Techmeme: Exclusive Interview: Rakuten's Mikitani Calls $900 Million He Paid for Viber a “No-Brainer” (Kara Swisher/Re/code)

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February 14, 2014, 12:20 PM

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Mayumi Negishi / Wall Street Journal:

Japanese e-commerce giant Rakuten to buy voice-call app maker Viber for $900 million — Rakuten to Buy Voice-Call App Maker Viber — Japanese e-commerce Giant to Spend $900 million — TOKYO—Japan's Rakuten Inc. said it will acquire call-application maker Cyprus-based Viber Media Inc …

More: Business Wire, Rakuten, Inc.Press Releases, BBC, SiliconANGLE, TechCrunch, The Next Web, Bloomberg, VentureBeat, Digital Trends, BGR, The Verge, AndroidOS.in, Re/code, CNET, Reuters, Engadget, Tech in Asia, Ubergizmo, Gigaom, Guardian, IntoMobile, Cult of Mac, ZDNet, iDownloadBlog.com, InfoWorld and App Advice

Tweets: @caseynewton, @semil, @fcourt and @benbajarin

Kara Swisher / Re/code:

Exclusive Interview: Rakuten's Mikitani Calls $900 Million He Paid for Viber a “No-Brainer” — “This is a no-brainer,” was the first thing that Hiroshi Mikitani, co-founder and CEO of Japan's online commerce giant Rakuten, said to me in his first interview after he spent $900 million in cash to buy messaging app Viber.

More: The Register, The Next Web, Business Insider, InfoWorld, Softpedia News, Tech in Asia, iPhone in Canada Blog, Electronista and Digits

Tweets: @hmikitani_e, @papadimitriou and @juroosawa

Yoree Koh / Digits:

When Twitter's IPO lockup expires Saturday, employees can sell 1.8% of company's shares — Twitter Employees' First Opportunity to Cash Out — A small pile of Twitter shares could be freed to the market this week as agreements that barred employees from selling a portion of their shares after the IPO expire.

More: Re/code and Bloomberg. Tweets: @hunterwalk and @qthrul

Alistair Barr / USA Today:

Google working on 10 gigabit Internet speeds — Project to develop ‘next generation’ of the Internet is part of Google's broader obsession with speed, CFO says — SAN FRANCISCO - Google is working on technology that will provide data transfer speeds over the Internet that are many times faster …

More: Los Angeles Times, Electronista, BGR, WebProNews, Gizmodo, ZDNet, Softpedia News, Mashable, SlashGear, CNET, Business Insider, The Switch, DSLreports and Droid Life

Tweets: @georgebludger, @davethefuturist and @alistairmbarr

Ina Fried / Re/code:

Now There's a Federal Bill to Require a Smartphone “Kill Switch” — Following on the heels of a California bill, four Democratic senators on Thursday proposed a federal law that would require those that make cellular devices to equip them with the ability to be permanently deactivated if stolen.

More: U.S. Senator Amy Klobuchar, The Technology Chronicles, T3 News, HotHardware.com News, CNET, PhoneNews.com, Electronista, Cult of Mac, MacRumors, iPhone Hacks, App Advice and AppleInsider

Andy Greenberg / Forbes:

Silk Road 2.0 ‘Hack’ Blamed On Bitcoin Bug, All Funds Stolen — The same bug that has plagued several of the biggest players in the Bitcoin economy may have just bitten the Silk Road. — On Thursday, one of the recently-reincarnated drug-selling black market site's administrators posted …

More: Deep Dot Web, Ars Technica, TechCrunch, Help Net Security, Gigaom, Lastest ITProPortal news, Business Insider, We Live Security, SiliconANGLE, Softpedia News, The Verge, MoneyBeat and SlashGear

Stephen Shankland / CNET:

Chrome speeds up web apps by compiling JavaScript in the background — Google: Under-the-hood change helps Web apps on Chrome — Google has taught Chrome how to walk and chew gum at the same time. — The newest Chrome beta version, 33, includes a feature called concurrent compilation …

More: Chromium Blog, Electronista, HEXUS.net Latest Content, SlashGear, The Next Web, Softpedia News and The Register

Michael Isikoff / NBC News:

Exclusive: Snowden Swiped Password From NSA Coworker — A civilian NSA employee recently resigned after being stripped of his security clearance for allowing former agency contractor Edward Snowden to use his pers...

More: Ars Technica, BBC, BGR, New York Times, Mashable, TheBlot, I4U News, Nextgov, Boing Boing and Slate

Ryan Lawler / TechCrunch:

Former Groupon Product SVP Jeff Holden Joins Uber As Chief Product Officer — Well that was fast. Just a few days after it was revealed that Groupon product chief Jeff Holden was leaving the daily deals giant to join a “Bay Area tech company,” we now know where he has landed.

More: Uber Blog, GeekWire, Re/code, Mashable, Digits and Street Fight

Craig Malisow / Dallas Observer:

How an 18yo Texan who posted a facetious threat to Facebook now faces 10 years in prison — The Facebook Comment That Ruined a Life — A young man's violent threat on Facebook lands him in jail, and limbo. — Approximately one hour after Justin Carter posted a sarcastic comment on a Facebook thread …

Tweets: @pronailprincesa, @jbrodkin and @nicolaskb

Kim-Mai Cutler / TechCrunch:

Yahoo Acquires Technical Recruiting Startup Distill — Yahoo just acquired a San Francisco-based startup called Distill, which was working on a way to make technical recruiting easier by pairing video interviews and programming challenges. They had raised $1.3 million in funding …

More: Computerworld, CNET, bizjournals, Softpedia News, VatorNews, Business Insider and WebProNews

Tweets: @joshconstine and @dsaezgil

Thanks:@anthonyha

Evelyn M. Rusli / Wall Street Journal:

New Apps Whisper and Secret Cater to a Craving to Dish Freely — Messaging Services Offer Anonymity and a Web With Fewer Consequences — Michael Edgeworth, a 20-year-old college student in Illinois, rarely texts and never tweets. — However, he sends more than 50 messages a day on Snapchat that disappear soon after they are read.

More: TechCrunch. Tweets: @zeynep, @scottmaustin, @wsjd, @scottmaustin and @evelynrusli

Samuel Gibbs / Guardian:

Thousands of Tesco.com customer accounts suspended after hacker attack — More than 2,000 leaked usernames and passwords forced the retailer to suspend online shopping accounts — Tesco has been forced to deactivate online customer accounts after thousands of login details, including passwords, were posted online.

More: BBC, Computerworld, CNET, The Register and Telegraph

Ron Amadeo / Ars Technica:

New Android OEM licensing terms leak; “Open” comes with a lot of restrictions — The least understood area of the Android ecosystem has always been the highly secretive Google Play Apps licensing process. While Android is open source, the Google applications, like the Play Store, Gmail …

More: Inquirer, Beyond Search, Android Community, WindowsITPro, BGR, Pocketnow, The Register and Digits. Tweets: @glennf

Amy Schatz / Re/code:

Peering could replace net neutrality as one of the key issues in Comcast-Time Warner review — Sleeper Issue Peers Around the Corner of Comcast-Time Warner Deal — Comcast executives scored big points three years ago with the Federal Communications Commission by volunteering to abide …

More: Comment, Wired, eWeek, The Technology Chronicles and Deadline.com. See also Mediagazer

Elizabeth Dwoskin / Wall Street Journal:

Pandora to let advertisers target listeners based on its sense of their political leanings starting next week — Internet Radio Service Builds Profiles of Its Audience — Pandora Hopes to Build Ad Revenue by Pinpointing Likely Voting Preferences — Next time you listen to a Bob Marley channel …

More: hypebot. Tweets: @lizzadwoskin, @a_grossman and @peteskomoroch. See also Mediagazer

Gregory T. Huang / Xconomy:

Bit9 buys Carbon Black, raises $38.25M to boost its enterprise security offering — Bit9 Buys Carbon Black, Gets $38M to Try to Win Security Arms Race — 2014 is shaping up to be the year of cybersecurity. Or lack thereof. — It seems every week we hear about a new data breach or major hacking operation.

More: VentureBeat, Computerworld, theWHIR.com, PE Hub Blog, SecurityWeek and Pulse 2.0

Martyn Williams / Computerworld:

Phil Schiller up again in next round of Apple-Samsung battle — The Apple executive is one of a handful of people Samsung said it will call to the court — Apple marketing chief Phil Schiller is among the witnesses that lawyers for Samsung plan to call when the two companies return to court in California in late March.

More: MacRumors, AppleInsider, 9to5Mac, InfoWorld, iDownloadBlog.com, App Advice, iPhone in Canada Blog and MacRumors

Lisa Jennings / Nation's Restaurant News:

Taco Bell testing mobile ordering for in-store pickup, will roll out nationally this year — Taco Bell to offer mobile ordering nationwide — Taco Bell is preparing to roll out mobile ordering nationwide later this year, a move that will likely fuel a trend expected to shake up the quick-service world.

More: ZDNet, Laughing Squid, Ubergizmo, TechSpot, Breaking Apple News …, Phandroid, Los Angeles Times, Electronista, The Switch, Droid Life, The Verge, MacRumors and AndroidGuys

Mikey Campbell / AppleInsider:

Apple files patent for automated disposable email addresses to combat spam — Apple wants to stop, track down spammers with automated disposable email addresses — The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office on Thursday published an Apple patent application describing a system that thwarts spam mail …

More: Business Insider, MacRumors, VentureBeat, CNET and TechCrunch. Tweets: @counternotions

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