Techmeme: The Rise and Fall of AIM, the Breakthrough AOL Never Wanted (Jason Abbruzzese/Mashable)

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April 16, 2014, 8:45 AM

Top News

Reuters:

Samsung plans to launch Tizen smartphones in Q2 and an Android Wear smartwatch later this year — Samsung executive says Galaxy S5 to outsell S4, sees second quarter rollout for Tizen phone — (Reuters) - Samsung Electronics Co Ltd's new Galaxy S5 smartphone should outsell its predecessor …

More: The Next Web, TechCrunch, LAPTOP Magazine, Inquirer, Wall Street Journal, ZDNet, TechEye, The Verge, Softpedia News, Phones Review, Electronista, Android Beat, SlashGear, Mashable, Pocketnow, Ubergizmo and Android Central

Ina Fried / Re/code:

Apple, Google, Microsoft, Samsung and Carriers Back Anti-Theft Measures for Smartphones — With several states and municipalities considering various mandatory “kill-switch” laws for mobile devices, the wireless industry announced a voluntary commitment to include new anti-theft technology on phones starting next year.

Jason Abbruzzese / Mashable:

The Rise and Fall of AIM, the Breakthrough AOL Never Wanted — When we think about the spectacular collapse of once untouchable Internet properties, companies like MySpace and Pets.com come to mind. The rise and fall of AOL Instant Messenger rivals them all.

Tweets: @hunterwalk, @gootecks, @chelseabot and @jasonrosenthal

Wall Street Journal:

Inside Alibaba, China's e-commerce giant with 2X Amazon's revenues, and plans for a $15B IPO — Alibaba Flexes Muscles Before IPO — Chinese E-Commerce Giant Speeds Toward $15 Billion Deal — Jack Ma still has the spartan apartment in the Chinese city of Hangzhou where the former English teacher started Alibaba.com in 1999.

More: ZDNet and The Next Web. Tweets: @shiraovide and @whatthebit

Reuters:

China e-commerce giant Alibaba seen filing for US IPO next week: sources

Wall Street Journal:

Mt. Gox gives up plan to rebuild under bankruptcy protection, files for liquidation — Mt. Gox Files for Liquidation — Defunct Bitcoin Exchange Gives Up On Plan to Rebuild — Defunct bitcoin exchange Mt. Gox has given up its plan to rebuild under bankruptcy protection and has asked …

More: Engadget, ZDNet, PC World, Gizmodo, Tech in Asia, CoinDesk, Softpedia News, The Next Web, The Verge, TechCrunch, Reuters and BBC. Tweets: @mochi_wsj

Dieter Bohn / The Verge:

Building blocks: how Project Ara is reinventing the smartphone — A handful of Google engineers and designers are building a phone the DARPA way — In a spare, drab office park in Sunnyvale, California, a bunch of two-by-fours and foamboard have been nailed together into a makeshift model of a shipping container.

More: The Guardian, Engadget, Wall Street Journal, The Next Web and LAPTOP Magazine

Seth Rosenblatt / CNET:

Google targeting Project Ara modular phone for January 2015

More: 9to5Google, TechCrunch, Neowin, Pocketnow, SlashGear and BGR

Jon Gertner / Fast Company:

Inside Google X: lab reveals it experimented with space elevators and hoverboards — The Truth About Google X: An Exclusive Look Behind The Secretive Lab's Closed Doors — Astro Teller is sharing a story about something bad. Or maybe it's something good. At Google X, it's sometimes hard to know the difference.

More: Gizmodo, Engadget, Quartz, 9to5Google, BGR, Business Insider and VentureBreak

Tweets: @fastcodesign, @hunterwalk and @mattcutts

Benjamin Mayo / 9to5Mac:

8 GB iPhone 5c now available in the Netherlands, Czech Republic, Sweden, Poland, Italy, Ireland and others — After a brief period of downtime, the Apple Store around the world has now gone back up. Aside from a bit of Mothers Day promotional advertising, there is no change to most regions.

More: MacRumors, CNET, SlashGear, iMore, Softpedia News, Phones Review and App Advice. Thanks:@mikebeas

Reuters:

New CEO Nadella pushes data culture at Microsoft — (Reuters) - Microsoft Corp needs a “data culture” to thrive in the new computing environment, according to chief executive Satya Nadella, in his third public appearance in three weeks putting his imprint on the software company.

More: The Official Microsoft Blog, Re/code and CITEworld. Tweets: @stevesi

Alex Wilhelm / TechCrunch:

Microsoft Announces New Tools Bringing The Cloud To The Internet Of Things, Uniting Hadoop And SQL

More: Business Insider, The Register, SQL Server Team Blog, MSDN Blogs, Ars Technica, eWeek, ZDNet, Gigaom, SiliconANGLE, WinBeta, Neowin, VentureBeat and GeekWire

Tweets: @maryjofoley and @levie

Thanks:@_trendspotter

Ingrid Lunden / TechCrunch:

Telefonica, Blackstone Launch Axonix, A Mobile Ad Exchange Built On Defunct MobClix Tech — Telefonica, the Spanish carrier with operations in 24 countries and 323 million customers, is making its latest bid to expand its business beyond basic mobile and telephone services, by moving into ad tech.

More: PC World, Mobile World Live, Wall Street Journal, thedrum.com, AdExchanger and Financial Times. Tweets: @ingridlunden

Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:

Google Play Still Tops iOS App Store Downloads, And Now Narrowing Revenue Gap, Too — Android's position as the most dominant smartphone platform worldwide is also having an impact on mobile app download growth, and now, increasing revenue. Google's app marketplace, Google Play …

More: App Annie Blog, Ubergizmo, Tech in Asia, Re/code, Cult of Mac, Android Community, iDownloadBlog.com, Marketing Land, Gamasutra and Business Insider. Tweets: @benbajarin

Kara Swisher / Re/code:

Yahoo's Q1 Earnings as Meh as Expected, But China's Alibaba Doing Great! — Yahoo pretty much came in on target in the first quarter with what Wall Street had been expecting, earning 38 cents a share on $1.087 billion in revenue. Minus traffic acquisition costs, that meant a pretty weak one percent increase in revenue.

More: Fortune, Softpedia News, USA Today, Marketing Land, eWeek, TheDomains.com, The Technology Chronicles, DailyFinance.com, Mercury News, WebProNews, The Verge, ZDNet, Wall Street Journal, Business Insider, AdExchanger and Electronista. Tweets: @yahooinc. See also Mediagazer

Douglas MacMillan / Wall Street Journal:

Yahoo's Display-Ad Sales Show Some Signs of Life

John Biggs / TechCrunch:

Weev Talks About Life In Prison And His Plans To Open A Hedge Fund, TRO LLC — Weev, aka Andrew Auernheimer, is free. The 29-year-old hacker, released from the Allenwood Federal Correctional Center in Pennsylvania last weekend, has spent the past few days celebrating a federal appeals court decision …

Tweets: @tsimonite, @essobi and @charnyr

Erin Griffith / Fortune:

Exclusive: Automattic seeking to raise more than $100 million — The round will value the company behind WordPress.com at north of $1 billion. — FORTUNE — Automattic, the company that runs blogging platforms WordPress.com and WordPress VIP, is out raising between $100 million and $150 million …

More: Gigaom Research, Gigaom, Mashable and VentureBeat. Tweets: @whatthebit. See also Mediagazer

Janko Roettgers / Gigaom:

Netgear adds BitTorrent Sync to its network-attached storage drives — Now this is smart: BitTorrent Inc. has teamed up with Netgear to take its P2P-powered Dropbox competitor BitTorrent Sync to the next level. Owners of a ReadyNAS device can now install apps for Sync directly on that device …

More: The Official BitTorrent Blog, The Next Web, Softpedia News and Gizmodo

Brian Krebs / Krebs on Security:

LaCie's online store was compromised for nearly a year, exposing credit cards and contact info — Hardware Giant LaCie Acknowledges Year-Long Credit Card Breach — Computer hard drive maker LaCie has acknowledged that a hacker break-in at its online store exposed credit card numbers …

More: LaCie, Threatpost, BBC, BGR, The Verge, ZDNet, Ubergizmo, Softpedia News, eSecurityPlanet, SC Magazine UK and The Mac Observer

Zach Epstein / BGR:

Amazon's 4.7-inch 720p smartphone to have glasses-free 3D UI, four head-tracking infrared cameras — This is Amazon's smartphone — BGR gives the world an exclusive first look at the unannounced smartphone Amazon is set to debut in the coming months — After years of development …

Hunter Walker / Business Insider:

NY state senator: NY Post report on prostitutes using Airbnb points to gambling, drug activity next — New York Lawmaker Warns That AirBNB Could Be Used For Gambling And Drugs Next — New York State Senator Liz Krueger issued a statement saying a New York Post report published Monday …

More: New York Post, Valleywag, nysenate.gov, SiliconBeat, TechHive, The Technology Chronicles and Gothamist. Tweets: @ron_miller

Brian Chesky / The Huffington Post:

Airbnb CEO: we could collect $21M per year in taxes for New York if tax laws change

Zac Hall / 9to5Mac:

Google debuts iPhone app for its Helpouts learning and tutorial service — Google has added yet another app to its collection of iPhone apps today. This time it's Google Helpouts, which connects users over its Hangouts service to experts knowledgeable in a specific subject for tutoring.

More: Softpedia News, MacNN, Redmond Pie, The Next Web, TechCrunch, iDownloadBlog.com, Engadget and iMore

Jordan Kahn / 9to5Mac:

Pioneer says CarPlay firmware update for existing 2014 in-dash systems coming this summer — Following reports yesterday that car electronics manufacturer Alpine was planning to launch aftermarket CarPlay units in the fall, Pioneer issued a press release today confirming a firmware update for existing in-dash systems.

More: Business Wire, The Verge, Mashable, Ars Technica, Pocketnow, Geek Beat, PC Magazine, MacRumors, SlashGear, TechnoBuffalo, iPhone in Canada Blog, iLounge, iDownloadBlog.com and Engadget

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