Techmeme: Outbox lands on Android as its service to digitalize snail mail opens to all in San Francisco (Ken Yeung/The Next Web)

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August 29, 2013, 4:50 PM

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Washington Post:

U.S. spy network's successes, failures and objectives detailed in ‘black budget’ summary — U.S. spy agencies have built an intelligence-gathering colossus since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, but remain unable to provide critical information to the president on a range of national security threats …

More: The Switch, ZDNet, The Verge and It's a Gadget

Tweets: @kgosztola, @wlpress, @shanewharris, @gregorydjohnsen, @nycjim, @granick, @declanm, @laughingstoic, @declanm, @yahoo and @declanm

Washington Post:

Inside the 2013 U.S. intelligence ‘black budget’ — The pages in this document appear in the summary of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence's multivolume FY 2013 Congressional Budget Justification — the U.S. intelligence community's top-secret “black budget.”

Tweets: @bcmerchant and @declanm

Bloomberg:

Microsoft Is Said to Be in Talks to Invest in Foursquare — Microsoft is in talks with Foursquare about a potential investment in the social-media company, according to people with knowledge of the discussions. The talks are at an advanced stage, said two of the people …

More: TechCrunch, The Next Web, ZDNet and Digits

Tweets: @dcurtis and @amir

See also Mediagazer

Sarah Frier / Bloomberg:

Foursquare Said in Talks for Strategic Investment — Foursquare Labs Inc. is in talks with multiple large technology companies about a potential strategic investment, according to people with knowledge of the discussions. — The social-media company, which lets users check in to show they're visiting …

More: Business Insider, GigaOM and ValueWalk

Tweets: @sarahfrier and @sarahfrier

Thanks:@mattlynley

Mark Gurman / 9to5Mac:

Apple begins training support staff on iOS 7 & iTunes Radio, preparing for customer surprise — Apple has started training its AppleCare technical support staff on the changes and feature-set of iOS 7, according to multiple AppleCare employees. These people say that training began today …

More: Benzinga, MacRumors, TechnoBuffalo, SlashGear, MacNN, ValueWalk, Gotta Be Mobile, App Advice and iClarified. Tweets: @markgurman. Thanks:@jordankahn

Todd Bishop / GeekWire:

Guess who's advising Box: Ex-Microsoft exec Sinofsky helping Levie and team — Like many modern relationships, this one started with a Facebook message. — Steven Sinofsky and Box CEO Aaron Levie — That was how Aaron Levie, the CEO of Box, connected with Steven Sinofsky after hearing …

More: The Box Blog, VentureBeat, TechCrunch, The Next Web and GigaOM

Tweets: @stevesi, @theromit and @caseynewton

Thanks:@johnhcook

Jennifer Van Grove / CNET:

Facebook forced to clarify how it's using your data for ads — In proposed terms of service, the social network illustrates how member data is used as a part of Sponsored Stories — because a court ordered it do so. — Facebook is making changes to the two key documents that govern …

More: AllThingsD, Facebook, Inside Facebook, TechCrunch, The Next Web and Engadget

Tweets: @dangillmor and @waltmossberg

Alexei Oreskovic / Reuters:

Facebook considers adding profile photos to facial recognition — (Reuters) - Facebook Inc is considering incorporating most of its 1 billion-plus members' profile photos into its growing facial recognition database, expanding the scope of the social network's controversial technology.

More: The Verge

Leo Kelion / BBC:

Skype confirms 3D video calls are under development — Skype said that limitations with current 3D technologies had stopped it launching the feature — Skype has confirmed it has developed 3D video calls. — The news was revealed by a senior executive in an exclusive interview with the BBC to mark Skype's tenth anniversary.

Hugo Barra / Google+:

A new Android chapter — After nearly 5½ years at Google and almost 3 years as a member of the Android team — the most amazing group of people I've ever worked with in my life — I have decided to start a new career chapter. In a few weeks, I'll be joining the Xiaomi team in China …

AllThingsD:

Android's Hugo Barra Departs Google for China's Xiaomi

Alexia Tsotsis / TechCrunch:

Google Exec Departs Amidst Rumors Of Tangled Love Quadrangle

More: PC World, NEWS.com.au, PC Pro, Business Insider, Businessweek and blogs.telegraph.co.uk. Tweets: @fromedome

Peter Kafka / AllThingsD:

Foursquare Launches New “Passive” Tip Feature for Phones — Earlier this year, Foursquare CEO Dennis Crowley raised $41 million, and promised to use that money “to do the things we want to do.” — Today he's giving people a glimpse of what that looks like: A new feature that will allow …

More: Foursquare Blog, TechCrunch, ReadWrite, Search Engine Land, Marketing Land, Betabeat, NYT Bits, Fast Company, About Foursquare and Engadget

Tweets: @jwherrman, @pkafka and @pkafka

Thanks:@mattlynley

Scott Buscemi / 9to5Mac:

Text-based bug that crashes apps in OS X 10.8 & iOS 6 discovered, fixed in OS X 10.9 and iOS 7 — An exploit publicly announced yesterday (picture of source page available here - won't force a crash) shows how a string of Arabic characters can crash applications in OS X 10.8 and iOS 6.

More: Ars Technica, TechCrunch, iMore, MacRumors, TUAW and Yahoo! News

Ingrid Lunden / TechCrunch:

Yahoo Sharpens Its Flickr iOS App With Enhanced Filters, More Camera Tools; Makes Pro Tools Free — Yahoo has just released a significant new update for its Flickr photo app for iOS, a further sign of how it wants to be not just where you go to store and view pictures, but where you create them as well.

More: Flickr Blog, The Verge, NYT Bits, The Verge, PC Magazine, Redmond Pie, 1001 Noisy Cameras, The Next Web, AppleInsider, Digital Trends, CNET, Engadget, 9to5Mac, Gotta Be Mobile, iPhone Hacks, iMore, Ubergizmo, IntoMobile and TUAW

Ken Yeung / The Next Web:

Outbox lands on Android as its service to digitalize snail mail opens to all in San Francisco — Outbox, the service that digitizes your postal mail and sends it to you wherever you are, has opened its doors to the public — well at least to those in San Francisco.

More: PandoDaily, VentureBeat and TechCrunch. Thanks:@johnrobertreed

Wall Street Journal:

Sales of BlackBerry's Q10 Keyboard Phone Fall Flat — Carrier Executives and Retailers Report Dismal Sales and Returns — When BlackBerry Ltd. Chief Executive Thorsten Heins was asked why he decided to start selling the company's new keyboard-equipped smartphone months after a new touch-screen device …

More: BGR, GigaOM, CrackBerry.com, TechnoBuffalo, The Verge, Digital Trends, ValueWalk, InvestorPlace, ZDNet and I4U News

Wall Street Journal:

Verizon and Vodafone Rekindle Talks on $100 Billion-Plus Deal

More: Bloomberg, DealBook, VentureBeat, eWeek, BGR, Reuters, AllThingsD, The Next Web, The Switch, Digits, ValueWalk, SlashGear, GigaOM, CrackBerry.com, FierceWireless, DSLreports, ZDNet and Reuters. Tweets: @dkberman

Charles Arthur / Guardian:

Facebook spam: a $200m business in links alone — Italian researchers uncover price lists for posting third-party links to Facebook fan pages - and calculate that they earn substantial amounts for most popular ones — Spammers posting links on Facebook fan pages to send people …

More: BGR, Marketing Land, Forbes, ValueWalk, Help Net Security, SiliconBeat, I4U News and memeburn

Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:

U.S. Losing Ground In Mobile App Market — If mobile apps are the post-PC era's software industry, the U.S. may be losing its edge. According to new findings mobile analytics firm Flurry released this morning, the U.S. isn't leading in the creation of mobile applications …

More: The Flurry Blog, ReadWrite, GigaOM, VentureBeat and bizjournals. Thanks:@flurrymobile

Wall Street Journal:

Amazon's Push to the Cloud Adds to Server-Market Woes — To understand the challenges facing makers of server systems, look to health-care staffing firm Schumacher Group. — The Lafayette, La., company, has been shifting a growing proportion of its computing chores to computers operated …

Tweets: @shiraovide

Quentin Hardy / NYT Bits:

The ‘Other’ Server Makers Are Gaining Ground

More: Washington Post, Forbes and SiliconANGLE. Tweets: @qhardy

Ingrid Lunden / TechCrunch:

IDC Lowers 2013 Tablet Forecast To 227M, As Phablets And Wearables Crowd Into The Market — The PC industry may be shaken up by the rapid encroachment of tablets into consumer and enterprise spending habits — a trend that's seeing lighter devices like the iPad, as well as cheaper tablets …

More: IDC, Digits, AllThingsD, Computerworld, SiliconBeat, VentureBeat, Mobile Marketing Watch and ZDNet

AppleInsider:

Parallels Desktop 9 for Mac launches with cloud storage support, Windows 8 Start button, 40% faster read times — Existing Parallels users can now get their hands on Parallels Desktop 9 for Mac, the latest version of the virtualization software that lets Mac users run Windows applications natively …

More: Business Wire, Macworld, MacRumors and 9to5Mac

Andrea Peterson / The Switch:

Here's how one hacker is waging war on the Syrian government — As President Obama weighed U.S. air strikes in Syria this week, a lone American hacker was waging his own attack on the Syrian government. He works a white-collar job in the United States by day, while at night he's …

More: Techdirt, Computerworld, Washington Post and The Verge. Tweets: @binarybits

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