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12:30 PM ET, August 4, 2011

Techmeme

 Top Items: 
David Drummond / The Official Google Blog:
When patents attack Android  —  I have worked in the tech sector for over two decades.  Microsoft and Apple have always been at each other's throats, so when they get into bed together you have to start wondering what's going on.  Here is what's happening:  —  Android is on fire.
RELATED:
MG Siegler / TechCrunch:
Google Threw A Punch, Microsoft Fires Back With A Missile  —  Earlier today, Google came out swinging.  Seemingly sick of being continuously slapped in the face by the patent issue, Google's SVP and Chief Legal Officer, David Drummond, wrote a blog post calling out several of Google's rivals …
Mary Branscombe / TechRadar.com:
How Microsoft makes money from Android  —  In Depth: And more secret Microsoft patent profits revealed  —  The recent revelation that Microsoft makes a packet from Android might come as a surprise.  —  But Android isn't the only competitor Microsoft makes money from - and more often than not, the competition is happy with the deal.
John Gruber / Daring Fireball:
Google: Patently Absurd  —  David Drummond, Google senior vice president and chief legal officer, “When Patents Attack Android”: … So if Google had acquired the rights to these patents, that would have been OK.  But when others acquired them, it's a “hostile, organized campaign”.
Timothy B. Lee / Disruptive Economics:
Google Should Publicly Oppose Software Patents
Discussion: Computerworld
Mark Douglas / The Big Blog:
Skype 2.1 for Android enables video on majority of Android devices  —  We promised to add support for additional handsets when we launched our new Skype for Android app with video a couple of weeks ago.  Today we are pleased to announce that with the release of Skype 2.1 for Android …
Dean Takahashi / VentureBeat:
Security researchers hack Google's Chrome OS  —  When Google first started talking about its Google Chrome OS software a few years ago, one of the selling points was the promise that it would come with much better built-in security than other operating systems.
Discussion: Inquirer and The Download Blog
Ben Parr / Mashable!:
Google To Revive Realtime Search, Thanks to Google+  —  Google Realtime Search is coming back soon, and it will include data from Google+ and other social sources.  —  Realtime Search was, until last month, the search giant's method of delivering relevant data from Twitter, Facebook and other social media services in real time.
Kara Swisher / AllThingsD:
Exclusive: Randi Zuckerberg Leaves Facebook to Start New Social Media Firm (Resignation Letter)  —  Randi Zuckerberg, who is director of marketing at Facebook and also the sister of CEO and Co-founder Mark Zuckerberg — is leaving Facebook after six years to start a new media firm to help companies become more social.
Ryan Paul / Ars Technica:
Study: Android is least open of open source mobile platforms  —  Market research firm VisionMobile has published a report that evaluates the openness of eight major open source software projects.  The study—which was partly funded by the European Union—focuses largely on open governance …
Discussion: Gizmodo and SlashGear
Alexia Tsotsis / TechCrunch:
FYI Google, Facebook's Former CTO Says It Would Take Two Years For ~250 People To Build A Clone  —  As the fruits of Google's rush to build a social network are now achingly public, someone has asked a pretty apropos question on Quora, “How long would it take to build Facebook as of July 2011?”
Ben / Carrypad:
Exclusive: Eight Leaked Sony S1 and S2 Screenshots Reveal Honeycomb 3.2, Chumby App, Proprietary Adapter and More  —  Today I went snooping around Sony's support site where I was able to uncover some support documents for their upcoming S1 and S2 tablets that have gone public before they were supposed to.
Bill Pardi / Windows Phone Blog:
Look who's talking: Speech in Mango  —  On a recent run around town with my wife to grab dinner and pick up one of the kids, a text message came in from my son.  Not an unusual event in itself, but what made this message interesting is that my phone read it aloud to me — and I replied back with my voice.
Bloomberg:
Sony's Debut of PlayStation Vita Player in U.S., Europe to Miss Christmas  —  Sony Corp. (6758) plans to begin sales of the PlayStation Vita portable player in the U.S. and Europe next year, missing the key Christmas-holiday shopping season.  —  The product will initially launch in Japan …
Jack Purcher / Patently Apple:
Apple's Inductive Charging Patent Finally Surfaces  —  On August 4, 2011, the US Patent & Trademark Office published a patent application from Apple that reveals two specific concepts of an “Inductive Charging System” for use with iOS devices.  The first concept involves an oddly designed charging tower.
Joseph Volpe / Engadget:
Microsoft Research's .NET Gadgeteer steps out into the light, shoots daggers at Arduino (video)  —  Arduino, meet .NET Gadgeteer — your newest homebrew hacking rival.  Born from Microsoft Research engineers' desire to build prototypes quickly and easily, the two-and-a-half-years …
Peter Kafka / AllThingsD:
Warner Bros. Pulls Back the Curtain on Flixster Collections, Its Ambitious Digital Video Bet  —  Time Warner CEO Jeff Bewkes spent a lot of yesterday's earnings call discussing the company's future in digital video.  Here's one of his focal points: Flixster Collections …
Discussion: MacNN and SlashGear
Alyson Shontell / The Business Insider:
THE BILLION-DOLLAR CLUB: 12 Startups With Skyrocketing Valuations  —  After watching startups like Facebook, Zynga, and Groupon explode in valuation, VCs are now pouring money into the next crop of startups.  —  Valuations are skyrocketing as VCs compete to get in the next hot deal.
Greg Finn / Search Engine Land:
Behind The Numbers Of Google+'s Monumental Rise To 25 Million Visitors  —  This week comScore released findings on Google+'s monumental surge to 25 million unique global visitors.  Launched just over a month ago, Google+ has become the fastest social networking service to reach 25 million unique visitors.
John Cook / GeekWire:
Why Zillow insiders want to keep the stock above $25 per share  —  Team Zillow ringing the opening bell on Nasdaq  —  Shares of Zillow tumbled a bit this week — falling below $30 for the first time since its red-hot initial public offering on July 20th.  Investors are closely watching …
Discussion: The Business Insider, Thanks:toddbishop
Jordan Golson / MacRumors:
Find My Mac Goes Live For Developers  —  Find My Mac has gone live for developers beta testing Apple's iCloud service.  Find My Mac was officially added to Lion in Developer Preview 4, released after WWDC in June, though evidence of the feature had leaked in prior releases.
Killian Bell / Cult of Mac:
Apple Already Approving App Updates for iOS 5 — Launch Next Month?  —  Although its public release isn't scheduled until this fall, Apple has already begun approving apps for its upcoming iOS 5 software for the iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch — suggesting the firmware could launch as early as next month alongside the iPhone 5.
John Paczkowski / AllThingsD:
iPhone 5, ‘Simplified iPhone 4’ Headed to China Telecom in October?  —  If Apple hasn't yet signed an agreement to bring the iPhone to China Telecom, it must be very close to doing so.  In July, Reuters reported that long-running discussions between the two companies were moving toward a deal …
Amar Toor / Engadget:
T-Mobile loses 50,000 customers in Q2 2011, revenue dips slightly  —  T-Mobile USA issued its Q2 earnings statement today and, while the outlook isn't quite as bleak as it was during the first quarter of this year, there's still some cause for concern up in Bellevue.
Mark Gurman / 9to5Mac:
Vonage releases Time to Call iPhone app with low-cost international calling over 3G/WiFi  —  Vonage has released a new application for the App Store called Time to Call.  The application is free to download and offers low-cost international calling to users.
Eliot Van Buskirk / Evolver.fm:
Former Google Engineer Builds Turntable.fm Clone: Rolling.fm  —  One good turn(table) deserves another, one might say.  —  Hot on the heels of Turntable.fm's big reported round of funding comes Rolling.fm, a Turntable.fm clone that does just about everything the original service does.
Discussion: Techdirt and All New Musings
Ryan Singel / Epicenter:
Spotify, Spokeo, AOL, Others Sued Over Web Tracking  —  Website analytics firm KISSmetrics and more than 20 of its customers, including Spotify, AOL's About.me, Slideshare.net, Spokeo and the news site Gigaom.com were sued Monday on the grounds that KISSmetrics' tracking technology violated federal and state privacy laws.
Discussion: GigaOM, MediaPost and Music Ally
Leena Rao / TechCrunch:
American Airlines And Gogo Roll Out In-Flight Personal Device Video Streaming To 767 Fleet  —  As we heard earlier this Spring, American Airlines became one of the first North American airlines to begin testing Gogo's in-flight streaming video to personal devices for passengers.
Jack Kim / Reuters:
North Korean hackers hired to attack South Korea game network  —  (Reuters) - More than 30 North Korean hackers were hired to work in China by a South Korean crime ring to steal the personal data of South Korean gamers, and channeled $5 million to their impoverished country in compensation, South Korea's police said on Thursday.
Discussion: Guardian and Inquirer
 
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 More Items: 
Leena Rao / TechCrunch:
LocalResponse Buys Social TV Advertising And Check-In Platform Philo
Discussion: VentureBeat, VatorNews and GigaOM
Evelyn M. Rusli / DealBook:
Daily Deal Web Sites Become Players in Their Own Deals
 Earlier Items: 
Brad Feld / Feld Thoughts:
Progress On The Startup Visa Movement
Jason Kincaid / TechCrunch:
Sources: Storm8 Raising Huge $300 Million Round At $1 Billion Valuation
Jay Yarow / The Business Insider:
Apple Has Secret Deals In Place To Launch A Video Streaming Service, Says Jefferies
Discussion: ReadWriteWeb
Patrick Klepek / Giant Bomb:
Read Satoru Iwata's Apologetic Letter to Existing 3DS Owners
Discussion: Digital Trends and SlashGear
Mary Jo Foley / All about Microsoft Blog:
Microsoft to focus on HTML5 and JavaScript for Office 15 extensions
Tiernan Ray / Tech Trader Daily:
Apple: 'A6′ Chip Will Merge iOS With OS X In 2012, Says Jefferies
 

 
From Mediagazer:

Athena Stavrou / The Independent:
More than 230 media industry professionals, including anonymous BBC staff, sign a letter accusing the BBC of bias favoring Israel in coverage of Gaza

Dominick Mastrangelo / The Hill:
Conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt quits as a contributing columnist at WaPo, after abruptly leaving a Post live video event hosted by Jonathan Capehart

Devin Gordon / New York Times:
AI in Hollywood is a tech leap with a vast impact but remains a tool, not a replacement, for creatives; its speed, quality, and cost allow for VFX breakthroughs
 
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