Top Items:
Gmail Blog:
New in Labs: Tasks — Posted by Jonathan Terleski, Michael Lancaster, and Brett Lider, Tasks team — People use Gmail to get stuff done, so we've added a lightweight way to keep track of what you need to do, right from within Gmail. — Take entering a new task: just click in an empty part of your list and start typing.
RELATED:
Erick Schonfeld / TechCrunch:
Gmail Finally Gets A To-Do List — Someone at Google finally realized how helpful it would be to add a to-do list to Gmail. It is called “Tasks” and is now available in Gmail Labs (click on the beaker icon next to “Settings” on the upper right hand corner of Gmail).
Aidan Malley / AppleInsider:
Rumor: Apple's iTunes going DRM-free starting Tuesday — Apple is believed to be on the verge of an end-of-year push that would start by finally offering unprotected iTunes Store music from all major labels and would switch a special post-holiday campaign giving away music and videos to Europeans.
Discussion:
VentureBeat, Mashable!, Gizmodo, The iPhone Blog, 9 to 5 Mac, CNET News, Technologizer, Tech Central, Engadget, Insanely Great Mac and Edible Apple
Google Code Blog:
Native Client: A Technology for Running Native Code on the Web — Modern PCs can execute billions of instructions per second, but today's web applications can access only a small fraction of this computational power. If web developers could use all of this power, just imagine the rich, dynamic experiences they could create.
Wall Street Journal:
Yahoo Closer to Naming CEO — Yahoo Inc. directors steering the search for a new chief executive are moving closer to a recommendation and have authorized checking references on a few key candidates, say people familiar with the matter, although a decision is likely to be weeks away at the earliest.
Nick Bilton / O'Reilly Radar:
The Twitter Gold Mine & Beating Google to the Semantic Web — There's always been jabs at Twitter for not having a viable business model and the chatter has increased in the current economic climate. In a recent interview Evan Williams, Twitter CEO, said “We had planned to focus on revenue …
RELATED:
Sony Corporation:
Sony Announces Initiatives to Improve Profitability and Enhance Operational Efficiencies in its Electronics Businesses — Sony Corporation ("Sony") has embarked on a series of measures to strengthen its corporate structure and bolster profitability across the Sony Group.
Discussion:
Engadget, Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, DailyTech, Tech Trader Daily and Computerworld
Dan Primack / PE Hub Blog:
What Sequoia Capital Was Thinking — It's been two months since Sequoia Capital gathered its portfolio company CEOs, for an evening of tough talk about new economic realities. It has come to be known as the graveyard presentation, both by those in attendance and the thousands more who've viewed leaked copies online.
Discussion:
Startup Chatter
Reuters:
Young graduates struggle for Silicon Valley jobs — SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Young professionals and recent graduates have struggled to find work in a sliding economy, but one area — Silicon Valley — has been relatively immune. Until now. — Silicon Valley companies that initially resisted …
Richard Wray / Guardian:
Technology stalwarts back Google rival Kosmix in fight for cyberspace — A Silicon Valley start-up that is taking on the might of Google has attracted investment from Time Warner, owner of AOL, and the man who launched one of the world's most popular mobile phones.
Discussion:
Datawocky, dot.life blog, blogs.ft.com, VentureBeat, Tech Beat, paidContent.org, GigaOM and TechCrunch
Matt Buchanan / Gizmodo:
New MacBooks Are Cranky: They Have Insomnia and Hate Third-Party RAM — The standard “journalism” rule is that three is trend. So here's one with the new MacBooks: They've got problems! Screwy video cards, insomniatic, power-sucking sleep and not playing well with other RAM.
RELATED:
Rick Auricchio / MacFixIt:Unibody (Late-2008) MacBooks have a relatively audible hum
Discussion:
O'Grady's PowerPage
Business Technology:
Burn Rate: Laid Off But No Longer Looking — Dozens of Silicon Valley technology startups have cut back on headcount over the past few weeks. But it's not all doom and gloom: Some of those layoff victims have quickly bounced back. — Consider the fate of those recently laid off …
Discussion:
Jobwire
Eric Savitz / Tech Trader Daily:
Microsoft: To Unveil Zune/Danger Device At CES Keynote? — The Consumer Electronics Show kicks off January 7 with a keynote from Microsoft (MSFT) CEO Steve Ballmer, taking the spot which in past years had been filled by the now semi-retired Bill Gates. The company always unveils a product …
Discussion:
Unwired View, Ubergizmo, The Register, Silicon Alley Insider, Podcasting News, CrunchGear, VentureBeat, Gadgetell, TECH.BLORGE.com and TechFlash
Ashlee Vance / Bits:
Dell Sees Double With Data Center in a Container — Ty Schmitt, principal thermal and mechanical architect for Dell's Data Center Solutions group, outside of Dell's double-stacked data center in Round Rock, Tex. (Credit: Erich Schlegel for The New York Times)
Ryan Paul / Ars Technica:
First look: Firefox 3.1 beta 2, now with private browsing — Mozilla has announced the official release of the second Firefox 3.1 beta. This version introduces the new private browsing mode feature and several other noteworthy changes. — The 3.1 roadmap began to coalesce after the release of 3.0 earlier this year.
Discussion:
Mozilla, AppScout, Computerworld, Lifehacker, TheNextWeb.com, Between the Lines and Mashable!
Joe Wilcox / Microsoft Watch:
Oxite: Just MIX and Serve — The thing is called Oxite, and Microsoft released the code to its CodePlex site on Dec. 5, but made the announcement today. Oxite is labeled an alpha, and as of this posting a whopping 344 people had downloaded the software. Let's not rush to give up Movable Type or WordPress, shall we?
Robin Wauters / TechCrunch:
Blackbird Is A Custom Browser For African Americans Built On Top Of Mozilla — Blackbird is a new browser built on top of Mozilla technology that is supposed to make it easier for African Americans to discover relevant content on the web and to interact with other members …
Michael Arrington / TechCrunch:
Vodafone Acquires Sweden's WayFinder For €24 Million — The increasingly acquisitive Vodafone accounted the acquisition of Sweden's WayFinder this morning in Europe for €24 Million. Last Spring they also acquired Danish mobile social network ZYB for €31.5 million.
DealBook:
Tribune Files for Bankruptcy — Updated: The Tribune Company filed for bankruptcy protection in a federal court in Delaware on Monday, as the owner of The Los Angeles Times, The Chicago Tribune and the Chicago Cubs baseball team struggled to cope with mountains of debt and falling ad revenue.
Discussion:
Bits, paidContent.org, Tribune Company, Gawker, Venture Chronicles, Recovering Journalist and Industry Standard
Eric Eldon / VentureBeat:
Confused yet? MySpace updates data-sharing service, fighting Facebook (and Google) — MySpace' web-wide identity service is announcing that it will get some new features soon. This is the latest attack in a two-and-a-half-sided battle the company is fighting with rival Facebook and frenemy Google.
Tim Stevens / Engadget:
Contract-laden 3G Acer Aspire One hitting US at just $99? — These days most people wouldn't think of buying a new phone without getting a couple hundies off in exchange for their wireless free will. But netbooks? Internationally such deals aren't altogether uncommon, but we haven't seen one here yet.
Scott M. Fulton, III / BetaNews:
Leaks indicate Microsoft is un-rethinking the Win7 taskbar — During last week's touring WinHEC conference in Beijing, attendees were treated to the latest Windows 7 build running in a virtual machine. Trouble is, someone apparently pilfered a copy of the VHD, and now it's loose.
Business Technology:
Tech Spending to Grow 1.6% in 2009 — Technology spending will grow at its lowest rate in six years in 2009, a research firm said, as businesses shift their buying habits in response to the economic downturn. — Businesses and other organizations in the U.S. will spend $573 billion on computer software …
Dean Takahashi / VentureBeat:
Nvidia will comply with OpenCL standard for new graphics-based computing — For the past couple of years, graphics chip maker Nvidia's big strategic thrust has been to make its chips capable of more than just graphics processing. It unveiled its own proprietary CUDA programming language …
Electronista:
i-mate intros custom Windows Mobile interface — i-mate, maker of the Ultimate brand of smartphones, has recently announced it is launching the i-mate Go interface for its Windows Mobile 6.1-powered offerings. Based on the VITO Winterface, i-mate Go brings Windows Mobile users …
Alexandra Kenin / Google Mobile Blog:
New AdWords options for iPhone and G1 — Today, the Google mobile ads team is announcing a new campaign-level option that allows those of you who are AdWords advertisers to show your desktop text and image ads on the iPhone, the T-Mobile G1, and other mobile devices with full (HTML) Internet browsers.
Discussion:
InformationWeek, Inside AdWords, ReadWriteWeb, AndroidGuys, Between the Lines, iMAndroid, Andy Beal's Marketing Pilgrim, Google Watch, Android Community, MediaMemo, AppScout, Unwired View, TechCrunch, Kelsey Group Blogs, Search Engine Watch, Local Mobile Search, Gearlog, VentureBeat, Silicon Alley Insider, IntoMobile, The Register, Search Engine Journal, Epicenter, MarketingVOX, TECH.BLORGE.com, Tech Beat, mocoNews.net, Search Engine Land, CNET News, Mashable!, Technologizer, CenterNetworks and iPhone Buzz
Kevin J. O'Brien / New York Times:
Microsoft Offers to Reduce Search Data in Europe — BERLIN — Microsoft offered Monday to abide by a European privacy panel's request that it reduce the length of time it kept records of Web searches if its rivals, Yahoo and Google, did the same. — Google and Yahoo, in separate statements …
