Hotels are known for relying on loyalty programs to keep customers coming back. To keep up with the consumer shift to mobile, many have also introduced apps that let people book rooms and get relevant information and services on their smartphones. But hotels still have work to do connecting loyalty programs with mobile properties, according to a new study by digital think tank L2.

HP enlisted some Vine stars to make its latest TV spot for a convertible tablet. The result was an eye-catching ad that married the product well with the Vine aesthetic. It also cut typical production time to 11 days.

It wasn't hard to see this one coming. Shares of King Digital plunged in after-hours trading Tuesday when the mobile game company reported weaker-than-expected revenue because of lower sales from its monster hit title -- "Candy Crush Saga." You mean even red-hot mobile games eventually cool off and stop throwing off cash at the same eye-popping rate? Shocking.

Major brands and retailers are still in the early stages of testing and rolling out beacons to enhance service and boost sales. But at least some indicate they are seeing positive early results, as attested by remarks from speakers at the OMMA mCommerce conference last week. These include beacon initiatives by companies such as Lord & Taylor, Hillshire Brands, and a group of 100 stores on London's famed Regent Street.

Get out of our way! That is the main message women have for mobile advertisers. Interrupting them with irrelevant messaging misunderstands why many of these busy consumers are on their phones in the first place.

In his latest quarterly report on the wireless market, mobile industry analyst Chetan Sharma doesn't hold much hope for Windows Phone ever becoming a credible challenger to the dominance of the iPhone and Android-based devices in the smartphone market. He suggests the Microsoft platform is on the verge of getting "Zuned out" of the market -- a term he coined a couple of years ago describing a phenomenon where a tech player, even a dominant one, gets punished for late entry into the market.

ABC News reports that video consumption via Apple TV is substantially greater -- and different from -- viewing patterns on other channels. As digital video settles into lean-back mode, time spent escalates.

The paradigm of four major wireless operators in the U.S. will continue. The news that Sprint is ending its pursuit of T-Mobile USA, and ousting CEO Dan Hesse, suggests that U.S. regulators want to maintain the four-way competition among the national carriers rather than having only three.

Will the skies remain one of the last havens free of cell phone chatter? That's a question that has been hanging in the air since last October when the FAA announced passengers could leave portable devices like smartphones and tablets throughout entire flights as long as they remained in airplane mode.

There is no one consumer journey. Not only is each shopper's path unique, but every product category. As a new survey shows, auto, entertainment and telecom shoppers are using different combinations of screens to consider purchases.