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According to the WSJ, Google has plans to finance, build and help operate a massive wireless network that will stretch from sub-Saharan Africa to Southeast Asia.

The ultimate plan is to connect over 1 billion people in emerging countries to the Internet.

Google has been holding discussions with regulators in African nations and has been patching together technology across the countries.

The search giant is said to be "lobbying regulators to use airwaves reserved for television broadcasts, which at lower frequencies can pass through buildings and over longer distances." Additionally, it is working on providing African citizens with low-cost phones and using blimps to transmit signals across greater distances.

Two weeks ago we reported that Facebook was interested in purchasing Israeli mapping startup Waze for up to $1 billion.

Today, it appears that Google is also now in the bidding, and that could up the buying price.

Waze specializes in satellite navigation for mobile devices, and uses members' smartphones to generate maps and traffic data. More importantly, Waze collects user's traveling speed and direction, which is extremely valuable data if monetized correctly. Google Maps and other popular mapping apps do not include such data.

It had been reported that due diligence between Waze and Facebook had been going on for six months and a term sheet had already been signed. The talks seems to have stalled due to Facebook's demand that the whole team relocate to Palo Alto from Israel.

The company currently has 47 million users, with 12 percent coming from the U.S. It also has particularly strong penetration in Brazil and its home country.

Yahoo, fresh off its $1.1 billion acquisition of Tumblr, is another potential buyer for Hulu, the popular streaming site that has put itself up for sale by its owners.

The company made a bid this morning for the site, say sources, although terms are unclear.

In the past two months, DirecTV, Time Warner Cable, PE firm Silverlake, PE firm KKR, Guggenheim Digital and Peter Chernin's The Chernin Group have all expressed interest if not placed bids for the video site.

The site is currently jointly owned by News Corp., Disney and Comcast (via their ownership of NBCU and without any management authority) and it is still unclear what price they are seeking, and how much of the company is actually up for sale.

Any purchase would need to include extended licenses for the broadcasting content provided by the owners, say the sources.

Intel is preparing to launch their new power-efficient Core processors, codenamed Haswell, next month.

The highly-anticipated processors will offer 50 percent better battery life than the current-gen 'Ivy Bridge' processors as the chips were built with notebooks/ultrabooks/tablets in mind.

Word comes via corporate vice president of the Intel Architecture Group Rani Borkar, who also quelled worries that the better battery life would also come at a performance cost to its predecessor.

Borkar also added that standby/idle mode would see battery life improvements of 2000 percent.

Intel says the chips, when used in tablets, will have "similar" battery life to current Android tablets, but performance will be significantly better. That remains to be seen, however, but Intel may finally have a competitor in the space.

According to tax records, the RIAA has had to lay off many employees as revenues continued to sink.

It appears that over the last two years, the major labels have cut back their dues from $33.6 million to $23.6 million, causing the company to layoff 47 of its 107 workers.

The RIAA recently filed its 2012 fiscal year tax return with the IRS.

Besides membership dues, the company makes little other revenue, with total sales coming in at $24.8 million.

$196,378 of that came as "anti-piracy" restitution; awards for damages in lawsuits.

Facebook has confirmed that its expected HTC First launch is indefinitely delayed in the UK and France as the company works on improving its Home software.

Home, which is a user interface on top of stock Android, launched last month in the U.S. and HTC's First smartphone was the first device to launch with the interface natively installed.

The device launched on AT&T but sales have been lackluster, to say the least. The carrier eventually dropped the price from $99 with contract to $0.99 and rumor is they will be dropping the phone completely in the coming weeks.

Home is available for 6 phones, including the latest Galaxy S devices, but ratings have been poor across the board.

When asked about the European delay, Facebook said "We're focusing the next few months on adding customization features that address the feedback we received. While we focus on making Home better, we are going to limit supporting new devices and think it makes a lot of sense for EE and Orange to hold off deploying the HTC First in Europe."

Microsoft has said today it believes that 25 million more Xbox 360s can be sold before the end of the console's life.

The company wants to hit 100 million, despite launching the new Xbox One later this year.

Currently, there has been an estimated 77 million consoles sold globally since launch in 2005.

Interactive Entertainment Business Senior VP Yusuf Mehdi says Microsoft has a 5 year plan for the 25 million consoles sold. This could be a possibility, of course, but not with current prices. If Microsoft were to drop the 360 to $99, that may change.

To get consumers excited, Microsoft is planning a "huge announcement" for E3 which should include a complete dashboard refresh but may include a new version of the hardware, as well.

In regards to the Xbox One, Mehdi says the focus on entertainment and TV could lead to over 300 million sales.

According to the WSJ, HTC has sold 5 million One smartphones, a surprisingly high number that still pales in comparison to the Samsung Galaxy S4, which sold almost 10 million in its first week.

"Orders are pretty good so far and are still more than what we can supply," says a source. "This is partly due to the shortage of components. When the issue is resolved next month, we will have a better idea if it's doing really well or not."

That shortage was a reference to the camera component shortage that led HTC to delay the launch of the phone by a month in most places.

Now that supply is back to normal, HTC has promised to double production.

Microsoft has confirmed that its Kinect motion control sensor built for Windows machines will be released next year.

Kinect for Windows will use the same tech as the upcoming Kinect 2 for the Xbox One, including improved voice and gesture controls.

As part of the new system, Microsoft is introducing tech called Time-of-Flight, "which measures how long it takes for photons to bounce off a person or object" allowing for better accuracy.

Finally, new infrared should help with low-light situations.

"We're continuing our commitment to equipping businesses and organizations with the latest natural technology from Microsoft so that they, in turn, can develop and deploy innovative touch-free applications for their businesses and customers," Microsoft added. "A new Kinect for Windows sensor and software development kit (SDK) are core to that commitment."

Major book publisher Penguin has settled with the U.S. State Attorney General (and others) over the long-standing eBook price case that Apple will take to trial next month.

Penguin will pay $75 million in damages and additional costs to end the antitrust claims against them.

Reports also claim the publisher has settled with EU authorities and will terminate any agency agreements it currently has with Apple.

Other publishers, Simon & Schuster, Hachette Book Group and HarperCollins, have already settled for similar figures and MacMillan settled for $12 million.

"Consumers are entitled to a fair, open and competitive marketplace," says Attorney General Jepsen. "This agreement is yet another step toward providing restitution to those consumers who were harmed by alleged price-fixing within the eBook market and will further ensure that, going forward, consumers benefit from fair competition in the sale of eBooks."

The "agency model" of pricing had publishers set the price while retailers took a commission, usually 30 percent. This led to higher prices for consumers and gave Apple a way into the market dominated by Amazon.

Samsung has purchased a 10 percent stake in Korea's mobile device maker Pantech for $48 million.

The company says the deal will help "further solidify" its relationship with Pantech, more specifically any joint efforts they currently have for hardware like tablets and smartphones.

Despite the large stake, Samsung says it will be a passive investor, with no input into Pantech management decisions.

Reads the statement:

Samsung Electronics has agreed to acquire a 10-percent stake in Pantech, valued at approximately KRW 53 billion. The investment is aimed at solidifying our relationship with Pantech, a key component customer of Samsung. Samsung will have no involvement in Pantech's business management in any way or form.

Sony, Panasonic, Pioneer and Philips of the joint venture One-Blue LLC., have sued Imation Corp. claiming that the company has broken patent laws by selling recordable Blu-ray discs with the official Blu-ray logo.

One-Blue LLC oversees Blu-ray licensing.

The companies claim that Imation selling blank Blu-ray discs with the official logo encourages buyers to use the discs for infringement when recording.

One-Blue claims that "Imation and its Blu-Ray products, including Blu-Ray discs, are especially made for use in an infringement of the patents."

While there hasn't been too many games confirmed yet for the upcoming Xbox One console, we at least have the first 13.

Here they are:

Forza Motorsport 5 – Microsoft Studios/Turn 10

Quantum Break – Microsoft Studios/Remedy Entertainment

Ryse - Crytek

Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag – Ubisoft/Ubisoft Montreal

Battlefield 4 – Electronic Arts/DICE

Call of Duty: Ghosts – Activision/Infinity Ward

Destiny – Activision/Bungie

FIFA 14 – EA Sports/EA Canada

Madden NFL 25 – EA Sports/EA Tiburon

NBA Live – EA Sports/EA Tiburon

Thief – Square Enix/Eidos Montreal

UFC – EA Sports/EA Canada

Watch Dogs – Ubisoft/Ubisoft Montreal

Today during a special event, Microsoft unveiled their hotly anticipated Xbox One console, set for release by the end of the year.

Rather than rehash what they unveiled, please read our earlier article here: Microsoft unveils Xbox One.

What Microsoft did not reveal, was how unfriendly the console will be to the average consumer.

So far, this is what we have learned about the Xbox One from multiple sources:

-The console is not backwards compatible, even for downloaded Xbox 360 games. This was not unexpected, but it still sucks for gamers who paid good money to build collections over the last 7 years.

-Installing games will be mandatory, but at least Microsoft says you can play while it installs. Once you place the disc in and install, you will never have to use the disc again.

-Used games, rented games and borrowed games from friends will not be playable unless you pay a fee to install from that disc. This will effectively kill the second-hand market unless you are willing to pay said "fee."

Amazon has finally expanded their Cloud Drive service to Canada, giving users an online locker to store their digital files for access from their phones and any Internet-connected device.

The e-commerce giant will give all users 5GB of free storage, and additional space will cost you. Amazon did not elaborate except to say "additional storage plans start at CAD $10 a year for 20 GB."

"Millions of customers around the globe have already discovered the benefits of Amazon Cloud Drive to safely store and manage precious files like photos, videos and documents," said Russell Dicker, Director of Amazon Cloud Drive. "We are proud to bring Amazon Cloud Drive to our customers in Canada. With Amazon Cloud Drive, you can manage and access files across multiple physical devices and you don't have to worry about hard drive crashes. All of your content is stored safely on Amazon's servers and is accessible from anywhere using a PC, Mac or web browser."

Amazon's cloud offering has to compete with plenty of rivals, including those from Google, Apple, Dropbox, Box and more.