Techmeme: Why Twitter's C.E.O. Demoted Himself (Claire Cain Miller/New York Times)

Top Items:

Michael Arrington / TechCrunch:

Are You A Pirate? — I read blog posts by Don Dodge and Glenn Kelman today about people jumping from Google to Facebook and it got me thinking about entrepreneurs. — Most people have an aversion to risk, my college economics professor told me. Which means they have to be rewarded to take on that risk.

Discussion: Life On the Wicked Stage

Glenn Kelman / Redfin Corporate Blog:

One in Five Facebook Employees Has No Imagination Whatsoever — Whoa! Shocking news, guys. An engineer left Google for Facebook. The great Lars Rasmussen, creator of Google Maps and Google Wave, quit Google Thursday to join Facebook. This has, admittedly, happened before.

Discussion: Victus Spiritus, The Register and Search Engine Land, Thanks:calbucci

Don Dodge / Don Dodge on The Next Big Thing:

Will Facebook have an IPO bounce? Has 409A changed the game? — The conventional wisdom is that you join a hot startup pre-IPO to get the low priced stock options. Techcrunch reports that some people are joining Facebook now to get in on pre-IPO shares.

Discussion: Venture Chronicles, Thanks:dondodge

Claire Cain Miller / New York Times:

Why Twitter's C.E.O. Demoted Himself — AT the annual South by Southwest gathering of techies in Austin, Tex., in March, conference organizers had chosen a hangar-size room to accommodate their star speaker: Evan Williams, the co-founder of Twitter, the messaging and social networking site that had become a digital phenomenon.

Discussion: SAI

Leena Rao / TechCrunch:

Twitter Added 30 Million Users In The Past Two Months — In a New York Times profile on Twitter co-founder Evan Williams, the company revealed a few interesting stats showing the growth trajectory of the network. Twitter now has 175 million registered users, which is up from 145 million users in September.

Doc Searls Weblog:

The Data Bubble II — In The Data Bubble, I told readers to mark the day: 31 July 2010. That's when The Wall Street Journal published The Web's Gold Mine: Your Secrets, subtitled A Journal investigation finds that one of the fastest-growing businesses on the Internet is the business of spying on consumers.

Thanks:kevinmarks

Danny Sullivan / Search Engine Land:

On Google Growing Up, Losing Employees & Being The New “California” — Google's lost yet another high profile employee, apparently to Facebook. Another sign that Google's slipping, to some. Perhaps. For me, Google has become the new “California,” stealing that role away from Yahoo.

Discussion: TechCrunch

Randall Stross / New York Times:

When the Assembly Line Moves Online — DO one assigned task on your computer. It shouldn't take you more than two seconds. Repeat 14,399 times. Congratulations! Your eight-hour work day is complete. — No such workplace yet exists, but with the fiendishly clever creation of standardized …

Oliver Chiang / SelectStart:

Twitter Investor Defends New ‘Tweet’ Usage Rules — Twitter is taking heat in the tech blogosphere (here and here) over its new guidelines about how others can use the words “Twitter” and “Tweet.” Now some well-known technology investors are also saying “Hey, Twitter, enough of this.”

Discussion: Brian Solis, TechCrunch and Pocket-lint

Henry Blodget / SAI:
Hey, Twitter, Enough Of This Crap About “Here's How You Can Use The Word Tweet”

Discussion: The Blog Herald and TechCrunch

Jean-Louis Gassée / Monday Note:

Apple's Next Macintosh OS — Operating systems don't age well. Some have better genes than others or they have more competent caretakers, but sooner or later they are stricken by a cancer of bug fixes upon bug fixes, upgrades upon upgrades. I know, I lived inside two OS sausage factories …

Discussion: TechCrunch

Ryan Pollock / Google Mobile Blog:

Find your polling place and follow the US Election on the go — The United States midterm election is on Tuesday, November 2, and we encourage all eligible US citizens to get out and vote. We've made it easy to find your polling place and follow election news by visiting our Election Center mobile site …

Discussion: The Next Web and PhoneArena

Jack Purcher / Patently Apple:

Apple Files Lawsuit against Motorola to Defend Multi-Touch — The inevitable: When Motorola preemptively launched their declaration judgment action against Apple earlier this month, we knew that Apple was likely to launch multiple patent infringement lawsuits against Motorola once …

AppleInsider:
Apple countersues Motorola over multi-touch iPhone patents

Discussion: IntoMobile and Engadget

Spencer Ackerman / Danger Room:

Real Men Use Android: Special Forces Favor Google Phone — The Army is 20 years and a half-billion dollars into a star-crossed effort to build custom communications and digital-mapping gadgets for its soldiers. Special Operations Command, on the other hand, is taking a simpler approach: They're planning to use Android phones.

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