5 O'Clock Roundup: Nook sold out, Sony launches online store, Bing gets slammed

We’ve been a little behind with roundup lately. Our apologies. Here’s the latest action:

Barnes & Noble Nook sold out — The bookseller’s entry into the eBook reader market is under way. The B&N Nook is out of stockk on the company’s web site and it is now taking orders for devices that will ship next year. Analysts say that the Nook wasn’t ready for shipment in huge quantities and B&N probably launched it anyway to head off sales for Amazon’s rival Kindle eBook reader. Well, there’s always Spring Design’s Alex.

Sony to launch online store – Sony executive Kaz Hirai says that the Japanese electronics giant will launch its own online store modeled after its successful PlayStation Network store. The store will include connections between Sony’s consumer electronics devices and its digital content.

NY Times columnist slams Bing over China — Nicholas Kristof, a columnist for the Gray Lady, called for a boycott of Microsoft’s Bing search engine today for failing to stand up to Chinese government censors. If you type Tiananmen and other controversial search subjects in simple Chinese characters in a Bing search, you get government propaganda instead of real search results. Google handles the problem in a different way, but Kristof says he isn’t buying Microsoft’s response.

Behind the FAA’s flight plan glitch — eWeek has a lengthy article describing the router failure that brought down the nation’s air traffic control system.

Oracle’s acquisition of Sun looking dim — Bloomberg reports that the European Union is likely to block Oracle’s $7.4 billion acquisition of Suny Microsystems. The hangup seems to be Sun’s ownership of the MySQL database software, which competes with Oracle.

McAfee warns of 12 scams of Christmas — Beware of everything from fake electronic greeting cards to charity scams that steal your identity and credit card data. McAfee offers the warnings in a podcast.

AOL to cut 2,500 jobs — AOL is asking a third of its work force to volunteer to end their jobs. If it can’t get the volunteers, it will resort to layoffs.

EA shuts down Pandemic – Electronic Arts has shut down its Pandemic game studio amid much criticism. EA bought BioWare/Pandemic from Elevation Partners for $800 million in 2007. John Riccitiello, who left Elevation to become CEO of EA, recused himself from that purchase decision because he stood to benefit from it. Now, faced with declining demand for its games, EA is making drastic cutbacks of 1,500 jobs — including 200 at Pandemic, which was about half of the original acquisition. The decision is understandable, since Pandemic had a string of weak games, including the Lord of the Rings Conquest game we panned. But the Riccitiello critics don’t seem to care about that.

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