving boxes and her husband was in Iowa planning a tryst for Hunter's birthday. Young writes that Edwards got the call and hurried home—and sent flowers to his angry mistress.

  Blame: 100 percent John, with Liz playing the delightfully devious spurned woman. What sick genius to blame the broken rib on John's overabundant love—I recall when this story broke, thinking that John and Liz had an awesome sex life. Turns out it was just him, and Elizabeth is an expert at inducing guilt trips.

• Claim: Rielle thought Frances Quinn was the second coming, and Edwards was God.
  

  Young writes that Hunter believed the baby to be “some kind of golden child, the reincarnated spirit of a Buddhist monk who was going to help save the world.”

  Blame: 60 percent Rielle, 30 percent Andrew (who, after being forced to claim paternity and cohabitate with a woman he loathes, is probably in scorched-earth ex-roommate mode), 10 percent John for sleeping with a sycophant.

• Claim: A socialite named Bunny Mellon turned Rielle into John's kept woman.
  

  To hide Hunter's expenses during her pregnancy, Edwards tapped funds from heiress and socialite Bunny Mellon, known as “the Bunny money,” as Young tells it, with payment totaling hundreds of thousands of dollars. Mellon's lawyer, Alex Forger, said that Mellon had sent money to Edwards for his personal use, had paid gift taxes on it, and did not know how Edwards used it. “Good old Andrew Young said it was for a personal need and she responded,” Forger told Washington Wire in an interview.

  Blame: John, Andrew, and Bunny, the eccentric Listerine heiress who New York Social Diary says “once built a large swimming pool on her Osterville estate only to decide when it was finished that the deep end was on the wrong side. The pool was dug up and completely reconstructed to her specifications.” Now that's a woman who knows how to finance a scandal.

• Claim: John and Rielle planned a fantasy wedding, with cheesy music.
  

  He also writes that he listened as Edwards told her that one day they would form their own family and have a wedding where the Dave Matthews Band would play.

  Blame: John. This leak was in an earlier NYT account, too, and it totally makes sense that the soundtrack to a rich white guy's mid-life crisis affair with a younger woman would be Crash Into Me. He probably murmured “Your body is a wonderland” as she slept, too.

• Claim: Elizabeth intercepted a Rielle love-rant.
  

  Shortly after John Edwards and Hunter returned from a trip to Uganda in 2006, Elizabeth Edwards answered a cell phone call to hear Hunter who “launched into a romantic monologue,” Young writes. According to Young's account, Elizabeth confronted her husband who “confessed to having had a one-night stand but didn't say with whom.”

  Blame: This tests the bounds of believability. How did Rielle know to start talking if Elizabeth didn't say “Hello”? Because if Liz spoke, woudn't Rielle have heard the voice and realized it wasn't John? This sounds like a fantasy from a teen rom com. If it's true, the blame goes to Rielle for not understanding how phones work. If false, it goes to Andrew for confusing an episode of Desperate Housewives with reality.

• Claim: John Edwards' true love, though, was Andrew Young.
  

  Young set up a nonprofit corporation, and Edwards left him a voicemail telling him, “I really love you, Andrew.”

  Young writes that Edwards promised “He would make sure I had a job in the future,” and told him: “You're family. A friend like no friend I've ever had.”

  Blame: Tragic misinterpretation at the hands of (cringe) “butt boy” Andrew Young, whose bizarre worship of Edwards is well-documented. But John encouraged and took advantage of Young, which is straight-up awful.

• Claim: The sex tape convinced Andrew to abandon John. Also, Rielle is preggers in it.
  

  Young describes his alleged discovery of a compromising videotape of Edwards and a naked, pregnant lover, identified by Young as Hunter. “It was like watching a traffic pileup occur in slow motion—it was repelling but also transfixing,” he writes.

  Blame: 100 percent John, because you can't just make a boy like Andrew fall for you, then rub your other lovers in his face. It's just not fair.

Send an email to Maureen O'Connor, the author of this post, at maureen@gawker.com.

“Innovation” and the “United States Postal Service” are not words that we would normally find in the same sentence, but next time you go to the airport, you might say a silent thanks to the postal service for their work in the early 20th century. They–before the military or the department of commerce–saw the potential in air travel and pushed for progress.

Shortly after Wilbur and Orville Wright's first successful flight in 1903, the brothers approached the “war department” for additional support; in return, the Wrights promised to share what they were learning. In 1908, the U.S. owned only one plane that was not in very good condition, and they did not warm to the Wrights' suggestion.

The postal service had always been interested in the latest in transportation methods as they looked for improved ways to move the mail. Whether it was building better roadways, developing canal systems, or subsidizing a network of railroads, the post office was accustomed to pushing forward, and they saw the possibilities offered by flight and were eager to embrace it.

Making their interest official, in 1911 Postmaster General Frank Hitchcock swore in as a mail carrier pilot Earle Ovington. Ovington flew a mail run daily from Garden City to Mineola, New York. At Mineola, mail bags were tossed out of the plane at a set location where the postmaster knew to pick them up. The first trips were considered very experimental, and so only postcards and souvenir-type mail was carried by this “unsafe method of transportation.” One fellow in Los Angeles had already written to the Postmaster General that “he does not want any of his mail transported by aeroplane.” (New York Times, 10-12-1911)

In 1911-12 the postal service set up 52 experimental flights and began lobbying Congress for money to fund airmail service. Finally money was allotted, and in 1918 the first regularly scheduled postal air service was instituted between New York and Washington with the planes stopping in Philadelphia for servicing. At the start, the postal service used Army pilots and military planes but after only three months, they invested in their own planes, hiring civilian pilots and mechanics. These were the very early days of flying; pilots had no radios or navigational aids, and they flew by dead reckoning. Bad weather meant forced landings.

By 1920 the postal service had crafted a transcontinental route that was a combination of air and railroad—planes did not yet fly at night so the mail was transferred to rail for night travel, and then shifted back to an airplane when daylight broke again. Within just a year, the post office was under pressure to speed up delivery time, and they began experimenting with night flights.

In 1921 the post office was able to prove that night flights–and reduced time on delivering the mail–was possible; workers throughout the central plains built bonfires to guide the pilots who were flying the mail from San Francisco to New York. Coast-to-coast delivery had taken 78 hours when the mail traveled by air only in the daytime; transit time was reduced to 35 hours when the mail remained airborne. This beat the fastest transcontinental trains by at least three days.

In 1925, the country was beginning to understand the potential of air travel, and Congress passed a law to permit the Postmaster General to contract to outsiders for mail service, a move that was intended to stimulate commercial aviation. By the end of 1926, more and more private contractors were taking on the postal air routes. The post office began transferring the facilities they had developed for the service–airways, landing fields, radio service, landing beacons–to the Department of Commerce. By September of 1927, all mail was carried by non-governmental planes.

These early mail flights, in turn, paved the way for passenger service. It was not uncommon for young men to hang out near the fields where they knew a mail plane would be landing. When the plane touched down, they would ask to hook a ride to the next place by sitting atop a mailbag in the back of the open cockpit.

Missile Mail
Not every type of postal delivery innovation turned to gold. In 1959, the postal service pronounced that mail could be delivered around the world more quickly by using guided missiles. Firing rockets loaded with mail was started in the 1930s by missile enthusiasts who were looking for practical uses for their devices. The first successful rocket flight in the U.S. was made in 1935 and contained a “a live cock, a hen, and 189 messages.”
On June 8, 1959, a Navy submarine fired a missile to reach the Naval Auxiliary Station in Mayport, Florida; the missile was carrying 3,000 letters, and the prediction was that soon mail would be delivered “within hours” from New York to California or as far away as India.
While “missile mail” never took hold, another postal innovation did–and one that most of us still enjoy a great deal–the advent of mail order, which began when the postal service instituted “parcel post.”
To read about this, e-mail me kate@americacomesalive.com with “U.S. mail” in the subject line. I'll send you my free newsletter that makes sense of today by looking at yesterday. This issue is filled with fascinating facts about mail service before there was e-mail.

http://www.americacomesalive.com/blog/

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John Edwards Tormented Man-Servant with Sex Tape, Hated 'Fat Rednecks,' Wanted Abortion

Someone finally read John Edwards aide Andrew Young's forthcoming tell-all, putting a cherry on top of months of crazy Edwards rumors. He's a wellspring of scandal—but is it all John's fault? A guide to the Edwards blame game.

Though The Politician doesn't hit shelves until Feb. 2, Wall Street Journal blog Washington Wire apparently “purchased a copy” and read it. (Maybe the bookstore jumped the gun because John Edwards' forcefield of irrational behavior infected them.) Let's go through the new leaks.

• Claim: “Fat rednecks” sicken John Edwards.
  

  Young says Edwards is an Atkins-dieter who hated making appearances at state fairs where “fat rednecks try to shove food down my face. I know I'm the people's senator, but do I have to hang out with them?”

  Blame: 90/10 split between Edwards and Andrew Young. The attitude tracks with the artifice depicted in election book Game Change, but the wording of that last sentence may be a bit too perfect.

• Claim: John wanted Andrew to “handle” Rielle's pregnancy and persuade her to abort.
  

  According to Young, Hunter called him in May 2007 to say she was pregnant. Young says that when he informed Edwards, the senator told him to “handle it,” to which he replied: “I can't handle this one.” Young writes that Edward unloaded on Hunter as a “crazy slut,” said they had an “open relationship,” and put his paternity chances at “one in three.” Young says that Edwards asked him for help persuading Hunter to have an abortion.

  Blame: All John. He convinced Andrew and Rielle to fake a relationship; it's no big leap to imagine he considered a few other strategies first.

• Claim: John was busy banging Rielle when Elizabeth realized her cancer was back, and incurable.
  

  Elizabeth Edwards said publicly that she discovered her cancer had returned shortly after a rib broke from a strong hug from her husband. Young writes that she broke her rib while she was moving boxes and her husband was in Iowa planning a tryst for Hunter's birthday. Young writes that Edwards got the call and hurried home—and sent flowers to his angry mistress.

  Blame: 100 percent John, with Liz playing the delightfully devious spurned woman. What sick genius to blame the broken rib on John's overabundant love—I recall when this story broke, thinking that John and Liz had an awesome sex life. Turns out it was just him, and Elizabeth is an expert at inducing guilt trips.

• Claim: Rielle thought Frances Quinn was the second coming, and Edwards was God.
  

  Young writes that Hunter believed the baby to be “some kind of golden child, the reincarnated spirit of a Buddhist monk who was going to help save the world.”

  Blame: 60 percent Rielle, 30 percent Andrew (who, after being forced to claim paternity and cohabitate with a woman he loathes, is probably in scorched-earth ex-roommate mode), 10 percent John for sleeping with a sycophant.

• Claim: A socialite named Bunny Mellon turned Rielle into John's kept woman.
  

  To hide Hunter's expenses during her pregnancy, Edwards tapped funds from heiress and socialite Bunny Mellon, known as “the Bunny money,” as Young tells it, with payment totaling hundreds of thousands of dollars. Mellon's lawyer, Alex Forger, said that Mellon had sent money to Edwards for his personal use, had paid gift taxes on it, and did not know how Edwards used it. “Good old Andrew Young said it was for a personal need and she responded,” Forger told Washington Wire in an interview.

  Blame: John, Andrew, and Bunny, the eccentric Listerine heiress who New York Social Diary says “once built a large swimming pool on her Osterville estate only to decide when it was finished that the deep end was on the wrong side. The pool was dug up and completely reconstructed to her specifications.” Now that's a woman who knows how to finance a scandal.

• Claim: John and Rielle planned a fantasy wedding, with cheesy music.
  

  He also writes that he listened as Edwards told her that one day they would form their own family and have a wedding where the Dave Matthews Band would play.

  Blame: John. This leak was in an earlier NYT account, too, and it totally makes sense that the soundtrack to a rich white guy's mid-life crisis affair with a younger woman would be Crash Into Me. He probably murmured “Your body is a wonderland” as she slept, too.

• Claim: Elizabeth intercepted a Rielle love-rant.
  

  Shortly after John Edwards and Hunter returned from a trip to Uganda in 2006, Elizabeth Edwards answered a cell phone call to hear Hunter who “launched into a romantic monologue,” Young writes. According to Young's account, Elizabeth confronted her husband who “confessed to having had a one-night stand but didn't say with whom.”

  Blame: This tests the bounds of believability. How did Rielle know to start talking if Elizabeth didn't say “Hello”? Because if Liz spoke, woudn't Rielle have heard the voice and realized it wasn't John? This sounds like a fantasy from a teen rom com. If it's true, the blame goes to Rielle for not understanding how phones work. If false, it goes to Andrew for confusing an episode of Desperate Housewives with reality.

• Claim: John Edwards' true love, though, was Andrew Young.
  

  Young set up a nonprofit corporation, and Edwards left him a voicemail telling him, “I really love you, Andrew.”

  Young writes that Edwards promised “He would make sure I had a job in the future,” and told him: “You're family. A friend like no friend I've ever had.”

  Blame: Tragic misinterpretation at the hands of (cringe) “butt boy” Andrew Young, whose bizarre worship of Edwards is well-documented. But John encouraged and took advantage of Young, which is straight-up awful.

• Claim: The sex tape convinced Andrew to abandon John. Also, Rielle is preggers in it.
  

  Young describes his alleged discovery of a compromising videotape of Edwards and a naked, pregnant lover, identified by Young as Hunter. “It was like watching a traffic pileup occur in slow motion—it was repelling but also transfixing,” he writes.

  Blame: 100 percent John, because you can't just make a boy like Andrew fall for you, then rub your other lovers in his face. It's just not fair.

Send an email to Maureen O'Connor, the author of this post, at maureen@gawker.com.

“Innovation” and the “United States Postal Service” are not words that we would normally find in the same sentence, but next time you go to the airport, you might say a silent thanks to the postal service for their work in the early 20th century. They–before the military or the department of commerce–saw the potential in air travel and pushed for progress.

Shortly after Wilbur and Orville Wright's first successful flight in 1903, the brothers approached the “war department” for additional support; in return, the Wrights promised to share what they were learning. In 1908, the U.S. owned only one plane that was not in very good condition, and they did not warm to the Wrights' suggestion.

The postal service had always been interested in the latest in transportation methods as they looked for improved ways to move the mail. Whether it was building better roadways, developing canal systems, or subsidizing a network of railroads, the post office was accustomed to pushing forward, and they saw the possibilities offered by flight and were eager to embrace it.

Making their interest official, in 1911 Postmaster General Frank Hitchcock swore in as a mail carrier pilot Earle Ovington. Ovington flew a mail run daily from Garden City to Mineola, New York. At Mineola, mail bags were tossed out of the plane at a set location where the postmaster knew to pick them up. The first trips were considered very experimental, and so only postcards and souvenir-type mail was carried by this “unsafe method of transportation.” One fellow in Los Angeles had already written to the Postmaster General that “he does not want any of his mail transported by aeroplane.” (New York Times, 10-12-1911)

In 1911-12 the postal service set up 52 experimental flights and began lobbying Congress for money to fund airmail service. Finally money was allotted, and in 1918 the first regularly scheduled postal air service was instituted between New York and Washington with the planes stopping in Philadelphia for servicing. At the start, the postal service used Army pilots and military planes but after only three months, they invested in their own planes, hiring civilian pilots and mechanics. These were the very early days of flying; pilots had no radios or navigational aids, and they flew by dead reckoning. Bad weather meant forced landings.

By 1920 the postal service had crafted a transcontinental route that was a combination of air and railroad—planes did not yet fly at night so the mail was transferred to rail for night travel, and then shifted back to an airplane when daylight broke again. Within just a year, the post office was under pressure to speed up delivery time, and they began experimenting with night flights.

In 1921 the post office was able to prove that night flights–and reduced time on delivering the mail–was possible; workers throughout the central plains built bonfires to guide the pilots who were flying the mail from San Francisco to New York. Coast-to-coast delivery had taken 78 hours when the mail traveled by air only in the daytime; transit time was reduced to 35 hours when the mail remained airborne. This beat the fastest transcontinental trains by at least three days.

In 1925, the country was beginning to understand the potential of air travel, and Congress passed a law to permit the Postmaster General to contract to outsiders for mail service, a move that was intended to stimulate commercial aviation. By the end of 1926, more and more private contractors were taking on the postal air routes. The post office began transferring the facilities they had developed for the service–airways, landing fields, radio service, landing beacons–to the Department of Commerce. By September of 1927, all mail was carried by non-governmental planes.

These early mail flights, in turn, paved the way for passenger service. It was not uncommon for young men to hang out near the fields where they knew a mail plane would be landing. When the plane touched down, they would ask to hook a ride to the next place by sitting atop a mailbag in the back of the open cockpit.

Missile Mail
Not every type of postal delivery innovation turned to gold. In 1959, the postal service pronounced that mail could be delivered around the world more quickly by using guided missiles. Firing rockets loaded with mail was started in the 1930s by missile enthusiasts who were looking for practical uses for their devices. The first successful rocket flight in the U.S. was made in 1935 and contained a “a live cock, a hen, and 189 messages.”
On June 8, 1959, a Navy submarine fired a missile to reach the Naval Auxiliary Station in Mayport, Florida; the missile was carrying 3,000 letters, and the prediction was that soon mail would be delivered “within hours” from New York to California or as far away as India.
While “missile mail” never took hold, another postal innovation did–and one that most of us still enjoy a great deal–the advent of mail order, which began when the postal service instituted “parcel post.”
To read about this, e-mail me kate@americacomesalive.com with “U.S. mail” in the subject line. I'll send you my free newsletter that makes sense of today by looking at yesterday. This issue is filled with fascinating facts about mail service before there was e-mail.

http://www.americacomesalive.com/blog/

Xbox Live ditching Xbox 1 support <b>News</b> | Xbox 360 | Eurogamer

Read our Xbox Live ditching Xbox 1 support <b>News</b> for Xbox, and Xbox 360.

Just Cause 2 demo &quot;on its way&quot; <b>News</b> | Eurogamer

Square Enix London Studios community manager Mike Oldman subsequent tweeted: "I'll have more <b>news</b> on the demo soon enough, for now though just relax safe in the knowledge that there's one on the way - and it's awesome." …

Facebook helps the <b>news</b> industry, but it's no white knight <b>…</b>

Facebook is assuming its rightful place in the Internet ecosystem as a significant distribution channel for media properties. Hitwise reported …

http://www.shumakerelays.com/

Creators | Brothers Ethan Nicolle (age 29) and Malachi Nicolle (age 5) chat about their new Internet-sensation webcomic Axe Cop.

Creators | Michael Cavna talks with Cleveland Plain Dealer reporter John Campanelli about scoring that rare interview with reclusive Calvin and Hobbes creator Bill Watterson. [Comic Riffs]

Comic strips | Here's Campanelli again, on how fans still mourn the loss of Calvin and Hobbes 15 years after the strip's end. [Plain Dealer]

Webcomics | The Escapist is holding a contest to find a twice-weekly video game-themed webcomic. [The Escapist, via Comics Worth Reading]

Blogosphere | Blogger and manga critic David Welsh has ended his weekly “Flipped” column after five years to focus on more “casual, conversational writing.” The feature originated at the now-defunct Comic World News before moving to The Comics Reporter. [The Comics Reporter]

Blogosphere | Christine Hanefalk and Ryan Lindsay have joined the blogging crew at The Weekly Crisis. [The Weekly Crisis]

Comics | This list of the “10 Most Bizarre Comic Books” doesn't even scratch the surface.

Wells Fargo's Awesome Refusal to Waive Haiti Donation Fees: Goalposts of Greed Moved Back

So: Visa and Mastercard—who've helped ensure that your brokeass stays broke after buying things that leave you broke—waived fees on Haiti donation transactions. Wells Fargo didn't. Somebody on the internet bitched about it. Wells Fargo's response is hysterical:

Michael Klosterman, a spokesman for Wells Fargo, defended the bank's response to the Haiti disaster, saying the money it donated to Haiti more than makes up for their transaction fees.

“We have given $100,000 to the American Red Cross, and on January 19 we pledged an additional $250,000 to support the non-profits in Florida that are mobilizing the relief efforts,” Klosterman said. “We decided that donating a sum of money would be quicker and more beneficial than waiving transaction fees because the funds would get to the people quicker. It would take the equivalent of $35 million in transactions to raise the amount of money we actually donated.“

Get why this is funny?

1. Because the amount Wells Fargo has given is so small! $350,000 is, um, nothing. That's a house. A small house. That's not even a studio in Manhattan. Is that even a college education?

2. There probably won't be $35M in transactions, which is the slimy inherent reasoning Wells Fargo uses to justify not waiving the fee, widely missing the point that transaction fees are the banking customer's bane of existence, and thus, might get in the way of getting money to Haiti. Also, they put out a press line that also subtly tries to advertise their low banking fees, which is as insensitive as it is stupid.

3. Bank of America donated $1M, waived fees, and are matching employee contributions, and they're just the worst. What's that make Wells Fargo? Seeing as how their stock price is thirteen points ahead of Bank of America's, for one thing, the more valued stock of the two companies for a reason, but for another, fucking cheap.

Anyway, the point is that a liquidated bank could turn Haiti from a Third World Country into a First World Country sometime by the middle of February, but because banks are institutions predicated on nothing more than trying to grow money when they're not separating their customers from their money and making it theirs, they'll simply throw a few bucks Haiti's way because they think it creates good will amongst The People and that it makes The People want to bank with them, and for the dumbest ones, it does! So really it's a choice between evil and really evil, and in this case, Wells Fargo won The “Really Evil” Trophy while Bank of America wins The “Bullshit Good Graces” Ribbon. If anything, it certainly makes choosing between buying the two stocks easier.

Update: A reader corrects my embarrassingly bad misreading of Google Finance. “Probably a better way to compare the value of the two companies is to look at the total value of their stock, which would be the price of one share times the number of shares they've issued. On Google Finance it's listed as Mkt Cap (market capitalization), and BAC's is 131.31B (8.65B shares x $15.18 per share), while WFC is 147.23B (5.18B shares x $28.43 per share). So WFC is worth, as a company, more than BAC, but only about 12% more. They just haven't issued as many shares (5.1 billion vs. 8.6 billion), so each share is more valuable because it represents a larger piece of the company. Google, for instance, has a market cap of 168B (about 12% more than WFC) but has only issued 317 million shares, which is why a single share costs $530.” And we learn something new every day!

Send an email to Foster Kamer, the author of this post, at foster@gawker.com.

http://www.webjam.com/gabrielle71 http://www.prlog.org/10248797-reitbuyercom-offers-opportunity-to-onlinereal-estate-stock-traders-in-albuquerque-new-mexico.html http://www.prlog.org/tag/online-stock-trading/ http://www.prlog.org/10219817-online-traders-discover-reits-and-real-estate-mutual-funds-to-be-good-investment.html http://www.prlog.org/10248797-reitbuyercom-offers-opportunity-to-onlinereal-estate-stock-traders-in-albuquerque-new-mexico.html http://www.webjam.com/gabrielle71

Creators | Brothers Ethan Nicolle (age 29) and Malachi Nicolle (age 5) chat about their new Internet-sensation webcomic Axe Cop.

Creators | Michael Cavna talks with Cleveland Plain Dealer reporter John Campanelli about scoring that rare interview with reclusive Calvin and Hobbes creator Bill Watterson. [Comic Riffs]

Comic strips | Here's Campanelli again, on how fans still mourn the loss of Calvin and Hobbes 15 years after the strip's end. [Plain Dealer]

Webcomics | The Escapist is holding a contest to find a twice-weekly video game-themed webcomic. [The Escapist, via Comics Worth Reading]

Blogosphere | Blogger and manga critic David Welsh has ended his weekly “Flipped” column after five years to focus on more “casual, conversational writing.” The feature originated at the now-defunct Comic World News before moving to The Comics Reporter. [The Comics Reporter]

Blogosphere | Christine Hanefalk and Ryan Lindsay have joined the blogging crew at The Weekly Crisis. [The Weekly Crisis]

Comics | This list of the “10 Most Bizarre Comic Books” doesn't even scratch the surface.

Wells Fargo's Awesome Refusal to Waive Haiti Donation Fees: Goalposts of Greed Moved Back

So: Visa and Mastercard—who've helped ensure that your brokeass stays broke after buying things that leave you broke—waived fees on Haiti donation transactions. Wells Fargo didn't. Somebody on the internet bitched about it. Wells Fargo's response is hysterical:

Michael Klosterman, a spokesman for Wells Fargo, defended the bank's response to the Haiti disaster, saying the money it donated to Haiti more than makes up for their transaction fees.

“We have given $100,000 to the American Red Cross, and on January 19 we pledged an additional $250,000 to support the non-profits in Florida that are mobilizing the relief efforts,” Klosterman said. “We decided that donating a sum of money would be quicker and more beneficial than waiving transaction fees because the funds would get to the people quicker. It would take the equivalent of $35 million in transactions to raise the amount of money we actually donated.“

Get why this is funny?

1. Because the amount Wells Fargo has given is so small! $350,000 is, um, nothing. That's a house. A small house. That's not even a studio in Manhattan. Is that even a college education?

2. There probably won't be $35M in transactions, which is the slimy inherent reasoning Wells Fargo uses to justify not waiving the fee, widely missing the point that transaction fees are the banking customer's bane of existence, and thus, might get in the way of getting money to Haiti. Also, they put out a press line that also subtly tries to advertise their low banking fees, which is as insensitive as it is stupid.

3. Bank of America donated $1M, waived fees, and are matching employee contributions, and they're just the worst. What's that make Wells Fargo? Seeing as how their stock price is thirteen points ahead of Bank of America's, for one thing, the more valued stock of the two companies for a reason, but for another, fucking cheap.

Anyway, the point is that a liquidated bank could turn Haiti from a Third World Country into a First World Country sometime by the middle of February, but because banks are institutions predicated on nothing more than trying to grow money when they're not separating their customers from their money and making it theirs, they'll simply throw a few bucks Haiti's way because they think it creates good will amongst The People and that it makes The People want to bank with them, and for the dumbest ones, it does! So really it's a choice between evil and really evil, and in this case, Wells Fargo won The “Really Evil” Trophy while Bank of America wins The “Bullshit Good Graces” Ribbon. If anything, it certainly makes choosing between buying the two stocks easier.

Update: A reader corrects my embarrassingly bad misreading of Google Finance. “Probably a better way to compare the value of the two companies is to look at the total value of their stock, which would be the price of one share times the number of shares they've issued. On Google Finance it's listed as Mkt Cap (market capitalization), and BAC's is 131.31B (8.65B shares x $15.18 per share), while WFC is 147.23B (5.18B shares x $28.43 per share). So WFC is worth, as a company, more than BAC, but only about 12% more. They just haven't issued as many shares (5.1 billion vs. 8.6 billion), so each share is more valuable because it represents a larger piece of the company. Google, for instance, has a market cap of 168B (about 12% more than WFC) but has only issued 317 million shares, which is why a single share costs $530.” And we learn something new every day!

Send an email to Foster Kamer, the author of this post, at foster@gawker.com.

Dallas Stars Blog | Sports <b>News</b> | <b>News</b> for Dallas, Texas | Dallas <b>…</b>

It was good <b>news</b> when norm Green was in trouble and sold the team to Tom Hicks now it's good <b>news</b> that Hicks will sell the team since he is in trouble. It seems as though all of his troubles started when he bought Liverpool, …

Teens prefer reading <b>news</b> online to Twitter | Media | guardian.co.uk

While most teenagers reject Twitter and blogging, 62% of them like to read their <b>news</b> online, US research reveals. By Mercedes Bunz.

Fox <b>News</b> Shuns Obama Q&amp;A, MSNBC Gets Snitty When He Encourages <b>…</b>

President Obama this morning took his 2010 Question-And-Answer Tour to the Senate Democratic Caucus, a few days after his foray to the House GOP Retreat in Baltimore turned into must-see TV.

http://www.shumakerelays.com/