Skift -- the travel intelligence and news startup founded by Rafat Ali -- has closed $1.1 million seed round led by Lerer Ventures, along with Ironfire Angel, MESA+, Advancit Capital, and Growlabs/LX Ventures. Ali, who sold PaidContent to The Guardian Media Group in 2008, co-founded Skift with former Frommer’s online editor Jason Clampet last summer. 

USA Network on Thursday is expected to debut a new Web and mobile platform that, as The Wall Street Journal reports, “will bring more of the real-time conversation about USA shows happening on Twitter, Facebook Inc. and other social-media outlets onto its own site.” Rather than stream its content on Twitter, “The cable network's plan is to surround those social-media conversations with its own content and sell ads to run alongside it.” 

After Microsoft updated its own YouTube application for Windows Phone the other week, Google sent the software giant a cease-and-desist letter demanding that Microsoft "immediately withdraw this application from the Windows Phone Store and disable existing downloads of the application,” The Verge reports. The issue was a lack of ads. Now, The Verge reports, “Microsoft has responded saying it's happy to include advertising.” 

More than personal quirk or mere curiosity, Larry Page’s soft-spokenness has led some analysts to question the management ability of Google’s CEO. At long last, however, Page is directly addressing the issue. “In a post to his page on the social network Google+, Page recounts his 14-year history with vocal cord nerve strain and says that he is slowly recovering and able to ‘do all I need to do at home and at work, though my voice is softer than before,’” Bloomberg Businessweek reports.    

Video distribution platform Brightcove is introducing a new module that is designed to help customers run live video streams across various devices. “The brilliantly named Brightcove Video Cloud Live module allow [sic] Brightcove customers to manage live events with many of the same features as their on-demand video streams,” TechCrunch reports. 

Having just finished the global rollout of its new Timeline design, Facebook is now letting users rate content from designated sections -- including music, movies, books, and fitness -- as well as from third-party apps. “The data could improve Graph Search results, News Feed relevancy, ad targeting and other components of Facebook, while allowing third-party apps to be even more personalized and offer users better recommendations,” Inside Facebook suggests. 

Taking on Spotify and other streaming music services, Google is expected to debut several music services, today. “Google has now signed separate licensing deals with Universal Music Group and Sony Music Entertainment for both YouTube and Google Play, setting the stage for such an announcement,” The Verge reports, citing sources. “Google plans to add separate music subscription services to YouTube and Google Play, the entertainment hub for the Android operating system.” 

Not comfortable putting membership numbers in the line of fire, Facebook has blocked Social Roulette -- an app that deletes one in six users’ Facebook account data. “While there’s no specific policy prohibiting apps from deleting your data, Social Roulette is clearly counter to Facebook’s mission and business model,” TechCrunch writes. 

In what could prove to be a minor setback for Facebook’s mobile ambitions, the HTC First -- the first smartphone to run Facebook Home -- is reportedly toast. “Sales of the HTC First have been shockingly bad,” BGR reports, citing a source. “So bad, in fact, that AT&T has already decided to discontinue the phone.” AT&T reportedly sold fewer than 15,000 units nationwide through last week. 

Twitter just bought data analytics start Lucky Sort. The company is “known for its ability to crunch huge amounts of texts to identify and visualize topics and trends,” according to The Verge. Joining Twitter's "Department of Revenue Engineering," the move “shows Twitter focused on building a data-driven business where advertisers can leverage the real time conversation.”