Filed last Friday, the latest version of the settlement is more limited in scope, but has still drawn the ire of critics, who claim it remains rife with “anti-trust, class action and copyright violations.”

Chin evidently disagrees, and Google (GOOG) is obviously quite pleased that he has done so. “The preliminary approval order sends a positive initial message; this agreement promises to benefit readers and researchers, and enhance the ability of authors and publishers to distribute their content in digital form,” the company said in a statement.

“We remain hopeful that the agreement will receive final approval from the court,” Google continues, “and will realize the goal of significantly expanding online access to works through Google Book Search, an ambitious effort to make millions of books searchable via the Web.”

In a statement of its own, the Open Books Alliance, one of the settlement’s harshest critics, warned Google not to get too, too hopeful. “Today, in an expected procedural move, Judge Denny Chin granted preliminary approval to the revised Settlement of Google’s copyright infringement lawsuit,” the group said.

“This is not a surprising development and is not any indication that the court will or will not accept the terms of Settlement 2.0,” the Alliance warned. “The same procedural preliminary approval was given to Settlement 1.0, and now sets up a court process that will allow those opposed to the revised settlement to let their objections known to the court. The U.S. Department of Justice has until February 4th to weigh in with the court, as their investigation into the matter continues.”

Under terms of the deal, a mix of new and library content from Univision, TeleFutura and Galavision TV programs will be featured and promoted throughout YouTube.

The deal, which marks the first time any Univision programming is available on the Web outside of its own properties, is part of YouTube’s effort to cater to one of the fastest growing segments of online users: The Hispanic community.

“We’ve seen 6.5 million Hispanic adults visit YouTube in the last year,” Chris Maxcy, head of content partnerships at YouTube, said during a call discussing the announcement. “That’s up 80 percent….To date our focus has mostly been on English language space….The Hispanic audience has been overlooked, yet it’s one of the fastest growing communities online.”

The official release:

UNIVISION BECOMES A PREMIER SPANISH-LANGUAGE CONTENT PARTNER WITH YOUTUBE

Partnership Marks One of the Most Comprehensive Deals of Full-Length Programming for YouTube and Brings YouTube’s Hispanic Community in the U.S. Top Programming from Univision’s Three Major Networks
NEW YORK, NY, November 16, 2009 — Univision Interactive Media, Inc., the digital division of Univision Communications Inc., the leading Spanish-language media company in the United States, today announced that it is partnering with YouTube to make short-length and long-form Univision videos available on the YouTube.com website.

“This is a very exciting milestone, as it represents the first time that any Univision programming is available on the Web outside our own properties in both a long and short form format,” said Kevin Conroy, president of Univision Interactive Media, Inc. “This partnership uniquely extends our reach to our audience and solidifies our position as the leading Spanish-language video provider for U.S. Hispanics with unparalleled programming in all respects.”

“Clearly, Univision has established itself as a premier provider of Spanish-language television content here in the U.S.,” said Chris Maxcy Head of Content Partnerships at YouTube. “This deal is a big win for us and marks one of the most comprehensive partnerships for full-length programming signed to date. There is a huge demand to watch Spanish-language content on YouTube. With this new partnership, our community here in the U.S. can watch and enjoy both short-length and long-form programming from Univision’s three major networks on our platform.”

Univision, TeleFutura and Galavisión television programs will be featured and promoted throughout the YouTube.com website. Content will be updated to include relevant offerings as well as an extensive archive of library programs. In addition to top Univision shows, users will have access to Univision.com videos across key content categories, as well as unique footage from Univision celebrity interviews and special events such as next year’s “Premio Lo Nuestro a la Música Latina” (Lo Nuestro Latin Music Awards). Univision will also be using YouTube’s leading Content ID technology to more effectively track user engagement and monetize Univision content uploaded by YouTube users.

This partnership solidifies Univision Interactive Media’s leadership position as it provides premier advertisers with unique sponsorship opportunities, including new inventory for display ads. This further establishes Univision Interactive Media as the ideal vehicle for advertisers to connect with U.S. Hispanics anytime, anywhere.

“The continued economic turmoil, and in particular the troubling unemployment rate, is undoubtedly impacting industry sales,” said NPD analyst Anita Frazier. “Our latest Economy Tracker indicated that although consumers’ general opinion about the economy is improving, their outlook on their own personal situation is worsening. If consumers’ personal outlook continues to erode, they could very well be much more conservative with their holiday shopping this year.”

A somber warning for the videogame industry. Even recent price cuts on game consoles have done little to spur demand.

“Year to date, the hardware category has experienced the sharpest decline in the industry, with unit sales down 10 percent compared to the same time period last year,” Frazier wrote. “Recent price cuts helped spur a one- to two-month increase in unit sales, and this month’s Wii sales reflect that boost, but the other platforms have not sustained the sales momentum after price reduction.”

The videogame industry may be recession-resistant, but it is clearly not recession-proof, as some once believed. Sales data, below.

U.S. Hardware Sales, October 2009

1. Wii 506.9K
2. Nintendo DS 457.6K
3. PlayStation 3 320.6K
4. Xbox 360 249.7K
5. PSP 174.6K
6. PlayStation 2 117.8K

U.S. Top Ten Software Sales, October 2009

1. Uncharted 2: Among Thieves (PS3, Sony) 537,000
2. Wii Fit Plus (Wii, Nintendo) 441,000
3. Borderlands (360, Take 2) 418,000
4. Wii Sports Resort (Wii, Nintendo) 314,000
5. NBA 2K10 (360, Take 2) 311,000
6. Halo 3: ODST (360, Microsoft) 271,000
7. NBA 2K10 (PS3, Take 2) 213,000
8. Forza Motorsport 3 (360, Microsoft) 175,000
9. Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days (DS, Square Enix) 169,000
10. FIFA Soccer 10 (360, Electronic Arts) 156,000

Once again, AT&T (T) argues that coverage maps featured in Verizon’s (VZ) ad are misleading and falsely suggest that AT&T offers no coverage in areas where it actually does service.

“Contrary to the image presented in the Verizon ads, our wireless network is pervasive,” said an AT&T spokesman. “It covers over 300 million people, or 97 percent of the U.S. population. Our fastest, or 3G, network covers approximately 233 million people, or 75 percent of the U.S. population….[Verizon's] use of white space is misleading.”

While AT&T is deadly serious about this accusation, the fact that it must make it by referencing creatures like the Abominable Snow Monster and a pink spotted elephant makes it, well, hysterical.

“The ‘Island of Misfit Toys’ television advertisement is a parody of the ‘Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer’ television special that depicts an island to which Rudolph travels after escaping an attack from the Abominable Snow Monster,” AT&T argues in its complaint. “The advertisement begins with outdated, discarded toys expressing surprise at the arrival of an Apple iPhone. The red Charlie-in-the-Box says ‘Hey! Check out the new guy!’ The spotted elephant, in a surprised manner, asks the iPhone ‘What are you doing here? You can download apps and browse the web!’ and a Dolly for Sue asserts that ‘Yeah. People will love you [the iPhone].’”

The complaint continues: “In response, a blue AT&T coverage map depicting large swaths of ‘white’ or ‘blank’ space across the United States appears above the iPhone. All the toys exclaim ‘Oh . . .’ in dismay, while the iPhone wilts and its screen turns dark. The toy airplane then assures the iPhone that ‘you’re going to fit right in here!’”

Finally, as AT&T describes it, “AT&T’s and Verizon’s coverage maps then appear and the announcer states, ‘with five times more 3G coverage than AT&T, Verizon Wireless is your destination for great gifts.’ The image of the sad and wilting iPhone on an island of misfit toys falsely communicates that the iPhone is a broken device because it cannot browse the web or download applications when outside of AT&T’s depicted coverage area. Further, the maps in the advertisement deceive consumers into believing that AT&T’s customers have no coverage whatsoever when they are outside of AT&T’s depicted coverage area and thus cannot use their wireless devices in many parts of the United States.”

Verizon’s attorneys are probably doubled over with laughter at this very moment.

Below, AT&T’s amended complaint in its entirety:

VerizonAmendComp _3_ –

Good news for Microsoft (MSFT). Clearly, Bing’s traffic is not yet leveling out. That said, it should be noted that according to comScore (SCOR), whose search data are most highly regarded by Wall Street, Bing never lost search market share in the U.S.

According to Oracle (ORCL) CEO Larry Ellison, Sun (JAVA) is already losing $100 million a month as it waits for regulatory approval, and judging from the price of the company’s stock today, it may be losing even more than that. Shares in Sun slid to $8.11–about 15 percent below Oracle’s offer price and a far cry from the $9.18 they hit in mid-October.

Clearly, investors are alarmed by this latest turn of events, though industry observers say there’s little reason for them to be. Morgan Stanley, for example, believes Oracle’s acquisition of Sun will win EU approval with few, if any, modifications to the MySQL database software about which regulators are so concerned.

“Based on our diligence, we believe the EC is likely to approve the deal with no remedies or remedies pertaining to MySQL’s licensing,” the research house said in a note to clients today. “It is highly unlikely that Oracle restructures the deal (e.g. spins MySQL) or walks away.”

Morgan Stanley’s call: The deal will go through and at $9.50 per share. As the firm notes, the EU hasn’t blocked a U.S.-based transaction since GE/Honeywell in 2001.

On November 9, 2009, the European Commission issued a statement of objections relating to the acquisition of Sun by Oracle Corporation. The Statement of Objections sets out the Commission’s preliminary assessment regarding, and is limited to, the combination of Sun’s open source MySQL database product with Oracle’s enterprise database products and its potential negative effects on competition in the market for database products. The issuing of a Statement of Objections allows addressees to present arguments in response to the Commission’s preliminary assessment of the competitive effects of a notified transaction. A Statement of Objections is a preparatory document that does not prejudge the European Commission’s final decision. Any final decision by the European Commission is subject to appeal to the European Court of First Instance.

Indignant that the EC would dare to bring the $7 billion deal into question, Oracle vowed to take it to the mat in a harshly worded rebuttal:

Oracle’s acquisition of Sun is essential for competition in the high end server market, for revitalizing Sparc and Solaris and for strengthening the Java development platform. The transaction does not threaten to reduce competition in the slightest, including in the database market. The Commission’s Statement of Objections reveals a profound misunderstanding of both database competition and open source dynamics. It is well understood by those knowledgeable about open source software that because MySQL is open source, it cannot be controlled by anyone. That is the whole point of open source.

The database market is intensely competitive with at least eight strong players, including IBM, Microsoft, Sybase and three distinct open source vendors. Oracle and MySQL are very different database products. There is no basis in European law for objecting to a merger of two among eight firms selling differentiated products. Mergers like this occur regularly and have not been prohibited by United States or European regulators in decades.

The U.S. Department of Justice carefully reviewed the proposed acquisition during the normal Hart-Scott-Rodino review and considered it again when the European Commission initiated a second phase review. On both occasions the Justice Department came to the conclusion that there is nothing anticompetitive about the deal, including specifically Oracle’s acquisition of the MySQL database product. The U.S. Department of Justice approved the acquisition without conditions and terminated the waiting period under the Hart-Scott-Rodino Act on August 20, 2009.

Sun’s customers universally support this merger and do not benefit from the continued uncertainty and delay. Oracle plans to vigorously oppose the Commission’s Statement of Objections as the evidence against the Commission’s position is overwhelming. Given the lack of any credible theory or evidence of competitive harm, we are confident we will ultimately obtain unconditional clearance of the transaction.

And Oracle will evidently pursue its case with help from the U.S. Department of Justice’s Antitrust Division, which also issued a statement on the EC’s move today:

After conducting a careful investigation of the proposed transaction between Oracle and Sun, the Department’s Antitrust Division concluded that the merger is unlikely to be anticompetitive. This conclusion was based on the particular facts of the transaction and the Division’s prior investigations in the relevant industries. The investigation included gathering statements from a variety of industry participants and a review of the parties’ internal business documents. At this point in its process, it appears that the EC holds a different view. We remain hopeful that the parties and the EC will reach a speedy resolution that benefits consumers in the Commission’s jurisdiction.

Several factors led the Division to conclude that the proposed transaction is unlikely to be anticompetitive. There are many open-source and proprietary database competitors. The Division concluded, based on the specific facts at issue in the transaction, that consumer harm is unlikely because customers would continue to have choices from a variety of well established and widely accepted database products. The Department also concluded that there is a large community of developers and users of Sun’s open source database with significant expertise in maintaining and improving the software, and who could support a derivative version of it.

The Department and the European Commission have a strong and positive relationship on competition policy matters. The two competition authorities have enjoyed close and cooperative relations. The Antitrust Division will continue to work constructively with the EC and competition authorities in other jurisdictions to preserve sound antitrust enforcement policies that benefit consumers around the world.

“I don’t think John McCain could run a major corporation. I don’t think Barack Obama could run a major corporation. I don’t think Joe Biden could, either. But it is not the same as being the president or vice president of the United States. It is a fallacy to suggest that the country is like a company. To run a business, you have to have a lifetime of experience in business, but that’s not what Sarah Palin, John McCain, Barack Obama or Joe Biden are doing.”

– Former Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina

Her dreams of heading up the World Bank dashed, former Hewlett-Packard (HPQ) CEO Carly Fiorina, the architect of one of the worst tech mergers in history, has turned her attention to the U.S. Senate.

After months of speculation, Fiorina officially announced her candidacy today. She’ll run as a Republican against Sen. Barbara Boxer (D., Calif.). Of course, to do that, she must first win the Republican primary. Fiorina broke the news in an op-ed in the Orange County Register.

“Admittedly, I have not always been engaged in the electoral process, and I should have been,” she wrote. “For many years I felt disconnected from the decisions made in Washington and, to be honest, really didn’t think my vote mattered because I didn’t have a direct line of sight from my vote to a result. I realize that thinking was wrong.”

Reflecting on her personal history, Fiorina continues: “As I grew throughout my career, beginning as a secretary and eventually becoming a CEO, I saw how government impacted business. I learned more as a member of advisory boards at the State Department, the Pentagon and the CIA. I now understand, in a very real way, that the decisions made by the Senate impact every family and every business, of any size, in America. This is what motivates me to run for the U.S. Senate. And so today I am announcing my candidacy to serve the people of California as your next U.S. senator….Together we can turn things around.”

Together we can turn things around? Not if Fiorina’s performance at HP is any indication. Before she was forced out of the company by its board of directors, she was so at odds with the uniquely Californian “HP Way” that her corner office could have been powered solely by Bill Hewlett spinning in his grave.

UPDATE: Here’s another Fiorina op-ed from earlier this year in which she discusses executive pay. Unsurprisingly, she is against President Obama’s efforts to restore “common sense” to CEO compensation. And why wouldn’t she be? After all, she walked away from HP with a $21 million severance package.

UPDATE: For those of you just joining us over at CNet, the headline is a joke referring to HP’s ill-starred merger with Compaq.

That’s nowhere near the one million iPhone 3Gs Apple (AAPL) sold in the first three days of the device’s launch in 2008. Nor is it the 13,500-a-day Apple sold during the first 74 days of the original iPhone’s debut. Disappointing to say the least — even if there are already an estimated 1.5 million to two million gray-market iPhones in use in China.

“We view the 5k units as soft,” Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster said in a note to clients this morning. “Using the Jun-07 U.S. launch as a comparison we would have expected about 30k units….We originally thought China would contribute about 1-2m iPhones to our 36m unit estimate for 2010. The launch runrate of about 1,500 units per day would suggest 550k units per year.”

Nonetheless, Munster is maintaining expectations. “We are maintaining our overall numbers,” the analyst notes, “despite the soft China launch based on our belief that other wild cards remain for upside to our iPhone units in CY10 including the rollout to new carriers. We believe that eventually China will emerge as a major market for iPhone sales but it could take a year or two to gain meaningful unit traction as it did in the U.S.”

[Image credit: Mobile163.com]

According to its 10-K, the company “anticipates utilizing approximately $1.9 billion for capital asset purchases during 2010, including approximately $400 million for Retail facilities and approximately $1.5 billion for corporate facilities, infrastructure, and product tooling and manufacturing process equipment.”

That’s a wide range of potential applications–wider, in fact, than it has been in years past, as Caris & Company analyst Robert Cihra notes. “Interestingly…this year’s 10K added wording for purchases of ‘product tooling and manufacturing process equipment’ which could imply Apple reversing course to actually build certain products/components in-house,” Cihra said in a note to clients today. “Beyond that are signals of Apple investing in massive new data center capacity (e.g., North Carolina) that could support anything from iTunes/iPhone Apps through new ‘cloud computing.’”

Sounds plausible. After all, there’s a lot a company like Apple could do with an additional $1.9 billion in capital expenditures. Certainly, an iTunes TV subscription service would require some investment. A tablet/slate device might as well. Whether that’s where this money is headed–if it’s headed anywhere at all–remains to be seen. Who knows, perhaps Apple intends to blow it all on CEO Steve Jobs’ dream of the “ultimate computer factory.”

In any event, those higher prices and the device’s lack of built-in Wi-Fi don’t seem to be as much of a barrier as you might think. And if those issues do end up tempering sales a bit, well, perhaps China Unicom can make them up by poaching iPhone users from rival China Mobile. As iPhonAsia’s Dan Butterfield reported earlier this week, China Unicom is offering an amnesty to users of gray-market iPhones.

“This amnesty program is designed to entice some 1.5 million grey-market iPhone owners in China to sign a contract and pop in a Unicom 3G sim card to take advantage of WCDMA 3G speeds and a variety of new ‘Wo’ 3G services,” Butterfield writes. “The ‘upgrade to 3G’ program is no doubt aimed squarely at the approximate 1,000,000+ iPhones now running on China Mobile’s EDGE 2G network.”

[Image credit: CCID]

That’s the word from Broadpoint AmTech analyst Brian Marshall, who believes Apple (AAPL) will bring the iPhone to Verizon (VZ) in the second half of 2010 and forfeit AT&T’s “sweetheart” carrier subsidy as a result.

“While [Apple] started off with exclusive arrangements in 2007 with the original iPhone launch, the company has since migrated towards multiple carriers per region,” Marshall wrote in a note to investors. “In our view, diverse carrier support is a key element to driving global penetration of the iPhone. Therefore, we believe the chances are high the iPhone will find its way onto the [Verizon] network in 2H10.”

Of course, should things play out that way, the iPhone will no longer be the powerful subscriber-retention tool it is today. And Marshall believes that will lower the subsidy it commands from an estimated $450 to around $300.

This might seem to imply a nasty hit to Apple’s bottom line, but Marshall figures any losses Apple might suffer would be more than made up in volume. He sees Verizon selling roughly 14 million iPhones in the 2011 calendar year. And with an average selling price of $500, that’s another $7 billion in revenue for Apple.

Much has changed at Yahoo since May 17, 2006, the last time the company held an investor day gathering. In May 2006, Yahoo’s shares traded at about $30 and the company claimed 28.98 percent of the U.S. search market. Today, its stock is worth a little over $16 and its share of the search market has fallen to 18.8 percent.

Ugly declines, both of them. Fitting then, that Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz, speaking at the company’s first investor day gathering in three-and-a-half years, would describe the company’s future as “a journey back to respect.” “We are not here to wow you today,” Bartz said “We are here to intrigue you.”

What follows is a brief historical overview of Yahoo (YHOO)–“Yahoo was the big shining star, then wasn’t”–and then a redefinition of the company as that more intriguing entity to which Bartz referred earlier. “We are not a search company, we are not a display company,” she said. “We are a broad-based Internet company….We are the largest communications engine in the world.”

Communications engine? Sounds like a sneaky way of avoiding comparisons with Google (GOOG). Not that anyone makes them anymore.

Anyway, Bartz continues, playing up Yahoo’s scale, diversity of content and technology. “We combine amazing editorial with very sophisticated machine-learning,” she says. But what makes Yahoo most unique, says Bartz, is the company’s ability to learn from its mistakes. “We have fallen and we really want to get back up. If you haven’t had good times and bad times, you don’t know what you’re doing. We prefer the good times. We have passion to get back there. Today is the start of that.”

This according to a new survey from ChangeWave Research (see chart below; click to enlarge), which found that the iPhone now accounts for 30 percent of the smart-phone market. That’s almost double the share it held a year ago. Remarkable considering that the device is currently available from just a single carrier.

“Apple’s share keeps skyrocketing,” said ChangeWave research director Paul Carton. “Their last earnings report points that out. But these numbers show that their momentum is continuing. They’re firing on all cylinders.”

Indeed. Of consumers who plan to buy a smart phone in the next 90 days, 36 percent plan to purchase an iPhone. Meanwhile, 27 percent are considering a BlackBerry and eight percent a Palm (PALM) device.

Said Carton: “In the horserace among manufacturers, the release of the iPhone 3GS has led to a big jump in smart phone market share for Apple and has placed them within striking distance of Research In Motion–whose slew of models are still number one but have fallen to their lowest level in two years.”

[Image Credit: GadgetPhix]

Not the most aggressive price considering that Amazon (AMZN) is currently offering the Pre, the Pixi’s elder, more robust sibling, for $99 (see image below; click to enlarge) with a two-year contract as well. Remember, the Pixi has a slower processor and a smaller screen than the Pre. And it doesn’t support Wi-Fi. Has some neat back covers though!

Worse, Pixi requires $200 to get out the door, and statistically speaking, there will be quite a few people who will fail to cash in that second $100 rebate. As I noted back when the Pre launched with a similar rebate program, redemption rates for offers like these typically run around 58 percent, thanks to customers who either find the process too cumbersome or forget about it entirely.

This can end up being quite lucrative for the issuing company. Consider this: In 2004, TiVo (TIVO) promised customers a $100 mail-in rebate within six to eight weeks of the purchase of a new DVR. About 50,000 of the 104,000 eligible for that offer failed to take advantage of it. That saved TiVo about $5 million.

PREVIOUSLY:

• Palm Pre: $199 After a $100 Rebate We Hope You Lose