Check out Mini-Techmeme for simple mobiles or Techmeme Mobile for modern smartphones.
7:55 PM ET, January 19, 2012

Techmeme

 Top Items: 
Dan Wineman / venomous porridge:
The Unprecedented Audacity of the iBooks Author EULA  —  Apple just released iBooks Author, a free Mac app for creating digital books for the new version of iBooks.  I haven't played with it much, but so far it looks like a very good tool.  However, a curious thing happens when you go to export your work in iBooks format:
RELATED:
Tom Neumayr / Apple:
Apple Unveils All-New iTunes U App for iPad, iPhone & iPod touch  —  Entire Courses from Top Universities Now Available in One App  —  Apple® today announced an all-new iTunes® U app, giving educators and students everything they need on their iPad®, iPhone® and iPod touch® to teach and take entire courses.
Peter Kafka / AllThingsD:
Apple's New Math.  Or: Why A $15 E-Book Equals a $75 Paper Book.  —  McGraw-Hill normally sells high-school textbooks for $75 a pop. Now it says it will sell electronic versions of the same books, via Apple, for $15 apiece.  How can the publisher make that work?
Darrell Etherington / GigaOM:
Apple announces new iPad textbook experience with iBooks 2
Erick Schonfeld / TechCrunch:   Kno CEO Osman Rashid To Apple: “Now We Will Fight On Who Has The Better Product”
Chris Ziegler / The Verge:
Anonymous claims DOJ and record label site takedowns in response to MegaUpload suit  —  By all appearances, Anonymous isn't too happy with the Department of Justice's move to take down file sharing site MegaUpload today, because it's now claiming that it's knocked the DOJ's site off the internet …
RELATED:
Devlin Barrett / Wall Street Journal:
FBI Charges Seven With Online Piracy  —  WASHINGTON—The Federal Bureau of Investigation moved against a group of suspected online pirates Thursday, targeting the popular file-sharing website megaupload.com a day after Washington lawmakers were besieged by complaints about legislation designed …
Billboard:
Swizz Beatz's Resume: The History of a Multi-Tasker  —  In today's fluid economy it's not uncommon to have a second job.  A third, fourth, or fifth job though, is something special.  And when you're super-producer Swizz Beatz and you have a baker's dozen jobs at once, it's frankly less …
Nilay Patel / The Verge:
Justice Department calls MegaUpload an ‘international organized criminal enterprise,’ founder Kim Dotcom arrested in New Zealand  —  The United States Justice Department filed charges against MegaUpload today, calling the file-sharing service an “international organized criminal enterprise …
Nitasha Tiku / Betabeat:
Surprising New Figure in the Piracy Wars? Swizz Beatz, Megaupload.com's Secret CEO
Google Investor Relations:
Google Announces Fourth Quarter and Fiscal Year 2011 Results  —  Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) today announced financial results for the quarter and the fiscal year ended December 31, 2011.  —  “Google had a really strong quarter ending a great year.  Full year revenue was up 29% …
RELATED:
Eric Eldon / TechCrunch:
Larry Page Is Super Excited To Announce That Google+ Has 90M Users [Update: Engagement+?]  —  The official numbers are in for Google's new social network, Google+.  Beating out most previous third-party estimates that we've seen, the company said today that it now has 90 million users worldwide.
Dan Gallagher / MarketWatch:
Google earnings rise 6%, but miss targets
Discussion: Bloomberg
Summify:
Summify Joins The Flock At Twitter!  —  You've probably noticed we've been quiet lately.  Well, we're extremely excited to announce that Summify has been acquired by Twitter!  I know, right?  We can hardly believe it ourselves!  —  Roughly 2 years ago, we moved from Romania to Vancouver …
RELATED:
Mike Davidson / mikeindustries.com:   Twitter Buys Summify, Gives Everyone a Reason to Use It
Alexia Tsotsis / TechCrunch:
Microsoft Reports Record Revenue: Up 5% To $20.9B, Earnings At $0.78 Per Share  —  Microsoft just reported its second quarter 2012 earnings with revenues of $20.9 billion, an 5% increase from the same period of the prior year.  Microsoft's operating income, net income, and diluted earnings per share …
RELATED:
Stuart Miles / Pocket-lint:
Bing Maps to get Nokia branding on all devices - including rivals'  —  Nokia CEO, Stephen Elop, has told Pocket-lint that we shall soon be seeing the Nokia brand name within other devices and not just the company's own phones.  —  “You'll starting seeing the word ‘Nokia’ on a map …
John Paczkowski / AllThingsD:
Amazon Makes More Than $100 Off Each Kindle Fire  —  The hardware and manufacturing costs of the Kindle Fire may exceed the device's retail price, but Amazon is not losing any money on it.  Every Kindle sold is another annuity revenue stream for the company, strengthening its core retail business.
Discussion: AndroidGuys
RELATED:
Eric Savitz / The Tech Trade:
Amazon Kindle Fire: More Profitable Than Expected?
Jack Purcher / Patently Apple:
Apple introduces us to Siri, the Killer Patent  —  On October 4, 2011Apple launched the iPhone 4S with Siri, just one day prior to Steve Jobs passing.  Today, the first killer patent application behind Siri was published by the US Patent and Trademark Office.
The Politico:
On PIPA, Senate in talks to yank search  —  Sens. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) and Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.) are in discussions to exempt search-result blocking from the PROTECT IP Act, sources confirmed to POLITICO.  —  Kyl made the proposal to Leahy on Wednesday.  The measure is one of the biggest sticking points …
RELATED:
David Goldman / CNN Money:
At $400 billion, Apple is worth more than Greece  —  NEW YORK (CNNMoney) — Apple's value on the stock market briefly rose to $400 billion on Thursday, a record high for what was already the world's most valuable technology company.  —  The company's market cap slipped below the $400 billion mark …
Discussion: 9to5Mac, AllThingsD and CNNMoney.com
Adam Lashinsky / Fortune:
Larry Page: Google should be like a family  —  In an exclusive Q&A, Google's co-founder and CEO explains how he built a No. 1 workplace — and why it matters.  —  Google also claimed the top spot on our list in 2007 and 2008 - making it the only three-time champion.
Danny Sullivan / Search Engine Land:
Pages With Too Many Ads “Above The Fold” Now Penalized By Google's “Page Layout” Algorithm  —  Do you shove lots of ads at the top of your web pages?  Think again.  Tired of doing a Google search and landing on these types of pages?  Rejoice.  Google has announced that it will penalize sites with pages that are top-heavy with ads.
Discussion: Inside Search
Krystal Peak / VatorNews:
Nike announces FitBit, JawboneUP competition ‘FuelBand’  —  As consumers demand more from mobile health, Nike pours fuel on the fire  —  With everyone trying to uphold their New Year's resolutions — or resuscitate them — Nike took some time out on Thursday to announce a new tool to track …
Nancy Messieh / The Next Web:
Death sentence for Iranian programmer accused of developing software used by porn sites  —  Iran's stranglehold on Internet use in the country is no secret.  From monitoring its users to blocking sites quicker than you can say Ahmadinejad, Iranian authorities will stop at nothing to ensure …
Leena Rao / TechCrunch:
IBM's Q4 Revenue Up 2 Percent To $29.5B; Net Income Up 4 Percent To $5.5B  —  IBM just released fourth quarter and fiscal year 2011 earnings today.  Non-GAAP earnings came in at $4.71, up 11 percent; GAAP earnings per share were $4.62 per share (up 11 percent) for the quarter.
Melanie Lee / Reuters:
China's challenge to the iPad raises a red flag  —  (Reuters) - China Communist Party members can now carry a tablet PC to verify identification cards, read the blogs of cadres and manage state-owned firms without fretting that using a bourgeois Apple Inc iPad will ruin their street cred.
Discussion: CNET, CNET and PhoneArena
 
 Archived Page Info: 
This is a snapshot of Techmeme at 7:55 PM ET, January 19, 2012.

View the current page or another snapshot:


 
 Techmeme Sponsor Posts: 
Meta:
Open Source AI: Available to all, not just the few  —  Meta's open source AI enables small businesses, start-ups, students, researchers and more to download and build with our models at no cost.
Tribe AI:
Build AI products that matter  —  Tribe AI helps organizations rapidly deploy AI solutions that have real business impact.  We bring together world class AI talent and tooling to drive differentiated results.
Zoho:
CIO challenge 5: Can we find an effective solution that also minimizes operational costs?  —  Welcome to the next and final installment of our CIO series!  After what feels like a thousand cups of coffee …
Hamming:
Make AI Voice Agents trustworthy  —  Hamming AI automatically tests AI voice agents and continuously monitors them in production.
Sponsor Techmeme
 
 See Also: 
Techmeme: site main
Techmeme River: reverse chronological Techmeme
Techmeme Mobile: for phones
Techmeme Leaderboard: Techmeme's top sources
 
 Subscribe: 
Techmeme RSS feed
Techmeme on X
Techmeme on Mastodon
 
 
 More Items: 
Matt Wirz / Wall Street Journal:
Icahn Buys LightSquared Debt as Distressed Investors Circle
Discussion: GigaOM and Wall Street Journal
Matt Lynley / Business Insider:
Path Is Raising A Big Funding Round To Go With Its Shiny New App
J.B. / Fusible.com:
Facebook registers domains for something called “FB Origin”
Bloomberg:
Apple Seeks ‘Clarifying Language’ on Patents in Kodak Loan
Kathleen De Vere / Inside Mobile Apps:
Exclusive: Xbox Live games coming to other platforms
Amir Efrati / Wall Street Journal:
Google Deepens Push Into Online Display Ads
 Earlier Items: 
Tim Stevens / Engadget:
Apple iTunes U hands-on (video)
Discussion: The Verge
Paul Graham:
A Word to the Resourceful  —  A year ago I noticed a pattern …
WantChinaTimes-News:
Foxconn chairman likens his workforce to animals
Leena Rao / TechCrunch:
Former Google CIO Raises $73 Million To Reform Payday Loans With Data-Driven Startup ZestCash
Discussion: VentureBeat
Kara Swisher / AllThingsD:
As Weak Q4 Earnings Loom, Yahoo Freezes Hiring and Also Contemplates Layoffs
Discussion: BGR
Austin Carr / Fast Company:
Could Instagram Come To Windows Phone Before Android?
Discussion: The Next Web
Carl Sjogreen / Facebook Blog:
Introducing New Apps for Timeline
 

 
From Mediagazer:

Alex Sherman / CNBC:
Analyzing Comcast's spinoff of cable networks, purposefully structured with low debt: the move might be a signal to the industry that it's time to consolidate

Daniel Thomas / Financial Times:
James Harding says the Tortoise-Observer deal could create a profitable media group and there isn't a guaranteed future for the Observer with the Guardian

Charlie Savage / New York Times:
Trump says Republicans must kill the PRESS Act, which would protect journalists' records and sources from the US government; the bill is stalled in the Senate

 
Sister Sites:

Mediagazer
 Top news and commentary for media professionals from all around the web
memeorandum
 What US political commentators are discussing online right now
WeSmirch
 The top celebrity news from all around the web on a single page