Ubuntu Edge smartphone misses its crowdfunding goal by over $19 million  —  When Canonical launched its crowdfunding campaign for the Ubuntu Edge smartphone last month it set an ambitious goal: raising $32 million through Indiegogo.  As it turns out, that goal was a little too ambitious …

Apple iCloud services offline for a few million users  —  iMessage and other online services have been down for several hours for close to 3 million users, according to Apple's status page.  —  Apple iCloud users have been hit by yet another outage, though this one seems to have affected a relatively small percentage of users.

NSA gathered thousands of Americans' e-mails before court struck down program  —  The National Security Agency unlawfully gathered as many as tens of thousands of e-mails and other electronic communications between Americans as part of a now-discontinued collection program, according to a 2011 secret court opinion.

Insight: At Apple, Tim Cook leads a quiet cultural revolution  —  (Reuters) - Shortly after signing on as chief operating officer at Facebook, Sheryl Sandberg was looking to connect with people in a similar role - No. 2 to a brilliant and passionate young founder.  She called Tim Cook.

Disney's ESPN Holds Preliminary Talks for Web-Based TV  —  Walt Disney Co. (DIS)'s ESPN sports network has held preliminary talks to offer programming on a Web-based TV service like those proposed by Google Inc. (GOOG), Sony Corp. and Intel Corp. (INTC)  —  An Internet TV provider …

Windows Phone, Latin America's second most widely used mobile platform  —  In one year, the operating system went from fourth to second place with good growth figures, especially in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Mexico and Peru.  —  This press release has been edited post publication to provide clarity on time frames.

Former Windows Head Sinofsky Joins Andreessen Horowitz as Board Partner  —  Steven Sinofsky, the high-profile Microsoft exec who most recently led its flagship Windows efforts, will be joining Andreessen Horowitz as a board partner.  —  The tech exec — who has been an entrepreneur-in-residence …

Yahoo, Foursquare In Talks Over Data Partnership  —  Foursquare sells a lot of ads, but the biggest upside for the location-sharing start-up may be in selling its data.  And sources say Yahoo is interested.  Foursquare, once criticized for not being able to figure out a business, may have finally struck gold deep in its data centers.

Yahoo #1 Web Property Again In US, First Time Since Early 2008 [Updated with comScore Statement]  —  ComScore just released its monthly Top 50 US Web properties list today.  I've generally stopped looking at this list.  But it was pointed out to me that Yahoo is back at number one.

Apple poaches Levi's Senior VP for U.S. Retail as search for chief continues  —  Apple has poached Enrique Atienza from Levi Strauss, a global clothing sales powerhouse, to become a top director for its U.S. Retail market, according to sources with knowledge of the hire.

Linux Hackers Rebuild Internet From Silicon Valley Garage  —  Alex Polvi is living the great Silicon Valley archetype.  Together with some old school friends, he's piecing together a tech revolution from inside a two-car Palo Alto garage.  —  He's like Dave Packard or Steve Jobs or Sergey Brin — at least up to a point.

C is for Choices  —  I have to admit, it was a bit of a thrill breaking the news to the western world of the latest iPhone leak: … Still, it really wasn't anything new (although I did learn the reason for dual flash), and certainly nothing of strategic import. … So let's analyze.

Steve Case's Second Life as D.C.'s Favorite Businessman  —  It helps that he's an hour late and his audience has spent the time getting into a keg of Shiner Bock, but when Steve Case walks into the Austin (Tex.) offices of the startup he's just invested $40 million in, he gets a deafening welcome.

Google Now updated with car rentals, concert tickets and more  —  Traffic and weather updates are great, but Google Now never shines better than when you're on vacation.  To that end, Mountain View has taught the feature a few new tricks, equipping it with cards for keeping track car rental and concert ticket.

Embedded Posts Now Available to Everyone  —  We introduced Embedded Posts in July to make it easy for publishers to add any public post from Facebook to their blog or web site.  Today, we're excited to make Embedded Posts available to everyone.  We've also added several enhancements based on feedback from our launch partners.

GM to Offer Smartphones Wireless Charging in 2014 Cars  —  General Motors Co. (GM), the largest U.S. automaker, will start offering wireless charging for smartphones in some vehicles next year, said Ran Poliakine, chief executive officer of Powermat Technologies Ltd.