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Videogames: The Console Wars, animated
Game reviewer Yahtzee Croshaw covers the videogame console wars.var VE_api = VE_getPlayerAPI("1.2");VE_api.embedPlayer('selfserve300.download.videoegg.com/gid389/cid1389/M6/FJ/1188252263Glw1mxh6BbRAiOh4zznk',400,332,false,'','',true,'site=warcry&area=games','opaque');

Gaming: The Console Wars, animated
Game reviewer Yahtzee Croshaw covers the video game console wars.var VE_api = VE_getPlayerAPI("1.2");VE_api.embedPlayer('selfserve300.download.videoegg.com/gid389/cid1389/M6/FJ/1188252263Glw1mxh6BbRAiOh4zznk',400,332,false,'','',true,'site=warcry&area=games','opaque');

Benchmark Capital: The end of the Benchmark boy's club?
An anonymous post about Benchmark Capital on VC-bashing site TheFunded.com piqued our curiosity. Titled "Don't Play with Women", it's a pretty damning claim:Benchmark has said publicly that they will never fund a woman-founded company. They've never had a woman partner. And the mood seems to be like a frat party (a real turnoff to women).So far, 13 voters have agreed with the statement, while 2 have disagreed. We're wondering, when and where did any Benchmark partner really make such a claim? ((Seriously, can anyone help me find it? I've been looking all day with no luck.) Secondly, well, i'ts not really true, right? Benchmark-backed E-Loan was cofounded by Janina Pawlowski. And Sarah Leary, pictured here, just joined Benchmark, along with Nirav Tolia, as an entrpreneur-in-residence -- the surest ticket a startup founder can get for getting back for a new venture.

Getaways: Where to go to escape the Internet
If you ever wanted to know which countries limit access to the great bountiful flow of information we call the World Wide Web, you only need glance at the gaping black holes in the above map. Reporters Without Borders has compiled the following list of 15 countries that restrict the Internet: Maldives, Tunisia, Belarus, Libya, Syria, Vietnam, Uzbekistan, Nepal, Saudi Arabia, Iran, China, Myanmar/Burma, Cuba, Turkmenistan, and North Korea. I don't know; some of them sound like marvelous vacation spots. And the lack of Internet access? Bonus.

Burning Man: The Man rises again -- for a day
BLACK ROCK CITY -- Friends playing along at home, you can stop fretting and sleep a tad better tonight, knowing that the dedicated hippie construction workers of Burning Man have erected a brand new Man, the giant wooden statue everyone came to Nevada to watch burn down. Following the early burn on Tuesday by local antihero Paul Addis, the all-volunteer Department of Public Works worked 'round the clock to build a brand new totem, after it was found that the portion of The Man left standing after the premature incineration was not stable enough to use as a base. The new Man is decked out with neon just like the old one, and the pavilion of corporate sponsor appeasement green technology exhibits will once more be open to the eager denizens of Black Rock City. And to think -- in a day, we're just going to burn it all down again.

Online Video: Apple claims it broke up with NBC
Apple is not content to let NBC hog all the drama after NBC's TV shows dropped off iTunes. In a "I broke up with you" move, Apple's iTunes store will not host NBC's upcoming fall season, even though the companies' contract runs through December. Why? Because after December, shows would be withdrawn from the store midseason. According to Apple, NBC was trying to rip consumers off by jacking episode prices from $1.99 to $4.99. Hopefully that's not the price NBC's hoping to charge on its Hulu online-video site. Who would be silly enough to pay the cost of a full DVD box set for just half a season? If so, expect rampant piracy.

Rumormonger: Does Sky Dayton need a new sugar daddy?
Helio, Sky Dayton's wireless-service provider, is cutting back, laying off one out of seven employees, mostly in sales. It's now concentrating efforts, the company says, on its 20 largest markets. The company only has 100,000 subscribers, and 600 employees even after the cutbacks, and is expected to lose more than $300 million this year. EarthLink, the troubled Internet service provider founded by Dayton that's one of Helio's two backers, is rumored to be looking to pull out.A company spokesperson says EarthLink remains behind Helio. But it only makes sense that EarthLink, having just laid off 900 employees of its own, might be looking to cash out its stake in Helio by finding a buyer. That would give EarthLink some immediate cash to shore up its operations, and spare it from making further investments in Helio; having put $220 million into Helio, its expected to sink another $100 million into the wireless carrier this year. The only problem with this rumor: Having cut back...

I Hate It Here: Dust storms roil the playa -- and this reporter
BLACK ROCK CITY -- We had a wee tiny, itty-bitty hardly-worth-mentioning dust storm yesterday. There was a moment when we could not see twenty feet across the street to the neighboring camp due to the whiteout conditions. The total lack of visual stimulation forced us to imbibe playa margaritas (a "playa" margarita because we used tasty, tasty Gatorade instead of lemon juice). The great thing about playa margaritas? The mixer rehydrates you as fast as the alcohol dehydrates you. Pretty soon, the packaging on the Spam Singles that someone had brought to camp was uproariously funny. We made it through the crisis just fine, never fear.

Social Networks: Yahoo wants to boost its social network presence ...
Yahoo wants to boost its social network presence with Kickstart, an amalgamation of Facebook, LinkedIn, and alumni mailing lists aimed at college grads. Still in concept stages, Kickstart will usher in Nepotism 2.0 by helping college students hook up with the alums who hold dream jobs. [The Web Services Report]

Copyfight: The Science Fiction Writers of America, presumably ...
The Science Fiction Writers of America, presumably acting on behalf of Robert Silverberg and Issac Asimov's estates, served a DMCA "takedown" notice that erroneously removed hundreds of unrelated works from the document-sharing startup Scribd. A mere mention of "Asimov" or "Silverberg" was enough to get a document booted from the site. [Boing Boing]

Earnings: Vivendi announced that its Universal Music ...
Vivendi announced that its Universal Music Group unit's digital music sales during the first half of 2007 have doubled over the past year. Despite that, it ran a $102 million loss. World of WarCraft, Vivendi's popular online game, boosted the company's videogames divisional profit to $162 million, almost double the same period last year. [PaidContent]

Geek Love: It's settled, money can't buy Yahoo love
Yahoo has agreed to settle the almost two-year-old class action lawsuit, Anthony v. Yahoo, in which Robert Anthony alleged Yahoo did not fulfill his needs -- or rather, its obligations to paid subscribers. He claimed that the Web giant's personal-ad listings were polluted with non-personal listings and defunct profiles. Yahoo, while continues to contest the charges, is accepting the settlement so that it, and Mr. Anthony, can get on with their lives, such as they are.The notion that Mr. Anthony wasn't able to meet the love of his life, for a fee, because of junk listings is pretty ridiculous, but it's equally pathetic that Yahoo, who is trying to compete with the free Craigslist, would fail to address complaints in favor of leaving up -- and charging for -- apparently useless profiles. At least Craigslist founder Craig Newmark makes a full-time job out of customer support. No such personal attention, alas, has been forthcoming from Yahoo founder Jerry Yang. If, like Anthony,...

Confirmed: Keith Kelly repeats yesterday's Valleywag ...
Keith Kelly repeats yesterday's Valleywag report that Mansueto Ventures, publisher of rival tech-business title Fast Company, is negotiating to buy Time Inc.'s Business 2.0, which is in the midst of publishing its last issue under the current staff. CNET, rumored to have also bid, has apparently dropped out of the sale process. [New York Post]

Acquisitions: Why Microsoft shouldn't buy the BlackBerry maker
For Wall Street, it's a juicy notion: Could Microsoft buy Research In Motion? It's the kind of high-concept idea that gets traders afroth and keeps analysts busy churning out reports. It's also -- how to put this delicately -- completely stupid. Yes, Microsoft could buy RIM -- and yes, you could go out and buy a gun and shoot yourself in the face. Both are in the realm of possibility, and both are suicidal ideas.RIM has a proprietary operating system for its BlackBerry smartphones; it also sells email server software for corporate sysadmins to install, and a "push" subscription service that links the phones and the servers together. Microsoft, meanwhile, makes a Windows Mobile operating system for phones manufactured by others, and has added BlackBerry-like "push" features to its own Exchange email software.One can debate the technical merits of the products, but on a high level, what's important to note is that much of what Microsoft and RIM do is duplicative and incompatible....

Online Video: NBC hands Apple its walking papers
Money makes people crazy. When it comes to media conglomerates, the lust is insatiable. NBC Universal plans to pull its television catalog off iTunes by the end of the year. The marriage, initially, was lovestruck, with NBC crediting iTunes sales for boosting ratings of "The Office." But now, the grounds for divorce ostensibly include disagreements over piracy controls and pricing; Apple now says NBC wanted to charge $4.99 an episode. Some may speculate, rather, that the decision is fueled by NBC's desire to stock its own online-video site, Hulu, with shows. But the real reason for NBC's withdrawal is probably much less sinister. NBC executives have most likely realized that the company can make more money off advertising than it can through selling content. And with shows popping up on file-sharing networks like BitTorrent, making shows free rather than charging for them makes more and more sense. While sales of television-series DVDs are a nice sideline business, they're...

Quotable: "My experience with the justice system opened ...
"My experience with the justice system opened my eyes to the horrific plight of wrongfully convicted prisoners, most of whom don't have the resources to regain their freedom by proving their innocence." -- Frank Quattrone, former Credit Suisse First Boston investment banker, in a statement released after federal charges for obstruction of justice were dropped. [San Jose Mercury News]

Geeks Gone Wild: Google's New York employees hit the clubs
Now here's a perk: We hear that Google's New York office gets local employees on the list of three clubs every weekend, so they don't have to wait in line with the bridge-and-tunnel crowd. While somehow we doubt Google's HR department houses the hippest arbiters of Gotham nightlife, we suspect that Google's Big Apple-based geeks party just a wee bit harder than the drones of the Googleplex in Mountain View. Most Googlers' idea a good time is exemplified by this month's hopelessly lame "Google Dance 2007" event at the Search Engine Strategies conference, pictured above. Know which clubs are on this week's list? Or spotted a Googler in the wild? Let us know. Bonus points for shirtless photos of engineering director Craig Neville-Manning, right, founder of the Google New York office. (Photo by Latham Jenkins)

Domain Names: Rupert Murdoch takes website away from 7-year-old girl
News Corp., under CEO Rupert Murdoch, already has developed a reputation for stealing websites, when a Fox television show or advertiser covets a desirable URL on the MySpace social network. But Murdoch's website-snatching ways extend further than that. On Wednesday, News Corp. and NBC Universal announced that their online-video joint venture finally had a name, "Hulu". But before Hulu.com fell into Murdoch's hands, the website featured no videos at all -- just innocent pictures of a couple's 7-year-old daughter. Copies of the Hulu.com website cached by the Internet Archive indicate that Posen and Lucy Hung previously owned the four-letter domain name, rare and valuable because of its brevity. (A person named Posen Hung works for Symbol Technologies in the Bay Area, according to LinkedIn.) One hopes the Hungs were handsomely rewarded for giving up their family photo album. Or was this deal, too, a steal for Murdoch & Co.?

Sponsors: Valleywag, advertisers pimp each other
Inspired by this example, we're considering inviting startup CEOs to film videos explaining how Valleywag's advertisers have changed their lives. No. No, we're not. That's a bad idea, sales department. Forget we ever mentioned it. But we do, nonetheless, remain thankful for our sponsors:American ApparelAsk.comBank of AmericaBlackBerryCanonMioPentaxSprintTechSmithTiVoToyotaZuneVideo clips on how to advertise can be found here: Advertise on Valleywag.

Acquisitions: Paul Graham's near-death experience
We suspect Paul Graham will not be very popular in Sunnyvale today. The entrepreneur sold his e-commerce venture, Viaweb, to Yahoo for nearly $50 million in 1998 -- a rich sum for the time. He's gone on to success coaching and funding other startups through his Y Combinator incubator. In a speech he gave to his latest hatchlings called "How Not to Die," on the mortal perils faced by startups, Graham makes a striking revelation. Even as he was negotiating the sale to Yahoo, Viaweb was on the verge of running out of money. Was Viaweb really worth $50 million? Or nothing? Then as now, in the Valley, there's a fine line between worthless and wealthy.

Sponsors: Inspired by this example, we're considering ...
Inspired by this example, we're considering inviting startup CEOs to film videos explaining how Valleywag's advertisers have changed their lives. No. No, we're not. That's a bad idea, sales department. Forget we ever mentioned it. But we do, nonetheless, remain thankful for our sponsors:American ApparelAsk.comBank of AmericaBlackBerryCanonMioPentaxSprintTechSmithTiVoToyotaZuneVideo clips on how to advertise can be found here: Advertise on Valleywag.

Politics: Mitt Romney's campaign is airing a user-generated ...
Mitt Romney's campaign is airing a user-generated advertisement, solicited from YouTube, for the Republican presidential candidate. This is, of course, a refreshing change from politicians passing lobbyist-generated bills. [Advertising Age]