The news yesterday that Apple founder and global tech visionary Steve Jobs had died reverberated through my Twitter stream. It was clear that people were deeply shaken, and deeply saddened. Time magazine stopped their presses to devote the week’s entire issue to Jobs. At a tech event I attended last night, I overheard a forty-something guy in a suit say that he had never reacted like this to the death of a business leader, that he wasn’t expecting to feel so sad.

This Monday will see TechCrunch Disrupt kick off once again in San Francisco. Leaving aside the recent brouhaha about TechCrunch (get yourself caught up , here and here here), it remains one of the most important and influential tech conferences around, lining up top-notch speakers, panels and attendees, making news and generating an epic number [...]

Yesterday, President Barack Obama concluded his address to the nation by urging Americans to contact their representatives and urge action on a debt ceiling resolution. “If you want to see a bipartisan compromise — a bill that can pass both houses of Congress and that I can sign — let your members of Congress know,” said the President. “Make a phone call. Send an e-mail. Tweet. Keep the pressure on Washington, and we can get past this.”

Earlier tonight — just before the New York Same Sex Marriage bill headed to the Senate floor – NY Assemblyman Daniel O’Donnell was on NY1, affirming that the yeas did indeed have a 32nd vote. Here is his simple yet incredibly eloquent rationale for same sex marriage:

The first thing you heard was the noise. Turns out a crowd of thousands strong – and growing – can make some noise. There was cheering, throaty renditions of “God Bless America” “America The Beautiful” and of course “The Star-Spangled Banner.” And flags, and flag vendors, and camera crews, and amateurs capturing the momen. The sea of glowing phones raised high in the night was actually quite beautiful, held against the similarly-glowing windows of 1 World Trade Center – and against the empty purple sky next to it.

In this week’s New York magazine, John Swansbourg takes an entertaining look at the deft comic stylings of NBC News Anchor Brian Williams and how he has developed a legitimate side career in comedy. As one who was an early chronicler of same (see: SNL maiden voyage, Colbert WristStrong stunt, Jon Stewart spar-fests, earnestly following up on a 2005 quip about Bea Arthur). I appreciated seeing how Swansbourg traced his gestation from anchor-who-hosts-lots-of-dinners to legit OMG-is-this-a-residuals-check? funnyman. And it’s nice to see BriWi no longer apologizing for cracking a few jokes outside the 6:30 – 7pm timeslot. Good times all around.

David Broder, the Dean of the Washington press corps, passed away today. He was in the business for almost 60 years, longer if you count his work during his military service. During that time, by all accounts, he always had a nice word and a helpful tip for those who were slightly less seasoned. This is what I thought of upon hearing the news, because just two years ago, I was one of those people.

Yesterday mega-pop superstar Katy Perry visited Facebook for a livechat with Randi Zuckerberg and a tour of the office, and many photos were taken. Many, many photos. Also, it was Nacho Wednesday! Photos and Teenage Dreams inside.

Ask not what your Google can do for you, ask what Google can do for its country: Today, Google is celebrating 50 years since President John F. Kennedy’s Inaugural Address, which contains the legendary phrase referenced above (“Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country”).

Last night just before 12 a.m., Twitter began exploding with the news: Facebook had raised $500 million — from Goldman Sachs. Bolstered by a $50-million stake from Russia’s Digital Sky Technologies, a previous FB investor, the Wall Street behemoth had slapped down $450 million to snag the Internet behemoth — now valued at a cool $50 billion. As if on cue, the internet noted that yes, that was cooler than a million dollars.

Yes, this is a big deal. Here’s what it will mean.

How cool and quirky are you? Let me know on Facto.me, the latest website where we can overshare about ourselves. It’s simple: Sign up. Add a fact about yourself. Then add another. Then, another.

For the third year in a row, DJ Earworm has created a mashup of the top 25 songs of the year, as determined by Billboard, in his 2010 United States of Pop (Don’t Stop the Pop). Featured: Katy Perry, Ke$ha, Lady Gaga, Beyoncé, Jay-Z, Enrique Iglesias (really? He was back this year?), the Black Eyed Peas, Rihanna, Eminem, and — wait, no Bieber?!? I can’t imagine a 2010 mashup without the Baby hook that I still maintain ripped off “Runaround Sue” (oh look! Proof!).

We know Oscar has, for most of its 83 years, been a boy’s club – Oscar hosts, Best Directors – we know, we know, we know. But often the focus is on the end result (with questions like, where were the X and Y by women?) as opposed to looking at the process. The gatekeepers [...]

One of the best things about dormant holiday weekends is the gems that idle Twitter surfing bring you to. For me this post-Christmas (and, for some, Boxing Day) morning, it was CBS News’ profile of the Chateau Marmont, one of Hollywood’s most storied hotels — and one of my favorite goofy nicknames

It’s that time again — the time to collect our favorite Christmas-themed songs in a fun video collection for your Yuletide pleasure. We’ve got Bowie & Bing (and Ferrell and Reilly), Jose Feliciano, some adorable SNL ladies with a furry-bearded Boyfriend, a classic Fairytale of New York, La Vie Boheme — and Bruuuuuce! Yes, Virginia, Santa Claus *is* coming to town.

You may choose to be depressed with a year-in-review video that leads with Justin Bieber, Jersey Shore, Lady Gaga and Glee. Don’t worry, WatchMojo’s 2010: Year In Review video also has Obama, health care, Haiti, Pakistan Chilean Miners, Palin, Oprah, Lost, Team Coco, Facebook, BP’s sticky legacy of oil and, of course, Julian Assange. Also, Canada! Also, Kathryn Bigelow (holla)! Year-end review videos are always a fun look-back, even as they make you cringe a little at how long ago X or Y was and what have you really accomplished since then? And why aren’t YOU on this list? YOU’RE A FAILURE. Just kidding. This is a fun video.

Okay, it’s actually $941,718 — but still, it was raised inside a month and it’s now officially Kickstarter’s most successful project. Chicago entrepreneur Scott Wilson captured the Kickstarter community with his super-cool, high-end, wearable and durable watch casing for the iPod Nano. The result: an almost-cool mil raised for the TikTok+LunaTik Multi-Touch watch kits, with over 13 thousand backers and a pretty damn impressive crowdfunding success story.

Larry King signed off his eponymous “Larry King Live” last night for the last time, after a star-studded show faded out to a final last Tron-like shot of his glowing microphone, after his final “so long.” But after, there was a party – and more heartfelt words after a quarter-century of that desk and those [...]

I am annoyed with Gawker. I have had other things to do over the past few days besides going to various sites on the Internet and resetting my stupid passwords. Because, you see, I’m one of the people whose email and password information was revealed in the Gawker hack. I had a busy weekend so I found out about the Gawker hack the old-fashioned way: via Twitter, off the numerous early stories from Mediaite. It wasn’t until 1 am on Monday morning, however, that I turned my attention to getting up to speed. Then I read this sentence: “You should change your Gawker password and on any other sites on which you’ve used the same passwords.”

Yesterday was a big day in the tech world as the number rolled in: Google had offered $5.3 billion – with a $700-million earnout – to buy Groupon. Whoa. Groupon, as you probably are by now aware, is exactly what it sounds like: a daily-deal site offering group discounts. Maybe you’ve seen that done before, [...]

Last May, I wrote something prescient about Eric Kuhn. In a piece titled “CNN’s Justin Bieber of Social Networking,” I took it a little more old-school and described Kuhn, CNN’s Audience Interaction Producer, as “the social media equivalent of Larry Levy.” For those who don’t remember the movie The Player, Robert Altman‘s delicious and dark [...]

Earlier this week, I hosted an online panel examining gender stereotypes surrounding sex and the double-standard in relationships and the workplace, hooked on the release of the film Love & Other Drugs, in which Anne Hathaway and Jake Gyllenhaal play a couple who initially meet because they are both fans of casual sex. That begins [...]

It’s wonderful when a tale of bikini waxing gone awry can bring you to a moment of blissed-out geekery, and that’s exactly what happened to me earlier this week when I clicked on Styleite for their Rihanna’s Waxing Tale From Hell story, as told to British television presenter Graham Norton on his eponymous show. While that’s certainly worth an excruciating look, for me the real gem was the next video in the YouTube chain from that program, featuring Daniel Radcliffe, aka Harry Potter — aka a ginormous geek. Because the thing he wanted to do, so badly that he studied and practiced and shushed the audience for breaking his concentration, was sing Tom Lehrer’s famous — and famously difficult — “The Elements Song.”

Earlier this week I was invited to join Joy Behar on her eponymous show to discuss some of the more pressing issues of the day: Was the TSA pushing it too far? Were Prince William and Kate Middleton headed for a rocky road? What did we really think of Bristol on “Dancing With The Stars?” I was joined by Laura Bennett, “Project Runway” designer and author of “Didn’t I Feed You Yesterday?: A Mother’s Guide To Sanity in Stilettos,” and comedian Jamie Kilstein, co-host of Citizen Radio.

Traveling today? Prefer not to risk being zapped by x-rays? Make the unfortunate decision to Travel While Underwired? Or just heard so much about the new TSA pat downs that you just have to know what it’s like? Whatever the reason for having your junk firmly felt in the name of national security, Foursquare will [...]