Top Items:
New York Times:
Banks and WikiLeaks — The whistle-blowing Web site WikiLeaks has not been convicted of a crime. The Justice Department has not even pressed charges over its disclosure of confidential State Department communications. Nonetheless, the financial industry is trying to shut it down.
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Dave Winer / Scripting News:
Can we use S3 and EC2 to host free speech?
Can we use S3 and EC2 to host free speech?
Discussion:
The Atlantic Online
Seth Weintraub / Fortune:
2011 will be the year Android explodes — (Not this kind of smartphone growth.) Image by @boetter via Flickr — Ever-improving networks and a big hardware announcement that will send handset prices plummeting both point to smartphone growth in 2011 that could totally eclipse anything we've seen before.
Walt Mossberg / Mossblog:
Mossberg's Best and Worst Products of 2010 — This week on WSJ Digits, Walt shared his thoughts on his best and worst reviewed products for 2010. Taking Walt's top spot this year was none other than Apple's iPad. For a 1.0 product, the iPad was amazing.
Discussion:
eWeek, AppleInsider, Edible Apple, Electronista, MacDailyNews and 9 to 5 Mac
Steve Kovach / The Business Insider:
Score A Kindle This Morning? Here's How To Load It With Free Google Books — E-Readers like the Nook and the Sony Reader automatically give you access to the thousands of books in Google's online library. But for devices like the Kindle, you need to work around a few obstacles before you can gain access.
Discussion:
Mashable!
MG Siegler / TechCrunch:
Flickr Should Have Built Instagram. But They Didn't. Here's Why. — Back in June, we reported on the departure of Kellan Elliott-McCrea from Yahoo. While not hugely known outside the developer community, we had received several tips indicating just how important Elliott-McCrea was to the Flickr team …
Discussion:
SAI
Ryan Flinn / Bloomberg:
IBM Expects to See Holographic Phone Calls, Air-Powered Batteries by 2015 — By 2015, your mobile phone will project a 3-D image of anyone who calls and your laptop will be powered by kinetic energy. At least that's what International Business Machines Corp. sees in its crystal ball.
Discussion:
IntoMobile, Examiner, PC Magazine, textually.org, AfterDawn.com and eWeek
Adam Rifkin / TechCrunch:
What Facebook Can Give Back To The Web — Editor's note: Guest author Adam Rifkin is a Silicon Valley veteran who organizes a networking group for entrepreneurial engineers called 106 Miles. You can read his previous guest posts for TechCrunch here and follow him on Twitter @ifindkarma.
Michaela Schiessl / Spiegel Online:
Nokia Looks to Recover the ‘Magic Dust’ — For years, Nokia effortlessly dominated the cell phone market. But then Apple and Google muscled in on its turf and changed the game forever. The Finnish company is pinning its hopes on a new operating system, but it might be too little, too late.
Discussion:
parislemon
Alexia Tsotsis / TechCrunch:
Theopeninter.net, A Visual Guide To Net Neutrality — With Theopeninter.net, web designer Michael Ciarlo has given you the holiday gift of being able to explain to the less web savvy members of your friends and family what net neutrality means (simply, and with visuals) …
Brooke Crothers / CNET News:
Dell drops ultrathin Adamo 13 to $899 — A lower-priced Adamo 13 has popped up on Dell's Web site. The Adamo page is now showing the price of the aluminum-clad ultrathin laptop at $899—and this discount comes with an unexpected bonus, too. — The Adamo is a slick …
Discussion:
Electronista, Examiner and Engadget
Julie Bosman / New York Times:
Christmas Gifts May Help E-Books Take Root — The publishing industry used to be afraid of e-books. In 2010 it embraced them. — Publishers expanded their digital divisions, experimented with video-enhanced e-books, worked on digitizing their older titles and made sure that new books …
Discussion:
TeleRead
Mike Elgan / Cult of Mac:
Gulliver's Travels to be One Giant Apple Ad — The upcoming Jack Black comedy, Gulliver's Travels, which opens Christmas Day, will be one giant Apple ad. — When Gulliver travels to Lilliput, he brings his iPhone, which when used by the Lilliputians appears gigantic.
Discussion:
Examiner