Is Apple Plotting A Route To A Waze Acquisition?  Rumours On The Road Point To Yes  —  There can be no doubt that one of the hottest startups of the last couple of years has been social sat-nav smartphone app Waze.  Not surprising in an era when - largely due to Apple initially dumping Google Maps …

Google Requires People to Use the Google+ Social Network, Gains Ground Against Facebook  —  Google Inc. is gaining ground against Facebook Inc. thanks to a controversial tactic: requiring people to use the Google+ social network.  —  Google over the past year has boosted the Google+ operation …

Ubuntu phone OS announced, first devices shipping in early 2014  —  As already teased and promised, today Canonical is taking the wraps off the mobile version of Ubuntu, which is built around the existing Android kernel and drivers, but doesn't use a Java Virtual Machine and promises to use “the full power of the phone.”

FTC Chairman Pushing for a Google Antitrust Decision This Week  —  It's likely that the Federal Trade Commission will rule on its antitrust investigation of Google this week, with a similar settlement to the one discussed before the December holidays, according to multiple sources familiar with the matter.

Life After The iPhone: How AT&T's Bet On Apple Mobilized The Company  —  AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson, who took over just as the iPhone was launched, talks about the fame, pain and change that's taken place under his leadership.  (Photo credit: Matthew Hawthorne)  —  Steve Jobs needed some advice.

Apple is partnering with Broadcom to bring super-fast 802.11ac networking to upcoming Macs  —  While it's believed that Apple's 2013 Mac lineup will feature the same designs as their late-2012 counterparts, they are set to include a range of updated internal features and hardware.

Oh, The Places Tumblr Can Go  —  Nothing says Internet opportunity like a social media juggernaut.  Tumblr, the meme-olicious, gif-tastic, photo-fabulous, (but also occasionally) thoughtful blogging platform that attracted 167 million visitors and nearly 18 billion pageviews in December, is certainly no exception.

Chitika says Kindle Fire web share jumped to 7.5% and iPad fell 7.1% over holidays in North America  —  The Apple iPad may be doing too well for its own good, at least when it comes to measuring percentage changes in Web traffic.  This holiday season, the tablet's Web usage share in the US …

Andrew Sullivan's Ad-Free Publishing Experiment Sees Six-Figure Revenue In First Six Hours  —  When political blogger Andrew Sullivan announced this morning that he's leaving The Daily Beast and launching an independent company called Dish Publishing, the most provocative bit of news was his intended business model.

Google Chairman Eric Schmidt to visit North Korea  —  SEOUL, South Korea — Google's (GOOG) executive chairman is preparing to travel to one of the last frontiers of cyberspace: North Korea.  —  Eric Schmidt will be traveling to North Korea on a private trip led by former New Mexico …

WhatsApp processed a whopping (record) 18 billion messages on the last day of 2012  —  Mobile messaging app WhatsApp has had a pretty remarkable 2012.  It just announced that it had set a new single day record for the most messages published on December 31.

Microsoft: Google Is (Still) Blocking Us From Building YouTube for Windows Phone  —  Microsoft today said that Google executives have blocked a full-featured YouTube app for Windows Phone, via a blog post from one of its chief lawyers.  —  The company is trying to put a little public antitrust pressure …

Patent trolls want $1,000—for using scanners  —  When Steven Vicinanza got a letter in the mail earlier this year informing him that he needed to pay $1,000 per employee for a license to some “distributed computer architecture” patents, he didn't quite believe it at first.

Judge can't order Yelp user to edit negative review  —  Jane Perez accused Christopher Dietz of improperly completing construction work on her property—then she gave him a negative Yelp review.  —  Jane Perez  —  The Virginia Supreme Court has overturned a preliminary injunction in a lawsuit …

Apple Killed the Netbook  —  And we're all better off for the demise of the $400 future of computing.  —  Netbooks are dead.  Good riddance!  Just a few years ago, these small, underpowered, ultracheap laptops were considered the future of the computer industry.

Samsung redesigns the Series 3 Chromebox case, leave specs the same  —  Samsung is offering a new version of the Series 3 Chromebox, a small desktop computer designed to run Google's Chrome OS operating system.  —  The new model is called the XE300M22-B01US, and in terms of hardware it's pretty …