Linked List: May 10, 2011

Tuesday, 10 May 2011

Apple Releases WebKit Source Code for iOS 4.3.3 

Closing this issue.

Ben Horowitz on Microsoft’s Purchase of Skype 

The inside perspective.

Mat Honan on Google Music 

Mat Honan, at Gizmodo:

But it’s still an island. It’s still a self-contained unit. You have to manage it yourself. It won’t grow unless you manually add tracks to it. There’s no serendipitous discovery. No social component. No Pandora or Last.fm-style suggestions that drop tracks you’ve never heard before, but already love. Google isn’t offering you a vast, new catalog. It’s just offering to hold your shit for you.

(Happy to see Gizmodo hire a good writer.)

iPhone Still Dead in the Water 

John Paczkowski:

Canaccord Genuity analyst Michael Walkley says his retail checks show continued strong demand for the iPhone 3GS at AT&T and iPad 1 at Verizon, even as the iPhone 4 and iPad 2 continue to fly off the shelves. At AT&T, for example, the iPhone 3GS is outselling newer Android phones like the HTC Inspire and Motorola Atrix.

Blanket Statement of the Day 

Jordan Yerman, beginning his summary of today’s news from Google I/O:

Android dominates the smartphone market, even though the iPhone gets most of the press and hipster love.

Android Market Gets Movie Rentals 

Matthew Lynley for MobileBeat on Google’s just-announced movie rentals for Android. One of the biggest holes in the Android landscape. I’ve always found it curious that the lack of any way to rent movies for offline viewing was seldom mentioned in Android product reviews. Not available yet anywhere other than on tablets running Android 3.1, though:

The new service will be available for Android 2.2 users in a few weeks.

This Is My Next’s Live Coverage of the Google I/O Keynote 

Lots going on this morning.

This Is My Next’s Live Coverage of the U.S. Senate’s Mobile Privacy Committee Hearing 

Apple is represented by Bud Tribble, a vice president of software engineering. Google is represented by Alan Davidson, a lobbyist.

Microsoft Buys Skype for $8.5 Billion 

What’s an extra few billion dollars?