Techmeme: Three UK offers free data, text and calls while roaming in the USA (Daniel Cooper/Engadget)

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December 4, 2013, 7:55 AM

Top News

John Markoff / New York Times:

Andy Rubin heads up a new robotics effort in Google that includes seven acquisitions to date — Google Puts Money on Robots, Using the Man Behind Android — PALO ALTO, Calif. — In an out-of-the-way Google office, two life-size humanoid robots hang suspended in a corner.

More: ZDNet, BBC, CNET, Gizmodo, Gigaom, SlashGear, The Verge, Cult of Mac, Ubergizmo, Business Insider, Larry Page, Engadget, Hunter Walk, Android Beat, Android Community, 9to5Google, AllThingsD and The Next Web

Tweets: @hunterwalk, @sacca, @jasonkincaid, @mikeisaac, @startupljackson, @percival, @laurengoode, @joshelman, @technogasms, @percival, @caseynewton and @caseynewton

Emil Protalinski / The Next Web:

Google is building Chrome apps support for Android and iOS, beta release coming as soon as January 2014 — Google is working on bringing Chrome packaged apps from the desktop to the mobile world. The company is currently building a toolkit to help developers create Chrome apps for Android and iOS …

More: Gizmodo, 9to5Mac, Softpedia News, CNET, iDownloadBlog.com, Android Beat, iPhone Hacks, Ubergizmo, The Verge, Phandroid, App Advice, AppleInsider, Android Authority, SlashGear, PhoneArena, Engadget, 9to5Google and I4U News

Frederic Lardinois / TechCrunch:

Chrome Beta Gets New Tools For Mobile Development With Better Viewport Emulation, Screencast-Enabled Remote Debugging

More: Chromium Blog, Gigaom, The Next Web and Engadget

Kara Swisher / AllThingsD:

Exclusive: Instagram Business Lead Emily White to Be Named COO of Snapchat — Emily White, the Facebook executive in charge of bringing advertising to its Instagram photo-sharing unit, is leaving to become COO of Snapchat. — The move is a major talent grab by the ephemeral photo and video mobile service …

More: Business Insider, Digits, The Next Web, CNET, The Verge, Mashable, PhoneArena and Wall Street Journal

Tweets: @jguynn, @howardlindzon, @katies, @dannysullivan, @brandee, @mikeisaac, @jess, @felixgillette, @orbuch, @ksimm, @ischafer and @alexia

Peter Kafka / AllThingsD:

YouTube's Music Subscription Service Won't Show Up This Year — Waiting for YouTube's subscription music service? You're going to have to be patient. — The video service, which is already the biggest free music service in the world, had planned on launching a paid service this year.

More: The Verge, Electronista, Engadget, Android Community, 9to5Google, PhoneArena, CNET, Softpedia News, Mashable and Music Week. See also Mediagazer

Mike Isaac / AllThingsD:

Twitter Considered Buying Topsy, Too — Here's Why It Didn't Happen — Apple just spent a bunch of money on social analytics company Topsy. And while everyone has good guesses on what Apple wants from Topsy, no one seems to know for sure. — But before Apple, Topsy had at least …

More: GeekWire, AllTwitter and Business Cloud News. Tweets: @mikeisaac

John Battelle / John Battelle's Search Blog:

Apple+Topsy: It's Not About Twitter (And Twitter Is Probably Cool With That)

More: LinkedIn Today and Real Story Group Recent …. Tweets: @monkbent

Daniel P. Howley / LAPTOP Magazine:

LG G Flex Hands-On: First Self-Healing, Flexible Smartphone — The future will not be flat. That's what LG's Dr. Ramchan Woo declared as he unveiled the new LG G Flex during an exclusive press event in California. The 6-inch handset is one of the first to offer a curved body that contours …

More: LG Newsroom, AllThingsD, The Next Web, Engadget, The Verge, Android Beat, AnandTech, IntoMobile, Ars Technica, pocketnow.com, Phones Review, Android Community, Tech in Asia and Unwired View

Daniel Cooper / Engadget:

Three UK offers free data, text and calls while roaming in the USA — Hey hey, it's a party in the USA, or at least, it will be for UK-to-US travelers who are signed up to Three. The network has just announced that those intrepid pond-hoppers will be entitled to roam with their UK allowances of data, text and calls absolutely free.

More: Three Media Centre, iMore, Inquirer, Gigaom, The Next Web, The Verge, Softpedia News, Cult of Mac, Mobile Industry Review, SlashGear, Geeky Gadgets, pocketnow.com, Phones Review and Android Central. Tweets: @ruskin147

Joe Mullin / Ars Technica:

Hotfile settles MPAA copyright case, agrees to $80 million in damages — Six days before movie studios were set to begin a jury trial over alleged copyright violations by the “cyberlocker” site Hotfile, the case has settled. Hotfile has agreed to pay $80 million and to stop operating …

More: Guardian, Digital Trends, TorrentFreak, Variety, Gigaom, Wall Street Journal, Techdirt and The Verge. See also Mediagazer

Hans Ku / Ptch Blog:

Dreamworks-incubated video-creation app Ptch acquired by Yahoo, shutting down January 2 — Ptch Joins Yahoo! — We launched Ptch just over a year ago. Our passion and our mission was to give you the best way to make and share beautiful movies made from the photos and videos on your phone.

More: TechCrunch, The Next Web, VatorNews, Engadget, Business Insider, Ubergizmo, Computerworld, CNET, AllThingsD, App Advice, I4U News, bizjournals and Softpedia News. Tweets: @hansku. Thanks:@hunterwalk

Jordan Kahn / 9to5Mac:

Honda integrates iPhone w/ 2014 Civic touchscreen in first steps towards iOS in the Car — Honda is introducing two new technologies in its new 2014 Civic that will make it easier for iPhone users to interact with content in the car in its first steps towards Apple's iOS in the Car.

More: MacRumors, AppleInsider, MacStories, Gigaom, iDownloadBlog.com, TUAW and Electronista. Thanks:@jordankahn

Matthew Panzarino / TechCrunch:

Apple, PrimeSense And Perceptive Computing Or: Why Your Phone Will See In 3D — Last month Apple confirmed the acquisition of Israeli motion-sensing company PrimeSense. Initial thoughts turned towards applications in the Apple TV set-top box, but other reports that Apple was interested in its ‘mapping’ capabilities as well.

More: MoneyBeat

Vlad Savov / The Verge:

Inside Vertu, makers of the world's most expensive phones — The company that grew out of Nokia's answer to ‘what if you could build a phone without worrying about the money?’ — Vertu started life in the late 1990s as an indulgence for Nokia's designers.

More: Business Insider. Tweets: @rustambaratov, @xesisoj, @joshuatopolsky and @schneidertobias

Richard Nieva / CNET:

You are the query: Yahoo's bold quest to reinvent search — When Yahoo launched its home page redesign in February — its first such overhaul in the Marissa Mayer era — the company's chief executive sent out a jovial tweet: — A new experience launching on Yahoo today with a newsfeed …

More: Beyond Search. Tweets: @livbarton

Jon Fingas / Engadget:

NORAD and Microsoft team on a touch-friendly Santa Claus web tracker — NORAD's Santa Claus tracking has officially entered the tablet era. The defense agency has teamed up with Microsoft on an updated web-based tracker that's designed for touch-friendly browsers, including Internet Explorer 11.

More: TechNet Blogs, The Next Web, Digits, Phones Review, Telegraph, Softpedia News, Cult of Mac, The Verge, Gizmodo, AllThingsD, Pocket-lint, Ubergizmo, BetaNews, The Windows Blog, Mashable, PC World and ABC News. Tweets: @dannysullivan

Bloomberg:

China Mobile License Paves Way for World's Largest 4G Network — China Mobile Ltd. (941), the world's largest phone company by users, received a license to start commercial service on its fourth-generation wireless network as it tries to attract smartphone users seeking faster downloads.

More: Engadget, The Next Web, Reuters and Unwired View

Jacob Kastrenakes / The Verge:

Obama administration backs patent troll bill, House vote set for this week — The White House has been trying to crack down on patent trolls, and today it's come out in support of a House bill that would begin to do just that. The bill, Representative Bob Goodlatte's (R-VA) Innovation Act …

More: Techdirt, A VC, TIME, Computerworld, TheHill, Gigaom, TheHill and Boing Boing

Sarah Frier / Bloomberg:

Twitter IPO Sparks Investor Interest in Social Startups — DataSift Inc., a startup that makes information from social sites easier to manipulate, wasn't planning on raising money this year — until Twitter Inc.'s initial public offering prompted a surge of investor interest.

More: VentureBeat

Ingrid Lunden / TechCrunch:

Firehose Provider DataSift Raises $42M Led By Insight Venture Partners For Global and Non-Social Ambitions

More: DataSift, VentureBeat, Gigaom, Telegraph, Tech City News, Digits, VatorNews, Tech Europe and Mashable. Tweets: @jasoncosta. Thanks:@ingridlunden

Amy Gesenhues / Search Engine Land:

New Google Trends Topic Reports Designed To Deliver More Accurate Results — Google Trends is rolling out new topic reports designed to deliver more accurate results, as well as offer topic predictions within the reports. Using Google's example, now when a user searches for “rice” …

More: Inside Search, Marketing Pilgrim, Softpedia News, TechCrunch, WebProNews and The Next Web

Washington Post:

Officials estimate a third of people enrolled through HealthCare.gov affected by system errors — Health-care enrollment on Web plagued by bugs — The enrollment records for a significant portion of the Americans who have chosen health plans through the online federal insurance marketplace …

More: Wired, ABC News, ThinkProgress, The Wire and The Week

Tweets: @shawnanbcnews, @sarahkliff, @washingtonpost and @sarahkliff

Gautham Nagesh / Wall Street Journal:

The Agency Running HealthCare.gov Mostly Kept to Itself as Warning Signs Grew About the Website

Tweets: @stefaniei

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