Latest news

Over the past few months, there have been ongoing rumors that Sprint is looking to bid on T-Mobile US in their ongoing efforts to remain relevant after years of losses and stagnant growth.

If the deal were to go through, which is certainly not a guarantee given the stringent FCC and DOJ, the new merged carrier would be able to compete with AT&T and Verizon in size and scale, breaking the duopoly in the nation. Sprint currently has 54 million subscribers and T-Mobile is quickly catching up, now at 49 million.

T-Mobile, which is majority owned by Deutsche Telekom, is no stranger to proposed acquisitions. AT&T tried to purchase the company in 2011 and the DOJ shut down the merger citing trust issues. For its troubles, T-Mobile received $4 billion in cash as a break-up fee, and additional spectrum. The move helped T-Mobile re-invent itself as the coolest carrier in the nation, and Telekom wants another large break-up fee if Sprint cannot complete the merger, with reports putting the figure at over $1 billion.

In addition, Telekom will not accept a buyout unless key T-Mobile executives keep their titles, and that the brand remains intact, meaning "T-Mobile," "Uncarrier" and other terms are not going away any time soon. CEO John Legere would need to be placed at the helm of the new company or at least have full oversight of the joint companies.

Initially leaked via Twitter and then confirmed by postings on retailer websites, the Motorola Moto E appears to be on the way.

The phone will be familiar to Moto G owners, as the design remains almost identical, with the speaker grille having moved.

Officially, the phone is expected to launch in the next few days, and the device will feature a 4.3-inch 960x540 display, a dual-core 1.2Ghz Snapdragon processor, 1GB RAM, 4GB internal storage (microSD slot included) and a 5MP rear camera.

It took more than a few years, but it appears that major ISPs in the UK have struck a deal with the entertainment industry in which alleged pirates will receive alerts and educational letters informing them of their wrongdoing.

The U.S. has had a similar system in place since last year, a "six-strike" system in which alleged pirates receive educational letters and alerts, as well, and could eventually have their Internet temporarily shut off by the sixth strike.

BT, Sky, TalkTalk and Virgin Media have signed on, and the first letters will be sent out next year.

The deal comes via a deal with the BPI and MPA (film and music), and the letters will not have any punitive measures, which the trade groups had begged for. There will also not be any database of those who have been sent letters, which the groups had asked for, as well.

Educational letters will be "promoting an increase in awareness" of legal alternatives, and the rights holders will pay £750,000 to each ISP to set up the system.

Source:
BBC

As expected, and announced a bit earlier for the European and UK markets, new Netflix users will be seeing a price raise in the U.S. and Canada.

New subscribers will see their monthly bill at $8.99 compared to the current $7.99 and current users will keep their $7.99 price for two years, including HD video streams.

Additionally, Netflix will be offering a $7.99 plan where users can only stream in SD (standard definition) and only on device at any time. The more expensive plan allows for streaming on two screens simultaneously.

All new users get a free trial, and you can change between plans at any time.

Netflix has confirmed that its impending price hike is no longer impending.

Overseas, European and UK users will see their subscriptions jump by £1 and €1, to £6.99 and €8.99, respectively.

Current customers will get to keep their existing price for two years.

Netflix first announced the changes during their quarterly earnings report last month.

The streaming company offers tens of thousands of TV episodes and movies and is most notable for its original content including House of Cards, Arrested Development and more.

Nokia's Lumia series photography lead, Ari Partinen, today announced on Twitter that he has quit his job at Microsoft and will be joining Apple's team in Cupertino, California in June.

Partinen is one of the figures behind Nokia's revolutionary oversampling technology, first introduced in Nokia Pureview 808 and later brought to Windows Phone-era in form of Nokia Lumia 1020.

Superb camera and imaging features have been among few strong marketing claims in Microsoft's attempt to grow its marketshare as it lags far behind Android and iOS, and so losing Partinen is going to be a big blow to Microsoft's camera division -- and a huge win for Apple.

Here's Partinen's original tweet:

According to the Financial Times, and later vetted by other outlets, Apple is preparing to purchase Beats Electronics for up to $3.2 billion.

Beats is popular for their headphones and more recently their music-streaming service that competes with Spotify and other unlimited streaming companies.

Apple has long been rumored to be developing their own streaming service, but it appears they could not innovate quickly enough, which could prove to be a negative turning point in the ongoing saga of Apple, a company that has not released a truly new product since the iPad in 2010.

Through its iTunes store, Apple created the market for music digital downloads, but there are plenty in the industry that believe that model is dead. Streaming services, where subscribers pay $5 to $10 for unlimited listens of huge catalogs, continue to see strong growth, especially through mobile devices.

Nintendo will develop and sell new hardware consoles aimed at emerging markets as it fights to climb out of a global slump it has fallen into in recent years.

Despite having a head start of a year, Nintendo's Wii U sales are actually lower than that of Sony's PlayStation 4 (PS4) consoles, despite the latter only launching in the holiday season in 2013. Consumers in major western markets are overlooking Nintendo's latest hardware and it is showing on the bottom line in big red figures.

In an effort to turn itself around, Nintendo will look for growth through the development and sale of new hardware. This hardware will be aimed at emerging markets and will not simply be cut downs of the Wii U and other items it sells.

"We want to make new things, with new thinking rather than a cheaper version of what we currently have," Nintendo President Satoru Iwata said, reports Bloomberg.

"The product and price balance must be made from scratch."

The timing is good considering that China only recently lifted its decade+ ban on video game console sales in the country, although there are still considerable factors to take into account launching in China.

A large number of Internet and tech firms have signed an open letter to the FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler opposing Net Neutrality proposals that could lead the way to paid prioritization.

Recent reports suggested that internal documents at the FCC proposed to allow Internet Service Providers (ISP) to negotiate a type of paid prioritization for better access to subscribers. Of course, the proposal has been widely condemned, as it is a clear break away from the FCC's position on paid prioritization in recent years.

Stating their objections to the possible rules change, a large number of Internet and tech firms have signed an open letter to Chairman Wheeler and the FCC, in which they argue essentially that the proposal is a major shift from the historical and traditional norm, and that it could seriously hurt innovation on the Internet.

"According to recent news reports, the Commission intends to propose rules that would enable phone and cable Internet service providers to discriminate both technically and financially against Internet companies and to impose new tolls on them. If these reports are correct, this represents a grave threat to the Internet," the letter reads.

"According to recent news reports, the Commission intends to propose rules that would enable phone and cable Internet service providers to discriminate both technically and financially against Internet companies and to impose new tolls on them. If these reports are correct, this represents a grave threat to the Internet."

Samsung has confirmed that Chang Dong-hoon has been replaced as the head of its mobile design team.

Chang had reportedly offered to resign his position as head of Samsung's mobile design team just last week. The Galaxy S5 smartphone launched recently and was met with criticism of its design and lack of hardware innovations. The plastic case design of the handset prompted the most negativity among reviewers.

Lee Min-hyouk, Samsung's vice president for mobile design, will take over Chang's position as head of the mobile design team, while Chang will continue to lead the design center at Samsung.

"The realignment will enable Chang to focus more on his role as head of the Design Strategy Team, the company's corporate design centre which is responsible for long-term design strategy across all of Samsung's businesses, including Mobile Communications," Samsung said in a statement.

Samsung's Galaxy-branded smartphones and tablets have been its flagship brand for several years now, helping it to overtake and surpass bitter mobile rival Apple globally in terms of smartphone sales.


Sources and Recommanded Reading:
Samsung Electronics replaces mobile design head: in.reuters.com

Google has released an update for its Google Maps apps on Android and iOS adding a proper Offline Maps mode that could come in very handy.

Previously versions of the app had the ability to cache offline maps for later use, but it was a more limited functionality that was cut out by Google. This upset some users to the point that they had to revert back to older versions of the apps.

Now with the release of Google Maps v3.0 for iOS and Maps for Android v8.0, Google has introduced a more useful Offline Mode, which could help your tremendously on your travels if you are not guaranteed a consistent data connection.

All you have to do is search for an area and tap on its place info sheet, then when available, you can select "Save map to use offline," and give your map a custom name, like "Toronto Vacation." It will then be available as a Saved Map when you tap the profile icon next to the search box in the top-right corner of the app. It is the same on both platforms.

The new Maps apps also can inform you which lane you should be driving in to make sure you don't take the wrong lane and end up in a jam. There has also been improvements to the search nearby feature, allowing you to apply filters like opening hours, ratings, prices and so on so you can find a bar or restaurant to suit your needs and tastes.

We've known for quite a while that HTC One (M8) will have a little brother like its predecessor. HTC One mini 2 or whatever it might be called has been rumored and leaked since February. Now we've got assurance that it indeed is coming – and we have a price as well!

According to rumors the smaller version of M8 will sport the same aluminum body but the display has been reduced to 4.5 inches. The resolution of the display is said to be 720p, the SOAC is Snapdragon 400 instead of 801 and the camera loses its UltraPixel name but gains megapixels (13mpix vs 4mpix).

According to the two different online retailers in Finland the model will be released next Tuesday, May 13th. It will be priced at around 520 euros which is a whopping $720 and approximately $580 before taxes. That doesn't sound too inexpensive for a smartphone with a 720p display.

It's also worth noting that the retailers call it HTC One Mini M8 instead of the rumored HTC One mini 2.

HBO's wildly popular Game of Throne has set yet another record for BitTorrent sharing after the latest episode was spread across the world.

Game of Thrones is already a heavily pirated TV show due to its exceptionally large fan base, and HBO's reluctance to license it to streaming services like Netflix.

It is extremely popular on torrent sites, and has been breaking records during the airing, and subsequent uploading, of episodes of recent seasons. The latest episode of Game of Thrones is estimated to have been downloaded around 1.5 million times within a day.

That's not the big deal however, the big deal is that the Demonii tracker reported that over 200,000 people were sharing one single torrent for it at the same time. 163,496 were sharing a complete copy while 43,558 were still leeching.

207,054 is pretty impressive, but probably won't give HBO much reason to be happy.

Read more: TorrentFreak

Yet another bug with the iOS lock screen has been revealed, and it affects iOS 7.1.1 too.

Apple's iOS operating system has had a few lock screen bugs in its time. One such bug allowed access to a variety of apps on the device which could allow an attacker to steal private information, while another one that hit iOS 7 would allow non-emergency phone calls by simply hammering the button until it got stuck and crashed the screen.

Those flaws have been fixed, but a new one has surfaced. This one was shown off by Egyptian programmer Sherif Hashim, and it allows you to use Siri to get to the Contacts of an iPhone without unlocking the device.

In a demo video, Hashim tries unsuccessful to access to the iPhone's contacts by commanding Siri, while the handset is locked. However, he then goes on to give Siri a "Call" demand instead, and Siri helpfully asks who he would like to call. From here, Hashim can gain access to the full list of contacts on the handset.

So far, no other feature has been found to be accessible by tricking Siri.

Until it is fixed, the simplest way to avoid this flaw being exploited is to disable Siri access when the phone is locked, which you can do under Settings - Passcode.

Xbox head Phil Spencer has denied rumors that a handheld Xbox console (or Xbox Surface) is on Microsoft's short list of upcoming projects.

"I don't think we'll do a dedicated handheld gaming device," he confirmed.

For the time being, all of Microsoft's mobile gaming will be dedicated to Windows Phone and Windows-based tablets, with a possibility that future Windows Phones could use Xbox controllers and stream to the large screen without lag.

This is not the first time Microsoft has denied a gaming handheld is in the works, and it probably won't be the last but it truly seems like Microsoft wants nothing to do with that industry dominated by the Nintendo DS/3DS line.