Top Items:
Nadia Damouni / Reuters:
Exclusive: Amazon weighed buying RIM but interest cooled — (Reuters) - Research In Motion Ltd has turned down takeover overtures from Amazon.com Inc and other potential buyers because the BlackBerry maker prefers to fix its problems on its own, according to people with knowledge of the situation.
RELATED:
Wall Street Journal:
Microsoft, Nokia Flirted With RIM — Microsoft Corp. and Nokia Corp. in recent months flirted with the idea of making a joint bid for Research In Motion Ltd., according to people familiar with the matter. — The status of the talks remains unclear. But the fact that the discussions took place …
Discussion:
GottaBeMobile, SlashGear, My Nokia Blog, Business Insider, Electronista, Engadget, WinRumors, The Verge, Neowin.net, Pulse2, parislemon and WMPoweruser
The Mozilla Blog:
Mozilla and Google Sign New Agreement for Default Search in Firefox — We're pleased to announce that we have negotiated a significant and mutually beneficial revenue agreement with Google. This new agreement extends our long term search relationship with Google for at least three additional years.
Discussion:
TechCrunch, BGR, CNET News, Pocket-lint, Ars Technica, The Ed Bott Report Blog, Business Insider, TechSpot, Pulse2, Digital Trends, ITworld.com, SlashGear, AllThingsD, SiliconFilter, PC Magazine, Mercury News, BetaNews, Washington Post, The Tech Trade, VentureBeat, MediaFile, The Verge, 9to5Google, ReadWriteWeb, NBC Bay Area, TechFlash, Neowin.net, Search Engine Land, Engadget, Asa Dotzler, iClarified, WebProNews, Technologizer, The Next Web and parislemon
Chris Foresman / Ars Technica:
Half a billion dollars: why Apple's acquisition of Anobit matters — Apple reportedly acquired the Israeli flash memory design firm Anobit in a deal that cost the company $500 million dollars. Anobit management told its staff of the acquisition this week, according to Israeli newspaper Calcalist …
Discussion:
paidContent, Reuters, AnandTech, Neowin.net, Engadget and MacStories
Ina Fried / AllThingsD:
ITC Initial Ruling: Motorola Infringes Single Microsoft Patent, but Not Six Others — Microsoft won a partial victory in its patent dispute with Motorola, as the International Trade Commission issued an initial ruling that certain Motorola products infringe on one of the software maker's patents.
Discussion:
Guardian, All about Microsoft Blog, Engadget, SlashGear, PC World, Neowin.net, GigaOM, mocoNews, WinRumors, PC Magazine, Electronista, Ars Technica, GeekWire, FOSS Patents, WMPoweruser, Business Insider and The Verge
Seth Weintraub / 9to5Google:
Andy Rubin announces: 700,000 Android devices activated every day — He made the announcement via Google Plus and notes: ...and for those wondering, we count each device only once (ie, we don't count re-sold devices), and “activations” means you go into a store, buy a device, put it on the network by subscribing to a wireless service.
Discussion:
@arubin, mocoNews, AppleInsider, Google+, IntoMobile, Inside Mobile Apps, CNET News, SlashGear, Engadget, The Verge, Electronista, Android Phone Fans, The Next Web and Android and Me
Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:
Distimo's Year-End Report Shows Why Developers Love iOS: iPhone 4x Android Revenue, iPad 2x — There are now over a million mobile applications available across the top seven major app stores, according to mobile analytics firm Distimo in its year-end report for 2011.
Discussion:
Inside Mobile Apps and Gamasutra
Josh Constine / TechCrunch:
Facebook Sponsored Story Ads To Appear In The Web News Feed In 2012 — Starting in January 2012, Facebook will gradually begin showing Sponsored Stories social ads in the main news feed of the web version of the site, a representative of the company tells us.
Discussion:
Inside Facebook, Neowin.net, ReadWriteWeb, MediaPost, Digital Trends, WebProNews, All Facebook, SlashGear, Gizmodo, Mashable! and The Verge, Thanks:joshconstine
Janko Roettgers / GigaOM:
Vevo by the numbers: 3.7B views, $100M royalties — Vevo clocked 3.6 billion video views globally in October and is expected to have reached 3.7 billion views worldwide in November, the major label-owned music video platform announced today. In December 2009, that number was at 341 million views.
Discussion:
Pop & Hiss
RELATED:
Charles Arthur / Guardian:
Nokia and Microsoft fingered over comments on adverse Lumia review — An Indian site's ‘reviewing’ of the Nokia Lumia 800 phone purely on its specifications was a strange thing to do - but anonymous commenting apparently from Nokia and Microsoft staff didn't help matters
Discussion:
CNET News, Computerworld, Hardware 2.0 Blog, WMPoweruser and Neowin.net
Kara Swisher / AllThingsD:
Yahoo Intensifies Search for CEO (With Hulu's Kilar as One Dream Unicorn Candidate) — Whatever you want to call him or her — a silver bullet, the cure or, as I like to say, the last unicorn — Yahoo's ever-seeking and never-deciding board has now renewed its focus on finding a new CEO.
Seth Rosenblatt / CNET Download.com:
New RockMelt socializes Chrome's Omnibox, new tabs — The Omnibox has been beefed up in RockMelt beta 5 with deep hooks directly into Facebook. — While the big browser conflagration between Chrome and, oh, just about everybody else tends to suck the oxygen from a room …
Discussion:
Xconomy
Thomas Ricker / The Verge:
Kickstarted: How one company is revolutionizing product development — Kickstarter is funding an era of product development uncompromised by focus groups and committees — The million dollar idea. We've all had it at one time or another, with very few luxuries to show for our sudden fits of brilliance.
Discussion:
Gizmodo
Matt Burns / TechCrunch:
Amazon Finally Releases OTA Kindle Fire Update To Address Performance And Touchscreen Issues — Great news, Kindle Fire owners. Amazon just announced the long overdue Kindle Fire update that's said to resolve many of the issues with the budget tablet. Most of the common complaints are addressed …
Discussion:
CNET News and AllThingsD
Electronista:
Google halts Nexus S Android 4.0 updates, Galaxy Nexus hit — Google Nexus S and Galaxy Nexus hit by battery bug — Google's Android 4.0 update for the Nexus S stalled out Tuesday. The company posted on its forums that it was holding the update to “monitor feedback” after users reported unusually high battery drain.
Discussion:
SlashGear and Softpedia News
Josh Constine / TechCrunch:
1 Million Articles Auto-Shared Daily, So Yahoo! Expands Facebook Integration To 26 More Sites — Facebook's Frictionless Sharing integration has been a huge win for Yahoo! News US. After just 2 months, 1 million articles are being shared to Facebook daily leading to 500,000 daily referrals.
Discussion:
CNET News, Business Wire and Yodel Anecdotal
Tim Culpan / Bloomberg:
HTC Completed Workaround to Skirt a U.S. Apple Patent Ruling — HTC Corp. (2498) has already completed a technical workaround to skirt a U.S. agency ruling that found a user interface in some handsets infringed an Apple Inc. (AAPL) patent. — “It's actually quite rarely used,” …
Discussion:
Gizmodo, Bloomberg, AppleInsider, Reuters and The Next Web
Donald Melanson / Engadget:
Apple fixes App Store bug on iOS 3.1.3 devices, you can hold off on that upgrade — Well, it looks like Apple hasn't completely left behind older iPhones and iPod touches stuck on iOS 3.1.3 just yet. After a few days of not being able to download or buy apps directly on the device due …
Discussion:
CNET News, iDownloadBlog.com, MacRumors, Ubergizmo and discussions.apple.com
RELATED:
Eric Slivka / MacRumors:
Apple Rolls Out ‘Complete My Season Pass’ for TV Shows — While Apple has long offered a “Complete My Album” feature in the iTunes Store to allow users who have previously purchased individual tracks to upgrade to the full album at a discounted price reflecting their single-track purchases …
Discussion:
SlashGear, Hollywood Reporter, VentureBeat, The Verge, BGR, everythingiCafe, Computerworld, PadGadget, TUAW, GigaOM, Macworld, RazorianFly and Ars Technica
Arik Hesseldahl / AllThingsD:
Oracle Falls Short on Weak Software Sales — Software giant Oracle reported quarterly results that fell short of the expectations of analysts, as licenses for new software rose only slightly and sales were $430 million below what analysts had forecast. Hardware sales were down by 14 percent year on year.
Discussion:
Bloomberg, The Register, Beyond Search, eWeek and Mercury News
Corynne McSherry / Electronic Frontier Foundation:
Ninth Circuit Puts Lump of Coal in UMG's Stocking, Affirms DMCA Safe Harbors for Veoh — Today the Ninth Circuit handed the Internet a bittersweet and crucial victory by affirming a district court's holding that the safe harbors created by the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) …
Discussion:
San Francisco Chronicle, Courthouse News Service, Ars Technica, MediaPost, Techdirt, Electronista and GigaOM
Ina Fried / AllThingsD:
LightSquared Asks FCC to Declare GPS Interference Not Its Fault — Aspiring wholesale wireless provider LightSquared wants the Federal Communications Commission to declare that any interference between its network and GPS systems is the fault of the way those systems are designed.
Discussion:
Engadget, GigaOM, Computerworld and FierceWireless
Sara Forden / Bloomberg:
Verizon Wireless Probed Over Cable Deals — Verizon Wireless's deals for spectrum with cable companies are under investigation by the U.S. Justice Department for their potential to hurt competition in the wireless and cable industries. — Gina Talamona, a Justice Department spokeswoman …
Melanie Lee / Reuters:
U.S. removes Baidu from “notorious markets” list — (Reuters) - The United States has removed Baidu Inc, China's largest search engine, from its list of notorious markets for piracy in a nod to the firm's efforts to clean up its music offerings. — Baidu, which has been on the notorious markets list …
Jeff Roberts / paidContent:
Publishing Insider Tipped Law Firms About E-Book Price Fixing Conspiracy — The decision by major publishers to strike a pricing deal with Apple (NSDQ: AAPL) has been the source of speculation and several antitrust investigations. Now, a new court filing suggests someone inside the industry …
Discussion:
Electronista and TeleRead, more at Mediagazer »
Jolie O'Dell / VentureBeat:
First Round Capital rings in the holidays with “Friday” spoof — First Round Capital is famous in these parts for its irreverent, awkward and often hilarious holiday e-greetings. — This year, the team and its family of startups pitched in to create an elaborate send-up of Rebecca Black's soulless mistake of a song, “Friday.”
Discussion:
YouTube, The Technology Chronicles, DealBook, Fortune, AllThingsD, Venture Capital Dispatch and TechCrunch
