Top Items:
Kara Swisher / BoomTown:
Steve Ballmer's Entire Memo to the Microsoft Troops About Layoffs and Weak Results — Here is the full memo to employees from Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer (pictured here) about the 5,000 layoffs and other cost cuts just announced, due to economic slowdown, which also resulted in weak financial results for the second quarter.
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Microsoft:
Microsoft Reports Second-Quarter Results — Modest revenue growth despite difficult economy; announces cost management initiatives. — Microsoft Corp. today announced revenue of $16.63 billion for the second quarter ended Dec. 31, 2008, a 2% increase over the same period of the prior year.
Discussion:
Mini-Microsoft, Between the Lines, Ed Bott's Windows Expertise, Search Engine Land, TechFlash, Financial Times, InfoWorld, Ars Technica, Beyond Binary, 9 to 5 Mac, New York Times, Bloomberg, CNNMoney.com, Reuters, All about Microsoft, Microsoft Pri0, BoomTown, Silicon Alley Insider, Search Engine Watch, CrunchGear, OSNews, Bink.nu, Microsoft News Tracker, Xconomy, SlashGear and Neowin.net
Mary Jo Foley / All about Microsoft:
Microsoft to cut 5,000 jobs — The official word on layoffs is out: Microsoft is going to cut 5,000 jobs over the next 18 months, 1,400 of them today, January 22. — From the company's Q2 earnings release: … I was predicting the Softies were going to get by simply by shuffling folks around and quietly closing groups.
Benjamin J. Romano / Microsoft Pri0:Majority of today's Microsoft job cuts to be in Redmond …
Discussion:
Silicon Alley Insider
Anne E. Kornblut / Washington Post:
Obama Staff Arrives to White House Stuck in Dark Ages of Technology — If the Obama campaign represented a sleek, new iPhone kind of future, the first day of the Obama administration looked more like the rotary-dial past. — Two years after launching the most technologically savvy presidential campaign …
Eric Savitz / Tech Trader Daily:
Nokia Cuts 2009 View After Grim Q4 Report; Stock Slides — Nokia (NOK) this morning reported a dismal Q4 - and forecast more grim days ahead. — The world's largest handset maker posted sales of 12.67 billion Euros, down 19.5% from 15.7 billion a year ago. Revenue was up 3% sequentially.
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Wall Street Journal:
Even in Test Form, Windows 7 Leaves Vista in the Dust — This will be a big year for new operating systems. Apple plans a new version of its Macintosh operating system, to be called Snow Leopard. Palm plans an all-new smart phone operating system called Palm WebOS.
Discussion:
Microsoft Pri0, Download Squad, Silicon Alley Insider, jkOnTheRun, The Register, TechFlash and Epicenter
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Ed Bott / Ed Bott's Windows Expertise:Windows 7 earns kudos from surprising sources
Discussion:
New York Times
HTC:
ALL NEW HTC TOUCH CRUISE WITH HTC FOOTPRINTS™ HELPS CAPTURE AND RELIVE LIFE'S JOURNEYS — Compact and Sophisticated Design Delivers an Advanced Location-Based Experience That Changes How People View Their Locations and Memories — HTC Corporation, a global leader in mobile phone innovation …
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Bloomberg:
Sony Projects Record Operating Loss as Recession Cuts Television Demand — Jan. 22 (Bloomberg) — Sony Corp. forecast a record 260 billion yen ($2.9 billion) full-year operating loss, almost four times analysts' estimates, as the global recession cuts sales of televisions and cameras.
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Matt Burns / MobileCrunch:
Treo PRO now available from Sprint for $249 — Palm and Sprint might have a pickle on their hands. Now that the Palm Pre is the hottest upcoming phone of 2009, how are they going to sell the Treo PRO when the Pre is rumored to launch next month? Sprint thankfully has priced the PRO …
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Stephen Hutcheon / Sydney Morning Herald:
Watch out Wikipedia, here comes Britannica 2.0 — Encyclopedia Britannica president Jorge Cauz. Inset: Wikipedia's cofounder Jimmy Wales. — In a move to take on Wikipedia, the Encyclopedia Britannica is inviting the hoi polloi to edit, enhance and contribute to its online version.
Kevin Michaluk / CrackBerry.com blogs:
Best Yet: OS 4.7.0.90 Leaked for the Storm 9530 & 9500! — So long .86! Another week, another leaked OS for the BlackBerry Storm. Can I hear a w00t?! A helpful friend put OS 4.7..90 into the wild for the both the BlackBerry Storm 9530 and 9500 and the initial impressions …
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Violet Blue / San Francisco Chronicle:
A Twitter Sex Guide — Violet Blue: A Twitter Sex Guide — Do you Tweet during sex? You might moan or squeal, but even if you've never heard of the free, minimalist social networking service that allows users to write, send and post to the Internet short messages via devices ranging from phones to laptops via SMS (text).
James / BlackBerry Sync:
BlackBerry Pearl Flip 8230 (CDMA) coming to TELUS - February 2009 — We've received a solid tip regarding TELUS and the un-released CDMA BlackBerry Pearl Flip 8230. Sources have confirmed that TELUS will be launching the Pearl Flip 8230 most likely next month (February).
Claire Cain Miller / New York Times:
Publisher Rethinks the Daily: It's Free and Printed and Has Blogs All Over — SAN FRANCISCO — Amid the din of naysayers who insist that newspapers are on the verge of death, a new company wants to start dozens of new ones — with a twist. — The Printed Blog, a Chicago start-up …
Discussion:
Beyond Search
Jessan Hutchison-Quillian / Gmail Blog:
Watch videos right in Gmail chat — My friends always hate it when I multi-task in other tabs while chatting with them (they can tell because of my obviously delayed reactions...). But sometimes it's not my fault: if they send me a link to a YouTube video, I have to open another tab in order to watch it.
David Chartier / Infinite Loop:
Interview: iPhone dev gets existential about “crap” apps — There has been no shortage of stories lately about the success of inane, debatably offensive iPhone apps, and their developers are typically (and understandably) thrilled at making it big in the App Store.
Discussion:
AppleInsider
Paul Buchheit:
Communicating with code — Some people can sell their ideas with a brilliant speech or a slick powerpoint presentation. — I can't. — Maybe that's why I'm skeptical of ideas that are sold via brilliant speeches and slick powerpoints. Or maybe it's because it's too easy to overlook the messy details …
Kara Swisher / BoomTown:
YAHOO=Yet Another Hiring Over and Out (Hadley Heads Back to Microsoft) — One of Yahoo's top marketing execs, Eric Hadley, who came to the company with a lot of acclaim in only November, is set to leave for a new job working in branding and global marketing for Microsoft's MSN online service, several sources said.
Reuters:
Autonomy to buy Interwoven for $775 mln — * Interwoven stockholders to get $16.20 a share — * Autonomy raises 223 mln pounds to fund the deal — * Sees $40 mln of synergies in first yr after completion — * Earnings enhancing in first quarter after completion
Marc Ambinder:
Obama Will Get His Blackberry — President Barack Obama is going to get his blackberry. — On Monday, a government agency that the Obama administration — but that is probably the National Security Agency — added to a standard blackberry a super-encryption package. …
Erick Schonfeld / TechCrunch:
Exclusive: YouTube Will Soon Let Big Content Partners Bring Their Own Ads — Big media companies have always had a love-hate relationship with YouTube. They don't know whether to sue YouTube for abetting copyright infringement or get in bed with it because it is the biggest Web video game in town.
Discussion:
CNET News, Terry Heaton's PoMo Blog, Wall Street Journal, Screenwerk, NewTeeVee, Mashable! and Beet.TV
