Steve Ballmer: Android Ecosystem Is Wild And Uncontrolled, Apple Is High Priced And Highly Controlled  —  Tonight during Reid Hoffman's interview with Steve Ballmer, the two talked about everything Microsoft.  Now that Ballmer is talking about his competitors he let out a few bonzo words …

HP's Todd Bradley: Surface is no competition to us  —  Todd Bradley, the head of HP's PC business, does not view Microsoft's Surface tablet as a challenge.  —  “I'd hardly call Surface competition,” Bradley said in an interview with IDG Enterprise.  He listed several reasons, “One, very limited distribution.

Social Warfare: Israel Live-Tweets Its Military Campaign Against Hamas  —  Cry havoc, and let slip the tweets of war.  —  The Israeli Defense Force, the official military arm of the state of Israel, has launched a full-scale combat campaign against Hamas, the Islamist party that governs the Gaza Strip area of the Middle East.

Andreessen Horowitz Isn't Selling Any Facebook Shares Because “We Believe In The Longterm Value Of The Company”  —  There are some erroneous reports floating around that investment firm Andreessen Horowitz is selling its stake in Facebook.  Quite the contrary, it's holding on to all of its direct investment …

Rumor: Release of new iMacs may be delayed into 2013  —  After Apple CEO Tim Cook revealed last month that there would be a “significant shortage” of the newly redesigned iMac, a report on Wednesday claims manufacturing difficulties may push back the all-in-one's launch date into next year.

Is Siri really Apple's future?  —  Siri is a promise.  A promise of a new computing environment, enormously empowering to the ordinary user, a new paradigm in our evolving relationship with machines.  Siri could change Apple's fortunes like iTunes and App Store...or end up being like the useful …

New WiFi protocol boosts congested wireless network throughput by 700%  —  Engineers at NC State University (NCSU) have discovered a way of boosting the throughput of busy WiFi networks by up to 700%.  Perhaps most importantly, the breakthrough is purely software-based …

RIM's Chief Is Confident of BlackBerry 10 Success  —  Thorsten Heins, the chief executive of Research In Motion, visited The New York Times readily tells his employees, developers and customers, BlackBerry 10, the name for the new phones and the software platform running it, is a very big bet for RIM.

Kindle Fire HD 8.9 ships today, 4G version to follow next week  —  Did you skip the iPad mini and Nexus 10?  Were you looking for something a little more content focused with a form factor in between the standard sizes?  Well folks, it your lucky day, because the Kindle Fire HD 8.9 is here!

One Simple Trick Could Disable a City's 4G Phone Network  —  High-speed LTE networks could be felled by a $650 piece of gear, says a new study.  —  Why It Matters  —  LTE networks can have 10 times the bandwidth of 3G, and are eyed as the basis for a new wave of data-rich applications worldwide.

Google vs. Samsung  —  Samsung's recent success in mobile phones has been spectacular.  It overtook Nokia for the top spot in overall unit sales.  It went from having almost no smartphone sales to selling over 50 million units per quarter in a matter of two years.  —  It now accounts for nearly 40% of all industry profits.

Built to win: Deep inside Obama's campaign tech  —  The tech unit's sign, autographed by its members.  —  The reelection of Barack Obama was won by people, not by software.  But in a contest as close as last week's election, software may have given the Obama for America organization's people a tiny edge …

Napster, Udacity, and the Academy  —  Fifteen years ago, a research group called The Fraunhofer Institute announced a new digital format for compressing movie files.  This wasn't a terribly momentous invention, but it did have one interesting side effect: Fraunhofer also had to figure out how to compress the soundtrack.

Gmail now lets you search for emails by size, with flexible date options, exact match, and more  —  Google just announced yet another improvement to Gmail's search function.  In short, there are a ton of new options available now that let you search through your email with a fine tooth comb.

How I Built It: Search for Doctor Leads to Creation of Yelp  —  Jeremy Stoppelman was a Harvard Business School student exploring ideas for promising startups when he caught the flu.  His online search for a doctor eventually led to the creation of Yelp Inc., a website that allows users to read and post reviews on local businesses.

‘Memory’ board game trademark threatens several iOS games  —  Apple is sending notices to several developers asking them to remove or rename Apps that have ‘Memory’ in their titles.  —  The notices are coming at the request of German company Ravensburger, which claims to hold trademark …

Facebook Finally Launches “Share” Button For The Mobile Feed, Its Version Of “Retweet”  —  Facebook has just confirmed with me that it is launching a retweet-style “Share” button for the mobile news feed.  The much-requested feature is now rolled out for the mobile site, and will soon come to the iOS and Android apps.

A Flickr Cofounder's Second Act Closes Shop  —  Glitch, a quirky, lovely online game, is closing its doors, and its maker, Tiny Speck, appears to be laying off about 30 employees—all except a “small core team.”  —  Tiny Speck was founded by Stewart Butterfield, the cofounder of Flickr …

Vodafone U.K. Launches Tariff For Perpetual Early Adopters: Rent The Latest Smartphone For A Year Then Switch To The Next Big Thing  —  Another bit of news to add to the ‘tech is now mainstream’ pile: U.K. carrier Vodafone has launched a mobile tariff aimed at perpetual early adopters …

California Regulator Issues Citations And Fines Against Transportation Services Uber, Lyft, And SideCar  —  The California Public Utilities Commission has taken its next step against a new breed of transportation startups in San Francisco, issuing citations and leveling fines against the likes …

HomeLight aims to change the real estate business with Google funding  —  Google Ventures' latest portfolio company to launch is HomeLight, a startup that's all about buying and selling real estate.  —  More specifically, it helps you find the real estate agent — the best one for your price point …

Apple to distribute another $2.5 billion to shareholders via Thursday dividend  —  Apple will pay shareholders its second dividend in 17 years tomorrow, distributing roughly $2.5 billion in $2.65 per share across the company's 935 million outstanding shares.

Queen gets Galaxy Note 10.1, not iPad, for Royal Collection  —  The Royal Collection includes a host of other digital products, including PCs and DVDs.  —  The Royal Collection is getting its first tablet.  —  Samsung's Galaxy Note 10.1 was chosen as the Royal Collection's tablet …