Top Items:
Michael Arrington / TechCrunch:
Google In Discussions To Acquire Yelp For A Half Billion Dollars Or More — Google and Yelp are in advanced acquisition negotiations, we've confirmed from multiple sources. And while the deal isn't done, we've heard that it's very likely to close. The price is supposedly at least $500 million.
Discussion:
Google Watch, Silicon Alley Insider, MediaMemo, Terry Heaton's PoMo Blog, Between the Lines, Tom Foremski: IMHO, GigaOM, Pulse2, Mobile Marketing Watch, Mark Evans Tech, Tech Trader Daily, Search Engine Land, Mihmorandum, Understanding Google …, The Register, GMSV, Silicon Valley Watcher, Softpedia News, Electronista, VentureBeat, paidContent, AndroidGuys, The Next Web Network, Search Engine Roundtable, Scobleizer, Andy Beal's Marketing Pilgrim and Seeking Alpha
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Claire Cain Miller / New York Times:
Google Is in Talks to Buy Yelp — SAN FRANCISCO — In a sign that Google is interested in broadening its reach among local businesses, the search giant is in acquisition talks with Yelp, the review site for local businesses, according to three peoplewith knowledge of the deal.
Discussion:
Telegraph, Screenwerk, Venture Capital Dispatch, TechFlash, Gawker, NBC Bay Area, TechCrunch, Dealscape, Lifehacker, FierceMobileContent, Silicon Alley Insider and AppScout
Michael Arrington / TechCrunch:
Twitter Hacked, Defaced By “Iranian Cyber Army” — We've received multiple tips right around 10 pm that Twitter was hacked and defaced with the message below. The site is currently offline. We're looking into this and waiting on a response from Twitter. — The message reads: — Iranian Cyber Army
Discussion:
CNET News, Between the Lines, Damon Cortesi's Blog, Reuters, Mashable!, GigaOM, GMSV, techPresident, Techland, Switched, Gizmodo, Digits, Twitter Status, DailyTech, Appfrica, Boy Genius Report, Guardian, Gear Diary, Twittercism, dot.life, TechTicker, The Register, CloudAve, Fudzilla, PC World, The Huffington Post, SiliconIndia.com, eWeek, Download Squad, Silicon Alley Insider, Donna's SecurityFlash and Pocket-lint.com
RELATED:
Biz / Twitter Blog:
DNS Disruption — As we tweeted a bit ago, Twitter's DNS records were temporarily compromised tonight but have now been fixed. As some noticed, Twitter.com was redirected for a while but API and platform applications were working. We will update with more information and details once we've investigated more fully.
Discussion:
Graham Cluley's blog, BBC, CNET News, Bits, PC World, http://www.techsploder.com …, Softpedia News, Mashable!, Guardian, CNN, Associated Press, Andy Beal's Marketing Pilgrim, CyberCrime & Doing Time, The Next Web Network, Telegraph, Praetorian Prefect, HeyJude, p2pnet, VentureBeat, Gadgetell, Security Watch and AppScout
Tnkgrl / tnkgrl Mobile:
Exclusive: Google Nexus One hands on — I just played with the Google Nexus One for a few minutes, Here's my report: — It's extremely thin — It's much nicer looking in person than in pictures — There's a 4 GB micro-SD card installed — The battery capacity is 1400 mAh
Discussion:
SlashGear, The Next Web Network, Silicon Alley Insider, I4U News, GottaBeMobile.com, Geekword, AndroidOS.in, Mashable!, Gizmodo and PalmAddicts
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Thomas Ricker / Engadget:
Google's Nexus One lacks multitouch — Our buddy Tnkgrl just had a sit down with Google and HTC's lovedroid, the Nexus One. She “wasn't allowed” to take pictures or video but she came away with plenty of detail. The biggest point of clarification might not be what's included in the handset, but what's missing: multitouch.
Philip Elmer-DeWitt / Brainstorm Tech:
Where in the world are Apple's 78 million handsets? — Mostly in the U.S., but Japan, France, Australia and China are coming on fast, says AdMob — Click to enlarge. Source: AdMob — By the end of December, according to Piper Jaffray's Gene Munster, Apple's (AAPL) will have sold 78 million iPhones and iPod touches worldwide.
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Jonny Evans / 9 to 5 Mac:
Apple iPhone is big, big, big in Japan — Apple is big - really big - in Japan, where the iPhone now accounts for 46.1 percent of the smartphone market, according to the latest data from Impress. — The company achieved sales accounting for almost half of the entire Japanese smartphone market across 2009, the analysts said.
RELATED:
Slash Lane / AppleInsider:Apple's iPhone commands 46% of Japanese smartphone market
Discussion:
Gearlog
Spencer E. Ante / Business Week:
Verizon Prepares for the iPhone — Verizon Wireless is buttressing its network in the event Apple drops AT&T as the exclusive carrier of its popular smartphone — There's no telling yet whether or when AT&T (T) might lose its position as the sole U.S. carrier of the Apple (AAPL) iPhone.
Discussion:
Macsimum News, I4U News, The Huffington Post, iPhone Buzz, Business Week, FierceWireless and MacDailyNews
Chris Davies / SlashGear:
Notion Ink Tegra Android smartpad uses Pixel Qi display — CES 2010 is likely to see a fair few internet tablets being announced, but SlashGear has heard about one particular model that has more than a little promise. Notion Ink's as-yet unnamed Android “smartpad” is based …
Discussion:
Engadget, Android Central, The eBook Test, AndroidGuys, Gearlog, Pocket-lint.com, Softpedia News, Liliputing, CrunchGear, GottaBeMobile.com, I4U News, Gizmodo and TeleRead
Enigmax / TorrentFreak:
DRM Fiasco Ruins James Cameron's Avatar 3D Preview — ‘Avatar’ from Titanic director James Cameron is certainly the most anticipated film of the year. — Set on a moon under siege by humans determined to exploit its resources, this science fiction epic has been in the planning for many years …
Barry Collins / PC Pro:
Mozilla: Firefox Mobile will kill off app stores — Mozilla claims that its new Firefox Mobile browser could be the beginning of the end for the hugely popular app stores created by Apple and its ilk. — Mozilla is releasing the first version of Firefox Mobile (codenamed Fennec) …
Discussion:
Download Squad, Boy Genius Report, I4U News, PMP Today, The Equity Kicker, Pocket-lint.com and Hardware 2.0
Sophie Hardach / Reuters:
French court rules against Google over book copying — A Paris court on Friday found U.S. Internet giant Google (GOOG.O: Quote, Profile, Research) guilty of violating copyright by digitising books and putting extracts online, following a legal challenge by major French publishers.
Discussion:
Search Engine Land, CNET News, BBC, Reuters, Bloomberg, Associated Press, Fast Company, Silicon Alley Insider and TeleRead
RELATED:
Stuart Dredge / Music Ally:
Rdio makes its debut... as an iPhone app — Rdio is set to be one of the more intriguing music startups of 2010 - it's a streaming subscription service set up by Skype/Kazaa founders Janus Friis and Niklas Zennstrom. It's still in stealth mode, but has today launched an iPhone app …
Discussion:
App Advice, mocoNews, TechCrunch, The Next Web Network, 9 to 5 Mac and Pocket-lint.com, Thanks:beamadelica
Philipp Lenssen / Google Blogoscoped:
Google Guru? — Chris writes in to say he's spotted a new service on his Google account services page: “Google Guru”, which points towards guru.google.com/guru/ ... which is non-existent at the moment. The account page reads, “Guru ... Ask questions and get answers from online users”.
Discussion:
Search Engine Land, Silicon Alley Insider, Andy Beal's Marketing Pilgrim and Pocket-lint.com, Thanks:atul
Aaron / The EtherPad Blog:
EtherPad Open Source Release — As promised, we hereby release all the source code to EtherPad. — http://code.google.com/p/etherpad/ — Our goal with this release is to let the world run their own etherpad servers so that the functionality can live on even after we shut down etherpad.com.
Phone Arena:
Verizon to get Palm Pre Plus, LG VS750, and Motorola Devour smartphones — Published on: Today by PhoneArena Team — Thanks to a few of our tipsters, we've learned what new smartphones are lurking to be released by Verizon Wireless over the next couple of months.
Discussion:
Engadget, Softpedia News, SlashGear, I4U News, WMExperts, Android Central, EverythingPre and PreCentral.net
Anthony Ha / VentureBeat:
Former Microsoft evangelist Don Dodge on Google vs. Microsoft (Q&A) — At Microsoft, Don Dodge was known as the software giant's ambassador to an at-times skeptical startup community. When he was laid off in November, TechCrunch's Michael Arrington declared, “This is a huge mistake,” …
Discussion:
Don Dodge on The Next …
Joe Wilcox / BetaNews:
Mac fan blogs miss the point about Android, iPhone and Windows Mobile — It amazes me how Mac and tech blogs can take data touting Google Android phone gains and turn it into an iPhone beats Windows Mobile phone foo fest. Give it up. The data reveals much more interesting findings than that.
Dieter Bohn / PreCentral.net:
Palm Confirms 1.3.5: Speed, Battery, App Limit all to be improved, Plus Investor Call Notes — Allowing for installation of more apps — Increased speed and responsiveness on the Palm Pixi — We're still listening in and hearing good things about what's coming.
Discussion:
Engadget, Business Wire, Softpedia News, WebOS Arena, Gizmodo, PhoneDog.com and Pocket-lint.com
Dean Takahashi / VentureBeat:
Facebook readies its Game Dashboard to organize your social gaming life — Facebook is in the midst of redesigning how users find, interact with, and keep track of games on the social network. Called the “Game Dashboard,” the new feature is Facebook's attempt to play nice with social game developers …
Discussion:
Lonely CEO Media
Michael M. Grynbaum / New York Times:
New Rule for Cabbies: No Devices in the Ear — The latest contraband for New York City cabbies is a diminutive beeping earpiece — a high-tech accoutrement that for many has been the cellphone of choice. — The latest dictate from the city's Taxi and Limousine Commission bans any electronic device …
The Official Google Blog:
Go thataway: Google Maps India learns to navigate like a local — Have you ever been lost? Perhaps you missed a turn because a street sign was poorly labeled, hard to see in the dark, or just not where it should have been? These are problems we've all faced, but they're especially complicated in India …
Ryan Singel / Threat Level:
Netflix Spilled Your Brokeback Mountain Secret, Lawsuit Claims — An in-the-closet lesbian mother is suing Netflix for privacy invasion, alleging the movie rental company made it possible for her to be outed when it disclosed insufficiently anonymous information about nearly half-a-million customers …
Discussion:
Techdirt, blogs.telegraph.co.uk, Lockergnome Blog Network, the Econsultancy blog, Between the Lines and Gizmodo
Paul Krill / InfoWorld:
Performance problems delay Visual Studio 2010 release — Microsoft has pushed back the original March 2010 release date and is extending the beta period — Beset by performance issues, Microsoft has decided to extend the beta testing period for its upcoming Visual Studio 2010 software development platform …
David Kaplan / paidContent:
AdMob: U.S. Smartphones Generated Nearly Half Of Mobile Web Traffic In November — Growing sales of iPhones and Android devices helped smartphones generate 48 percent of mobile web and app traffic on AdMob's ad network in November, up from 30 percent a year ago, the company found.
