Top Items:
Business Wire:
AOL to Acquire Global Social Media Network Bebo — NEW YORK—(BUSINESS WIRE)—AOL announced today that it has entered into an agreement to acquire Bebo (http://www.bebo.com), a leading global social media network. Together with its AIM and ICQ personal communications network …
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Michael Arrington / TechCrunch:
AOL Buys Bebo For $850 Million — I'm not going to say that we told you so, but we told you so. — AOL has acquired social networking site Bebo for $850 million in cash. AOL CEO Randy Falco (left in picture) sent an email to all AOL employees this morning. Allen Stern's press call notes are here.
Discussion:
CenterNetworks, Fortune, TechCrunch UK, Silicon Alley Insider, Patricia Handschiegel, broadstuff and PE Hub Blog
Allen Stern / CenterNetworks:
Bebo To AOL for $850 Million — AOL has announced this morning that they have acquired social networking service Bebo for $850 million in cash. Bebo has 100 employees operating in offices in the UK, San Francisco and Austin, TX. Bebo is the third-largest social networking service in the U.S. behind MySpace and Facebook.
Caroline McCarthy / The Social:
AOL buys social network Bebo for $850 million — AOL issued a press release on Thursday morning to announce that the company has acquired social-networking site Bebo. The price tag, according to the AOL statement, is $850 million in cash. Neither company has yet stated when the deal is expected to be closed.
AOL News:
AOL to Acquire Social Media Network Bebo — AOL has entered into an agreement to acquire Bebo, a leading global social media network. Founded in 2005, Bebo now has 40 million members worldwide. Together with AIM and ICQ, AOL will have a social network of approximately 80 million unique users worldwide …
Discussion:
Download Squad, paidContent.org, The Next Web, Digital Daily, Digital Trends, TECH.BLORGE.com, Creative Capital and ResourceShelf
Michael Arrington / TechCrunch:
Yahoo Embraces The Semantic Web - Expect The Internet To Organize Itself In A Hurry — Yahoo's embrace of all things open continues today - expect an announcement in an hour or so that they are expanding their Open Search Platform that we wrote about last month.
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Duncan Riley / TechCrunch:
The Future Of Voice May Be Voiceless — The above video is a little rough in terms of processing delay, but it's staggering. Voice without voice. — According to New Scientist, the neckband translates thought into speech by picking up nerve signals; “with careful training a person …
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Tom Simonite / New Scientist:
Nerve-tapping neckband allows ‘telepathic’ chat — A neckband that translates thought into speech by picking up nerve signals has been used to demonstrate a “voiceless” phone call for the first time. — With careful training a person can send nerve signals to their vocal cords without making a sound.
Discussion:
Crave, Today @ PC World, Gizmodo, Boing Boing Gadgets, GottaBeMobile, BUZZYEAH, Tom Raftery's Social Media and textually.org
Vishesh Kumar / Wall Street Journal:
DirecTV to Start On-Demand — In its yearslong battle with cable-TV operators, DirecTV Group Inc.'s Achilles' heel has been its inability to offer any sort of video-on-demand service. The company intends to change that. — The No. 1 satellite-TV provider by subscribers is testing …
Discussion:
NewTeeVee, DSLreports, paidContent.org, Gizmodo, MediaBytes with Shelly Palmer and BloggingStocks
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Rohit Dhawan / Official Google Blog:
Our solutions for ad serving — Earlier this week, we completed our acquisition of DoubleClick. Together, we're now focused on building a full suite of products and tools that help publishers of all sizes improve productivity, manage their inventory, generate additional revenue opportunities …
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Bonnie Cha / Crave: The gadget blog:
RIM BlackBerry Pearl 8120 lands at AT&T — You knew it was just a matter of time before one of the GSM carriers got a hold of the next-generation RIM BlackBerry Pearl after Verizon Wireless released the RIM BlackBerry Pearl 8130. That lucky carrier would be AT&T. Today …
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Scott Hillis / Reuters:
Microsoft says no Blu-ray for Xbox 360 — SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Microsoft Corp (MSFT.O: Quote, Profile, Research) is not in talks to include Sony Corp's (6758.T: Quote, Profile, Research) Blu-ray high-definition DVD technology in its Xbox 360 video game console, an executive said on Wednesday.
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louisgray.com:
Elite Bloggers Joining FriendFeed In Droves — Although it hasn't even been a month since FriendFeed opened up to the masses, and announced Series A financing of $5 million, momentum is definitely on the company's side. Garnering incredible media and blog coverage, FriendFeed has also been a magnet …
Discussion:
Mark Evans, The Last Podcast, The Blog Herald, Scobleizer, SheGeeks and Susan Mernit's Blog
Steve Lohr / New York Times:
Video Road Hogs Stir Fear of Internet Traffic Jam — Caution: Heavy Internet traffic ahead. Delays possible. — For months there has been a rising chorus of alarm about the surging growth in the amount of data flying across the Internet. The threat, according to some industry groups …
Discussion:
Gadgetell, CinemaTech, Know It All, 901am, Enterprise 2.0 Blog, VCMike's Blog, IP Democracy and Peter O'Kelly's Reality Check
Frank Rose / Wired News:
Music Industry Proposes a Piracy Surcharge on ISPs — Having failed to stop piracy by suing internet users, the music industry is for the first time seriously considering a file sharing surcharge that internet service providers would collect from users. — In recent months …
Anne Broache / CNET News.com:
Gates, Mundie: Congress must make trade-offs to propel tech's future — WASHINGTON—It's not always easy persuading politicians on Capitol Hill to take up items on Silicon Valley's wishlist, even if you're Bill Gates and his posse. — That was one message that the Microsoft chairman …
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Ars Technica
