Techmeme: Google's Language Immersion Chrome extension translates random text to teach foreign lingo (Michael Gorman/Engadget)

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May 3, 2012, 10:30 AM

Top News

Josh Constine / TechCrunch:

Evernote Raises $70M At A $1B Valuation To Prep For An IPO, And The Next 100 Years — It's official. To transition from a startup into a late-stage company that aims to be around for 100 years, Evernote today confirms it's raised a $70 million Series D round of funding at a $1 billion valuation.

More: VatorNews, VentureBeat, Business Insider, Evernote Blogcast, PhoneArena and Market Wire

Tweets: @mathewi, @alexia and @om

Liz Gannes / AllThingsD:

Microsoft Hires 14 Yahoo Researchers to Kick-Start New NYC Research Lab — Over the weekend, I reported that Duncan Watts, the well-known social network researcher, had left Yahoo to join Microsoft. Turns out he's not the only one. — Microsoft snatched up not only Watts …

More: Microsoft Corporation, Betabeat, TechNet Blogs, The Verge, Bits, Technology Review, CNET, Softpedia News, TechNet Blogs, GeekWire and The Next Web

Forbes:

The Midas List — 2012's Top Tech Investors — 1 Jim Breyer Accel Partners Facebook — 2 Marc Andreessen Andreessen Horowitz Skype — 3 Reid Hoffman Greylock Partners LinkedIn — 4 David Sze Greylock Partners Facebook — 5 Peter Fenton Benchmark Capital Twitter — 6 Josh Kopelman …

More: The Next Web and Forbes. Tweets: @om, @fredwilson, @danprimack, @danprimack, @joshelman, @peterpham, @cdixon, @cdixon, @birsic, @danprimack, @joelmoxley and @martinvars

Jay Yarow / Business Insider:

Apple Is Beating Android In The U.S., Despite Reports To The Contrary — Apple appears to have taken control of 50% of the smartphone market in the first quarter of 2012, despite a report to the contrary by NPD this morning. — NPD put out a press release saying Android …

More: GigaOM, parislemon, TechCrunch, SlashGear, I4U News and Daring Fireball

Steve Kovach / Business Insider:

Liquidmetal Inventor: Apple Will Use It In A ‘Breakthrough Product’ — We've been hearing a lot about Liquidmetal lately, mostly because of rumors that Apple could be using the alloy in its next iPhone. — But what exactly is Liquidmetal? What makes it so special that Apple decided to license the rights to use it in its products?

More: Appolicious Advisor, Guardian, App Advice, Phones Review, AppleInsider, msnbc.com, Mobile, CNET, iDownloadBlog.com, PadGadget, iPhone in Canada Blog, Redmond Pie, Computerworld, 9to5Mac, MacRumors and iClarified

New York Times:

Target, Unhappy With Being an Amazon Showroom, Will Stop Selling Kindles — Target, signaling its growing irritation with its rival Amazon, announced on Wednesday that it would stop selling the online retailer's Kindle e-readers. — Target, with almost 1,800 stores, is one of the bigger carriers …

Leena Rao / TechCrunch:

Next-Generation Publishing Platform Hyperink Wants To Transform Blogs Into Books — YC company Hyperink, a next-generation digital book publishing platform, is debuting a new service which helps bloggers create short books from their existing content. — As we've reported in the past …

More: Good E-Reader, Fast Company, The New Persuaders, VatorNews, BetaKit and PandoDaily

Joel Schectman / The CIO Report:

Skype Knew of Security Flaw Since November 2010, Researchers say — Skype was told a year and a half ago about a security flaw that allows for the location tracking of customers, but left it unfixed, the security researchers who first discovered the vulnerability told CIO Journal.

More: The Verge, Inquirer, Naked Security, eWeek, Wired and Digits

Michael Learmonth / AdAge:

YouTube Commits $200M to Promote Premium “Channels” — Jay-Z Gives Surprise Performance, And, Yes, It's Already on YouTube — There was Jay-Z, Flo Rida and the Neon Trees; Julia Stiles, Jennifer Beals, Virginia Madsen and Google executive chairman Eric Schmidt.

More: AllThingsD, Business Insider, Adweek and The Next Web

Michael Gorman / Engadget:

Google's Language Immersion Chrome extension translates random text to teach foreign lingo — Berlitz may be the best way to learn a foreign language, but most of us have neither the time nor the ability to fully immerse ourselves in the vocabulary of another country.

More: 9to5Google, The Verge, Google+ and WebProNews

Thomas Houston / The Verge:

Rdio launches in the UK and France — We're seeing reports on Twitter that music streaming service Rdio has launched in the UK and France with a 7-day free trial of unlimited listening. There's no official word yet from Rdio, but we've also been able to successfully sign up for the free trial …

More: TechCrunch, The Next Web and App Advice

Michael Carney / PandoDaily:

“Apple DNA” Attracts Nate Johnson to Join Path as VP of Marketing — Path's biggest challenge has never been the quality of its product (it's gorgeous). The greatest obstacle for the startup has been getting the word out about the value proposition of a more intimate social network.

Reuters:

Settlement with HP isn't going to happen: Oracle — (Reuters) - An Oracle Corp attorney ruled out a settlement with Hewlett-Packard Co in a bitter lawsuit over the Itanium microprocessor, a day after the judge refused to resolve the case for either side before trial.

More: AllThingsD, The Register and TechEye

Enigmax / TorrentFreak:

Pirate Bay Enjoys 12 Million Traffic Boost, Shares Unblocking Tips — Last Friday the UK High Court ruled that several of country's leading ISPs must censor The Pirate Bay website having ruled in February that the site and its users breach copyright on a grand scale.

More: The Register, Inquirer, ZDNet, Fast Company, Forbes, Geek.com, Naked Security, Guardian, Telegraph, NEWS.com.au, NevilleHobson.com, Hillicon Valley, gHacks Technology News, WebProNews, Washington Post, GamePolitics blogs, Softpedia News and ZeroPaid.com

Wall Street Journal:

Microchip Tech to Buy Standard Microsystems for $939 Million — Microchip Technology Inc. agreed to buy Standard Microsystems Corp. for about $939 million, the latest sign of market forces pushing mid-sized semiconductor makers together. — The chip sector has many specialized vendors …

More: Bloomberg, Reuters and The Tech Trade

Ina Fried / AllThingsD:

Novel Android Malware Spotted on Compromised Web Sites — Demonstrating the increasing sophistication of mobile malware, a new Android Trojan is spreading via compromised Web sites and could potentially be used to crack corporate and government networks. — The bug, dubbed NotCompatible …

More: CNET, InfoWorld, Help Net Security, Redmond Pie, blog.chron.com, The Official Lookout Blog, Ars Technica, PC World, ZDNet, Gizmodo, PC Magazine, VentureBeat, PandoDaily and msnbc.com

Paul McNamara / Network World:

EXCLUSIVE: Watch Steve Jobs play FDR in Apple's long-lost takeoff on famous ‘1984’ Macintosh TV commercial — Nine-minute film called ‘1944’ was produced to inspire Apple sales team to take on IBM — h(f)){c=a.createElement('script'); c.type='text/javascript';c.src= 'http …

More: Mashable!, BuzzFeed, Techland, Macgasm, Redmond Pie, The Verge, Engadget, WebProNews, CNET, iDownloadBlog.com, MacStories, App Advice, MacDailyNews and iFans

Ethan Smith / Wall Street Journal:

AT&T Chief Says Blocked Deal Will Cost Consumers — BEVERLY HILLS, Calif.—The government's decision to block AT&T Inc.'s takeover of Deutsche Telekom AG's T-Mobile USA unit will result in higher prices to consumers, AT&T Chairman and Chief Executive Randall Stephenson contended during a public interview Wednesday.

More: IntoMobile

Eric Lichtblau / New York Times:

Wireless Carriers Who Aid Police Are Asked for Data — WASHINGTON — A leading House Democrat is demanding information from the country's biggest cellphone companies about their role in helping local police departments conduct surveillance and tracking of suspects and others in criminal investigations.

More: Betabeat

Chris Velazco / TechCrunch:

Thorsten Talks: RIM CEO Sounds Off On Licensing, Updating Devices, And The U.S. Market — Just because the first day of BlackBerry World is over doesn't mean we mobile geeks have run out of BlackBerry-related tidbits to pick apart. — Oh, far from it — in fact, RIM CEO Thorsten Heins took the stage …

More: ZDNet, PhoneArena, The Verge and Shiny Objects

Stephen Lawson / Computerworld:

Judge again orders Apple, Samsung to streamline claims in iPad patent case — The companies' lawyers have until Monday to simplify the case enough for a scheduled July 30 trial — Apple and Samsung Electronics have until Monday to further boil down the number of claims to be considered …

More: CNET and AppleInsider

Tom Warren / The Verge:

Windows Phone web Marketplace launches in 22 new countries — Microsoft is continuing its Windows Phone Marketplace rollouts this week, opening its online store for apps and games in 22 new markets. Although the Marketplace launched on Windows Phone devices back in March for the new markets …

More: Engadget, Neowin, The Windows Blog, Softpedia News, WMPoweruser, PhoneArena and Techie Buzz

Ryan Mac / Mobile:

Reid Hoffman And Peter Thiel In Conversation: The Biggest Misses — This is the final post of a five-part series from a conversation between Founders Fund cofounder Peter Thiel and LinkedIn cofounder and Greylock partner Reid Hoffman. One new video has been posted each day leading …

More: Forbes

Joel Rosenblatt / Bloomberg:

Oracle Claims $777 Million Damages in SAP Infringement Case — Oracle Corp. (ORCL) said it will claim damages of $776.7 million in its retrial of a copyright- infringement lawsuit against SAP AG (SAP), the biggest maker of business-management software. — Oracle decided in February to pursue …

David Cohen / AllFacebook:

Facebook Introduces Open Graph Action Links — Move over, action verbs, and make way for action links, which Facebook introduced today as a way for users to interact directly with timeline applications. Action links are customizable links that permit app developers to allow users …

More: CNET, The Next Web, Softpedia News, The Verge, Simply Zesty, VentureBeat, Los Angeles Times, AllThingsD, ZDNet, Mashable!, Facebook Developer Blog, internetretailer.com and WebProNews

Tero Kuittinen / Forbes:

Is the OMGPOP Acquisition Haunting Zynga? — Zynga's much-anticipated quarterly report was very close to being a non-event - ten minutes after the press release, the share price was within 0.3% of the close. Yet ZNGA declined from nearly $16 to $8 between early March and late April.

More: CNET, Gotta Be Mobile, BGR, The Atlantic Wire, New York Times, Pocket-lint, Know Your Mobile, www.pocketgamer.biz and Betabeat

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