Techmeme
January 17, 2013, 1:45 PM

Top News

Steven Levy / Wired:
Google's Larry Page on Why Moon Shots Matter  —  Larry Page lives by the gospel of 10x.  Most companies would be happy to improve a product by 10 percent.  Not the CEO and cofounder of Google.  The way Page sees it, a 10 percent improvement means that you're basically doing the same thing as everybody else.
James Kendrick / ZDNet:
Lenovo announces ThinkPad Chromebook for schools  —  Summary: Lenovo will offer a Chromebook version of its ThinkPad X131e for the education sector.  The Chromebook will be sold only to schools for grades K-12.  —  James Kendrick  —  The folks at Lenovo are going into the Chromebook space …
Wall Street Journal:
AT&T Stalking Europe for Mergers  —  AT&T Inc. is once again starting up its deal machine.  —  The telecommunications giant is considering buying a counterpart in Europe, a bet that it can best escape constraints on growth at home by getting into a new wireless market where it can upgrade technology …
Eva Dou / Wall Street Journal:
Asustek in Talks to Offer Windows 8 Phones  —  TAIPEI—Taiwanese PC maker Asustek Computer Inc. is in talks with Microsoft Corp. on a licensing deal to offer Windows 8 mobile phones, an executive said, making it the latest Asian computer maker eyeing the new operating system.
Steve Cheney / steve's blog:
Graph Search's False Promise and the Con of the Facebook “Like”  —  We all know that the pressure for Facebook to monetize is massive and growing.  Yesterday Zuckerberg fulfilled the promise he dropped at TC Disrupt to release a product that will finally compete with Google.
Matt Brian / The Next Web:
Amazon looks to reduce Apple's hold on music sales with launch of MP3 web store for iPhone and iPod touch  —  Amazon has taken another step at reducing Apple's hold over on-device music sales, today announcing the launch of its HTML5 MP3 web store specifically for iPhone and iPod touch …
Kara Swisher / AllThingsD:
Exclusive: SurveyMonkey Raises $850 Million in Debt and Equity for Tender Offer — Including New Investment From Google's New Late-Stage Unit  —  SurveyMonkey has raised a massive $800 million in debt and additional equity funding, which it plans to distribute in a tender offer, said sources with knowledge of the situation.
More: Fortune, Deal Journal and ValueWalkTweets: @pkedrosky
Todd Spangler / multichannel.com/rss:
TWC: Netflix Is Withholding Content to Gain ‘Unprecedented’ Access to ISPs  —  Operator Says It Is in Discussions on Connecting Into Netflix's Private CDN  —  Time Warner Cable said it is currently in discussions with Netflix on terms for connecting into the video streamer's private content delivery network …
Ellis Hamburger / The Verge:
Facebook launches free calling for all iPhone users in the US  —  In early January, Facebook began testing free calling over Wi-Fi and cellular data for all Messenger for iPhone users in Canada, and said that a US launch could be coming soon.  Apparently, the test went well — a new free calling button has appeared in the app.
Rick Broida / CNET:
MediaFire debuts for Android, offers users 50GB of free cloud storage  —  No, really: 50 gigabytes.  The app has a few limitations, but it's still a major score for any Android user with an eye to the cloud.  —  Back in August, I wrote about cloud-storage service MediaFire …
Royal Pingdom:
Internet 2012 in numbers  —  There is so much happening on the Internet during a year that it's impossible to capture it all in a blog post, but we're going to give it a shot anyway.  How many emails were sent during 2012?  How many domains are there?  What's the most popular web browser?
Galen Moore / Boston Business Journal:
U.S. Attorney breaks silence, defends prosecution of Aaron Swartz … U.S. Attorney Carmen Ortiz, under fire for the prosecution of Internet entrepreneur and activist Aaron Swartz, on Wednesday issued her first statement responding to the controversy that has followed Swartz's suicide.
Matt Brian / The Next Web:
Yelp begins adding restaurant inspection scores to listings, starting in San Francisco and New York  —  Giving its users more information on the restaurants within its listings, Yelp has today added a new metric to restaurant listings — hygiene scores — providing businesses with a way of advertising …
Ingrid Lunden / TechCrunch:
Nokia Cuts 300 Jobs, Outsources Up To 820 More To HCL And Tata To ‘Align IT With Its Business Focus’  —  Here's the cloud to Nokia's silver lining statement the other day of better than expected handset sales: it is cutting IT 300 jobs, and outsourcing 820 more, with Indian outsourcing giants HCL …
Peter Kafka / AllThingsD:
YouTube Is Ready to Invest in Vevo, but the Deal Isn't Done  —  YouTube is set to make another big investment in a content partner.  This time around it's Vevo, the music video site.  —  YouTube and its owner Google have agreed to buy a minority stake in Vevo, according to people familiar with the deal, which hasn't been finalized.
Lee Mathews / Geek.com:
Demo shows how easily malicious extensions can infect Firefox  —  Firefox is widely regarded as a very secure web browser, and that's a reputation that Mozilla has worked tirelessly to build over the past eight years — blacklisting extensions, shutting down insecure plug-ins, revoking certificates …
Patrick Temple-West / Reuters:
Amazon fighting $234 million tax deficiency in Tax Court : filing  —  (Reuters) - Amazon.com Inc. is challenging a $234 million U.S. tax bill, contesting Internal Revenue Service tax calculations for cash transfers between the parent company and its European subsidiaries, according to a court filing.
Sarah Mitroff / Wired:
Does Facebook Praise Kill Self-Control?  —  One hateful Facebook comment might reduce you to tears, but a recent study found that the “likes” prompted by your status updates and photo posts might also have a negative impact, especially on your waistline and pocketbook.
Josh Ong / The Next Web:
Ticketfly acquires Prime Box Office as it moves into Canada for its first international expansion  —  Ticketfly has announced a push into the Canadian market through the acquisition of local ticketing company Prime Box Office and agreements with event promoters Collective Concerts and Union Events.
More: TechCrunch
John Koetsier / VentureBeat:
AppGratis closes $13.5M in funding with revenue at $1M/month and users growing at 300K/day  —  AppGratis announced today that it closed a $13.5 million series A round of funding to get bigger and even more international, even though the French app-discovery company is already profitable and growing at breakneck speed.
Nathan Ingraham / The Verge:
Galaxy Note 8.0 tablet rumored to be unveiled at Mobile World Congress  —  It sounds like the Galaxy Note family is ready to grow, again — though with a new tablet, not a new phone.  According to SamMobile, Samsung is planning to introduce a mid-range 8-inch Galaxy Note tablet at Mobile World Congress next month.

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