Top Items:
David / weblog.rubyonrails.org:
Merb gets merged into Rails 3! — It's christmas, baby, and do we have a present for you. We're ending the bickering between Merb and Rails with a this bombshell: Merb is being merged into Rails 3! — We all realized that working together for a common good would be much more productive …
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Larry Dignan / Between the Lines:
FriendFinder isn't likely to find any pals on Wall Street; Needs IPO to pay debt — FriendFinder Networks, the company formerly known as Penthouse Media Group, is filing to go public to pay off almost a half a billion in debt in an equity market that stinks. Simply put, FriendFinder is launching an IPO Hail Mary to stay alive.
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Michael Arrington / TechCrunch:
Adult FriendFinder Files To Go Public — Florida-based FriendFinder Networks (formerly Penthouse Media Group), a group of sites that includes Penthouse and Adult FriendFinder, has filed a registration statement with the SEC to go public. — Little known Russian investment bank Renaissance Capital is representing them in the deal.
MG Siegler / VentureBeat:
iPhone fart app pulls in nearly $10,000 a day — Apple's App Store is currently experiencing a plague of fart applications. Last week, I detailed one day in which at least 14 new fart apps were accepted into the store. And now, just in a quick search, it looks like there are about 50 apps …
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Arn / MacRumors:iPhone App Store Sales for #1 Spot Revealed
Discussion:
Apple 2.0, GPS Obsessed, JoelComm.com, TECH.BLORGE.com, Profy, Mashable!, Life On the Wicked Stage and 9 to 5 Mac
Ashlee Vance / Bits:
Dell's MacBook Air Rival Confirmed by . . . Dell — CLARIFICATION 5:55 p.m. - The story below references a Dell ad placed in UptownLife magazine. The online version of that ad, which has since been removed, appeared to include both an image from Dell and text.
Discussion:
SlashGear, Electronista, GottaBeMobile.com, Mobility Site, Gizmodo, Engadget, Peter O'Kelly's Reality Check and PC World
David / TmoNews:
Blackberry 8900 release date... We've previewed this highly anticipated follow up to the uber popular blackberry curve. We've been gifted with a hands on video from our friends at crackberry.com who gave us a great walkthrough. Now, we have a HOPEFUL release date...February 18th.
Sean Fallon / Gizmodo:
9 Year Old Girl Becomes the Youngest Microsoft Certified Professional — Today's crushing blow to our self confidence comes to us from India, where a 9 year old girl has become the youngest person to ever pass a Microsoft Certified Professional examination.
Serkan Toto / CrunchGear:
Sony Japan follows Sony New Zealand with mysterious new Vaio mobile ad — Following Sony New Zealand, Sony Japan today updated its dedicated Vaio website with a mysterious announcement. If you click here [JP], you can see a woman getting out a small UMPC-like object out of her hand bag.
Peter Kafka / MediaMemo:
New York Times: November Was So Terrible, Even Our Internet Ads Were Down — Earlier this month, executives at the New York Times (NYT) warned investors that they had a miserable November. They weren't kidding. — The grim details are here, but I'll save you some time:
Peter Kafka / MediaMemo:
Facebook Bails on Project Playlist, Too — Four days after MySpace cut the legs out from under Project Playlist by disabling the music streaming service's app, Facebook is following suit. Here's the official statement from Facebook PR: … The only surprise here is that it took Facebook …
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AMP / Gravitational Pull:
New York Times killing Times File - How to move your library — Terrible news for those who love news today. I was reading a story about e-books in the New York Times this morning and I decided it was worth saving as a future reference. I clicked the little “save” button …
Timothy Lee / Techdirt:
The Death Of Online Advertising Is Greatly Exaggerated — Over at his personal blog, occasional Techdirt contributor Tom Lee weighs in on an interesting discussion going on around the blogosphere about who, if anyone, is to blame for the precipitous decline of the newspaper business.
James Kendrick / jkOnTheRun:
Netbook enthusiast web sites getting C & D using term “netbook” — This is very preliminary but we are hearing that some netbook enthusiast sites are getting “cease & desist” letters from a firm in the UK ordering the sites to stop using the term “netbook”.
Monica Chen / DigiTimes:
Intel insists Atom only for Intel chipsets, does not want to share Nvidia's Ion — Nvidia's recent move to try to extend Intel's Atom ecosystem to its recently announced Ion platform appears to have been knocked back by Intel, according to a response primarily directed at PC manufacturers as seen by Digitimes.
Jason Kincaid / TechCrunch:
Telecom Giant Vodafone Gets Into Location Based Social Networking With Pocket Life — Pocket Life, a geo-aware social network backed by mobile network giant Vodafone, has launched to the public. The service allows users to update their friends on their current locations automatically …
Ajay Kamalakaran / Reuters:
RIM accuses Motorola of blocking job offers: report — (Reuters) - BlackBerry maker Research In Motion Ltd sued Motorola Inc over claims the mobile-phone maker is improperly blocking it from offering jobs to laid-off Motorola workers, Bloomberg said. — RIM, in a complaint filed in state court …
Ilinca Nita / Unwired View:
Nokia 6208 Classic has a touchscreen and an alphanumeric keypad — While Nokia N97 is the Finns' first smartphone to feature a touchscreen and a full QWERTY keyboard, the unannounced Nokia 6208 Classic is (almost) the first to have a touchscreen and a regular, alphanumeric keypad.
Keith Rabois / VentureBeat:
The plight of branded apps and the future of social marketing — [Editor's note: So it turns out branded apps are a bust — even if you're Nike or Coca-Cola. Below, Keith Rabois, vice president of strategy and business development at app maker Slide, explains why and gives big-name advertisers some much-needed advice.]
Brian McClendon / The Official Google Blog:
Tracking Santa: the backstory — When I look back on four years of tracking Old St. Nick on Christmas Eve, I can't help but smile. The Santa tracker has really come a long way. I always thought NORAD's Santa Tracker was a great holiday tradition, but I felt like it could have been even better …
