Chinese search giant Baidu has lost its CFO under mysterious circumstances, but has won a major piracy case.

In a statement, Baidu said that CFO Shawn Wang had died in “an accident” whilst on holidays in China. No further details on the death were provided. Baidu shares dropped $9.07 following the news.

On a more positive note a Beijing appeals court ruled that Baidu was not guilty of copyright infringement for posting links to websites that offer illegal music downloads. Baidu offers music search on its front page and the service is often cited as being one of the core reasons behind its success in China over Google, who does not offer a similar music search facility. Yahoo China lost a similar case December 21.

(via AFP/ NY Times)

Crunch Network: CrunchGear drool over the sexiest new gadgets and hardware.

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Read full story for latest details.

Read full story for latest details.

A new piece of software by Pointui launched this afternoon that makes Windows Mobile devices a little bit more iPhone-like.

The CrunchGear team isn’t answering emails or phone calls (It’s their job to test this stuff, but I imagine they are all drinking heavily somewhere celebrating the New Year), and I don’t have a Windows Mobile device in my house (they’ve been banned), so we haven’t tested it out yet. See the video below and screen shots, and if you are able to get it up and running, let us know what you think.

Why in the world all you people on Windows devices don’t just go out and buy an iPhone is a mystery to me. Yeah, Exchange Server and all that, I know. Anyway, perhaps now with Pointui you can be a little bit more like the cool kids and still sync with Outlook from the office.

Crunch Network: CrunchBoard because it’s time for you to find a new Job2.0

Stocks fizzled Monday, limping through the last trading day of 2007 but will close the year with respectable gains.

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Stocks fizzled Monday, limping through the last trading day of 2007 but will close the year with respectable gains.

When I sat down for my annual review of what I’ve written over the past year, something jumped out at me. Usually, I write about widely diversified subjects. But in 2007, I devoted an inordinate number of columns to the shenanigans of leveraged buyout firms and the attempts by the world’s central banks to rescue financial markets.

Stocks fizzled Monday afternoon, limping through the last trading day of the year but, for the year, markets are set to see respectable gains.