Top Items:
Patrick Altoft / Blogstorm:
Google starts showing full page previews in search results — Google is today testing a major new layout to their search results - full page previews of the target site and blue backgrounds behind the search results when you hover over them. Click the image below for a full size version.
Robin Wauters / TechCrunch:
Trouble In Clever Domain Land: Bit.ly And Others Risk Losing Theirs Swift.ly — Bit.ly, HootSuite (with its Ow.ly service), Ad.ly and perhaps even Smel.ly could well be at risk of having their domain names sudden.ly taken away by the Libyan government. — Ben Metcalfe blogs …
Discussion:
Inc.com, Geekosystem, Gizmodo and Go Rumors
RELATED:
Violet / techyum:
Official: vb.ly Link Shortener Seized by Libyan Government — It's official: the Libyan government has seized vb.ly. This was done with no warning. Despite the fact that vb.ly was a one-page link-shortening service, Nic.ly (the registry for .ly domain reseller registrar Libyan Spider) …
Discussion:
Domain Name Wire, The Next Web, ReadWriteWeb, The Huffington Post, Ben Metcalfe Blog and techPresident
Dan Frommer / Silicon Alley Insider:
Apple Fan John Gruber: Windows Phone 7 “Really Nice” And Better Than Android — Hey, maybe Microsoft isn't screwed when it comes to mobile, after all. — Windows Phone 7, its forthcoming mobile phone platform, just got a rave review from Daring Fireball's John Gruber …
Tarmo Virki / Reuters:
HP to launch new webOS phones in early 2011 — (Reuters) - Hewlett-Packard Co will introduce smartphones in early 2011 using the webOS software it acquired through its $1.2 billion Palm buy earlier this year, a senior company official said on Wednesday. — “You will see us coming early next year …
Discussion:
eWeek, VentureBeat, Digital Daily, SlashGear, IntoMobile, I4U News, SiliconANGLE, Boy Genius Report, PreCentral.net, Phone Arena, Engadget, jkOnTheRun, Silicon Alley Insider, Product Reviews Net, Mashable!, The Next Web, FierceWireless, Everything webOS, Electronista, Know Your Cell, iClarified and Gizmodo, Thanks:michaelkroker
Nilay Patel / Engadget:
T-Mobile's Passes prepaid data plans leak out — We've been saying prepaid data plans are going to be the next big wave in mobile, and it looks like T-Mobile's getting on board — we were just sent this employee training sheet detailing the upcoming Passes plans.
Discussion:
TmoNews, Android Phone Fans, DailyTech, IntoMobile, Erictric, DSLreports, Electronista, MobileCrunch, Boy Genius Report, WMExperts, Android Community, Phone Arena and Liliputing
Ross Miller / Engadget:
Sony's Google TV controller outed on ABC's Nightline (video) — Well, this is a bit unexpected. We just happened to catch ABC Nightline's Google TV special, and lo and behold, there's a sneak preview of Sony's Google TV ad blitz... and with it, a never-before-s een controller.
Discussion:
ReadWriteWeb, Silicon Alley Insider, The Toybox Blog, Fortune, Guardian, VentureBeat, TechCrunch, Gadget Lab, Obsessable, Newlaunches.com, ITworld.com, Android Phone Fans, TiPb, Gearlog, Geeky-Gadgets, SlashGear, Pocket-lint, The Brooks Review, Inquirer, Product Reviews Net, Sony Insider, Geek.com, Electronista, Tech Report, iClarified, Electricpig.co.uk and CrunchGear
Emma Barnett / Telegraph:
Twitter is not for sale says new CEO Dick Costolo — Dick Costolo, the newly appointed chief executive of Twitter, has told The Telegraph that he has no plans to sell the site, despite his record of selling start-ups to big players. — Costolo, prior to joining Twitter …
Discussion:
Hillicon Valley and TechCrunch
Eric Savitz / Tech Trader Daily:
Nice Hobby! Apple TV Reportedly Selling Out In Many Stores — It's nice if you can make a little money with your hobby, don't you think? — Apple (AAPL) seems to have a modest hit on its hands with the new Apple TV box. JMP Research analyst Alex Gauna writes this morning that the device …
Discussion:
Silicon Alley Insider, MacRumors, TheAppleBlog, CrunchGear, SlashGear, MacStories, Macsimum News, MacNN, Webomatica, Edible Apple, MacDailyNews and Electricpig.co.uk
Charles Arthur / Guardian:
Is your private phone number on Facebook? Probably. And so are your friends' — Uploads from iPhones using the Facebook app will push all your contacts onto Facebook's servers - where they'll be matched against any and everyone. Worried at all? Update: Or how about a random Facebooker's number?
Discussion:
TechEye, I4U News and Electricpig.co.uk
Sean Hollister / Engadget:
Motorola Droid Pro, first hands-on! (update: video!) — Motorola's BlackBerry? The freshly-announced Moto Droid Pro's keyboard feels like it, to be sure, and after trying it out, we believed the Motorola rep who told us they tested comparable speeds of 37WPM in several focus groups.
Foursquare Blog:
Quite the way to celebrate our 200 millionth check-in — So... yeah. An exhaustive explanation of last night's downtime would be a bit redundant to yesterday's post. In a nutshell, the same thing happened: an overloaded database, the solution to which again was manually redistributing check …
Discussion:
TechCrunch, CNN, louisgray.com, Mashable! and About Foursquare
Paul Krill / InfoWorld:
W3C: Hold off on deploying HTML5 in websites — Despite the hype, the HTML5 specification isn't yet ready due to interoperability issues, a W3C official says — HTML5, which updates the HTML specification to accommodate modern Web applications, has gained a lot of adherents in vendors like Microsoft, Google, and Apple.
Discussion:
ReadWriteWeb and MacDailyNews
Adam Fusfeld / Silicon Alley Insider:
Accidental Tweet Breaks Huge NFL Story — ESPN's hugely popular columnist, “Sports Guy” Bill Simmons, accidentally tweeted “moss vikings” Tuesday afternoon, hours before NFL beat reporters ever released word of this morning's Randy Moss trade. — This is fascinating for two reasons:
Wall Street Journal:
Motorola Co-CEO Open to Microsoft Software Despite Suit — The head of Motorola Inc.'s mobile-phone business said he is open to developing devices that run Microsoft Corp.'s new mobile operating system, despite the patent-infringement lawsuits the software giant recently filed against his company.
Discussion:
Computerworld, eWeek, Engadget, Bloomberg, Digital Trends, SiliconANGLE, SlashGear, Electronista, MobileTechWorld, MobileBurn.com, AppScout, MobileCrunch, Inquirer and TechEye
RELATED:
Dan Rayburn / The Business Of Online Video:
Apple TV and Roku Go Head-To-Head, Here's The Winner — What's better, the new Apple TV or the newly announced lineup of Roku boxes? That's the question I keep getting asked now that both devices are in the market. Over the past week, I've had the chance to use both the Apple TV …
Discussion:
Fortune, Thanks:danrayburn
Michael Arrington / TechCrunch:
The $4 Million Line — I wrote about two startups today that raised angel-sized financing rounds of around $1 million each: Hipmunk and Alphonso Labs. What caught my eye about both deals is this - neither had involvement from the so called “super angels” (except Hipmunk, which took an investment from SV Angel).
Discussion:
broadstuff
Matthew Lasar / Ars Technica:
KISS frontman on P2P: “Sue everybody. Take their homes, their cars.” — The bassist and businessman behind the legendary rock band KISS was on hand at the MIPCOM convention in Cannes, France on Tuesday. And Gene Simmons had a message for aspiring entertainers everywhere: sue first, think later.
Discussion:
The Register, PlagiarismToday and Fast Company
Jason Magder / Montreal Gazette:
Quebec spammer must pay Facebook $1 billion — $200 U.S. each for 4,366,386 spam emails — More Images » — Montrealer Adam Guerbuez, dubbed The Facebook spammer, has been order to pay to pay $1,068,928,721,46, in Canadian funds which amounts to $100 U.S. in damages …
Discussion:
CANOE, Techdirt, PC World, The Register, Gizmodo, TechEye and Softpedia News
Brian Barrett / Gizmodo:
T-Mobile G2 Auto-Reinstalls Stock Android After a Jailbreak — If you were hoping to make any modifications to your T-Mobile G2, my apologies. Because the phone apparently ships with a rootkit that will override any changes you make to Android and reinstall the original firmware. That ain't right.
Discussion:
MobileCrunch, DSLreports, NewAmerica.net, Neowin.net, Engadget, Droid Life and Boing Boing
MG Siegler / TechCrunch:
A Facebook Redesign Likely Being Unveiled Tomorrow After An Employee “Lockdown” — As you're probably aware by now, Facebook is holding an event at their headquarters in Palo Alto, CA. The invite we received didn't seem to give any real clues about what would be announced, but that didn't stop everyone from guessing anyway.
Discussion:
PC World, Techland, Geekosystem, MWD Tech News, Softpedia News, Electricpig.co.uk, Neowin.net, Telegraph, Geek.com, Velocity, The Huffington Post, Tech Report, All Facebook and CNET News, Thanks:atul
NBC Universal:
CNBC'S THE FACEBOOK OBSESSION WILL PREMIERE JANUARY 6TH — CNBC will premiere an original documentary, THE FACEBOOK OBSESSION, on Thursday, January 6, 2011 at 9pm ET. It will repeat that same evening at 10pm ET, 12am ET and 1am ET. — It will also air on the following dates:
Liz Gannes / GigaOM:
Eventbrite Raises $20M. Ticket Sales Top $200M — Eventbrite has closed $20 million in Series D funding led by DAG Ventures, and including Tenaya Capital as well as previous investor Sequoia Capital. The four-year-old, San Francisco-based company has now raised a total of $29.5 million.
Discussion:
Bits, VatorNews, TechCrunch, paidContent and silicontap.com
Scott Moritz / TheStreet.com:
Google, PayPal Set on Android Deal — Stock quotes in this article:GOOG, EBAY, AAPL, AMZN — NEW YORK (TheStreet) — Google(GOOG) has finally enlisted eBay's(EBAY) PayPal service and is preparing to launch the payment system on its Android OS later this month.
Discussion:
CNET News, Droid Life, Google Android News … and Android Community
Mark Spoonauer / LAPTOP Mag:
Cisco umi Brings HD Telepresence to Consumers...for $599 — Skype gave it a shot, but Cisco is taking video calling via your TV to the next level. The new Cisco umi telepresence promises to deliver full HD video quality in your living room. The product bundle includes an HD camera …
Discussion:
BoomTown and Cisco Blog
Ryan Paul / Ars Technica:
Citing relevance, Mozilla to include Bing in Firefox 4 search box — Mozilla has announced its plans to update the search options in Firefox 4, the next major version of the popular open source Web browser. Google will remain Firefox's default search engine, but Microsoft's Bing search …
Discussion:
The Mozilla Blog, CNET News, At Your Servers and Search Blog
Jim Wolf / Reuters:
Special report: The Pentagon's new cyber warriors — (Reuters) - Guarding water wells and granaries from enemy raids is as old as war itself. In the Middle Ages, vital resources were hoarded behind castle walls, protected by moats, drawbridges and knights with double-edged swords.
Thanks:marcusschuler
Peter Kafka / MediaMemo:
Netflix Adds Another Studio: Sony Agrees to 28-Day DVD “Window” — More movement from Netflix as it transitions from discs to digital: A distribution deal with Sony that reduces its access to DVDs in exchange for lower fees and more rights to stream movies to your home.
Discussion:
Home Media Magazine and NewTeeVee
Philip Winston / kmeme:
The Future of Google's Street View — The Need for Speed racing game franchise has been around for 16 years, sold over 100 million copies and generated more than $2.7B in revenue. People love to drive fast and they love to race, and it's much safer to do this in a video game than in the carpool lane.