The Mounting Minuses at Google+  —  Playing Catchup to Facebook, Google's Social Network Is a Virtual Ghost Town by Comparison  —  To hear Google Inc. Chief Executive Larry Page tell it, Google+ has become a robust competitor in the social networking space, with 90 million users registering since its June launch.

Yahoo Warns Facebook of a Potential Patent Fight  —  As Yahoo struggles to keep up with younger competitors, the Web portal company is weighing a new tactic: threatening legal action over its patent holdings.  —  Yahoo is seeking to force Facebook into licensing 10 to 20 patents over technologies …

Google exec hints of Android 5.0 release this fall  —  Pattern of earlier releases suggest fall, but Lockheimer says Google wants to be ‘flexible’ on timing  —  BARCELONA — Google is not letting on much about the next version of Android, even though it is rumored to be coming to a smartphone by early summer.

Chrome now easily opens email links in Gmail, thanks to some HTML5 magic  —  The next time you open up Gmail in Chrome keep an eye out for the prompt above, which uses HTML5 to finally close the gap between the way Google's browser handles mailto: links and its popular email service.

Samsung: 'We're not doing very well in the tablet market'  —  One Samsung executive gets brutally honest about his company's performance in the tablet market, even while offering up some hope for its line of Galaxy Note mobile devices.  —  Samsung executive Hankil Yoon speaking during …

French Regulator Warns of Google Privacy Policy  —  BRUSSELS (AP) — Google's new privacy policy appears to violate the European Union's data protection rules, France's regulator said Tuesday, just two days before the new guidelines are set to come into force.  —  Google announced its new privacy policy with much fanfare last month.

Google Will Offer $1 Million In Rewards For Hacking Chrome In Contest  —  For the last three years, Google's Chrome browser has left the world's premiere hacking competition unscathed, even as Firefox, Internet Explorer and Safari have all been taken down by the assembled security researchers.

Intel lays out its plan for Android, will cut chip size in half by 2014  —  As Paul Otellini said at the Intel press event at Mobile World Congress, “it wouldn't be an Intel presentation without a roadmap.”  The company has laid out the long-term plans for its mobile processors …

Microsoft shows ‘Holoflector’ augmented-reality mirror  —  This afternoon at the Microsoft TechForum event in Redmond, the company's researchers showed a series of prototypes and demos in areas including advanced displays and augmented-reality applications.  —  One of the research projects …

Mercedes-Benz Brings Siri To Their Cars  —  Luxury carmaker Mercedes-Benz unveiled plans to integrate Apple's Siri into its A-Class electronics system that would allow drivers access to their iPhone apps using voice commands.  The program, called the Drive Kit Plus will work in conjunction …

Goodbye Erick, Hello Eric  —  TechCrunch has been through a lot lately, and we need to focus on what truly matters: covering startups and innovation.  So, this post is going to be short.  —  But here is what's going on: Erick Schonfeld is leaving and Eric Eldon is replacing him as editor.

Whole Foods prototype puts Kinect on shopping cart, follows people around store  —  The quest for a high-tech “shopping cart of the future” is nothing new, but Whole Foods is planning to test a new spin on the concept, using Microsoft's Kinect sensor for Windows.

Once Film-Focused, Netflix Transitions to TV Shows  —  Belying the “flix” in its name, Netflix is now primarily an Internet streaming service for television shows, not feature films.  —  TV series now account for more than half of all Netflix viewing.  That helps to explain why this Wednesday …

IBM takes big steps toward extremely fast quantum computing  —  IBM is announcing today that it has made major advances toward creating a practical, full-scale quantum computer, a fabled, theoretical machine that relies on the tiniest atomic properties to compute problems faster than any supercomputer that exists today.

HBO Go coming to Xbox 360 on April 1st  —  HBO has slowly been bringing HBO Go to a multitude of connected platforms, from Roku boxes to some Samsung connected TVs, and now we finally know when it'll come to the Xbox 360.  Tonight at an HBO event in San Francisco, company Co-President …

Hot Item: Pre-IPO Facebook Shares  —  Facebook Inc. isn't publicly traded yet, but that hasn't stopped investors like Leon Cohen from trying to buy the social network's stock now.  —  The 83-year-old resident of Aventura, Fla., would like to purchase 10,000 or more of Facebook's private, before-initial-public-offering shares.

On Google & Being “Evil”  —  “I don't think they were ever not evil,” I'm quoted as saying about Google in a New York Times column yesterday.  True enough, I said that.  But I wanted to provide some further context about my comments as well as the truly disastrous two months Google has had on the public relations front.

Sequoia, Kleiner Perkins, And Obvious Put $4.5M In Sleek Social, Mobile Gifting Platform Karma  —  Karma, a new social, mobile gifting service from the founder of TapJoy, has raised funding from Kleiner Perkins, Sequoia Capital, The Obvious Corporation, Stephen Gillett, Felicis Ventures and other angel investors.

Microsoft's next Steve: Windows boss faces biggest test  —  (Reuters) - For Steven Sinofsky, the stern but creative engineering manager who runs Microsoft Corp's flagship Windows division, February 29 is showtime.  —  On that day, in Barcelona, Sinofsky will preside over the public test release …