Gambling on Tumblr: Marissa Mayer’s Billion-Dollar Bet to Make Yahoo Cool

What’s the price of “cool”? For Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer, the number appears to be $1.1 billion. That’s how much cash Yahoo plans to pay for New York-based social blogging platform Tumblr, according to multiple reports. Yahoo’s board approved the transaction on Sunday, and an announcement is expected Monday, according to AllThingsD. Although $1.1 billion seems like a massive amount to pay for a com

Republicans Seem to Be Out of Economic Ideas — Here Are Two Suggestions

If you think about thrift as a moral quality, it’s easy to understand why Republicans have gotten things so wrong in terms of macro-economic policy over the last few years. Austerity, after all, has a folksy and intuitive appeal, the idea being that you can’t cure debt with more debt. No household could – and why shouldn’t the government be run like a stable household, never borrowing what it can’

How Much Will a Legal Marijuana Habit Cost You?

If you’re an average pot smoker in Colorado—paying average prices for average-quality marijuana—you can expect to spend around $650 on weed next year. A study conducted by the Colorado Futures Center at Colorado State University aimed to get to the bottom of how much the state can expect to collect in tax revenues now that marijuana is legal. By doing a little extra math, we can get a rough estima

U.S. Gas Prices Up 11 Cents Over Past 2 Weeks

(CAMARILLO, Calif.) — The average U.S. price of a gallon of gasoline has jumped 11 cents over the past two weeks. The Lundberg Survey of fuel prices released Sunday says the price of a gallon of regular is $3.66. Midgrade costs an average of $3.84 a gallon, and premium is $3.98. Diesel held steady at $3.93 gallon. Of the cities surveyed in the lower 48 states, Tucson, Ariz., has the nation’s lowes

Yahoo Acquires Tumblr: Initial Reactions From Around the Web

Tumblr seemed to be playing hard-to-get for a little while, but no longer: Yahoo has approved a $1.1 billion deal to purchase the hip social-blogging platform. According to All Things D, the tech giant’s board unanimously approved the all-cash deal on Sunday, although it won’t be officially announced until Monday. In the meantime, the news is, of course, making the rounds on the Web, and plenty of

Report: Yahoo Nearing $1.1B Acquisition of Tumblr

(NEW YORK) — Yahoo may be on the verge of closing its biggest acquisition during the 10-month reign of CEO Marissa Mayer as she tries to attract more traffic and advertisers to the Internet company’s website and mobile applications. The Sunnyvale, Calif., company’s board of directors will meet Sunday evening to consider approving a $1.1 billion acquisition of online content-sharing site Tumblr in

Slices of History: Great Moments in Pizza Innovation

Pizza has reached a new pinnacle. It’s available in more places, and in weirder and more wonderful varieties, than ever before. And we’re scarfing it down: The research firm Technomic estimates that Americans eat 350 slices per second, and that more than four in 10 of us now munch on pizza at least once a week. Read on for a brief look back at some of the big innovations that have helped pizza bec

5 Tech Stocks You Should Have Bought Instead of Facebook

Facebook’s intensely hyped initial public offering one year ago today was supposed to be a triumphant moment for Silicon Valley and Wall Street. After years of buildup and a valuation that had ballooned to $100 billion, ordinary investors would finally get the chance to own a slice of the hottest tech company on the planet. In the weeks leading up to the IPO, many tech experts — including some of

Weak Financial Literacy Scores Threaten a Global Education Movement

The global movement to teach kids about money in school has produced little hard evidence that the effort is paying off. That doesn’t mean it’s all been a waste of time, or that we’ll never get the results we want. But it certainly gives doubters ammunition. In a series of financial literacy tests dating to 1997, the JumpStart Coalition for Personal Financial Literacy has found that young people’s

Report: Yahoo! Board Approves Billion-Dollar Tumblr Deal

Updated May 19, 1 p.m. EST: AllThingsD reports that the Yahoo! board has unanimously approved a deal to purchase Tumblr for $1.1 billion. More updates to follow. Updated May 17, 8:20 p.m. EST: Yahoo!’s board plans to meet Sunday to decide whether to approve a $1.1 billion all-cash offer for New York-based social blogging platform Tumblr, AllThingsD’s Kara Swisher and Peter Kafka reported late Frid

Unemployment Falls in 40 U.S. States, Rises in 3

(WASHINGTON) — Solid hiring helped lower unemployment rates in 40 U.S. states last month, the most since November. The declines show the job market is improving throughout most of the country. The Labor Department said Friday that unemployment rates increased in only three states: Louisiana, Tennessee and North Dakota. Rates were unchanged in seven states. California, New York and South Carolina a

Give Feedback That Crosses Cultures

Giving critical feedback is an essential part of a manager’s job. But people in Shanghai don’t provide feedback in the same way as people in Strasbourg or Stockholm, so how can do your job when you’re working across cultures? Here are three tips: Learn the new rules. Read up on the values, beliefs, and assumptions people generally hold about social interactions in this region. Observe it in action

Money Talking: Is College Worth It?

Should some college-bound students opt for a two-year degree at a technical school? Will an education give you a better life? Money Talking digs into the tough questions in the debate over the high cost of higher education and the mounting student debt that’s one of its byproducts. The central question: Is college worth it?

Arresting Small Business Fraud

It’s tough enough to grow a business without people ripping you off. Here are four simple ways to protect your business from fraud. Small business owners know that it takes lot of hard work to build a successful business. You most likely read this and other advice articles looking for ideas and inspiration to help push your business to even greater success. That’s awesome. But while you fine tune

For JC Penney, the Right Direction May Be … Reverse

JC Penney has its old CEO, Mike Ullman, in charge of the company again. Abundant sales and coupons have returned, as have brands that disappeared for a spell. In many ways, the JC Penney of old is back. Whether this is a good thing for the company remains to be seen. About month ago, within days of Ron Johnson being fired as CEO and Mike Ullman retaking his former position at the helm of JC Penney

Car? House? Sorry: Graduates of 2013 Are Each $35,200 in Debt

The typical college graduate will leave campus this month owing nearly as much money as they stand to earn in their first year of full-time employment, new research shows. At a personal level, graduates toting up their private and government student loans, credit card balances, and personal debt will find the sum shocking. On average, they owe $35,200 and half say they are surprised by how much de

Facebook’s IPO One Year Later: Mobile Growth, Legal Headaches, and a Stalled Stock Price

One year ago tomorrow, social networking phenomenon Facebook went public in one of the most highly anticipated initial public offerings of the last decade. Leading up to the IPO, which valued the company at a whopping $104 billion — or 100 times revenue — the hype was intense. Facebook, market prognosticators predicted, would soar in the first day of trading, generating easy gains for the investor

The Fight for Streaming TV

We can stream movies on Netflix. We can buy TV episodes on iTunes. So why, in 2013, can’t we watch live television on our smartphones, tablets and computers without a pricey cable subscription? That’s the question driving a growing number of innovators who are upending the TV status quo—designated set, $100 provider bill, dozens of channels you don’t actually want—to offer a cheaper, more accessib

This Trick Will Motivate You to Reach Your Financial Goals

You’ll be more successful reaching your financial goals if you give yourself a target range rather than a single number you want to achieve. It sounds weird, but a new study shows that we’re more motivated when we have a little wiggle room in our goal. Let’s say, for instance, that you want to save $100 a month, or put an extra $100 a month towards paying down a credit card. Rather than committing

Stop Going to So Many Meetings

How can you get any work done when you’re in meetings all day? You can’t. But instead of griping, be more discerning about which meetings you got to. Before saying yes to invitation, ask yourself, “If I was sick on the day of this meeting, would it need to be rescheduled?” If you answer “no,” then decline the meeting and try one of these less time-intensive alternatives: Get an agenda. Ask to look

Take Advantage of Free Resources to Grow Your Business

Don’t let a tight budget keep you from growing your business. These free resources can connect you with mentors, train employees and save money on software. Whether you’re just starting a new business venture, thinking about expanding your current business or taking it in a new direction altogether, coming up with the money to fund those plans is a challenge for most aspiring entrepreneurs and sma

After The Office, Dunder Mifflin Will Live On in Every Office

It sounds like the plot of an unaired episode of The Office—Staples, the archnemesis of regional paper company Dunder Mifflin, licenses the smaller business’s name and starts selling paper and other office products under its banner. You can easily envision Michael Scott and Dwight Schrute flying to the office supply giant’s headquarters to win their company’s name and honor back. Maybe there’d be

4 Dirty Secrets of So-Called Installment Loans

There’s been a lot of chatter about the risk of payday loans lately, prompted by a new report from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau that called them “a long-term, expensive debt burden.” But there’s another, fast-growing category of small, short-term loans pitched mostly to low-income Americans — and the unbanked in particular — that can be just as dangerous. ProPublica and Marketplace tea

U.S. Weekly Jobless Claims Jump to Highest Level in 6 Weeks

(WASHINGTON) — The number of Americans seeking unemployment aid rose 32,000 last week to a seasonally adjusted 360,000, the most since late March. The jump comes after applications fell to a five-year low. The Labor Department said Thursday that the less volatile four-week average rose just 1,250 to 339,250, a level consistent with modest hiring. Weekly applications are a proxy for layoffs. The bi

A Bump on the Road to Green

Fisker automotive may be kaput. But my friend Dave insisted that before I joined the parade of writers comparing the failed electric-car company to Solyndra, the other California-based manufacturer that went bust after landing a federal clean-energy loan, I had to borrow his curvaceous Fisker Karma. It’s been described as the most beautiful sedan ever built, and I must say that Dave’s sparkling oc

Rejoice! The End of ‘User Name and Password’ May Be Nigh

What’s the absolute worst part of the Internet? Reasonable folks may disagree, but most would say keeping track of an endless string passwords ranks somewhere at the top. Nobody, of course, can remember a unique password for the dozens of sites we each sign into each day, so we end up using the same one over and over again. But as recent breaches of high-profile websites like LinkedIn and Gawker s

Airline Baggage Fees: On the Rise — Yet More Passengers Deem Them ‘Reasonable’

Even as overall baggage fees have increased, some of the nation’s biggest airlines aren’t collecting as much as they did a couple of years ago. Perhaps even more surprisingly, there’s been a sharp rise in travelers who aren’t bothered by the idea of paying extra for checked luggage. The Bureau of Transportation Statistics just released airline revenue data for 2012, and guess what? We paid more in

Investors Are Betting That Japan Is at a Tipping Point

A few weeks ago I wrote a column titled “The Barbarians Are Back,” which looked at how cash-rich U.S. firms were drawing the attention of “activist investors” — a.k.a. corporate vultures. Well, American companies aren’t the only ones in their crosshairs — Japanese blue chips are too. Sony, one of Japan’s best-known brands, has become a target for American activist investor Daniel Loeb. His $11 bil

The Mystery of the Incredible Shrinking Budget Deficit

The Obama Administration is having pretty much the worst week ever, but somewhere amidst the fog of scandal lies some pretty good news about the budget deficit, namely that the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) is predicting it will be much smaller in 2013 than was projected just a few months ago. That’s right, the federal budget deficit, which topped $1.4 trillion in 2009, or 10.1% of GDP, and do

Peak Traffic Ticket Season Is Here: Police Pushed to Give More Seat Belt Violation Citations

For the two weeks around Memorial Day, there’s more reason than normal to buckle up: Police around the country are stepping up enforcement of seat belt laws and plan on giving out double the usual number of tickets. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) is promoting the two-week period from May 20 to June 2 as the National Seat Belt Enforcement Mobilization campaign. The annua