Despite what will likely be "huge demand" for the forthcoming Verizon iPhone, the partnership is coming too late for Apple to challenge Android's mobile monopoly. So says Daniel Lyons, author of "Options: The Secret Life of Steve Jobs," in Newsweek (in a column that originally appeared in The Daily Beast). Along with rapid quality improvements, Google's mobile operating system has one key advantage over the iPhone -- "diversity," says Lyons. "The iPhone, in contrast, is a bit like the situation people once had with Henry Ford's Model T, where you could have any color you wanted, as …

Maybe they should call it "The Delay." Yep, Rupert Murdoch's forthcoming iPad newspaper, "The Daily," is facing another setback, which appears to rest solely on the shoulders of Apple. "Apple and News Corp. have made a joint decision to push back next week's planned launch," reports MediaMemo, citing sources. "The delay is supposed to give Apple time to tweak its new subscription service for publications sold through its iTunes platform. What sort of a hold up are we talking about? "Weeks, not months," a source tells MediaMemo. The highly anticipated iPad newspaper was expected to make its …

Cementing the perceived power of social buying, Groupon is reportedly preparing for an initial public offering as soon as mid-year. What's more, "The offering may value the company at $15 billion," a source tells Bloomberg. Just days ago, Groupon announced a $950 million round of funding, which was said to value the company at a measly $4.75 billion. "The offering, which would also be among the most anticipated since Google's in 2004, would also represent the highest valuation of the company to date," according to DealBook. "It wasn't long ago that we …

For better or worse, Chatroulette isn't going away anytime soon. Traffic-wise, the site has shown signs of life following a redesign last year. And, as Chatroulette founder Andrey Ternovskiy tells Fast Company, the site's content is increasingly kosher. "Since we've implemented the content-control system, the site has become cleaner, and more people are starting to use it," he says. Still, as Fast Company puts it, of the roughly 500,000 visitors Chatroulette receives daily, about 10% are males "itching to show their business." Rather than hide from this fact, Ternovskiy is actively attempting to turn such X-rated content …

Business Insider was never a fan of AOL's decision to buy TechCrunch. Now, four months after the deal, it's laughing out loud as TechCrunch founder Michael Arrington goes after AOL's top tech blog, Engadget -- and its editor, Joshua Topolsky -- calling Engadget "a plasticized caricature of a real blog." What's more, in a direct email to Business Insider, Arrington calls AOL "plodding and conservative." Sources tell Business Insider that Arrington's "bomb" led to phone calls to AOL senior executives, "but management does not appear to have regarded it as 'crossing the line.'" Meanwhile, the Engadget …

Online travel services like Travelocity and Expedia can breathe a little easier today upon reports that the U.S. Justice Department is preparing for a antitrust lawsuit to block Google's $700 million acquisition of ITA Software. Still, "Department officials haven't made a final decision about whether to sue to block the purchase by Google," reports Bloomberg, citing sources. This past summer, Google announced plans to acquire ITA -- which provides online airline flight and ticket information -- soon after which government lawyers said they were extending their ITA investigation. Experts say further involvement by the Justice Department will …

Thanks to some tech-heavy sleuthing, Poynter has unearthed images of the The Daily, Rupert Murdoch's forthcoming iPad newspaper. What appears to be a house ad for the new app features two headlines, which read "Oprah's Biggest Gamble" and "A Bridge Too Favre." According to Poynter, "The Daily staff has reportedly been producing sample editions of the tablet app for several weeks, so the covers shown here may represent that work." Yet, "Aside from the pithy writing style and photo-dominated front page, it is difficult to discern much else about the personality or content of the publication." Still, …

VentureBeat is just as sure in its belief that Google's search results "suck," as it is that the tech giant is doing something about it. "The folks at Google have not been asleep at the wheel," it writes. "They are well aware that their search results were being increasingly gamed by search marketers and that this was not a battle they were going to win." But, what has Google been doing about it? "Over the past couple of years, Google has progressively added vertical search results above its regular results." Now, when users search for the weather, …

Denoting a Gladwellian-like tipping point in mobile media, Android appears to have established itself as the dominant domestic smartphone platform. Google's mobile operating system now commands a 46% share of all impressions, and 55% of all revenue generated from apps, according to new data from ad network Millennial Media. "While the numbers reflect the obvious continued growth of the Android platform, it also solidifies the idea that Android has become the top platform for mobile advertising, which is fitting considering Google's strength in advertising," according to GigaOm. "This is the first …

"Backend" though it may seem, Chrome's plans to phase out support for the H.264 video codec has serious industry implications. "Google has essentially declared war against the web's dominant video format," writes paidContent. Codecs, if you didn't know, are the programs that encode or decode any digital data stream, such as digital video. Making Google's position all the more polarizing, Microsoft's Internet Explorer and Apple's Safari will soon have built-in H.264 support. "The move is a direct challenge to Apple and Microsoft, which own some of the patent rights …