Techmeme: Google, Apple, Microsoft, Khan Academy, and others sign pledge to protect K-12 student privacy (Hayley Tsukayama/Washington Post)

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January 21, 2015, 9:55 AM

Top News

Bloomberg:

Samsung Said to Drop Qualcomm Chip From Next Galaxy Smartphone — Samsung Electronics Co. (005930) will use its own microprocessors in the next version of the Galaxy S smartphone, dropping its use of a Qualcomm Inc. (QCOM) chip that overheated during the Korean company's testing, people with direct knowledge of the matter said.

More: Forbes, BGR, The Verge, Inquirer, MobileSyrup.com, Ubergizmo, Pocketnow, Fortune, Gizmodo, PhoneArena, Reuters, Phones Review, Channel EYE, AppleInsider, Android Central, SlashGear and SamMobile. Tweets: @puiwingtam

Stuart Dredge / Guardian:

Apple acquires UK startup Semetric, which runs music analytics service Musicmetric — Apple buys the British startup behind music analytics service Musicmetric — Company helps record labels track digital sales, streams and social stats, and could become part of Beats Music relaunch

Douglas MacMillan / Wall Street Journal:

Dropbox acquires Israel-based CloudOn, a developer of mobile productivity tools — Dropbox Dips Into Israel With CloudOn Buy — Acquisitive tech startup Dropbox just gobbled up another young app maker to bolster its European expansion. — The cloud-storage provider on Tuesday closed …

More: Gigaom, TechCrunch, BetaNews, SiliconANGLE, SlashGear, Tech in Asia, Jewish Business News, The Next Web, Reuters, Ubergizmo, Forbes, VentureBeat and App Advice

Bloomberg:

Apple Steps Up Lobbying in Washington to Counter Government Scrutiny — Tim Cook recently traveled to an unfamiliar destination for an Apple Inc. (AAPL) chief executive officer: The U.S. Capitol. — During the trip last month, Cook posed for a photo with Senator Orrin Hatch …

More: AppleInsider, InvestCorrectly.com, 9to5Mac, MacNN, MacRumors, iPhone in Canada Blog, Digital Trends, Patently Apple and Cult of Mac

Cooper Quintin / Electronic Frontier Foundation:

HealthCare.gov Sends Personal Data to Dozens of Tracking Websites — The Associated Press reports that healthcare.gov-the flagship site of the Affordable Care Act, where millions of Americans have signed up to receive health care-is quietly sending personal health information to a number of third party websites.

More: Associated Press, SlashGear, Gigaom, PC World, The Daily Caller, RT and PandoDaily

Tweets: @superglaze and @yuris

Nathan Ingraham / The Verge:

Every Khan Academy course is now available on the iPad for the first time — Over 150,000 training exercises have been added — Two technology trends are inescapable: people want to do everything online, and they want to do those things on a mobile device.

More: Engadget, VentureBeat, PR Newswire, iMore, MacStories, MacNN and iPhone in Canada Blog

Alan Yuhas / Guardian:

White House breaks own State of the Union embargo for online audience — Obama administration posts full text of president's speech before its own media embargo in unprecedented decision targeting internet-savvy readers — The White House posted the entire text of President Obama's 2015 State …

Cory Bennett / The Hill:

Obama calls for bipartisan effort on cybersecurity legislation in State of the Union address

More: The Register

Stephen Hall / 9to5Google:

Users of 3rd-party WhatsApp clients reportedly being banned from the service for 24 hours — WhatsApp is one of the most-used messaging apps in existence, and today countless users of the service have taken to Google+ and Twitter to report that they're being banned from the service for 24 hours.

More: WhatsApp, Android Police, BBC, Phandroid, Android Beat, bgr.in, Gigaom, Android Central, The Cryptosphere, The Droid Guy, Ausdroid, Ubergizmo and Technology Personalized

Facebook:

Facebook to reduce distribution of deliberately false or misleading posts in News Feed, characterized by hoax-busting comments and high removal rate by sharers — News Feed FYI: Showing Fewer Hoaxes — The goal of News Feed is to catch up with your friends and find the things that matter to you.

Peter Kafka / Re/code:

Netflix Q4 earnings beat estimates with $1.48B in revenue and $0.75 EPS; now has 39.11M US subscribers and 18.28M more globally — Netflix Says Its Subscribers Love the Shows It Makes — So It's Going to Make a Lot More — A quick look at Netflix's Q4 numbers: $1.48 billion and earnings …

More: Business Insider, TechCrunch, WebProNews, USA Today, TechCrunch, CNET, Hollywood Reporter, VentureBeat, GeekWire and bizjournals. See also Mediagazer

Janko Roettgers / Gigaom:

Netflix wants to complete its global expansion within two years, expanding to 200 countries

More: TechCrunch, Wired.co.uk, CNET and WebProNews. Tweets: @jank0. See also Mediagazer

Sarah Buhr / TechCrunch:

Startup L. Jackson Speaks Out About Diversity, Cool Products, And All The People He's Not — Anonymous Twitter persona Startup L. Jackson has captured a large following in the tech community due to his biting commentary on Silicon Valley culture and regular startup advice.

Tweets: @davemcclure, @jonrussell, @ryanlawler, @4strngz and @semil

Hayley Tsukayama / Washington Post:

Google, Apple, Microsoft, Khan Academy, and others sign pledge to protect K-12 student privacy — Google, Khan Academy join in student privacy pledge — Google has signed on to a pledge promising not to sell ads on its products designed for schools. (AP Photo/Marcio Jose Sanchez, File)

More: Wall Street Journal, 9to5Google, SiliconANGLE, Future of Privacy, AppleInsider, SlashGear and Digital Education

Bloomberg:

Shazam raises $30M at a valuation of over $1B, has over 100M monthly active mobile users — Shazam Music App Valued at More Than $1 Billion in New Funding — Shazam Entertainment Ltd. raised $30 million in a new financing that values the music-finding application at more than $1 billion.

More: SiliconANGLE, Shazam, Wall Street Journal, The Verge, VentureBeat, TechCrunch, Business Insider, PE Hub Blog, Tech City News, Fox Business and iPhone in Canada Blog. Tweets: @startupljackson. See also Mediagazer

Emil Protalinski / VentureBeat:

Chrome 40 for iOS arrives with Material Design, Handoff support to your default browser on OS X — Google today released Chrome 40 for iOS. You can download the new version now directly from Apple's App Store. — The first change you'll notice in version 40.0.2214.61 is the implementation of Google's Material Design mantra.

More: Chrome Releases, Google Chrome Releases, TechCrunch, 9to5Mac, MacRumors, iMore, BetaNews, AnandTech, AppleInsider, Engadget, Gigaom, 9to5Google, SlashGear, MobileSyrup.com, The Next Web, 9to5Google and iDownloadBlog.com

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