Top Items:
Shira Ovide / Deal Journal:
Yahoo Names PayPal Boss Scott Thompson as CEO … It's official. As Kara Swisher reported earlier, Yahoo just named Scott Thompson, the president of eBay's PayPal business, as CEO. Thompson also will be named to the Yahoo board, which has been weighing for months a sale or other possible strategic options for the company.
RELATED:
Yahoo! Inc.:
Yahoo! Appoints Scott Thompson Chief Executive Officer — SUNNYVALE, Calif.—(BUSINESS WIRE)— Yahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ: YHOO), the premier digital media company, today announced the appointment of Scott Thompson as Chief Executive Officer, effective January 9, 2012, at which time Tim Morse will resume his role as Chief Financial Officer.
Discussion:
GigaOM, paidContent, SiliconANGLE, The Tech Trade, Tech Trader Daily, Engadget, Deal Journal and SlashGear
Larry Dignan / Between the Lines Blog:
Yahoo's new CEO Thompson: Five big challenges — Summary: Yahoo's likely new CEO—PayPal president Scott Thompson—has a big to-do list including making the company relevant again. — Yahoo is reportedly set to name a new CEO—PayPal president Scott Thompson—but challenges abound.
Discussion:
Computerworld, The Register, AllThingsD, Business Insider, CNET, Search Engine Land, TechCrunch, AllThingsD, The Tech Trade and paidContent
Matt Burns / TechCrunch:
Ebay Boss John Donahoe To Serve PayPal's Interim President — Yahoo just announced PayPal President Scott Thompson as its new CEO. That obviously leaves a hole at PayPal as Thompson was currently serving in that role. Well, now that he's leaving and officially starts at Yahoo on January 9 …
Discussion:
The PayPal Blog
Ed Oswald / BetaNews:
Windows Phone partners bet $100M on Nokia Ace — The importance of the Nokia Ace to Microsoft's mobile plans is apparent as sources tell BetaNews of a major marketing push for the smartphone in the second quarter of this year. The Ace will launch in late March, sources confirm …
Tiuri van Agten / Distimo:
Google Android Market Tops 400,000 Applications — Google Android Market gave itself a nice new year's present last weekend. The total number of active applications worldwide in the Android Market reached the 400,000 milestone. Android Market has topped the 200K and 300K available apps milestones …
Discussion:
The Verge, Digital Trends, TechCrunch, MobileBurn.com, The Next Web, PhoneArena, Android Phone Fans, MobileSyrup.com, Electronista, SlashGear and AndroidOS.in, Thanks:gert_jan
Darrell Etherington / GigaOM:
Apple's long silence on call mute issue raising ire of iPhone owners — Apple's iPhone 4S wasn't without its share of launch troubles, including complaints of poor battery life. But while Apple was quick to address said issues in an update (and then promised to do so again in another) …
Discussion:
MacRumors, AllThingsD, The Verge, CNET, AppleInsider, Softpedia News, O'Grady's PowerPage, Softpedia News, Electronista, PhoneArena, PalmAddicts, Electronista and ZDNet
Julie Bort / Business Insider:
Cisco's Alternative To Skype Has Quietly Been Killed — Cisco has quietly pulled the plug on its ill-fated consumer home videoconferencing system, Umi. This could be the final blow to the company's once-grand consumer plans. — Umi was introduced a little over a year ago, in October, 2010.
Discussion:
AllThingsD, VoIP & Gadgets Blog, SlashGear, CNET, The Verge, PC Magazine and Skype Journal
Larry Downes / Forbes:
Why Best Buy is Going out of Business...Gradually — Electronics retailer Best Buy is headed for the exits. I can't say when exactly, but my guess is that it's only a matter of time, maybe a few more years. — Consider a few key metrics. Despite the disappearance of competitors including Circuit City …
Discussion:
Business Insider, Newsome.Org, Digital Trends, HotHardware.com News and Howard Lindzon
Vlad Savov / The Verge:
Microsoft sues UK retailer Comet for ‘creating and selling’ counterfeit Windows Vista and XP CDs — Now this is highly unusual. Microsoft has just reported it's taking legal action against Comet, one of the two big high street tech retailers in the UK, for “creating and selling …
Wall Street Journal:
Spam Finds New Target — Facebook and Twitter Build Up Their Defenses as Hackers Attack Social Networks — Facebook Inc. and Twitter Inc. are building up their forces to fight an emerging enemy: “social” spam. — One of their foot soldiers is Tao Stein, a Facebook engineer.
Discussion:
Marketing Land
Dieter Bohn / The Verge:
Google requiring default ‘Holo’ theme in Android 4.0 devices for Android Market access — When Google unveiled the SDK for Android 4.0, the first thing we noted about Ice Cream Sandwich is that the default “Holo” theme would be baked right in at the OS level.
Michael Arrington / Uncrunched:
Nobody Goes to Facebook Anymore. It's Too Crowded. — A year ago Steven Levy suggested that Facebook should give us each a single “friend-list do-over.” — A lot of commenters challenged him. “Grow some balls and just unfriend people,” said one of the more even tempered readers.
Discussion:
@howardlindzon
Jason Kincaid / TechCrunch:
Codecademy's CodeYear Attracts 100,000 Aspiring Programmers In 48 Hours — Talk about starting your year off on the right foot. — Two days ago, Codecademy — a startup that's looking to bring programming to the masses — launched a nifty initiative called Code Year.
Discussion:
TechPinions, Business Insider, SachaGreif.com, Tech Cocktail, Web 2.0 Asia Blog and Lifehacker
Chetan / Always On Real-Time Access:
2012 Mobile Industry Predictions Survey — First things first. From all of us at Chetan Sharma Consulting, we wish you and yours a very happy, healthy, and prosperous 2012. My thanks to all who participated in our 2012 Mobile Predictions Annual Survey. It gives our community an insider's view of trends.
Discussion:
AllThingsD, Xconomy, Phones Review, GigaOM and ReadWriteWeb, Thanks:chetansharma
Adam Taylor / Business Insider:
Anonymous Have Begun Targeting German Neo-Nazis — The Anonymous hacking network has a new target — German Neo Nazis. — Deutsche Welle reports that the new operation is nicknamed “Operation Blitzkrieg”, and sees the group attacking a number of websites linked with the National Democratic Party (NPD).
Discussion:
Spiegel Online, Softpedia News, Deutsche Welle, The Local, TG Daily and ReadWriteWeb
Sean Hollister / The Verge:
Samsung Series 5 Ultra up for pre-order in the US, brings optical media to the ultrabook for $949 — Koreans won't be the only ones sticking DVDs into exceptionally thin laptops this year: Samsung's Series 5 Ultra laptops are now available for pre-order at J&R. The first time we heard …
Discussion:
Liliputing, Softpedia News and Electronista
Jennifer Van Grove / VentureBeat:
Embroiled in the Google sponsored-post debacle, Unruly raises $25M (exclusive) — Happier times: Unruly team poses for company photo — A five year-old company that seeks to deliver “awesome social video campaigns” finds itself embroiled in a hairy Internet pickle on a day that would have otherwise been ripe for celebration.
Discussion:
Washington Post, Techdirt, ZDNet, paidContent, Search Engine Land and the Econsultancy blog, more at Mediagazer »
Josh Constine / TechCrunch:
Spool Raises $1 Million To Let You Cache Content To Mobile And Push It To Friends — When Spool debuted at TechCrunch Disrupt in September, the app and browser extension was focused on caching videos, articles, and other web content to your mobile device. It was like Instapaper on steroids.
Discussion:
AllThingsD, Thanks:joshconstine
Kevin Fitchard / GigaOM:
Meet the spectrum bosses — If AT&T-Mo's failure taught us anything it's that if the big U.S. operators are going to grow they can't do it by acquiring each other. Instead they're going to have to buy up what unused spectrum is left on the market to stockpile bandwidth for their future mobile broadband networks.
Mathew Ingram / GigaOM:
Why Twitter's “verified account” failure matters — The new year brought a treat for those who like to follow aging media moguls, with the launch of official Twitter accounts belonging to both News Corp. chairman Rupert Murdoch and his wife Wendi Deng, including some awkward banter around …
Discussion:
Inquirer, The Daily Beast, @twittercomms, Examiner, Emily Bell, Telegraph, Guardian, Marketing Land, @dannysullivan, IBD Click and London Calling Blog, more at Mediagazer »
Matt Brian / The Next Web:
Apple to launch iPhone 4S in China and 21 new countries on January 13 — Apple has announced that it will launch its new iPhone 4S smartphone in China and 21 additional countries on January 13, ensuring that the handset will become available in over 90 countries since it launched.
Discussion:
Business Wire, CNET, MacRumors, TechCrunch, GigaOM, BGR, Mashable!, Mobile, iPhone, MacStories and SlashGear
David Kravets / Threat Level:
No Warrant Needed for GPS Monitoring, Judge Rules — A Missouri federal judge ruled the FBI did not need a warrant to secretly attach a GPS monitoring device to a suspect's car to track his public movements for two months. — The ruling, upholding federal theft and other charges …
Discussion:
The Not-So Private Parts
Fraser Speirs:
Misconceptions About iOS Multitasking — There is one iOS “tip” that I keep hearing and it is wrong. Worse, I keep hearing it from supposedly authoritative sources. I have even heard it from the lips of Apple “Geniuses” in stores. — Here is the advice - and remember it is wrong: … Wrong.
Emil Protalinski / Friending Facebook Blog:
Citi lets Facebook friends share points — Summary: Citi has launched a Facebook app that lets ThankYou Rewards members share points with their Facebook friends. This means you can pool your collective points towards a shared goal. — Citi today announced the Citi ThankYou Point Sharing App …
Discussion:
Washington Times, Ubergizmo, Business Insider and the Econsultancy blog
Zeljka Zorz / Help Net Security:
Defensive search-and-destroy “virus” delivered to Japanese government — It took three years and 178.5 million yen (around $2.3 m) to develop a defensive cyber weapon that can track down the sources of cyber attacks and disable them, but Fujitsu apparently did it.
Discussion:
ZDNet, eWeek, Daily Yomiuri Online, TechEye, Daily Yomiuri Online, Naked Security, Softpedia News, The Register, The Register and Inquirer
Sarah Hodges / RunKeeper:
How Getting Featured in the Android Market Boosted RunKeeper App Downloads by 637% — When the clock struck midnight this weekend, ringing in the New Year, social feeds lit up with New Year's resolution chatter. And RunKeeper's inbox lit up with news that we'd been featured in the Android Market's Health and Fitness section.
Discussion:
9to5Google
