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Google has banned the advertisement of pornography on its ad network, specifying sites that contain "graphic sexual acts with intent to arouse including sex acts such as masturbation."

The search giant says it expects most advertisers have already looked into different venues to get their ads out, but those in the industry speak differently. AVN Media, one of the largest in the business, says it was caught by surprise, having used AdWords since 2002.

All those that could potentially be in violation were notified in June with an email:

"Beginning in the coming weeks, we'll no longer accept ads that promote graphic depictions of sexual acts including, but not limited to, hardcore pornography; graphic sexual acts including sex acts such as masturbation; genital, anal, and oral sexual activity.

When we make this change, Google will disapprove all ads and sites that are identified as being in violation of our revised policy. Our system identified your account as potentially affected by this policy change. We ask that you make any necessary changes to your ads and sites to comply so that your campaigns can continue to run."

Porn is one of the most common searches on Google, with the company confirming that searches for "sex," "porn," "free porn" and "porno" totaled 351 million for the month of May.

After being wildly profitable amid strong smartphone sales in 2011 and even in 2012, Taiwanese smartphone maker HTC has fallen on some hard times of late, showing losses for the couple of quarters following a year of falling profits.

Thanks to the new One (M8) and some significant cost cutting, however, it appears the company has turned a corner, reporting a profitable Q2. The company had revenue of $2.17 billion and a small profit of $75 million. This compares favorably in revenue and profit year-over-year.

HTC has cut costs and increased marketing, and it seems the moves paid off with the One M8, which was well received by consumers and critics.

The company is also looking into wearables such as smartwatches, which could help growth into the future.

Microsoft has announced a cross-licensing pact with camera and imaging giant Canon, a deal that will affect "a broad range of products and services each company offers, including certain digital imaging and mobile consumer products."

The Redmond giant was quick to boast about their commitment to licensing and IP in general, unsurprising from a company that makes a cut of nearly every Android device that is sold despite not having anything to do with production.

Says the company: "The patent agreement is another example of the important role intellectual property (IP) plays in ensuring a healthy and vibrant technology ecosystem. Since Microsoft launched its IP licensing program in December 2003, the company has entered into more than 1,100 licensing agreements and continues to develop programs that open Microsoft's IP portfolio for customers, partners and competitors."

There is speculation that Microsoft will use the tech for Windows Phone cameras, enhancing the PureView tech seen in a few higher-end Lumias.

Prospective plasma TV buyers beware: Another major OEM is dropping out the market.

Samsung SDI has announced this week that it will be stopping all production on PDP (plasma display panels) by the end of November, marking the end of an era for the company.

As expected, the company cited declining profit margins and increasingly low demand for plasma TVs in general.

The company now says it will "concentrate its resources on growing its energy and materials businesses." In addition, SDI is expected to ramp up LED and 4K TV production, the latter of which is growing in popularity as prices fall.

From all the major OEMs, only LG now remains in the plasma business, as Sony, Sharp and now Samsung have all dropped out in the past years.

Pictures have surfaced on Chinese microblogging site Weibo that show off an unknown new Windows Phone 8.1 device.

The new device will be in addition to the previously rumored "Superman," "Rock" and "McLaren" smartphones expected before the end of the year.

Likely, the newly pictured "Lumia 830" will replace the mid-range Lumia 820 although the design will be different and include an aluminum frame with a polycarbonate back. Other sources claim the phone will be the Lumia 730 (codename Tesla).

On the rear, the camera is flat, implying Nokia will not be including the PureView 41MP sensor seen in other devices, but rather a more standard 8MP or 12MP shooter. The phone will also keep physical capacitive buttons despite the addition of on-screen virtual buttons with Windows Phone 8.1.

There is little else known about the specs of the upcoming device.

VR firm Oculus has begun shipping the Developer Kit 2 of its Rift headset to buyers, just a few months after the initial kits went out.

10,000 devices will be built this month, and Oculus says over half of the units will reach dev's mail boxes by the end of the month.

Over 45,000 consumers pre-ordered the DK2 at $350, and everyone is likely to receive their device by the end of September. The DK2 is the final model before the company releases a consumer version of the Rift next year. Says the company: "We're now over 45,000 DK2 pre-orders, which is incredibly exciting. That said, we're slightly behind in manufacturing and there's currently a high chance that some developers with estimated shipping in July may not have their DK2s shipped until August. We have a team in China working on continued ramp of production at our factory, and we'll work our way through the queue as fast as we can."

As an upgrade to the previous kit, the DK2 now has a 1080p OLED display, a huge improvement on the 720p resolution of the previous model. Additionally, the device comes with a tracking camera that allows for real-time incorporation of your head movements to make the VR experience more natural. The tracking should also reduce blurring and motion sickness, which is a huge positive for consumers.

Microsoft has seemingly put out an endless amount of updates for its Xbox One and Xbox One controller in the past few months and now the company wants to give its gamers a better chance to contribute to the process.

Those in the preview program will now be able to provide feedback on new features they have tested, either through a poll, a quick star-rating and a survey.

Additionally, the quest system that allows previewers to test ongoing tweaks to the console's live-TV setup, will also snap your achievements and will track all of your stats for a yet unknown reason in the future.

Finally, Microsoft has added an option to invite friends to the program, although it it unclear how many gamers will be able to join.

Although there are currently no cars that have Apple's CarPlay support built in, the tech giant has added even more partners to the list.

Apple has added Mazda and most of the Fiat Chrysler group, as well including: Abarth, Alfa Romeo, Chrysler, Dodge, Fiat, Jeep, and Ram. The car manufacturers will all integrate the operating system into their vehicles starting at the beginning of 2015.

Among the company's existing partners are Mercedes-Benz, Volvo, BMW, Ford, Hyundai, GM, and Honda, all of which will have at least one compatible vehicle before the end of 2014.

If you are not in the market for a new car, Alpine and Pioneer are also adding CarPlay support to their consoles, allowing for existing car owners to add the dashboard tech.

iPhone 5, 5C and 5S users can use CarPlay to control phone calls, use Maps, play their music, and have messages dictated to them. When released, cars will have a native CarPlay interface or you can choose to activate Siri from a new voice control button on the steering wheel.

Thanks to a new report, it looks like we have a full spec sheet for the yet unannounced Galaxy Mega 2 (SM-G7508).

The specs come via the GFXBench database, which also highlights the 3D graphic abilities of the device.

Originally marketed as a mid-range device with a massive screen, the original Mega was somewhat popular due to its 6.3-inch (practically a tablet) sized display. The new Mega 2 will have a smaller 5.9-inch device with 720p resolution, but be powered by Qualcomm's new 64-bit Snapdragon 410 quad-core processor at 1.2GHz and 2GB RAM. Graphics are powered by an Adreno 306 GPU. There is only 8GB internal storage, but there is likely a MicroSD slot allowing for expansion.

The device will also ship with Android 4.4.3 KitKat, use the Samsung Touchwiz UI, and should be upgradeable to Android L in the future.

OUYA, the Android gaming set-top box that failed to gain any traction outside of Kickstarter, has started a new annual pass give gamers access to the a nice library of games.

The All-Access Pass costs $60 per year and will give you access to all of the games on OUYA, but there of course some major restrictions to this all-you-can-eat model.

In the finer print, the pass stipulates that all games you can play must have been originally priced at $30 or less. Additionally, all games are not simply available like they would be in Netflix or similar services, you still have to "buy" them at a price of $0.00 by looking through the catalog and selecting each game. All in-game purchases do not have their prices discounted.

The new Pass is available for a limited time only as OUYA continues to test new models to stay afloat.

Recently, the company discussed creating an OUYA SDK for use on set-top boxes by OEMs and also on HDTVs. So far there have not been any major developments on that front.

Source:
Engadget

The VAIO PC brand has returned.

Earlier this year, Sony agreed to sell the brand as it continues to focus on core products including gaming, smartphones and tablets. The willing buyer was investment fund Japan Industrial Partners. The fund specializes in acquiring assets from companies that are looking to shed unwanted or poor performing divisions to help cut costs.

As promised, the deal has closed as of July 1st, and the fund is already selling two new VAIO laptops, the Fit and Pro, both for sale in Japan.

The devices are still available through Sony's online store, although it does not have Sony branding any longer. Sony is a five percent owner of the new VAIO Corp.

Check the products here: VAIO

A couple of weeks after it was reported that Google had offered $15 million for curated playlist streaming music service Songza, the deal is now official.

Reads Songza's email to customers (myself included): "Great news: today Songza is officially joining Google. We can't think of a more inspiring company to be part of in our quest to provide the perfect soundtrack for everything you do. Read more about it on Songza Daily.

You can absolutely keep using Songza as usual (we aren't planning any immediate changes -- other than making Songza faster, smarter, and even more fun to use)."

The six-year old startup has 5.5 million active users, and an acquisition will certainly help Google's playlist features for Google Play Music All-Access. Those features have been lacking since the service's full launch last year. Terms for the new deal were not disclosed.

Songza is popular due to its large offering of curated playlists. Besides time of day, mood and weather, the service can also build work out mixes, mixes for being at work in an office, music for listening in the shower, and everything in between.

The Chinese government, just a month after banning Windows 8 on its employee's computers, has continued the trend, this time banning the Office productivity suite.

Employees have been asked to use alternative (mainly Chinese-based) suites, such as the popular and free Kingsoft Office.

Microsoft was shocked when it was revealed that China was banning the latest Windows, but the company has been promoting Windows 7 in the nation, and has ongoing discussions with officials to get the operating system reinstated in the nation. China has branded Windows 8 a threat to national security.

It has been suggested that Chinese officials were not fond of Microsoft cutting update support to Windows XP, which despite being 13 years old, is still used on over 40 percent of Chinese computers. In fact, the Chinese government only relatively recently ensured that all official computers were running genuine Windows XP, after a long fight with piracy.

Regardless, the fight is getting dirty now, and Microsoft cannot be happy with their cash cows being banned in a nation with over 1 billion computers.

Samsung, the unequivocal king of the Android world, has released its best tablets to date, the Galaxy Tab S line, hoping to strike directly at the Apple Air and iPad Mini with Retina.

Over time, Samsung has pumped out tablet after tablet, all with confusingly similar names and features, and in fact, the Galaxy Tab S is the eleventh tablet from the company in 2014 alone. Each tablet iteration has seen minor technical improvements, and a thinner or lighter design, but so far there is no "killer" model that has been as popular as even the worst selling iPad.

With its Galaxy S Tab, the 10.5-inch model (which we have been using for the past week), is definitely the best the company has ever released, and it compares favorably as the best Android tablet of all-time at its size with the Nexus 10, although the latter is already a year old and its specs cannot compete.

The new tablet has some "killer" hardware features, most notably its display and form factor and its proprietary software is less bloat than it used to be. Read on to get the full review on Samsung's latest.

As part of the upcoming Android L refresh, Google changed the visual design of the operating system, as well, going with the new "Material" interface.

As part of the Material update has come a makeover of the stock Google keyboard, which promises to be faster and better predictive than previous iterations.

Unfortunately for most, Android L is not available until later this year but Nexus 5 and Nexus 7 owners can flash a developer preview and so tons of screenshots and code have been released for the new OS. Fans of the new keyboard look are in luck, as well, as a developer has ported the keyboard without mod as a standalone app that can be downloaded from the Google Play Store.

When you install it, you will be run through a three step process to have it set as your default input device, and you can choose from a couple of colors including "Material" (navy blue) to your liking.