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1:40 PM ET, December 29, 2011

Techmeme

 Top Items: 
Kellex / Droid Life:
Verizon to Charge Customers $2 Fee When Paying Bills Online or Over the Phone Starting January 15  —  Time to set up “auto pay” through your Verizon Wireless account.  According to our sources, Big Red will start charging you a $2 fee both over the phone and online for your monthly bill transaction unless …
RELATED:
Kevin Fitchard / GigaOM:
Verizon's New Year's vow: Cut back on credit cards
Discussion: CNET and LAPTOP Magazine
Leena Rao / TechCrunch:
Amazon: We Sold Over 4 Million Kindle Devices This Month; Gifting Of E-Books Up 175 Percent  —  Amazon has just released new data regarding its Kindle sales for the holiday season.  According to the e-commerce giant, Amazon customers purchased millions of Kindle Fires and millions of Kindle e-readers.
DigiTimes:
Apple to unveil two versions of next-generation iPad in January, sources claim  —  Apple is set to unveil its next-generation iPad - which will come in two versions - at the iWorld scheduled for January 26, 2012, according to sources at its supply chain partners.
RELATED:
Darrell Etherington / GigaOM:
Three models of iPad in January? Not very likely
Discussion: GottaBeMobile and Phones Review
Paul Thurrott / SuperSite for Windows:
Exclusive: Microsoft'S LTE Plans For Windows Phone  —  Since other sites are starting to leak glimpses of what Microsoft is doing with Windows Phone and LTE in 2012, I've decided to simply reveal what's happening.  And as you might expect, Microsoft and its Windows Phone partners do indeed intend …
RELATED:
Dave Copeland / ReadWriteWeb:
Twitter Ignored Request To Keep Subpoena Under Wraps [UPDATED]  —  Twitter appears to have forwarded a subpoena requesting user information to at least one of the owners of the accounts in question, despite a request from the Suffolk Massachusetts District Attorney's office that the request not be disclosed …
Christina Bonnington / Gadget Lab:
Why Windows 8 Tablets Will Surprise Everyone  —  At Microsoft's Build conference, Michael Angiulo, corporate vice president of Windows Planning, Hardware and PC Ecosystem, displays a prototype Windows 8 tablet.  Photo: Microsoft  —  Windows-based tablets haven't been treated kindly by the test of time.
Arik Hesseldahl / AllThingsD:
Hurd Loses Appeal to Keep Accuser's Letter Confidential  —  Former Hewlett-Packard CEO and current Oracle president Mark Hurd has lost an appeal before a court in Delaware in which he sought to keep confidential a letter that contained allegations of sexual harassment.
Kunal / Sammy Hub:
Samsung ships 1 million Galaxy Note units globally; coming soon to US  —  The phone / tablet hybrid devices sales are pretty good, going by the numbers released by Samsung today.  The Korean giant has shipped over a million units since its launch in late October.
Jack Purcher / Patently Apple:
Apple Envisions Face & Presence Detection Security for iOS Devices  —  On December 29, 2011, the US Patent & Trademark Office published a patent application from Apple that reveals one of the next chapters for device security.  In 2009, Apple's presence detection patent first came to light in relation to future MacBooks.
Jane Wakefield / BBC:
British teenage designer of Summly app hits jackpot  —  Nick D'Aloisio talks to Jane Wakefield about the inspiration for his app  —  Most teenagers will find any reason under the sun not to do their homework.  —  But 16-year-old South Londoner Nick D'Aloisio's excuse is better than most …
Ina Fried / AllThingsD:
Apple's iPad Looms Large as Small Businesses Start Making Tablet Plans  —  Nearly three-quarters of small businesses are planning on buying a tablet over the next year, with the iPad topping the consideration list, according to a new survey from NPD.  —  Even the smallest of businesses …
Evelyn M. Rusli / DealBook:
Ahead of I.P.O., S.E.C. Pressed Groupon on Accounting  —  Ahead of Groupon's highly anticipated initial public offering in November, the Securities and Exchange Commission repeatedly pressed the daily deals giant to defend its business model and its accounting measures, according to comment letters recently disclosed.
Discussion: Pulse2, AllThingsD and @karaswisher
Jennifer Van Grove / VentureBeat:
Google and Facebook reign as the most-visited sites of 2011  —  Facebook may be growing in popularity, but Google is still the web brand to beat.  —  In 2011, an average 153.4 million people in the U.S. visited Google sites each month, making the search giant the most-visited U.S. web brand of the year, according to Nielsen.
Chris Ziegler / The Verge:
Verizon says LTE outage is resolved, 3G never affected  —  We've received a brief statement from Verizon this morning regarding the LTE outage it suffered yesterday afternoon: … As the company notes, 3G data service was totally unaffected — the problem is that LTE-enabled phones …
Amir Efrati / Wall Street Journal:
Bid for Same-Day Delivery Taps the Smartphone Boom  —  Numerous start-ups have tried to go after the Holy Grail of e-commerce—delivering things to people's homes and offices on the same day they ordered them—and have failed.  —  Postmates Inc., a San Francisco Internet start-up that launched …
Matt Brian / The Next Web:
Report: 300 million users now access Facebook via its mobile apps  —  Christmas gadget gifting appears to have boosted Facebook app use, with it being reported in the last couple of days the world's largest social network saw monthly active users of its mobile apps pass 300 million users.
Azrienoch / xda-developers:
HTC Unlocks Its Verizon and AT&T Bootloaders  —  Today, Peter Chou makes good on his word to no longer lock the bootloaders on HTC Android phones.  Just in time for those New Year's Resolutions.  —  XDA Junior Member nightwings noticed, when trying out HTCDev's bootloader unlocking tool on his HTC Rezound …
Emil Protalinski / Friending Facebook Blog:
Facebook tries to appease frustrated developers  —  Summary: Developers this week complained about two separate Facebook issues.  The first was in regards to the Javascript SDK and the second was about the Python SDK.  Facebook responded to both.  —  Two different developers posted …
Discussion: Lincoln's blog and WebProNews
Florian Mueller / FOSS Patents:
Not even one of Oracle's six patents-in-suit has been definitively invalidated — but four of them are under pressure  —  It's time for another fact check on the state of the Java-related patents Oracle is asserting against Google.  Contrary to widespread misbelief, none of the six patents Oracle …
Mike Masnick / Techdirt:
Indian ISP Blocks A Bunch Of Websites To Try To Prevent File Sharing Of A Single Movie  —  TorrentFreak has the story of an Indian court seemingly having no problems issuing widespread ISP blockades in response to a request from movie studio Reliance Entertainment.
 
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 More Items: 
Sakthi Prasad / Reuters:
Stratfor delays website launch after hack attack
Discussion: VentureBeat, Pastebin and CNET
Mike Masnick / Techdirt:
Copyright Office Seeks To Make It More Difficult To Retain DMCA Safe Harbors
T.C. Sottek / The Verge:
To build a holodeck: an exclusive look at Microsoft's Edison lab
Discussion: TechNet Blogs and Neowin.net
Stacey Higginbotham / GigaOM:
Getting to a gigabit. How Sonic.net will take on caps, residents and AT&T in San Francisco
Discussion: Aswath Weblog
Horace Dediu / asymco:
Discerning Apple's international product positioning through the big Mac index
Greg Kumparak / TechCrunch:
Khan Academy Jumps To 4M Uniques Per Month (Up 4X From Last Year)
 Earlier Items: 
Lee Spears / Bloomberg:
2012 To Be Biggest Internet IPO Year Since '99
Sarah Lacy:
Golden Age of Tech Blogging Done? I Couldn't Disagree More
 

 
From Mediagazer:

Caitlin Huston / The Hollywood Reporter:
Internal memo: Hearst Magazines president announces layoffs as part of a decision to “reallocate resources” to “continue our focus on digital innovation”

Jon Brodkin / Ars Technica:
FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel announced she will leave the agency on January 20; she was the first woman to be confirmed to lead the agency

Lachlan Cartwright / The Ankler:
Sources: MSNBC renewed Rachel Maddow's contract early this fall, but with a pay cut; MSNBC bosses' plan to shake up daytime and weekend programming

 
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