Techmeme: Verizon will bring Skype to non-smartphone users this year (Florin/Unwired View)

11:35 AM ET, June 11, 2010

Top Items:

Kellex / Droid Life:

Exclusive: First Photos of the Motorola Droid 2 — Well, hello there Motorola Droid 2. We would like to officially introduce you to the readers of Droid Life. We saw your activation screen just the other day, but we'll admit that it's nice to finally see the rest of you. — What do you think everyone?

Ryan Hamrick / knowyourcell.com:
Motorola to launch 2GHz Android phone in 2010

Matt McGee / Search Engine Land:

Google Testing New Google News Home Page (With Sharing Options) — This never happens to me. Until now. While writing my earlier piece, Google News Tests Editors' Picks, I went to Google News on the off-chance that I'd be able to see the “limited test” of editors' picks. Nope. As expected.

Discussion: Silicon Alley Insider and The Next Web

Megan Garber / Nieman Journalism Lab:
Google News experiments with human control, promotes a new serendipity …

Discussion: GigaOM, Search Engine Land, GMSV, Search Engine Roundtable and The Next Web

Dan Frommer / Silicon Alley Insider:

Comscore Says It'll Fix Search Share Measurement Now That Yahoo And Microsoft Are Gaming It (YHOO, MSFT, GOOG) — Yahoo and Microsoft's Bing have recently been “gaining” market share in comScore's search engine stats for somewhat sketchy reasons: The companies have increasingly been putting …

Discussion: The Next Web and Yahoo! Search Blog

Robin Wauters / TechCrunch:
comScore Says Bing And Yahoo Gained Market Share In May. Or Have They?

Discussion: Digital Daily, comScore Voices and Silicon Alley Insider

Robin Wauters / TechCrunch:

Motorola And RIM Make Peace, End All Outstanding Litigation Worldwide — Is it Christmas? — Motorola and BlackBerry maker Research In Motion have just jointly announced that they have entered into a settlement and licensing agreement that ends all outstanding worldwide litigation between the two companies.

Discussion: Bloomberg, Agence France Presse, Digital Daily, Tech Eye, PR Newswire, Erictric, Fone Arena, Electronista, Reuters and Boy Genius Report

Spencer E. Ante / Wall Street Journal:

FBI Opens Probe of iPad Breach — The Federal Bureau of Investigation has opened an investigation into the security breach in AT&T Inc.'s website that exposed the email addresses of some iPad owners. — “The FBI is aware of these possible computer intrusions and has opened an investigation …

Goatse Security:
On disclosure ethics — There's some buzz about that the FBI …

Discussion: Bits, Switched, Gawker, Computerworld and Silicon Alley Insider

Cade Metz / The Register:

Google morphs Chrome OS into netbook thin client — ‘Chromotes’ legacy PC apps inside browser — Exclusive Google's Chrome OS — the operating system that moves all apps and data into a web browser — will provide remote access to “legacy PC applications” through a mystery process …

Discussion: SlashGear, Boy Genius Report, Geek.com, Liliputing and Gizmodo

Julie Scelfo / New York Times:

The Risks of Parenting While Plugged In — WHILE waiting for an elevator at the Fair Oaks Mall near her home in Virginia recently, Janice Im, who works in early-childhood development, witnessed a troubling incident between a young boy and his mother. — The boy, who Ms. Im estimates …

Discussion: Gawker

Bryan Wolfe / App Advice:

AT&T Offers Up Specials For Recent iPhone 3GS Buyers — More A&T customers are about to become happy. Just days after the company announced that anyone with an iPhone contract ending at anytime in 2010 would be eligible for a iPhone 4 upgrade, comes word that recent purchasers of the iPhone 3GS will also be getting a deal.

Discussion: Pogue's Posts and MacRumors

MG Siegler / TechCrunch:

Apple Begins Urging Developers To Get Their iOS 4 Apps In For Launch — Today, Apple has begun emailing iPhone app developers to let them know they're now accepting iOS 4-compatible apps in the App Store. Just as it does each time before a new OS launches (such as earlier this year with the iPad OS …

Discussion: App Advice, everythingiCafe, MacRumors, Mobile Entertainment, 9 to 5 Mac, Erictric, Fonehome.co.uk and Fast Company

Sean Hollister / Engadget:

Macs running Steam are more powerful than PCs, on average — No matter which three-legged sentry turret you pick, Steam games run fine if it houses a decent graphics card. That said, stick this in your breech and shoot it — the latest edition of Valve's hardware survey shows …

Discussion: GamePolitics News, ZDNet, Gadget Lab and Download Squad

Chris Morrison / Inside Social Games:

Super Whales: Top Social Game Spenders Pay More than $10,000 Apiece for Virtual Goods — By now, most people in the social gaming industry have heard about “whales”, those players who spend massively on virtual goods and gifts in games like Mafia Wars or Happy Aquarium.

Discussion: Forbes, the Econsultancy blog and Silicon Alley Insider

James McQuivey / Consumer Product Strategy:

Google TV Is A Bigger Deal Than You Think — It has only been a few weeks since Google announced it would create a brave, new world with its Google TV platform. In all the reactions and the commentary, I have been amazed at how little people understand what's really going on here.

Discussion: eWeek, Tech Trader Daily and WebProNews

Emil Protalinski / Ars Technica:

Microsoft hides mystery Firefox extension in toolbar update — As part of its regular Patch Tuesday, Microsoft released an update for its various toolbars, and this update came with more than just documented fixes. The update also installs an add-on for Internet Explorer and an extension …

Discussion: Microsoft Support, Geek.com and TechSpot

Florin / Unwired View:

Verizon will bring Skype to non-smartphone users this year — Launched by Verizon in March for Android and BlackBerry users, Skype Mobile will be available to some of the carrier's non-smartphone users, too. — According to Verizon, “several 3G Multimedia phones” will be compatible with Skype sometime later this year.

Discussion: Verizon and Phone Scoop

Jason Kincaid / TechCrunch:

WordPress Gives Us The VIP Treatment, Goes Down On Us Again — Well, that was fun. If you tried to access TechCrunch any time in the last hour or so, you probably noticed that it wasn't working at all. Instead, you were greeted by the overly cheery notice “WordPress.com will be back in a minute!”

Discussion: Mashable!, SmoothSpan Blog, Data Center Knowledge, The Next Web, ReadWriteWeb, CenterNetworks and Lockergnome Blog Network, Thanks:evelynrusli

Ryan Paul / Ars Technica:

SCOwned: no new trial, Novell can shut down IBM lawsuit — SCO was dealt yet another blow in court today when District Judge Ted Stewart rejected the company's motion requesting a new trial or judgement of law. In a ruling issued today, Judge Stewart sided with a jury that issued a verdict …

Discussion: ZDNet, Electronista, Techdirt, Tech Eye and The Register

Ben Patterson / Yahoo! News:

Trade-in sites offering up to $320 for old iPhones — Leery of coughing up $200 or even $300 for yet another iPhone? Well, you can always sell your old iPhone on eBay. But there's another, potentially easier option: trading it in for cash. Some online trade-in sites offer up to $320 for iPhone hand-me-downs.

DigiTimes:

Foxconn and Flextronics to begin shipping Project Natal to Microsoft in August — Electronic manufacturing service (EMS) providers Foxconn Electronics (Hon Hai Precision Industry) and Flextronics International are expected to start shipping Project Natal devices for Microsoft's' Xbox 360 gaming consoles …

Discussion: Tech Eye, SlashGear, I4U News and Pocket-lint, Thanks:michaelkroker

Glenn Fleishman / Ars Technica:

Feature: WWDC Keynote WiFi woes may have been due to iPhone 4 drivers — “Ladies and gentleman, put down your MiFis, and step away from your laptops, or there's going to be trouble.” — Apple's CEO didn't actually utter these words during his demonstration of the iPhone 4's higher-density screen …

Jon Brodkin / Computerworld:

Amazon cloud uses FedEx instead of the Internet to ship data — Amazon's new way to quickly move data to the cloud relies on air mail, not the Internet. — Amazon's cloud storage service has unveiled a brand new way to quickly move giant amounts of data to the cloud …

Discussion: Download Squad, fiercecio.comwatch, eWeek, ReadWriteWeb, Amazon Web Services Blog and GigaOM

Nilay Patel / Engadget:

Adobe Flash Player 10.1 now officially available for download — Well look at that — Adobe's now officially serving up Flash Player 10.1 on its download pages. If you're anything like us, you've been running 10.1 since it hit Release Candidate status a couple months ago …

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