Apple apparently wants to make a big splash in Hollywood.  The tech giant is ready to spend $1 billion on new entertainment content over the next year,  the Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday. That amount signals how serious Apple is about getting into the original content business. It’s the latest big-name tech company to jump into this …

Not to be outdone by Amazon’s big Prime Day promotion, electronics retailer Best Buy also has a bunch of high-tech deals up its sleeve. The list of discounted gear includes everything from Apple Watches, Roomba robot vacuums, iPhones, headphones, and HDTVs. The bulk of the sale kicks off tomorrow on Tuesday 11 July, though some products are already on sale …

Windows 10 laptops running Qualcomm chips just gained stronger manufacturer support. Today at the Computex show in Taipei, computer makers Lenovo, HP and Asus officially expressed plans to build Windows devices powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 835 mobile processor. The idea of a Windows 10 machine running a Snapdragon chip isn’t new. Qualcomm confirmed that the Snapdragon 835 could handle …

The April Fools’ Day jokes have started early, judging by the new Lyft Mono. The ride-hailing company recently unveiled a site for the glove-like device, with the tag line “Raise. Request. Ride.” There’s also an outlandish video that’s full of retro ’80s synth pop and is reminiscent of vintage Worlds of Wonder Lazer Tag ads. In the video, a dancer …

Sling TV just struck a deal with Amazon that gives select customers first dibs on the Sling Cloud DVR service. Classified as Amazon “First Look” subscribers, this subset of Sling TV customers can now cough up another $5 per month to save their recorded TV shows to Sling Cloud DVR servers online. From there they’ll be able to stream these …

It turns out there’s an actual reason some owners of Google Pixel and Pixel XL Android handsets have been noticing microphone problems. Almost eight hundred people and counting have posted questions regarding this topic on Google’s Pixel support forum. Google VP of Product and expert Googler Brian Rakowski confirmed with CNET that there is a snafu and it is a …

Are you a T-Mobile customer and worried that you’re burning through your bucket of monthly mobile data? Perhaps this will help you breathe a little easier. The carrier has raised its throttling limbo bar by a few inches, to 30GB per monthly billing, a cycle up from 28GB. T-Mobile-focused website TMOnews reported that this unpublicized shift took place Wednesday. To …

Android fans, Thursday is going to be generous. Google is about update Gboard for Android with new features and abilities. The first of these is GIF and emoji suggestions as you type. Also coming: The keyboard will translate your entered text into another language in real time. Other improvements include a different interface for voice typing, which is tweaked to …

Facebook really wants to serve you original TV shows over social media. The social network just hired Mina Lefevre, an experienced TV executive, to manage all of its video content programming, according to Bloomberg. Lefevre hails from MTV where she was responsible for scripted programming. The move follows Facebook’s recently announced plans to create an app for television set-top boxes. …

It turns out that anime fans will pay for their content fix, and in a big way. The online anime subscription service Crunchyroll said Thursday that paid memberships have surpassed the 1 million mark. The milestone at San Francisco-based Crunchyroll, which is backed by telecom giant AT&T through a joint venture, is an example of how relatively niche genres can …