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5:15 PM ET, November 9, 2008

Techmeme

 Top Items: 
Ashkan Karbasfrooshan / HipMojo.com:
Reality For Startups: Bye Bye Buyers?  —  PaidContent.org's Staci Kramer put it best: … Not quite sure if the NYT is a modern day Titanic... but the more we dive into the Gray Lady's balance sheet and income statement, the greater we doubt that she can go on.
RELATED:
Henry Blodget / Silicon Alley Insider:
Cash Crunch At New York Times (NYT): $400 Million Due In May  —  The New York Times Company's 10Q (NYT) contains more details on the company's cash crunch.  —  Specifically, the company must deliver $400 million to lenders in May of 2009, six months from now.
Discussion: paidContent.org and Beyond Search
Philip Elmer-DeWitt / Apple 2.0:
Apple's Papermaster was misquoted  —  Mark Papermaster must know how Barack Obama, John McCain and, for that matter, Sarah Palin feel when they get shafted by the press.  —  The 25-year IBM veteran engineer is in the middle of a nasty civil case in which his former employer has sued to stop …
RELATED:
Gabriel Madway / Reuters:
Google CEO on Obama tech czar job: No thanks  —  SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Google Inc Chief Executive Eric Schmidt said Friday he would not serve as technology czar in Barack Obama's administration if he was asked.  —  “I love working at Google and I'm very happy to stay at Google …
RELATED:
Dan Farber / Outside the Lines:
Obama's CTO: Watch out for the turf wars  —  Google CEO Eric Schmidt is out of the running for the chief technology officer (CTO) position that the Obama administration is planning to create.  In an interview with CNBC's Jim Cramer, Schmidt said, “I love working at Google and I'm very happy …
Discussion: Gadgetell
Cleve Nettles / 9 to 5 Mac:
Sony rolling out iTunes plus  —  Let's just say we have a hunch on this one.  Sony iTunes Plus high quality AAC files coming to the iTunes store in the next few weeks/months..same deal, 256kbit quality, no DRM.  —  Now when are they going to drop the “BMG”?  We have no idea.
Discussion: Boy Genius Report and MacRumors
GamePolitics News:
New Class-Action Suits Target EA, SecuROM, The Sims & Spore Creature Creator  —  GamePolitics has learned that a pair of new class-action lawsuits were lodged against Electronic Arts in October.  Both suits were filed with the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California …
Tom Evslin / Fractals of Change:
Maybe We Don't Need So Much Credit  —  A friend of ours has started a “new economy” business; she makes delicious Vermont brownies and sells them online at vermontbrowniecompany.com.  —  Lots of brownies made with good Vermont ingredients are rolling out of South Hero to the brownie-starved world.
Amanda Gardner / US News:
MP3 Player Headphones May Throw Off Cardiac Devices  —  Study found they could cause interference when placed too closely to pacemakers, ICDs  —  Tucking the headphones for your iPod into your coat pocket might not be exactly heart-stopping, but it could interfere with the normal functioning of your implanted cardiac device.
Discussion: Associated Press and Reuters
Matt Buchanan / Gizmodo:
Android Bug Reboots Phone Every Time You Type “Reboot”  —  The latest big bug discovered in Android has to be one of the craziest that's shipped with a phone.  Basically, Android invisibly interprets every word as a command and executes it with “superuser privileges.”
Markcuban / blog maverick:
PE Obama's 1st Big Mistake  —  Its great to see President Elect Obama aggressively taking on the economy prior to his taking office.  Unfortunately, the economic advisory team that he has put together looks more like a semester's worth of great guest speakers for an MBA class than an economic advisory team that can truly help him.
Robin Wauters / TechCrunch:
Conversation Consolidation: JS-Kit To Acquire coComment?  (Update: No)  —  We're still looking to confirm, but alarm:clock says they've learned that web widget provider JS-Kit has agreed to acquire conversation tracking service coComment.  —  Update: looks like alarm:clock jumped the shark …
Discussion: Startup Meme
 
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 More Items: 
Richard Pérez-Peña / New York Times:
Hearst to Close Its Spinoff of O, the Oprah Magazine
Allen Stern / CenterNetworks:
SitOrSquat - Find a Clean Toilet Wherever You Are
Discussion: Startup Meme
DeWitt Clinton:
Clearing up inaccuracies about the Google OpenID IDP launch
Jason Kincaid / TechCrunch:
Breaking Down The Election Season Minute-By-Minute
Discussion: Startup Meme and TECH.BLORGE.com
LinuxDevices.com:
Voting-machine firm sued for GPL violations
Discussion: Gizmodo and Engadget
Matt Buchanan / Gizmodo:
TeleNav Shotgun Web-Connected GPS Delivers Real-Time Traffic …
Brian X. Chen / Gadget Lab:
Gesture-Based Interface Ditches Mice, Keyboards
Discussion: Newlaunches.com and Slashdot
 Earlier Items: 
Windows Live Wire:
Update on the new Hotmail
Lidija Davis / ReadWriteWeb:
StarOffice No Longer Part of Google Pack
Mark Evans:
Help, We're Being Digitally Bombarded
Nick / Rough Type:
Zuckerberg's Second Law
 

 
From Mediagazer:

Todd Spangler / Variety:
The FCC approves the Paramount-Skydance deal, granting the transfer of licenses for 28 CBS-owned local TV stations to the Skydance-led ownership group

Peter White / Deadline:
Source: E! News, the long-running celebrity news show, will end on September 25; its digital brand will continue with a focus on social platforms

Andrew Deck / Nieman Lab:
Muck Rack analysis of 1M+ citations by Gen AI models; journalistic content was cited 27% of the time, rising to 49% for queries implying “a level of recency”

 
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