Techmeme: Microsoft to run a startup accelerator focused on home automation at its Redmond campus from September through December of this year (Blair Hanley Frank/GeekWire)

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June 18, 2014, 12:45 AM

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Brad Stone / Businessweek:

Amazon's Lab126 has been working on a 3D smartphone since 2009 — Inside the Secretive R&D Lab Behind the Amazon Phone — Disclosure: Brad Stone is author of The Everything Store: Jeff Bezos and the Age of Amazon. The book is published by Little, Brown & Co., a division of the Hachette Book Group …

More: BGR, I4U News, Quartz, Business Insider, TechCrunch, TechnoBuffalo, 9to5Google, Gizmodo, SlashGear, ZDNet, Digital Trends, Pocketnow, CNNMoney.com, Liliputing, Re/code and The Verge. Tweets: @nytimesbits

Thomas Gryta / Wall Street Journal:

AT&T to Exclusively Carry Amazon Smartphone

More: VentureBeat, TechCrunch, Gigaom, CNET, Pocketnow, Forbes, Droid Life, Re/code, VatorNews, Ubergizmo, BGR, TIME, SlashGear, The Technology Chronicles, Phandroid, Geeky Gadgets and Mobile Magazine

Tweets: @johnlegere, @johnlegere and @zpower

Yinka Adegoke / Billboard:

YouTube Confirms Subscription Service Imminent, Warns of Takedowns — YouTube has confirmed it is close to launching its music subscription service, even as it in the process of pulling down some of the biggest indie label acts in a dispute over payments. — Acts like Adele …

More: Associated Press, Rolling Stone and Businessweek

Tweets: @viticci and @ow

Stuart Dredge / Guardian:

YouTube to block indie labels who don't sign up to new music service

Josh Constine / TechCrunch:

Facebook's Slingshot Challenges Snapchat With ‘Reply To Unlock’ — Facebook wants to break the “1% Rule” of Internet culture that says a tiny fraction of users create the content for everyone else. So after a momentary leak last week, today Facebook officially launches Slingshot for iOS …

More: Facebook, New York Times, Joey Flynn, Business Insider, blogs.ft.com, TechHive, Mashable, iPhone Hacks, The Register, Julie Zhuo, The Next Web, Geek Beat, ABC News, Marketing Pilgrim and MacRumors

Tweets: @stevecheney, @levie, @tim, @drew, @mikeisaac, @mikeisaac, @parislemon and @panzer

Thanks:@kylebrussell

Ellis Hamburger / The Verge:

Facebook Slingshot is much more than a Snapchat clone — A new kind of network that feels more like a feed than a messenger — At first, Facebook's new ephemeral messaging app, Slingshot, feels like yet another Snapchat clone. The free app, available now for iPhone and Android …

Peter Kafka / Re/code:

Apple Is Happy to Sell You the Hachette Books Amazon Won't Stock — Amazon doesn't want to sell books from Hachette Book Group. — More for us, says Apple, which is taking advantage of the fight between the world's biggest bookstore and one of the world's biggest publishers.

More: The Mac Observer, GeekWire, iPhone in Canada Blog, Cult of Mac, AppleInsider, MacDailyNews, MacNN, Gizmodo, App Advice and MacRumors. See also Mediagazer

Bloomberg:

Oracle close to buying hospitality-industry software provider Micros Systems for more than $5B — Oracle Said to Near Deal to Buy Micros Systems — Oracle Corp. (ORCL) is nearing a deal to buy hospitality-industry software provider Micros Systems Inc. (MCRS) for more than $5 billion, people familiar with the matter said.

More: SiliconBeat, Mercury News, VentureBeat, eWeek, Forbes, The Register, bizjournals, Business Insider, TheStreet.com, DailyFinance.com and Network World

Brian Fung / Washington Post:

Democrats unveil legislation forcing the FCC to ban Internet fast lanes — Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt. gesturing during a hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite, File) — Democratic lawmakers will unveil a piece …

More: Patrick Leahy, Computerworld, Wired, VentureBeat, Digital Trends, Re/code, InfoWorld, The Register, Salon, The Hill, CNET, Gigaom, DSLreports, NPR, Inquirer, The Verge and BGR. Tweets: @darth. See also Mediagazer

Ely L. / Yelp Official Blog:

Hold the Phone! Now You Can Message Business Owners Directly Through Yelp — With more than 57 million local reviews contributed across 27 countries, there's already a boatload of info people can gather through Yelp on any local business they're thinking about trying.

More: Engadget, Marketing Land, VentureBeat, Phandroid and WebProNews

Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:

eBay Launches “eBay Valet,” An iPhone App That Does The Selling For You — eBay today is expanding its lesser-known eBay Sell For Me service to mobile with the launch of a new app called eBay Valet, which promises to let eBay do the selling for you. That is, it takes every step of the selling process …

More: eBay Inc, WebProNews, TUAW, Business Insider, VatorNews, The Next Web, TechSpot, iPhone Hacks, Engadget and iMore

Natalie Gagliordi / ZDNet:

Adobe delivers strong Q2 with 2.3 million Creative Cloud subscriptions — Summary: The creative software maker managed to beat estimates with growth fueled by accelerated cloud-subscription adoption. — Adobe CEO Shantanu Narayen — Adobe reported its fiscal second quarter earnings Tuesday after the bell.

More: Tech Trader Daily, Bloomberg, TechCrunch, The Next Web, Wall Street Journal, Reuters and AdExchanger

Jason Del Rey / Re/code:

One Kings Lane, after raising $112M in January, is laying off between 75-100 people, or up to 20% of its staff — One Kings Lane Will Cut Up to 20 Percent of Its Staff — Just six months after landing a big round of investment that valued One Kings Lane at $900 million …

Tweets: @werty

Sakari Suoninen / Reuters:

Nokia ‘paid millions to software blackmailers six years ago’ — (Reuters) - Finnish telecoms equipment company Nokia paid several million euros to criminals who threatened to reveal the source code for part of an operating system used in its smartphones some six years ago, Finnish TV station MTV said on Tuesday.

More: MTV.fi, The Verge, Forbes, Pocketnow, Engadget, Ubergizmo, ZDNet, TechnoBuffalo, WinBeta, Electronista and MobileBurn.com

Klint Finley / Wired:

Department of Energy network ESnet is capable of cross-country data transfers at 91 Gbps — The Shadow Internet That's 100 Times Faster Than Google Fiber — When Google chief financial officer Patrick Pichette said the tech giant might bring 10 gigabits per second internet connections to American homes …

More: Engadget and Gizmodo. Tweets: @aarnet

Blair Hanley Frank / GeekWire:

Microsoft to run a startup accelerator focused on home automation at its Redmond campus from September through December of this year — Microsoft launches new startup accelerator in Redmond, focusing on home automation and the ‘Internet of Things’ — Microsoft announced today …

More: VentureBeat, PC World, Microsoft Corporation, ZDNet, The Next Web and Wall Street Journal

Mary Jo Foley / ZDNet:

Microsoft cuts Surface Pro 2 prices by up to $200 ahead of June 20 Surface 3 availability — Microsoft trims Surface Pro 2 prices ahead of Surface Pro 3 availability — Summary: Microsoft is trimming between $100 and $200 off the price of its second-generation, Intel-based Surface Pro 2 tablets …

More: TechCrunch, TechnoBuffalo, Neowin, Computerworld, PC World, InformationWeek, VR-Zone, Geeky Gadgets, Engadget and The Tech Report

Graham Cluley / Graham Cluley Security News:

Chinese Android smartphone comes with malware pre-installed — A German security firm is reporting that an Android smartphone manufactured in China is shipping with malware pre-installed on it. — The Star N9500 smartphone, which can be easily found available for sale via outlets like Amazon …

More: SlashGear, BGR, Cable UK Blogs, TG Daily, Softpedia News, Associated Press, Tom's Guide, Digital Trends and Wall Street Journal

J.M. Berger / The Atlantic Online:

How ISIS, the militant group that recently seized Iraq's second-largest city, games Twitter — How ISIS Games Twitter — The advance of an army used to be marked by war drums. Now it's marked by volleys of tweets. — The Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), the Sunni militant group …

More: TechPresident. Tweets: @intelwire

Jordan Novet / VentureBeat:

Amazon strikes back, launching speedy solid-state block storage one day after Google — If you're looking for more proof that Google's public cloud is a competitive threat to market leader Amazon Web Services, consider this. — Just a day after Google announced that it would back up its …

More: Amazon Web Services (AWS), ITworld.com, The Register, TechCrunch, eWeek and Gigaom

Jackie Reses / Yahoo:

Yahoo the latest to disclose diversity: 62% men globally, and 50% white in US, more diverse than Google — Workforce Diversity at Yahoo — Here at Yahoo we are committed to attracting, developing and retaining a diverse workforce. We're in the business of building products for hundreds …

More: CNET, San Francisco Chronicle, New York Times, The Register, VentureBeat, SiliconBeat, The Verge, Business Insider, Bloomberg, Gawker, NPR and TIME

Tweets: @dmac1, @wadhwa and @ceciliakang

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