Techmeme: Ex-Googlers announce Beep, a Pandora-enabled WiFi controller for streaming music to any speaker (Josh Ong/The Next Web)

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February 6, 2014, 4:50 PM

Top News

Mark Gurman / 9to5Mac:

iWatch time: Apple seeking physiologists to run fitness, energy expenditure tests — Apple has published a job listing on its website seeking physiologists and engineers to run tests related to health and fitness data. This job will require the employees to “design and run user studies related …

More: ReadWrite, AppleInsider, USA Today, PadGadget, BGR, Mashable, PhoneArena, CNET, TechCrunch, TechnoBuffalo, iDownloadBlog.com, Apple Bitch, iPhone in Canada Blog, App Advice, SlashGear, MacRumors, everythingiCafe, Business Insider, iLounge and I4U News. Tweets: @markgurman. Thanks:@apollozac

Mark Gurman / 9to5Mac:

Apple buys Sapphire Crystal furnaces for AZ plant, capable of producing 100-200M ~5" iPhone displays per year — Exclusive: Apple just procured enough Sapphire Crystal furnaces to make 100-200M ~5-inch iPhone displays in Arizona — Last year, Apple and GT Advanced struck a deal to open …

More: MacRumors, TechCrunch, BGR and iDownloadBlog.com. Thanks:@swb1192

Mike Isaac / Re/code:

LinkedIn to Acquire Job-Seeking Site Bright for $120 Million — LinkedIn announced on Thursday it plans to acquire Bright, a data-driven job search startup, for $120 million. — The buy is LinkedIn's largest acquisition to date, topping the company's earlier major acquisitions of SlideShare ($119 million) and Pulse ($90 million).

More: LinkedIn, blog.linkedin.com, TechCrunch, ReadWrite, CNET, LinkedIn and MarketWatch

Alex Wilhelm / TechCrunch:

LinkedIn Beats In Q4 With Revenue Of $447.2M, But Growth Concerns Dampen After Hours Trading — Today, following the close of regular trading, LinkedIn reported its fourth-quarter financial performance, including revenue of $447.2 million and non-GAAP earnings per share of $0.39 .

More: Re/code, ZDNet, Tech Trader Daily, Reuters, MarketWatch, Forbes and WebProNews

TechCrunch:

Amazon Acquires Video Gaming Studio Double Helix Games — Amazon has acquired a gaming studio called Double Helix Games, TechCrunch has learned, and Amazon now confirms. The deal was for both talent and IP, we understand. Financial terms have not been disclosed.

Ryan Lawler / TechCrunch:

That Secret App Is Becoming Silicon Valley's New Blind Item — “I work at Evernote and we're about to get acquired... Watch this space” — That could be the first big acquisition rumor to have found its way onto Secret, the new “anonymish” sharing app launched late last week. But it won't be the last.

More: Valleywag, Digits and Yahoo Tech

Tweets: @plibin, @dcurtis, @danprimack, @frankba, @sarahlane, @tedr, @profjeffjarvis, @ryanlawler, @benparr, @jyarow, @ajs, @jessicalessin, @karaswisher, @danprimack, @panzer, @sg and @hunterwalk

Mat Smith / Engadget:

Sony to exit VAIO PC business, spin off TV business, cut 5000 jobs worldwide — Sony sells its VAIO PC business, makes TV arm its own subsidiary — Sony said it was “addressing various options” as recently as yesterday when it came to its VAIO PC and laptop arm, and while announcing …

More: Sony Global, New York Times, CITEworld, Gigaom, Xperia Blog, ZDNet, Android Central, PC World, Bloomberg, Re/code, Tech in Asia, Tech Trader Daily, The Verge, It's a Gadget, Geek.com, Inquirer, MobileBurn.com, VentureBeat, WebProNews, BetaNews, Electronista, Gizmodo, BBC, SlashGear, Ubergizmo, TechSpot, TechEye, IntoMobile, TechCrunch, Agence France Presse, BGR, CNET, Reuters, CNET and DisplayBlog. Tweets: @dannysullivan

Laura Hazard Owen / Gigaom:

Sony exits the North American ebook business and gives its customers to Kobo

More: Engadget, The Register, Press Articles, Computerworld, TechCrunch and The Verge. Tweets: @nvbinder. See also Mediagazer

Josh Ong / The Next Web:

Ex-Googlers announce Beep, a Pandora-enabled WiFi controller for streaming music to any speaker — A pair of ex-Googlers have launched Beep, a beautiful WiFi-equipped dial that lets you stream music to any speaker with a line-in port. The device will launch this Fall with Pandora integration.

More: Engadget, Computerworld, TechSpot, Geek.com, PandoDaily, Gigaom and Co.Labs

Bloomberg:

HTC Sees New Devices and Fresh Marketing Push Driving Turnaround — HTC Corp. (2498) said an updated version of the One smartphone, its first wearable device and a renewed focus on marketing will help turn around the company this year after two straight annual declines in revenue.

Sean Hollister / The Verge:

Google wants to replace your office's teleconference system with a $999 Chromebox — Google's $35 Chromecast dongle made it cheap and easy to show off YouTube videos on your TV. Now, the company sees another narrow window of opportunity for Chrome: teleconferencing.

More: Google Chrome Blog, TechCrunch, 9to5Google, Wired, CITEworld, ZDNet, Forbes, The Next Web, IT PRO and Liliputing

Robert McMillan / Wired:

Apple pulls popular Bitcoin wallet app Blockchain from App Store, used by over a million people — Apple Yanks World's Most Popular Bitcoin Wallet From App Store — Apple has removed the world's most popular bitcoin wallet from its App Store. — Late Wednesday, the tech giant yanked …

Alex Barinka / Bloomberg:

Aereo Reopens New York Online-TV Service to New Subscribers — Aereo Inc., the online-television company that's battling broadcasters in the Supreme Court, reopened its service to New York subscribers after regaining enough capacity to handle demand. — People who were on a waiting list …

More: DSLreports, The Verge and TechCrunch. See also Mediagazer

Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:

Now With 75% Of All Traffic Coming From Apps, Pinterest Revamps Its Mobile Website — Pinterest is today launching a new version of its mobile website, which the company says is “complete rewrite and redesign” aimed at better integrating the features found in Pinterest's native mobile applications …

More: Oh, How Pinteresting!, Gigaom, Engadget, Marketing Land and CNET. Thanks:@jasoncosta

Michael Carney / PandoDaily:

After tripling year-on-year, PayNearMe raises $20M to build out its payments network for cash-only Americans — Entrepreneurs and VCs are falling all over themselves to grab a piece of the next-gen payments ecosystem. But while much of Silicon Valley laments over the future of digital wallets …

More: VentureBeat, Re/code, VatorNews and Payments News

Ellis Hamburger / The Verge:

Indie smash hit ‘Flappy Bird’ racks up $50K per day in ad revenue — The enigmatic and oppressively difficult mobile game Flappy Bird has turned into quite the cash cow for Vietnamese developer Dong Nguyen. In an interview with The Verge, Nguyen revealed that the game …

More: Forbes, Examiner, Kotaku, CNN, PadGadget, Los Angeles Times, Digits, TechSpot, Business Insider, Cult of Mac, Gigaom Research, iPhone in Canada Blog, Polygon, Gearburn, destructoid and Network World. Tweets: @paul_austin

Adi Robertson / The Verge:

Twitter rejects compromise on secret government orders — Twitter's latest transparency report is out, and the company seems furious about what it can't reveal. While Google, Facebook, and others have reached a deal with the US government to break out national security requests in broad numbers …

More: The Twitter Blog, Washington Post, SiliconBeat, Digits, BetaNews, ReadWrite, Re/code, NYT Bits and Softpedia News. See also Mediagazer

Richard Byrne Reilly / VentureBeat:

New York Police Department is beta-testing Google Glass — Caption: Google Glass: watching me, watching you. — Source: Jolie O'Dell/VentureBeat — Google Glass may soon become a favored tool for law enforcement agencies in the United States. — The New York City Police Department's massive …

More: TechSpot, Examiner, WebProNews, Geeky Gadgets, SocialTimes, bizjournals, Gizmodo, Digital Trends, Glass Almanac and Softpedia News

Ken Yeung / The Next Web:

Klout lets you share content recommendations, will boost your score if they're engaging — Klout evolves into a content creation platform as it seeks to help you become more influential — Klout is evolving from a service that told you how much influence you had in terms of a numerical value …

More: The Official Klout Blog, TechCrunch, Business Insider, Fast Company and WebProNews

Jordan Crook / TechCrunch:

Truecaller Lands $18.8M Series B From Sequoia, Partners With Yelp To Verify Business Numbers — Truecaller, the mobile phone number verification directory with over 45 million users, has today secured an $18.8 million Series B financing round led by Sequoia Capital, alongside existing investor Open Ocean …

More: VatorNews

Danny Goodwin / Search Engine Watch:

Google Gives More Prominence to First Playable Music Video Search Result — Searching for a music video on Google? Maybe “Locked Out of Heaven” by Bruno Mars or “Get Lucky” by Daft Punk? Now Google is using the space above its organic search results to give more prominence to the top playable music video result.

More: The Verge, Engadget, Electronista, 9to5Google, The Next Web, Ubergizmo, WebProNews and Softpedia News

Saqib Iqbal Ahmed / Reuters:

Twitter stock opens down 25%, wiping out about $9.8 billion in market value — Investors dump Twitter stock as results divide Wall Street — (Reuters) - Twitter Inc's shares fell almost 25 percent on Thursday, wiping out about $9.8 billion in market value, after the company reported a sharp slowdown in user growth.

More: Business Insider, TechCrunch, Mashable and New York Post

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