Twitter

Ron Conway is a Silicon Valley startup's best friend

The prolific angel investor has rarely met an Internet startup he didn't like. When it comes to picking the next big thing, there's a right way and a wrong way. And then there's the Conway.

FORTUNE -- The rooftop deck of Ron Conway's San Francisco apartment building is packed with a random and seemingly incongruous assortment of tech A-listers, celebrities, and sports stars snacking on hors d'oeuvres and sipping fine wines. MORE

Today in Tech: Will Facebook file for IPO today?

Fortune's curated selection of tech stories from the last 24 hours. Sign up to get the round-up delivered to you each and every day.

* If the flurry of recent reports prove correct, Facebook could file for an IPO later today, seeking to raise up to $5 billion. (CNNMoney)

* Amazon (AMZN) announced its latest earnings and while revenues climbed 35% to nearly $17.4 billion, the figure was at least a billion dollars less than MORE

Today in Tech: Did the Kindle Fire sell better than expected?

Fortune's curated selection of tech stories from the last 24 hours. Sign up to get the round-up delivered to you each and every day.

"Piracy may not be a bad thing: it can get us more business at the end of the day."
-- Mikael Hed, CEO of Angry Birds-maker Rovio Mobile (The Guardian)

* Stifel Nicolaus analyst Jordan Rohan raised his estimates for sales of the Kindle Fire during the fourth quarter from five MORE

Today in Tech: Twitter's new censorship ability

Fortune's curated selection of tech stories from the last 24 hours. Sign up to get the round-up delivered to you each and every day.

* Twitter now has the ability to censor tweets or accounts in certain countries if legally required, a move some writers see as a "huge setback and disappointment." "As we continue to grow internationally, we will enter countries that have different ideas about the contours of freedom of expression," the MORE

Today in Tech: Silicon Valley salaries rise

Fortune's curated selection of tech stories from the last 24 hours. Sign up to get the round-up delivered to you each and every day.

* Google (GOOG) is still getting flack for its recently-introduced "Search Plus Your World" feature, which emphasizes Google+ over Twitter and Facebook in Google search. While the move would have likely been controversial regardless, the fact that Google has always positioned itself as being "unbiased and objective" doesn't help its cause. MORE

Today in Tech: Did the Kindle Fire steal the iPad's holiday thunder?

Fortune's curated selection of tech stories from the last 24 hours. Sign up to get the round-up delivered to you each and every day.

* Did the Kindle Fire steal sales away from the iPad this holiday? Morgan Keegan analyst Travis McCourt says Apple (AAPL) may have sold as many as two million less units thanks to Amazon (AMZN). McCourt estimates Amazon may have moved between 4-5 million of its own $199 tablet. (All Things MORE

Today in Tech: Apple compromises on iAds

Fortune's curated selection of tech stories from the last 24 hours. Sign up to get the round-up delivered to you each and ever

"What we see is that youth are pretty much fed up with iPhones. ... Also, many are not happy with the complexity of Android and the lack of security. So we do increasingly see that the youth who want to be on the cutting edge and try something new MORE

Today in Tech: Salman Rushdie takes on Facebook

Fortune's curated selection of newsworthy tech stories from the last 24 hours. Sign up to get the round-up delivered to you every day.

* Warren Buffett, CEO of Berkshire Hathaway, told CNBC that his company spent about $10.7 billion this year to buy 64 million IBM (IBM) shares, acquiring a bold 5.5% stake in the company. (Fortune)

* Author Salman Rushdie raised a ruckus on Twitter yesterday after Facebook deactivated his account, then later MORE

Today in Tech: Sony predicts another big sales loss

Fortune's curated selection of newsworthy tech stories from the last 24 hours. Sign up to get the round-up delivered to you every day.

* Sony (SNE) predicts a $1.2 billion annual loss and slashed sales targets for TVs, personal computers, compact cameras, and Blu-ray players. (Bloomberg)

* Colleague Scott Olster on how the race for education tech is heating up. (Fortune)

* Apple (AAPL) will reportedly release a new store app that will, among other things, MORE

Today in Tech: UberMedia launches Facebook and Twitter competitor

Fortune's curated selection of newsworthy tech stories from the last 24 hours. Sign up to get the round-up delivered to you every day.

* UberMedia, maker of of the Twitter app UberSocial, announced Chime.in, a new social platform centered on relevance and monetization for publishers. "Existing systems don't really have a good way of pulling good content and putting it up top," CEO Bill Gross told Fortune last week. Users create posts called "Chimes," MORE