Top Items:
Antony Bruno / billboard.biz:
ZUNE GETS IN THE RING — Microsoft Preps Music Player, Service To Rival Apple's Wares — Microsoft officials for the first time have confirmed that the Redmond, Wash.-based company is readying a portable music player and integrated service, shedding new light on a topic …
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Nick / Rough Type:
Zune and the Apple way — Early last year, Bill Gates commented on Apple's success with its "closed" iTunes/iPod system and laid out Microsoft's very different, "open" strategy for the music-player market: … "Other than Apple and Microsoft," he should have said.
CNET News.com:
Microsoft's Zune to rival Apple's iPod — update After trying for years to compete with the iPod through an array of partners, Microsoft confirmed Friday that it plans to directly go after Apple Computer with its own rival, Zune. — Confirming weeks of rumors, Microsoft …
Gizmodo:
Zune News Trifecta — Since Microsoft's official announcement in Billboard didn't tell us all that much new info, here's a little bit more on Zune's rumored capabilities from another tipster. — There's going to be an add-on game pad similar to the Sony Ericsson P800 Bluetooth game pad.
Don Dodge / Don Dodge on The Next Big Thing:
Zune entertaintment experience — Microsoft has officially announced the Zune entertainment device that will compete with iPod. Microsoft said Zune will deliver "a family of hardware and software products" that will "bring together technology and community to allow consumers to explore and discover music together."
Fred / A VC:
Scars From The Last Bubble — In general, I think entrepreneurs and VCs who lived through the last bubble and its burst are better off because of it. We've seen what can go wrong and what happens when it does go wrong. I think it has made us all better at what we do.
Kevin O'Keefe / Real Lawyers:
Best blogs send audience away — Jeff Jarvis writes "The problem with portals is that they aren't portals at all. ... They want to lure you in and then not let you leave." … Some of the best blogs are what Buzz Bruggeman describes as intelligence agents.
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Ryan Block / Engadget:
Apple to do eBooks? — We tend to field a lot of inside information here at Engadget HQ, but we've gotten not one, but two bits from separate, trustworthy insiders that Apple's not satisfied merely vending Audible's books-on-digital-audio solution. With the iRex iLiad and Sony PRS-50 Portable Reader …
Discussion:
rexblog, TeleRead, Infinite Loop, CyberNet Technology News, The Unofficial Apple Weblog, MobileRead Networks and digg
Michelle Pearcy / Dell one2one:
No Bloatware, Please — Michelle Pearcy, WW Client Software Manager — Lots of chatter these days on why Dell pre-loads so much software on new systems. Several of you have asked about how this software affects performance, some have commented about the sheer number of apps …
Nick / Rough Type:
When "direct" becomes a disadvantage — Dell's latest and greatest earnings disappointment pretty much settles it: The company isn't just struggling to overcome a blip; its traditional strategy is no longer working, at least not the way it used to. — What went wrong?
Russell Shaw / IP Telephony, VoIP, Broadband:
Skype applies for trademark that could mean worldwide free calling to any phone — This is going to sound strange and quite likely improbable, but I have information that may indicate that Skype could be considering dropping the equivalent of a nuclear bomb on the VoIP world.
Matt Cutts / Gadgets, Google, and SEO:
Independent report on invalid clicks released — Seems like a good time to remind people of my disclaimer, because this post is purely my opinion. — Normally, reading court documents is nearly the last thing I would want to do on a Saturday. But if you're a search engine geek like me …
Reuters:
AMD seen close to $5.5 billion chip deal — Source says Applied Micro Devices could announce deal with #2 Canadian chipmaker as early as Monday. — PHILADELPHIA (Reuters) — Advanced Micro Devices, the No. 2 supplier of computer processors, is close to a deal to buy graphics chip maker ATI …
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the cool hunter:
GOOGLE VISION - POINT AND AIM — Get lost? Do you? Well, yet another bright young designer from the U.K is developing a system that will have tag and name exactly what your staring at. Google Vision is a conceptual product developed by Callum Peden, for the worlds favorite search engine.
Jeff Jarvis / BuzzMachine:
Too many journalists — The accepted wisdom in the news biz is that you can never have too many journalists and that the ad and circ crunch hitting papers will hurt papers by reducing newsroom staff. I've been questioning that wisdom here. — But sitting on another darned panel yesterday …
Doc Searls / Linux Journal:
Markets without Marketing — Next Tuesday at OSCON in Portland, I'll be giving a 3.5 hour tutorial titled Open Source Clue Training: How to Market to People Who Hate Marketing. — As I prepare for that, I thought I'd share some of the curriculum I've come up with.
Discussion:
People Over Process
Steve Lohr / New York Times:
Profit Lags as Microsoft Spends to Meet Competitors — Microsoft reported yesterday that its sales grew strongly in the recent quarter, but its profits lagged. — The company is in the midst of product transition as sales of its new, as yet unprofitable, Xbox video game console are increasing rapidly …
Discussion:
DealBreaker.com
Jon Arnold / Jon Arnold's Blog:
Gizmo Project, Part 2 - What About the Biz Model? — Yesterday, I posted about Gizmo's All Calls Free offering. Notice that I'm calling this an "offering" - not a "plan". It's an offering - you can take it or leave it. — I don't normally do follow-ons to my posts, but I am here.
