Top Items:
New York Times:
Higher Offer by Microsoft Brings Yahoo to Table — After a three-month standoff, Microsoft was in active merger talks with Yahoo on Friday, several people involved in the discussions said. — Microsoft, which had threatened to abandon its bid or initiate an attempt to oust Yahoo's board …
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Dan Farber / Outside the Lines:
The Silicon Valley triangle: Google, Yahoo and Microsoft — It's Friday night and still no word from the Microsoft or Yahoo bunkers. The headlines for today tell the story (see Techmeme). — The Wall Street Journal, which appears to be a conduit for the negotiations, has a story …
Discussion:
Brier Dudley's blog
Eric Eldon / VentureBeat:
Watercooler: Yet another social network app company that's making money — Nobody really knows how much social networks applications are worth, which leads some people to think that they're not worth much of anything. But try telling that to the companies that are building businesses through applications …
Discussion:
alarm:clock
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Steve / The Secret Diary of Steve Jobs:
The problem with Facebook — This chart says it all. A new study discovers that the vast majority of Facebook apps are an utter waste of time. But oh yeah — Facebook is worth $9 billion, or $15 billion. And Slide is worth half a billion because it makes that super important FunWall application.
Discussion:
Capitol Valley
Caroline McCarthy / The Social:Study reveals shocking truth: Most Facebook apps are silly, pointless
Discussion:
Technology Liberation Front
Kara Swisher / BoomTown:
MicroHoo: Hasta La Vista, Hotmail? — Yesterday, BoomTown wrote a piece about Yahoo's worries about the scrutiny that the monopolistic combination of Yahoo! Mail and Microsoft's Hotmail would get if it merged with the software giant. — The issue-which has not gotten a lot of attention …
Discussion:
Silicon Alley Insider
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Dan Farber / Outside the Lines:
YouTube disappears from the screen temporarily — At 7:00 a.m. PDT I was heading for my video page on YouTube and ran into this message: — I was getting to other sites just fine, so it's safe to assume it's a Google problem. YouTube receives 10 hours of video per minute and is by far the leader in the crowded field.
Allen Stern / CenterNetworks:
YouTube Down - Possible DNS Hack — YouTube down? We have been receiving reports for the past 90 minutes that users are not able to access YouTube. Upon further testing, it looks like the YouTube CDN (static file server) is down. All images are not currently being served (see screenshot below) …
Hiptop 3:
Sidekick Gekko/Aspen Screenshot — That's right, a Hiptop3.com exclusive where we bring you the first screenshots from the Sidekick Aspen/Gekko. Everything we've been hearing points to the Aspen and Gekko being one and the same. We're not 100% sure which name T-Mobile is going to market this as …
Ryan Singel / Threat Level:
What's Up with the Secret Cybersecurity Plans, Senators Ask DHS — The government's new cyber-security “Manhattan Project” is so secretive that a key Senate oversight panel has been reduced to writing a letter to beg for answers to the most basic questions, such as what's going on, what's the point and what about privacy laws.
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Sarah Lacy:
Larry Highest Paid CEO? Damn Right. — It's not everyday you find yourself defending a guy that everyone else hates. Oh wait. Actually, I tend to do that a lot. I even found myself doing that last night! But most of them, I defend because I've gotten to know them well enough …
John Markoff / New York Times:
Pursuing the Next Level of Artificial Intelligence — PALO ALTO, Calif. — Like a good gambler, Daphne Koller, a researcher at Stanford whose work has led to advances in artificial intelligence, sees the world as a web of probabilities. — There is, however, nothing uncertain about her impact.
Discussion:
Peter O'Kelly's Reality Check
Ryan Block / Engadget Mobile:
The Engadget Mobile Interview: Jonathan Schwartz, CEO of Sun — We recently got a chance to sit down with Sun CEO Jonathan Schwartz, who definitely ranks among the geekier and more sincere CEOs we've had the privilege to meet. We discussed the long-missing JavaFX Mobile platform Sun promised a while back …
