Check out Mini-Techmeme for simple mobiles or Techmeme Mobile for modern smartphones.
6:00 PM ET, December 20, 2010

Techmeme

 Top Items: 
Michael Arrington / TechCrunch:
AOL Acquires Personal Profile Startup About.Me  —  Personal profile startup About.me launched publicly, oh, all of four days ago.  And, boom.  Today AOL (our parent company), will announce that they've acquired the company.  It will become part of the consumer applications group, led by AOL exec Brad Garlinghouse.
RELATED:
Tony Conrad / Tony Conrad's Photo Blog:
Booyah!  —  Ryan, Tim and I are thrilled to announce that about.me has been acquired by Aol.  Whereto begin, there is so much to say but we'll try to be informative, yet brief for today's ‘get it now, read it fast, tweet it’ internet reader.  —  We founded about.me so that any of us …
Robin Schriebman / Gmail Blog:
Free calling in Gmail extended through 2011  —  When we launched calling in Gmail back in August, we wanted it to be easy and affordable, so we made calls to the U.S. and Canada free for the rest of 2010.  In the spirit of holiday giving and to help people keep in touch in the new year, we're extending free calling for all of 2011.
Al Franken / The Huffington Post:
The Most Important Free Speech Issue of Our Time  —  This Tuesday is an important day in the fight to save the Internet.  As a source of innovation, an engine of our economy, and a forum for our political discourse, the Internet can only work if it's a truly level playing field.
RELATED:
Cecilia Kang / Post Tech:
FCC expected to pass net neutrality rules
Staska / Unwired View:
Holy crap!  Nokia is in talks with Microsoft about Windows Phone devices?!  —  Holy crap!  —  I don't believe I'm writing this, especially after publicly ridiculing even idea of such a thing for a year now.  But given the source of the info...  Here it goes- in his weekly op-ed Mobile …
RELATED:
New York Times:
Google TV Faces Delays Amid Poor Reviews  —  Google TV has just enacted its first programming cancellation.  —  The Consumer Electronics Show next month in Las Vegas was meant to be the great coming-out party for Google's new software for televisions, which adds Web video and other computer smarts to TV sets.
RELATED:
Oliver Chiang / SelectStart:
Facebook Should Be In China, Says Baidu  —  Image by Getty Images North America via @daylife  —  As I reported earlier, Facebook chief Mark Zuckerberg has begun his trip in China, with a stop by top Chinese search engine Baidu in Beijing.  Though Baidu's director of international communications Kaiser Kuo …
RELATED:
Max Read / Gawker:
Mark Zuckerberg's Beijing Adventure
Federico Viticci / MacStories:
Apple Launches iAd Producer - HTML & CSS Layout App for iAds  —  A few minutes ago Apple launched a new app for the Mac called iAd Producer which is aimed at developers and designers willing to create visually rich, interactive iAds. iAd Producer “automatically manages the HTML5 …
Discussion: 9 to 5 Mac, MacRumors and Macgasm, Thanks:viticci
Reed Hastings / Seeking Alpha:
Netflix CEO Reed Hastings Responds to Whitney Tilson: Cover Your Short Position.  Now.  —  A great investor and a wonderful human being, Whitney Tilson recently posted an article about why he is short Netflix (NFLX).  Whitney, who is a major co-donor with me to charter public schools like KIPP …
Royal Pingdom:
The most reliable (and unreliable) blogging services on the Web  —  Blogging services have been around for a long time, with pioneers like Blogger paving the way for WordPress.com and more recent arrivals like Tumblr and Posterous.  There are millions upon millions of blogs out there, many of them residing on these services.
Joe Maller:
iTunes slowdowns with Google DNS  —  Last night we tried to rent an iTunes movie on our newish Apple TV.  Instead of starting right away, the Apple TV said it would be 2+ hours before we could start watching.  I've got a healthy 15-20Mb/s connection and a clean wire to the Apple TV, so this shouldn't be happening.
Thomas E. Weber / The Daily Beast:
Cracking the New York Times Popularity Code  —  Just how many people does it take to propel a story onto the Times' influential most-emailed list?  And can it be gamed?  Thomas E. Weber finds the answers.  —  The most-emailed articles list on the New York Times website …
Tim Bray / Android Developers Blog:
It's not “rooting”, it's openness  —  [This post is by Nick Kralevich, an engineer on the Android Security Team.  — Tim Bray]  —  “Nexus S has been rooted, let the madness commence!” proclaims Engadget.  “This is only possible because Android's security is crap and it's exploited easily …
Suzanne Vranica / Wall Street Journal:
Targeted TV Ads Set for Takeoff  —  DirecTV to Pioneer Commercials Keyed to Each Household; Concerns About Privacy, Technology Linger  —  After years of promises and false starts, TV commercials targeted at individual homes may finally be ready for prime time.
Andrew Wallenstein / paidContent:
Google Poaches Paramount Executive For Content Role  —  Google (NSDQ: GOOG) has turned to Hollywood to fill out its content team, hiring Malik Ducard, who is currently senior vice president of digital distribution at Viacom-owned film studio Paramount, according to sources.
Vlad Savov / Engadget:
iPhone 4 hits new low of $147 on contract at Sam's Club this week  —  Radio Shack's $149 price for the 16GB iPhone 4 just got undercut by a whole two bucks.  We've been tipped off to Sam's Club now offering the AT&T-locked device for a $147 fee, subject to the usual two-year agreement.
Elizabeth Weingarten / The Atlantic Online:
Forget Journalism School and Enroll in Groupon Academy  —  It's a Friday afternoon and Jane Flotte is getting a little tired of spa treatments.  “Today I've written a lot of salon deals,” the Groupon employee said.  “And I'm getting kind of sick of talking about facials.”
John Biggs / CrunchGear:
Motorola Teases With The New “Buzz” Tablet  —  CES 2011 is just around the corner and in a rare bit of intelligent marketing Motorola is showing off what appears to be a new tablet, probably called something like “Buzz,” judging by the clever bee flitting around at the end.
Peter Kafka / MediaMemo:
Twitter List Service TLists Becomes Sulia, Raises $3.5 Million  —  Ah!  You can still raise money for a start-up whose fate is tied directly to Twitter.  —  Here's Sulia, which is dedicated to finding and sorting the most relevant Twitter users into related groups, so you can follow them.
David Dalka / TechCrunch:
Dear Facebook, Please Return Our Social Networking Space  —  The following is a guest post by David Dalka.  Dalka is a digital business strategist and keynote speaker who was a member of BlackRock (BLK) during its hyper-growth phase of 80 to 800 people.  He is a top ten contributor to CrunchBase …
Thanks:jimhedger
 
 Archived Page Info: 
This is a snapshot of Techmeme at 6:00 PM ET, December 20, 2010.

View the current page or another snapshot:


 
 Techmeme Sponsor Posts: 
Meta:
Open Source AI: Available to all, not just the few  —  Meta's open source AI enables small businesses, start-ups, students, researchers and more to download and build with our models at no cost.
Tribe AI:
Build AI products that matter  —  Tribe AI helps organizations rapidly deploy AI solutions that have real business impact.  We bring together world class AI talent and tooling to drive differentiated results.
Zoho:
5 common accounting mistakes  —  This is a guest post by Yaali Bizappln Solutions.  A lot of businesses manage their customers and finances on separate platforms.  This disconnect often leads to missed invoices …
Hamming:
Make AI Voice Agents trustworthy  —  Hamming AI automatically tests AI voice agents and continuously monitors them in production.
Sponsor Techmeme
 
 See Also: 
Techmeme: site main
Techmeme River: reverse chronological Techmeme
Techmeme Mobile: for phones
Techmeme Leaderboard: Techmeme's top sources
 
 Subscribe: 
Techmeme RSS feed
Techmeme on X
Techmeme on Mastodon
 
 
 More Items: 
Bloomberg:
Adobe's Forecast Exceeds Estimates on Sales of Desktop-Publishing Software
Nate Anderson / Ars Technica:
Undue process: how Uncle Sam seized BitTorrent domain names
Jon C. Ogg / 24/7 Wall St.:
Zipcar Closer to IPO (ZIP)
Om Malik / GigaOM:
Will the FCC Approve Qualcomm's Spectrum Sale to AT&T?
Robin Wauters / TechCrunch:
Amazon Vet Jason Child Joins Groupon As CFO
Discussion: TechFlash, Business Wire, SAI and VatorNews
Leena Rao / TechCrunch:
Professional Social Network LinkedIn Takes Groups Public
Discussion: The LinkedIn Blog
Adam Satariano / Bloomberg:
Insider-Trading Suit Shows Piercing of Apple's Veil of Secrecy
Discussion: iPhone in Canada Blog
Courtney Boyd Myers / The Next Web:
Foursquare adds photos and comments to its new iPhone app
 Earlier Items: 
Gwen / Electronic Frontier Foundation:
Not-So-Gentle Persuasion: US Bullies Spain into Proposed Website Blocking Law
Discussion: Music Ally and ZeroPaid.com
Jon Marcus / Times Higher Education:
Drop out and innovate  —  The man who financed Facebook …
Pui-Wing Tam / Wall Street Journal:
Tech Revival Lifts Silicon Valley
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry / SAI:
Apple's Cleverest — And Most Annoying — Marketing Gimmick
Discussion: Examiner
 

 
From Mediagazer:

Caitlin Huston / The Hollywood Reporter:
Internal memo: Hearst Magazines president announces layoffs as part of a decision to “reallocate resources” to “continue our focus on digital innovation”

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

Lachlan Cartwright / The Ankler:
Sources: MSNBC renewed Rachel Maddow's contract early this fall, but with a pay cut; MSNBC bosses' plan to shake up daytime and weekend programming
 
Sister Sites:

Mediagazer
 Top news and commentary for media professionals from all around the web
memeorandum
 What US political commentators are discussing online right now
WeSmirch
 The top celebrity news from all around the web on a single page