Top Items:
Mathew / mathewingram.com/work:
Let's force people to take our music — It's hard to know where to start with Universal's rumoured TotalMusic plan, which Business Week has just written about (although as Techdirt points out, Digital Music News first had the story weeks ago). Apparently the idea is to get all the record labels together …
RELATED:
Mike Masnick / Techdirt:Universal Music's Plan To Take On iTunes: Bring Back PressPlay And MusicNow!
Nate Anderson / Ars Technica:Report: Universal prepping revolutionary free music service
Discussion:
TechCrunch, Lefsetz Letter, Today @ PC World, Crave, Business Communities …, The Register and Podcasting News
David Kaplan / paidContent.org:
As Online Ad Revenue Remains Concentrated In Few Hands, Frustration Builds — With online ad spending growing more slowly, are internet ad dollars being spread too thin? Reuters put the question to a few media execs and digital agency heads who express concern about the heavy reliance on advertising as a means of support.
RELATED:
Paul Thomasch / Reuters:Ad dollars flood Web, but will they go far enough?
Discussion:
Micro Persuasion
GigaOM:
Enterprise Software's Youth Drain — By M.R. Rangaswami, publisher of SandHill.com and co-founder of Sand Hill Group — They say that youth is fleeting. In the enterprise software industry, the youth are fleeing. — One need only look at the hairlines of today's software leaders.
Chris Ziegler / Engadget Mobile:
"Deep red" iPhone in the works for AT&T? — With iPod shuffles and nanos available in a variety of shades, it only makes sense to bring the love to the iPhone too, right? AT&T's internal inventory sheet is apparently now showing iPhones in "deep red" (we probably would've gone with something …
Eric Savitz / Tech Trader Daily:
BEA To Oracle: "Your Bid Is Too Low"; This Could Get Ugly — BEA (BEAS) has issued a statement in response to Oracle's (ORCL) unsolicited $17-a-share takeover bid: and they're asserting that the offer is too low. BEA notes that the letter was sent to Oracle yesterday, before the bid was announced.
RELATED:
Henry Blodget / Silicon Alley Insider:
NYT Adds Reader Comments to Front Page! * — We're always impressed with the New York Times' (NYT) progressive use of its web site, but seeing reader comments above the fold on the Home page was still startling. Hats off to the company's web team for this smart move!
Discussion:
How To Split An Atom, Read/WriteWeb, Download Squad, muhammad.saleem, Valleywag, Mashable! and The Zeitgeist
David Kaplan / paidContent.org:
Interview: Henry Copeland, CEO, Founder of BlogAds: To Make Money At Blogging, Rein In Comments — BlogAds' CEO and founder Henry Copeland stirred up the audience at Wednesday's Networked Journalism Summit with two points about blogs and advertising. First, he told attendees of the conference …
Steve Lohr / New York Times:
As Its Stock Tops $600, Google Faces Growing Risks — Can anything stop the ascent of Google's stock? — When the company's shares pierced $600 for the first time last Monday, Wall Street analysts scrambled to jack up their price targets, most to about $700.
Discussion:
Clickety Clack
Janet Meiners / Andy Beal's Marketing Pilgrim:
Costco.com Hits the Billion Dollar Sales Mark — Internet Retailer.com reports that Costco Wholesale has reached a billion in online sales. This year their online sales grew by about 39% to $1.22 billion. Last year they were at $880 million. They reported net income of $1.08 billion …
Merlin Mann / 43 Folders:
Geek Throwdown: How to sync two or more Macs? — Enter the Octagon — Here's an experimental new feature: The Throwdown. Take a problem that lots of people face and tell us your personal favorite way to deal with it — in as much detail and with as much persuasion as you can muster.
Georgina Prodhan / Reuters:
Google, Random House move closer on book search — FRANKFURT (Reuters) - Random House, the world's biggest book publisher, is considering joining a book-search project run by Google, once considered an arch-enemy by the paper publishing industry. — The two parties are talking to one another …
Edo / Pink Tentacle:
Brain-computer interface for Second Life — While recent developments in brain-computer interface (BCI) technology have given humans the power to mentally control computers, nobody has used the technology in conjunction with the Second Life online virtual world — until now.
Tom Krazit / CNET News.com:
ATA Airlines detains passenger for using iPhone in 'airplane mode' — Apparently putting your iPhone in airplane mode is not the digital equivalent of returning your seatback to the upright position. — A flight attendant for ATA Airlines recently asked a flier watching a movie midflight …
Erick Schonfeld / TechCrunch:
Exclusive: MapQuest Plays Catch-Up With Launch of Beta — AOL's MapQuest may be the market-leading map site by a long shot (with 50 million monthly visitors versus 30 million for Google Maps), but it is still playing catch-up when it comes to features, functionality, and mash-up capabilities.
Saul Hansell / Bits:
LinkedIn Plans to Open Up in a Closed Sort of Way — Dan Nye, the chief executive of LinkedIn, has looked closely at the frenzy around Facebook, and has made a crucial decision: There will be no food fights on LinkedIn. — Yes, he's rushing to copy the electronic underpinnings …
Discussion:
WebProNews, Profy.Com, Between the Lines, All Facebook, Read/WriteWeb, CenterNetworks, muhammad.saleem, CNET News.com, Valleywag and Mashable!
Matthew Karnitschnig / Wall Street Journal:
Business Magazines' Issues: Ad Slump, Web, New Rival — For many decades, publishers of business magazines such as BusinessWeek, Fortune and Forbes thrived by following a simple formula: Target upscale executives and sell ad space to auto makers, financial-services firms and technology companies.
