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4:05 AM ET, August 15, 2008

Techmeme

 Top Items: 
Jim Goldman / Tech Check with Jim Goldman:
Netflix Goes Dark And Finds It's No Place To Be  —  It started this morning with an email apology from online movie rental powerhouse Netflix, confirming to its 8.4 million users that the company was suffering a shipping and distribution outage.  —  I called the company this morning …
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Larry Dignan / Between the Lines:
Netflix may lose $1.8M to $3.6M in revenue per day over outage  —  Update: Netflix has been facing shipping delays and outages in its distribution centers for the last two days and has been fumbling to find a fix.  The company said Thursday that it is hoping to bring its systems online overnight.
Steve / Netflix Community Blog:
Thursday Morning Shipping Update
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Kara Swisher / BoomTown:
Ben Ling Lands (Back) at Google-This Time, at YouTube  —  Please see this disclosure related to me and Google.  —  Ben Ling-the high-profile Facebook platform exec who came from Google less than a year ago and then up and left the social-networking site earlier this week-is about to head back to Google …
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Owen Thomas / Valleywag:
Ben Ling boomerangs from Facebook to Google
New York Times:
Smartphone Is Expected via Google  —  T-Mobile will be the first carrier to offer a mobile phone powered by Google's Android software, according to people briefed on the company's plans.  The phone will be made by HTC, one of the largest makers of mobile phones in the world …
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Om Malik / GigaOM:
Why Blogs Need To Be Social  —  Earlier this week, San Francisco-based web publishing software company Six Apart released the newest version of its flagship product, Moveable Type, and pushed the blogging community into taking the first step toward a very social future.
Discussion: Six Apart and metarand
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Sarah Perez / ReadWriteWeb:
The Next Social Networks Will Be Powered By WordPress and Movable Type
Caroline McCarthy / The Social:
Confirmed: AOL will acquire Socialthing  —  AOL's People Networks division, formed when the company acquired Bebo, has picked up a new friend: Socialthing, a Boulder, Colo.-based start-up that aggregates social feeds from sites like Digg, Twitter, and Flickr.  —  The acquisition has not yet been completed, but is close to it.
Matt Buchanan / Gizmodo:
Palm Treo Pro Revealed (Best Looking Palm Ever)  —  Wow, check out the Treo Pro, previously thought to be the Treo 850.  It's safe to say Palm is plunging ahead with the Centro's industrial design, but the stark (glossy?) black and white color scheme with the phone/end orbs make it slick, rather than kiddie cool.
John Battelle / John Battelle's Searchblog:
Exclusive: A Look at Google Ad Planner Data Vs. Comscore  —  When Google Ad Planner came out back in June, I immediately thought of Comscore - and I was not alone.  Many in the marketing industry thought that Google's product would be a “Comscore killer,” and when I noted as much in my coverage …
Jeff DeChambeau / Wikinomics:
Remember Photosynth?  Well, it's old-hat now.  —  Photosynth (ted talk, demo page, our coverage), a project acquired by Microsoft, made for one of the coolest tech demos to grace the internet in a very long time.  The experience that Photosynth provided by inferring 3d structures from collections …
Discussion: Webware.com, webmonkey and Gizmodo
Yahoo!:
Frank J. Biondi, Jr. and John H. Chapple Appointed to Yahoo!'s Board of Directors  —  Yahoo! Inc. (Nasdaq:YHOO), a leading global Internet company, announced today that Frank J. Biondi, Jr. and John H. Chapple were appointed to Yahoo!'s board of directors.  —  “We are pleased to add people …
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Miguel Helft / Bits:
Yahoo Appoints 2 Icahn Allies to Its Board
Discussion: Between the Lines and Valleywag
Industry Standard:
Facebook users change middle names to Hussein in Obama solidarity protest  —  Facebook claims it cracks down on fraudulent profiles and approves every name change that users make — so why are they letting Barack Obama supporters to change their middle name to “Hussein”?
Discussion: Valleywag
Jon / p2pnet:
RIAA pays Tanyan Andersen $107,951  —  RIAA News:- Another huge hole has appeared in Vivendi Universal, EMI, Warner Music and Sony BMG's s(t)inking ship, the SS Sue 'Em All.  —  And it's well below the water-line.  —  Nor is the rapidly foundering merchant vessel MediaSentry looking too good.
Peter Burrows / Byte of the Apple:
Coming in September: Better 3G In The iPhone 3G  —  As we reported last night, two reliable sources say Apple will issue a software fix that will address the widespread complaints regarding lost calls and inconsistent 3G access with the iPhone 3G.  The problem (and it is a real issue …
Clarence / Zoho Blogs:
Live Olympics 2008 Dashboard - Powered by Zoho DB & Reports  —  Olympic fever has gripped many of us.  This edition could provide a much closer finish at the top of the table with China and USA running head-head.  China being the host nation, could have the home advantage to topple US leadership this Olympics.
Discussion: diversity.net.nz
Mike Butcher / TechCrunch UK:
As Twitter withdraws SMS, startups rush to fill the void  —  Assuming the founders of Twitter are listening, then they will have been be hearing about the outcry from users outside the US (just read these comments) after they completely cut off all outbound SMS services in the UK and chose …
Discussion: The Next Web, MobHappy and Mashable!
Vasanth Sridharan / Silicon Alley Insider:
Indie Game Developer Finds Success On Xbox 360 — Est.  $825K Sales In First Week  —  Console game developers — people who make games for the Xbox, PlayStation, etc. — have mostly been big companies — EA, Activision, etc. — because of the high cost of game development and retail distribution.
RELATED:
Barbara Ortutay / Associated Press:
July video game sales jump 28 percent
Jack Davis / Docu-Drama:
Heinen settles with SEC over Apple option backdating complaint  —  In doing so, Heinen neither admitted or denied the Commission's allegations.  —  According to the complaint, “Heinen caused Apple to fraudulently backdate two large options grants to senior executives of Apple …
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 More Items: 
Gmail Blog:
Get your Google Calendar in 38 languages
Discussion: LiewCF.com and Pulse 2.0
ExtremeTech:
Intel DG45ID Motherboard Review
David Chartier / Ars Technica:
First look: Wuala online P2P backup service makes us nervous
Karl Bode / DSLreports:
McCain Offers Vague, Unoffensive Technology Policy …
Joel Hruska / Ars Technica:
Police nab Shadow creators, force botnet to commit suicide
Discussion: ZDNet
Owen Thomas / Valleywag:
Layoffs coming in AOL's datacenters?
Marguerite Reardon / CNET News.com:
Verizon Wireless ranks No. 1 in customer service
InfoWorld:
Sun: Mobile dev tool heals fragmentation
Discussion: The Register
 Earlier Items: 
Farhad Manjoo / Slate:
The Google Black Hole
Discussion: Deal Journal
Declan McCullagh / CNET News.com:
Massachusetts: MIT students deserve ‘no First Amendment protection’
Discussion: Boston Globe and The Register
Richard Koman / ZDNet Government:
MBTA published checksum info in court filings
Michael Copeland / Fortune:
A chip too far?  —  The latest microchips have gotten …
InfoWorld:
MobileMe users fall prey to phishing scam
Dean Takahashi / VentureBeat:
Q&A: an interview with Sega's Simon Jeffery on monkeying around …
Eric Savitz / Tech Trader Daily:
Beware The Strengthening Dollar
John Timmer / Ars Technica:
CAPTCHAs work—for digitizing old, damaged texts, manuscripts
Discussion: TeleRead and Slashdot