Comcast Roundup: Shaq and Ralph Roberts kiss, Warren Buffet and More

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Nothing gets us jacked up to welcome the new year more than keeping a watchful eye on corporate giants.

DEFINITE READS

• Minnesota Public Radio devotes air time to Comcast, NBC and their future for TV. H/T Philly Tech News
• The Canadian Press reports that the Comcast-NBC merger will indeed create a big power in sports, but it will take time.

Below, a Comcast executive joins Warren Buffet’s team, delightful video of Shaq and Comcast’s founder and five more.

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Ten Philadelphia iPhone apps that don’t exist but should

The iPhone application news has to be getting a little tiresome, no?

Google says the mobile application collection is a fleeting concept. The iPhone store is completely flooded with more than 36,000 and few are making money or much worth the time.

Still, they keep coming. We reported that Comcast has its own new iPhone and iPod touch mobile app. Educational software company Blackboard and freakin’ Harry Potter have apps. Newspapers on occasion have them, but big ones like the Wall Street Journal and USA Today are trying to figure out how to charge.

Philly has many apps made by Philadelphians, like one about old Abe Lincoln and a righteous one for Philly concerts, but they are hardly comprehensive.

So why doesn’t Philadelphia, rife with culture and on the cusp (and perhaps in need of a bit) of a technology renaissance, have more of their own?

That profit problem, of course. Because, really, with rare exception no real money is being made, so it isn’t likely that a crush of Philadelphia-specific iPhone apps are going to be made anytime soon. But it sure is fun to indulge.

So, after the jump, find the 10 Philadelphia iPhone (or Windows mobile) apps  that should exist, but don’t and probably never will.

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RJ Metrics makes a rap video and admits it

Jake Stein at left and Robert Moore at right of business dashboard firm RJ Metrics performing in their "Business Intelligence" rap video.

And now for something totally different.

You may be tired of the ironic rap video — we know we are — but sometimes an old idea can pass. Does this?

Jake Stein and Robert Moore, the two Ivy League-educated entrepreneurs behind the business intelligence dashboard RJ Metrics that opened up shop earlier this month, have broken from their cipher and put business on wax.

Stein, who lives in Center City, sings the hook and plays straight man to Moore in their single “Straight Outta Camden,” noting their recent move to the Rutgers University-Camden tech incubator.

Peep the video and score an exclusive download after the jump.

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Another city list: Philadelphia named top spot for tech jobs

Update 9:23 p.m. 5/19/09

Philadelphia is one of the 10 best cities in the country to find a tech job, according to PC World.

Add this to the heaping pile of other ways cities are ordered, grouped and ranked by magazines seeking attention.

This tech list, which doesn’t put the 10 in order, includes tech mainstays like the Silicon Valley and Seattle. Other major cultural cities like Los Angeles, Chicago and Boston were also on the list.

Of course, it ain’t the first time one of these lists breezed by.
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GPTMC, other urban destinations attract LGBT community online

Courting gay travelers is old hat for tourist agencies. What’s new is that now the courting is moving increasingly online.

In partnership with the the Greater Philadelphia Tourism and Marketing Corp., Southwest Airlines announced earlier this week that it launched Southwest.com/gayphilly, considered the first airline landing page for a gay destination, as first reported by the Inquirer. The GPTMC is giving away six free trips to Philly in a contest that, while featured in print advertisements, is almost otherwise entirely being promoted online, housed at gophila.com/gayphilly.

It may the first so Web-heavy advertising blitz directed at the gay community by the GPTMC, but it is certainly not the firsT — insert mildly euphemistic pun on the City of Brotherly Love.

In November 2003, GPTMC decided the city’s culture, history, nightlife and dining, packaged with the famed gayborhood could make Philly a top-tier destination for the LGBTQ community. So born was the popular “Get your History Straight and your Nightlife Gay” promotional campaign.

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Chaka Fattah supports Stephen Colbert’s choice for NASA module

Comedian Stephen Colbert so owes our boy Chaka Fattah.

The U.S. Congressman who grew up in the Overbrook neighborhood in West Philadelphia has gone to bat for the star of Comedy Central show the Colbert Report in his bid to choose the name of a NASA space station module.

Colbert received the highest number of votes in an open naming contest, boosted by his calls for support on  his show. Still, NASA has reserved the right to choose its own name, despite the comedian’s choice of “Colbert” getting the most votes.

Fattah is clamoring for justice to be done.

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