In tough economic times such as these, even the biggest businesses get the urge to restructure, re-=org and reshuffle. Kara reported on several big breakups (of the tech variety), including the separation of AOL from Time Warner. Even ICQ got into the mix.
If you follow AllThingsD, and Weekend Update hopes you do, then one thing you’ve come to value is the special way the staff gets around the world to cover the important stuff and report it straight from the geek’s mouth. This week our bicoastal brigade brought the tech news as it happened, and in Boomtown’s case, from 30,000 feet.
Sometimes big news comes in small packages–especially in the world of high tech. This week, AllThingsD covered some little changes that mean serious consequences for the companies that make the stuff and consumers who rely on it.
Books vanishing from e-readers…magazines on Hulu…DVDs from a kiosk…cats and dogs living together…mass hysteria!
Kara was half James Bond, half Indiana Jones in the cities and jungles of BoomTown this week. She jet-setted, jet-lagged and still managed to report on a genuine cougar fight.
The iPhone is finally coming to the world’s most wired country. South Korean regulators on Wednesday cleared the iPhone for sale. Great news for Apple. The South Korean market is a robust one, and analysts say that with the right carrier partner, Cupertino could be looking at first-year sales ranging from 500,000 to two million.
Geekfighting may never become its own UFC event, but following tech news this week seemed, in places, like a view to a big, well-funded cage match.
While the highlight 
of the week was undoubtedly Apple’s Rock and Roll event on Wednesday featuring Steve Jobs 2.0, that was only the anodized aluminum, candy-colored, video-shooting cherry on top of another week of tech sector reporting from All Things Digital.
The week that took us from August to September was one for the books over at BoomTown, especially if you’re 12.
Kara spent Monday morning at Activision Blizzard, where they are pushing forward with the entire Guitar Hero line, even as the game industry faces a nearly 50 percent decline in U.S. sales this year. Kara got to play hero to several of the forthcoming releases, including previewing the much anticipated DJ Hero console.
Google began using billboard advertising for the first time earlier this month, though it may not have needed to. Because according to Millward Brown Optimor, the Google brand is the most well known and valuable brand in the world.
Moving on now to in-app purchases, peer-to-peer support, accessories, and push notifications — things we heard about at Apple’s previous iPhone 3.0 event.
Forestall invites gameloft to the stage to demo its new app for iPhone 3.0. Asphalt 5, a 3-D racing game. With media player access, users can access their iPod music via a “car stereo.” Developer describes Asphalt 5 as a console gaming experience. Doesn’t seem to quite live up to that description, but it’s still impressive.
Onstage now, Airstrip Technologies, a medical app developer. Airstrip Critical Care. Wow. Realtime medical data delivered remotely to iPhone. Measurable, viewable with zoom, searchable.
What does Apple have in store for its army of third-party Mac OS X and iPhone developers at its Worldwide Developers Conference in San Francisco today? Click through for a liveblog of the keynote and full coverage of the event, happening now.
Apple rolled out updates to QuickTime and iTunes on Monday, presumably as preface to iPhone 3.0. Included in iTunes 8.2 are “many accessibility improvements and bug fixes.” Just what Apple means by that is unclear, although one wonders if it might be a clever euphemism for the Palm Pre’s recently disclosed Media Sync feature, which allows the device to synchronize seamlessly with iTunes, essentially by masquerading as an iPod.
As we head into the summer iPhone refresh cycle, the Mac rumor sites are fast pulling together a wire-and-string outline of what the device might look like. Last week brought with it reports that iPhone ’09, or whatever it might be called, will sport a 3.2 megapixel camera. Now comes news that it may support 802.11n wireless connectivity and video editing as well.
Is Microsoft truly committed to bringing its major productivity applications to mobile devices? Of course it is. Will the iPhone be one of them? Absolutely. How can I say that with such certainty? Well, because Stephen Elop, president of Microsoft’s Business Division, hinted at Web 2.0 Expo yesterday that it would be. But more importantly, because Microsoft formally announced it last November.
John Paczkowski has been poking fun at the tech industry and the personalities that drive it since 1997. From 1999 to 2007, he wrote the award-winning tech news Web log Good Morning Silicon Valley for the San Jose Mercury News, Silicon Valley's daily newspaper. Read more »
Here is a statement of my ethics and coverage policies. It is more than most of you want to know, but, in the age of suspicion of the media, I am laying it all out.
12:58 AM: Breakfast: Two schools of fish from Tokyo Bay. Calories: 782,000. How I was feeling when I ate this: confused, irradiated, hating my size.
11:37 AM: Exercise: “Taxi Stomp” (alternating legs, for 30 blocks). Calories burned: 148,900,183.
1983. The Beatles announce their first tour in thirteen years, but likewise announce that Michael Jackson will be going on tour with them as a one gigantic mega-concert event.
Best video mashup ever.
A Facebook Memorial
Wow.
Worth it for the Rickrolling photo alone.
Excellent.
Flughumor!
… you vacuous, toffee-nosed, malodorous perverts
Stephen Fry and zoologist Mark Carwardine meet the kakapo — a fat, flightless and very randy rare parrot.
D is unlike any other executive conference. Since its debut in 2003, D has brought to life the energy and excitement of the digital revolution in an unscripted, upfront and unparalleled way. Read more »
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