• LivingSocial Loses Co-Founder
    LivingSocial co-founder Eddie Frederick is relinquishing his dual roles as president and board member of the company, reports StartupStats, citing an internal memo. In the memo, LivingSocial CEO Tim O’Shaughnessy said Frederick was “moving on to new challenges and adventures.” In an emailed response to the memo, Frederick said: “The opportunities in local ecommerce are enormous, and I’m more confident than ever that livingsocial has just the right team to capitalize on them.” “LivingSocial is the direct competitor to Groupon, which went public late last year,” StartupStats’ Nick O’Neill notes. “It’s also anticipated that LivingSocial will soon file to go …
  • RIM Cleans House On Poor Sales
    Heads are rolling at RIM in the wake of a quarterly net loss, and the Blackberry maker’s first slump in shipments since 2006. Former co-CEO and the company’s current director Jim Balsillie, is out. Chief Executive Thorsten Heins -- who recently took over from Balsillie and co-CEO Mike Lazaridis -- said he was still focused on a turnaround, which might now include "strategic opportunities" such as partnerships, and joint-venture licensing. As for selling the company outright, Balsillie said: "We would consider it, but it is not the main direction we are pursuing right now,” Reuters reports. Also out is David …
  • Report: Facebook Serious About Search
    Web watchers have long speculated on the prospect of Facebook taking search more seriously, and what that would mean for rivals like Google. Now, according to Businessweek, the social network is almost ready to put said speculation to rest. “Searching the social network could get a lot better in the near future,” the magazine reports. About two dozen Facebook engineers, led by a former Google engineer named Lars Rasmussen, are working on an improved search engine, according to two separate sources. “The goal, they say, is to help users better sift through the volume of content that members create on …
  • Dell Suspends Smartphone Strategy
    News that Dell has stopped selling smartphones domestically raised one big question, this week: Who knew Dell sold smartphones? Still, the computer maker apparently did, and plans to tweak its mobile strategy to focus more on emerging markets and higher-margin products. “It's ready to push the reset button on its tablet and smartphone business after many missteps,” reports PCWorld, citing comments from Jack Gold, principal analyst at J. Gold Associates. "If you're not a Motorola, RIM or Apple, people won't take you seriously," Gold said. Dell does plans on introducing more mobile products in the U.S. later this year, but …
  • Tumblr Continues Rapid Growth
    While Pinterest and Instagram burn up the buzz meter, Tumblr continues to grow at a remarkable pace. According to the social sharing service, it just hit 20 billion posts -- doubling in size in just over 6 months -- and is fast approaching 50 million blogs. Speaking about how Tumblr differs from traditional “editorial” services like WordPress, founder and CEO David Karp recently quoted figures from traffic measuring company Quantcast, not directly referencing internal figures from its own analytics. “Referencing the social aspect of the service, Karp said that the average Tumblr blog is re-blogged nine times, helping to distribute …
  • House GOP Kills Facebook Privacy Amendment
    Attempting to give Facebook users some semblance of security, Democratic lawmakers in Congress this week inserted an amendment into a Federal Communications Commission bill that would have prevented employers from accessing users’ Facebook accounts. House Republicans blocked the measure, however, in a mostly party-line vote of 184 to 236. “The legislation, offered by Democratic Congressman Ed Perlmutter, would have added new restrictions to FCC rules that would have prohibited employers from demanding workers’ social networking usernames and passwords,” TechCrunch reports. “Had it passed, this amendment would have tacked on an extra section to H.R. 3309, the Federal Communications Commission Process Reform …
  • Facebook: Yahoo Suit Threatens "Material" Impact
    No one knows how Yahoo's patent suit against Facebook will play out. Yet based on a new S-1 filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, the social network is bracing for the worst. "This litigation is still in its early stages and the final outcome, including our liability, if any, with respect to these claims, is uncertain," Facebook explains in its latest filing. "If an unfavorable outcome were to occur in this litigation, the impact could be material to our business, financial condition, or results of operations."
  • Pottermore Casts Spell on Amazon, B&N
    Follows several delays, Harry Potter has finally been available in e-book edition. Remarkably, however, if consumers try to find J.K. Rowling’s fantasy series at Amazon or Barnes & Noble’s Web site, they will be instructed to buy the e-books elsewhere. “Instead of being sold through the retailers and their devices, or even through the publishers, all sales are made through a site owned and branded by the author,” Wired.com reports. “Harry Potter is the only publishing brand big enough (so far) to break all the rules about how e-bookstores work.” Rowling and Pottermore apparently convinced retailers to digitally support the books with device syncing, …
  • Can Microsoft Rival Google Maps?
    Despite Google’s huge head start in online mapping, some suggest that Microsoft could quickly come from behind. How? “Microsoft is employing an under-the-radar approach to fighting back, lending big support and big dollars to the open source map project OpenStreetMap,” PCWorld reports. “It looks as if the tactic is starting to pay off.” OpenStreetMap is run much like Wikipedia, in which volunteers provide mapping information to build a free, open mapping service. People, sites, and companies can then use that mapping information. The services is overseen by the non-profit OpenStreetMap Foundation, which says that a half a million volunteers have …
  • Rovio Nabs Futuremark
    In the wake of Zynga dropping upwards of $200 million on OMGPOP, Angry Birds publisher Rovio Entertainment has acquired Futuremark Games Studio. With the fellow Finnish game development house, Rovio is said to be after new talent. “Rovio, which just launched its Angry Birds Space mobile game blockbuster, is buying the game-making division of benchmark software creator Futuremark,” reports VentureBeat. Regarding Futuremark, Mikael Hed, Rovio Entertainment’s chief executive, said: “They are an incredibly talented and experienced team, and we are thrilled to have them on board … Rovio’s success is founded on the excellence of our team, and Futuremark Games …
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