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January 21, 2014, 9:45 AM

Top News

Philip Elmer-DeWitt / Fortune:

Analysts' estimates for iPhones sold last quarter range from 50M to 60M, or 55.3M on average — How many iPhones did Apple sell last quarter? — The analysts' estimates range from 50 million to nearly 60 million. Average: 55.3 million. — FORTUNE — There's a lot chatter …

More: 9to5Mac, Business Insider, memeburn, iPhone in Canada Blog, Network World, BGR India, BGR, Mobile Marketing Watch, Cult of Mac, Ubergizmo, App Advice, TechnoBuffalo, AppleInsider, MacRumors and MacNN. Tweets: @asymco

Aaron Souppouris / The Verge:

Verizon agrees to buy Intel's failed internet TV project — After publicly announcing and failing to follow through with a big plan to launch a set-top box, Intel is selling the project to Verizon. The telecoms company will purchase assets of Intel Media, a division set up to develop “over the top” TV services.

More: Intel Newsroom, Re/code, Gigaom, The Switch, Gizmodo, The Register, ZDNet, Wall Street Journal, TechEye, Engadget, Bloomberg, blogs.ft.com, The Next Web, TechCrunch, SlashGear, Electronista, Pocketables and Mashable. See also Mediagazer

Janko Roettgers / Gigaom:

Why Verizon is buying Intel Media: it's all about taking on Comcast

See also Mediagazer

Walt Mossberg / Re/code:

Beats Music Streams With a Human Touch — For years and years, people have predicted that subscription streaming music services would eventually overtake paid download services in the hearts of average consumers. The theory was that people would rather pay monthly for access to all the music …

More: 9to5Mac, Gigaom, CNET, The Verge, BGR, TechCrunch, The Next Web, pocketnow.com, SlashGear, Cult of Mac, iClarified, Android Central, MacRumors and Engadget. Tweets: @waltmossberg

Ingrid Lunden / TechCrunch:

Beats Will Shut Down MOG Music April 15; MOG Founder Joins Stealth Mobile Startup Chosen.fm — As Beats Music turns up the volume on its new streaming service (which is now live in the App Store), it is calling it a day on MOG, the streaming service its parent Beats Electronics acquired …

More: Beats Music Support, Gizmodo, iMore, USA Today, Redmond Pie, Phandroid, iPhone Hacks, AppleInsider, Engadget and The Next Web. Thanks:@ingridlunden. See also Mediagazer

Roger Cheng / CNET:

Verizon posts Q4 profit of $7.9B, adds 1.7M net connections — Verizon swung to a fourth-quarter profit as it continued to add wireless customers at a healthy clip. — The New York company on Tuesday posted a net income of $7.9 billion, or $1.77 a share, compared with a year-earlier loss of $1.9 billion, or $1.48 a share.

More: Verizon, The Verge, DSLreports, TechCrunch, ZDNet, BGR, Reuters, iDownloadBlog.com, Android Central and Electronista

Terence Kawaja / Re/code:

Color by Numbers: A new valuation framework for the Ad Tech sector — Ad-Tech Valuation: Color by Numbers — This past summer, trade press commentary focused on the impending doom of the ad-tech space, pointing to the industry's fragmentation and noting the underperformance of recent IPOs: Millennial Media, Tremor Video and YuMe.

More: AdExchanger and ExchangeWire.com. Tweets: @cdixon and @pkafka

JC Torres / SlashGear:

Initial D-Wave 2 quantum computer benchmarks show mixed results — Google gives an update on D-Wave 2 quantum computer benchmark status — As a tech company, Google has been known to branch out into different areas of interests, from self-driving cars to smart wearable technology and, more recently, to robotics.

More: Stephan Berry, The Register and Engadget

Liz Gannes / Re/code:

Airbnb Design May Lead Black Hosts to Charge Less, Say Researchers — Airbnb's prominent and large profile photos may facilitate discrimination against home-rental hosts who are black, according to a study conducted by two Harvard Business School professors.

More: Boston Globe, Valleywag, Daily Dot and Betabeat

Tweets: @tressiemcphd and @reformedbroker

David Talbot / MIT Technology Review:

In Developing Countries, Google and Facebook Already Defy Net Neutrality — In much of the world, the concept of “net neutrality” generates less public debate, given there's no affordable Net in the first place. — Net neutrality—the idea that all Internet traffic should generally be treated equally …

More: Wired, BGR and Dice News

Dara Kerr / CNET:

Yahoo tops the most-trafficked Web site list for desktop in US — While Yahoo's earnings haven't been exactly stellar over the past few months, its Web traffic certainly has. According to new data from analytics firm ComScore, Yahoo had more than 195 million unique US visitors …

More: SocialTimes, SlashGear, comScore, UPI and The Next Web

Tweets: @pogue and @aseidman

Barry Schwartz / Search Engine Land:

Expedia Lost 25% Of Their Search Visibility In Google Possibly Over Unnatural Links — The major travel website, Expedia, seems to have lost 25% of their search visibility in Google according to Search Metrics. It appears that drop was due to an unnatural link penalty …

More: Search Engine Roundtable and Skift. Tweets: @whatthebit. Thanks:@forrestkoba

Florian Mueller / FOSS Patents:

Apple insists on anti-cloning provision as part of any patent settlement with Samsung — When the CEOs of Apple and Samsung, accompanied by several in-house lawyers, meet for their (court-requested) settlement negotiations on or before February 19, there will probably be flexibility …

More: SiliconANGLE, AppleInsider, CNET, Cult of Mac, The Mac Observer, SlashGear, Ubergizmo, PhoneArena, iPhone in Canada Blog and Electronista

Alexia Tsotsis / TechCrunch:

Google encourages employees to attend SF hearing on shuttle regulations, issues talking points — Google's “High Handed” Bus Memo — Like the last time people tried busing as a solution to a socioeconomic problem, the tech busing in San Francisco has become a hot-button topic.

More: Valleywag, NYT Bits, San Francisco Bay Guardian, The Technology Chronicles and Medium

Tweets: @kevinroose, @sarahkunst and @counternotions

Jeffrey Grubb / VentureBeat:

Tencent's CrossFire and League of Legends top 2013 revenue rankings for free-to-play PC games — 10 online PC games that made more than $100M in microtransaction sales last year — The developer is one of many that is making a huge amount of cash by selling virtual goods in its online PC games.

More: SuperData Research, Daily Dot, GamePolitics blogs, Wired.co.uk, destructoid, Polygon, I4U News, Softpedia News, Develop Feed and VG247

Nick Wingfield / New York Times:

Spammers use automated calls and caller ID masking to extract sensitive personal data — Swindlers Use Telephones, With Internet's Tactics — SEATTLE — Phone swindles are practically as old as the telephone itself. But new technology has led to an onslaught of Internet-inspired fraud tactics …

MSDN Blogs:

Microsoft Research adopts Open Access policy for publications — In a recent interview with Scientific American, Peter Lee, head of Microsoft Research, discussed three main motivations for basic research at Microsoft. The first relates to an aspiration to advance human knowledge …

Ben Thompson / stratechery:

While Dropbox leads in consumer adoption, Box's early focus on enterprise sales a key strength — Battle of the Box — The problem with the old thin client model was the assumption that processing power was scarce. In fact, Moore's Law and the rise of ARM has made the exact opposite the case - processing is abundant.

Kyle Orland / Ars Technica:

Stealth marketing: Microsoft paying YouTubers for Xbox One mentions — Machinima campaign offered undisclosed money to videos promoting new console The line between traditional, paid advertising and organic editorial content on the Internet can sometimes be hazy.

Emil Protalinski / The Next Web:

VLC gets iOS 7 redesign, Google Drive integration, Dropbox streaming, the ability to download files, and more — VideoLAN today updated VLC for iOS with a slew of new features, including a new design for iOS 7 as well as Google Drive and Dropbox features. You can download the new version now from Apple's App Store.

More: feepk@videolan, Engadget, Lifehacker, Cult of Mac, iClarified, AppleInsider, GSMArena Blog, PC & Tech Authority, Gigaom, Softpedia News, PadGadget, Ubergizmo, iMore, Gotta Be Mobile, MobileSyrup.com, Cult of Mac, App Advice, 9to5Mac and iDownloadBlog.com

Andrea Peterson / The Switch:

Half of taxpayer funded research will soon be available to the public — Proponents of the open access model for academic research notched a huge victory Thursday night when Congress passed a budget that will make about half of taxpayer-funded research available to the public.

More: SPARC, Creative Commons and Personanondata. Tweets: @pmarca

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