That’s because Microsoft’s online-services business has been, um, well, a work in progress for far too long. (I recently returned from a vacation abroad, and the glow hasn’t fully worn off yet.) While Google extends its domination in search advertising, Microsoft is conceding defeat. The company’s CFO said last week during a conference call that Microsoft expected to lose money in online services for the foreseeable future.

Send those resumes my way, folks

Not to get melodramatic on you, but this may rank as Microsoft’s most important decision since anointing Steve Ballmer as Bill Gates’ replacement in 2000.

Swisher also suggests that an outsider has a shot.

But perhaps holding off on naming an immediate replacement is the more prudent strategy. With six months’ worth of Yahoo-yes, Yahoo-no, Yahoo-maybe, this company still seems confused about what its online strategy ought to be.

(Credit:
CNET News)

More seriously, McAndrews is just one among many capable online executives with the right resume for this job. Microsoft can afford to be picky. The last thing that Ballmer needs is a reprise of the Michael Hallman affair. (Hallman was hired away from Boeing to become company president, only to get the boot two years later.)

“More interesting, perhaps, is one of the top outside candidates on the list, former AOL head Jon Miller, who is poised to be added to the–wait for it–Yahoo board, as part of its recent proxy fight settlement (with) activist investor Carl Icahn.”

I like the idea of bringing in an outsider, someone presumably with a fresh perspective. In that sense, McAndrews might qualify, albeit with an asterisk. Microsoft acquired his company months ago, and it takes at least a year for the corporate Kool-Aid to have its true effect.

I’ve seen McAndrews speak on several occasions–the latest being yesterday, during a conference organized by Fortune magazine–and he is impressive in person.

Wanted: Experienced online executive not afraid of challenges. Must be self-starter. Ideal candidate a glutton for punishment, willing to deal with stress, as well as excitable CEO prone to throwing chairs when in foul mood. Huge payout if successful; ritual defenestration if a failure. No phone calls. Send all e-mails to sballmer@microsoft.com.

Mary Jo Foley says Brian McAndrews, who arrived at Microsoft via its acquisition of Aquantive, is expected to emerge as a “strong candidate.” Kara Swisher over at All Things Digital writes that her sources put McAndrews as the leading candidate, while company veteran Yusuf Mehdi is also in the running.

In this episode, I explore the possibility of Android never being released and Google eating its investment. Will it happen? It’s entirely possible.

I also misspoke: I’m looking for a 15 second intro, not a 15 minute intro! Sorry about that!

And, come to think about it, if TMZ-inspired campaigning has reinvigorated public interest in the nation’s future, I don’t see anything wrong with that. But I’ll pass on the text message, Barack. I can wait until it shows up on Google News.

In one of his recent–and subsequently parodied–attack ads on U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama, Republican John McCain accused his rival of being too much of a celebrity and not enough of a political leader.

On the other hand, this could net the Obama campaign quite a few more e-mail addresses and cell phone numbers for its Rolodex of supporters. And text message initiative like this is an appeal to the Britney generation, the hordes of young supporters who have grown up drinking a highly caffeinated blend of AIM and the E! network, and who don’t see the slightest problem with applying the rhetoric and strategy of celebrity infatuation to national politics. That’s the crowd who made Obama into a “celebrity.”

That was what I first thought of upon learning that the Obama campaign has instituted text-message alerts to inform supporters of the candidate’s choice for vice presidential running mate.

Overall, I scored 90, which is better than random but nowhere near Michael Johnston’s score of 4 (lower is better). The site shows how your score compares to your peers’ scores, but only crudely: it’s too bad there’s no frequency distribution to show better how people fared.

X-Rite's vision-straining color test.

I confess I enjoyed taking the test–it was intriguing to pay that much attention to the subtle color perception. For example, the part I found easiest also turned out to be the color range where I made the most errors.

One more little tidbit: Lori Grunin, who gauges color fidelity all day long as she reviews cameras for CNET, scored a perfect zero. She uses a Sony Artisan CRT monitor.

(Credit:
CNET News)

X-Rite, which wants you to buy its technology for precisely calibrating your monitor’s colors, published the test, which requires you to put 100 colored chits in the right order. It presents you with a score and a color chart showing where you’re unreliable.

I’m not sure how much faith to put in the test, which probably scores your monitor’s quality and your patience as well as your visual abilities. But if nothing else, it’s a good marketing gimmick.

My mediocre score on the test.

Update 6:50 a.m. PDT October 10: Yup, the technology you’re using makes a big difference. Thursday’s test was on a Lenovo laptop, but then I redid my test on my home machine’s high-gamut Dell 2408WFP monitor. My new score was a less disgraceful 17–and the test was much easier, taking me only about half the time.

(Credit:
CNET News)

There are some Web quizzes out there that are fun. Then there’s X-Rite’s test of how well you can distinguish between subtle differences in hue.

My score was less embarrassing using the higher-end monitor I have at home.

(Credit:
X-Rite)

“Imperium Renewables has reduced its corporate workforce. The move is part of an ongoing restructuring plan that realigns the company to address short term challenges and ensure the company’s long term growth. These changes do not impact production of biodiesel at Imperium Grays Harbor.”

Update: A spokesperson from Imperium Renewables issues the following statement, which is all the company is saying at this point:

It said that the changes will not affect the operation of its Grays Harbor, Wash., biodiesel plant which will produce 100 million gallons of biodiesel a year.

Imperium Renewables has cut its workforce, only weeks after pulling plans for its public offering and replacing its CEO, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer reports.

Company founder John Plaza is now interim CEO and investor Nancy Floyd is chairman.

The Seattle-based biodiesel producer told the newspaper that the workforce reductions were done to “address short-term challenges and ensure the company’s long-term growth.”

Beyond the financial investment, this means that Universal artists will post promotional blogs on Buzznet, and the social site will have access to the label’s music and video catalog.

Goldman hinted that more partnerships with big media companies were on the way for Buzznet. That’s good, because having a single label behind a community and editorial site is a bit questionable.

According to a release from the two companies, this is “one of the first times that a music company will be directly involved in developing editorial programming for a social-media site, with both companies sharing in the revenue.”

It’s more extensive than Universal’s partnerships with other social networks; the label has licensed its catalog to MySpace.com for its MySpace Music endeavor, as well as to music-focused social-media site Imeem.

Last week, Buzznet CEO Tyler Goldman told CNET News.com to expect a partnership announcement that would bring more audio content to the site.

Let’s hope that Universal’s investment doesn’t start tainting Buzznet’s snappy editorial.

Earlier this week, Buzznet announced that it had purchased another music blog, Idolator, from former owner Gawker Media.

With only 10 million active members–that’s less than a tenth the size of News Corp.’s MySpace–Buzznet has some growth to do before it reaches its goal of being an MTV-caliber pop-culture influencer. The site has been aggressively bolstering its editorial content, acquiring music blog Stereogum and launching sister blog Videogum, with several hip blogging veterans at the helm.

Not only does Buzznet own music blogs like Stereogum and Idolator, but it also has deep partnerships with irreverent gossip blogs such as A Socialite’s Life and Just Jared.

Electric-car maker Tesla Motors has filed suit against a competitor, claiming the company stole trade secrets and copied design ideas.

The company, based in San Carlos, Calif., said in February that it plans to produce two types of its WhiteStar sedan–one being completely battery-powered, the other being a so-called range-extended vehicle, or REV, wherein a small gas motor recharges the battery as the car is driven.

“I think it’s ironic that Fisker chose to name his car the Karma, when what he’s done is very bad karma,” said Adam C. Belsky, a lawyer at Gross, Belsky & Alonso who represents Tesla, told the Times.

The Times attempted to reach Fisker Automotive, but was unsuccessful. Someone who picked up the phone at the San Francisco law firm that is representing Fisker Coachbuild said it is “the firm’s policy not to comment on litigation,” according to the newspaper.

Last year, Tesla said it plans to come out with WhiteStar, an all-electric passenger sedan, in late 2009 or 2010. At the time, it said the price would range from $50,000 to $70,000.

The lawsuit was filed Monday in San Mateo County Superior Court in California. Tesla hired Henrik Fisker, CEO of
car design firm Fisker Coachbuild, last year to design the body of its all-electric WhiteStar sedan. In the suit, Tesla alleges that Fisker and Fisker Coachbuild Chief Operating Officer Bernhard Koehler accepted the contract “to gain access to confidential design information and trade secrets, then announced a competing vehicle,” according to a New York Times article.

Tesla said it decided to scrap Fisker’s design for the WhiteStar and began working on a new design when it found out he was going to be a competitor, according to the Times article.

Last month, Tesla began commercial production of its all-electric Tesla Roadster, which costs $98,000. The company has dealerships in Los Angeles and Northern California. Production of the roadster had been delayed because of problems with the car’s transmission, among other components. The company also had a change in top management last year.

But by the time I navigated to my Facebook profile to get rid of the spammy (and possibly virus-ridden) message–within an hour or two of the notification showing up in the first place–the wall post was gone. This means one of either two things: someone else saw the message on my profile and flagged it, or Facebook is actively policing the site to keep it under control, probably by searching for duplicates of a known spam message.

The message in question read, “Some thinks you are special and has a hot^crush on you. Find out who it could be!! ;)” with a link to a Flash file claiming to be hosted on the imageshack.us domain.

I’ve asked Facebook for comment on exactly what their strategy is and whether any members’ login credentials are getting compromised by this spam or virus. I’ll update when I hear back.

“Wall spam” rose to notoriety earlier this month, when members started noticing the phenomenon, and security firms started flagging worms that were spreading via Facebook members’ walls and installing malware when a link in the message was clicked. The company has recommended antivirus fixes and says it’s acting fast.

On Sunday, I had an e-mail alert about someone writing on my Facebook wall–a college acquaintance with whom I hadn’t spoken in quite some time. As it turns out, I was a victim of “wall spam,” a recent phenomenon on Facebook in which automated spam posts show up on members’ message walls. It’s similar to a wave of profile spam that swept News Corp.’s MySpace a few years ago.

The Silicon Alley Insider reported earlier this month that Facebook had been deactivating links in identified spam posts; removing the posts entirely is a more aggressive measure.

“If we get a report of a bug or a hole from a user, a security researcher, a reporter, blogger, or anyone, we check it out and fix it as quickly as possible,” Facebook security chair Max Kelly wrote several weeks ago on the company blog in response to another virus. “In fact, we appreciate it when help comes our way from the many security experts and organizations out there.”

Denon has announced several new AV receivers for 2008, ranging from $1,200 down to $300. While last year’s line of AV receivers marked a huge break from previous generations–with a colorful graphical user interfaces and curvy exterior design–the 2008 line looks to mostly continue the innovations from last year. The initial announcement lacked most of the important specifics we’d like to know about these receivers, but we have a broad idea of what they will offer.

The following product is available:

On Sale Now: $499.00
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According to Electronic House, the new receivers will be available in July. The suggested retail prices of the announced models is as follows: AVR-2809CI ($1,200), AVR-2309CI ($850), AVR-1909 ($650), AVR-1709 ($450), AVR-1609 ($350), AVR-989 ($1,200), AVR-889 ($750), AVR-789 ($600), AVR-689 ($400), and AVR-589 ($300).

All receivers will feature Audyssey Dynamic Volume, which is a sound processing mode that aims to keep volume at a stable level while you watch, so commercials don’t sound louder than shows and explosions in movies won’t startle you. We haven’t tested Audyssey Dynamic Volume ourselves, but we could see it being a popular feature as varying sound levels is a complaint we often hear. All the new receivers will also have Audyssey Dynamic EQ, which is designed to make softer passages sound richer. While it’s always nice to have these options, we’re betting audiophiles will shun both of these sound processing modes as they tend to distort audio, either stripping it of its impact or making it artificially bassy.

The six most expensive models (AVR-2809CI, AVR-2309CI, AVR-1909, AVR-989, AVR-889, and AVR-789) feature upconversion of analog signals up to 1080p, as well as onboard decoding for high-resolution audio soundtracks, such as Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio. HDMI connectivity wasn’t released for all models, but Denon did specify how many inputs a few of the receivers will have: two for the AVR-589, three for the AVR-689 and AVR-789, and four for the AVR-889 and AVR-989. The AVR-2809CI will offer three-zone, three source capability, meaning you can listen to three separate audio sources in three different rooms. All other receivers feature two-zone, two source capability.

Matt points out that maybe this is greed on Apple’s part, it’s insane that Apple refused to let customers purchase the phone directly from Apple stores. And it’s even crazier that the company hasn’t yet released a statement explaining it.

As an Apple fan boy I find it hard to believe that this could even happen, but anyone who has dealt with AT&T should have expected something crazy to occur. Someone in the office here mocked me for running out and buying
Leopard when it came out, but at least then I knew I was just dealing with Apple–no horrific cellphone carrier experience to deal with.

I can’t even believe what an unbelievable debacle the new iPhone sales/activation process has been.