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5:50 PM ET, January 17, 2011

Techmeme

 Top Items: 
Apple:
Apple Media Advisory  —  Apple CEO Steve Jobs today sent the following email to all Apple employees:  —  Team,  —  At my request, the board of directors has granted me a medical leave of absence so I can focus on my health.  I will continue as CEO and be involved in major strategic decisions for the company.
RELATED:
Miguel Helft / New York Times:
Apple Says Steve Jobs Is Taking a New Medical Leave  —  Steven P. Jobs, the co-founder and chief executive of Apple Inc., is taking a medical leave of absence, a year and a half after his return from a liver transplant, the company said on Monday.  —  Mr. Jobs announced his leave in a letter to employees …
MG Siegler / TechCrunch:
A Few Thoughts On Apple's 2011, Stock, Tim Cook, And The Future  —  As you've undoubtedly heard by now, Apple CEO Steve Jobs is taking an indefinite medical leave of absence from the company, while remaining on as CEO.  As I'm the guy around these parts who is known for writing about Apple …
Jonathan S. Geller / BGR:
Could Steve Jobs' leave of absence be more serious this time around?
Discussion: Digits and SAI
Philip Elmer-DeWitt / Fortune:
Thinking the unthinkable: Apple without Steve Jobs
Discussion: I4U News and TUAW
Digits:
How Much Privacy Does Steve Jobs Deserve?
Larry Dignan / Between the Lines Blog:
Apple's Jobs takes medical leave, remains CEO; Succession planning in focus
Aaron Lucchetti / Wall Street Journal:
Goldman to Offer Facebook Shares Only to Non-U.S. Clients  —  Goldman Sachs Group Inc. decided to exclude U.S. clients from the private offering of as much as $1.5 billion in shares of social-networking company Facebook Inc., citing “intense media attention.”
RELATED:
Andrew Ross Sorkin / DealBook:
Goldman Limits Facebook Investment to Foreign Clients
Discussion: Felix Salmon and NBC Bay Area
Henry Blodget / SAI:   Goldman Sachs Thumbs Nose At SEC, Sells Facebook Deal Outside Its Jurisdiction
Dean Takahashi / VentureBeat:
Eighth grader knocks Angry Birds out of the top free spot on the App Store  —  Angry Birds and its variants have dominated the top ranks of iPhone games for the past year.  But on Thursday, a game called Bubble Ball ousted Angry Birds: Seasons from the No. 1 spot on the App Store's top free apps list.
Andrew Wallenstein / paidContent:
Netflix Enrages Subscribers By Limiting DVD Queue  —  Converting to a streaming-only business isn't easy, as Netflix (NSDQ: NFLX) discovered Monday when the company's blog was bombarded by complaints over its decision to remove the ability to add to DVD queues from connected devices.
RELATED:
Jamie / The Official Netflix Blog:
Removing “Add to DVD Queue” from Streaming Devices
Discussion: Download Squad
Jeremy W. Peters / New York Times:
For Magazines, a Bitter Pill in iPad  —  The frustration that the country's magazine and newspaper publishers feel toward Apple can sound a lot like a variation on the old relationship gripe, “can't live with 'em, may get left behind without 'em.”  —  Since Apple introduced the iPad last year …
RELATED:
Dan Frommer / SAI: Silicon Alley Insider:   “The Daily” Won't Run Apple's iAds
Yeeguy / FrameThink:
How Facebook Ships Code  —  I'm fascinated by the way Facebook operates.  It's a very unique environment, not easily replicated (nor would their system work for all companies, even if they tried).  These are notes gathered from talking with many friends at Facebook about how the company develops and releases software.
Maria Bartiromo / USA Today:
Maria Bartiromo interviews Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer  —  Q: What's most important right now for Microsoft (MSFT) in terms of your new product launches?  A: If you want to know where is the consumer heat, the things that people want to get their hands on, it's Xbox and Xbox Kinect.
Daniel Eran Dilger / AppleInsider:
Apple to pack ultrafast, dual core SGX543 graphics into iPad 2, iPhone 5  —  Apple's next generation iPad and iPhone, both due the first half of this year, will pack a new version of the company's custom A4 chip, with dual, faster graphics cores capable of supporting a Retina Display iPad …
RELATED:
Arn / MacRumors:
iPad 2 LCD for Sale Already? iPad 2 to Include Vibrating Motor?
Tarmo Virki / Reuters:
Nokia pulls plug on free music in most markets  —  (Reuters) - The world's top cellphone maker, Nokia, is ending its bundling of free music downloads with cellphones in 27 countries, where it has gained little traction since its 2008 launch.  —  Nokia will continue to sell phones …
Microsoft:
Microsoft Launches Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online Cloud Service Globally  —  Steve Ballmer introduces the new service that delivers the Power of Productivity to customers worldwide.  —  Microsoft Corp. (Nasdaq “MSFT") CEO Steve Ballmer today announced the worldwide availability …
RELATED:
Mary Jo Foley / All about Microsoft Blog:
Microsoft makes CRM Online 2011 available worldwide
Dan Sabbagh / Guardian:
Music makers plan ‘instant pop’ to beat piracy  —  • New singles to go ‘on air, on sale’ simultaneously  —  • Record labels target X Factor generation  —  Ten years after piracy first began to ravage the music industry, Britain's two biggest record labels will finally try to play …
Elizabeth Woyke / Forbes:
RIM: BlackBerry PlayBook Is Great Even Without A BlackBerry  —  One of the more unusual aspects of the upcoming tablet from BlackBerry maker Research In Motion is the fact that users need to synch their BlackBerrys to it to fully access their email, calendars and memos.
Ryan Radia / Ars Technica:
Why you should always encrypt your smartphone  —  Last week, California's Supreme Court reached a controversial 5-2 decision in People v. Diaz (PDF), holding that police officers may lawfully search mobile phones found on arrested individuals' persons without first obtaining a search warrant.
Michael Arrington / TechCrunch:
Blog Fight Rules Of Engagement  —  Blog fights happen.  Sometimes for attention, but most of the time because someone is really pissed off about something.  And don't count out big media, they jump right in too when they feel it.  —  No one's ever written down any rules for blog fights that I know of.
RELATED:
Jay Yarow / SAI: Silicon Alley Insider:
AOL'S CIVIL WAR CONTINUES: Mike Arrington Tears Into Engadget Again
Discussion: Pluggd.in
 
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 More Items: 
Chiara Remondini / Bloomberg:
Italy Closes Antitrust Probe of Google News, Accepts AdSense Commitments
Horace Dediu / asymco:
iTunes has paid over $2 billion to app developers and $12 billion to record labels
Discussion: AppleInsider and Fortune
New York Times:
In New Military, Data Overload Can Be Deadly
 Earlier Items: 
Dave McClure / 500 Startups:
Top 10 Tech Investing Trends For 2011
Kara Swisher / BoomTown:
Groupon Poised to Strike Partnership With China's Tencent …
 

 
From Mediagazer:

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

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

Brian Steinberg / Variety:
Sources: Comcast execs told staff that MSNBC may have to change its identity as part of the spinoff, including losing access to NBC News' newsgathering process
 
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