Techmeme: Silicon Valley workers may pursue collusion case as group- court (Jonathan Stempel/Reuters)

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January 15, 2014, 5:25 PM

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John Paczkowski / Re/code:

Apple Agrees to FTC Consent Decree Over In-App Purchases (Memo) — Looks like Apple's settlement last year of a lawsuit over the unauthorized use of in-app purchasing in games and apps sold through the App Store wasn't enough for the Federal Trade Commission.

Federal Trade Commission:

Apple to refund consumers at least $32.5M for in-app purchases made without parental consent — Apple Inc. Will Provide Full Consumer Refunds of At Least $32.5 Million to Settle FTC Complaint It Charged for Kids' In-App Purchases Without Parental Consent — Company Also Will Modify its Billing Practices Under FTC Settlement

Fred Wilson / A VC:

How losing net neutrality will discourage investing in bandwidth-intensive startups — VC Pitches In A Year Or Two — Entrepreneur: I plan to launch a better streaming music service. It leverages the data on what you and your friends currently listen to, combines that with the schedule …

More: Bloomberg, Gigaom, the build, Co.Labs, InfoWorld and Wall Street Journal

Tweets: @dangillmor, @mattyglesias, @amir, @mkapor, @emilybell, @fredwilson and @mathewi

Peter Kafka / Re/code:

What's Net Neutrality? What Happened to Net Neutrality Yesterday? What Happens Next? A Q&A for the Rest of Us — Net neutrality is dead, and the Internet is in peril. — Or, maybe: Net neutrality is dead, and the Internet will be fine. — Or, perhaps: Net neutrality is threatened, but can be saved.

More: Slate, CNET, Business Insider, ZDNet, The Verge, The Switch, Computerworld, New Yorker, Fortune, Gigaom Research, ReadWrite, Tubefilter, NYT Bits and dailywireless.org. Tweets: @dangillmor. Thanks:@srikardr. See also Mediagazer

Edward Wyatt / NYT Bits:

F.C.C. Chairman Adds More Ambiguity to His Position on Network Neutrality

More: Official FCC Blog, Mashable and SlashGear. Tweets: @mathewi

Arik Hesseldahl / Re/code:

HP to Re-Enter Smartphone Market With “Phablets” in India — Hewlett-Packard will today announce plans to re-enter the market for smartphones and tablets that it exited in 2011, with a pair of voice-enabled tablets that will debut in India later this year. — HP's plans call for releasing …

CNBC:

Apple-China Mobile deal a ‘watershed’ moment: Tim Cook — By: Reporting by Eunice Yoon, Written by Dhara Ranasinghe — Apple CEO Tim Cook says the deal to sell iPhones on China Mobile's vast network is a “watershed” moment. — A deal to sell iPhones on China Mobile's vast network is a …

Peter Kafka / Re/code:

AOL hands over control of Patch to investment fund Hale Global, keeps small stake — AOL Finds a Home — Off Its Books — For Patch — Patch isn't dead, and AOL isn't officially done with it. But Tim Armstrong's big bet on local news has come to an end: The AOL CEO is handing over Patch …

More: Business Insider, CNET, TechCrunch, AOL Corp and Forbes. Tweets: @pkafka. See also Mediagazer

Evan Schuman / Computerworld:

Starbucks caught storing mobile passwords in clear text — In a case of convenience for users trumping security, Starbucks has been storing the passwords for its mobile-payment app, along with geolocation data, in clear text — The Starbucks mobile app, the most used mobile-payment app in the U.S. …

More: Full Disclosure, Examiner, Computerworld, Threatpost, GeekWire, SlashGear and FierceMobileIT News

New York Times:

NSA is using radio waves to monitor and alter data on computers not connected to the Internet — N.S.A. Devises Radio Pathway Into Computers — WASHINGTON — The National Security Agency has implanted software in nearly 100,000 computers around the world that allows the United States …

More: PandoDaily, Computerworld, eWeek, Techdirt, Business Insider, Digital Trends, SiliconBeat, SlashGear, BBC, Examiner, TechSpot, SiliconANGLE, The Daily Caller, SecurityWeek, Valleywag, PC Magazine, Gawker, Nextgov, TheHill, VentureBeat, The Switch, AEIdeas, Telegraph, BGR, USA Today, The Tech Report and Ars Technica

Tweets: @pmarca, @rsingel, @pmarca, @ryan, @declanm, @niubi and @viasimonromero

See also Mediagazer

Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:

Google Adds Optional Data Compression Feature To Chrome For Mobile, Reducing Your Data Usage By Up To 50% — Google today is officially announcing the release of a data compression feature for its Chrome mobile web browser which allows you to reduce your data usage on smartphones and tablets …

More: Google Chrome Blog, The Next Web, BGR, ReadWrite, The Verge, MobileBurn.com, iPhone Hacks, VentureBeat, Inquirer, BrowserNative, pocketnow.com, Engadget, 9to5Mac, 9to5Google and Softpedia News

Brent Rose / Gizmodo:

Google Play Movies and TV Finally Comes to iOS — First Google Play Books made its way to iOS. Then Google Play Music undertook the pilgrimage. So, it should be little surprise that today Google Play Movies and TV has finally made the jump. This is significant not just because it brings …

More: The Verge, 9to5Google, iDownloadBlog.com and MobileSyrup.com. Tweets: @googleplay

Jonathan Stempel / Reuters:

Silicon Valley workers may pursue collusion case as group- court — Roughly 60,000 Silicon Valley workers won clearance to pursue a lawsuit accusing Apple Inc, Google Inc and other companies of conspiring to drive down pay by not poaching each other's staff, after a federal appeals court refused …

More: SiliconBeat, StrictlyVC, CNET, iPhone in Canada Blog, iDownloadBlog.com, Valleywag, NBC Bay Area, Cult of Mac and App Advice

Kara Swisher / Re/code:

COO Henrique De Castro Out at Yahoo — As as long been rumored, Yahoo COO Henrique De Castro is departing Yahoo. — I had reported last week that he was in trouble as he was not in attendance at any major events at CES and was working on a story about his expected departure.

More: SiliconBeat, TechCrunch and Business Insider

Tweets: @mikeisaac and @danprimack

Natasha Lomas / TechCrunch:

Silent Circle & Geeksphone Join Forces To Build Blackphone: A Pro-Privacy Android-Based Smartphone — As the reality of the extent and invasiveness of the security services' dragnet surveillance programs hits home, the pro-privacy movement has been cranking up its own ideas to counter spy-tech with pro-privacy tech.

More: PR Newswire, Gigaom, Engadget, ABC News, BGR, ZDNet, TechHive, The Verge, Re/code, VentureBeat, TechSpot, Ars Technica, Gizmodo, TechnoBuffalo, Digits, Inquirer, Business Insider, The Next Web and MobileBurn.com. Tweets: @silent_circle

Wall Street Journal:

Cloud-Software Startup Zendesk Hires Bankers for IPO — Maker of Online Help-Desk Software Part of Wave of Cloud Companies — Zendesk Inc., a maker of online help-desk software for businesses, has hired banks in preparation for an initial public offering this year.

More: StreetInsider.com

Jennifer Slegg / Search Engine Watch:

Bing Begins Rollout of Secure Search, Say Goodbye to More Keyword Data — ClickZ Intel is a resource hub for online marketers. Gain access to white papers, webinars, case studies and more! — In November, we reported that Microsoft was looking into switching their search traffic into encrypted SSL search.

More: Search Engine Roundtable, WebProNews and Marketing Pilgrim. Tweets: @doubleyewdee

Ken Yeung / The Next Web:

Box is giving away 50GB of free storage, as it introduces file previews and more to its iOS app — Box has released an update to its iOS apps that now features a sleeker and faster experience, new preview file capabilities, full text search functionality, and more.

More: The Box Blog, The Verge, Los Angeles Times, Gizmodo, Engadget, TechCrunch, 9to5Mac, PC Magazine, ZDNet and CITEworld

Kevin C. Tofel / Gigaom:

HP Chromebook 11 with LTE spotted with $379 price (possible $50 rebate too) — Earlier this morning, I noted that Altair announced its chip would power the HP Chromebook 11 LTE model on Verizon's network. I figured the updated model would be available soon, but I didn't think it would be this soon.

More: Liliputing, Reuters, Altair, BetaNews, Gigaom, The Next Web, CNET, PC World, Altair, Engadget, Android Central, Digital Trends, AndroidHeadlines.com, ZDNet, Softpedia News and Altair

Gabe Rivera / Techmeme News:

Why Techmeme's calendar is now listing even more events — Nearly two years ago, Techmeme began listing technology events, both on its front page, which showed events expected to result in news on Techmeme, and a dedicated events page which showed the same list, but projected several more months into the future.

Tweets: @roi and @gaberivera

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