iFive: Apple Buys iCloud.com, Yahoo Sells Delicious, Panasonic Slashes Workforce, TomTom Says Sorry, Nokia's Tablet Plans

1. Hot rumors are circulating this morning thatApple has boughtthe domain name iCloud.com from network cloud storage firm Xcerion in Sweden. Inside sources say Xcerion sold the name to Apple for about $4.5 million--and it's rebranded its system to CloudMe. This news, of course, has everyone excited that Apple's embrace of cloud services with a MobileMe revamp is imminent (bringing with it cloud streaming in iTunes).

2.Yahoohas revealed that Delicious has been acquired by YouTube founders Chad Hurley and Steve Chen, ready to become part of their new Net venture AVOS. Users have to agree to transfer their bookmarks from Yahoo's servers to AVOS' if they want to keep using the bookmark sharing/site discovery service. Excitement is now building about AVOS, thanks to Hurley and Chen's experience in building YouTube and PayPal before that.

3. Panasonic'sannouncedit's cutting another 17,000 jobs from its workforce (around 5% of the total) over the next three years. This brings the total number of job cuts announced over the last year to 35,000. It's due to Panasonic's competition in the consumer electronics space--Korean firms like Samsung and Chinese peers are undercutting Panasonic's prices. The Japanese giant is refocussing on environmental and energy-related ventures.

4. Adding a spicy, unsettling angle to recent debates about user location privacy, GPS maker TomTom hasapologizedfor selling user data to Dutch police forces so they can better choose where to place speed traps. No person has been identified among TomTom's crowd-sourced database, and TomTom didn't know the intended use at first. But faced with angry clients, TomTom has said it is sorry and won't try the trick again. It needed to because its traditional market is being attacked by smartphones.

5. Speaking on Finnish TV, Nokia CEO Stephen Elophas revealedinformation about something commentators have noted for its absence: Nokia's entry to the tablet game. Elop says Nokia definitely has something planned, but it's working with its own and Microsoft's resources to make its tablet something special--Elop noted the tablet game is dominated by Apple and there are"200"weaker, similar offerings. Nokia doesn't want to make the 201st.

Chat about this news withKit Eaton on TwitterandFast Companytoo.

{Image via Flickrkarindalziel}

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