Top Items:
Duncan Riley / TechCrunch:
Could Facebook Become The Next Microsoft? — Amongst all the noise today over Facebook's acquisition of Parakey, little has been said on what the acquisition means for Facebook in the broader sense. Robert Scoble says that Facebook is the new data black hole, noting that many of his favorite apps are now appearing on Facebook.
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Dave McClure / Master of 500 Hats:
Kottke is wrong — Facebook isn't AOL; it's Visual Basic. — For about a year or two, i've been meaning to do a followup piece on how Google, Microsoft, & Yahoo all screwed the pooch by not building out a REAL web application OS worth developing apps for, but i'm too late. — GYM is Old & Busted.
Justin Smith / Inside Facebook:
Breaking: Facebook Acquires Parakey — Just received word from Facebook that the company has made its first acquisition: Parakey, a startup founded by Blake Ross and Joe Hewitt, co-founders of Mozilla Firefox. Ross and Hewitt will join Facebook immediately to work on the Facebook Platform.
Discussion:
WebProNews, Between the Lines, VentureBeat, Digital Trends, Valleywag, Mashable!, FaceReviews.com, BloggingStocks, GigaOM, All Facebook, InfoWorld, franticindustries, CNET News.com, Brij Singh's One More Idea, WinBeta, TECH.BLORGE.com, Profy.Com, The Universal Desktop, Insider Chatter, alarm:clock, Cloudy Thinking, Compiler, HipMojo.com and paidContent.org
Michael Arrington / TechCrunch:
FaceBook's First Acquisition: Parakey — Their first acquisition: Facebook has bought Parakey, the yet-to-launch "web operating system" created by Firefox co-founders Blake Ross and Joe Hewitt. The price isn't being disclosed, but Facebook should be issuing a press release this afternoon.
Discussion:
JoeHewitt.com, A VC, All Facebook, MarketingVOX, Susan Mernit's Blog, Read/WriteWeb, Neomeme, CostPerNews and Rev2.org
BBC:
Facebook buys start-up Parakey — Social networking site Facebook has bought internet start-up, Parakey, run by two of the co-creators of the popular web browser, Mozilla Firefox. — Parakey is described as a platform that "bridges the gap between information on the web and the desktop".
Discussion:
Dave Naylor a UK SEO
San Francisco Chronicle:
Google exec's past returns with a demand for payment — A top Google executive, David Drummond, has agreed to pay $700,000 to settle a complaint by federal regulators that accused him of helping to misstate the financial results of his previous employer, SmartForce.
Discussion:
Andy Beal's Marketing Pilgrim
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David A. Utter / WebProNews:
Google Lawyer Settles With SEC — David Drummond will pay the Securities and Exchange Commission almost $700,000 to settle their claims against him stemming from his work with a technology training firm. … We used to call this "no blood, no foul" when we played basketball on the playground.
Discussion:
PC World
Duncan Riley / TechCrunch:
YouTube: Now With Customizable Player — YouTube has launched a new "custom player" feature that allows users to customize embedded YouTube videos. — Users are able to customize player features including the name of the player, color theme, layout (a standard layout or one with related videos to the right), and content.
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Aoife White / Associated Press:
EU OKs German online search-engine grant — BRUSSELS, Belgium - The European Union on Thursday authorized Germany to give $165 million for research on Internet search-engine technologies that could someday challenge U.S. search giant Google Inc. — The Theseus research project …
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irconnect.com:
Ask.com to Give People Unmatched Privacy Control — Ask.com(R), a leading search engine and wholly-owned business of IAC (Nasdaq: IACI), today announced it will soon be implementing a new product called AskEraser that will offer its searchers unmatched control over their privacy when searching for information on the Web.
Discussion:
Search Engine Journal, Compiler, Internet Marketing Monitor, Webware.com, TechConsumer, 901am and HipMojo.com
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Brian Ashcraft / Kotaku:
Busted: Unreal Engine 3, Half-Baked, Broken and Late? — At Sony's E307 presser, Jack Tretton stood on stage, announced Epic's Unreal Tournament III as a PS3 exclusive and said that Sony was working closely with Epic to "adjust" the Unreal Engine for the PS3 so that it reaches the "best of its potential."
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John Biggs / CrunchGear:
Class Action Suit Against Microsoft Alleges XBox 360 Skwatches Disks, Makes Baby Saaad! — InformationWeek is reporting that two California residents, Christine Moskowitz and Dan Wood, are seeking over $5 million in damages for XBox 360 owners. They allege that the big bad game machines …
Discussion:
Inquirer
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Jack Ewing / Business Week:
Why Nokia Is Leaving Moto in the Dust — Phones for high- and low-end consumers, a great supply chain, and lots of cash—the Finnish company has it all (except the iPhone) — Pop singer Alicia Keys and Ramkishen Pyarelal, proprieter of a Mumbai tea stall, may not have a lot in common.
Linda Haugsted / Multichannel News:
CBS Aims to Spread Web Content — Broadcast Network Targets 400 Sites by Fall — CBS television content will be available through 400 sites on the Internet by the fall, according to executives from the broadcast network's interactive division. — "CBS is al about open, nonexclusive partnerships …
Paul Miller / Engadget:
iPhone says "Hello World," here come the 3rd party apps — If there wasn't a vast, cold expanse of internet in the way, we could just hug those iPhone Dev Wiki folks. Apparently a particularly dedicated hacker who goes by "Nightwatch" has compiled and launched the iPhone's very first independent …
Discussion:
digg
Ryan Singel / Threat Level:
Nearly Ten Percent of Companies Have Fired Bloggers, Survey Claims — Nearly ten percent of companies have fired an employee for violating corporate blogging or message board policies, and 19 percent have disciplined an employee for the same infractions, according to a new survey from Proofpoint, a messaging security company.
Chris Taylor / Business 2.0:
The Google backlash begins — The Internet search giant is having a rough week — and not just because it missed Wall Street earnings forecast. Business 2.0's Chris Taylor suggests four steps the company should take now to stem the fallout. — (Business 2.0 Magazine) …
Jonathan Richards / Times of London:
Digital DNA could finger Harry Potter leaker — A few lines of 'digital DNA' could allow the publishers of Harry Potter to find and finger the person apparently responsible for leaking the final adventures of the boy wizard. — A leaked version of what is claimed to be the latest Harry Potter novel …
