Exclusive: Microsoft's Ballmer Throws Down Gauntlet Against Apple  —  Declaring that Microsoft (NSDQ:MSFT) and its partners had in the past “ceded some of the boundary between hardware and software innovation” to Apple (NSDQ:AAPL), Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer told CRN in an exclusive interview Monday …

Google, FTC Near Settlement on Privacy  —  Google Inc. is close to a deal to pay $22.5 million to settle charges related to its surreptitious bypassing of the privacy settings of millions of Apple Inc. users, according to officials briefed on the settlement terms.

RIM Said To Sell Jet To Help Save $1 Billion  —  Research In Motion Ltd. (RIMM), which has lost 95 percent of its market value since 2008, is selling one of its two business jets under a plan to save $1 billion in operating costs, two people with knowledge of the matter said.

Let's Try to Think This iPad Mini Thing All the Way Through  —  We're Talking About a Smaller iPad, Not a Bigger iPod Touch  —  I've seen a fair bit of speculation that, if Apple produces a 7-inch iOS device, then maybe it would be a bigger iPod Touch, not a smaller iPad.

Apple Seeds Golden Master of OS X Mountain Lion to Developers  —  “200 New Features” Mountain Lion slide shown at WWDC  —  Apple released the Golden Master (GM) version of OS X Mountain Lion to developers today.  The “golden master” designation indicates that this version of the software …

Next Issue brings its all-you-can-read magazine store to the iPad, plans start at $10 a month  —  The last time we heard about Next Issue, the all-you-can-read magazine store was launching on Android, with an iOS version said to be coming “soon.”  Three months later, the startup's made good on its promise …

Steve Wozniak Shares His Thoughts On Google Glass And Microsoft's Surface Tablet  —  Steve Wozniak recently spoke at the Entel Summit in Chile, and as usual, expressed his thoughts on emerging technology.  Wozniak offered his opinion on Google Glass, Microsoft's Surface tablet, and even the Kim Dotcom case surrounding Megaupload.

Google Nexus Q hacked to run launcher, apps, Netflix, and more  —  While Google's Nexus Q is an undeniably attractive piece of hardware, we found the device to be lacking in overall functionality.  Enterprising developers are already on the case, however, with the latest Nexus Q hack bringing apps …

Apple launches new iPad in China on July 20th (update: here's why)  —  Apple is about to complete an important part of the puzzle for the new iPad's world rollout: it just confirmed that its Retina display-packing tablet will reach mainland China on July 20th.

A Reality Series Intrudes on Silicon Valley, and Finds It Cringing  —  SAN FRANCISCO — Silicon Valley is finally getting the treatment once reserved for rowdy housewives and excitable chefs: its own Bravo reality series.  But the tech world is not quite ready for its close-up.

Eric Schmidt: The Great Firewall of China will fall  —  Technology and information penetration in China will eventually force the Great Firewall of China to crumble and even lead to the political opening of the Chinese system, according to Google Chairman Eric Schmidt.

Kim Dotcom's Extradition Hearing Postponed Until March 2013  —  In this Feb. 22, 2012 file photo, Kim Dotcom, the founder of the file-sharing website Megaupload, comments after he was granted bail and released in Auckland, New Zealand.  The U.S. wants to extradite Dotcom from New Zealand …

Paydiant Gets $12M More To Build Out Its White-Label Mobile Payments API  —  Paydiant, one of the more recent entrants in mobile payments, has closed a $12 million round of funding that it plans to use to build out its white-label, API-based product for banks and merchants to offer …

Salesforce.com suffers worldwide disruption after power outage  —  Summary: Salesforce.com has suffered a series of outages that left many unable to use the CRM service.  Even the service status page was down for a while.  —  Zack Whittaker  —  Follow @zackwhittaker

Apple's $74B overseas cash hoard leads all U.S. tech companies  —  A report released on Monday from investment bank Moody's revealed that Apple leads a list of technology U.S. companies holding overseas cash with some $74 billion, up from $64 billion in December and $35 billion at the end of 2010.

Reddit lifts its ban on “The Atlantic”  —  The Atlantic has returned to Reddit.  —  A month after the social news site kicked out the news magazine and dozens of other sites —including Bloomberg BusinessWeek, and Discovery News—for spam, Reddit has welcomed many back into the warm embrace of its monster traffic, with little fanfare.

Noise Free says Apple stole its technology, sues to stop patent claim  —  A Silicon Valley firm called Noise Free says it showed Apple its secret noise cancellation technology in a series of meetings but that Apple then turned around and used the technology without permission for its iPad and iPhone devices.

DC City Council Shelves “Uber Amendment” Against Discounted Private Cars, Road Looks Clearer For UberX  —  An explosive day of online and traditional campaigning appears to have worked.  The Washington DC city council was set to approve an amendment to its far-reaching taxi legislation …

Readability for iOS 1.1 improves article discovery, UI, and performance  —  Readability has given its iOS reading app its most significant update yet, taking the application to version 1.1.  The update brings with it two new article discovery methods: first is Top Reads …

Nokia Bridge: Nokia's Incubator Gives Departing Employees €25k And More To Pursue Ideas That Nokia Has Not  —  Nokia may still be fighting some pretty major fires on its burning platform, but it's also building some bridges — namely the Nokia Bridge incubator program …

Ouya's Android-based, hackable game console now official: we chat with designer Yves Behar  —  A handful of details briefly slipped out about the project earlier, but now it's here: the Ouya, an attempt not just to delve into the cutthroat world of TV game consoles but to try and shift the goal posts.

Ukrainian Students Win Microsoft's Imagine Cup With Their Sign Language-To-Speech Translation Gloves  —  During an awards ceremony in Sydney today, Ukraine's team quadSquad just won this year's Microsoft Imagine Cup student technology competition (and $25,000) thanks to its gloves that can translate sign language into speech.

Should (And Will) Kleiner Perkins Settle Its Gender Discrimination Fight?  —  High-profile venture firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers faces off in San Francisco court later today against its partner Ellen Pao in what will be the first public face-off in one of the most closely watched stories of the past months in Silicon Valley.

Motorola announces Atrix HD for AT&T: 4.5-inch 720p display, LTE, Android 4.0 for $99  —  Motorola officially announced the much-leaked Atrix HD this morning, bringing the new handset to AT&T's LTE network.  At first blush, the new phone's something of a Droid RAZR / RAZR Maxx hybrid …

BlackBerry Curve 9310 makes a straight line to Verizon, July 12th  —  RIM's BlackBerry Curve 9310 hasn't exactly been shy.  It's already made a cameo over at the FCC and got some Boost Mobile face time, and now the QWERTY keyboard-packing smartphone will be hitting Verizon, arriving on the carrier this week.