Techmeme
October 19, 2012, 11:30 PM

Top News

9to5Mac:
Estimated prices on 13-inch Retina MacBook Pros: Starts around U$1,699  —  Alongside the new mini/iPads, Mac Minis, and iMacs, Apple will reveal a 13-inch MacBook Pro with Retina Display on Oct. 23.  We have now received pricing information on the base model and the “best” model.
Eric Slivka / MacRumors:
New Photos of 13-Inch Retina MacBook Pro Show Battery Layout, Ports, and More  —  Earlier this week, we pointed to a forum thread [Google translation] at Chinese site WeiPhone.com sharing a pair of photos of what was said to be the display assembly from Apple's upcoming 13-inch Retina MacBook Pro.
More: CNET, Gizmodo, 9to5Mac and AppleInsiderTweets: @panzer
Alex Williams / TechCrunch:
Jeff Bezos: The Smart People Change Their Minds  —  Amazon.com Founder and CEO Jeff Bezos stopped by the 37signals office yesterday and offered some wise thoughts about strategy.  His views are especially refreshing in a time when people who change their views often get portrayed as weak and lacking confidence.
Josh Constine / TechCrunch:
Facebook Officially Begins Shutting Down “Questions” Product, May Refocus On Search  —  It was no Quora.  Today Facebook finally confirmed it is retiring Questions, which originally launched in July 2010.  The Questions Dashboard and option to share a poll to the news feed are being removed.
Mike Rogoway / Oregonian:
Apple starts work on massive Prineville data center  —  Apple has begun work on the first, $68 million phase of its new Prineville data center, clearing and flattening land for the one of two, 338,000 square-foot buildings atop the bluff that overlooks town.  —  Each building is more than twice the size of a typical Costco store.
Amir Efrati / Wall Street Journal:
Google Weighs Mobile-Patent Antitrust Settlement  —  Google Inc. is weighing whether to settle a potential claim by U.S. authorities that it violated antitrust law in the way it handles mobile-device patents, according to a person familiar with the matter.  —  At issue, according …
Amol Sharma / Wall Street Journal:
India, A New Facebook Testing Ground  —  BANGALORE—India is becoming a critical testing ground for Facebook as it strives to cash in on growth in emerging markets and better target mobile-phone users—two increasingly pressing goals for the social-networking firm.
Fruzsina Eördögh / ReadWriteWeb:
YouTube Networks: An Inside Look At Their Unsavory Business Practices  —  Ray William Johnson, the world's most successful YouTuber, announced he is leaving his signed network Maker Studios earlier this week via video.  The news sent the YouTube-o-sphere abuzz with gossip as both Johnson …
Mat Honan / Wired:
Why Windows Just Can't Win  —  Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer talks about the future of Windows at the Consumer Electronics Show in January 2011.  Photo: Jon Snyder/Wired.com  —  Microsoft is about to have its biggest product release in nearly 20 years.  Before the end of the month, Windows 8 …
Ina Fried / AllThingsD:
Facebook: We Weren't Moving Fast Enough in Mobile  —  One of Facebook's mottos is “Move Fast.”  Indeed, there are posters extolling that mind-set throughout the company's offices.  —  But when it comes to mobile, even Facebook wasn't moving fast enough.  That was the message on Friday from Facebook Mobile VP Vaughan Smith.
Will Oremus / Slate:
Minnesota bans Coursera: State takes bold stand against free education  —  Honorable mentions go to New York City's Taxi and Limousine Commission for driving out Uber's online taxi-hailing service and to automobile dealers' groups in four states for trying to have Tesla dealerships declared illegal.
Jessica E. Lessin / Wall Street Journal:
Thiel in Talks to Invest in Airbnb at $2.5B Valuation  —  Online room rental service Airbnb Inc. is in discussions with venture capitalist Peter Thiel about a roughly $150 million investment that would value the company at around $2.5 billion, according to people familiar with the matter.
Pamela Parker / Search Engine Land:
Google Gives Update On Shopping Going Full Paid Inclusion, Hints At AdWords' Future On Q3 Call  —  Now that Google's new pay-for-play Shopping is in full swing (the changeover took place October 17), the company used its earnings call to share thoughts on its success thus far, and its future vision for the product.
Emil Protalinski / The Next Web:
GitHub hit by DDoS attack second day in a row  —  GitHub is having one hell of a week, with four outages in five weekdays.  The social coding site is currently being hit by a Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attack, the second one in two days.  The site's engineers are working on fixing the issue …
More: CNET, The H Security and Softpedia NewsTweets: @github
Alex Wilhelm / The Next Web:
Microsoft announces Office 365 University, bringing subscription-based productivity apps to students  —  This morning Microsoft announced Office 365 University.  Due in the first quarter of calendar 2013, the product offering is the Office 365 suite, tweaked for students, and priced so that anyone heading into school can afford it.
Zack Whittaker / ZDNet:
Microsoft offers only one-year Surface warranty, despite EU law  —  Summary: Microsoft is offering only one-year warranty for the enterprise-favored Surface tablet, while EU law dictates it should be “at least two.”  Didn't Apple recently get stung for this kind of behavior?  —  Zack Whittaker
Sam Byford / The Verge:
New Samsung Chromebook also available with 3G for $329.99  —  We were under the impression that Google's new Samsung Chromebook would only be able to hook up to the internet via Wi-Fi, but it seems that something got lost in the announcement.  A 3G model will in fact be available …
Jenna Wortham / New York Times:
Airtime, a Pedigreed Start-Up, Is Struggling  —  It sounds like a recipe for success for a new start-up: Two famed entrepreneurs, tens of millions of dollars in the bank and endorsements from celebrities like Alicia Keys and Jim Carrey.  —  But Airtime, the much-hyped video chat site created …
Ilya Pozin / Forbes:
Is Pheed the New Twitter?  —  Miley Cyrus seems to think so.  As does Ashley Tisdale, David Guetta, Paris Hilton, Chris Brown, and thousands of others who have joined the site in a matter of days.  —  So what is Pheed?  —  In short, think of it as Twitter, with a business plan.

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