Top Items:
Catherine Holahan / Business Week:
Sony BMG Lets the Music Play — The last of the major labels finally throws in the towel on DRM, and prepares to fight Apple for valuable download revenues — In a move that would mark the end of a digital music era, Sony BMG Music Entertainment is finalizing plans to sell songs without …
Discussion:
Download Squad, Engadget, Podcasting News, TechCrunch, Mashable!, Silicon Alley Insider, bit-tech.net, Blackfriars' Marketing and WebProNews
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Ken Fisher / Ars Technica:
Lone holdout in DRMed music recommends DRM circumvention — With three of the big four music labels abandoning DRM, that leaves Sony as the big holdout. That's right, the same company that brought you the Sony rootkit scandal is also the last of the major labels to repent and abandon their DRMed ways.
Thomas Claburn / InformationWeek:
Google Patent Imagines Robots Indexing The Grocery Aisle — The two computer scientists behind “recognizing text in images” search technology also worked on Google Street View and Google Book Search. — A patent application filed by Google with the World Intellectual Property Organization …
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wipo.int:
(WO/2008/003095) RECOGNIZING TEXT IN IMAGES — Publication Number: — WO/2008/003095 — International Application No.: — PCT/US2007/072578 — Publication Date: — International Filing Date: — Int. Class.: — G06F 17/30 (2006.01) — Applicants:
Paul Buchheit:
Should Gmail, Yahoo, and Hotmail block Facebook? — Apparently Facebook will ban you (or at least Robert Scoble) if you attempt to extract your friend's email addresses from the service. — Automated access is a difficult issue for any web service, so I won't argue with their decision — it's their service and they own you.
Discussion:
mathewingram.com/work, Virtual Economics, WebProNews, bub.blicio.us, Todd Watson, Like It Matters, Valleywag, Marc's Voice, VentureBeat and MediaVidea
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Robert Scoble / Scobleizer:Facebook lets me back in... I just received this email.
Discussion:
PDA, Get Engagd, Alec Saunders .LOG, social media and green horses, FactoryCity, TechCrunch, broadstuff, The Secret Diary of Steve Jobs, 901am, Techdirt, ZefHemel.com, All Facebook, Global Neighbourhoods, The Stalwart, Mashable!, Valleywag, Elliott C. Back, larry borsato, Marketing.fm, rexblog.com, Between the Lines, Facebook Applications … and LucaFiligheddu.com
Fury.com:
Today is My Last Day at Google — After a life-changing four and a half years of working with the most talented group of people I have ever met, I've decided to take the plunge and do it all over again, working for a very small start-up. Today is my last day at the Big G.
John Markoff / New York Times:
Intel Leaves Group Backing Education PCs — SAN FRANCISCO — Intel said Thursday that it had chosen to withdraw from the One Laptop Per Child educational computer organization, which it joined in July after years of public squabbling between Intel's chairman, Craig R. Barrett, and the group's founder, Nicholas P. Negroponte.
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Dean Takahashi / Tech Talk with Dean Takahashi:Intel pulls out of One Laptop Per Child group
Discussion:
CrunchGear, Electronista, Between the Lines, TeleRead, PC World, Hardware 2.0, The Register, Digital Trends, Bloomberg, CNET News.com, Wall Street Journal, Gizmodo, Ars Technica, Engadget and Slashdot
Mary Kathleen Flynn / Behind The Money Blog:
Leah Culver, 25, writes the code that powers Pownce — Technorati — Facebook — Digg — How does a 25-year-old computer science major from the University of Minnesota wind up as a co-founder of one of Silicon Valley's most closely watched startups?
Discussion:
CenterNetworks
Xbox.com:
An Open Letter from Marc Whitten about Xbox LIVE this Holiday — Dear Xbox LIVE Members: — During this past holiday season you helped us break a number of Xbox LIVE records. This included our largest sign-up of new members to Xbox LIVE in our 5 year history and just yesterday you broke …
Discussion:
Kotaku, Primotech, Xbox 360 Fanboy, Windows Connected, Engadget, Joystiq and Xbox Live's Major Nelson
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Om Malik / GigaOM:
A Heart-to-Heart with GigaOM Readers — Happy New Year. As you may have noticed, my byline hasn't been up on the site for a few days. That's because the holidays weren't exactly my most jolly. — I had a heart attack on Dec. 28. I was able to walk into the hospital for treatment …
Discussion:
Screenwerk, VoIP Watch, THE BLOGGING JOURNALIST, ComparisonEngines.com, TechCrunch, Loic Le Meur Blog, WebMetricsGuru, LucaFiligheddu.com, Between the Lines, Master of 500 Hats, WebProNews, Geek Speaker, FoundRead, atmaspheric, Marketing.fm, VentureBeat, IP Democracy, Silicon Alley Insider, Epicenter, The Crunchies, The Jason Calacanis Weblog, BoomTown, bub.blicio.us, Digital Common Sense, Valleywag, The Stalwart, Venture Chronicles, Furrier.org and Scripting News
Alex Veiga / Associated Press:
U.S. Album Sales Down, Digital Sales Up — LOS ANGELES (AP) — U.S. album sales plunged 9.5 percent last year from 2006, continuing a downward trend for the recording industry, despite a 45 percent surge in the sale of digital tracks, according to figures released Thursday.
Greg Sandoval / CNET News.com:
RIAA shreds Washington Post story in debate — An executive with the music industry's lobbying group engaged in a verbal sparring match on Thursday with the Washington Post columnist who alleges that the organization is trying to outlaw the practice of copying CDs to a computer.
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Quentin / Rogue Amoeba:
Live Disc — Every time we exhibit at Macworld Expo, we hand out CDs with trial copies of all our software on them. And every time, we face the same problem, of how best to create these discs such that the software on them is up to date with the latest we have.
Joseph Weisenthal / paidContent.org:
Monster Acquires Affinity Labs, Developer Of Vertical Career Sites, For $61 Million — Online jobs firm Monster Worldwide has acquired SF-based Affinity Labs, a developer of community sites centered around various vocations, for $61 million in cash. Examples of its portfolio include Policelink.com …
Tony Smith / The Register:
Sony confirms Skype coming to PSP — There's no doubt now that Skype is coming to the Sony PlayStation Portable - Sony's own website, updated to preview next week's Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas, admits as much. — “Call friends, talk trash to fellow gamers or catch …
