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Motorola deal offers Google tax, patent benefits - Yahoo! News

FAIRFIELD, Conn./CHAPEL HILL, North Carolina (Reuters) -- Google Inc's blockbuster acquisition of Motorola Mobility Holdings Inc will bring an unusual stable of tax and accounting benefits to the search-engine giant, already one of Corporate America's most savvy users of such perks.

The deal also underscores a trend by technology companies to snap up patents in a bid to stave off competitive threats and patent-infringement lawsuits. Google's patent portfolio is seen as one of the weakest in the industry.

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O'Neill's Walk of Fame star in front of shoe store - Yahoo! News

YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio (AP) — Ed O'Neill's new star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame would seem to be in an appropriate spot: in front of a DSW shoe store on Hollywood Boulevard.

O'Neill used to play shoe salesman Al Bundy on the long-running sitcom "Married With Children."

The Walk of Fame says the Emmy-nominated star of "Modern Family" will receive his sidewalk honor on Tuesday. The ceremony will feature his two TV wives, Sofia Vergara from "Modern," the current ABC hit, and Katey Sagal from "Married," which aired on Fox.

The 65-year-old O'Neill recently told The Vindicator, his hometown newspaper in Youngstown, Ohio, that he almost turned down the Walk of Fame star because he thought it was "kind of weird." But his daughter helped him see it was a point of pride.

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Perry wins top award but Beyonce baby tops show - Yahoo! News

Beyonce and Jay-Z's offspring doesn't even have a name yet, but it was the indisputable breakout star of Sunday's MTV Video Music Awards, upstaging everyone, even Katy Perry's win for video of the year.

Perry, who had the most nominations coming into the show with 10, came away with three moonman trophies, including video of the year for the inspirational clip "Firework."

"I feel like I'm doing something right when I sing that song," said Perry, conservatively dressed in a cotton-candy pink jacket, a skirt and something best described as a Green Bay Packers cheesehead decoration.

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Irene makes landfall on quiet, anxious NYC - Yahoo! News

NEW YORK (AP) — Rainfall overflowed sewers and seawater lapped at sidewalks at the edges of New York City from densely populated lower Manhattan to the far reaches of Queens as a weakening Irene made landfall over Coney Island early Sunday.

Ocean water streamed into the main streets of the Rockaways, a peninsula in Queens that Mayor Michael Bloomberg had ordered evacuated. In Brooklyn, Coney Island streets were also under water, and in Red Hook, also along the harbor, water was coming in about 100 yards.

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Sofia Coppola to wed in ancestral Italian town - Yahoo! News

ROME (AP) — Filmmaker Sofia Coppola is going back to her roots, getting married Saturday in the southern Italian town where her great-grandfather was born.

Coppola is marrying Thomas Mars, lead singer of the French rock band Phoenix and the father of their two young daughters.

The ceremony will take place in the garden of a historic palazzo that her famous father, Francis Ford Coppola, has renovated in the center of the Italian town of Bernalda, according to mayor Leonardo Chiruzzi. The senior Coppola plans to turn it into a luxury boutique hotel.

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Jamaica's elderly Jolly Boys a hit on int'l stages - Yahoo! News

PORT ANTONIO, Jamaica (AP) — The Jolly Boys, a trio of elderly Jamaican musicians who play a rollicking type of folk music nearly forgotten by time, are enjoying an unexpected revival after nearly 60 years of entertaining tourists on the island's hotels.

Playing on acoustic, sometimes homemade instruments, the group's forte is mento — a Jamaican dance music created by the descendants of African slaves in the late 19th century. It features banjo, maracas, a rough-hewn wooden box with metal prongs to pluck bass notes, and often bawdy lyrics.

But these days, by fusing traditional sounds with rock and pop hits, including Amy Winehouse's "Rehab" and Lou Reed's "Perfect Day," the septuagenarian Jolly Boys are bringing the jubilant sound of mento — the rhythm of the Caribbean island's dancehalls long before ska and reggae — to European arenas and hipster venues in the United States.

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Studio scraps big screen adaptation of Hasbro's 'Ouija' - Yahoo! News

LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) - Universal has scrapped plans to make "Ouija," a movie based on Hasbro's fortune-telling game board.

McG was set to direct the movie. Michael Bay, among others, was to produce.

The studio cited budget concerns. An individual close to the studio said that the budget -- described as "tentpole" -- is right for the film, but the film isn't right for Universal.

It's the second major Hasbro movie Universal has backed out of. Last year it ditched plans for a screen remake of the popular board game "Clue," a spokesperson for Universal told TheWrap.

Universal still has Hasbro projects underway. Its "Battleship" is set to be released next May. But it's closely evaluating "Stretch Armstrong" and "Candyland."

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