Daily News Brief: MC Hammer to YouTube - U Can't Touch This!

Hammer Time!

Stanley Burrell (kudos if you recognized MC Hammer's real name) kept parachute pants popular up into the 90s before ultimately crash landing...like his career (ZING!). Down but not out, Hammer's making a comeback, this time into the tech world. Serving as both co-founder and CEO of DanceJam.com, Burrell will debut the site later this month with hopes of competing with YouTube and becoming THE portal for watching dance videos.

Path to Powerless PCs

There's a push towards superconductivity research, which has the potential to shake up the PC industry. Superconductors lose almost all resistance to electricity, but finding room temperature superconductors has thus far been fruitless; -135.14°C is the highest temp superconductor currently known. Adding to the challenge, scientists didn't know what caused superconducting phenomena on an atomic level, but researchers at the University of Tennessee and Oak Ridge National Laboratory claim to have made a breakthrough. If it holds up, we very well may see the technology trickle into the PC landscape during our lifetime.

50 Greatest Websites of 2007

No, we didn't compile a list of 50 websites deemed best of 2007, but Time did. The list includes gems such as StumbleUpon and Twitter, but Chow.com? Of course, any 'Best of' list opens itself up to scrutinty and "OMGBBQWTF!!!11 How could you not include _____.com!," but to not include MaximumPC.com? Blasphemy.

LANCOR v OLPC

LANCOR has managed to get a temporary injunction against the distribution of OLPC XO laptops in Nigeria, and will seek $20 million in damages. If something about the whole situation seems wrong, you may be closer on your hunch than you think. According to the Boston Globe, LANCOR founder Ade Oyegbolas has a criminal record with a year in prision under his belt for bank fraud, and the alleged patent which serves as the foundation for this case may have been backdated. Stay tuned...

AMD Outlook 2008

AMD has to be glad to have 2007 behind them, but what does 2008 look like? Not good, according to Bank of America analyst Sumit Dhanda. In a research note released earlier this week, Dhanda downgraded AMD to 'sell' and predicted "more pain ahead." Despite promises to ramp up Barcelona production, Dhanda isn't convinced it will be enough to compete with Intel. AMD shares are expected to drop in 2008, which already took a 62 percent hit in 2007. Not just picking on AMD, Dhanda had a less than rosy outlook for semiconductors as a whole, downgrading five chipmakers to neutral, including Intel.

Japanese PM Turns to YouTube

In an attempt to raise his country's profile, Japanese Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda has begun posting English language messages on YouTube, starting with a New Year's resolution to overcome challenges facing the environment. You can view the 5 1/2 minute clip here.