Latest news

Barnes & Noble has surprisingly announced a new version of their once popular Nook GlowLight e-reader.

The new GlowLight Plus has a new slimmer design, offers double the pixels of its predecessor (300ppi) and is also waterproof. The device also promises a glare-free screen.

It is unclear how much internal storage there is, but B&N promises enough room for thousands of books at one time.

The GlowLight Plus is available now for $129.99.

Hard drive maker Western Digital has announced their acquisition of memory card giant SanDisk for $19 billion in cash and stock.

There had been rumors for months that SanDisk was looking for a buyer and in the last week Western Digital was increasingly seen as a potential acquirer.

The move has synergies for both companies, including the merger of huge lines of SSDs, HDDs, and NAND storage.

"This transformational acquisition aligns with our long-term strategy to be an innovative leader in the storage industry by providing compelling, high-quality products with leading technology," said Steve Milligan, chief executive officer, Western Digital. "The combined company will be ideally positioned to capture the growth opportunities created by the rapidly evolving storage industry. I'm excited to welcome the SanDisk team as we look to create additional value for all of our stakeholders, including our customers, shareholders and employees."

Apple has quietly removed 250 apps from the App Store after it was discovered that the Youmi ad network was actually stealing private information including email addresses.

Most of the apps came from Chinese-based devs, and all used the Youmi SDK to build in advertising. Unfortunately, Youmi was also secretly taking user info and uploading it to their servers.

The move follows a research report from SourceDNA that stated the apps were the first they had ever seen to bypass Apple's stringent app review process. Combined, the apps have seen over 1 million downloads around the globe.

"We've identified a group of apps that are using a third-party advertising SDK, developed by Youmi, a mobile advertising provider, that uses private APIs to gather private information, such as user email addresses and device identifiers, and route data to its company server. This is a violation of our security and privacy guidelines.

"The apps using Youmi's SDK will be removed from the App Store and any new apps submitted to the App Store using this SDK will be rejected. We are working closely with developers to help them get updated versions of their apps that are safe for customers and in compliance with our guidelines back in the App Store quickly," concluded Apple.

Yahoo has confirmed this week that its plan to jump into the original streaming content business has not gone as planned.

During their recent earnings call, the company noted a $42 million write-down for its video division. "We thought long and hard about it," noted Yahoo CFO Ken Goldman. "What we concluded is [that] certain of our original video content, we couldn't see a way to make money over time. I'm thinking of Community, I'm thinking of Sin City Saints and so forth. So there, where we had spent money and had some assets on our balance sheet, we elected to write those off."

Community, which was a hit on NBC in its earlier seasons, was renewed for a final season on Yahoo, but Yahoo's service was not as easy to access compared to longstanding apps and services like Hulu and Netflix and it appears that Yahoo could not profit on the shows popularity.

Goldman agreed the streaming content did not go as planned but he did not rule out the company trying again in the future.

Following a similar announcement in different regions, Sony has confirmed that Europe will also be receiving a price drop for the popular PlayStation 4 console.

"Since the launch of PS4 our aim has always been to provide players with the best gaming experiences at the best value, and we've been thrilled with the amount of players who have joined our world," added Sony.

For the UK, the 500GB model PS4 will set you back £299.99, while most of mainland Europe will get the console for €349.99.

Additionally, Sony says New Zealand will see a price cut to $569.95 and Australia will, as well, to $479.95.

The newly released web version of Popcorn Time has already been taken down, but the site has quickly found a new domain.

Browser Popcorn was taken down by the MPAA, and its 15-year-old owner Milan Kragujevic posted a message to the old domain: "Browser Popcorn has been taken down by the E.V.I.L. money-grabbing s**tlords of America, The Motion Picture Association of Murica [sic]."

The site has now moved to browserpopcorn.gq after the MPAA made sure his original web host took the site down. "Basically, MPAA sent me a [cease and desist] letter and contacted my hosting provider and domain registrar and ordered them to take down the infringing content," Kragujeviche added. "I live in a country where copyright law is almost nonexistent, and simply I don't care. I will keep moving the website, changing domains and providers."

Thanks to a new report, we have some more proof that Google's Chrome browser is killing your battery life, and in some cases, to a huge degree.

Testing different browsers with different Windows 10 notebooks/2-in-1s, Chrome actually killed overall battery life by as much as 28 percent compared to Microsoft Internet Explorer, a scary figure.

In the report, the tester used an Asus Zenbook UX305F, a Surface Pro 3 and a Toshiba Portege Z20t-B, while testing IE11, Chrome 46, Firefox 41 and Microsoft Edge 20. All browsers were on default configurations. They ran the Peacekeeper battery test twice and averaged the battery time.

Microsoft's browsers were unquestionably the top dogs, saving 30-59 minutes in battery life depending on the device.

Here were the full results:

A few of the top developers for the Popcortime.io fork have reportedly left the project this weekend, following a number of internal disputes.

Popcorntime.io is the most popular of the Popcorn Time forks, and the software currently has millions of users and the blessing of the original creators.

Reportedly, there have been disagreements over how the project should move forward and those disputes have led to a few of the top developers leaving, practically breaking up the group. Allegedly, the disagreements started over the rumor of a Hollywood lawsuit due to the service's integration of VPN.ht. The software was created by two of the developers of Popcorn Time and has added a revenue stream, which in the past has led to lawsuits against otherwise free services.

Some of the team demanded getting away from VPN.ht, with plans to release a new Popcorn Time fork without the commercial VPN. The devs who created the VPN took that as a sort of "hostile takeover" and froze access to the software's code. At that point, a handful of devs decided it was time to move on. It is unclear what the next steps for the platform are.

Apple has acknowledged the very valid concerns of Retina MacBook Pro users who are being affected by 'Staingate' and will replace the screens free of charge.

Staingate had been affecting thousands of Mac users, and within a few months the anti-reflecting layer had begun to wear off, leaving a hideous stain across the screen that could not be replaced without voiding the warranty.

Notably, if you already paid for a replacement, you may be eligible for a refund through AppleCare.

The new program will cover MacBooks and MacBook Pros from within three years of their original purchase date or for one year from October 16th, 2015.

Yahoo has announced a new search deal with Google today in which the search giant will provide Yahoo with 'search ads, algorithmic search, and image search services' for mobile and desktop browsing.

The deal is in effect now and will last until 2018.

"In October, the Company reached an agreement with Google that provides Yahoo with additional flexibility to choose among suppliers of search results and ads," Yahoo wrote in its earnings release today. "Google's offerings complement the search services provided by Microsoft, which remains a strong partner, as well as Yahoo's own search technologies and ad products."

The deal makes perfect sense for Yahoo as it tries to profit from its search engine. Google has 64 percent of desktop queries in the U.S. compared to Yahoo at 12.7 percent.

Yahoo is in the middle of a 10-year deal with rival Microsoft in which Microsoft's search technology powers Yahoo's search engine in exchange for an 8 percent cut of search ad revenue.

In a new interview today, Apple CEO Tim Cook announced a milestone for the fledgling Apple Music service: 6.5 million paying subscribers.

Altogether, the service has 15 million total subscribers, a solid number for a service that has only been around since June. Keep in mind, Apple offers three free months to anybody who wants to try it, so the numbers are potentially inflated.

Cook said customers have been praising the human curation features of the platform and that he himself had been stuck listening to the same tracks over and over until he started using Apple Music.

The service launched with some issues, including a high-profile attack by the music industry over royalties but has since seemed to have settled into a groove.

According to Korean sources, Samsung plans to move the release of its flagship model, Samsung Galaxy S7 to happen couple of weeks before the MWC event where it has traditionally released its flagship models.

The move indicates that Samsung doesn't want to compete for the media attention during the MWC expo where several vendors release their products.

More interestingly, according to SamMobile, Samsung might be changing its flagship model tactic to have "super premium", "premium" and "sub-premium" flagship models in order to be able to compete against the iPhone (super premium) and against newcomers, like OnePlus and Xiaomi (premium & sub-premium).

HTC announced, without much fanfare, its mid-range model, HTC One A9, today that mimicks very effectively the current iPhone design, promises to deliver Android updates almost Nexus-like and will cost $399 unlocked.

Despite the promises of a quick rollout of future Android releases to One A9's users, HTC hasn't dropped its Sense user interface. Phone sports metallic back, with antenna stripes, very much like iPhone has. Internally the phone has Snapdragon 617 chip, 2GB RAM in 16GB storage version and 4GB RAM in 32GB version. Both models have a microSD memory card slot.

Full HD display is 5" and uses Gorilla Glass 4. Main camera is a 13Mpix camera with optical image stabilization and f/2.0 optics. Other than those details, the phone has fingerprint scanner, UltraPixel front camera and Dolby Audio.

Phone is expected to start shipping in beginning of November. Availability varies geographically.

HTC's reputation hasn't been exactly stellar when it comes to Android updates, but now the company has apparently taken different road.

HTC announced its One A9 mid-range smartphone today and the big news was that the company pledged to roll out all the Android updates to One A9 within fourteen days after Google releases the Android update.

The unlocked MSRP for One A9 will be $399, but Europeans will have to pay significantly more for the device once it arrives to old continent.

Match Group, the parent company of Tinder, Match and other dating sites, is set to go public using the symbol MTCH.

Besides Tinder and Match, the company also runs PlentyOfFish, HowAboutWe and OkCupid, giving it the largest portfolio of dating apps and sites.

Last year, the Match Group had $888.3 million in revenue, up 11 percent year-over-year and most of the sales comes through user membership fees. Net profit was $147.8 million, up 18 percent year-over-year. Altogether, the portfolio has 59 million monthly active users and 4.7 million paid members.

While the IPO will help the company raise money, it will still have over 50 percent of its shares owned by IAC, the media conglomerate.