Top Items:
Joshua Topolsky / Engadget:
Palm Pre in-depth impressions, video, and huge hands-on gallery — We just sat down with Palm for a more in-depth look at the device, and here are our takeaways. First off, the software and hardware they're showing right now aren't the final versions. They're updating and tweaking as we speak …
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Adrian Covert / Gizmodo:
Palm Pre Preview: Simply Amazing — Hey, I just had some time to play with the Palm Pre, maybe the most important handset to be announced in two years, and here's what it was like to use it. Updates coming. — The Palm Pre is a lot smaller than I initially thought it would be.
Wall Street Journal:
Yahoo Nears End of CEO Search — Yahoo Inc. is in the final stretch of its search for a chief executive officer, and a decision could come as soon as next week, said people close to the Internet company. — Among candidates still under consideration is Carol Bartz, the former chief executive officer …
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John Oates / The Register:
Ballmer tries to breathe life into Yahoo! deal — Dead! horse! flogged! — Steve Ballmer is still trying to resurrect a possible search deal with Yahoo!. — Ballmer told the FT that he thought a search deal was still possible - and that it would most likely happen when Yahoo! …
Alex Chitu / Google Operating System:
Google Chrome 2.0 Pre-Beta — Google Chrome's development is high-paced and version numbers are not very significant, but it's weird to see a pre-beta release of Chrome 2.0, four months after Chrome 0.2. There are many new things in Chrome 2.0: — * form autocomplete …
Discussion:
Epicenter, PC World, Ars Technica, Download Squad, The Register, OSNews, TECH.BLORGE.com, Google Blogoscoped, Neowin.net, Lifehacker, ReadWriteWeb and VentureBeat
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Jonathan Skillings / Webware.com:
Google tunes up Chrome development — Google's Chrome development team has offered a status update of its work on the company's young open-source browser. — The most significant changes, according to a Chromium Development Documentation posting on Thursday, include the following:
Stephanie Clifford / New York Times:
For BlackBerry, Obama's Devotion Is Priceless — This week, Michael Phelps signed a deal worth more than $1 million to advertise Mazda in China. Jerry Seinfeld earned a reported $10 million to appear in Microsoft's recent television campaign. — But the person who may be the biggest celebrity pitchman …
Amazon Web Services Blog:
Manage Amazon EC2 With New Web-Based AWS Management Console — Today we're announcing the availability of the Web-based AWS Management Console, which in this first release provides management of your Amazon EC2 environment via a point-and-click interface. A number of management tools already exist …
Speaking of Security, the RSA Blog and Podcast:
Online Fraudsters Prey Upon the Media and Public Interest in Current Events to Launch “Cease-Fire Trojan Attack” — Yesterday morning, the RSA FraudAction Research Lab discovered a social engineering scam designed to lure people, via an email spam attack, to a fake news website designed to look like CNN.com.
Randy Nelson / Joystiq:
The First Wii: Obama brings video games to the White House — When Barack Obama takes office on January 20th, he'll not only be the most powerful man in the world, but also the most powerful gamer. (Nintendo did give outgoing President Bush a DS and Brain Age some years ago; it's up to you to decide if he ever played it.)
Matt Richtel / Bits:
Microsoft: Expect Fewer Phones With Windows — Microsoft says it is responding to the fierce competition in the phone market by retooling and beefing up its mobile operating system-and by putting it on fewer devices. — Todd Peters, the vice president of marketing for the Windows Mobile division …
Discussion:
All about Microsoft, GPS Obsessed, MobileDevicesToday, Gizmodo, wmpoweruser.com and MobileBurn.com
Saul Hansell / Bits:
C.E.S. Interview: Samsung's Jong Woo Park on Interactive TVs — It's quite an admission for an executive of Samsung Electronics to say that success in selling televisions over the next few years is not going to come from having the thinnest television, the best color, the brightest picture …
Discussion:
Techdirt
Jacob Schulman / Engadget:
Coby's sub-$200 netbooks handled at CES — Remember those sub-$100 Coby netbooks that we deemed a hoax? Well, it looks like they might not be as hoax-y as we originally thought. Here at CES, Coby has a bunch of base models on the show floor in a myriad of color combos.
Datamation:
How China's ‘50 Cent Army’ Could Wreck Web 2.0 — Two years ago, Chinese President Hu Jintao called on Chinese Communist Party (CCP) members to “assert supremacy over online public opinion, raise the level and study the art of online guidance and actively use new technologies to increase the strength of positive propaganda.”
Discussion:
Beyond Search
Fox News:
French Parking Meters Call Cops When Time's Up — You're shopping when you receive a text message on your cell phone. It's from the parking meter to tell you that you've been given a fine. — A science-fiction nightmare? No, this could soon be the reality of urban parking in Britain …
Discussion:
Newlaunches.com
Lester Haines / The Register:
‘Kidnapped’ child tracked by mobile phone and Street View — Cops cuff grandmother following tech dragnet — A “kidnapped” nine-year-old Massachusetts girl is safely back at home after a team effort by an enterprising local cop and deputy fire chief which exploited the signal from her mobile phone …
Joel Hruska / Ars Technica:
AMD's Phenom II could mark company turnaround — AMD's 45nm Phenom II (codenamed Deneb) has the dubious honor of being what may be the most immediately anticipated processor, ever. Even before AMD had finished shoveling its original Phenom out the door, the company was talking up 45nm Shanghai …
Reuters:
Panasonic and LG bet boldly on flatscreen TV growth — TOKYO/SEOUL (Reuters) - Japanese electronics maker Panasonic Corp said it aims to boost sales of flatscreen TVs by 50 percent, joining rival LG Electronics Inc in setting bold growth targets in a slowing market.
Jason D. O'Grady / The Apple Core:
Four core iPhones and firmware 3.0 — One of the most interesting rumors I've been tracking here at Macworld Expo in San Francisco surrounds the mysterious four-core iPhone. While the current iPhone has (roughly) the processing power of the Sony PSP, an upgraded four core iPhone …
Chaim / About Skype:
Skype Launches on Android Platform and more than 100 Java-Enabled Mobile Phones — Updated Beta version of Skype offered for millions worldwide to load onto their mobile phones — LAS VEGAS (CES BOOTH: HILTON #5121), January 8, 2009 - Skype today announced the release of a lite version of Skype&trade …
Zach Spear / AppleInsider:
Apple files patent for camera hidden behind display — We've already seen the iSight indicator light “disappear” behind the bezel of Apple's MacBook and iMac computers. A recently published patent application could make the iSight itself not only disappear, but move to the middle of the screen.
Daily Mail:
What credit crunch? Apple launch £1.6m diamond-encrusted iPhone … As the global credit crunch continues to bite in 2009 one jeweller has decided to buck the trend by designing the world's most expensive phone. — The new Apple iPhone 3G ‘Kings Button’ is made of solid 18 carat yellow gold, white gold and rose gold.
Mark Ward / BBC:
Do-it-yourself 3D movies at home — BBC News technology correspondent, Las Vegas — 3D films may soon no longer be the sole province of movie studios with big budgets. — At CES, two firms have been showing off ways for home users to make and share their own 3D films.
John Timmer / Ars Technica:
Report: Gmail about one-third as expensive as hosted e-mail — What does it cost to host an e-mail account? It seems like a simple question, but a remarkable number of enterprises surveyed by Forrester had no idea of how to answer that question. A new report by the research company …
Discussion:
PC World
