Top Items:
Mary Jo Foley / All about Microsoft:
Microsoft's Azure cloud platform: A guide for the perplexed — Now that the initial Microsoft PDC pixie dust has settled, developers are trying to digest exactly what Microsoft's cloud platform is. Here's my attempt to explain it. — Microsoft layed out its “Azure” …
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Gmail Blog:
New in Labs: Calendar and Docs gadgets — Gmail Labs has been a really fun way to easily try out new ideas and get some of our pet feature requests implemented quickly. We wanted to take this to the next level and let you start adding your own stuff to Gmail.
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Rick Turoczy / ReadWriteWeb:
Google Labs Adds More Gmail Goodness: Gadgets for Calendar, Docs — If you use Google's apps, you likely find yourself spending an inordinate amount of time in Gmail. And with good reason. Gmail is where the majority of the activity is happening, so it tends to be where you live.
Peter Ha / TechCrunch:
Sonos Launches Free iPhone, iPod Touch App — Those of you with Sonos equipment already filling your abode with the sweet tunes of your music library and an iPhone or iPod Touch should promptly hit up Apple's App Store and download their free app now. It may or may not be available right this second …
Discussion:
9 to 5 Mac, Music Ally, Brier Dudley's blog, CNET News, Electronista, Gizmodo and Engadget
Owen Thomas / Valleywag:
The layoff lie — A wave of layoffs is sweeping startupland. But why? “Today is my last day at Revision3,” writes Damon Berger, one of the victims, in a mass email. “Due to budgetary cutbacks that are a direct result of the economic meltdown, I will no longer be employed at the company.”
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Long Zheng / istartedsomething:
Windows 7 (M3) pre-beta features detailed in privacy statement — God I love privacy, or to be more exact, privacy statements. Microsoft today has just published the “Windows 7: Pre-release privacy statement” detailing some new and very interesting features which we're expected to see tomorrow …
Discussion:
Microsoft Corporation, Gizmodo, I4U News, gHacks technology news, Download Squad and Hardware 2.0
George Colony / George F. Colony:
Why this tech recession will be different — Quickly: For tech, this recession will be different than 2001-2003 — Content: I'm not an economist. But I've been present for a bunch of recessions and watched how technology markets survived. And I spend a lot of my time talking …
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Nick Gonzalez / TechCrunch:
Playfish Gets $17 Million More For Social Games — Over the past year video games have begun invading every computing platform, from social networks to mobile devices. They've also been picked up in the portfolios of a number of firms. — London based Playfish has just raised …
Dan Goodin / The Register:
Student charged after alerting principal to server hack — ‘Intentional criminal act’? — A 15-year-old high school student in New York State has been charged with three felonies after he allegedly accessed personnel information on his school's poorly configured computer network …
David Kravets / Threat Level:
10 Years Later, Misunderstood DMCA is the Law That Saved the Web — If you're wondering whom to thank for the Web 2.0 explosion in interactive websites, consider sending a bouquet to Congress. Today's internet is largely an outgrowth of the much-reviled Digital Millennium Copyright Act …
Discussion:
Public Knowledge, Freedom to Tinker blogs, Electronic Frontier Foundation, Infothought and Slashdot
Windows Live Dev:
Windows Live ID Becomes an OpenID Provider — Windows Live ID Commits to Support OpenID — Beginning today, Windows Live ID is publicly committing to support the OpenID digital identity framework with the announcement of the public availability of a Community Technology Preview (CTP) of the Windows Live ID OpenID Provider.
Jason Kincaid / TechCrunch:
SlideRocket's Impressive Online Presentation App Hits General Release — SlideRocket, an online presentation application that produces slideshows that rival (and in many cases, better) PowerPoint, has launched to the general public. The site had previously been available under a public beta …
Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols / Computerworld Blogs:
Ubuntu's Shuttleworth: “I don't think anyone can make money from the Linux desktop.” — A popular question in desktop circles is “Can anyone make money from the Linux desktop?” Canonical CEO and Ubuntu founder, Mark Shuttleworth's answer is “I don't think anyone can make money from the Linux desktop.”
John Timmer / Ars Technica:
Darkstrand lights up LambdaRail for commercial use — The Internet started out as a government-funded effort to link up disparate academic institutions. Over time, however, it morphed into a commercial venture, and the public gradually hopped online. Unfortunately, the commercial Internet …
Erick Schonfeld / TechCrunch:
Helium Raises $17 Million, Lays Off 30 Percent of Employees — The bomb-shelter mentality among startups is now so severe that even companies raising money are announcing layoffs in response to diminished economic prospects. Boston-based Helium just closed a $17 million series A financing …
Kelsey Blodget / Beet.TV:
Microsoft Teams up with Akamai for High-Def Video Solution — Microsoft and Akamai Technologies will release a beta version of a high-definition video solution for PCs in early 2009, the companies announced today. Both companies are introducing new streaming technologies to make the new service possible.
Discussion:
Contentinople
Michael Arrington / TechCrunch:
Stanford's SSE Ventures Funds Diffbot — Stanford's new on-campus venture fund, SSE Ventures, has made its first investment. The company, Diffbot, offers a RSS reader and a tool called Feedbeater that creates RSS feeds for web pages that don't already have them.
Reuters:
And the Word became digital — ROME (Hollywood Reporter) - An assembly of Catholic bishops on Monday called for the use of mass communications — including television, cinema, DVDs and even iPods — to be used to spread the Bible in as many languages as possible.
Discussion:
Engadget
Brad Stone / Bits:
A Site for Workplace Scuttlebutt Gets More Financing — Plenty of people are likely to be bookmarking Glassdoor.com soon. The four-month-old Web site can come in handy for navigating an era of heavy layoffs and endemic unemployment. — Glassdoor.com, based in Sausalito, Calif. …
