Top Items:
Wall Street Journal:
Microsoft Near Deal to Buy Skype for Nearly $8 Billion — Microsoft Corp. is close to a deal to buy Internet phone company Skype Technologies SA for more than $7 billion, and a deal could be announced as early as Tuesday, people familiar with the matter said.
Discussion:
GeekWire, Between the Lines Blog, GigaOM, PC Magazine, Tech Trader Daily, LiveSide.net, Computerworld, CNET News, 9 to 5 Mac, VentureBeat, All about Microsoft Blog, paidContent, Seattle Times, SAI, This is my next, TechFlash, DealBook, The Next Web, Daring Fireball, Communications …, @ross, @percival, PE Hub Blog, CrackBerry.com blogs, FierceVoIP, PhoneNews.com, Electronista, WMPoweruser.com, @qthrul, @parislemon, @jeffjarvis, Network World, @rsingel, @felixsalmon, Appletell, WPCentral.com, TUAW, Geekosystem and Voices on All Things Digital
RELATED:
Kara Swisher / BoomTown:
Confirmed: Microsoft Will Announce Acquisition of Skype Tomorrow Morning — The Wall Street Journal reported tonight that Microsoft-in what would be its most aggressive acquisition in the digital space-was zeroing in on buying Skype for $8.5 billion. — Sources told BoomTown tonight …
Erick Schonfeld / TechCrunch:
Is Microsoft About To Overpay For Skype? — The deal buzzards are swirling around Skype, and Microsoft may end up with the prize. Om first reported the rumor, which is now getting major play by the WSJ. Microsoft is in final negotiations to buy Skype for $7 billion, according to the WSJ report.
MG Siegler / TechCrunch:
Apple's Massive New Data Center Set To Host Nuance Tech; Partnership Announcement Due At WWDC — Last Friday, we posted about the negotiations between Apple and voice recognition company Nuance. While these talks have been going on for months, sources told us that it wasn't yet entirely clear …
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Peter Kafka / MediaMemo:
Google Launching Its Cloud Service Tomorrow, Without Big Music's Approval — You've seen Amazon's cloud music service. Now get ready for Google's music service. — They're going to look pretty similar. — Google is preparing to show off a new music service at tomorrow's I/o conference.
Discussion:
eWeek, AppleInsider, VentureBeat, mocoNews, L.A. Times Tech Blog, Bits, SAI, Gizmodo, Wall Street Journal, Media Maverick, MacNN, @pkafka, parislemon, @danackerman, The Next Web, msnbc.com, Android and Me and Gizmodo Australia
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Alexia Tsotsis / TechCrunch:
Google Partners With Sony Pictures, Universal And Warner Brothers For YouTube Movies — Google confirmed the existence of its YouTube Movies service earlier today and has just released more details on which studios and movies will provide the 3,000 titles in its repertoire.
RELATED:
Claire Cain Miller / Bits:
YouTube Expands Video Rental Service
Discussion:
Ubergizmo, Engadget, YouTube Blog, TechCrunch, Yahoo! News, PC World, Digits, PC Magazine, TG Daily, ReadWriteWeb, paidContent and Gizmodo Australia, more at Mediagazer »
Jamin Spitzer / TechNet Blogs:
Microsoft Announces Windows Azure Toolkits for iOS, Android and Windows Phone — Today, Microsoft announced Windows Azure Toolkits for Devices, consisting of assets for Windows Phone, iOS and a preview of tools for Android. — Using the toolkits, developers can use the cloud to accelerate …
Neil Hughes / AppleInsider:
Previous-gen Apple iPad, iPhone 3GS often outsell new Android devices — Older Apple iOS products sold at a discounted price, like the iPhone 3GS and first-generation iPad, are often more popular than newer devices running the Google Android operating system, a new report claims.
Discussion:
eWeek, Electronista, Redmond Pie, iPhone Download Blog, GottaBeMobile, Pulse2, Fast Company, The Toybox Blog, RazorianFly, PhoneArena, BGR, @mrinaldesai and TUAW
David Kravets / Threat Level:
Biggest BitTorrent Downloading Case in U.S. History Targets 23,000 Defendants — At least 23,000 file sharers soon will likely get notified they are being sued for downloading the Expendables in what has become the single largest illegal-BitTorrent-downloading case in U.S. history.
Discussion:
The Register and TechSpot
Adam Lashinsky / Fortune:
How Apple works: Inside the world's biggest startup — From Steve Jobs down to the janitor: How America's most successful — and most secretive — big company really operates. — Apple doesn't often fail, and when it does, it isn't a pretty sight at 1 Infinite Loop.
Discussion:
Gadget Lab, SAI, NBC Bay Area, InfoWorld, iLounge and PC Magazine
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Peter Kafka / MediaMemo:
Why Fortune's Apple Story is AWOL from the Web-And Why You Can Buy It on Amazon
Discussion:
I4U News and DailyTech, more at Mediagazer »
Donald Tanguay / The Official Google Blog:
Sort by subject in Google Images — When you're searching for images, sometimes it can be hard to come up with exactly the right words to describe what you have in mind. For example, when you think of London, you might picture the iconic clock tower or the big Ferris wheel.
Discussion:
Liliputing, Network World, Pulse2, ReadWriteWeb, TechCrunch, The Next Web, Pocket-lint, thinq_, Search Engine Land and Softpedia News
John Markoff / Bits:
The iPad in Your Hand: As Fast as a Supercomputer of Yore — It's common wisdom that the computer you can hold in the palm of your hand today is as powerful as a computer from years ago that filled an entire room. — But now Jack Dongarra, one of the computer scientists who keeps track …
Discussion:
App Advice, MacStories, Xconomy and TUAW
iFixit:
Tracking Device Teardown — Disclaimer: We love the FBI. We've worked with them on several occasions to fight crime and locate criminals. We've helped them with instructions on gaining entry into certain devices. We have nothing against them, and we hope they don't come after us for publishing this teardown.
Discussion:
Geek.com, iFixit Blog, Gizmodo, Boing Boing, Techland and Hardware 2.0 Blog
RELATED:
Kim Zetter / Threat Level:
Battle Brews Over FBI's Warrantless GPS Tracking
Discussion:
Neowin.net, PC Magazine, Techdirt and PC World
Alberto Vildosola / Android and Me:
New Google Goggles app turns your phone into the perfect business card scanner — Poised to be demoed at Google I/O, the Google Goggles Android app got quite a sizable update today. Since its inception, Goggles has helped us read QR codes, find better deals than your local store's …
Discussion:
Google Mobile Blog, SocialTimes.com and Search Engine Land
Jason Kincaid / TechCrunch:
LevelUp Now Lets You Swipe Your AmEx Card To Redeem Deals, No Print-Outs Required — Back in March location-based game SCVNGR launched a spinoff venture called LevelUp — a direct competitor to Groupon, Living Social, and other daily deal sites. LevelUp's key twist is that it has a heavy focus …
Discussion:
Social Markets, NetworkEffect, VentureBeat, Mashable!, IntoMobile and Fast Company
James Nixon / thinq_:
Exclusive: AnonOps splinter group speaks out — IP address leak ‘regrettable but necessary’ — A self-styled Anonymous “splinter group” that has seized control of two sites used by the ‘hacktivist’ collective to organise Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks and other operations …
Discussion:
thinq_, The Firewall, The Next Web, www.thehostingnews.com, I4U News and ITProPortal
Mike Snider / USA Today:
Cellphones get emergency alerts — Consumers will get emergency alerts for hurricanes, tornadoes and other disasters on their cellphones as part of a new alert network to be announced Tuesday by the Federal Communications Commission. — The Personal Localized Alerting Network (PLAN) …
Discussion:
New York Times, Electronista, Bloomberg and Associated Press
Kevin Krause / Android Phone Fans:
Countdown to Google I/O: What Can We Expect? — Google I/O is set to kick off in just about 24 hours. Don't believe me? Check out the official countdown clock on the I/O site. But what can we expect? A new Android version to be revealed? Some new info on Google TV?
Discussion:
Mobilized, Engadget, The Official Google Blog, CNET News, GigaOM and Neowin.net
Mary Jo Foley / All about Microsoft Blog:
Microsoft slates ‘Mango’ VIP unveiling for May 24 in New York — Microsoft officials have demonstrated the upcoming “Mango” Windows Phone update a number of times in recent months. But the official VIP unveiling for press and analysts is May 24 in New York.
Discussion:
MobileCrunch, LiveSide.net, WPCentral.com, BetaNews, MobileTechWorld, WinRumors, Softpedia News, Neowin.net and The Microsoft Blog
Georgina Prodhan / Reuters:
Twitter outings undermine “super injunctions” — (Reuters) - Twitter revelations of alleged attempts by British celebrities to cover up sexual indiscretions show that “super injunctions” to gag the press are unsustainable, lawyers said Monday. — A Twitter user posted details Sunday …
Discussion:
Crave
Vangelis Kokkevis / Google Chrome Blog:
Fancier graphics, safer downloads, and more privacy controls — Today's beta channel release includes a number of additions, as well as one subtraction! — First, we've made Chrome's graphics snazzier. We've finished implementing support for hardware-accelerated 3D CSS …
Joab Jackson / PC World:
Google Launches Discovery Service for Its APIs — Developers wishing to embed into their own applications some of the Web services that Google offers should take a look at a new directory service the company has launched. — The Google APIs Discovery Service, which debuted Monday …
Discussion:
Google Code Blog
Zach Seward:
Sparktweets — Sparklines, according to Edward Tufte, who invented them, are “small, high-resolution graphics embedded in a context of words, numbers, images.” Among designers, there's general agreement that sparklines are fantastic for conveying time-series data, particularly financial …
Mathew Ingram / GigaOM:
Can Flattr Plus Twitter Make Micropayments a Reality? — Flattr, the micropayment startup founded by Peter Sunde — one of the co-founders of the notorious Swedish file-sharing site The Pirate Bay — said Monday it's preparing to launch a new feature that will combine its payment system with Twitter …
Discussion:
Flattr Blog
Thomas Claburn / InformationWeek:
Google ‘Panda’ Update Kills Content Farming Jobs — Freelancer.com's quarterly jobs report finds less demand for cheap articles and more projects for iOS and Android developers. — While the U.S. economy demonstrated some strength in April with the addition of 244,000 jobs …
Discussion:
Digital Journal and Tom Foremski
