News written by Andre Yoskowitz (November, 2013)

Instagram has announced that Thanksgiving 2013 was the busiest day of all-time for the photo sharing service, thanks to the expected flood of food-related photos and videos and the addition of Hanukkah-related photos.

The company did not announce specific figures, as of yet, unlike last year when they celebrated a record-breaking day with a blog full of data.

This year, the company offered the vague sentence, "We saw record usage as Instagrammers shared a heaping help of holiday cheer."

Instagram, not including the new Thanksgiving data, has seen over 16 billion photos uploaded and 55 million new photos every day.

Reads the post:

Thursday marked a once-in-a-lifetime holiday as Thanksgiving and the first full day of Hanukkah shared the same calendar date for the first time since 1888, a confluence that won't occur again for tens of thousands of years.

Images of turkeys and latkes--and even an occasional "menurky"--from around the world flooded our Instagram feeds as friends and families gathered to celebrate and share these special holiday events.

We saw record usage as Instagrammers shared a heaping helping of holiday cheer. Your Thanksgiving and Hanukkah-related photos and videos helped make yesterday our busiest day on Instagram so far.

The world's second-largest PC motherboard maker, Gigabyte, has seen strong growth for 2013.

In 2012, the company shipped 19 million units, second to Asus at 22 million. So far, in 2013 (as of October 30th), the company has shipped 17.5 million units, giving it a forecast of 21 million for the year. If the company does reach the projection, it will be the highest ever volume shipped for Gigabyte, which has been in the business for 28 years.

Asus as shipped 15.5 million units in the same time frame, with a forecast of 20.5 million for the year.

Industry watchers believe Gigabyte could potentially surpass Asus this year, if the forecasts are accurate. Gigabyte ships motherboards for consumer PCs, workstations and servers, and both for AMD and Intel.

BlackBerry, getting in the holiday spirit, has dropped the price of their Z10 smartphone to just $199 off-contract, while supplies last.

The unlocked device works with all GSM carriers, including T-Mobile and AT&T here in the States, and is available in white and black.

Reads the company's site:

"Get $200 off an unlocked BlackBerry Z10 (your choice of black or white)

Enter code BFEMAILZ10 at checkout

Offer ends December 2, 2013, or while supplies last. Quantities are limited. Offer is not transferable. Orders placed under this offer must use the original offer recipients email address."

The Z10 features a Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 Dual Core CPU, 2GB RAM, 16GB Internal Memory (expandable with microSD), a 4.2" 1280x768 Display w/ 8MP Rear Camera & 2MP Front Camera, a small 1800mAh Battery and the most recent BlackBerry 10 OS.

Get it here.

Sony Europe has started a major sale through the European PlayStation Store, with the sales available from today through December 2nd.

The games are up to 80 percent off.

Full list (via CVG):

PS3 Games:

Deep Black, Was €14.99/AU$21.95/£11.99, Now €4.94/AU$7.24/£3.95, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Terraria, Was €14.99/AU$21.95/£11.99, now €4.94/AU$5.92/£3.95, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Super Street Fighter IV Arcade Edition, Was €14.99/AU$17.95/£10.99, now €4.94/AU$7.24/£3.62, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? ACTIVE Bundle, Was €14.99/AU$21.95/£11.99, now €4.94/AU$7.24/£3.95, Not available in South Africa, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Disney Universe, Was €16.99/AU$24.95/£12.99, now €4.41/AU$6.48/£3.37, Not available in Denmark, Finland, Norway, Sweden, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Divekick, Was €9.99/AU$14.45/£7.99, now €4.99/AU$7.22/£3.99, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Port Royale 3, Was €29.99/AU$39.95/£19.99, now €5.09/AU$6.79/£3.39, Not available in Russia and South Africa, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
WRC 3 FIA World Rally Championship, Was €29.99/AU$39.95/£19.99, now €5.09/AU$6.79/£3.39, Not available in Norway, Finland, South Africa, Turkey, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
MUD - FIM Motocross World Championship, Was €39.99/AU$58.95/£31.99, now €6.79/AU$10.02/£5.43, Not available in Israel, Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Slovenia, Turkey, Ukraine, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Aliens: Colonial Marines, Was €29.99/AU$39.95/£19.99, now €5.09/AU$6.79/£3.39, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
The Cave, Was €12.99/AU$18.45/£9.99, now €4.93/AU$7.01/£3.79, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Kayne and Lynch: Dead Men, Was €19.99/AU$24.95/£15.99, now €4.99/AU$6.23/£3.99, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Kayne and Lynch 2: Dog Days, Was €21.99/AU$32.95/£7.99, now €5.05/AU$7.57/£4.13, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Strong Bad's Cool Game for Attractive People, Was €14.99/AU$21.95/£11.99, now €4.94/AU$7.24/£3.95, Not available in Bulgaria, Hungary, Qatar, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Jurassic Park The Game, Was €29.99/AU$43.95/£23.99, now €5.09/AU$7.47/£4.07, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Back to the Future: The Game - 5 Game Series, Was €29.99/AU$43.95/£23.99, now €5.09/AU$7.47/£4.07, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell Trilogy HD, Was €29.99/AU$43.95/£23.99, now €5.09/AU$7.47/£4.07, Not available in Bulgaria, Hungary, Qatar, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Shaun White Snowboarding, Was €14.99/AU$17.95/£10.99, now €4.94/AU$5.92/£3.62, Not available in Turkey, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Shaun White Skateboarding, Was €14.99/AU$21.95/£11.99, now €4.94/AU$7.24/£3.95, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
From Dust, Was €14.99/AU$21.95/£11.99, now €4.94/AU$7.24/£3.95, Not available in Bulgaria, Hungary, Qatar, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Call of Juarez Gunslinger, Was €14.99/AU$21.95/£11.99, now €4.94/AU$7.24/£3.95, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Call of Juarez Bound in Blood, Was €14.99/AU$17.95/£10.99, now €4.94/AU$5.92/£3.62, Not available in Bulgaria, Hungary, Qatar, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Magic 2014 - Duels of the Planeswalkers, Was €7.99/AU$11.75/£6.49, now €3.99/AU$5.87/£3.24
Magic 2014 - Duels of the Planeswalkers Expansion, Was €3.99/AU$5.85/£3.19, now €1.99/AU$2.92/£1.59
Test Drive: Ferrari Racing Legends, Was €29.99/AU$43.95/£23.99, now €5.09/AU$7.47/£4.07, Only available in Australia, Austria, France, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Spain, Switzerland, UK
Dungeons & Dragons: Chronicles of Mystara, Was €14.99/AU$21.95/£11.99, now €4.94/AU$7.24/£3.95, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Prince of Persia Classic, Was €9.99/AU$14.45/£7.99, now €4.99/AU$7.22/£3.99, Not available in Bulgaria, Hungary, Israel, Kuwait, Qatar, Ukraine, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Prince of Persia, Was €14.99/AU$17.95/£10.99, now €4.94/AU$5.92/£3.62, Not available in Bulgaria, Hungary, Qatar, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Prince of Persia The Forgotten Sands, Was €14.99/$21.95/£11.99, now €4.94/$7.24/£3.95, Not available in Bulgaria, Hungary, Qatar, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Racket Sports, Was €9.99/AU$12.95/£7.99, now €4.99/AU$6.47/£3.99, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Cloudberry Kingdom, Was €9.99/AU$14.45/£7.99, now €4.99/AU$7.22/£3.99, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
CSI: Crime Scene Investigation - Fatal Conspiracy, Was €14.99/AU$17.95/£10.99, now €4.94/AU$5.92/£3.62, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Flashback, Was €9.99/AU$14.45/£7.99, now €4.99/AU$7.22/£3.99, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Blazing Angels 2: The Secret Missions of WWII, Was €14.99/AU$17.95/£10.99, now €4.94/AU$5.92/£3.62, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Everybody's Golf 2, Was €4.99/AU$7.35/£3.99, now €1.99/AU$2.94/£1.59, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Jet Rider, Was €4.99/AU$7.35/£3.99, now €1.99/AU$2.94/£1.59, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Jet Rider 2, Was €4.99/AU$7.35/£3.99, now €1.99/AU$2.94/£1.59, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Kula World, Was €4.99/AU$7.35/£3.99, now €2.99/AU$4.41/£2.39, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Motor Toon Grand Prix 2, Was €4.99/AU$7.35/£3.99, now €1.99/AU$2.94/£1.59, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
PAIN, Was €7.99/AU$11.75/£6.49, now €3.99/AU$5.87/£3.24, Not available in Bulgaria, Hungary, Qatar, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Rally Cross, Was €4.99/AU$7.35/£3.99, now €1.99/AU$2.94/£1.59, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Syphon Filter 3, Was €4.99/AU$7.35/£3.99, now €2.99/AU$4.41/£2.39, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Toy Home, Was €7.99/AU$11.75/£6.49, now €2.95/AU$4.34/£2.40, Not available in Bulgaria, Hungary, Qatar, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Warhawk, Was €4.99/AU$7.35/£3.99, now €1.99/AU$2.94/£1.59, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Blast Factor Advanced, Was €7.99/AU$11.75/£6.49, now €3.99/AU$5.87/£3.24, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Operation Creature Feature, Was €4.99/AU$7.35/£3.99, now €1.99/AU$2.94/£1.59, Not available in Bulgaria, Hungary, Qatar, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Snakeball, Was €7.99/AU$11.75/£6.49, now €2.95/AU$4.34/£2.40, Not available in Bulgaria, Hungary, Qatar, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Crash Commando, Was €7.99/AU$11.75/£6.49, now €3.99/AU$5.87/£3.24, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
The Trials of Topoq, Was €4.99/AU$7.35/£3.99, now €2.99/AU$4.41/£2.39, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Beat Sketcher, Was €9.99/AU$14.45/£7.99, now €3.99/AU$5.78/£3.19, Not available in Israel, Kuwait, Ukraine, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Dark Mist, Was €7.99/AU$11.75/£6.49, now €3.99/AU$5.87/£3.24, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Tori Emaki, Was €2.99/AU$4.35/£2.39, now €0.98/AU$1.43/£0.78, Not available in Bulgaria, Hungary, Qatar, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Mesmerize (Distort), Was €2.99/AU$4.35/£2.39, now €0.98/AU$1.43/£0.78, Not available in Bulgaria, Hungary, Qatar, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
Elefunk, Was €7.99/AU$11.75/£6.49, now €2.95/AU$4.34/£2.40, Not available in Bulgaria, Hungary, Qatar, Additional 10% discount for PS Plus members
PSP/Vita Games:

Read more...

According to Reuters, Samsung will have spent $14 billion on marketing and advertising in 2013, an enormous figure.

Samsung has an overall market value of $227 billion, below Apple at $500 billion but still one of the largest tech companies in the world.

Does Samsung get its money worth, however? Not everyone believes so.

"Samsung's marketing is too much focused on projecting an image they aspire to: being innovative and ahead of the pack," says Oh Jung-suk, associate professor at the business school of Seoul National University. "They are failing to efficiently bridge the gap between the aspiration and how consumers actually respond to the campaign. It's got to be more aligned."

By percent, Samsung spends the largest amount of its annual revenues on advertising, at 5.4 percent. By comparison, Apple spends just 0.6 percent. "When your brand doesn't have a clear identity, as is the case with Samsung, to keep spending is probably the best strategy," adds Moon Ji-hun, head of brand consultant Interbrand's Korean operation. "But maintaining marketing spend at that level in the longer term wouldn't bring much more benefit. No one can beat Samsung in terms of (ad) presence, and I doubt whether keeping investing at this level is effective."

Walmart boastfully reported today that the company had a 'record-breaking' Black Friday, boosted by tech sales.

"We said Black Friday is the Super Bowl of retail, we ran a play that only Walmart could deliver and our customers loved it," added Bill Simon, president and CEO of Walmart U.S. "Our Black Friday events were bigger, better, faster, cheaper and safer than ever. More customers chose us, we had the prices and products they were looking for, and we're not finished yet. Helping families get ready for a great Christmas – and get a lot of great deals while they're at it – is exactly what we're going to continue to do."

The company says the top sellers were HDTVs, the iPad Mini, notebooks, the new Xbox One and PS4 and Call of Duty Ghosts. Online, SLRs and the Nintendo 3DS were major sellers, as well.

Altogether, the company sold an incredible 1.4 million tablets.

Earlier this week we reported that Motorola had put the Moto G smartphone up for pre-order direct through their own store with a December 2nd ship date.

Today, Amazon has followed suit, but with a December 4th ship date.

The unlocked global GSM-based phone sells for just $179 (8GB) or $199 (16GB) without contract and features a 4.5-inch 720p LCD TFT display, a quad-core Snapdragon 400 processor, 1GB RAM and dual cameras, 1.3MP/5MP. On the design side, the Moto G looks just like its more powerful and expensive brother, the Moto X with some minor cosmetic differences.

Moto G handsets will start with Android 4.3, but KitKat will be rolled out by December. The Moto G was not given access to Moto X's software gestures, like Active Notifications, Quick Capture, and Touchless Control, due to its lack of the Moto X's specialized CPU/GPU.

Google has begun offering $6 in Google Play credit with all new Chromecast purchases.

From Black Friday until December 7th, the credit is included if you buy the device through Amazon, Best Buy and directly from Google.

The offer is "valid for any movie rental or other content on Google Play valued at $6 or less," reads the offer, but you cannot put the credit towards new devices (Nexus, accessories, etc) or subscriptions.

At launch, Google offered three months of Netflix for free ($21 value) even for existing customers, and that deal does come back on occasion, as well.

Chromecast devices offer native Netflix, Hulu Plus, Pandora and HBO Go 'casting' ability.

Amazon users in the U.S. were able to buy the Pebble smartwatch today for Black Friday, but the device quickly sold out.

Selling, on sale for $150, the smartwatch is still available on Pebble's official site, although without Prime shipping.

The Kickstarter crowdfunded watch is available in black, grey, red, orange, and white.

Outside of Amazon and Pebble, the smartwatch is available at Best Buy, as well.

Although very buggy at launch, the device recently updated to add iOS 7 Notification Center integration, allowing for Twitter, Facebook and Instagram alerts, a huge boost in functionality for the watch.

Chinese giant ZTE has confirmed that the company is working on a smartwatch.

Lu Qianhao, the company's head of handset marketing strategy, made the announcement this week.

"We are focusing on the mainstream market," says Qianhao. The watch will be similar in feature set to the existing watches on the market, such as the Samsung Galaxy Gear and Sony Smartwatch 2, but will be significantly cheaper.

The watch will be unveiled in the Q1 and getting into consumer's hands in the Q2 of next year. The watch will only be compatible with ZTE smartphones, just like the Galaxy Gear only works with Samsung devices

As expected, ZTE will sell the device in China first, but eventually it is expected to make its way to the EU and U.S.

Kim Dotcom's cloud storage service Mega has made its way to iOS 7, five months after launching on Android.

The app allows users to manage any content they may have stored to their cloud locker.

Additionally, iOS users can preview and stream a multitude of supported media files, and you can send links and files directly from within the application.

If you don't already have it, you can subscribe to Mega's $11 per month premium tier via an in-app purchase and get 500GB of storage and 1TB of bandwidth per month.

As iPad app is on the way, as well.

The latest mandatory PlayStation 4 system 1.51 patch is now available in Europe.

Released in North America earlier in the week, the 300MB+ download is now available to European gamers and must be installed before you can access PSN features on the console, which launches tomorrow around the continent.

The update improves "stability" for the system and makes other minor tweaks.

As a precaution following the issues plaguing the NA versions of the system, the patch can be placed on a USB drive and installed using the PS4's safe mode.

Sony listed the features included in the update:

The major carriers in the U.S.; Verizon, AT&T, T-Mobile and Sprint have completed their database system for stolen phones, nearly a year after it was first launched.

Wireless industry trade group CTIA president and CEO Steve Largent announced that the completed database will allow carriers to block activation of stolen 3G and LTE smartphones in the U.S. and around the globe. "As more countries and more carriers around the world participate in the 3G and 4G/LTE databases, criminals will have fewer outlets since these stolen phones would be blacklisted and could not be reactivated," adds Largent.

While the database has been marginally successful in the U.S., the biggest issue is with international carriers, who rarely enforce such rules. Officials in New York and San Francisco say efforts to block stolen devices have been fruitless since the devices are quickly sent overseas. Both cities have been asking US carriers and OEMs to install 'kill switches' into all new smartphones that allow consumers to deactivate the phones permanently if they are stolen.

A federal judge has dismissed a class action lawsuit against Apple over data privacy, stating that the plaintiffs failed to "show they had relied on any alleged company misrepresentations and that they had suffered harm."

In 2011, four plaintiffs claimed that Apple violated its own privacy policy by designing iOS to "easily transmit personal information to third parties that collect and analyze such data without user consent or detection." The accusers claimed they suffered damages by losing storage space on their iPhones and that they overpaid for the devices.

"Plaintiffs must be able to provide some evidence that they saw one or more of Apple's alleged misrepresentations, that they actually relied on those misrepresentations, and that they were harmed thereby," Judge Lucu Koh said.

The case is just one of 19 similar lawsuits filed across the nation that Koh is overseeing. Others may be more successful.

Prosecutors have claimed that South Korea's National Intelligence Service (NIS) abused Twitter in an effort to support Park Geun-hye for president during last year's elections.

The president ended up winning by one million votes last December and many have accused the campaign team of foul play ever since.

Allegedly, NIS agents posted over 1.2 million tweets in praise of Park and her policies, as well as tweets that slandered her rivals, dubbing them North Korea sympathizers.

There were 26,550 original tweets that computer programs then disseminated on Twitter, adding up to over 1.2 million total tweets or retweets.

"What's clear so far is that the National Intelligence Service and other state agencies had engaged in a systematic and massive intervention in elections," opposition party leader Kim Han-gil stated after the news was released.

Facebook is testing a read-it-later feature that will help the company compete with standalone apps like Instapaper and Pocket.

The social network giant will let you save links posted to Facebook for reading later, whether you are online or offline, and some users will see a "Saved" option in their mobile app next to the Facebook apps.

It is unclear whether the feature will go live for everyone ever, as Facebook, like Google, is infamous for experimenting with features but eventually abandoning them.

When asked for comment, the company simply said, "We're constantly testing new features, but we have nothing further to share at this time." Regardless, the experimental feature does not have robust features like Pocket does, which continues to improve daily and is cross-platform with deep integration into your browser and mobile devices.

Acer has announced that their upcoming C720P touchscreen Chromebook will be priced at just $299, a very affordable price given the specs.

Until the C720P launches, the only Chromebook option with a touchscreen is Google's pricey high-end Pixel, which is a $1299 reference device.

Besides the multi-touch 11.6-inch HD LED back-lit display (1366×768 resolution), the notebook has a Haswell-based Intel Celeron, 32GB internal storage, 2GB RAM and the company claims a 7 second startup with 7.5 hour battery life.

Additionally, the new device features an integrated HD webcam, dual speaker design, USB 3.0 and USB 2.0 ports, an HDMI port and 802.11a/b/g/n Wi-Fi. It measures 0.78-inches and weighs just 2.98 pounds.

Google has announced that their popular Maps service has been updated to allow for the embedding of maps into websites.

Ken Hoetmer of Google Maps says: "[Earlier this week] we introduced a feature in the new Google Maps that enables you to embed a Google Map by copying and pasting an HTML snippet. Make sure you're opted in, and then head over to Google Maps, click on the gear icon on the lower right, and give it a go.

Like the new Google Maps, embedded maps are now built for you. Your users can sign in to these maps to see relevant content, like their saved places from Google Maps. Conversely, they can also save a location from your embedded map for viewing on Google Maps for desktop or mobile. To top it off, embedded maps are free of usage limits, so you don't have to worry about quotas."

Additionally, Google has updated their ad experience to include more relevant local businesses.

Head over to Maps on your mobile device or desktop to get the update.

Amazon has announced that its Instant Video streaming service has been expanded to Japan.

The service will have 26,000 global and local movies and TV shows available for streaming, download rental and purchase.

Rental fees will start at 99 cents, (100 yen) for older titles and newer titles will start at $5 to rent or $15 to purchase.

As a launch promotion, the company says the first episode of the first season of programs (including local hit Boys over Flowers) are being offered completely free of charge.

You are allowed to download the titles to just one device, but stream to two.

According to the latest figures from AdDuplex, Windows Phone is now dominated by just one manufacturer, Nokia.

The Finnish smartphone maker (soon to be part of Microsoft) controls 90 percent share of the OS, followed by HTC at 7 percent and everyone else at a measly 3 percent.

As far as devices go, the cheap but excellent Lumia 520 continues to take share, now at 26.5 percent share, far and away the most for an individual model. The more powerful (and larger) Nokia Lumia 920 and 620 follow with 8.8 and 8.6 percent share, respectively. The Nokia 521 (which is the same device as the 520 but optimized for T-Mobile in the US) has another 3.5 percent share, effectively giving the Lumia 520 a massive 30 percent share of current Windows Phones.

Cyanogen Inc. has confirmed that their CyanogenMod Installer application, which we reviewed here, has been removed from the Google Play Store.

Reads the post:

Today, we were contacted by the Google Play Support team to say that our CyanogenMod Installer application is in violation of Google Play's developer terms.

They advised us to voluntarily remove the application, or they would be forced to remove it administratively. We have complied with their wishes while we wait for a more favorable resolution.

To those unfamiliar with the application, it has a single function – to guide users to enable "ADB", a built in development and debugging tool, and then navigates the user to the desktop installer. The desktop application then performs the installation of the CyanogenMod on their Android device.

Read more...

SSD hard drive maker OCZ Technology Group has announced bankruptcy, also confirming it has received an offer from Toshiba to buy the company's remaining assets.

OCZ had a market value of $43 million before the news but the company's stock fell 75 percent, leaving it with a capitalization of just $11 million.

The company will file its official bankruptcy after completing the asset purchase agreement with Toshiba and Hercules Technology Growth Capital Inc, one of their current lenders. If the deal falls apart, the company would immediately file for bankruptcy and liquidate.

OCZ has been hit with a shortage of NAND flash memory storage chips for the last year, and has not had a full-year profit in over five years.

Majors players in the industry such as Seagate, Western Digital and Micron had long been rumored to be acquirers for the struggling SSD maker, but it seems Japan's largest chipmaker, Toshiba, stepped in.

Intel, which has been working on their OnCue Internet TV platform for two years, is looking to sell the project for $500 million and to complete the deal before the end of the year.

The service, which has been delayed three times as Intel struggles to close deals with content providers, could be sold in part to Verizon Communications.

In 2011, Intel began its venture into Web TV by hiring Erik Huggers, who previously led web video for the BBC. Huggers was put in charge of creating an Intel-built set-top box and an Intel-branded pay TV service that could be accessed via desktops, the set-top or other Internet-connected devices.

As expected, Intel had issues gaining content for the "OnCue" service due to its lack of connections in the industry, and a mid-July 2013 launch was pushed back indefinitely.

Intel then began looking for strategic partnerships to help distribute OnCue, talking with Netflix and Amazon to no avail. Verizon, on the other hand, already offers pay TV via FiOS and also offer Redbox Instant, a movie rental service.

According to research firm IHS, Microsoft, just like its rival Sony and its Playstation 4, is making a very tiny profit on each unit sold of the new Xbox One.

The Xbox One, which costs $499 to consumers, costs $471 to build, not including R&D and advertising costs which could certainly add up to $20 or more per unit.

Sony, which sells its PS4 for $399, spends $381 to build the console.

Microsoft's added costs come mainly via the Kinect motion control sensor, which costs $75 and the AMD CPU/GPU at $110.

Both console makers lost significant money for their PS3 and Xbox 360 consoles, respectively, with Sony losing as much as $300 per unit for over a year. While they may not be making more than a few pennies this time around, the figures certainly seem better than a loss.

Motorola Mobility has made the new Moto G available in the U.S. a lot earlier than expected, with pre-orders now being taken directly at Motorola.com.

The unlocked global GSM-based phone sells for just $179 without contract but still packs a punch, especially at that price. The change in plans is significant as CEO Dennis Woodside had originally planned a January launch for the device.

For your money, you get a 4.5-inch 720p LCD TFT display, a quad-core Snapdragon 400 processor, 1GB RAM, 8GB internal storage and dual cameras, 1.3MP/5MP. On the design side, the Moto G looks just like its more powerful and expensive brother, the Moto X with some minor cosmetic differences.

You cannot use the Moto Maker customization site for the Moto G, but the backplate is removable and blue, teal, red, yellow, purple, white, and black covers are available at launch. Additionally, there are rugged versions and flip-style portfolio covers. Although you can take off the cover, the battery is non-removable.

Our most read article of the past week was the news that AOL had announced the shutdown of popular cross-platform media player Winamp.

Despite rumors that Microsoft may come to save the day, one fan took matters into his own hands, starting a petition on Change.org the day of the announcement begging AOL to make the software open-source rather than shutting it down for good.

The petition has now reached 27,000 signatures, with 35,000 being the necessary minimum for "change."

Reads the page:

After more than 15 years and millions of users worldwide, Winamp Media Player will cease forever as of 20th Dec 2013.

Winamp is the best media player ever built. If there were other alternatives that would be fine. But there is nothing that can do what Winamp can do. It is the most versatile media player on earth.

It can't be left to die. It must live on.

If AOL allows it to go open source it WILL live on forever and be in the hands of people who love it and use it every day.

Read more...

After hinting during their annual Analyst Day that an upcoming device would feature 560 ppi, reports are claiming that device will be the upcoming flagship Galaxy S5.

Samsung Display CEO Kinam Kim made a whole presentation on the company's 2014 lineup, and with it he confirmed a 560 ppi Super AMOLED phone display.

At an expected 5.3-inch screen, that would suggest a resolution of 2600x1440. Samsung calls that display a WQHD resolution, and the standard calls for a 2560x1440 resolution (3.7 million pixels).

Additionally, the slideshow includes plans for bending, foldable and stretchable designs that will likely be the first of their kind.

According to reports from the Chinese government, Apple has struck a deal with China Mobile to finally bring 4G-capable iPhones to the world's largest carrier.

The reports say China Mobile will start 4G services on December 18th, announcing the iPhone deal on that date, as well.

China Mobile uses TD-LTE, and Apple received the final government license needed to run their phones on that network back in September.

The carrier has 745 million subscribers, making it far and away the largest carrier on the planet.

According to Kotaku, there are at least hundreds, if not thousands of new Xbox One owners whose disc drives simply don't work.

Microsoft does not have any response other than to contact customer service.

Angry customers have begun calling the drive the "Disc Drive of Doom," as it does not read discs and produces a loud grinding noise when optical media is inserted.

As even more proof of the issue, launch edition consoles sent to major gaming outlets IGN, Polygon and GamesRadar all had faulty drives.

Adds Microsoft: "The issue is affecting a very small number of Xbox One customers. We're working directly with those affected to get a replacement console to them as soon as possible through our advance exchange program. Rest assured, we are taking care of our customers.

Customers have the option for us to send a replacement console right away without waiting until they have returned their old one. This means a customer only has to wait a matter of days, rather than weeks to get back up and running."

Samsung has announced the launch of the Galaxy Grand 2, another phablet to round out their line of Galaxy smartphones.

The Grand 2 features a 5.25-inch 720p display, a quad-core 1.2GHz processor, 1.5GB RAM and a 2,600 mAh battery. For cameras, the smartphone has two; an 8MP AF/LED Flash rear camera and a 1.9MP front camera.

Running on Android 4.3, the phone has 8GB internal storage, a microSD slot, WiFi a/b/g/n, BT4.0, GPS ＋ Glonass along with dual-SIM capabilities.

"This evolution of the Galaxy Grand series brings meaningful upgrades to its predecessor including an improved HD viewing experience, enhanced performance, and many other intuitive features," Samsung adds.

According to sources, Amazon is preparing a new Kindle White for release in the Q2 2014, one that includes a high-end 300 ppi display.

Besides the upgraded display, the e-reader will also move to matte glass instead of plastic and the front screen will be "flush with the edges of the device, rather than recessed."

Current model Paperwhite have a 212 ppi screen but others in the market, such as the Kobo Aura HD, have higher pixel density at similar prices. E Ink, the company which manufactures the Pearl E Ink, is said to have drawn the ire of Amazon after the Aura HD hit retail shelves with a 265 ppi display.

Outside of the display, there is not expected to be any other updates to the Kindle software except that it will be upscaled properly for the new pixel density. Additionally, Amazon will be working on a custom-built font that is supposedly better for reading.

Apple has confirmed their purchase of PrimeSense, the Israeli 3D sensor startup.

The reported price was about $360 million for the company that created the tech behind the original Microsoft Kinect.

Says Apple: "Apple buys smaller technology companies from time to time, and we generally do not discuss our purpose or plans." PrimeSense was a bit more forthcoming: "We can confirm the deal with Apple. Further than that, we cannot comment at this stage."

There had been reports of Apple purchasing the company since July, at prices varying from $280-$360 million.

PrimeSense has been working on creating new, smaller sensors more a wider variety of devices, with the expectation that 3D gesture based tech will eventually be added to smartphones.

The well-regarded developer Winocm has been quietly working on porting Apple's iOS to non-Apple hardware, and he appears to have succeeded in achieving the first "core milestone."

Winocm has now managed to port the core elements of iOS, getting them to work on a Nokia N900 phone.

As of writing there are really no benefits for the average user, but as a basis for future development it could be huge. The hardware was released in 2009 by Nokia, running the Maemo 5 OS. Additionally, the port will work on the following hardware:

ARM RealView Emulation Baseboard (ARMPBA8_ALT)
ARM RealView Platform Baseboard for Cortex-A8 (ARMPBA8)
Texas Instruments OMAP3530 (BeagleBoard/BeagleBoard xM) (OMAP3530)
Texas Instruments OMAP3430 (Nokia N900) (OMAP3430_RX51)
Texas Instruments AM335x (BeagleBone/BeagleBone Black) (OMAP335X)

Windows RT, the failed experiment that has cost numerous companies, including Microsoft, billions in writedowns, may be at the end of its life.

Microsoft's EVP of the Devices and Studios Julie Larson-Green has fueled the rumor while speaking at the UBS Global Technology Summit.

When asked about the future of Windows, Larson-Green responded: "We have the Windows Phone OS. We have Windows RT and we have full Windows. We're not going to have three. We do think there's a world where there is a more mobile operating system that doesn't have the risks to battery life, or the risks to security. But, it also comes at the cost of flexibility. So we believe in that vision and that direction and we're continuing down that path."

The important quote to take from her speech is the fact that she says "we're not going to have three." It's quite clear that Windows 8.1 and Windows Phone 8.1 are going nowhere so that leaves Windows RT as the odd man out.

Sony, which was rumored to have purchased the IP for the once extremely popular Crash Bandicoot series, does not appear to have done so.

Activision, the current owner, took down the official Crash Bandicoot site earlier this week, leading to speculation that it had sold the rights and moved on. All Crash references were also removed from the publisher's web properties.

Sony had been rumored as a buyer as there was a supposed easter egg in the recent PS4 launch trailer (below), which appeared to show Crash moving from Activision to Sony Computer Entertainment.

Crash was a huge hit franchise for the original PSone and PS2, and was originally created by Naughty Dog for Sony. The last game for consoles was "Activision's Crash: Mind Over Mutant" which launched in 2008 to mild success.

Says Activision of the series: "Activision owns Crash Bandicoot and we continue to explore ways in which we could bring the beloved series back to life."

Pokemon X and Y, the latest games in the blockbuster franchise, are the fastest ever to reach 1 million sales on the 3DS handheld, says Nintendo.

The titles took just one day to reach the milestone, beating out first-party winners like Mario Kart 7 which took a few weeks.

Nintendo offered a little bit of everything in the new games, including 3D battles, legacy Pokemon, new "mega-evolutions" and just general updates to the gameplay.

Check this interesting infographic for more on the release and milestones of the game:

Last week, the Android 4.4 update began rolling out for the Moto X, as long as you were a Verizon customer.

As of today, the new operating system is now headed to T-Mobile and AT&T users, as well. Following the news, Sprint is the only carrier without the update.

The rollout will begin just a month after the launch of the Google Nexus 5 (and with it, KitKat) and it even beats Google's older Nexus devices like the Nexus 4, and the Google Play Experience versions of the Samsung Galaxy S4 and HTC One.

Android 4.4 adds SMS/MMS support in Hangouts, aesthetic changes and performance tweaks under the hood.

All Google Chromebook users will soon be able to use voice activation like their Android 4.4 counterparts.

The new update will give Chromebook users the ability to say "Okay Google" to activate voice search within ChromeOS offline and online.

Developer channel users will get the update first, but the service is likely to be in an early beta at first launch.

If you are in the developer channel, Google says to head over to chrome://flags/#enable-app-launcher-start-page to enable experimental updates.

Outside of being available for the Nexus 5, Google has also been testing it for the Chrome browser although without a timeframe for release.

According to sources, streaming music giant Spotify has secured $250 million in financing that now values the company at over $4 billion.

The money will be used to help global expansion, as the company is already well established in the U.S. and Western European nations. Spotify is looking to expand to nations like Japan.

Spotify, at a valuation north of $4 billion, would approach the market value of Pandora, which is the only public streaming music company. Pandora IPOd in 2011 and is now valued at $5.7 billion.

The company generated revenue of $585 million but the company has never earned a profit as expansion expenses increase.

Spotify has over 6 million paying subscribers, paying either $5 or $10 per month for premium features like unlimited ad-free streaming and mobile access. The company has 24 million active free users.

The major Taiwanese PC maker, which continues to struggle financially, has accepted the resignations of Chairman and CEO J.T. Wang and President Jim Wong.

Making the news even more major is the fact that Wong had been long rumored to be replacing Wang if he ever left as CEO.

Company founder Stan Shih has taken over the positions as the company searches both internally and externally for a new candidate. The title of CEO will be eliminated and those responsibilities will be transferred to the chairman.

Shih will not take a salary for his new role, and Wang and Wong will stay on as advisers. "I will honor and complete all the public affairs and event engagements that I have committed to, but I will also fully support Acer's ICT (information and communications technology) device business and carry out the company transformation," Shih said in a statement. "In addition, George Huang who is one of my co-founding partners of Acer will join with me and the management team to lead our company at this time."

Verizon has become the second carrier to get the HTC One Max phablet.

The device features a 5.9-inch 1920x1080 LCD, is powered by a quad-core 1.7GHz processor, 2GB RAM has 32GB internal storage and a large 3300mAh battery.

Additionally, the phone has an UltraPixel camera with an f/2.0, 28mm wide angle lens.

The phone will not come cheap. Verizon has priced the Max at $299.99 with two-year contract, and will also be available for $25 per month through Verizon Edge. Sprint is offering the phone for $249 or $149 for brand new customers.

Check the product page.

Fans of J.R.R Tolkien, rejoice, Google has created a new Chrome 'experiment' for Middle-Earth, building large detailed interactive maps as "a showcase of web experiments written by the creative coding community."

The maps come just weeks before the hugely anticipated release of the "The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug" on December 13th. The film is the second of a new trilogy for Lord of The Rings fans.

Within the maps there are three interactive locations; The Trollshaws, the Elven refuge of Rivendell and the fortress of Dol Guldur.

If you click through, you will get an audio introduction and the bios of different characters that you can swipe through to learn more about. There are a few mini-games, as well, playable through the Chrome browser or on Android.

Google says new locations will be added in the near future, including Lake Town and Lonely Mountain (where the dragon Smaug lives). The map is zoomable and includes all of the major landmarks and towns.

Microsoft has boasted that over 1 million Xbox One units were sold during the console's first day of availability.

The figure surpasses that of Microsoft's predecessor, the Xbox 360, and matches Sony's recent PlayStation 4 launch.

Xbox One consoles went on sale in 13 markets on November 22nd, and Microsoft also added that many retailers had sold out and that the company was working to replenish stock.

Sony and Microsoft are leading a revival of the gaming industry, which just had its biggest growth in over two years, even before the launch of the new next-generation consoles.

According to research firm NPD, the video game industry had its best quarter in over two years.

For the quarter ended September 30th, US gamers spent $3.45 billion, a large 17 percent year-over-year increase.

Digital sales, which include social network casual games, full games, DLC, subscriptions and mobile games jumped to $1.72 billion, followed by new physical game sales at $1.3 billion and used games accounting for $436 million.

Digital content sales were up 35 percent, and new physical games were up 20 percent.

The fourth quarter is expected to be massive for the industry, following the launch of the Xbox One and PlayStation 4. Each console saw over 1 million unit sales in their first days of launch, and game sales are expected to get a large boost across the board.

Game of Thrones fans received some great news this week as HBO announced that their popular HBO Go platform is now available through Google's Chromecast HDMI dongle.

Says the search giant: "Grab your favorite snack and get cozy on your Iron Throne, because HBO GO has added Chromecast support to their Android, iOS and web app. Now you can easily enjoy "Game of Thrones," "Boardwalk Empire," "Girls" and your favorite movies on your TV by casting from the HBO GO app or website.

To start casting from HBO GO, just check that you have the latest version of the app for Android or iOS. You can also cast from hbogo.com using Chrome browser on your laptop or any Chromebook. The mobile and web apps will be rolling out over the next few days."

As with other services, once you download the app or visit the web page, you just have to hit the "cast" button to send the stream to your TV via your home network.

A jury has ruled today that Samsung must pay Apple $290 million in additional damages for their patent infringement loss. Apple had been requesting $380 million.

Altogether, the damages award now totals $930 million. Samsung had argued that it only owed $52 million in additional damages.

"For Apple, this case has always been about more than patents and money," Apple said in a statement. "It has been about innovation and the hard work that goes into inventing products that people love. While it's impossible to put a price tag on those values, we are grateful to the jury for showing Samsung that copying has a cost."

Samsung will of course be appealing, and says they are "disappointed by today's decision, which is based in large part on a patent that the US Patent and Trademark Office has recently deemed invalid."

Last year, a jury ruled that Samsung infringed on five Apple patents related to design and functionality. From the first trial, Samsung owed $640 million in damages. The new award ruling was dependent on what the two sides what agree to in regards to Apple's lost profits, Samsung's profits, and the amount that would have been paid in royalties. What was eventually agreed upon was that Samsung sold 10.7 million devices that infringed on Apple patents, generating a whopping $3.5 billion in revenue.

Yesterday we reported that popular media player Winamp was being shutdown by its owner AOL at the end of December.

The outpour of support for the software was great, and a petition on Change.org reached nearly 6000 signatures overnight to save the media player or at least make it open source. While many were sad the software was to be shut down, there may be an unlikely white knight; Microsoft.

Crunch is reporting that AOL and Microsoft are currently in talks for the software giant to potentially purchase Winamp along with media streaming service Shoutcast.

If the deal does not go through, the report states that AOL will announce the shut down of Shoutcast next week, as well.

AOL purchased Winamp creator Nullsoft for $80 million in 1999 but has never really cared about making the service mainstream. The software just made it to Android in 2011.

After 15 years, the end of an era is here. Media player Winamp will shut down for good on December 20th.

Its parent company, AOL, announced today that the music player and all related services will be closed.

The player was first released in 1997 and offered a light playback tool for MP3s and other audio and video files. More recently, the software added online music streaming, and Gracenote integration.

Reads the Winamp homepage: "Winamp.com and associated web services will no longer be available past December 20, 2013. Additionally, Winamp Media players will no longer be available for download. Please download the latest version before that date. See release notes for latest improvements to this last release.
Thanks for supporting the Winamp community for over 15 years."

You can still get the media player here at Afterdawn: Winamp v5

Years after it made its introduction on iOS and Android, Windows Phone has finally gotten an official Instagram app.

Reads the blog post:

In that past year, however, Instagram isn't all that's grown. We've also seen the rise of a new mobile platform as tens of millions of people around the world have taken to Windows Phones. Our mission is to give everyone the ability to capture and share the moments around them, so our team has been working hard to bring Instagram to Windows Phone users everywhere.

We wanted to make Instagram available to people with Windows Phones as quickly as possible, so we focused on creating an awesome experience with Instagram's core features. We're not finished, and our team will continue developing the Windows Phone app to keep releasing features and bringing you the best Instagram possible.

Instagram is a place where people come to be inspired and connect with others, and we're thrilled to welcome Windows Phone users to the community. We can't wait to see what you'll create.

Sony has pushed out PS4 firmware version 1.51 today, "boosting" overall stability of the console.

In addition, the minor patch brings some UI tweaks, says Sony.

Reads the blog post: "With this minor required update, stability of system software has been improved. In addition, minor refinements to elements of the system UI (such as clearly indicating when a user downloads a game and a game patch at the same time) have been introduced."

"In the North American region, automatic downloads for system and game updates are enabled by default when PS4 is in stand-by mode," added Lempel. "Once system software update 1.51 is available later tonight, your PS4 will automatically download it, enabling you to update quickly and easily."

The system launched on November 15th and has seen two required updates so far.

For Apple fans who like to shop online, your experience just got easier.

The Cupertino giant has released their dedicated Apple Store app for the iPad, bringing a gesture-based UI and a list of all available Apple products, including tablets, smartphones and accessories.

As compared to its iPhone equivalent, the iPad app allows you to change the amount of products shown on the screen with pinch to zoom, and you can even remove all texts to see a minimalist 4 x 6 grid of product photos.

Would-be buyers can purchase and customize the products directly through the app before purchasing or setting up in-store pickup.

Additionally, the app brings a "Now Trending" section, an always updating listing of the most popular products based on user purchases, reviews or what they are sharing socially.

Get the app here.

Cupid Media, the company behind niche online dating sites like ChristianCupid.com, was hacked earlier this year and over 42 million unencrypted names, dates of birth, emails and passwords were stolen.

The hack took place in January, and the company did not admit to it until forced to by security researcher Brian Krebs.

Krebs discovered the files on the same server where user information stolen from Adobe last month was being stored. Adobe used some low-end encryption on their data, but Cupid Media almost shockingly stored everything in plain text.

Cupid Media's managing director Andrew Bolton says that in January when the hack occurred, "we took what we believed to be appropriate actions to notify affected customers and reset passwords for a particular group of user accounts. We are currently in the process of double-checking that all affected accounts have had their passwords reset and have received an email notification."

Only active users have been notified, which Bolton says "is considerably less than the 42 million that you have previously quoted". Since the breach, the company has begun salting and hashing, an industry standard that is also easily broken but at least offers some protection.

MOGA has announced the launch of the first iOS 7 game controller today, the Ace Power.

The controller plugs into the lightning port of the iPhone 5, 5C, 5S and fifth-generation iPod Touch, and has standard dual analog sticks, a D-pad, multiple action buttons and trigger L1/R1/L2/R2 buttons.

Additionally, the controller will charge your device while in use, allowing for extended gameplay time.

Many who have reviewed the controller have panned it, however, citing a lack of testing by developers who may have already implemented support into their apps. For example, the virtual buttons still show up on the screen regardless of whether the controller is plugged in or not.

Furthermore, there is huge noticeable lag when trying to play via AirPlay, making it unusable.

At $99, most reviewers claim the controller feels cheap, but it will be available in Apple retail stores as well as online if you want to test it.

Amazon has dropped the price of the Verizon model of the Motorola Moto X, selling the standard black and white case units for just one cent with a new two-year contract.

The deal represents the cheapest offer on the flagship device, so far, as it costs $99 to get a customized version through Moto Maker.

Yesterday, Motorola began rolling out Android 4.4 KitKat for the device, so at one penny the Moto X from Amazon is certainly the cheapest way to get your hands on the latest Android.

The device has a 4.7-inch AMOLED 720p display, Android 4.4 (with minor Motorola bloat), a 10MP "ClearPixel" camera, and a new Motorola X8 chipset that includes a powerful 1.7GHz dual-core Snapdragon S4, an Adreno 320 GPU, 2GB RAM and built-in specialized processors for natural language processing. The Moto X has a motion-sensitive Active Display, always-on Google Now voice commands and a camera activation gesture that requires just two wrist twists.

In October, Apple CEO Tim Cook took to Twitter to celebrate the approval of Apple's new 'spaceship' campus by the Cupertino City Council.

After that approval, the council needed one more approval vote (mainly a formality) and as of this morning, the campus has received its final approval.

Construction is slated to begin this year as Apple demolishes the current HP office buildings that stand at the site.

As part of the approval, Apple will begin a 20-year-long development agreement with Cupertino and increase the annual taxes it pays to the city. Last year, the council refunded 50 percent of the taxes Apple paid, $12.7 million, and moving forward that figure will be 35 percent.

Apple has dubbed the building "Campus 2," and it is almost one mile in circumference with 3.1 million square feet. The location will house an Office, Research and Development Building, a 1,000 seat Corporate Auditorium, a Corporate Fitness Center, 300,000 feet of Research Facilities, a Central Plant, a 150-acre interior courtyard and be home to 12,000 employees.

Russian email giant Mail.ru has expanded to the U.S. with the new brand name, My.com, launching an email, IM and gaming service.

myMail is an email client for iOS and Android users that allows for Gmail, AOL, Outlook and Yahoo to be supported (and other POP/IMAP) and includes realtime push notifications when you receive emails.

Mail.ru's new myChat application is an IM service similar to WhatsApp, Line and others, and offers instant messaging, VoIP and voice calling. There is also, of course, emojis and stickers.

The company confirmed that the myCamera photo editing app would be coming soon.

Check out the new offerings here.

As leaked last month, Comcast has made their Xfinity TV Store available, selling movies and TV shows through user's cable boxes.

Until now, Comcast had offered pay-per-view and VOD rentals, but the new Store offers permanent downloads.

Pricing will be similar to rivals, such as Vudu, iTunes, Google and Amazon.

Comcast says you can steam the videos on PCs if you prefer using the Xfinity Purchases site, and iOS and Android apps are already available, as well.

More information via Comcast's video:

Gaming sotfware company E-Sports Entertainment Association (ESEA) has been fined $1 million after it was discovered they secretly added Bitcoin mining software as part of a standard product update this year.

14,000 customers received the code, which helped ESEA mine 30 Bitcoins over two weeks in May. At current prices, those coins are worth a little over $17,000. "What transpired the past two weeks is a case of an employee acting on his own and without authorization to access our community through our company's resources," ESEA co-founder Craig Levine said at the time.

The company blamed a single employee, who has been fired. Regardless, the company is facing a class-action lawsuit in California over the situation.

As part of the settlement, ESEA will pay $325,000 of the fine, and will only need to pay the rest of the penalty if it is ever caught "misbehaving" again. "These defendants illegally hijacked thousands of people's personal computers without their knowledge or consent, and in doing so gained the ability to monitor their activities, mine for virtual currency that had real dollar value, and otherwise invade and damage their computers," the attorney general's office said.

Qualcomm unveiled a new set of chips today, including the Snapdragon 805 aimed at mobile devices and UltraHD streaming.

The quad-core processor will "deliver the highest-quality mobile video, imaging, and graphics experiences" and the company confirms it is the best performing chip to date. The Snapdragon 805 includes the Adreno 420 graphics processor, "with up to 40 percent more graphics processing power" than current Adreno 330 chips. The chip can be clocked up to 2.5 GHz per core. Furthermore, it's "able to stream more video content at higher quality using less power and it allows for sharper, higher resolution photos in low light and advanced post-processing features."

Additionally, the company also unveiled its Gobi 9x35 fourth-generation 4G LTE modem, and a new RF transceiver chip, the WTR3925. Both of these wildly improved chips display "significant improvements in performance, power consumption, and printed circuit board area requirements." The Gobi 9x35 used 20nm dye, the smallest yet, allowing for even thinner and lighter devices moving forward.

Amazon has updated the operating system of their popular Kindle Paperwhite e-reader, following a similar update to their Kindle Fire HD line of tablets.

Among the new enhancements are Goodreads integration and new parental controls. Amazon says the rollout is expected wirelessly over the coming days or it can be manually installed by downloading the file through Amazon.

For Goodreads, which Amazon purchased earlier this year, you will be able to directly share passages from the book with Goodreads friends, as well as see what others are reading. You can then rate the book after you are done.

On the parental control side, Kindle "FreeTime" allows parents to set daily and long-term reading goals, which come with achievement awards

Google has made their Nexus Wireless Charger available this week through the Google Play Store.

The charger is a small, 60 x 60 x 12.5 mm all-black box that can charge a Nexus 4, Nexus 5 and Nexus 7 FHD (along with other Qi-compatible devices).

Priced at $49.99, the charger will ship in one to two business days.

If you are interested, you can get the charger here: Nexus Wireless Charger

According to a Snapchat spokesperson, the company is now processing 400 million photos per day, even more than Facebook.

Facebook, the king of social media, said recently that users upload 350 million photos per day.

It is unclear how Snapchat is calculating their figure, but Cnet suggests that the company counts the same "snap" multiple times as most Snapchat users send the same message to multiple friends.

Numbers appear to be jumping, as CEO Evan Spiegel announced in June that 200 million snaps were being uploaded daily.

Snapchat recently turned down multiple cash offers above $3 billion, waiting instead for higher offers or to go public.

Motorola has announced today that the new Android 4.4 KitKat operating system is now available to Moto X owners, at least if you are on Verizon.

The rollout will begin just three weeks after the launch of the Google Nexus 5 (and with it, KitKat) and it even beats Google's older Nexus devices like the Nexus 4, and the Google Play Experience versions of the Samsung Galaxy S4 and HTC One.

Motorola's Moto X, which features an almost stock Android, will get the 4.4 updates, including the new UI refresh, emojis, smart dialer and Google Now enhancements.

Other carriers will begin their Moto X Android 4.4 rollouts "very soon."

More info here.

Microsoft has confirmed today that its live gameplay streaming feature has been delayed until next year.

The streaming, which uses Twitch.tv, will be made available during the "first part" of 2014.

Says Microsoft: "We know the ability to instantly broadcast gameplay is something the gaming community is excited about, and we are too. We are working to ensure the initial Twitch on Xbox One broadcasting experience meets the expectations of the Twitch community, so while this feature won't be available right away, we'll let you know as soon as it is ready. Our goal is to deliver it during the first part of 2014."

Twitch and live streaming is available on the PlayStation 4, which has quickly become one of the more popular features of the new console.

Although the streaming is delayed, Xbox One owners will still be able to record gameplay clips for up to five minutes and then upload them to SkyDrive or Xbox Live. Gamers can also view outside streams through Twitch while they wait for the app to be updated next year.

Nokia's highly-anticipated Lumia 1520 phablet has gone on sale in France, the first country in a global launch.

Later this week, the smartphone will hit the U.S., Italy, Russia and Hong Kong.

The powerful device features a 6-inch 1080p FullHD display, a quad-core 2.2GHz Snapdragon 800 processor and 2GB RAM along with 32GB internal storage and a microSD slot.

Additionally, the device has a 20MP PureView camera with OIS, a huge draw for cameraphone fans.

Other features include pre-installed Microsoft Office and wireless charging capabilities.

The Android-based gaming console maker Ouya has started taking pre-orders for a new 'limited edition' model of the box.

Identical to its predecessor for the most part, the new Ouya is white in color and includes double the internal storage, at 16GB instead of 8GB.

Available only in the U.S., the limited edition white Ouya has a 1.7GHz quad-core Tegra 3 processor, 1GB of RAM, a USB 2.0 port, a micro USB port, HDMI output, a wireless controller and runs on Android 4.1 Jelly Bean.

Ouya has increased the price to $129 for the added storage, and the console will ship to those that preorder on December 8th.

Google has confirmed today that they have finished upgrading all of their SSL certificates to 2048-bit RSA or better, a process they began in May of this year.

Says the search giant:

Coming in ahead of schedule, we have completed this process, which will allow the industry to start removing trust from weaker, 1024-bit keys next year.

Thanks to our use of forward secrecy, the confidentiality of SSL connections to Google services from modern browsers was never dependent on our 1024-bit RSA keys. But the deprecation of 1024-bit RSA is an industry-wide effort that we're happy to support, particularly light of concerns about overbroad government surveillance and other forms of unwanted intrusion.

The hardware security module (HSM) that contained our old, 1024-bit, intermediate certificate has served us well. Its final duty after all outstanding certificates were revoked, was to be carefully destroyed. With the demolition of the HSM and revocation of the old certificates, Google Internet Authority G2 will issue 2048-bit certificates for Google web sites and properties going forward.

Samsung has announced Galaxy Gear smartwatch sales figures for the first time today, and they are higher than expected.

The company has sold 800,000 units to date, including 50,000 in South Korea.

In an effort to boost sales, Samsung has been bundling the Gear with its Note 3 phablet with a discount, and some retailers in the UK have gone even further and made the Gear free with contract and a Note purchase.

According to the report, Samsung now calls the Gear the "most sold wearable watch available in the marketplace," although the competition is not great with only Sony and Pebble as competitors.

Additionally, the company says it will continue to add Gear support to more of its devices, and offer more promotions for the holidays.

According to research firm IHS iSuppli, Sony may be eking out a small profit on PlayStation 4 hardware sales.

After performing a teardown and cost analysis on the new console, the company says the component and cost of assembly breaks down to about $381. The electronics giant sells the console for $399. The analysis does not include R&D, marketing and shipping costs, which more than likely could add up to $15 per console, leaving Sony with a tiny profit margin per hardware unit sold.

Most of the cost comes from the AMD-designed APU and the 8GB of GDDR5 RAM, which clock in at $100 and $88. The 500GB HDD cost $37, the Blu-ray drive cost $28 and the new Dualshock 4 controller costs $18.

This entire situation should be a relief to Sony, who took a bath on the PS3 for years before the manufacturing process got cheap enough for them to make a profit. At its launch, Sony sold the PS3 for $599 but it was coting them about $800 to build due to its proprietary Cell processor and the (at the time) brand new Blu-ray drive.

Google has settled today with 37 states (and D.C.) over allegations that it had used unauthorized cookies in Apple's Safari browser to collect data on millions of users from 2011 to 2012.

The search giant had been using a loophole that enabled their DoubleClick advertising network "to shadow unwitting Safari users, even though Apple prohibited the tracking without obtaining a person's permission." By following the Safari browsing habits, DoubleClick was able to target ads.

Last year, the FTC fined Google $22.5 million for the same violation, and Google has settled with the States for $17 million. The violations took place between June 2011 and February 2012.

Google, for their part, has said the "snooping" was an inadvertent side effect in their ongoing efforts to target ads better.

"We work hard to get privacy right at Google and have taken steps to remove the ad cookies, which collected no personal information, from Apple's browsers," the company added. "We're pleased to have worked with the state attorneys general to reach this agreement."

Qualcomm has made their Toq smartwatch available, after announcing the wearable device in September.

Toq devices go on sale directly from the company on December 2nd, selling at $350 directly rivaling the Galaxy Gear.

The Android-based device uses the company's Mirasol low-energy display tech, which has struggled to catch on with other device makers. The tech will make reading the device in direct sunlight easier, and will make battery life significantly better than rival devices.

Qualcomm says the device will last five days per charge, compared to one day for the Galaxy Gear.

Users can connect to all Android 4.0.3 or higher devices to accept calls, read texts, notifications and reminders, as well as control music playback. Additionally, the device can pull stock quotes, weather and will feature different watch face designs.

For charging, you can "simply set the device down on its case to charge the Toq without the need for plugs or clunky cables" adds the company.

Ten months after announcing they had sold 500,000 units, the team behind the Raspberry Pi has confirmed that they have now reached 2 million sold as of the end of October.

The team says they had initially expected to reach the milestone by February of next year, so there was a "bit of a shock" when it was hit so early.

Raspberry Pi devices are mini-computer created by UK programmers that sell for $35. What makes the computer so impressive (besides its price tag) is the fact that it can play 1080p HD video with no issues. The devices are intended to promote the teaching of basic computer science in schools or at home. The company is looking to promote the Python programming language, alongside Basic and C among others.

For your $35 you get a 3.3-inch wide board with a 700 MHz ARM11, 256MB RAM, HDMI-out, SD card slot, a USB port, ethernet, audio jack and Broadcom VideoCore IV GPU.

For the second time this year, it has been reported that Apple has purchased Israeli startup PrimeSense.

The company created the technology behind the original Microsoft Kinect sensor and makes the 3D sensors allowing you to control devices through gestures.

Reportedly, the deal was for $345 million and will be announced officially before the end of the year.

PrimeSense released this statement when asked about the report: "PrimeSense is the leading 3D technology in the market. We are focused on building a prosperous company while bringing 3D sensing and Natural Interaction to the mass market in a variety of markets such as interactive living room and mobile devices. We do not comment on what any of our partners, customers or potential customers are doing and we do not relate to rumors or recycled rumors."

Back in July, the same outlet reported Apple had purchased the company for $300 million.

Google has finally made its Google Play Music app available for the iPhone.

At its core, the free download allows you to listen to any song you have saved to Google's cloud, up to 20,000 free of charge. You get to use Google's radio and instant mix features, while streaming at 320kbps (if your uploads were at that quality).

If you pay $10 per month, you get Google All Access. You can download or stream (on your desktop or mobile device) from Google's 20 million-strong catalog of music, similar to Spotify or Rdio. Using their own algorithms, Google will recommend tracks based on your listening history, and you can create as many ad-free stations as you want.

Additionally, as part of the app's "Explore" tab, you get to see playlists created by humans and not alogrithms, including starter playlists for over 200 genres.

The new app can connect to speakers and TVs via AirPlay and Bluetooth and is available in 20 countries.

Sony has noted this weekend that they sold over 1 million PlayStation 4 units in the console's first 24 hours of availability.

The console went on sale in the U.S. and Canada on November 15th.

"PS4 was designed with an unwavering commitment to gamers, and we are thrilled that consumer reaction has been so phenomenal," said Andrew House, President and Group CEO, Sony Computer Entertainment, Inc. "Sales remain very strong in North America, and we expect continued enthusiasm as we launch the PlayStation 4 in Europe and Latin America on November 29. We are extremely grateful for the passion of PlayStation fans and thank them for their continued support."

Sony recently stated they are aiming to sell 5 million PS4 units by the end of their fiscal year, March 31.

The PS4 sells for $399 in the U.S.

In September, CyanogenMod, the popular custom Android developer became a real company, Cyanogen Inc., and raised $7 million in venture capital funding as it provided plans to become the third biggest operating system in the world behind Android and iOS.

Founder Steve Kondik admitted at the time that in its current state, installing CyanogenMod was not accessible to the average smartphone user, as rooting and flashing are not the most simple of processes, even for experienced Android owners.

To remedy the situation, Cyanogen Inc. began work on the CyanogenMod Installer, an app that walks you through the process of get your phone to the latest version of CyanogenMod. It requires a PC currently (OS X support coming soon) and there are only a handful of phones that can use it so far, but the eventual goal is to make it available to all Android handsets.

For this guide and review, I used an unlocked Google Nexus 4, running on stock Android 4.3 Jelly Bean. Read ahead for the process and initial thoughts on the operating system.

According to the FBI, Anonymous hackers have been stealing sensitive information from U.S. government computers are multiple agencies for a year now.

Exploiting a flaw in Adobe's ColdFusion software, the activist hackers entered the computers, left back doors, and returned multiple times to steal new information.

In their memo, the FBI called the attacks "a widespread problem that should be addressed" and claimed it affected the U.S. Army, Department of Energy, Department of Health and Human Services and more. The FBI adds that it believes the attacks are still ongoing.

System administrators were given instructions on what to look for to see if their systems have been compromised.

One example, Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz' chief of staff, Kevin Knobloch says the data stolen included personal information on 104,000 employees, contractors, family members and others associated with the Department of Energy. Even worse, over 2000 bank account details were stolen.

The attacks are related to the case of UK resident Lauri Love who was recently indicted for hacking US government agency computers.

The MPAA has released its annual "Best Practices to Prevent Film Theft" for movie theater owners, and as expected the trade group wants theaters to use extreme measures to avoid camera-based piracy.

"The MPAA recommends that theaters adopt a Zero Tolerance policy that prohibits the video or audio recording and the taking of photographs of any portion of a movie," the MPAA says in the report.

Thankfully, the MPAA has removed a paragraph from last year's edition in which they claimed the industry loses billions every year due to piracy as that figure has been generally debunked.

Now, if a suspect individual is spotted recording, the MPAA says movie theater employees should take immediate action and have the local police notified. "Theater managers should immediately alert law enforcement authorities whenever they suspect prohibited activity is taking place. Do not assume that a cell phone or digital camera is being used to take still photographs and not a full-length video recording. Let the proper authorities determine what laws may have been violated and what enforcement action should be taken."

Newly launched on Friday, the new Sony PlayStation 4 was hit with some early problems, most notably with the PlayStation Network (PSN) and with redeeming included vouchers for Sony Unlimited and PlayStation Plus.

According to Sony's official channels, most of those problems have been solved as of this afternoon.

The first issue was customers having issues just signing into PSN:

BitTorrent, the company that created the P2P protocol, says reports that Netflix is responsible for just about a third of U.S. peak time download traffic is nothing to be proud of, as it is inefficient and hurts ISPs.

Sandvine published the report earlier this year, showing Netflix being responsible for 31 percent of peak download traffic, with YouTube taking another 18 percent. BitTorrent, by comparison, was at just 4 percent. Of course, BitTorrent controlled a much bigger share of upload traffic, due to the fact that all files being downloaded via BitTorrent must be shared by another peer.

"Netflix is hogging all of the bandwidth in North America," BitTorrent's vice president of marketing, Matt Mason (via Guardian). "This is a problem for Netflix. They're talking about [the super-high-definition TV format] 4K, but they're crushing the network already; if they deliver 4K they're going to completely grind it to a halt. All the ISPs are pissed at Netflix, because this is an unsustainable situation.

Officials in London have confirmed that the city will become one of the first in the world to get its own domain name, ".london," sometime in 2014.

Internet overseer ICANN has approved the city for its own top level domain.

London-based businesses, organizations and individuals can begin applying for web addresses starting in the spring, and at least thirty thousand businesses have already expressed interest.

"Adopting the .london suffix will enable organisations to more closely associate themselves with our great city's powerful global brand," says mayor Boris Johnson. "This is also an excellent opportunity to expand London's digital presence, which in turn is set to generate funds to invest back into the city."

While there is expected to be squatters, ICANN will offer a trademark claims service to prevent third parties from sitting on new domains in your name.

Jeremy Hammond, the infamous Anonymous hacktivist that pleaded guilty to hacking into private intelligence firm Stratfor and then releasing millions of private emails, has been sentenced to ten years in prison for his crime.

In addition, Hammond will see another three years of supervised release.

The hacktivist pleaded guilty to one count under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA), and was sentenced to the maximum time of ten years.

Calling the extremely lengthy prison sentence a "vengeful, spiteful act," Hammond says the government made an example of him to stop the rise of political-based hacking.

Speaking of his prosecutors, Hammond says "they have made it clear they are trying to send a message to others who come after me. A lot of it is because they got slapped around, they were embarrassed by Anonymous and they feel that they need to save face."

During his time with Anonymous, Hammond often worked with Hector Xavier "Sabu" Monsegur, the leader of Lulzsec and also secretly an FBI informant. Sabu provided the targets, and Hammond and others did the dirty work. "It is kind of funny that here they are sentencing me for hacking Stratfor, but at the same time as I was doing that an FBI informant was suggesting to me foreign targets to hit. So you have to wonder how much they really care about protecting the security of websites."

Earlier this week, Google took the wrapping off its Moto G device, an entry-level smartphone that the company hopes will help it dominate the low-cost market.

Google has priced that device at $179 off-contract and unlocked, making it easily one of the best deals for an Android phone, ever. Google says carrier partners will sell it for much less, with the potential for the device to sell for $49 or less.

For your money, you get a 4.5-inch 720p LCD TFT display, a quad-core Snapdragon 400 processor, 1GB RAM, 8GB internal storage and dual cameras, 1.3MP/5MP. On the design side, the Moto G looks just like its more powerful and expensive brother, the Moto X with some minor cosmetic differences.

You cannot use the Moto Maker customization site for the Moto G, but the backplate is removable and blue, teal, red, yellow, purple, white, and black covers are available at launch. Additionally, there are rugged versions and flip-style portfolio covers. Although you can take off the cover, the battery is non-removable.

According to major memory maker Crucial, DDR4 RAM will be available starting next month.

The company provided a comparison to DDR3, and the new memory will use only 1.2Volts, while moving to double the speed of DDR3 Memory. DDR4 will have a base speed of 2133MHz, and 4GB will be the smallest density.

DDR4 will be 100 percent faster than its predecessor, have 300 percent more density, and require 20 percent less voltage. Finally, a smaller die will allow for more memory per RAM and up to 16GB per stick.

It is important to note that DDR4 has a different architecture, so if you are in the market you will need a motherboard that can handle it.

A group of Chinese companies including major video hosts Youku, Sohu and Tencent's v.qq.com have joined together for a $48.9 million lawsuit against market leading search engine Baidu.

Baidu currently feeds content to its mobile video services, Baidu Yingyin, Baidu Video App, and Baidu TV Stick. However, the video search also leads users to places where they can download copyrighted material.

"We cannot keep competing because where thieves and robbers are having their way, law-abiding companies cannot survive," Sohu chairman Charles Zhang recently noted.

Baidu has blocked videos in the past and also paid licensing fees to music content producers, but it appears that has not been enough. Lawyers in the nation suggested many more lawsuits were coming.

As expected, the MPA praised the announcement of the lawsuit.

Just days after it was revealed that Facebook tried to buy popular mobile app Snapchat for $3 billion and was turned down, it appears that Google tried make a similar offer, to no avail.

The reports say Google offered $4 billion in cash, but the search giant was also rebuffed.

It appears that Snapchat CEO Evan Spiegel believes the company's growth is so exponential that it is worth more than $4 billion in the future. Spiegel had originally looked to Google for "a strategic investment" in the app.

Google would have left the app as a standalone, the same way Facebook did with Instagram after purchasing it for over $1 billion last year.

Snapchat is currently in a funding round that would value the company at around $3.8 billion.

Apple has released iOS 7.0.4 today, bringing "bug fixes and improvements" but no new features.

Most notably, the patch eliminates a FaceTime bug that caused calls to repeatedly fail for some users.

The small update is 17MB, but Apple's downloader says you need 765MB of free storage before you can download it.

You can read more about the update here: Apple Support

Last night, just days before the Sony PlayStation 4 launch, popular comedy show South Park did their duty to troll console fanboys.

For the episode titled "Black Friday," the show mixed Game of Thrones references along with Black Friday craziness and the console war craziness.

Of course, Cartman wins with the quote of the night, "Let these Sony f***s wallow in their limited voice-control functionality."

Check the video here:

Two months after debuting exclusively for AT&T, the Motorola Moto Maker site is now available for all major U.S. carriers.

The site allows buyers to customize their Moto X smartphone, including thousands of different color options, accents and combos.

Now available for Verizon, T-Mobile and Sprint, US Cellular customers will have to wait some more time to get the service.

Motorola builds the device in the U.S., so shipping times to U.S. buyers is four days or less from purchase.

The Moto X costs $99 for the base 16GB model with two year contract.

Comcast has plans to open a movie download and streaming store that will be available to subscribers through the company's set-top boxes and its Xfinity TV site.

The major ISP and cable provider hopes to launch the service before the end of the year, say the sources.

At launch, the service will include a wide range of titles "from several Hollywood studios that include new releases, older movies and some TV shows."

Currently, Comcast offers free on-demand movies and pay rentals during a specific period. Hollywood is actively looking to boost their digital sales as more customers move away from DVD and Blu-ray purchases, and Comcast is a major player in the industry.

According to leaking pro @evleaks, Nokia's upcoming Windows Phone 8.1 device will include '3D Touch' features.

The source says the company is actually planning two phones, codenamed 'Goldfinger' and 'Moneypenny,' with Gold being the flagship.

3D Touch, which Nokia has been working on for quite some time, uses the hardware sensors "to detect interactions that are off-the-glass."

Supposedly, the new features will make use of off-glass gestures above and to the side of the device. According to the source, the new gestures "currently under consideration include scrolling and flipping to let Windows Phone 8.1 users navigate around a phone without touching the screen."

Windows Phone 8.1 is currently under development and should be launched in time for the Mobile World Congress 2014 in February.

Nokia Goldfinger and Moneypenny are shaping up to be the first Windows Phone Blue devices.

-- @evleaks (@evleaks) November 14, 2013

The Mac and iOS-based news site MacRumors confirmed this week that their forums were attacked by hackers, with 860,000 usernames and passwords being stolen.

Fortunately, the hacker says he will not leak any of the passwords stolen, but MacRumors has still begged users to change their password on the site and on other sites where they might have used the same pass and username combo.

"We're not terrorists," says the attacker, who goes by "lol." "Stop worrying, and stop blaming it on Macrumors when it was your own fault for reusing passwords in the first place."

The hacker accessed a moderator account for the vBulletin software that runs the site, then escalated their access privileges, eventually dumping a database containing all the usernames, email addresses and passwords. The passwords were md5 hashed and salted, which means they will be cracked within days if not sooner. MacRumors was upfront with their users and confirmed that hash/salt is not secure and reported the breach within hours of it occurring, unlike major corporations, many of which have waited days following attacks to say anything.

Apple II's source code, which was released 35 years ago and was the company's first mass-market computer, is now available to the public.

The Computer History Museum has made the original DOS code available after it was donated by Paul Laughton, the man who created the operating system on a strict deadline from Apple founder Steve Jobs.

Apple II used a cassette tape for data storage and needed just 4KB of memory to run.

The OS took Laughton seven weeks to build and he was paid $13,000 for his work.

Read more on the OS and get the source code here: Computer History

As expected, the rumor mill is heating up for 2014's Samsung Galaxy S5.

Following the company's analyst day, we have a few confirmations about the device.

The smartphone will include a 16MP camera with ISOCELL technology which "allows for better photography in low light settings as well as improved color, sharpness, and richness," say the sources.

In addition, the device will use a 64-bit Exynos chip. The processor is built on an ARM design, and then "optimized" by Samsung who licenses the designs and then brands it as Exynos.

Samsung announced the S4 last March for sale in April. It is rumored that the upcoming S5 will be released even earlier, perhaps during February.

Google has announced new music-based features for its Google Glass wearable device.

Glass now has Google Play Music support, which can be accessed by saying "Okay Glass, listen to..." and stating whatever track you would like to begin with.

Additionally, you will have access to All Access, Google's unlimited streaming catalog (if you pay for it).

To use Google's Sound Search feature, you can say "Okay Google, what song is this?" and it will provide you then name of the track along with the artist and an image of the album cover or track image.

Finally, Google will begin selling stereo earbuds for $85, including 5 interchangeable color caps.

Netflix has announced this week that it has just undergone the "biggest update in Netflix history to our TV experience"

The update affects the universal Netflix on TV experience, including the platforms for Roku 3, Smart TVs, Blu-ray players and consoles.

As Netflix explains, the "new experience evolved through a process of design exploration, iteration and testing that extended throughout all parts of the Netflix TV experience. We set out to deliver an update that would make it even easier to discover something great to watch and we think we succeeded."

Throughout the navigation of the streaming library, there will be three large images for each show/movie and full context about the title rather than just the name. Furthermore, there is a "shorter, more descriptive synopsis as well as personalized information to provide more detail about why you should watch a specific title."That information includes info based on your viewing habits, taste preferences or your social networking.

At the end of October, Google officially unveiled the Nexus 5, the latest flagship device for the company that offers a pure Android experience along with higher-end specs.

The device sold out of initial supply through the Google Play Store within hours and moved to expected one week shipping and then two week shipping before the launch day was completed. The experience was significantly better than the Nexus 4 launch, which saw server crashes and delays and shipping times as long as 10 weeks.

I've been able to test the new reference device for about a week now, and the question is not whether it is the best phone in its price range (which it certainly is), but whether it can compete with the best-in-class devices such as the iPhone 5S, Lumia 1020, HTC One, Galaxy S4 and some would argue, the Note III.

Seiki has unveiled the cheapest large 4K display to date, available exclusively at Sears.

The 55-inch display with 4K resolution will cost just $1499, and be available at over 500 US Sears retail stores.

In addition, the company is offering a 39-inch model for $699. Each TV has 'UltraHD' resolution of 3840 x 2160, use a 120 Hz refresh rate for 1080p and a 30Hz rate for 4K content.

The TVs have a USB port for built-in audio and photo viewing, and HDMI v1.4 for connectivity.

Check more about the devices here.

Pioneer quietly bowed out of the TV market in 2010, saddening fans of the high-quality Kuro plasma displays.

It appears now that the company is getting back into the business, building exclusively for Dixons/Currys, the large retailer in the UK and other parts of Europe.

The new TVs will all be 1080p LED models in 40-, 46- and 55-inch sizes along with 3D and Smart TV capabilities. Each has built-in Wi-Fi, USB and HDMI ports.

Yoshihide Beppu, Business Planning Director of Pioneer Home Electronics Corporation said:

"We're delighted to collaborate with Dixons Retail. With our unparalleled reputation for cutting edge technology and sophisticated designs, we know these technologically advanced high-end TVs have a unique place within the market. Our decision to work with Dixons Retail was a natural one, as we highly value their clear customer focus, market leading positions and innovative approach to retailing. With their highly respectful approach to the premium positioning of the Pioneer brand, alongside our loyal customer base, we believe this is a winning combination and we're excited to watch these new products transport customers in to a world of fun, entertainment and interactivity."

Apple has quietly put up the new iPad Mini with Retina for sale today through it online store, a surprisingly low-key launch for the hotly anticipated device.

The company had unveiled the tablet at its major product event three weeks ago, but so far all of the hype and press has been for the full-sized iPad Air.

Most of the Wi-Fi tablet variations have a 1-3 business day shipping estimate, while the bigger capacity LTE models have 5-10 business day shipping times.

Prices for the base models are $399, and get as expensive as $829 for the 128GB LTE + Wi-Fi model.

CEO Tim Cook said last month that "it's unclear whether we will have enough for the quarter or not," when asked about supply, and the quiet launch seems to imply that there really may not be enough devices to go around.

The tablet will reach consumers on November 20th.

The BBC has confirmed this week that it is currently developing an Xbox One version of its popular iPlayer app.

Unfortunately, the app will not be completely ready for the Xbox One's November 22nd launch, but it is far into development.

"BBC iPlayer is already available to audiences on over 1,000 devices and platforms in the UK," reads a general statement from the BBC. "While we are working to bring BBC iPlayer to Xbox One in the future, we have no further details to share at this time."

The PS3, Wii and Xbox 360 currently have iPlayer apps, and it is unclear if the PS4 will get the app.

Famitsu has released an interesting list this week, the top 100 best-selling games in Japan for the 21st century.

Sales are for the period beginning January 1, 2001 and ending September 29, 2013.

Posted below are the top 40, which are lead by 2006's New Super Mario Bros. for the DS with 6.5 million copies sold.

Here is the top 40, which is unsurprisingly filled with Nintendo hits:

Sony's most recent update to their terms and conditions makes it clear that the company can actively monitor and record your PSN activity and communications between players.

In the new Software Usage Terms, there is a section that reads 'Are we monitoring PSN?', where the company reveals that it is indeed able to monitor.

The company says it reserves the right to "monitor and record" text or voice communication, or user-generated media (UGM) if they feel it is necessary. One such example would be if a player submits a grief report about another player.

Reads the section:

Are we monitoring PSN?
Yes but we can't monitor all PSN activity and we make no commitment to do so. However, we reserve the right in our sole discretion to monitor and record any or all of your PSN activity and to remove any of your UGM at our sole discretion, without further notice to you.

Your use of PSN and our community features may be recorded and collected by us or sent to us by other users as described in 13.1.

Any information collected in this way, for example, your UGM, the content of your voice and text communications, video of your gameplay, the time and location of your activities, and your name, your PSN Online ID and IP address, may be used by us or our affiliated companies to enforce these Terms and the SEN Terms of Service, to comply with the law, to protect our rights and those of our licensors and users, and to protect the personal safety of our employees and users.

Read more...

Intel has acquired Kno, an education startup that provides apps for interactive versions of digitized textbooks.

John Galvin, the GM of Intel Education, confirmed the move (via Crunch):

"The acquisition of Kno boosts Intel's global digital content library to more than 225,000 higher education and K-12 titles through existing partnerships with 75 educational publishers. Even more, the Kno platform provides administrators and teachers with the tools they need to easily assign, manage and monitor their digital learning content and assessments ... We're looking forward to combining our expertise with Kno's rich content so that together, we can help teachers create classroom environments and personalized learning experiences that lead to student success."

Kno has apps for iPad, Windows 7, Windows 8 and Android.

Line, the cross platform messaging app, has now reached $100 million in quarterly revenue.

Net revenue for the quarter ending in September reached 9.9 billion yen ($99.9 million), and overall revenue, which includes what Line pays to app stores and developers, jumped to 15.6 billion yen ($157.6 million).

When asked about an IPO, Line responded: "Of course you're going to ask questions about an IPO. It's a strategy we're thinking about, especially looking at services like Twitter. But at the current moment, we don't believe that it's something that we have to do right away. We currently have enough cash and we don't have a pressing need to do an IPO."

Line opened for business in 2011 in Japan, and now has 280 million registered users. The app has 49 million registered users in Japan, over one-third of the whole population there. Line has also expanded to the gaming world, with 39 published titles or deals in the works.

Games now make up 60 percent of revenue for the company, followed by stickers at 20 percent and then sponsored accounts and merchandising.

Chinese OEM Oppo has announced that their N1 smartphone, running CyanogenMod as its operating system, will see a global launch next month.

Oppo is known for its quality receivers and Blu-ray/DVD players, but more recently they have introduced cheap yet powerful Android devices.

Cyanogen, which recently became it a real company and raised money as it tries to take on Android, Windows Phone and iOS, announced Oppo as its first partner back in September.

The device has a 6-inch 1080 display, a 1.6GHz quad-core Snapdragon 600, 2GB RAM and a very intriguing rotating camera that allows you to use the better rear camera for video chat and portrait shots, as well. A limited quantity will be built with CyanogenMod already pre-installed, while the rest of the production will start with Android but have the application and instructions ready for Cyanogen.

Steam In-Home Streaming, a new feature that will allow people to stream games from one computer to another anywhere in their house, is open for beta applications.

The service will go to beta later this year, and the participants will be selected at random from members who sign up for the group here.

Right now the community website has over 16,000 members, and it is unclear how many beta testers will be selected.

Steam says the service will compliment its upcoming SteamOS Linux-based operating system, set for launch next year.

HP has quietly unveiled their new Omni 10 tablet, running on Windows 8.1.

The tablet has a 10.1-inch 1080p display with Gorilla Glass 3 and runs on the new 22nm Bay Trail Atom Z3770.

Clocked at 1.5GHz, the quad-core processor can boost to 2.4GHz if it is needed by the tasks at hand.

Under the hood is 2GB LPDDR3 RAM, 32GB internal storage, an 8MP Auto Focus/LED Flash rear camera and 2MP front camera, Micro HDMI slot, Bluetooth 4.0 and Wi-Fi 802.11a (b/g/n), and a battery that should last up to 8.5 hours with standard use.

On the design side, the tablet is extremely generic, heavy and has large bezels. The device costs $399 for the 32GB model and it is unclear if there are more storage configurations available.

Microsoft's Windows operating system turned 30 on November 10th, after first being unveiled in 1983 by founder Bill Gates.

The story goes a little bit further back, when Gates and friend Paul Allen started what was then called 'Micro-Soft' in an Albuquerque garage in 1975. By 1980, IBM asked Microsoft to create an OS for its PC, and the company purchased the operating system QDOS, before changing it to MS-DOS before licensing it to IBM.

MS-DOS was hard to use, and required a good knowledge of the command line, so the company began working on a better graphical interface that used a mouse and on-screen icons, menus and scroll bars.

Windows was then announced in 1983 and eventually version 1.0 was launched in November 1985. Windows 2.0 came later, in December 1987, followed by Version 3.0 in May 1990. Windows 3.1 became a huge commercial success, selling 10 million copies.

In 1993, the company revealed the first 32-bit OS, Windows NT, which became a basis for later versions. Windows 95 added the Start button, taskbar and built-in Internet support for dial-up networking. In 1998, Windows 98 added USB and DVD support, and was the last version of the OS to be based off of DOS.

Samsung has finally confirmed what their first Tizen-based device will be, and surprised by saying it was already launched.

The NX300M camera is the first commercial product with the operating system, and it launched in October in Korea.

Samsung executive VP Jong-Deok Choi showed off the camera, which runs on the Tizen Camera Platform, with the OS at its core. The device has 200 percent faster booting speed compared to other Linux-based cameras, says Choi, and improved capture performance of 9 shots per second at a 20MP resolution.

The first Tizen smartphones, however, have been pushed again, this time until the Q1 2014. This marks the third time Samsung has pushed back the operating system's smartphone launch. The device, whatever it is, will run on Tizen 2.2.1, as Samsung works on Tizen 3.0 for the Q3 2014.

Tizen 3.0 will bring multi-user accounts, 64bit architecture for Intel, ARM chips and 3D rendering.

Amazon has confirmed that it will be teaming up with the United States Postal Service to deliver packages on Sundays.

At launch, the Sunday delivery will only be in the LA and New York City metro areas.

Amazon Prime, which costs $79 per year, gives unlimited, free two-day shipping, discounted one-day shipping and free access to hundreds of thousands of TV episodes and movies via Amazon Prime Instant Video.

The Sunday service will expand in 2014 to Dallas, Houston, New Orleans and Phoenix and other major metros, adds the company.

"If you're an Amazon Prime member, you can order a backpack for your child on Friday and be packing it for them Sunday night," said Dave Clark, Amazon's vice president of worldwide operations and customer service. "We're excited that now every day is an Amazon delivery day and we know our Prime members, who voraciously shop on Amazon, will love the additional convenience they will experience as part of this new service."

Sony's marketing team has released an unboxing video for their upcoming PlayStation 4 console, parodying Daft Punk.

Rather than a step-by-step unboxing of what's under the hood of the device, Sony put the console in the same server room used in Daft Punk's Random Access Memories unboxing.

In the video, a pair of hands belonging to Shuhei Yoshida, president of Sony Worldwide Studios, inspects each of the box's contents, including the PSN voucher, a quick start guide, a DualShock 4 controller, an HDMI cable, an AC cord, a mono headset, and a USB cable.

Activision Blizzard has announced this quarter that their hit franchise World of Warcraft once again lost subscribers, although the drop was significantly better than last time.

The game now has 7.6 million subscribers, down from 7.7 million last quarter. The quarter previously the game had 8.3 million subs.

WoW remains the top-subscription based game in the MMO world, says Activision, although its competition is not what it used to be. Most major games have moved to the free-to-play model.

The company added that "significant and exciting new content" was coming soon, but no other details were revealed. Blizzard recently trademarked "Warlords of Draenor," which many believe is some sort of DLC for the MMO.

A judge has agreed that Samsung violated a court-ordered agreement and leaked sensitive Apple documents to attorney and employees.

Judge Paul Grewal took a month to review all of the documents himself, and "having finally crawled out from under the boxes," the judge says he believes "sanctions against Samsung and its attorneys are warranted."

Apple had given Samsung copies of the sensitive documents profiling the patent licensing agreements with Sharp, Nokia and Philips as part of the legal discovery process.

In the motion, Apple claimed that Dr. Seungho Ahn, a Samsung executive, knew the terms of the settlement and leveraged that knowledge to 'negotiate other potential patent settlements in Samsung's favor.' In the complaint, Apple says the licensing terms were given to Samsung's lawyers clearly marked "Highly Confidential -- Attorneys' Eyes Only", but the files were shared anyway.

BlackBerry's board of directors rejected any proposals that required the company to be broken up, as it does not believe a breakup is in best interest of the company or investors.

Microsoft, Apple, Lenovo and many others expressed interest in parts (but not the whole) of BlackBerry over the past three months.

Cisco, Google and Lenovo had interest in unknown parts of the company, while Apple and Microsoft wanted the company's IP and patents.

Last week, BlackBerry announced it had scrapped its tentative $4.7 billion plan to go private and would instead remain public with a new $1 billion investment from multiple shareholders. CEO Thorsten Heins has been replaced, and is stepping down immediately with John Chen taking over on an interim basis. Chen was the former CEO of Sybase Inc.

The company has sold $1 billion of convertible debt to large shareholder Fairfax Financial Holdings Ltd. and a number of other institutional investors. Fairfax owns 10 percent of BlackBerry already.

Kickstarter has confirmed it has permanently banned one backer who made malicious donations to over 100 different campaigns.

The user would pay, wait until the reward or product was shipped and then dispute the credit card charge, scamming the product maker and the credit card companies.

Chargeback scams like this have been around forever online, and in smaller iterations on Kickstarter, as well. The pledger in question went by the name Encik Farhan, and his donations were also all cancelled. Says Kickstarter: "Kickstarter and Amazon Payments, our US payments processor, were recently alerted to a series of malicious pledges by a single individual to more than 100 Kickstarter projects. Upon learning this information, we shut down this person's account, canceled their live pledges, and permanently banned them from Kickstarter."

"Kickstarter and Amazon are working together to investigate this situation. We won't let a single bad apple harm the integrity or goodwill of our incredible community," adds the crowdfunding giant.

For months now, a mysterious four-story barge has been being built at the port of San Francisco, and more recently it was revealed Google was the owner, although it was unclear what the barge would hold.

It has now been revealed that the barge will be a "technology exhibition space" that will migrate to a few ports in the San Francisco Bay area and other West coast locations for the next two years.

"We believe this curious and visually stunning structure will be a welcome addition to the waterfront; an experience unlike any other that celebrates community, local organizations and the history of San Francisco," reads a 36-page document submitted to the port.

Google, as a response, says they are "exploring using the barge as an interactive space where people can learn about new technology," but that the plans could ultimately change.

The barge will have over 13,000 square feet of studio space, and will include catwalks and a rooftop deck, reads the document. The space will stay open from 10am to 10pm, and the entire second and third floors will house technology demonstrations.

According to the latest F-Secure report, mobile malware threat families rose 26 percent quarter-over-quarter, to 259.

The security firm says it uses data from the Google Play Store and Apple's App Store, third-party app markets and other anonymized data from F-Secure's own mobile security customers.

As expected, most of the threats are aimed at Google's open Android, with the company saying 97 percent of the malware is for the operating system. The other three percent is aimed at Symbian, the now defunct OS previously run by Nokia. The figure is none too surprising either, given that Android owns 80 percent of the global market share for smartphones.

There was no malware found for iOS, BlackBerry 7 or 10, or Windows Phone.

Most notably, a toolkit for Android malware was created called 'Androrat APK binder,' which helps those who want to insert malicious code in legitimate Android apps. This development is scary for Android device owners and developers alike. Additionally, there was an increase in threats that used infected devices to send premium-rate SMS messages without the owners consent. Some of the SMS-sending trojan families are called FakeInst, OpFake, PremiumSms and SmsSend.

According to Bloomberg, Apple is designing new iPhones with bigger screens and curved glass that will include enhanced sensors to detect levels of pressure.

The devices, one with a 4.7-inch display and the other with 5.5-inches, will be easily Apple's largest phones, ever. The displays will curve downward at the edges.

Rivals Samsung and LG recently revealed their curved glass smartphones, the Round and G Flex, respectively although the practical uses of a flexible display remain low, at least in 2013.

In addition, the company continues to test the pressure-sensitive technology, although it may not be ready for 2014 edition iPhones.

Seagate has announced their new Samsung-branded Spinpoint M9T, an HDD the company calls the world's thinnest at the 2TB storage point.

The 2.5-inch drive is just 9.5mm thin, and Seagate also offers it in a 1.5TB capacity.

"The M9T combines the highest areal density shipping in a single storage device with an innovative design that fits into mainstream notebook applications. While other 2TB are solutions on the market are 15 mm thick, the vast majority of mobile devices are designed to use a 9.5 mm drive; with the M9T, those devices can now have 2TB of storage, enabling a richer computing experience," noted Dave Frankovich, senior product line manager, Samsung HDD.

"Samsung HDD with the new Spinpoint M9T continues to lead the effort in aerial density in a small form factor to supply our channel partners and customers with the highest-capacity and thinnest storage solution in the market," added Doug DeHaan, general manager, Samsung HDD division. "With consumer demand for storage capacity continuing to grow in mobile applications, the M9T answers this demand and is positioned to fulfill capacity needs in virtually any application."

Nintendo has confirmed it will add content warnings to its Wii Karaoke U app after it became clear that the game does not censor mature lyrics.

The app lets you sing to unedited versions of songs using your favorite Mii avatar. The app has songs of all genres.

Since launch, the app had a notice informing gamers that the songs were not being rated by ratings groups but now Nintendo will issue a new warning even before download that the game has mature content.

"It is however very important to us that all users of Wii Karaoke U by Joysound understand that some lyrics contained within songs may not be suitable for all audiences and as such we will immediately be implementing an additional message within the Nintendo eShop (prior to downloading the application and ticket purchase) as well as on the Wii Karaoke U by Joysound website pages," Nintendo added. "In the near future this message will also be incorporated within the notification that is displayed as the Wii Karaoke U by Joysound application is launched."

LG's upcoming G Flex flexible display smartphone will be available in Korea starting next week.

The company had previously announced the device, along with specs and features, but had not supplied a price.

Beginning November 12th, the device will sell for 999,900 Korean Won (about $935 USD), a price that will likely scare away most would-be buyers unless you just need to have it.

European carriers will get the curved device starting next month.

The G Flex features a 720p 6-inch curved P-OLED, which LG claims is ultra-light, ultra-thin and flexible. The device runs on Android 4.2.2, is powered by a 2.26GHz Snapdragon 800, an Adreno 330 GPU, 2GB RAM and a 3500mAh battery.

In addition, the device has a 13-megapixel rear camera, and a 2.1-megapixel front camera. The OLED panel is also built with plastic substrates, for better durability. The display also includes Real RGB technology for all three sub-pixels in one pixel, increasing brightness.

This week, Mozilla's popular Firefox browser turned nine years old.

The browser turned nine today, and the Firefox team says the browser was created to "be an amazingly fun, safe and fast Web browser that embodies the values of our mission to promote openness, innovation and opportunity online."

In order to celebrate, Mozilla put together a list of nine contributions they have made to the Web (and Firefox) this year. The list:

Firefox in Mobile: Firefox has always made a significant impact on the Web and we've recently grown Firefox to support not just Windows, Mac and Linux, but also Android phones and tablets. As more and more people access the Web from a mobile device than ever before, our Firefox for Android Web browser consistently offers users an amazing browsing experience, receives 4.5 stars in the Google Play Store and has been downloaded millions of times.

Read more...

Earlier this week, two labor rights watchdogs accused Dell and other company's Chinese-based suppliers of exploiting their factory workers, including some of which are minors.

The Danish nonprofit DanWatch says the factories in China's Guangdong and Jiangsu region force workers to work for up to 74 hours per week, at below the Chinese minimum wage. The workers are also subject to verbal abuse, adds the report.

Additionally, the China Labor Watch (CLW) says the companies are employing underage labor, making the gross abuses even worse.

"When companies compete on supplying computers in the cheapest way possible, and when our public buyers aim for the cheapest wares on the market, a high human cost is paid," Eva Hesse Lundström, DanWatch editor, added. "Our research shows that the conditions at Dell's suppliers violate [International Labour Organization] conventions and Chinese labor law as well as Dell's own policy."

Four factories building PC parts for Dell, Asus, HP, Samsung and Microsoft were part of the investigation.

Fifteen months after shutting down, it looks like infamous semi-private torrent tracker Demonoid may be trying to make a comeback.

A notice on the site seems to imply the site is coming back, with the owners of the site asking for Bitcoin donations to help rebuild.

TorrentFreak confirms the site is being resurrected, although the admin would not give any type of timetable or other specifics. "I can't give you any specifics at the moment, but yeah, we are planning to bring the site back," says the site's owner.

Demonoid was taken down last August after its Ukranian host received a takedown notice from Interpol as part of a criminal investigation into the site's owners, who are believed to be in Mexico.

Activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick has confirmed a new Call of Duty and a new Skylanders title for 2014.

"We also expect to launch new Call of Duty and Skylanders titles and a major new potential franchise with Bungie's Destiny," Kotick added.

The company did not provide any other details about the upcoming titles. Treyarch and Sledgehammer Games are said to be working on the new games.

Additionally, the company continues to develop the Call of Duty online free-to-play series aimed at the Chinese market.

The most recent in the series, Call of Duty Ghosts, was released on November 5th for the PS3, Wii U, PC and Xbox 360.

Panasonic has announced that their 20-inch 4K resolution Windows 8 tablet, the Toughpad 4K, will go on sale in January.

The tablet has a 3840 x 2560 LCD display, and Panasonic says it's the "world's lightest and thinnest 20-inch tablet," even though the competition in that market is almost non-existent.

Under the hood is a 1.9GHz Intel i5, 256GB of SSD and 8GB RAM.

In addition, the device has a USB 3.0 port, SD card slot, and built-in smart card reader. Due to the power necessary for the monitor and the powerful specs Panasonic says you will only get two hours of battery life with normal use, making this tablet much less portable than you would hope for.

Nvidia confirmed that its Tegra 4 SoC has not fared particularly well, reporting that overall Tegra revenue fell 54 percent, year-over-year.

The processor is in the new Microsoft Surface 2 and is also in many automotive systems, but as far as Android devices go, Tegra lost whatever share it had to Qualcomm and its Snapdragon processors. Nearly every major company uses a Snapdragon 600 or 800 in its flagships, including LG, Sony, Google and HTC.

CEO Jen-Hsun Huang has now moved up the timetable for its upcoming Tegra 4i, which has a built-in LTE modem and will be the first of the company's chips to be able to compete with Qualcomm.

The new chip will begin shipping in the Q2 2014 at the latest, says the exec, with a full unveiling likely for CES in January. Huang says AT&T has already certified use of the 4i, so there is the possibility the company could make a return to the smartphone Android market.

Google has confirmed that T-Mobile users can now send MMS messages (picture/audio/video messages) through Google Voice.

Sprint users were the first with the perk, getting access last month.

While it sounds good in theory, the actual process is not that great. Rather than seeing the MMS in your Voice account, you get a text message saying a multimedia message was sent to your Gmail as an attachment, where you can then view it.

Reads the post: "Last week +Nikhyl Singhal announced MMS support is coming to Google Voice. We're happy to announce this week another step towards improving MMS support for Google Voice. T-Mobile has allowed MMS messages from their users to be sent to Google Voice users. Similar to MMS messages from Sprint users, these messages will appear in Gmail, and you can be notified of the message via SMS. We continue to work with other carriers to broaden support for messaging and bring MMS to Hangouts. More good things are coming!"

Lenovo, the world's biggest PC maker, actively tried to bid for BlackBerry, but the Canadian government told them it would not accept a Chinese takeover due to national security concerns.

BlackBerry, which is a source of national pride and is also tied into Canada's telecom infrastructure, never received a formal bid due to the government making their decision known to Lenovo executives.

Earlier this week, the company dropped its plans to go private, and instead took a $1 billion financing injection from a group including major shareholder Fairfax Financial.

Lenovo operates in over 60 countries and is a public company, but 32 percent of its shares are owned by Legend Holdings Ltd., a Chinese investment firm that is widely believed to be run by the Chinese government. BlackBerry says its infrastructure sees 30 petabytes of data traffic each month.

The Canadian government recently rejected an Egyptian bid to purchase a division of Manitoba Telecom Services, also due to unspecified national security concerns about the national fibre-optic network.

The hotly anticipated Dell Venue 11 Pro is now available in the U.S.

Based on a Bay Trail-based 1.5GHz Atom chip and Windows 8.1, the tablet has a 10.8 inch IPS Display with FHD (1920 x 1080) resolution and 10-pt capacitive touch.

In addition, the device has 2GB DDR3 Memory, Intel Gen7 graphics, 64GB internal storage, Dell Wireless 1538 Dual-Band 2x2 802.11n WiFi, Bluetooth 4.0 and dual cameras 8/2 MP.

At $499 for this base model, Dell may have issues competing with the new iPad Air.

Moving up to more premium models, you can get a Y-series Core i3 with 128GB for $800 or a Core i5 with 128GB storage for $850.

The tablet ships December 5th.

Apple is in the process of equipping its retail stores to handle repairs for the iPhone 5S and 5C.

The move will expand on Apple's launch of the in-house repair program for the iPhone 5 earlier this year.

If you are no longer under warranty, you will have to pay a fee depending the damage to the device. For example, a broken screen will cost $150 to repair, replacement batteries will cost $79 and a stuck or damaged Home button for the 5C will cost $29. It is unclear what damaged Touch ID sensors cost to repair.

Any iPhone owner covered by AppleCare will receive free repairs.

Verizon has launched its own branded tablet, following a few weeks of leaks and speculation.

The Ellipsis 7 is based on Android and has low-end specs compared to newer devices.

Ellipsis 7 tablets have a 1280 x 800, 7-inch IPS display, 8GB of storage, 1GB of RAM, and a 1.2GHz quad-core processor. Additionally, the device has LTE connectivity and a front-side camera and runs on a near-stock Android 4.2.

The device goes on sale tomorrow, November 7th for $249.99 off-contract, which is pricier than the Nexus 7, which boasts much nicer specs.

One notable feature, is the addition of Verizon Messages. The carrier says the service allows "users to send and receive text messages from their tablet. And with the most recent app update, users can send customized photos with collages for a more personal messaging experience."

Amazon is looking to greatly expand its Kindle retail availability, by offering the e-reader to indie bookstores at a discount.

Dubbed 'Amazon Source,' the program lets local small businesses purchase the hardware, as well as accessories for resale at a slightly discounted rate. Additionally, Amazon will also give 10 percent of all ebook sales made by a consumer to the retailer where that Kindle was originally purchased.

The incentive runs for two years from original purchase date.

"We believe that retailers, online or offline, small or large, should be striving to offer customers what they want--and many customers want to read both digital and print books," said Russ Grandinetti, Vice President, Amazon Kindle. "For many years, bookstores have successfully sold print books on Amazon--now Amazon Source extends this opportunity to digital. With Amazon Source, customers don't have to choose between e-books and their favorite neighborhood bookstore--they can have both."

Finally, Amazon says retailers can get an ever bigger discount on the hardware if they choose to opt-out of the 10% deal.

Warner Bros. has started the next Humble Bundle pack, offering a few notable games including Batman for whatever you feel like donating.

If you donate over $1, you get access to Batman: Arkham Asylum Game of the Year Edition, F.E.A.R. 2: Project Origin and F.E.A.R. 3 and Lord of the Rings: War in the North.

Paying over $4.63 gets you Scribblenauts Unlimited and the sequel to Arkham Asylum, Batman: Arkham City Game of the Year Edition.

As with all Humble Bundles, you get to choose how your donation goes, split between Humble Bundle, the creator of the games and a charity, in this case 'We Can Be Heroes.'

Check the bundle here.

Samsung completed their annual analyst day in South Korea today, and there was certainly some interesting news to be had.

The company confirmed that it is now working on its own application processor. Rather than licensing from ARM and then moving those cores into their own chips, the Exynos line, the company will now design their own. Qualcomm, with its Krait cores (Snapdragon chips) and Apple do the same.

In addition, Samsung seems to be really stepping up their display features. In 2014, the company will have AMOLED panels with a massive 560 ppi. By 2015, the displays will have 3840 x 2160 UltraHD resolutions.

Samsung made it clear that they are trying to innovate in the areas of display, memory and processing, as the high-end smartphone market has likely peaked for the time being.

Ouya has announced today that the console's games store now has over 500 games available.

The Android-powered system now has 507 games, according to an internal ticker on the website.

All Ouya games are free to download and try, and the milestone was hit four months after the company's hardware launch in June.

A few of the major games include Sonic the Hedgehog, AVP: Evolution, Final Fantasy III and soon, the blockbuster hit 'The Walking Dead' episodic series.

Ouya has never disclosed hardware sales.

According to a new Reuters report, Microsoft has narrowed down its list of candidates for their CEO position being vacated by longtime exec Steve Ballmer.

Besides external candidates, there are a few internal candidates, as well, including Microsoft's business development boss Tony Bates (former CEO of Skype) and Satya Nadella, the head of cloud and enterprise.

The list had started at about 40 names and has been pruned, say the sources, but the process will still take a few more months. Ballmer announced his retirement in August, giving a twelve months or less timeframe.

A few of the most speculated about names are Ford's Alan Mulally and Computer Sciences' Mike Lawrie, both of which are known as "turnaround experts" and have certainly done so for their respective companies. Ford called the report speculation.

Stephen Elop, who left Microsoft to run Nokia into the ground before returning after Microsoft acquired the company, is also up for the position.

According to Nintendo president Satoru Iwata, the upcoming launch of the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One will be good for the struggling gaming giant.

The new launch will generate buzz for the entire industry, which could overlap to the Wii U.

"I think the launch of other video game systems is also good for us because they energize the video game industry as a whole," Iwata added. "Though there are some who take the view that intensified competition means overseas competition will be tough for Nintendo, no matter how Nintendo does domestically, I do not necessarily see it that way. This year, what Nintendo is promoting is, conversely, to stand out in the game industry for individuality. I believe we have become a unique value."

In order to boost interest in the Wii U, Nintendo will also introduce a whole slate of new family-friendly games. "We have an offering of software for the end of this calendar year that encourages family fun at home," Iwata added, such as Super Mario 3D World, Wii Party U, Mario & Sonic at the Sochi 2014 Olympic Winter Games, Wii Sports Club, and Wii Fit U.

T-Mobile, which recently moved away from contracts and began innovating in the industry that has been stagnant for years, has added over 1 million new customers in the last quarter, beating out larger rivals Verizon, AT&T and Sprint.

The carrier ended the period with 45 million customers, as growth has been accelerating. "Our momentum is great and we have confidence that we can continue to deliver sustainable and profitable growth," CEO John Legere said in a statement.

Revenue jumped 37 percent to $6.69 billion, above estimates. The turnaround is thanks to T-Mobile's "Uncarrier" initiative, which included a move to no contracts, free international roaming, unlimited data (with some throttling after certain points), cheaper service and an industry-first early upgrade program for new devices.

In the same quarter, Sprint lost 313,000 customers, AT&T admitted all of its feature phone customers were jumping ship and Verizon's growth slowed.

T-Mobile says now it expects to see 1.8 million new customers for the year, up from their original projection of 1.2 million.

According to a teardown by research firm IHS, Apple has managed to build its new iPad Air with even less cost than previous models.

The base model device costs $274 to build, and Apple sells the tablet for $499.

As expected, the Retina display is the most costly component, clocking in at $90. The multitouch adds another $43, for a total of $133 for the display.

Overall, despite getting thinner and lighter and more powerful, the device is $42 cheaper to produce than the third-generation iPad base model.

Surprisingly, the new 64-bit A7 processor cost only $18, a full $5 cheaper than last years A-series processor.

HTC has announced it will begin selling low-cost smartphones and slash costs significantly in order to try to save the company.

The company also warned that it expects revenue to be 15 percent lower than last quarter, well below analyst expectations.

In the Q3, the company had its first ever quarterly loss, but the company expects to eke out a tiny profit for the Q4. After racing to 11 percent global market share in 2011, the company now controls about 2.5 percent share.

To help remain profitable, the company says it will slash expenses by 24 percent quarter-over-quarter. Additionally, the company is looking into selling lower-cost handsets: "We're looking at broader products in this quarter...we aim for higher volume into 2014 that will give better profitability."

HTC had previously tried to break into the high-end smartphone market, specifically in China, to little success.

LG has started its new 'loaner' program, loaning devices to developers who create apps for LG devices.

The program loans devices to devs free of charge, but LG does expect you to design proprietary apps. Additionally, if you have non-exclusive apps, you can test actively test it on your G2.

Reads the site: "LG is pleased to offer the LG Device Loaner Program. The LG Device Loaner Program is designed to make it easier for developers to test and debug their apps on LG smartphones or tablets. Registered developers in the US and Canada will be able to borrow an LG device for a 30-day period.

Please sign in to gain access to the customer prospect demo order form and process. This sign-in process will be required only once while your web browser remains open. If you have questions, please contact us via email."

If you are a developer, check the program here.

Sony has posted the latest concept movie for the upcoming Gran Turismo 6 blockbuster.

The company says over 120 new cars have been added to the game, with a new total of about 1220. Additionally, track layouts have increased to 100, with new circuits such as Ascari, Spain "and the world famous Silverstone, Goodwood and Mount Panorama tracks."

More importantly, Sony says there is a "completely overhauled physics engine making gameplay even more dynamic and realistic, a new interface, and enhanced online functionality to allow you to tailor your multiplayer gaming sessions as you wish."

One of the features is 'GPS Logger'. The GPS Logger "will employ the GPS function of your phone or tablet and Gran Turismo's in-game Course Maker to recreate your everyday school run or work commute as a circuit." Very cool.

Kazunori Yamauchi, creator of the Gran Turismo series, added: "With the release of GT6 we are celebrating 15 years of Gran Turismo. It has been a privilege to have seen so many advancements made over this period, with GT6 now continuing to set new standards that blur the line between virtual and reality racing. With GT6 we will make it even more flexible and expandable by continuing to develop and add new content throughout its life."

According to the latest figures from Canalys, smartphone shipments jumped 44 percent year-over-year, surpassing 250 million for the Q3 2013.

Samsung and Apple unsurprisingly led the pack, followed by Huawei, Lenovo and LG. Samsung had 34 percent market share, followed by Apple at 15 percent.

Android remained king, as well, followed by iOS, and Windows Phone managed to jump 185 percent to 4 percent market share. Windows Phone was the second most popular OS in 19 countries, including Finland (home of Nokia) at 39 percent share, Italy at 15 percent share and Russia at 8 percent share.

Another interesting fact was the breakdown of devices by size. 5" or larger display smartphones accounted for 22 percent of total shipments, with 66 percent of those devices having a 5-inch display. 3 percent had larger than a 6" display.

Motorola has confirmed its Moto G smartphone will be launched on November 13.

The device is a cheaper alternative to the company's flagship Moto X, but the manufacturer has not revealed too many specs of yet.

Via leaks, including a Phones4U card, we know that the device will most likely run on a 1.2GHz quad-core Snapdragon processor, 1GB RAM and have 8GB internal storage and a 5MP camera.

The unlocked Google Nexus 5 appears to continue to show strong demand (or dwindling supply).

Google's recently unveiled flagship sold out of initial supply through the Google Play Store within hours and moved to expected 1 week shipping and then 2 week shipping before the launch day was completed.

As of writing, the smartphone is now on 3 to 5 week backorder, depending on which variant you want. The 16GB models, in black and in black/white, are on "4-5 week" backorder, the black 32GB model is on 3-4 week backorder and the white 32GB model (clearly the least popular), is on 2-3 week backorder.

The flagship has a Full HD IPS 4.95" 1920x1080 display (445 ppi) protected by Gorilla Glass 3, runs on the brand new Android 4.4 KitKat and is powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 800 at 2.3GHz, 2GB RAM, and an Adreno 330 GPU. The phone weighs just 4.59 oz, has a premium glass design, a 1.3MP front facing camera, an 8MP rear facing camera with Optical Image Stabilization, a 2,300 mAH battery and wireless charging capabilities.

The BlackBerry circus continues.

After failing to find a buyer for the entire company, BlackBerry has announced it has scrapped its tentative $4.7 billion plan to go private and will instead remain public with a new $1 billion investment from multiple shareholders.

CEO Thorsten Heins will be replaced, and is stepping down immediately with John Chen taking over on an interim basis. Chen was the former CEO of Sybase Inc.

The company's stock collapsed 17 percent today, following the news that it would sell $1 billion of convertible debt to large shareholder Fairfax Financial Holdings Ltd. and a number of other institutional investors. Fairfax owns 10 percent of BlackBerry already, and will buy at least $250 million of the new convertible debt. Fairfax had offered $4.7 billion to buy the company in September but it is clear that that deal had some issues.

As part of the deal, CEO Heins will step down and make way for Chen, who will also become chairman. Chen says he needs "a little bit of time" to build a workable plan for the company, but it wants to be a business-focused service. "Obviously there are a lot of assets there," Chen added.

According to multiple sources, AT&T is preparing for a potential takeover of Europe's biggest mobile carrier, Vodafone.

The complex deal is in early stages, as AT&T needs to know what assets it would retain after the acquisition, and what assets would be sold to others.

If such a deal were to fall through, AT&T also has its eyes on UK-based carrier EE.

AT&T has been actively looking to get into the European mobile market, and approached Verizon Communications earlier this year to try to purchase Vodafone's European operations. Verizon dismissed the deal as too complicated, and did not want to slow down their own $130 billion purchase of Vodafone's stake in U.S. carrier Verizon Wireless.

If merged, Vodafone and AT&T would form the largest wireless telco in the world, with a market capitalization exceeding $250 billion, and over 500 million wireless subscribers.

Boost Mobile, one of the more popular prepaid carriers in the U.S., has announced this weekend that they will begin offering the iPhone 5S and iPhone 5C, with a $100 discount to boot.

The devices will be available starting on November 8th, and the pricing matches that of Virgin Mobile, another prepaid carrier in the States.

Discounting all versions of the phone, the 5S will retail for 549/$649/$749 for the 16/32/64GB models, respectively. The 16GB 5C will sell for $100 off at $449, but the 32GB model will strangely retail for $649, leaving little incentive to purchase that model when you can get the better 5S for the same price.

The aging iPhone 4S will sell for $300.

Boost offers monthly unlimited everything no-contract plans for $55 that run on Sprint's 4G network.

According to the WSJ, three potential bidders are considering joining together for a bid for the struggling smartphone maker, BlackBerry.

Mike Lazaridis and Doug Fregin, who co-founded the company in 1984, but left the company in the last two years, have been talking with mobile chipset giant Qualcomm and major investor Cerberus Capital Management for a joint bid on the company.

In September, top shareholder Fairfax Financial Holdings Ltd. offered $9 per share for the company, but it has still not lined up the financing necessary and is likely to get hit with a breakup fee over $100 million for its wasted offer. Fairfax already owns 10 percent of the company. Investors have laughed off the preliminary deal, with the stock closing at $7.77 on Friday, well below the $9 offered.

BlackBerry has been up for sale in the last few months but buyers are cautious as the company only has a few assets worth anything. Its BBM network, its enterprise and security network and its patents are the only parts of the company seen with any value, and those may not be worth more than the company is currently trading for. The company's stock currently gives it a value of $4 billion.

Google has announced that Android 4.4 KitKat will ship with the company's own word processing suite, QuickOffice, already pre-installed.

The app, purchased in 2012 by the search giant, allows you to edit Microsoft Office documents, including spreadsheets and presentations.

Before it was acquired, the app sold for up to $9.99 and still had hundreds of thousands of downloads. In December of last year, the company made the app free, as long as you used Google Apps on iPad, iPhone and Android. As of last month, the app is now free to everyone using iOS and Android.

Microsoft offers a version of their market leading Office for Android and iOS, but it requires an Office 365 subscription to use, which is not cheap as it costs at minimum $5 per month.

Video-streaming startup PLAiR, which last year released an HDMI-dongle very similar to what Google released this year, has now scrambled to release a sequel to take on the giant's entry to the market.

Last year, the fish fin-shaped dongle plugged directly into the TV and allowed for streaming video. It was priced at $99 and was originally marketed to rival Apple TV, including the ability to find local content on your notebook, smartphone, tablet and then send it to the TV.

Chromecast, which does the exact same thing, is sold by Google for $39 and even included a free 90-day subscription to Netflix. So far, Hulu, Netflix and Pandora have created native apps for Chromecast with HBO Go expected later in the year.

The new PLAiR 2, which will sell for $49, is powered by a 1GHz ARM Processor, 1 GB DDR3 RAM, has 802.11n wireless, and a built-in GPU/VPU for full 1080p streaming.

As of this weekend, JetBlue and Delta airlines will no longer stop fliers from using their electronics during takeoff and landing.

The recent FAA announcement now allows for electronics to remain on during the flight, but phone calls and using cell data is still not allowed (aka airplane mode). Laptops are still not allowed, but only smaller devices like e-readers, smartphones and tablets. While the FAA decision is broad-based, each airline must ask for approval and it is not required for them to follow the new decision.

"We have worked very closely with the FAA to achieve this new policy, which will be a significant improvement in customers' onboard experience," Robin Hayes, JetBlue's chief commercial officer, noted. "JetBlue now allows all customers gate-to-gate use of personal electronic devices, which means customers can now use their devices at any time during their time onboard."

Delta noted that it recently completed the "carrier-defined PED tolerance testing" required to see if electronic device frequencies would interfere with the aircraft's machinery.

As of Friday, popular photo and video-sharing site Instagram is no longer ad-free.

The first official ad (sponsored photo) is from Michael Kors brand, and the picture of a watch saw over 250,000 likes in its first day.

Facebook (owners of Instagram) had an extended preview period allowing the 150 million users of the service to acclimate to seeing occasional ads in their feeds.

All future ads will include the label "sponsored" so users can differentiate and users can hide the ads if they don't care for the content. Eventually that will lead to better product targeting.

Facebook purchased Instagram for $1 billion last year, and the company has been careful in their efforts to begin monetizing the service.

According to new figures from NetMarketshare, Microsoft saw their new Windows 8.1 operating system take 1.72 percent global market share, following its first few weeks of general availability.

Overall, Windows 8 and Windows 8.1 took 9.25 percent share, a tiny 0.36 percentage point gain from the month before. Windows 8 itself fell 0.49 percentage points month-over-month, due to upgrades. Windows 8, as a standalone, likely peaked in September.

Windows 7 remained the champ, at 46.42 percent, although the OS was flat month-over-month.

Moving to Mac, OS X 10.9 was released late in the month, as well, and jumped to 0.84 percent share.

Windows Vista and Windows XP also remained relatively flat, but within major downtrends.

Netflix has confirmed they have begun testing 4K streaming, hoping to become a major provider by the end of 2014.

The company has added a handful of 4K UltraHD videos to its streaming library this week, with a much wider rollout expected in the next few months. Additionally, the company says it "hopes to launch Ultra HD next year."

For now, the titles are really just reference footage, including one title called "El Fuente: 24 MP," with a description that bluntly reads, "an example of 4K at 24 frames per second." The footage is kids playing in a fountain and people riding on bicycles, showing the streaming in different conditions.

Netflix is expected to make its own original content offerings in UltraHD next year, along with some other major content from licensing partners.

Sprint has begun taking pre-orders for the Google Nexus 5, offering the flagship device for $50 with two-year contract (for new customers).

The unlocked model starts at $349 for 16GB and works for AT&T, Sprint or T-Mobile.

Sprint's new deal is for new customers only, as it requires you to port your number from an existing carrier. Additionally, the company says the deal has a mail-in-rebate, as well, for $50.

If you are an existing customer, the carrier is charging $150 after rebate, for the 16GB model.

Read more about the new flagship here: Google Nexus 5 on Afterdawn

Popular Internet Radio provider Pandora has unveiled a new version of their app built specifically for Android tablets.

The app, Pandora 5.0 for Android, optimizes the larger tablet screen sizes and resolutions.

Reads the post:

Here are some more details of what you will experience with Pandora 5.0 for Android tablets:

Enhanced Listening Experience & Personalization – App interface is optimized for larger screens and features upgraded core Pandora functionality, such as adding variety to a station and viewing station details, in addition to the ability to easily shuffle, rename and delete stations.

Deeper Music Discovery & Exploration –Explore more about the artist and album that is currently playing with enriched artist pages that include similar artists and genome traits of the current track playing, plus lyrics, artist biographies and album discographies.

Your Personal Profile & Music Feed – Your detailed timeline Capture your music preferences on this detailed timeline, such as stations created, bookmarked tracks and thumb history and choose to make your profile either public or private. The Music Feed offers a centralized place to view music activity, making it easy to explore what friends and other listeners with similar musical tastes are discovering and enjoying on Pandora.

Read more...

According to Strategy Analytics, Android remains the king of the smartphone.

Global smartphone shipments jumped to 251.4 million units in the Q3 2013, up from 172.8 million year-over-year.

Android remains king, with 81.3 percent global share, followed by Apple at 13.4 percent and Windows Phone taking third at 4.1 percent. The growth for Android and Windows Phone was at the expense of iOS and BlackBerry. Apple saw strong growth, but fell from 15.6 percent share in the Q3 2012. BlackBerry just about fell off the map entirely, and now has 1 percent share. Windows Phone shipments doubled year-over-year.

iOS will continue to lose share as it has no presence in the low end market dominated by developing nations in Europe and Asia, says Strategy. Nokia, especially, has made a concentrated effort to create nice, cheap devices to fill that niche.

Rockstar, the consortium that purchased Nortel patents for $4.5 billion in 2011, has sued a number of major wireless industry players for patent infringement.

The group has sued Samsung, Google, HTC, Huawei, Asus and ZTE in the U.S. Rockstar is a group consisting of Apple, Microsoft, Blackberry, Ericsson and Sony. The consortium outbid Google for the patents, forcing the search giant to purchase Motorola Mobility for its patent trove.

Google has been accused of infringing on 7 separate patents, many of which cover tech related to Internet search and relevant advertising. All of the other companies build Android devices, which run on Google software and are deeply integrated with Google services.

This may be the final nail in the coffin of plasma display televisions.

Following Pioneer exiting the market earlier this year, Panasonic had confirmed today that they will be exiting the plasma TV market, ending production in December and all related operations by March of next year.

Two of Panasonic's three factories have already ceased production of new plasma displays, and the third will conclude by the end of next month. Last April, the company ceased all research and development on future plasma tech.

Panasonic says that "rapid, drastic changes in the business environment" (including price pressure from cheaper LCD TVs) forced their hand and the end of the plasma.

The company will move future R&D to OLED as Panasonic sees the tech as "one of the key future products" for the industry.

Alongside its announcement of the Nexus 5 today, Google also revealed that the device would be available through T-Mobile and Sprint, marking the first time a Nexus has been available on more than one carrier at launch.

There had been some reports stating that AT&T would also be carrying the device, but Google clarified by saying that the phone works on its network, but the carrier will not sell the device. Verizon also opted out of the device.

In the past, carrier support has been uneven, to say the least. The original G1 was a T-Mobile exclusive, Google's Nexus One worked on GSM carriers, its Nexus S was a Sprint exclusive (an unlocked version worked on T-Mobile) and the recent Nexus 4 was available unlocked or through T-Mobile only.

The new device works on nearly all bands, for 2G, 3G and 4G, making it a truly universal device. Sprint and T-Mobile will sell the phone in stores, and it is available through the Google Play store online.

Google has confirmed today that the Galaxy Nexus, the company's reference device from two years ago, will not receive the brand new Android 4.4 KitKat.

Sources claim that the issues are related to the Galaxy Nexus' Texas Instruments chipset. TI bowed out of the mobile chipset market in 2012, and therefore cannot offer proper support for new operating systems and compatibility.

The open-source community will likely create a capable Android 4.4 ROM, but Galaxy Nexus owners may not be as happy with needing to root their device when they had Google-fed updates for so long.

Google Nexus 4, 7 and 10 owners will be receiving the update within two weeks. The Nexus 5 will launch with the device, but will require a small update when setting up your phone.

As promised, Google's Chromecast now has native Pandora streaming.

The most recent update to the Android and iPhone app allow for the popular Internet radio service to be 'cast' to the big screen via the HDMI dongle.

Pandora says an iPad app update is on the way, but is not available now.

The popular $35 device now has native streaming apps for Netflix, Hulu and Pandora with HBO Go expected later this year.

Google officially announced the Nexus 5 earlier today, following months of leaks that revealed the hardware, its specs and its price.

The flagship has a Full HD IPS 4.95" 1920x1080 display (445 ppi) protected by Gorilla Glass 3, runs on the brand new Android 4.4 KitKat and is powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 800 at 2.3GHz, 2GB RAM, and an Adreno 330 GPU.

Additionally, the phone weighs just 4.59 oz, has a premium glass design, a 1.3MP front facing camera, an 8MP rear facing camera with Optical Image Stabilization, a 2,300 mAH battery and wireless charging capabilities.

The LTE-capable device also has dual-band Wi-Fi (2.4G/5G) 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac, NFC (Android Beam), Bluetooth 4.0 LE, and a micro USB port with SlimPort enabled for full connectivity options.