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12:50 PM ET, January 20, 2012

Techmeme

 Top Items: 
Nate Anderson / Ars Technica:
Why the feds smashed Megaupload  —  The US government dropped a nuclear bomb on “cyberlocker” site Megaupload today, seizing its domain names, grabbing $50 million in assets, and getting New Zealand police to arrest four of the site's key employees, including enigmatic founder Kim Dotcom.
RELATED:
Molly Wood / CNET:
Anonymous goes nuclear; everybody loses?  —  #OpMegaUpload: like watching “War Games” play out, but with cyber-bombs.  —  In the aftermath of the Jan. 18 SOPA/PIPA blackout protests, the Internet community had amassed quite a bit of goodwill, flexed its muscles in a friendly, humorous …
Ernesto / TorrentFreak:
Feds, Please Return My Personal Files Stored at MegaUpload!  —  The feds shut down MegaUpload a few hours ago.  Eight people we charged with criminal copyright infringement charges, and all files hosted on the site were pulled offline.  However, do the feds realize that hundreds of thousands …
Adrian Chen / Gawker:
The Evil New Tactic Behind Anonymous' Massive Megaupload Revenge Attack  —  The hacktivist collective Anonymous is in the middle of a huge revenge spree after the Feds shut down popular filesharing site Megaupload today.  But they're using an evil new tactic that tricks people into helping their attack if they click an innocuous link.
Josh Harkinson / Mother Jones:
Inside Anonymous' “Largest Attack Ever”  —  Yesterday, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, working with police in New Zealand, arrested the leaders of the popular file sharing service MegaUpload.com and scrubbed the site from the internet, alleging that it supports widespread copyright infringement.
Greg Sandoval / CNET:
Megaupload assembles worldwide criminal defense
Discussion: PC Magazine
Carl Franzen / TPM Livewire:
Former Sen. Chris Dodd, MPAA CEO, Blasts Congress For Halting SOPA and PIPA  —  Former Senator Chris Dodd (D-CT), now the CEO of the Motion Picture Association of America, released a statement late Friday morning responding to the sudden announcements earlier from Congressional leaders …
Discussion: @dannysullivan and MPAA Blog
RELATED:
Paul Kane / Washington Post:
SOPA, PIPA votes to be delayed in House and Senate  —  Rep. Lamar Smith (R-Tex.), author of the Stop Online Privacy Act, said on Friday that he is postponing consideration of the bill in response to concerns from critics who said the bill could lead to censorship.
David Pierson / Los Angeles Times:
U.S. website blackout draws praise in China
Discussion: Letter from China
Peter Kafka / AllThingsD:
Publisher Terry McGraw on Steve Jobs and Digital Textbooks: “This Was His Vision”  —  After Apple's big education presentation yesterday, McGraw-Hill CEO Terry McGraw chatted with a gaggle of reporters, and explained things like the logic behind $15 digital textbooks.
RELATED:
Dan Wineman / venomous porridge:
The Unprecedented Audacity of the iBooks Author EULA
Erick Schonfeld / TechCrunch:
Kno CEO Osman Rashid To Apple: “Now We Will Fight On Who Has The Better Product”
Discussion: PC World and Techland
Megan Garber / The Atlantic Online:
A Brief History of Textbooks, or, Why Apple's ‘New Textbook Experience’ Is Actually Revolutionary
Greg Sandoval / CNET:
Facebook in talks to replace YouTube as Vevo's host  —  Facebook has held talks with Vevo about moving the music-video service away from YouTube and over to the social network's platform, sources with knowledge of the talks told CNET.  —  While the sources said the discussions are very preliminary …
Alex Chitu / Google Operating System:
New Google Accounts Require Gmail and Google+  —  If you try to create a Google account from Google's homepage, you'll notice that Google redesigned the page, but that's not all.  You'll now have to create a Gmail account, a Google Profile and you'll automatically join Google+.
Florian Mueller / FOSS Patents:
Mannheim court rejects the first one of Samsung's German lawsuits against Apple  —  Judge Andreas Voss of the Mannheim Regional Court just pronounced his ruling on the first one of Samsung's seven patent infringement claims against Apple in Germany.  Samsung's complaint over a patent declared essential …
Farhad Manjoo / Slate:
The Great and Powerful Reddit  —  How the site went from a second-tier aggregator to the Web's unstoppable force.  —  Of all the sites that went dark on Wednesday to protest Congress' misguided anti-piracy legislation, Reddit was the one I missed most.  Sure, there were a couple times …
David Carnoy / CNET:
Exede: The satellite broadband service you've been waiting for?  —  ViaSat's Exede satellite broadband service has officially launched, with an entry-level package that starts at $50 a month and promises “feels-like-fiber” performance.  —  Buried among the gadgets, superthin screen OLED TVs …
Arik Hesseldahl / AllThingsD:
Who Says Intel Is Weak?  Just Look at Those Crazy Numbers!  —  Chipmaker Intel has grown its annual revenue by nearly $20 billion in two years.  Let that thought sink in for a minute.  —  In 2011, it crossed the threshold of $50 billion in annual sales for the first time, having hit the $40 billion mark only last year.
Ben Drawbaugh / Engadget:
TiVo Premiere updates rolling out to the masses  —  Knowing an update is coming and actually getting it are two different things entirely and if you were saddened that you missed out the latest build on your TiVo Premiere or Elite early, your wait is over.  TiVo has announced via …
Discussion: Electronista
Adrianne Jeffries / Betabeat:
Union Square Ventures Leading Series B in Iowa-Based Dwolla for About $10 M.  —  “It's deal every VC was flying to Iowa or something to try to invest in.”  —one New York investor  —  Des Moines-based payments provider Dwolla, which enables seamless online payments for a quarter per transaction …
Eric Savitz / The Tech Trade:
Intel Names Kraznich COO; Perlmutter Chief Product Officer  —  Intel this morning promoted two of its most senior executives, and rearranged a number of other roles.  The changes will contribute to ongoing speculation about who will eventually succeed current CEO Paul Otellini.
Discussion: AllThingsD, Bloomberg and Electronista
Donald Melanson / Engadget:
Don't call it an ultrabook  —  Every year at CES, the tech-watching masses engage in a bit of trendspotting — an attempt to identify the one or two big themes of the show that may or may not come to define the year in technology.  Some years those are easy to spot (tablets and 3D TV …
Geoff Duncan / Digital Trends:
Is ‘5G’ mobile broadband just around the corner?  IMT-Advanced explained  —  Can't wait to get on the 4G LTE bandwagon?  Think bigger.  A new standard called IMT-Advanced promises speeds up to 10 times faster, and it's just been approved.  —  With Verizon, AT&T, and Sprint racing …
Discussion: itu.int, The Verge and Phone Scoop
Owen Fletcher / China Real Time Report:
China Telecom-Compatible iPhone Gets Regulatory Nod  —  Chinese Apple fans upset over the company's decision to temporarily halt sales of the iPhone 4S at its retail stores in China may soon have another way to get their hands on the device.  An iPhone compatible with the mobile network …
 
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 More Items: 
Hana Stewart-Smith / Unboxing Asia Blog:
China expands micro-blogging ‘online accountability’ regulation
Discussion: PandoDaily and SocialTimes.com
Forbes:
Hackers Target Children as Adults Wise Up to Spam
Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:
Bitly Rolls Out New Enterprise Dashboard, Providing Better Access To The Real-Time Social Web
Alexia Tsotsis / TechCrunch:
Does Google Have An Interest In Pinterest?
Discussion: Electronista
Mark Gurman / 9to5Mac:
Apple Store coming to London's world-famous Harrods department store
Om Malik / GigaOM:
Why Kodak's bankruptcy should scare Nokia
 Earlier Items: 
Adrianne Jeffries / Betabeat:
Layoffs at Lot18: 15 Percent of Employees Were Just Let Go From Fast-Growing Luxury Discount Site
Kara Swisher / AllThingsD:
The Valley Girl Takes On Facebook's Sheryl Sandberg (Video)
Discussion: Fortune
Antonio Rodriguez / The Grain:
How iOS can lose: the independent developer as a canary in the coal mine
Danny Sullivan / Search Engine Land:
Pages With Too Many Ads “Above The Fold” Now Penalized By Google's “Page Layout” Algorithm
Nancy Messieh / The Next Web:
Death sentence for Iranian programmer accused of developing software used by porn sites
Discussion: CNET
Google Investor Relations:
Google Announces Fourth Quarter and Fiscal Year 2011 Results
 

 
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”

Sam Wolfson / The Guardian:
A look at the rise of celebrity-hosted interview podcasts, whose long running times mean guests delve into deep and personal topics, resembling therapy sessions

 
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