Consumer content

Microsoft has reportedly offered to pay as much as $1 billion to buy out the digital assets of Nook Media, the e-book joint venture between the software giant and bookseller Barnes & Noble.

Under the plan, according to internal documents obtained by TechCrunch, Microsoft would purchase preferred units in the joint venture, which includes a college textbook division, while leaving Nook Media with the e-book and e-reader operations.

The documents also reportedly outline plans to discontinue its Android-based tablet business next year as it transitions to a strategy that focuses on licensing content to third-party developers. The bookseller had acknowledged … Read more

Even though Hipstamatic and Instagram are photo-sharing partners, it seems like Hipstamatic is looking to add a little more social networking to its world.

The company announced Wednesday that it's launching a Hipstamatic spin-off app called Oggl for iOS. The idea is for people to take Hipstamatic-like photos and then share them with friends and family.

According to a Hipstamatic blog post by co-founders Lucas Buick and Ryan Dorshorst, Oggl is "a community for creative people to capture and curate their lives through photography." The company is clear that it doesn't want Oggl to be full … Read more

You can rent a castle on Airbnb and a treehouse. Boats are popular, and there are plenty of farmhouses. So why not a van?

As reported on the SF.StreetsBlog, an enterprising Airbnb user in San Francisco has started advertising a 1990 Chevy Conversion van, offering the vehicle (with just 45,000 miles!) for only $92 a night.

One might think the nightly rate (which is more if you consider the service charge) is a bit much to pay to sleep in a cramped space probably better suited for a Scooby Doo video. But, as everyone knows, real estate is … Read more

If you've been relying on TweetDeck as a front-end for your Facebook account, it's time to look elsewhere.

Starting today, Twitter-owned TweetDeck no longer supports Facebook. That move, which Twitter announced in March, was part of the social-networking giant's effort to "focus our development efforts on our modern, Web-based versions of TweetDeck."

As expected, as part of the move Twitter also has removed support for TweetDeck for Air and versions of the client for iPhone and Android.

For now, TweetDeck for Mac is still available, but one has to wonder how long that will be … Read more

Syria is back online after an Internet outage cut it off from the rest of the online world on Tuesday.

Internet monitoring company Renesys updated its latest blog post on Wednesday, saying that "Syrian Internet has returned." The outage itself lasted 19.5 hours from Tuesday to Wednesday.

A new graph tweeted by content delivery network Akamai shows a huge spike in traffic to Syria, indicating that the Internet is flowing once again.

Syria Digital Reports earlier confirmed the news by tweeting that it received reports that Internet connectivity was returning.

This latest outage marks the third time … Read more

Nokia has something "colorful" up its sleeve for Thursday, though the company is mum on the details.

The Finnish phone maker said Wednesday that an event is taking place in New Delhi, India, and teased it by asking if you're "ready to add some color to your week?"

A live global Webcast of the event will kick off at noon local time in New Delhi, 9:30 a.m. in Helsinki, and 7:30 a.m. in London. Nokia didn't specifically list the U.S., but the overseas times would put the Webcast at … Read more

Ouya, the open-source game console that took the Kickstarter world by storm, has been ripped apart by the folks over at iFixit.

The Ouya device earned a score of 9 out of 10 from iFixit for its high repairability. The iFixit team was able to tear apart the gadget with ease, and found that it was packed with several important components, including two Samsung 4-gigabit SDRAM modules (for a total of 1 gigabyte), a Texas Instruments power management tool, and Nvidia's Tegra 3 multicore CPU.… Read more

AOL has continued to shed subscribers but managed to turn a decent profit last quarter thanks mostly to its advertising trade.

The online Internet provider scored a 9 percent increase in global advertising revenue for the first quarter, compared with the year-ago quarter. Global display revenue climbed by 8 percent year over year thanks to 6 percent growth in the U.S. and ongoing double-digit growth abroad.

AOL also saw a 9 percent rise in search revenue due to gains in global queries and higher revenue per search at AOL.com.

"Growth continues at AOL," AOL CEO Tim … Read more

When you're young and observing or experiencing abuse, especially when it involves people close to you, it can be hard to find the strength to talk to someone about it. An innovative new advertisement could help direct children -- without alerting their parents or others who may be threatening them -- that there's a way to seek help.

Spain's ANAR Foundation (Aid to Children and Adolescents at Risk) created an anti-abuse ad that uses lenticular printing to display two pictures that differ based on the viewer's height. The group created the ad to reach abuse victims who might be accompanied by their aggressor. … Read more