News Byte

Flint Mobile Raises $3 Million in Capital for Mobile Payments App

Flint Mobile said it has raised $3 million in a first round of capital, and that it is launching its new mobile payments app, which enables merchants to process payments with a mobile phone. But rather than requiring a merchant to buy a card reader, the app allows the merchant to snap a picture of a credit card. The round, which will be used on product development and hiring, was led by Storm Ventures and True Ventures.

Sephora’s Not Afraid of Smartphone-Carrying Customers

To the contrary, Sephora is encouraging customers to use their phones in the store to help them shop.
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News Byte

Intuit’s GoPayment Mobile Credit-Card Reader Beats Square’s into Canada

Intuit will soon launch its mobile credit-card reader in Canada, beating the well-funded-and-recognized Square to the market. Both companies distribute devices that allow small-scale merchants to accept credit cards on a cellphone or tablet; so far, Square only operates in the U.S. Intuit, the publicly held company that sells other small-business resources, such as QuickBooks, said its GoPayment device will be available in Canada early this year; it plans to push into other international markets in the future.

A Gift to Developers: A Quarter of a Billion Apps Downloaded on Christmas

A record number of applications were downloaded on Dec. 25, making it a very “appy” Christmas for at least some mobile developers.
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Verizon Wireless and American Express Find an Intermediary Path to Mobile Payments

Verizon Wireless is announcing a partnership with American Express that will enable its 100-million-plus mobile subscribers to pay for goods online using their phone numbers.
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Nokia to Apple: From Hell's Heart I Stab at Thee

Nokia’s obsession with Apple has officially crossed over into the Ahabian. Aghast at the U.S. International Trade Commission’s ruling on its first complaint against Apple, Nokia has filed a second, accusing Apple of infringing its patents “in virtually all of its mobile phones, portable music players, tablets, and computers.”

Bubbly "Voice Twitter" Service Launches in the Philippines

I last wrote about Bubble Motion, provider of the Bubbly mobile messaging service, exactly a year ago. At the time, the company had 150,000 users. Today, it has more than seven million.

Square's Jack Dorsey Wants to Replace Everything, From the Receipt to the Register

From the San Francisco Chronicle offices where some of the newspaper’s local ad sales used to be, we caught up with Jack Dorsey, co-founder of Twitter and CEO of Square, who wants to redefine the payments process.

AT&T’s New Early-Termination Fee for the iPhone: $325

A word of warning to AT&T subscribers who would switch carriers when the company’s iPhone exclusivity deal with Apple finally ends: The cost of doing so will soon rise–substantially. Come June 1, AT&T is raising its early-termination fee on smartphones to $325 from $175.
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Nokia’s Biggest Problem? Symbian.

It has been almost three years since Apple’s iPhone arrived at market, and Nokia, the world’s largest mobile phone maker, has still failed to develop a worthy rival to it. Will the company ever figure this out or will it continue to play a slow game of catch-up in the smartphone market?

Nokia Slashes Prices

Will Apple Break Twitter? [UPDATED]

Nokia Reorg Actually "Job Rotation"

Nokia Reorg Actually “Job Rotation”