Google Inc. Announces Fourth Quarter and Fiscal Year 2012 Results  —  Google Inc. reported consolidated revenues of $14.42 billion for the quarter ended December 31, 2012.  Consolidated revenues would have been $15.24 billion had Motorola Home been included.

The no-hire paper trail Steve Jobs and Eric Schmidt didn't want you to see  —  Steve Jobs threatened patent litigation if Palm wouldn't agree to stop hiring Apple employees, says former Palm CEO Edward Colligan in a statement dated August 7th, 2012.  Apple, Google, Intel …

Apple Pulls 500px's Mobile Apps From The App Store, Claiming It's Too Easy To Search For Nude Photos  —  Toronto photo-sharing startup 500px is reporting today that both of its applications, 500px for iOS and its recent acquisition ISO500, have been pulled from the Apple App Store due to concerns about nude photos.

Microsoft Grows Surface Family  —  Announces Surface Windows 8 Pro availability, market expansion and new accessories.  —  Microsoft Corp. today announced that its Surface family of PCs is growing.  Its newest model — Surface Windows 8 Pro — will be available for purchase on Feb. 9 …

An update to embedded Tweets  —  Tweets bring you closer to what's happening around the world, from breaking news to global conversations.  With embedded Tweets, you can see and interact with Tweets across the web.  We often embed Tweets here on our blog to highlight great Tweets …

A word on cryptography  —  The cloud storage market is dominated by players that do not take advantage of cryptography beyond HTTPS and server-side encryption.  Since we set out to improve this rather dissatisfying situation three days ago, some news outlets have made attempts to dismantle our crypto architecture.

Samsung's road to global domination  —  South Korea's Samsung is trampling rivals and gunning for Apple.  Can its hot streak last?  —  FORTUNE — To understand how Samsung — yes, Samsung — became America's No. 1 mobile phonemaker and thorn in Apple's side, it's helpful to rewind to last fall.

SIRI RISING: The Inside Story Of Siri's Origins — And Why She Could Overshadow The iPhone  —  The world got its first inkling of the quick wit that would make Apple's Siri an icon during a packed press conference held before an auditorium of tech elite.  “Who are you?” an Apple executive asked the assistant.

RIM Ready With Software For Managing Both New BlackBerrys and Rival Devices  —  RIM on Wednesday announced availability of the first version of its server software capable of managing its forthcoming BlackBerry 10 smartphones as well as mobile devices made by rivals.

Microsoft Might Kick In $1-$3 Billion To Help With The Dell Buy Out  —  Microsoft is in talks to participate in the deal to take Dell private, CNBC's David Faber reports.  According to his sources, Microsoft might invest $1-$3 billion with the group looking to take Dell private.

Announcing Release of Windows Azure Media Services  —  I'm excited to announce the general availability (GA) release of Windows Azure Media Services.  This release is now live in production, supported by a new media services dev center, backed by an enterprise SLA, and is ready to be used for all media projects.

If, Why, and How Founders Should Hire a “Professional” CEO  —  20 years ago, the classic startup model was to have young founders start a breakthrough company, then bring in “grey hair” in the form of experienced executives once it was time to scale the business.

The End of an Era: Intel's Desktop Motherboard Business to Ramp Down Over Next 3 Years  —  Today Intel made a sobering, but not entirely unexpected announcement: over the next 3 years Intel will be ramping down its own desktop motherboard business.  Intel will continue to supply desktop chipsets …

Memory to myth: tracing Aaron Swartz through the 21st century  —  To understand his contributions, we have to look beyond the headlines  —  I met Aaron Swartz in Cambridge shortly after he'd been indicted for downloading lots of JSTOR articles on MIT's network in 2011.

A New Group Aims to Make Programming Cool  —  The presence of technology in the lives of most teenagers hasn't done much to entice more of them to become programmers.  So Hadi Partovi has formed a nonprofit foundation aimed at making computer science as interesting to young people as smartphones, Instagram and iPads.

EE adds 20GB plan for 4G power users, pricing starts at £46 per month  —  Want to take advantage of blazing-fast LTE speeds in the UK?  You better be prepared to drop a few dozen quid, each and every month.  The nation's only LTE provider is clearly taking advantage of that exclusivity …

As Obama heads back to office, a battle rages over the tech that got him reelected  —  Programmers and politicians spar over sharing the campaign-winning code with the public  —  The tech team behind the 2012 Obama campaign has probably received more attention than any political programmers in history.

Sky Go Extra launches to let you download movies and shows for offline viewing in the UK and Ireland  —  Sky has launched its latest subscription service for downloadable content that can be viewed offline in the UK and Ireland.  Sky Go Extra provides content from channels including Sky 1 …