Showing up the critics -- and surpassing its own expectations -- Samsung says it sold 800,000 Galaxy Gear smartwatches since their debut two months ago. Explaining the gadget’s success, Reuters writes: “Samsung has poured marketing resources into the Gear with heavy advertisements and collaborations with fashion shows to seize leadership in the wearable computer market after the device got off to a rocky start after being critically panned by reviewers.” 

Google is facing a backlash over its recent decision to require that people use Google Plus accounts to comment on YouTube videos. “Google's move to force Plus onto YouTube has outraged the YouTube community -- and beyond,” ZDNet reports. “YouTube user fury is fueling [one] anti-Plus petition with over 112,000 signatures, increasing by the minute.” 

Apple is reporedly in talks to buy 3-D sensing company PrimeSense. Yet, “the deal is not yet done, and that its reported valuation would not represent a huge win for investors,” AllThingsD reports. The Israeli publication Calcalist put the value of the deal at $345 million. “PrimeSense was the original supplier for Microsoft’s breakthrough Kinect gaming device, which incorporated cameras and depth sensors so that players could control games with their gestures.” 

Google and Microsoft are teaming up with the British government to help curb the distribution of child porn in the country, The Washington Post reports. Already, the companies have identified 100,000 search queries that they suspected were “related to the sexual abuse of kids,” Google executive chairman Eric Schmidt noted in a column in the Daily Mail. 

Farhad Manjoo, Wall Street Journal columnist and self-described grumpy old man, doesn’t believe that the tech tastes of young consumers are good indicators of future mass-market trends. “We all tend to assume that young people are on the technological vanguard,” he writes. “For tech execs, youngsters are the canaries in the gold mine.” Alas, “dids are often wrong,” and, according to Manjoo, “There is little evidence to support the idea that the youth have any closer insight on the future than the rest of us do.” 

The Financial Times sits down with Henry Blodget for a ranging discussion about everything from his Wall Street exile to Business Insider (his successful financial and tech news property) to the wild valuations that tech companies are once again enjoying. Among other tasty morsels, Blodget says BI’s revenues will approach $20 million, this year, and we learn that Keith McNally, owner of Balthazar, recently said that getting advice from Blodget was “a bit like receiving a lesson in business ethics from Bernie Madoff.” 

After months of delays, Google on Friday finally launched its native Google Play Music app for iOS. “Google’s music ecosystem differs greatly from Apple’s and more closely resembles Spotify or Amazon with a focus on the Cloud,” 9To5Mac writes. “On Macs and PCs, you can use it through a browser with an interface that is remarkably robust for a Webpage, but obviously not quite as responsive as iTunes, especially with local music.” 

TinyCo just closed $20 million in financing to continue building its mobile game business. As TechCrunch reports, the startup isn’t exactly thriving. “Part of this investment was a debt -- not an equity -- investment,” it reports. Bigger picture: “The gaming landscape has changed substantially in the last two years, with European game makers like King and Supercell taking a decisive lead over their Silicon Valley counterparts [i.e., TinyCo].” 

Showing the daily deal space still has a heartbeat, Zulily is preparing to go public. The site, which specializes in kid’s gear and apparel, just priced its initial public offering at $22 per share, GeekWire reports. “The Seattle company sold 6.3 million shares, equating to about $140 million worth of stock,” it writes. “As part of the deal, insiders also sold 5.1 million shares for $112 million.” 

The Next Web gives us a peek inside Microsoft’s new Cybercrime Center, which is says houses “some of the company’s best legal and technical experts, who will be tasked with tackling malware, botnets, technology-facilitated child exploitation and other types of online crime.” Based in Microsoft’s campus in Redmond, Washington, the center includes SitePrint, which maps online organized crime networks, PhotoDNA, an anti-child-pornography system, and Microsoft’s own botnet takedown operations, The Next Web reports.