Techmeme: Marriott Abandons Quest to Block Personal Wi-Fi Hot Spots (Kimberly Weisul/Inc.com)

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January 15, 2015, 10:10 AM

Top News

Mike Shields / Wall Street Journal:

MySpace says it reached 50.6M unique users in US in November, 575% over same month in 2013, and generated over 300M video views — MySpace Still Reaches 50 Million People Each Month — Did you know that 50 million people still visit MySpace each month? — Would you be surprised …

More: Business Insider, The Huffington Post, SiliconANGLE and TIME

See also Mediagazer

BlackBerry Press Room:

BlackBerry denies it has engaged in buyout discussions with Samsung — BlackBerry Responds to Media Report — Waterloo, ON - BlackBerry Limited (NASDAQ: BBRY; TSX: BB) ("BlackBerry") is aware of certain press reports published today with respect to a possible offer by Samsung to purchase BlackBerry.

More: ZDNet, Bloomberg, Reuters, Digital Trends, Geek.com, Phones Review, The Register, Globe and Mail, TechSpot, The Digital Reader, Benzinga, SiteProNews, TechnoBuffalo, Associated Press, GeekWire, TechCrunch, The Next Web, TmoNews, Phandroid, Gigaom and Tech Trader Daily

Tweets: @markgurman, @s_m_i and @fxmacro

Steve Kovach / Business Insider:

BlackBerry shares spiked almost 30% after Samsung buyout report, back down about 15% after BlackBerry denial; claim that Samsung wanted patents appears suspect

Andy Greenberg / Wired:

Peerio announces free desktop productivity suite for end-to-end encryption of email, files, and IMs, coming to mobile soon — The Free Encryption App That Wants to Replace Gmail, Dropbox, and HipChat — Cryptographers devote their careers to the science of securing your communications.

More: The Hacker News, Peerio Blog and Gigaom. Tweets: @kaepora

Richard Lai / Engadget:

Xiaomi takes on iPhone 6 Plus with 5.7" Mi Note premium phablet for $370 with 13MP camera with OIS — Xiaomi mocks Apple with its very own premium phablet — There's just no stopping for the world's most valuable startup. After adding an air purifier, an IP camera …

Ben Popper / The Verge:

Skydio raises $3M from Andreessen Horowitz and Accel Partners to create self-navigating drones — A tiny startup has made big strides in creating self-navigating drones — Veterans of Google X and MIT have created some remarkable computer vision systems

More: Wired, Wall Street Journal, VentureBeat, skyd.io and cdixon blog. Tweets: @cdixon

Billy Steele / Engadget:

Adobe Lightroom mobile comes to Android, but it's only for phones — Last spring, Adobe brought a version of its Lightroom photo-editing software to the iPad making for some convenient editing on the go. Months later, a version of the app is ready for Android devices and it brings …

More: CNET, Gizmodo, The Verge, Pocketnow, Phandroid, Ubergizmo, connect.dpreview.com, The Next Web, 9to5Google, TechCrunch and Android Police. Tweets: @wmsteele

Associated Press:

France faces 19,000 cyberattacks since terror rampage — PARIS (AP) — Hackers have targeted about 19,000 French websites since a rampage by Islamic extremists left 20 dead last week, France's cyberdefense official said Thursday, as the president tried to calm the nation's inflamed religious tensions.

More: VentureBeat

See also Mediagazer

Guardian:

David Cameron seeks cooperation of US president over encryption crackdown — PM to ask Barack Obama to put pressure on US internet companies to work more closely with UK intelligence agencies — David Cameron is to urge Barack Obama to pressure internet firms such as Twitter and Facebook …

More: Wall Street Journal, TechCrunch, Gigaom, Telegraph, Daily Mail, Daily Express and Bloomberg

Garett Sloane / Adweek:

Snapchat is asking brands for $750,000 a day for its new ads, higher than YouTube's $500,000/day rate for a masthead — Snapchat Is Asking Brands for $750,000 to Advertise and Won't Budge — Brands balk at paying top dollar for one day of disappearing ads

More: Digital Trends, SlashGear, Business Insider and Mobile Marketing Watch

Tweets: @moorehn, @dmac1, @jguynn and @adamsinger

Kurt Wagner / Re/code:

Video chat startup Rounds raises $12M led by Sequoia, allows chats with up to 12 users and gameplay and video watching while chatting — Video Chat Startup Rounds Raises $12 Million — Rounds, a Tel Aviv-based video chat startup, has raised $12 million in new venture funding, according to CEO Dany Fishel.

More: VentureBeat, Webrazzi, VatorNews, TechCrunch and PE Hub Blog

Jon Southurst / CoinDesk:

Bitcoin falls below $185; hash rate drops, mining not profitable, making network volatile — Bitcoin Price Continues to Fall, Breaks $200 Mark — The bitcoin price fell below the landmark $200 point at 07:24 (GMT) today, putting it back into territory not seen since late 2013.

More: CEX.IO Official Blog, Wired, New York Times, Vox, TechCrunch, TechSpot, PandoDaily, Inside Bitcoins, The Daily Dot, Sydney Morning Herald, CoinDesk, Bloomberg, Guardian, Mashable, Washington Post, Bloomberg View, USA Today and Business Insider Australia. Tweets: @coindesk

Kimberly Weisul / Inc.com:

Marriott Abandons Quest to Block Personal Wi-Fi Hot Spots — After an unsuccessful legal and PR battle, the hotel chain says it will not seek to be allowed to block personal hot spots in its conference and convention areas. — Inc.com editor-at-large @weisul — WRITE A COMMENT

More: Marriott Newsroom, BBC, Re/code, Engadget, Skift, Electronista, Ubergizmo, SlashGear and Tnooz

Tweets: @dlprager, @harrymccracken and @amy_schatz

Robert Graham / Errata Security:

Obama's proposed laws against hacking will negatively impact cybersecurity professionals, create a cyber police state — Obama's War on Hackers … In next week's State of the Union address, President Obama will propose new laws against hacking that could make either retweeting or clicking on the above link illegal.

More: The Register and The Next Web. Tweets: @sehnaoui

David Lewis / ABC:

Uber blocking undercover regulators' accounts to avoid fines for illegally operating in Australia — Illegal ride-sharing service UberX outsmarts transport inspectors, disrupting undercover stings — Emails obtained by the 7.30 program reveal illegal ride-sharing application UberX …

More: ABC, Brisbane Times, CNET, Engadget, The Register, Slashdot and Business Insider

Reuters:

Google has begun discussions with top automakers including General Motors, Ford, Toyota, Daimler, and Volkswagen, to bring self-driving cars to market by 2020 — Google partners with auto suppliers on self-driving car — (Reuters) - Internet company Google Inc has begun discussions …

More: Detroit Free Press, Wall Street Journal, bizjournals, SiliconANGLE, SlashGear, USA Today, VentureBeat, Gigaom, Ubergizmo, Associated Press, Droid Life, Automotive News Automaker, The Verge, Android Authority, 9to5Google, Android Central and Tech Trader Daily

Peter Kafka / Re/code:

Wavelength Lets Viewers Share Movies for Free Using Ultraviolet — Hollywood's home movie sales and rentals business is shrinking. Spencer Wang says he has a solution: Make it easier for people to watch movies at home, without paying a penny. — Wang, a longtime Wall Street analyst …

More: PC World, The Verge and BGR. Tweets: @waltmossberg

See also Mediagazer

Jonathan Mayer / Web Policy:

How Verizon partner Turn is using the UIDH injected by Verizon to resurrect deleted cookies — The Turn-Verizon Zombie Cookie — Verizon Wireless injects a unique header into customer web traffic. When the practice came to light last year, it was widely panned.

More: PC World, Electronic Frontier Foundation, ProPublica, Gizmodo, gHacks Technology News and Freedom to Tinker

Tweets: @juliaangwin and @jonathanmayer

Erin Griffith / Fortune:

Boxed, a wholesale shopping app, raises $25M series B led by GGV and DST — Boxed, a bulk shopping app, raises $25 million — Boxed, a mobile application for wholesale shopping, has raised $25 million in a Series B round of funding. GGV Capital and Digital Sky Technologies led the round …

More: TheStreet.com and bizjournals. Tweets: @jrichlive and @twang

Nathan Ingraham / The Verge:

Google to offer Ara Configurator app to help users build Project Ara phones, will also offer pre-built options through its “simple phone maker” — The Ara Configurator app is how you'll build your custom Project Ara smartphone — Even though Google is a long ways off …

More: Computerworld, SiteProNews, Ubergizmo, SlashGear and Engadget

Nathan Ingraham / The Verge:

Google's modular Project Ara smartphone to pilot in Puerto Rico later this year with between 20 and 30 Ara modules available by launch

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