Techmeme: Photosynth creator and architect of Bing mobile and mapping leaves Microsoft to join Google (Nick Wingfield/NYT Bits)

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December 16, 2013, 5:25 PM

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Andy Greenberg / Forbes:

An NSA Coworker Remembers The Real Edward Snowden: ‘A Genius Among Geniuses’ — Perhaps Edward Snowden's hoodie should have raised suspicions. — The black sweatshirt sold by the civil libertarian Electronic Frontier Foundation featured a parody of the National Security Agency's logo …

More: The Switch, CBS News, The Register, The Verge, SiliconANGLE, Reuters, Business Insider, Mashable, Softpedia News, emptywheel, PC World, Pixel Envy, SecurityWeek and POPSUGAR

Tweets: @qthrul, @jesselynradack, @weldpond and @youranonnews

Spencer Ackerman / Guardian:

NSA goes on 60 Minutes: the definitive facts behind CBS's flawed report — Our take on five things the spy agency would like the public to believe about its vast surveillance powers — The National Security Agency is telling its story like never before. Never mind whether that story is, well, true.

More: Yahoo! News, The Verge and Softpedia News

Tweets: @ggreenwald, @tonyromm, @schestowitz and @bartongellman

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Sara Morrison / The Wire:

‘60 Minutes’: NSA Good, Snowden Bad — As if that whole retracted Benghazi report and the Amazon commercial/drone reveal didn't undermine 60 Minutes' credibility enough in the last few weeks, here's another gem: a report on how the NSA has simply been misunderstood by all those Snowden leaks and is a good guy, really.

More: Poynter, Errata Security, The Nation, CBS News, Gizmodo, emptywheel, Computerworld, Techdirt, Firedoglake, Motherboard, Hit & Run and Softpedia News

Tweets: @jbrodkin, @jaycstanley, @qhardy, @csoghoian, @nickbilton, @ggreenwald, @benpopper, @ggreenwald, @tonyromm and @pourmecoffee

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Josh Gerstein / Politico:

Judge: NSA phone program likely unconstitutional — A federal judge ruled Monday that the National Security Agency program which collects information on nearly all telephone calls made to, from or within the United States is likely unconstitutional. — U.S. District Court Judge Richard Leon found …

More: Guardian, ZDNet, The Verge, Ars Technica, CNET, Daring Fireball, Gigaom, VentureBeat, ACLU, Yahoo! News, Hit & Run, Mashable, Business Insider, U.S. News, The Raw Story, Gizmodo, VentureBreak and Gawker

Tweets: @ggreenwald, @ronwyden, @laughingstoic, @pourmecoffee, @attackerman, @tonyromm, @tulsigabbard, @trevortimm, @ggreenwald, @ggreenwald, @aclu_mass and @micahflee

Guardian:

Edward Snowden says judge's ruling vindicates NSA surveillance disclosures

More: New York Times, TechCrunch and Hit & Run. See also Mediagazer

Tom Warren / The Verge:

Windows Phone 8.1 includes notification center and Siri-like personal assistant — Microsoft is preparing to ship its Windows Phone 8.1 update with two significant changes: a notification center and a Siri-like personal assistant. Sources familiar with Microsoft's plans have revealed …

Nick Wingfield / NYT Bits:

Photosynth creator and architect of Bing mobile and mapping leaves Microsoft to join Google — A Microsoft Star Goes to Google — SEATTLE — Blaise Agüera y Arcas, a respected engineer and software designer at Microsoft, has left the company to join its rival Google.

More: AllThingsD, style is violence, eWeek, TechHive, bizjournals, The Verge, GeekWire, Search Engine Land, Geek News Central, SlashGear, CNET, IntoMobile, WinBeta, VentureBeat and Gigaom. Tweets: @dannysullivan

Peter Kafka / AllThingsD:

Ho Ho No! Amazon Apologizes After Customers Lose Access to Christmas Content. — If you buy a digital song, book or movie, do you really own that song, book or movie? — Or are you just renting a collection of bits, which are never really going to be yours?

More: Boing Boing, TorrentFreak, Examiner, Guardian, BetaNews, Ars Technica, Gizmodo, TechHive, DSLreports, internetretailer.com, WebProNews, ExtremeTech, Gigaom and Softpedia News. Tweets: @chartier

Brian R. Fitzgerald / Digits:

As Walt Mossberg exits, WSJ's new personal tech team includes Geoffrey Fowler and new hires Joanna Stern, Wilson Rothman, and Nathan Olivarez-Giles — WSJ Announces Personal Tech Reviewing Team — Today we are announcing expanded Wall Street Journal coverage of personal technology …

Tweets: @ohnorosco, @nottechmeme, @qthrul, @geoffreyfowler, @scottmaustin, @dsilverman, @waltmossberg, @blam and @joannastern. See also Mediagazer

Garett Sloane / Adweek:

Apple pushes iTunes Radio ad sales, builds real-time bidding exchange for in-app ads — Apple Is Building an RTB Platform to Sell In-App Ads — Apple leadership has given the iAds team a new mission: always be selling iTunes Radio. And while the sales team is busy pushing Apple radio inventory …

More: MacRumors, 9to5Mac and iPhone in Canada Blog

Tweets: @ericfranchi, @jyarow and @jessicalessin

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David Carr / New York Times:

AOL's Tim Armstrong reluctantly lets go of Patch as shareholder pressures mount — AOL Chief's White Whale Finally Slips His Grasp — Tim Armstrong, the chief executive of AOL, is finally winding down Patch, a network of local news sites that he helped invent and that AOL bought after he took over.

More: BuzzMachine, TechCrunch, Businessweek, Wired, Consumerist, Business Insider, Gigaom, Gawker, Forbes and Associated Press

Tweets: @karenpinchin, @pkafka, @peterlattman, @daveambrose and @shacker

See also Mediagazer

Josh Constine / TechCrunch:

Facebook Launches “Donate” Button For Non-Profits That Also Collects Billing Info For Itself — Facebook unveiled a “Donate Now” button today to make it much easier for non-profits to take contributions. A nice side effect for its business? The button will collect credit card numbers …

More: Facebook, CNET, Gigaom, VentureBeat, TechHive, AllFacebook, AllThingsD, SlashGear, Marketing Pilgrim and The Next Web. Tweets: @mikeisaac

Zeke J Miller / TIME:

Obama To Meet Tech Execs Over NSA Spying, Obamacare Website — President Barack Obama will meet with many of Silicon Valley's best-known executives Tuesday at the White House to discuss the troubled Healthcare.gov website and controversial surveillance programs run by the National Security Agency, the administration announced.

More: The Lead with Jake Tapper, 9to5Mac, PandoDaily and Valleywag. Tweets: @zekejmiller

Will Connors / Wall Street Journal:

Two More Executives Leaving BlackBerry — EVP of Global Sales, Official in Charge of M&A Strategy to Depart in Weeks — TORONTO—The leadership upheaval at BlackBerry Ltd. continues under interim Chief Executive John Chen, according to people familiar with the matter.

More: Gigaom, Techvibes Global News, BGR, CrackBerry.com, FierceWireless, Lastest ITProPortal news, TheStreet.com, MobileSyrup.com, IntoMobile, Financial Post, The Verge and Business Insider

Josh Halliday / Guardian:

Google will not answer to British court over UK privacy claim — Search giant insists lawsuit concerning UK internet users' privacy should be brought in California where it is based — Google has been called “arrogant and immoral” for arguing that a privacy claim brought by internet users …

More: PR Newswire, Telegraph, Gigaom, Electronista, 9to5Mac, SlashGear, BBC, TechWeekEurope UK, Daily Mail, PC Pro and Mashable

Tweets: @raycorrigan, @ellieaskswhy and @joshhalliday

David Streitfeld / NYT Bits:

Amazon Workers in Germany Strike Again — This post has been updated to include new reporting. — Amazon warehouse employees in Germany walked off the job again Monday even as they tried to take their case directly to the e-commerce giant's Seattle headquarters.

More: Reuters, GeekWire, VatorNews, ZDNet, Motherboard, GeekWire, Bloomberg, Forbes, Softpedia News, The Register and BBC

Michael J. De La Merced / DealBook:

Avago to Buy LSI for $6.6 Billion — Avago Technologies plans to make the biggest acquisition in its history — with the help of a former owner. — Avago, a semiconductor company, said on Monday that it had agreed to buy the LSI Corporation for about $6.6 billion in cash …

More: bizjournals, VentureBeat, AllThingsD, PE Hub Blog, Bloomberg, ABC News, Tech Trader Daily, ZDNet, USA Today, Reuters and Gigaom

Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:

Crowdtilt Raises Another $23 Million From Andreessen Horowitz & Others For International Expansion, Enterprise Tools — Crowdfunding platform Crowdtilt wasn't looking to raise another round, but when their Series A lead investor Andreessen Horowitz offered to lead their B round, the team decided it would make sense given their plans.

More: AllThingsD, Venture Capital Dispatch, Y Combinator Posthaven, VatorNews, Forbes and silicontap.com

Arik Hesseldahl / AllThingsD:

Violin Memory Fires CEO Basile as IPO and Quarterly Results Disappoint — Violin Memory, the flash-storage player, just fired CEO Don Basile (pictured) in the wake of the lousy performance of its initial public offering and quarterly results that were worse than anyone expected.

More: Gigaom, Tech Trader Daily, ZDNet, Tech Trader Daily, Business Wire and Bloomberg

Glenn Peoples / Billboard:

The Download Hits Middle Age (and It Shows) — The slow but steady rise of on-demand services like Spotify and Rdio coincided with a drop-off in sales for various download fomats. — The digital download hit middle age in 2013. Although retirement may be far in the future …

More: Apple

Ben Sisario / New York Times:

Music streaming services struggle to attract paying subscribers amidst increasing competition

More: 9to5Mac, TechSpot and Business Insider. Tweets: @nycjim

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