PC World - Intel plans to detail an eight-core Xeon processor at the International Solid-State Circuits Conference in San Francisco next month, offering an early look at what appears to be the company's first eight-core chip.

Reuters - Sony Corp said on Thursday it sold 4.46 million units of its PlayStation 3 game console in October-December, down 9 percent from 4.9 million units a year earlier.

AP - Chip maker Qualcomm Inc. slashed its forecasts for revenue and operating income Wednesday as it reported its fiscal first-quarter income plunged 56 percent.

PC World - The R4 Revolution device that allows users to play cloned Nintendo DS software is openly back on sale in Tokyo's Akihabara electronics district, several months after legal action by Nintendo threatened to halt sales.

AFP - Japan's Toshiba Corp. said Thursday it would cut 4,500 jobs and slash investment as the global economic slowdown pushes the bellwether company into the red this year.

Reuters - Japanese video game maker Nintendo Co Ltd said on Thursday it now expects to sell 26.5 million Wii game consoles in the year to March, down from its previous target of 27.5 million units.

AP - Nintendo Co. says its net profit for the April-December period fell 18 percent as a strong yen cut into strong demand for its gaming products, forcing the company to slash its full year forecast.

CNET - Europe's largest chipmaker, STMicroelectronics, has reported a $366 million net loss for the fourth quarter of 2008, and has said it will lay off as many as 4,500 jobs in a cost-cutting drive.

AFP - US videogame lovers seeking fun during tough economic times are turning increasingly to free-to-play online games supported by advertising.

Reuters - Nokia unveiled on Thursday three new cellphone models, including the successor to its slim hit model Nokia 6300, as the world's top handset vendor pushes to win a larger share of a shrinking market.

Reuters - Sony Corp fell into the red in the latest quarter and reiterated its forecast for a record annual loss due to sliding demand and a stronger yen, while rival Nintendo Co cut its full-year outlook for the second time in three months.

PC World - Nintendo saw improved sales of its Wii and DS gaming devices during the last three months of 2008, but revised down its sales and profits forecasts due to the stronger Japanese yen.

AP - Sony said Thursday its net profit plunged 95 percent in the October-December quarter, as the holiday shopping season provided no respite for the struggling electronics giant and tepid sales of TVs, digital cameras and mobile phones hit its bottom line.

AFP - Japanese video game giant Nintendo Co. on Thursday cut its annual net profit forecast by a third, blaming a strong yen which offset robust sales of the Wii and DS machines.

Reuters - Businesses risk losing over $1 trillion from loss or theft of data and other cybercrime, according to a study released on Thursday by security technology firm McAfee Inc.

Reuters - Sony Corp fell into the red in the latest quarter and reiterated its forecast for a record annual loss due to sliding demand and a stronger yen, while rival Nintendo Co cut its full-year outlook for the second time in three months.

AP - Hawaii leaders want to create a new state agency to oversee Internet providers and encourage them to speed up their connections.

Investor's Business Daily - If you run a business and haven't heard of the terms blogging, twitter and texting, you're missing out on a great opportunity to boost sales. Online social networking sites such as Facebook, MySpace and YouTube are not just for teens anymore. These networks boast people of all ages and backgrounds. Yet most advertisers are ignoring this trend, experts say.

PC World - Nokia today announced three attractive new phones--and they couldn't be more boring. While most phone makers are trying to wow consumers with yet another iPhone killer or some super trendy device based on Google's Android platform, Nokia is launching middle-of-the-pack phones with features we've seen before.

CNET - Adobe Integrated Runtime (AIR) and Flash Player 10 latch onto a tailwind, capturing record adoption rates within a year after their release, Adobe Systems said Thursday.

NewsFactor - Google on Wednesday launched its latest innovation -- one that sheds new light on a controversial problem: Net neutrality.

InfoWorld - Microsoft has made source code for its Live Labs Web Sandbox project for securing Web content through isolation available via open source under the Apache License 2.0, according to a report this week on Microsoft's Port 25 site.

AP - Swiss police said Thursday they stumbled across a large marijuana plantation while using Google Earth, the search engine company's satellite mapping software.

Reuters - With just days until Super Bowl Sunday, a who's who of NFL players and celebrities are lined up for one of the hottest parties in Florida on Thursday -- the annual videogame competition, the Madden Bowl.

NewsFactor - The first touchscreen BlackBerry, the Storm, received a mixed reception from reviewers when it launched in late November. But Verizon Wireless, the exclusive U.S. carrier, said earlier this week that the smartphone has taken the market by storm, with one million sold.

PC World - Even Nintendo gets the blues, judging from the Wii-maker's latest counterintuitive financial announcement. In a shock reversal, the company has inexplicably slashed its full-year profit forecasts by 33 percent.

PC Magazine - The dual-screen version of the Lenovo W700d arrives in the PCMag.com labs, and we took it out for a spin. It works as intended, and many professionals in its target audience may find it worth it to plunk down the 400+ bucks for this novel option.

CNET - Adobe Integrated Runtime and Flash Player 10 have latched onto a tailwind, capturing record adoption rates within a year after their release, Adobe Systems said Thursday.

PC World - How does the Recording Industry Association of America plan to stop illegal file sharing? Perhaps by turning two of America's largest Internet service providers into stooges. Last year, after a round of very public defeats over its plans to sue individuals for illegal file sharing, the RIAA unveiled a new plan to have ISPs do its dirty work. Now, AT&T and Comcast may have signed on to do just that.

Macworld.com - In New York? Want to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the Mac? Looking for something to do this weekend? Never fear, the Big Apple's TekServe is here to satisfy this classic triumvirate.

PC Magazine - Netgear has announced that with the launch of its new line of Security Threat Management (STM) products, it is delivering levels of security and performance to the SMB that are normally only within reach of the enterprise.

NewsFactor - Sony on Thursday reported a 95 percent decline in profit for the fourth quarter of 2008. The electronics maker didn't get the sales boost it hoped for during the holiday shopping season as consumers turned to competing products.

AP - In a Jan. 28 story about satellite TV provider Dish Network Corp., The Associated Press erroneously reported that Goldman Sachs analyst Ingrid Chung expects Dish to be near the release of new video recorders that avoid using technology involved in its patent dispute with TiVo Inc. Chung did not make that assertion. The analyst noted that a hearing in the patent case is scheduled for Feb. 17.

AP - Visit any electronics store and it's clear that flat-screen TVs are among their best sellers — and that they hope consumers continue a years-long tradition of upgrading their home entertainment systems for the Super Bowl.

AP - Online retail sales will likely keep climbing in 2009, even in the recession.

PC World - A Windows enthusiast is calling for Microsoft to release Windows 7 now, only a few weeks after the company made available the software's first public test version.

Macworld.com - It’s time for yet another roundup of new game offerings at the App Store. There are almost too many to keep track of, so here are af ew that have crossed our desk since the last time we gave you some game roundup news.

Reuters - Research In Motion's touchscreen BlackBerry Storm costs almost $30 more to produce than rival Apple Inc's iPhone 3G, according to an analysis by technology research firm iSuppli Corp.

NewsFactor - A mix of strong currency in Japan along with a decrease in sales of TVs, digital cameras and other consumer technology devices has left three Japanese industry giants with earnings headaches. Sony, Nintendo and Toshiba all reported poor earnings for their third fiscal quarters.

Macworld.com - Clearly, iSuppli didn’t heed James Dean’s outburst in Rebel Without a Cause, because they keep tearing things apart. The latest device to go under their knives screwdrivers isn’t an Apple product—rather, it’s a competitor—but what lies beneath the surface can shed some light on Apple's iPhone too.

Macworld.com - The Iconfactory on Thursday announced the release of Twitterific 3.2, an update to its Twitter client for Mac OS X. A free update for registered users, Twitterific is available in ad-sponsored (free) and registered ($14.95) versions.

AP - Amazon.com Inc. said Thursday that its fourth-quarter profit rose 9 percent and easily surpassed analysts' forecasts. Those results, plus an optimistic forecast, sent its shares soaring 13 percent in extended trading.

AP - He won the fight to keep it. Now, Barack Obama is putting his beloved BlackBerry to work. Upon returning to the White House on Thursday morning after a trip to his younger daughter's school for a class presentation, the president walked along the West Wing Colonnade toward the Oval Office while looking down at the electronic communicating device he held in both hands.

NewsFactor - With Windows Vista hanging in the balance between a coming-to-life Windows 7 and a refusing-to-die Windows XP, a second service pack for Vista and Windows Server 2008 has reportedly been sent to testers. The reports say a release candidate escrow build has been sent for feedback, with other versions to be available in the next few months.

PC World - Mobile phone maker i-mate has something special planned for Mobile World Congress 2009 in Barcelona next month, according to a brief report on msmobiles.com. Details? Um...no. Here's all we know so far:

PC World - One way that consumers can cut back on spending during the economic crisis is to keep a closer eye on cell-phone rip offs, a consumer group said on Thursday.

AFP - Holiday sales were glum for most retailers but online giant Amazon managed to buck the trend.

Reuters - Nortel Networks Corp, the ailing telecom equipment provider, has decided to abandon its WiMax wireless technology business as it restructures in bankruptcy protection.

Reuters - Dell Inc is plotting a foray into the cell phone arena as early as next month, making and selling smartphones to revitalize a business walloped by crumbling PC sales and pitting the firm against Apple, the Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday.

CNET - Googlers who want to revalue their underwater stock options will have to wait until Tuesday for the voluntary employee option exchange program to launch, Google said in a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on Thursday that did not explain why.

AP - Fourteen news organizations, including The Associated Press and The New York Times Co., are urging a federal appeals court to allow online streaming of a hearing in a music downloading lawsuit the recording industry filed against a Boston University graduate student.

PC World - Anyone daring to hope for better financial news from IT vendors this week has been sorely disappointed, as the financial report season continues with layoff announcements by SAP, IBM, Sprint, AOL, Citrix, Texas Instruments and Eastman Kodak, as well as losses and revenue declines.

PC World - Services that store enterprise data in a 'cloud' on the Internet raise questions that organizations are just beginning to ask, but for all their limitations, they may be no more risky than on-site storage platforms.

Reuters - Shares in Nintendo Co Ltd (7974.OS) sank 12 percent after the Wii video game maker cut its earnings and game console sales forecasts, raising doubt over growth at a company that had previously defied the global financial crisis.