rumor

Ooooweee--those are some pretty enticing photos. It seems Engadget Mobile got its hands on some marketing material from Sprint about the carrier's upcoming portfolio of smart phones and cell phones for Q4, and if true, we think a lot of Sprint customers will be pleased by it.

On tap, we've got the HTC Touch with its innovative touch screen; the RIM BlackBerry Pearl 8130 (aka BlackBerry Pearl 2), rocking EV-DO and GPS; the Palm Centro, the company's slimmest smart phone with EV-DO support; and finally, the LG Rumor, a slide-out QWERTY device with a focus on social … Read more

Another day, another clump of Facebook financial dirt.

Kara Swisher at All Things Digital wrote early Tuesday that "according to sources," Facebook is considering the possibility of a massive new investment round. If this turns out to be true, it could lift the company's much-talked-about valuation even further into the stratosphere. Facebook's last investment round, a $25 million bounty in 2006, pushed its pre-money valuation to about $525 million. This rumored new round, which Swisher claims is "well beyond" that scope, could solidify Facebook's position in the $6 billion to $10 billion club (… Read more

With rumors of new iPods heating up, fresh news comes of a trademarked Apple "special event" to be held in two weeks.

Ars Technica's Infinite Loop is reporting that unidentified Apple sources have brought word of an upcoming Apple event scheduled for September 5. While Infinite Loop's sources were unable to specify the exact details of what is coming, they signed off on a general reading of AppleInsider's recent report that a series of new iPods are on tap.

There will be at least one new iPod, according to Infinite Loop's sources, but details … Read more

Throughout Facebook's recent and meteoric rise, one of the detractors raised by skeptics has continually been the social networking site's failure to show concrete proof of a strong revenue model.

But that all might change very soon.

According to a report on the Wall Street Journal's Web site, the social network is "quietly" assembling a new advertising model that will take advantage of the copious personal information that its members post on their profiles. These new advertisements would not be in the form of traditional graphical advertisements but would rather pepper the "news feed&… Read more

This post has been updated to include the Facebook app creator's statement on the issue.

Ouch, here's a zinger: contrary to reports, travel site TripAdvisor apparently did not purchase the Facebook Platform application Where I've Been for $3 million. The news was originally reported on Inside Facebook on Thursday night.

A statement from a TripAdvisor representative read, "This is untrue. Beyond that, we do not have any comment."

The company isn't saying any more, obviously. You could really dig into the nuances of the statement, implying it to mean that either the entire rumor … Read more

Update 9:37 a.m. PDT: It turns out TripAdvisor apparently did not purchase the Facebook Platform application Where I've Been for $3 million. Here's our follow-up story.

Who knew that Facebook Platform applications might one day be million-dollar acquisition targets?

Inside Facebook is reporting that Where I've Been, a third-party application developed with the Facebook Platform APIs, has been acquired by online travel company TripAdvisor for somewhere in the ballpark of $3 million. Inside Facebook blogger Justin Smith did not cite any sources; we have sent requests to both Smith and TripAdvisor for comment.

Where I'… Read more

Remember back when Verizon Wireless COO Jack Plating scoffed at the iPhone in a company memo, calling it the "iWhatever"?

Yeah, we all chuckled. Although he couldn't point to a single device that would command the attention of the Apple phone, he tried to rally his troops by saying that AT&T wouldn't be able to compete with Verizon's choice of phones.

Meanwhile, gadget blog Phone Arena says it's found Verizon's road map for which products are in store for what remains of 2007. Is this likely to erase the iPhone from … Read more

VentureBeat reported this evening that "an inside source" had informed them that Forbes Magazine--home publication of the now-outed Fake Steve Jobs--has acquired Clipmarks, a New York-based start-up that allows users to share snippets and bits of Web pages rather than simply a hyperlink or an entire article. This is done through a downloadable browser plug-in that enables "highlighting" up to a certain amount of text on a site.

No financial details were provided, but VentureBeat's Eric Eldon wrote that "Forbes finds the service useful for helping their reporters collect and share information … Read more

Note: This story was updated at 6:00 a.m. PDT to include a correction from a New York Times representative regarding TimesSelect subscriber figures cited by the New York Post.

Citing anonymous sources, the New York Post has reported that rival Manhattan paper The New York Times is planning to do away with TimesSelect, the subscription-only content on its NYTimes.com Web site. According to the article by Holly M. Sanders, the main obstacle at the moment is reconfiguring the site's software.

A Times representative told CNET News.com that the company isn't releasing any statement beyond: &… Read more