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8:50 PM ET, December 19, 2008

Techmeme

 Top Items: 
Wall Street Journal:
Music Industry to Abandon Mass Suits  —  After years of suing thousands of people for allegedly stealing music via the Internet, the recording industry is set to drop its legal assault as it searches for more effective ways to combat online music piracy.  —  The decision represents …
RELATED:
David Kravets / Threat Level:
No ISP Filtering Under New RIAA Copyright Strategy
Discussion: The Register
Greg Sandoval / CNET News:   RIAA president: No talk of blacklisting file sharers
Times Online / Tech Central:
Is the internet going down?  Undersea sub-cables have just broken...  Breaking news: something's happening to the internet, right now.  We're just not quite sure what.  —  Interoute, the internet networks company, reports that three of the four internet sub-cables that run from Asia to North America have been damaged.
Discussion: The Toybox, Neowin.net and Engadget
RELATED:
fibresystems.org:
3 cables cut this morning (Sea Me We3 partly + Sea Me We4 + FLAG)France Telecom Marine cable ship about to depart  —  PARIS — France Telecom observed today that 3 major underwater cables were cut: “Sea Me We 4” at 7:28am, “Sea Me We3” at 7:33am and FLAG at 8:06am.
Discussion: Threat Level and timesofmalta.com
Bloomberg:
Severed Cables in Mediterranean Disrupt Communication  —  A A A  —  Dec. 19 (Bloomberg) — Internet and telephone communications between the Middle East and Europe were disrupted after three submarine cables between Italy and Egypt in the Mediterranean Sea were damaged.
Michael Masnick / Techdirt:
Why Do Undersea Cables Seem To Get Severed In Bunches?
Discussion: BBC and Ars Technica
comScore:
comScore Releases November 2008 U.S. Search Engine Rankings  —  comScore, Inc. (NASDAQ: SCOR), a leader in measuring the digital world, today released its monthly comScore qSearch analysis of the U.S. search marketplace.  In November 2008, Americans conducted 12.3 billion core searches …
RELATED:
T-Marco / Cell Phone Signal:
T-Mobile G2 coming on January 26th '09  —  Yesterday we told you about the new update coming to T-Mobile G1.  This update will include new features like mms, and video capable.  Unfortunately, some features will not be including for the G1.  Instead, they will be include in feature Android devices..oops.. That's right!
Spencer E. Ante / Business Week:
A Wrench in Silicon Valley's Wealth Machine  —  A year ago, cash rained on tech startups like Digg.  Now their valuations are slipping, and venture capital is drying up  —  A year ago there were reports that Digg had hired investment bank Allen & Co. to put the popular news aggregation Web site …
RELATED:
Caroline McCarthy / The Social:
Report: Digg still mining for profits
Discussion: Lonely CEO Media
Dave / MacBlogz:
One More Thing: Apple's New Multi-touch Mighty Mouse  —  Let's face it, the Mighty Mouse is flawed.  Luckily, Apple has filed for numerous patents directly hinting at a multi-touch Mighty Mouse, which could prove to bring us an unexpected treat sometime in the near future.
Arn / MacRumors:
Evidence that Next iMacs and Mac Minis to use NVIDIA Chipsets  —  Configuration files buried within some versions of Mac OS X show evidence that the next iMac and Mac Mini will indeed be based on the NVIDIA MCP79 chipset.  Apple recently switched their MacBook, MacBook Pro and MacBook Air models to the NVIDIA chipsets in October.
RELATED:
Slash Lane / AppleInsider:
New iMacs and Mac minis confirmed to use NVIDIA chipsets
Discussion: Homotron.net and TUAW
Sascha Segan / PC Magazine:
Palm CEO Confirms ‘Nova’ OS Is in the Wild  —  Both wireless carriers and software developers are already holding devices with the new Palm “Nova” OS, Palm chief executive Ed Colligan revealed in a financial earnings conference call yesterday.  —  Speaking with financial analysts …
Discussion: Industry Standard
RELATED:
Chris Ziegler / Engadget:
UPDATED: Palm doesn't confirm Nova launch at CES, but they may as well have
Discussion: Business Wire, Phone Scoop and Gearlog
Erick Schonfeld / TechCrunch:
Meebo Passes IMs Between MySpace And Facebook  —  MySpace and Facebook may be frenemies forever, but now they have a new mutual friend that will pass notes between them.  Meebo, the Web-based IM service, now supports IM accounts from both social networks.  That means you can enter your Facebook …
RELATED:
Eric Eldon / VentureBeat:   AOL using AIM chat to boost Bebo, challenge Meebo
Nicholas Carlson / Silicon Alley Insider:
Google's Secret Revenue Weapon Revealed (GOOG)  —  All quarter long, Wall Street has been trying to figure out why Google has introduced a slew of new revenue-generating products and suddenly developed new religion with regard to costs.  The obvious answer is that Google is light on revenue and desperately trying to make the quarter.
Discussion: HipMojo.com
english.etnews.co.kr:
Samsung Electronics will launch Google Phone in Q2  —  Samsung Electronics will release its first Google phone in the second quarter of the next year in North America.  —  The launch of Google phone by Samsung is regarded as a signal of its plan for increasing the shares in the smart phone market …
Steve Poland:
Evan - Twitter needs a better policy on Usernames  —  I have a bunch of Twitter usernames — I gobbled them up in March 2007.  I'd consider them some of the “quality” ones.  Almost like the domain game of 1995, I grabbed some of the best Twitter usernames, because I could see value in their use in the future.
Sean O'Malley / The Official Google Blog:
New search-by-style options for Google Image Search  —  Many of us use Google Image Search to find imagery of people, clip art for presentations, diagrams for reports, and of course symbols and patterns for artistic inspiration.  Unfortunately, searching for the perfect image can be challenging …
Zach Epstein / Boy Genius Report:
iPhone 3G goes on sale for two weeks only at Best Buy Mobile  —  One of our trusty Best Buy Mobile ninjas just hit us with some good news for all you last-minute holiday shoppers out there.  Starting today (December 19) through Saturday January 3, the iPhone 3G will be available from Best Buy Mobile for the lowest price in the country.
Alexis Madrigal / Wired Science:
Google Shutters Its Science Data Service  —  Google will shutter its highly-anticipated scientific data service in January without even officially launching the product, the company said in an e-mail to its beta testers.  —  Once nicknamed Palimpsests, but more recently going by the staid name …
Discussion: Google Watch
Matt Richtel / Bits:
Job Losses Hit the Tech Sector (At Long Last)  —  In the fine print of a jobs report published today is some mixed news for Silicon Valley.  —  For the first time in this downturn, the region lost jobs; it has 4,000 fewer jobs than it did a year ago at this time, and its unemployment rate is 7 percent …
Michael Arrington / TechCrunch:
MySpace Puts The Hammer Down On Project Playlist  —  MySpace is getting back into the business of blocking third party widgets, it seems - today they've banned embedded music widgets from the fast growing Project Playlist.  But unlike previous 2006 and 2007 blocks of iMeem, Photobucket and many others …
 
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 More Items: 
Ryan Singel / Epicenter:
The Huffington Post Slammed for Content Theft
Discussion: Gawker
Rory Cellan-Jones / dot.life blog:
Five grand for Sock And Awe
Eric Lai / Computerworld:
Lenovo to release ThinkPad laptop with 2 LCD screens
Discussion: eWeek and NotebookReview.com
Abbey Klaassen / AdAge:
Google Leads in Ad-Serving Share
Discussion: Microsoft Pri0
Peter Kafka / MediaMemo:
YouTube's Music Videos: Popular, Money-Losing. For Now.
Eric Savitz / Tech Trader Daily:
Google: Is The Search Ad Business In Trouble?
Discussion: Clickety Clack
Colin Barras / New Scientist:
Fat fingers no problem with ‘see-through’ touchscreen
Discussion: Engadget
David Meyer / CNET News:
Google reveals upcoming Android features
Discussion: TECH.BLORGE.com and Obsessable
 Earlier Items: 
Kara Swisher / BoomTown:
Lloyd Braun's Not Going to Take It Anymore: “I Am Not an Umbrella …
Discussion: Valleywag
Andy Greenberg / Forbes:
Seeking Obama's Cyber Czar
Michelle Maltais / L.A. Times Tech Blog:
New question for iPod: Am iDrunk?
Stephen Shankland / Webware.com:
Search results show Delicious remains a tech niche
Discussion: delicious blog
Michael Masnick / Techdirt:
Chilling Effects: Another Mixtape Provider Shut Down
Discussion: Epicenter
 

 
From Mediagazer:

Benjamin Mullin / New York Times:
Authentic Brands licenses Sports Illustrated's publishing rights to The Players' Tribune owner Minute Media for 10 years, with plans to keep the print edition

Charlotte Tobitt / Press Gazette:
Ofcom rules that five GB News programs presented by Conservative politicians have broken its due impartiality rules and puts the channel “on notice”

Todd Spangler / Variety:
YouTuber MrBeast announces a deal with Prime Video for Beast Games, a reality-competition show with 1,000 contestants, promising the winner a $5M cash prize

 
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