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Rumor Has It, Ep. 2: Amazon grosses us out (podcast)

We're back this week with another round of juicy rumors, and for once, not one of them is about the iPhone 5. That's because it doesn't exist...yet, but that doesn't stop us from talking about it for a solid 2 minutes (we timed it!).

We changed the rules a little and decided to vote on all the rumors, rather than picking just one. That way we can get more points on the board; remember that the winner at the end of the month gets to make the other person do something embarrassing (as if the "Muffin Top" song wasn't embarrassing enough).

Also this week, Yahoo puts on some lipstick and waits for suitors, and Karyne wonders why; Samsung stirs the rumor pot by sending out an invite for an event where it will announce something big and swoopy; cable providers might fulfill Emily's dreams; and Amazon Silk may just be the grossest name for anything ever. In the entire world.

Check out the show and see which one of us got a point this week (hint: it might not have been fair, but at least one of us is a gentleman about it). And tune in next Tuesday at 10 a.m. PT, when Sharon Vaknin will step in for Emily and bet on her behalf.

Microsoft: Software puts kibosh on energy waste

Before hauling new equipment to their boiler rooms, companies would do well installing software to improve building efficiency, a Microsoft pilot test found.

Microsoft is expected to publish a paper on a test done at its Redmond, Wash., campus geared at lowering the corporate energy usage with information technology. The premise of the project was straight-forward: does it make more sense to upgrade mechanical equipment, such as HVAC systems, or use software?

Coming from a giant software company, the results are perhaps not surprising. But the tests help validate the notion that information systems are an important ingredient to reducing … Read more

iFixIt takes apart Apple Thunderbolt Display

When new Mac systems and devices come out, expect the do-it-yourself repair guide iFixIt to be one of the first to rip it apart and show you what's inside. When Thunderbolt was issued iFixIt disassembled the first MacBook systems to show the Thunderbolt controller chips, and also took apart the Thunderbolt cable to show the signal conditioning electronics in them. Only days after Apple released its Thunderbolt Display, iFixIt is at it again and has fully disassembled the monitor to show a surprising amount of circuitry.

Apple's Thunderbolt Display is in essence a Thunderbolt hub, and as iFixIt … Read more

Rumor Has It, Ep. 1: Inaugural episode (podcast)

We sprint out of the gate for our first show ever, opening up with a bunch of juicy rumors and our first (obviously), very exciting rumor confirmation.

Yep, you guessed it: it's about the iPhone 5. But before you roll your eyes too hard, Apple haters, fret not, because the confirmation is that the iPhone 5 will be announced next Tuesday, October 4, which means you'll never have to hear an iPhone 5 rumor on our show again.* Praise be! (Now, we'd better get busy finding other rumors for you, or this will be the first and … Read more

Introducing the new CNET Live podcast schedule

We're here to announce our all new CNET Live lineup beginning September 26th! Everyday we'll be bringing you the best Live CNET content from 9 a.m. to noon Pacific Time at cnet.com/live. CNET Live will always be your place to get the best analysis, live coverage of events, and perspective covering the hottest tech happenings. Plus, we'll throw in a few laughs for you too. In addition to the new revamped schedule there's plenty of new shows and content we're working on so watch it all at CNET Live. Check out the schedule below and we'll see you on the internet!

CNET TV Live Schedule

Day 9am 10am 11am 12n

Monday The 404 Dialed In CNET Labscast

Tuesday The 404 Rumor Has It Crave PreGame

Wednesday The 404 Android Atlas

Thursday The 404 Buzz Out Loud Car Tech Live / Roadside Assistance

Friday The 404 Reporters' Roundtable… Read more

Virtual building audit spots energy savings

Now there's an app to tell you how to make commercial buildings more energy efficient.

Startup FirstFuel announced today it has raised $2.4 million from venture capital companies Nth Power and Battery Ventures to commercialize a software system to remotely evaluate and measure commercial building efficiency.

What's unusual about the application is that it doesn't require a person to be dispatched to perform an energy audit or install meters to gather data. Instead, the company collects utility data on hourly energy consumption and combines it with weather information to create a profile of a specific building. … Read more

Was brief Google Docs outage a tremor or a tsunami?

My pronouncement at the end of the short story about the brief Google Docs outage did not go over well. I said, "This is likely to be a major blow to the growth of cloud computing, as it reminds IT managers of the danger of relying on a unified product to serve all a company's users."

As commenters said, and I'm generously paraphrasing, I'm a kook. One little outage may send worrywarts like me running for the safety of Microsoft Word, but work is moving to the cloud, and it's high time, since overall it's a more reliable and more cost effective place to store documents.

Right on all counts. Let's posit that the cloud is a hundred times more reliable and less expensive than a corporate working infrastructure built on local computing power and local storage. Fine. Now let's imagine what failures look like on a fully old-fashioned (local model) system compared with a modern, fully cloud-based one.

Create and share a countdown timer with ItsAlmo.st

Having a countdown timer counting down the exact seconds until a big event can be very entertaining. Since the creation of the Internet, there have been countless services and methods of creating a countdown timer to put on display. ItsAlmo.st looks to be a quick and easy way of creating and sharing a countdown timer. … Read more

BMC's vision for the cloud

For a company with an $8 billion market cap, we really don't hear too much about BMC. And yet, when I met CTO Kia Behnia this week, I couldn't help but be very impressed by the company's focus on the cloud and its vision for where much of enterprise IT is likely to be heading.

According to Behnia, BMC currently has more than 85 customers for its cloud services products, primarily large companies looking into both public and private clouds as ways to enhance their environments.

From Behnia's perspective, the primary opportunity for the private cloud … Read more

YouSendIt delivers unlimited cloud storage

The Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 4G will launch this Thursday, Apple forces developers to update their apps to remove external links to e-books and subscriptions, and YouSendIt offers unlimited cloud-based storage for less than you'd expect.

Links from Tuesday's episode of Loaded: