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10:50 AM ET, December 20, 2008

Techmeme

 Top Items: 
Harry McCracken / Technologizer:
The Wide (and Weird) World of Two-Screen Laptops  —  Lenovo's upcoming ThinkPad W700 mobile workstations are loaded with high-end features, including Intel Core 2 Quad CPUs and Nvidia Quadro Express graphics, RAID storage, and built-in Wacom pen tablets.  But one feature is as close …
Discussion: eWeek
RELATED:
Nicholas Carlson / Silicon Alley Insider:
Digg's Miserable Business  —  BusinessWeek got ahold of social news site Digg's financials.  —  For a site that gets as much traffic as Digg.com does — 22.6 million monthly uniques, according to Quantcast — the numbers are gruesome:  — Last year the company lost $2.8 million on $4.8 million of revenue
Henry Blodget / Silicon Alley Insider:
Huffington Post Blasted For Stealing Content  —  The Huffington Post's news aggregation business drives enormous traffic to the third-party sites its editors link to (including, occasionally, this one).  The Huffington Post also often excerpts liberally from third-party sites' stories and uses …
Discussion: Chicagoland
RELATED:
Ryan Singel / Epicenter:
The Huffington Post Slammed for Content Theft  —  The Huffington Post, a venture-capital-backed new media site that mixes links to other sites content with hundreds of celebrity and volunteer blogger posts, is being accused of slimy business practices by a handful of smaller publications …
Discussion: Chicagoland and Gawker
RELATED:
Todd Bishop / TechFlash:   Google search share hits new high, as Microsoft matches its all-time low
Michael Arrington / TechCrunch:
Facebook Stares Down Labels Over Project Playlist Takedown Demand  —  Earlier this afternoon MySpace scrubbed all traces of Project Playlist music widgets from the site, and users are unable to embed any further playlists.  The scrub was the result of infringement notices from the major labels …
Discussion: Webware.com
RELATED:
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 …
Discussion: hypebot and VentureBeat
David Kravets / Threat Level:
No ISP Filtering Under New RIAA Copyright Strategy  —  The Recording Industry Association of America on Friday announced a new strategy in its quest to curtail online copyright infringement — a plan that for now requires no filtering from internet service providers.
RELATED:
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.
Michael Masnick / Techdirt:
Why Do Undersea Cables Seem To Get Severed In Bunches?  —  There's just something about undersea internet cables that seem to have them get severed in groups.  You may recall the various conspiracy theories that cropped up, at the beginning of the year, after four such cables were broken …
Discussion: Ars Technica, Electronista and Gizmodo
Saul Hansell / Bits:
What Xbox Wants to Be When It Grows Up  —  (Credit: David Paul Morris/Getty Images)  —  After more than four years running Microsoft's game studio, Shane Kim was given a new assignment this fall, running strategy and business development for the unit that makes the Xbox game console.
Discussion: Kotaku and Gizmodo
David Kaplan / paidContent.org:
Newspapers Suddenly Adapt To Socal Media; Nearly 60 Percent Offer User-Gen Content  —  Newspapers' tough times appear to have spurred the industry to adopt the kind of social media habits that have led so many readers away from the traditional news format.  In The Bivings Group's annual look …
Discussion: PR 2.0 and Journalistopia
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 …
Peter Kafka / MediaMemo:
YouTube's Music Videos: Popular, Money-Losing.  For Now.  —  Universal Music Group officials told CNET this week that they're going to make close to $100 million from Internet videos this year-an 80 percent increase-and that most of that will come from Google's (GOOG) YouTube.
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!
John Cook / TechFlash:
Mag regrets Count Me In CEO story, says it went to press before scandal  —  Talk about bad timing.  The latest issue of Seattle Business Monthly features a cover story on Count Me In Chief Executive Terry Drayton, whose Bellevue company has been at the center of a scandal for failing to pay …
Jenna Wortham / Bits:
Filtering Twitter, One Tweet at a Time  —  This is part of a series of posts this week on happenings in the sprawling but always succinct world of Twitter.  —  Here are a few that caught our eye:  —  As the San Francisco-based Twitter grows in popularity, third-party developers have jumped …
Discussion: Twist Image and TheNextWeb.com
MG Siegler / VentureBeat:
Google Reader quietly launches a “What's hot” area.  Where's the “most shared” area?  —  Given the number of people who use Google Reader's “Starred items” and “Shared items” features, you'd think Google would have some very good data for creating a killer “best of” area for stories across the web.
 
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 More Items: 
Erick Schonfeld / TechCrunch:
Pandora Hits 20 Million Registered Users (Via Twitter)
Discussion: Online Media Cultist and digg.com
Claudine Beaumont / Telegraph:
Gadget frustration peaks at 11.48am on Christmas Day says survey
Discussion: Sony Insider
Declan McCullagh / CNET News:
After six years, Homeland Security still without ‘cybercrisis’ plan
Connie Loizos / PE Hub Blog:
FreedomPay Raises More $$  —  FreedomPay, a 9-year-old cashless …
Matt Richtel / Bits:
Job Losses Hit the Tech Sector
Eric Eldon / VentureBeat:
AOL using AIM chat to boost Bebo, challenge Meebo
Rory Cellan-Jones / dot.life blog:
Five grand for Sock And Awe
Abbey Klaassen / AdAge:
Google Leads in Ad-Serving Share
 Earlier Items: 
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: Gizmodo, Engadget and Slashdot
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
Nicholas Carlson / Silicon Alley Insider:
Google's Secret Revenue Weapon Revealed (GOOG)
Discussion: HipMojo.com
 

 
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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