Top Items:
Robert X. Cringely / InfoWorld:
Look before you leak — I bet you thought people banked in the Cayman Islands because they serve fruity cocktails with tiny parasols in them while you're waiting for your checks to clear. Well, you're only partly right. The other reason people keep accounts in the Caymans is to avoid paying taxes …
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Brandi Stewart / Fortune Small Business:
eBay seller strike starts, listings dip — EBay's listings appear to be down 3% since this week's seller strike began, but separating the boycott's effects from standard daily fluctuations is a tricky task. — (FORTUNE Small Business) — Monday marked the start of a week-long eBay (EBAY …
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Brad Linder / Download Squad:
Microsoft releases Windows XP SP3 RC2 — Microsoft has released Windows XP Service Pack 3 Release Candidate 2 to the general public. For the last few weeks the latest pre-release version of SP3 was only available to about 15,000 beta testers. But now you can download the update from Microsoft's servers using Windows Update.
Discussion:
WinBeta
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Reuters:
Sprint expected to undercut rivals' call plans — NEW YORK (Reuters) - No. 3 U.S. mobile service provider Sprint Nextel Corp (S.N) is expected to offer flat-rate calling plans at up to a 40 percent discount to its rivals, hurtling the industry into a price war, analysts said on Wednesday.
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Ina Fried / CNET News.com:
Gates on Yahoo: It's the people — PALO ALTO, Calif.—Bill Gates is willing to pay a lot for engineering talent. — Asked what makes Yahoo worth more than $40 billion, Gates pointed not to the company's products, its huge base of advertisers or its market share, but rather to the company's engineers.
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Greg Sterling / Search Engine Land:Gates On Yahoo Acquisition: It's The Engineers We Want
Discussion:
CNET News.com
Ryan Block / Engadget:
Microsoft announces games for Zune via XNA Studio — Looks like games are coming for the Zune after all! Microsoft just announed XNA Studio developers will be able to use the Zune as a multiplayer wireless mobile gaming platform. Details are sparse at this point, but it looks like it's …
Adam Frucci / Gizmodo:
Sharper Image Files for Bankruptcy; You'll Need to Go Elsewhere to Try Out a Massage Recliner — When I was a kid and would get dragged to the mall by my parents, I would always gravitate to stores like Sharper Image. These gadget-stuffed stores probably never actually got a sale out of me …
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Thomas Ricker / Engadget:
HP's UMPC 2133 to cost $630 when shipping in April? — A report by the Commercial Times says that HP will launch its 8.9-inch UMPC in April for “more than” NT$20,000 or about $630 bucks. Sure sounds like the UMPC 2133 we showed you yesterday, eh? That's about right when you compare it to the $300, entry-level 7-inch Eee PC.
Discussion:
Electronista, UMPCPortal, The Mobile Gadgeteer, The Boy Genius Report, Mobility Site, The Register and Digg
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Om Malik / GigaOM:
Google & Its 99 Broadband Balloons — Google, according to The Wall Street Journal is thinking about teaming up with Space Data Corp., a company that sends balloons carrying small (micro) base stations about 20 miles up in the air for providing connectivity to truckers and oil companies.
Ashkan Karbasfrooshan / HipMojo.com:
Why Most VC-Backed, Ad-Supported Companies Are Doomed to Fail — Most of the web projects out there are ad-supported, or intend to be ad-supported. — While a lot of companies are bootstrapped, most are financed by angel investors or venture capitalists.
Discussion:
Tech Confidential
Michael Arrington / TechCrunch:
GenieTown Launches To Tackle Local Services — Palo Alto-based Genie Town launches this morning. They're trying to crack the local services nut - a huge market, but one that a lot of the big guys are eyeing, too. — The company says they are addressing the long tail of local services.
Discussion:
Tech Confidential, Insider Chatter, Screenwerk, Rational rants, 901am, CenterNetworks, bub.blicio.us, VentureBeat and Mashable!
Niro / Nir Ofir:
Olympic committe says yes to bloggers!?! No! — The IOC Blogging Guidelines just fell into my mailbox. It was clear to me the the Olympic committee must adjust it's rules to the emerging world of social media, blogging, photo sharing and video sharing and to use it as an advantage.
Discussion:
ReadWriteWeb
Nivi / Venture Hacks:
T-Shirts for VCs — Hilarious new t-shirts for the “top 2/20%” (get it?) of the population from VC Wear: — There are more awesome t-shirts at VC Wear as well a Powerpoint Pitch and a Buy it (the company) Now button. — There's truth in every shirt. Brilliant.
Discussion:
Valleywag
Ernesto / TorrentFreak:
EU Invests $22 Million in Next-Generation BitTorrent Client — A few weeks ago we reported that the EU Greens launched a pro-filesharing campaign named “I Wouldn't Steal”. In a continued effort to support the development of P2P technology, the European Union has now invested $22 million …
Discussion:
CrunchGear, Ars Technica, TechSpot News, NewTeeVee, Mashable!, The Open Road, All News Feeds, paidContent and Digg
Jason / Signal vs. Noise:
The New Backpack's First 24 Hours — Yesterday's big Backpack update was a huge success. It was the best day in Backpack's history — even better than the last big update in July '07 and add anywhere in Oct '07. — We usually don't share numbers, but we thought we'd break tradition …
Doug Aamoth / CrunchGear:
Wired tells us how to convert HD DVD to Blu-ray — Holy crap, this almost seems like more trouble than it's worth but if you're looking to convert your “old” HD DVDs to Blu-ray, Wired's How-To Wiki has got you covered. You'll need a fast Windows machine, an HD DVD drive, a Blu-ray burner …
Frank Caron / Ars Technica:
XNA games coming to the Zune, Xbox Live Arcade — This morning at the Game Developers Conference in San Francisco, Microsoft announced the next step in its Xbox Live and XNA initiative: the Zune will be entering the fray as new third pillar of XNA software support, with over 1,000 games for the device by year end.
