Techmeme: The Facebook Mobile Plot Thickens: Orange To Offer ‘Party Call’, A Social Calling Service Starting Summer 2013 (Ingrid Lunden/TechCrunch)

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November 21, 2012, 5:00 PM

Top News

Tom Warren / The Verge:

Microsoft ‘Xbox TV’ device due in 2013 with casual gaming and streaming — A set-top box to compete with Apple TV and others — Microsoft is building an Xbox set-top box. Multiple sources familiar with Redmond's plans have confirmed to The Verge that the company plans to introduce …

Peter Burrows / Bloomberg:

Jobs's Spaceship-Like Apple Offices to Arrive Later Than Planned — Apple Inc. (AAPL) said the construction of a new spaceship-like headquarters with a circular design in Cupertino, California, won't be completed until mid-2016, later than originally projected, as the company revises its plans.

Josh Constine / TechCrunch:

Facebook Asks Users If It Can Abolish Their Right To Vote On Future Site Governance Changes — Today Facebook will send its largest email blast to date, informing all 1 billion users that it's proposing to modify the site's governance structure and remove the ability for users to vote on changes.

More: PC World, Los Angeles Times, PC Magazine, VentureBeat, CNET, AllFacebook, Facebook, Betabeat, ZDNet, WebProNews, SlashGear and TPM IdeaLab

Alexei Oreskovic / Reuters:

Facebook to share data with Instagram, loosen email rules — (Reuters) - Facebook Inc is proposing to combine user data with that of recently acquired photo-sharing service Instagram, and will loosen restrictions on emails between members of the social network.

More: The Next Web and Business Insider

Philip Elmer-DeWitt / Fortune:

Apple has solved its iPhone 5 supply problems - just in time — Ship times hit 2 weeks Tuesday and a spot check found it at 9 out of 10 of Apple stores — FORTUNE — Despite stock-outs, production hiccups and Foxconn worker unrest, it looks like Apple (AAPL) will have an iPhone 5 available …

More: AllThingsD, Computerworld, CNET, ZDNet, TechCrunch, 9to5Mac, iDownloadBlog.com, Mashable!, iPhone Hacks, everythingiCafe and AppleInsider

Cecilia Kang / Washington Post:

FCC chairman backs Dish Network plan to compete with wireless giants — The chairman of the Federal Communications Commission on Tuesday proposed to greenlight Dish Network's long-fought plan to create a wireless service that would compete with those of giants AT&T and Verizon Wireless.

More: Tech Trader Daily, Phone Scoop, PC Magazine, TechnoBuffalo, CNET, PhoneArena, The Register, MobileBurn.com and GigaOM

Mike Dano / FierceWireless:

Dish blasts FCC's rules for its AWS-4 spectrum

More: SlashGear and Reuters

BBC:

Kickstarter sued over 3D Systems' printer patent — Formlabs's printer was developed by researchers working at Massachusetts Institute of Technology — Crowd-funding website Kickstarter is being sued for its promotion of a new 3D printer. — More than 2,000 users contributed over $2.9m …

More: WebProNews and Wired. Thanks:@leokelion

Bloomberg:

U.S. Said to Waver on Antitrust Case Against Google — Google Inc. (GOOG) may skirt the most serious antitrust allegations under investigation by the U.S. as regulators waver on whether they can prove consumers are hurt by the way the company ranks its search results, three people familiar with the matter said.

More: Techdirt, CNET, Search Engine Land, Softpedia News, The Verge and WebProNews

Michael J. de la Merced / DealBook:

Deloitte Denies Knowledge of Fraud at Autonomy — Deloitte is finally speaking up about Autonomy P.L.C. — and the accounting firm says it knew nothing about potential fraud at its onetime client. — The statement by Deloitte comes after Autonomy's parent, Hewlett-Packard …

More: Bloomberg, Mashable!, WebProNews and Bloomberg

DealBook:

In Hewlett's Claims About Autonomy, Legal Costs Could Pile Up

Kim Yoo-chul / The Korea Times:

‘No iPhone without Samsung patents’ — The chief executive of Samsung Electronics has expressed confidence about the ongoing patent battle with Apple, saying that no smartpohone can exist without patents from Korea's technology giants. — “The truth never lies.

More: BGR, 9to5Mac, ZDNet, CNET, iPhone Hacks, Android Authority, Pocketnow and iphoneincanada.ca

Alex Wilhelm / The Next Web:

BlackJet, the Uber for private air travel, is now live — BlackJet, the Uber for private air travel, founded by the co-founder of Uber, is now live. If you managed to score an invite, and have the cash - you bastard - you can now “book seats, manage [...] travel and invite [...] friends.”

Tweets: @blackjet

Peter Kafka / AllThingsD:

A Peek at TV's Future, Via Google Fiber — The Google Fiber experiment/maybe-not-an-experiment in Kansas City is important because it shows Google's ability to compete directly with broadband providers for control of the Internet pipe itself. — If Google doesn't need to rely on the Comcasts …

More: VentureBeat and 9to5Google

Spencer E. Ante / Wall Street Journal:

Checking In on Foursquare's Valuation — Facebook's IPO, Flattening Valuations Put Hurdles Before Social Media Startups — Some social media startups are finding investors a lot less friendly in the wake of Facebook Inc.'s messy initial public offering. — A few months before Facebook went public …

More: Mobile Marketing Watch, Business Insider, GigaOM, Skift and FierceMobileContent News

Mike Isaac / AllThingsD:

With Site Badges Debut, “Mobile First” Instagram Is Catching Up to the Web — Building on the momentum of its Web profiles launch earlier this month, Instagram announced Wednesday the rollout of badges, small icons that users can post to promote their Instagram pages. — They'll certainly look familiar.

More: Instagram for Business, Marketing Land, TechCrunch, GigaOM, CNET, Engadget, Ubergizmo, Mashable! and WebProNews

Arnold Kim / MacRumors:

AT&T Seems to Be Extending FaceTime-Over-Cellular to All Customers — AT&T appears to be quietly extending FaceTime-Over-Cellular capabilities to all their iPhone customers. Earlier this month, AT&T announced that they would allow any customer “with an LTE device” on a “tiered data plan” to use iOS 6's FaceTime over Cellular feature.

Stephen Hall / WindowsWave:

Security Hole Allows Pirates to Get a Legitimate Windows 8 Activation for Free — A new security hole has been discovered in Microsoft's product activation process that allows pirates to get a free legitimate activation of Windows 8 using the current Windows Media Center upgrade promotion.

More: The Register, Examiner, TechSpot, PC Magazine, The Verge, CNET, VentureBeat, SlashGear, WindowsClub News, gHacks Technology News and Neowin. Thanks:@steqheu

Florian Mueller / FOSS Patents:

Apple and HTC fine with showing license agreement to Samsung — but not the royalty rate — On Friday Samsung's counsel in the Apple case in California brought a motion to compel, demanding access to the newly-minted Apple-HTC license agreement that settled Apple's first Android patent case ever.

More: AllThingsD, PhoneArena, Mac Weekend and iDownloadBlog.com

Elaine Burke / Silicon Republic:

BitTorrent seeks broadcasters to help develop live streaming tool — BitTorrent has put the call out to qualified broadcasters and content creators to sign up to help build BitTorrent Live, which it believes is the next generation of live streaming. — Currently in beta mode …

More: The Official BitTorrent Blog and Broadband TV News

Will Connors / Digits:

NTSB May Drop BlackBerrys for iPhones, Citing Reliability — Research In Motion Ltd. may be losing another U.S. government customer, but this time the reason isn't fickle employees who prefer to carry around an iPhone. — The National Transportation Safety Board said it's looking to switch …

More: USA Today, AllThingsD, AllThingsD, SiliconANGLE, BGR, TUAW, PC Magazine, The Register, AppleInsider, SlashGear and Computerworld

Dave Herman / Hulu Blog:

Hulu Plus Launching on Nintendo Wii U with Integrated Second Screen Experience — At Hulu's development center in Seattle, we spend our time focusing on making the Hulu Plus living room experience delightful for our subscribers. With our latest innovation, we've teamed up with Nintendo …

More: GeekWire, AllThingsD, PC Magazine, VatorNews, CNET, Geek.com, Cinema Blend Games, WebProNews, TechCrunch, SocialTimes and SlashGear

Andrew Roberts / Bloomberg:

Bionic Mannequins Spy on Shoppers to Boost Luxury Sales — Store mannequins are meant to catch your eye. Soon you may catch theirs. — Benetton Group SpA is among fashion brands deploying mannequins equipped with technology used to identify criminals at airports to watch over shoppers in their stores.

More: PSFK and Globe and Mail

Josh Constine / TechCrunch:

What's Spotify's Secret For Its Dec 6th Event? Discovery Via Twitter-Style Influencer Following — In the post-FM era of streaming music, anyone can be a DJ. Spotify wants to provide the audience. That's why industry sources confirm Spotify will launch an enhanced influencer following system …

Thanks:@mattsf

Richard Shim / DisplaySearch Blog:

Black Friday: Catalyst for Tablets to Far Surpass Notebook Shipments in North America — This year's Black Friday is expected to be the catalyst for tablets to pass notebook shipments for the first time in North America, a trend which we expect to continue for the foreseeable future.

More: CITEworld, Tech Trader Daily, PC Magazine, LAPTOP Magazine, The Tech Report, FierceWireless and TechSpot

Ingrid Lunden / TechCrunch:

The Facebook Mobile Plot Thickens: Orange To Offer ‘Party Call’, A Social Calling Service Starting Summer 2013 — Facebook Phone it may not be, but today we have one more example of how users will be able to use Facebook on their phones — and in place of traditional phone services.

More: CNET, digitaltrends.com, Inside Facebook, Engadget, The Next Web, AllThingsD, GigaOM, Ubergizmo, FierceWireless, GadgeTell, Mobile Magazine and Gizmodo. Thanks:@_alexlawrence

Jake Smith / 9to5Google:

HTC DROID DNA now available from Verizon for $199 — We loved it. You might too. Today, the HTC DROID DNA is officially available from Verizon Wireless for $199 on a two-year contract. For those who need a spec refresh, the DNA features a 5-inch, 1080p 441PPI display, which seemed a little …

More: BGR, TechCrunch, Zealous About Great Gadgets, IntoMobile, Gotta Be Mobile, Droid Life, TechnoBuffalo, SlashGear, Engadget, Android Police and Softpedia News

David Kravets / Wired:

Megaupload Assisted U.S. Prosecution of Smaller File-Sharing Service — Eighteen months before Megaupload's operators were indicted in the United States, the company complied with a secret U.S. search warrant targeting five of its users who were running their own file-sharing service using …

More: Techdirt, TorrentFreak and Web Host Industry Review

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