Top Items:
Jesusdiaz / Gizmodo:
iPhone 3G Launch Date Confirmed — We all suspected it, but now it is confirmed: someone very, very close to the 3G iPhone launch has told me that Apple will announce their new model at the WWDC Keynote on June 9th. The second-generation iPhone will be available worldwide right after the launch …
John P. Falcone / CNET News.com:
Look out, Apple TV: The $100 Netflix Player has arrived — The Netflix box is finally a reality. — The Netflix Player by Roku is the first product that allows subscribers to have movies and TV shows from the service's Instant Viewing feature (aka “Watch Now") to be streamed directly to their TV screen.
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Danny Dumas / Gadget Lab:
Review: Roku Netflix Set Top Box is Just Shy of Totally Amazing — Netflix Player by Roku — Yeah, yeah, yeah, we've heard this all before, right? For years now, everyone from computer companies like Apple to OS companies like Microsoft to content providers like NBC have been trying …
Discussion:
DSLreports, Gadgetell, Reel Pop, Online Video Watch, Engadget, MediaBytes with Shelly Palmer and The Equity Kicker
Michael Arrington / TechCrunch:
Netflix Roku: Free Is Such A Beautiful Word — Netflix made a big splash today with their announcement of a $100 set top box, built by a California startup called Roku, that streams free movies (for Netflix subscribers) to the living room. — Good for them.
Discussion:
PSFK
Jasmine France / CNET News.com:
Now at Napster: 6 million DRM-free MP3s — Probably the biggest piece of digital music news to come out of CES 2008 was that Napster was planning to offer its complete catalog of more than 6 million tracks in the unprotected MP3 format. — On Tuesday, with the launch of version 4.5 …
Discussion:
Digital Daily, TechCrunch, Electronista, Mashable!, CrunchGear, Gizmodo, AppScout, Bit Player, The Blogging Times, iLounge, Podcasting News and WinBeta
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Joseph Weisenthal / paidContent.org:Napster Starts Selling MP3s; 6 Million Tracks; All Majors Signed On
Andrew Ross Sorkin / New York Times:
A Gamble, but What if He Wins? — About a month and a half ago, Carl Icahn and I went to dinner at Tse Yang, an upscale Chinese restaurant in Midtown Manhattan. Mr. Icahn, the corporate raider turned activist investor, came blustering through the dimly lit restaurant about 20 minutes late …
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Mike Butcher / TechCrunch UK:
BBC's Sound Index is good, but we won't get the data — The BBC's SoundIndex, currently in beta, lists the top 1,000 artists based on discussions crawled from Bebo, Last.fm, Google Groups, iTunes, MySpace and YouTube. The top five bands according to SoundIndex right now are Coldplay …
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Michael Arrington / TechCrunch: Who's The Hottest Band On The Internet? Coldplay, Says BBC SoundIndex
Sarah Perez / ReadWriteWeb:
How to Make Facebook Useful Again — Oh the heels of some of Facebook's missteps (ahem, Beacon) and the proliferation of a myriad of useless, silly, and time-wasting apps, some former Facebook users decided to quit the site for good this year. However, a handful of early adopter angst doesn't have Facebook worried.
Discussion:
AppScout
Erick Schonfeld / TechCrunch:
Google Backers Back Aster Data Systems. It's All About The Clusters. — Clusters are the way to go. Google and Yahoo run their Websites on distributed databases spread across vast clusters of servers. Now Aster Data Systems, a startup that is coming out of stealth mode today …
Reuters:
T-Mobile to keep iPhone exclusivity in Germany — PARIS (Reuters) - T-Mobile TMOG.UL expects to remain the only seller of Apple's (AAPL.O: Quote, Profile, Research) coveted iPhone in Germany, T-Mobile Chief Executive Hamid Akhavan said on Tuesday. — “We have a very good relationship with Apple …
Simson Garfinkel / Technology Review:
Alarming Open-Source Security Holes — How a programming error introduced profound security vulnerabilities in millions of computer systems. — Back in May 2006, a few programmers working on an open-source security project made a whopper of a mistake. Last week, the full impact …
Richard Ford / Times of London:
‘Big Brother’ database for phones and e-mails — A massive government database holding details of every phone call, e-mail and time spent on the internet by the public is being planned as part of the fight against crime and terrorism. Internet service providers (ISPs) …
Karl / DSLreports:
Sprint To Impose 5GB Monthly EVDO Cap - 300MB per month when you're off the network... When comparing Sprint and Verizon's EVDO service, Verizon usually came up short, given their 5GB monthly cap, and terms of service that restricts everything but browsing and e-mail.
Tim Leberecht / CNET News.com:
Mobile IM to surpass SMS? — A recent Gartner study estimates that 189 billion mobile messages have been sent by U.S. mobile-phone subscribers in 2007. It forecasts 301 billion mobile messages sent in 2008. — If correct, those figures would still account for only a small fraction …
Joseph Weisenthal / paidContent.org:
IAC Acquires GirlSense.com Parent StarNet; Targeting Tweens — On path to break into five pieces, IAC (NSDQ: IACI) has announced the acquisition of StarNet Interactive, the parent company of the GirlSense.com community site. Basically the site offers a virtual way to play dressup …
