Two legs cool four legs chopped

We've got the good, the bad, the ugly, the sexy and the bestial for you this week. And all thanks to a handful of dot-coms.

First up, Priceline, which has actually made money this quarter. As in profit - $2.8m to be precise. Hardly earth-shattering, but compared with the $11.7m loss it made in the same period last year, it can certainly be classed as 'good'.

Meanwhile, Scoot.com has just one month to live - unless it stumbles across a big pile of cash. In June, it cut 285 jobs, lost its CEO and abandoned European expansion plans - but despite this pruning exercise its shares have continued to plunge as investors become increasingly concerned about its impending penury. Scoot's business model should have worked online, so its current predicament is decidedly 'bad'.

Over at Webvan, things are going much, much better. Sort of. Its shares are trading at around the $400 mark, which may seem 'good'. But you may remember that Webvan went bust in July, and it's only the company's stock certificates (in mint condition) which are trading hands for such sums. The practice is akin to philately in the US: shares from historic American railroad and mining companies are particularly sought after. You can also buy Webvan watches and Webvan vans if you so wish.

The fact that Webvan's shares are now worth more than they were when the company was actually delivering groceries is, undoubtedly, 'ugly'.

And now for the interesting stuff. Lastminute.com dipped its toes into murky waters recently by selling subscriptions to Penthouse. And now it's gone the whole hog by launching a brand, spanking new sex section on its website. As well as ordering your rudey reads, you can also browse a range of inflatable husbands and wives, and investigate a range of edible underwear.

So if eating pants tickles your fancy, lastminute is your 'sexy' solution.

But the ultimate dot-com derring-do this week belongs to a Devon farmer. Suffering from Big Brother withdrawal? Fear not - now you've got Pig Brother.

Exeter agricultural type Andrew Freemantle is to broadcast the antics of his pigs in a live, round-the-clock webcast at www.pigbrother.uk.com .

The pigs' numbers will dwindle as viewers vote to eliminate their least favourite porcine contestants, proving that all animals are equal, but some are more equal than others...

Unlike the Big Brother housemates, who get their 15 weeks or so of fame before being consigned to the c-list celebrity scrapheap, the pigs have a worse fate in store: the short sharp chop treatment at the local abattoir.

The winner will be allowed to stay on the farm and breed. Lucky little piggy.

So there you have it: the good, the bad, the ugly, the sexy and the bestial. Nice.

Networking giant Cisco is now allowing employees to wear shorts to the office in an attempt to save money on air-conditioning. Seriously.

CEO John Chambers announced the scheme at a recent company meeting wearing a pair of Bermuda shorts. Thermostats at the company's Silicon Valley offices will now be fixed at 78F.

The news comes hot on the heels (or should that be 'cool on the knees'?) of one bright spark at Lucent's idea to save his employers some cash by removing three quarters of the lightbulbs from workers' cubicles.

We reckon there are better money-saving ideas out there. Share yours with other Round-Up readers by posting a reader comment at the bottom of the online version of this column here.

Forget women are from mars, women are from venus. A new survey has revealed the totally uncliched news that men are macho while women are moody.

Online recruitment outfit FirstPersonGlobal carried out research on its website which found that 72 per cent of the technology worker respondents - both male and female - branded men "arrogant sexists" who actively preserve the male dominated status quo in their companies.

Women scored highly on positive attributes, being seen as more inclusive and considerate. They are also better at multi-tasking then men. But then they are moody, flirt to gain corporate brownie points and are less likely to be fun to work with.

This rather dubious research did reveal a couple of interesting (and probably truly accurate) statistics, however: 58 per cent of men believe that women get treated equally in the office only 25 per cent of women think that.

Sixty-five per cent of men are unable to foresee the advent of complete equality in the next decade the figure for women is 90 per cent.

One female respondent to the survey said: "In my opinion, the 'old boys' network' is still alive and well and looking after its own. Most decisions at a certain level seem to be made in the gents."

Which implies this individual has actually spent time in men's toilets. Odd. We know what she means of course, but it has to be said that men hardly ever talk in toilets. It's just not the done thing.

But we do read (as do women, so I'm told). So next time you fancy taking the weight of your feet, why not take your PDA with you and catch up on silicon.com's latest headlines? Have a look at http://www.silicon.com/goto-PDA-round if that interests you.

We'll be back next Friday. Until then, why not check out just the tip of this week's news ice berg below?

The Weekly Round-Up is an equal opportunities article.