Webwire: Sony said to slash 10k jobs; Facebook buys Instagram for $1b

Staff writer??|?? April 10, 2012

telecomseurope.net

Sony will reportedly cut 10,000 jobs, or around 6% of its workforce, in a bid to return to profitability after four years of losses.

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Facebook will pay $1 billion to acquire Instagram, a free smartphone app for applying sepia and other filters to photos, and allowing users to share the results.

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Hacker collective Anonymous has threatened to launch new online attacks on Chinese UK government sites every weekend, in the wake of the group's claimed disruption of Home Office websites in a DDoS attack last week.

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RIM will remove the ability for BlackBerry PlayBook users to sideload apps onto the device without using BlackBerry App World. The company wants to prevent app piracy and avoid duplicating conditions in the Android app arena, which a RIM VP called a ?chaotic cesspool.?

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AT&T will sell a majority stake in its Yellow Pages phone directory division to Cerberus Capital Management for $750 million in cash and a $200 million note.

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A financial analyst has downgraded his rating on Apple stock to ?neutral? from ?buy,? in response to concerns that mobile operators are getting sick of offering huge subsidies for the iPhone.

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Language software maker Rosetta Stone has been cleared to take its legal battle with Google - covering Google selling trademarked Rosetta Stone terms as AdWords to competitors ? to a US appeals court.

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A class action lawsuit filed in the US by a marketing company accuses major mobile operators of conspiring to set up a system that requires entities that send high volumes of text messages to lease a special number and pay excessive fees.

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