Jordan Golson and I are blogging live, but briefly, from the Macworld 2008 expo at Moscone West in San Francisco.

Read on for the full report:

For the gadget blogs, Macworld Expo is the Olympics. Liveblogging, as Macworld veteran Paul Boutin explained to me recently, is all about speed and precision. A bit like a relay-race baton-toss. Mechanical, uncomplicated — and yet people crowd stadiums to watch those. As significant as the event is to Apple — it’s a vital showcase for the only consumer-electronics company that seems to matter anymore — Macworld is even more important to the online tech press, which has turned real-time blog coverage into an art, and Macworld into a stage on which it shows off the power of the Web as a medium. As a business story, the latter aspect is what fascinates me.

The last thing the world needs is another logorrheic liveblog transcribing every last word out of Steve Jobs’s mouth. (Gizmodo, Engadget, and many others, will be providing those.) Inspired by CNET’s Rafe Needleman, I am embracing the discipline of Twitter. Anything important can be said in 140 words or less, right? And fitting, too, since Twitter’s Jack Dorsey and Evan Williams are rumored to be taking the stage on Tuesday. Check back here Tuesday morning, or follow “vwag” on Twitter. I’ll be liveblogging the livebloggers, and Steve Jobs, in a mercifully brief way.

You know, I’m perfectly fine with funtrepreneur-in-residence Jason Calacanis telling us to “please die.” I’m totally OK when Calacanis emails me “Subject: Idiot,” because I can take a joke, especially when it’s true. But dammit, Janet, Calacanis has stopped posting pics of his puppies. Valleywag has been forced to outsource to Professor Chips (above), winner of last year’s Babies vs Puppies showdown. After a week where the big stories were Larry Page planting one on new bride Lucy Southworth, Heidi Roizen singing her thighs thin, Google ripping off AOL — AOL? — the Times poaching yours truly, and Megan “Leggy” McCarthy leaving Valleywag for Wired, we could all use some face-blurpy time.

Source:Valleywag

Special correspondent Paul Boutin and I are at Moose’s, a historic bar in San Francisco’s North beach district. “23 people have posted on the Facebook wall for Megan’s farewell party, but no one’s actually shown up,” I tell Boutin. “So Web 2.0,” he says. “Fail.” The Uncov guys aren’t even here to give Boutin shit for stealing their line. Unbelievable. People, unplug already. Moose’s has a cool bar, a hot bartender named Valen (above), and even trippy vacuum-tube lighting for the geeks. After the jump, photos of the bash in progress, such as it is. Come on and join us!

Boutin checks Facebook by Blackberry.

I’m blogging, and yes, my cheeks are already a little red.

So I’m here at Keplers, the bookstore in Menlo Park, with a bunch of Stevetards waiting for Dan Lyons, the faux Apple CEO who pens The Secret Diary of Steve Jobs and the new book Options, a parody memoir of Steve Jobs. Apple cofounder Steve Wozniak has taken the podium, and is speaking a mile a minute, referencing his on-again, off-again romance with comedienne Kathy Griffin. And then he spins into a weird numerological digression. I’m starting to think this guy is actually kind of nuts. And then Wozniak presents him with a genuine Apple turtleneck. It’s only getting weirder from here, I fear.

“This is the highlight of my life — the birth of my children, and meeting Woz,” says Lyons, like some pathetic starstruck fanboy. This is the man who called me “Bigglesworth“? I’m wondering who the real pussycat is.

Lyons starts by explaining how he got the “Secret Diary” moniker from the British magazine Private Eye. The whole idea, he explains, was just to learn more about blogging and figure out how tools like Blogger works. The blog spiraled from there.

“I don’t know anything about Steve Jobs,” Lyons says. “This is as close as I’ve ever gotten,” he adds, pointing to Wozniak. He recounts how he closed down the blog, and a reader actually reposted his archive, which prompted Lyons to continue.

Lyons then makes a gaffe: “I’ve written a lot of books, which are still available on Amazon.com.” The owner of Keplers coughs and glares at him. “Sorry. In a brick-and-mortar store, you never say the ‘A’ word.”

Turns out I wasn’t the only person kicked out of the MySpace party last night. A tipster writes in:

I was at the myspace party last night and there’s one thing i didn’t see mentioned at all. At around midnight, me and buddy headed to oola for a late night dinner, and about an hour later I was driving my friend to his car. I was driving up third street in front of the moma and there were three cop cars and one of those cop paddywagons with a stripey shirted guy being escorted into the van- cuffed with his hands behind his back. I didn’t see anything about it on sfgate of valleywag- but i’m guessing it would be on a police blotter.

According to the San Francisco Police Department, police were called to the museum to break up a fight between two parties around 1:23 a.m., but no one was arrested. FutureWorks PR head Brian Solis took a few snapshots of the brawl, printed after the jump.

According to an eyewitness,

[The fight] was between 3 guys, two went down, one right after the other after a pushing match. The second broke glasses and took another girl down with him. She went down pretty good and started crying on the floor. Then it was broken up.

So, was this shoving match over valuation jealousy or did someone try to cut in line to sit next to Rupert Murdoch? If you know any more details, please fill us in.

(Photos by Brian Solis)

Source:Valleywag

It’s 1:33 p.m. Pacific Time and we’re going. CEO Eric Schmidt, founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page, departing CFO George Reyes are all on the call. Ready to hear oh so much good news?

1:36: Schmidt’s saying that Google didn’t see the same seasonal slow-down it usually does.

1:38: Schmidt turning the call over to departing CFO George Reyes. He’s giving him credit for all the financial success. Nothing to do with search ads, of course.

1:41: Lots of numbers from Reyes. You want them? Get them yourself you lazy bastard. We’re here for color, OK?

1:44: Turning it over to Larry. He’s holding his nose as usual. He’s here to talk about search improvements. I’m excited, you?

1:45: Page’s impressed that he can get California weather from his iGoogle page.

1:46: Larry’s on to Maps and Mapplets. Those are the little widgets that aren’t as popular as Facebook apps.

1:47: Sergey talking now about ads and apps. Google’s philosophy is to create a “win-win” for advertisers and customers. “Win-lose” didn’t pan out, apparently.

1:50: They’re making Sergey talk about a Nissan gadget ad. “It’s fun for users and it helps Nissan build their brand. Uh. Anyway. We are really excited about these.”

1:52: He’s on to Google TV ads. Interest and bookings are up. The remarkable thing about television advertising, is that it is almost as accountable as online advertising. Almost. Sort of. Okay, not at all. But it sounds semi-believable when Brin says it.

1:56: Google Gears, you’ll recall, allows you to develop applications while you fly on an airplane. Where there is no Internet.

1:56: Eric again. “It’s obvious to us that our model works very well.”

1:57: We’re on to questions and answers. Hey you. Turn on your mute button.

1:58: JP Morgan wants to know what Google’s learned from the MySpace deal.

1:59: Sergey answers. Advertising on social networking isn’t as good as advertising on search. Shh. OK, it’s an opportunity. Shh.

2:01: This analyst wants to know Google can take applications from the Facebook platform. The answer is no, FB apps are written in FBML. And it’s illegal, Schmidt said. We’re encouraging them to build it for iGoogle instead.

2:03: A UBS analyst asks a questions with his mouth full.

2:04: Google traffic acquisition costs went up, Reyes tells us. And then there’s a long pause. Probably because he called it TAC and no one knows what that is. It’s what Google has to pay publishers and popular web sites such as MySpace to embed its search engine and inflate search growth.

2:05: Page’s answering a question about the 700mhz spectrum auction. He’s pleased about the openness put into the rules. The ones that mean the winner of the auction will have to allow anybody’s device to access the spectrum.

2:07: Any update on when DoubleClick will close, an analyst asks.

2:07: Schmidt says Google is following procedure and that it will result “in a very good outcome for us. Our next question?”

2:09: This smartass analyst wants to know why Google thinks its required to build a mobile OS. One of the geek founders answers. “There are opportunities available.” And do you know how much money we have?

2:10: Analyst wants to know: You said you were going to watch headcount. Instead, you added more new people in the third quarter than you did in the second. WTF.

2:11: “You should be comfortable that we’re paying a lot of attention to the headcount,” Schmidt replies.

2:13: An analyst asks, With your ability to monetize better than others, will your TAC rates go down?

2:14: Answer: We have more academic traffic, unlike other players in the market, so we have more traffic that goes unmonetized, alas.

2:15: Jeffrey Lindsay from Sanford Bernstein wants to know where Postini sales force is located. Also, he wants to know why Google thinks it needs more sales people. Didn’t you people say you were watching headcount?

2:16: One of the things we’re trying to avoid is having multiple sales forces for different sales products. Named customers get one voice from Google. I am not going to answer your question. How dare you doubt us. Gawd.

2:18: This guy just asked “when do you expect to turn up the monetization dial on YouTube?” Douche.

2:19: Brin, “we have fantastic technology.”

2:19: To what degree are brand advertisers evaluating their online advertising along with their offline advertising as a single message?

2:21: “We are very confident in terms of the future, especially the video, as well as TV. Search will continue to remain a very strong focus.”

2:21: This analyst is on a speakerphone. And he’s getting AIM pings. How is Google Checkout going?

2:22: Brin: “I personally use it all the time.”

2:23: Merchants who are using Google Checkout are getting a higher click-through rate and decreasing cost-per-click.

2:25: Oppenheimer & Co wants to know the breakdown between mobile and PC searching.

2:27: Schmidt answers, saying that mobile searches are still a small percentage of total searches. But it’s growing faster than anything else. We wish all devices could run our software.

2:28: Time for only one more question!

2:28: Analyst: Just two questions here.

2:29: He asked about growth rates in China and India. And privacy standards.

2:29: “Our growth there is quite significant,” Schmidt says. In India, we have majority share. In China there is a local player. A local player run by the government, capable of blocking us entirely. Us and everybody else.

2:30: “On privacy: Our ultimate success is based on the success and happiness of users.” Not our fantastic profits. No, no. Though yes, they are nice. “So with that, we’ve run out of time. Come back for a financial analyst meeting next week.”

For more gloating? Bah!

Source:Valleywag
Libertarian group sues Google over massive tax breaks used to attract a datacenter to rural North Carolina. [News.com]

Source:Valleywag

Apple’s stock was up more than two bucks to close at $137.26 today, as the company gets set to report June-quarter earnings. Investors have recovered somewhat from the revelation that AT&T activated fewer iPhones in the last couple days of June than some on Wall Street hoped for. With only two days of sales, no one expects the iPhone to contribute much to sales. MarketWatch states the obvious: Mac and iPod sales will make up for most of Apple’s sales for the quarter, which analysts think will come in at around $5.2 billion. Nonetheless, the cell phone, as Apple’s big growth opportunity, will be the focus of everyone’s attention. I covered the call live, blogging the highlights here. On the call: CFO Peter Oppenheimer and COO Tim Cook. CEO Steve Jobs usually doesn’t show for these things, and he didn’t tune in for this one, either, even with all the iPhone buzz.

2:57 p.m. Pacific Cook says sales were “skewed” to the $599, 8GB model of the iPhone for early sales in June. And with that, the call wraps up.

2:49 p.m. Pacific And an adjective from Cook on Mac sales: “blowout.” Adobe’s shipment of Creative Suite 3 and a new version of Apple’s Final Cut video-editing software helped Pro line sales.

2:45 p.m. Pacific I really should catalog all of the adjectives Oppenheimer uses: “tremendous,” “outstanding,” and “landmark,” among others. You can tell he’s running short of them. I wonder if he’s using a lawyer-approved list of adjectives and trying very hard not to stray from it.

2:42 p.m. Pacific No cannibalization of iPod sales by the iPhone in June, says Cook, but Apple’s watching to see if there will be any this quarter.

2:40 p.m. Pacific Cook dodges a question on whether iPhone prices will drop over time. No vindication for American Technology Research analyst Shaw Wu yet!

2:35 p.m. Pacific The surprise in earnings came from lower memory prices, says Cook, who adds that he believed they “bottomed” in the quarter. He now expects memory and LCD prices to rise as supplies tighten.

2:30 p.m. Pacific An analyst asks if there’s a “tech nerd … bubble” in iPhone sales. COO Tim Cook sticks by his prediction that it will sell a million total by the end of the current quarter — in other words, another 730,000 iPhones from the begining of July through the end of September.

2:30 p.m. Pacific Oppenheimer does it again, hinting at “some product transitions I can’t get into.” If you can’t get into them, Peter, why mention them at all?

2:22 p.m. Pacific Ouch. An analyst questions Oppenheimer’s guidance given for this quarter, given how badly Apple’s guidance missed this quarter’s actual result. Oppenheimer defends his conservative guidance for the September quarter, citing back-to-school discounts, higher parts prices, and — oooh! — “product transitions.” That means some new products, people. You heard it here first. Anyone else smell new versions of the iPod coming?

2:20 p.m. Pacific Looking forward to the September quarter, Oppenheimer reiterates that the company expects revenue of $5.7 billion.

2:19 p.m. Pacific Oppenheimer says Apple is regaining its position in education sales. Those who have been watching Apple remember that a few years ago, it had badly fumbled in this market thanks to poor sales management.

2:18 p.m. Pacific Six years in, Apple is starting to remodel some of its older stores — 15 this quarter. More than half of customers buying Macs in stores continue to be switchers from Windows.

2:16 p.m. Pacific Apple is tweaking its retail-store accounting to make it more comparable to how third-party retailers report sales, as well as with other Apple operating segments. AppleCare and .Mac subscriptions are also being accounted for over the life of the service.

2:15 p.m. Pacific Deferred revenue from iPhone and Apple TV sales: $180 million. That will be accounted for over the next eight quarters, under what Oppenheimer calls “subscription accounting.”

2:14 p.m. Pacific Apple’s plans for Europe, including its wireless-carrier partner or partners will be announced in the current quarter — that is, by the end of September. Launch is still on for the fourth quarter of the calendar year.

2:12 p.m. Pacific iPod sales were 9.8 million. Music sales exceeded Target’s, bringing Apple ever-closer to current music king Wal-Mart. Oppenheimer acknowledges that some iPhone customers had activation problems.

2:11 p.m. Pacific Sales of Mac notebooks accounted for 64 percent of all Macs sold. Anyone still use desktops out there?

2:09 p.m. Pacific Call has started. “Landmark quarter,” says Oppenheimer. Operating margins continue to be high at 19.2 percent, and a “favorable” cost of electronic parts. Apple had cautioned Wall Street that margins would drop as parts prices rise, but that seems not to have happened.

2:08 p.m. Pacific Must be a lot of interest — they’re still trying to get people on the call. Whoa! Stock is down more than 3 percent in after-hours trading. Were the iPhone sales not spectacularly high enough for forward-looking Apple investors?

2:02 p.m. Pacific Dialed in, waiting for the call to start.

1:50 p.m. Pacific I’m musing on the difference between Apple’s report of 270,000 iPhones sold, and AT&T’s report of 146,000 iPhones activated. I think the difference comes down to that: sold versus activated. There were widely reported problems with activations over the first weekend the iPhone was on sale, and not everyone necessarily activated their iPhone right away.

1:45 p.m. Pacific Apple always provides a useful data summary (PDF) to accompany its earnings release. Every region and sector’s doing well, except for Japan. An interesting stat: Apple sold 270,000 iPhones, but only recorded $5 million in related revenues. You mathletes out there might think that, at $500-plus a pop, that seems a bit low. Where’d the other $130 million go? Remember that Apple accounts for iPhone sales over the course of 24 months after a sale. That adds up to a hefty chunk of deferred revenue to boost future quarters.

1:36 p.m. Pacific Earnings are in. 92 cents a share, 20 cents above expectations, and $5.41 billion in sales, $200 million more than Wall Street’s consensus. Mac sales up 33 percent, iPods up 21 percent year-over-year. In the release, Jobs says he expects Apple to sell 1 million iPhones by the end of September.

1:30 p.m. Pacific Still waiting for the earnings release. In the meantime, reading Nick Wingfield’s (subscription-only) story in the Wall Street Journal about why Jobs hates buttons. Apparently, he doesn’t have to bully his underlings into following his whims; Apple’s designers just fall in line with Jobs. “More royalist than the king,” quips former Apple executive Jean-Louis Gassee.