It’s curious that rumors of a Plaxo sale exploded at the same time that Robert Scoble got his Facebook account suspended using a secret, unreleased tool for extracting data from Facebook. Curious, too, that Plaxo is so eager to milk the incident for good PR. While a battle of words takes place in public, we hear that quieter talks are happening behind the scenes: A sale of Plaxo to Facebook. A clash between the company’s backers, though, could sink any deal.

Technically, the sale makes sense. Plaxo CTO Joseph Smarr is an engineering rock star, with many fans among the Valley’s brainiac collectors. And Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg is said to admire other members of Plaxo’s engineering team. The process of synching multiple address books, Plaxo’s specialty, is more complex than it sounds, and would save Facebook some trouble as it tries to become more of a hub for its users’ online activities on and off the Facebook site.

Bringing the investors to terms, however, would prove troublesome. Michael Moritz at Sequoia Capital is said to be eager to get a stake in Facebook, however small, so it can claim to have had a hand in its success. It’s a move he played skillfully in the first bubble when he merged a failing online bank, X.com, into Peter Thiel’s PayPal.

Thiel, now a Facebook board member and venture capitalist in his own right, remembers that maneuver all too keenly, and believes Moritz got the better of him in the deal. Then, too, Moritz forced Sean Parker, now a partner in Thiel’s Founders Fund, out of Plaxo; he next joined Facebook, and while he didn’t stay long, he still owns a substantial stake in the company. Any deal that reunites Sequoia, Thiel, and Parker would produce a moment of boardroom drama the likes of which we haven’t seen in a long while.

The talks aren’t advanced, and haven’t even reached the point of naming numbers. But Facebook’s lofty $15 billion valuation gives it a currency for acquisitions. Will Plaxo take Facebook’s paper? The decision, if it ever comes to that, will rest in part with Thiel. How delicious it would be to have Moritz at a disadvantage.

I know I’m not the only one thinking Amazon.com’s e-book reader Kindle sounds more like kindling, something that should be burned, rather than something that ignites ideas and revolutions — a problem that a good naming myth, well told, will not easily overcome. Fortunately for Bezos, Charlie Rose can’t help but interrupt his guests and provide the answers to his own questions. In an interview, the CEO fumbled through the origin of the e-book reader’s name. But why is Jeff Bezos completely failing to tell the true, compelling, and literary origins of the Kindle name?

Kindle’s definition “to ignite” is straightforward enough, but starting fires in the context of books? Fahrenheit 451, maybe, and we’re hardly the first to point that out. But there just happens to be a famous quote using kindle and books in the same context that states exactly Bezos’s vision … by the 18th century philosopher and satirist François-Marie Arouet, better known as Voltaire:

The instruction we find in books is like fire. We fetch it from our neighbors, kindle it at home, communicate it to others, and it becomes the property of all.

Certainly, this quote could have inspired the name. Wouldn’t Amazon be better served by invoking the highly-esteemed and quotable philosopher as the inspiration for their device in explaining Kindle to its literary audience? At least they’d have someone else to blame … and a dead guy who wrote a lot of books, at that.

So why no Voltaire tributes? Either Amazon wanted to avoid associating the only-available-in-America device with the hated French, or Jeff Bezos hoped to keep all of the credit to himself. I’ll assume the latter, and blame Bezos for the awkwardly named Kindle.

Source:Valleywag

German iPhone reseller T-Mobile began selling unlocked iPhones — phones that can be used on almost any network — for €999 ($1,477) because of a court order. Orange, the iPhone reseller in France, was required to sell a “carrier independent” phone from the beginning because of French law. The iPhone went on sale in France today with the unlocked version selling for €749 vs €399 for the standard contract-limited phone. (Photo by mukluk)

Source:Valleywag

There was a rumor floating around last year that Valley bad boy Sean Parker was
forced out of startup Plaxo for a cocaine arrest. Turns out that rumor wasn’t exactly true. According to “a misunderstanding.” We’ll say.