Techmeme: The new Ubuntu Desktop: Unity (Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols/Open Source …)

12:20 AM ET, April 5, 2011

Top Items:

Mike Swift / Mercury News:

Google: Product chief, Silicon Valley veteran Jonathan Rosenberg to step down — Larry Page's retaking the reins as Google's (GOOG) CEO Monday came with the most significant change in years in the makeup of the company's tight-knit senior management core: Jonathan Rosenberg …

Discussion: SAI, PC Magazine, The Register, Bits, TechCrunch, L.A. Times Tech Blog, @jlanzone, Fortune, CNET News, paidContent:UK, Search Engine Land and Digital Daily

Matt Rosoff / SAI: Silicon Alley Insider: Departing Product Chief Rosenberg Will Write A Book With Eric Schmidt

Kent Walker / The Official Google Blog:

Patents and innovation — The tech world has recently seen an explosion in patent litigation, often involving low-quality software patents, which threatens to stifle innovation. Some of these lawsuits have been filed by people or companies that have never actually created anything …

Todd Bishop / GeekWire:

Google bids $900M for Nortel patents, but Microsoft already has them in the bag — [Post updated at 1:45 p.m. with clarification of Microsoft's rights to these patents under a previous licensing deal with Nortel.] — An executive with bankrupt Nortel Networks calls its intellectual property holdings …

Discussion: TechNet Blogs, BGR, Pulse2, silicontap.com, Financial Post, All about Microsoft Blog and Market Wire

SuperSite for Windows:

Windows 8 Secrets: Modern Reader — Part four in a series of co-posts by Windows 8 Secrets co-authors Rafael Rivera and Paul Thurrott. — There are two big pieces of news in today's revelation. First, Microsoft will apparently be including its own PDF reader in Windows 8.

Discussion: WinRumors, Within Windows, istartedsomething, Windows 8 Center, Neowin.net, Gizmodo, Download Squad, Electronista, GeekWire, Microsoft News and Neowin.net

Alex Wilhelm / The Next Web: Windows 8 to include new AppX PDF reader

Wall Street Journal:

Mobile-App Makers Face U.S. Privacy Investigation — Federal prosecutors in New Jersey are investigating whether numerous smartphone applications illegally obtained or transmitted information about their users without proper disclosures, according to a person familiar with the matter.

Discussion: Examiner, Engadget, The Register, FM Blog, 9 to 5 Mac, CNET News, Electronista, PC World, GigaOM, MobileCrunch, App Advice, MacDailyNews, AppleInsider and Voices on All Things Digital

Adam Satariano / Bloomberg:
Pandora Discloses Privacy-Related Grand Jury Probe of Apps

Discussion: IntoMobile, The Loop, mocoNews, Android Community, L.A. Times Tech Blog, BGR, Ars Technica and TechCrunch

Philip Elmer-DeWitt / Fortune:

Android is a mess, say developers — A new survey analyzes the pros and cons of writing for various mobile platforms — On the heels of the debate played out over the weekend between Union Square Ventures' Fred Wilson and Instapaper's Marco Arment about whether it's wiser to be writing apps for Apple's …

Discussion: AppleInsider, Electronista, Droid Life, CrunchGear, IntoMobile, I4U News, Ubergizmo, SAI, parislemon, Betabeat and GottaBeMobile, Thanks:hornokplease

Carolyn Penner / Twitter Blog:

Discover new accounts and search like a pro — We've made it easier to find and follow Twitter accounts based on your interests. When you search for a topic, you can now discover accounts that are relevant to that particular subject. (Previously, you would have seen accounts that have the specific term in their name or username. )

Discussion: techPresident, Search Engine Land, VentureBeat, VatorNews, TechCrunch, ReadWriteWeb, The Next Web, WebProNews, PC Magazine, Engadget and GeekSugar

Sarah Lacy / TechCrunch:

Milk: Kevin Rose's New Company Aims to Solve Big Problems on the Mobile Web — Well by Silicon Valley standards, that certainly wasn't a long “stealth” period. Just weeks after he quit Digg, Kevin Rose is announcing details of his new startup. Knowing Rose, I can tell why he's so excited to get started.

Discussion: Pulse2, VentureBeat, Fast Company, metarand, PC Magazine, NetworkEffect and Gear Live

Susan Decker / Bloomberg:

Apple Wins Reversal of $625.5 Million Mirror Worlds Verdict — Apple Inc. (AAPL) won a court ruling that throws out a $625.5 million patent-infringement verdict over how documents are displayed on a computer screen. — A federal judge in Tyler, Texas, today said Apple didn't infringe …

Discussion: CNET News, 9 to 5 Mac, AppleInsider, MacRumors, MacNN, MacStories, Edible Apple and The Loop

MG Siegler / TechCrunch:

Facebook For iPhone Gets Event Check-Ins, Maps, And Unfriending — A couple weeks ago, after All Facebook spotted the ability to check-in to Facebook events, the social network confirmed to us that the feature would be launching shortly on the iPhone and their mobile-based touch site. Today, here it is.

Discussion: MacStories, ReadWriteWeb, MacNN, SAI, GeekSmack, Inside Mobile Apps, GottaBeMobile, Redmond Pie, All Facebook, TiPb, IntoMobile, GigaOM, App Advice, 9 to 5 Mac, TUAW and everythingiCafe

Georgina Prodhan / Reuters:

FT won't give up subscriber relationship to Apple — (Reuters) - The Financial Times wants to keep selling subscriptions for its digital news directly to readers rather than surrender control of new customers who sign up via Apple's iPad, the managing director of FT.com said.

Discussion: Macworld, App Advice, TUAW, MacStories, thinq_, MacRumors, Electronista, MobileBurn.com, Daring Fireball, everythingiCafe, MacDailyNews, Gizmodo Australia and Gizmodo, more at Mediagazer »

Alexia Tsotsis / TechCrunch:

LivingSocial Files To Authorize Up To $565M In Series E [Update: And Raises $400M] — Reports of daily deals site LivingSocial being in talks to raise around $500 million in Series E are now backed up by LivingSocial's amended and restated Certificate of Incorporation filed on March 31st and unearthed today by the VCExperts blog.

Discussion: VentureBeat and VC Experts

Evelyn M. Rusli / DealBook:
LivingSocial Chief Races to Escape Shadow of Groupon

Discussion: eMoney, Thanks:bensign

Jay Yarow / The Wire:

Hulu On Track To Generate $500 Million In Revenue This Year — Hulu is on pace to generate $500 million in revenue this year, CEO Jason Kilar revealed in a blog post tonight. — He also says “the content community” will earn $300 million this year from Hulu. — Other details from Kilar's post:

Discussion: Hulu Blog, paidContent, Hollywood Reporter and @learmonth

Christian Zibreg / 9 to 5 Mac:

After 201 days in review, Apple greenlights iPhone app that unmasks blocked calls (updated with video) — Apple's review process has gone a long way since the early days when every day would bring a new story about a controversial rejection. It's rare nowadays that an app would take longer …

Discussion: Examiner, The Next Web, Gizmodo, iClarified, msnbc.com, App Advice, Softpedia News and MacNN

Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols / Open Source Blog:

The new Ubuntu Desktop: Unity — When Mark Shuttleworth, founder of Ubuntu announced that the next version of the popular Linux, Ubuntu 11.04, would use Unity, instead of GNOME as its default desktop interface he shocked the Linux desktop community. Now, with the release of the Ubuntu 11.04 beta, we can get a real look at Unity.

Bloomberg:

Google Said to Be Possible Target of U.S. FTC Antitrust Probe — The U.S. Federal Trade Commission is considering a broad antitrust investigation of Google Inc. (GOOG)'s dominance of the Internet-search industry, two people familiar with the matter said. — Before proceeding with any probe …

Thanks:dinabass

Business Insider:

EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW WITH NETFLIX CEO REED HASTINGS: Netflix's Market Opportunity Is A Lot Bigger Than You Think — Our INTERVIEW OF THE WEEK this week is with one of the most successful Founder-CEOs in the history of the online industry: Reed Hastings of Netflix.

Discussion: The Wire and Tech Trader Daily

Greg Sandoval / Media Maverick:

MPAA files copyright suit against Zediva — The trade group representing the six major Hollywood film studios filed a copyright suit in federal court against online video distributor Zediva today. — The suit has started the process that almost certainly will end with Zediva's demise.

Discussion: Ars Technica, GigaOM, SFGate, Engadget, Mashable!, Technologizer, Electronista and Epicenter

Jott Blog:

Jott service ending on May 3rd, 2011 — By now you probably know that we will no longer be offering the Jott service. We have included below the text of an email we sent to our active customers today. — We founded Jott in April of 2006. In the five years that have followed …

Discussion: Mobilized and GeekWire

Derrick Harris / GigaOM:

VMware Takes Over EMC's Mozy Cloud Storage Service — VMware is officially entering the service provider market by taking over the operations of the Mozy cloud-based storage service from parent company EMC. VMware CTO Steven Herrod announced the news on his blog today, writing that …

Discussion: VMware Blogs, GeekWire and eWeek

Zach Epstein / BGR:

AT&T confirms early upgrade price changes for iPhone 4, other smartphones — AT&T has confirmed to BGR that it has made changes to early upgrade pricing for its smartphones. The changes impact customers who wish to upgrade to a new smartphone but are not yet eligible for an upgrade at fully discounted two-year contract prices.

Matthew Lasar / Ars Technica:

It could be worse: data caps around the world — Here at Ars we spend a lot of time writing about data caps—those ceilings on how much broadband data you can use before your ISP taps you on the shoulder and tells you it's time to pay more. Depending on where you live, these can range from “inconvenient” to “ruinous.”

Discussion: CrunchGear, PC World and msnbc.com

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