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2:05 PM ET, November 29, 2010

Techmeme

 Top Items: 
Faith Merino / VatorNews:
Google buys Groupon for $2.5 billion?  —  While neither company has confirmed the story, the acquisition follows a week of buyout rumors  —  Google has just purchased Groupon for $2.5 billion, according to an unnamed insider who spoke with VatorNews.  Neither Google nor Groupon …
RELATED:
Alexia Tsotsis / TechCrunch:
Google M&A Lead Congratulates Groupon CEO On Um, Something  —  Rumors of a Google Groupon acquisition are circling through the blogosphere this Sunday night/Monday morning and for good reason, the scrappy little Vator.tv has come up with a 2.5 billion dollar acquisition price for the deal, according to sources.
Kara Swisher / BoomTown:
If Google Buys Groupon, It'll Be a Windfall for Investors, Bankers...and Regulators?  —  If Google does manage to close the deal to buy Groupon-acquisition discussions flagged by BoomTown 10 days ago-it will be at a cost that is likely to be much more than the $2.5 billion price tag being floated in the latest batch of rumors.
Discussion: SiliconANGLE
Yinka Adegoke / Reuters:
Microsoft in talks for new TV service: sources  —  (Reuters) - Microsoft Corp (MSFT.O) has held talks with media companies to license TV networks for a new online pay-television subscription service through devices such as its Xbox video game console, two people familiar with the plans told Reuters.
Bloomberg:
Apple Lawyers Up for Patent Showdowns With Nokia, Motorola, HTC  —  Nov. 29 (Bloomberg) — Steve Jobs made Apple Inc.'s iPhone one of the best-selling smartphones on the market with its touch screen, fast Web connection and access to more than 300,000 downloadable applications.  Now he's adding lawyers to the mix.
Courtney Comstock / SAI:
Morgan Stanley's Legendary Tech Analyst Mary Meeker Moving To Kleiner Perkins  —  Kleiner Perkins just poached Mary Meeker, Morgan Stanley's star tech analyst, says CNBC, citing WSJ.  —  Meeker has been a huge name since the .com days, and every year comes out with a hugely influential report/overview of the industry.
RELATED:
Sarah Lacy / TechCrunch:
John Doerr and Mary Meeker Speak about their New Partnership
Graham Cluley / Naked Security:
Can you really see who viewed your Facebook profile?  Rogue application spreads virally  —  Once again, a rogue application is spreading virally between Facebook users pretending to offer you a way of seeing who has viewed your profile.  —  As we've described a couple of times before …
Avery Morrow / Avery's Diaspora News:
I'm Dropping Diaspora, This Site Is Now Closed  —  This blog was dormant for a while because I didn't want to give Diaspora bad press.  There were security and licensing issues; the team claims that they have been fixed.  There were issues with the very model of the code; they weren't game-enders.
Paul Marks / New Scientist:
Microsoft develops shape-shifting touchscreen  —  Microsoft this week filed a patent application covering a novel way to construct a “tactile” touchscreen - a display that uses technical tricks to convince users they are actually touching the ridges, bumps and textures of a displayed image.
Claire Cain Miller / New York Times:
Now a Giant, Google Works to Retain Nimble Minds  —  When a product manager at Google told his bosses this year that he was quitting to take a job at Facebook, they offered him a large raise.  When he said it was not about the money, they told him he could have a promotion …
Discussion: SAI and Tech Report
Georgina Prodhan / Reuters:
Few smartphone owners are loyal to their brand: survey  —  (Reuters) - The booming smartphone market shows no sign of slowing but manufacturers will have to fight hard to keep their customers as smartphone owners show little loyalty to their current brands, a GfK survey shows.
Tiernan Ray / Barron's Online:
Will Tablets Kill the PC Star?  —  The proliferation of iPads and other tablets is starting to curtail sales of laptops.  —  THE AGE OF THE TABLET COMPUTER is upon us, and Wall Street stepped up its efforts this week to gauge just how destructive the trend will be to the traditional personal-computer market.
RELATED:
Donald Melanson / Engadget:
Samsung Nexus S reappears at the FCC with a pair of new antennas  —  Thinking that the not-yet-announced Samsung GT-i9020T (a.k.a. Nexus S) might be delayed due to a last minute addition of a dual-core processor, as recently seen in the seemingly similar i9100?
Verne G. Kopytoff / New York Times:
For PayPal, the Future Is Mobile  —  SAN JOSE, Calif. — When Scott Thompson, the president of PayPal, chats with executives at its parent, eBay, he is diplomatic about the size of his business compared with eBay's marketplace.  —  “I hope — honestly, genuinely — that we never get bigger than you,” he tells them.
Discussion: TechCrunch
Gizmodo:
WikiLeaks Diplomatic Bombshell Reveals Strange Tech Snooping Schemes  —  Today's not a good morning to wake up as an American diplomat.  The weekend's WikiLeaks disclosure of covert communications has revealed some strange tech plots surrounding world figures—Bluetooth bugs implanted in prisoners.
RELATED:
Erick Schonfeld / TechCrunch:
WikiLeaked Diplomatic Cables Confirm China's Politburo Was Behind …
AppleInsider:
Apple sees strong iPad, 11-inch MacBook Air sales on Black Friday  —  Wall Street analysts kept a close watch on sales at Apple stores and authorized retailers on Black Friday, and found a healthy demand for the company's products across the board.  —  Analyst Gene Munster and his team …
Harry McCracken / Technologizer:
New Google Earth: Better Street View and More  —  Google is announcing version 6 of Google Earth, its geographical-exploration software for Windows, OS X, and Linux today.  The update follows version 5.2, which was released last June, and while the revisions aren't enormous, they look neat.
 
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 More Items: 
Gmail Blog:
Optional attendees in Google Calendar
Discussion: The Next Web
Mike Masnick / Techdirt:
Fox Sues Woman For $15M Because She Aggregated TV And Movie Scripts She Found Online
Discussion: TorrentFreak
Electronista:
Apple Cyber Monday gives discounts on audio, cases
Rik Myslewski / The Register:
The Mac that saved Apple (and Steve Jobs)
 Earlier Items: 
Dan Frommer / SAI: Silicon Alley Insider:
Etsy's Facebook-Powered “Shop For A Friend” Site Is Awesome
Brian Lam / Gizmodo:
Lifechanger: Happiness Is a Loaded Sonos
Brad McCarty / The Next Web:
Sprint fires another shot at Verizon; launches 4G in six more markets
MG Siegler / TechCrunch:
Momento Is Perhaps The Perfect Passive Diary App
Michael Kan / Computerworld:
Google Maps faces July 2011 deadline on China regulations
comScore, Inc.:
Black Friday Boasts $648 Million in U.S. Online Holiday Spending …