Earlier today we got a tip from reader whose buddy was one of the selected recipients of Google's Nexus One Android phone. Google has admitted to "dogfooding" a phone—that is, testing it on its employees—so we expected reports like this. What we didn't expect, though, was his friend's response:

Two problems, however: first, the phone is GSM only, so he's not happy about that. Second, this phone is HIS BONUS for this year. His usual bonus is $1K in cash, taxes paid by Google.

SO according to him the phone is just going to sit, unused, in a drawer in his apartment. Hoo...ray?

Complaining about getting a free phone might seem sour at this proud time in our nation's economic history, but if you're accustomed to getting cash—you know, money, that you can spend on things you might need—instead of a niche smartphone that you probably can't even use properly on your carrier, I can understand the bitterness. And what kind of Googler doesn't already have a smartphone? Didn't they all get Android handsets back in 2008, when Google pulled a nearly identical bonus stunt with the HTC Dream? People loved that! —Thanks, AndPreciousLittleofThat!

Talks are very advanced, said the sources Friday. One of the sources said that the sides have already agreed on terms and have only to sign a final agreement.

Steve Dowling, Apple's spokesman, said the company doesn't comment on rumors and speculation. A representative from Lala was not immediately available.

An acquisition of Lala, a streaming-music site that has gone through multiple iterations including one as a CD-swapping service, would be the third acquisition deal of a digital-music site in recent months.

MySpace acquired iLike in August and Imeem last month.

Exactly what Apple intends to do with Lala remains unclear, but it would appear that Apple intends to offer some kind of streaming service to iTunes users. Right now, Apple is the largest music store online or offline and Apple has made more money than any other music service by selling music downloads.

But the public has shown an appetite for free music and many people have clamored for a better way to store music. Right now, most music libraries can be found on an owner's computer hard drive, which can malfunction. Lala enables users to store songs on the company's servers and access them from Web-enabled devices.

This story originally appeared on CNET

iSuppli's quarterly report on computer shipments is a little dry, but today's report that Dell's shipments declined 5.9% caught our eye. It's easy enough to blame the economy, but not when your major competitors are all growing, and especially not when Acer knocks you out of the number two spot. It's true that netbooks and pricing are big factors in Acer's success, and that Dell's still second—barely—to HP in total shipments. But someone in Round Rock needs to realize that what's true for plants and populations is also true for computer companies: if you don't grow, you die. [iSuppli via Electronista]

There are several apps on the iPhone designed to accept credit card payments but, as far as I can tell, SquareUp has the best set of features. It doesn't require any contracts or monthly fees, and card payments can be accepted through a small device that plugs into the audio jack. Receipts can be sent via email or viewed online and text messages can be used to verify payments in real time.

There are even benefits to using the service for cardholders, much like the points you might accrue for making purchases. SquareUp lets business owners know that you are a repeat customer that may be entitled to a freebie—kind of like punch cards do now. They also donate one cent of each transaction to the charity of your choice.

SquareUP claims the service will roll out to everyone in 2010, which is good news for small businesses. No word yet on how much the swiping plug-in will cost, but you can bet that it will be a hell of a lot cheaper than the machines you currently have to contend with. [SquareUp via VentureBeat]

According to Strategy Analytics, Apple made a $1.6 billion profit in iPhone sales alone, while Nokia only made $1.1 billion on whatever they are trying to pass as smartphones these days. However, Betanews' Joe Wilcox was quick to point out that the $1.6 billion profit was for all Apple sales:

the numbers don't add up to Apple's overall handset profitability exceeding Nokia's during third quarter, unless someone is making the bold assumption that all, or nearly all, Apple profits came from iPhone. They surely do not. What? Apple made only $700,000 on iPod, Macintosh, retail and software — $1.6 billion — on iPhone. No way.

Sounds logical? Wrong! says John Gruber, grubbing in with one of his grubby-grubby arguments:

Perhaps if Wilcox had actually read more than just the first paragraph of Apple's press release announcing the company's earnings, he'd understand:

"Adjusting GAAP sales and product costs to eliminate the impact of subscription accounting, the corresponding non-GAAP measures for the quarter are $12.25 billion of "Adjusted Sales" and $2.85 billion of "Adjusted Net Income."

That's where Gruber says the $1.6 iPhone profit comes from. If you use non-GAAP accounting—which spreads the quarter's income along the total projected life of the product—Apple wins hands down:

...it's pretty safe to say that the iPhone accounts for nearly all of the difference between Apple's GAAP and non-GAAP reported profit, which difference came to $1.18 billion for the quarter [...] take Strategy Analytics's estimate of $1.6 billion in profit, divide by 7.4 million iPhones, and you get $216 in profit per iPhone, which, again, sounds like it's in the ballpark.

The fact, however, is that nobody have a single clue about what Apple's real numbers are: Wilcox, Gruber, and Strategy Analytics are building their cases over a lot of assumptions. So I'm going to pull a King Solomon here, smack all of them, and send them to the principal. [Cnet, Betanews, and Daring Fireball]

Here's how Intel describes the settlement:

Intel Corporation and Advanced Micro Devices today announced a comprehensive agreement to end all outstanding legal disputes between the companies, including antitrust litigation and patent cross license disputes.

So, they're not fighting directly anymore, and the mountains of patent and antitrust disputes are resolved: Intel will pay this ridiculously large sum of money to AMD, and agree to not engage in anything even resembling monopolistic behavior, and both companies will live in harmony, cross-licensing technologies and competing, but softly! Great. Well, sort of: Intel's biggest problems right now don't come from other companies, but from governments: complaints from AMD no doubt helped spur investigations by the European Commission and New York Attorney General into Intel's business practices, and as part of the agreement AMD is withdrawing their complaints with both agencies, but the EC issued their $1bn+ fine quite a while ago, and from the looks of it, the AG's office is eager to move forward with their investigation too. In other words, this probably isn't the end of the pain for Intel.

That, kids, is why you don't engage in anticompetetive practices in a two-company industry. [WSJ Law Blog]

Levinson was, until recently, the Chairman and CEO of genetic research firm Genentec. But lately, he's been spending a little more time on other projects—namely, sitting as a Corporate Director for both Apple and Google. The FTC made it pretty clear back in May that they were uncomfortable with such cozy ties between companies that are increasingly working on the same stuff, at the same time—phones software, web services, and now even OSes—so Levinson's resignation firmly qualifies as "kinda tardy."

What interesting this time around is that the companies were essentially fighting for talent: As CEO, Schmidt was obviously going with the home team. Levinson, though? He was a free agent. Score one for Apple, I guess. And score 10 for the FTC.

UPDATE: 9to5Mac has a possible theory as to why Levinson went with Apple over Google, though they note that he isn't exactly hurting for cash. Anyway, here it is: Levinson's simply making more money from his seat with Apple. Like, a lot more: All other things equal—which they're not—it's a pretty compelling case. [AllThingsD]

What makes CNN Mobile interesting is its video content, which is split between on-demand clips from the network, and an intermittent live feed from CNN.com, which kicks on during major news events:

[CNN] has packed the app with recorded video "news" clips — for example, "Take a Look at This!" featuring a "crazy burger like no other!" — and will sometimes offer a live stream of its separate CNN.com news feed. (We're tuned in right now. The picture quality is fine; the programming isn't as sharp as the TV network.)

The complaint is that the occasional live news feed is from CNN the website, not CNN the network, meaning that you're getting second-tier content. I don't really take issue with this as much as Frommer does, since the live stream, as I understand it, is meant to air breaking new or scheduled event content that'll look the same no matter how it's packaged like speeches, disaster footage, anticipated milestones, etc. But the larger point? Why can't we use the app to tune in to CNN whenever we want?:

Cable giants like Comcast and Time Warner Cable pay big bucks to distribute channels like CNN in your area — perhaps $7 or $8 per subscriber, per year — and have no interest watching their monopoly evaporate thanks to the Web, the iPhone App Store, or any other distribution vehicle they don't control. And because CNN gets a huge portion of its revenue from these cable subscriber fees, it has an economic incentive to preserve the status quo, even if it means offering its iPhone app users an inferior product.

So, our TV apps will be crippled senseless until the cable industry, as we know it today, ceases to exist. Good evening! [Silicon Alley Insider]

Mike was previously on the Newton team before he left to work on stuff like Nike's Techlab, which produced products like the Nike+ iPod system that I actually used three hours ago.

Will Michael be back to head up the marketing efforts for the Apple Tablet? Or maybe some sort of exercise device similar to the Nike+? Is it annoying when I write sentences in the form of a question? [NYTimes]

Sony Ericsson has taken leadership in the music phones and the camera phones with the Cybershot and the Walkman, but there are some weaknesses in the smart phone segment and we need to restore that

To translate: Sony Ericsson has spent the last five years desperately striving to dominate a segment of cellphones—dumbphones—that nobody really cares about that much, and that reasonably-priced smartphones have made obsolete. Congratulations on figuring out this painfully obvious thing, large company! Now hurry up with that Rachael. [WSJ]

They ain't revolutionary, but should get the job done. The 14-inch Compaq 515 comes with either an AMD Athlon X2 or Turion X2 processor, while the 15.6-inch Compaq 610 goes the Intel route, with either a Core 2 Duo T5870 or dual-core Celeron.

Both laptops have 1366 by 768 LED-backlit displays, and support up to 8GB of DDR-800 memory. Standard fare includes Wi-Fi, a LightScribe DVD writer, SD card slot, and VGA-output.

The basic $429 Compaq 515 has a 160GB hard disk, but you can up that to a 250GB for more spreadsheet storage power. Graphics are served up by an integrated ATI Radeon HD 3200 GPU.

Though the Compaq 610 has lowly Intel GMA X3100 graphics, even the entry-level $449 model includes a 250GB hard disk as standard.

[HP via Laptoping via Electronista]

That's not to say that Schmidt left over a tussle in the App Store, or even the FCC's recent investigation into Apple's handling of Google Voice apps, but these little shitstorms could've been a reminder that, as much as Apple and Google have worked together over the years, they are competitors in all kinds of markets, from online services to cellphones to browsers to, soon, OSes. On this, the brief press release doesn't mince words:

Unfortunately, as Google enters more of Apple's core businesses, with Android and now Chrome OS, Eric's effectiveness as an Apple Board member will be significantly diminished, since he will have to recuse himself from even larger portions of our meetings due to potential conflicts of interest.

Therefore, we have mutually decided that now is the right time for Eric to resign his position on Apple's Board

It's hard to tell if this "mutual decision" was kind of thing where Schmidt just saw the big picture and said "Hey y'all, it's been real," or if the rest of the board told him to pack his bags, but either way, it seems like the inevitable is happening, and Google's entering its next stage of evolution as a tech compay, full of flamewars and fanboys, taunting blog posts and constant controversy. Pick your sides; this should be fun.

This follows sequential declines of 2.3 percent in the third quarter, of 18.6 percent in the fourth quarter of 2008 and 2 percent in the first quarter of 2008.

That's quite a big jump for a supposedly lousy market. [iSuppli]

In a letter to lawmakers, the carrier announced intentions to institute a six-month limit on handset exclusivity, allowing competing companies to move in on Verizon exclusives big and small. Great! Except for one minor detail: These "competing companies," it turns out, must have 500,000 consumers or less. This shuts out every national carrier you've ever heard of and quite a few regional ones, meaning this change only has the potential to affect about 5.6% of wireless users, according to the Consumer Union.

And then there's that nasty business of motivation: Verizon has been stewing over AT&T's exclusive iPhone contract for over two years now, and can't have been too happy about getting snubbed by Palm with the Pre—a handset that they've been very vocal about pursuing. Loosening their own exclusivity deals, however slightly, gives them a sturdier leg to stand on should they choose to publicly grouse about another carrier's phone-hoarding—something they're already positioned fairly well to do, simply because the most exciting Verizon exclusive is probably the BlackBerry Storm. They don't have much to lose, basically.

Beyond business savvy, there's a legal angle too. From the WSJ:

Verizon's change comes at a time that the exclusive handset deals are being examined by the Federal Communications Commission and the Department of Justice.The move could ease pressure on the FCC to take up the issue because the most vocal critics of exclusive handset deals at the agency have been some of the same small, rural wireless carriers who could benefit from Friday's change.

The public's opposition to carrier exclusivity is nebulous, faint and hard to convert into any kind of meaningful pressure on larger companies; small carriers, however, are more than ready to take larger carriers' anti-competitive habits to task, in court and with lawmakers. If this can placate the little guys, Verizon is free to draw up its contracts however it pleases. So there's that.

This plan isn't going to change anything for most people, and it could be part of a larger maneuver against the kind of legislation that could really further to anti-exlusivity cause, but for now, it means more options for (a few) more people, which can't be all bad. [WSJ]