Check out Mini-Techmeme for simple mobiles or Techmeme Mobile for modern smartphones.
3:25 PM ET, August 18, 2008

Techmeme

 Top Items: 
Minnie Ingersoll / The Official Google Blog:
Time to “Free the Airwaves”  —  For quite some time we've been talking about the potential of the unused airwaves between broadcast TV channels ("white spaces") to provide affordable, high-speed wireless Internet connectivity nationwide.  For this to happen, the Federal Communications Commission …
RELATED:
Amy Schatz / Wall Street Journal:
FCC to Decide in Battle for TV Spectrum  —  As Google, Others Push for Sharing, Broadcasters Fret  —  Landover, Md. — After eight months of testing, a plan to employ unused TV channels to provide cheap, high-speed wireless Internet networks still faces determined opposition and an uncertain future.
Om Malik / GigaOM:
Google Pushes White Space, Says Free The AirWaves  —  Updated: Today, Google is launching a new advocacy campaign, Free The Airwaves, an effort by the company to get some traction around white spaces, the tiny slivers of spectrum that resides in the 700 MHz band spectrum vacated by analog television's switch to digital transmissions.
Erick Schonfeld / TechCrunch:
Google Uses YouTube To Try To Rally Public Support For WiFi 2.0
Thomas Ricker / Engadget:
HTC Dream FCC approved, Android clear for launch?  —  The long rumored HTC Dream handset — once referred to as “The Googlephone” — just received FCC approval.  The handset is listed as type, “Dream' with a model of “DREA100.  ” The same model also appears with a WiFi Interoperability Certificate touting 802.11b/g WiFi.
RELATED:
Matt Marshall / VentureBeat:
Google's Android phone, the HTC Dream, is apparently approved by FCC — Nov. 10 is the latest release date  —  The Federal Communications Commission has approved the much anticipated Google Android phone, and documents suggest a release date of about Nov. 10 at the latest.
Randall Kennedy / Windows Sentinel:
Bursting the Vista sales bubble  —  Our Windows Sentinel tracking data shows that 35 percent of mainly enterprise-class users “downgrade” their Vista systems to XP  —  For weeks now there've been rumors that major PC makers, like Hewlett-Packard, have been quietly selling PCs with a Vista license …
RELATED:
InfoWorld:   New data: 1 in 3 business PCs drop Vista for Windows XP
Arn / MacRumors:
iPhone 3G Connectivity Affecting 2% of Customers?  Software Fix Soon?  —  One MacRumors reader claims to have received a response from Steve Jobs after emailing in a complaint about the current iPhone 3G connectivity issues that have been widely reported.  —  According to the email response …
Mark Wilson / Gizmodo:
Leaked: Dell Inspiron 910 (Mini Note) Specs and Release Date  —  A few weeks ago we ran some rumored specs of Dell's answer to the Eee, the Dell Inspiron 910 (aka Mini Inspiron and Inspiron Mini).  Now we've gotten our hands on the full (internal) 910 web documentation.
Discussion: Crave, Liliputing, jkOnTheRun and Engadget
Aaron Ricadela / Business Week:
Open Source: An Open Question for Red Hat and Others  —  It's been tough lately for companies like Red Hat and Novell that bet their business on open source.  Here's a look at the haves and the have-nots  —  Software supplier Red Hat is racking up growth figures that much of techdom might envy.
RELATED:
Dan Woods / Forbes:
Open Source Goes Mainstream
Discussion: Open Source
MG Siegler / VentureBeat:
Spin Reader?  Google Reader lets political candidates and pundits share news  —  I'm not sure how much the two major party U.S. Presidential candidates, Barack Obama and John McCain, actually use the RSS feed reader Google Reader to get their news (I'd think they'd be too busy with other stuff), but apparently now their aides are.
RELATED:
Chrix Finne / Google Reader:
Read what they read  —  The Reader team has always been interested …
Discussion: Mashable!
Larry Dignan / Between the Lines:
Maintain an automated networked database?  GraphOn wants to sue you  —  GraphOn is suing Google for patent infringement and the company appears to be doing a nice imitation of NTP, the company that made its name by suing Research in Motion.  GraphOn is going for gold in the patent troll Olympics.
Discussion: Beyond Search, WebProNews and Mashable!
RELATED:
Sam Diaz / Between the Lines:
cloud computing - lowercase, please.  hold the (TM)  —  Feel free to approach a co-worker at the Red Bull station this morning and casually ask: “So, did you do any cloud computing over the weekend?”  OK, maybe that ice-breaker won't get you invited to happy hour with the cool crew from HR …
RELATED:
Caroline McCarthy / CNET News.com:
EA revises Take-Two acquisition offer, again  —  Spore isn't the only thing on Electronic Arts' mind.  It still wants Take-Two Interactive.  —  On Monday, CEO John Riccitiello sent an open letter to Take-Two chairman Strauss Zelnick saying that the company's existing offer to acquire …
RELATED:
Long Zheng / istartedsomething:
FCC approves Microsoft's unreleased 120GB Zune  —  Ever since Samsung had announced their new 120GB 1.8-inch hard drive in April 2007, Zune fansites has been buzzing with anticipation of a new Zune fitted with the higher capacity drives.  Now the wait is nearly over as the FCC publishes a test report …
Discussion: Anything But iPod, Engadget and Gizmodo
Michael Learmonth / Silicon Alley Insider:
Video Ad Companies: People Love Watching Video Ads!  —  Everyone knows it, so it must be true: Everyone hates pre-roll video ads — the mini-ads that publishers want you to sit through before you actually watch a clip.  We bail out on them constantly, and everyone we know does the same.
Discussion: MediaPost and HipMojo.com
Mary Jo Foley / All about Microsoft:
Might Office be where Microsoft gets socked with Chinese antitrust charges?  —  Back in June, there were more than a few stories about PC makers in China getting ready to sue Microsoft for alleged antitrust violations pertaining to Windows.  Microsoft and China's State Intellectual Property Office …
Discussion: Windows Connected and Electronista
 
 Archived Page Info: 
This is a snapshot of Techmeme at 3:25 PM ET, August 18, 2008.

View the current page or another snapshot:


 
 Techmeme Sponsor Posts: 
Meta:
Open Source AI: Available to all, not just the few  —  Meta's open source AI enables small businesses, start-ups, students, researchers and more to download and build with our models at no cost.
Tribe AI:
Build AI products that matter  —  Tribe AI helps organizations rapidly deploy AI solutions that have real business impact.  We bring together world class AI talent and tooling to drive differentiated results.
Zoho:
5 common accounting mistakes  —  This is a guest post by Yaali Bizappln Solutions.  A lot of businesses manage their customers and finances on separate platforms.  This disconnect often leads to missed invoices …
Hamming:
Make AI Voice Agents trustworthy  —  Hamming AI automatically tests AI voice agents and continuously monitors them in production.
Sponsor Techmeme
 
 See Also: 
Techmeme: site main
Techmeme River: reverse chronological Techmeme
Techmeme Mobile: for phones
Techmeme Leaderboard: Techmeme's top sources
 
 Subscribe: 
Techmeme RSS feed
Techmeme on X
Techmeme on Mastodon
 
 
 More Items: 
Jeff Smykil / Infinite Loop:
Apple building fire caused $2 million in damages
Peggy Anne Salz / msearchgroove:
Chinese Mobile Search Engine mInfo Gets Boost From Olympics …
Discussion: Alt Search Engines
Christine Tsai / Google Mobile Blog:
This is a test — ads on YouTube's mobile site
Jon / p2pnet:
Tenise Barker v RIAA ‘settled’
Discussion: Slyck and ZDNet Government
eWeek:
HP Introduces Lightweight Business Laptops
Jeremiah Owyang / Web Strategy:
Web Strategy: The Evolution of Brands on Twitter
Discussion: CostPerNews
Steven Musil / CNET News.com:
Bono blamed for unreleased U2 songs on Internet
John C. Drake / Boston Globe:
Judge awaits students' research paper
Discussion: CNET News.com
 Earlier Items: 
John Timmer / Ars Technica:
Evolution of DRM: streaming services use unencrypted MP3s
New York Times:
A Surprise Winner at the Olympic Games in Beijing: NBC
BBC:
Clipboards hijacked in web attack
Nicholas Deleon / CrunchGear:
‘Subtle but noticeable’: Toshiba XD-E500 upconverting DVD player
Aaron Brazell / Technosailor:
Findability is a Legitimate Concern for Bloggers
Wall Street Journal:
AC/DC to Sell New Album Only Through Wal-Mart
Steve Johnson / Chicago Tribune:
Cyberstar  —  Adrian Holovaty is as red-hot as a techie can get.
Michael Arrington / TechCrunch:
Pouring Our Heart Into TechCrunch50
 

 
From Mediagazer:

Jonathan Stempel / Reuters:
A New York judge finds Sirius XM liable for a difficult subscription cancellation process; Sirius says it will appeal but abide by a new “click-to-cancel” rule

Ashley Carman / Bloomberg:
A growing number of podcasters, including Tim Ferriss, are moving away from interviews to monologues or co-hosts, as some well-known guests can be overexposed

Matthew Keys / The Desk:
DirecTV terminates its Dish acquisition after a group of Dish creditors rejected a modified bond exchange offer

 
Sister Sites:

Mediagazer
 Top news and commentary for media professionals from all around the web
memeorandum
 What US political commentators are discussing online right now
WeSmirch
 The top celebrity news from all around the web on a single page