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One of the world's most addictive and iconic games has been born yet again, and this time its in pure HTML5.

Full Screen Mario is an open-source effort started by Josh Goldberg. It recreates Super Mario using just HTML5, letting you play the game in your browser.

In addition to the Super Mario we all know and love (admit it!), you can also play randomly generated levels which can result in some surprising and very difficult situations. If you are the creative type, you can build your own level, or you can just stick to recreated Super Mario levels.

Either way it is pretty cool to see.

Check it out: Full Screen Mario

(via BoingBoing)

Vonage has purchased VoIP company Vocalocity for $130 million.

The company will look to improve its position in the small-to-mid size enterprise business with the new acquisition.

Chief Executive Marc Lefar says the company will pay $105 million in cash and $25 million in stock and calls the move "transformative."

Vonage has 2.3 million VoIP/communications customers, but has a tiny presence in the lucrative business market. Vocalocity has 21,000 business customers, with the average customer paying $230 per month, well above what the average Vonage customer pays.

Istagram for Android is catching up to the iPhone app with photo straightening.

The feature has been available to fix crooked pics on iPhones for a while now, but it took until today for Instagram to push out an update for Android that included photo straightening.

For those who use it to capture video, the update also adds sound and data usage controls.

Today's Android update includes photo straightening and new sound and data usage controls for Instagram videos: http://t.co/nH3gArR2Fy

-- Instagram (@instagram) October 10, 2013

A class-action lawsuit against Google over the secret storing of cookies in Safari despite users' settings has been dismissed.

Delaware Judge Sue Robinson dismissed the case, finding that the plaintiffs had failed to prove any real harm had been done, and failed to convincingly argue that Google violated their rights. At issue is Google's storing of cookies in the Safari and Safari mobile browser even when users had privacy settings that should prevent it.

Google had been using a flaw in the Safari browser to do so, and when it was caught the company claimed it was a mistake. However, it was later revealed that Google was doing something similar with Internet Explorer.

The company found itself on the end of a $22.5 million fine from the FTC for its actions in August 2012.

However, in the class-action lawsuit, Judge Robsinon foudn no evidence that the cookies themselves caused tangible harm to users, and the information the cookies provided to Google (URLs) fell short of the criteria demanded by the Wiretap Act.

Google now faces another lawsuit over GMail keyword scanning.

BlackBerry co-founders Mike Lazaridis and Douglas Fregin might be considering a bid for the seriously troubles company.

A securities filing made on Thursday opened up the possibility that the pair may be assessing their options, perhaps providing an alternative to the Fairfax $4.7 billion deal. Some analysts have questioned whether even the Fairfax proposal can secure the financing required.

Lazaridis and Fregin could then face the exact same problem. Between them, they own about 8 percent of BlackBerry's shares. It could also be possible that they are considering joining the Fairfax bid.

BlackBerry wouldn't comment on the reports, just repeating that it is looking at alternatives for the time being.

John Lewis, a UK department store chain, is expecting the Xbox One console to outsell the PS4 out of the gate.

The person responsible for tech buying at John Lewis is Jonathan Marsh, who said that while the chain is stocking both consoles, the expectation is that the Xbox One will outsell the PS4 after launch. Marsh cites the game line-up and Xbox Live as a major factor for that belief.

"We are expecting more interest in the Xbox One," Marsh said.

"We are stocking both the PS4 and the Xbox One but if we were to back one, we are thinking that Xbox One will appeal a bit more to our customers in terms of the experience it creates."

Back in July, analyst Colin Sebastian also predicted the Xbox One would outsell the PS4 this year due to supply constraints, but at the same time, the mood from the public leans toward the PS4 in polls.

EE has said it will provide mobile services for fixed-line operator BT, replacing Vodafone.

Vodafone had a mobile virtual network operator (MVNO) partnership with BT for the past nine years but withdrew from talks about continuing the partnership earlier this year.

Now Britain's largest mobile provider, EE, said it will take Vodafone's place and provide service to BT, the country's largest fixed-line operator.

BT has a limited number of mobile customers across the public service, and to private businesses.

EE is joint-owned by Orange and Deutsche Telekom.

Mobile operators in Britain have been stunned by proposed increases in the license fees they must pay to use spectrum in the country.

If they were to go through, Britain's major mobile service providers could see their license fees rise more than 400 percent. Vodafone, for example, would see its fee rise from £15.6 million, to £83.1 million, while EE would jump from £24.9 million to £107.1 million. Three would see its rates rise from £8.3 million to £35.7 million.

Ofcom justifies the proposal based on the rates paid by operators in equivalent European markets, arguing that by comparison the rates in the UK are very low.

But operators told the BBC that the hike was excessive, with Vodafone saying it was disappointed. Others fear that the cost increase may pass on to consumers.

"The size of these figures may come as bad news to the mobile networks, but more worryingly could sound alarm bells for consumers," said Adam Kirby, telecoms expert at uSwitch.com.

"The proposed new costs reflect a huge leap in the amount networks will have to pay the regulator for using the spectrum - our concern is that it will be consumers who are left to foot the bill."

Best Buy is running a trade-in scheme on Microsoft's first-generation Surface tablets, guaranteeing at least a $200 gift card for your tablet.

Still, even if you do get a $350 card for a high quality Surface Pro, that's still quite a cut down. To qualify, the device must not have a damaged screen, or have any liquid damage of any kind.

Best Buy will run the Surface promo throughout the month, until October 21, just a day shy of the release of Microsoft's upgraded Surface 2 and Surface Pro 2.

The Surface Pro 2 upgrades to an Intel Core i5-4200U 1.6Ghz, with Microsoft saying it is 20 percent faster, has 50 percent better graphics performance and operates quieter than the first generation Pro. Up to 512GB of internal storage is available, and with either 4GB or 8GB or RAM. It runs Windows 8.1.

According to an in-depth report by Quartz, Foxconn forced almost 1000 engineering students to accept internship positions to build the upcoming Sony PlayStation 4.

The students, from the Xi'an Institute of Technology, were allegedly told that they would not graduate if they did not participate in the internship. The students were then forced to work night shifts and overtime in violation of company practices.

"Immediate actions have been taken to bring that campus into full compliance with our code and policies," Foxconn responded after an internal investigation. The company is also "reinforcing the policies of no overtime and no night shifts for student interns, even though such work is voluntary, and reminding all interns of their rights to terminate their participation in the program at any time."

This is not the first time Foxconn has been accused of forcing students to work under the threat of not graduating.

According to a report, Google is set to drop the, 'Google TV' brand and switch to 'Android TV' instead.

The report comes from GigaOm, citing a source that said Google intends to phase out Google TV but a re-branded Android TV will follow. Of course, Google TV is already based on Android anyway.

Google seems to be experimenting with its living room efforts, having launched the Chromecast dongle to beam content from a variety of compatible devices and services directly to TV over a network.

Google TV has been waiting for an update for some time now, so its likely that the re-branding will come with it.

(via: The Verge)

The alleged operator of the recently-shut Silk Road online drug market has been sent to New York to face charges.

Authorities in New York charged Ross Ulbricht with operating the drug market, which let users buy and sell drugs using BitCoin. US magistrate judge Joseph Spero ordered Ulbricht to New York to face the charges, which Ulbricht's attorney denies.

He was arrested on October 1 at a public library in San Franciso. Court documents claim that he was talking with a co-operating witness at the time.

Ulbricht was also charged in a Baltimore court with soliciting the murder of a former worker. According to the FBI, he unknowingly hired an undercover agent to commit the murder.

Since the shut down of the Silk Road, several arrests have been made in different areas of the world, including four in the United Kingdom, and one of the allegedly most prolific dealers in Seattle.

SimplyGames, the popular UK retailer, has been accused of profiteering over forcing customers to pay for an unofficial (and expensive) PS4 bundle if they want to keep their pre-orders.

Trading Standards, the group that enforces consumer related legislation in the UK, has said the practice is illegal and akin to profiteering. The group added that "swift injunctive action is needed" to block the retailer.

Earlier this week, SimplyGames shocked consumers by stating that anyone who pre-ordered a PS4 would need to pay £470 to stay in queue, being offered a number of bundles that are not affiliated with official Sony bundles.

"You can have a contract where the price agreed is the price at the time of delivery, such as a new car on a long waiting list. Here the seller cannot control the product price months down the line," says Trading Standards Institute (via CVG). "This appears to be profiteering. The seller is raising the price hoping people either drop out or pay more. If they drop out the seller can resell at a higher price to another customer. It is illegal and up to the Home Authority to intervene if the seller is UK based. This is one of those occasions when swift injunctive action is needed to prevent consumers being ripped off."

According to multiple reports, Apple is preparing to slash production on its iPhone 5C, moving down to 150,000 units per day from as much as 300,000 per day before launch.

By one measure, (China's gray market), the iPhone 5C has already been priced way down to $500, much lower than Apple's $725 retail price in the nation.

Apple said opening weekend they had sold 9 million new iPhones, but did not break down how many were iPhone 5S and how many were iPhone 5C.

Most reports claim at least 6 million of the devices sold were the higher-end 5S models.

Last week we reported that Microsoft had approached HTC in an effort to get the company to begin offering Android phones that can also dual-boot Windows Phone 8.

Microsoft is said to be dropping the licensing fee for Windows Phone significantly, if not outright removing it, if the OEMs will agree to such a situation.

New reports state that the software giant has now approached Samsung and Huawei, as well, with similar propositions.

Samsung, the report states, is actually working on such a device, a dual-boot tablet that will offer Android and Windows RT, and interesting development.

In addition, the new reports states that along with dropping the licensing fee, Microsoft will compensate companies for any "necessary adaptation costs."