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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!"

Activision Blizzard CEO Robert Kotick believes that price cuts will come quicker for the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One than they did for the current generation of consoles.

When the Xbox 360 launched it was priced at $300-$400 depending on the model you bought, and when the PS3 launched it was priced at $500-$600. It took Microsoft over 20 months to cut the price of the Xbox 360 consoles while Sony did so just seven months after - although the PS3 arrived on the market around a year after the Xbox 360 did.

This time around, we could see price cuts sooner according to Kotick.

"They've made more investments in the back office than ever before. I think you've got lots of efficiency in manufacturing costs that could potentially drive hardware prices down sooner in the cycle," Kotick said during a post-earnings financial call.

"There's no indication, from our perspective, that you're going to see anything other than a very successful next seven or eight years."

Microsoft will launch the Xbox One on November 22, priced at $500, with Sony launching the PS4 on November 15, priced at $400.

Google has alerted developers that extensions for its Google Chrome web browser must be hosted by the Chrome Web Store from January.

Google claims it is enforcing this policy in response to complaints from Windows users about malicious extensions that bypass the typical installation prompt and silently install, usually making changes to browser settings such as the homepage or search engines.

"Since these malicious extensions are not hosted on the Chrome Web Store, it's difficult to limit the damage they can cause to our users," wrote Erik Kay, Engineering Director, on the Chromium Blog.

"Starting in January on the Windows stable and beta channels, we'll require all extensions to be hosted in the Chrome Web Store. We'll continue to support local extension installs during development as well as installs via Enterprise policy, and Chrome Apps will also continue to be supported normally."

Kay explains that developers can choose to keep their extensions hidden on the Web Store if they like, but that protecting Chrome users is a key priority.

An Australian man who ran a Bitcoin wallet service claims that hackers have stolen over $1 million worth of Bitcoins.

Identified only as TradeFortress, the man said 4,100 Bitcoins (about $1.04 million) were stolen in two separate attacks on the service he operated. He would not report the crime to the police however, claiming Bitcoin transactions are virtually impossible to trace.

"I know this doesn't mean much, but I'm sorry, and saying that I'm very sad that this has happened is an understatement," he wrote on the website.

"Please don't store Bitcoins on an internet-connected device, regardless if it is your own or a service's."

Of course, there are many suggestions that this was an inside job, which he denied outright in an interview with ABC News.

The next instalment in the Star Wars franchise has been slated for a December 18, 2015 release as pre-production begins.

Shooting is scheduled to begin on the film in Spring, 2014 at Pinewood Studios.

Star Wars: Episode VII will be directed by J.J. Abrams, who directed Super 8, Mission Impossible III and Star Trek. Abrams and Lawrence Kasdan (The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi) will work on the script.

Kathleen Kennedy, J.J. Abrams, and Bryan Burk wil, produce with Tommy Harper (Star Trek: Into Darkness) and Jason McGatlin (War of the Worlds) serving as executive producers.

"We're very excited to share the official 2015 release date for Star Wars: Episode VII, where it will not only anchor the popular holiday filmgoing season but also ensure our extraordinary filmmaking team has the time needed to deliver a sensational picture," said Alan Horn, chairman of The Walt Disney Studios.

Microsoft has listed digital entertainment apps that will be available for the Xbox One console between launch (November 22) and Spring 2014.

The apps have been listed by country.

"The list is just the first wave of third-party apps that are coming to Xbox One over the course of the next few months," Microsoft's Xbox news site reads.

"We will continue to announce more apps coming to the platform and both the Xbox One and Xbox 360 entertainment app portfolios will continue to grow weekly."

Here is the list:

Australia

• Crackle
• Machinima
• MUZU TV
• Network Ten's tenplay
• Quickflix
• SBS On Demand
• TED
• Twitch

• Eurosport
• Machinima
• MUZU TV
• TED
• Twitch

• Crackle
• Muu
• Netflix
• Saraiva Player
• Sky Online
• SporTV
• TED
• Telecine
• Twitch
• Vivo Play

• CinemaNow
• Crackle
• Machinima
• MUZU TV
• Netflix
• Rogers Anyplace TV
• Sportsnet
• TED
• The NFL on Xbox One
• Twitch

• 6Play
• Canal+/CanalSat
• France 2,3,4,5
• La TV d'Orange
• Machinima
• MUZU TV
• MyTF1
• MYTF1VOD
• SFR TV
• TED
• Twitch

• AmazonLOVEFiLM
• Eurosport
• Machinima
• MUZU TV
• TED
• Twitch
• Watchever
• Zattoo

• Eurosport
• Machinima
• MUZU TV
• Netflix
• TED
• Twitch

• Eurosport
• Machinima
• MUZU TV
• Premium Play
• TED
• Twitch

• Clarovideo
• Crackle
• Machinima
• Netflix
• TED
• Televisa
• The NFL on Xbox One
• TV Azteca
• Twitch
• Veo

• Machinima
• MUZU TV
• Quickflix
• TED
• Twitch

• Eurosport
• Gol Televisión
• Machinima
• MUZU TV
• RTVE
• TED
• Twitch
• Wuaki.tv
• Zattoo

• 4oD
• AmazonLOVEFiLM
• blinkbox
• Crackle
• Demand 5
• Eurosport
• Machinima
• MUZU TV
• Netflix
• NOW TV
• TED
• Twitch
• Wuaki.tv

• Amazon Instant Video
• Crackle
• The CW
• ESPN
• FOX NOW
• FXNOW
• HBO GO (coming soon)
• Hulu Plus
• Machinima
• MUZU TV
• Netflix
• Redbox Instant by Verizon
• Target Ticket
• TED
• The NFL on Xbox One
• Twitch
• Univision Deportes
• Verizon FiOS TV
• VUDU

Microsoft has uploaded a 12 minute video giving us a tour of the Xbox One user interface (Dashboard), Kinect and apps on the soon-to-launch console.

The Xbox One demo is given by Microsoft's Marc Whitten and Yusuf Mehdi, showing off instant switching, biometric sign-in, watching Live TV, using the Kinect's 1080p camera with Skype, the game Digital Video Recorder (DVR) feature, OneGuide and plenty more.

It shows how responsive the Xbox One console is when switching between apps, such as switching from a game to Live TV and then returning quickly to the game, all with voice commands.

Skype does look excellent with the Kinect 1080p camera, which follows the caller around the room.

Here's the 12 minute demonstration video, enjoy:

Be warned: Microsoft's Xbox One console requires an immediate update on launch day without which it won't function properly at all.

Having a good Internet connection at home is obviously a boost for gaming nowadays - some would say an absolutely necessity even. Still, there are people who don't have a home Internet connection or perhaps an inadequate/unreliable connection.

For those folks, Xbox One launch day might be no fun at all as the system requires an immediate Day One update to function properly.

Even if you have a new game on a physical disc to play, you still need the update. That's according to Microsoft senior director of product management, Albert Penello, who was asked about it by Engadget.

The tech site proposed a scenario to him of a customer returning home to find their Internet connection is unavailable, but they have bought a game, so what can they do with an Xbox One out of the box without the update on launch day?

"Nothing. You need the Day One update," he said.

Ouch. That's not likely to affect most people who buy an Xbox One at launch of course, but it will be a real downer to those in areas where an Internet connection is either unavailable or unreliable.

Bloomberg is citing people close to Stephen Elop in reporting that he would make some big chances to Microsoft's traditional business practices as CEO.

The main shift Bloomberg's sources say would be to end Microsoft's use of popular applications like Word and Excel to drive demand for Windows operating systems. Elop would rather make these applications available on a broad variety of devices, including those made by rivals like Apple.

He would also reportedly considering selling healthy businesses, like Microsoft's Xbox business, if he didn't feel it was critical to the company's strategy. Microsoft's Bing - an expensive attempt to compete with Google - could also face being scrapped by Elop as CEO.

When he took over at Nokia, Elop made the decision almost immediately to stop development of Symbian, which was at the time the dominant smartphone operating system in the world, albeit in decline. He also cut 40,000 jobs at the Finnish giant to reduce operating expenses.

Bloomberg's sources say Microsoft would face similar re-adjustments, with job cuts and downsizing of teams.

The SD Card Association has announced the new Ultra High Speed Class 3 (U3) card format, made for devices that record 4K2K (UltraHD) video.

The new Ultra High Speed (UHS) Speed Class 3 (U3) symbol will indicate products capable of recording 4K2K video and will operate exclusively on SDXC UHS-I and UHS-II memory cards and devices and SDHC UHS-I and UHS-II memory cards and devices.

This SD card class defines 30 MB/s constant minimum write speed to be able to make such recordings without issues.

"The world's favorite SD memory card continues to evolve and meet shifting industry needs," said Brian Kumagai, president of the SD Association.

"Our new UHS Speed Class 3 standard will give consumers and businesses more flexibility and capability as the market shifts to 4K2K video formats. Both SDXC and SDHC memory card standards already offer the massive storage needed to support 4K2K video with enough room to store photos, music, documents and other data on a single portable card."

Windows 7 users can now download the latest version of Microsoft's Internet Explorer for the Windows 7 operating system.

Up until now, Internet Explorer 11 was only available as a release preview for the Windows 7. The final build of Internet Explorer 11 is now available to download, and it brings considerable performance improvements with it over IE10.

Pre-fetch and pre-render features deliver faster loading times than previous versions of the browser, and a "Flip Ahead" feature makes switching back and forth between pages on a site must faster.

Download Internet Explorer 11 for Windows 7 from: windows.microsoft.com

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.

The Google Opinion Rewards app on Google Play will reward users for filling out periodic surveys with Google Play credits that can be used in the store.

For now it appears limited to the United States. It requires that you link it to your Google Wallet so your credits can be deposited, which Google claims will happen immediately after filling out surveys.

That can be done as part of the app setup, which also requires you enter certain information about yourself such as what age group you belong to.

When new surveys are available for you to take part in (typically 10 questions) it will show on your Android devices' notification bar.

Get the app at: Google Play