Top Items:
USA Today:
AT&T flings cellphone network wide open — NEW YORK — Starting immediately, AT&T (T) customers can ditch their AT&T phones and use any wireless phone, device and software application from any maker — think smartphones, e-mail and music downloading. And they don't have to sign a contract.
Discussion:
Ars Technica, GigaOM, Epicenter, DSLreports, Christopher Null, WebProNews, mathewingram.com/work, Digital Trends, BetaNews, TECH.BLORGE.com, IntoMobile, IP Democracy, Digital Daily, Blackfriars' Marketing, mocoNews.net, dailywireless.org, bijansabet.com, michael parekh on IT, IP Telephony, VoIP, Broadband, ParisLemon, atmaspheric, Podcasting News and Mashable!
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Ryan Block / Engadget:
AT&T claims completely open network, too — "the most open," even! — Who'd have thought the end of 2007 would see US cellphone carrier heavyweights duking it out with PR one-upsmanship to be... open? Seriously, someone pinch us, it's as amazing as it is farcical.
Mike Masnick / Techdirt:
AT&T Does Nothing, Convinces Reporter It Has Now 'Opened' Its Network — When Verizon Wireless announced last month its plans to "open" its network some people noticed very quickly that what Verizon Wireless was announcing didn't sound any different from what GSM operators, like AT&T and T-Mobile already had.
Michael Arrington / TechCrunch:
Facebook Messages: Small Change, Big Impact. — Dear Facebook: Thank You. Thank You. Thank You. — In August Facebook opened up their messaging system to allow people to add normal email addresses. I wrote a post praising the change, but I specifically asked for more:
Declan McCullagh / CNET News.com:
House vote on illegal images sweeps in Wi-Fi, Web sites — The U.S. House of Representatives on Wednesday overwhelmingly approved a bill saying that anyone offering an open Wi-Fi connection to the public must report illegal images including "obscene" cartoons and drawings—or face fines of up to $300,000.
Discussion:
Gizmodo, Read/WriteWeb, WebProNews, Engadget, DSLreports, Podcasting News, Gadget Lab, Channel 9, Wi-Fi Networking News, Slashdot, WebProBlog, RSS, The Last Podcast and Digg
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George Ou:
We need to calm down over the SAFE act — Slashdot had this eye-popping headliner "House Bill Could Criminalize Free Wi-Fi Operators" which linked to Declan McCullagh's story "House vote on illegal images sweeps in Wi-Fi, Web sites". The bill in question H.R.876 would enact huge fines …
InfoWorld:
IBM researchers build supercomputer-on-a-chip — San Francisco - Supercomputers may soon be the same size as a laptop if IBM brings to market research detailed on Thursday, in which pulses of light replace electricity to make data transfer between processor cores on a chip up to one-hundred times faster.
RELATED:
Joshua Topolsky / Engadget:IBM creates a chip-sized supercomputer
Discussion:
Data Center Knowledge
Electronista:
iPhone 1.1.3 to bring voice capture, disk mode? — Apple may be preparing a significant update for the iPhone as early as this weekend that will have some heavily requested features, according to a claim from CNET France. The site points to multiple reports that a 1.1.3 upgrade for the iPhone …
Declan McCullagh / CNET News.com:
Major copyright bill boosts penalties, creates new agency — In the aftermath of the $222,000 jury verdict that the Recording Industry Association of America recently won against a Minnesota woman who shared 24 songs on Kazaa, the U.S. Congress is preparing to amend copyright law.
Discussion:
TorrentFreak
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Chris Kanaracus / PC World:
SourceForge Opens Online Marketplace — SourceForge.net now has a marketplace, where users can offer support services. — Recommend this story? — SourceForge Inc.'s open-source, project-hosting Web site now has an eBay-like marketplace, where users can offer support services for sale.
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Erica Ogg / Crave: The gadget blog:
Dell to sell PCs at Best Buy — Beginning in the next few weeks, Dell notebooks and desktops will be for sale at Best Buy, the companies announced Thursday. — Several models of XPS and Inspiron PCs will be available at 900 Best Buy locations, including the XPS M1330 in white …
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Ionut Alex Chitu / Google Operating System:
Small New Features Make Gmail Better — It seems that Gmail 2.0 is all about small new features. There may be small, but you'll find plenty of minor updates and there are more to come. — Contact tooltips — The tooltip that showed up when you hovered over the name of a contact …
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Robert A. Guth / Wall Street Journal:
Microsoft to Field Test PC For Developing Countries — Microsoft Corp. said that it will field test an inexpensive laptop PC for developing nations being championed by Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor Nicholas Negroponte. — Microsoft's plans mark a step closer …
RELATED:
Ina Fried / CNET News.com:More on Microsoft's effort to put XP on XO
Discussion:
dailywireless.org, Incremental Blogger, BetaNews, Gadgetell, Inside UP, Gizmodo, Microsoft Watch, Compiler and TechSpot News
Vauhini Vara / Wall Street Journal:
Facebook Rethinks Tracking — Site Apologizes, — Makes It Easier — To Retain Privacy — After weeks of criticism over a new advertising program that was perceived as a privacy threat, Facebook Inc. has tweaked its privacy settings and offered a public apology from its chief executive — but advertisers remain wary.
Discussion:
DailyTech
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Kevin Allison / Financial Times:
Apple's rising popularity lures hackers — After years of relative safety, the Apple Mac is becoming an increasingly tempting target for malicious computer hackers, according to a new report published this week. — Security researchers have been aware of the threat to Apple since last year …
Duncan Riley / TechCrunch:
Google Books Adds Hand Scans — The often controversial Google Books program, Google's effort to scan and digitize every book ever printed has an interesting new addition: hand scans. — It appears that the Google employees scanning 3000 books a day may be under a bit too much pressure …
IEBlog:
Internet Explorer 8 — Just as he was the first to talk about IE7, Bill Gates kept the tradition alive and discussed IE8 at the Mix 'n Mash event here on campus yesterday. Bill was talking to some bloggers about IE.Next and called it IE8, the same way we do here in the IE team hallway.
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John Biggs / CrunchGear:
Sony Ericsson patent to amaze friends, family with bogus gesture-based controls — Raise your finger if you think this patent is stupid. — Dear Gadget Bloggers: — Patents are ideas officially recorded by companies to ensure no one else gets them first.
