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10:55 AM ET, April 24, 2009

Techmeme

 Top Items: 
Harry McCracken / Technologizer:
Whatever Happened to the Top 15 Web Properties of April, 1999?  —  As I quietly lamented (or at least noted) the impending death of GeoCities today, I wanted to double-check my memory that it was once one of the very largest sites on the Web.  Yup-ten years ago, in April 1999 …
BBC:
Facebook users say yes to changes  —  Facebook users have voted to back changes which give them control over data and content they post on the site.  —  Early results suggest 75% of those who voted support the proposals.  —  The vote was triggered by changes Facebook made to its terms and conditions in February.
RELATED:
Ted Ullyot / Facebook Blog:
Results of the Inaugural Facebook Site Governance Vote  —  Today, the Facebook site governance vote ended after a week in which you were able to voice your opinions as to which documents should serve as the foundation for governing the site.  On behalf of everyone at Facebook …
Discussion: Telegraph, AppScout, Mashable! and Inside Facebook, Thanks:dmac1
David Sarno / L.A. Times Tech Blog:
Facebook governance vote is a homework assignment no one did
Bill Gertz / Washington Times:
Obama's BlackBerry  —  President Obama will soon get his souped-up, high-security BlackBerry for use in and around the White House and during presidential travel, according to Obama administration officials.  The top-secret BlackBerry 8830 is in the final stages of development …
Lee Mathews / Download Squad:
Windows 7 RC (7100) out early on torrent trackers  —  While the partner page Microsoft put up a few days back announcing the availability of the Windows 7 RC turned out to be another minor slip-up, the results in Mininova's index are a bit more real.  —  You guessed it - the Windows 7 RC build (7100) has been leaked.
The Official Google Blog:
Try out new features in Google Toolbar Labs  —  One of the best things about working on the Google Toolbar team is that when someone says “Wouldn't it be great if Toolbar could...,” our answer is usually “Yes!  Let's build it!”  And then it's just a question of when.
Renai LeMay / CNET News:
Ubuntu 9.04 as slick as Windows 7, Mac OS X  —  Here's what the official press release won't tell you about Ubuntu 9.04, which formally hit the streets overnight: its designers have polished the hell out of its user interface since the last release in October.
Discussion: ZDNET.com.au and Gadgetell
RELATED:
Fred / A VC:
Geocities  —  Yesterday, TechCrunch reported the news that Yahoo! is planning to shut down Geocities.  That is sad news on many levels.  Geocities was the web's first community and it was my first “mega deal” when it was sold to Yahoo! in 1999 for $3.5bn (including the value of the options Yahoo! assumed).
Sam Oliver / AppleInsider:
Snow Leopard Server to offer low cost, secure mobile access to iPhone  —  Apple will leverage the popularity of the iPhone to deliver business users new Mobile Access services in Snow Leopard Server to securely deliver corporate email, contact, calendar, and intranet web services to iPhone …
Discussion: The iPhone Blog
RELATED:
Slash Lane / AppleInsider:
Apple taps developers to test new Snow Leopard beta
Discussion: Softpedia News and MacRumors
Sarah Perez / ReadWriteWeb:
The Technology Generation Gap at Work is Oh So Wide  —  Recently, business information solutions provider LexisNexis released the results of a study that examined how technology was used in the American workplace.  The focus of the study was on the differing opinions between generational groups.
Discussion: SEO and Tech Daily
Bill Ray / The Register:
Self-replicating machine replicates  —  Destroy industry and money and make us all wealthy?  Sweet  —  Free whitepaper - CRM your salespeople will love  —  Next month will see a new version of the self-replicating RepRap machine, but owners of the existing model won't need to buy a replacement …
Brad Stone / New York Times:
Software That Copies DVDs to Players Is on Trial  —  SAN FRANCISCO — RealNetworks says it wants to help increase DVD sales by allowing people to copy their movie discs.  Hollywood studios say that idea will only hurt their already struggling business.  The two sides square off in a federal court …
Antone Gonsalves / InformationWeek:
Apple Apology For Baby Shaker Criticized  —  The application, which depicts a crying baby, has users quiet the infant by vigorously shaking the smartphone.  —  Apple on Thursday apologized for offering on its App Store the “deeply offensive” Baby Shaker iPhone application that sparked protests from groups fighting infant abuse.
RELATED:
Tom Krazit / CNET News:
Apple apologizes for Baby Shaker
Owen Fletcher / PC World:
China Pushes Its Own Blue-laser Optical Discs  —  Chinese manufacturers hope to sell hundreds of thousands of optical disc players for a locally developed next-generation disc format this year, a spokesman for an industry group promoting the format said Friday.
Discussion: Gearlog
Bkis Blog:
New worm bypasses Gmail's CAPTCHA  —  On April 22 2009, Bkis Honeypot system discovered a new worm, which we named W32.Gaptcha.Worm.  The worm automatically signs up and creates random Gmail accounts for spamming purposes.  To do so, it must be able to break Google's CAPTCHA first.
Discussion: PC World
Erick Schonfeld / TechCrunch:
Twitter Eats World: Global Visitors Shoot Up To 19 Million  —  Twitter's march towards world domination continues apace.  This morning comScore released its global numbers for March, 2009.  Worldwide visitors to Twitter.com increased 95 percent in the month of March from 9.8 million to 19.1 million, according to its estimates.
Elinor Mills / CNET News:
Conficker infected critical hospital equipment, expert says  —  SAN FRANCISCO — The Conficker worm infected several hundred machines and critical medical equipment in an undisclosed number of hospitals recently, a security expert said on Thursday in a panel at the RSA security conference.
Saul Hansell / Bits:
Undoing Meg Whitman's eBay  —  Before voting for Meg Whitman for governor, California residents would do well to consider what has been happening at eBay since she stepped down as chief executive.  John Donahoe, her successor, has pretty much disassembled all of her major strategic moves.
Discussion: Payments News and TomsTechBlog.com
Kara Swisher / BoomTown:
When GeoCities Grabbed the Web's Golden Ticket-A Trip Down Silicon-Valley-Has-No-Memory Lane  —  In Web years, BoomTown is now officially 143 years old.  —  Why?  Well, I was the one who got to write the big Page One piece in The Wall Street Journal, after GeoCities was sold to Yahoo in January of 1999 for $5 billion in stock.
Discussion: Guardian and Silicon Alley Insider
Gmail Blog:
PowerPoint and TIFF file viewing  —  A few months ago, we added fast online viewing of PDFs in your browser.  As of today, that same viewer now supports TIFF and Microsoft PowerPoint document formats too: you can now view TIFF and PPT files online, directly in your browser …
Discussion: Google Operating System and Mashable!, Thanks:atul
Peter Pachal / DVICE:
Talking Gadget Theater: Blade Runner, starring the Kindle 2 and iPod Shuffle  —  From GPSes to synthetic rabbits, more and more gadgets are being blessed with the ability to speak.  Two prominent examples from recent weeks are the Amazon Kindle 2 and Apple's latest iPod Shuffle.
Discussion: CrunchGear, Gizmodo, Gadget Lab and Engadget
Robert McMillan / PC World:
Conficker Hype a ‘problem,’ Says FBI Cyber-chief  —  Mainstream media hype leading up to the Conficker worm's April 1 software update may have distracted people from legitimate cyber threats, the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation's head of cyber security said Thursday.
Joel Garreau / Washington Post:
Toys — and More — for the 21st Century Make Use of Mind Control Over Matter  —  What If You Could Move Objects With Your Mind?  Well, That Time Has Come.  —  You slip the wireless headset on.  It looks like something a telemarketer would wear, except the earpieces are actually sensors …
 
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 More Items: 
Adrian Kingsley-Hughes / Hardware 2.0:
SPARKLE packs 2GB or video memory onto GeForce GTX 285
Discussion: Softpedia News
Elinor Mills / CNET News:
Device identification in online banking is privacy threat, expert says
Business Week:
The Mad Dash to Digitize Medical Records
Carlo Longino / Techdirt:
After Five Years, Apparently The Mobile Virus Flood Is Really Coming This Time
Discussion: BBC
Yelp Official Blog:
Public Comments for Business Owners
 Earlier Items: 
Eric Eldon / VentureBeat:
As VCs struggle to survive, Trinity closes new $300M fund
Ben Charny / Digits:
Steve Jobs Spends Less Time on His Private Jet
Michael Arrington / TechCrunch:
Hiring Of New MySpace CEO Settles Many Old Scores
Discussion: BoomTown
Therese Poletti / MarketWatch:
Inaptly-named Cuil has disappeared from view
Discussion: Venture Chronicles
Microsoft:
Microsoft Reports Third-Quarter Results