Feeling down? Let's go over some of the more uplifting headlines of the past seven days. Rest assured, this week's headlines weren't all layoffs, missed earnings, and shrinking guidance.
1. There's green in them there red mailers
Two cheers for Netflix
The second cheer lauds the company's slick announcement that it's testing the practice of shipping out rentals on Saturday. The company has historically only staffed its distribution centers from Monday through Friday.
That's a great preemptive strike, since the Postmaster General is now discussing scaling back the mail delivery schedule. To trim the USPS budget, postal service may be suspended on a typically light day for mail like Tuesday. Such a move would normally devalue a Netflix subscription, so it's great to see Netflix offer more before the government cuts back.
2. Tying The Knot
Wedding-day planning hub The Knot
WedSnap's Weddingbook allows wedding guests to convene, socialize, and gear up for the big day together online.
It remains to be seen whether social networking is a threat or an opportunity to a niche leader like The Knot, but why take the chance? By snapping up the app leader, The Knot is positioned to profit either way.
3. Not the Skype type
eBay
eBay finally seems to realize that it will never be prudent to have buyers and sellers talk on their computers, since they may very well devise ways to circumvent the auction site -- and its commission fees.
The company is unlikely to recoup the $2.6 billion it originally laid out for the telephony app. What reasonable telco provider would buy a cannibal? However, it's easy to see a cash-rich dot-com like Google
4. Start swearing purple
Remember the original Saturday Night Live news updates, when Chevy Chase would pronounce that Generalissimo Francisco Franco was still dead? It seems as if every three months, we find ourselves confirming that Yahoo!
At long last, though, the company's enjoying renewed optimism, even if its quarterly results saw revenue (before traffic acquisition costs) take a dip. For starters, the search-engine giant actually beat Wall Street's profit expectations. Perhaps more importantly, it finally has an outsider CEO armed with a ridiculous amount of cash ($3.5 billion), a lot of baked-in pessimism, and (we hope) fresh ideas to snap the company out of its slump.
5. You go, E*Trade Baby
Be on the lookout for a new E*Trade
Though E*Trade isn't profitable like its peers, the company did close out the quarter with 97,000 more accounts than when it started. After E*Trade survived all the turbulence following its iffy mortgage loans in 2007, this is one discounter Fools should no longer discount.