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Google has purchased the natural language engine startup Wavii.

Apple is said to have placed a bid, as well, but Google offered the more appealing terms.

Wavii specialized in "aggregation technology and natural summarization algorithms" and it was reported that Apple wanted to integrate the company into its Siri division.

Google will bring the 25-person Wavii team into their Knowledge Graph division, and some could do work for Google Now.

Although the terms were not disclosed, the purchase is expected to be around $30 million.

According to Digitimes, panel makers are preparing to build Ultra HD/4K displays for use in notebooks and even tablets.

The displays have resolutions of 3840 x 2160 and are currently only seen in a few TVs and monitors.

Reads the report, "downstream system makers have reportedly been contacting Taiwan-based panel makers about producing Ultra HD tablet panels while Sharp is planning to produce Ultra HD notebook panels.

The sources have yet to reveal whether the panels will be used in products released in 2013, but said that Panasonic is likely to be a major purchaser of the technology."

Sharp will likely use their IGZO transparent compound semiconductor tech, making the panels very high end.

Microsoft has announced a new patent licensing deal with ZTE that will cover all Android and Chrome devices.

The deal comes just a week after the company signed a similar deal with Hon Hai, the parent of Foxconn. Hon Hai is now their largest patent licensee, paying a flat fee for all Android and Chrome devices it manufactures. Hon Hai builds 40 percent of the world's smartphones, so Microsoft's haul should be huge.

ZTE is the fifth largest Android maker in the world, shipping 9.5 million units in the Q4 2012.

Microsoft has similar deals with Samsung, HTC, Quanta, Pegatron and others and is said to make much more off royalty payments of devices they don't make than off the devices they do build, such as Surface tablets.

"Experience has taught us that respect for intellectual property rights is a two-way street and we have always been prepared to respect the rights of others just as we seek respect for our rights," concluded Microsoft general counsel Horacio Gutierrez in a statement.

Yesterday afternoon, Apple released their quarterly earnings report, one of the most anticipated reports in an extremely long time.

The company posted a profit of $9.5 billion of revenues of $43.6 billion, drops across the board but obviously still massive numbers.

iPhone sales remained fairly strong at 37 million, and iPad sales (especially Mini) exploded to 19.5 million. While the iPad figure was nice, it came with a steep decline in ASP (average selling price) due to the Mini's discounted price.

The company also sold less Macs, 3.95 million, and less iPods, down to 5.6 million.

More importantly for investors, Apple guided down their revenue forecasts for next quarter significantly, to $33.5-35.5 billion, down from an expected $38 billion. The company also announced it was authorizing a $60 billion buyback of its own stock, borrowing money to do so instead of using their $145 billion cash hoard.

During the earnings conference call, CEO Tim Cook dismissed rumors that the company would begin shipping iPhones with larger screens. All they would say is that new products are coming this fall, and in 2014, without elaborating.

Earlier today, Microsoft sent out invites for the unveiling of their highly anticipated Xbox successor.

The Redmond giant will reveal the console on May 21st at 1PM EST, and the unveiling will take place at the company's campus in Washington.

Xbox Live boss Larry "Major Nelson" Hryb wrote this of the upcoming console:

On Tuesday May 21st, we'll mark the beginning of a new generation of games, TV and entertainment. On that day, we'll be holding a special press event on the Xbox campus and we invite you to join us via the live global stream that will be available on Xbox.com, Xbox LIVE and broadcast on Spike TV if you are in the US or Canada.

On that day, we'll share our vision for Xbox, and give you a real taste of the future. Then, 19-days later at the Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) in Los Angeles, we'll continue the conversation and showcase our full lineup of blockbuster games.

We are thrilled to pull back the curtain and reveal what we've been working on.

Nokia has teased their latest feature phone, set for launch tomorrow.

The teaser reveals a standard Nokia design with rounded corners and colorful hardware.

By showing off a Z and Shift key, it is clear the device will feature a full QWERTY keypad, a feature rarely seen nowadays.

Most expect the device to be similar to the company's popular Asha 205, and the announcement is coming from the Mobile Phones team, guaranteeing it is not a Lumia phone.

Nokia's feature phones have been aimed at emerging markets in Asia, Europe and Africa.

Microsoft has confirmed a global expansion for its Surface RT and Surface Pro tablets.

The cheaper RT will be launching in Malaysia on April 25th, and in Mexico by the end of May. Additionally, the device will be headed to Korea and Thailand by mid-June.

Surface RT is currently available in 25 nations; Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, China, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, Russia, Singapore, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

The more expensive (but better) Surface Pro will be expanding significantly by the end of May, with Microsoft confirming launches in Australia, Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, New Zealand, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom. Surface Pro will launch in Korea, Malaysia, Russia, Singapore, and Thailand before the end of June.

To date, the tablet is only available in the U.S., Canada, and very recently China.

LG Display, the second biggest maker of flat-panel displays, posted a profit this quarter that missed analyst expectations.

The company reported a profit of just $3.1 million, compared to expectations of $68 million, for the Q1.

A weaker currency, mixed in with falling sales of displays sold to Apple, led to the disastrous quarter.

LGD is not the first to cite Apple in its reports. Hon Hai, the parent of Foxconn, and the biggest manufacturer of iOS devices, reported their largest revenue decline in 13 years this quarter. Cirrus Logic, another maker of Apple chips, reported a huge amount of oversupply.

Apple is set to report earnings tonight, and is expected to see its first quarter of smaller profits in almost a decade.

Search engine giant has been fined 145,000 euros ($189,230) by German regulators following a long-standing case over Wi-Fi data collecting by their Street View cars.

In 2008 through 2010, the cars captured the data from unsecured networks while driving through taking pictures for their Google Maps/Street View service. Data included emails, passwords and even photos.

"In my view, this is one of the biggest data protection rules violations known. Google's internal control mechanisms must have severely failed," says Hamburg data regulator Johannes Caspar.

French regulators had already hit Google with a similar fine last year, 100,000 euro.

Google has always maintained they never used the data, nor stored it anywhere or ever viewed it.

Doing some quick calculations using Google's recent earnings report, the company makes $190,000 in profit every 7 minutes or so.

Apple has finally added the option to download content later from iTunes, including TV episodes, season passes and movies.

Using iTunes 11 or higher, or an iOS device with iOS 6, you'll have the option to "buy now" and "download later," a good move for bigger content you may not want to start downloading at the time of purchase.

Macworld says if you "tap Later the purchased items will be added to your iTunes account and accessible to stream or download in the future via Apple's iTunes in the Cloud feature."

The new feature is available only if you live in a nation that has iTunes for Cloud for audio and video. There are plenty of countries that do support both, but not all. Check the full list here: iTunes in the Cloud availability

Hackers caused a mini stock market "flash crash" this afternoon after sending a bogus tweet from a hacked Associated Press (AP) Twitter account.

The tweet, posted below, read that there were explosions at the White House and President Barack Obama had been injured. The account was quickly shut down, but the damage had been done.

U.S. markets, including the Dow Jones and S&P 500 fell 1 percent in one minute before rebounding.

White House spokesperson Jay Carney quickly dismissed the story by saying the President was doing just fine. The AP has had all of its Twitter accounts suspended.

According to new comments from Google chairman Eric Schmidt, there will be no consumer Google Glass rollout until 2014.

During an interview the exec was asked when the Google Glass would come to market in which he responded, "there will be thousands of [Google Glass] in use by developers over the next months, and then based on their feedback, we'll make some product changes, and it's probably a year-ish away."

Schmidt also addressed privacy concerns, which are valid given the fact that Google Glass users could record in any situation: "The fact of the matter is that we'll have to develop some new social etiquette. It's obviously not appropriate to wear these glasses in situations where recording is not correct. Companies like Google have a very important responsibility to keep your information safe but you have a responsibility as well which is to understand what you're doing, how you're doing it, and behave appropriately and also keep everything up to date."

The Google Glass glasses were just rolled out to early adopters via the Google Explorers program.

During their quarterly earnings report, streaming giant Netflix announced they had reached 29.17 million domestic subscribers.

The figure means Netflix has finally surpassed HBO, its new rival in original content.

HBO has 28.7 million subscribers, according to the most recent data.

Netflix had a great quarter, adding just over 2 million subscribers, thanks mainly to an upgraded TV catalog and original content like the popular "House of Cards."

On a global scale, HBO is still king, with 114 million subscribers. Netflix only has 36.2 million.

As current Netflix subscribers know, you can simultaneously stream two videos from different devices, allowing couples and families to keep just one account.

Netflix also knows that plenty of people share accounts.

In an effort to combat this and also appeal to larger families that may have more than two people using the service at one time, the company has unveiled a new plan that will allow up to 4 simultaneous streams.

Says CEO Reed Hastings: "A few members with large families run into our 2-simultaneous-stream limit. To best serve these members, we're shortly adding a 4-stream plan, at $11.99 in the U.S."

Hastings notes that he only expects 1 percent of the current subscriber base to use the new plan.

According to new market research, Google Play Store revenues are growing at a much faster pace than Apple, but Apple remains the dominant store in overall sales.

For the first quarter of 2013, all mobile app stores brought in $2.2 billion in revenue, with Apple's App Store accounting for 74 percent of that, at $1.48 billion. Google Play amounted to 18 percent. A second report claims the numbers are different, with Android taking 38.5 percent share. Regardless, Apple still dominates.

Google Play revenue jumped 90 percent quarter-over-quarter, easily beating Apple's 25 percent growth.

"Although Google is catching up, Apple has such a head-start in revenues that, on present trends, we would not expect Google to overtake Apple until sometime in 2016," said Daum, chief analyst at Canalys (via Reuters).

Most of the revenue gap is do to one simple fact; Android offers more games and apps for free than Apple's store does. Additionally, it is much easier to pirate apps on Android.