Author: Nicholas Carlson

Facebook’s new data center in Pineville, Oregon runs mostly on coal-power, according to TreeHugger.com

But other than a few environmentalists, nobody much cares.

Protesting the data-center, there’s a petition with 2,753 signatures and a Facebook group with 144 members, AllFacebook reports.

For the record, Google’s Oregon data center is hydro-powered.

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Obama will announce Monday that he wants to kill NASA’s Ares I rocket program and funnel its money (along with another $6 billion) into private space travel.

The goal is to “put NASA on a more sustainable and ambitious path to the future,” an anonymous White House news cycle-shaper told the New York Times.

This is a nice lift for some West Coast-based entrepreneurs like Amazon cofounder Jeff Bezos and PayPal cofounder Elon Musk, who have put big money into starting private space travel companies.

Meet some more of today’s winners and losers >

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• Elon Musk’s SpaceX Fails Third Launch
• Abu Dhabi Makes Its First Move To Own Outer Space
• Obama Wants To Privatize Space Travel

Apple COO Tim Cook is executive search firm Spencer Stuart’s first choice for the open CEO spot at General Motors, a reader tells us.

We have no idea whether this is true or not, but it makes sense. 

Tim would be a bold choice for GM and a clean break with the car company’s past.  Cars are vastly different than gadgets, but the magic Apple has brought to consumer product design could be just what GM needs to turn itself around.

Whether Tim would want the job is a different story (the answer is probably “no”).  Tim led Apple brilliantly for six months this year as interim CEO during Steve Jobs’s medical leave.  He’s also clearly in line for the CEO slot when Steve Jobs decides to relinquish it. 

Tim would be GM’s second C-level hire from the tech sector. Earlier this month, Microsoft CFO Chris Liddell announced he would become GM’s CFO and vice-chairman.  As our reader notes, the combination of a CEO from Apple and a CFO from Microsoft running one of America’s most iconic “old technology” companies would be interesting and ironic.

Again, this is an anonymous tip, and we have no idea whether it’s true:

I saw your recent post on Tim Cook at Apple.  I don’t know if he has been contacted yet but he is the top candidate that Spencer Stuart has identified as the next CEO of GM.  I have an inside source at Spencer Stuart.

[Interim GM CEO Edward E. Whitacre] wants the candidate to come from a company known for operational excellence, innovation and customer satisfaction and in addition he is looking for someone that has turnaround experience. It also doesn’t hurt that [Tim] has been able to work with Jobs. Whitacre does want to stay on as Chairman.  Also, Cook has been the key link to AT&T and should understand the culture that Whitacre,  [a former AT&T CEO] built.  

Will be interesting to see if he would leave Apple for this.  I don’t know him but if he wants to be a CEO it does seem he needs to leave with Jobs back.  Most interesting will be to see a CEO from Apple and a CFO from Microsoft.

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• Microsoft CFO Chris Liddell Out
• Microsoft’s Departing CFO Joins GM As CFO And Vice-Chair
• Apple COO Saves The Company, Gets $12.3 Million Stock Award