New York City reportedly plans to test "pay by phone" parking meters that warn motorists as their time winds down, and then invites them to buy extra minutes without returning to their cars. "Hoping that the cellphone can do to the parking meter what it did to the pay phone, transportation officials say the technology provides convenience to drivers as well as savings to the city," reports The New York Post.,br> The program would represent one more way mobile devices are permeating consumers' lives, as well as a likely marketing channel for the city. In the coming months, some …

Refining its recommendations, social discovery service StumbleUpon is now letting users find pages related to hundreds of thousands specific topics rather than 500 set categories. Regarding the new "Explore Box," Mashable writes: "It's as though a search engine and a 'best of' list had a child." If StumbleUpon hasn't sorted the exact term users are looking for, it will match them with what it considers the next best thing. At launch, the feature is limited to a small search bar in the browser product. "But despite the minimal presence on the homepage, it's a huge change for StumbleUpon," …

It was clear from the moment the news broke that Google's bid to buy Motorola Mobility would change Android. Still, having had a few days to digest the deal, Slate's Farhad Manjoo paints a sharper picture of Google's new mobile outlook. "In the aftermath of this deal, Google will seek to exert greater influence over hardware companies," he expects. Why? Because, if the deal goes through, Google will have dropped an astounding $12.5 billion on its mobile strategy. "Now Google has to find a way to recoup at least $12.5 billion from Android (on top of whatever else …

It looks like Google's agreement to buy Motorola Mobility might have been more defensive than anyone thought. "If it didn't, someone else would have and that would have put the company in an even bigger patent hole," reports GigaOm. "Our sources say that Motorola was in acquisition talks with several parties, including Microsoft for quite some time." Microsoft was interested in acquiring Motorola's patent portfolio, which would have allowed it to take down Android. Motorola, meanwhile, reportedly found a Google deal more desirable because Microsoft had no interest in running a hardware business and was essentially interested in …

In daily-deal land, BuyWithMe just acquired New York City-focused deal site Scoop St. Acquisitions in the space are heating up and are happening nearly every day, as smaller players struggle to stay afloat, reports All Things Digital. Indeed, a recent report found that daily deal acquisitions were up 700% year-over-year, and this marks BuyWithMe's fifth buy of the year. Given the big dip in market share between the leaders and the rest of the masses, the transactions are usually small and consist of players looking to enter new markets. Translation: While terms of the deal were not disclosed, …

The good new for AOL, as The Wall Street Journal reports, is that top advertisers, including Unilever, Ford and Best Buy, see promise in AOL's strategy, and plan to boost spending on AOL sites as part of overall increases in digital-ad expenditures. The bad news is that AOL has so far failed to sufficiently increase traffic to its hundreds of Web sites, while it faces more competition from social-networking sites and new technology-focused methods for buying digital ads. AOL is presently spending about $160 million a year on Patch, which equates to about $150,000 to run each individual …

LinkedIn this week released a major update to its mobile apps, including a new iPhone, Android and mobile Web apps. Telegraphing the move, "LinkedIn CEO Jeff Weiner explained on the company's first earnings call a few weeks ago that the company is planning to make a big investment in its mobile strategy," TechCrunch notes. LinkedIn Mobile is already growing 400% year-over-year in terms of users. To keep up with demand, the professional social network said changes were needed to improve engagement user experience. The network has re-organized its iPhone and Android applications around four areas, including updates, inbox, …

Britain is allocating about $864 million to turn many of the nation's "not spots" into high-speed "hot spots." As a result, "Cornish fishing villages, Welsh valleys and Cumbrian farmsteads will all have access to high-speed internet within four years if telecoms companies add their money to the state pot and consumers show interest," the Guardian writes. Diverted from the BBC to create a digital Britain, the money is expected to be shared among 40 areas, including English councils, Scotland and Northern Ireland. A additional $489 million has been promised after 2015. The government apparently wants all 25 million UK homes …

In other cyber-security news, antivirus software maker McAfee is launching a consumer-focused anti-theft app for the iPhone. The new McAfee WaveSecure allows users to protect their privacy and data in case their iPhones are lost or stolen. "The new product shows that PC-focused security companies are shifting their resources into mobile security as mobile computing devices begin to face the same kind of sophisticated cyber attacks as their PC brethren," according to VentureBeat. "If security and mobile companies act fast enough, they might even be able to create a worry-free environment for mobile phone users with it comes to feeling …

Buddy Media, which helps advertisers manage their presence on social networks (i.e., Facebook), is now worth $500 million. "That's the valuation sources say the company earned in its most recent $54 million financing round," reports All Things Digital. New investor Insight Venture Partners put money into the company along with earlier investors Institutional Venture Partners, Bay Partners and GGV Capital, which led the round. None of the money will go to employee or early investors, Buddy Media CEO Mike Lazerow tell All Things D. "Instead it will be used to fuel expansion in Europe and to double the size of …