China consumers to spend more in November 11 ‘Singles Day’ shopping spree: Nielsen

Most online consumers in China will spend more during the Nov. 11 “Singles' Day” shopping promotion this year than they did last year, according to the results of a survey by consultancy Nielsen Holdings made available to Reuters on Wednesday. In a survey of more than 1,000 internet users in China this month, 56 percent said that they would spend more on Singles Day this year compared to 2014

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LinkedIn profit beats as recruitment services revenue jumps

(Reuters) – LinkedIn Corp reported higher-than-expected quarterly revenue and profit as it earned more from its recruitment services business and benefited from the acquisition of training video company lynda.com. Shares of LinkedIn, the operator of the biggest social networking site for professionals, rose about 10 percent in extended trading on Thursday. Revenue in the company's Talents Solutions business, which connects recruiters with job candidates, rose 46 percent to $502 million in the third quarter.

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Twitter announces layoffs as CEO Dorsey looks to revive growth

The layoffs, primarily in the company's engineering and product functions, come a week after Dorsey took over as permanent CEO. Shares of Twitter, which had about 4,100 employees globally as of June 30, rose as much as 6.7 percent to $30.68 on Tuesday. “We feel strongly that engineering will move much faster with a smaller and nimbler team, while remaining the biggest percentage of our workforce,” Dorsey said in a letter to employees

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UAE’s Etihad Airways signs $700 million IT deal with IBM

Abu Dhabi's Etihad Airways has signed a 10-year $700 million deal with IBM for a range of information technology services and infrastructure, the companies said on Tuesday. The state-owned airline with equity stakes in Alitalia [CAITLA.UL] and Air Berlin among others chose IBM to move its IT infrastructure to cloud-based platforms to serve its clients better, a statement said.

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Charter Communications nears $55 billion deal for Time Warner Cable – sources

Time Warner Cable Inc is nearing an agreement to be acquired by smaller peer Charter Communications Inc for about $55 billion, combining the second and third largest U.S. cable operators, people familiar with the matter said on Monday. A deal would create a major rival to Comcast Corp, the biggest operator in the U.S.

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Cyberbullying is avenged by a digital ghost in horror ‘Unfriended’

“Unfriended,” out in U.S. theaters on Friday, follows six high school students gathering on the video conferencing platform Skype on the anniversary of the suicide of a fellow student, who killed herself after an embarrassing video of her was posted online. Filmed entirely as if the events are unfolding on a computer screen, a mysterious entity joins the group’s Skype conversation and begins to coerce secrets out of each friend, before exacting gory revenge one by one, as the others watch in horror.

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Online gambling company GVC interested in ‘something like’ Bwin

Online gambling company GVC Holdings Plc is in talks for potential acquisitions and “something like” rival Bwin.party would be of interest, Chief Executive Kenneth Alexander said. Consolidation activity in the gambling industry has gathered steam as an increase in taxes and regulations in some of the biggest markets hurts companies

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CIA to make sweeping changes, focus more on cyber ops: agency chief

By Mark Hosenball WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The Central Intelligence Agency will make one of the biggest overhauls in its nearly 70-year history, aimed in part at sharpening its focus on cyber operations and incorporating digital innovations, CIA director John Brennan said. Brennan said he is creating new units within the CIA, called “mission centers,” intended to concentrate the agency's focus on specific challenges or geographic areas, such as weapons proliferation or Africa

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