Top Items:
Richard Whitt / Google Public Policy Blog:
Response to AT&T's letter to FCC on Google Voice — This afternoon AT&T filed a letter with the Federal Communications Commission, alleging that Google Voice is preventing its users from making outbound calls to certain phone numbers with inflated access charges, and asking the Commission to intervene.
Discussion:
CNET News, Bits, TechCrunch, mocoNews, Digital Daily, Tech Daily Dose, NBC Bay Area, Post I.T., Electronista, Engadget Mobile and FierceWireless, Thanks:mrinaldesai
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Cecilia Kang / Post I.T.:
AT&T Accuses Google of Violating Telecom Laws; Google Rejects Claims — AT&T asked the Federal Communications Commission Friday afternoon to look into Google's alleged blocking of some phone calls through its Google Voice service, a practice the phone giant called a violation of federal telecommunications laws.
Discussion:
Mashable!
Reuters:
AT&T: net neutrality should apply to Web firms too — WASHINGTON/NEW YORK (Reuters) - AT&T Inc said any new “net neutrality” rules imposed by U.S. regulators need to apply to Web companies like Google Inc as much as to phone companies to ensure a level playing field.
Twitter Blog:
New Twitter Funding — There's a lot of talk today about our financing. Yesterday we closed a significant round of funding with a group of investment firms that we're excited to publicly thank: Insight Venture Partners, T. Rowe Price, Institutional Venture Partners, Spark Capital, Benchmark Capital, and Morgan Stanley.
Discussion:
Fast Company, TechCrunch, Hitwise Intelligence, Tech Trader Daily, blogs.ft.com, eWeek, Dealscape, Traffick, ReadWriteWeb, Between the Lines, Bits, The SiliconANGLE, Mashable! and AppScout
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Peter Kafka / MediaMemo:
Early Twitter Backer Union Square Sits This One Out — Twitter CEO Evan Williams thanked a long list of investors in his blog post today formally announcing his newest funding round. Not included: New York's Union Square Ventures, which has been one of the messaging service's most prominent backers …
Brad Stone / New York Times:
Twitter Appears Set to Raise $100 Million, Valuing It at $1 Billion — SAN FRANCISCO — Twitter has trained people to compress their thoughts into 140 characters and given a public stage to both dissidents in Iran and voluble stars like Shaquille O'Neal. — Now the start-up appears to have chalked up another achievement.
Eric Slivka / MacRumors:
AT&T Activates MMS Functionality for U.S. iPhone Users — As previously scheduled, AT&T has activated MMS for iPhone 3G and 3GS users in the United States, bringing to an end months of speculation and waiting since software support for the feature was introduced in iPhone OS 3.0 in mid-June.
Discussion:
L.A. Times Tech Blog, Computerworld, NEWSFACTOR, VentureBeat, Macworld, CNET News, MobileCrunch, Cult of Mac, Phone Arena, AppleInsider, Engadget, The iPhone Blog and iPhone Savior
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Michael Arrington / TechCrunch:
Exclusive Interview With Steve Ballmer: Products, Competition, The Road Ahead — Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer visited Silicon Valley on Thursday for his annual meeting with top venture capitalists to talk about Microsoft product strategy. This was his first visit to Silicon Valley since announcing …
Discussion:
CNET News, WMPoweruser.com, The Microsoft Blog, Techgeist, MacDailyNews, TechSpot, Electronista, Mobile Roar, Andy Beal's Marketing Pilgrim, WMExperts, Engadget Mobile, DVICE, Seeking Alpha, MobileTechWorld, Gizmodo, TechFlash, ithinkdifferent, OakLeaf Systems, GottaBeMobile.com, ParisLemon and Engadget, Thanks:mgcreed
Hiroko Tabuchi / New York Times:
Apple's Shadow Hangs Over Game Console Makers — TOKYO — As video game giants like Sony and Microsoft touted their new gizmos at the Tokyo Game Show this week, industry executives had more than the coming holiday sales season on their minds. — Apple's recent foray into video games …
Boy Genius Report:
Confirmed: Verizon Wireless will sell the Palm Pre — We've just confirmed this with one of our ninjas: the rumor of Verizon Wireless passing on adding the Palm Pre to its line-up is totally and 100% bogus. We don't have any other information to share at this time but hopefully those analysts stay …
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John Paczkowski / Digital Daily:Analyst: Reports that Verizon Snubbed Palm “Off Base”
Discussion:
MobileCrunch, Mobile Roar, WebOS Arena, E-Commerce Times, Engadget Mobile, DSLreports, FierceWireless, Gizmodo, IntoMobile, EverythingPre, Fast Company, I4U News, Between the Lines, TechSpot, TheStreet.com, techblog.dallasnews.com, Bloomberg, Computerworld, PreCentral.net, The Toybox and Tech Check with Jim Goldman
Chris Kern / The Official Google Blog:
Jump to the information you want right from the search snippets — For most search results, Google shows you a few lines of text to give you an idea of what the page is about — we call this a “search snippet.” Recently, we've enhanced the search snippet with two new features that make it easier …
Discussion:
Google Webmaster Central Blog, TechCrunch, Computerworld, Search Engine Land and Mashable!, Thanks:mgcreed
Stephen Shankland / CNET News:
Mozilla coders join Palm, apparently jabbing Apple — Two prominent Web-based programming advocates have left Mozilla for Palm, arguing that the time has come to use browsers to bypass Apple's controlling role in mobile applications. — Dion Almaer and Ben Galbraith …
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Kara Swisher / BoomTown:
Yahoo Loses Board Member: Wilderotter to Resign — Maggie Wilderotter, a Yahoo director who was once under consideration to be its CEO, has told the company she intends to resign from the board at the end of the year. — She has served on the Yahoo (YHOO) board since mid-2007, during its most tumultuous period ever.
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The Microsoft Blog
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Erin Geiger Smith / Silicon Alley Insider:
VERDICT: Why Gawker Will Win The McSteamy Sex Tape Lawsuit — We all know the details by now: — Grey's Anatomy's McSteamy, his wife, and what is apparently a very good friend made a sexless sex tape. Gawker posted the video and McSteamy and wife (hereinafter referred to collectively as “McSteamy") sue.
Discussion:
The Smoking Gun
Nik Cubrilovic / TechCrunch:
Squidoo Backs Down On ‘Brand Campaign’ As Many Are ‘Not so Happy’ About It — Squidoo founder and author Seth Godin has backed down on creating company pages by default as part of their new ‘Brands In Public’ service that launched a few days ago. The idea behind the new service is that brands …
Emil Protalinski / Ars Technica:
Microsoft: Google Chrome Frame makes IE less secure — Microsoft does not recommend that Internet Explorer users install Google Chrome Frame, in order to avoid having more security issues. — The release of Google Chrome Frame, a new open source plugin that injects Chrome's renderer …
Larry Dignan / Between the Lines:
RIM signals price war potential; Fallout could be substantial — Research in Motion's second quarter sounded alarm bells and may have signaled a smartphone price war, according to analysts. The company's contention that it would target a ‘more mainstream’ market was viewed as a sign …
Gavin Newsom / Mashable!:
San Francisco Launches City App Store — This guest post was written by San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, who was elected to the position in 2003 and reelected in 2007. In this guest post, Mayor Newsom details the launch of a City App Store, the DataSF App Showcase, a new web site …
Nilay Patel / Engadget:
Video: Phoenix Instant Boot BIOS starts loading Windows in under a second — Phoenix is showing off a few interesting things at IDF, but the real standout is their new Instant Boot BIOS, a highly optimized UEFI implementation that can start loading an OS in just under a second.
Discussion:
Gizmodo, TweakTown News, The Tech Report, blog.laptopmag.com, Maximum PC, Netbooked, GottaBeMobile.com and techeblog.com
Eric Savitz / Tech Trader Daily:
Oy, What A Shanda: Chinese Gaming IPO Flops — I wonder if the people who run China-based Shanda Interactive (SNDA), or its newly public spin-off Shanda Games (GAME), know that in Yiddish the word “shanda” refers to something that is deeply shameful. You might say something like, “Oy …
Discussion:
Silicon Alley Insider
Michael Learmonth / AdAge:
Warner Inks Deal to Bring Green Day, Madonna, U2 Back to YouTube — Label Also in Talks to Join Vevo, the ‘Hulu for Music’ Initiative — NEW YORK (AdAge.com) — Warner Music Group has completed a deal with YouTube that will bring back music videos for Green Day, U2, Madonna and other artists …
Nilay Patel / Engadget:
Google hits Android ROM modder with a cease-and-desist letter — So this is interesting: apparently Google's hit the developer of the Cyanogen modded Android ROM with a cease-and-desist letter, asking him to stop distributing the closed-source Google apps like Gmail, Maps, and YouTube.
Discussion:
The Register, AndroidGuys, Android and Me, Android Phone Fans, Maximum PC, MobileCrunch, Techgeist, TweakTown News, GigaOM and Gizmodo, Thanks:atul
Gus Sentementes / BaltTech:
Sticky situation: WhoGlue v. Facebook — By now, you may have heard about WhoGlue Inc., a tiny Baltimore tech firm, launching a lawsuit this week against Facebook for infringing on a key patent that essentially covers social networking and privacy features. (Here's my original story from yesterday.)
Steve DelBianco / CircleID:
On New Domains and ICANN Accountability, More Questions than Answers — The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) went before a Congressional panel this week to defend its plan to create an unlimited number of new Internet domains (like .web, .food, etc.) I was a witness …
