Tumblr, the company that Karp founded in 2007 when he was 20, was bought by Yahoo (YHOO, Fortune 500) on Monday. It's not clear how much Karp, now 26, stands to make from the deal. But selling the company for $1.1 billion isn't bad for a high school dropout who was then homeschooled.

Tumblr allows users to share their thoughts for free with a community of bloggers. A friend of Karp's describes Tumblr as "a place for the lonely to be less lonely."

Search for just about anything and you can find a community built around that topic. That friend said that if Karp had not been a bit of a loner himself, when he was a teen, he may not have even been able to envision a platform like Tumblr.

Thriving outside of Silicon Valley: Karp built his company in New York City, far away from the exclusive world of Silicon Valley startups and venture capitalists. And he gathered inspiration from much of what defines New York -- design, energy, and a constant desire to create.

After initially receiving funding from large East Coast-based investors, Tumblr later attracted attention from top Silicon Valley investor Sequoia Capital. As social networks like Facebook (FB) and Twitter have flourished over the past few years, so has Karp's profile in the tech community.

"He's definitely helped shape the startup entrepreneurship community in New York City," said Matt Van Horn, vice president of business development at Path. "I think he's done an incredible job."

Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer must think so too. She has vowed to not "screw up" Tumblr and stressed that the site will remain independent under Karp's leadership.

Related story: Yahoo's $1.1 billion acqui-hire of David Karp So who is David Karp? CNNMoney reached out to Karp for comment for this story but has yet to hear back.

But even though those close to him maintain that he is a private person, Karp's own Tumblr is full of quotes, pictures, and intimate details that help paint a picture of his life. He has been known to drive a Vespa on the streets of New York, and owns a French bulldog with a girlfriend he constantly posts about on his Tumblr.

Karp has an eye for design and a bit of edge. At one point, he was featured in advertisements for the clothing company Uniqlo. "With Tumblr we're trying to build the perfect platform for self-expression," Karp said in one Uniqlo ad.

The hearing marked another foray by the Senate's most powerful investigative committee into corporate offshore tax avoidance, which is increasingly a target of many governments from the United States to Western Europe.

Senator Carl Levin, who has led several probes into offshore tax issues as chairman of the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, said Apple shifted billions of dollars in profits offshore to avoid U.S. taxes on a massive scale.

In 2012 alone, Levin said, Apple avoided paying $9 billion in U.S. taxes.

Apple CEO Tim Cook said at the hearing that his company was a major U.S. taxpayer, handing over nearly $6 billion in cash to the federal government in 2012.

"We expect to pay even more this year," Cook said in his first congressional testimony since becoming CEO in 2011.

"We pay all the taxes we owe," he said. "We don't depend on tax gimmicks. We don't move intellectual property offshore and use it to sell our products back to the United States to avoid taxes. We don't stash money on some Caribbean island."

Cash-strapped governments worldwide are trying to wring more tax revenue from companies whose interests in many countries enable them to shift capital and assets across borders. Critics say the companies exploit tax loopholes.

MCCAIN FAULTS TAX SYSTEM

"Closing these kinds of unjustified loopholes could provide hundreds of billions of dollars to reduce the deficit and avert damaging budget cuts," Levin, a Democrat, said at the hearing.

"We should close them and dedicate the revenue that generates to these important priorities, whether or not we reform the overall tax code," he said.

Senator John McCain praised Apple as an American business success story, but he said the company's tax strategy reflected a "flawed" tax system.

"For years, Apple has opted to forego fully contributing to the U.S. Treasury and to American society by shifting profits and circumventing U.S. taxes," McCain said.

Levin's panel issued a report saying that Apple used three subsidiaries with no "tax residency" in Ireland, where they are incorporated, or in the United States, where corporate executives manage those companies.

The main subsidiary, a holding company that includes Apple's retail stores throughout Europe, has not paid any corporate income tax in the last five years, the subcommittee said.

The third-generation Microsoft console, coming eight years after the Xbox 360, was unveiled by games unit chief Don Mattrick at an event at the software company's campus near Seattle.

The Xbox One is an "ultimate all-in-one entertainment system," Mattrick said.

The new device interacts with a user's television, responds to voice and gesture commands, and includes Skype video calling.

It will have 8 gigabytes of memory, with an updated controller and new-generation Kinect sensor that communicates a user's voice and gesture commands to the console. The technology is built on the Xbox operating system and the kernel of Windows software to handle Internet-based content.

The Xbox One will chiefly compete with Nintendo Co.'s new Wii U and Sony Corp.'s forthcoming PlayStation 4 for a bigger slice of the $65 billion-a-year computer game market.

But the world's largest software company also sees it as a broader strategic piece in the battle with Apple Inc., Google Inc. and others to control consumer entertainment in the age of tablets and smartphones.

The shakeup, announced internally just days after the 30-year veteran took the helm, places most of Intel's main product groups directly under his supervision and hands its sprawling global manufacturing operation to new president Renee James, said a source close to the company, who declined to be identified.

Details of the reorganization were outlined in an internal memo sent to employees on Monday. It was described to Reuters by a company source and details of the reorganization, which is effective immediately, were confirmed by spokesman Chuck Mulloy on Tuesday.

"As your CEO I am committed to making quick, informed decisions. I am committed to being bolder, moving faster, and accepting that this means changes will be made knowing that we will listen, learn and then make adjustments in order to keep pace with a rapidly changing industry," Krzanich said in the email, according to the source.

Krzanich officially took over as CEO last week and said that under his leadership, the top chipmaker will be more responsive to customers in an intensified focus on the fast-growing smartphone and tablet market where it lags rivals.

The chipmaker's main product groups - including the PC client group, mobile communications and data center unit that previously reported to Intel Architecture group chief Dadi Perlmutter - now report directly to Krzanich.

Intel has called the shots in the personal computer industry for decades, but it was slow to react to the explosion of smartphones and tablets. The latter two markets are now dominated by competitors like Qualcomm Inc and Samsung Electronics Co Ltd, which design their chips using architecture licensed from ARM Holdings Plc.

James, formerly head of the software arm, will now also oversee the company's sprawling global manufacturing operations and take on additional parts of security efforts.

Mulloy said Intel presidents have traditionally been responsible for managing the manufacturing operations.

James will also lead corporate strategy and planning. Her previous job as Intel's software chief has been taken over by Doug Fisher, a senior executive from that group.

Mike Bell will head up Intel's newly formed "new devices" group," which Mulloy said will focus on emerging product trends.

Herman Eul previously shared responsibility for Intel's mobile communications group, which makes smartphone chips, with Bell, and he will now take full responsibility for that business.

Exasperated senators questioned the truthfulness of former IRS Commissioner Douglas Shulman, who led the agency from 2008 to 2012, and outgoing acting IRS chief Steven Miller. Republican Senator Orrin Hatch of Utah accused IRS leaders of a "lie by omission."

At a Senate Finance Committee hearing, Shulman said he was "dismayed" when he read an inspector general's report last week laying out evidence that IRS workers in Cincinnati, Ohio, had inappropriately focused on groups with the words "Tea Party" and "patriots" in their names.

Senators asked why Shulman did not reveal the practice, which started in March or April of 2010, during congressional testimony in late March 2012. At the time, he rejected conservatives' complaints that the IRS was targeting groups for extra scrutiny.

"The full set of facts around these circumstances came out last week ... until that point I did not have a full set of facts," Shulman said on Tuesday.

"What I knew sometime in the spring of 2012 was that there was a list that was being used. I knew that the word "Tea Party" was on the list. I didn't know what other words were on the list," he said.

A Treasury Department watchdog has said he informed Shulman about an investigation into the matter in May 2012, but assumed IRS officials would have told Shulman about potential targeting problems before that.

Lawmakers said they were disappointed in the answers, but Miller and Shulman denied they had hidden the truth from Congress. "I did not lie, sir," Miller told Hatch.

Miller was forced to resign last week and more senior agency officials could be on the firing line in the broadening scandal, as members of both parties have rushed to condemn the IRS for overstepping its authority.

The rising political storm has undercut President Barack Obama's second-term agenda and put the White House on the defensive as he tries to negotiate a budget deal with Republicans and push a comprehensive immigration reform bill through Congress.

SCANDAL QUESTIONS

"One out of 10 - not very good," Captain Ibrahim Soumassa, commander of the Malian unit, tells one of the men. "We're at 25 meters. When we're at 100, it'll be difficult."

A European Union training mission faces a considerable challenge as it seeks to succeed where years of U.S. instruction failed by turning Mali's rag-tag army into a force capable of facing an Islamist threat stretching across the Sahara.

Years of corruption and neglect led the army to a string of defeats against al Qaeda-linked militants last year, leaving northern Mali under Islamist control and sparking a military coup by disgruntled officers in the capital, Bamako.

Only a lightning intervention in January by France - which warned that the al Qaeda enclave posed a threat to Europe - dislodged the well-armed Islamist fighters from northern Mali's towns. Paris now plans to pull out most of its troops and hand over to a United Nations peacekeeping force.

But the EU overhaul of Mali's army - one battalion of 700 men at a time - is at the heart of long-term efforts to keep the nation's desert north free not only of Islamist militants but also of traffickers ferrying cocaine, contraband and illegal immigrants into Europe.

Cameron has ruled with the Liberal Democrats, his junior coalition partner, since 2010, but the two have taken increasingly different positions on issues such as Britain's role in Europe and Cameron on Sunday for the first time raised the possibility that the coalition might not last until 2015.

Some analysts believe the Lib Dems might be tempted to leave Cameron ruling alone at the head of a minority government nearer the next election to try to differentiate themselves in voters' minds from Cameron's ruling Conservative Party.

When asked on Tuesday whether Cameron himself was committed to governing in coalition until the next election, his spokesman simply said "yes".

"The coalition has a very clear program and it's getting on with implementing it," the spokesman told reporters.

The unanimous ruling by three judges on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit rejected a request for the images by a conservative nonprofit watchdog group.

Judicial Watch sued for photographs and video from the May 2011 raid in which U.S. special forces killed bin Laden in Abbottabad, Pakistan, after more than a decade of searching.

The organization's lawsuit relied on the Freedom of Information Act, a 1966 law that guarantees public access to some government documents.

In an unsigned opinion, the appeals court accepted an assertion from President Barack Obama's administration that the images are so potent that releasing them could cause riots that would put Americans abroad at risk.

"It is undisputed that the government is withholding the images not to shield wrongdoing or avoid embarrassment, but rather to prevent the killing of Americans and violence against American interests," the opinion said.

The court ruled that the risk of violence justifies the decision to classify the images top secret, and that the CIA may withhold the images under an exception to the Freedom of Information Act for documents that are classified.

Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton said in a statement that the ruling "would allow terrorists to dictate our laws." Fitton said his lawyers are considering what to do next. The group could ask the U.S. Supreme Court to hear the case.

A spokeswoman for the Justice Department, which represents the Obama administration in court, had no immediate comment.

The images show a dead bin Laden at his compound in Pakistan, the transportation of his body to a U.S. ship and his burial at sea, the government has said.

Some of the photographs were taken so the CIA could conduct facial recognition analysis to confirm the body's identity, according to court papers.

But while the government tolerates such anti-corruption vigilantism, it is also extremely leery of the threat the Internet can pose to Communist Party rule.

The Internet is the new tool in the fight against corruption - a cornerstone policy of new President Xi Jinping, who has pledged to tackle the problem head-on.

But while acknowledging that China's online world is helpful, authorities have also moved quickly to quash rumors that might fan protests that could escalate out of control, deleting microblog posts or even entire accounts.

The accounts of two people who spread potentially panic-inducing rumors of bird flu breaking out in Guizhou province were erased, according to the China Daily newspaper.

He Bing, vice president of the law school at China University of Political Science and Law, told media that his Twitter-like microblog, or "weibo", was closed down after he forwarded what turned out to be a rumor of a student killing an Internet enforcement officer who had suspended his account.

Author Murong Xuecun, an outspoken censorship critic, said his four weibo accounts, with 8.5 million combined followers, were deleted after he posted criticism of restrictions on what university teachers can discuss with students.

China unveiled tighter Internet controls in December, legalizing the deletion of posts and accounts, underscoring the government's desire to muzzle online debate.

Those convicted of spreading rumors and false reports can be jailed for up to 10 years.

China has more than a half-billion Internet users, and the great popularity of weibo has spawned a legion of corruption watchdogs whose posts can circulate among millions.

"Citizens have readily transitioned from being extremely reluctant to voice their views to being extremely competitive about trying to get their views out there and to gain followers," said Ken Lieberthal of the Brookings Institution in Washington.

PUNISHED FOR POSTING

But protests could threaten stability and the disciplinary apparatus has moved quickly to squelch hearsay.

Police this month detained a 28-year-old Beijing woman for posting that another woman, 22, was gang-raped and thrown off a building to her death and that police refused to investigate.

Police said the victim committed suicide, but were alarmed when hundreds protested against her death, demanding an inquiry.

Cameron's intervention came days after British lawmakers accused Google of using "smoke and mirrors" to avoid paying tax, fuelling a debate over corporate taxation that has angered the public and led to calls for a tougher approach from the government.

Cameron was speaking at a regular quarterly meeting of the government's business advisory group attended by Schmidt at which corporate taxation was discussed.

"He said, on tax and transparency, that as part of having very low corporation tax he expects companies who are due to pay tax, to pay that tax," a government source said.

All those present at the meeting agreed with Cameron's position, the source said.

Britain holds the G8 presidency and will host a meeting of G8 leaders on June 17-18 at a golf resort in Northern Ireland. Cameron said in April that tax compliance was one of his G8 priorities, along with trade and financial transparency.

Earlier on Monday, Cameron wrote to Britain's overseas territories, urging them to "get their house in order" over the sharing of tax information.

Jolla was founded by Nokia's former MeeGo software team that was shut down after the company decided to switch to Microsoft's Windows Phone software in 2011.

With just 70 employees and 11 million euros ($14.11 million)in venture financing, Jolla joins a handful of boutique operating systems such as Ubuntu which together have less than a one-percent presence in the mobile phone market.

Start-ups such as Jolla face a tough task breaking into the smartphone market. Google's Android operating system and Apple's iOS together account for 92 percent of all shipments, according to data from industry research firm IDC.

Even Windows Phone and BlackBerry OS trail far behind the top two with a mere 3 percent share each.

Jolla chairman Antti Saarnio said the Jolla's openness in allowing users to download Android apps would differentiate it from others. He said the dominance of the top two players wasn't necessarily permanent.

"In the long run, if someone brings fresh and new ideas, eventually, the market changes."

The new Jolla phone, priced at 399 euros ($510), runs on the MeeGo-based Sailfish operating system and will also be compatible with Google's Android applications in a clear break from Nokia.

The phone comes with a 4.5-inch display and 8-megapixel camera. It will also be 4G-capable, depending on market. The Jolla will go on sale in the fourth quarter, the company said.

The deal, announced on Monday, is a bold bet by Yahoo Chief Executive Marissa Mayer to revitalize the company by co-opting a Web property with strong visitor traffic but little revenue.

The combination of Yahoo and Tumblr creates an online powerhouse with roughly one billion users, which will draw in more advertisers and help Yahoo keep visitors on its properties for longer periods of time, Mayer told Reuters in an interview.

"Tumblr in terms of users and traffic is an immediate growth story for us," she said.

Analysts say Yahoo appeared to be overpaying for a business that has never posted a profit, makes a fraction of Yahoo's sales, and may not contribute significantly to revenue for years. But the company, rebuffed by the French government when it tried to pay $1 billion for video site Dailymotion earlier this year, had to do something to plug a hole in its social media efforts.

Yahoo made clear it was sensitive to concerns that it might damage Tumblr by making it less irreverent or more corporate.

"Per the agreement and our promise not to screw it up, Tumblr will be independently operated as a separate business," Yahoo said in a statement.

The deal will make Tumblr founder and CEO David Karp, 26, a multimillionaire.

Tumblr is one of the Web's most popular hubs of so-called user-generated content, drawing young people who use the platform to post pictures and text. It has more than 100 million blogs in its network, ranging from "White Men Wearing Google Glass" - a collection of photos poking fun at the early adopters of the wearable computing devices - to housing-focused "The Worst Room."

Though Yahoo remains one of the Web's most popular destinations, it has seen its revenue shrink in recent years as consumers and advertisers favor rivals such as Google Inc and Facebook Inc. The deal is expected to increase Yahoo's audience by 50 percent.