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12:45 PM ET, March 18, 2010

Techmeme

 Top Items: 
Nick Bilton / New York Times:
Google and Partners Seek a Television Foothold  —  Google and Intel have teamed with Sony to develop a platform called Google TV to bring the Web into the living room through a new generation of televisions and set-top boxes.  —  The move is an effort by Google and Intel to extend their dominance …
RELATED:
MG Siegler / TechCrunch:
Google TV Should Finally Push Apple TV Beyond A “Hobby”  —  For the past couple of years now, when talking about the Apple TV product, Apple likes to throw out the word “hobby.”  It's as if they're ashamed of the device.  And considering sales are anemic next to Macs, iPods, and iPhones, it's no big surprise that they talk this way.
Discussion: MacDailyNews, Electricpig and Gizmodo
Amazon:
Introducing “Kindle for Mac” — the Free Application for Reading Kindle Books on the Mac, Now Available in over 100 Countries  —  Read on Your Kindle, Read Some on Your iPhone, and Now, Read Some on Your Mac - Read Wherever and Whenever You Want, and Never Lose Your Place
RELATED:
Michael Rose / TUAW:
Amazon stealthily releases Kindle app for Mac  —  [No press release], no big fanfare, but reader Chris sent in the news earlier tonight: Amazon's long-awaited Kindle application for Mac is ready for download.  The 22 MB free application works on Intel Macs running Mac OS X 10.5 and above, and reports a version number of 1.0.0 beta 1.
Jack Purcher / Patently Apple:
iGroups: Apple's New iPhone Social App in Development  —  Apple is working on a new communications based social networking application that they're simply calling “iGroups.”  According to the documents published by USPTO today, Apple's iGroup will be a new service that will work on your iPhone and likely work with MobileMe.
Nilay Patel / Engadget:
HTC responds to Apple's patent lawsuit, will ‘fully defend itself’  —  HTC hasn't filed its official reply to Apple's patent lawsuit in court yet, but the company just gave us an updated and expanded statement on the case, saying that while it “strongly advocates intellectual property protection …
RELATED:
Nick Douglas / All Shook Down:
SXSW Interactive Is Dead  —  No annual festival, conference, or party will ever be as good as the first year you went.  That's not what I'm talking about when I say that South by Southwest Interactive died this year.  —  Earlier this week, Jolie O'Dell wrote the usual “Why SXSW Sucks” post.
Kevin Poulsen / Threat Level:
Hacker Disables More Than 100 Cars Remotely  —  More than 100 drivers in Austin, Texas found their cars disabled or the horns honking out of control, after an intruder ran amok in a web-based vehicle-immobilization system normally used to get the attention of consumers delinquent in their auto payments.
Long Zheng / istartedsomething:
Windows Phone 7 Series will have copy & paste, eventually  —  Contrary to the controversial report out of Microsoft MIX10 this week that Windows Phone 7 Series will not feature copy & paste functionality, a person close to the den explained that copy & paste is definitely a scenario and feature …
New York Times:
A Rift at Amazon on E-Book Prices  —  Amazon.com has threatened to stop directly selling the books of some publishers online unless they agree to a detailed list of concessions regarding the sale of electronic books, according to two industry executives with direct knowledge the discussions.
James Lewin / Podcasting News:
More Bad News For Adobe & Flash - Wikipedia Is Going Open Video  —  Adobe already has trouble on its hands over Apple's decision to not support Flash on the iPhone and the iPad - and the general public's “meh” response.  —  Now Adobe's got bigger Flash problems.
Discussion: Mozilla Links
RELATED:
Noah Elkin / The eMarketer Blog:
Looking Beyond the Staggering Mobile Stats in the BRIC Countries  —  My latest report - on wireless usage and advertising trends in the BRIC countries (Brazil / Russia / India / China) - launches today.  Given their large populations, some of the numbers are understandably eye-popping.
Discussion: Erictric and MobileCrunch
RELATED:
Robin Wauters / TechCrunch:   Soon, There'll Be More Mobile Web Users In China Than People In The United States
Google Mobile Blog:
Google Maps for Android: Search 'n Swipe, Latitude Widget, and More  —  Making sense of a fast paced and changing world is difficult under the best of circumstances, but when you're on the go, it's even harder.  With the new Google Maps for mobile 4.1, we're introducing a few features …
Slash Lane / AppleInsider:
Apple exploring iPhone audio text message, walkie-talkie feature  —  Apple has been brainstorming a new capability that could allow iPhone users to transmit data — such as simple text messages — to each other over voice channels, forgoing a reliance wireless carriers' backend servers …
Discussion: EverythingiCafe and Erictric
Jenna Wortham / Bits:
RandomDorm: Chatroulette for the College Set  —  Taking a dizzying spin through the video chat service Chatroulette can be highly entertaining — you might stumble onto a celebrity or an impromptu performance by a pianist.  —  But there's always the chance of encountering something unsavory on the service …
Douglas Quenqua / New York Times:
When Couples Fight on Facebook, Everyone Knows the Score  —  WHAT is the sound of an awkward silence on Facebook?  If you have to ask, then you probably don't have friends like James Gower and Ashley Andrews, high school sweethearts from Spring, Tex., who are both 22 and engaged to be married this May.
Discussion: Gawker
Geoffrey A. Fowler / Digits:
Facebook Co-Founder Hughes Launches Philanthropic Venture Jumo  —  Chris Hughes, a co-founder of Facebook and director of online organizing for Barack Obama's 2008 campaign, unveiled his new project on Thursday: a Web site for charitable organizations.
Mikek / Hacking NetFlix:
Netflix VP Apologizes & Explains Why They're Killing Friends  —  Todd Yellin, Netflix's VP of Product Management, posted an apology on the Netflix blog for how they handled the removal of the Friends feature, and he explains that they're permanently removing it because only 2% of customers used the feature:
Jason Kincaid / TechCrunch:
Gist Acquires Startup Weekend App ‘Learn That Name’  —  Every few weeks (and sometimes even more often than that), dozens of techies gather together for regional Startup Weekends — fast-paced code writing frenzies where entrepreneurs and developers conceive of and build a new application …
Michael Arrington / TechCrunch:
Choosing Sides?  John Doerr Leaves Amazon's Board Of Directors  —  Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers partner John Doerr, perhaps the most celebrated venture capitalist and certainly one of the most successful, will leave the Amazon board of directors this year.
New York Times:
Time Seems Right for Paypal to Fly  —  Should eBay change its name to PayPal?  The company's auction business is mature, but PayPal, its online payments business, is growing fast.  Plans announced on Wednesday to double PayPal's Asian staff by the end of the year accentuate the point.
Discussion: Tech Trader Daily
John Paczkowski / Digital Daily:
China Mobile Getting Desperate for an iPhone, iPad Deal?  —  Four years after first entering them, China Mobile — China's largest wireless phone operator, is still in talks with Apple (AAPL) about adding the iPhone to its smartphone line-up.  But these days its sounding a bit more hopeful for a deal.
Cecilia Kang / Post Tech:
FCC testing finds fastest broadband speeds in D.C., N.Y. areas  —  Already, 150,000 people have taken the Federal Communications Commission's broadband speed test and the results so far show that the fastest download and upload speeds are in the Washington and New York areas.
Discussion: blogband
Ben Horowitz / Voices on All Things Digital:
The Case for the Fat Start-Up  —  Much has been written and said about the current economic downturn and the resulting lessons on how to run a high-technology company.  Quite famously, Sequoia Capital, the premier venture capital firm in Silicon Valley, held a mandatory all-CEO meeting …
Discussion: Silicon Alley Insider, Thanks:mrinaldesai
Avner Ronen / Boxee Blog:
The Future of TV  —  On Friday I had a debate with Mark Cuban on the future of TV.  We disagreed on most things.  The main debate circled around whether the future living room will be driven by the Internet, or by the existing TV infrastructure delivered by Cable/Sat/IPTV operators.
Reuters:
Kremlin picks site for Russian “Silicon Valley”  —  (Reuters) - President Dmitry Medvedev on Thursday announced that Russia would build a high-tech hub near Moscow to spur modernization of the economy and reduce its dependence on oil and gas.  —  The center, designed to develop five priority sectors …
 
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 More Items: 
Stephanie Strom / New York Times:
Pentagon Sees a Threat From Online Muckrakers
Discussion: Silicon Alley Insider and Gawker
Leena Rao / TechCrunch:
Zillow Launches Android App To Browse Home Sales And Rental Listings On The Go
Janko Roettgers / NewTeeVee:
Kaltura Launches HTML5Video.org, Publishes HTML5 Media Library
Discussion: Beet.TV
Leena Rao / TechCrunch:
Trada Raises $2.2 Million For Crowdsourced SEM Management Service
Kim-Mai Cutler / VentureBeat:
Videoplaza raises $5 million for video ad-serving technology
Discussion: paidContent, Beet.TV and NewTeeVee
Bloomberg:
Alcatel-Lucent Risks $2 Billion Loss in Royalties at DVD, TV Patent Trial
 Earlier Items: 
MG Siegler / TechCrunch:
Traducción Necesita? Smartling Raises $4 Million To Do It For You.
Discussion: Silicon Alley Insider
Cody Barbierri / VentureBeat:
Facebook emails traffic, stat summaries to Page owners — but it's only a test
Discussion: Stay N' Alive and Mashable!
David Kaplan / paidContent:
Hyperlocal Newswire Fwix To Provide Content To NYTCo Properties
Nick O'Neill / All Facebook:
Facebook Begins Letting Users Share Music (Updated)
Discussion: Softpedia News and The Next Web
James Niccolai / PC World:
Hosted Drupal CMS Planned for Midyear
Discussion: CenterNetworks
Doug Tsuruoka / IBD Click:
In China, Internet Fast Replacing TV
Gregg Keizer / Computerworld:
IT's ‘love affair’ with Windows XP ending, says survey
 

 
From Mediagazer:

Athena Stavrou / The Independent:
More than 230 media industry professionals, including anonymous BBC staff, sign a letter accusing the BBC of bias favoring Israel in coverage of Gaza

Devin Gordon / New York Times:
AI in Hollywood is a tech leap with a vast impact but remains a tool, not a replacement, for creatives; its speed, quality, and cost allow for VFX breakthroughs

Ben Jacobs / Slate:
A profile of John Avlon, former CNN anchor, former Daily Beast EIC, former speechwriter for Rudy Giuliani, and now a congressional candidate running in New York

 
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