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2:45 PM ET, December 1, 2010

Techmeme

 Top Items: 
Nielsen Wire:
U.S. Smartphone Battle Heats Up: Which is the “Most Desired” Operating System?  —  According to October 2010 data from The Nielsen Company, 29.7 percent of U.S. mobile subscribers now own smartphones that run full operating systems.  —  The most popular smartphones are the Apple iPhone and RIM Blackberry …
RELATED:
Philip Elmer-DeWitt / Fortune:
Nielsen: iPhone and Android are tied for ‘most-desired’ smartphones
Greg Kumparak / MobileCrunch:
Verizon 4G Going Live Dec 5th; 5 GB Per Month For $50, 10 GB For $80  —  Fresh off of their 4G press conference call, Verizon has just dumped a host of details surrounding the launch of their 4G LTE network.  Here's what you need to know: They'll officially start lighting up their network as of December 5th.
RELATED:
David Sarno / L.A. Times Tech Blog:
Verizon to switch on 4G network on Sunday, but not for smartphones  —  Verizon Wireless said Wednesday that it would turn on its 4G wireless network Sunday in 38 U.S. cities, though the new network will not support smartphones until the first half of 2011.  —  Instead, the 4G network …
Ina Fried / Mobilized:
Verizon 4G Network to Launch Sunday  —  Verizon Wireless announced on Wednesday that it will launch its 4G network on Sunday in 38 markets across the United States.  —  The company had shared most of its plans ahead of time.  One of the unknowns, though, was what Verizon would charge for the service.
Wall Street Journal:
Google Set to Launch E-Book Venture  —  Google Inc. is in the final stages of launching its long-awaited e-book retailing venture, Google Editions, a move that could shake up the way digital books are sold.  —  The long-delayed venture—Google executives had said they hoped to launch this summer …
RELATED:
Kit Eaton / Fast Company:   Google Editions E-bookstore Due Soon, Controversy (And Failure?)
DealBook:
Google Gambit for Groupon Raises Concerns  —  Google's $6 billion bid for Groupon, an online coupon start-up, is an aggressive move by the company to dominate local online advertising and help with its long-sought move into social networking.  —  Google has offered Groupon $5.3 billion …
RELATED:
Wall Street Journal:
Google in Talks to Buy Groupon  —  Google Inc. is in talks to buy local deals site Groupon Inc., said people familiar with the matter, a move that would mark Google's biggest acquisition yet and a major push into local advertising.  —  The two sides weren't prepared to announce a deal as of Tuesday …
Kat Hannaford / Gizmodo:
Motorola Olympus Found at Flea Market Poses For Hi-Res Photoshoot  —  Of course, we're never too sure that what our tipsters have told us is the truth, but this one claims he bought Motorola's unannounced new flagship at a market.  The very same Android that's leaked all over the place recently.
Michael Arrington / TechCrunch:
Bidding War For Twitter Raises Valuation To Nearly $4 Billion.  Kleiner Perkins Currently In Pole Position  —  Two weeks ago we reported that Twitter was mulling over raising a big new round of financing and the expected valuation was in the $3 billion range.  Things have developed since then, it seems.
Andrew / Groublogpon:
Coming Soon: Groupon Stores and the Deal Feed  —  This summer, we launched personalization to bring you deals that better suit your interests.  We weren't about to stop there - today, we're giving you a sneak peak of some new stuff that will bring you even more deals you love: Groupon Stores and the Deal Feed.
RELATED:
Geoffrey A. Fowler / Digits:
Groupon Grows Beyond One Deal Per Day
Discussion: Telegraph
Robin Wauters / TechCrunch:
Groupon Acquires Local Marketing Services Startup Ludic Labs, Expands Some More  —  Groupon is expanding its presence in Silicon Valley with a brand new office and the acquisition of San Mateo-based Ludic Labs, the local marketing services startup behind offerfoundry.com and diddit.com.
RELATED:
Melanie Lee / Reuters:
Groupon buys 3 discount sites, expands into Asia
Discussion: Fast Company
Mike Melanson / ReadWriteWeb:
Netflix Boosts Streaming Catalog With First-Run Movies  —  Netflix announced today that it has signed a multi-year deal with newly-formed film distribution company FilmDistrict to bring first-run films to its streaming catalog.  —  Last week, Netflix introduced a streaming-only subscription plan …
Wall Street Journal:
Race Is On to ‘Fingerprint’ Phones, PCs  —  IRVINE, Calif.—David Norris wants to collect the digital equivalent of fingerprints from every computer, cellphone and TV set-top box in the world.  —  He's off to a good start.  So far, Mr. Norris's start-up company, BlueCava Inc., has identified 200 million devices.
Leena Rao / TechCrunch:
AOL Acquires Email Prioritization App Unblab To Boost Project Phoenix  —  It looks like AOL has just acquired email prioritization app Unblab, according to an email sent from Unblab's founder Eli Holder.  The acquisition was also announced on Unblab's website.  Terms of the deal were not disclosed (AOL also owns TechCrunch).
Discussion: paidContent, Adotas and The Next Web
Don Clark / Wall Street Journal:
IBM Claims Breakthrough in Laser-Based Chips  —  A race to transform computers with laser-based communications is accelerating, with International Business Machines Corp. the latest to claim breakthroughs in chips that send data at blazing speeds using pulses of light.
Discussion: The Register, VentureBeat and PC World
Christy Pettey / Gartner:
Gartner Reveals Top Predictions for IT Organizations and Users for 2011 and Beyond  —  Predictions Show Clear Linkage of IT Investments and Business Results Becoming an Imperative for IT Organizations  —    Gartner, Inc. has revealed its top predictions for IT organizations and users for 2011 and beyond.
David Lam / David Lam's Business & …:
RIM sues Kik for patent infringement  —  If you've been following BlackBerry news lately, you know that Kik Messenger was booted out of the Blackberry app store by RIM on Nov 12, for “breaching contractual obligations”.  —  Kik is an in instant messaging service, much like RIM's BlackBerry Messenger (BBM).
Vlad Savov / Engadget:
Dell Venue Pro finally available to order: $99 on contract, shipping December 9th  —  The much-delayed and much-desired Venue Pro is now finally ready for its proper launch.  Dell has begun taking online orders for its first Windows Phone 7 device and prices are set at $99 for the 8GB handset …
Vijay Sankaran / Nokia Siemens Networks Blog:
New iPhone OS supports our network technology to boost smartphone performance  —  With its latest iPhone iOs 4.2 software, it looks like Apple is joining efforts to cut smartphone signalling down to size.  Tests by Nokia Siemens Networks have shown that iPhone iOs 4.2 supports …
Jason Kincaid / TechCrunch:
YouTube Officially Launches Ads You Can Skip  —  Yep, you read that right.  Today, YouTube is officially launching TrueView, a new ad format that lets users skip over ads they aren't interested in — and advertisers are actually okay with it.  —  It's a new format that YouTube has been testing …
Discussion: GigaOM and SAI
Peter Svensson / Associated Press:
WikiLeaks site, pummeled by attacks, leaves US  —  NEW YORK (AP) — The WikiLeaks website has left its U.S. Web host, Amazon.com, and moved back to a Swedish provider.  The site, which just released a trove of sensitive U.S. State Department documents, took up residence on Amazon.com Inc.'s …
Matt Brian / The Next Web:
BlackBerry Mobile Internet Use Overtakes Apple In US  —  Website analytics provider StatCounter has published a new report showing that for the first time since its starting collecting mobile internet data, RIM's BlackBerry OS overtook Apple's iOS in terms of mobile internet usage …
Jason Kincaid / TechCrunch:
The Future Is Here: DoubleTwist Brings Wireless Sync To Android For Music, Photos & Video  —  Earlier today, Winamp released a new version of its Android application that allowed users to sync their music wirelessly with their Windows desktop (disclosure: Winamp and TechCrunch are both owned by AOL).
Alex Howard / Gov 2.0:
FTC online privacy report endorses “Do-Not-Track” mechanism for Web browsers  —  The Federal Trade Commision released an online privacy report today that will reshape how companies, consumers and businesses interact on the Internet.  The agency will take questions from reporters at 1 PM EST …
Danny Sullivan / Search Engine Land:
What Social Signals Do Google & Bing Really Count?  —  Both Google and Bing have added many social search features over the past year.  There's also been talk about using “social signals” to help rank regular search results.  But are either of the major search engines actually using those social signals to rank regular search results?
Thanks:rawmeet
John Paczkowski / Digital Daily:
Kindle Feels iPad's Heat, Sees E-Reader Lead Going Up in Smoke  —  When Apple CEO Steve Jobs first announced the company's new iBookstore and iBooks application for the iPad back in January, he said that while Amazon had done a great job with its Kindle e-book reader, Apple planned to “stand on their shoulders and go a little further.”
 
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 More Items: 
Karin Matussek / Bloomberg:
Nokia, HTC Overturn Two-Thirds of IPCom Phone Patent
MG Siegler / TechCrunch:
Nearly Every Single Topic On Quora Now Has A Twitter Account
Discussion: Skeptic Geek
Julia Angwin / Digits:
A New Type of Tracking: Akamai's ‘Pixel-Free’ Technology
 Earlier Items: 
Rob Walker / Fast Company:
Inside the Wild, Wacky, Profitable World of Boing Boing
Bing:
Bing Feature Update: Shop, compare and share on Facebook with new …
Sui-Lee Wee / Reuters:
China arrests hundreds of hackers, says situation “grim”
Liz Gannes / NetworkEffect:
Facebook Engineering Director Aditya Agarwal Departs
Peter Kafka / MediaMemo:
Google Cuts Off AppNexus, and the Ad Tech World Shudders
 

 
From Mediagazer:

Alex Sherman / CNBC:
Analyzing Comcast's spinoff of cable networks, purposefully structured with low debt: the move might be a signal to the industry that it's time to consolidate

Daniel Thomas / Financial Times:
James Harding says the Tortoise-Observer deal could create a profitable media group and there isn't a guaranteed future for the Observer with the Guardian

Terry Gross / NPR:
Excerpts from a Q&A with Marty Baron and David Remnick on coming retribution against media: prosecutions for posting government leaks, public media cuts, more
 
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