Two more advances for Facebook in its ongoing quest to make its service ever more sticky and useful for its 800 million-plus base of subscribers: the company has officially started to roll out its Timeline feature, and it looks like Netflix (NSDQ: NFLX) has moved one step closer to getting…

What will be the most-used medium for consuming mobile content in the future: the web or apps? It’s a question that gets hotly debated, and a pair of funding deals underscores the fact that people are continuing to back both horses. Urban Airship, which adds functionality to apps, has picked…

Our neighbors up north can now shop at the Canadian *Google* eBookstore, which is open for business today.

Even since BlackBerry users lost service for three days in mid-October, many have speculated that Research In Motion will be smacked with a class action suit. Well, two class actions have now been filed but there are good reasons to think RIM’s legal department is not wringing its hands just…

It looks like Apple (NSDQ: AAPL) is once again rewriting the books on what it is that makes a smartphone sell. Those who thought that the iPhone 4S would be something of a disappointment—it looks just like its predecessor, and many had been anticipating something more dramatic—may have to eat…

There’s no question that apps have become a global phenomenon in the mobile world—and who doesn’t want to catapult a cute red bird onto some logs to kill a pig? But not all apps are as wildly successful as Angry Birds. So just as importantly, when it comes to what…

Amazon (NSDQ: AMZN) thrives on scale for its business model. But when it comes to launching new products, the company has often taken a cautious—and, some might argue, slow—approach in rolling them out worldwide. That was the case with the Kindle, which took nearly two years to make its way…

A pretty troubling set of numbers out for RIM (NSDQ: RIMM) today. The Canada-based handset maker says that it has only shipped 200,000 PlayBook tablets, and sales in BlackBerry smartphones were dismal, too: the company has sold only 10.6 million handsets, well short of original estimates of 11.9 million.

		EPS*	Rev. vs Q310	Net Inc. vs Q310
Research in Motion	Release		10%	52%

* vs. Analysts' Estimates: Beat Met Missed

As promised, the streaming side of Netflix (NSDQ: NFLX) has made its way south. The service went live in Brazil today with Netflix Brasil (announced here in Portuguese), with plans to roll out across Latin America and the Caribbean over the next week. By Sept. 12, Netflix expects to have…

Another day, another patent suit is hitting the courts. Today the Canada-based patent holder WiLAN has filed a suit in a U.S. court against a host of big-name tech companies, including Apple (NSDQ: AAPL) and HTC, alleging patent infringements related to WiLAN patents in WiFi, LTE, CDMA and HSPA technologies.…

A look at some of the big stories in mobile today: » AT&T looks like it is prepping for a “no” on its deal to buy T-Mobile, now developing a two-track plan. (via Reuters)

It’s taken a little while, but it looks like RIM (NSDQ: RIMM) might have finally woken up and smelled the coffee in the social media world and started to leverage some of the power it’s already established through one of its most viral products, BlackBerry Messenger.

A look at some of the big stories in mobile today: » RIM launched three new BlackBerry devices today, extensions of its Curve range. The 9350, 9360 and 9370 are aimed at the mass market and will be priced economically when they begin to ship worldwide in September (this month in…

Bit by bit, we are starting to get a better idea of what Nokia (NYSE: NOK) plans to do to reassert itself in the mobile phone market in the months ahead. In the past few days, we’ve learned of an operator partnership with China Mobile; a new focus at a…

Apple (NSDQ: AAPL) has all but cornered the market for tablets in the U.S., say researchers at Forrester, who predict that its iPad will take 80 percent of all tablet sales this year in North America. But that’s not entirely the case in Europe, it seems.

Those “cost optimization” plans promised by Research in Motion (NSDQ: RIMM) last month have kicked into gear. The company will lay off 10 percent of its global workforce—roughly 2,000—with notices started in Canada, the U.S. and some other countries this week, and reorganize some of the deck chairs at the…

Our look at some of the big stories in mobile today: —GetJar: Apple (NSDQ: AAPL) is antsy about GetJar’s use of “app store,” and GetJar looks like it is trying to fight back. (via GetJar blog)

A look at some of the big stories in mobile today: Patents roundup: As expected, Canadian authorities are starting their due diligence on the $4.5 billion Nortel patent sale to see if it needs further regulatory inquiry. Meawhile, a closer look at Microsoft’s patent royalty collecting ways.

Nortel’s announcement late Thursday that it has sold a portfolio of 6,000 patents to a consortium consisting of Apple (NSDQ: AAPL), EMC, Ericsson (NSDQ: ERIC), Microsoft (NSDQ: MSFT), Research In Motion and Sony (NYSE: SNE) for $4.5 billion has meant that another key party interested in the patents, Google (NSDQ:…