Could the selfie actually serve a practical purpose? In place of a password or some other ID verifier, Alibaba’s Jack Ma thinks the self-portraits should be used to quickly and easily authenticate mobile purchases. Alibaba’s new facial recognition tool, intended for use with Alipay mobile payments service, “validates mobile payments by matching a photo taken by the user at the point of purchase to a stored profile photo,” Fortune reports. 

Sufficiently scared by Apple’s bold entry into the marketplace, TAG Heuer has enlisted Google and Intel to help build the “greatest connected watch,” in the words of LVMH watch chief Jean-Claude Biver. The Swiss watchmaker is the first of the old guard to partner with Google, according Bloomberg Businessweek. But “the partnership could open the door to other collaborations with high-end brands owned by LVMH, including Hublot and Zenith.” 

Making for a solid quarter, Adobe reported revenues of $1.11 billion and non-GAAP earnings per share of $0.44 for the first fiscal quarter. “Analysts had expected Adobe to report earnings per share of $0.39 on revenues of $1.09 billion,” according to VentureBeat. “In short, Adobe beat financial expectations across the board.” Also of note, “Adobe’s marketing business continues to grow.” 

As part of its reported plan to launch a TV service later this year, Apple is enticing potential programming partners with detailed consumer data, according to the New York Post. “The company is willing to share details on who its viewers are, what they watch and when they watch it to entice broadcast networks and others to go along with the service,” NYP reports. “The information could help programmers better target shows to viewers and advertisers.” 

Continuing the post-mortem of GigaOm, The New York Times’ Farhad Manjoo delves into the publisher’s downfall. Compared to other media start-ups, “Gigaom … was special, and not in a good way,” Manjoo suggests, citing interviews with more than half a dozen staffers and executives. “It was a company troubled by poor leadership, a history of spending beyond its means and an inattention to major problems that had dogged its businesses for years.” 

As with Steve Jobs, Tim Cook would much rather produce superior product that be first to market with a half-baked idea. “Don’t ship something before it’s ready,” he tells Fast Company during a far-ranging Q&A. “Have the patience to get it right … And that is exactly what’s happened to us with the watch.” Yes, while new and improved iterations are inevitable, Cook seems to honestly believe that the Apple Watch is fully-baked, and destined for success. 

Almost every year, one app dominates SXSW Interactive. In 2007, it was Twitter. Two years later, it was Foursquare. At this year's conference, it was all about Meerkat. Meerkat's CEO Ben Rubin contends his app's small but loyal base spends two hours watching live video daily. However, Twitter cut off the start-up's access to Meerkat's social graph on Friday, making it currently impossible for new users to quickly "auto-follow" the same people they follow on Twitter. Yet Meerkat said the effort backfired -- and it's user base grew 30%.

Software company Cheetah Mobile, based in China, said it will buy MobPartner in a $58 million cash-and-stock deal. MobParter specializes in performance-based advertising and other mobile marketing services. MobPartner is active in 200 countries and with more than 10,000 publishers worldwide. Cheetah's acquisition gives it access to more advertisers, publishers and developers.

"Streaming services are going to be the major method in the way music is accessed. I don't think enough money trickles down to the songwriters," says Sony/ATV CEO Marty Bandier. Streaming music was supposed to be the savior of the record business, putting the brakes on piracy while mining new ground for revenue. But artists argue they are getting paid a fraction of their worth — and that advertisers, not musicians — are profiting.

Cortana -- Microsoft’s answer to Apple’s Siri -- is coming to devices that run iOS and Android as a standalone app, Reuters reports. To boot, “Microsoft is working on an advanced version of its competitor to Apple's Siri, using research from an artificial intelligence project called ‘Einstein.’” The moves “represent a new front in CEO Satya Nadella's battle to sell Microsoft software on any device or platform,” Reuters suggests.