A daily news summary will be on offer for WSJ readers, in addition to the digital version of the paper. The digital copy of the paper will sell punters back $14.99 a month, with the daily summary another $5, and the New York Post will cost $9.99 a month, exclusively sold on the Reader Daily Edition.

On sale sometime before 2010 (that's 13 days, then), it'll cost $399.99. [WSJ]

Walt, after all, is the basis for this. And this. Microsoft should be very proud, or we should all be very scared. [WSJ]

More ominously, while revealing the paid app switcheroo at a Goldman Sachs conference, Rupert Murdoch also predicted a pay-per-view or subscription model for Hulu. (His News Corp. owns the WSJ, and partners with NBC Universal on Hulu.) Yikes. [paidContent via Editorialiste]

In the Palm Pre reviews, nobody used the word "iPhone" as much as WSJ's Walt Mossberg—he was a third more likely to use it than his colleagues David Pogue (NYT) and Ed Baig (USA Today) were, and he even lead with a discussion of it, before mentioning the Pre. Nobody wrote nearly as long as Josh at Engadget: His review is over 10,000 words; ours, the next longest, was just over 3,000. There was a lot of consensus here, though notable disharmony when it came to Sprint service and the Pre's tight keyboard.

And nobody, but nobody, mastered the metaphor like Jason Chen. Except maybe David Pogue. Read on...

Of course, there's no way to fit even all the main points into the review matrix, so if you want to go and check out the other reviews for yourself, damnit, you should!

*Apologies for not including Steven Levy's piece from Wired. We saw it too late to include it in the mix.

• NYT - David Pogue
• USA Today - Ed Baig
• WSJ - Walt Mossberg
• Engadget - Josh Topolsky
• Gizmodo - Jason Chen

UPDATE: Check Out All These Other Palm Pre Reviews
• Time - Josh Quittner
• Newsweek - Dan Lyons
• PC Magazine - Sascha Segan
• Laptop - Mark Spoonauer
• SlashGear and MyPre - Vincent Nguyen
• PC World - Ginny Mies

The offer could potentially mean Samsung wants to absorb and/or eliminating SanDisk's brand and distinct products altogether. Even though this was a seriously nice offer given SanDisk's crappy stock performance of late, the company told Samsung to eff off, calling it an "opportunistic attempt" to pick up SanDisk while it's down. Samsung says that SanDisk "continues to cling to unrealistic expectations." Tell me, why does this intended corporate marriage sound so much like my parents' divorce? [WSJ]

Click the headline once and you see a paragraph summary—click again to read the whole article, which only takes 10 secs to load on EDGE. And you can save stories for subway or air reading. No word on an iPhone version specifically, but the Journal told us that the reader is "currently in development" for "other smartphone platforms." It makes sense to hit BlackBerry first since that's what the suit-and-tie, richer-than-you crowd—the WSJ's audience—are toting by and large. If you've got a BlackBerry, there's no reason to not grab this. If you don't read the Journal, try it, it'll make you smarter (maybe not the editorial pages, but the rest of it will). [WSJ via Silicon Alley Insider]

If you need more gritty and less nitty, check out Chen's rundown of the reviews. Or, if you have some spare time, read the Three Amigos' own unexpurgated scribblings. [USA Today, WSJ/AllThingsD, NYT]

While most of the additional material covered in the reviews is basically factual stuff that you've already been agonizing over for a week or more, they're all decent reads if you have the time.

• Pogue's preview-review from 1/17 New York Times

• Ed Baig's story in USA Today

• Steven Levy's piece from Newsweek's website

• Walt Mossberg's review from Wall Street Journal and allthingd.com

Of course, if you don't have the time for those, pop over to Chen's superfast big-shot review summary and then, well, get about your business. [All About MacBook Air]

USA Today: USA Today's Ed Baig summarizes with this verdict: "Given the compromises, I don't expect anyone to use Air as their only computer. But it is a yummy machine for people who spend a lot of time traveling." Going more in depth, he lauds the Air's thinness, and revels at the little things like the magnetic latch and the backlit LED display. The worst part? He got more than an hour less than Apple's rated battery life.

Baig also notes that this is the weakest Core 2 Duo in the entire Mac lineup, which means you won't be using this for video editing. He knocks points off for the sacrifices, such as the internal optical drive, the scant 80GB hard disk space, the one USB port, lack of FireWire, and the average battery life. Apple rated it at 5 hours, but he only got three hours and 40 minutes just surfing the web, using Remote Disc and writing. It only lasted two hours and 40 minutes when watching a movie. Verdict: Not for everyone (mostly travelers), and definitely not a main computer. [USA Today]

Newsweek: Steven Levy at Newsweek compares the Macbook Air's thinness to ritualistic circumcision, noting that they sliced off just enough to make it meaty, yet super thin. Thin enough for him to spend a good third of his review saying how thin it is, and how it's so great on a lap, on a Starbucks' table, on a conference table, and on an airplane seatback tray. He then decries the obvious lack of features we've been talking about since we heard about the Air: lack of user-replaceable battery, the one USB port, no optical drive, blah blah blah.

It essentially reads like Levy reviewed off the spec sheet, and doesn't have many tales of his first-hand experience with such topics as how snappy the sluggish processor is or how convenient (or inconvenient) using the Remote Disc is (he does note that you have to lower your Firewall to its lowest setting to allow easier configuration). Verdict: Not much of one, but what he does have agrees with Baig: it's thin and even though Apple's removed much of its innards, "the things that Apple left on were the ingredients for a quality computer." Also, he spends much of the review talking in a roundabout way about penises, so it's worth a read just for that. [Newsweek]

Wall Street Journal: Mossberg from the big J also loves the svelteness, owning up to his own Contact moment by saying that "it's impossible to convey in words just how pleasing and surprising this computer feels in the hand." Of course, he hates the non-removable battery, the 1 USB port, the fact that you can't put a bigger hard drive in there and the lack of an optical drive.

In his own tests, he says the machine was "speedy" and the keyboard and screen were a "pleasure to use". His own battery tests gave him three hours and 24 minutes with Wi-Fi on and playing music nonstop. He theorizes that you could possibly get 4 hours and 30 minutes without playing music and just working normally, bug Baig's own test disproves that. Verdict: Great if you love thinness or a full-sized screen and keyboard on a "subnotebook", but he "can't recommend it for all." [AllThingsD]

• Pogue's NYT review
• Ed Baig's USA Today review
• Mossy's WSJ review

I think Microsoft used to actually care about trying to help the consumer. I may not think that they did wonderful technology, but I think they really did try to serve their customers. But look at their [digital rights management] and their "Genuine Windows Advantage" — they're not trying to serve their customers any more in their products; they are adding features that are actively bad for users, because they probably feel like they aren't even competing any more.

You know every (AT&T) Blackberry gets its mail over EDGE. It turns out EDGE is great for mail, and it works well for maps and a whole bunch of other stuff. Where you wish you had faster speed is...on a Web browser. It's good enough, but you wish it was a little faster.

What do you guys think? Are iPods designed to break right on the warranty line so you need to buy a new one, or did the WSJ just interview a bunch of whiners who kept their iPods at the bottom of textbook-filled backpacks? –Adam Frucci

When iPods Die [Wall Street Journal]

Vicarious Consumer Thrills [via WSJ]
WSJ Drools Over Gadget Unboxings [Gizmodo]

"It is an art," he says. "You have to unbox it quickly, and talk about it at the same time."

At New Video Sites, Opening Up the Box is a Ritual to Savor [via WSJ]