Comcast cleared one more hurdle last week in it’s bid to acquire control of NBC Universal. FCC chairman Julius Genachowski gave the deal his blessing as long as they agreed to certain conditions. Conditions that certainly took the merry out of Hulu’s Christmas.

Says the Wall Street Journal:

According to people close to the FCC negotiations, those conditions would require that Comcast make NBC Universal and its other Comcast-owned video content available to pay-TV competitors at reasonable, nondiscriminatory terms. He also wants to impose conditions that would require Comcast to offer NBC Universal programming to other online video providers.

Right now, Hulu is the preferred carrier of all NBC programming online. They do syndicate out the video feeds to other third party sites, but they still get a piece of the pie and control of what and where it goes.

Sometimes, merger and acquisition rumors are juicy, thrilling, with a sense of mystery.

Other times, they’re a lame duck and you wonder why anyone–let alone Reuters–would waste the time writing the story.

Exhibit A:

Exclusive: AOL mulls breakup, then merger with Yahoo

Ooh, that’s a BIG story, right? AOL, trying to reinvent itself and Yahoo, looking at a boatload of options to survive.

This is a huge story for a Monday in December. Let’s examine the “smoke” to this “fire” shall we?

…The plans are still in the exploratory stage…

Oh, OK. But I am sure the two sides are deep in talks, right?

…and Yahoo has not been contacted, the sources said…

Oh well, I’m sure Reuters has someone reliable that can be quoted here.

eBay took another step today toward becoming Amazon.com and away from the collectibles auction site we all fell for more than ten years ago when they bought Milo.com, a website that locates in-stock merchandise on the local level.

According to Business Insider, eBay payed $75 million for the company and they seem to think it’s a good buy. It may be because, as we all know,  when it comes to deals and shopping, local is everything these days. Local isn’t even a buzzword anymore, it’s a god marketers must bow down to every morning and I don’t like it.

I think someone at Google might have had a little too much spiked apple cider over Thanksgiving, because rumors are heating up that the search giant just acquired online coupon service Groupon for $2.5 billion!

According to VatorNews…

Google has just purchased Groupon for $2.5 billion, according to an unnamed insider who spoke with VatorNews.  Neither Google nor Groupon could be reached for comment to confirm the report, but Vator’s source is reliable and the report falls in line with the recent string of Groupon acquisition rumors.

If that is true, then Groupon might just be a bigger acquisition than the monstrous purchase of YouTube back in 2006. Not only is the purchase price about $1B more, but unlike YouTube at the time, Groupon is said to be raking in as much as $50 million a month!

Claire Atkinson of the New York Post says Facebook Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg and AOL CEO Tim Armstrong are thinking about going into business together. While it’s pretty clear what Facebook brings to the table, what could AOL possibly have to offer that would be worth a swap? Once the only game in town when it came to social media on the web, AOL is now an aging brand name that means nothing to users under forty.

Says Atkinson, it’s AOL’s online ad marketing mojo that is of interest to Facebook, and it’s enough for the popular kid on the playground to consider hanging out with the nerd.

“Think of Tim Armstrong’s former role running ad sales for Google and think of where Facebook needs help.”

“We met for dinner in Chicago. We liked each other.  Our companies had very complementary strengths.  One thing led to another.”

Sounds like an influential CEO confessing to an elicit affair, but it’s really VigLink CEO Oliver Roup talking about how his company happened to acquire rival DrivingRevenue this past Friday. It began with an email from Revenue’s Raymond Lyle and Jack Bafia saying they should talk. That was in May, so it was quite a rush to the alter. Says Roup;

“We’re very excited to be joining forces. Ray is going to lead the sales and merchant relationship team and run our Chicago office. Jack will be moving to San Francisco to assume leadership of the product team. Everyone else is keeping their job as well.  They’ve all made a big bet on the future of the combined business. They are doubling down, not cashing out.”

Holy smack in the face Batman! Yahoo Japan just signed a 2-year deal with Google!

Yes, with Google! Not, Bing!

Before the word “mutiny” jumps to your prefrontal cortex–your “mind” for the rest of us–you need to know this: Yahoo holds only a 35% stake in Yahoo Japan, so the search engine couldn’t put its foot down and insist that Bing be the search engine of choice.

Still, what an embarrassment! I mean, Yahoo Japan basically just told the world that its US sibling has made a terrible mistake and it’s not prepared to make the same one!

Of course, Yahoo is having none of that, releasing its own statement on the deal: