Top Items:


Hide sites to find more of what you want — Over the years we've experimented with a number of ways to help you personalize the results you find on Google, from SearchWiki to stars in search to location settings. Now there's yet another way to find more of what you want on Google by blocking the sites you don't want to see.
Discussion:
Examiner, paidContent, iClarified, Mashable!, BetaNews, Digital Trends, gHacks Technology News, Bloomberg, PC World, Mixed Media, Techie Buzz, Erictric, Pulse2, WebProNews, SAI, Geek.com, Search Engine Watch, Between the Lines Blog, Computerworld, Marketing Pilgrim, Hillicon Valley, Gizmodo, The Domains, Search Engine Land, The Huffington Post, @mattcutts, silicontap.com, NBC Bay Area, GeekSugar and Voices on All Things Digital
RELATED:

Google Now Lets You Block Sites You Don't Like Directly from Your Search Results
Discussion:
ReadWriteWeb, Fortune, GigaOM, AdExchanger.com, L.A. Times Tech Blog, Google Operating System, Epicenter, Download Squad, WebProNews, Post Tech and The Next Web


If You Bought Apple Stock Instead of Products — Let us pretend for a moment that the year is 1997 and you're in the market for a new laptop computer. You want the top-of-the-line product at the time, so you opt for the newly released Apple Computer PowerBook G3 250 laptop.
Discussion:
CNET News, TUAW, The Daily What, Gizmodo, SAI and NBC Bay Area

Apple changes purchases policy to protect kids on iPad, iPhone games — Apple said Thursday that it changed its policy for how purchases can be made within applications on the iPhone and iPad, an attempt to protect users, particularly children, from accidentally racking up iTunes charges.
Discussion:
Examiner, MacRumors, Ars Technica, GigaOM, paidContent, RazorianFly, TidBITS, iLounge, SAI, Pulse2, SlashGear, MobileWhack, Hillicon Valley, iClarified, PhoneArena, AppleInsider, MobileCrunch, 9 to 5 Mac, MacStories, TiPb, CrunchGear, App Advice, Know Your Cell, Erictric, Phone Scoop, TUAW, Gizmodo and everythingiCafe


Veteran Journos Out as AOL/HuffPo Cuts 900 Jobs — It's a bloodbath. — AOL, the beleaguered internet company, is cutting as many as 900 jobs, CEO Tim Armstrong announced Thursday, including as many as 200 editorial staffers in the United States. The layoffs, which were expected …
Discussion:
mediabistro.com, Epicenter, @bobbuch, paidContent, Mixed Media, SAI, MediaFile, paidContent:UK, @ldignan, CNNMoney.com, Reuters, SAI, VentureBeat, TechCrunch, VatorNews and TechCrunch, more at Mediagazer »
RELATED:


Amid 900 Layoffs, Just How Are AOL's Media Brands Doing? — Finance and Politics Daily Lead Declines While News and Tech Are Up — AOL laid off 900 employees, or around 15% of its work force today, the fallout from its $315 million acquisition of the Huffington Post in February.
Discussion:
Wall Street Journal, PE Hub Blog and Mixed Media

Why iPad 2 Won't Have Much Competition In 2011—Unless It's From Amazon — Forrester published a new report today making the call that the iPad challengers that have been announced so far—Android Honeycomb tablets from Motorola, Toshiba, and others, as well as the BlackBerry PlayBook and HP TouchPad …
Discussion:
eWeek, Fortune, SAI, GigaOM, FierceWireless, Geek.com and VentureBeat
RELATED:

iPad 2 release spells a bleak 2011 for other tablet makers
Discussion:
SAI


Introducing LinkedIn Today — Staying on top of industry news is something we think matters for any professional whose success depends on being well informed. With all the news websites, blogs, tweets and newsletters out there, staying in-the-know can be time consuming and it's increasingly hard …
Discussion:
ReadWriteWeb, Examiner, eWeek, HubSpot's Inbound …, paidContent, WebProNews, Bloggers Blog, Pulse2, @dannysullivan and The Huffington Post
RELATED:


Why Nokia failed: ‘Wasted 2,000 man years’ on UIs that didn't work — For want of a nail, the Kingdom was lost? — When Nokia CEO Stephen Elop announced that Nokia was abandoning its development of its own smartphone platforms and APIs, and betting the farm on somebody else's, many people asked why it was necessary.
Discussion:
MobileCrunch


Click to call phone numbers — With the ability to call phones built right into Gmail, you no longer have to get out your phone and retype a number anytime someone send you one in an email or chat message. Starting today, you'll see that phone numbers appear as links, like this:
Discussion:
Techie Buzz


Dell's Number Two In The PC Market Again, Thanks To The iPad — Having languished in third place behind Hewlett-Packard and Acer for some time, Dell finally scrambled its way back to the PC market's number two spot during the fourth quarter of 2010, a new survey by research firm iSuppli says.
Discussion:
CNET News


WiMAX throttling lawsuit: Clearwire can't deliver the goods — Wireless operator Clearwire has had a bumpy few months, and now things are getting worse. A lawsuit has been filed by 15 users over the company's throttling practices, accusing Clearwire of not delivering advertised …
Discussion:
DSLreports, SlashGear and Electronista
RELATED:

Clearwire CEO Bill Morrow resigns
Discussion:
Mobilized, paidContent, Computerworld, CNET News, GeekWire, Tech Trader Daily, The Seattle Times and PhoneDog.com

Need Advice on What to Read? Ask the Internet — Netflix uses a software algorithm to recommend movies and Zappos uses one to recommend shoes. Now Goodreads, the social network for book lovers, is introducing an algorithm to recommend books. — Goodreads was started in 2006 for people who wanted to talk about books online.
Discussion:
ReadWriteWeb and @loic, Thanks:blogfisher


Why we need to get rid of anonymous comments. — Once or twice a week, I get a letter taking me to task for Slate's commenting policy. The reader wants to tell me that I suck, but he doesn't want to log in to Slate's comment system using his credentials for Facebook, Google, Yahoo, or Twitter.
Discussion:
TomsTechBlog.com, more at Mediagazer »

Yahoo fixes their implementation of IMAP, finally — Back in January, I wrote about a Yahoo Mail issue that affected smartphones such as Windows Phone and the iPhone. To quickly summarize, whenever a smartphone checked for new Yahoo mail, the server would transmit more information than needed.
Discussion:
Engadget, Electronista, pocketnow.com, MobileTechWorld, Neowin.net, ThinkMobile, Erictric, WPCentral.com and Windows Phone Secrets, Thanks:withinrafael


New XML Standard for Super-Fast, Lightweight Applications Announced by W3C — From embedded sensors to high-frequency stock trading to everyday mobile web applications, the race is on for technologists to build the most efficient systems for quickly streaming large sets of data from one device to another.
Thanks:marshallk


Amazon.com Slammed With Lawsuit Over Instant Search Patent — When you go to Amazon.com and start typing in the top search box, you will automatically see a number of search suggestions for items on sale before you finish typing your query. The company also offers such enhanced search …
Discussion:
GeekWire, TechFlash, Pulse2, Marketing Pilgrim and Electronista, Thanks:robinwauters

Google contradicts own counsel in face of antitrust probe — Admits existence of search algorithm whitelists — Google has admitted that it uses whitelists to manually override its search algorithms, more than a year after its European corporate counsel denied the existence of whitelists …
Discussion:
Search Engine Land and Search Engine Watch


Pwn2Own 2011: BlackBerry falls to WebKit browser attack — VANCOUVER — Research in Motion's recent decision to add a WebKit browser to BlackBerry has immediately backfired. A trio of security researchers used the spotlight of the CanSecWest Pwn2Own contest here to exploit multiple WebKit vulnerabilities …
Discussion:
eWeek and CrackBerry.com blogs

In A Post-PC Era, Apple Wants To Be Your IT Department — A decade ago if a computer vendor didn't have a strong relationship with corporate information technology departments they didn't get anywhere. No longer. Smart phones don't need a link to a corporate network to appeal to office workers.


BlackBerry PlayBook hits FCC in 16GB, 32GB, and 64GB flavors — No surprises here, just the straight-up news that RIM's BlackBerry PlayBook is one small step closer to retail: it's gotten FCC clearance. Well, at least the WiFi-only version has — no sign of the WiMAX-capable version for Sprint yet …
Discussion:
wirelessgoodness.com, iGeneration Blog, Erictric, MobileWhack, Electronista, Liliputing, Know Your Cell and CrackBerry.com blogs


The Billionaire Who Friended the Web — Tech's titans used to wonder about Yuri Milner. Now he's the guy everyone wants to copy. — It's 8 p.m. on a winter's night in Moscow. Yuri Milner steps into an elevator for the quick, quiet ride to his penthouse apartment.


Beyond Facebook, SecondMarket Opens Its Doors to Thousands — The marketplace for private Internet companies is about to get a bit more crowded. — SecondMarket, an exchange for alternative investments, will introduce a new trading platform on Friday that will integrate social media …


Google fires a shot at Foursquare with check-in rewards and titles [Updated] — It wasn't long ago that Google pulled the trigger by offering check-ins with the Latitude service. Now, the company is stepping up the game one more notch by offering rewards for those check-ins, starting in Austin for SXSW.
Discussion:
Google LatLong, @loic, @paidcontent, Search Engine Land, Screenwerk, Google Maps Mania and NBC Bay Area

NYTimes: When We Do It, It's Journalism, When HuffPo Does It, It's ‘Piracy’ — We regularly see established newspaper journalists look down on the world of sites that add value to news by assuming that aggregating, commenting on and providing context for news first reported by others is somehow a “lesser” product.
Discussion:
New York Times, New York Times, @fromedome, All Things Digital, SAI, @gaberivera and Guardian, more at Mediagazer »


YouTube To Expand Staff by 30% — YouTube expects to have its biggest hiring year in 2011, with plans to grow its staff by 30%. — The Google-owned video site has dozens of open positions in all areas — although an especially high number in advertising sales and customer support — and all around the world.
Discussion:
YouTube Blog