Techmeme: Nest's smart Thermostat is now available to buy in the UK, priced from £179 (Ben Woods/The Next Web)

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April 2, 2014, 8:35 AM

Top News

Yuichiro Kanematsu / Nikkei:

Report: Apple in talks to buy 55% stake in Renesas SP display chip design unit for $479M — Apple looking to buy Japanese chipmaker — SILICON VALLEY — Apple is in talks with Japan's Renesas Electronics to take over a unit that designs chips for smartphone displays …

Lisa Eadicicco / Business Insider:

Apple Is Suing Samsung For $2 Billion Over These 5 iPhone Features — Apple is back in U.S. court with Samsung this week, suing the Korean software maker for $2 billion. — The last time the two companies met in the U.S. was in 2012. Apple won a $1 billion judgment Samsung is currently appealing.

More: 9to5Mac, BGR, Bloomberg, Redmond Pie, Computerworld and 9to5Mac

Josh Lowensohn / The Verge:

Apple lays out its new case against Samsung, says 50 patents could have been at stake

More: The Register, New York Times, TechEye, BGR, Computerworld, FOSS Patents, Bloomberg, Electronista, 9to5Mac, TechnoBuffalo, The Mac Observer, Reuters, CNET, Pocketnow, Associated Press, CNET and SlashGear

Tweets: @daiwaka, @tim and @tim

Ina Fried / Re/code:

Samsung: Apple's Patent Claims Are “Gross Exaggeration”

More: Re/code, 9to5Mac, The Verge, Digital Trends, Business Insider, Phandroid, iDownloadBlog.com, AppleInsider, App Advice and Mercury News. Tweets: @tim

Ben Woods / The Next Web:

Nest's smart Thermostat is now available to buy in the UK, priced from £179 — Nest, the company looking to reinvent dull-but-worthy household items such as the smoke detector, has announced that its Nest Thermostat is now finally available to buy in the UK.

More: Nest, The Verge, iMore, Inquirer, BGR, Engadget, TechCrunch, Telegraph, New York Times, TechWeekEurope UK, Electronista, Cult of Mac, Geeky Gadgets, SlashGear, Android Central and App Advice

Simon Khalaf / The Flurry Blog:

Average US consumer spends 2 hours and 42 minutes per day on mobile devices, 86% of time spent in apps, 14% on web — Apps Solidify Leadership Six Years into the Mobile Revolution — Last year, on the eve of the fifth anniversary of the mobile revolution, Flurry issed its five-year report on the mobile industry.

More: Forbes, Tech.pinions, Guardian, SocialTimes, Ubergizmo, AdExchanger, textually.org, TechSpot, Poynter, The Next Web, VatorNews, Re/code, PadGadget, App Advice, iPhone in Canada Blog and AppleInsider

Greg Bensinger / Wall Street Journal:

Amazon Will Now Allow Returns Using Lockers — Amazon.com has quietly rolled out a new service to let customers return unwanted merchandise using large metal lockers it has installed for deliveries in garages, convenience and grocery stores in major metropolitan areas.

More: Gizmodo, SlashGear and Engadget

Will Connors / Wall Street Journal:

BlackBerry Ends Licensing Agreement With T-Mobile — Blackberry Says Strategies Are Not Complementary — TORONTO— BlackBerry Ltd. said late Tuesday that it is ending its licensing agreement with T-Mobile Inc. when it expires later this month, a surprise move that comes two months …

More: BlackBerry Press Room, TechCrunch, Inquirer, BGR, ZDNet, The Verge, Engadget, Digital Trends, Gizmodo, CNET, Ars Technica, Cult of Mac, Canadianreviewer.com, Geeky Gadgets, Bloomberg, SlashGear, The Next Web, Electronista and iDownloadBlog.com

Charles Arthur / Guardian:

Wearables: one-third of consumers abandoning devices — Hundreds of Galaxy Gear smartwatches are listed on eBay barely six months after launch. Why isn't the wearable tech market taking off? — The advert was blunt: a second-hand Samsung Galaxy Gear smartwatch for sale, priced at “£100 ONO”.

More: Venture Chronicles and BGR. Tweets: @kevinpauldowney

Harry McCracken / TIME:

How Gmail Happened: The Inside Story of Its Launch 10 Years Ago Today … It All Began With Search … Gmail's creator, Paul Buchheit, at his desk at Google in 1999 — Courtesy Paul Buchheit … What Does Google Email Look Like? … Going Public

More: SiliconANGLE, Wall Street Journal, The Verge, Mashable, BGR, Marketing Land, Slate, Phandroid, Pocketables and Canadianreviewer.com

Tweets: @natebrix, @chrisgeidner and @alistairmbarr

Thanks:@mariedomingo

Mikey Campbell / AppleInsider:

Apple patent describes bayonet mounts for interchangeable lenses on iPhone-like devices — Apple may use bayonet mounts for interchangeable iPhone camera lenses — Apple is investigating the use of bayonet lens mounts — one of the most common lens attachment mechanisms used in modern photography …

More: SoyaCincau, Pocketnow, Business Insider, iPhone in Canada Blog, PC Magazine, TechSpot and iLounge

Gregg Keizer / Computerworld:

Ex-Microsoft employee pleads guilty to trade secret theft — Prosecutors will recommend three-month prison sentence for insider who allegedly shared info with French blogger — Former Microsoft employee Alex Kibkalo, who two weeks ago was charged with stealing — then leaking …

More: seattlepi.com, Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, Redmond Reporter, The Register, WinBeta and ITworld.com

Tom Hals / Reuters:

Judge orders Mt Gox CEO to U.S. for questions on failed bitcoin exchange — (Reuters) - The chief executive of Japan's Mt. Gox, once the world's leading bitcoin exchange, was ordered to the United States to answer questions related to its U.S. bankruptcy case, filed after the company lost $400 million of customers' digital currency.

More: InfoWorld, Softpedia News, Bloomberg, CoinDesk and The Register

Mark Bergen / AdAge:

Apple opens iAd Workbench to everyone with an Apple ID, launches video ads — Build Your Own iAd: Apple Throws Open Door to Platform — As It Takes On Google, Company Expands Access to Workbench — Ad Age Digital Conference 2014 — Apple is making its advertising ecosystem more accessible.

More: iPhone in Canada Blog, MacRumors, Softpedia News, iDownloadBlog.com, Business Insider, TechCrunch, Cult of Mac, AppleInsider and 9to5Mac. See also Mediagazer

Terrence O'Brien / Engadget:

Spotify's new design is cleaner, darker and puts the focus on content — If you're using Spotify on the web, desktop or iOS you should notice a pretty massive change starting today. (The new look should be coming to Android “near future.") The company is launching its most dramatic overhaul since its launch in 2008.

More: Spotify Blog, The Next Web, Guardian, TechCrunch, MacRumors, Gizmodo, NEWS.com.au, Inquirer, CNET, The Verge, Geeky Gadgets, iDownloadBlog.com and Pocketnow. Tweets: @zseward. See also Mediagazer

Stephen Shankland / CNET:

Exclusive: Mozilla CEO Eich says gay-marriage firestorm could hurt Firefox (Q&A) — Brendan Eich's 2008 donation to an anti-gay-marriage cause now dogs his new CEO job. In his first interview about it, he resists calls to resign or recant, but argues inclusiveness makes Mozilla's world-spanning community possible.

More: Re/code, The Verge and SiliconBeat

Tweets: @mattbraga, @mikeisaac, @karaswisher, @mikeisaac, @stshank, @binarybits and @caseynewton

Matt Brian / Engadget:

Google to focus on portrait shots and effects with improved camera app — We know that Google has been looking to bring more advanced photo features to Android for a while, but it may soon be ready to show off what it's been working on. Sources aware of Google's plans have confirmed to us …

More: TechnoBuffalo, Android Beat, Ubergizmo, TechSpot, GSMArena Blog, Phandroid, Droid Life, The Droid Guy, Gotta Be Mobile, Mashable, Greenbot and Pocketnow. Tweets: @dannysullivan

Kevin Poulsen / Wired:

Google Takes Wi-Fi Snooping Scandal to the Supreme Court — The biggest U.S. internet wiretapping program outside the NSA may be headed to the Supreme Court. — Google is asking the high court to rule on the legality of the company's past sniffing of unencrypted Wi-Fi traffic …

More: PC World, The Verge, TechEye, Ars Technica and Android Central

Jon Brodkin / Ars Technica:

Box wants to let businesses control cloud encryption keys “this year” — Box CEO Aaron Levie told Ars last September that the cloud storage company is trying to build a service that would let customers store data in Box data centers but would keep encryption keys in-house.

Jonathan Krim / Wall Street Journal:

The Chamber of Commerce Comes to Silicon Valley — Powerful Lobby Group Tries to Win Over Startups, VCs — The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, among the most powerful business lobbying organizations in Washington, is planning a second outpost in Silicon Valley in an effort to broaden its membership and clout.

More: SiliconBeat, Mercury News, bizjournals, TheHill and TechPresident

Tweets: @iansherr and @wsjd

Jeff John Roberts / Gigaom:

LinkedIn names HiringSolved as the recruiting competitor it has sued for scraping profiles — LinkedIn names company that used bots to steal profiles for competing Recruiter service — In January, LinkedIn filed a lawsuit that accused unnamed “John Does” of creating fake profiles in order to …

More: Sell Hack Blog, BetaNews, Yahoo Tech, TechWeekEurope UK, Graham Cluley and Business Insider. Tweets: @shon. Thanks:@jeffjohnroberts

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