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5:30 AM ET, August 6, 2009

Techmeme

 Top Items: 
Min Li Chan / Google Chrome Blog:
A New Beta: Why slow down when you can speed up?  —  There's a brand new beta for you to try out today.  As always, we continue to focus on speed, and this beta release shows over 30% improvement on both the V8 and SunSpider benchmarks over our current stable channel release.
RELATED:
Clint Boulton / eWeek:
Google Chrome Gets 30% Speed Bump, HTML5 Functionality
Discussion: AppScout and Electronista
Apple:
About the Mac OS X v10.5.8 Update  —  The Mac OS X v10.5.8 Update is recommended for Mac OS X v10.5 Leopard users and includes general operating system fixes that enhance the stability, compatibility and security of your Mac.  For detailed information about the security content of this update, please visit this website.
RELATED:
Jacqui Cheng / Ars Technica:
Mac OS X 10.5.8 chock full of security, reliability fixes
Discussion: Softpedia News and Macworld
Boy Genius Report:
Apple launching iPhone 3GS 8GB soon?  —  We've had a number of unconfirmed tips over the last few days about this so we figured we'd post it... apparently it seems that Rogers in Canada is in the process of shipping iPhone 3GS 8GB flavor handsets to stores.  Again, unconfirmed, no idea on pricing …
RELATED:
Chris Ziegler / Engadget:
Apple phasing out iPhone 3G in favor of 8GB 3GS?
Discussion: TUAW and Electronista
MG Siegler / TechCrunch:
Bing Has Succeeded... In Finding The Worst Jingle Ever  —  A few weeks ago, we wrote about the contest Microsoft's new search engine Bing was holding to find a catchy jingle for the product.  Today, they have announced the winner.  “Catchy” is one word for it.  Another is “awful.”
Ed Bott / Ed Bott's Microsoft Report:
A killer Windows 7 bug?  Sorry, no  —  The blogosphere is abuzz over a newly publicized bug in Windows 7.  I read about it yesterday on Chris123NT's blog, where it was described as a “critical bug in Windows 7 RTM.”  The story picked up momentum today when InfoWorld's Randall Kennedy …
Inside Edge:
TomTom iPhone pricing leaked  —  Please support our Hardware and Software advertiser: Programming Forums  —  How much for an iPhone-powered TomTom satnav?  That's the question that has been on the lips of many an iPhone user ever since TomTom announced it was developing a version …
Robert Scoble / Scobleizer:
You are SO unfollowed!  —  Whew, it's been a while since I've done a good old fashioned blog.  I've been busy, though.  Posting tons of videos, both on my personal site on Blip.tv as well as professional videos over on building43.com.  Last night I put up a live video of USA's new CTO speaking to a bunch of Silicon Valley geeks, too.
John C. Dvorak / PC Magazine:
What is Happening to Windows 7?  —  Blame the tricky upgrade process—and, by extension, the Registry—for the backlash against Windows 7.  —  Why has Windows 7 suddenly fallen off the track with negative publicity?  What happened?  What changed?  —  This is one of the strangest developments …
Discussion: Mossblog and digg.com
Dan Rayburn / The Business Of Online Video:
Debunking Some Myths Of The Google/On2 Deal, Questioning VP8's Quality  —  Following up on my earlier post today entitled “Google's Acquisition Of On2 Not A Big Deal, Here's Why”, here's some more thoughts on the subject.  While clearly no one, including me, truly knows what Google plans to do with On2 …
RELATED:
Google:
Google to Acquire On2 Technologies
Discussion: Technologizer, Thanks:shankargan
Sysomos:
Inside Twitter  —  An In-Depth Look at the 5% of Most Active Users  —  When Sysomos published its initial “Inside Twitter” report last month that looked at the people on Twitter and how it was being used, we discovered that 5% of users accounted for 75% of all activity.
Discussion: ReadWriteWeb, Twitterrati, WebProNews and Mark Evans, Thanks:atul
Rosa Golijan / Lifehacker:
Massacre Gmail Ads with These Two Sentences (and Some Tragic Words)  —  Those “Sponsored Ads” in e-mails are an annoyance to both sender and recipient and they seem to escape blocking.  Until now.  These two (so far) fail-proof sentences at the end of an email will let you enjoy e-mailed rants, ad-free.
Discussion: Download Squad and Gizmodo
Dan Goodin / The Register:
XML flaws threaten ‘enormous’ array of apps  —  Java, Python, and Apache - for starters  —  Free whitepaper - Avoiding 7 common mistakes of IT security compliance  —  Security researchers have uncovered critical flaws in open-source software that implements the Extensible Markup Language …
Discussion: eWeek
Andrew Clark / Guardian:
Murdoch plans charge for all news websites by next summer  —  Times and Sun readers to pay as loss-making Murdoch declares end to free-for-all  —  The billionaire media mogul Rupert Murdoch suffered the indignity of seeing his global empire make a huge financial loss yesterday and promptly pledged …
Discussion: Mashable! and open
RELATED:
Dan Frommer / Silicon Alley Insider:
Arrington's CrunchPad Will Be ‘A Real Hit’, Says Best Buy Marketing Boss  —  Best Buy (BBY) chief marketing officer Barry Judge just met with the “chief blogger” at TechCrunch.  Presumably, that's Michael Arrington.  —  Judge also took a peek at the CrunchPad, Arrington's Web-only tablet PC project.
Oliver J. Chiang / Forbes:
The Challenge Of User-Generated Porn  —  YouTube-like pornography sites have YouTube-like profit problems.  —  BURLINGAME, Calif. — You would think that if anyone were making boatloads of money from Internet video, it would be high-traffic porn sites.  You would be wrong.
Matt Marshall / VentureBeat:
Symantec helps pump $20M into identity theft protection company Lifelock  —  Internet security company Symantec and other investors have invested $20 million into identity theft protection company Lifelock, VentureBeat has learned from a source.  The two companies have also signed …
Discussion: WebWire
Jane Macartney / Times of London:
Chinese teenager beaten to death in internet addiction clinic  —  His parents hoped their teenage son would be home in a month, cured of his addiction to the internet.  They never thought that within 10 hours of taking him to an addiction clinic they would receive a telephone call notifying them that he was dead.
Discussion: TECH.BLORGE.com, Thanks:mikeharvey
Erica Alini / Wall Street Journal:
Coffee Shops Pull the Plug on Laptops  —  They Sit for Hours and Don't Spend Much; Getting the Bum's Rush in the Big Apple  —  A sign at Naidre's, a small neighborhood coffee shop in Brooklyn, N.Y., begins warmly: “Dear customers, we are absolutely thrilled that you like us so much that you want to spend the day...”
Discussion: Wi-Fi Networking News and Gawker
Nate Anderson / Ars Technica:
Comcast adopts DNS hijacking, imposes irritating opt-out  —  Despite knowing the ways in which DNS hijacking can cause problems for non-Web clients, Comcast has rolled it out in an attempt to make money off misspelled URLs.  To make matters worse, opting out is a hassle.
Discussion: Comcast Voices and DSLreports
TechCrunch:
Eight New Startups Pop Out Of The LaunchBox  —  Washington DC based LaunchBox Digital, an early stage investment firm and incubator founded in 2007 by John McKinley, Sean Green, and Julius Genachowski (now the new head of the FCC and divested from LaunchBox), just wrapped up its second annual 12-week program.
Paul Carr:
An open letter to Sam Sethi, on the occasion of him completely losing his mind  —  For the past few weeks, you have been embroiled in a one-sided libel suit against Michael Arrington, the Silicon Valley-based editor of TechCrunch - a publication for which, in the interests of disclosure, I recently began writing a weekly column.
Discussion: Robin Wauters
W. David Gardner / InformationWeek:
WiMax Versus WiMax In Texas Towns  —  The battle is likely a harbinger of the wireless future in which different high speed wireless technologies will compete against each other on a wide scale.  —  Mobile WiMax is still in its deployment infancy, but two providers are already competing …
Alex Pham / L.A. Times Tech Blog:
Online ad spending dropped 7% in second quarter, worst not yet over, says IDC  —  Google grew its online ad business, while the rest of the industry faltered.  Credit: David Paul Morris / Getty Images  —  The worst is not yet over.  U.S. spending on online ads, which dropped 7% to $6.2 billion …
Discussion: IDC, Bits, CNET News, WebProNews and blogs.ft.com
Greg Kumparak / MobileCrunch:
Qik for Android gets video editing, “Speed sharing”  —  Just over a month back, an Alpha version of Qik found its way into the Android Market.  As the Alpha tag implies, it was a bit of a rough cut; it lacked a number of features found on other ports, and plenty of bugs were abound.
Brooke Crothers / Bits:
Google's Android Jumps to the Living Room  —  MIPS Technologies, a microprocessor design firm, is trying to push Google's Android software beyond mobile phones into the living room.  —  Though Android was developed originally as an operating system for smartphones, computer makers quickly started toying …
Erick Schonfeld / TechCrunch:
Here Come The Twitter Patent Lawsuits.  TechRadium Files The First One.  —  Twitter is being sued again, and this time it isn't some angry baseball manager who doesn't like people impersonating him on the service.  This time it is a little more serious.  Twitter is being sued for patent infringement …
Discussion: VentureBeat and Threat Level
Jason Kincaid / TechCrunch:
ShoeMoney Reaches Settlement With Google Employee Over AdWords Violations  —  Over the last few months we've been tracking a lawsuit between online marketing guru Jeremy Schoemaker and a Google employee named Keyen Farrell.  This week comes news that Schoemaker has settled the case with Farrell, though details are scant.
 
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 More Items: 
Bill Rigby / Reuters:
Publicis front-runner to buy Razorfish: report
Discussion: Wall Street Journal
Philip Elmer-DeWitt / Brainstorm Tech:
iPhone triggers boom in flash memory
Discussion: Electronista
Preston Gralla / Computerworld:
Report: Microsoft Bing benefits from illegal pharmaceutical sales
Discussion: LiveSide, Ars Technica and eWeek
Ryan Tate / Gawker:
It's Time for Current TV to Talk About What Happened to Their Captured Reporters
Nick O'Neill / All Facebook:
Facebook Removes Ability To Search Based On Relationship Status
Discussion: blogs.ft.com and Gawker
 Earlier Items: 
Mark Walsh / MediaPost:
Top Execs Exit Tremor Media
Discussion: Contentinople and NewTeeVee
Randy McIlwain / NBC Bay Area:
HP's Huge Salary Cuts Forcing Out Old EDS Employees
Olga Kharif / Business Week:
Palm's Pre Is Trying to Live Up to the Hype
Discussion: PreCentral.net and PalmAddicts
Marianne Schultz / MacRumors iPhone Blog:
Banned App Store Developer Had Been Trying to Auction Off Business
Discussion: Edible Apple
 

 
From Mediagazer:

Alex Sherman / CNBC:
Analyzing Comcast's spinoff of cable networks, purposefully structured with low debt: the move might be a signal to the industry that it's time to consolidate

Daniel Thomas / Financial Times:
James Harding says the Tortoise-Observer deal could create a profitable media group and there isn't a guaranteed future for the Observer with the Guardian

John Gruber / Daring Fireball:
Substack, very deliberately, tries to have it both ways by saying publications on their platform are independent while presenting them all as parts of Substack

 
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