We told you about the Finnish startup Ruuvi and its Bluetooth beacon technology that heading to Kickstarter couple months ago. Now the RuuviTag is finally on Kickstarter and before the first five hours passed it was already fully funded.
Now after three days it has been funded over five times the original goal of ten thousands dollars and unlocked the first stretch goal.
RuuviTag is a Bluetooth enabled Internet of Things beacon that provides environmental information with multiple sensors and transmits its data to smartphones via low-power Bluetooth 4.2. Its key selling points are the open source community that builds and enhances the device and a battery life of up to 10 years with just one coin battery.
The variety of sensors give readings about the ambient temperature, relative humidity, barometric pressure, altitude, and acceleration. Ruuvi says that the beacon works for example as weather station or a physical web address but the possibilities are endless with community support and good ideas.
RuuviTag costs $25 with all sensors and $20 with just the thermometer. Check the video below to get some inspiration for your own beacons.
Google's Nexus devices have served for years as a reference device on Android. Developed by most of the largest smartphone manufacturers in the world they have provided different takes on what is a Google phone.
For a long time it has been suggested that Google wants to some day do it all by themselves but so far there hasn't been an official Google phone. According to The Telegraph this is going to change later this year.
Even though Google has always participated in the development of Nexus devices it has never made one from the ground up. The products always reflect the manufacturer and this time around Google wants to make it special.
The rumors have it that the device will be released this year but it won't replace Nexus devices, which are as well still arriving from HTC and possibly other manufacturers this fall.
Like Microsoft after the acquisition of Nokia, Google needs to be careful not to step on its partners' toes. Giving special attention to your own baby might discourage other manufacturers. Those questions were certainly in the air when the search giant bought Motorola.
A group of security researchers have found a vulnerability in Google's Chrome browser that allows downloading movies straight from Netflix. This is obviously not a feature especially the entertainment industry wants in what is the most popular browser on the globe.
David Livshits from the Cyber Security Research Center at Ben-Gurion University in Israel and Alexandra Mikityuk with Telekom Innovation Laboratories in Berlin, Germany have found that the implementation of Widevine EME/CDM technology that is used to stream encrypted video was lacking and enabled downloading of the video. According to Wired, the two researchers informed Google of this bug already in May but it hasn't yet been patched.
This not only works with Netflix but many of its competitors, like HBO. The researchers will not reveal the details to the bug before 90 days has passed since they told Google about it. Google still has time to issue a fix before pirate jump all over this security hole. The researchers have though released a brief video showcasing the vulnerability.
Google has acknowledged that the bug exists and says that it's working on fixing the problem. The vulnerability might also be found on other Chromium based browsers which include for example Opera.
For a long time Netflix was adamant on its pricing. No changes were made for a long time and everything seemed to be good. The markets obviously reacted and more expensive deals and original content meant that price increases, several of them in fact, were needed.
Fortunately for the customers the increase was not a radical one and for many I would argue the new content was worth every penny. However, it might not be all over yet, and there's been even rumors about advertisements.
Will Netflix adopt the Hulu strategy and show ads even for paying customers? Who knows, but if they indeed decide to do it, how will the customers react?
AllFlicks decided to do a poll on exactly that. Approximately 1200 Reddit users answered questions regarding ads on Netflix. The negativity towards ads was clear.
90 percent would rather see another price increase instead of ads. Most of them were at least a dollar or two and over 10 percent were willing to go over 4 dollars more.
The most shocking of the poll results, however, was that nearly three out of four answered that they would rather cancel the subscription than watch ads. That's 74 percent of the people who answered the poll. It's hard to say how many would actually act on it but it's safe to say that Netflix probably doesn't want to try their luck, unless it's the last option.
Spotify has told The Telegraph that it has surpassed the 100 million mark in subscribers. Paying subscribers was earlier this year reported to have passed 30 million. Apple meanwhile is having trouble growing its service past its initial base.
Apple told us in April that it had mustered 13 million Apple Music subscribers which is not much more than it had 9 months earlier just after Apple Music's release. Now though those people are paying and not just enjoying their free three months of music.
Just before the launch of Apple Music Spotify revealed that it had more than 20 million subscribers. So Apple might have beat Spotify's growth within the year but that is mostly because of the launch boom. Spotify has thus been growing faster than Apple Music for most of the past year – or at least on par.
It will be really hard to catch Spotify in this game unless you come up with something completely different. Its free model also is a springboard for potentially new paying customers who are ready to pay for convenience.
The next iPhone will be a major upgrade to current iPhone 6s. This biyearly full upgrade cycle provides us with a bigger upgrade every two years. But how will Apple update its number one product, sales of which has started declining.
The rumors have had for the past few months that Apple will introduce its first dual camera smartphone. After months of speculation it was widely recognized that it's more likely that only the bigger and better Plus version of iPhone 7 will have the double lens.
Now rumors from a Foxconn employee suggest that plans might have changed. According to the subcontractors claims Apple has decided to back down from having a dual camera at all, a plan that it once did indeed have.
This, like other rumors, should be taken with a grain of salt. It remains to be seen if the feature some Android phones already have is there or whether Apple's big new feature is something completely different.
The small Chinese smartphone maker OnePlus took the world by storm two years ago by releasing a super cheap flagship smartphone. They called it the flagship killer, and it indeed challenged the best Android smartphones without big drawbacks and with a tiny price tag. Now the company has revealed this years model.
As expected it is called the OnePlus 3. The third generation is not quite as cheap as the first, or even the second model, but it certainly is worth the flagship killer moniker. Comparing it to Samsung's number one smartphone, the Galaxy S7, OnePlus 3 only loses in screen resolution. Some would say not going QHD was a smart move from OnePlus too.
OnePlus 3 features a super thing 7,4 mm (0.29 in) thin, single-piece aluminium body which holds a 3000 milliamp battery. Performance is ensured by Snapdragon 820 and six gigs of RAM. The sixteen megapixel f2.0 camera features optical image stabilization and phase detection auto focus.
Everything seems to be in order for a good top end smartphone but it's the price what makes the deal sweet. You can buy one unlocked for only $399.
OnePlus has however revealed that the 5,5 inch smartphone will be the only option for now, and there's only the one 64 GB version. The company has discontinued the X model that was introduced last year as the cheaper and smaller option.
Twitter has invested $70 million in popular streaming music service SoundCloud in an effort by both companies to share users.
"Earlier this year, we made an investment in SoundCloud through Twitter Ventures to help support some of our efforts with creators," said Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey. "They've been great partners of ours over the years, and their community-supported approach mirrors ours in many ways."
SoundCloud has 175 million users while Twitter has 300 million monthly active users, and over 500 million accounts. The streaming service has struggled in recent years, however, with losses in the tens of millions despite increasing revenues. The investment will certainly help keep the company afloat for some time and "enable SoundCloud to remain focused on building value for creators and listeners alike," adds the company.
Apple will continue its crusade against the ultra-vulnerable Adobe Flash soon, blocking the plugin by default starting with the next version of desktop Safari.
Flash will still be allowed to run, but the user will have to activate it on a site-by-site basis.
Apple is following in the footsteps of Google, who announced last month that upcoming Chrome versions will act similarly although Chrome will give exceptions to major websites.
In addition to Flash, Apple is also blocking other plugins like Silverlight and Java, although neither has been as prone to security issues like Flash has been for the last decade.
Music streaming service Rhapsody will soon begin using the Napster brand name.
The service currently has 3.5 million customers, a respectable number, but well below Spotify, Apple and Google.
"No changes to your playlists, favorites, albums, and artists," says a blog post on Rhapsody's website. "Same music. Same service. Same price. 100% the music you love. Stay tuned!"
Napster, of course, started the music piracy revolution in the late 90s and has been widely credited with being part of the start of the downfall of the music industry. Rhapsody acquired the name Napster and some other IP in 2011.
For now, all we know is "Napster is coming" but there was little else in terms of details.
One of the less reported on pieces of news from Apple's WWDC event yesterday was the fact that you can now delete Apple bloat from your iOS devices.
With the launch of iOS 10, you will be to remove all apps from your iPhone and iPad, including Apple's own pre-installed apps that you never use.
A few of the apps that are expected to see quick deletion are Watch (for non-Watch owners), Compass, Tips, Stocks and Podcasts although there are plenty of others that could go.
As a secondary function, Apple has added the native apps to the App Store, allowing you to download them all again if you ever want them back.
Sony has confirmed the release date for the upcoming PlayStation VR headset, October 13th.
The headset was officially unveiled at GDC this March.
At $399 for the headset, or $499 bundled with a camera and Move controllers (if you don't already own them), the device won't be cheap but so far from everything we've seen it looks truly revolutionary.
Sony says there will be 50 games available before the end of the year, putting in on par with offerings from Oculus and HTC.
At E3, Ubisoft showed off new gameplay footage for Watch Dogs 2, telling gamers that they will be able to "hack everything."
The game is set in San Francisco and you control a hacker while engaging in gun battles, drone snooping, sports car racing and parkour, lots of parkour.
Ubi says the game will be available on November 15th for Xbox One, PS4 and PC.
Daetwyler Holding has agreed to purchase the largest Raspberry Pi supplier, Premier Farnell, for 615 million pounds ($871 million).
The company currently supplies for power-systems manufacturers and machinery makers but has been looking to expand into other markets.
Raspberry Pis are tiny computers that cost $35 and can be loaded with different operating systems and are intended to help students learn how to code on a budget.
"The combination represents a strong strategic fit and is highly attractive," Premier Farnell said in the statement, and the deal valued Premier Farnell at a 51 percent premium to yesterday's closing price.
Sony started their E3 keynote yesterday giving the fans exactly what they wanted: a new God of War game.
In the brief gameplay video, we see Kratos training his son to hunt, and the two then take down a few monsters using the games' patented slashing and button mashing action.
For the time being, the game does not look like a God of War 4, but it certainly could be an expansion of the God of War universe.
Legendary game developer Hideo Kojima stole the show yesterday at E3, showing off a new game titled "Death Stranding" featuring The Walking Dead star Norman Reedus.
Not too much was revealed except for a short video featuring a grief-stricken Norman Reedus holding his dead child and a zoom out to a decimated landscape.
The game is the first for Kojima productions since the latest MGS and the first since Kojima's highly-anticipated 'Silent Hills' game fell through following some in-fighting.
Gaming fans rejoice: 'The Last Guardian' will finally make its way to Sony's PlayStation 4 on October 25th.
The company announced the end of the Ico trilogy in 2009, but the game has been killed by delays for years, making it one of the most highly-anticipated games in PlayStation history.
Sony did not reveal much at E3 yesterday but did show off some touching scenes and some gameplay.
As we have known for years, TLG revolves around a boy left in ancient ruins with a giant bird-dog hybrid creature named Trico. The two must escape by solving puzzles.
As expected, Apple used their WWDC event today to officially change the branding of their Mac operating system OS X.
The OS will now go by macOS, a smart move by the company that will simplify its ecosystem which now includes watchOS, tvOS, iOS and macOS.
In addition to the name change, Apple also announced the upcoming macOS will be called Sierra and it will include built-in Siri support. Available for iOS since 2011, Siri for desktop will work similarly. Click on the Siri icon and you'll be able to use the 'personal assistant' to look up whatever you need, or set timers, reminders, calendar items, etc. You will also be able to search your on files using Siri, which could be useful.
Finally, Apple is updating 'Continuity' by adding a universal clipboard for copying between iOS and macOS devices and adding automatic unlock options if you have an Apple Watch. iCloud has also been updated on the file management front, letting users sync between desktop and documents folders on multiple devices.
Expect a Sierra beta soon and a final release in September.
Despite a tepid opening week in the U.S., the Duncan Jones directed 'Warcraft' film has set the record for largest debut in China by a foreign film.
The film brought in an astounding $156 million in its first five days in China, on its way to a $300 million gross worldwide.
In scope, the number is huge. The previous record holder was Avengers: Age of Ultron and the blockbuster film had a lifetime gross of $240 million in the nation. That figure seems to be beatable relatively quickly at its current pace.
The film's distributor, Legendary, used financing partnerships with Chinese companies like Tencent, and sponsorship and promotional partnerships with other Chinese companies to build hype in China, which appears to have worked nicely.
As leaked yesterday, Microsoft has confirmed and launched the new slimmed down Xbox One S console, available for pre-order now.
The new console is 40 percent smaller than the original Xbox One, and now comes in the "robot white" color scheme. On the outside, the Xbox One S has lost the gigantic power brick of its predecessor and will come with the option to buy a vertical stand.
On the inside, Microsoft has upgraded the raw processing power of the console, adding 4K video support (including 4K Ultra HD Blu-rays), HDR support for gaming and video and a built-in IR blaster. Aesthetically, the USB ports have been moved to a more convinient spot up front, along with the controller pairing button.
"The Xbox One S for us was a realization that first, we want to make a smaller Xbox, but there was also some capability that we saw growing out in the market around HDR and 4K video," Xbox head Phil Spencer noted. "So we said, if we're going to do an upgrade to our console, let's go ahead and embrace some of the technologies that are coming and make those part of our core SKU."
In addition, the console comes with a modified controller that has textured grips and the addition of Bluetooth.
Microsoft has announced today that its highly-anticipated 'Halo Wars 2' will be released late February next year, with a beta now live following the company's E3 keynote.
The sequel will follow the events of Halo 5, and will be an RTS game just like its predecessor.
In the new game, humanity is fighting back against a new race of aliens called "the Banished," and we have a nice gameplay trailer for those interested.
The game has been developed by Halo studio 343 Industries in partnership with The Creative Assembly, the team behind the popular Total War games, suggesting Microsoft has really amped up the strategy aspects.
Earlier today, Microsoft agreed to acquire professional social network and job posting site LinkedIn for $26.2 billion.
The companies say LinkedIn will keep its "brand, culture and independence" and current CEO Jeff Weiner will remain at the helm. The executive will now report to Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella.
LinkedIn revealed some membership and financial figures following the acquisition, including 433 million current members worldwide, a jump of 19 percent year-over-year, 49 percent growth in mobile usage and 101 percent growth in active job listings.
"The LinkedIn team has grown a fantastic business centered on connecting the world's professionals," Nadella added. "Together we can accelerate the growth of LinkedIn, as well as Microsoft Office 365 and Dynamics as we seek to empower every person and organization on the planet."
Ahead of E3, EA has unveiled the latest trailer for BioWare's upcoming Mass Effect sequel, a title in which BioWare says will give gamers "more freedom" than they've had in past games.
Andromeda uses the Frostbite engine used in recent hits like Battlefront, Battlefield 1 and Mirror's Edge, so the graphics will certainly be stunning.
Microsoft's oft-rumored slim Xbox One has leaked ahead of an expected launch during E3 next week.
The reported Xbox One S (S for 'Slim') will be 40 percent thinner than the original, and we have some leaked images to back up the claims.
With the pictures, we also have some leaked specs which suggest the slim console will include 4K video playback, HDR support, include a 2TB hard drive, and a new "streamlined controller."
Finally, the power supply appears to built-in to the console, a first for the Xbox One. We will know more for sure tomorrow.
In an effort to diversify their supplier base, Apple's upcoming iPhone 7 will use modems from Intel rather than Qualcomm in some models.
According to sources, the Intel modem chips will be built into the iPhones developed for AT&T, as well as for some overseas carriers. AT&T expects to sell about 25 million iPhones this year, while Apple sells over 200 million a year globally.
Importantly for Qualcomm, their modems will still be in Verizon models as well as all models sold in China.
The news is big for Intel, which currently has under 1 percent share of the smartphone baseband market.
According to a new article, Apple will unveil iMessage for Android next week at WWDC.
While unconfirmed, a move to bring the encrypted messaging service to the world's most-used mobile OS would make good business sense for the tech giant. There are millions of Android users that would prefer to use the emojis and other features of iMessage in a group chat with friends and family with iPhones.
Apple recently launched Apple Music for Android, making it clear the company is willing to expand their ecosystem when the bottom line demands it.
For now, take the report as rumor but we will learn more for sure next week at the company's WWDC keynote.
Twitter has notified over 33 million account holders that their accounts are at risk following a database leak not related to the micro-blogging company.
The data dump was part of a much larger release that included millions of MySpace and LinkedIn usernames and passwords and tens of millions of logins for Russian-language sites.
Twitter, for their part, says there is "no indication that we have been compromised," suggesting the names and passwords were stolen from other sites but users used the same details across multiple sites.
There have been some prominent takeovers in the last few days due to the leak. Attackers took over Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg's Twitter account, Twitter co-founder Evan William's account and the account of NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell, among others.
Apple has revealed even more evidence that the longstanding OS X name will soon be MacOS, as the company tries to keep the brand naming in line with the rest of their products.
The tech giant is likely to unveil the change next week at WWDC 2016, alongside updates to iOS, watchOS and tvOS.
Supporting documentation released yesterday show the macOS name (for the third time now in an official doc), this time in relation to the changes in revenue split for subscription-based apps.
Apple quickly replaced macOS with OS X in the docs but not before it had been screened.
Sony Interactive Entertainment CEO Andrew House has confirmed the rumored "PlayStation 4 UHD" is indeed coming; but not at E3.
The mid-generation upgrade, codenamed "Neo," will be capable of 4K video output as previously rumored, in addition to a more powerful GPU.
Neo won't launch at E3, but it is expected before the end of 2016. House did also say that the console will cost over $350 in the U.S. when it launches.
Even though Sailfish OS creator Jolla has had its fair share of challenges in the past two years (including a failed tablet and a near bankruptcy) it appears that its operating system lives on.
Russian phone maker Plural has released its new Oysters SF phone powered by Sailfish, thanks to a partnership with Jolla.
Here are the full specs:
5-inch 720p display
MediaTek MT6753 ARM Cortex-A53 octa-core processor
2GB of RAM
16GB of storage
13-megapixel rear camera
5-megapixel front-facing camera
microSD slot
3,000 mAh battery
Regardless, the smartphone world has been and will always be a two-horse race.
Microsoft has announced the open beta of Minecraft: Education Edition, which it hopes to get into schools by the end of the third quarter.
The software giant hopes teachers will access the beta to create lesson plans that will engage students using the block world, for example recreating scenarios from books or historical landmarks.
For the most part, Education Edition is identical to the standard game, but it includes an "in-game camera" for screenshots, in-game chalkboards for letting teachers write and place text, and a "Classroom Mode," for teachers that will "grant resources to students, view where everyone is on a map, send chat messages, and teleport people to specific places, which will be useful should students run off or get lost."
The beta is free until September and then licensing will be anywhere from $1 to $5 per year, per student for schools.
Uber has been fined €800,000 ($907,000) in France over its cheap UberPop service, a service that was banned in 2014.
UberPop connected app users with non-professional drivers that did not have taxi/limo requirements, causing an uproar from the taxi unions. Two Uber executives were even arrested for "operating an illegal business" as a court deliberated on the legality of the service.
The unions won in 2014, but an appeals court overturned and the case went to France's highest court which upheld the ban.
Comically, the taxi unions were seeking 100 million euro in damages but will get less than 1 million.
Tinder has discontinued use of the popular dating app for anyone under the age of 18.
Until now, the app had allowed everyone above the age of 13 to use the app, but all minors could only be matched with other minors.
Says Tinder: "On a platform that has facilitated over 11 billion connections, we have the responsibility of constantly assessing our different user experiences. Consistent with this responsibility, we have decided to discontinue service for under 18 users. We believe this is the best policy moving forward. This change will take effect next week."
The company said only 3 percent of users were under 18 years of age.
According to multiple reports, Samsung is looking into releasing two new smartphones that will have bendable screens in 2017.
Using OLED screens, one of the devices could even fold in half (like a clam shell design) and will have a "5-inch screen when used as a handset, that unfurls into a display that's as large as 8 inches, similar to a tablet."
The sources claim that Samsung has resolved any issues with making the bendable screens durable, but is now working on an interface that makes sense for such a device.
Many expect the devices to be unveiled at next year's MWC in Spain, scheduled for the first week of February.
Earlier, we reported that Apple was making major changes to its App Store policies, and it appears that Google is matching and exceeding those changes for the Google Play Store.
Google will also move to a 85/15 split in favor of developers for subscriptions, but developers will not have to wait a year to get paid. Google's new policy has the split working immediately, unlike Apple where the customer must stay subscribed for over a year for the developer to get the better pay structure.
Another change that has been ongoing is the fact that Google lets developers handle payments themselves, while Apple still forces everyone to use the Apple iTunes billing system.
According to Apple's Phil Schiller, major changes are coming to the App Store, including big changes to how subscriptions work for developers.
Schiller says app subscriptions are now open to all product categories, giving developers more options to earn revenue. For example, a productivity company could offer a bundle of their popular apps for $19.99 per year, rather than charging an upfront fee for each app. Apple is also opening up tiered pricing options for app subscriptions.
In addition, Apple is dropping the amount they take on subscription fees, from the current 30 percent to 15 percent, but only if the customer stays subscribed for longer than a year. This has been a huge point of pain for big developers like Netflix, who had to charge more for their services via Apple because Apple was taking a 30 percent cut.
Finally, Apple is adding ads to App Store search results, and Apple is opening the ad space to developers, only. "We've thought about how to carefully do it in a way that, first and foremost, customers will be happy with," Schiller says. The auction system will "fair to developers, and fair for indie developers, too," developers that may not have as much in ad budget as, say, Supercell.
Media conglomerate Vivendi SA has bought out the founding family of Gameloft, increasing their majority stake in the French mobile gaming company.
The Guillemot family owned nearly 22 percent of the company while Vivendi controlled 56 percent of Gameloft's voting rights before the acquisition. Somewhat strangely, the company says they sold their shares "with regret" and the "family maintains that Vivendi's hostile approach goes against the best interest of Gameloft, both for its activity and for its teams."
Vivendi valued the company at about $800 million USD. Gameloft, which has hit games using their own IP and IP of other companies, had sales of about $300 million last year.
The Guillemot family also controls Ubisoft, of which Vivendi now has a 17.7 percent stake, with many in the industry expecting another hostile bid for the large gaming publisher. Ubisoft, however, has a $4.5 billion value, multiple times that of Gameloft's.
Yahoo is set to begin auctioning off a portfolio of 3000 patents that are expected to bring in over a billion dollars for the struggling web pioneer.
A few of the patents date as far back as 1996 (when Yahoo IPOd) and will include original search technology.
The company has set a mid-June deadline for preliminary bids, but it is unclear which companies are interested in the catalog of patents at this time. The patents mainly cover search, e-commerce and online advertising and one patent specifically is expected to be worth a significant amount given the fact that Google licensed it in perpetuity for $300 million.
"This represents a unique opportunity for companies operating in the internet industry to acquire some of the most pioneering and foundational patents related to web search and advertising," said Yahoo.
Yahoo is currently up for sale, with Verizon the top bidder for other core assets at a price of around $3 billion.
Microsoft has announced that they will not be adding a TV DVR feature to the Xbox One, despite announcing it last August.
"After careful consideration, we've decided to put development of DVR for Over-the-Air TV on hold to focus our attention on launching new, higher fan-requested gaming experiences across Xbox One and Windows 10," said Microsoft. "We're always listening to fan feedback and we look forward to bringing more requested experiences on Xbox One, Windows 10 and Xbox Live this year."
The announcement last year had promised a launch of the feature in 2016, including the ability to DVR OTA TV using digital TV tuners that Microsoft released in NA and the EU.
For now, it will be exciting to see what gaming-related features will be announced at E3.
It took 8 months, but Android Marshmallow has finally hit its first adoption milestone, reaching 10 percent share of the operating system.
Android 5.x Lollipop remains the most popular, with 35.4 percent share, followed by the nearly three-year-old Android 4.4 KitKat at 31.6 percent. Perhaps more shockingly is Android 4.1/4.2/4.3 Jelly Bean which still has 18.9 percent share despite originally launching in 2012.
At its current rate, it is expected that Marshmallow will at least overtake Jelly Bean by the end of the year, as more and more smartphone OEMs update their devices to the latest OS.
Less than a month after the company laid off half its staff, it appears that mobile payments company CurrentC could be DOA.
Current beta testers received an email this week titled "An Important Message from CurrentC," noting that the mobile payment system will shut down in its current form on June 28th.
"We will be concluding our beta test and postponing further releases of CurrentC on June 28, 2016," the email said. "Therefore, June 28th will be the last day that transactions will be accepted using CurrentC."
Merchant Customer Exchange (MCX), the group behind the system, added that they have "not announced future timelines or plans around the app but we're looking forward to analyzing and learning from the data we gleaned throughout the beta."
There had been high hopes for CurrentC due to its backing by MCX, which included huge retailers like 7-Eleven, Best Buy, CVS Health, Lowe's, Publix, Sears, Target and Walmart but it appears Apple Pay and Android Pay just got too far ahead.
HTC's Vive VR headset is now shipping to 24 countries, and demo headsets will be available in retail locations like GameStop and Microsoft Stores in the coming days.
In total, the demos will be available in 100 retail locations across North America, giving potential buyers a chance to "experience room-scale virtual reality first-hand."
Thanks to Valve's partnership with HTC, there will be a large amount of content available on Stream right from the onset.
"Since beginning preorders at the end of February and shipping in early April, we've seen incredible interest in Vive," said Dan O'Brien, vice president of VR at HTC, in a statement. "Working with our retail partners has only enhanced that momentum because more people are able to try the only truly immersive virtual reality offering on the market today."
The Vive is not cheap. The headset will cost you $800 and will require a higher-end PC, just like the market leading Oculus Rift.
Chinese smartphone giant Xiaomi will buy 1500 patents from Microsoft in the coming months, likely a sign that the company wants to finally expand sales outside of Asia.
Xiaomi exploded onto the scene four years ago and quickly become the largest smartphone maker in China, and one of the top smartphone makers on the planet. Since 2014, however, sales have saturated and the company has seen its expenses gradually increase as they acquire patents, invest in R&D, and advertise more.
Along with the patents, Xiaomi also signed a cross-licensing agreement with Microsoft, where Xiaomi will preload Microsoft Office and Skype on a number of devices.
"Both Xiaomi and Microsoft respect intellectual-property rights,"said Xiaomi. "We believe that with this kind of collaboration and also our commitment for the long-term investment in IP, we are going to build a very strong patent portfolio."
Japanese carrier SoftBank has announced it will sell about $8 billion worth of its shares in the Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba.
SoftBank says it will use the money to reduce its leverage and pay down debt that it took on when it acquired the failing U.S. carrier Sprint three years ago.
The company owns about 32 percent of Alibaba shares. Alibaba has a current market value of almost $200 billion. SoftBank founder Masayoshi Son invested $20 million in 2000 for the stake, making it one of the best bets in history.
SoftBank will sell $2.4 billion of its shares to Alibaba itself, $500 million to a sovereign-wealth fund and the last $5 billion to institutional buyers.
Apple's external display's are somewhat popular among certain professionals but the company hasn't released any new models in ages. Soon, however, we will likely see an upgrade.
What makes this display special, though, is not its amazingly color accurate panel or the super fast Thunderbolt connectivity. No, according to 9to5Mac the new Thunderbolt Display from Apple has an integrated GPU.
That means that the display will feature a full-fledged graphics card to run your Photoshop or Premiere on 5K resolution that your MacBook's GPU might not support.
Of course the upgrade will bring the resolution from QHD resolution in the 2011 model to a 5K resolution (5120x2880). This will bring it on par with the best current iMacs.
The sources have it that the display(s) won't be revealed at this years WWDC in June but it could be that they have been postponed to the fall iPhone event. They are reported to become available this year.
Sony has a huge lead in this generation's console wars but it's far from over yet. There might be another hurdle that could change things up – virtual reality. However, looking at the current situation it seems like Microsoft is behind the curve on this too. Or is it?
Even though PlayStation intends to bring the VR experience to PlayStation as early as this year, Microsoft might not be out of the race as we've thought. According to Ars Technica's source a large European game studio is developing a VR game for both Windows and Xbox.
According to the leaked information this game will, however, not be available before 2017. This reaffirms that Microsoft is, like Sony, developing an improved console, mostly VR experience in mind.
It could be that Microsoft will rival the first official introduction of VR experience to their console at the E3 this year but would have to wait until 2017 to release it to the public. It also remains to be seen if the new Xbox is compatible with Oculus and/or Microsoft's own glasses. However, it does seem that Sony doesn't have this aspect totally in the bag yet.
Samsung has introduced a new super small SSD that might only cover your regular postage stamp but can fit 512 gigabytes of data. This PM971-NVMe chip is sized at one hundredth of a normal 2.5 inch SSD you usually see on laptops.
Laptops are becoming smaller by the year and storage this is one of the key things holding them back. Replacing a standard 2.5 inch drive with a miniscule chip like this not only slims the laptop down but also removes some excess weight. This first of it's kind SSD NVMe chip weighs only one gram – around 60 rice grains.
Obviously Apple is one of the key partners of Samsung – as well as a competitor – and it would be (read: have been) hugely important for Samsung's SSDs to grab a deal with the Cupertino giant for their next super slim MacBook. As Apple Insider notes the companies are closely cooperating in SSD space already.
The next question is obviously going to be if it's fast enough for laptops. And yes, in fact, it is. Read and write speeds are 500 MB/s and 900 MB/s respectively which puts it above most SSD drives that you'd find in computers. The chip is manufactured with Samsung's V-NAND technology that packs sixteen 48-layered 256-gigabit chips, an in-house controller and DRAM into one tiny drive.
Microsoft has announced a price cut on the Xbox One console ahead of next month's E3 event, suggesting the long-rumored "Xbox 1.5" could be on the way.
Every Xbox One bundle now has a $50 discount until June 13th, the start of E3, although there is speculation the price drop will be permanent.
The rumored Xbox 1.5 will be 40 percent lighter than the current model, following the previous generation's model of offering "slim" consoles halfway through the life cycle of the console.
We told you about the Finnish startup Ruuvi and its Bluetooth beacon technology that heading to Kickstarter couple months ago. Now the RuuviTag is finally on Kickstarter and before the first five hours passed it was already fully funded.
Google's Nexus devices have served for years as a reference device on Android. Developed by most of the largest smartphone manufacturers in the world they have provided different takes on what is a Google phone.
A group of security researchers have found a vulnerability in Google's Chrome browser that allows downloading movies straight from Netflix. This is obviously not a feature especially the entertainment industry wants in what is the most popular browser on the globe.
