Top Items:
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 as a Powerpoint Pitch and a Buy it (the company) Now button. — There's truth in every t-shirt.
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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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.
RELATED:
Amol Sharma / Wall Street Journal:Floating a New Idea For Going Wireless, Parachute Included
Discussion:
Techdirt, Gizmodo, DSLreports, All News Feeds, localmobilesearch.net, MobHappy and Blogcosm
Todd Bishop / Todd Bishop's Microsoft Blog:
Bill Gates pooh-poohed Yahoo deal last year — In a series of interviews this week, Bill Gates has spoken positively about Microsoft's proposed Yahoo deal — telling CNet News.com, for example, that the addition of Yahoo's engineers is why Microsoft believes the potential combination would be “powerful.”
RELATED:
Ina Fried / CNET News.com:Gates on Yahoo: It's the people
Discussion:
Search Engine Land, Valleywag, Between the Lines, Network World and The Technology Chronicles
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:
VC Ratings, Clickety Clack, One By One Media, broadstuff and Bubblegeneration Strategy Lab
nextgendesigncomp.com:
Momenta, the PC for Life — Momenta, the neck worn PC also captures the best and most exciting moments of your life. Ever thought, “Man I wish I had that on tape!” When everybody is laughing themselves to tears, Momenta has already captured the previous 5 minutes from its rolling buffer …
Discussion:
Life On the Wicked Stage
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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 …
Discussion:
Christopher Null, WebProNews, CyberNet, VC Ratings, Download Squad, MarketingShift, Mashable! and Silicon Alley Insider
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Jacqui Cheng / Infinite Loop:
Apple: Have a keyboard update! Oh, and IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH — Are you a MacBook or MacBook Pro owner who recently installed Apple's Keyboard Firmware Upgrade 1.0? Turns out, that update brings more than the first keypress after the machine has been sitting idle.
Ryan Block / Engadget:
Microsoft announces games for Zune via XNA Studio — Looks like games are coming for the Zune after all! Microsoft just announced 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 …
Discussion:
Channel 10, Zune Insider, Gizmodo, Joystiq, CyberNet, Crave, anythingbutipod>>, Electronista, Paul Colligan's …, Gadgetophile and Digg
Doug Aamoth / CrunchGear:
AirDrives for iPhone now available — Now we're talking. Back in July, yours truly did a post on the new AirDrives headphones — you know, the headphones that basically sit on the outside of your ear “eliminating the need to choose between music and social interaction” …
Discussion:
Ubergizmo
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.
Henry Blodget / Silicon Alley Insider:
How Much Will Yahoo's New Severance Plan Cost Microsoft? — Yahoo's new severance/retention plan is the envy of every employee on earth (details here). So how much will it cost an acquirer? At least $1 billion and possibly as much as $3 billion. — The most expensive aspects …
Todd Bishop / Todd Bishop's Microsoft Blog:
Departing Microsoft exec has big house, warm pants — Here's some interesting timing: The new issue of “425,” a magazine about the Seattle region's Eastside, includes a big spread on the home of Steve Berkowitz — a senior vice president in Microsoft's unprofitable online division …
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.
Eric Eldon / VentureBeat:
Trends: Secretive New York bank Allen & Co. gets into Silicon Valley media tech — Some big social web companies have recently started working with a small New York bank called Allen & Company. It's a secretive, family-run firm that specializes in high-level connections between investors, media executives and other power brokers.
