One Billion People on Facebook  —  This morning, there are more than one billion people using Facebook actively each month.  —  If you're reading this: thank you for giving me and my little team the honor of serving you.  —  Helping a billion people connect is amazing, humbling and by far the thing I am most proud of in my life.

Microsoft to launch Surface at midnight on October 26th  —  Microsoft has started sending out invites to a special “Surface Reception” event on October 25th.  Alongside a Windows 8 introduction, the software giant will launch its highly anticipated tablet at midnight on October 26th — according to a company spokesperson.

Zynga Lowering Full-Year Results Again; Recording Huge Negative for OMGPOP  —  Zynga is reporting preliminary third-quarter results today, but it won't do much to comfort investors who were already growing wary of the company's prospects.  —  The social games company says that the third quarter …

Updating our built-in apps for Windows 8 … As we get close to the general availability (GA) of Windows 8, there are many things that the Windows team and other teams at Microsoft have been doing to get ready.  Of course, the most important thing has been working with PC makers to help …

Sprint Said to Eye MetroPCS Bid to Rival T-Mobile Offer  —  Sprint Nextel Corp. (S), the third- largest U.S. mobile-phone carrier, is in the early stages of evaluating whether it should make a counter offer for MetroPCS Communications Inc. (PCS) to top Deutsche Telekom AG (DTE) …

Facebook confirms it is scanning your private messages for links to increase Like counters  —  Yesterday I spotted a video submitted to Hacker News by the Polish startup Killswitch.me that clearly showed sending a link in a Facebook private message increases the Like counter on the link's originating third-party website.

Mozilla's First Preview Release Of Firefox Metro Arrives On Windows 8  —  With the official launch of Windows 8 just around the corner, Mozilla today unveiled its first preview release of Firefox Metro.  The Metro version of Firefox, Mozilla says, was “designed from the ground up for Windows 8″ …

Suspicion over Dotcom net glitch  —  Telecom engineers investigating internet irregularities weeks before GCSB has said it started spying on him.  —  Kim Dotcom's internet connection was being diverted inside New Zealand weeks before the Government Communications Security Bureau says it started spying on him.

Samsung's Galaxy phones drive record $7.3 billion profit  —  (Reuters) - Samsung Electronics reported quarterly profit of $7.3 billion on Friday, a fourth straight record quarter and nearly double last year's figure, as strong sales of its Galaxy smartphones more than offset reduced orders …

HP smartphone not coming in 2013, says CEO Meg Whitman  —  But HP will need one within five years to avoid missing out on a big segment of the market, its CEO said  —  HP has no plans to launch a smartphone next year but will need to sell one eventually to avoid missing out on …

Street View comes to Google Maps on your Mobile Browser  —  To make Google Maps even more comprehensive, accurate and useful, today we're making Street View available on mobile browsers.  With access to Street View on your phone, you can use panoramic, street-level imagery to explore and navigate the places around you, even on the go.

Samsung Galaxy Camera marries Android and photography on AT&T, we go hands-on (update: video!)  —  Samsung's Android-powered Galaxy Camera is a bit of a wild card, marrying Google's Android Jelly Bean OS with a 16-megapixel camera — heck, it's even got a 4.8-inch 1,280 x 720-pixel (308 ppi) touchscreen display.

Razer's Project Fiona Gaming Tablet Confirmed for Production  —  Razer garnered a lot of press at CES this year with their Fiona gaming tablet, a 10.1" Windows-based tablet packing a Core i7 processor and two joystick handles featuring dual analog sticks and a typical controller-style button layout.

Google warns of more cuts at Motorola, third-quarter cuts to cost $340 million  —  (Reuters) - Google Inc said planned job cuts at its Motorola Mobility mobile phone unit will cost about $340 million in severance and other costs in the third quarter and it warned of further restructuring.

UK considers Facebook logins for access to public services  —  Summary: Social networking meets social security, as the Cabinet Office reveals it is considering Facebook as one of the firms whose login process can be used to get access to government services such as applying for a driver's licence.

Tumblr gets its first analytics tool by way of Union Metrics  —  Tumblr will get its first analytics platform, its marketing and revenue consultant Rick Webb announced today on stage during his keynote at Advertising Week's OPS conference, alongside Union Metrics's CEO, Hayes Davis.

Interbrand: Apple, Amazon, Samsung fast becoming brand darlings, ousting crusty traditional labels  —  Interbrand likes to give the world's top companies a brand value, or a mix of their on-the-ground fiscal performance with an estimate of the premium they can ask through name alone.

Cisco buys VCider to boost its distributed cloud vision  —  Cisco is buying vCider, a specialist in virtual network overlay technology (and a former GigaOM Structure LaunchPad finalist).  The move is a response to VMware's acquisition of Nicira and its software-defined networking technology …