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3:30 PM ET, January 25, 2009

Techmeme

 Top Items: 
Michael Arrington / TechCrunch:
Twitter Raising New Cash At $250 Million Valuation  —  Twitter, which just recently turned down a half billion dollar acquisition offer from Facebook (albeit to be paid mostly with Facebook stock), is dipping back into the venture capital market, we've heard from a source with knowledge of the deal.
RELATED:
Ashkan Karbasfrooshan / HipMojo.com:
Twitter is 2009's Facebook, With Less Upside  —  Twitter is making the same mistakes Facebook did, which are:  — raising money instead of generating any,  — letting the valuation get ahead of realistic business prospects which will make any M&A nearly impossible,
Peter Kafka / MediaMemo:
No Revenue?  No Problem.  More Money For Twitter On The Way  —  Remember the good old days of Bubble 2.0?  When a webby company with no real business plan could raise piles of money at an eye-popping valuation?  —  That would have been par for the course as recently as a year ago …
Discussion: Silicon Alley Insider
Robert Darnton / New York Review of Books:
Google & the Future of Books  —  How can we navigate through the information landscape that is only beginning to come into view?  The question is more urgent than ever following the recent settlement between Google and the authors and publishers who were suing it for alleged breach of copyright.
RELATED:
Tim O'Reilly / O'Reilly Radar:
Competition in the eBook Market  —  There's been a lot of buzz on forward-looking publisher mailing lists in the past few days about Robert Darnton's piece in the New York Review of Books, Google and the Future of Books.  When it hit techmeme today, I thought it might be appropriate to share …
Robert Scoble / Scobleizer:
Facebook screws iFart author  —  You couldn't make this stuff up if you tried.  —  OK, I'm on the phone with Joel Comm right now.  He's been doing business online since 1995.  He's the co-creator of Yahoo Games.  He wrote the Adsense Code, which got onto New York Times best selling list.
Leslie Berlin / New York Times:
Cellphones as Credit Cards?  Americans Must Wait  —  A wave of a cellphone replaces the swipe of a credit card in a pilot program involving MasterCard PayPass, right.  At left, a phone is used to pay for items at a Tokyo candy stand.  Account information can be embedded in the phone.
Luke Hutchison:
Zoom-Zoom-Zoom — Get Multi-Touch Zooming Support on your T-Mobile G1 TODAY  —  I posted recently to show that working multi-touch input is available on the T-Mobile G1 phone.  Now the necessary changes to the Android software stack are finally in good shape, and the software is easily installable on your own phone.
Discussion: Boy Genius Report and Engadget
Dave Winer / Scripting News:
What made the Mac different  —  Rex Hammock: “It's hard to convey to my kids how radically different the Mac was from any consumer-oriented computer that came before.”  —  So here's a list of things, off the top of my head, that made the Mac radically different from any other computer, 25 years ago, from my point of view.
RELATED:
Erick Schonfeld / TechCrunch:   Video: Steve Jobs Giving His First Big Demo
Chris Gampat / Geek.com:
Android app destroying G1 users' memory?  —  A new app called MemoryUp Personal appears to be responsible for the destruction of many G1 users' memory, as stated in the comments about the app in Android's App Market.  The app, created by Peter Liu, is being called a “scam” by users in the App Market.
Discussion: Gizmodo
Jesus Diaz / Gizmodo:
iPhone Bluetooth File Transfer Coming Soon (YES!)  —  Trust the rogue programmers and Cydia—the independent equivalent to the iTunes App Store—to bring you one of the most awaited features ever for the iPhone: Bluetooth file transfer.  —  As you can see in the video, iBluetooth will bring you just that …
Discussion: 9 to 5 Mac and iSpazio
Michael Arrington / TechCrunch:
Stories From The Tell-All MySpace Book  —  Wall Street Journal editor Julia Angwin's tell-all book about MySpace is set for official publication on March 17, 2009.  We've got our hands on a draft of the 268 page book.  Some of the more interesting stories are below (you can pre-order it here).
Discussion: All Facebook
 
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 More Items: 
Wendy M Grossman / Guardian:
Why you can't find a library book in your search engine
Discussion: PersonaNonData
Ellen Messmer / Network World:
Downadup/Conflicker worm: When will the next shoe fall?
Discussion: Slashdot
Jesse Stay / louisgray.com:
Learn More About Who You Follow With TweepSearch
Kara Swisher / BoomTown:
Carol Bartz's First-Week-at-Yahoo Memo to the Troops
Discussion: Silicon Alley Insider
 Earlier Items: 
Daniel Jacobs / International Business Times:
Hacker wins court review
Discussion: DailyTech and CNET News
Dean Takahashi / VentureBeat:
Microsoft's Chris Early, head of Games for Windows Live, among the layoffs
Rich Karpinski / TELEPHONY Magazine:
Comcast's Congestion Catch-22
Discussion: Slashdot
Justin Gardner / Donklephant:
Obama To Launch Recovery.gov
Discussion: Slashdot and Mashable!
Dan Frommer / Silicon Alley Insider:
What A Nigerian Facebook Scam Looks Like
Discussion: louisgray.com
Jeff Jedras / PC World:
IBM Confirms Layoffs
Discussion: Computerworld
 

 
From Mediagazer:

James Oliphant / Reuters:
The White House's decision to remove a spot for newswires from the press pool will affect local news organizations who rely on the wire services for reporting

Kelsey Warner / Semafor:
Sources: Moniify, a well-funded UAE financial news startup launched in November 2024, struggled to monetize and find an editorial strategy before pivoting

Larry Neumeister / Associated Press:
Palin v. NYT opening statements: Sarah Palin's lawyers say the NYT engaged in a “sickeningly familiar pattern” by targeting her, and she will testify next week

 
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