Apple Computer was halted right before the release of the earnings. In this stock market trading video below, we highlight the trade live and we highlight the AAPL earnings and give you a full break down of the importance of the report and our take on the stock for 2010. Sign up today to learn more about how to get involved in after hours trading.

YouTube getting into movie rental business

By MICHAEL LIEDTKE

AP TECHNOLOGY WRITER

SAN FRANCISCO -- YouTube's coming attractions now include movie rentals.

The Internet's most popular video channel will make its debut as a rental outlet Friday to help promote some of the movies that will be shown at the upcoming Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah.

It's part of a test that YouTube hopes will encourage more studios to rent movies through its site, eventually creating a new financial stream to supplement the Internet ads that bring in most of its revenue.

The first five films available to rent through YouTube will cost $3.99 for a 48-hour viewing period. Movie studios will be able to set their own prices, with rental viewing windows ranging from one to 90 days. YouTube will get an unspecified commission from each rental.

The expansion announced Wednesday marks the latest step in YouTube's evolution from a quirky and sometimes edgy Web site that showed free clips posted by wannabe stars, showoffs, bored teens, lonely hearts and video pirates.

While YouTube still has plenty of eclectic entertainment, the site increasingly has been trying to reel in more traditional fare from movie, television and music producers.

The reason: most major advertisers are more comfortable placing their commercials next to professionally produced videos than alongside wacky - and potentially offensive - clips posted by amateurs.

The strategy appears to be paying off for YouTube and its owner, Google Inc. Barclays Capital analyst Douglas Anmuch expects YouTube to generate about $700 million in revenue this year, an estimated 55 percent increase from 2009. If YouTube hits that target, it likely will turn profitable, helping to justify the $1.76 billion in stock that Google paid for the site more than three years ago.

YouTube says it is diversifying into movie rentals to meet user demand and provide an alternative means of distribution for movie makers that don't want ads cluttering up their work.

There already are plenty of places to rent movies that can be downloaded or streamed over high-speed Internet connections. The major vendors include Apple Inc.'s iTunes store, Amazon.com Inc., Netflix Inc. and Blockbuster Inc.

YouTube's biggest challenge figures to be a familiar one: persuading movie studios to make their digital rentals available at the same time the films are released on DVDs and Blu-ray discs. The studios aren't keen on that particular idea, partly because selling DVDs and Blu-ray discs is so profitable.

Learn more about Online Trading

Court bans sale of Word; Microsoft has fix ready

Appeals court finds Microsoft violated patent; company has to change Word program

By Jessica Mintz, AP Technology Writer , On Tuesday December 22, 2009, 2:15 pm EST

SEATTLE (AP) -- A federal appeals court ordered Microsoft Corp. to stop selling its Word program in January and pay a Canadian software company $290 million for violating a patent, upholding the judgment of a lower court.

But people looking to buy Word or Microsoft's Office package in the U.S. won't have to go without the software. Microsoft said Tuesday it expects that new versions of the product, with the computer code in question removed, will be ready for sale when the injunction begins on Jan. 11.

Toronto-based i4i Inc. sued Microsoft in 2007, saying it owned the technology behind a tool in the popular word processing program. The technology in question gives Word users an improved way to edit XML, or code that tells the program how to interpret and display a document's contents.

A Texas jury found that Microsoft Word willfully infringed on the patent. Microsoft appealed that decision, but the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit on Tuesday upheld the lower court's damage award and the injunction against future sales of infringing copies of Word.

Michel Vulpe, founder and co-inventor of i4i, said in a statement that the company is pleased with the decision, calling it "an important step in protecting the property rights of small inventors."

Microsoft said it has been preparing for such a judgment since August. Copies of Word and Office sold before Jan. 11 aren't affected by the court's decision. And Microsoft said it has "put the wheels in motion to remove this little-used feature" from versions of Word 2007 and Office 2007 that would be sold after that date.

"Beta" or test versions of Word 2010 and Office 2010, expected to be finalized next year, do not contain the offending code, the software maker said.

Redmond, Wash.-based Microsoft said it may appeal further, asking for either a rehearing in front of the appeals court's full panel of judges or in front of the U.S. Supreme Court.

Associated Press Writer Devlin Barrett in Washington contributed to this report.

Sign up and Start Trading a $50,000 Account at No Risk To You

The new iPhone went on sale Friday morning, greeted by much smaller lines and less hoopla than previous models. A few hundred people were in line just before the 7 a.m. opening of Apple Inc.'s flagship store on Manhattan's Fifth Avenue, a fraction of the people who lined up around the block for last year's launch. That launch turned into a debacle as Apple's servers failed to cope with the load of new customers trying to activate their phones. People who already had iPhones were trying to install a software update on the same day, adding to the pressure. This year, Apple and AT&T Inc., the phone's U.S. carrier, defused the drama by taking pre-orders for the new phone online. That means fewer prospective buyers had a reason to stand in line, and it sped up the activation process. Apple also released its software update for previous customers two days early. There were only scattered reports of problems with that upgrade. The new model is called the 3G S. AT&T said it had taken pre-orders for "hundreds of thousands" of the phones. Apple sold one million units of the older model, the 3G, in the first three days last year. For new customers signing a two-year contract with AT&T, the 3G S costs $199 or $299 depending on the memory capacity. Compared to the 3G, it has a faster processor and an upgraded camera. Owners of the previous model, the iPhone 3G, will have to pay more than that. Most of them are not eligible for the new-customer pricing because the AT&T subsidizes the cost of the phone and requires customers to "pay off" the subsidy through their monthly service fees before it will subsidize a new phone. In line at the Fifth Avenue store, Brandon Dennie, 27, was not put off by the prospect of having to pay the unsubsidized price of $599 for the new phone. He's had a 3G for only six months, so he didn't qualify for the lowest price. He's creating his own subsidy by selling his old phone for $200 to a colleague, and he has an Apple gift card. "I want the video option and the speed," Dennie said. In its two-year life, the iPhone range has revolutionized phone design and given AT&T a leg up on its rivals in recruiting customers willing to pay high monthly fees. At an AT&T store in the New York borough of Queens, there were three people in line at 5:45 a.m. Sarah Gates and Ed Phyfe, the couple who were first in line, didn't know about the pre-order option until it was too late, and wanted to be sure to get phones from the small stock set aside for walk-ins. "We got Sprint smart phones since just before the first iPhone came out, and we immediately regretted it," said Gates, 33. She has nothing against Sprint Nextel Corp., but the Motorola Q phones were awful, she said. "I feel kind of bad to leave Sprint ... but I don't like any of the phones they have half as much the iPhone," she said. Apart from the U.S., the phone went on sale Friday in Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Switzerland and the U.K. Other countries will get it throughout the summer.

Prepare yourself for the "New Economy"

Sign up and Start Trading a $50,000 Account at No Risk To You

The new iPhone went on sale Friday morning, greeted by much smaller lines and less hoopla than previous models. A few hundred people were in line just before the 7 a.m. opening of Apple Inc.'s flagship store on Manhattan's Fifth Avenue, a fraction of the people who lined up around the block for last year's launch. That launch turned into a debacle as Apple's servers failed to cope with the load of new customers trying to activate their phones. People who already had iPhones were trying to install a software update on the same day, adding to the pressure. This year, Apple and AT&T Inc., the phone's U.S. carrier, defused the drama by taking pre-orders for the new phone online. That means fewer prospective buyers had a reason to stand in line, and it sped up the activation process. Apple also released its software update for previous customers two days early. There were only scattered reports of problems with that upgrade. The new model is called the 3G S. AT&T said it had taken pre-orders for "hundreds of thousands" of the phones. Apple sold one million units of the older model, the 3G, in the first three days last year. For new customers signing a two-year contract with AT&T, the 3G S costs $199 or $299 depending on the memory capacity. Compared to the 3G, it has a faster processor and an upgraded camera. Owners of the previous model, the iPhone 3G, will have to pay more than that. Most of them are not eligible for the new-customer pricing because the AT&T subsidizes the cost of the phone and requires customers to "pay off" the subsidy through their monthly service fees before it will subsidize a new phone. In line at the Fifth Avenue store, Brandon Dennie, 27, was not put off by the prospect of having to pay the unsubsidized price of $599 for the new phone. He's had a 3G for only six months, so he didn't qualify for the lowest price. He's creating his own subsidy by selling his old phone for $200 to a colleague, and he has an Apple gift card. "I want the video option and the speed," Dennie said. In its two-year life, the iPhone range has revolutionized phone design and given AT&T a leg up on its rivals in recruiting customers willing to pay high monthly fees. At an AT&T store in the New York borough of Queens, there were three people in line at 5:45 a.m. Sarah Gates and Ed Phyfe, the couple who were first in line, didn't know about the pre-order option until it was too late, and wanted to be sure to get phones from the small stock set aside for walk-ins. "We got Sprint smart phones since just before the first iPhone came out, and we immediately regretted it," said Gates, 33. She has nothing against Sprint Nextel Corp., but the Motorola Q phones were awful, she said. "I feel kind of bad to leave Sprint ... but I don't like any of the phones they have half as much the iPhone," she said. Apart from the U.S., the phone went on sale Friday in Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Switzerland and the U.K. Other countries will get it throughout the summer.

Prepare yourself for the "New Economy"

SMF Services

YouTube getting into movie rental business

Court bans sale of Word; Microsoft has fix ready

My favorite websites

Recent posts

Syndication

Post archive