Techmeme: “Killing It” Isn't Worth It — It's unfair to take a particular moment … (Alexia Tsotsis/TechCrunch)

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February 18, 2013, 8:05 PM

Top News

Peter Farago / The Flurry Blog:

China Knocks Off U.S. to Become World's Top Smart Device Market — Just days into the Chinese New Year (Year of the “Snake” for anyone keeping track), China has passed the U.S. to become the world's top country for active Android and iOS smartphones and tablets.

Chris Ziegler / The Verge:

Galaxy S IV will ‘definitely’ be announced on March 14th: sources — Expect it to take design cues from the Galaxy Note 8.0, which doesn't look like the leaks — Earlier today, mobile-review's Eldar Murtazin suggested on Twitter that March 14th would see a “big announcement,” …

More: SamMobile, Examiner, VentureBeat, Business Insider, Gizmodo, TechSpot, Los Angeles Times, CNET, WebProNews, BostInno, Gotta Be Mobile, Android and Me, Pocketnow, IntoMobile, MobileSyrup.com, digitaltrends.com, Neowin and Pocket-lint. Tweets: @dannysullivan

Gregg Keizer / Computerworld:

Microsoft quietly raises prices of Mac Office by up to 17% — Dumps multi-license packages, all to make Office 365's subscription pricing more attractive — Microsoft has quietly raised prices of Office for the Mac as much as 17% and stopped selling multi-license packages of the application suite.

More: Ars Technica, 9to5Mac, ZDNet, TUAW and MacNN

Adi Robertson / The Verge:

Hacked Burger King account embarrasses brand-friendly Twitter — Burger King's Twitter account has been suspended after hackers took it over, announced Burger King had been sold to McDonalds, and performed “shout-outs” to various users while claiming employees had been caught sniffing Percocet in restaurant bathrooms.

More: Gizmodo, TechCrunch, CNET, BuzzFeed, Business Insider, Reuters, Business Insider, The Atlantic Wire, The Next Web, Guardian, Digits, ABCNEWS, Marketing Pilgrim, Telegraph, BetaNews, digitaltrends.com, TechnoBuffalo, Digiday, Mashable!, Zennie62, GigaOM, TG Daily, AllThingsD, memeburn, The Raw Story, NBC Bay Area and SiliconBeat

Tweets: @mcdonalds, @amyrosebrown, @samfbiddle, @fwd, @ischafer, @davepell and @drew

Tom Warren / The Verge:

Bill Gates calls for more innovation at Microsoft after mobile ‘mistake’ — In an interview with CBS This Morning, Microsoft chairman Bill Gates has admitted that the software giant didn't nail the mobile market when it had the opportunity. “There's a lot of things like cellphones …

More: CBS News, CNET, BGR, AllThingsD, The Register, Los Angeles Times, Betabeat, Computerworld, TechSpot, PhoneArena, GeekWire, Electronista, VentureBeat, SlashGear, Neowin and WinBeta. Tweets: @nytimesbits

Alexia Tsotsis / TechCrunch:

“Killing It” Isn't Worth It — It's unfair to take a particular moment in time, slice it, and pass judgement on that particular slice. Yet that's our precise function, as chroniclers of news, and our role in the startup community. — Like many others, I read the news this week …

More: Benjy Weinberger, Forbes and Betabeat

Tweets: @jaberman, @s_gubbi and @joshconstine

Bloomberg:

Ex-Google China Head With 30 Million Followers Barred From Weibo — Lee Kai-fu, the former head of Google Inc.'s China division, said he was banned for three days from posting on local micro-blogging sites, where he has more than 30 million followers. — The ban applies to Sina Corp.'s Weibo …

More: VentureBeat, Engadget, PandoDaily, Huxiu.me, TechCrunch, Telegraph, Business Insider, CNET, Shanghaiist and Daily Dot

Chris Welch / The Verge:

Ubuntu teases tablet-related announcement for February 19th — Tomorrow's already looking to be a busy day thanks to HTC's big event, but it seems that the company will be sharing the spotlight to some degree. A timer has appeared on Ubuntu's website today hinting at tablet-related news to be revealed tomorrow.

More: Droid Life, Pocket-lint and Softpedia News

Emil Protalinski / The Next Web:

University of Oxford temporarily blocks Google Docs to halt phishing attacks against students and staff — The University of Oxford on Monday announced it had temporarily blocked Google Docs on its campus. The Oxford University Computer Services department revealed that the service …

More: OxCERT's blog

Carl Franzen / The Verge:

Sprint switches on LTE in some parts of San Francisco, New York City, and Washington, D.C. — Sprint has switched on its 4G LTE network in some pockets of San Francisco, New York City (and other parts of New York State), Washington, D.C. and some “cities in Florida,” including Jacksonville …

More: CNET, digitaltrends.com, Mobile Marketing Watch, Examiner, BGR, Android Authority, Gotta Be Mobile, PadGadget, iDownloadBlog.com, PhoneDog.com, The Full Signal, Electronista, Engadget, PhoneArena and iClarified

Claire Davenport / Reuters:

EU privacy regulators take aim at Google privacy policy — (Reuters) - European data watchdogs said on Monday they plan to take action against Google by this summer for its privacy policy, which allows the search engine to pool user data from across all its services ranging from YouTube to Gmail.

More: CNIL, TechCrunch, Ars Technica, The Verge, SiliconANGLE, Computerworld, DailyTech, Marketing Land, PC Magazine, Bloomberg and Electronista

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