Buzz Out Loud 984: Pre comes to Verizon

We were pretty shocked to find the announcement on Reuters that Verizon will get the Palm Pre in six months. Color us shocked. Also, Time Warner and AOL are breaking up; it's for the best. And Natali calls Brian Tong short. Wow. Pot call the kettle black much?

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EPISODE_983

Time Warner ditches AOL
http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-10250944-93.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/29/business/media/29warner.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

Verizon and Palm Pre???
http://us.mobile.reuters.com/m/FullArticle/p.rdt/CIND/nrbssTechMediaTelecomNews_uUSN2833749320090528

AT&T wants the Palm Pre
http://d7.allthingsd.com/20090527/atts-pre-envy/?mod=ATD_rss

Hands-on with Palm Pre
http://www.boygeniusreport.com/2009/05/28/palm-pre-first-hands-on/

Palm Pre said to sync up nicely with Apple’s iTunes
http://www.engadget.com/2009/05/28/palm-pre-said-to-sync-up-nicely-with-apples-itunes/

PSP Go! details confirmed, smaller PS3 is on the way
http://arstechnica.com/gaming/news/2009/05/mole-confirms-psp-go-details-with-a-smaller-ps3-on-the-way.ars

Gmail in real-time: Google does the Wave
http://news.cnet.com/8301-17939_109-10250742-2.html

Google considers taking beta tag off Gmail
http://tech.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=09/05/28/1236240
http://www.pcpro.co.uk/news/253690/is-google-finally-ready-to-take-beta-tag-off-gmail.html

It’s official. Kumo is now named Bing!
http://arstechnica.com/microsoft/news/2009/05/hands-on-with-microsofts-new-search-to-bing-or-not-to-bing.ars
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13860_3-10250614-56.html

AT&T says 7.2Mbps wireless coming this year
http://hardware.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=09/05/27/1829210

Blackberry wins 101 domains in one lawsuit
http://domainnamewire.com/2009/05/28/blackberry-wins-101-domain-names-in-single-udrp-case/
http://www.att.com/gen/press-room?pid=4800&cdvn=news&newsarticleid=26835

Cambridge study: DRM turns users into pirates
http://www.boingboing.net/2009/05/27/cambridge-study-drm.html

Liquid helium trumps liquid hydrogen at AMD’s Phenom II overclocking love-in
http://www.engadget.com/2009/05/28/liquid-helium-trumps-liquid-hydrogen-at-amds-phenom-ii-overcloc/

Bitterness to be classified as a mental illness
http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=09/05/27/162216&from=rss

VOICE MAIL

Sand – Waterproof Kindle case
http://m-edge-accessories-llc.amazonwebstore.com/Medge-Leisure-Jacket-for-Amazon-Kindle/M/B001C5PI8G.htm?traffic_src=froogle&utm_medium=organic&utm_source=froogle
http://ireaderreview.com/2009/04/23/kindle-2-waterproof-case-trendy-digitals-case-for-kindle-1-2/

E-MAIL

Dear Buzz Crew:
I have to confirm that Facebook is not filtered, in first few hours it was open and filtered again because of many difficulties of ISPs in Iran trying to change their filtering lists.
But at last after a few hours Facebook was complete out of Iran's government filtering protocol.
You should know it only 6 month that Facebook and YouTube are not filtered in Iran, other sites like Myspace or Orkut are still being filtered.

Best Regards

Siavash

——————————–
Hi Buzz Crew,

Am I missing something? If you can get a Pre under contract for $199
and if the Sprint cancellation fee is $200, why would anyone buy an
unlocked Pre for $549? The math would say that’s a $150 penalty to
buy it unlocked with no real benefit. Add to that the fact that you
can only go to one other carrier in the U.S. with this phone and
buying an unlocked Pre makes no sense.

Love the show,
Terry
Prairie Village, KS

——————————–
Hey Buzzers of the past and present,
On the occasion of the upcoming historic 10^3 episode of Buzz Out Loud, I would love to hear from a selection of long-time Buzzers what Buzz Out Loud story has most surprised you in that you would never have predicted the technology or technological development that story represents at the time the show launched. In other words, what story from the history of the show would have been most unbelievable to you had the ghost of buzzing future come to you in a dream the night of the very first BOL episode and told you you would one day report this?

Congratulations and keep up the good work!

~ Chris the Human Factors Grad Student

——————————–
Hey Buzz Crew,

I just finished listening to episode 982 where Cooley asked the
question “Is there any data on Internet yellow page usage?” Well ask
and ye shall receive… I work for a yellow page directory publisher
so I looked up a couple of statistics for you.

* Print yellow pages usage remained stable with 13.4 billion
references in 2006 and 2007. (1)
* Approximately 87% of the U.S. population used the print yellow
pages in 2007. (1)
* Internet yellow pages (IYP) searches increased 15% in 2007 to 3.8
billion searches, up from 3.3 billion in 2006. (2)
* 51% of the 144 million people performing online local searches in
December 2007 used IYP. (2)

(1) KN/SRI 2007 Industry Usage Study
(2) comScore

Everyone here understands that it is hard to get people to go to our
web site when they could just “Google it”, so they are trying to roll
out features to get people to come to our site, such as reviews and
even 30 second web commercials in selected areas.

Just trying to put up some numbers to fight the ever-present argument,
“who uses the phonebook anymore?” because every time I hear someone
ask that question I want to get on a soap box and scream that WE ARE
NOT OBSOLETE YET! And before anyone starts to complain… the books
are made from recycled wood pulp (NO trees are cut down to make a
book) and are 100% recyclable.

Just my two cents.

Love the show.

Kat T
the phone book layout artist in Iowa
(oh yeah, real exciting job, I know)

——————————–
1000th episode coming Thursday June 18th. Want to be on the episode? Post a video of yourself. MUST be less than 30 seconds long. And send a link. No attachments. Could be well-wishing, could be memories, epithets we don’t care. We’ll choose from all the messages we get and play a selection on the 1000th episode as well as post them in the Wiki.

Want to get involved in the production of the show? Find your favorite BOL moment, clip it out of the MP3, or video, and send us the moment. For video, please upload to a video hosting service and send us a link. Email either to buzz@cnet.com