During Drones’ Big Week, Drone-Maker 3D Robotics Discloses Some More Funding

3D Robotics and one of its VCs are piggybacking on the Amazon Prime Air news, but it appears that the flying drone delivery scheme may be reciprocally piggybacked on their technology.

News Byte

Distributor Magnify, a Web Video Curator, Raises $1 Million

Magnify, a video distribution and curation startup, has raised $1 million from a group of investors that includes TED conference producer Chris Anderson and Chris Kelly, Facebook’s former chief privacy officer. Magnify, which has previously raised $4.2 million over five years, helps publishers find, sort and publish Web video on some 90,000 sites. The New York-based company has 13 employees.

Conde Nast Creative Director Scott Dadich Named Wired Editor in Chief

Conde’s digital “golden boy” returns to the company’s flagship tech publication.

News Byte

Wired Magazine’s Chris Anderson Leaves

Wired editor-in-chief Chris Anderson is leaving the magazine after an 11-year run to lead 3D Robotics, the drone company he started a few years ago. No word from publisher Conde Nast on a replacement.

Voices

Music Video For Database Start-Up? That's How CouchOne Rolls

How does a small Bay Area start-up whose business revolves around arcane coding compete for developers with the likes of Facebook and Google? By making a rap video, of course.

Wired’s iPad App Boasts a New Feature: A Price Cut

Condé Nast sold some 95,000 digital copies of Wired’s June issue at $4.99, the same price the ink-and-paper edition commands. So why sell the July issue at $3.99?

Voices

Almost Famous: David Maher Roberts of The Filter

This week we caught up with the globe-trotting David Maher Roberts, CEO of The Filter, a media recommendation engine founded by music legend Peter Gabriel. David commutes between the United Kingdom where he lives and the United States, where he works. We found him during a stop in Texas, appropriately via Skype.

Wired Comes to the iPad, Version 2.0

We’ve seen the iPad. And we’ve seen what some magazine people think their stuff might look like once it gets to the wonderdevice. But what will it really look like? Here’s a more informed guess, via Condé Nast’s Wired magazine, which has been working on an iPad-compatible version of the title for many months.

Google's Brin Says He Is "Always Optimistic" About China Solution

Google’s Sergey Brin took the stage at the TED conference this morning for a brief discussion about the search giant’s recent declaration that it will pull out of the country if it has to continue to censor results. “We want to find a way to work within the Chinese system,” said Brin, but without having to censor political search terms. “A lot of people might think I am naive and that might be true.”

BoomTown Heads to TED (And Promises No Pretentious Tweets!)

What is it about TED, the iconic conference founded an astonishing 25 years ago, that gets so many people who don’t go in a lather? Nonetheless, the gathering still represents one of the best venues for deep and varied thinking on a wide range of important issues, even if there are moments that might seem twee and elitist to some. TED2010 officially opens tomorrow morning in Long Beach, Calif., although events at the conference actually began last night. Speakers run the gamut and will talk on a wide range of topics, from poverty to clean tech to global warming to ukulele playing.

Kara Visits TED (The Belated Video)