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6:05 PM ET, March 5, 2009

Techmeme

 Top Items: 
Saul Hansell / Bits:
The Nation's New Chief Information Officer Speaks  —  Reforming the entire health care system may be easier than doing everything Vivek Kundra says he wants to do when it comes to reforming the government's computer systems.  —  Mr. Kundra, the 34-year-old former chief technology officer …
RELATED:
Patrick Thibodeau / Computerworld:
New federal CIO Vivek Kundra wants a Web 2.0 government
Discussion: The FASTForward Blog
Kim Hart / Washington Post:
D.C. Tech Chief Tapped for White House Slot
Kevin Michaluk / CrackBerry.com blogs:
Exclusive: First Real Photos of the BlackBerry 9630!  —  FINALLY!!!!!  What you're looking at above are the first real photos of the BlackBerry “Niagara” 9630.  As you can see, this CDMA full-QWERTY BlackBerry is looking sweet and very much has the appearance of the BlackBerry Curve 8900 and BlackBerry Bold morphed into one.
John Paczkowski / Digital Daily:
Perhaps if They Think of Their Win Mobile Devices as Broken iPhones...  What an uncomfortable moment for Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer at the CIO Summit Wednesday.  Fielding questions at Microsoft's annual event for government and education sector IT workers, Ballmer was asked how best …
Business Wire:
Clearwire Reports Fourth Quarter and Full Year 2008 Results  —  Key 2008 Highlights  — Completed Combination with Sprint's 4G Assets, Resulting in Largest U.S. Mobile Wireless Spectrum Portfolio  — 2008 Pro Forma Revenue Increases 52 Percent Driven by 21 Percent Subscriber Growth and 6 Percent ARPU Increase
RELATED:
Larry Dignan / Between the Lines:
Clearwire: The race between Wimax expansion and cash burn is on  —  Clearwire on Thursday outlined its Wimax rollout plans for 2010 as it announced a $118 million fourth quarter net loss.  The company also outlined its capital spending plan for 2009, which calls for it burning through …
Discussion: TechFlash, Sidecut Reports and Gearlog
Jason Calacanis / The Jason Calacanis Weblog:
Why I employed a felon  —  Yesterday, I joined one of our Mahalo employees at Federal District Court as he was sentenced to 48 months in jail for crimes related to computer security.  —  Before my employee John Schiefer was sentenced, a violent career criminal was facing 60 months for beating up a prison guard.
Discussion: CNET News and Threat Level
RELATED:
Brian Prince / eWeek:
Security Consultant Turned Hacker Gets Prison for Running Botnet  —  Former security consultant John Schiefer was sentenced to four years in federal prison for running a botnet that infected as many as 250,000 and stole passwords and account information.  Schiefer was one of eight defendants nabbed …
Discussion: The Register and Ars Technica
Rick Aristotle Munarriz / Motley Fool:
Game Over for GameStop?  —  GameStop (NYSE: GME) probably doesn't see Toys “R” Us as much of a competitor in video game retailing, but that is about to change.  —  Toys “R” Us is starting to buy and resell used games in a few test stores, according to Forbes.
RELATED:
Erick Schonfeld / TechCrunch:
Yahoo's Inquisitor Makes Search Shine On The iPhone  —  Last May, Yahoo acquired a startup called Inquisitor which offers a search plug-in for all the major browsers.  Today, Inquisitor is available as an iPhone app and it shows how certain features, such as Yahoo's Search Assist …
RELATED:
Arik Hesseldahl / Business Week:
At DEMO, VCs Have Stern Advice for Startups  —  With less money available to entrepreneurs and with fewer startups being bought, VCs are pushing portfolio companies to focus on frugality  —  Watch the Video...  Venture capital investor Christine Herron has a bit of advice for technology startups …
Discussion: HipMojo.com
Microsoft:
Microsoft Security Bulletin Advance Notification for March 2009  —  Microsoft Security Bulletin Advance Notification issued: March 5, 2009  —  Microsoft Security Bulletins to be issued: March 10, 2009  —  This is an advance notification of security bulletins that Microsoft is intending to release on March 10, 2009.
Discussion: PC World, eWeek, Zero Day and CNET News
RELATED:
Gregg Keizer / Computerworld:
Microsoft: No patch for Excel zero-day flaw next week
Discussion: Slashdot
David Evans / Online Dating Insider:
PlentyOfFish Starts Charging Premium Membership Fees … Free dating sites have had a good run the past few years.  Everyone starting a free dating site jumped, and continues to jump, on the free dating bandwagon.  Meanwhile, top paid dating sites are making hundreds of millions of dollars …
Discussion: Gear Diary, Thanks:daveevans
RELATED:
Markus / The Paradigm Shift:   Plentyoffish Serious Member Profile Upgrade...
Raju Vegesna / Zoho Blogs:
Zoho Writer 2.0 launches with fresh look  —  Refreshing changes don't come often.  Today, we are launching a new major version of our word processor - Zoho Writer 2.0 - with a fresh and elegant user interface & significant improvements.  This important upgrade comes with hundreds of improvements, mostly on the user interface.
Lee Gomes / Forbes:
Google Disrupts—Again  —  The Internet giant's search engine could make Web site design and navigation obsolete.  —  BURLINGAME, Calif.—Google has turned the advertising industry upside down.  Here's something else the Internet giant is changing: Web sites—both how they are used …
Michael Arrington / TechCrunch:
It's Time To Start Thinking Of Twitter As A Search Engine  —  At a dinner tonight with a friend the conversation turned to Twitter.  He just didn't get it, and he's certainly not the first person to tell me that.  Specifically, my friend didn't understand the massive valuation …
Heather Hopkins / Hitwise Intelligence:
Yahoo! Mail More than One Third of Yahoo! Traffic  —  Tuesday, Yahoo!'s new CEO, Carol Bartz spoke to analysts and one comment in particular caught my attention.  According to an article on ZDNet, she said “Yahoo Mail is becoming increasingly critical to the company.
David Pogue / New York Times:
It Rings, It Shoots, It Stumbles  —  I'll never forget the time I visited a Riverwalk restaurant in San Antonio and ordered risotto: rice that's been stirred in broth until it's rich, creamy and perfect.  —  But what the waiter brought to the table wasn't risotto.  It was just rice.
Discussion: Electronic Pulp
Chicago Breaking News:
Sheriff sues Craigslist as ‘largest source’ of prostitution  —  Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart announced today that his office has sued Craigslist and has asked a federal judge to ban the Internet company from posting its “erotic services” section, which the sheriff said is a clearing house for prostitution.
Mike Butcher / TechCrunch UK & Europe:
Sky News realises news breaks first on Twitter, not TV - Creates a Twitter Correspondent  —  TechCrunch has been saying for a long time - at least since November last year - that Twitter is an emerging source of news.  Recent tragic events have only served to emphasise this.
Paul Biba / TeleRead:
Fictionwise acquired by Barnes & Noble for $15.7 million in cash  —  Fictionwise has been acquired by Barnes & Noble, said to be the world's largest bookseller, for $15.7 million in a stock deal that TeleRead revealed earlier today.  —  I spoke with Scott Pendergrast of Fictionwise at 7:20 …
Colby Ranger / The Official Google Blog:
Tipping points  —  Ideas are everywhere, but how do we know which ones actually work?  At Google, we put a lot of stock in both the wisdom of crowds — the idea that lots of people responding to a given question can collectively find the best answer — and the value of community.
Marshall Kirkpatrick / ReadWriteWeb:
New NYTimes iPhone App Enables Offline Reading  —  The New York Times released the 2.0 version of its popular free iPhone app today and it's one you'll want to be sure to grab.  The app now offers extensive support for offline reading, making it one of the easiest ways to catch up with the news on a plane.
Discussion: Oatmeal Stout
Rebecca Buckman / Forbes:
VC View From The Rockies  —  Tough sledding for most Colorado venture firms.  —  AVON, Colo.—Even in this dismal economy, venture capitalist Chris Onan can spot lots of high-quality start-ups he'd like to fund.  There's only one problem: Onan's firm, Appian Ventures, doesn't have any cash in its pockets.
Alex Chitu / Google Operating System:
Google Chrome, Bundled with RealPlayer  —  If you try to install RealPlayer, a media player available at real.com, you'll notice that the setup downloads Google Chrome.  The option to install Google's browser is enabled by default and I assume that most people will not bother to disable it.
Discussion: Webware.com, Mashable! and The Toybox
 
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 More Items: 
Eric Krangel / Silicon Alley Insider:
Sony: iPhone Gaming Blows
Discussion: Electronista
Philip Elmer-DeWitt / Apple 2.0:
Apple so far immune to PC price “collapse”
Discussion: ZDNet and MacNN
Eric Goldman / Technology & Marketing Law Blog:
Utah Trying to Regulate Keyword Advertising....Again!? Utah HB 450
Discussion: Search Engine Land and SearchViews, Thanks:atul
Gregg Keizer / Computerworld:
Analyst: Apple turns its back on e-book market
Daniel / Disqus:
Preview our next big features exclusively on Mashable
Discussion: Download Squad, Mashable! and A VC
Liz Gannes / NewTeeVee:
Big Money! Vidyo and Verivue Score Funding for Video Tech
Discussion: Dealscape, VatorNews and Xconomy
 Earlier Items: 
Aza Raskin / Mozilla Labs:
New Tab Page: Proposed design principles and prototype
Discussion: Download Squad, ReadWriteWeb and Mozilla Links, Thanks:atul
John Leyden / The Register:
Zero-day Adobe PDF peril goes click free
Discussion: Didier Stevens and Obsessable
Dan Frommer / Silicon Alley Insider:
Tacoda, Real Media Founder Dave Morgan Back With Another Ad Startup
Discussion: VentureBeat and paidContent.org
Dean Takahashi / VentureBeat:
Enthusiasts keep pushing Smule's Ocarina iPhone app to higher numbers
Discussion: Obsessable
Justin Smith / Inside Facebook:
When Will Facebook Open Up the Public Timeline?
Monica Hesse / Washington Post:
Offbeat Name? Then Facebook's No Friend
Business Week:
Twitter Has Potential Buyers Atwitter
 

 
From Mediagazer:

Dominic Ponsford / Press Gazette:
Jason Cowley, the editor-in-chief of UK magazine the New Statesman, is stepping down from the position at the end of December after 16 years

The New York Times Company:
The New York Times names Dick Stevenson as Washington bureau chief; Stevenson has been at the paper for nearly 40 years and Washington editor since 2021

Ayodeji Rotinwa / Columbia Journalism Review:
A look at the Agora Center for Research, a Ugandan newsroom sitting between activism and investigative reporting, posting its work on various social media sites

 
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