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• SOCHI, Russia (AP) -- The International Olympic Committee says images of the attack on the Pussy Riot punk group in Sochi are "very unsettling."
• IOC spokesman Mark Adams says the governor of the Krasnodar region has apologized for the attack and is investigating.
• Adams says it's a matter not directly related to the Sochi Games but he "found the pictures and the video very unsettling."
• On Wednesday, Cossack militia attacked the group with horsewhips as they tried to perform under a sign advertising the Sochi Olympics.
• Adams says the IOC wants to know more details but called it "largely an issue for" the Russian government.
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• NEW YORK (AP) -- Facebook is placing a $19 billion bet on reaching its next billion mobile users with the acquisition of WhatsApp, a popular messaging service that lets people send texts, photos and videos on their smartphones.
• The $19 billion deal is by far Facebook's largest and bigger than any that Google, Microsoft or Apple have ever done. But it is likely to raise worries that Facebook and other technology companies are starting to become overzealous in their pursuit of promising new products and services, said Anthony Michael Sabino, a St. John's University business professor.
• "This could be seen as a microcosm of a bubble," Sabino said. "I expect there to be a lot of skepticism about this deal. People are going to look at this and say, 'Uh-oh, did they pay way too much for this?"
• Facebook, for its part, is taking the long view. WhatsApp has 450 million monthly users, 70 percent of whom use it every day. The service is adding a million new users a day. There are 19 billion messages sent and 34 billion received via WhatsApp each day, in addition to 600 million photos and 100 million video messages.
• At this rate, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg is confident the app will reach a billion users. Services that reach that milestone, Zuckerberg said in a statement, "are all incredibly valuable."
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