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Samsung has confirmed that it will release a new model of the Galaxy S III smartphone later this year.

The new model will include 64GB of internal storage, double the current storage of the popular device.

Says the company: "The 64GB model of the Galaxy S III will be available during the second half of this year. The market availability and timing may vary and will be determined at the time."

There was no word at all to narrow the time frame, but the extra storage will be a welcome addition to consumers who like to download a lot of movies, music and books.

You can read our review here: Review: Is Samsung's Galaxy S III worth all the hype?

Just a year after they sold 50 percent of the company to HTC, Beats Audio has bought back 25 percent of that stake.

HTC originally purchased their 50 percent stake for $300 million, and Beats bought their 25 percent share back at the same equivalent price, $150 million. Beats will now have a controlling 75 percent stake.

Beats says it will now have "more flexibility for global expansion."

For its part, HTC will keep exclusivity on the Beats Audio tech for mobile, meaning you won't be seeing it in Samsung, Motorola or other company's phones anytime soon.

The two companies will also work on a major joint marketing campaign later this year.

Uniloc, the notorious patent troll, has sued the creators of 'Minecraft,' claiming it infringes on patents they hold for certain copy protection software.

The company, making their case even more ridiculous, calls the game "Mindcraft" in the official filing.

Creator Markus 'Notch' Persson, known for his sense of humor, has already responded to the filing: "Step 1: Wake up. Step 2: Check email. Step 3: See we're being sued for patent infringement. Step 4: Smile. Unfortunately for them, they're suing us over a software patent. If needed, I will throw piles of money at making sure they don't get a cent."

Uniloc's patent, awarded back in 2005, is for a system "preventing unauthorized access to electronic data" between a portable device and a license registration authority. Uniloc has long claimed they have rights to all software that verify licensing on the Android OS.

Notch says Minecraft does not perform licensing checks in any manner similar to the patent.

Microsoft has updated its Bing Maps service with 215TB of high-resolution imagery.

The new images cover most of the U.S. and important cities in Europe, Australia, New Zealand and Tokyo.

Dubbed "Bird's Eye," all of the new images were captured at "a 45-degree angle to provide increased detail of buildings and landmarks," says TT.

The 215TB is over 1.1 million files and covers roughly 230,000 square kilometers.

Altogether, Bing Maps now covers 1.39 million square kilometers, with a total of 302TB of data.

Restoring faith in humanity, Lenovo CEO Yang Yuanqing has distributed his bonus check to almost 10,000 junior level employees.

The company posted a great quarterly earnings report in May, and the exec was given a $3 million bonus for his work and the performance.

Rather than pocketing the money, however, the CEO paid checks of $314 to almost 10,000 production-line workers, assistants and receptionists. The average monthly salary for most of these employees ranged from $350-$450, so the bonus check was significant.

Not to take anything away from the CEO's outstanding gesture, but Yuanqing did earn over $14 million last year for his position (with bonuses).

Regardless, it is great to see an exec giving money back to the employees that help him earn it.

Asus has confirmed that it will be bringing the Android 4.1 Jelly Bean update to its Transformer line of tablets.

The Transformer Prime, Transformer (Original) and Transformer Infinity will each get the update in "the coming months."

Asus added that it plans to bring "regular software and firmware updates."

If you happen to own another Asus Android device, for now the company is still "investigating Jelly Bean updates for other devices."

Earlier this month, we reported that DirecTV had dropped over two dozen Viacom cable channels thanks to an ongoing dispute over licensing fees.

Popular channels like Nickelodeon, Comedy Central and MTV went dark while the two companies tried to work out an agreement on fees.

Earlier this week, the groups announced a formal agreement, and 26 channels have been returned.

Says Viacom: "Viacom is extremely pleased to bring its programming back to DirecTV subscribers, and thanks everyone affected by the disrupting for their patience and understanding during this challenging period."

Allegedly, DirecTV will pay out $600 million per year for access to the channels, which is an increase of over 20 percent from the previous deal.

Additionally, with the new deal, DirecTV subscribers will be able to watch Viacom content via "tablets, laptops, handhelds and other personal devices" using the DirecTV Everywhere platform.

DirecTV has 19 million subscribers and is the largest satellite TV provider in the nation.

HTC has confirmed today that their latest phones will be getting Android 4.1 Jelly Bean.

The popular One X and One S devices will be getting Google's latest operating system and all of its goodies.

Word comes via Jeff Gordon, HTC's Global Online Communications Manager: "We know HTC fans are excited to get their hands on Google's latest version of Android. At this point in time, we can confirm that we have plans to upgrade our HTC One X, HTC One XL and HTC One S to Jelly Bean. Please stay tuned for more updates regarding device upgrades, timing and other details about HTC and Jelly Bean."

Screenshots have leaked of Mozilla's new mobile operating system, which is set for release next year.

For the time being, the OS will launch in Brazil and the rest of Latin America, but a European launch may be the cards, as well.

Mozilla claims that the mobile OS will be faster (and lighter) than anything currently on the market, including Android and iOS, the market leaders.

The company should have a very tough road ahead, but it is always good to see some new competition.

Apple has expanded its iTunes in the Cloud for movies service to 35 new nations.

The new nations with access to movies are Australia, Argentine, Bolivia, Brazil, Brunei, Cambodia, Canada, Chile, Costa Rica, Czech Republic, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Hong Kong, Hungary, Ireland, Laos, Macau, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, the Philippines, Singapore, Slovakia, Sri Lanka, Taiwan, Thailand, the U.K., Venezuela, and Vietnam.

American and Canadian users already had access since launch.

Not all content is available due to licensing restrictions but the selections should be pretty hefty for most.

According to the latest figures from the China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC), the amount of Internet users in the nation has grown to 538 million.

Additionally, 388 million are accessing the Internet from mobile devices.

China's growth has been exponential since 2008, when there were only 298 million users. Just 6 months ago, in January, there were 513 million users.

The CNNIC does say overall growth has slowed since 2011, which is understandable after a few years of furious growth.

Over 100 million Chinese use their mobile phones to watch video, which was an increase of 27.7 percent.

Microsoft reported record revenue during their quarterly earnings today, although they had to post a loss, their first ever.

Revenue came in at $18.06 billion, a record, but the company had to report a loss of $492 million. The loss was due to a massive write-off of $6.2 billion from their 2007 acquisition of aQuantive. The ad company just never panned out, and Microsoft lost almost all it invested to purchase it.

Without the one-time charge, revenues were up 7 percent year-over-year and profits would have been up 12 percent.

Revenue in the Entertainment and Devices division (Xbox 360, Windows Phone, Xbox Live) grew the most, spiking 20 percent to $1.7 billion.

For the fiscal year, Microsoft posted $73.72 billion in revenue and $21.76 billion in operating income.

AT&T will give users the chance to sign up for shared data plans starting this August.

Dubbed the "AT&T Mobile Share" plans, new and existing users can choose to move to the new plans where they can share a "bucket" of data, minutes and texts across multiple devices.

Moving to a shared contract is not mandatory but can be done without extending your current contract length.

Each plan can have 10 devices attached and each comes with tethering and unlimited texts and voice calls.

"We offer customers a broad choice and the best lineup of plans, now enhanced by Mobile Share," said David Christopher, chief marketing officer, AT&T Mobility. "With these new plans, the more you share, the more you save. They'll be a good fit for a variety of new and existing customers. But if customers want to stay on their current plan or choose from our existing plans, they can do that, too. It's their choice.

"Today we think of people's smartphones and tablets sharing a bucket of data. But in the future we'll see health care monitors, connected cars, security systems and other devices in the home all connected to the mobile Internet," said Christopher. "Our Mobile Share plans are simple, easy and a great value for individuals or families with multiple mobile Internet devices."

Nokia reported its quarterly earnings earlier this morning, which as expected, were a disaster.

The company had an operating loss of €826 million, and would have been much worse had it not been for a crutch by Microsoft.

Microsoft pays Nokia royalties on a quarterly basis, and the most recent check led to a rise in net cash of €102 million. Last quarter, even with Microsoft helping, the Finnish company showed a loss of €1.3 billion, its largest ever.

Lumia sales, since launch, totaled 4 million. In the U.S. and Canada, Nokia only shipped a total of 600,000 units during the quarter, meaning the Lumia 900 was certainly a flop, even at its $99 price tag. The company has since slashed the price to $49 to spur sales.

While the Lumia sales were not a complete mess, Nokia's feature phone and Symbian/MeeGo phone sales continue to fall, with overall sales down 4.8 million compared to the comparable period last year.

Nokia says it expects the third quarter to be "challenging," as well.

While most manufacturers are planning Windows Phone 8 devices for the end of this year, Acer seems to be taking a backseat, waiting until the 3Q 2013 for their first entry to the market.

Nokia, Samsung, HTC and Huawei, among others, have already announced phones for this year running on Qualcomm chips.

Acer released a Windows Phone 7 smartphone for Europe last year, with low-end specs, which was met with mediocre sales.

For now, the company is focused on Android, says Acer spokesperson Chen Guowei.

Windows Phone 8 is expected to launch alongside the release of the desktop Windows 8, in late October. The new OS will allow for multi-core processor support, NFC, mass storage support and 720p screen resolution.