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The Governments That Want Facebook and Twitter to Hand Over Data   Facebook, for the first time, has detailed how many user data requests it receives from each country. And since Twitter does the same thing, we can compare the two rivals by a curious but revealing metric: how much governments want their data. Overall, data about Facebook users are much more coveted: The social network received at least 25,607 government requests in the first half of this year, compared with 1,113 for Twitter. That makes sense since Facebook is bigger, and Twitter stores less sensitive information about its users. There are simply more secrets hiding on Facebook.com. But the comparison gets more interesting when you look at specific countries and think of government data requests as an indicator of the social network’s perceived importance. For instance, Japan requested data from Twitter 87 times in the first six months of 2013; the country asked Facebook for data only once in the ...

What is Wrong With Firefox? As I write this column, my mouse pointer, whereever it is on the screen, is blinking incessantly. This happens when a webpage is loaded and a video someplace on the screen is paused. This isn't right. In some situations in Firefox, a paused or loaded video will be on the screen and a gray box will appear asking permission for some crappy tracker to use some of my memory. I always click deny. Most of the time, the box reappears and asks again. Does it think I was kidding? The worst part about this box, when it appears, is that the cursor completely disappears and I have to pound the control key to make the "where's the pointer" target appear. I have had to set this feature as a default for finding a missing cursor. So there it is, the circle, not the pointer. I guesstimate where the arrow might be and hammer on the deny button. One click finally takes and the box goes away. This is bullcrap. The stupid box is cle...

Twitter Update Makes It Easier to Follow Conversations Twitter released an update Wednesday that makes it easier to keep up with conversations on the social network. Now, Twitter.com and Twitter’s mobile apps show conversations in chronological order. Tweets in a conversation are connected using a vertical line. Up to three tweets in a sequence are shown connected on your home timeline, so you can catch up on a whole conversation at a glance. If three tweets aren't enough, you can tap on any single tweet to see all of the replies, including any responses from people you don’t currently follow. Whole conversations can be shared with friends via email from Twitter.com, or as individual tweets from the iPhone and Android apps. Wednesday’s update also expands on Twitter’s abuse button. Already available for iPhone, now you can report individual tweets for abuse or spam from the Android app and Twitter.com. Check out the video below for a quick look at how the new...

Your dream iPhone What you want in the next iPhone (pictures) We asked what you wanted to see in the next iPhone, and you responded with several ideas that may or may not make it into Apple's next smartphone, including better battery life and a bigger screen. Here we give you a full visual rundown of how that dream iPhone might look, thanks to a few photo mockups. At 4 inches, the iPhone 5's screen is bigger and taller than all of Apple's previous iPhones. From what you told us, that's still not big enough. From our poll, 31 percent of people asked for a 4.7-inch screen on the next iPhone. When we asked what materials you want Apple to use for the back of the next iPhone, an all-metal backing won with 39 percent of the vote, followed by a glass backing like we saw on the iPhone 4 and 4S. Since the aluminum casing can't shatter like glass, it seems obvious why it is the top choice. Plastic earned the fewest votes, only 6 percent, but if re...