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October 21, 2014, 8:30 PM

Top News

Ingrid Lunden / TechCrunch:

Yahoo Beats In Q3 With Revenue Of $1.09B, EPS Of $0.52 — With all eyes on what Yahoo will do with its $5 billion+ in Alibaba cash, Yahoo today reported its Q3 earnings after the close of trading, with sales of $1.09 billion excluding traffic acquisition costs and non-GAAP earnings per share of $0.52.

Douglas MacMillan / Wall Street Journal:

Yahoo Reveals Mobile Sales for First Time: $200 Million, 17% of Total

More: ZDNet, AdExchanger, Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, MarketWatch and Seeking Alpha. Tweets: @dmac1. See also Mediagazer

Dieter Bohn / The Verge:

Nexus 6 hands-on: supersized, even by today's standards, with much improved camera — The Nexus 6: hands-on with Google's phablet — After watching Apple unapologetically release the gigantic iPhone 6 Plus and Samsung release the fourth iteration of its massive Galaxy Note …

More: TechCrunch, 9to5Google and Phandroid

Dieter Bohn / The Verge:

Nexus 9 hands-on: premium feel, impressive screen quality, but unlikely to challenge iPad — The Nexus 9: hands-on with Google's latest attempt to take on the iPad — Android has never gotten much respect in the big tablet market. Sure, the Nexus 7 has been surprisingly successful …

More: 9to5Mac, TechCrunch, PCMag Australia cpus …, Android and Me and HTC Source

Brian Krebs / Krebs on Security:

Staples investigating credit card breach at its retail stores after multiple banks report fraud — Banks: Credit Card Breach at Staples Stores — Multiple banks say they have identified a pattern of credit and debit card fraud suggesting that several Staples Inc. office supply locations …

More: Ars Technica, The Verge, BGR, VentureBeat, Re/code, Fortune, Reuters, Wall Street Journal, Computerworld, TechCrunch, New York Times, Ubergizmo, internetretailer.com, The Daily Caller, ABC News, BBC, Inquirer, ZDNet, SC Magazine, Help Net Security, Forbes, Electronista, The Register, CNET, TIME and Benzinga. Tweets: @lessien

Eric Slivka / MacRumors:

iPad Air 2 Up to 55% Faster Than iPhone 6, Up to 68% Faster Than iPad Air — A short time ago, we highlighted a new benchmark appearing to show an iPad Air 2 device carrying an A8X chip with a triple-core 1.5 GHz processor and 2 GB of RAM. — While we mentioned that the enhanced specs …

More: Ars Technica, AppleInsider, MacRumors, Gigaom, BGR, 9to5Mac, Gizmobic, iDownloadBlog.com, SlashGear, TechnoBuffalo, App Advice and MobileSyrup.com

Charlie Warzel / BuzzFeed:

Sexist French Uber Promotion Pairs Riders With “Hot Chick” Drivers — “Who said women don't know how to drive?” the Uber blog post asks. The post was deleted after an inquiry from BuzzFeed News. — Yesterday, Uber's Lyon office unveiled a new promotion with an app called “Avions de Chasse.”

More: The Daily Caller

Tom Warren / The Verge:

Microsoft Lumia to replace Nokia brand, starting in France, global rollout in the coming weeks — Microsoft Lumia will replace the Nokia brand — Microsoft started dropping hints about its plans to kill off the Nokia and Windows Phone brands last month, and now the company is ready to make it official.

More: TechCrunch, Re/code, InfoWorld, WMPoweruser, Ubergizmo, MobileSyrup.com, TechnoBuffalo, FierceWireless, SuperSite for Windows, Electronista, WinBeta, TechSpot, Pocketnow, Windows Phone Central, The Next Web and Business Insider

Frederic Lardinois / TechCrunch:

Google Acquires Firebase To Help Developers Build Better Real-Time Apps — Google today announced that it has acquired Firebase, a backend service that helps developers build realtime apps for iOS, Android and the web that can store and sync data instantly.

More: Firebase, Google Cloud Platform Blog, Gigaom, VatorNews, The Next Web, 9to5Google and VentureBeat

Tom Warren / The Verge:

Microsoft releases new Windows 10 preview with a Notification Center — Microsoft released its first Windows 10 Technical Preview just three weeks ago and the software maker is now ready to issue a fresh update. If you're already testing Windows 10 then a new preview build (9860) …

More: Blogging Windows, ZDNet, BetaNews, BGR, GeekWire, CNET, PC World, ZDNet, The Next Web, SuperSite for Windows, Electronista, Windows Phone Central, WinBeta, Gotta Be Mobile, VentureBeat, Neowin and Windows Phone Central

Greg Sterling / Search Engine Land:

Apple Launches “Maps Connect,” Self-Service Local Listings Portal — This afternoon Apple notified us of a new self-service portal to add or edit local business listings: Apple Maps Connect. It's intended for small business owners or their authorized representatives (though not agencies) …

More: 9to5Mac, AppleInsider and iDownloadBlog.com

Tiernan Ray / Tech Trader Daily:

GT Advanced To Sell Furnaces for Cash to Pay Back Apple, Says Fortune — Fortune columnist Philip Elmer-DeWitt a short while ago tweeted from the courtroom in Springfield, Massachusetts that one-time Apple (AAPL) supplier GT Advanced Technologies (GTAT) has agreed to pay off its debts to Apple …

More: Wall Street Journal, StreetInsider.com, 9to5Mac, Fortune, MacRumors, AppleInsider, Reuters, Seeking Alpha, Bloomberg, SlashGear, iDownloadBlog.com and Cult of Mac. Tweets: @philiped

Arik Hesseldahl / Re/code:

HP to announce Sprout, a computing device combining a large display, touch surface, 3D scanner, and overhead projector — HP Will Unveil New Computing Product Called Sprout Next Week — When Hewlett-Packard announced it would split in two — one company devoted to PCs and printing …

More: Digital Trends, ZDNet and Business Insider

Bloomberg:

EMC Said to Absorb VCE Joint Venture as Cisco Reduces Stake — EMC Corp. (EMC) is buying out much of Cisco Systems Inc. (CSCO)'s stake in joint venture VCE, which sells high-end data center equipment, according to people with knowledge of the matter. — EMC will meld the joint venture …

More: The Register and Seeking Alpha

John Cook / GeekWire:

Former Microsoft exec Bob Muglia raises $26M for Snowflake, a data warehousing startup — Bob Muglia is floating in the clouds, or should we say on some snowflakes. The longtime Microsoft veteran — who left the company in 2011 after 23 years, including a stint as the president …

More: TechCrunch, PE Hub Blog, The New Stack, InfoWorld, Bloomberg, Gigaom and VentureBeat

Emil Protalinski / VentureBeat:

Google beefs up 2-step verification with physical USB Security Key option in Chrome — Google today announced it is beefing up its two-step verification feature with Security Key, a physical USB second factor that only works after verifying the login site is truly a Google website.

More: Google Online Security Blog, PC Magazine, Computerworld, The Verge, eWeek, Tech Times, Gizmodo, PC World, Android Police, GSMArena Blog, 9to5Google, Lifehacker, The Next Web, Android Central, TechCrunch, BetaNews, WebProNews and SlashGear

Kurt Wagner / Re/code:

New Social Network Tsu — Which Pays Users Who Post — Raises $7 Million — New social network Tsu believes it can get you excited about seeing advertisements. (Seriously!) — That's because Tsu, which launched on Tuesday with a $7 million investment led by Sancus Capital …

More: Billboard, VentureBeat and Examiner

Chris Welch / The Verge:

Google Play Music adds Songza's contextual playlists for All Access subscribers, Material Design UI — Google brings Songza's best feature to Play Music — But only All Access subscribers get to use it — After purchasing Songza for an undisclosed sum earlier this year …

More: Official Android Blog, The Next Web, VentureBeat, Wall Street Journal, BGR, Associated Press, Android Police, The Wrap, Gotta Be Mobile, Billboard, 9to5Google, Droid Life, Android Central, Lifehacker, Gizmodo, CNET and Liliputing

Marcus Wohlsen / Wired:

Nielsen partners with Adobe to rate all online content, from videos and podcasts to articles — Nielsen Will Soon Rate Everything on the Web, From Videos to Articles — The Nielsen ratings have long held huge sway over the business of television, but television isn't like it used to be.

More: Computerworld, Reuters, The Wrap, Wall Street Journal, VentureBeat, ZDNet and Broadcasting & Cable. See also Mediagazer

Darrell Etherington / TechCrunch:

Magic Leap Secures $542M Led By Google For “Lightweight Wearable” Tech That Merges Physical And Digital Worlds — It's rare that a company can stay relatively secretive while raising a huge amount of funding, but Florida's Magic Leap has managed that. The startup, led by CEO Rony Abovitz …

Juli Clover / MacRumors:

Apple Aware of iCloud Login Harvesting in China, Launches Browser Security Guide — Earlier this week, web censorship blog Great Fire suggested that hackers aligned with Chinese authorities were using man-in-the-middle attacks in order to harvest Apple ID information from Chinese users that visited Apple's iCloud.com website.

More: Re/code, Official Apple Support, Digital Trends, Washington Post, Tech Times, iPhone in Canada Blog, Engadget, iDownloadBlog.com, BGR and TechCrunch

Reuters:

Keith Alexander terminates deal allowing sitting NSA CTO Patrick Dowd to work part-time at at IronNet Cybersecurity — Exclusive: Ex-spy chief's private firm ends deal with U.S. official — (Reuters) - Former National Security Agency director Keith Alexander has ended a deal …

More: The Hill and The Daily Caller

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