Twitter on Friday announced the acquisition of a small Seattle-based wireless technology company named Cloudhopper. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed, but it's sure to be tiny. In a blog post, Twitter says it's been working with Cloudhopper for eight months. The top microblogging platform also now claims to process upwards of a billion SMS tweets per month -- a number that continues to grow exponentially around the world. Twitter says the deal will help it "further grow and scale our SMS service," while allowing it "to connect directly to mobile carrier networks in countries …

From Facebook to Foursquare, The New York Times looks at the new culture of information sharing, and the companies betting their success on consumers' willingness to go along for the (sure to be bumpy) ride. "A wave of Web start-ups aims to help people indulge their urge to divulge," writes reporter Brad Stone. "These start-ups are exploiting a mood of online openness, despite possible hidden dangers." Chris Conley, a technology and civil liberties fellow at the American Civil Liberties Union, tells Stone: "People are not necessarily thinking about how long this information will stick around, or how …

Microsoft increases its net income 35% in the third quarter, "but investors wanted even stronger signals of a recovery and sent Microsoft shares down in after-hours trading Thursday," reports The Philadelphia Inquirer. For the January-to-March fiscal third quarter, Microsoft earned $4.01 billion, or 45 cents a share. That was higher than the 42-cents-a-share forecast by analysts surveyed by Thomson Reuters. It was an increase from $2.98 billion, or 33 cents a share, a year earlier. Revenue rose 6 percent to $14.5 billion, slightly more than the $14.4 billion analysts were expecting. Microsoft had $13.6 billion in revenue …

If only for the moment, dedicated turn-by-turn GPS navigators like Garmin and TomTom can breathe a sigh of relief. Google is denying rumors that it plans to introduce its free turn-by-turn GPS navigation service to iPhone users anytime soon. Reports surfaced on Thursday quoting a Google executive speaking about plans to bring such a service to other mobile platforms during a London press conference. Denying the reports, a Google spokesperson tells PCWorld: "We did not say we would bring it to iPhone, we said to date we've had it on Android and that in the future it may come …

Social buying site Blippy just got a nice write-up on The New York Time's Bits blog. The startup lets people link their credit cards and e-commerce accounts to its site, so users can share their purchase decisions with "friends." Bits goes so far as to suggest that Blippy -- along with a similar startup named Swipely -- could eventually present a significant challenge to mega e-tailers like Amazon. Unfortunately for Blippy -- if not would-be users -- Venture Beats reports that "at least one Internet power user" subsequently figured out a way to search for Blippy …

Location-based social network Foursquare is reportedly the hottest acquisition target from the Valley to the Alley, but top bloggers are portraying its prospects -- along with its own aims and ambitions -- quite differently. "It's already been widely reported that Yahoo is seriously pursuing a Foursquare acquisition, but now we're hearing that at least two other companies are in talks or have been in talks recently with the location-based startup as well," writes TechCrunch. "And they're big ones: Facebook and Microsoft." "Facebook, from what we're hearing, has been talking to Foursquare …

Apple's iPhone business now represents a whopping 40% of the company's revenue, according to Business Insider's "chart of the day." Remarkably, that's a share of the business that didn't exist three years ago. Now, for three quarters and counting, the iPhone is Apple's biggest revenue generator. During the March quarter, iPhone revenue grew 124% year-over-year to $5.4 billion -- or 40% of Apple's $13.5 billion in total revenue. "Because of high profit margins on the iPhone, it's likely Apple's biggest profit contributor, too," suggests Business Insider. "But that's another chart. Apple's second-biggest business is its Mac computer division, which grew …

Location-based social network Foursquare has added a link to every page representing an unclaimed business venue, which asks: "Are you the manager of this business?" The link takes presumed managers to a page asking them for proof that they are in fact a business's manager, and an open-offer to discuss various marketing opportunities with a member of Foursquare's sales team. As TechCrunch explains, "If Foursquare is ever going to be worth more than $100 million to Yahoo or anyone, it will have to add not just a hell of a lot more users, but also a hell of a lot …

Google is no stranger to rivalries and potential competition, but Fortune suggests that the search giant may have finally met its match with Facebook. Indeed, new features from the social network "may lay the groundwork for reorganizing the Internet according to the relationships between people instead of pages -- with massive implications for both search and advertising," it writes. In particular, Facebook's new "like" button is being positioned to create "an expanding map of the preferences people express across the the [sic] entire Internet." More broadly, "As [Facebook] launches more features outside the Facebook site, the company's strategy is starting …

Blogger Robert Scoble -- who knows a thing or two about ambitious tech giants -- is trying to wrap his head around Facebook's grand strategy, and, well, he's freakin' out a bit. "Facebook wants to own your digital fingerprints," according to Scoble. Regarding the social network's new sharing tools, he predicts: "I'd expect to see Facebook's new social features to show up on at least 30% of the web's most popular sites within a month." As a result, "Facebook gets to study everything we touch now and will bring a much more complete stream back to the mother ship." So, …