Top Items:
New York Times:
Amazon Is Said to Buy Touch-Screen Company — In a sign that Amazon wants to upgrade its Kindle e-reader to compete head-on with the Apple iPad, Amazon has acquired Touchco, a New York-based start-up specializing in touch-screen technology, a person briefed on the deal said Wednesday.
Discussion:
Digits, Engadget, Computerworld, Mashable!, Xconomy, GigaOM, AppleInsider, Gizmodo, TeleRead, GeekSmack, Digital Trends, Techland, Gear Diary, Gadgetell, TechFlash, SlashGear, VentureBeat, CrunchGear, Silicon Alley Insider, Electronista, Obsessable, Between the Lines, The Next Web, paidContent, 9 to 5 Mac, Edible Apple, Gizmodo Australia, Reuters, Gearlog, GeekSugar, DisplayBlog and techeblog.com
RELATED:
Nick Bilton / Bits:
Is Amazon Building a Superkindle? — If you were Amazon, and Apple released the iPad, what would you do? Scurry away into the corner, or buy a small company in New York and use its technology to build a Superkindle, with a multitouch color screen and built-in applications? If you guessed the latter, you're right.
Discussion:
Kindle Review
Priya Ganapati / Gadget Lab:
Symbian Operating System, Now Open Source and Free — The source code for the ten-year old Symbian platform will be completely open source and available for free starting Thursday. The transition from proprietary code to open source is the largest in software history, claims the Symbian Foundation.
Discussion:
Associated Press, Computerworld, Tech Beat, Phone Arena, Network World, BBC, IntoMobile, SlashGear, GigaOM, Engadget Mobile and Electronista
Jennadawn / Twitter Blog:
Flying Around With Hovercards — Because many of you use twitter.com to read and write tweets, we've been spending some time focusing on ways to improve your experience on the site. Today, we're introducing a feature called Hovercards that will be a handy way to interact with the folks behind each tweet.
Heather Hopkins / Hitwise Intelligence:
Facebook Largest News Reader? — Marshall Kirkpatrick at Read Write Web had an interesting piece suggesting that Facebook could become the world's leading news reader. A recent Facebook company blog entry encouraged members to set up a news feed on Facebook.
Discussion:
All Facebook, ReadWriteWeb, VentureBeat, GigaOM, Silicon Valley Watcher and Andy Beal's Marketing Pilgrim, Thanks:atul
Dan Frommer / Silicon Alley Insider:
Verizon Drops ‘Droid’ Brand For Newest Android Phone (VZ, MOT, GOOG) — More Android phones are coming to Verizon Wireless, but the latest one won't get the carrier's memorable “Droid” branding. — The Motorola Devour, announced today, is scheduled to launch in March.
Discussion:
Verizon, MobileCrunch, Gizmodo, Engadget, Android and Me, Obsessable, 901am, internetnews.com, blogs.ft.com, Digital Trends, Boy Genius Report, eWeek, I4U News, The Toybox, PhoneNews.com, Unwired View, SlashGear, AndroidGuys, Gearlog, Android Central, BetaNews, Softpedia News, lalawag and Electronista
RELATED:
Sam Diaz / Between the Lines:
Is Android buzz starting to tarnish the iPhone's luster? — I pinched and zoomed the Google Maps images on my Nexus One smartphone this morning, the same pinch-and-zoom feature that iPhone (and iPod Touch) owners have been using for some time. — The pinch-and-zoom experience on the Nexus One …
David Watson / Comcast Voices:
Comcast Launches XFINITY — Today on Comcast's earnings call Brian Roberts and Steve Burke talked about XFINITY, the new brand for our technology platform and products. Simply put, XFINITY is about offering our customers more — more HD, more speed, more choice and more control over their services.
Discussion:
internetnews.com, Gizmodo, BetaNews, Engadget, TechFlash, The Seattle Times, Gizmodo Australia and Dow Jones Newswires
Mike Masnick / Techdirt:
ICanHasLawsuit? Pet Holdings Sues Other Site For Framing Failbooking With Better Domain Name — A few weeks ago, when I attended Public Knowledge's World Fair Use Day, I had been excited to meet the guy behind ICanHasCheezburger, Ben Huh, who was supposed to be on my panel …
Nicholas Carlson / Silicon Alley Insider:
Monster Buys Yahoo HotJobs For $225 Million In Cash (YHOO, MWW) — Monster (MWW) will buy Yahoo (YHOO) HotJobs for $225 million in cash, the companies announced today. — Details from the release: — “Monster and Yahoo! have also entered into a three year commercial traffic agreement …
Walter S. Mossberg / Personal Technology:
Two Little Laptops With a Lot to Offer Their Core Users — For all the talk about new tablet computers like Apple's iPad, laptops remain the computer industry's bread and butter, and smaller laptops are especially popular with consumers. — So, I've been testing two diminutive laptops …
Eric Eldon / Inside Facebook:
Facebook Puts Email Addresses on User Profiles Back Into Plain Text — Facebook has been investing in tools to detect and block automated systems and scripts created by spammers heavily in recent years. When it comes to user email addresses on Facebook profiles, Facebook for years has taken …
Erick Schonfeld / TechCrunch:
Factual Raises $1 Million Seed Round From Andreessen Horowitz, Idealab, And Angels — If you co-founded the company that became Google AdSense, as Gil Elbaz did with Applied Semantics, you don't have any problem finding investors when you want to start a new venture.
Lisa Barone / Outspoken Media:
Content is not King. Self Promotion Is. — While I was at the airport last week, Dr. Pete sent me a link to his post on SEOmoz about SEO cliques and asked for my thoughts. The post talked about the various groups that exist in SEO, how not friendly the industry can be sometimes …
Discussion:
Bruce Clay Blog
Michael Arrington / TechCrunch:
Kwedit Launches: The First Completely Unreliable Payment Network — Something tells me Kwedit, which launches today, is going to be a hit. It's a new payment service that absolutely doesn't guarantee payments. In fact, its unreliability is what makes it so attractive to social game publishers and other people selling virtual goods.
Mary Jo Foley / All about Microsoft:
Windows veteran Mike Nash to leave Microsoft — A couple of weeks after Windows Senior Vice President Bill Veghte decided to leave Microsoft, another Windows marketing veteran is doing the same. — Mike Nash, Corporate Vice President of Windows Platform Strategy, will be leaving the company in February.
Discussion:
internetnews.com, The Register, ChannelWeb, CNET News, Digital Daily, TechFlash and The Microsoft Blog
Schneier on Security:
Anonymity and the Internet — Universal identification is portrayed by some as the holy grail of Internet security. Anonymity is bad, the argument goes; and if we abolish it, we can ensure only the proper people have access to their own information. We'll know who is sending us spam …
Discussion:
broadstuff
Suzanne Bearne / nma.co.uk:
Apple recruits key talent to lead drive into mobile ad sales — Apple has made its first concerted move into the UK mobile advertising market as it seeks to take advantage of the burgeoning sector. — The iPhone manufacturer has recruited two mobile ad industry heavyweights as it plans goes head to head with Google.
Jaikumar Vijayan / Computerworld:
Versign fails to take action against malicious sites, researcher says — Verisign notified of problem but domains still ‘live ... and still serving malware’ — Computerworld - A security researcher is accusing Verisign Inc. of not acting fast enough to take down several dozen sites that he says are known to be spewing malware.
Ellen Nakashima / Washington Post:
Google to enlist NSA to help it ward off cyberattacks — The world's largest Internet search company and the world's most powerful electronic surveillance organization are teaming up in the name of cybersecurity. — Under an agreement that is still being finalized, the National Security Agency …
Kim Zetter / Threat Level:
Report Details Hacks Targeting Google, Others — It's been three weeks since Google announced that a sophisticated and coordinated hack attack dubbed Operation Aurora recently targeted it and numerous other U.S. companies. — Until now we've only known that the attackers got in through …
Discussion:
NBC Bay Area
Reuters:
Microsoft's Bing will make money: executive — SEATTLE (Reuters) - Microsoft Corp's 10-month-old search engine Bing, which has struggled to make headway against Google, can be a viable runner-up and make money online eventually, according to one of its top executives.
Discussion:
paidContent, ReadWriteWeb, The Next Web, The Register, Silicon Alley Insider and LiveSide.net
David Sarno / L.A. Times Tech Blog:
Skype says new 3G iPhone app coming ‘really soon,’ will have CD-quality sound — After the news last week that Apple and AT&T are now allowing VoIP apps to make phone calls over the 3G network, Skype said it's still waiting to release a new 3G-ready version of its software for the iPhone.
Discussion:
InformationWeek, Skype Blogs, Mashable!, GigaOM, VentureBeat, Techland, TUAW, Epicenter, ReadWriteWeb, App Advice, Voice on the Web, EverythingiCafe and I4U News
Jaikumar Vijayan / Computerworld:
Facebook comes out swinging at critics of settlement offer in Beacon lawsuit — Offer to spend $9.5 million on privacy foundation fair and adequate, company says — Computerworld - Facebook has come out swinging at those opposing a settlement offer it made last year in a privacy lawsuit involving …
Joel Hruska / HotHardware.com News:
Intel Details Upcoming Mobile and Six-Core Processors — With the International Solid-State Circuits Conference less than a week away, Intel has released additional details on its hexa-core desktop, next generation mobile and dual-core Westmere processors. Much of the dual-core data …
Enigmax / TorrentFreak:
Movie Studios Lose Landmark Case Against Aussie ISP — The Federal Court has today ruled in favor of Aussie ISP iiNet following a copyright infringement case instigated by AFACT, the Australian Federation Against Copyright Theft. — Last year several studios including Village Roadshow …
Anthony Ha / MobileBeat:
Remote wipe, other new features make Google's mobile apps more business friendly — Google has been working over the past year to make Google Apps, its bundle of productivity applications like Gmail, work better with smartphones. Now it's announcing several new features that may be crucial …
Discussion:
Google Enterprise Blog
Mohan Belani / e27:
Fusion Garage Announces Strategic Partnership With CSL Group of Malaysia, joojoo to Ship by End Feb — Fusion Garage just announced a manufacturing agreement and strategic partnership with mobile device OEM and distribution giant CSL Group of Malaysia. This effectively means that the joojoo tablet …
Casey Chan / Android Central:
Firefox on Android Progressing Nicely, Loads First Page — Like we said before, it's going to take some time before Fennec aka Firefox Mobile actually gets on Android. But at least it looks like porting Fennec over to Android is progressing rather nicely—they actually got their first page load.
Discussion:
Android Phone Fans, ReadWriteWeb, Geekword, jkOnTheRun, ARMdevices.net, Phone Arena, ithinkdifferent, Gizmodo, Vladimir Vukievi and Download Squad
Jordy Yager / Hillicon Valley:
iPad-inspired vending machine woos Hill staffers — T echnology has changed how we communicate, watch television and travel the globe. This morning, Capitol Hill staffers got to enjoy how technology has upgraded their Snickers bar experience. — The National Automatic Merchandising …
