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Best Buy and TiVo Get Cozier

Rick Aristotle Munarriz — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 07:18:52 +0000

Now, of course you know that press releases are peppered with
hyperbole and promises of free ponies. Best Buy has been selling TiVo
DVRs for years, so what's the point of some "strategic alliance" when
the two are already in commercial cahoots?

Can This Stock Be Gr-r-reat?

Mike Pienciak — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 07:17:17 +0000

As any cash-strapped college student can tell you, cereal is a
relatively cheap and easy breakfast. When necessary, it can also double
as lunch, dinner, and midnight snack. With many consumers feeling exactly that kind of pinch, Kellogg's status as the world's leading cereal maker looks like a decoder ring for profits.

Netflix Sleeps With the Frenemy

Rick Aristotle Munarriz — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 07:15:49 +0000

Netflix announced Thursday morning that it will team up with Sony (NYSE: SNE)
to offer owners of Sony BRAVIA HDTVs with Internet video the ability to
watch any movies in the Netflix catalog that are accessible digitally.
The service is available at no additional cost to subscribers of any of
Netflix's unlimited rental plans.

Customers decide barbershop price

preet_20 — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 07:00:09 +0000

The facility in Xian, capital of the northwest Shaanxi province, initiated the marketing strategy in December and the response has been quite good, local media reports quoted by China Daily said.

Under the strategy, customers are asked to rate the service on scale of one to 10.

"If the customer gives us 10 marks, he has to make the full payment, if he says eight, he gets a 20 percent discount," said the shop's manager.

Whatever a customer pays then become his barber's wage.

Woman carrying grasshoppers put off bus

preet_20 — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 06:55:07 +0000

In the incident -- reported Monday in Wuhan, the capital of China's central Hubei province -- the bus driver had to listen not only to the grasshoppers' racket but also to the screams of passengers for allowing the village woman to board the vehicle, China Daily said.

The driver's plea that there was no law against transporting grasshoppers fell on deaf ears and the woman was forced to step out of the bus.

The report identified the non-human noisemakers as the long-horned species.

MLB: Florida 14, Arizona 7

preet_20 — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 06:55:04 +0000

The Diamondbacks had won a season-best five straight games and took a 7-0 lead through five innings. Florida, however, brought an emphatic end to the Arizona run of success by scoring 14 times in the course of three innings.

The Marlins sent 14 men to the plate in the eighth and came up with eight hits while taking advantage of an error and a passed ball. The big inning began with Arizona still holding a 7-4 lead but the Marlins quickly loaded the bases against Juan Gutierrez.

MLB: San Francisco 9, San Diego 3

preet_20 — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 06:48:30 +0000

The Padres lost their fifth straight.

San Francisco held onto its 2-0 advantage until the sixth, when the Giants blew the game open on solo homers by Travis Ishikawa and Juan Uribe, along with a two-run double by Pablo Sandoval.

Tim Lincecum (10-2) took a shutout into the seventh, but wound up surrendering two runs on three hits in 6 2/3 innings.

The loss went to Josh Geer (1-4), who was touched for six runs on seven hits in 4 2/3.

Lincecum struck out eight to run his National League-leading total to 149. He is in a position to challenge for his second consecutive Cy Young Award.

MLB: Seattle 3, Texas 1

preet_20 — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 06:39:16 +0000

The Rangers scored a run in the sixth on a bases-loaded wild pitch thrown by Felix Hernandez and it appeared for a while that one miscue would cost the Mariners the game.

Texas starter Tommy Hunter threw six shutout innings, allowing four hits, and reliever Darren O'Day worked a perfect seventh.

C.J. Wilson, however, coughed up the one-run lead in the eighth. After Ichiro Suzuki doubled to open the eighth, Wilson (4-4) retired the next two batters. Ken Griffey kept the inning going by drawing a walk and Gutierrez drove a 1-0 pitch out to left-center.

Chinese condom plant starts production

preet_20 — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 06:38:21 +0000

The plant in Qingdao city in the eastern coastal province is owned by Britain's Durex, the world's largest condom maker, China Daily reported. The plant is Durex's largest unit in the world, bigger than the city's first one, which was opened in 1998 with an annual capacity of 250 million pieces.

"We decided to build the new factory much before the (global financial) crisis," Garry Watts, chief executive of Durex's parent SSL International, was quoted as saying. "Compared with other industries, our products are recession resistant."

4-Star Stocks on the Upswing

Motley Fool — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 06:37:27 +0000

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