Check out Mini-Techmeme for simple mobiles or Techmeme Mobile for modern smartphones.
3:40 PM ET, August 17, 2009

Techmeme

 Top Items: 
Bryan Appleyard / Times of London:
Steve Jobs: The man who polished Apple  —  Chief executive of Apple Inc and owner of Jackling House changed the world and cheated death.  So why the paranoia?  —  For five years the owner of the Jackling House in Woodside, California, has been trying to knock it down.
RELATED:
Softpedia News:
Apple Tries to Block Newspaper Story on Steve Jobs  —  The life of Steve Jobs, and the life at Apple  —  Apple reportedly tried to block a lengthy, 4,000-word piece in yesterday's Sunday Times newspaper.  In the story (eventually published), Apple and its iconic CEO are described as imperfect entities.
Discussion: Gearlog
Michael Arrington / TechCrunch:
Breaking: MySpace Close To Acquiring iLike For $20 Million  —  MySpace is close to acquiring popular social music service iLike, we've confirmed with multiple sources.  The deal, which should close this week, will be MySpace's first acquisition since new CEO Owen Van Natta took control of the company in April 2009.
msnbc.com:
Msnbc.com acquires local news Web site  —  Chicago-based EveryBlock will continue as independent brand  —  Msnbc.com has acquired EveryBlock, a Chicago-based Web site that offers news and information down to the neighborhood level in 15 cities, the two companies announced Monday.
RELATED:
Kara Swisher / BoomTown:
More Local Heat: MSNBC.com Buys EveryBlock for Several Million Dollars  —  It looks like the local market is heating up even more, with MSNBC.com announcing the acquisition of Chicago-based EveryBlock.  —  MSNBC.com-a joint venture of Microsoft (MSFT) and GE (GE) unit NBC Universal-paid …
Thomas Ricker / Engadget:
Dell Mini 3i smartphone gets official outing in China  —  At last, the much rumored Dell cellphone has made its first official appearance.  The 3.5-inch 360 x 640 pixel device with capacitive touchscreen was on display in China running the Android-based Open Mobile System (OMS).
RELATED:
Kara Swisher / BoomTown:
Huffington Post and Facebook Go “Social News,” With Connect on Steroids  —  In an unusually robust collaboration using Facebook Connect, the Huffington Post is launching a feature on Monday called “HuffPost Social News,” which lets readers create a personalized social networking-like news page on the Huffington Post itself.
RELATED:
Elizabeth Judge / Times of London:
Big noises join chorus behind Twitter TweetDeck  —  Two of the biggest names in the British technology sector have thrown their weight behind a start-up operation aimed at providing easier access to Twitter, the social networking and microblogging site.  —  Brent Hoberman, co-founder of Lastminute.com …
Andrew Lim / Recombu:
TomTom for iPhone 3G and 3GS: Satisfied-nav  —  Do you look at your iPhone so much that you often get lost?  There's an app for that.  Today TomTom released its iPhone 3G and 3GS app that offers sat-nav goodness without the clunky looking sat-nav.  It costs £60, which isn't that expensive …
RELATED:
John Gruber / Daring Fireball:
The Android Opportunity  —  In just the past few weeks Steven Frank, Alex Payne, and Andre Torrez all tried switching from the iPhone to Android.  All three are smart, open-minded, and eloquent regarding their reasons for trying Android.  All three are developers who care about the quality and design of software and hardware.
Discussion: Technologizer and Andre's Notes
Dana Blankenhorn / Open Source:
Mozilla pushes out .Net incompatible Firefox 3.5  —  Firefox users got a surprise when they booted up this morning, a software update box for Firefox 3.5, “the most advanced Firefox yet.”  —  A warning sticker at the bottom of the box notes that it will cause “some of your extensions …
tr.im URLs:
tr.im to be Community-Owned  —  First Off ...  Everyone involved at Nambu would like to apologize again for the hastiness in which we acted last Sunday, announcing the shutdown of tr.im by the end of the year.  As a commercial URL shortener, however, we still believe that tr.im would not be able …
Discussion: ReadWriteWeb and Internetnews Blog
Caroline McCarthy / CNET News:
Twitter going after buy-more-followers services?  —  Twitter may be working to stop companies that partake in the controversial practice of selling higher follower counts, according to one Australian company that claims Twitter is trying to shut it down over allegations of spamming.
RELATED:
Patrick Stafford / SmartCompany:
Twitter, Melbourne IT order uSocial to be shut down
Leander Kahney / Cult of Mac:
Interview: Apple's Gigantic New Data Center Hints at Cloud Computing … Google's Eric Schmidt “resigned” from Apple's board because Chrome and Android were encroaching on Apple's core business, or so Steve Jobs says.  —  But what if the opposite were true?  What if Apple is encroaching on Google's core business?
Kevin Purdy / Lifehacker:
Make Your Own URL Shortening Service  —  URL shortening services are ubiquitous on Twitter and other cramped online spaces.  They won't all last, as tr.im has demonstrated, and their shutdowns could annihilate your linking history.  If you own a domain, though, you can host your own service.
Discussion: Techgeist and AppScout, Thanks:mrinaldesai
Jason Hiner / Between the Lines:
Directory: 100 technology experts on Twitter  —  One the most important — and most difficult — things to do when you first start using Twitter is to develop a good list of people to follow.  You can check your friends' lists of followers, watch for interesting people that come up in @replies …
Erick Schonfeld / TechCrunch:
Zendesk Raises $6 Million In B Round, Benchmark's Peter Fenton Joins Board  —  Benchmark Capital is investing in Danish startup Zendesk, and led a $6 million B round of funding.  Benchmark's rock star partner Peter Fenton is joining the board.  —  Zendesk just raised money in May in an A round …
Ashlee Vance / Bits:
In the New Data Center, It's Roofs Off and Taxes Down  —  Data centers can be such touchy things.  —  Google and Microsoft continue to spar over both their data center designs and how much information they reveal about the inner workings of their vast computing centers.
David Carr / New York Times:
AOL Blossoms as Print Retreats  —  The office at Ninth Street and Broadway in Manhattan in the former Wanamaker's department store has all of the trademarks of a well-financed digital start-up.  Young people eat pizza and chat about applications while others are jammed into conference rooms discussing search optimization.
Galen Ward / TechFlash:
New Google is the old Microsoft  —  Galen Ward: Google is supposed to be an unbiased search engine, but they are hurting consumers by using their dominance to become a king maker for their own, increasingly inferior products.  —  Google's search results are the ultimate world flattener …
Discussion: Technologizer and TechFlash, Thanks:galenward
Michael Arrington / TechCrunch:
CBS, Amazon Already Sniffing Around GDGT  —  It's less than two months old, and GDGT is already getting some high profile attention, and maybe even a few acquisition sniffs.  —  One of our reliable sources told us today that they had reason to believe both CBS/CNET and Amazon were considering acquiring the company.
Thanks:atul
Ernesto / TorrentFreak:
Download a Copy of The Pirate Bay Before It's Gone  —  In common with music and movies, it's not that hard to copy a website.  It might take some serious server power to serve torrents to millions of people every day, but all the torrent files and site code don't take up that much space.
Clint Boulton / eWeek:
Marc Andreessen's RockMelt Could Boost Sales For Facebook  —  Table of Contents:  —  Forrester Research's Sheri McLeish suggests the Marc Andreessen-forged RockMelt browser could open up new advertising opportunities for Facebook.  RockMelt could resemble the Flock social Web browser …
Discussion: DailyTech
Electronista:
iPhone 3GS bestselling phone in Japan  —  Apple's third iPhone generation has ousted Japan's own phone manufacturers for the top sales spot in the country, according to market data from Gfk Japan.  The 32GB iPhone 3GS was the most popular phone in Japan during July and outsold …
 
 Archived Page Info: 
This is a snapshot of Techmeme at 3:40 PM ET, August 17, 2009.

View the current page or another snapshot:


 
 Techmeme Sponsor Posts: 
Tribe AI:
Is AI just hype?  —  Find out how top enterprises use Tribe to get real business results.
Techmeme Leaderboards:
Discover the top reporters on AI, VR, policy, and much more  —  We've analyzed Techmeme's news crawl to identify the most influential and prolific writers on 48 news topics.  Download reports immediately for just $100.
Zoho:
All new Zoho Workerly 2024  —  Staffing businesses around the world face a unique set of challenges when it comes to managing their temporary workforce.  With a constantly shifting job market and changing staffing needs …
Comprehensive.io:
Browse salary data from 3,000 startups for free  —  Click for FREE, immediate access to real-time compensation benchmarking data.  Paid version helps HR automate comp reviews and communicate total compensation to employees.
Sponsor Techmeme
 
 See Also: 
Techmeme: site main
Techmeme River: reverse chronological Techmeme
Techmeme Mobile: for phones
Techmeme Leaderboard: Techmeme's top sources
 
 Subscribe: 
Techmeme RSS feed
Techmeme on X
Techmeme on Mastodon
 
 
 More Items: 
Rob Jackson / Android Phone Fans:
Layar Reality Browser: Now Available On Android Market!
Discussion: VentureBeat and ReadWriteWeb
Jenn K. Lee / Pocketables:
More photos of unknown Android MID surface
Daniel Martin / Daily Mail:
Mandelson goes to war on teenagers downloading their music …
Discussion: ISPreview UK and Techdirt
internetnews.com:
Novell Gets Closer to Silverlight With Moonlight 2
Discussion: CNET News
Neil Hughes / AppleInsider:
Apple accuses Psystar of destroying evidence in latest court filing
Discussion: Softpedia News
 Earlier Items: 
Eric Pfanner / New York Times:
The Paper That Doesn't Want to Be Free
Discussion: CJR, Thanks:mrinaldesai
Tameka Kee / paidContent:
myYearbook Turns A Profit By Getting Users To Pay
Discussion: Tech Beat and MediaPost
Josh Lowensohn / CNET News:
Preview of Jolicloud: The social Netbook OS
Discussion: Engadget
Erick Schonfeld / TechCrunch:
Yahoo Veterans Launch Rocket Fuel, A “Hybrid” Ad Network
Brooke Crothers / Crave: The gadget blog:
The rise of the $299 Wal-Mart laptop