Top Items:
Daya Baran / WebGuild:
Google Layoffs - 10,000 Workers Affected — Google has been quietly laying off staff and up to 10,000 jobs could be on the chopping block according to sources. Since August, hundreds of employees have been laid off and there are reports that about 500 of them were recruiters for Google.
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Stephen Shankland / CNET News:
Google cutting contractor workforce — Google is in the process of paring back a contractor workforce that numbers about 10,000, the company confirmed Monday. The news, though, isn't as fresh as it might appear at first blush. — The contractor cut story made the rounds Monday …
Discussion:
Brier Dudley's blog
Dean Takahashi / VentureBeat:
HP's outlook for next year unchanged despite tough economy — Hewlett-Packard reported its fourth fiscal quarter earnings this afternoon for the quarter ended Oct. 31 that were consistent with the company's upbeat preliminary results. The surprising thing is that the world's biggest …
Twitter Blog:
Meet Rael Dornfest — Rael Dornfest is a famously talented engineer, author, and entrepreneur. Before founding Values of n, Rael served as Chief Technology Officer at O'Reilly Media and is known for his pioneering work on RSS as well being the series editor of O'Reilly's celebrated Hacks books.
Max Kelly / Facebook Blog:
Making Facebook Safe Against Spam — Last Friday, Facebook won an important victory for our users - and against spam and those who create it. — We've all experienced spam - those unwanted and, sometimes, inappropriate marketing messages. The bad guys behind those messages are always looking …
Discussion:
L.A. Times Tech Blog, Epicenter, InformationWeek, AppScout, ChannelWeb Complete Feed, TG Daily and WebProNews
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Kara Swisher / BoomTown:
When Twitter Met Facebook: The Acquisition Deal That Fail-Whaled — [Updated with new details about deal, including who worked on it and info on a cash component.] — About three weeks ago, Facebook and Twitter ended several weeks of serious talks, in which Facebook was offering …
Discussion:
VentureBeat, Webware.com, Tech Confidential, Search Engine Land, Bits, Mashable!, Industry Standard, Alley Insider, TechCrunch, Between the Lines, Mark Evans, Homotron.net, Contentinople, Charles Hudson's Weblog, Maximum PC all, The FASTForward Blog, Regular Geek, PR 2.0, bub.blicio.us, John Battelle's Searchblog and ZDNet.com.au
Marshall Kirkpatrick / ReadWriteWeb:
Google SearchWiki is Not a Wiki — Late last week Google unveiled the first major change to its search interface since the introduction of multi-media ("Universal") results into the search results page. They called it Google SearchWiki. — It's a big deal, it's awkward, it's frightening …
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Peter Kafka / MediaMemo:
Web 2.O Music Pioneer iLike Looking for Buyers — iLike, the Web start-up that made a name for itself by becoming Facebook's de facto music service, is looking for a buyer, according to multiple sources. I'm told that iLike is actively soliciting a list of buyers that include RealNetworks and Ticketmaster …
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David Worthington / Technologizer:
A Zune Phone? Likely. — It is plausible that rumors about Microsoft is close to announcing its answer to the iPhone are true. Microsoft must maintain parity with Apple, and its acquisition of Danger Inc. has given it the industrial design known-how to get the job done well.
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Charlie Sorrel / Gadget Lab:
Why the iPod Touch Didn't Get Google Street View — The new 2.2 update for the iPhone brings a lot of great new features. Google Street View, direct viewing, listening and download of podcasts and a few small but neat tweaks. The iPod Touch also got a 2.2 upgrade, but it lacks one headline feature: Street View.
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Appletell
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Jason Kincaid / TechCrunch:
LinkedIn Launches Streamlined People Search — LinkedIn has a launched a revamped version of its search engine that aims to streamline the business social network's most oft-used features. Most of the new features revolve around people-search (not surprising given the network's theme) …
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Guy Patrick / The Sun:
Juror axed for verdict poll on net — A JUROR was kicked off a trial after using Facebook to ask pals if they thought the defendants were guilty. — The woman posted details of the child abduction and sex assault case on the website. — Then she told friends: “I don't know which way to go, so I'm holding a poll.”
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Matthew Miller / Smartphones and Cell Phones:
T-Mobile G1 Android gets Opera Mini and visual voicemail — It seems like the gold rush of applications for the T-Mobile G1 (see my review) has slowed down considerably over the last couple of weeks with just a few apps trickling out here and there. I imagine most of this is because developers …
Eric Savitz / Tech Trader Daily:
Palm: The Beginning Of The End? — At a moment in time when smartphones are one of the few hot tech products, Palm (PALM), the industry's pioneer, appears to be dying. — This morning, Global Crown Capital analyst Pablo Perez-Fernandez cut his rating on the company to Underweight from Neutral …
James Sherwood / The Register:
Samsung demos amazing folding phone — A video has appeared online of what's claimed to be an OLED display able to fold itself in half to become a mobile phone. — Initially, the phone - which it's thought was recently seen on a Samsung stand at a display tech trade show in Japan …
Discussion:
Gizmodo, OLED-Info, Boing Boing Gadgets, Electronista, blogs.telegraph.co.uk …, Anything But iPod, Obsessable and Mobility Site
Dan Frommer / Alley Insider:
‘GPhone’ Sales Strong: HTC Eyes 1 Million G1s Shipped In 2008 (GOOG) — Google's (GOOG) first cellphone — the T-Mobile G1 — seems to be finding an audience. HTC, the Taiwanese company that makes the phone, just jacked its sales estimates. — HTC now thinks it'll ship 1 million G1s this year …
Discussion:
Valleywag
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Daniel Shen / DigiTimes:HTC raises shipment forecasts for G1 and Touch Diamond handsets
Discussion:
CrunchGear, Crave, TG Daily, MobileCrunch, VentureBeat, PhoneReport v2.0, Unwired View, wmpoweruser.com and Google Android News …
MG Siegler / VentureBeat:
Google stock rains on the tech rally parade — The stock market had a good day today. The tech-heavy Nasdaq continued its climb back towards 1,500, ending the day up 87.67 points (6.33 percent) to close at 1,472.02. Looking at various tech stocks, it looks like most had very nice gains today, but one notable one did not: Google.
Discussion:
Reuters
Michael Arrington / TechCrunch:
Be-A-Magpie Is PayPerPost For Twitter — Like much-criticized PayPerPost for blogs, German/UK startup Be-A-Mapgpie will pay you to insert advertisements into your Twitter stream. — Advertisers pay on a cost-per-thousand-impression basis, and the ads are promised to be delivered to relevant audiences based on keywords.
Meera Selva / Associated Press:
Negotiations to put Beatles on iTunes stalled — Paul McCartney says negotiations to put Beatles songs on iTunes have stalled — LONDON (AP) — Paul McCartney said Monday negotiations on a long-awaited deal to make the Beatles' catalog available on the online music service iTunes have stalled.
Mark Peter Davis / Alley Insider:
Why VCs Aren't Investing Anymore — There is one topic on the minds of all entrepreneurs right now: the impact of the economy on their startups. The economy is the centerpiece of every networking event and panel, and it even consumed the Q&A session after my speech at VANJ last week on how to raise VC.
Mike Shields / Adweek:
Is the End Near for Display Ads? — As ad budgets shrink, buyers and publishers face growing pressure to prove value of banners — NEW YORK Digital media buyers have been trying to kill the banner ad for years. Now, it appears, the recession might just finish the job for them.
