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8:45 AM ET, November 30, 2010

Techmeme

 Top Items: 
Kara Swisher / BoomTown:
Google's Groupon Offer: $5.3 Billion, With $700 Million Earnout  —  According to sources close to the situation, Google has offered $5.3 billion for Groupon, in what will be its largest acquisition yet if completed.  —  Sources said the deal for the social buying site seemed likely to be struck …
RELATED:
Stacey Higginbotham / GigaOM:
Forget Net Neutrality, Comcast Might Break the Web  —  The fight that erupted today between Level 3 and Comcast involves an esoteric agreement between two of the Internet's big players providers colliding with a series of equally arcane policy arguments, but at its core this fight is about money.
Discussion: Post Tech
RELATED:
Joe Waz / Comcast Voices:
Comcast Comments on Level 3  —  Level 3 has inaccurately portrayed the commercial negotiations between it and Comcast.  These discussions have nothing to do with Level 3's desire to distribute different types of network traffic.  —  Comcast has long established and mutually acceptable …
Level 3 Communications:
Level 3 Communications Issues Statement Concerning Comcast's Actions  —  Level 3 Communications, Inc. (NASDAQ: LVLT) today issued the following statement, which can be attributed to Thomas Stortz, Chief Legal Officer of Level 3:  —  “On November 19, 2010, Comcast informed Level 3 that …
Marshall Kirkpatrick / ReadWriteWeb:
Kinect is Selling 2X as Fast as the iPad  —  The iPad was crowned the fastest-adopted consumer electronic device ever last month, stealing the title from the once-coveted DVD player.  Records are made to be broken, though, and the Microsoft Kinect has already come out of the gate twice as fast.
RELATED:
Tiernan Ray / Tech Trader Daily:
Microsoft: Over 2.5M Kinect Sold
Daniel Rubino / WPCentral.com:
Rumor: January Windows Phone 7 update to be massive, catches up with iPhone  —  We've been covering the rumored software update for Windows Phone 7 for sometime now, even having our forum members add some info to the mix.  So far, the update is suppose to have the following features:
Ben Parr / Mashable!:
Google's Secret Social Initiative Delayed Until Spring 2011 [EXCLUSIVE]  —  Google's big social initiative, once thought to be a full-fledged social network named “Google Me,” is experiencing delays that have pushed back the launch until spring 2011.  —  Mashable has learned …
Aoife White / Bloomberg:
Google Investigated by European Union Over Online Ads, Search  —  Nov. 30 (Bloomberg) — Google Inc. is being investigated by European Union regulators for allegedly demoting rival services in its search results and for restrictions that may prevent websites accepting some competing ads.
Ingrid Lunden / mocoNews:
The Biggest iPad Subsidy Of All: Softbank Gives It Away - What's Behind It?  —  One more operator is offering a reduced price for the iPad if you take it on a two-year contract: Softbank in Japan is preparing to launch a deal that offers users a 16GB iPad for free.
Jessica Guynn / L.A. Times Tech Blog:
Facebook co-founder Chris Hughes officially launches Jumo, social network for social activism  —  Status update from Chris Hughes, co-founder of Facebook and the social media whiz kid behind Barack Obama's presidential campaign: On Tuesday he officially launched Jumo.
Michael Arrington / TechCrunch:
Facebook Now Worth $50 Billion In Secondary Trading  —  It was just a few weeks ago that Accel Partners sold off around half a billion dollars of Facebook shares at a company valuation of $35 billion.  If you thought that was insane, and a lot of commenters did, then don't read the rest of this post.
Discussion: VatorNews and All Facebook
Lev Grossman / Time:
The Men Who Stole the World  —  A decade ago, four young men changed the way the world works.  They did this not with laws or guns or money but with software: they had radical, disruptive ideas, which they turned into code, which they released on the Internet for free.
John Rennie / IEEE Spectrum:
Ray Kurzweil's Slippery Futurism  —  His stunning prophecies have earned him a reputation as a tech visionary, but many of them don't look so good on close inspection  —  Don't panic if you look for your computer today and can't find it.  We have it on the authority of technology maven Ray Kurzweil …
Charles Arthur / Guardian:
Wikileaks evades hackers with shift to Amazon  —  Website moves front page to Amazon server hire service but keeps US embassy cables out of reach  —  Wikileaks, the site that has infuriated the US government by releasing thousands of US diplomatic cables, is being hosted by one of the symbols …
Kelly Fiveash / The Register:
Mozilla rages at MS, Apple and Google's ‘trojan horse’ tactics  —  Shove your plug-ins where the sun don't shine  —  A well-respected Mozilla man has attacked Apple, Google and Microsoft for installing plug-ins without first asking for a web surfer's permission.
MG Siegler / TechCrunch:
Instagram Captures Their First Big Brand Partner: National Geographic  —  There seems to be a common cycle for many startups.  First, you capture users.  Then, you capture brands/celebrities.  Then you capture revenues.  Most startups never make it past step one, let alone steps two and three.
Ina Fried / Mobilized:
Microsoft's Plan B to Make Money in Phones: Patents  —  Although Microsoft is still hoping that Windows Phone 7 proves to be a hit, the company doesn't see its success as the only way to make a profit from all those millions it has poured into mobile phone technology.
Thomas Ricker / Engadget:
Sandisk, Sony, and Nikon propose 500MBps memory card with more than 2TB capacity  —  While the CompactFlash Association scoots along at a maximum transfer rate of 167MB per second under its just released CF6.0 specification, Sandisk, Sony, and Nikon are already looking to the future.
Danny Sullivan / Daggle:
How Facebook Connect Freaks Me Out  —  More and more sites I run into these days are offering a way for me to log-in using Facebook.  That's cool, if it means I don't have to fill out yet another registration form.  But the permission pages that come up sometimes are so scary that I decline the offer.
Wall Street Journal:
Makers of Firefox Browser Explore Do-Not-Track Tool After Scrapping Earlier Effort  —  Makers of Firefox Browser Explore Do-Not-Track Tool After Scrapping Earlier Effort  —  The makers of the popular Firefox Web browser are exploring ways to create a do-not-track mechanism that could offer Internet users …
Nathan Olivarez-Giles / L.A. Times Tech Blog:
Playboy Magazine releases every issue from 1953 to 2010 on a hard drive  —  Playboy Magazine is on magazine racks, on the Web, on iPad, and now it's also on a hard drive.  —  The iconic publication, which has struggled a bit as the world goes increasingly digital, is offering every issue of Playboy …
Robert Quigley / Geekosystem:
How to Make Google Translate Beatbox  —  Not sure if this falls in the category of Easter Egg or clever manipulation, but either way, there go our afternoons: Redditor harrichr has devised a scheme for turning Google Translate into a makeshift beatbox machine. … For the lazy, just click this link and it'll be done for you.
Discussion: TechCrunch and Neatorama
Ben Parr / Mashable!:
Flock Social Browser Declares War on RockMelt with Version 3.5  —  Flock, the self-described “social web browser,” is responding to the launch of RockMelt with the release of Flock 3.5, which boasts greater speed and added functionality.  —  The browser touts social integration …
Liz Gannes / NetworkEffect:
Twitter Gets a Hollywood Guy: Omid Ashtari  —  Twitter has hired its first official liaison to the stars: Creative Artists Agency veteran Omid Ashtari.  His first day at the microblogging service was today.  —  Ashtari told me he is “going to be Twitter's L.A. person” and will be dealing with media companies and celebrities.
Discussion: Lost Remote
Zach Epstein / BGR:
WP7 developers complain of missing payments, broken reporting tools  —  Microsoft is making good progress in its efforts to woo developers to the new Windows Phone 7 platform, but we hope the company is equally devoted to keeping devs on board once they arrive.
 
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 More Items: 
MG Siegler / TechCrunch:
Apple Exec Schiller Steps Out On Twitter A Bit More; Answers …
Mac Slocum / O'Reilly Radar:
For social search, similarity could trump friendship
Devin Coldewey / TechCrunch:
Peter Sunde Seconds The Idea Of An Alternative Root DNS
Discussion: Geek.com and OSNews
Chuck Kisselburg / CircleID:
DNS: The Basis for Billions
 Earlier Items: 
Andy Greenberg / The Firewall:
WikiLeaks' Julian Assange Wants To Spill Your Corporate Secrets
John Biggs / TechCrunch:
Microsoft TV: A Bold Move That May Blow Up Broadcast
Rand Fishkin / Rand's Blog:
The Algorithm + the Crowd are Not Enough
Discussion: Stage Two
Georgina Prodhan / Reuters:
Few smartphone owners are loyal to their brand: survey
 

 
From Mediagazer:

Jon Brodkin / Ars Technica:
FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel announced she will leave the agency on January 20; she was the first woman to be confirmed to lead the agency

Evan Drellich / New York Times:
The MLB is planning national packages for streaming companies to bid on in 2028, when its national TV deals with ESPN, Fox, and Turner expire

Lauren Forristal / TechCrunch:
Tubi launches Scenes, a mobile feature that lets viewers watch 60-to-90-second trailer-style clips from its library to help with content discovery
 
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