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YouTube will be radically redesigning its comments section, a section which is globally infamous as being a cesspool for racism, anti-Semitic comments, sexism, homophobia and overall terrible grammar and fanboyism.

Starting today, the comments section will now be transformed into "conversations that matter to you," and will be tied to the commenter's Google+ account.

Google says the new goal is for relevance, not recency. YouTube has removed the reverse chronological order for new comments, where the latest comment shows at the top. For popular videos, like music, the comments can reach tens of thousands, making finding relevant conversations almost impossible to find.

Nundu Janakiram, a YouTube product manager, admits the comments needed much improvement. The new design will bring the more interesting discussions to the top and more relevant to you, such as posts from the video's creator, and people in your Google+ circles. More active discussions will be threaded, as well.

How did the company decide what is relevant? "This is a very complex problem," says Janakiram (via Verge). "Trying to surface meaningful conversations is something that takes work." They company used existing signals (up/downvotes) and completely new ones, 'like the level of engagement in threaded conversations.'

Markus "Notch" Persson, creator of Minecraft, had nothing but love for Valve's new Linux-powered operating system.

Read the tweets here, and read our original article on SteamOS after the jump.

Seriously, this overly drawn out steambox announcement thing is amazing news. Win8's been worrying me. <3 valve

-- Markus Persson (@notch) September 23, 2013

Valve is saving the entire gaming world, but I all I can do is mumble passive aggressively about crowbars.

-- Markus Persson (@notch) September 23, 2013

Valve has announced SteamOS, a linux-based free operating system aimed at bringing PC gaming into the living room.

Set to be available soon, SteamOS will be free forever and will help to bring better PC gaming into the living room. Not only does Valve claim to have achieved significant performance increases in graphics performance (and is working now on audio and reducing input latecy) but you can also stream games from your PC or Mac to a living room "machine" running SteamOS.

Sony and Taco Bell have announced a new promotion in which gamers can receive free PS4s every 15 minutes from September 26th to November 10th.

The PS4 goes on sale on November 15th.

Says Sony: "You have six weeks to head over to your local Taco Bell for your chance to 'Play the Future First.' Taco Bell will mark their $5 Buck Boxes– which include a Crunchwrap, Crunchy Taco, Burrito Supreme and medium fountain drink – with a special code that you can text in for a chance to win a PS4 prize pack."

The prize pack includes the console, a copy of 'Knack,' and a one year PS Plus membership.

For more information, check here.

Over the last few years, Google has acquiesced to Hollywood and the music industry, blacklisting almost fifty piracy-related terms from appearing in Autocomplete and Instant Services.

According to Freak, Google has recently unbanned at least two of those terms, the most popular clients, 'BitTorrent' and 'uTorrent.'

BitTorrent Inc., the company behind the client, has long shown disappointment that Google labeled them as "piracy related."

For the last few months, the company has continuously pleaded to Google to get the name removed from filters, and those efforts appear to have paid off.

"This is almost certainly a result of that improving understanding helped by products like BitTorrent Bundle and BitTorrent Sync. They help those who are confused about BitTorrent understand that it is not a piracy website," a BitTorrent Inc. spokesperson added.

Electronics giants Samsung and LG have ended their year-long dispute over display tech patents.

The patents had led to a number of brutal lawsuits between the rivals.

"It was agreed that we two should focus more on cementing our leadership in the global market by cooperation, instead of engaging in all-consuming patent disputes," Samsung Display said in a statement.

"What's most important for both of us is upgrading our competitiveness globally," LG added.

The tech in question was mainly for LCD and OLED hardware, and the companies accused each other of stealing key engineers, as well.

According to research firm IDC, the Chinese smartphone market will likely reach over 450 million units shipped in 2014.

The major increase will be driven by new government issued 4G licenses, and the oft-rumored addition of the iPhone to China Mobile, which has over 700 million subscribers, more than most of the world combined.

For this year, IDC says 120 million 4G-enabled smartphones will ship, with total shipments reaching 360 million.

Samsung remains the leader in the country, with 18.5 percent market share, followed by Lenovo at 9.8 percent. Apple was in sixth place, but is expected to gain a decent percent of share following the release of their iPhone 5C and 5S this week.

Apple has declined to provide sales figures for China for the new devices, so far.

Spotify has expanded to Argentina, Greece, Turkey and Taiwan, meaning the platform is now available in 32 nations.

The music streaming company first expanded to Asia in April with releases in Singapore, Hong Kong and Malaysia, and Taiwan will play a big part in the expansion to the "Mandarin pop" industry.

Desktop streaming in the nation is free and premium (unlimited/mobile play) will cost $4.99 (NT$149), half of what it costs in the U.S. and other countries.

Adds Spotify: "We're delighted to announce that Spotify is available in Argentina, Taiwan, Greece and Turkey starting today. There are millions of songs on Spotify – from old favourites to the latest hits. Just hit play to stream anything you like!"

Apple recently revealed that 9 million new iPhone 5S and 5C were sold over launch weekend, beating out last year's iPhone 5 launch which saw 5 million units sold.

It appears, probably to Apple's delight, that the high-end 5S is clearly outpacing its cheaper plastic brother around the globe.

Analytics firm Localytics says that for every iPhone 5C being activated in the U.S., there are 3.4 iPhone 5S units doing the same. In Japan, that factor is 3.7x, and there are similar figures in other nations.

The 5C is still widely available (with one day shipping time from the Apple online store), while the 5S has a shipping date of October, at the earliest.

So far, the 5C, which lacks 64-bit processing and the new fingerprint scanning Touch ID but has colorful varieties, seems to be a flop (by Apple standards) but it may also be too early to tell given that there is still stock of the iPhone 5 out there.

In addition to showing off two new tablets today, Microsoft also unveiled new and updated accessories for the devices.

The Type Cover 2 now comes with backlit keys, the Power Cover adds typing ability and will add 2.5 times more battery life, and the new docking station pretty much turns your tablet into a full-fledged PC.

Via Microsoft (with pictures added):

Touch Cover 2. Thinner and lighter than the original Touch Cover, measuring only 2.75 mm thin, Touch Cover 2 features backlit keys for even better readability. Touch Cover 2 is more rigid, registers keystrokes with greater accuracy and features updated sensors that support a variety of gestures across the entire keyboard. Touch Cover 2 has an estimated retail price of $119.99. It will be available for pre-order on Sept. 24 in all markets where Surface devices are available for pre-order.

Alongside their announcement of a Surface RT sequel, the company also unveiled the sequel to their flagship, the Surface Pro 2.

The Pro 2, which comes with the full version of Windows including legacy app support for hundreds of thousands of your favorite applications, has seen its share of hardware updates, as well.

For the display, it remains a 10.6-inch panel with 1080p resolution, but Microsoft says the tablet has 50 percent better color accuracy and better graphics performance.

Under the hood is a 1.6GHz Core i5 Haswell processor which will give users 75 percent better battery life than the previous model, a huge boost. When added to the Power Cover (check our other post), the tablet will have over 300 percent better battery life than the first-generation model. For connectivity, the device has three USB 2 ports, a single USB 3 port, mini DisplayPort and Ethernet. There is an included stylus, as well.

Microsoft used a press event today to unveil the new Surface Pro 2 and Surface 2 (sequel to the Surface RT) along with a plethora of new accessories and updated keyboards.

Surface 2, which comes on the heels of a huge writedown due to excess Surface RT units, is vastly improved from its predecessor.

The tablet will now feature a 1080p ClearType display, a Nvidia Tegra 4 quad-core processor (with 'dramatically' increased CPU speed, 25 percent better battery life, a USB 3.0 port and improved bus speeds for the memory and Wi-Fi. Additionally, it is lighter and thinner and built from two pieces of magnesium, as opposed to three.

Microsoft says the tablet should run 300 percent faster than the RT, which was generally panned by critics and consumers alike for its lackluster performance.

Finally, Microsoft also says it improved the camera sensor to manage the light better when using Skype or other webcam videos. Surface buyers will also receive 200GB of free SkyDrive storage, for two years, and a year of free international calling and Skype hotspot access. The base product (with 32GB) will sell for $449 and go on sale on October 22nd. Pre-orders go live tomorrow.

BlackBerry Messenger (BBM) was supposed to launch on iOS and Android devices over the weekend, but technical problems have pushed it back to next week on the platforms.

The issue stems from an unreleased app for Android that leaked to file sharing websites before the weekend. The app had a known flaw that resulted in volumes of data traffic orders of magnitude higher than normal for each active user, so it ended up really hammering BlackBerry's systems and putting the whole roll-out on ice.

The version that was supposed to roll-out to Android on Saturday fixed the known issue, but unfortunately for BlackBerry, it could not block users of the faulty leaked app. As users of the bad app neared a million, BlackBerry pulled the plug altogether.

"The team is now focused on adjusting the system to completely block this unreleased version of the Android app when we go live with the official BBM for Android app," wrote Andrew Bocking, head of BBM.

"We are also making sure that the system is reinforced to handle this kind of scenario in the future. While this may sound like a simple task – it's not. This will take some time and I do not anticipate launching this week."

A judge has found that HTC Corp. violated patents held by Nokia with several of its smartphone and tablet products.

Nokia filed a complaint with the International Trade Commission (ITC) against HTC last year, alleging that it violated patents it holds with several of its tech products, including the HTC Amaze 4G, the Inspire 4G, Flyer, Jetstream, Radar 4G, Rezound and Sensation 4G.

A judge has agreed with Nokia, in a preliminary ruling for ITC finding that HTC violated two patents related to signal technology in the devices.

A final decision from the ITC is expected on January 23rd, 2014.

The ITC is approached constantly with such complaints, because it has the power to block products from being imported into the United States if found to be infringing.

A crowd-funded contest to hack Apple's Touch ID has ended with a verified hack that emerged during the weekend.

We reported on Friday that a website had been setup - IsTouchIDHackedYet.com - by security researcher Nick Depetrillo and Robert David Graham as a crowd-funded contest to see who could spoof the Touch ID system into accepting a fingerprint lifted from an item.

On Sunday, the Chaos Computer Club claimed that one of its hackers had managed to spoof the system, and now it appears to be verified as legitimate.

"Big congratulations to Starbug (of the Chaos Computer Club), the first to demonstrate the hack! Starbug is giving the challenge pledge funds to Raumfahrtagentur, a spinoff from CCC-Berlin," the hack challenge website reads now.

"We don't have exactly the video we wanted from him, but others have confirmed it, including Marc Rogers (@marcwrogers) and the team of Mudge Zatko and Dominick Rizzo. We are in contact with Starbug, he's working on the video for us (apparently he's got a day job that delays things), but since we have several confirmations, it's pointless to hold things up."

Canadian smartphone maker BlackBerry has agreed in principle to a $4.7 billion takeover deal led by Fairfax.

Fairfax Financial Holdings Limited already owns a 10 percent stake in BlackBerry, and now it seeks to bring the company under private ownership in a deal that would pay shareholders $9 per share. The consortium would acquire for cash all of the outstanding shares of BlackBerry not held by Fairfax.

Back in August, BlackBerry formed a Special Committee to review strategic alternatives for the company, and it has advised the BlackBerry Board of Directors to approve the terms of the LOI (letter of intent agreement) under which the consortium would acquire BlackBerry and take the company private subject to a number of conditions, including due diligence, negotiation and execution of a definitive agreement and customary regulatory approvals.

Diligence is expected to be complete by November 4, 2013.

During the Diligence period, BlackBerry is permitted to enter into negotiations for alternative deals.

Once a pioneer in smartphones, BlackBerry has struggled to regain its position in the market due to the emergence and rapid growth of iPhones and Android devices. It has made efforts to fight its downward trend with the release of new devices running a revamped BlackBerry 10 operating system, but according to reports it has a stock of over $1 billion worth of unsold phones.