At a hearing yesterday US District Judge Lucy Koh told Apple and Samsung that both sides need to limit their cases to 25 patent claims each, and no more than 25 allegedly infringing products could be listed. Judge Koh threatened to put the whole case on hold unless both sides narrow the case down and accused them of overbroad accusations.

"As this case as it is currently framed, I'm refusing to go forward," Koh said.

Just take your best shots," Koh said. "I don't want a lot of sausage filler."

Apple should probably get ready for a lawsuit or a settlement agreement in Brazil. Brazil’s patent authority announced on Wednesday that Apple does not own the iPhone name in Brazil. That distinction belongs to a local company called Gradiente SA. While this ruling from the agency doesn't mean that Apple can't use the name for its products in the region, it does mean that Apple may have a court fight on its hands somewhere down the road.

Mike Blank, EA's Vice President, Production, Design, and Engineering for Origin, announced on EA's Blog the official launch of the Mac OS X client for its digital distribution platform. The OS X version of Origin offers dual-platform play for select EA games (that are available on both PC and Mac) for those gamers that use both platforms.

Temple Run 2 has been downloaded over 50 million times on iOS, Android and Kindle devices, according to developer Imangi Studios. The latest game from Imangi Studios reached that milestone in just 13 days, breaking the previously set record for the fastest growing mobile game (Angry Birds held the previous record with 50 million downloads in 35 days in April of 2012).

Apple had a pretty good Christmas, selling tens of millions of its portable iOS devices and generating billions in revenue. In the three-month period that included the holiday shopping season, Apple sold 47.8 million iPhones, 22.9 million iPads, 4.1 million Macs and more than 2 million Apple TVs. During the same period last year, Apple sold 37 million iPhones, 15.4 million iPads, 5.2 million Macs and approximately 1.2 million Apple TVs.

Those device sales generated a profit of $13.1 billion during the three month period. Apple now has an estimated war chest of $137.1 billion.

New York Senator Charles Schumer and New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg criticized the National Rifle Association for releasing its iOS shooting range simulation app NRA Practice Range on the one month anniversary of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in Newtown Connecticut. Pressure from politicians around the country ultimately forced Apple to change the rating from age 4+ to a rating of 12+. Schumer had called for a rating of 17+.

When the NRA-branded iOS app NRA: Practice Range launched earlier this week (nearly on the one month anniversary of the Sandy Hook Elementary School Shooting that took place in Newtown Connecticut on December 14, 2012) it carried a rating of ages 4+.

A game that explores the Syrian civil war, Endgame: Syria, has been rejected by Apple for distribution on its App Store.  A press release from the game's developer reveals that Apple's App Store guidelines forbid games that "solely target a specific race, culture, a real government or corporation, or any other real entity."

Apple announced that its App store saw 2 billion downloads in December, along with a number of other milestones that happened in 2012. All in all, the numbers show that Apple's app Store had a pretty good year. According to data released by Apple, 40 billion apps have been downloaded since the store opened in 2008; 20 billion of those downloads occurred in 2012; there are now 775,000 iOS apps available in the store; there are over 500 million active iTunes accounts; and app developers have made $7 billion dollars from the 70 percent cut they get of sales - since 2008.

The Federal Trade Commission issued a Consent Order (PDF) this week forbidding Google from charging a lot of money for certain critical patents it gained when it bought Motorola Mobility for $12.5 billion in May 2012. This is good news for both Apple and Microsoft, but particularly for Microsoft because (according to Microsoft) Motorola Mobility wanted to charge $4 billion a year in royalties for patents Motorola holds on Wi-Fi and video technology.

Hackulous closed its doors for good, according to a report from TorrentFreak. The entire community that catered to offering cracked apps for Apple's iOS devices seems to have unceremoniously died or shut down yesterday. This includes Apptrackr, the web-based partner index for cracked apps; and Installous, an app used by millions to transfer those cracked apps to iOS devices.

On Christmas day iOS and Android device activations were greater than any other day in history, according to a new report from mobile analytics company Flurry. As highlighted by VentureBeat Flurry claims that over 17 million new smartphones and tablets were activated on Christmas day. Compared to the rest of December, new iOS and Android activations rose a whopping 332 percent on Christmas Day.

A jury has ruled in favor of MobileMedia and against Apple in a patent lawsuit involving the iPhone. The jury came to the conclusion that Apple's iPhone infringes on three U.S. patents and some claims of the '068, '075, and '078 patents. The '068 and '075 U.S. patents cover "rejecting incoming calls" and call-processing techniques - or how these functions are communicated wirelessly between base stations and landline telecommunications networks. The U.S. '078 patent relates to changeable keys. The judge overseeing the jury trial, U.S.

The Federal Trade Commission announced today that it has updated its ten-year-old rules on children's online safety but came just short of adding changes that would sanction or hold responsible platform holders like Facebook and Apple, reports All Things D. The new rules hope to tighten privacy and sharing restriction rules for children who might use social networks or mobile apps.

Following yesterday's ruling by U.S District Judge Lucy Koh that rejected Apple's motion for a ban on the sale of three older Samsung devices still being sold in the U.S. that infringed on the company's iPhone-related patents, Samsung has decided to withdraw all of its requests for injunctions against Apple products currently pending in European courts.

Yesterday afternoon U.S District Judge Lucy Koh rejected a request by Apple to ban the sale of three older Samsung devices that a San Jose Jury determined were infringing on technology patents that were central to Apple's iPhone. Back in August of this year, that jury ruled in favor of Apple and awarded the company a $1.05 billion judgment against Samsung, who it concluded had infringed several of Apple’s patents in creating 26 products – three of which are still being sold in the United States.

Here's a not-so-shocking revelation about 2012: games were the most popular software on iOS devices in 2012 according to data released by Apple and collected by Inside Mobile Apps. Seven of the ten highest-grossing iPad apps and ten highest-grossing iPhone apps were games, according to the data.

According to All Things D, Apple has secured the regulatory approvals it needs from China to bring the iPhone 5 to the region, and this morning the company announced a release date for the phone: Dec. 14. Apple will launch the iPhone 5 after it launches the Wi-Fi versions of the iPad Mini and its fourth-generation iPad on Dec. 7

If you have ever thought to yourself "what would happen if Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak and actor Danny Trejo teamed up to fight crime?" then the iOS game "Vengeance: Woz With A Coz" may be worth a look. The game turns that "other guy" that helped start Apple into an 8-bit hero in a side-scrolling beat 'em up, alongside popular actor Danny Trejo (Machete, Once Upon a Time in Mexico, Sons of Anarchy). Woz solicits the help of Trejo after his wife is kidnapped.

Apple is fighting back against Samsung's recent move to add some of its newer devices to the ongoing patent infringement war the two have been fighting in courts around the world. After successfully getting the iPhone 5 added to a U.S. lawsuit, Samsung has asked the U.S. District Court in San Jose to add the iPod touch 5, iPad 4, and iPad mini to the list of devices that infringe on its patents.

According to this Reuters report, Apple is now complying with local warranty laws in Italy after the company was threatened by the Italian government with shut downs of its local businesses and hefty fines if it did not comply. Last week Apple stopped selling its AppleCare warranty plans in its retail stores in Italy. The paid warranty program from Apple offers coverage after the limited warranty on an Apple product expires.

Blizzard's World of Warcraft web site introduces a new in-game pet called the Cinder Kitten that will give 100 percent of the proceeds to the Red Cross’s Superstorm Sandy Response relief efforts. Coming "later this year" the new pet will cost $10 and all of the proceeds will go to the Red Cross's effort in the North East in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy.

The judge hearing Apple's lawsuit against Amazon for having an "appstore" has expressed some strong skepticism in Apple's core arguments. Today in an Oakland federal court US District Judge Phyllis Hamilton expressed strong doubt that Apple will be able to prove its case that consumers are confused or deceived by Amazon's use of the word "Appstore." This is not a new view by Judge Hamilton, who said pretty much the same thing a year ago after hearing Apple's arguments and denied a request by the company for a preliminary injunction against Amazon.

The UK court of appeal was not happy and strongly admonished Apple for adding additional text regarding other court cases. Ultimately the court said that Apple's statement was "non-compliant," and that it must reword it within 48 hours, link prominently to it from its homepage until December 14, and use at least an 11-point font. The statement is currently linked at the bottom of the site and requires visitors to actually look for it. It's not exactly getting a prominent placement at the moment.

iPhone iOS 6 users are complaining that since they have started using Apple's new operating system for its hand-held devices, they have seen a dramatic increase in the amount of data they consume. UK publication The Guardian is reporting that a number of iOS 6 users have been complaining about a "significant hike" in their data usage, which translates into higher monthly mobile data usage bills.

A judge in the United Kingdom has delivered a stinging rebuke of Apple, ordering the company to run ads publicly apologizing to Samsung. This ruling comes after the same judge ruled that Samsung’s Galaxy line of tablets does not infringe on Apple iPad patents. While Apple has better luck in other regions with its patent lawsuits, the UK seems to have dealt the company the most embarrassing of blows.

Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak is not happy with the direction of Apple. He has called the company "arrogant' while speaking out against the iPhone 5's design in a recent interview with Tech Central.

Wozniak says that Apple is arrogant for refusing to make the iPhone 5 larger. The phone is a bit smaller than competitors' phones - like Samsung’s Galaxy S III. Wozniak thinks this is a big mistake.

Samsung got some good news today: an appeals court has lifted the injunction against the Galaxy Nexus, which Apple won in a lower court. The court ruled today that Apple should not have been granted the ban in the first place.

Speaking to the New York Times, social game developer Supercell claims that it is raking in copious amounts of cash with its mobile endeavors. How much cash is it making on a daily basis of its games? According to the company, it is averaging over $500,000 a day from two of its most popular releases.

A "day late and 30 minutes short" would be the best way to describe Episode 23 of the Super Podcast Action Committee as host Andrew Eisen struggles with being sick and co-host E. Zachary Knight rails against the wickedness of the state of Oklahoma keeping his preferred candidate off the ballot. In between these trials and tribulations, Andrew and EZK talk about Kevin Butler being sued by Sony, Nintendo's non-gamer ad, the latest poll on GamePolitics, and troubles at the drive-in.