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12:10 PM ET, December 9, 2011

Techmeme

 Top Items: 
Florian Mueller / FOSS Patents:
Motorola Mobility wins German patent suit against Apple, overcomes FRAND defense  —  At 9 AM today, the Mannheim Regional Court pronounced its ruling on one of the patent infringement lawsuits Motorola Mobility brought against Apple in Germany in April 2011.  This is the first substantive ruling in this dispute.
RELATED:
Eric Slivka / MacRumors:
Motorola Wins Preliminary Injunction, Could Bar Sales of iPhone and 3G iPad in Europe
Discussion: GigaOM and FOSS Patents
John Gruber / Daring Fireball:
The New Twitter (R.I.P. Tweetie)  —  Twitter today unveiled a new UI, debuting first in updated versions of its official iPhone, Android, and web clients.  Coming soon: an updated version of their iPad app.  (No mention of the Mac app — a sign of the times.)  —  This is more than an update.
RELATED:
Nick Bilton / Bits:
A Twitter for My Sister  —  In the early days of Twitter the company's founders repeatedly said that expanding the service was like building a rocket ship in mid-flight.  Twitter grew so quickly that it was almost impossible to add new features because engineers spent their time trying to keep …
Philip Elmer-DeWitt / Fortune:
Video: Hundreds queue up for Apple's Grand Central store  —  And hundreds more crowd the terminal's main lobby to see what the fuss is about  —  Line-goers (lower left) pushing through the onlookers.  Photo: PED  —  What if Apple (AAPL) opened a new store and nobody came?  We may never know.
RELATED:
Wall Street Journal:
At Apple's Grand Central Store, iPhones Aren't the Only Draw  —  Fans Collect Company's T-Shirts, Kept in Limited Supply; ‘Star Trek’ Model  —  When thousands of fans line up for Apple Inc.'s opening of its Grand Central Terminal store Friday, many won't be queuing to ogle iPads.
Discussion: ZDNet
Matt Lynley / Business Insider:
Sarah Lacy And Mike Arrington Are Starting TechCrunch 2.0  —  Former managing editor of TechCrunch Sarah Lacy is doing what many people expected her to do after she left TechCrunch last month — building a brand new version of it.  —  Lacy is working on starting a new tech news site, according to multiple sources.
Darren Murph / Engadget:
AT&T's 4G LTE network is live in San Francisco  —  New York City by the end of 2011?  How's about San Francisco by the end of December 8th?  We can't say for certain that it's lit up for good ("testing," you know), but at least for now it's absolutely screaming on our LTE-equipped AT&T handsets in downtown SF.
Thomas Baekdal / Baekdal.com:
Apple Never Designed the iPad - They Undesigned it  —  You have probably heard about the continual struggle between Apple and Samsung over similarities in their designs.  Apple is suing Samsung and asking the courts to block the sale of the Galaxy Tab in many countries (and succeeding).
Thomas Ricker / The Verge:
Panasonic's 4.3-inch ultra-thin Android smartphone headed to Europe in March  —  Panasonic said it will launch smartphones in Europe starting this March, five years after abandoning the international phone market.  The move confirms earlier Nikkei reports that the Osaka-based company …
Courtney Boyd Myers / The Next Web:
Zite, the smart iPad newspaper is now available on your iPhone  —  When Zite's smart iPad newspaper launched in March, we were all down in Austin waiting in line for the iPad 2.  —  It was the perfect storm of Twitter adoption, news curation and iPad frenzy for the social, simple and intelligent app's debut.
Florian Mueller / FOSS Patents:
Apple complains that Samsung's lawyers are stalling and ducking  —  One of Apple's highest priorities in its litigation with Samsung is the objective of winning a ruling against Samsung in the largest market, the United States.  Not only has Apple just appealed to the Federal Circuit …
RELATED:
Amy Pyett / Reuters:
Australia court lifts Samsung Galaxy Tab sales ban
Dean Takahashi / VentureBeat:
Google nabs Square Enix and other game developers to do native client Chrome games  —  Google announced today that its three-year effort to create a muscular browser technology that can run heavy duty apps such as console-like games is now ready for prime time.
Discussion: CNET News and TekGoblin, Thanks:deantak
Jonathan S. Geller / BGR:
Samsung to beat Apple to market with Retina-resolution tablet in February  —  BGR has learned from a trusted source that Samsung is set to launch an 11.6-inch tablet running Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich next year, and it will most likely be unveiled at Mobile World Congress in February.
AppleInsider:
Rare Apple '80s MultiServer, '70s Apple II ROM prototypes appear on eBay  —  A handful of rare, never-before-seen Apple prototypes have appeared for sale on eBay, including an unreleased product from the 1980s called “MultiServer,” and a prototype ROM board from the 1970s.
Discussion: Gizmodo and Electronista
DigiTimes:
OEM shipments of Nook Tablets to Barnes & Noble reach one million units, say sources  —  Barnes & Noble should have so far taken delivery of one million units of Nook Tablet PCs from OEM production partners, according to an estimate by sources at upstream suppliers.
Robin Wauters / TechCrunch:
Investor Group Buys Web Security Company Blue Coat For $1.3 Billion In Cash  —  Blue Coat, which specializes in Web security and WAN optimization solutions, has agreed to be acquired by an investor group led by San Francisco-based PE firm Thoma Bravo in a transaction valued at roughly $1.3 billion.
Brian Krebs / Krebs on Security:
Twitter Bots Drown Out Anti-Kremlin Tweets  —  Thousands of Twitter accounts apparently created in advance to blast automated messages are being used to drown out Tweets sent by bloggers and activists this week who are protesting the disputed parliamentary elections in Russia, security experts said.
Discussion: LAPTOP Magazine and Boing Boing
Cecilia Kang / Washington Post:
Verizon ends satellite deal, FiOS expansion as it partners with cable  —  Verizon Chief Executive Lowell McAdam said the telecom giant plans to end its wireless partnership with satellite provider DirectTV and will stop its buildout of FiOS television and Internet services in the next couple years.
Discussion: DSLreports
Elizabeth Woyke / Mobilized:
BlackBerry Owners Want iPads And So Do Android And Windows Phone Owners: Survey  —  A new survey provides details on the percentage of non-Apple smartphone users who want to buy iPads.  —  Nearly two years after its debut, Apple's iPad still dominates tablet sales.
Discussion: Electronista, PhoneArena and BGR
Jaikumar Vijayan / Computerworld:
Google's Schmidt calls Carrier IQ software a keylogger  —  It actually records keystrokes, he says at a conference in the Netherlands  —  Google Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt today distanced his company from Carrier IQ's software, even as he described the technology as a keylogger.
Paul Sawers / The Next Web:
Spotify Radio gets a big makeover, goes truly unlimited  —  Spotify has already had a busy year, what with international roll-outs, its Facebook tie-up and its recent ‘Spotify as a platform for apps’ announcement.  —  Now, Spotify has given one of its earliest features a complete makeover.
Washington Post:
How AT&T fumbled its $39 million bid to acquire T-Mobile  —  The phone call hit like a one-two punch.  —  Days before Thanksgiving, AT&T's heavyweight lobbying team was busy setting up meetings with antitrust authorities scrutinizing the company's $39 billion acquisition of T-Mobile.
Discussion: Business Insider
Amar Toor / Engadget:
Motorola's Droid Xyboard tablets go up for sale at Verizon, prices start at $430 (update: in stores on December 12th)  —  Motorola's pair of Droid Xyboard tablets has finally gone up for order on Verizon's site this morning, fulfilling the promise that Big Red made earlier this week.
Gary Ng / iPhone in Canada Blog:
Apple Pulls ‘TV Shows’ Menu from Apple TV in Canada  —  Last night, Apple TV units in Canada were silently given an over the air update to introduce the TV Shows menu.  Everything looked fine and dandy, however users were unable to purchase rentals, watch previews and more.  It was essentially a useless update.
Discussion: 9to5Mac, Thanks:appletelevision
Koushik Dutta / Google+:
The Unintended Effects of Driverless Cars  —  Google has been working on driverless cars for a few years now.  The obvious selling point is that the cars will be much safer without a human behind the wheel.  —  Currently, a car spends 96% of its time idle.
Discussion: TechCrunch
DigiTimes:
Thailand flood spurs nearly 4 million-unit shortfall in PC shipments in 1Q12, says IHS  —  Hard disk drive (HDD) shortages triggered by the Thailand floods will result in a 3.8 million-unit shortfall in PC shipments in the first quarter of 2012 compared to the previous IHS forecast issued in August.
Discussion: Inquirer
MG Siegler / TechCrunch:
Mark It Down: June 6, 2012  —  “Six months from now you'll say the opposite.  Because ultimately applications vendors are driven by volume.  And the volume is favored by the open approach that Google is taking.”  —  That was Google Chairman Eric Schmidt speaking at LeWeb a couple days ago.
 
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 More Items: 
Eric Eldon / TechCrunch:
Ness Adds Social Sharing To Its Mobile Restaurant Recommendation App
Discussion: Social Markets, Thanks:malouie
David Lee / daslee.com:
What We Look For  —  Like many investors, we often get asked …
Emily Steel / Wall Street Journal:
New ‘Adware’ Apps Bug Facebook, Google
Sebastian Anthony / ExtremeTech:
IBM Watson to battle patent trolls
Discussion: Engadget and Gizmodo
 Earlier Items: 
Jason Kincaid / TechCrunch:
Groupon In Talks To Acquire Clever Sense, The Startup Behind ‘Alfred’
Jay Yarow / Business Insider:
The Next iPad Will Launch In February — Citi
 

 
From Mediagazer:

Joshua Benton / Nieman Lab:
Around 75% of the largest US newspapers aren't endorsing anyone for president this year, as publishers try not to annoy any sliver of their remaining customers

Ellen Clegg / What Works:
After The Minnesota Star Tribune decided last summer not to endorse anyone for president, 15 former opinion staffers posted their own endorsement online

Alyson Krueger / New York Times:
A profile of Town & Country EIC Stellene Volandes, who is trying to keep the Hearst-owned 178-year-old magazine relevant via social media and its website

 
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