Ban on demanding Facebook passwords among new 2013 state laws

                       
(Reuters) - Employers in California and Illinois will be prohibited from demanding access to workers' password-protected social networking accounts and teachers in Oregon will be required to report suspected student bullies thanks to new laws taking effect in 2013.

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Zynga carries out planned games shutdown, including "Petville"

                      
(Reuters) - Social games publisher Zynga Inc confirmed on Monday that it has carried out 11 of the planned shutdowns of 13 game titles, with "Petville" being the latest game on which it pulled the plug.

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Angry Birds, YouTube among top apps of 2012

                                   
(Reuters) - Angry Birds, Instagram and Facebook continued to be among the most downloaded apps of the year but rising stars also earned coveted spots on smartphones and tablets.

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Microsoft gives Xbox Live users free month following outage

                                
Microsoft is offering a free month of Xbox Live to subscribers affected by the company's Xbox Live and Cloud Saved Games outage over the weekend. XBL general manager Alex Garden says the free one-month extension will be applied automatically to affected accounts, so there's no need to file a claim or otherwise contact support.

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Pakistan lifts YouTube ban, reinstates ban minutes later

                                       
When YouTube refused to take down a controversial video called "Innocence of Muslims" this summer, a small number of violent protests were sparked. Pakistani officials reacted by imposing a country-wide block of YouTube. According to the New York Times, YouTube was made available for only three minutes before Pakistani officials pulled the plug once more. According to other, unverified accounts, YouTube access may have lasted up to 90 minutes -- something which may be confirmed by Google's Transparency Report.

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Apple to drop patent claims against new Samsung phone

                            
(Reuters) - Apple Inc has agreed to withdraw patent claims against a new Samsung phone with a high-end display after Samsung said it was not offering to sell the product in the crucial U.S. market.

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Exclusive: Huawei partner offered embargoed HP gear to Iran

                          
(Reuters) - A major Iranian partner of Huawei Technologies offered to sell at least 1.3 million euros worth of embargoed Hewlett-Packard computer equipment to Iran's largest mobile-phone operator in late 2010, documents show.

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Amazon tops customer satisfaction survey for eighth straight year

                                 
A new report from ForeSee reveals that Amazon is once again the most popular online destination with regards to customer satisfaction. The store that claims to have everything from A to Z is no stranger to being in first place in the online shopping survey as they have earned the honor for eight straight years.

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IDC lowers semiconductor revenue outlook for 2012, 2013

                                      
IDC has lowered its outlook for global semiconductor revenue in 2012 and 2013. Previously, the outfit expected industry revenue to grow 4.6% to $315 billion this year, but its latest forecast has reduced those figures to less than 1% growth on revenue of $304 billion. Meanwhile, the firm anticipated next year's revenue to hit $335 billion, up 6.2%, while the newest estimates are 4.9% growth with $319 billion revenue.

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Toshiba creating Lytro-like camera for smartphones and tablets

                                        
Toshiba is developing a new camera for mobile devices that will allow users to adjust the focus of shots after they're taken. The new module measures about a centimeter per side and carries an array of half a million lenses that measure 0.03mm in diameter and are positioned in front of an image sensor that spans 5x7mm.

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Silicon Valley entrepreneur Krikorian quits Amazon board

                       
(Reuters) - Silicon Valley entrepreneur and investor Blake Krikorian has quit the board of Amazon.com Inc about a year and a half after joining to take up an unspecified role at the buyer of a company he owned.

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Facebook Instagram use dived after photo fiasco: AppData

                       
(Reuters) - Facebook Inc's Instagram lost almost a quarter of its daily users a week after it rolled out and then withdrew policy changes that incensed users who feared the photo-sharing service would use their pictures without compensation.

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OUYA ships developer consoles ahead of schedule

                          
It’s a big day for fans of the Kickstarter-funded Ouya gaming console as we have learned that developer consoles are now shipping to early project backers. Those who laid down money for the console early on should expect to have the open-source Android machine in their hands no later than January 10, according to new posts on the official Ouya forums.

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CMU wins $1.17 billion verdict against Marvell over HDD patents

                                       
Nine jurors have ordered Marvell to pay Carnegie Mellon University $1,169,140,271 in damages for infringing two hard drive patents. If the ruling sticks on appeal, it would claim more than a year's worth of profits at Marvell, which earned just over $900 million last year and $615 million this year. Additionally, it would be the largest US patent verdict to date, topping this August's $1.05 billion ruling in the Apple versus Samsung case.

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Bug in Snapchat and Facebook Poke lets recipients save video files

                            
A new bug has been discovered that allows the recipient of a Snapchat or Facebook Poke video to revisit and keep it forever without the sender ever knowing it. All that’s needed to save videos is an iPhone or iPad, a data cable and a free file browser.

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Sony stops shipping the PlayStation 2 in Japan after nearly 13 years

                                               
According to Japanese publication Famitsu, Sony has halted shipments of the PlayStation 2 in Japan this week, leaving local retailers with their final quantities of the iconic console. It's unclear whether Sony has immediate plans to stop shipments in other regions as well, though some believe the system will continue to be readily available in many developing countries where the machine remains popular for its affordability and library.

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Apple loses another copyright lawsuit in China: Xinhua

                         
(Reuters) - A Chinese court has fined Apple Inc 1 million yuan ($160,400) for hosting third-party applications on its App Store that were selling pirated electronic books, the official Xinhua news agency reported on Friday.

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Autonomy's Lynch defends record as HP confirms Federal probe

                        
(Reuters) - Mike Lynch, the founder of the software firm sold to Hewlett-Packard last year in a deal tainted by accusations of accounting fraud, said he would defend the company's accounts to U.S. Federal investigators.

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Weekend Open Forum: What is your New Year's resolution?

                     
We’re just a few days away from ringing in the New Year which of course means we all survived the Mayan apocalypse. And with that global catastrophe averted, it’s time to look ahead to 2013 with a fresh start. For many, that means trying to stick to a New Year’s resolution which as we all know, is often times easier said than done.

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Blizzard abandons Diablo III Team Deathmatch mode

                        
Blizzard game director Jay Wilson recently penned a post outlining the fact that there won’t be a Team Deathmatch mode for Diablo III – at least not anytime in the near future. The initial plan was to release a patch with the new mode as soon as possible but after extensive testing, the team determined it simply wasn’t good enough and scrapped the idea altogether.

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More than half of Americans use mobile phones instead of landlines

                                               
A recent study from the Centers for Disease Control used to track demographics of landline telephones reveals that more than half of US homes don’t have or didn’t use their land-based telephones in 2012. The evidence really isn’t all that surprising when you consider the adoption rate of mobile phones, especially among young people.

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Google outlines their top 12 Android apps of 2012

                       
A new post in the Google Play store by merchandising manager Tavares Ford outlines the top 12 Android apps for 2012 in the eyes of the search giant. Those of you that picked up a new Android handset or tablet this holiday will likely want to pay close attention as part of the fun with a new connected device is discovering the latest and greatest apps that everyone is using.

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Apple and Google activated 17 million devices on Christmas Day

                         
Apple and Google likely have a lot to be happy about following this year’s holiday season. According to data recently released from mobile app analytics firm Flurry, the two companies combined to activate 17.4 million devices on Christmas Day. That’s good for a 332 percent increase over the average number of activations in December and more than 2.5 times more than on Christmas Day a year ago.

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Apple CEO's pay takes big hit vs. record 2011 package

                            
(Reuters) - Apple Inc CEO Tim Cook's 2012 compensation package of $4.17 million is a huge cut on paper for the top executive of the most valuable U.S. corporation, after a 2011 package fattened by more than $376 million in long-term stock awards.

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Analysis: For tech investors, it's hard to know when to bolt

                        
(Reuters) - When Hewlett-Packard Co agreed to buy British software company Autonomy in August last year for $11.1 billion, two well-known investors made diametrically different bets on how the big deal would play out.

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Hole in W3 Total Cache WordPress plugin exposes site database info

                                        
Security researcher Jason A. Donenfeld has revealed a security hole in a popular WordPress plugin that could be used to obtain sensitive data from an affected site. The flaw was discovered in W3 Total Cache, which has been downloaded over a million times and is used by high traffic sites including Mashable and LockerGnome.

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Apple reportedly moving Mac mini production to the US

                                      
In a BusinessWeek interview earlier this month, Apple CEO Tim Cook confirmed plans to manufacturer some of the company's Mac computers in the US. At the time, Cook didn't say specifically what models would be made in Apple's home country, but he noted that the plans went beyond mere assembly and have been in the works for a long time. He also revealed that the production wouldn't be handled directly by Apple, but that the company would be investing over $100 million to make it happen.

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Microsoft: Windows Phone market doubled in size in 2012

                                                    
Microsoft might not have had the banner year they were hoping for with Windows 8 thus far but it’s hard to overlook the success that Windows Phone has had in 2012. A recent post on the official Windows blog by Microsoft Senior Director for Windows Marketplace Todd Brix highlights some of Microsoft’s most significant achievements in this market.

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Samsung is planning to ship a half billion phones in 2013

                                    
A new report from The Korea Times points out that Samsung plans to increase handset shipments by 20 percent next year following a record-setting 2012. In total, the Korean electronics giant wants to move some 510 million phones in 2013, up from the 420 million they are expected to ship by the end of this year.

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Apple and Intel rumored to be developing an iWatch for 2013

                         
Apple and Intel are rumored to be working on a smartwatch that could be ready for production sometime in the first half of 2013. Some elements of this rumor do make sense from a business standpoint but others seem a bit too far-fetched to fall into the plausible category.

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