Chunk

BFG to Offer Rebate Relief for Bounced Checks — Last week we reported that Continental Promotions Group (CPG), one of the largest and oldest rebate entities in the business, managed to put itself in a rather sticky situation by not having enough funds to pay off its obligations. To quickly recap, manufacturers have a pretty good idea of how many rebates on any given product will be processed and cut a check to CPG based on that amount. CPG then doles out the funds as rebate forms come trickling in, but a large chunk of money has gone inexplicably missing. According to HardOCP, CPG owes anywhere between $9 million... [Tags: bfg products, bfg technologies, canadian customers, chunk, consumers]

Franken Camp: We're Doing Even Better Than Reported — Aides to Al Franken told reporters on Thursday afternoon that their chances of winning a recount election against Norm Coleman looked far more positive than even Wednesday evening's optimistic reports suggest. Speaking to reporters in person and on phone, Marc Elias, the Franken campaign's chief counsel, said that the early recount results (which decreased the margin separating the Democratic challenger and Coleman by 43 votes) actually underestimated the ground gained. "We do in fact feel very good about how the first day of the recount went... We believe that through last night, 26.5 percent of the ballots were hand counted.... [Tags: aides, al franken, ballots, chief counsel, chunk]

Can You Save A Scratched CD? — You may have a disc, be it music or data, that is scratched and will not read in your optical disc drive no matter what you do to it. Can it be saved? Possibly. There are a few things you can try to save that disc. Hardware method: It could be just the drive you’re using If the disc won’t read in your optical drive, try another one that’s close by. If you don’t have one to spare, try a friend’s computer. Interesting side note: Older optical drives with slower read speeds have a much higher chance of reading... [Tags: chunk, copying software, disc copy, long time, maximum speed]

Finished With My RSS Reorg — It’s 4:30 AM right now. I’m bushed. A few days ago, I started on a quest to make myself more efficient with respect to my RSS reading.  For as long as I can remember, I’ve had far in excess of 800 feeds a day I go through, and I generally spend at least three hours a day specifically devoted to clearing my reads (with light reading throughout the rest of the work-day). I’m at a point where I want to be a lot more productive in terms of my writing output, and the biggest expendable chunk of my workload was... [Tags: chunk, corporate news, efficient with respect, few days, glance]

Local Listings Angie's List Gets Another Big One: $18 Million In Venture Debt — Home improvement and contractor online listings and review service Angie's List has picked up $18 million in venture debt from Lighthouse Capital Partners. It's the second double-digit round of funding the Indianapolis-based company has received just this year—Battery Ventures invested $35 million in the service for a minority stake in April. Angie's List expanded from covering just home-focused companies like plumbers to health care providers in March, and will use the new funds to scale out to other categories and internationally. It also is a major underwriter of shows on NPR and other public radio, and that probably takes a... [Tags: access company, angie, battery ventures, capital partners, chunk]

Samsung intros colorful Tobi S3030, unashamedly markets it to tweens — Filed under: Handsets, Samsung, GSM, EDGE No one can get on Samsung's case for being bashful with its marketing, as the Tobi S3030 is being aimed squarely at "pre-teens, young adults, and anyone who desires to experience fun and safety features from their mobile phones." In other words, the Tobi won't do anything spectacular, but it is offered up in a variety (six, to be exact) of lovable hues and includes a gaggle of safety features including SOS Call, SOS Message and Fake Call (saywha?). Furthermore, you'll be thrilled to know that it's built with recyclable and biodegradable plastic so... [Tags: 18 nov, biodegradable plastic, chunk, engadget mobile, gaggle]

Necessary Ventilation: Ultimately Cheaper Than Health Care: Get out those inhalers: an ordinance... — Get out those inhalers: an ordinance introduced by the Board of Supervisors that would require developers who build near freeways and other busy thoroughfares to protect their residents from air pollution goes before the Land Use and Economic Development Committee today. But in this market, any extra chunk of change could mean the death knell for a development... [SF Examiner]... [Tags: air pollution, board of supervisors, chunk, death knell, developers]

Storefronting: End is Nigh for Streetlight Records — Another victim of high rents and, oh yeah, the Internet: Streetlight Records' flagship store on 24th Street in Noe Valley is closing. The 32-year-old company will still keep its other SF outlet at Market and Castro. Besides the obvious toll downloads have taken on record sales, "Noe Valley has become particularly expensive and we can’t afford the rent," says the official Streetlight press release. But apparently the rents in the prime of the Castro are standing strong... So what would you like to see at this pricey chunk of 24th Street and Noe real estate? To the comments with complaints... [Tags: amp, castro, chunk, flagship store, press release]

Karen Stabiner: Who Wants to Be a (Self-Sacrificing, Heroic) Millionaire? — I was at an airport gate yesterday with a bunch of other recessionists who'd been enticed to travel by Virgin America's dirt-cheap cross-country web fare, all of us listening to a CNN commentator gripe about destitute banking concerns that plan to use a chunk of our taxpayer bailout to pay out multi-millions in annual bonuses. If there were ever a right moment for earmarked money, this might have been it. Didn't anyone in the Treasury department think to say here, we're going to bail you out, but you're supposed to use this money to make credit more available and jump-start... [Tags: altruists, bad intentions, bailout, chunk, cnn]

'One Laptop' Project Revives Give One, Get One Deal — In its effort to put affordable, educational notebooks in the hands of third-world children, One Laptop Per Child is reviving its Give One, Get One promotion on Monday. The deal enables consumers to buy an XO laptop for themselves for $400, which in turn donates a second unit to a child in a developing country. The organization is working with Amazon to offer the deal, according to an Associated Press story. Since 2005, OLPC has been striving toward the goal of producing a $100 laptop with the idea that technology can rectify e-learning and computer illiteracy issues throughout the... [Tags: amazon, ap photo, chunk, computer illiteracy, consumers]

Spam drop could boost Trojan attacks — The dramatic fall in spam traffic reported last week after alleged rogue ISP McColo was taken offline will only be a temporary reprieve and could actually generate a new wave of Trojans, experts have warned.ISPs disagree on the global percentage drop caused by the shuttering of California-based McColo last Tuesday, with estimates given by those contacted by Techworld ranging from 50 to 80 percent, but even the lower figure is still an unprecedented fall in such a short space of time. It appears that even those who were aware of its use as a hosting port had not guessed that... [Tags: chunk, criminality, dramatic fall, eight times, last tuesday]

New Poll: Tell Us About Your Monitor(s) — If you find yourself sitting in front of the computer for hours on end during a days time, a nice LCD monitor can really make a difference. Compared to conventional CRT monitors, flat screens are sharper, and thus a little easier on the eyes. Over the last several years, the prices have come down as well which means it doesn’t take long to save up for one. A few weeks ago at work I was asked to order several LCD monitors to replace old CRT monitors. It was when I went to remove the old monitors that I was reminded... [Tags: benefit, chunk, conventional crt, crt monitors, desk space]

Carl Icahn-ic: Shareholder Activist Talks About His Quest to Improve Boardrooms (Are You Listening, Yahoo?) [BoomTown] — What does Carl Icahn, the billionaire activist shareholder who waged war on Yahoo and now sits on its board, really think? “…I really think current boards and managements are killing the country,” he said in an interview published Friday in The Wall Street Journal’s Opinion Journal. “I’ll tell you why, ’cause I’ve lived it. I’m on a lot of boards, I see how ineffectual they are.” While he was talking about the state of American management in general and not Yahoo in particular, it’s worth reading an interesting chat Icahn had for a feature called “The Weekend Interview.” The... [Tags: american management, billionaire, board meeting, boardrooms, boomtown]

White Vote And The South — With his graphics wizardry, Prof. Charles Franklin has posted a piece at pollster.com looking at the percentage of African-American voters, the percentage of white voters who voted for Obama, and how they correlate. Click for a larger view. Prof. Franklin notes that below 20% of A-A participation, there's not much correlation between white vote for Obama and A-A turnout voting pool. However, once you reach 20% A-A voting, (for whatever reason) the white vote tends to drop precipitously. To help illustrate that, I've added a red line at the 20% range to see it visually. Look over to the right... [Tags: assumptions, charles franklin, chunk, correlation, curve]

FDIC Wants To Rework Mortgage Loans — The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. is proposing a plan to offer incentives to companies that reduce monthly mortgage payments. FDIC Chairwoman Sheila Bair wants to use a chunk of the government's $700 billion bailout fund to rework mortgage loans. She tells Steve Inskeep that it is similar to what the FDIC is doing at IndyMac, the giant California bank that failed over the summer, with tens of thousands of delinquent loans.» E-Mail This     » Add to Del.icio.us... [Tags: bailout, california bank, chairwoman, chunk, delinquent loans]

Writing Content that Works for a Living — Most web copy is still being written by people who aren't writers and don't have time. The good news? Anyone who touches copy can make a difference by insisting that every chunk of text on the site do something concrete.... [Tags: chunk, something concrete, web copy]

Next Year's iPhone Sales: A Crapshoot (AAPL) — The end of the year is close, and the gadget economy is in the toilet, so Apple (AAPL) analysts will soon start honing their 2009 iPhone sales estimates. We wish them luck. Why? Because several major considerations could lead to wildly different results. Now that the iPhone makes up a significant chunk of Apple's revenue, moreover, these considerations could also materially affect Apple's broader sales and profits for 2009. What are these considerations? They include: Whether Apple will cut the iPhone's wholesale price so that AT&T/other carriers can subsidize it down to $99 or less. Whether Apple will release a... [Tags: aapl, abramsky, amp, chunk, crapshoot]

It’s Time for Some Business Brainstorming! — The following is republished from The SitePoint Tribune #421. Some time ago in the SitePoint Forums, johnyboy came up with a “mad crazy payment scheme idea” for discussion in the forums. It attracted a bit of interest and some terrific responses. johnyboy’s idea was to build clients’ sites for free, with payment being a percentage of the sales. I really like how he’s applying alternative thinking to construct a different business model for future enterprises. But here’s some advice from someone who’s been there: the concept may sound okay, but in practice it might end up being the worst thing... [Tags: arrangement work, bottom line, brainstorming ideas, business cash flow, business model]

Suburbanites And The Depression — Jeff Vail argues, counter-intuitively, that suburbanites may be more resilient than urbanites to a economic downturn and energy cost increase:As long as suburbanites maintain their present income levels, they should be able to afford their present costs of commuting--in most cases rising gas prices won't break the bank, and can largely be addressed through improved efficiency. However, a sharp economic downturn has the potential to dramatically reduce these income levels. Here’s the key: a sharp economic downturn will most likely reduce urbanites’ income levels by a similar amount. So while these economic troubles may make life in suburbia much more... [Tags: budgets, chunk, commuter cars, depression, economic downturn]

Dow Falls Over 400 Points — Photograph of job seekers outside a Monster.com job fair in midtown by Kathy Willens/AP The Dow tumbled 411 points (down 4.73%) while the Nasdaq fell 5.17% and S&P 500 fell 5.19%. According to the NY Times, "Wall Street spent the day looking at Washington for guidance, and investors did not like what they saw, analysts said." The chief economist at Moody's, Marc Zandi, further explained, “Wall Street is increasingly taking its cues from D.C. Policymakers are deciding who survives and who doesn’t.” And, therefore, when Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson explained the change of plans for a chunk of the... [Tags: 411, bad news, bailout, best buy, chief economist]