We have already some of the most impressive and stylish startups, including SoundCloud, 6Wunderkinder and Amen, of Europe emerged from the Berlin.

Focus, while quoting industry sources, reports that Twitter has already employed its German chief and also finds out that the job vacancies in the country have vanished from the country’s website. The reports further claims that the ads for these vacancies had pointed put that the company was considering Berlin, Hamburg or Munich as the location for its German HQ.

However, Twitter declines to comment on the report saying that it currently doesn’t have anything to tell about the location of its HQ in Germany.

Following London and Dublin offices, the opening of German office would be Twitter’s third major in Europe. The choice of Berlin is certainly sensible for the fact that it is the country’s capital and a hub for startups. However, it is not normally the first choice for international companies to open their offices in. For instance, the search giant Google has its office in Munich.

It seems that Twitter will utilize its new office to build relationships with sports clubs and other brands, going after the common practice of US tech companies using the majority of their technical skills base in their home turf and utilizing satellite offices abroad for business development.

To your utter surprise, Rovio CEO Mikael Hed said in one of his announcement that the team here is working to bring the game to the Microsoft platform.

While talking to Reuters, Hed said that “We are working towards getting Angry Birds Space to WP7,” discarding all the rumors including yesterday’s Bloomberg report that quoted the Rovio’s “Mighty Eagle” Peter Vesterbacka who said that company had no plans to release Angry Birds to Windows Phone platform.

Hed further added that it was a “big undertaking to support” the new platform as “you have to completely rewrite the application.”

Angry Birds Space launched simultaneously on the App Store, Android, on PC and on the Mac earlier yesterday. Compared to its earlier version, the developer included some new twist in the latest version, introducing new characters and a new physics engine, due to the fact that the new environment introduced in the latest version needs you to use the gravitational pull of the planets to successfully complete the levels.

Moreover, the developer of the games has included a new power-up called Space Eagles, which is awarded for successful progressing during the game, or you can bought through an in-app purchase. The first download will allow you to complete 60 levels of the game, while more levels will be added through game updates.

So far, the game has already been topped the sales charts on many of the platforms, where it launched. We are trying to reach Rovio to have a word on its first day sales. We will get back to you as soon as we receive any response.

Surprisingly, Amazon has not yet started local operations in Brazil. However, the report claims that the local launch of Amazon will be finalized in two steps. On its first step, the company would only offer small items, including books, CDs, Kindles, DVDs, video games and software, with an aim to sell 1.1 million products from September to December.

Based on the statistics of this first phase of launch, the company will think about its full launch that could possibly be scheduled for December. With the introduction of second phase of launch, the company will offer some sort of bulky items available on the company official website, according to an unknown Amazon executive. Amazon has plans to sell as much as 4.8 million items by next year.

The report further claims that the retailer is searching for a distribution center in Sao Paulo at the moment. The selection of location certainly makes sense, when it is considered a state where most online retail websites host their logistics, because of the region’s significance for e-commerce.

However, Amazon has not confirmed the report yet, but the rumors aren’t fresh. We have heard news back in May 2011 that the company was in negotiations with local publishers to sell e-books in Brazil, raising questions in minds that the company could not only launch a Brazilian Kindle, but also aiming to launch retail operations in the country. It is from that time that Amazon Web Services (AWS) has begun to work Brazilian data centers, adding fuel to the fire.

According to few reports, there will be only five ARM machines ready to get Windows 8, compared to a few 40 machines that will run on Intel silicon. It has been reported that the Redmond-based software giant is planning an April event, aiming to let company’s partners in on timings and strategies related to the launch of Windows 8. The event will focus around the launch date and marketing details for Microsoft’s forthcoming OS.

Microsoft’s upcoming OS is in fact a comprehensive retake on the classic Windows experience, offering new capabilities and interfaces, presenting the honored brand into the touch era in one pounce. It is important to mention here that the lesser number of ARM machines are for the fact that the company is executing intense controls on what is being delivered.

The report of Windows 8 launch in October seems to be the last possible opportunity for the Redmond-based software giant if it wants tablet manufacturers to ship devices featuring Windows 8 this year. In this context, we have heard about a report claiming that Lenovo is planning to release its Windows 8-based tablet somewhere around in October this year.

As far as our knowledge about Windows 8 is concerned, the OS development is right on schedule. The company released a Consumer Preview version of the operating system back in February. Luckily, we got a chance to have our hands on it and found it well-polished. There is still plenty of time left for Microsoft to make necessary improvements to its new operating system.

While answering a question about a financial analyst as how the new iPad did on its launch weekend, Tim Cook said “We had a record weekend and we are thrilled with it.”

Phil Schiller, Vice President of Worldwide Marketing at Apple, in one of his statement said, “The new iPad is a blockbuster with three million sold?the strongest iPad launch yet,” further saying, “customers are loving the incredible new features of iPad, including the stunning Retina display, and we can’t wait to get it into the hands of even more customers around the world this Friday.”

The Cupertino-based company is all set to launch its new iPad in about 24 more countries on Friday at 8.00 a.m. The countries that will get the new iPad include Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Macau, Mexico, The Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain and Sweden.

The growing popularity of the iPad can certainly be the major reason in the increase in sales. But the most interesting point worth noting here is the fact that it is for the first time that Apple has launched its tablet simultaneously in other countries across the world all together with United States.

Apple’s partner AT&T stated earlier today that it had also experienced records broken regarding its single day activation and sales records by Apple’s new tablet device on its launch day.

If we look at the internet traffic from all versions of iPad in the U.S., the new tablet makes up for 5% of the total internet traffic. Apple is in the habit of sharing early sales numbers in the days after launch weekend, thus we can expect some official numbers from Apple soon.

During first day of launch, the company sold around 300K units of its previous device and passed the 1 million units mark in 28 days. However, the latest iPad tripled that figures within a span of 4 days. Interestingly, the first iPad launched reached 3 million sales mark in 80 days. This clearly shows that Apple’s iPad has grown in popularity in recent few months.

According to Bloomberg, the notice is sent in an email with respect to Directive 2005/29/EC concerning “unfair business-to-consumer commercial practices in the internal market.”

In fact the problem is related to the fact that the minimum warranty for products sold in the European Commission is by now two years. As a result, the commission claims that the company is misleading customers by encouraging them to purchase AppleCare warranties that extend coverage to two years, along with other benefits.

Director General of the European Consumer Organization, Monique Goyens said in one of his statement, “In the EU, consumers are entitled to a minimum two-year legal guarantee. Consumers should not be misled and confused as to fundamental EU consumer rights because a company wants to sell their commercial warranty services.”

There are different consumer organizations that have brought their complaints to EUC or some even sent letters of complaint to Apple as well related to the warranties, said Goyens. He further adds that the case is vital due to the fact that it includes a “market leader” and could have the potential for a wide influence on European consumers.

For the fact, the Cupertino-based tech giant is appealing the AGCM fine in a hearing scheduled for March 21. However, the arguments from both parties not just limited to AppleCare, but to the fact that the standard Apple warranty is restricted to just one year.

It’s been only a year when the Fab.com’s launch page went live and since then the site has seen great amount traffic. Goldberg said that the popularity of the site is really very impressive with the site now having 3 million members all across the world. Interestingly, out of its 3 million members, 2.5 million live in the United States.

The growth Fab.com seen is really impressive, considering the fact that when it acquired the German site Casacanda few weeks earlier, the numbers for both companies were added up to 2.3 million. This clearly shows that Fab.com has been on the move since it acquired the German site.

The growing popularity of the site also resulted in massive sales records, as the site sold around one million products inside its first nine months of launch. At the moment, the site is offering a massive 2.6 products per minute.

Back in October, the site released its first mobile app and mobile logins already accounts for 40% of its traffic. According to Goldberg, the conversion rates are on the higher side on the iPad. He pointed out that 10% of the iPad user made their first purchase inside the first week of downloading the app.

Undoubtedly, the popularity graph of Fab.com began to rise as soon as the site went live a year ago. Goldberg stated that viral mechanics started operating within the one month after its launch, with over 50,000 pre-launch sign-ups in the first 30 days.

While talking to the audience, Goldberg said that this didn’t happen in one day as “A lot of people say that Fab.com is an overnight success, but we were an overnight success on Day 418, which was the day we actually launched our store.”

In an updated version, the Local section will show users merchants available close by that use the new PayPal Here service particularly. It is the new service PayPal launched recently to compete with the already popular service Square. The service in fact needs a different PayPal Here app available on the App Store, and is available for merchants only.

PayPal refreshes its application in order to offer quick access to managing your account, sending money and requesting money from people. The previous version was certainly lagging behind on many fronts and the latest version is also not as good as it could be, but yet it addresses many issues, particularly the speed at which you are able to navigate between different options.

Many people including me turn to mobile version of PayPal particularly to check on available balance or to verify if payments went through as well as to pay a friend for the occasional lunch if anyone forget to bring his/her wallet. One can easily notice that apart from heavy eBay users or event organizers, the updated application would be a nice upgrading and will offer pretty handy features required by users.

Surprisingly, the look of the PayPal Here application is very slick and smoother than the newly released application, which normally gives you a very “Hey look, I’m your wallet” like feel.

PayPal for iPhone

The very first detail came out of iFixit camp about new iPad is that the Retina Display of the latest tablet from Apple carries a model number associated with panel maker Samsung. This was also reported earlier this week, when it was pointed out that LG and Sharp won’t be manufacturing the initial batch of displays, but they would join the company later once they had their products up to the said quality.

Furthermore, the logic board of the latest iPad includes a number of different chips, such as Apple’s A5X processor, made by Samsung, in the beginning of this year. The CPU of the processor is pretty similar to the iPad 2’s, with 0.2GHz of improved clock speed. Other than that there is also present a Broadcom BCM 4330 Wi-Fi B/G/N chip that has support for Bluetooth 4.0 high speed and an FM transmitter. As for Broadcom chip, it is capable of single-band 2.4GHz or a dual band mode, which offers 5GHz Wi-Fi. The driver used to run the Touch screen is a Texas Instrument CD 3240.

There is also present an Epcos B4064 SAW filter that offers signal enhancement for the radio and a Fairchild FDMC 6683 – the same semiconductor found in iPad 2. The baseband chip used is Qualcomm RTR 8600. There is also present I/O controller from Broadco, BCM 5973.

The other components that iFixit reveals include NAND flash memory, 1GB of RAM form Elpida that carries a number of THGVX1G7D2GLA08 for the 16GB version. The 3G/4G modems used are Qualcomm MDM 9600.

There is also a chip found in the new iPad with IC (power controller) promoted to model 343S0561.

It is certainly a great move from the YouTube, particularly if you have not really signed up for YouTube to upload videos or comment on the other available videos. But if you already have an account, you cannot really bind them together.

YouTube team had this to say about its new feature:

…today we’re adding a feature that lets you sign up for a new YouTube channel using your existing Google+ profile. You can now use your Google+ profile name and photo on a new YouTube channel, giving you one consistent identity across platforms when uploading videos, sharing, commenting and other public activities.

Here the mention of “New YouTube channel” from YouTube team is just a reference to an account. The new signup will appear like this once it begins rolling out:

This is another move from the search giant to integrate all its services by using Google+ as the social platform. This certainly makes sense, when it comes to rely on Google+ accounts as a reliable identity, but this will certainly affect the way people using the video sharing service.

However, this doesn’t mean at all that YouTube is going to change the option to have a regular username for new YouTube users. The video sharing service has only made Google+ profile integration the default in case you are already sign up into the service.

Earlier, YouTube also announced that it is working on to bring the ability to link your accounts. But it is still not sure whether this will really encourage user to go for it. YouTube is out there for a long time and Google+ is just launched few months ago, but still the search giant must have reasons to bring these news features to its products.

The initiative taken by Google is an obvious example of its determination on bringing its social layer to everything it produces.

In a speech at the Royal Television Society (RTS) in London, Thompson made this announcement. Last week rumblings began to surface regarding BBC plans on the said project, called “Project Barcelona.”

Some of the reports suggest that each episode could be priced at £1.89 (US$3) and also the platform would only offer purchases. Frankly speaking, TV rentals have never proved to be a success and for this reason, Apple decided to drop them completely back in August.

The most interesting part of all this is the discussion regarding price. Previously, it was reported that the BBC was considering charging UK iPlayer users to watch archived content. However, the BBC’s spokesman later announced that the fee would only be a micropayment to cover up company’s own costs.

Expecting heavy criticism, Thompson insisted on the fact that this project wants a “second license fee by stealth,” in a country, where the annual license fee costs as much as £145.50 (US$228). He is of the view that people are already used to purchase DVDs, and this platform will actually do the same at a lower price.

However, it is still to be seen how content producers will respond to the project. Thompson also revealed that he had already begun dialogues with British indie producers as well as to their trade association, Pact.

He also stated that any license deal with content owners would be non-exclusive, which means that content producers can license their content to other platforms as well.

Thompson further added that more and more programs from the archive would be uploaded to the service, reports BBC News. It is also hoped that programs will make their way in the same window as catch-up TV, immediately after broadcast.

Now the question is whether the attempts from BBC are enough not to annoy regulators. We have to wait for a while to find out the answer of this question. BBC already has an experience where European Commission found its Worldwide Project Kangaroo anticompetitive.

BBC Trust will review the Project Barcelona later this year to see whether it is ready to go live or not.

Waze is in fact a community-driven app offered on all the major mobile platforms, such as Android, iOS and BlackBerry. The service makes use of driving times to give routing and real-time traffic updates.

Although, the app is available for download all across the world, the full ‘basemap’ is limited to few countries, including US, Canada, UK, Germany, Italy, France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Belgium, Ecuador, parts of Argentina, Panama and, Israel and now the latest inclusion comes in the form of South Africa. In the rest of the countries users need to record the roads and edit the maps on their own.

The excerpt from an official announcement says, “Every now and then, we do an ‘official’ launch in a new territory, and just recently, we added South Africa to the mix. Partnering with MiX Telematics, the launch builds upon the community of more than 30,000 ‘early adapters,’ [SIC] based mainly in Johannesburg, that already exist.”

It was reported in January that Waze had passed 12 million users mark and launched three version of its Android app.

The idea of developing a service like Waze was first in Israel few years ago, when a software engineer Ehud Shabtai was presented a PDA with an external GPS device pre-installed with navigation software. Ehud pointed out that the product didn’t depict the real-time changes that exemplify real conditions on the road. So, he decided to work on it and started working on a traffic platform that combined GPS, open-source software and a community of drivers.

The company has announced that it is planning to expand its services to other countries as well and will come up with more announcements later.

The announcement is made through a tweet by Twitter’s API account. The entire team expressed its gratitude to developers for developing apps on the platform. The screenshot of an original tweet given below will tell you the entire story.

It is worth noting here that “registered apps” doesn’t essentially mean that all applications in the network are in fact active. This, however, points out that every single discarded application is also added to the total count. In a response to the tweet, a third-party developer, Chris Field explained that a few dozen of those were me messing about.

“Growth, however, has been pretty good with the ecosystem apparently, as Twitter’s last milestone of 1 million “apps” was only last July. Twitter might not be raking in the revenue that many would like it to have, but it certainly is still taking a strong hold on many services across the Internet (but not as strong as Facebook of course),” reported Tip Desk.

Regardless of what may happen developers are certainly hopping over to the platform in crowd or multitudes, eager to leverage all that Twitter has to offer. However, it is still unclear whether how the company manages to monetize this massive growth, but one thing is obvious that the potential of the company is definitely on rise. The way Twitter is growing it certainly has its role to play in social platforms in the coming future.

The FTC is particularly focusing on the agreements that made Google the preferred search engine in Safari for iPhone and iPad, an unknown source reports Bloomberg. The Redmond-based software giant Microsoft, a strong rival of Google along with several others has called these agreements anticompetitive.

New York Senator Charles Schumer directed FTC to investigate Apple and Google for violating users’ privacy by accessing personal contacts and photos without permission, earlier this month.

It was announced earlier in January by FTC that it would include Google+ into its investigation as well, describing that it would see whether Google is using its search engine to support its products over others.

It’s been a while that the search giant has been under investigation on several fronts by the FTC into its operations from the way it handles user privacy to claims that the company is trying to force search into its products. The recent probe into Google by FTC, however, seems to be a massive one that launched last summer.

When the investigation was initiated, the Federal Trade Commission was considering the complaints from companies including Yelp, Expedia and Microsoft that accused Google for trying to drive clicks to its products. The Head of Google Search Ranking team, Amit Singhal stated in one of his blog post that the team would fully cooperate with the FTC during the investigation.

The search giant also managed to settle an issue with the FTC in 2011 regarding claims that company’s Buzz social network violated Google’s own privacy policy.

According to GigaOm, PayPal is going to announce the solution on Thursday. Citing “sources we’ve talked to who are familiar with PayPal’s plan,” the report states the dongle will look like a triangle and compete not just with Square, but with Verifone’s PAYware and Intuit’s GoPayment as well.

PayPal’s representatives couldn’t be reached for immediate comment on the report.

Considering the recent excursions of PayPal into offline payment systems, this initiative seems to be a reasonable one. Back in November last year, the eBay-owned company announced PayPal Wallet – a card that allows consumers pay from multiple accounts, store and use gift cards, access special offers and even store receipts. The product is scheduled to roll out somewhere this year. In addition to this, PayPal has also already rolled out a program that enables shoppers use its services in over 2,000 Home Depot stores. PayPal also has plans to enlist over 20 retailers to its program by the end of this year.

Square, on the other hand, is owned and run by Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey. It has pointed out earlier how fertile the market is for small business-based mobile payment solutions.  Square is currently processing $4 billion worth of payments. The company saw its 1 millionth small business customer back in December. Also, the company is colonizing new areas of commerce, such as New York taxis. Square also launched an iPad app earlier this month that focuses on supplant traditional cash registers.

Yahoo filed its company in the U.S. District Court in San Jose, California. In its complaint, Yahoo described that it innovated several features, such as messaging, news feed generation, social commenting, advertising display, preventing click fraud and privacy controls.

The Yahoo’s complaint reads as, “Facebook was not launched until 2004, 10 years after Yahoo was founded. Facebook has since grown to be one of the most widely trafficked sites on the Internet. That growth, however, has been based in a large part on Facebook’s use of Yahoo’s patented technology.”

Yahoo also quotes Facebook’s CEO Mark Zuckerberg as acknowledging the fact that “getting there first is not what it’s all about.” The complaint further adds, “Facebook’s entire social network model, which allows users to create profiles for and connect with, among other things, persons and businesses, is based on Yahoo’s patented social networking technology.”

This is certainly an awkward time for Facebook to face such legal claims from Yahoo, as the social network is likely to launch an IPO (initial public offering) in May to raise $5 billion. Yahoo, on the other hand, is also struggling to keep its quickly declining market shares and revenues on track by implementing right policies. Yahoo is taking risks to engage it in patent trolling to regain its lost image.

The dispute reaches the courtroom room after both the companies failed to reach any agreement over the issue outside the courtroom. The New York Times reports that Yahoo was in talks with the social networking giant over its patent claims earlier, but could not find any clue to settle the dispute. The report also suggests that Yahoo was threatening a lawsuit in case Facebook didn’t offer licensing fees.

The native apps for Google+ seem to get mobile team pretty late for unknown reasons. However, the team finally has something worth to announce eventually, as it has refreshed the mobile web experience for the product.

Google’s PM Tom Charytoniuk discussed on one of his posts about the complete makeover of Google+ for the web. He stated:

Keeping up with Google+ on the go just got easier. We launched a newer, cleaner design of the Google+ experience for mobile web and support for 60 locales. Now it is easier to find, enjoy, and share the content you care about in Bengali, Icelandic, Swahili and more!

Check it out at plus.google.com on your mobile browser – you should see the updated web app if you’re on an Android, iOS, or Blackberry 7 device.

It seems that the native apps for Google+ are still buggy ones, particularly the one for iOS. I have tested the app and found it a herky-jerky one, so I preferred to go for mobile web version. The latest makeover of the app seems to be a massive one that adds some revamped navigation and better speed experience.

The latest refresh offers a smooth hopping and out experience along with a quicker and simpler +1 items. Unluckily, if you prefer to use the web version, you will definitely miss out the chance to enjoy on native-only features for Google+, such as instant photo and video upload and Hangouts. The mobile web version also makes it easy for you to switch between Gmail, Calendar and Search.

There is a common that people will continue to prefer the mobile web version unless Google+ team seriously though about creating versions particularly for Android and Apple tablets. Google needs to work really hard to promote its native apps so as to keep pace with the rapidly growing tech market.

However, the change doesn’t seem to affect all Blogger sites. For instance, if a user tries to post from the Official Google Mobile Blog, no Captcha will appear. But if a user tries to post from a lesser-known site, such as Abbie, then a Captcha will appear. For popular blogs, Captcha will not appear, as it apparently seems.

This is not the first time that Facebook has used Captcha on its service to avoid spam. Some similar sort of Captcha will appear when you try to post from Tumblr. But there are several blogging services for which Facebook doesn’t want you to enter Captcha, including LiveJournal, WordPress, TypePad and Squarespace.

The search giant Google is in possession of Blogger that uses blogspot.com domain. Both Facebook and Google have been battling a digital cold war for last few years. None of the company offers a simple way to share contact lists with each other. The battle was intensified last year with an introduction of Google’s social platform Google+.

The search giant recently modified its search engine to add social-media links and it preferred its Google+ over the most popular Facebook. However, Facebook’s team of engineers among other social sites replied well with a tool (purposely named Don’t Be Evil, a Google tagline) that apparently corrects the search results with social links from several other social services.

Both Facebook and Google could not be reached for immediate comment on the subject.

The Finnish company has already doing great with its new range of Windows Phone handsets. The company is reportedly going to become another of Microsoft’s Windows on ARM partners, offering a dual-core Qualcomm-powered 10-inch Windows 8 tablet just before the year ends.

This has also been reported by a technology-focused industry publication that the Finnish company will heavily depend on its manufacturing contracts in Asia, outsourcing production to Compal Electronics. According to report, the company will initially ship around 200,000 units of its new tablet.

Last week, during its annual filing to the SEC in United States, Nokia described how the tablets had helped its competitors expand their brands and increase competition. Stephen Elop, CEO of Nokia, also stated that the company is “studying the markets closely” after one of its regional offices leaked news that tablet may likely be launched as early June 2012.

The Redmond-based software giant has recently announced Windows 8 Consumer Preview at Mobile World Congress held in Barcelona. The on-stage demos included prototype devices from Fujitsu and Samsung, but a partnership with Nokia wasn’t disclosed at that time.

Partnering with Nokia will definitely help the Redmond-based software giant to regain the tablet market shares from the Cupertino-based technology giant Apple and will also provide a healthy competition to Google’s open-source Android platform.

Boards of Directors of both the companies have approved the deal, while the deal is currently looking for an approval from shareholders of the companies. According to Tudou, if everything works according to plan, the deal will be finalized in the third quarter of 2012.

This is certainly big news as both these companies are the largest video websites in the country. This deal makes itself identical to what we have already seen in case of a merger between YouTube and VEVO.

Tudou recently announced that it is having 300 million visitors each month, after it went public. One of the major causes of traffic is microblog service Sina Weibo. Sina has also become the world’s second largest video site, thanks to the deal between the two companies.

Both Youko and Tudou are popular for strong rivalry and the deal is certainly a big surprise, considering their battles both in webspace and on the courtroom. At the beginning of this year, Youku filed the latest round of lawsuits, blaming Tudou of misusing copyrighted content.

Regardless of massive rivalry, there have been signs of co-operation as well between the two companies. For instance, in an attempt to turn aside rivalry, both companies agreed upon sharing content last year. And such sort of cooperation raised so many doubts of a merger but no one was sure at that time that this would end up in a real merger.

The founder, chairman and CEO of Tudou, Gary Wang, while commenting on the deal said:

Youku and Tudou share a vision for the future of online video in China and how to deliver the best user experience possible. This transaction further strengthens our market position as Tudou brings its valuable brand, library of professional licensed content, user generated content platform, extensive user base, broad range of partnerships and expertise in mobile video.

Together, we believe Youku Tudou Inc. will be able to provide the best-in-class experience for users interested in uploading, watching and sharing videos, and to grow together with our advertisers, and our content and industry partners.

Victor Koo, founder, chairman and CEO at Youku said:

We intend to lead the next phase of online video development in China. Youku Tudou Inc. will represent a differentiated leader in the online video market in China with the largest user base, most comprehensive content library, most advanced bandwidth infrastructure and strongest monetization capability within the sector.

Youku Tudou Inc. will have the reach and scale to bring our users high quality content at high speeds. The combined company will have the two leading online video brands in China: Youku and Tudou.

Both the companies together have a lot of potential to expand their workings into other areas, as they can offer an access to a wide range of content easily. We have already approached both companies for immediate comments. We will update you as soon as we receive any response.

Facebook, along with three other websites, were blocked in the country, after authorities directed ISPs to restrict access to these sites. The three other websites which were block include Russian news sites, particularly zevzda.ru, centrasia.ru, tjk.news.com, and maxala.org. The decision was taken in a response to several articles published on the sites, criticizing the Tajik president.

It was reported by EFF that any user who attempted to access the blocked the sites were directed to their ISP’s homepage.

However, AFP reported, citing a spokesman for one of Tajikistan’s ISP’s said, “Yes, we’ve allowed access to Facebook but we don’t know how long it will last. If we again receive a signal to shut it down we will have to comply.”

Eurasia states that where Facebook has been removed from the blacklisted sites, the news sites will remain blocked. The source further states that Facebook was accessible throughout its ban period via the use of proxy servers.

In spite of apparent threat, the use of social network in the country is negligible under the most favorable conditions. The world’s largest social networking website only has more than 34,000 users that account for a mere 0.46% of the total population. When we look at the social network’s penetration rate of its online population, it is still miserably low at 4.95%.

If we consider the figures of December 2011, the country’s Internet population rates calculated at slightly over 10% of the total population of Tajikistan.

The point to consider here is what and when actually Konami is going to release as a social game on Zynga. The answer is yet not known, but it is confirmed that it is the third game partner.

Zynga’s Vice President of Publisher Partners, Rob Dyer mentioned earlier that Konami is on board and it will soon release a social game on Zynga’s game platform.

Considering his statement, we can speculate to have a total of at least 11 social games on Zynga’s platform this year. The five of these 11 games will be presented by Zynga – including CityVille, Words with Friends, Hidden Chronicles, CastleVille, and Zynga Poker – while six of them will be third party titles – including games from Row Sham Bow, Mob Science, Sava Transmedia, Rebellion, Playdemic and Konami.

Three benefits are offered to game partners by Zynga. Firstly, the front-end promotion and access to its millions of game players; secondly, the back-end assistance, as the games can be hosted on its Z-Cloud optimized for social games; and thirdly, leverage to analytics tools, as Zynga is providing game developers the chance to control its analytics tools to optimize games for monetization and growth.

Distribution is vital and has already been offered by Facebook, Apple, and Google to their platforms and devices. The hosting and analytics are certainly unique options on their own. The most important thing here is to see whether the extra value Zynga offers increase its revenues to extent to make up for the amount of money a game developer has to pay Zynga to be a part of its game platform.

The time will show what exactly be the cost of getting game on Zynga’s platform.

The very first thing that user will notice in the revamped user-interface of Dropbox is the action bar that allows you to sort files by name, date, size and even type. Interesting, isn’t it!

What you need to do is to click on file and you will be shown new options by action bar. For instance, the action bar will now allow you to download, delete, rename, move or copy a file from there.

This can also be done by right-clicking on a file. This will give you a hint of Dropbox working in an identical way to Microsoft’s Windows Explorer. This certainly makes things easier for users of Dropbox to handle their files in a seamless way.

In addition to these, the makeover of Dropbox also offers new video and photo viewer. With new video and photo viewer, you can view your content on the whole screen. Dropbox introduces thumbnails for photos and videos – including Photoshop and Illustrator files – to make things easier for users to preview.

The revamped Dropbox also brings a drag-and-drop feature, easier and simpler multiple file selections and keyboard shortcuts (you can view the full list of shortcuts by clicking on ‘?’). Another handy feature introduced by Dropbox is instant search, which means that it will display search results for you as you type in the search box.

Interestingly, this redesign is described as only a first step in a complete refurbishing of the service by Dropbox. More new stuff is coming within “next few months,” says company.

If you have experienced the new Dropbox, let us know how you find it.

The BBC is reportedly busy testing its new ‘Project Barcelona’ which if come to fruition, could see a massive amount of BBC content find its way to users through a download-to-own business model.

The BBC only offers streams content through its own iPlayer apps, but the Project Barcelona would bring an iTunes-like model, where users would pay fee to have a digital version of their favorite shows.

However, the BBC service won’t operate completely like iTunes, as it won’t allow content from other studios, at least in the beginning. This is certainly interesting to see a company as big as the BBC is opting to enter into a market controlled by Apple.

Without any surprise, when the BBC is approached for a comment, it preferred to stay silent on its new project. It is worth noting here that the BBC needs to have approval from several entities in order to make its download-to-own service go operational. The BBC is currently funded by UK citizens by large part through the TV license. And we believe that thinking of paying for the content twice may not entice the viewers.

At the moment, the BBC iPlayer streaming service provides TV shows for thirty-days after their original air date. Once this period passed, the content is pulled and only 7% of them find their way back online through an alternative legal method. If Project Barcelona comes to fruition, the whole scenario would be changed.

But this will only benefit viewers living in UK; if you are not in UK then you can’t even imagine of taking benefit BBC’s new service.

Customers can order the Apple’s new smartphone on the Apple China Store or through China Telecom’s website. With the sales of iPhone 4S, China Telecom has become the second official carrier in the country. This ends the 18-month exclusive partnership of China Unicom with Apple.

It was on January 13 when China Unicom started offering the Apple’s iPhone 4S in the country. China Telecom waited for almost two months to receive approval from the local regulators to sell the device. The Cupertino-based company has wisely employed a dual-mode baseband to make certain that it won’t have to manufacture separate device to operate on both frequencies. This is an interesting initiative taken by the company to make sure that as soon as carriers got approval, they instantly stock supplies of the iPhone 4S.

According MICGadget, orders in Shanghai and Beijing have already crossed 10,000 and 20,000 units respectively, which are much more than anticipated by the carrier. China Telecom offers a complete range of iPhone 4S versions – including 16GB, 32GB and 64GB, with price starting at $0 RMB on select contracts.

With the today’s announcement, it is obvious that China Mobile – the world’s largest mobile carrier – is the only major operator in China that is not offering Apple’s smartphone to its large customer-base.

Still, considering the ‘worldphone’ capabilities of the iPhone 4S, China Mobile is enjoying more than 15 million iPhone users, all of which use an unlocked iPhone on the carrier’s 2G networks due to its network incompatibility with the handset.

There are some parties, of which details are not known, that met with the DOJ to settle the antitrust case, reports The Wall Street Journal, quoting “people familiar with the matter.” Report claims that a settlement of this kind could possibly lower ebook prices.

CBS Corp.’s Simon & Schuster Inc.; Lagardere SCA’s Hachette Book Group; Pearson PLC’s Penguin Group (USA); Macmillan, a unit of Verlagsgruppe Georg von Holtzbrinck GmbH; and HarperCollins Publishers, are the five publishers facing a potential lawsuit.

Apple could not be reached for immediate comment, while the representatives for the publishers – including Simon & Schuster, Hachette Book Group, Penguin Group, McMillan and HarperCollins – also refused to comment, said The Wall Street Journal.

According to Wall Street Journal, the DOJ’s major focus is on “agency pricing,” a plan that former Apple CEO Steve Jobs had used with publishers. Conventionally, book publishers sold hardcover books to retailers for almost half their cover price and allow retailers discount. However, with the introduction of ebooks, Amazon started selling books for $9.99 at a loss. However, Amazon still expected to create market share with that low price.

In Steve Jobs biography, Walter Isaacson stated that when Apple launched the iPad back in 2010, Jobs approached publishers with the agency model that offer Apple a 30% cut of each title sold in its iBookStore. The publishers getting a strong backing from Apple told Amazon that they won’t offer titles unless Amazon turned to agency pricing.

DOJ believes that both Apple and publishers are responsible for the increased ebook prices.  It is not only the U.S. Department of Justice that making an argument, the European Commission is also investigating the issue.

Seeing the growing trend of photography in the iOS ecosystem, the company has decided to offer a dedicated third-party photo editor for the iPad.

With iPhoto for iOS, Apple has brought some of the best features of iPhoto ’11 for Mac to the iPad. iPhoto for iOS is designed to let photographers of all strengths to quickly edit photos on the move.

Some of the most prominent features include:

• Smart Browsing
• Multi-touch Editing
• Professional quality effects
• Brushes
• Photo Beaming
• Photo Journals

The screenshots provided by Apple in the event suggest that the app is more of an Aperture Lite than just iPhoto. With this app, photographers can work with images up to 19MP. It is however unsure whether what type of RAW support the software would have.

Some of the popular iPhoto features including straighten and resize and red-eye removal are also included in the pack. Furthermore, a host of new brushes to repair, adjust contrast and saturation as well as sharpness, are also added.

Above all, it is non-destructive editing, meaning that you never have the risk of spoiling your original image. iPhoto for iOS offers a collection of pre-configured photo effects to Instagram users.

The users can make virtual photo albums with notes, text and more by utilizing new photo journals or photo books. The app also offers users to add maps and weather to events inside their journals. Moreover, users will be able to publish straight to iCloud or even send to iTunes.

More importantly, you can download iPhoto for iOS in the App Store, as it is already there for download.

You might be wondering about the name of the device, so to calm your nerves down, the company didn’t use anything but the new iPad phrase for the device. The device was announced by Apple’s CEO Tim Cook who took stage to open the event at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in Sans Francisco. The same platform is used to announce the previous two generations of iPad as well.

The new iPad sports a retina display, with 2048 × 1536 pixels (264 pixels in each inch). The device has a massive 1 million more pixels than HDTV. Also, the new iPad has 44% greater saturation. The device sports A5X quad-core graphics. It has a 5-megapixel camera having same optics sensor used in iPhone 4S and ability to capture 1080p video.

The Senior Vice President of Worldwide Marketing, Phil Schiller said, “[It has] text sharper than a newspaper. Photos will look incredible. Fonts look amazing. [It has] the best mobile display that has ever shipped.”

The new device will make debut on March 16 in countries – including US, UK, Japan, Canada, Switzerland, Germany, France, Hong Kong, Singapore and Australia. The device will be offered both in white and black finishes.

The device offers 10 hours of battery life on normal use, while 9 hours on 4G. It has a weight of around 1.4 lbs and thickness of 9.4 mm.

The device is available for pre-orders straight-away. The cost for Wi-Fi only iPads are: $499 for 16GB, $599 for 32GB and $699 for 64GB, while 4G models will be available for: $629 for 16GB, $729 for 32GB and $829 for 64GB.

On the other hand, the second generation iPad 2 will be sold for $399 for Wi-Fi and $529 for both 3G and Wi-Fi.

The most noticeable point here is the use of phrase ‘post-PC’ and not ‘mobile’ by Cook. The reason for this is that the company’s iPad is swiftly becoming a PC alternative for those who don’t want or need a desktop setup or for those who often find themselves on business trips away form office and home. It was reported earlier that the number of people owning an iPad device has increased by 74% in Europe year-on-year.

Apple shipped 62 million iOS devices in the last quarter of 2011 – impressive numbers. While Apple has already announced its new iPad, we can expect these numbers to further rise in the coming future. Apple announced that its new iPad will go on sale on March 16 in several countries including US, UK, Australia, Germany, Japan Canada, Switzerland, Hong Kong, Singapore and France.

In addition to new iPad, Apple also announced updates to its Apple TV platform that now seems to work more line one of these ‘post-PC’ devices. The new interface introduced is a part of Apple’s unification process, which is very much identical to other iOS devices

The way Apple is progressing and planning things carefully we can easily assume that the revenues will further go up for the Cupertino-based tech giant in future. However, we have to wait and see what sort of response its new products will receive from the customers.

However, Microsoft has some other plans for its users, as the Redmond-based software giant is aiming to offer developers the world around use Bing’s mapping abilities in their apps. For this purpose, the company has publicized a new SDK for third-party developers. Remember the fact that the future of company’s brand is largely based on the success of its Windows Store, so one can hope to see more released in the coming days, with the company aiming to move ahead with developers to enter into the new race.

The new SDK offers a new JavaScript that will assist developers to address issues that were common with the normal Bing tools had with Windows 8’s Metro Style app format. In simple word, the Redmond-based company is trying making its core products more simple and hoping to integrate it into a host of third-party apps, so as to make them relevant on the new platform. Download the new SDK here.

In addition to additional features, Microsoft is offering “free and unlimited use of Bing Maps controls and APIs within your Metro style apps for the duration of the Windows 8 pre-release period.” In order to get it licensed, you need to have a code available here.

Comparing the wider Bing horizon, Bing Maps has considered as one of its best feature. It is certainly a positive sign to see it driving its way into Windows 8, as a native feature. We will get back to you with more updates as they become available.

Gazetta, a Russian news site explains the situation rather explicitly. The news site reports that the FCS received requests to reclassify two Apple products after it had originally said that “tablet computers from Apple are classified as electronic computers of tablet type, despite the fact that they have a GPS system inside,” as per reported on February 14, 2012.

Being classified as radio navigation equipment, the GPS function found in the tablet was the major reason for import duties on iPad. Initially, tablet devices were ranked as simple computers, and were exempted from import tax.

The FCS has finally decided to group iPad as a simple computer, which means that it is no more subject to import duty.

This is certainly a massive blow for the rival tablet makers. Samsung’s Russian office has already requested for an explanation from the agency over its decision, while Acer’s local office says that it is waiting for a confirmation from the customs office regarding the exemption offered to Apple devices over import duty.

This is what Acer’s spokesman said over the issue:

“There has not been an official confirmation of that yet. But if this information is true, we will demand explanations from the FCS and we will seek cancellation of customs duties on our tablet computers.”

The FCS, on the other hand, said that it will thoroughly consider the customs apps of Apple’s tablet rivals and may likely to classify them as ‘simple computers’ later, until then the exemption will be limited to Apple’s devices.

According to the unaudited consolidated revenues posted by the company, its February 2012 revenues stood at NT$20,294 million ($687.4 million), down 36.79% from the figures recorded last year. However, the revenues between January and February stood at NT$36,910 million ($1.25 million), down 45.01% from the same period last year.

For January, the company’s revenues dropped to NT$16,615 million ($562.8 million), down over 50% from the same period last year. However, HTC has shown some recovery signs from the competitive Christmas season, following the big blow from increased sales of Apple and Samsung smartphones.

This is, however, not an unexpected blow for HTC, as the company has already been aiming for posting another disastrous quarter, with an estimate drop of 36% in revenue from the last quarter of 2011.

According to estimates, the first quarter revenue will drop to $2.20-$2.37 billion (T$65-T$70 billion) from $3.44 billion (T$101.42 billion) in the last quarter. The company feels that the decline in revenues is only for a short term.

The Taiwanese smartphone manufacturer believes that it can reverse the decline by focusing on its ‘hero’ phones. The company is of the view that its line of ‘hero’ phones will help bring it back on track to compete with Apple and Samsung. Improving the hardware and software features, HTC announced its ‘One’ range of Android smartphones recently to show world that its focus is not entirely on hardware specs.

We have got an opportunity to have over hand on its ‘One’ range devices and can say that HTC is not far from back in the competition.

However, for the mobile maker, it is certainly a hard time. Its line of ‘One’ devices including HTC One X, One V and One S will make debut in April and decide the fate of the company.

It clearly shows the higher demand for apps worldwide as well as the increasing smartphone penetration and Apple profits (30% cut from every app or in-app purchase goes to the company).

It is noticed that iOS users are downloading an increasing number of apps. A study was conducted last year that revealed iOS owners downloaded about 60 apps each, 50 more apps that each iOS owner downloaded back in 2008.

The increase in number of apps downloaded means that the number of devices sold also increased. According to Pew Survey conducted in 2011, 35% of the 2,277 US adults questioned in English or Spanish said that they had a smartphone. In one of its recent study Pew revealed that the percentage has now jumped to 46%. In the last quarter alone, 37 million smartphones were sold by Apple.

In 2011, the combined net sales for the iTunes Store, App Store and iBookstore remained at $5.4 billion, which were just 6% of the company’s net sales. However, these figures saw a rise of 33% over 2010.

In last quarter, Apple posted its highest revenue and earnings. Interestingly, if you see at the market value of the Apple, it is now worth more than the tea in China.

The Cupertino-based company promised to offer $10.000 gift card on hitting the 25^th billionth app from its App Store. The company, however, not yet announced the winner. We soon will have the lucky winner who will receive $10,000 gift card that was promised ealier.

The New York Post while quoting some unknown sources states that media companies are reluctant to agree to Apple’s terms over content packages and pricing. Apple’s stance on the matter is described as “We decide the price, we decide what content” by the source.

Furthermore, very little detail is available about the streaming service, which the Cupertino-based tech giant hasn’t confirmed yet. Apple may likely be designing a service which will let owners of iOS and Apple TV devices to purchase subscriptions to individual channels, just like the subscriptions users purchase for newspaper and magazines through the Newsstand. One other speculation is that Apple may bundle those channels together to build its own cable TV-like group subscription offering.

The Cupertino-based company currently offers users to purchase and download individual TV shows and movies via its iTunes Store. With streaming subscription service, Apple aims to push users’ access to video content. This will put Apple into direct competition with the likes of Netflix and Hulu Plus, and also to cable TV providers.

Previously, Apple has had done great in tempting the music industry to licensing options on its terms, both with the iTunes Match and iTunes Music Store service. However, the company had to wait long before scoring a major progress with television and movie studios.

The increased competition in the subscription streaming space over the recent few months is the major reason why Apple has to struggle that hard. Over the recent one year, the power of streaming service has moved from content distributors, such as Netflix, Amazon and Hulu Plus, to the content owners themselves. This eventually makes it harder to secure deals.

It is expected that the Cupertino-based company may likely launch its next-generation Apple TV at the forthcoming event on March 7 along with next-generation iPad.

The Redmond-based software giant finalized the deal during the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. Under the deal, Zain is liable for offering Windows Phone line devices in MENA region. Bahrain, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Sudan and South Sudan are the countries that will get their share of Windows Phone.

The current announcement backs the earlier reports revealing Microsoft’s intentions to open an online store targeting the customers in MENA region.

Nabeel Bin Salamah, CEO of Zain while talking about the agreement said, “This agreement with Microsoft, one of the world’s leading technology companies, is just the beginning of yet another example of Zain delivering on its brand promise to achieve our vision of ‘A Wonderful World’.”

“We have the utmost confidence in the capabilities of Windows smartphone technology and believe such an appealing offering will further attract, empower and enhance the lifestyles of our customers,” he further added.

Gustavo Fuchs, Microsoft Mobility Director for Middle East and Africa, said that smartphone growth in MENA region is expected to rise up to 38% this year. He went on to say, “The partnership with local mobile phone operators will help drive the appetite of consumers in the region. We are pleased to cement our long-term partnership with Zain, a company that has been with us since the first version of Windows Mobile was released, and has now embraced Windows Phone as a part of its portfolio.”

In addition to this announcement, some other announcements were made during the Mobile World Congress regarding Windows Phone, including the announcement of Nokia Lumia 610 that targets the low-income group. Also, Windows Phone version of Skype was also announced during the event. Similarly, Microsoft also revealed an updated version of its mobile operating system called ‘Tango’.

However, the report also claims that the company’s firmness over controlling “all aspects of the service, such as prices and sources, doesn’t sit well with content providers. An unnamed source close to discussions described Apple’s position as: “we decide the price, we decide what content”, while another said “they want everything for nothing.”

The Cupertino-based technology giant is pursuing America’s cable operators as part of the project. A source told the Post that “they [Apple] want to create the interface, and they wanted to work with the cable guys to manage bandwidth across the TV and broadband pipeline.”

Report further claims that the approach will see channels offered as apps for a host of Apple products, one of which would definitely be soon-to-launched redesigned set-top box. However, the question still be raised on monetization and it isn’t yet clear whether channels would be packaged or available to freely buy and watch.

It was reported last month that Apple was working with Rogers over its ‘iTV’ product and the Canadian firm may likely be the content provider, while it is said to be targeting AT&T and Verizon.

Regardless of Apple’s efforts, a major US cable provider has already shifted to the Web space, following the launch of VOD service by Comcast couple of weeks ago. There are many other brands which are coming as well, for instance, Sony has its own ambitious plans, and Verizon is reportedly eyeing Netflix.

Back in 2009, the Cupertino-based technology giant attempted to launch a similar sort of service, but the company’s firmness over compensating content providers through ad revenue sharing, instead of distribution fees, became one of the major hurdles behind its collapse.

The company is planning to expand its operations beyond its signature Facebook games. Zynga.com won’t remain the only corporate website for the company, as it will also become a platform that features the company’s most popular games along with titles from other publishers.

The site is scheduled to go live in some days. According to company’s blog post, the site will feature the games including Words with Friends, CastleVille, Zynga Poker, Hidden Chronicles and CityVille. Furthermore, Zynga has inked a deal with MobSceince, Row Sham Bow and Sava so as to develop games for the platform.

There will also present a feature called the Social Stream that enables user to play in real time with your friends and find new ones. Although, it appears that the company is planning to develop its own social network, CEO Mark Pincus wrote in the blog post that “we built Zynga.com to complement [Facebook's] pervasive social graph.”

He further pointed out that other publishers while using Zynga.com will be able to “extend the reach of their games and connect to even more players. Later this year we’ll make our platform available for all social game developers through a Zynga API.”

Zynga is enjoying a very favorable relationship with the world’s largest social network and accounts for 12% of company’s revenues. Interestingly, almost 93% of the Zynga’s revenue coming from Facebook, so the company is looking to expand its revenue sources.

Considering the symbiotic relationship between Zynga and Facebook, it won’t be surprising to see investors encouraging the news. The company’s stock was already up 6% after the announcement made on Thursday.

RIM’s head in Southeast Asia, Gregory Wade said at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona that the company will expand the number of BlackBerry sales points in Indonesia to 4,000, including flagship stores, store-in-stores and kiosks.

According to Wade, the Canadian firm that recently appointed new CEO Thorsten Heins is serious about the company and has some ‘aggressive’ plans to grow the number of outlets selling BlackBerry phones in Thailand and Malaysia, major markets for its smartphone sales.

Similar sort of plans has been implemented by the Canadian firm in India, where it has doubled the number of retail points selling BlackBerry smartphone and now it is targeting the other  major markets of Asia.

Indonesia is described as a ‘proving ground’ for the region, said Wade. He believes that the country is a vital part of the company’s strategy in Asia. RIM held a global launch in the capital city Jakarta back in 2011 and also people showed great interest when Apple was launching its new handset there.

For RIM, SE Asia is one of the major markets across the world, as the region accounted for 31% increase in sales outside of UK, US and Canada during the last quarter. While the sales of the company dropped drastically in US to come down 45%.

There are several reasons that make Southeast Asia a vital market for RIM. Some of the reasons include competitive pricing, early mover advantage and the support of celebrities.

Like the increasing popularity of Apple’s smartphone, Android shipments are also on rise across Asia, both of which giving a tough competition to BlackBerry. Majority of customers prefer the affordable Android-based devices over BlackBerry and even over Apple’s smartphone. Apps are the big edge over the RIM’s BlackBerry platform.

Above all, the new CEO of RIM, Thorsten Heins is firm on his approach to keep RIM among the top three mobile firms. RIM is expected to launch some new devices in the ongoing year. The idea is not only to keep its position in Asia, but to further expand it.

The most interesting fact about this app is its time of release which is perfectly in coincidence with Windows 8 Consumer Preview release. The app offers us an explicit look of how the apps might look after going through the unique filter of Microsoft’s new Metro interface. One can surely see a significant ‘horizontal’ feel in the entire app that offers content from its Freshly Pressed section.

It is important to note here that the app is not actually a full-featured WordPress publishing tool for self-installs, but rather offers a way to browse content from WordPress.com and instantly reblog it. With the app, you will also be able to share photos links and quotes from any app on your blog.

The Metro-focused interface offers a unique look with a focus on typographic elements. It is certainly something impressive for the WordPress app. If this is so impressive, how the other apps will come out to be. We have to wait for this. A description of the applications is read as follows:

Beyond just reblogging, you can share content from any app in Windows 8 to your WordPress.com blog. Just open the Share charm, and you’ll find a posting interface customized to the type of content you’re sharing — whether that’s text selected on a web page, or a picture from your photo library.

One can also opt for Windows 8’s “Semantic Zoom” feature, a feature primarily a version of “pinch-to-zoom” gesture available on tablet devices.

If you already have the Windows 8 Consumer Preview, you can download the app here. However, if you still have to get your share of Windows 8 Consumer Preview, you can get it here.

According to Reuters, the Paris-based data watchdog CNIL will investigate Google’s new policies across Europe. CNIL sent a letter to Google that stated that the team of regulators will devise questions for the company by mid of March and the search giant has to give satisfactory answer to all questions.

CNIL wrote, “The CNIL and EU data authorities are deeply concerned about the combination of personal data across services. They have strong doubts about the lawfulness and fairness of such processing, and its compliance with European data protection legislation.”

Back in January, the search giant came up with some controversial changes in its privacy policy. Under the new privacy policy, the company brings all of its products, such as YouTube, Gmail and Google+ under one roof.

Furthermore, the search giant announced that it will make use of data collected by non-search products, including Google Docs, to enhance results in Google Search. This means that if you more often share news and photos of the latest sports cars on your Google+ profile, the search giant will now use that data to give you Volkswagen rather than insects when you enter beetle in the search box.

Earlier this month, the search giant repeated its commitment to privacy in one of its blog post. The company says that it will remain open to questions about the changes. Google has also replied to the CNIL in response to their letter.

Google says that the changes are announced to make Google experience smooth, simple, clean and above all user-friendly. The company also says that cross-platform data will not be shared with advertisers at any cost.

Google’s Global Privacy Counsel, Peter Fleischer wrote, ““As we’ve said several times over the past week, while our privacy policies will change on 1st March, our commitment to our privacy principles is as strong as ever.” Despite being European requests to hold off, the search giant is releasing the new privacy policy.

It was back in December when Bloomberg announced mobile ads, however, the idea of ads appearing once a user log-out is a new one. Such sort of ads will go live in April this year. The Director of Customer Marketing at Facebook, Mike Hoefflinger stated that ads will go live to 37 million people log out of site each day.

Facebook likes to call its log-out ads “Stories” and it is one of the four new “Premium” products that the social network announced at the Facebook Marketing Conference in New York for advertisers. Some of the changes made include right-hand side ads on the homepage and ads within the News Feed on desktops. Both these feature had already been in operation since January.

With Premium products, Facebook is trying to look for a model shift from advertising to stories. Considering the change, Premium ads will all develop from brand Pages and will quite different from the traditional ads. However, the ads will still base on updates, questions and videos. According to Hoefflinger, the ads navigated by Dr. Pepper, Butterfinger and EA, offer $3 of sales for every $1 spent by advertisers and offer five to ten times the click-through rate of other ads on the social network.

Looking at the growing popularity of ads, company asserts that consumers and advertisers are developing their symbiotic relationship further than advertising and into storytelling. Company says, “[Fans] will engage more with you, are going to like you more and create little stories on top of your stories.”

Facebook announced Premium ads just after announcing the long-awaited Timeline for Brand Pages on last evening of February.

The recent app updates from Twitter will now bring Promoted Accounts to both Twitter for iPhone and Twitter for Android, with Promoted Tweets join the party soon after.

According to Twitter, bringing the new products to its mobile platform will offer users a similar kind of experience they have on the web. The Promoted Accounts will be located in list of “Who to Follow’ recommendations inside the app.

On the other hand, Promoted Tweets will appear both in the search and in the timeline. When tweets appear in the timeline, they will show up like any other and won’t appear being stuck at the top of the screen as they usually appear in search. With new tweets rolling in, the Promoted Tweet will automatically fall off the page. However, in search, the Promoted Tweet will appear at the top of the screen as mentioned above. You can even swipe a tweet to remove it, if the Promoted Tweet is irrelevant.

Initially, the roll out will be limited to some particular users who can see the Promoted Tweets at the top of their timelines. The company says that it is not sure of the exact timeline of how long the roll out would take to complete.

Ads can be avoided at present with the help of a third-party client, such as Tweetbot – a great backup choice.

Twitter CEO Dick Costolo, while speaking at the D; Dive Into Media Conference, in January, said that company’s advertising business is rising and the engagement rates on Promoted Tweets, Trends and Accounts is high. He said, “We’ve figured out the business. The advertising model is working, we just have to scale it.”

It seems that it is a good move from Twitter to move all the ad products to mobile platform.

According to the Mail Online, DataSift is appeared to be the first company that got access to the users’ old tweets, which go back two years. Interestingly, there are more than 1,000 companies which are still on the waiting list for DataSift.

It has been confirmed by DataSift that the report of its purchasing old tweets from Twitter is true. However, Twitter couldn’t be reached for immediate comment. The marketing firm has announced a product named DataSift Historics that enables companies take out insights and trends related to brands, businesses, financial markets, news and public opinion, according to DataSift representative. Public tweets would be analyzed by Datasift, not private ones. It is important to note here that if a user deletes a tweet, it would be deleted from DataSift’s archive as well.

Twitter is monetizing its archive by selling old tweets. Until this time, Twitter’s all focus has been on boosting revenues by advertising to its 100 million plus active monthly users instead of selling its data, but this is a huge initiative taken by Twitter this time.

A good bunch of Twitter’s revenue generates via advertising. Being a private company, Twitter doesn’t reveal its finances as yet. Still, eMarketer estimates that Twitter will earn around $259.9 million in the ongoing year, while an expected $399.5 million in the coming year.

The latest report will certainly tickle the privacy advocates, whose focus have so far been on Google and Facebook. Both these companies have been accused of misusing consumer data without the knowledge of consumers.

The social network partners with AT&T, T-Mobile USA and Verizon among others. Consumers will now be able to pay for their Facebook Credits through carrier billing, under the terms of new deal. Chief Technology Officer at Facebook, Bret Taylor said in a statement at the MWC that the payments experience on the web is broken. He further added, “Even with operator billing support most require a step called SMS device verification. That means if I’m in the middle of the game and want to pay 99 cents, I have to wait for an SMS to arrive,” reports Inside Facebook.

To users’ further annoyance, Taylor said, once the SMS arrives, user needs to verify that his/her account is linked to their Facebook account.

He further said, “Then I have to awkwardly memorize the code and resubmit the transactions. If I manage to make it this far, then I can finally go back to playing the game.” We have tried to approach Facebook for comments but couldn’t be reached.

The announcement comes at the vital time when the social network is preparing for its $5 billion IPO. The company is supposed to be setting its sights on monetizing its mobile operations through advertising. However, it is yet not revealed what Facebook’s stake in mobile payments would be. However, some reports suggest that the social networking giant is promising mobile carriers a higher share of revenues and influence over the current mobile giants offer, including Google and Apple.

Taylor also made an interesting remark, while talking to Telegraph, saying that if Mark Zuckerberg developed Facebook today, it would have been a mobile app instead of a web-based entity.

Users of iPad 2 can have this app for just $9.99 so as to have their hands on this remarkable app from Adobe. A little disappointment for iPad 1 owners as this app doesn’t support the device. The app offers sophisticated selection of tools and ‘scribble’ over images to get rid of unwanted portions. With Photoshop Touch for iPad, users can also touch up photos, paint over them and create new layouts. Interestingly, the new app is in fact a part of Adobe’s forthcoming suite of iPad ‘Touch’ Apps.

The suite is an inspiration of Adobe’s Creative Suite that includes:

“Adobe Collage; Adobe Debut presentation software; Adobe Ideas, which will be similar to the Illustrator vector-based desktop drawing software; Adobe Kuler color theme manager; and website- prototyping and wireframe tool Adobe Proto.”

According to Adobe, the rest of apps will be launched for iOS later in 2012 and all will be compatible to work with Adobe’s Creative Cloud services.

Some of the other features added in the Adobe Touch for iPad are the added ability to share to Facebook directly from the app, search, using Google, from inside the app, add sophisticated effects and capability to use your tablet’s camera to fill in sections of your image project.

David Wadhwani, Digital Media Business Unit’s Senior President and General Manager at Adobe said, “Photoshop Touch combines the magic of Photoshop and its core features with the convenience of a tablet, bringing image-editing power to the fingertips of millions of people.”

In order to run Adobe Photoshop Touch, you need to have iOS 5 running on your device. The app is available for download in the App Store from Monday, February 27. Initially, the app was mistakenly being pushed in the App Store but pulled back instantly. However, it is now officially available for download in the App Store. Some users also commented that the iPad version of app “works better than the Android version.”

The Sony’s Xperia NXT series of Android smartphones began its journey with the Xperia S and the first to join Xperia S in the series is Xperia P, encased within aluminum unibody construction. The Xperia P sports a 4-inch touchscreen that Sony praises as its ‘Reality Display’. The company says that the screen’s WhiteMagic technology offers it wider viewing angles under bright light.

The P variant also sports a relatively slower 1.0GHz dual-core processor. It also features an 8-megapixel camera with Sony’s Fast Capture technology, with an ability to capture 1080p video. The device also features Sony’s NFC SmartTags that offers users an ability to swap series of settings for use in different conditions. The device is supposed to go on sale in second quarter of 2012.

Sony also reveals its Xperia smart dock into which one can plug the Xperia P in order to connect it to an HDTV with the help of HDMI.

Next to Xperia P, the second device to join the Xperia series of smartphones is Xepria U. It sports a dual-core 1GHz processor, a 3.5-inch ‘Reality Display’ screen and a 5-megapixel camera. It also includes some of the features of Xperia P. Like Xepria P, it is expected to make debut in the second quarter of this year.

Xperia P will be available in three, while Xperia U will be offered in two finishes. It is, however, not mentioned by Sony whether the smartphones run on Android 4.0 or Ice Cream Sandwich. Also, there are no clues given about the pricing of the devices.

Although, the claim made by the manufacturer is not as simple to calculate, but it probably has something to do with a K3V2 quad-core 1.2GHz/1.5GHz processor and the latest Google mobile operating system Ice Cream Sandwich.

The device also boasts off a 4.5-inch 720p HD display, with a 32-bit true color graphic processor and 330ppi, Dolby 5.1 Surround Sound and Audience earSmart voice technology. The device is enclosed within a 64mm × 8.9mm casing. The smartphone features dual-camera, an 8-megapixel camera facing rear and a 1.3-megapixel camera on the front. In addition to this, the smartphone also offers a 1080p full HD video-capturing and playback.

Considering the battery issues, Huawei has used an 1800mAh battery to offer a longer battery time that will last “for one or two days with normal usage.” Furthermore, the company has also claimed that proprietary power management technology pushes battery life by up to 30%. The smartphone will be offered in two colors, Black and White.

Ascend D Quad is not the only smartphone announced by the Chinese manufacturer, the company has also announced the Ascend D quad XL, featuring a 2500mAh battery to offer a “two or three days of normal usage,” and the Ascend D1, featuring a 1.5GHz dual-core processor with 1670mAh battery.

Initially, the Ascend D quad series is scheduled to launch in China, Australia, Europe, Asia-Pacific, North and South America and the Middle East somewhere around the second quarter, while the Ascend D1 is supposed to make debut in April.

In the meantime, The Verge has images of Huawei’s MediaPad 10 HD, an Android Ice Cream Sandwich tablet, featuring a 1080p display and an 8-megapixel camera in a super-thin 8.8mm thick casing.

Huawei hasn’t said anything about the prices of the devices yet.

The Korean company announced that its next Android Tablet will be the 10.1-inch Samsung Galaxy Note, also known as Galaxy Tab 2, replacing its previous tablet device Galaxy Tab. We have been waiting for this latest tablet for some time now. We have already seen a 7.0-inch version of the tab release just a week ago. Just like 5.0-inch Samsung Galaxy Note, these latest devices feature a stylus.

The Galaxy Tab 2 boasts off a 1280×800 resolution screen (the 7-inch model has a 1024×600 pixel screen), similar 1GHz dual-core processor, 1GB of RAM, dual camera – 3-megapixel on the rear and a VGA on the front for video calling. It is worth noting that the tablet doesn’t feature OLED screen this time.

It is speculated that both the 10.1 and 7.0-inch models can have 3G support (HSPA) or Wi-Fi only. Both will run the latest version of Google’s mobile operating system, Android 4.0 or Ice Cream Sandwich. The other features include Bluetooth 3.0, USB 2.0, Wi-Fi Direct, available in 8GB, 16GB and 32GB variants, upgradable with microSD card up to 32GB (64GB in total). The devices will go on sale in March. However, the company has not said anything about the pricing plan.

If you want to have a closer look at the device, Pocket-lint offers a good collection of images.

In addition to tablet device, the South Korean electronics giant has also announced the Galaxy Beam smartphone. The device boasts off a built-in projector that can purportedly beam an image onto a screen of up to 50-inches. The device is 12.5 mm thick and running Android 2.3. It also features a 1GHz dual-core processor and an 8GB of memory storage.

With 33.1%, Nokia accounts for about third of all Windows Phone shipments. It is the first time in company’s history that it has raised to top spot, beating Taiwanese vendor HTC. It is through the sales of Nokia Lumia 800 and Lumia 710 smartphones, launched back in November last year, that Nokia could be able to capture the top rank.

According to research firm, Nokia’s global Windows Phone shipments remains at 0.9 million units, while company itself announced in its Q4 financial report that it had sold more than 1 million units of Windows Phone handsets.

The Executive Director at Strategy Analytics, Neil Mawston, says that it is through pushing its Lumia devices in more retail locations and partner with more operators helped Nokia stimulate sales, but still points out that the company still has to go long way:

“Nokia is by no means out of the woods yet, and it is still on a long road to recovery, but capturing top spot in the Microsoft smartphone ecosystem is an encouraging baby-step forward for the company.”

Certainly, Nokia overtaking HTC is not a big surprise, as the Taiwanese company has been forced to go back to basics over the recent two quarters after its sales dropped following the increased competition from its major rivals, including Apple and Samsung.

In one of its statement, HTC said that all its focus is on ‘hero’ smartphones, with a view to consider different aspect thoroughly instead of releasing a large number of handsets with slightest of improvement in specifications. This is why company has to back off on its Windows Phone plans in 2012.

In addition to all this, the Finnish mobile manufacturer has an exclusive agreement with software giant Microsoft to license the Windows Phone platform. Nokia seems to be a potential Windows Phone vendor for Microsoft as it continues to show growth in sales of Windows Phone. Now the question is whether it is capable of facing a tough competition in the global smartphone market.

According to report from Shanghaiist blog that quotes a Sina report [Chinese], the social network is targeting country’s top five universities, including Tsinghua University in Beijing, as a part of its program to enlist 900 employees from all over the world.

The hired graduates need to move to United States, as social network’s aim isn’t to focus on China. Facebook is looking to hire candidates having good C++ and/or Java skills along with experience of Perl, PHP or Python.

Initially, candidates need to pass through two to three telephonic interviews and three face-to-face interviews. They also need to go through two rounds of coding on white boards to show their skills to qualify for a competitive package:

All new employees are expected to work in California and Seattle, with annual salaries of around $200,000 USD. Welfare and benefits will reportedly be on par with Google employees, while work visas and even US green cards also offered for future Facebookers [from China].

Some local reports suggest that Hangzhou-based Zhejiang University has confirmed Facebook’s intentions, but yet to get more details from the social network.

Although, recruitment of Chinese graduates not at all implies that the social network wants to step into the country, it will certainly have some positive consequences between the relations of the company and government officials on long-term basis. In an IPO documents, the company clearly said that it is skeptical whether it can make the compromises essential to please Chinese regulators.

The co-founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg is seemed to have some personal interest in China, as his girlfriend Priscilla Chan’s family has links there. He has also found learning Mandarin and spent some time in the country back in 2010.

Although, his visit to China was not official, but Bloomberg’s report suggested that he met with Baidu (a local equivalent to Google) and Sina (owner of China’s top microblog) during his visit.