Top Items:
Richard Jones / Last.fm:
Free the Music — A few days ago we sent out some cryptic invitations to a press conference in New York that Felix and Martin are presiding over. We've had fun in the office reading the rumors and speculation, but it's time to spill the beans: — As of today, you can play full-length tracks …
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Joseph Weisenthal / paidContent.org:
@ Last.fm Announcement: Free On-Demand Music Platform; CBS To Ramp Up Promotion — I'm here at Studio 19 at CBS (NYSE: CBS) headquarters, as Last.fm unveils its new direction: a free on-demand music streaming platform. Some quick details, from a press release that's just been passed around:
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PR Newswire:
Last.fm Launches Largest Global Free-On-Demand Music Platform — CBS Owned Social Music Network to Offer Free Streaming of Full-length Recordings From All 4 Major Record Labels and More Than 150,000 Independent Labels and ArtistsUnsigned Artists Also Given Opportunity to Earn Revenue Through Revolutionary New “Artist Royalty” Service
Jon Fortt / Big Tech:
Apple turns tech stocks sour — Apple reported earnings that beat analyst estimates on strong sales of iMacs, laptops and iPhones. But its cautious outlook led investors to slam the stock Wednesday morning, and take much of the Nasdaq down with it. — Why?
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Marshall Kirkpatrick / ReadWriteWeb:
Microsoft Joining DataPortability.org — Chris Saad, Chairman of the Data Portability Working Group, confirmed to me this morning that Microsoft's David Treadwell, a VP at Windows Live, will be joining the organization. Microsoft is expected to make a formal announcement in the coming days.
Om Malik / GigaOM:
WordPress.com Creator Raises $29.5M — Matt Mullenweg, founder of Automattic and creator of open-source blogging system WordPress, stopped by my apartment earlier this week. Matt, who is one of my closest friends, brought his Texan sense of humor and all-around good cheer …
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Devin Coldewey / CrunchGear:
Virgin Galactic reveals SpaceShipTwo, plans open-source starships — Burt Rutan and Richard Branson are doing their “deep pocketed space explorer” thing again. They've revealed the second version of their suborbital spacecraft, aptly called “SpaceShipTwo” and pictured above, presumably via a cell phone camera at the event.
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Robert Scoble / Scobleizer:
What to do if you're laid off in 2008 recession — It's sad to hear about layoffs at companies like Yahoo. Right now it seems like a bad time to be laid off. I'm here to offer some hope. — I laid myself off in February 2002. Remember that time? It was far worse than what we've seen so far in the economic turmoil of 2008.
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Deep Jive Interests
Robin Sidel / Wall Street Journal:
Cheer Up, Ben: Your Economy Isn't As Bad as This One — In the Make-Believe World Of ‘Second Life,’ Banks Are Really Collapsing — In the real world, banks are reeling from the subprime-mortgage mess. In the online game Second Life, a shutdown of the make-believe banking system is causing real-life havoc for thousands of people.
Donald Melanson / Engadget:
Southwest Airlines to test in-flight WiFi via satellite — It's taken a while, but it looks like Southwest Airlines is the latest (and no doubt far from the last) to jump on the in-flight WiFi bandwagon although, as with most, it's still quite a ways from rolling out the service across the board.
Motorola:
Motorola Announces Fourth-Quarter and Full-Year Sales and Earnings — Fourth-quarter sales of $9.65 billion — Fourth-quarter GAAP earnings from continuing operations of $0.05 per share, including net charges of $0.09 per share from items highlighted below
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Charles Cooper / CNET News.com:
Take your tech recession and stuff it — newsmaker Like a lot of technology CEOs these days, Seagate's Bill Watkins finds himself frequently asked whether the world as we know it is coming to an end—or something like that. — What with regular triple-digit losses on the Dow Jones …
Laurel Wentz / AdAge:
Publicis, Google to Exchange Execs — Companies Plan to Share Talent, Collaborate to Develop New Products — NEW YORK (AdAge.com) — Publicis Groupe and Google are collaborating to develop new products and tools and exchange talent by embedding executives in each others' companies.
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Brian Lam / Gizmodo:
Sony DSC-W170, DSC-W150, DSC-W120: Regular Point and Shoots — Sony's W series cameras are their midline point and shoots in feature and size. Best feature: Like the T300, it has a smile shutter mode which snaps the show when the subject grins. The W170 has a 10.1mp rating with 28-140mm 5x Carl Zeiss lens.
Discussion:
Electronista
Don Reisinger / The Digital Home:
Why the MPAA and RIAA can't stand college students — According to a recent report from the Associated Press, the Motion Picture Association of America—Hollywood's antipiracy wing—admitted to releasing data that was not only factually incorrect, it grossly overstated the impact college students have on the movie industry's losses.
AT&T:
AT&T Boosts Bandwidth Choices and Speed with 10 Mbps Offer for U-verse Customers — Millions of consumers now have a new option to keep them surfing in the fast lane with the nation's leading provider of broadband services. AT&T Inc. (NYSE:T) has announced plans to offer AT&T Yahoo! High Speed Internet Max in February 2008.
