Top Items:
Paul Miller / Engadget:
Zune HD a major sellout? — Let it be known: we liked the Zune HD before it was popular, before all the poseurs jumped on the bandwagon with their tight-fitting jeans and their hairstyles. If various stores on the internet are to be believed, the Zune HD is selling out in a pretty big way.
Discussion:
Electronista, WMPoweruser.com, Gizmodo, Smalltalk Tidbits …, Addicted to Digital Media, Joystiq, Engadget HD and BloggingStocks
Brad Stone / New York Times:
Can Amazon Be Wal-Mart of the Web? — THE hum of 102 rooftop air conditioners and a chorus of beeping electric carts provide the acoustic backdrop in Amazon.com's 605,000-square-foot distribution facility on this city's west side. But the center's employees can almost always hear Terry Jones.
Discussion:
Business Wire, Silicon Alley Insider, Amazon Strategies and digg.com, Thanks:mrinaldesai
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Eric Engleman / TechFlash:
Amazon creates own house brand of consumer electronics — Amazon.com has been quietly building a private label strategy for the last couple years, creating house brands around kitchen tools (Pinzon), outdoor furniture (Strathwood), bed and bath products (Pike Street) and power tools (Denali).
Discussion:
Bits
Cleve Nettles / 9 to 5 Mac:
Off Topic: Microsoft will reveal two iPhone competitors in 2010 — It isn't really our area of expertise, but we've gotten word that Microsoft will unleash two new Smartphones, probably at CES in January 2010. Developed under the project “Pink” moniker, these two slider phones stem …
Oliver J. Chiang / Forbes:
Creating A Hit IPhone Game — How to “Swarm” to the top of the App Store. — BURLINGAME, Calif. — David Whatley's fast-paced action-strategy game “geoDefense Swarm” is the latest to top the iPhone App Store. — Priced at 99 cents, “Swarm,” which was released Sept. 14 …
Cade Metz / The Register:
Google Apps sics crawlers on public docs and sheets — Beware what you publish — Google will soon allow search engines to crawl and index documents, spreadsheets, and presentations published to the web via its online office suite, Google Apps. — On Friday, in a letter to Google Apps users …
Discussion:
Webware.com
Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols / Computerworld:
WiMax in 2010: Too little, too late? — WiMax is finally making wide-area wireless broadband a reality in many cities — but another technology is fast encroaching. — Computerworld - By the end of 2010, users in more than 80 U.S. cities may be able to ditch their cable modems …
Paul Carr / TechCrunch:
WITTC50?: Will there be a TechCrunch50 next year? What Jason wants, Jason Getz — So here we go then, the fourth and final part of my award-winning TechCrunch50 coverage; the all-important ‘round-up’. This is where I ask appropriately round-uppy questions like “what did we learn this week? …
Justin Smith / Inside Facebook:
Josh Elman Leaving Facebook, Returning to More “Hands-On” Product Role — Facebook Platform Program Manager Josh Elman, who has been with the company since early 2008, has decided to leave Facebook. Elman, who worked on the launch of Facebook Connect and has been focused on helping large developers …
Thanks:atul
Caroline McCarthy / The Social:
Facebook Beacon has poked its last — It's finally over for Beacon, the ill-fated advertising program that the social network initially launched with splashy Madison Avenue fanfare nearly two years ago. — The social network has settled a year-old class action lawsuit that targeted …
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Greg Sandoval / CNET News:
Jammie Thomas lawyers file suit against Scribd — A legal complaint seeking class action status filed in Houston on Friday accuses social-publishing site Scribd of egregious copyright infringement. — Scribd managers have “built a technology that's broken barriers to copyright infringement …
MG Siegler / TechCrunch:
Once Again, Facebook Owns ‘Talk Like A Pirate Day’ On The Web — Last year, Facebook rolled out a new “pirate” language on Talk Like A Pirate Day, it was quite funny. Naturally, it's back again this year, and it's maybe even more awesome. — Most impressive is Facebook's attention to detail …
Discussion:
Inside Facebook
Todd Bishop / TechFlash:
Microsoft Reader, back from dead — A TechFlash reader who commented on our E-Book Universe chart yesterday pointed out that we didn't include Microsoft Reader. That's the Redmond company's software for reading electronic books, which has been updated over the past few years …