Monday Evening Links

Verizon Communications and CBS Corp said on Monday they had reached an expanded deal to carry CBS television shows like "CSI" and "Survivor" on Verizon's FiOS TV service as well as its wireless network.

The companies said Verizon has broadened and extended the rights for retransmission consent for CBS network stations as well as its affiliates, and local video-on-demand for the FiOS TV platform as well as mobile rights for Verizon Wireless' V CAST Video service.

CBS reached a similar retransmission agreement with Time Warner Cable Inc earlier this month and still needs to work out agreements with other major cable operators including Comcast Corp and Charter Communications.

CBS is expected to announce content deals with MGM, PBS, Showtime, Sony, and Endemol USA (producers of shows such as "Deal or No Deal" and "Fear Factor") to add popular shows to its online video streaming site TV. com.

There are 22 states participating in the Streamlined Sales Tax Project, an effort to simplify the nationwide patchwork of tax rates. In exchange, some retailers will collect online sales taxes in those states even if the companies have no operations located there. Eventually, if Congress goes along, the states could be allowed to force businesses that don't have a physical presence there — such as online retailers — to collect sales taxes.

The states whose tax laws meet the standards of the streamlining group:

Arkansas, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Michigan, Minnesota, Nebraska, Nevada, New Jersey, North Carolina, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Vermont, Washington, West Virginia and Wyoming.

said by russotto:

It means nothing for the New York Supreme Court to approve a New York tax on an out of state business. This one has to be settled in the Federal courts.

said by BF69:

Look for amazon to no longer allow people from NY to become affiliates or simply to no longer to sell to NY residents. Once NY residents get pissed off enough the law will change. State need to get with the times and find another source of revenue. It's 2009 not 1909. The same methods are not going to work.

said by fifty nine:

Another source of revenue such as what? Increased income or property taxes? Or do you propose the states fund their projects with more deficit spending?

said by BF69:

The point is relying on sales taxes for revenue is dumb. In bad economy guess what revenues go down. My state( TN ) doesn't have a state income tax and 90% of our budget comes from sales taxes. Now our state is in a world of hurt with budget shortfall and cuts have to be made everywhere. With a state income tax at least the budget would be more stable. So yes states to need to find something else to finance their budgets with other than sales taxes.

Two Google searches produce the same amount of CO2 as bringing water to a boil on your stovetop, according to research from Harvard University. Google claims that the Harvard study is flawed. The Harvard study was first published in British newspaper The Sunday Times. »technology.timesonline.co.uk/tol···9134.ece

Google doesn't seem to be happy with the negative publicity the latest Harvard research brings. Only hours after the initial publishing, Google posted on their official blog an article explaining how they "have designed and built the most energy efficient data centers in the world," calling Dr. Wissner-Gross's research numbers "many times too high." Google also says that driving a car for a kilometer (0.6 miles) equates to the same amount of CO2 produced by a thousand of your Google searches.

So is Googling bad for the environment or not? The only thing left to see is how good to the planet Google will be as years go by and even more people gain access to the Internet.

said by pcdebb:

Verizon didn't by all of Alltel's markets. Divested markets are still Alltel in certain areas.