Top Items:
Wall Street Journal:
Goldman, Citing Strong Response, to End Facebook Solicitation — Interest in shares of Facebook Inc. is so strong that Goldman Sachs Group Inc. plans to stop soliciting interest from potential investors on Thursday, after the securities firm received orders of several billion dollars, according to people familiar with the situation.
Discussion:
L.A. Times Tech Blog, SAI, Deal Journal, Fortune and Epicenter
RELATED:
Wall Street Journal:
Facebook Deal Spurs Inquiry — SEC Launches Review of 1960s-Era Disclosure Regulations for Private Firms — The Securities and Exchange Commission has begun examining whether disclosure rules for privately held firms need to be rewritten as a result of recent deals allowing investors …
Shira Ovide / Deal Journal:
Read Goldman Sachs' Secret Facebook Pitch Memo — Goldman Sachs has been overrun with demand for private shares of Facebook, forcing the investment bank to stop offering the stock to its wealthy clients, our Deal Journal colleagues are reporting this afternoon.
Nicholas Carlson / SAI:
Facebook Has More Than 600 Million Users, Goldman Tells Clients
Discussion:
Pulse2 and MarketingVOX
Max Abelson / Bloomberg:
Goldman's New Facebook Friend Said to Tutor Wealth Managers on Barred Site
Discussion:
Fast Company, SAI and msnbc.com
John Battelle / John Battelle's Searchblog:
What Everyone Seems to Miss In Facebook's Private or Public Debate...
Discussion:
MarketWatch, The Business Insider, Dow Jones Newswires and Bloomberg
Mary Jo Foley / ZDNet:
Microsoft shows off Windows 8 on ARM — Microsoft demonstrated at a press conference on January 5 the “next version of Windows” running on ARM processors, as many Microsoft watchers had been expecting. — At the press conference — held a few hours before CEO Steve Ballmer will keynote …
Discussion:
Mobilized, All about Microsoft Blog, VentureBeat, Microsoft, Between the Lines Blog and Download Squad
RELATED:
Paul Thurrott / SuperSite for Windows:
New Tile-Based Shell, App Model, And App Store Coming In Windows 8? — I don't normally like to publish rumors that I can't verify with at least a second source, but based on the corroborating evidence I received along with this tip, I do believe it's genuine.
Discussion:
All about Microsoft Blog, GottaBeMobile, The Next Web, Neowin.net and Softpedia News
Brandon LeBlanc / The Windows Blog:
Next Version of Windows to Run on System-on-a-Chip Architectures
Discussion:
Microsoft, Engadget, The Microsoft Blog, VentureBeat, All about Microsoft Blog, The Next Web and Mobilized
Zach Epstein / BGR:
AT&T details 4G plans [updated] — AT&T CEO Ralph de la Vega gave a keynote at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas on Tuesday. The focus was undoubtedly 4G — as we reported earlier today — and de la Vega was joined by Motorola Mobility CEO Sanjay Jha, HTC CEO Peter Chou …
Discussion:
SFGate, AppleInsider, Examiner, Engadget, SAI, 9 to 5 Mac, Computerworld, LiveSide.net, Ars Technica, DSLreports, RazorianFly, TiPb, Pulse2, BetaNews, Mobilized, VentureBeat, Mass High Tech, IntoMobile, PhoneArena, Gearlog, Erictric, GottaBeMobile, WPCentral.com, MacRumors, iClarified and Reuters
Amir Efrati / Wall Street Journal:
Google Wins One Against Microsoft — Google Inc. has won a key ruling in its lawsuit against the U.S. Interior Department, two months after the Web giant accused the agency of improperly favoring rival Microsoft Corp. in a contract bid to provide a new email system.
Discussion:
SAI, Computerworld, L.A. Times Tech Blog, LiveSide.net, All about Microsoft Blog, GMSV, NewEnterprise, Pulse2 and Reuters
RELATED:
Tom Schoenberg / Bloomberg:
Google Wins Freeze on Microsoft Contract With U.S. Department of Interior
Discussion:
Between the Lines Blog and The Microsoft Blog
Paul Miller / Engadget:
iPad 2 case shows up at CES, packing a mockup iPad 2 — We've been seeing supposed iPad 2 cases for about a month now, all of them with the same telltale cutouts: a camera hole in the back, a camera hole in the front, and a big ol' speaker hole. Today's find beats them all, however …
Discussion:
Bits, Digital Trends, RazorianFly, Startup Meme, TG Daily, SAI, Switched, Redmond Pie, BGR, PC World, iThinkDifferent, NBC Bay Area, IntoMobile, Faster Forward, The Next Web, Pulse2, TUAW, MacRumors, MacHackPC, PhoneDog.com, TiPb, MacStories, PadGadget, GottaBeMobile, everythingiCafe, App Advice, Black Web 2.0, Geek.com, 9 to 5 Mac and Techie Buzz
Jason Kincaid / TechCrunch:
Amazon's Disruptive Android App Store Now Open To Developers — Full Details — Fragmentation. Curation. Recommendations. Take your pick: Android is getting all three, compliments of a new Amazon-run application marketplace due to launch later this year.
Discussion:
Ars Technica, Search Engine Journal, Kindle Review, GottaBeMobile, BGR, Andy Beal's Marketing Pilgrim, Poynter, ReadWriteWeb, BetaNews, ZDNet, Softpedia News, SAI, TechSpot, Pulse2, InfoQ, Android Phone Fans, AndroidGuys, VG247, The Register, Engadget, BloggingStocks, GigaOM, Electricpig.co.uk, HEXUS.channel, Black Web 2.0, Eurodroid, TeleRead, Gizmodo, CNET News, Android Community, PhoneArena, Inquirer and Between the Lines Blog
Allen Kiehl / AndroidSPIN:
Exclusive: Hands on with the HTC Thunderbolt 4G — We managed to get our hands on one of the new HTC Thunderbolt 4G's today and took a few pictures for your viewing pleasure. As well we also managed to run a Quadrant Benchmark and show the results (which are at the bottom of this post).
Discussion:
Pulse2, Engadget, Erictric, Android Phone Fans, Android Community, SlashGear, Thoughts from the Sidelines, Android Central and PhoneArena
Jake Smith / Teens in Tech:
Google Posts Android 3.0 Promotional Video; Confirms Tablet Exclusivity — While all of the press are at CES and we're stuck with school, Google decided to post this video to give us a little taste of Android 3.0. Check out the video below. This is definitely getting us excited for the future of Android on tablets.
Discussion:
BGR, Engadget, Pocket-lint, GottaBeMobile and LaptopMemo, Thanks:jakeosmith
Leander Kahney / Cult of Mac:
Apple Is Granted Its First Liquidmetal Patent [Exclusive] — A prototype fuel cell mobile phone by Hitachi. Apple may be working on similar technology for the iPhone and iPad. Photo: Slashphone — Apple has been granted its first patent related to Liquidmetal, a space-age metal alloy.
Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry / SAI:
Gene Munster: Google Has Given Up On Social — Count Piper Jaffray tech analyst Gene Munster among the Facebook bulls. He just gave an interview to Bloomberg TV which must have made any Googlers listening cringe. — Here are the main points, paraphrased: — Google has given up on social.
Joe Wilcox / BetaNews:
Samsung's Series 9 laptop is the Windows Macbook Air killer you've been waiting for — Second-generation Intel Core Family processors are here, and laptop manufacturers are wasting no time announcing new models. Samsung has the eye-popper of the Consumer Electronics Show (OK, so far) …
Discussion:
Engadget
Jim Dalrymple / The Loop:
Mac App Store will launch at 12:00 pm ET on Thursday — The Mac App Store will officially launch on January 6, but nobody has been able to nail down a time when the service will be publicly available. — According to my sources, the Mac App Store will be available at 12:00 pm (noon) ET on Thursday.
Discussion:
9 to 5 Mac, RazorianFly, AppleInsider, TechCrunch, MacRumors, Gizmodo, MacStories, Erictric and iClarified
Shira Ovide / Deal Journal:
Google Was the Busiest Startup Acquirer of 2010 — Google Inc. missed out on prized daily discounter Groupon in 2010, but it still acquired far more start-ups owned by venture capital firms than any other company last year. — In fact, it's the first time that Google has topped the annual list …
Discussion:
NBC Bay Area
Andrew Munchbach / BGR:
Next generation iPhone casing, innards revealed on video; are you the Verizon iPhone? — A firm named GlobalDirectParts has put together a fairly extensive, five-plus minute video showcasing what they claim to be parts from Apple's next generation iPhone (referred to as the iPhone 5 in the video).
Discussion:
AppleInsider, MacRumors, SmartPhone Medic, 9 to 5 Mac, MacStories, RazorianFly, PhoneDog.com, GottaBeMobile, CrunchGear, Geek.com, TUAW, Engadget, SlashGear, Erictric, iPhone Download Blog, Redmond Pie and everythingiCafe
Anil Dash:
If You Didn't Blog It, It Didn't Happen — Clive Thompson's newest Wired piece argues that the flow of short-form messages as we see on Twitter and Facebook is encouraging longer meditations in other media. I've been thinking about this phenomenon for a while in terms of the impact …
Discussion:
Stowe Boyd
Leena Rao / TechCrunch:
PostUp Buys Twitter And Facebook Application Developer EchoFon — Twitter search and advertising startup PostUp (formerly TweetUp) has bought Twitter application developer Echofon, according to a release issued today. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.
Discussion:
Business Wire, MacStories, VatorNews, Startup Meme and The Blog Herald
John Paczkowski / Digital Daily:
Exclusive: HP CMO Replaced by SAP Exec — Hewlett-Packard is kicking off the new year with a bit of an executive shake-up: Senior Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer Michael Mendenhall is leaving the company. — It's not yet clear why, and there are conflicting narratives developing around his as-of-yet unannounced departure.
Marshall Kirkpatrick / ReadWriteWeb:
Blogging Forefather Seeks to Re-Invent Blogging, Again — Dave Winer, a man who was key to the creation and growth of blogging, RSS, podcasting, OPML and several more technical standards that helped social media become what it is today, announced this morning that he's working on a new technology …
Discussion:
Scripting News
Ryan Lawler / GigaOM:
Cisco's Videoscape: Ready to Reinvent TV? — Cisco announced an ambitious strategy for making high-quality video — whether it be from online or traditional TV and cable providers — pervasive across a wide range of devices, from broadband-connected set-top boxes to tablets and other mobile devices at CES Wednesday.
Discussion:
Cisco, Computerworld, Between the Lines Blog, TheStreet.com, TelevisionInfo.com, Bloomberg and Cisco Blog
Jennifer Valentino-DeVries / Digits:
Android's Users Eclipse IPhone's for First Time, comScore Says — For the first time, more Americans say they are using cellphones powered by Google Inc.'s Android system than Apple Inc.'s iPhone, according to a new survey from technology-tracking firm comScore Inc.
Jason Chen / Gizmodo:
Motorola's Atrix Android Phone: Twin CPU Cores And a Laptop Dock! — It runs Android 2.2, with HTML5 support, and is AT&T's first dual-core processor in an Android phone. And it docks into a laptop. They're calling it the world's most powerful smartphone. ORLY?
Discussion:
MobileCrunch, 901am, Android Phone Fans and BGR
