Top Items:
The Official Google Blog:
Two new improvements to Google results pages — Today we're rolling out two new improvements to Google search. The first offers an expanded list of useful related searches and the second is the addition of longer search result descriptions — both of which help guide users more effectively to the information they need.
Discussion:
paidContent.org, Technologizer, PC World, Download Squad, CNET News, eWeek, Search Engine Watch, Silicon Alley Insider, Mashable!, TECH.BLORGE.com, tinyComb, VoIP & Gadgets Blog, The Noisy Channel, InformationWeek, AppScout, Andy Beal's Marketing Pilgrim, Lifehacker and techblog.dallasnews.com, Thanks:atul
RELATED:
Greg Sterling / Search Engine Land:
Google Implements ‘Orion’ Technology, Improves Search Refinements & Adds Longer Snippets — Google is announcing two changes to search results this morning. The first involves the use of longer “snippets” (text extracts containing the keywords) when users input queries of three words or more.
Marshall Kirkpatrick / ReadWriteWeb:
Google Changes Could Decrease Downstream Traffic — Google says it gets smarter every day, but today the company made a big enough leap in what it shows to users that an announcement was in order. The company blog post says that today's improvements are intended to “get you to the web page you want as quickly as possible.”
Erick Schonfeld / TechCrunch:
iPhone Makes Up 50 Percent of Smartphone Web Traffic In U.S., Android Already 5 Percent — The iPhone now accounts for 50 percent of mobile Web traffic from smartphones in the U.S., according to an AdMob Mobile Metrics report released this morning. Over the past six months …
Martyn Williams / Computerworld:
Michael Dell hints at smartphones, mobile Internet devices — CEO says it wouldn't be unreasonable to expect a smartphone or similar device from the company — IDG News Service) Michael Dell gave the strongest hint to-date that his company is developing a mobile Internet device or smartphone at a speech in Tokyo today.
Discussion:
Between the Lines, ChannelWeb, Tech Trader Daily, Crave, mocoNews, Electronista, SlashGear, Gearlog, Engadget and Digital Daily
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Wall Street Journal:
Sprint Looks Beyond Cellphones — As Core Business Slumps, Wireless Carrier Aims to Use Its Network for Dashboard Computers, GPS Devices — Unable to sign up enough new cellphone subscribers, Sprint Nextel Corp. is increasingly trying to use the excess capacity on its wireless network to power other consumer gadgets.
Discussion:
CNET News, Gadget Lab, Phone Arena, InformationWeek, Unwired View, Electronista, FierceWireless, SlashGear and CrunchGear
Richard Jones / Last.fm:
Last.fm Radio Announcement — Today we're announcing an upcoming change to the way Last.fm Radio works in some parts of the world. In the United States, United Kingdom and Germany, nothing will change. — In all other countries, listening to Last.fm Radio will soon require a subscription of €3.00 per month.
Dean Takahashi / VentureBeat:
New OnLive service could turn the video game world upside down — Few startups have a chance to revolutionize an industry. But if entrepreneur Steve Perlman's OnLive lives up to its goals, the company will disrupt the entire video game industry — to the delight of both game publishers and gamers.
Discussion:
CNET News, PC World, Digital Daily, Wall Street Journal, Dealscape, L.A. Times Tech Blog, Kotaku, USA Today, EE Times, Engadget, Rock, Paper, Shotgun, ITworld.com, Blue's News and Ubergizmo
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Lucy Hornby / Reuters:
“Unafraid” of Internet, China appears to block YouTube — BEIJING (Reuters) - China is not afraid of the Internet, its Foreign Ministry said on Tuesday, even as access to the popular video sharing site YouTube appeared to be blocked. — YouTube has unavailable for users in China …
Discussion:
New York Times, Digital Daily, paidContent.org, Silicon Alley Insider, BBC and Wall Street Journal
Robin Wauters / TechCrunch:
Twitter Tweaks Its Title Tags For Better Google Juice — Notice that title tag for my Twitter profile page? — It reads “Robin Wauters (robinwauters) on Twitter” where it used to say “Twitter / robinwauters”. For the TechCrunch Twitter account, it used to read “Twitter / TechCrunch” …
BBC:
Call to ‘shut down’ Street View — Images of 25 cities are viewable via Google Street View — A formal complaint about Google's Street View has been sent to the Information Commissioner (ICO). — Drawn up by privacy campaigners, it cites more than 200 reports from members of the public identifiable via the service.
Discussion:
Privacy International, TechCrunch Europe, PC World, CNET News, Softpedia News and Electricpig.co.uk
Robert Andrews / paidContent.org:
Industry Moves: Hulu Adds New Exec Larcher For International Push — Hulu has further signaled its overseas ambitions by hiring a dedicated international SVP to acquire TV rights. Johannes Larcher had previously been search firm Overture's international GM, international VP for Friendster …
Ploth / perceptdev.com:
iPhone Keyboard - no Jailbreaking required, using 2.0 SDK — A number of industrious individuals have achieved what to some is the holy grail of iPhone accessories: an iPhone keyboard. But most have done it in a very hard-to-repeat manner, and few have shared the methods they used.
Discussion:
Ars Technica, TUAW, Apple Gazette, Gizmodo, Softpedia News, Gadget Lab, The Apple Core, Obsessable, Hack a Day and VOIP IP Telephony
Peter Burrows / Business Week:
Palm's Secret Weapon for the Pre — Against the odds, Palm courted a formidable community of developers whose apps may prove vital to the fortunes of the make-or-break Pre smartphone — As recently as late 2008, Pandora Networks' Chief Technology Officer Tom Conrad still had big doubts about the prospects for smartphone maker Palm.
John D. Sutter / CNN:
No joke in April Fool's Day computer worm — (CNN) — A computer-science detective story is playing out on the Internet as security experts try to hunt down a worm called Conficker C and prevent it from damaging millions of computers on April Fool's Day. — The anti-worm researchers …
Seth Weintraub / 9 to 5 Mac:
Woops! China Unicom post iPhone Page - Guess who is bringing the iPhone to China? — They don't get any better than this! It looks like the biggest mobile market in the world will be served the iPhone by China Unicom - unless there is something very shady going on.
Hicham Alaoui / Google News Blog:
New Insights for your Search — Some of you may already be familiar with Google Insights for Search, which launched last August. — Much like Google Trends, you can use Insights for Search to analyze search volume patterns over time, as well as related queries and rising searches.
Discussion:
Inside AdWords, Search Engine Land, Search Engine Watch, AppScout, Google Operating System and Search Engine Journal, Thanks:atul
Elaine Chow / Gizmodo:
Rumored Lenovo oPhone OS Looks Too Apple-like — Chinese bloggers have posted photos that are rumored to depict what the Lenovo oPhone's operating system looks like. Apparently, much like their moniker, the oPhone OS also has that slight Apple-y touch. — Rounded square icons against a black background?
Om Malik / GigaOM:
Skype, Now the Largest Long-distance Phone Company — TeleGeography says that cross-border telephone traffic grew 14 percent in 2007 and is estimated to have grown 12 percent in 2008, to 384 billion minutes. Falling prices and rising popularity have flattened the revenues (see graph below the fold).
Katie Marsal / AppleInsider:
Apple sued for promoting iPhone as eBook reader — A overseas communications firm is suing Apple for promoting its iPhone handset as a touchscreen digital book reader, a concept it claims to have patented over seven years ago. — In a 7-page complaint filed with a Virginia district court Monday …
alarm:clock:
Flat World Knowledge Raises $8M For Open Source Text Books — Having just put the alarm:clock wife through school, we are big fans of any startup that reduces the costs of text books and Flat World Knowledge of Nyack, NY claims to do just that with its open-source textbooks model.
Roi Carthy / TechCrunch:
Face.com Brings Facial Recognition To Facebook Photos (We Have Invites) — If there is one feature on Facebook which delivers “social utility” magic even to the most average of users, it's Photos. In fact the feature is so popular that by Facebook's own account 1 billion photos are uploaded every month …
Sue McAllister / Mercury News:
More office space, lower leases in Silicon Valley — An ugly economy has affected more than Silicon Valley's residential real estate market; it's pummeling the commercial real estate market as well. — About 8.7 million square feet of Silicon Valley office space was vacant in the fourth quarter of 2008 …
Josh Lowensohn / CNET News:
Skimmer brings your social streams to the desktop — Skimmer is a new social aggregator powered by Adobe AIR. It supports Twitter, Flickr, Facebook, YouTube, and Blogger, and lets you stay abreast of the latest content from each of those services. Everything gets sucked up into a single stream …
Michael Arrington / TechCrunch:
MySpace Music Announces Executive Team (Internal Memo) — MySpace Music, the joint venture between MySpace and the major labels to provide free streaming music to users, is announcing its executive team this afternoon. The president of the company, Courtney Holt, was announced late last year.
The Boy Genius / Boy Genius Report:
BlackBerry 9630 Review: Part 1 — We've been playing with it non-stop all weekend. We've tastelessly shown it off with a dash of hood on video. But the review is now finally ready. We decided to split this into two parts, one now and one right before launch.
Peter Parkes / Skype Blogs:
Skype 3.0 Beta for Windows Mobile — For those of you reading this in an RSS reader, you can watch the video here. You can also grab the embed code if you want to use this video in your own blog. — Just over a month ago, I mentioned on this blog that we were gearing up to launch Skype 3. Beta …
