Business Topics

Sony pulls back curtain on new PS4 console

Sony Corp. has given the world the first look at its new PlayStation 4 console, promising to combine its film, music, television and game strengths in a powerhouse home entertainment box. Sony Computer Entertainment Inc. President Andrew House on Monday touted the next-generation video game consoles as having been built ...

Jun 16, 2013

Most parents monitor kids on Facebook

Some two-thirds of American parents monitor their children’s Facebook activities, but a large percentage say they trust their youngsters to manage on their own, a study showed Thursday. The survey by the Annenberg Center for the Digital Future at the University of Southern California ...

New Myspace takes it back to the future

Jun 16, 2013

New Myspace takes it back to the future

by Chris Talbott

Tim and Chris Vanderhook think Myspace had it right — at one point. And they believe they’ve revived and improved that formula for success as the revamped first titan of social media debuts its latest incarnation. The Vanderhooks unveiled the new Myspace.com on June ...

Epic search for first Web page may prove futile

Jun 15, 2013

Epic search for first Web page may prove futile

For the European physicists who created the World Wide Web, preserving its history is as elusive as unlocking the mysteries of how the universe began. The scientists at the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) are searching for the first Web page. It was ...

Real-time translation start-up leaves much to be desired

Jun 14, 2013

Real-time translation start-up leaves much to be desired

by Max J. Rosenthal

An Israeli start-up says it has come up with a way to overcome language barriers when conducting international business: an automated service that provides quick translations between English and seven other languages over the telephone. Lexifone allows people to get translations without paying hundreds ...

ITunes Radio service enters crowded field

Jun 12, 2013

ITunes Radio service enters crowded field

Apple on Monday unveiled a long-expected Internet radio service called iTunes Radio and said it will personalize listeners’ music based on what they’ve listened to and what they’ve purchased on iTunes. Apple said iTunes Radio will be available this year in the U.S. It ...

Porn app for Google Glass faces development hurdles

Jun 6, 2013

Porn app for Google Glass faces development hurdles

The makers of a porn app for Google’s Internet-linked eyewear were modifying the software Tuesday in response to a move by the company to keep sex off the new devices. Google evidently updated its Glass developer rules over the weekend, ahead of the release ...

Jun 6, 2013

Samsung wins U.S. import ban on older iPhones

Samsung won a round in its long-running patent battle with Apple on Tuesday when a U.S. trade panel banned the import and sale of some older models of the iPhone and iPad. The quasi-judicial International Trade Commission said it issued a “limited exclusion order” ...

3-D printing goes from sci-fi fantasy to reality

Jun 4, 2013

3-D printing goes from sci-fi fantasy to reality

Invisalign, a San Jose company, uses 3-D printing to make each mouthful of customized, transparent braces. Mackenzies Chocolates, a confectioner in Santa Cruz, uses a 3-D printer to pump out chocolate molds. And earlier this year, Cornell University researchers used a 3-D printer, along ...

Prototype eyewear brings wraparound manipulable 3-D Net

Jun 2, 2013

Prototype eyewear brings wraparound manipulable 3-D Net

While Google prepares to release eyewear that provides a window to the Web, a startup on the edge of its campus is readying glasses that overlay the Internet on the world in 3-D. Atheer Labs on Thursday provided the first public look at prototype ...

Jun 1, 2013

Microsoft backtracks on Windows

Microsoft is trying to fix what it got wrong with its radical makeover of Windows. It is making the operating system easier to navigate and enabling users to set up the software so it starts in a more familiar format. The revisions to Windows ...