The bad U.S. economy didn’t stop consumers from emptying their wallets on Black Friday. comScore reports Black Friday online spending in 2011 increased 26 percent from $648 million last year, to $816 million. Black Friday also was the most profitable day of the year for online stores. comScore believes Cyber Monday spending will be even greater than Black Friday.

A common theme for retailers this year is to show their hands early. The economy is in the toilet, and spending isn’t expected to be stellar this year. That’s one of the reasons why stores such as Walmart are pushing out their deals early. If customers are going to spend money this holiday season, Walmart wants to make sure you hear about their deals well ahead of Black Friday. Walmart has placed a number of items on sale through its website. We’ve combed through the products to bring you some of the best deals.

As promised, the 4G Samsung Infuse is now on sale at AT&T. The feature set reads like a list of what’s hot: 4G, 4.5″ Super AMOLED Plus touchscreen, Android 2.2 and an 8MP camera. Samsung claims this phone to be the thinnest 4G smartphone on the planet. The phone is available for online sales at more »

If you love Pandora for streaming music, there’s a new reason to love the service: comedy. The content provider is adding comedy from over 700 comics to its offering. Pandora says over 10,000 clips will be available starting today. Pandora is one of the darlings of the tech world. You can find Pandora on TVs, more »

If you are still looking for a lower price on the HTC Thunderbolt, another option to consider should be LetsTalk as they have a nice (albeit temporary) price cut in effect. For those wondering the break down, that comes after a $55 LetsTalk instant discount from their regular price of $229.99. But really, the bottom more »

Slide this to the interesting column: Google is in the process of buying fflick a service that marries Twitter to movie reviews. It is not immediately clear why Google is picking up the service whether for the what the company did or the people that work for the company. What is clear is Google found more »

Yesterday, Netflix announced a brand new streaming only plan as well as a $1 price increase on the lowest plan to get streaming plus DVDs by mail. The price changes will take effect on billing statements dated after Jan. 2, 2011. Within the hour Netflix made this announcement, I had lowered my plan. Streaming has more »

SugarSync has officially announced their latest new feature — multi-user sync. “SugarSync Inc., makers of the award-winning SugarSync file sync, backup and sharing service, today announced the ability for users to instantly sync folders and files between people. The new feature leverages SugarSync’s flexible structure to enable users to work the way they always work, more »

When everyone first learned about the Boxee set-top back in 2009, we were all equally excited about the the web video universal catch-all to be one plug integrated with our TVs. Placement of the device is obvious and will be a direct competitor with refangled Apple TV. As initially anticipated, the upcoming Boxee with not more »

Pandora is now calling the tune, or tunes as the case may be. The company is adding users like mad, adding 20 million, yes million, users since December of ’09. More over, the company that most people stream music for free is now profitable. How is that possible? Like Netflix, it is pursuing a path more »