Techmeme
December 23, 2013, 9:10 PM

Top News

Mark Gurman / 9to5Mac:
Apple acquired mapping firm BroadMap's talent, location-infused Evernote competitor Catch  —  Apple has been on a roll this year in terms of acquisitions.  According to Apple CEO Tim Cook, the Cupertino firm acquired 15 companies this year, but only ten have been revealed.
BBC:
Royal pardon for codebreaker Alan Turing  —  Computer pioneer and codebreaker Alan Turing has been given a posthumous royal pardon.  —  It overturns his 1952 conviction for homosexuality for which he was punished by being chemically castrated.  —  The conviction meant he lost …
Anthony Ha / TechCrunch:
Jack Dorsey Joins Disney's Board Of Directors  —  The Walt Disney Company just announced that Jack Dorsey (co-founder and CEO Square, as well co-founder and chairman at Twitter, as if you didn't know) has joined its board if directors.  —  “Jack Dorsey is a talented entrepreneur …
Ellis Hamburger / The Verge:
Samsung shows just how awkward life can be in its latest Galaxy Gear ad  —  In Samsung's world, the quickest way to a woman's heart is through your Galaxy Gear smart watch.  —  The tech industry has become well known for its odd, tone-deaf advertisements, and Samsung's latest is no exception.
Graham Morrison / TechRadar:
Interview with Chris DiBona, the Director of Open Source at Google  —  How open source changed Google - and how Google changed open source  —  INTERVIEW We chat to Google's head of open source software … Google has just celebrated its 15th birthday, and much of its success is thanks to Linux and open source software.
Kwame Opam / The Verge:
HP reportedly may launch cheap, big smartphones by the end of this year  —  Reporting on HP's desire to return to the smartphone market, sources tell The Information that the company plans to release new six- and seven-inch phablets by the end of the year.  The devices will be aimed …
New York Times:
In Tech Buying, U.S. Still Stuck in Last Century  —  WASHINGTON — Four years after President Obama vowed to “dramatically reform the way we do business on contracts,” the spectacular failure of the HealthCare.gov website has renewed calls for changes in how the government hires and manages private technology companies.
Barb Darrow / Gigaom:
Seagate snaps up hard disk testing expert for $374M  —  Amid all the hoopla about flash storage, it pays to step back and remember that hard disks are still storing a heckuva lot of our stuff, and will continue to do so for the foreseeable future.  Remember flash fanboys, even slow tape storage lives on.
Ina Fried / AllThingsD:
T-Mobile's GoSmart Hopes to Boost Data Use by Offering Unlimited Free Mobile Access to Facebook  —  Overseas, Facebook has worked with a number of carriers to bring free access to the social network for those who don't otherwise have data plans for their phones.
Joe Mullin / Ars Technica:
The case against Kim Dotcom, finally revealed  —  Nearly two years after Kim Dotcom's New Zealand mansion was raided by police, US authorities have made their case as to why the man behind Megaupload shouldn't simply go bankrupt like previous copyright violators before have—he should go to jail, they argue.
More: GigaomTweets: @arstechnica and @jeffjohnroberts

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