eBay Inc. (NASDAQ:EBAY) will be taking over Gmarket, an online e-commerce company based in South Korea through a $1.2 billion deal.  As part of the deal Yahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ:YHOO) will be selling their 10% share in Gmarket to eBay.  The $1.2 billion will give eBay a 67% controlling stake in Gmarket.  eBay’s offer is at $24 per share.  This is 20% more than the closing price of $19.96 on the NASDAQ yesterday.

Gmarket would be rolled into Internet Auction Co., the Seoul-based company eBay owns.  This move more than doubles eBay’s sales footprint in South Korea.  Gmarket’s revenue was about $210 million last year.  The value of the goods sold on their website increased 23% over the last year.  In the fourth quarter, eBay made about $1.27 billion.

Interpark Corp., another major shareholder in Gmarket sold their 14.6 million shares to eBay for $350 million as part of the agreement.  After the deal closes, eBay plans to de-list Gmarket from the NASDAQ.  However the auction company plans to spin out Skype through a separate IPO sometime in the next year.

[via Bloomberg]

Nowadays people want to join companies where in fast-paced and challenging environments. They want to make sure that they can have an impact on the company overall. Above is a video that Facebook’s recruiting division put together in HD.

The video boasts the number of photos that Facebook has to handle and how they have a low employee count. According to the video Facebook handles 2,000 photos per second which amounts to about 40 billion photos thus far. Each image uploaded has 4 versions including a thumbnail. Facebook has about 1 million active users per developer ratio at the company.

With so many executives leaving Facebook recently, a video like this becomes important to put a positive spin on the company.

AT&T Inc. (NYSE:T) wants to remain the exclusive seller of the Apple iPhone.  AT&T wants to extend the deal with Apple until 2011.  Their contract expires in 2010 and AT&T hit a goldmine with the Apple partnership.  A source with the WSJ stated that AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson is in discussions with Apple to extend the deal.

Even if Apple does not renew their contract, Stephenson stated that AT&T will invest in wireless technology.  Two thirds of their capital will be spent on wireless network investments and acquisitions over the next five years.

So far AT&T spent $18.8 billion on radio spectrums and cellphone companies.  For iPhone discounts, AT&T spent $1.3 billion.  Even last year, AT&T considered making an offer for Reliance Communications in India, but the company was asking for $30 billion.

“This business cycle is going to cycle,” stated Mr. Stephenson. “You got to make sure that you’re positioned when it cycles back out to be the leader in the industry, and to do that you have to be the leader in mobility, first and foremost.”

[via WSJ]

Smule raised $3.9 million two months ago.  Dr. Ge Wang, Assistant Professor of Computer Research in Music and Acoustics at Stanford is the co-founder of the company and their first application was a hit.  The first app is called Ocarina and now they have released their next application Leaf Trombone World Stage [iTunes link].

The Leaf Trombone is a traditional Chinese leaf instrument.  To use the application, players run their fingers across the touchscreen and blow into the iPhone microphone.  Leaf Trombone has a music box that also accompanies the music you play.  You can also download music for Leaf Trombone.  The application tells you if you hit the notes correctly with the music when blowing into the microphone.

[via Macworld]

Ashton Kutcher and Britney Spears are fighting to hit 1 million followers on Twitter. Britney currently has 912,520 followers and Ashton has 914,473. Both are competing with the CNNbrk account which tweets out breaking news on CNN.com. CNNbrk has about 946,673 followers.

If Ashton wins, Electronic Arts agreed to put the millionth follower in the next version of The Sims. Perhaps that will give people incentive to follow the That 70′s Show star. Ashton’s wife, Demi Moore has about half a million followers on Twitter, but keep in mind that she has already saved a life using the service.

[via BusinessInsider]

Thanks to tax credits and incentives Johnson Controls is revamping an old factory in Holland, Michigan in order to build batteries for hybrid cars for Ford, BMW, and Azure Dynamics.

“Battery technology is strategically important to the future of the U.S. automotive industry and the economy at large,” stated Alex Molinaroli, President of Power Solutions at Johnson Controls. “Our first U.S. plant will bring about 500 jobs to Michigan, and many additional jobs through suppliers and the businesses these employees will support. It is a key element of our broader strategy and commitment to the hybrid vehicle industry in North America.”

The cost of the renovation is about $220 million, but with tax credits the cost will end up costing $71.4 million.  This will save Johnson Controls $148.5 million.  Currently General Motors orders batteries from LG in South Korea and Chrysler orders batteries from A123 Systems in Massachusetts.

[via Green Sheet]

Google Street View remains to be one of the my most favorite services. Notably because Street View captures some of the most funniest moments on camera whether it is a guy throwing up or a man dressed like Waldo. This time Google Street View knocked down their own camera by driving under a low bridge and photographed the incident.

The bridge involved is on Merchant Street in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Check out the below screenshots:

Here is the bridge.

Here are pictures that the knocked down camera took of the Google Street View car itself. D’oh!

And the camera is back to normal position.

[Screenshots taken by CNET]

Tom Monaghan founded Domino’s Pizza in Ann Arbor, Michigan around 1960. Today Domino’s is a $400 million public company with over 8,000 stores employing over 10,000 people across the globe. With that many employees working for Domino’s, it is hard to track some of the “bad apples” that have the potential to tarnish the company’s image. It could happen at any of the stores.

In this particular Domino’s store in North Carolina, a couple of dirty employees filmed a video and uploaded it on YouTube. In the video, the Domino’s employees taint the food by sticking some of the ingredients up their nose. The Consumerist wrote about this video earlier this week. The two teenagers took down the video, but it was re-uploaded by someone that downloaded the video. Dominos’ VP of Communications Tim McIntyre reported that the franchise owners fired those two teenagers immediately.

Although I feel bad for Domino’s having to deal with this mess, I like the fact that social media was able to bring down punishment upon those who deserve it. Personally I think that just being fired is not enough of a punishment. They could just move on to another restaurant and do the same thing there. I think their names should be released and they should be banned from working at any place that serves food. Give the guy a desk job, he can put all the boogers he wants under the desk there.