Techmeme: TechFlash founders jump ship, start Web site (Brier Dudley/The Seattle Times)

4:45 PM ET, March 7, 2011

Top Items:

Doug Bewsher / The Big Blog:

Advertising in Skype — Today we announce something new - the launch of advertising in Skype, which will appear in the Home tab in Skype starting this week. — The Skype experience is our first priority, which is why we we've taken a lot of time working through and testing what kind …

Ingrid Lunden / mocoNews:
Skype Launches In-App Advertising, Limited To Windows For Now

Discussion: Skype Journal

Robert Scoble / Scobleizer:

The Real “Authenticity Killer” (and an aside about how bad the Yahoo brand has gotten) — Steve Cheney has never written something that so pissed me off than the blog he wrote today stating that Techcrunch's switch to Facebook comments has killed authenticity. — Here's the rub. He used his real name.

Discussion: Adam Sherk

Steve Cheney / steve's blog:
How Facebook is Killing Your Authenticity

Discussion: Technologizer, zenroll.com, InfoWorld, Edelman Digital, Stowe Boyd, Howard Lindzon, @alexia, The Blog Herald, broadstuff, @stevecheney and @loic

MG Siegler / TechCrunch:
Facebook Comments Have Silenced The Trolls — But Is It Too Quiet?

Discussion: Inside Facebook, @sbmiller5, @parislemon, The Next Web, @ed, @mattcutts, @loic and @stevecheney, more at Mediagazer »

Dina Bass / Bloomberg:

Microsoft Is Said to Pay Nokia More Than $1 Billion in Accord — Microsoft Corp. will pay Nokia Oyj more than $1 billion to promote and develop Windows-based handsets as part of their smartphone software agreement, according to two people with knowledge of the terms.

Discussion: VentureBeat, The Seattle Times, LiveSide.net, SAI, The Next Web and Electronista

Surur / WMPoweruser.com:

More pictures of the Sony Ericsson Windows Phone 7 prototype — More pictures of the supposed Sony Ericsson Windows Phone 7 prototype handset has popped up on a Chinese blog, clearly taken at the same session as the first leaked picture. These show a device clearly labelled as a prototype not for sale …

Discussion: SlashGear, Engadget, Softpedia News, Techie Buzz, Pocket-lint, Fonehome, GottaBeMobile, Phones Review, Electricpig.co.uk, Esato, SlashPhone, Gadgetell, Windows 8 Beta, Neowin.net and WinRumors

Seth Weintraub / Fortune:
Latest comScore numbers have Android at #1 in US

Discussion: AppleInsider, CNNMoney.com, The Seattle Times, SAI, TechCrunch, comScore, Inc., iLounge, The Next Web, WinRumors and WMPoweruser.com

Nick Eaton / The Microsoft Blog:
Windows Phone 7 not reversing Microsoft's mobile slide

Discussion: ZDNet, Electronista, WebProNews and PhoneArena

Matt Brian / The Next Web:

Google buys UK comparison website BeatThatQuote.com for £37.7 million — Google has bought UK price comparison website BeatThatQuote.com, acquiring the web property for £37.7 million earlier today. — John Paleomylites, Managing Director of the newly acquired company, took to the website to announce the deal, posting:

Discussion: money.co.uk, TechCrunch, @ashleyjfletcher, Search Engine Land, TechSpot and Blogstorm

Aaron Wall / SEO Book.com:
Google Buys BeatThatQuote, a UK Comparison Site Violating Google's Guidelines

Thanks:aaronwall

Ryan Paul / Ars Technica:

Feature: Ars reviews the Motorola Xoom — Motorola's Xoom tablet is the first device to ship with Android 3.0, codenamed Honeycomb, a highly anticipated new version of Google's mobile operating system. Honeycomb introduces a sophisticated new user interface that was designed for the tablet form factor …

Discussion: GottaBeMobile, Edible Apple and MacDailyNews

Lucas Atkins / N4BB:

Exclusive: BlackBerry 2011 Software Roadmap - OS 7, BIS 4.1, and more! — In the beginning of the year we learned the 2011 BlackBerry lineup through various leaks and roadmaps surfacing. It looks like an exciting year to see RIM release the Dakota/Montana, Malibu, Apollo/Sedona, Monaco …

Discussion: PhoneArena, TechEye, IntoMobile, iGeneration Blog, GottaBeMobile, Geek.com, Softpedia News, Life On My Mobile, Electronista, BlackBerry Cool and MobileWhack

Ina Fried / Mobilized:

Google's Navigation App Now Able to Steer Android Users Away From Traffic — Google said on Monday that it is adding a feature to its Android-based navigation app that will allow the turn-by-turn program to automatically reroute users around traffic jams. — “You don't have to do anything …

Discussion: Technologizer, Examiner, ReadWriteWeb, Google Mobile Blog, Techland, MobileCrunch, PC Magazine, Electronista and silicontap.com

Nemesis / The Local:

Text messages to replace stamps in Sweden — Double click on a word to get a translation — The Swedish postal service plans to give customers' tongues a rest by allowing them to pay their postage via mobile phone text message instead of stamps. — A similar system is set for launch …

Discussion: Examiner and p2pnet

Jessica E. Vascellaro / Wall Street Journal:

TV's Next Wave: Tuning In to You — The television is channeling you. — Data-gathering firms and technology companies are aggressively matching people's TV-viewing behavior with other personal data—in some cases, prescription-drug records obtained from insurers—and using …

Discussion: Hillicon Valley, Technology Liberation Front, The Atlantic Online, Digits, ReelSEO Online Video … and Company Town, more at Mediagazer »

Brier Dudley / The Seattle Times:

TechFlash founders jump ship, start Web site — Seattle tech reporters Todd Bishop and John Cook have started a new online news venture called Geekwire, ending their run at the Puget Sound Business Journal. — Bishop and Cook left the Seattle Post-Intelligencer to work for the PSBJ and launch its TechFlash site in October 2008.

Discussion: TechFlash, GeekWire, @mathewi, @rafat, @pkafka, Xconomy and Seattle 2.0

Joseph L. Flatley / Engadget:

Pay-as-you-go shocker! CDMA iPhone 4 makes its way to Cricket Wireless (via jailbreak) — As any astute follower of the “pay-as-you-go” world knows, there are quite a few back alley Cricket dealers (and quite a few main street ones as well) that will happily flash any phone you give …

Discussion: App Advice, 9 to 5 Mac, Gizmodo, MacStories and Electronista

Darren Murph / Engadget:

Western Digital drops $4.3 billion to acquire Hitachi GST, enter staring contest with Seagate — Yow. Western Digital — the company responsible for shipping the planet's first 1TB 2.5-inch hard drive way back in 2009 — just announced a monstrous deal to acquire one of its primary competitors, Hitachi Global Storage Technologies.

Leena Rao / TechCrunch:

Mobile Messaging Startup Kik Raises $8M; Launches Group Chat And Photo Sharing — Mobile messaging startup Kik Interactive has raised $8 million in Series A funding from RRE Ventures, Spark Capital, and Union Square Ventures. Kik also announced that Union Square Ventures' Fred Wilson …

Discussion: ReadWriteWeb, A VC, VentureBeat, VatorNews, alarm:clock, bijan sabet and CrackBerry.com blogs

Peter Kafka / MediaMemo:

YouTube Grabs Another Hollywood Guy: Paramount's Alex Carloss — YouTube is still trying to figure out how to link up with Hollywood. Maybe Alex Carloss will help. — Until last week, Carloss was head of digital distribution at Viacom's Paramount. Now he's a Google employee, working on YouTube's content acquisition team.

Discussion: Between the Lines Blog, paidContent and WebProNews

Jonathan I Ezor / PreCentral.net:

HP lists TouchPad on Amazon (but not for preorder) — HP has taken one more step toward actually selling the TouchPad to customers: it has listed it on Amazon.com. Although the TouchPad shows as “currently not available,” and there's no pricing either, the page allows Amazon customers …

Discussion: Engadget, Unwired View, ZDNet, MobileBurn.com, TechSpot, Liliputing and Gadgetell

Chris Ziegler / Engadget:

Sprint's Nexus website is ‘coming soon’ — Just to throw a little more fuel on the fire, it turns out that directing your browser to now.sprint.com/nexus takes you to an landing site where you're told that “this page will be ready soon.” Certainly sounds more likely than ever that Sprint's preparing …

Fred / A VC:

The Always Logged In Experience — Last week I blogged about mobile notifications which I think is a big game changer. There are a few other aspects of the mobile experience that I think present great opportunity. Another one is the always logged in experience.

Greg Sterling / Search Engine Land:

Google Controls 97 Percent Of Mobile Paid Search: Report — Almost 5 percent of paid search spending in the US is now in mobile, according to a report released last week from banking and investment firm Macquarie Group, using Efficient Frontier data. That mobile search spend could double …

Discussion: MediaMemo, Softpedia News and FierceMobileContent

Leena Rao / TechCrunch:

Skype Revenue Up 20 Percent To $860M In 2010; Paid Users Up 19 Percent — As the company prepares for a public offering in the next year, Skype released an updated S-1 filing that includes several new revenue, income and usage numbers. As you may have heard, Skype initially filed …

Discussion: GigaOM and Techie Buzz

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