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Bill Gates, founder of Microsoft and the world's second-richest man, decided it might be fun to challenge the best chess player on the planet to a match. The results were not pretty.

Gates challenged Mangun Carlsen to a match broadcasted on the Norwegian talk show Skavlan and the chess master defeated the tech genius in 79 seconds, outmatching him from the first move on.

Check the video here (only 90 seconds long):

After smashing its goal in just 24 hours, the Avegant Glyph VR headset has now nearly tripled its goal in just four days.

Needing $250,000, the company has now raised $671,847 from 1400 backers on the crowdfunding platform.

The Glyph in of itself is a very interesting concept. The VR noise-canceling headset has a flip down feature that turns the device into a personal display, compatible with nearly all of your devices, including consoles, smartphones and computers.

Tizen, the oft-delayed operating system backed mainly by Samsung, may not be dead just yet.

Samsung has sent out invites for a dedicated Tizen event at next month's Mobile World Congress. The company promises to show off the latest devices, but who knows what those devices will be since the OS is only powering one digital camera, to date.

Slated for February 23rd, the event is invite-only and will also include representatives from major Korean carriers SK Telecom, KT and LG U+.

NTT DoCoMo, the largest carrier in Japan, recently canceled all plans for Tizen devices, stating that there just isn't enough growth in Japan for a a third operating system to gain traction (after Android and iOS).

Earlier this week, eBay user muresan began an auction for the extremely rare "Nintendo World Championships" game for the original NES.

There were only 116 copies of the game created, and it was never sold to consumers. The game was given out to gamers in 1990 at a special event where fans competed in games like Tetris and Super Mario.

Read the auction:

This is your chance to own the Super RARE Nintendo World Championship Cart for the NES!!!! As you can see by the pictures, this is an authentic, true to life original cart; no reproduction cart here.

Obviously, you'll immediately notice the ripped label. This is quite unfortunate but happened many decades ago by this point in time. No one knows the exact number of this cart (as each NWC cart was individually labeled upon production) as it appears in the upper left-hand corner of the cart label. This is known as the infamous "Mario" NWC cart that someone probably wrote on there long ago not having a clue what they actually had. Still, case in point, this is an authentic, original NWC cart from the championship back in the early 90s. The cart plays just fine and may some day be worth much more if someone decides to investigate a forensics lab's involvement to see if they can determine the official number by running tests on the cart.

Sony has sent out an invite for a UK press event in which the company will unveil the "slimmest" PlayStation device for the region.

Engadget says the company will not be launching a new device but rather unveiling the PlayStation Vita TV that has been available in Japan, only, so far.

The micro-console, at 6.5cm x 10.5cm x 1.3cm, competes Android-based gaming set-tops like the Ouya. Allowing you to play Vita games on your TV, the hardware has a slot that lets you load games from the handheld and then play it with a standard DualShock 3 or 4 PlayStation controller.

Additionally, the hardware lets you use streaming services such as Netflix and Hulu Plus and eventually will let you play your PlayStation 4 via Remote Play with DualShock 4, an impressive feature. Finally, if you have a controller, you can play PSOne Classic and original PSP games, as well.

Massive mobile processor maker Qualcomm has acquired a portfolio of patents that has been jumping around for years including those once owned by defunct smartphone maker Palm.

HP was the current owner of the patent portfolio, and the figure of the sale is undisclosed.

Qualcomm will use the 1400 US patents and 1000 foreign patents to strengthen their mobile computing technology, says the company.

In 2010, HP acquired Palm and its patents for $1 billion, in an effort to get into the tablet and smartphone market. HP failed to make any headway, and bowed out of the industry until just recently when they began selling Android-based tablets.

iPAQ patents include those related to the Pocket PC and personal digital assistants unveiled at the turn of the century by Compaq, which was eventually purchased by HP.

Chinese giant Lenovo has announced their acquisition of IBM's x86 server hardware division for $2.3 billion.

The division includes IBM's "System x, BladeCenter and Flex System blade servers and switches, x86-based Flex integrated systems, NeXtScale and iDataPlex servers and associated software, blade networking and maintenance operations."

As part of the deal, IBM will keep their System z mainframes, Power Systems, Storage Systems, Power-based Flex servers, and PureApplication and PureData appliances.

Lenovo will pay $2.07 billion and cash and the rest in stock.

While the servers are low-end, Lenovo should have a strong start in the enterprise hardware market. Lenovo already sells servers and storage in China. HP, IBM and Dell lead the market, accounting for about 70 percent of all server sales.

The Rockstar Consortium, which is an alliance between Apple, Microsoft, BlackBerry, Ericsson, and Sony, has dropped their longstanding patent infringement suit against Chinese telecom manufacturer Huawei.

Both parties have requested the dismissal of the suit, which had accused Huawei of violating patents that the group acquired through the bankruptcy of Nortel a few years ago. It was unclear if the suit was dropped outright or if a settlement and licensing agreement had been reached.

Other lawsuits against Google and other Android device makers remain in play, however. Nortel's patents (over 6000 in total) included wireless, wireless 4G, data networking, optical, voice, Internet, and semiconductor tech.

In 2011, during a heated auction, Google lost out on buying the patents by a mere $100 million, with Rockstar paying $4.5 billion for the portfolio. Google then bought Motorola Mobility in 2012 for $12.5 billion, mainly for their patents.

Pope Francis has said today in a statement that the Internet is "a gift from God" and that the net offers "immense possibilities for encounter and solidarity."

As part of the 48th annual World Communications Day, the pontiff released a statement in which he discussed both the pros and cons of the digital age, the sharing of ideas and information, social media and the Internet in general.

The statement in its entirety:

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

Today we are living in a world which is growing ever "smaller" and where, as a result, it would seem to be easier for all of us to be neighbours. Developments in travel and communications technology are bringing us closer together and making us more connected, even as globalization makes us increasingly interdependent. Nonetheless, divisions, which are sometimes quite deep, continue to exist within our human family. On the global level we see a scandalous gap between the opulence of the wealthy and the utter destitution of the poor. Often we need only walk the streets of a city to see the contrast between people living on the street and the brilliant lights of the store windows. We have become so accustomed to these things that they no longer unsettle us. Our world suffers from many forms of exclusion, marginalization and poverty, to say nothing of conflicts born of a combination of economic, political, ideological, and, sadly, even religious motives.

According to the WSJ, Apple will finally be releasing iPhones with screens that can compete with Android and Windows Phone.

The paper says two devices will be released this year, one with a 4.5-inch display and one with a display larger than 5 inches.

Additionally, Apple will dump the iPhone 5C and its plastic style after one year of the failed experiment. All new phones will keep the metal design of the iPhone 5 and 5S. The iPhone 6 with the 4.5-inch display is already ready for mass production, while the other is still in development.

Just like in previous years, the iPhone will be released in September of this year.

According to PhoneArena, the Google Nexus 5 is likely to get new colorways in the near future.

A leaked screenshot (and video) of the overhauled Google Play Hardware Store shows the Nexus 5 available in Black, White, Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue and Purple.

It is unclear when the new colors will become available (if they ever do) but it would mark the first time a Nexus device would be available outside of the standard black or white colorways.


Original Video- More videos at TinyPic

According to Romanian media, the infamous hacker "Guccifer," convicted of multiple cyber crimes over the past couple of years, has been arrested.

40-year-old Marcel Lazar Lehel is best known for hacking the emails of former President George W. Bush and releasing his pet paintings. Additionally, the hacker also broke into the emails of numerous other celebrities and politicians including actor Steve Martin, Colin Powell and many others.

Since the breach of the Bush's accounts last February the US Secret Service has been investigating into the hacker.

Inside Romania, the hacker was even more infamous after breaching the accounts of George-Cristian Maior, the head of Romania's Intelligence Service. When Lehel released those emails, it came with the warning that he might "disappear" soon if law enforcement in the nation captured him.

Sharp's first smartphone and tablet with IGZO displays are on the way, months after they were first rumored.

The Aquos Pad tablet and Aquos Phone Serie mini smartphone will both feature the technology and will be released in Japan through carrier KDDI.

Both feature high-end specs, with the Aquos Pad including a 7.0 inch 1080p IGZO display, a 2.3GHz Snapdragon 800 processor, 2GB RAM, 16GB internal storage with a microSD slot, a 4080 mAh battery and dual 13.1MP/2.1MP cameras.

The camera, besides having a large sensor, also has an f/1.9 aperture, "BrightEye" technology for image processing and 0.4 second booting time.

On the smartphone side, the device has a 4.5-inch 1080p IGZO display, a 2.2GHz Snapdragon 800 processor, 2GB RAM, 16GB internal storage, a 2120 mAh battery the same cameras and features.

Both devices are also waterproof, says the carrier.

Netflix reported its quarterly earnings yesterday, showing a profit and strong subscriber momentum.

Profit grew to $48.4 million and the company added another 4 million global subscribers, with the total now reaching 44 million. Netflix says it expects to reach 48 million by the end of March.

The company also used its earnings call to address a giant elephant in the room: net neutrality. An appeals court recently ruled for the major ISPs (and against the FCC), killing net neutrality laws in the U.S., and allowing the companies to throttle Internet speeds at their own discretion. Theoretically, the ISPs can also make Netflix pay added fees to stop the throttling of their service, which would almost certainly be passed on to the consumer eventually.

"Were this draconian scenario to unfold with some ISP, we would vigorously protest and encourage our members to demand the open Internet they are paying their ISP to deliver," says the company. "The most likely case, however, is that ISPs will avoid this consumer-unfriendly path of discrimination. ISPs are generally aware of the broad public support for Net neutrality and don't want to galvanize government action."

Following their quarterly earnings report, Netflix has announced that it will move to three pricing tiers for new subscribers.

CEO Reed Hastings and CFO David Wells noted the change, which would be the first time the company had offered more than two price tiers for its streaming service. Say the execs: "Last April we introduced a 4-concurrent stream $11.99 option to begin our evaluation of plan tiering. Since late last year, we have also been testing 1-stream and 3-stream variants, as well as SD/HD variations, at various price points. Eventually, we hope to be able to offer new members a selection of three simple options to fit everyone's taste."

All existing members would get "generous grandfathering of their existing plans and prices," but the company also noted there is no timeframe for the new plans, as the company continues to test different options.

Hastings then added, "We try to make our pricing as straight-forward as possible. But it's not clear that one price fits all."