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The Drum’s top ten tech disruptions of the week - Nokia rose from the ashes and Uber apologised a lot

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By John McCarthy, Opinion Editor

November 21, 2014 | 3 min read

It’s been a busy week in technology. Here The Drum has rounded up ten of the top tech innovations that have been touted this week as capable of disrupting the world as we know it.

Uber chief executive Travis Kalanick

1. It emerged that Netflix is responsible for over a third of all US web traffic, eclipsing second-placed YouTube's 14 per cent of the market.

2. Google launched an experimental ad-free subscription service effectively removing participating publishers' ads from users' browsers.

3. Apple replaced 'Free' with 'Get' in app store to avoid in-app purchase to acknowledge games like Candy Crush's limit gameplay until money changes hands.

4. Uber hired data experts after US senator Franken slated its 'troubling disregard for customers’ privacy' bringing to an end a tough week for the taxi-hailing firm.

5. Nokia jumped back into electronics with surprise iPad Mini rival, letting out its brand rights to Foxconn.

6. Snapchat teamed with Square to let users send money to friends with Snapcash - almost immediately, concerns arose over the fact the app could be used to pay for live sex streams.

7. Google introduced ‘mobile-friendly’ tags to guide users to sites optimised for smartphones and tablets, it said it might rank sites on their mobile accessibility in future.

8. Seventy eight per cent of families claimed technology brought them closer together, according to research from OMD UK and Time Inc.

9. Ad-free social network Ello announced its first revenue stream - branded t-shirts -entering a partnership with design firm Threadless.

10. Mobile traffic was projected to increase eight-fold by 2020, according to research from Ericsson.

Last week's top disruptions included Jeremy Paxman claiming mobile is killing kids’ social lives and Jennifer Lawrence claimed she would never get a Twitter.

Speaking of disrupting the status quo with technology, Dave Birss, head of Drum TV, launched the first episode of the 'Day Before Tomorrow' documentary looking into how innovation is changing the world at an exponential rate.

Catch the series below or check out the Disruption Day webpage.

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