Top Items:
Microsoft:
Microsoft to Acquire aQuantive, Inc. — Company details plans to build Internet-wide advertising platform for advertisers, publishers and ad agencies. — Microsoft Corp. today announced it will acquire aQuantive, Inc., for $66.50 per share in an all-cash transaction valued at approximately $6 billion.
Discussion:
CNET News.com, Publishing 2.0, Valleywag, Wall Street Journal, Business Week, Blackfriars' Marketing, Ars Technica, ContextWeb Internet …, GigaOM, Software as services, Tech Trader Daily, mathewingram.com/work, Deal Journal, Between the Lines, Deep Jive Interests, PodTech Network, All about Microsoft, Read/WriteWeb, CenterNetworks, Techdirt, Things That, Epicenter, Sadagopan's weblog …, HipMojo.com, Microsoft News Tracker, Search Engine Land, Mark Evans, dailywireless.org, Incremental Blogger, Don Dodge on The Next …, Screenwerk, PSFK Trend: PSFK, SearchViews, 901am, Digital Inspiration, The Globe and Mail, Dare Obasanjo aka Carnage4Life, Search Engine Watch Blog, LiveSide, StartupSquad.com, Channel 9, Peter O'Kelly's Reality Check, PC4Media and Search Engine Roundtable
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Michael Arrington / TechCrunch:
Microsoft Pays $6 billion for aQuantive: Massive Ad Network Consolidation Is Occuring — Breaking: Microsoft is acquiring advertising network aQuantive, the parent company to Avenue A | Razorfish, Atlas and DRIVEpm, for roughly $6 billion in an all-cash transaction, the company said this morning.
Nik Cubrilovic / TechCrunch:
Microsoft Launches Popfly: Mashup App Creator Built On Silverlight — Microsoft will announce the private beta launch of Popfly this morning, a new Silverlight application that allows users to create mashups, widgets and other applications using a very cool and easy to use web-based graphical interface.
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Ryan Stewart / The Universal Desktop:
Popfly - Mashup the web with Silverlight — Disclosure: This morning I announced that I'm working for Adobe. While I haven't officially started, consider me an Adobe employee for all intents and purposes. I have the disclosure statement at the bottom of the page, but I'll probably run …
Sam Sethi / Vecosys:
Rumour: Google to buy Feedburner — I have just heard from a VERY trusted source that Google is buying Feedburner in order to get into the rapidly evolving RSS Ad market. The delay in announcing the deal, I am told is solely due to the delay in closing out the DoubleClick deal.
Discussion:
CenterNetworks, SEO Book.com, Deep Jive Interests, Mashable!, BeyondVC, Search Engine Journal, StartupSquad.com, Google Operating System, Bloggers Blog, alarm:clock, Search Engine Land, Chip Griffin, broadstuff, Andy Beal's Marketing Pilgrim, Good Morning Silicon Valley, Google Blogoscoped, Digital Alchemy, Ken McGuire On The Web and The Webpreneur
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Valleywag:
Rumormonger: Google buying Feedburner for about $100m — On the surface, this looks like a straightforward story. Google is tightening its grip on text advertising with the acquisition of Feedburner. We've confirmed yesterday's speculation on the Mountain View search engine's latest deal …
Discussion:
parislemon
Om Malik / GigaOM:
Now that Feedburner Story.... Every so often we hear about Chicago-based FeedBurner, the RSS remixer/syndicator is getting bought by someone. This morning, Sam Sethi pointed out that Feedburner was in talks with Google. Valleywag says they have a confirmation and the price range is in the $100 million ballpark.
Direct2Dell:
Dell Tablet PC — There's been some chatter about a Latitude Tablet PC coming from Dell. Check out what Jeff Clarke has to say. — View Video — Format: flv — Duration: 0:58
Discussion:
Gadget Lab, Gizmodo, Mobility Site, Windows-Now.com, Ministry of Tech, CNET News.com, Engadget, GottaBeMobile.com, Neowin.net and Digital Inspiration
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Kevin C. Tofel / jkOnTheRun:
Dell Latitude Tablet PC spotted on Dell's blog — Let the rumors subside: Dell will indeed have a Tablet PC this year and you can see it showcased in a short video right on the Direct2Dell blog! My first impressions: this looks light and very thin, possibly the thinnest convertible yet!
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TechSpot News
Smaran / TorrentFreak:
The Pirate Bay to Launch YouTube Competitor — Some believed the video site might evolve from the idea that is Playable.com — a free music site started by Brokep of The Pirate Bay and the Swedish rock band Lamont — that aims at compensating artists directly and cutting out record companies.
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Brokep / The Pirate Bay:
Oh some problems and a treat! — We did some stupid stuff to put up some more security, so we had to recover some stuff. Some user accounts might have bad passwords now, so try the old one (those we f**ked up, we put old ones on from a previous backup) or try recovering it.
Discussion:
Epicenter
Ryan Block / Engadget:
Apple MacBook, MacBook Pro screens subject of class-action lawsuit — Looks like Apple is about to face its next date in court: a San Diego filing by private citizens Fred Greaves and Dave Gatley calls for a class-action lawsuit, accusing Cupertino of deceptive advertising with regard …
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Mike Masnick / Techdirt:Netflix Sued For Violating Antitrust Law With Its Patents
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Slashdot
Eric Eldon / VentureBeat:
Facebook growing, but more roadkill coming? — Facebook is growing quickly, adding between 100,000 and 150,000 new users per day, the company tells us, with the highest growth rates coming from abroad. — Particularly noteworthy is its traction in Canada, where it has more than 2 million active users …
Discussion:
Deep Jive Interests
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Jacqui Cheng / Ars Technica:
Origami 2.0 to be thinner, smaller, and (maybe) less expensive — Microsoft is working on a new set of specifications for its Origami project. Microsoft development manager Vikram Madan spoke this week at the Windows Hardware Engineering Conference in Los Angeles about some of the specs …
Paul Kedrosky's Infectious Greed:
Clearing Up a Myth About L'Affaire Apple/Engadget — While I think Engadget is a great site, and Ryan has already stabbed himself enough in apologizing for his misstep in running as news a spoofed internal Apple email, he and others are still missing an important point on this nutty episode.
J. Alex Halderman / Freedom to Tinker:
AACS Updated, Broken Again — We predicted in past posts that AACS, the encryption system intended to protect HD-DVD and Blu-ray movies, would suffer a gradual meltdown from its inability to respond quickly enough to attacks. Like most DRM, AACS depends on the secrecy of encryption keys built into hardware and software players.
Jon Healey / Los Angeles Times:
Nabbing (some) camcorders — Spider-Man 3 photo courtesy of Sony Pictures — The movie industry's assault on piracy in theaters has intensified in the past couple of years, and the most quantifiable result is a dramatic increase in the number of people stopped in the act of filming a movie.
