Techmeme: Fusion-Io to Be Worth Up to $1.17 Billion in Initial Share Sale (Ari Levy/Bloomberg)

10:15 PM ET, May 23, 2011

Top Items:

Jim Dalrymple / The Loop:

Apple says developers are licensed for Lodsys patents — In a letter sent to Lodsys on Monday, Apple asked that the company withdraw letters sent to app developers demanding they license the technology. “Apple is undisputedly licensed to these patents and the App Makers are protected by that license …

Discussion: CNET News, Macworld, AllThingsD, Technologizer, TechCrunch, MacRumors, ReadWriteWeb, AppleInsider, CNET News, Fortune, MacStories, @fosspatents, App Advice, World of Apple, TUAW, Electronista, GottaBeMobile, 9 to 5 Mac and GigaOM, Thanks:jdalrymple

Mark Small / Macworld:

Full text: Apple Legal's letter to Lodsys — Dear Mr. Small: I write to you on behalf of Apple Inc. ("Apple") regarding your recent notice letters to application developers ("App Makers") alleging infringement of certain patents through the App Makers' use of Apple products and services for the marketing …

Florian Mueller / FOSS Patents:

Analysis of Apple's letter to Lodsys — The first app devs to have received Lodsys's letter were only a few days away from a deadline to respond, and under that circumstance I already felt forced to recommend to app developers to be cooperative and ask Lodsys to provide its license agreement for review …

Discussion: Gizmodo, Daring Fireball, Inside Mobile Apps, SAI, The Register, Ars Technica, Engadget, paidContent, TeleRead, BGR, The Loop, MacStories, Edible Apple and iClarified

Mary Jo Foley / All about Microsoft Blog:

Microsoft's Ballmer says next-gen Windows systems due in 2012 — During remarks at a developers conference in Japan on May 23, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer referred to the next version of Windows as “Windows 8.” He also said the next generation of Windows systems will be out next year.

Discussion: L.A. Times Tech Blog, AllThingsD, The Microsoft Blog, Computerworld, Microsoft, SAI, GeekWire, PC Magazine, Engadget, GottaBeMobile, Neowin.net and The Next Web

Matt Rosoff / SAI: Silicon Alley Insider:

Windows 8 Could Make Its Public Debut Next Week — Windows chief Steven Sinofsky has just been confirmed to appear at the ninth D: AllThingsDigital conference next week, and the smart odds are that he'll use the high-profile event to give the public its first view of Windows 8, the next version of Microsoft's operating system.

Discussion: AllThingsD, BetaNews, WinRumors, This is my next, Electronista, The Seattle Times, The Next Web, Windows 8 News, LiveSide.net and SlashGear

Surur / WMPoweruser.com:
Over 500 new features coming in Windows Phone 7.5

Leena Rao / TechCrunch:

Square's Disruptive New iPad Payments Service Will Replace Cash Registers — Mobile payments startup Square is announcing big numbers today—500,000 Square card readers shipped, 1 million Square transactions in May, and the startup is now processing $3 million in mobile payments per day.

Mason Cohn / Fortune:
Dorsey's Square tries to eliminate the card swipe by bringing back the tab

Discussion: RazorianFly, 9 to 5 Mac, TechCrunch, TUAW, Electronista and CNN

Peter Kafka / AllThingsD:

Amazon Almost Giving Away Lady Gaga's New Album — It's not free, but it's close: Amazon is selling digital downloads of “Born This Way,” Lady Gaga's newest album, for 99 cents. — That gets you 14 songs and a digital booklet. The same album goes for $11.99 at Apple's iTunes …

Discussion: CNET News, MacRumors, 9 to 5 Mac, VatorNews, bub.blicio.us, TechnoBuffalo, NBC Bay Area, Pulse2, MacDailyNews and louisgray.com

Chloe Albanesius / PC Magazine:
Lady Gaga Downloads Overwhelm Amazon

Discussion: Mashable!, Gizmodo, hypebot, Speakeasy and MarketBeat

Ina Fried / AllThingsD:

Exclusive: France Telecom CEO on Apple, Android and How You Can Kiss Your Unlimited Plan Goodbye — Stephane Richard knows a thing or two about the iPhone. — In addition to carrying one of Apple's iconic smartphones, Richard is also the CEO of France Telecom, whose networks carry traffic …

Discussion: 9 to 5 Mac, Electronista, TUAW and Ubergizmo

Dennis Crouch / Patent Law Blog:

Apple Buys 200+ Patents from Freescale Semiconductor — Apple Inc. recently recorded the receipt of 200 patents and pending patent applications from the electronics company Freescale Semiconductor, Inc. Although not recorded until May 18, 2011, the assignment is dated April 11, 2011.

Discussion: AppleInsider, MacRumors and TUAW

Danny Sullivan / Search Engine Land:

Google Buys Sparkbuy: Comparison Shopping Site Now Closes, Team Remains — Google has acquired Sparkbuy, a comparison shopping site that has focused on laptops. The site closed today as part of the purchase; the three person team will continue on with Google. — Was this a talent acquisition, then?

Discussion: Search Engine Watch, SAI, TechFlash, The Seattle Times, AllThingsD, GeekWire, TechCrunch, Xconomy and Pulse2

@twitter:

Starting today, we're rolling out an email notification that lets you know if someone you follow retweets or favorites one of your Tweets.

Discussion: PC Magazine, TechCrunch, Ubergizmo, @sameerpatel, The Next Web and @fredericl

Audrey Watters / ReadWriteWeb: Twitter Adds A New Feature, Another Blindside for Third Party Developers?

Erick Schonfeld / TechCrunch:

Introducing Omar Hamoui's First Project From Churn Labs: Gnonstop Gnomes — When Omar Hamoui left Google a few months after selling AdMob to the search giant for $750 million, he set up shop with mobile engineer Mike Rowehl as Churn Labs. Today at Disrupt NYC, we get to see the first product churned out by the labs: Gnonstop Gnomes.

Discussion: GigaOM

Mathew Ingram / GigaOM:

Do@ Gets $7 Million to Try to Disrupt Mobile Search — Search is a market many assume is over as far as startups are concerned. After all, how could anyone compete with Google and Microsoft? A new service called Do@ thinks there is still room to change the way we search, however …

Discussion: Epicenter, TechCrunch, AllThingsD, VentureBeat, Bits, TechCrunch, Scobleizer, The Next Web, Pulse2, @scobleizer, Search Engine Land, Digits and Crave

John Cook / GeekWire:

Zillow.com selects “Z” for ticker symbol, trims Q1 net loss — Zillow.com plans to trade on the Nasdaq stock exchange under the one letter ticker symbol Z when it expects to debut later this year. That's slightly unusual, since most of the tickers on the exchange such as Microsoft (MSFT) …

Ari Levy / Bloomberg:

Fusion-Io to Be Worth Up to $1.17 Billion in Initial Share Sale — Fusion-io Inc., a maker of flash- memory technology for companies including Facebook Inc., plans to sell shares in its initial public offering for $13 to $15 apiece, valuing the company at as much as $1.17 billion.

Discussion: AllThingsD

Matt Warman / Telegraph:

HP: ‘Touchpad will be better than number one’ tablet — HP talks up forthcoming Touchpad tablet ahead of European launch later in the year and announces first app partners — HP will emulate its PC market success in the tablet world when it launches the Touchpad over the summer, the company's European head Eric Cador has claimed.

Discussion: Electronista, PC Magazine, PreCentral.net, 9 to 5 Mac, Neowin.net, Internet2Go, DailyTech, 901am, LAPTOP Magazine, Pulse2, TiPb, Gadgetell, I4U News, RazorianFly and AllThingsD

Abe Murray / Google Book Search Blog:

Google eBooks: By the Numbers, Then and Now — It's been about six months since we launched Google eBooks. Now, we're happy to report there are more than three million free Google eBooks available in the U.S. for your enjoyment and enlightenment (as compared to more than two million at launch).

Discussion: ITworld.com, more at Mediagazer »

Stuart Elliott / Media Decoder:

YouTube Extends Plans for Ads Before Videos — In the early days of online video, commercials that appeared before viewers could watch clips, known as preroll, got “thumbs down” from most computer users. That attitude seems to have softened more recently, a change of heart that Web giants have noticed.

Discussion: The Next Web, Thanks:beet_tv

Mike Swift / Mercury News:

Facebook to assemble global team of ‘diplomats’ — With 70 percent of its more than 600 million members outside the United States, Facebook is creating its own foreign service, hiring a network of ambassadors from India to Ireland to represent the Palo Alto-based social network with foreign governments and cultures.

Discussion: All Facebook and techPresident

Jason Kincaid / TechCrunch:

Ashton Kutcher Teams With UberMedia To Launch A.plus, His Own Custom Twitter App — Ashton Kutcher fans who can't get enough of the star on Twitter are about to get some very good news. And the rest of you — even if you aren't necessarily huge Ashton fans — will want to pay attention too.

Discussion: PC Magazine, L.A. Times Tech Blog, AllThingsD, Lost Remote, AllTwitter, WebProNews and Techland

Wall Street Journal:

Liberty Says Nook Inspired B&N Bid — Liberty Media Corp. executives laid out their rationale for their surprise bid for Barnes & Noble Inc., touting the potential of the bookseller's Nook e-reader and the vast network of retail stores it can use to promote it.

Kunur Patel / AdAge:

One Year Later, AdMob Making Its Mark on Google — Mobile Display and Search Integrated Into Larger Infrastructure — One year after regulators gave Google the green light to acquire AdMob, the union of search giant and mobile ad network is beginning to bear fruit.

Sam Biddle / Gizmodo:

Dot Gives Your iPhone a 360-Degree Video Eyeball — Everyone loves panoramas. But they're usually kind of tricky to shoot—and video? Forget it. But the Dot attachment by Kogeto is a clever add-on for your iPhone 4 that turns it into a 360-shooting machine.

Discussion: Mobilized, CrunchGear, SAI, 9 to 5 Mac, TUAW and SlashGear

Alexia Tsotsis / TechCrunch:

Sonar Finds You The Most Relevant People In The Room — Using almost every publicly available profile, Facebook, Linked, Foursquare, Instagram, Eventbrite etc, mobile app Sonar, shows you who, how many, and why particular people are relevant to you in a room.

Discussion: App Advice and Gizmodo

Jeff Atwood / Coding Horror:

The Infinite Version — One of the things I like most about Google's Chrome web browser is how often it is updated. But now that Chrome has rocketed through eleven versions in two and a half years, the thrill of seeing that version number increment has largely worn off.

Federico Viticci / MacStories:

iPad 2 Head Tracking + Glasses-free 3D App Now Available — Back in April, you might remember we posted a video showing a software experiment by Jeremie Francone and Laurence Nigay from the Laboratory of Informatics of Grenoble at the EHCI Research Group aimed at bringing glasses-free 3D to the iPad's screen.

Discussion: Redmond Pie, PhoneArena, PadGadget, Touch Arcade, 9 to 5 Mac and MacRumors

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