Mobile Minutes: Pandora?s growth slows; free data; Microsoft tops estimates; Adobe
Pandora Media Inc. declined the most in three months after the largest Internet radio service reported user growth slowed to 5.2 percent in the third quarter. Active listeners for the Oakland, California-based company grew to 76.5 million from 72.7 million a year ago, when Pandora reported user growth of 25 percent.
Earlier this year, Dan Check, the vice president of technology at Slate, was looking for ways to increase traffic to the online magazine?s podcasts. After a bit of brainstorming, he decided to try paying the toll.
Microsoft Corp.?s quarterly sales topped estimates on cloud-computing growth and recovering personal-computer sales, as Chief Executive Officer Satya Nadella shows progress in his effort to revive the company. Revenue at the ailing Nokia handset business, which Microsoft acquired earlier this year, also topped projections, while sales of Azure cloud software and Web-based versions of Office programs more than doubled.
Adobe recently released a video in which it showed off forward-looking features for its suite of apps on the tablet. In the video, you see a woman manipulating a chair?s orientation just by twisting her hand in the air, you see paint being splattered from a smartphone onto a tablet and a circular vector drawing bending a line in real time.