What sounds worse to you: fingernails dragged across a chalkboard or the incessant honking of a broken car alarm? It is this kind of distinction that Professor Trevor Cox of Manchester's Salford University is studying with his BadVibes site, which solicits votes from the public in "the hunt for the worst sound in the world."
Web sites launch all the time, but they also shut their doors. We highlight 15 that bit the dust this year.
Let the debate begin: Was the iPhone more important than iTunes? Was anything bigger than Google finding a great business model? CNET offers its list of the 10 most important stories of the '00s.
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Deep Tech
Long-awaited Bibble 5 raw photo editor arrivesBibble 5 Pro is out, bringing higher performance and a higher price to the raw-photo editing and cataloging software. Also new: selective editing.
Gallery
En route to GPS-based air traffic control (images)
Apple
Report: Apple event to be held January 26Unnamed source tells Fox News that the company will hold a mobile-focused event in San Francisco on January 26, which could be the day its long-awaited tablet makes its debut.
Beyond Binary
Visual Studio launch delayed by 'a few weeks'Microsoft says it's still working to resolve some performance issues related to the Visual Studio 2010 developer tool suite, which was slated for a March release.
Video
Deep-sea volcanic explosion--part 2 (video)
Digital Media
Online holiday sales hit $27 billionE-commerce sales grow 5 percent for the holiday season, reaching $27 billion compared with $25.8 billion last year, says new ComScore report.
Video
Deep-sea volcanic explosion--part 1 (video)
Deep Tech
'Don't-be-evil' Google spurns no-evil softwareOne open-source software programmer's joke--'The Software shall be used for Good, not Evil'--is a serious matter at Google.
The Space Shot
Soyuz craft docks, boosts space station crewA Russian Soyuz spacecraft docked with the International Space Station Tuesday after a smooth, automated approach, boosting the lab's crew back up to five.
Gallery
NASA trains WISE eye on the sky (photos)
Gadgettes, the blog
Gadgettes Podcast 168: The Web obviously-not-exclusive-at-all-anymore EpisodeThere are a LOT of great pre and post-show moments. So many, in fact, that I couldn't possibly fit them all into one episode. As a result, here's a second collection!
Green Tech
Green-tech venture investing cools off in 2009Green tech is still attracting billions of dollars a year, but the amount of money has shrunk significantly as investors began to focus on start-ups with the most potential.
