Dylan’s Desk: How apps are chipping away at the open Web

Corporations have found a way to roll back the web's decades-long openness. One of of the most successful? Apple, whose quarterly earnings report lands later today.

Tech world wrestles with how to respond to tragedy

For the tech industry, it's hard to know how to respond to a tragedy like the Boston Marathon bombings. Here are some suggestions from our readers.

Summly, Pocket point the way to publishing’s revival — or its complete destruction

Readers have more control than ever over the content that they reader, with tools to reformat web pages, remove ads, and save them for later. How should publishers respond?

Somehow, we’re all stumbling along without Google Reader

Google has taught us all a valuable lesson: Don't trust in web services too much. Everything changes, and what you're relying on today could be gone tomorrow.

Nasdaq-SharesPost deal provides liquidity at the price of transparency

The new Nasdaq-SharesPost private market will make it far easier for pre-IPO companies and their investors to turn shares into cash. But at what price?

It’s so easy to start a company, everyone’s doing it now

Why are there so many Pinterest clones and subscription-commerce sites? It's all thanks to a decade of engineering that has made it cheaper to start a company than ever before.

What you need to do to get more women at your conference — or company

If you want to recruit more women to your conference -- or to the ranks of your company's employees -- there's a way to do it without lowering your standards.

Once king of enterprise software, Lotus Notes is dragging IBM down

IBM purchased high-flying software company Lotus for $3.5 billion in 1995. Its Lotus division still makes money, but it lags far behind the industry in innovation.

We need more people like Aaron Swartz

Coder and activist Aaron Swartz, who died last week, was one of a rare breed: Geeks who make a real difference in the world, without trying to profit from their talents.

Why CES still matters, even if you hate it

CES is a pain in the ass, but don't write it off completely. It's still an incredibly important trade show for the electronics industry, and this year it reveals some new startup opportunities.

How to take back control of your own social networks

If you don't like the way social networks try to own your data, but you're not willing to sign off completely, there is a third way. Here's how to regain control of your own stuff without giving up Twitter and Facebook.

Dylan’s Desk: How Microsoft can break the logjam of carrier anti-innovation

Microsoft could give its mobile operating system a boost by subsidizing phones itself, rather than waiting for carriers to do that.

Vint Cerf invented the Internet, and now he’s trying to save it

Vint Cerf, one of the cofounders of the Internet, is worried about an intergovernmental panel meeting this week that -- if his fears are confirmed -- might try to limit the net's "free and open" nature.

Dylan’s Desk: 6 reasons CloudBeat will be the cloud event of the year

Our CloudBeat conference is happening this week, and if you want to learn about cloud technologies from people who are actually using them, this is the place you need to be.

Dylan’s Desk: Artificial intelligence’s new hope is … targeted marketing

For decades, "artificial intelligence" was a long-sought-after ideal in computing circles. Now it's finally starting to become real -- just not in the way anyone expected.

Dylan’s Desk: Windows Phone, you’ve let me down for the last time

I want to love you, Windows Phone 8, but there's something coming between us. I'll give you a hint: It starts with A, and ends with T&T.

Dylan’s Desk: The tech industry is losing touch with the reality of working life

There's a right way and a wrong way to announce layoffs. Sadly, too many tech companies take an insensitive and shortsighted approach that shows just how out of touch they are with the rest of the world.