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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 …
Discussion:
mathewingram.com/work, ReadWriteWeb, Download Squad, Gizmodo, Mashable!, Online Fandom, Orbitcast and Digg
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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:
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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Matt / Photo Matt:
Act Two — You've probably seen the news on GigaOM, Automattic has raised a new “series B” round of funding. We're entering what I consider Act II of the Automattic story. I'll talk about where we're going, but first some history. — In 2005 Automattic was small.
Jon Fortt / Big Tech:
Will Apple turn 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?
Discussion:
HipMojo.com, Hardware 2.0, Silicon Alley Insider, michael parekh on IT, PC World and Zoli's Blog
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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.
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GigaOM
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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.
Discussion:
Download Squad, LiveSide, bub.blicio.us, Changing Way, The Social Times, Mashable!, The Real McCrea, Wikinomics and Digg
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Eric Lai / Computerworld:
Microsoft to join Web 2.0 data portability group, says source
Microsoft to join Web 2.0 data portability group, says source
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Alec Saunders .LOG
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
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 …
Discussion:
bub.blicio.us
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PR Newswire:
Motorola Announces Fourth-Quarter and Full-Year Sales and Earnings — Fourth-quarter GAAP earnings from continuing operations of $0.05 per share, including net charges of $0.09 per share from items highlighted below — Fourth-quarter positive operating cash flow of $470 million and cash conversion cycle improved by 10 days
Discussion:
eWeek, CrunchGear, Tech Trader Daily, IntoMobile, Silicon Alley Insider and Seeking Alpha
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.
Eric Eldon / VentureBeat:
ShareThis, a button for sharing articles on other sites, says it is growing fast — ShareThis is a bookmarking service for social news sites and social networks that helps you easily share an item such as a blog post, on sites like Digg or Facebook. — You click on the ShareThis button beneath …
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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.
Discussion:
Search Engine Watch Blog, Insider Chatter, WebProNews, Reuters and MediaBytes with Shelly …
Erick Schonfeld / TechCrunch:
Real-Estate Search Engine Roost Launches With Full MLS Listings — Just when you thought the real-estate bubble had burst and the economy was going to hell, here comes another real-estate search engine. Today we see the launch of Roost, a real-estate site inspired by the lean look and feel of travel search engine Kayak.
Steven Hodson / WinExtra:
Why is email stuck in the 80's? — Email is screwed up. — Not that email as a method of communication is screwed but more the fact that the software we use to manage the ever increasing amount of email we get is brain dead and next to ineffectual in letting us control our information flow.
John Battelle / John Battelle's Searchblog:
GOOGLE DROPS MORE THAN 160 POINTS — That's not something we're used to hearing, but since its peak back in the Fall at nearly 750, Google has dropped to 584 currently, a 166 point drop (it's dropped more in after hours, all the way down to 568). It's on a steep decline in the past few days …
Discussion:
AppScout, HipMojo.com, Search Engine Land, WebProNews, broadstuff, ParisLemon and CenterNetworks
Tony Dennis / Inquirer:
Iphone sales are at around a tenth of early estimates — The INQ may have been playing with sales figures but someone (cough!) may also have been bamboozled by zeros. Any fule with a calculator knows that 4,000,000/200=20,000. Our apologies, dear reader.
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Ars Technica