Techmeme: Microsoft slashes Surface Pro's price by another $100: 64GB for $699, 128GB for $799, and 256GB for $999 (Emil Protalinski/The Next Web)

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October 24, 2013, 12:35 PM

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Alex Pham / Billboard:

YouTube preparing a $10/month premium on-demand music service, may come this year — YouTube Close to Launching Subscription Music Service (Breaking) — YouTube is preparing a premium on-demand music service — akin to a Spotify, but with video — to launch later this year, according to several sources familiar with the plans.

Aaron Souppouris / The Verge:

Samsung fined $340,000 for faking online comments — After being caught paying for false praise and negative comments about competitors, Samsung has been fined just over $340,000. The issue first arose internationally in April, when Taiwan's Fair Trade Commission (FTC) announced it was opening an investigation into the allegations.

Globe and Mail:

Former Apple CEO Sculley mulls BlackBerry bid — John Sculley, the former Apple Inc. CEO who famously clashed with Steve Jobs, is exploring a bid for beleaguered BlackBerry Ltd. with Canadian partners, sources have told The Globe and Mail. — Mr. Sculley said he could not comment on the matter …

More: Reuters, BGR, Cult of Mac, Daring Fireball, Telegraph, The Verge, iPhone in Canada Blog, PhoneArena, ValueWalk, Digital Trends, Inquirer, T3 News, IntoMobile, The Next Web and Ubergizmo

AllThingsD:

Pinterest Does Another Massive Funding — $225 Million at $3.8 Billion Valuation (Confirmed) — According to several sources, Pinterest has completed another enormous funding, this time nabbing $225 million with late-stage investor Fidelity Investments in the lead.

More: SiliconANGLE, The Register, internetretailer.com, Inquirer, Forbes, DealBook, SocialTimes, CNET, PandoDaily, Business Insider, WebProNews, Digits, I4U News, TechCrunch, Skift, Softpedia News, Marketing Land and Mashable

Tweets: @jkwade, @brooke, @bendwalsh and @felixsalmon

See also Mediagazer

Kara Swisher / AllThingsD:

Pinterest boasts strong international and mobile usage, plans to launch in 10 more countries

More: Softpedia News. Tweets: @laurengoode

Emil Protalinski / The Next Web:

Microsoft slashes Surface Pro's price by another $100: 64GB for $699, 128GB for $799, and 256GB for $999 — Microsoft has slashed the price of its original Surface Pro by $100. While the tablet has been largely dropped from the broader Surface product line, it's still available on the Microsoft Store …

More: Examiner, BGR, ZDNet, The Verge, LAPTOP Magazine, Engadget, ValueWalk, WebProNews, Yahoo! News, Geeky Gadgets, BetaNews, VR-Zone, Electronista, Pureinfotech Newsletter, Softpedia News, Gearburn, WinBeta and WindowsObserver.com. Tweets: @parislemon

Tom Warren / The Verge:

Microsoft erects a giant Surface tablet in the center of London — Microsoft has a fascination with big screens. The software giant has demonstrated Windows 8 on its 82-inch Perceptive Pixel PC and created giant displays with Kinect built-in. Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates even uses a giant 80-inch Windows 8 display occasionally.

More: The Next Web, TechHive, PhoneArena, The Escapist, Pureinfotech Newsletter, Geeky Gadgets and Softpedia News

Mike Beasley / 9to5Mac:

Mac App Store bug allows iWork trial users to update the entire suite for free (Update: Aperture, too) — Users who have previously downloaded the free 30-day iWork trial and kept it on their systems found themselves able to update to the latest version of Apple's productivity suite …

More: The Verge, Ars Technica, Geek.com, Gizmodo, Softpedia News, MacNN and Gizmodo UK

Bloomberg:

Hewlett-Packard Said to Be Seeking to Sell Mobile Patents — Hewlett-Packard Co. (HPQ) is seeking buyers for some of its mobile-computing patents, according to people with direct knowledge of the matter, as Chief Executive Officer Meg Whitman tries to bolster the company's financial position.

More: Gigaom, The Verge, SiliconANGLE, Android Community, Reuters and bizjournals

Dieter Bohn / The Verge:

Amazon's set-top box runs into further delays — Amazon has been been rushing to finalize and release a set-top box in time for the holidays, designed to compete directly with the Apple TV and Roku. However, The Verge has learned that the company recently made the decision to delay the device, possibly beyond the holiday season.

More: CNET, WebProNews, Wired, AndroidOS.in, T3 News, GeekWire, 9to5Google, bizjournals and Electronista

Lucian Constantin / PC World:

Flash Player now sandboxed under Safari on Mac OS X — Adobe has worked with Apple to sandbox Flash Player under Safari in Mac OS X, restricting the ability of attackers to exploit any vulnerabilities they might find in the browser plug-in. — “With this week's release of Safari in OS X Mavericks …

More: Adobe Secure Software …, Engadget, PC Magazine, MacRumors, iMore, CNET, ZDNet, 9to5Mac, iDownloadBlog.com, AppleInsider, Geeky Gadgets, Cult of Mac, whatmobile.net and SecurityWeek

Lee Hutchinson / Ars Technica:

Blackberry's Android BBM app drawing lots of suspicious 5-star ratings — Blackberry's standalone BBM messaging app debuted on Android yesterday, and it has already received more than 150,000 reviews on the Google Play Store. However, as first pointed out on Twitter by Matt Baxter-Reynolds …

More: The Verge, Terence Eden's Blog, Gizmodo and ValueWalk. Tweets: @mbrit

Sean Hollister / The Verge:

Why would anyone buy an iPad 2 now? — For $399, Apple's iPad mini with Retina display is a far better choice — Yesterday, Apple announced two new iPads: the iPad Air, and the iPad mini with Retina display. Both carry Apple's speedy new A7 processor, and both come with high-resolution screens.

More: AppleInsider. Tweets: @verge and @starfire2258

Neil Hughes / AppleInsider:

Apple has sold 170M iPads to date, implying sales near 15M in Sept. quarter

More: BGR, iPhone in Canada Blog, iDownloadBlog.com and App Advice

Wall Street Journal:

The Boss Is Watching: Tracking Technology Shakes Up Workplace — Dennis Gray suspected that workers in his pest-control company were spending too much time on personal issues during the workday. So the general manager of Accurid Pest Solutions in southern Virginia quietly installed a piece …

Tweets: @wsj

Linette Lopez / Business Insider:

Here's Carl Icahn's Letter To Tim Cook Saying He Wants Apple To Buyback $150 Billion In Stock Immediately — Yesterday Carl Icahn tweeted that he sent a letter to Tim Cook, and would put it on a new website he was launching called Shareholder's Square Table — now the site is live.

More: StreetInsider.com, 9to5Mac, MacRumors, CNET, SiliconBeat, Associated Press, Digits, The Tell, Reuters, DealBook, iDownloadBlog.com, TheStreet.com, MacDailyNews, The Tell and Fortune

Tweets: @hblodget, @cnbc and @cnbc

Joe Mullin / Ars Technica:

Proposed bipartisan bill increases risks and costs to patent trolls, has chance of passing — Finally, a bill to end patent trolling — Congressman Bob Goodlatte, breaking ground in patent law reform. — VaDOT — The chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, Rep. Bob Goodlatte …

More: BGR, The Switch, VentureBeat and ITworld.com

Tweets: @joemullin, @tapbot_paul and @cdixon

Ken Yeung / The Next Web:

App monitoring service New Relic unveils its vision for analytics, updates its mobile SDK and more — Application performance monitoring (APM) service and platform New Relic is making significant efforts to scale its mission in helping developers better understand who is using their apps.

More: AllThingsD, TechCrunch, VentureBeat, Gigaom, VentureBeat, Wired and New Relic blog

Peter Lauria / BuzzFeed:

Netflix needs to invest in content to gain subscribers, but that hurts profit growth — The Netflix Conundrum — The company needs to spend money on content to continue growing its subscriber base. But the cost of content is hurting its profit growth. — Orange Is the New Black promotional poster.

Tweets: @elamin88

Ben Drawbaugh / Engadget:

TiVo Roamio DVRs can stream or download TV to iPhones, iPads — It's just over two months since the release of the TiVo Roamio Plus and Pro, and the namesake feature is now available. Beginning today, iOS device users can update their TiVo apps and start streaming live or recorded content …

More: TechCrunch, Associated Press, TiVo, Gigaom, MacRumors, CNET, The Verge, Gizmodo, Geeky Gadgets, AllThingsD, SlashGear and Electronista

Dan Tynan / ITworld:

How Box.com allowed a complete stranger to delete all my files — Six months ago the cloud storage service gave control over my account to someone else, who then nuked it. Fortunately, my data survived. — Let me start by saying that I am a bit of a nut about cloud storage.

Tweets: @infoworld

Andy / TorrentFreak:

YouTube MP3 Converter Loses Court Battle But The Music Plays On — In addition to obtaining music from file-sharing networks, those looking for free tracks often get them from so-called tube-rippers, sites and services that transform YouTube videos into downloadable MP3s.

More: Digital Music News and whatmobile.net

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