Top Items:
Brian Garner / AppleInsider:
Apple's TV subscription plan gains potential partners in CBS, Disney — Both CBS Corp. and Walt Disney Co. have shown interest in offering content for Apple's TV subscription proposal slated for roll out sometime in 2010. — Walt Disney Co. and CBS Corp. are considering participating …
Discussion:
Between the Lines, Wall Street Journal, Gizmodo, Engadget, New York Times, 9 to 5 Mac, The iPhone Blog, Gizmodo Australia, SFGate, Edible Apple, MacRumors, bizjournals and DisplayBlog
RELATED:
MG Siegler / TechCrunch:
Apple May Be On The Verge Of Kneecapping The Cable Industry. Finally. — The cable companies suck. All of them. Some suck less than others. But they all suck. We need someone to whip them into shape. And that someone may be Apple. — Apple may be on the verge of gaining …
Clive Thompson / Wired News:
Learn to Let Go: How Success Killed Duke Nukem — On the last day, they gathered for a group photo. They were videogame programmers, artists, level builders, artificial-intelligence experts. Their team was — finally — giving up, declaring defeat, and disbanding.
Discussion:
4 color rebellion, Gizmodo Australia, SEO BlackHat, Kotaku, Rock, Paper, Shotgun and GMSV
Lars Backstrom / Facebook Blog:
Facebook Memology: Top Status Trends of 2009 — Status updates on Facebook help people understand their friends and the people around them—how they're feeling, what they're doing and what they're thinking. In the United States alone, people on Facebook are sharing hundreds of millions of words every day …
Discussion:
TechCrunch, Facebook, GigaOM, Pocket-lint.com, NBC Bay Area, Erictric, All Facebook, AppScout, Between the Lines, Maximum PC, Mashable!, WebProNews, The Next Web, Games.com News and ResourceShelf
The Official Google Blog:
The meaning of open — Last week I sent an email to Googlers about the meaning of “open” as it relates to the Internet, Google, and our users. In the spirit of openness, I thought it would be appropriate to share these thoughts with those outside of Google as well. — At Google we believe that open systems win.
Discussion:
Howard Lindzon, GigaOM, Mark Sigal's Blog, Beyond Search and Google Operating System, Thanks:mgcreed
MG Siegler / TechCrunch:
Twitter Captures A Nexus One Unboxing And Another Video — A number of pictures have hit the web now showing the Nexus One, aka the Google Phone, in the flesh. But there haven't been too many showing its packaging, and it getting unboxed. Today, some Twitpics shared by one user show those.
Discussion:
Engadget, Mobile Whack, Fone Arena, Erictric, The Next Web, Android Central, TmoNews, Techie Buzz and Gizmodo
Miguel Helft / Bits:
Who Walked, Google or Yelp? — One thing is certain about the Google-Yelp courtship: After turning hot as recently as Friday, a bitter chill has spread over the relationship, and for now, the mating dance is definitely off. — But why things fell apart after the two sides had virtually agreed …
RELATED:
Peter Kafka / MediaMemo:Yelp Is Gone-For Now-But Google Has Plenty of Fish Left to Fry
Discussion:
Silicon Alley Insider, PC World, Bits, MediaPost, Tech Trader Daily, blogs.ft.com, the Econsultancy blog and Android Phone Fans
Wilson Rothman / Gizmodo:
Our 2009 12-City 3G Data Mega Test: AT&T Won — Given carrier reputation and our own iPhone call drops, we were pretty surprised to discover, through careful testing in 12 markets, that AT&T's has pretty consistently the fastest 3G network nationwide, followed closely—in downloads at least—by Verizon Wireless.
Discussion:
VentureBeat, SFGate, Electronista, Lifehacker, DSLreports, Maximum PC, ClipperHouse and Technologizer
Seth Weintraub / 9 to 5 Mac:
Hurry up and download an NES emulator that slipped into the App Store — We're not sure how this one slipped through, but Nescaline, a Nintendo Entertainment System emulator is in the App Store as we speak. Yes, Apple has prohibited emulators in the past as a security measure although it did eventually approve a Commodore64 emulator.
Roberto Mateu / Opera Labs:
Opera 10.5 pre-alpha for Labs — Today we are releasing Opera 10.5 pre-alpha for Labs. This pre-alpha is based on the Evenes branch and includes Windows and Mac builds, with an UNIX/Linux version coming later. — As you may know, we don't typically open to user-testing this early in the development cycle.
RELATED:
Lee Mathews / Download Squad:Opera 10.5's new Carakan Javascript engine is fast - Google Chrome fast.
Discussion:
Web Browsers
Mia / YouTube Blog:
Make Way for youtu.be Links — It's all the rage: link shorteners to ensure that those useful URLs you're sharing don't take up too much precious character count while also giving you an inkling of what you're about to click on. Well, we've just launched youtu.be as a shortener for YouTube video links …
Discussion:
TechCrunch, Erictric, Download Squad, Search Engine Journal, NewTeeVee, ReadWriteWeb, The Next Web, Mashable!, Search Engine Watch and Gizmodo
Paul Kedrosky's Infectious Greed:
Netscape, Yelp, and the Tech IPO Boom of 2010 … Yelp may have just turned down a half-billion dollar takeover offer from Google. Zynga does a crazy-big $180m funding. Not long ago, Twitter took another $100-million in financing, and now we learn it's ... profitable.
Ed Bayley / Electronic Frontier Foundation:
An E-Book Buyer's Guide to Privacy — As we count down to end of 2009, the emerging star of this year's holiday shopping season is shaping up to be the electronic book reader (or e-reader). From Amazon's Kindle to Barnes and Noble's forthcoming Nook, e-readers are starting to transform …
Anthony Ha / VentureBeat:
80legs sets its web crawler free — When 80legs launched its web crawling service at DEMO (a conference co-produced by VentureBeat) last fall, chief executive Shion Deysarkar told me he wanted to place tools previously exclusive to web giants within the reach of smaller companies …
Miguel Helft / New York Times:
The Science of Managing Search Ads — MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. — Cyber Monday had gone swimmingly for Tiny Prints. — Despite the economic downturn, customers streamed into the Tiny Prints online store on the Monday after Thanksgiving, called Cyber Monday because it is one of the busiest days of the year for Web retailers.
Boy Genius Report:
Motorola Opus One specifications — When we say we have specifications, boy, do we mean it. One of our connects has sent us the full rundown on Motorla's Opus One (their first iDEN Android handset) that we revealed a little while back. The features on the device are actually pretty reasonable …
Discussion:
Phone Arena, Gizmodo Australia, InformationWeek, AndroidGuys, Internet2Go, Gadgetell, Android Central, Techie Buzz, SlashGear, Android Phone Fans, Electronista and I4U News
Connie Guglielmo / Bloomberg:
Hewlett-Packard Reviews Claim That Its Facial-Tracking Software Is Racist — Dec. 21 (Bloomberg) — Hewlett-Packard Co. is looking into the facial-tracking software used in its personal computers, after a customer calling himself “Black Desi” said the program was racist because it was unable to follow his movements.
Discussion:
The Daily What, New blog articles …, NBC Bay Area, Gizmodo, PC World, Maximum PC, The Consumerist, Mashable!, Pulse2, Computerworld and CrunchGear
David Sancho / TrendLabs:
Microsoft Virus Scanning Recommendations Bring Risks — We have recently received queries from customers about the official exclusion list recommendations from Microsoft. It seems that they have published a Knowledge Base entry that lists down recommendations to improve performance in Windows when running antivirus scanners.
Jarrod Krug / MapQuest Blog:
Over 700,000 New Business Listings Added To MapQuest.com — Never thought PowerPoint and Olive oil would go together? Well, you just might find that they do the next time you're planning a trip or searching for something nearby on MapQuest. — Now you'll find more than 700,000 …
Zee / The Next Web:
Firefox 3.5 is Now the World's Most Popular Browser — Site tracking and analytics tool StatCounter Global Statistics now shows that Firefox 3.5 is the most used browser in the world. — Note this is the version of the browser rather than the browser brand but nevertheless an incredible achievement.
Discussion:
InfoWorld, Royal Pingdom, Maximum PC, Technologizer, GigaOM, Download Squad, Slashdot, bit-tech.net and Mashable!
Steve Blank:
The Elves Leave Middle Earth - Sodas Are No Longer Free — Sometimes financial decisions that are seemingly rational on their face can precipitate mass exodus of your best engineers. — We Hired the CFO — Last week as a favor to a friend, I sat in on a board meeting of a fairly successful 3½ year-old startup.
Thanks:atul
Mary Jo Foley / All about Microsoft:
Microsoft CEO Ballmer to be bounced in 2010? No way — I don't make a habit of commenting on other pundits' prediction lists. After all, a prediction is just a person's opinion, and who knows what might happen in a year or 10.... But I am going to make an exception and call …
Chloe Albanesius / PC Magazine:
Sony Adds Content from 16 Pubs to 3G E-Reader — Sony has struck content deals with 16 additional publishers to make the newspaper's stories available on its new Daily Edition 3G e-reader. — In addition to a previously announced deal with News Corp., Sony has also secured content …
Etsy News:
Etsy's New Old Young CEO — As 2010 begins, I will return to Etsy as CEO, and Maria will leave the company. — Maria joined Etsy in the middle of 2008 and led Etsy through an important foundational phase. We are a profitable company now, and Maria helped us reach this major milestone.
Michael Arrington / TechCrunch:
Voice May Join Google's Enterprise Lineup — GrandCentral, which Google acquired in 2007, relaunched as Google Voice way back in March. It's still technically in private beta, but invitations aren't all that hard to find. — From what we've heard, Google is very seriously planning to add …
