Techmeme: Reddit, still unprofitable, looks to grow ad revenues without alienating users (Mike Isaac/New York Times)

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July 28, 2014, 8:45 AM

Top News

Liz Gannes / Re/code:

Apple to Buy Radio App Swell for $30 Million — Apple is close to buying the Pandora-for-talk-radio app Swell, according to multiple sources. — The deal is worth about $30 million, these sources say. — Swell had raised $7.2 million from investors including DFJ, Google Ventures and InterWest Partners.

More: 9to5Mac, Inquirer, BGR, CNET, iMore, Business Insider, Cult of Mac, MacRumors, Gizmodo, Tech.pinions, Gizmodo UK, iDownloadBlog.com, App Advice and GSMArena Blog. Tweets: @rsarver. See also Mediagazer

Mike Isaac / New York Times:

Reddit, still unprofitable, looks to grow ad revenues without alienating users — Can Reddit Grow Up? — Since its founding nine years ago, Reddit has stuck to its own weird guns. — The site, where users find, share and talk about web links and photos, has been faithful to an antiquated design …

More: Guardian and ITProPortal. Tweets: @alexjamesfitz, @mims and @pinboard

Mark Gurman / 9to5Mac:

Amazon apparently set to launch Square-competitor in August as it develops biometric payment solutions — Amazon could be preparing to launch its own mobile credit card reading hardware in the coming weeks, according to internal Staples documents hinting at such a launch that we've obtained.

More: CNET, Digital Trends, The Verge, Guardian, Business Insider, ITProPortal, VentureBeat, The Next Web, PC Magazine, Gizmodo, Engadget, Mashable and Electronista

Builtvisible:

A history of the undersea cables that carry much of the world's international internet traffic — Messages in the Deep - The Remarkable Story of the Underwater Internet — In October of 1971, in the midst of the Cold War, the nuclear-powered submarine USS Halibut entered heavily guarded Russian waters in the Sea of Okhotsk.

Steve Dent / Engadget:

Europe approves Apple's $3 billion takeover of Beats — Apple is official a step closer to owning Beats, as the $3 billion merger has just been cleared by European regulators. The EU commission ruled that the merger “did not raise concerns because the combined (headphone) market share of Apple and Beats Electronics is low.”

More: EU Press Room, AppleInsider, The Next Web, 9to5Mac, iMore and TechCrunch. See also Mediagazer

Darrell Etherington / TechCrunch:

Zillow To Acquire Trulia In $3.5B Stock-For-Stock Deal — Zillow is going to acquire Trulia in a deal worth $3.5 billion in stock, according to the company. The combination of these two real estate tech companies should secure Zillow's position as a market leader in the U.S. …

More: New York Times

Will Oremus / Slate:

Facebook's privacy pivot: Mark Zuckerberg's plan to win back trust — Why Mark Zuckerberg is trying to win back users' trust. — Remember when Mark Zuckerberg didn't believe in privacy? When he argued that it was “no longer a social norm”? When Facebook employees wouldn't even use the word …

More: Gigaom and bizjournals. Tweets: @howardlindzon and @joshconstine

Mark Gurman / 9to5Mac:

Apple Stores to soon open up iPhone sales via AT&T Next, T-Mobile JUMP, & Verizon Edge — Apple is preparing a significant expansion of its iPhone sales capabilities in its official retail stores, according to sources. Late in August, many Apple Stores in the United States will kick off …

More: iPhone Hacks, iMore, MacRumors, App Advice and Business Insider

Kashmir Hill / Forbes:

How Your Security System Could Be Hacked To Spy On You — On a recent Friday evening, Logan Lamb and his girlfriend turned up at a co-worker's birthday party in Knoxville, Tennessee with a 12-pack of cheap beer, 4 craft beers for the birthday boy, and some hacking tools, namely a software-defined radio …

Farhad Manjoo / New York Times:

Ultrapak external battery packs can grab a full charge for a standard smartphone in 15 minutes — How to Charge Your Phone in 15 Minutes — Say you've got 15 minutes in an airport between flights and your phone is nearly dead. What do you do? — In the past, you had two choices.

More: AndroidHeadlines.com. Tweets: @msquinn

Ellen Huet / Forbes:

Snapchat stars begin making lucrative advertising deals to create “authentic” branded content — Snaps To Riches: The Rise Of Snapchat Celebrities — Shaun McBride takes no risks when drawing a Snapchat. He takes screenshots instead, to protect his works in progress in case of calamity.

More: TIME. Tweets: @stevecheney

Darryl K. Taft / eWeek:

Watson's first consumer-facing use: advising military members on transition to civilian life — USAA Taps IBM's Watson as Military Veterans Advisor — For the first consumer-facing application of IBM's Watson cognitive computing technology, USAA, the insurance and financial services firm …

More: Gizmodo, Washington Post, Bloomberg, hngn.com, IOL, Wired.co.uk, Computer Business Review, Digital Journal, Fast Company, InformationWeek, CNET, SiliconANGLE and Nextgov

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