Top Items:
Matt McGee / Search Engine Land:
Google's Search Results Get More Social; Twitter As The New Facebook “Like” — Your friends' activity on Twitter, Flickr and elsewhere — but for now, not Facebook — will soon be a lot more visible in Google's search results, including having an impact on how pages rank.
Discussion:
TechCrunch, ReadWriteWeb, NetworkEffect and Mashable!
RELATED:
The Official Google Blog:
An update to Google Social Search — Today we're doing a little bit more to bring you all the goodness of Google, plus the opinions of the people you care about. As always, we want to help you find the most relevant answers among the billions of interconnected pages on the web.
DigiTimes:
Apple secures 60% of global touch panel capacity, causing tight supply — In order to achieve its internal goal of shipping 40 million iPad products in 2011, Apple has occupied close to 60% of the global touch panel capacity causing tight supply among Apple's competitors, according to sources from upstream component makers.
Discussion:
AppleInsider, GigaOM, SAI, RazorianFly, Geek.com, The Tech Trade, iLounge, TechEye, 9 to 5 Mac, MacRumors, The Apple Core Blog, The Next Web, Engadget and DisplayBlog
Jake Tapper / Political Punch:
Steve Jobs, Eric Schmidt and Mark Zuckerberg to Meet With President Obama Thursday in San Francisco — Apple CEO Steve Jobs, who recently took a medical leave of absence from his company, and Google chief executive Eric Schmidt will be among the attendees of President Obama's event …
Discussion:
All Facebook, Fortune, Computerworld, AppleInsider, CNET News, SAI, Between the Lines Blog, Softpedia News, NBC Bay Area, RazorianFly, TUAW, Black Web 2.0, MacRumors, Neowin.net, MacHackPC, Gizmodo, Electricpig.co.uk, Covering Web, The Huffington Post, Andy Beal's Marketing Pilgrim, Geek.com, TiPb, The Next Web and 9 to 5 Mac
RELATED:
Sean Hollister / Engadget:
Dell's 2011 smartphone and tablet lineup leaked: Android Ice Cream, WP7 sliders, and a slate running Windows 8 — Wrigley, Hancock, Millennium, Gallo, Sterling, Rosemount, Silver Oak, Peju and Opus One. What are we rattling off? Oh, just the list of codenames from one of the largest leaks we've ever seen out of Dell.
Discussion:
ZDNet, FierceWireless, Fudzilla, Fonehome, Electricpig.co.uk and All about Microsoft Blog
RELATED:
Greg Weston / CBC News:
Foreign hackers attack Canadian government — An unprecedented cyberattack on the Canadian government, apparently from China, has given foreign hackers access to highly classified federal information and forced at least two key departments off the internet, CBC News has learned.
Discussion:
Computerworld, PC World, Post Tech, The Register, Inquirer, p2pnet, The Next Web, Zero Day Blog, SecurityWeek and Neowin.net
Matt Rosoff / SAI: Silicon Alley Insider:
Sony Exec: We Are Not Abandoning iTunes — Sony has no plans to withdraw Sony Music songs from Apple's iTunes as payback for Apple's decision to block the Sony e-reader app from the App Store. — Sony is launching its own subscription service, Music Unlimited, in the U.S., Australia, and New Zealand today.
Discussion:
ReadWriteWeb, MacStories, Softpedia News and Electronista
RELATED:
Peter Kafka / MediaMemo:
Sony's Music Service Comes to the U.S., Still Won't Work on the Go
Discussion:
MacRumors, Digital Trends, The Toybox Blog, Bloomberg, mocoNews, RazorianFly, Engadget and SAI
Ben Rooney / Tech Europe:
Motorola Executive Defends Tablet Price Tag … Motorola mobility chief Sanjay Jha confirmed that the company's new Xoom tablet will go on sale in the U.S. at $800, a higher price tag than current market leader Apple's iPad. — And in what has been described as the worst kept secret in the tech world …
Discussion:
Between the Lines Blog, Inquirer, FierceWireless, Eurodroid, Liliputing, The Next Web, GottaBeMobile, PadGadget, Reuters, ThinkMobile, Engadget, GigaOM, MacDailyNews, CrunchGear, The Toybox Blog and SAI
Jay Yarow / SAI: Silicon Alley Insider:
CHART OF THE DAY: The Death Of The Music Industry — Here is a stunning visualization of the collapse of the music industry from Bain. As you can see, the growth of digital sales is not doing enough to offset the death of the CD. — (Chart via Peter Kafka, who spotted it on Flickr.)
Discussion:
p2pnet
Shayndi Raice / Wall Street Journal:
Android Big in Barcelona — System Powers Slew of New Devices; Some Fear Market Duopoly With Apple's iOS — A year after wireless carriers gave Google Inc. a testy reception at their big industry conference in Barcelona, the software company's Android operating system has become the star of the show.
Discussion:
Mobilized and The Register
Charles Arthur / Guardian:
Google will launch iTunes music store competitor with upgrade to Android — ‘Google Music’ service will form part of new version of Android operating system designed specifically for tablet devices — Google is to launch a music service to compete with Apple's iTunes music store as part …
Mathew Ingram / GigaOM:
Why Google's One Pass Could Be a Ticket to Nowhere — Google has gotten a lot of attention for the launch of One Pass, the all-in-one subscription plan for publishers that the search giant revealed earlier today — primarily because it made for a nice counterpoint to Apple's new in-app subscription system, which launched on Tuesday.
Discussion:
PC World, Search Engine Land, Music Ally, Tech Trader Daily, FierceMobileContent, MediaPost and TechCrunch, more at Mediagazer »
Ben Fritz / Company Town:
Redbox digital service will go toe-to-toe with Netflix — Redbox is gearing up to challenge Netflix head-on, the kiosk DVD rental company confirmed Wednesday. — At a meeting with analysts, Redbox President Mitch Lowe said his company's forthcoming digital option will be subscription-based …
Discussion:
Bloomberg, Digital Trends, The Digital Home, Home Theater Blog, SlashGear, Hollywood Reporter, DailyTech, Engadget and DailyFinance
Daniel Eran Dilger / AppleInsider:
Apple's iPhone 4 wins Best Mobile Device award at Mobile World Congress — Apple didn't attend Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, but it took the event's top award for a mobile device. — The event, a major confab of the mobile industry, has been virtually ignored by Apple in much the same …
Discussion:
Electronista, Crave, BlackBerry Cool, BlogsDNA, Computerworld, MacDailyNews and Phones Review
Larry Dignan / Between the Lines Blog:
IBM's Watson victorious in Jeopardy; Our new computer overlord? — IBM's Watson computer ultimately proved to be too much for the humans in Jeopardy. — Ken Jennings and Brad Rutter, two of the most successful players in Jeopardy, put up a spirited fight, but ultimately couldn't hang.
Sarah Lacy / TechCrunch:
Groupon Spars with Tencent; Joint Venture Isn't Inspiring Local Confidence — There's trouble in Tencent and Groupon's China group buying joint venture, Gaopeng.com, according to press reports from China. Apparently the site went up for a day, Tencent balked and pulled it back down.
Bloomberg:
Satyam Computer Agrees to Pay $125 Million to Settle U.S. Suit — Feb. 17 (Bloomberg) — Satyam Computer Services Ltd., the software services exporter embroiled in India's biggest corporate fraud, agreed to pay $125 million to settle a shareholder lawsuit in federal court in New York.
Discussion:
India Real Time, Agence France Presse, Wall Street Journal and Reuters
Tory Newmyer / Fortune:
Apple, Cisco, others organize for a tax holiday lobby — FORTUNE — Economists, businessmen, and politicians of every stripe have spent months talking themselves hoarse about how to get the roughly $2 trillion in corporate reserves back into the economy. Get ready to start hearing a lot about that sum's international cousin.
Discussion:
PhoneArena, AppleInsider, MacRumors, CNNMoney.com and Tech Trader Daily
Barry Collins / PC Pro:
The true cost of publishing on the Amazon Kindle — Ever wondered why newspapers and magazines published on the Amazon Kindle rarely contain photos? I've downloaded several copies of The Times and The Telegraph on my Kindle, and you're lucky if you get more than one photo in the entire newspaper.
Discussion:
Slashdot
Sean Hollister / Engadget:
Motorola pushes up Atrix 4G launch to Feb. 22, shoves Xoom pre-sales back to Feb. 20th? — The best laid plans of Motorola may be in disarray, as we hear the device manufacturer is shuffling release dates for its hottest new Android devices. Supposedly, AT&T customer service reps are getting …
Discussion:
The Toybox Blog, Droid Life, Phones Review, MobileWhack, BetaNews, MobileBurn.com and Life On My Mobile
Jason Kincaid / TechCrunch:
Why Are You People Defending Apple? — As you've doubtless heard by now, yesterday Apple revealed its new fee structure for premium content: all apps that offer premium content outside of the App Store have to also offer it via Apple's official in-app purchases (this includes Amazon's Kindle) …
Discussion:
parislemon, more at Mediagazer »
Michael Kan / PC World:
China Microblog Blocks Searches for Hillary Clinton — A top microblog in China has blocked searches for the Chinese words for “Hillary Clinton” and “Hillary”, just a day after the U.S. Secretary of State gave a speech urging governments to end Internet censorship.
Discussion:
Wall Street Journal and Reuters
