INTC, AMD, QCOM, ARMH, MU, SNDK, BRCM, MRVL, NVDA, TXN, AMAT, SMH,

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“Add another name to the list of critics concerned with attempts to rewrite the International Telecommunication Union to give governments control of the Internet: Silicon Valley’s Mozilla now officially opposes the ITU.

Mozilla, the makers of the highly successful Firefox Web browser for Macs, PCs and smart phones, have come out to condemn a top-secret meeting in Dubai this week that could lead to changes with how the world is wired to the Internet.

The details of the closed-door discussions being held between members of the United Nation’s World Conference on International Telecommunications (WCIT) this week in the United Arab Emirates remains a secret, and that’s exactly why Mozilla is speaking up. In a plea posted on Mozilla.org, the developers write, “The issue isn’t whether our governments, the UN or even the ITU should play a role in shaping the Web. The problem is that they are trying to do it behind closed doors, in secret, without us.”

“The Web lets us speak out, share and connect around the things that matter. It creates new opportunities, holds governments to account, breaks through barriers and makes cats famous. This isn’t a coincidence. It’s because the Web belongs to all of us,” insists Mozilla. “We all get a say in how it’s built.”

Now in order to raise awareness of what the WCIT can do by rewriting the ITU, Mozilla has released an “Engagement Kit” in order to get people around the globe talking about what could happen to the Web without their input ever being considered.

“Mozilla has made it our mission to keep the power of the web in people’s hands,” the developers say. ”

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“Internet analyst Mary Meeker released new data showing a changing of the tech guard and a Darwinian survival of the fittest — Microsoft is being eclipsed by Apple, while Google’s Android system is showing even more remarkable worldwide growth.

Meeker, whose annual “State of the Internet” report is widely followed in Silicon Valley and beyond, validated the notion that smartphones are a transformative phenomenon. But the disruption they represent to the communications chain may be just beginning.

Her data show a dramatic shift away from Windows-powered Intel machines (Wintel) in less than a decade.”

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“According to IDC’s latest report on smart device shipments, we’re in for a record-breaking holiday season. The analyst firm is expecting device shipments to grow 19.2% over third quarter levels, and 26.5% year-over-year to reach 362 million shipments in the fourth quarter of 2012 with a total market value of $169.2 billion dollars.  In Q3, worldwide smart device shipments grew 17.1% year-over-year, also setting a record, with 303.6 million shipments valued at $140.4 billion dollars….”

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“Don’t look now e-commerce, but m-commerce has arrived.

So says EBay‘s vice president of mobile Steve Yankovich, who told CNBC’s“Squawk on the Street” that the Thanksgiving weekend kickoff of this shopping season saw more than double the transactions on the company’s mobile platform than last year.

“Mobile growth has been phenomenal,” said Yankovich. “Think of only four years back — no one thought about mobile at all. Now we expect to do $10 billion globally on eBay Mobile.”

As mobile devices become increasingly ubiquitous — smartphone shipments are expected to be up 45 percent compared with last year, reaching 718 million new units globally, according to IDC Worldwide Quarterly Mobile Phone Tracker — for many, they are the go-to vehicle for shopping…”

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“Nokia Oyj (NOK), the Finnish mobile-phone maker trying to win back customers of Apple Inc. (AAPL)’s iPhone and devices using Google Inc. (GOOG)’s Android, unveiled a version of its flagship smartphone for China’s largest wireless carrier.

China Mobile Ltd. (941) agreed to carry the Lumia 920T, which is compatible with the country’s homegrown TD-SCDMA technology that powers the carrier’s network, the companies said in a statement today. The handset, the first Lumia based on Microsoft Corp. (MSFT)’s Windows Phone 8 software for the Chinese market, will cost 4,599 yuan ($739) without a contract and will go on sale before the end of this month.”

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“Research firm Nielsen and NM Incite, a joint venture between Nielsen and McKinsey, todaypublished a comprehensive look at the state of social media ecosystem in 2012. Consumers now spend around 20 percent of their total time online using social networks via their personal computers, and 30 percent of their time online visiting social networking on mobile, the report found. In addition, time spent on social media in the U.S. across both platforms grew 37 percent to reach 121 billion minutes in July 2012, up from 88 billion minutes in July 2011.

Mobile devices are aiding in growing these numbers, with consumers’ time spent using social media mobile apps and mobile websites accounting for 63 percent of the year-over-year growth. Forty-six percent of social media users say they use their smartphone to access social media, and 16 percent say they use social media on a tablet.

…”

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Technology changes on a dime. For those of you looking for new ideas or areas to invest in; here is some tech trends expected to take place in 2013.

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“Online retailers are poised for a record $43.4 billion holiday sales season as shoppers increasingly rely on social networks and mobile devices to find and buy merchandise.

Internet sales will grow 17 percent from a year earlier and make up more than 10 percent of U.S. retail spending, excluding gas, food and cars in the last two months of the year, saidAndrew Lipsman, vice president of industry analysis at ComScore Inc. (SCOR) That compares with $29.2 billion spent online during the same period in 2007, when electronic commerce made up 7.4 percent of total spending.”

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“The U.S. International Trade Commission will review a judge’s decision which found that Apple did not violate patents owned by Samsung Electronics in making the iPod touch, iPhone and iPad.

An administrative law judge at the ITC had said in a preliminary ruling in September that Apple was innocent of violating the patents. The ITC, which could have opted to simply uphold the judge’s decision, said that it would take up the matter. A final decision is expected in January.

If Apple is found to infringe, its devices can be banned for sale in the U.S.

Apple and Samsung have taken their bruising patent disputes to some 10 countries as they vie for market share in the booming mobile industry.”

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Smartphone plays have been a theme all over The PPT and 12631 for quite some time. There is still time to catch a ride on this tsunami.

LVLT, TKLC, STM, ONNN, ALU, TSYS, ARMH, CIEN, BRCD and AMD.

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2:17PM EST October 8. 2012 – The media business eats itself. General-interest magazines, national television networks and all-purpose portals are always succeeded by an ever-narrower special-interest approach.This has tended to happen over a reasonably long span of time, a generation or two, but in an ever-quickening world, the term du jour is the “disassembling” of Facebook, which, arguably to its detriment, has just added its billionth monthly user.

Not only is Facebook challenged by its inability to grow advertising revenue fast enough — the primary culprit in its 50% share-price plunge — but now it’s facing a carve-up of the social experience.

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“WASHINGTON (AP) — American companies should avoid doing business with China’s two leading technology firms because they pose a national security threat to the United States, the House Intelligence Committee is warning in a report to be issued Monday.

The panel says U.S. regulators should block mergers and acquisitions in this country by Huawei Technologies Ltd. and ZTE Corp, among the world’s leading suppliers of telecommunications gear and mobile phones.

Reflecting U.S. concern over cyber-attacks traced to China, the report also recommends that U.S. government computer systems not include any components from the two firms because that could pose an espionage risk.”

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“Up to now, the European Commission has kept a relatively light position on where it stands with cloud services — putting more effort into the wider issues like broadband and mobile regulation and ensuring that users all get a fair deal as these services continue to grow. Today that changed, as the EC unveiled a high-level cloud services strategy, with the aim of adding €160 billion ($206 billion) to the region’s economy by 2020, equivalent to 1% of total GDP. Plans include improving interoperability standards; setting up lists of “trustworthy” cloud providers; taking a part in regulating how service level agreements (SLAs) should work; and creating a formalized structure for how governments and other public bodies in the region should procure in cloud services: the public sector accounts for 20% of all IT spend in the European Union.

Some will undoubtedly argue that government intervention in cloud services, especially at this relatively early stage in their development, may actually slow down rather than speed up innovation in the area.”

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Reports early Monday from China suggest that a mass disturbance or riots may have broken out at a Foxconn factory in the Chinese city of Taiyuan.

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Apple Inc. released its latest iPhone which helped to lift technology stocks in Asia. Commodities and energy stocks followed suit.

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“Intel’s mobile chipsets have popped up in a handfulof devices over the past few months, but Motorola — arguably the biggest of Intel’s smartphone partners — has been content to keep quiet about the fruits of its efforts longer than others.

Well, that wait is finally over. Motorola officially revealed the Intel-powered RAZR i at a (relatively brief) press event in London today, and as early rumors foretold it looks nearly identical to the recently-released RAZR M.

Seriously, not even Motorola could tell them apart — the two phones look so similar that Motorola Europe erroneously used an image of the Verizon phone in its announcement photo on Facebook. Way to go, guys.”

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“Today, Twitter’s CEO Dick Costolo announced anew design with a focus on profile pages and an iPad update on the TODAY Show, live. The show teased “big changes” coming to Twitter, and drew it out pretty well giving a company tour.

The company announced that there are over 140 million users, with 340 million tweets per day, currently. Twitter also has an $8B valuation, which is just massive, not to mention a whopping 900 employees in San Francisco alone.

At times, this felt like a commercial for Twitter, discussing the free snacks they get.

“Twitter brings you closer to the action and your heroes” said Costolo.”

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“This is my personal vendetta against the broken healthcare system,” Ari Tulla tells me, mid-pitch, while standing on the sidewalk after a recentTechCrunch event in Redwood City. He’s talking about BetterDoctor, a startup he co-founded last year after struggling to find the best, local physicians in San Francisco during a series of family medical emergencies. Ari left his position as the head of Nokia’s App Studios not long thereafter, teaming up with Nokia’s Chief Architect Tapio Tolvanen to pursue BetterDoctor.”

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