Techmeme: DOJ used 225-year-old law to get federal court to order manufacturer to bypass phone password (Danny Yadron/Wall Street Journal)

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November 26, 2014, 11:35 PM

Top News

Kurt Wagner / Re/code:

Twitter to Start Tracking Which Apps Its Users Have Downloaded — Twitter will soon be peeking in on your smartphone. Literally. — The social network says it will start collecting data on which apps its users have downloaded onto their phones. The update is opt-out …

Pocket Blog:

Apple's new phones taking screen time from iPads; iPhone 6+ owners open 65% more articles and videos than those with smaller phones — The Screen-Size Debate: How the iPhone 6 Plus Impacts Where We Read & Watch — Every day, millions of articles, videos and web pages are saved and viewed …

More: TechCrunch, Quartz, Gigaom, MacRumors, iPhone in Canada Blog, BetaNews, PandoDaily, SlashGear, MobileSyrup.com, GeekWire, The Next Web, 9to5Mac and MacStories

Tweets: @lukew, @cgpgrey, @lowresolution and @ropiku

Jack Nicas / Wall Street Journal:

GoPro to sell multirotor consumer drones with high definition cameras late next year for $500-$1000 — GoPro Developing Line of Consumer Drones — Company Plans to Start Selling Multirotor Helicopters With High-Definition Cameras Late Next Year — The wearable video camera maker …

More: BGR, The Verge, Engadget, Photography Bay, The Verge, TechnoBuffalo, CNET, PC Magazine, Quartz, bizjournals, Gigaom, TechSpot, Gizmodo and WebProNews

Jeff Baumgartner / Multichannel News:

Google Fiber Austin pricing: basic internet free, Gigabit $70/month, Gigabit+TV $130/month — Google Fiber Posts Austin Pricing — 1-Gig/Pay-TV Bundle To Start At $10 More Than In K.C. & Provo — Google Fiber has posted details on the three residential service plans it will offer …

More: 9to5Google, Google Fiber, KXAN-TV, PC World, PC Magazine, Android Authority and DSLreports

Danny Yadron / Wall Street Journal:

DOJ used 225-year-old law to get federal court to order manufacturer to bypass phone password — Case Suggests How Government May Get Around Phone Encryption — The Justice Department is turning to a 225-year-old law to tackle a very modern problem: password-protected cellphones.

More: Electronista, Cult of Mac and Patently Apple

Tweets: @dangillmor, @dannyyadron, @scottthurm, @csoghoian, @nikkipjah and @kevinmitnick

Alex Wilhelm / TechCrunch:

Microsoft Appears To Pre-Announce Its Purchase Of Email Startup Acompli — Whoops. Welcome to literal fait accompli. — A short, unfinished blog listed as written by Microsoft corporate vice president Rajesh Jha hit the RSS wires earlier today. Here's what it looked like:

More: The Verge and BetaNews. Tweets: @chrisfralic, @katie_roof and @raju

Ian Paul / PC World:

Chromecast snags Nickelodeon, Sesame Street, Comedy Central, and more — Google is adding some big names to the Chromecast roster just in time for Thanksgiving. On Tuesday, seven new apps embraced Google's $35 streaming media stick, and almost all of them are from big name media companies.

More: TechCrunch, Google Chrome Blog, 9to5Google, Hollywood Reporter, Multichannel News, Ubergizmo, Android Authority, SlashGear, Gigaom, Liliputing, Variety, The Next Web, The Verge, Engadget, TIME, Droid Life and Android Police

Ingrid Lunden / TechCrunch:

Tumblr Overtakes Instagram As Fastest-Growing Social Platform, Snapchat Is The Fastest-Growing App — With 1.35 billion active monthly users, Facebook continues to be the world's largest social network by some margin, but when it comes to picking up new users, it appears to have reached a saturation point.

More: Ubergizmo, Marketing Pilgrim, Marketing Land, Mashable, memeburn and Neowin

Tweets: @johnjannuzzi and @bessemervp

Kia Kokalitcheva / VentureBeat:

Lyft says it had record usage last week in wake of Uber controversy — Uber had a rough week following its PR meltdown involving a journalist, an Uber executive, possible threats against that journalist, calls to ban Uber, and the specter of possible privacy violations by Uber execs.

More: Gigaom, BuzzFeed and Business Insider. Thanks:@dylan20

Josh Lowensohn / The Verge:

Obama signs E-Label Act, allowing manufacturers to put labels such as FCC symbols in software menus instead of on hardware — The US bill to phase out wonky symbols on the back of gadgets is now a law — The legislation designed to do away with printing various symbols and regulatory compliance numbers …

More: The Hill, The Next Web and iMore

Greg Kumparak / TechCrunch:

Unity Finally Releases Its Long Promised User Interface Creator — Good news, everyone! — Once upon a time, Unity promised to overhaul the way developers would build user interfaces in their Unity-powered games. This was roughly around the time man discovered fire*.

Thanks:@grg

Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:

Tumblr Rolls Out Mobile App Install Ads In The Form Of Shareable Sponsored Posts — Tumblr this morning is rolling a new mobile-only ad unit called “Tumblr Sponsored Apps” which will allow app publishers to target the social blogging service's largely Millennial (and heavily mobile) …

More: MediaPost and Fast Company. Thanks:@techtipster1

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