Techmeme
April 18, 2012, 4:55 PM

Top News

Wall Street Journal:
In Facebook Deal for Instagram, Board Was All But Out of Picture  —  On the morning of Sunday, April 8, Facebook Inc.'s youthful chief executive, Mark Zuckerberg, alerted his board of directors that he intended to buy Instagram, the hot photo-sharing service.
Evelyn M. Rusli / DealBook:
With Instagram Deal, Facebook Shows Its Worth  —  To win over Instagram, Facebook was forced to show its hand.  —  In early April, Facebook bought the photo-sharing service for $1 billion, agreeing to pay roughly 30 percent in cash and 70 percent in stock, according to people briefed on the negotiations.
Sergey Brin / Google+:
I believe the internet has been one of the greatest forces for good in the world over the past quarter century.  So when the Guardian requested that I speak to them over the past few months about internet freedom, I decided it was important to participate.  —  I think the article is a pretty …
Dieter Bohn / The Verge:
Sources: current Windows Phone devices will not get ‘Apollo’ upgrade  —  Earlier today, a developer evangelist for Microsoft was quoted as saying that all Windows Phone devices would get an upgrade to the “next major version” of the operating system.  Now, a trusted source close to Microsoft tells us …
Walt Mossberg / AllThingsD:
Permission to Procrastinate: Wait to Get a New Laptop  —  If you're thinking of buying a new laptop this spring, my advice is to think again.  Unless your laptop is on its last legs and you have to move quickly, there are compelling reasons to wait until at least the summer, and probably the fall …
Brent Schlender / Fast Company:
The Lost Steve Jobs Tapes  —  A treasure trove of unearthed interviews, conducted by the writer who knew him best, reveals how Jobs's ultimate success at Apple can be traced directly to his so-called wilderness years.  —  If Steve Jobs's life were staged as an opera, it would be a tragedy in three acts.
Biz Stone / Obvious:
Why Obvious Invested in Neighborland  —  We need only glance at the headlines—from Arab Spring to Occupy—to understand that people are passionate about connecting over issues.  We all have issues, big and small.  Toppling oppressive regimes and protesting corruption are appropriately top of mind.
Fred Wilson / A VC:
The Twitter “Patent Hack”  —  Yesterday Twitter announced that they plan to amend the assignments agreements that they sign with their employees.  They call this proposed amendment the Innovator's Patent Agreement.  I've been aware of this effort inside of Twitter for a while and I like to call …
Robert McMillan / Wired:
Amazon's Secretive Cloud Carries 1 Percent of the Internet  —  An Amazon data center in Sterling, Virginia.  Photo: Eric Hunsaker/Flickr  —  Amazon's cloud computing infrastructure is growing so fast that it's silently becoming a core piece of the internet.
More: GeekWire
Ben Kuchera / Penny Arcade Report:
The ugly side of Kickstarter: the risks in backing game dev campaigns are greater than you think  —  The Penny Arcade Report has an email address for story leads and tips, and a significant percentage of those “tips” are solicitations for coverage of indie game Kickstarter projects.
More: Bloomberg
Mark Sullivan / PC World:
3G and 4G Wireless Speed Showdown: Which Networks Are Fastest?  —  We tested 3G and 4G wireless data transfer speeds—indoors and out—for AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile, and Verizon, at multiple locations in 13 major cities.  Here's what we found.  —  It's been a year since we looked closely …
Leena Rao / TechCrunch:
Uber Experiments With Lower-Priced Taxis In Chicago Through Newly Launched Labs Group, ‘Garage’  —  Back when Uber launched in San Francisco, it was heralded as a service that would disrupt the taxi industry by providing black cars on-demand via mobile phones.
Ina Fried / AllThingsD:
Verizon Aims New Data Package at Global Travelers  —  Aiming to make international cellphone use slightly less excruciatingly expensive, Verizon Wireless announced a new $25 plan that gives users 100 megabytes of data when traveling; it will be available in 120 countries.
Alexis Madrigal / The Atlantic Online:
The Jig Is Up: Time to Get Past Facebook and Invent a New Future  —  After five years pursuing the social-local-mobile dream, we need a fresh paradigm for technology startups.  —  We're there.  The future that visionaries imagined in the late 1990s of phones in our pockets and high-speed Internet in the air: Well, we're living in it.
Brittany Darwell / Inside Facebook:
Facebook tests ‘trending articles’ feature to encourage users to try social reader apps  —  Facebook appears to be testing new feature to highlight social reader articles within users' News Feeds.  —  Some users now see a “trending articles” section of their feeds that includes headlines …
Erin Bury / BetaKit:
Coursera Launches Online Education Platform with $16 Million in Funding  —  Online educational marketplaces are on the rise, with tools like Udemy and Khan Academy allowing people of all ages to become an expert in any topic.  New company Coursera is targeting higher education …
Barb Darrow / GigaOM:
Amazon, seeking to relieve partner angst, launches partner program  —  Amazon, the provider of public cloud services which have — at times - made its technology partners nervous, is launching an official partner program.  —  The new AWS Partner Network, (APN) targets ISVs, SaaS companies …
Brandon Bailey / Mercury News:
Larry Page evasive with Oracle's lawyer, but admits Google never obtained Java license  —  SAN FRANCISCO — Google (GOOG) CEO Larry Page completed his testimony in federal court Wednesday morning after an hour of laborious grilling by an attorney for tech rival Oracle (ORCL) …
Cyrus Farivar / Ars Technica:
Security researcher unearths plans for Iran's halal Internet  —  Iran appears to have recently published a Persian-language “Request for Information” (RFI) for an even-more filtered and monitored version of the Internet than what presently exists in the Islamic Republic.
Elad Blog:
VC Signaling Coming Home To Roost  —  VC SIGNALING IS SCREWING UP THE ABILITY OF SOME COMPANIES TO RAISE A SERIES A … Dear Entrepreneur - remember that TechCrunch story you placed about your funding round that mentioned the VCs who invested in your seed round?
Horace Dediu / asymco:
Apple Stores have seventeen times better performance than the average retailer  —  Thanks to RetailSails we have some data on retailers in the US which can be used to calibrate the performance of Apple retail.  RetailSails compiled a table of the top 20 chains by sales per square foot (annual basis).
Stuart Dredge / Guardian:
Draw Something gets more social with chat and Facebook/Twitter sharing  —  Dan Porter talks new features, TV possibilities and localisation plans for popular game.  By Stuart Dredge  —  50m downloads and a $180m acquisition by Zynga later, hit mobile game Draw Something is getting even more social with its latest update.

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Drew Olanoff / The Next Web: