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8:05 AM ET, November 25, 2009

Techmeme

 Top Items: 
Kara Swisher / BoomTown:
What's Really Behind the Rupe-a-Dope With Google and Microsoft?  Here Are Five Possibilities!  —  Please see this disclosure related to me and Google.  —  There certainly is a lot of noisy swirl of late around the escalating fight between Google and some traditional media companies over content online.
Discussion: Financial Times, MediaPost and Guardian, Thanks:atul
RELATED:
Danny Sullivan / Daggle:
If Newspapers Were Stores, Would Visitors Be “Worthless” Then?
Geoffrey A. Fowler / Digits:
Amazon Upgrades Users' Kindles, Automatically  —  Owners of new Amazon Kindles are about to get two improvements to their e-readers.  They won't have to do anything; indeed, they might not even notice the upgrade.  —  AFP/Getty Images  —  The changes — to software called firmware …
Discussion: Computerworld and Hardware 2.0
RELATED:
Larry Dignan / Between the Lines:
Amazon bolsters battery life for Kindle; Adds native PDF reader
Paul Miller / Engadget:
Chrome OS like lightning from a USB key: we could get used to this  —  We finally got around to prepping a USB key so we could boot to Chrome OS natively, and let us tell you: it's a world of difference.  Of course, running something natively instead of virtualized is always going to be a treat …
Richard Lai / Engadget:
Emblaze's First Else unveiled in London, promises to be a game-changer  —  Folks, today might be the day when you start to notice how ancient our smartphones have become, even if they only came out in last few months.  Blame Else (formerly Emblaze Mobile) for their confusingly-named First Else …
Google Mobile Blog:
The Iterative Web App: A new look for Gmail and Google mobile web apps  —  On April 7th, we announced a new version of Gmail for mobile for iPhone and Android-powered devices.  Among the improvements was a complete redesign of the web application's underlying code which allows us …
Discussion: App Advice and Phone Scoop
UTalkMarketing:
Ikea campaign innovation on Facebook breaks new ground  —  Marketing through Social Media channels still leaves many marketers scratching their heads but occasionally the industry is provided with some inspiration to help provide a guiding light.  Take for example a new project to help market …
Discussion: CNET News
Google Mobile Blog:
Get movie trailers and more with Google Search for mobile  —  Heads up, movie fans — today we've launched a mobile version of our new Google Search results for movies, which makes it easier to plan a trip to the movies.  Just go to google.com in the web browser on your iPhone, Palm WebOS …
Discussion: ReadWriteWeb, Mashable!, 901am and ResourceShelf, Thanks:atul
Bill Gorman / TV by the numbers:
TiVo Loses 314,000 Subscribers, Worst Quarterly Subscriber Fall Yet, Now Below 3 Million  —  TiVo Loses 314,000 Subscribers vs. 146,000 in Previous Quarter Even by the standards of its continuing loss of subscribers, the last quarter was a particularly bad one for TiVo.
RELATED:
Robert Andrews / paidContent:
TiVo Re-Entering UK With Co-Branded Virgin Media Box In 2010
Liz Gannes / GigaOM:
Dropbox Raises $7.25M, Crosses 3M Users  —  Updated with new information from Dropbox: You don't go into file backup and syncing for the fame and glory, but that's what it seems to be yielding for 2-year-old Dropbox.  Simply put, people — including my GigaOM coworkers and I — love Dropbox because it works.
Discussion: TechCrunch, Thanks:chrismessina
Nicholas Deleon / CrunchGear:
Take-down notices going after Microsoft Cofee  —  You'll recall that CrunchGear broke the news regarding the leak of Microsoft Cofee, a suite of applications used by law enforcement officials for their own devices.  The leak came from a popular BitTorrent site, and then spread to The Pirate Bay and all over the Internet.
Discussion: The Register
Leena Rao / TechCrunch:
Mobile Web Usage Continues To Explode As Opera Mini Nears 40 Million Monthly Users  —  We all know the Mobile web is exploding in popularity.  Opera Mini, Opera's mobile browser, grew its monthly users by 11 percent to nearly 40 million users in October from 32 million users in August.
Eric Savitz / Tech Trader Daily:
Microsoft CFO Liddell Leaving; Replaced By Peter Klein  —  Microsoft (MSFT) this afternoon announced that CFO Chris Liddell is leaving the company at the end of 2009, and will be replaced by Peter Klein, who is now CFO of the Microsoft Business Division.  —  Liddell joined the company in May 2005 …
Jessica E. Vascellaro / Wall Street Journal:
Facebook Creates Dual-Class Stock Structure  —  Facebook Inc. has established a dual class stock structure, a move that helps lay the groundwork for an eventual initial public offering.  —  The company is in the process of converting all current shareholders to Class B stock …
Jason Kincaid / TechCrunch:
YC-Funded WakeMate Helps You Kiss Groggy Mornings Goodbye  —  Ah, the curse of the groggy morning.  You may have followed all the rules: no caffeine before bed, an early bedtime, and all the rest.  But your best efforts are oftentimes for naught, foiled by the mysterious ways of sleep cycles.
BBC:
Opera ‘censors’ Chinese content  —  Web browser Opera has closed a loophole which allowed Chinese users to access sites banned by the government.  —  At the weekend mobile users of the Opera Mini browser were asked to upgrade to a Chinese version.  —  According to the BBC's Beijing Bureau …
Discussion: The Register and Software Journal
Kevin Poulsen / Threat Level:
Wikileaks Says It Has Half-a-Million 9/11 Pager Messages  —  The document-leaking site Wikileaks says it's preparing to release 500,000 intercepted wireless pager messages from a 24-hour period encompassing the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.  —  Site operators say they plan …
Discussion: Guardian
Susan Wojcicki / The Official Google Blog:
New search ad formats  —  At Google, we're committed to giving you the information you want — regardless of the form in which it might appear.  —  Text is often useful, but sometimes videos and pictures are a more effective way to receive information.  For example, if you want to learn a magic trick …
Erick Schonfeld / TechCrunch:
Leaked Video: Swyping Versus iPhone Typing.  (Swype For Android Is Next).  —  A year ago, Swype launched a new way to type on a touchscreen phone at TechCrunch50.  Swype was created by the inventor of the T9 predictive typing system used on most phones today because he felt that new text input methods …
Richard MacManus / ReadWriteWeb:
The Most Influential Websites in the World: Wikipedia #1, Twitter #4 With a Bullet  —  A year ago we profiled an oddly-named service called ://URLFAN, which we concluded was a good ‘Influence Index’ for the Web. ://URLFAN ranks websites by popularity, based on blog mentions.
Discussion: Tech Central and Softpedia News
Cecilia Kang / Washington Post:
White House official's net neutrality comments irk AT&T  —  White House official links the issue to censorship in China  —  AT&T doesn't like the idea of new regulations mandating unfettered access to the Internet, and recent comments from the Obama administration that connected the issue …
Discussion: IntoMobile and The Hill
Alan Long:
Searches getting longer  —  Last week I spoke at Search Engine Room in Sydney and presented some of the trends we are seeing in how Australian's interactions with search Engines are changing.  —  There has been a global trend that my international colleagues have been reporting on for some time - the lengthening of search terms.
Taylor Wimberly / Android and Me:
Fring to bring free video calls to Android?  —  Last week Fring launched their free VOIP service for Android and the early reviews were positive.  Fring allows users to make free VoIP calls over Skype, MSN, GoogleTalk and via hundreds of SIP providers.  —  It looks like they have been hard …
Discussion: Mobile Tech Addicts
Kevin Purdy / Lifehacker:
Hands-On Look at What's New in Office 2010  —  Now that we've had some time to play with the Office 2010 Professional Beta, we thought we'd share what's new and useful inside Microsoft's big suite.  Take a gander at the pictorial evidence below.  —  Overall, Office 2010 is not the kind …
Discussion: Gadget Venue
Brad Stone / Bits:
Independent Skype Set for Executive Shakeup  —  Last week, Skype became a newly independent company, formally separating from its parent of the last four years, eBay.  Now the Internet phone company, with major offices in Luxembourg and London, is set for a significant reorganization of its management team.
Michael Arrington / TechCrunch:
Scamville Shakeout: Was Gambit The Right Fall Guy?  —  I'm not sure any lasting change will come from our series of Scamville posts.  For now the most egregious of the social gaming offers are gone, which is a good thing.  But none of the big players seem to have felt much pain.
Discussion: Gambit Blog
Aza Raskin / Aza's Thoughts:
Identity in the Browser (Firefox)  —  Identity will be one of the defining themes in the next five years of the Web.  Nearly every site has a concept of a user account, registration, and identity.  Searching for “sign in” on Google yields over 1.8 billion hits.
Discussion: ReadWriteWeb
 
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 More Items: 
Venture Capital Dispatch:
VC-Backed Co. Pushes Envelope With Postmarked Email Service
Discussion: VentureBeat
Grant Gross / Computerworld:
U.S. senators ask EU to hurry probe of Oracle-Sun
Discussion: internetnews.com
Associated Press:
Verizon opposes Sprint's “Most Dependable” claim
Discussion: Electronista
Nick O'Neill / All Facebook:
New Developer Policies Go Into Effect On December 16
Nathan Becker / Digits:
Online Shopping Up From Last Year, but Well Below Trend
Discussion: internetnews.com
 Earlier Items: 
Neil Hughes / AppleInsider:
Apple seeks permanent injunction to prevent Psystar sales
Chris Davies / SlashGear:
Sony VAIO X gets OS X Snow Leopard
Leslie Meredith / LiveScience:
Color E-readers Inspired by Butterflies
Discussion: Softpedia News
Danny Sullivan / Search Engine Land:
Under The Hood: Google News & Ranking Stories
Thanks:atul
Robin Wauters / TechCrunch Europe:
Achtung! Google Analytics is illegal, say German government officials
 

 
From Mediagazer:

Ruth La Ferla / New York Times:
Graydon Carter opens a physical store called Air Mail Newsstand in NYC, as an extension of his digital newsletter Air Mail, selling books, magazines, and more

Todd Spangler / Variety:
Filing: Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav's 2023 compensation package was worth $49.7M, up 26.5% from the year prior, with $23.1M in stock awards

Andrew Beaujon / Washingtonian:
Interviews with over a dozen current and former WAMU staffers and contractors show management's contradictory, unclear messaging about its closure of DCist

 
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