Techmeme
July 8, 2013, 11:05 AM

Top News

Eric Lichtblau / New York Times:
In Secret, Court Vastly Broadens Powers of N.S.A.  —  WASHINGTON — In more than a dozen classified rulings, the nation's surveillance court has created a secret body of law giving the National Security Agency the power to amass vast collections of data on Americans while pursuing not only terrorism suspects …
Ezra Klein / Wonkblog:
Did you know John Roberts is also chief justice of the NSA's surveillance state?  —  Chief justice of the United States is a pretty big job.  You lead the Supreme Court conferences where cases are discussed and voted on.  You preside over oral arguments.  When in the majority, you decide who writes the opinion.
Tweets: @benparr and @csoghoian
David Harris-Gershon / Tikkun Daily Blog:
NSA Rejecting Every FOIA Request Made by U.S. Citizens  —  Clayton Seymour, a 36-year-old IT specialist from Hilliard, Ohio, recently sent a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request to the NSA, curious as to whether any data about him was being collected.  What he received in response made his blood boil.
Bloomberg:
Zynga's Mattrick Looked to Buy Company While at Microsoft  —  Don Mattrick, the former head of Microsoft Corp. (MSFT)'s entertainment division who takes the reins as chief executive officer of Zynga Inc. (ZNGA) today, has been hankering to run all or part of the social-gaming company for at least three years.
Joanna Stern / ABC News:
With New Improvements, Facebook Brings Graph Search Function to All U.S. Users  —  Get ready for your Facebook search bar to start looking a little different.  —  Starting Monday Facebook will begin rolling out the advanced search feature it announced earlier this year to all users in the United States.
Sam Byford / The Verge:
Top iOS apps and games go free ahead of App Store's fifth anniversary  —  ‘Infinity Blade II,’ Traktor DJ, ‘Sword and Sworcery,’ Day One, and more  —  A host of highly regarded apps for iPhone and iPad have gone free today in what could be a major celebration to mark five years since Apple launched the App Store.
Rolfe Winkler / Wall Street Journal:
Microsoft's Products Need More Horsepower  —  By - ROLFE WINKLER -  —  Microsoft keeps hitching its fortunes to lame horses.  It shows how rickety parts of the software giant's business are.  —  Barnes & Noble, Best Buy, Nokia, Yahoo and Dell all face very difficult circumstances of their own.
More: ZDNet
Kara Swisher / AllThingsD:
Microsoft Quietly Shuts Down MSN TV, Once Known as WebTV  —  Microsoft said that its MSN TV service will be closing down at the end of September, in a post on its Web site and in an email to users.  —  MSN TV, of course, was born of WebTV, which was thought up by well-known entrepreneur Steve Perlman.
Quentin Hardy / NYT Bits:
Technology Workers Are Young (Really Young)  —  It's well known that technology is a young man's game.  Still, it is surprising to see just how young (and how male).  —  PayScale, a company based in Seattle, has determined that the median age of workers at many of the most successful companies …
Sarah Young / Reuters:
App developer Shazam gets $40 mln backing from tycoon Carlos Slim  —  (Reuters) - Smartphone app developer Shazam has found an unlikely ally in the form of Carlos Slim, one of the world's richest men, who is investing $40 million to back the development of the start-up best known for helping music fans identify catchy songs.
Jon Fingas / Engadget:
LG teasers drop not-so-subtle hints of G2 launch at August 7th event (video)  —  While LG initially gave no clues as to the focus of its August 7th event, the company isn't leaving much room for doubt now.  It's sending both formal invitations and a teaser video (after the break) …

Sponsor Posts

Google:
Try Gemini 3 Pro  —  Google's newest and most intelligent AI model that helps you bring any idea to life
Shopify:
Transform ML Experimentation with Tangle  —  Save months of compute time with Tangle, built by Shopify.  Try this open-source platform to simplify ML workflows, ensure reproducibility, and seamlessly share with collaborators.
Zoho:
Contract Signed.  Project Ready.  Tasks Created.  —  Every project begins with a promise; a contract that outlines the deliverables, the timelines, and the terms.  But for most businesses …
Bitrix24:
Bitrix24 powers the next generation of high-performing businesses  —  Chat, projects, CRM, and automation — all in one place.  Replace dozens of tools so your team moves faster, collaborates smarter, and grows effortlessly.
IDrive:
Protecting your Cloud Applications Data  —  Backing up Office 365, Google Workspace, Dropbox & Box data is critical to preventing data loss or corruption, complying with laws and avoiding critical downtime in case of a disaster.

Featured Podcasts

Hard Fork:
OpenAI Calls a 'Code Red' + Which Model Should I Use? + The Hard Fork Review of Slop
The future is already here. Each week, journalists Kevin Roose and Casey Newton explore and make sense of the latest in the rapidly changing world of tech.
Subscribe to Hard Fork.
Access:
Is Roblox making the internet better or worse? We asked the CEO
A show about the tech industry's inside conversation, hosted by tech reporter Alex Heath and founder whisperer Ellis Hamburger.
Subscribe to Access.
Lenny's Podcast:
Why LinkedIn is turning PMs into AI-powered "full stack builders" | Tomer Cohen (LinkedIn CPO)
Interviews with world-class product leaders and growth experts to uncover actionable advice to help you build, launch, and grow your own product.
Subscribe to Lenny's Podcast.
Great Chat:
Code red: our favorite tech rivalries
A podcast mostly about tech. Brought to you weekly by Angela Du, Sally Shin, Mac Bohannon, Helen Min, and Ashley Mayer.
Subscribe to Great Chat.
Big Technology Podcast:
How An AI Model Learned To Be Bad — With Evan Hubinger And Monte MacDiarmid
The Big Technology Podcast takes you behind the scenes in the tech world featuring interviews with plugged-in insiders and outside agitators.
Subscribe to Big Technology Podcast.
 

About This Page

This is a Techmeme archive page. It shows how the site appeared at 11:05 AM ET, July 8, 2013.

The most current version of the site as always is available at our home page. To view an earlier snapshot click here and then modify the date indicated.

More News

Earlier Picks