Roundup: Ad market reset, Windows 7 pricing, Pogue’s voicemail crusade continues

Online advertising stops its nose-dive — Second-quarter global ad revenues, at $7.864 billion, were down 3.4 percent from a year ago. But admit it: After the past year, a 3.4 percent drop almost feels like growth.Is this a “reset” of base level from which the ad market can now grow again? TechCrunch’s Erick Schonfeld plots the line and explains the economist-speak. Erick, I hate to be all VentureBeat fussy, but do you have more granular data to work with? I’d love to see week-to-week revenues, rather than a plot that jumps in three-month increments. Really, why aren’t we able to keep a real-time ticker on our screens by now?
How to profit from Bubble 3.0 – “Don’t be afraid of a bubble” is the first big step, says Wall Street Journal writer James Altucher. He offers his educated guesses on where the next bubble might appear, and how people in different roles can profit from it.
Windows 7 pricing is higher than home buyers had probably hoped — A box of Windows 7 Home Premium will cost about $150. Upgrade packages will be in the $80-90 range. Buying made simple: You want the Premium edition. The Basic edition lacks the faster, slicker Aero interface that uses your desktop or laptop’s graphics chip —  yes, your laptop has one. The Professional and Ultimate editions have office-IT-network tools and applications that only your boss should pay for. Stick with Premium, which really should be called Normal, and you’ll be fine. Ed Bott at ZD has the long version.
Windows Mobile, meanwhile, has been kicked out of Motorola in favor of Android - Om Malik talked to Motorola co-CEO Sanjay Jha, who explained that Motorolla has decided that the way for a smartphone handset maker to succeed is to pick one OS and focus everything on it.
David Pogue’s Take Back the Beep campaign continues — The New York Times’ Broadway-trained gadget reviewer has struck a nerve with his attack on “the obnoxious, drawn-out, 15-second instructions that Verizon, Sprint, AT&T and T-Mobile tack on to your own voice mail greeting” in order to run up your monthly minutes usage.
Here’s the cheat sheet on which key to press to skip past voicemail intros on America’s four major carriers.
Verizon: *
Sprint: 1
T-Mobile: #
AT&T: #
Pogue today recounts the responses he got from readers, who seemed unusually polite,  and from wireless carrier PR people, some of whom seemed to barely understand their own voicemail systems.
Space Shuttle Endeavor puts in a perfect landing — Seven astronauts spent the last sixteen days docked to the International Space Station, building an addition to Japan’s billion-dollar lab. Shuttle landings are cool. While the Shuttle is smaller than an airliner, it comes in a lot faster — 215 mph rather than 160 — and with its nose high in the air. Then it pops out a 40-foot parachute to brake itself to 110 mph before rolling to a stop.