Techmeme
May 9, 2012, 1:10 PM

Top News

Dana Wollman / Engadget:
HP unveils Envy Spectre XT Ultrabook, other thin-and-lights in various sizes  —  What's that?  You're hungry for more HP laptops?  Good!  Because we're not nearly done yet!  The company just expanded its line of Ultrabooks from two to five, and that's not even counting this guy.
Richard Lai / Engadget:
HP on laptop design similarities with Apple's: it's a struggle as we drive to simplicity  —  HP's spent the afternoon here in Shanghai to share some details about its latest products and strategy, and to our delight, there was one session dedicated to “Style Meets Function,” …
Jason Del Rey / AdAge:
Tim Armstrong Says AOL Plans to Invest in TechCrunch and Engadget, Not Sell Them  —  Domestic Display Advertising Falls as Activist Investor Seeks Shakeup  —  AOL reported a 4% drop in average monthly visitors to AOL owned-and-operated properties, when it reported first-quarter earnings on Wednesday.
Sarah Lacy / PandoDaily:
Mark Milian / Bloomberg:
Zuckerberg's Hoodie a ‘Mark of Immaturity,’ Analyst Says  —  Mark Zuckerberg is known for having arrived late for a meeting with prospective investor Sequoia Capital and giving a less-than-serious pitch while wearing pajamas.  —  Now, as Facebook preps its initial public offering …
Henry Blodget / Business Insider:
How Goldman Sachs Blew The Facebook IPO  —  IPOs are wildly profitable deals for Wall Street investment banks, and they come with huge bragging rights.  —  So it's no surprise that the biggest Wall Street banks fought over the Facebook IPO for years.  —  The inside story of the Facebook …
Chris Ziegler / The Verge:
Nano-SIM update: Apple design modified to fix concerns, standard will be decided this month  —  We just spoke with SIM card maker (and pioneer) Giesecke & Devrient here at CTIA about progress on the creation of the 4FF standard — the so-called nano-SIM — over which Apple and Nokia have been warring in recent months.
Spencer E. Ante / Wall Street Journal:
Foursquare Joins the Coupon Craze  —  Foursquare doesn't want to be another popular—but unprofitable—social network.  Its new plan to make money?  Personalized coupons.  —  The company, which lets users alert their friends to their location by “checking in” via smartphone from coffee shops …
Sam Oliver / AppleInsider:
Apple's next iPhone coming in September, 7-in. iPad launching in August - report  —  Pegatron has reportedly landed orders for Apple's next-generation iPhone, rumored to launch in September, while Foxconn will allegedly manufacture a new 7-inch iPad arriving in August.
Jenna Wortham / Bits:
Etsy Raises $40 Million for International Expansion  —  Etsy, the online marketplace for handmade and vintage goods, is getting a very non-D.I.Y. present.  —  On Wednesday, the company announced it was raising a $40 million Series F round in venture financing, from Index Ventures …
Kara Swisher / AllThingsD:
Loeb Again Calls for Thompson Firing From Yahoo, as Former eBay Boss Support Him  —  As expected, Yahoo activist shareholder Daniel Loeb released a new letter on the bio controversy he set off at Yahoo, again calling for the firing of CEO Scott Thompson.  —  “It seems farcical to us …
Jamie Keene / The Verge:
Flipboard for Android leaks out for all to download  —  At the launch of the Samsung Galaxy S III, one unexpected inclusion was the Flipboard app — supposedly exclusive to the handset for the first few months.  However, despite the fact that the Galaxy S III hasn't even been released yet …
Michael Degusta / Technology Review:
Are Smart Phones Spreading Faster than Any Technology in Human History?  —  Mobile computers are on track to saturate markets in the U.S. and the developing world in record time.  —  Today's technology scene seems overheated to some.  Apple is the most valuable company on earth.
Sharif Sakr / Engadget:
BlackBerry Curve 9320 now official: BB OS 7.1, 2.44-inch display, BBM button  —  The 9320 has visited more countries during its short gestation than some phones get to see in their whole lives, but it's finally arrived.  The specs are pretty much what we guessed, with the socially-focused BB OS 7.1 onboard …
Ben Rudolph / The Windows Blog:
Smoked by Windows Phone by the numbers (and new ads!)  —  When I kicked off Smoked by Windows Phone at CES in January, I did it with one thing in mind - show the world that Windows Phone is simply faster at the everyday stuff that people do on their smartphones.
Jon Brodkin / Ars Technica:
How Amazon saved Zynga's butt—and why Zynga built a cloud of its own  —  Five years ago, the social gaming company Zynga was cruising along with a fairly standard IT infrastructure.  Servers were racked and stacked in a retail data center where Zynga rented space.
More: The Verge
Janko Roettgers / GigaOM:
DDOS attack: Ustream down, Bambuser under heavy load  —  Updated.  Ustream has been unavailable this morning, and Bambuser has been under a heavy load of unusual traffic due to what looks like a distributed denial-of-service (DDOS) attack against both live streaming providers.
More: TechCrunch and Business InsiderTweets: @ustream
Kelly Fiveash / The Register:
Virgin Media site goes titsup in Pirate Bay payback attack  —  Anonymous claims takedown victory  —  Virgin Media's main website dropped off the interwebs on Tuesday with hackivist collective Anonymous claiming responsibility for the DDoS attacks in response to the company's recent cut-off of The Pirate Bay.
Mike Swift / Mercury News:
Facebook spawns ecosystem of startups  —  To get the true measure of what's often called “The Facebook Effect,” look beyond the company.  Generally ignored in the klieg lights focused on Facebook's IPO is a growing ecosystem of other startups that are using the social network's 900 million users to launch their own businesses.
Darrell Etherington / BetaKit:
Flint Launches image-Based Mobile Payment App, Raises $3M Series A  —  The race to find the mobile payments solution that works best for every type of business is on, and San Francisco-based Flint Mobile thinks it has the ideal offering for small businesses who operate mostly on the go.

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Earlier Picks

Elinor Mills / CNET: