How important is it to Google to be the first place iPhone users go to for search results? Important enough that the Web giant reportedly pays its biggest rival in mobile big bucks for the privilege. The search giant paid Apple $1 billion in 2014 to keep its search bar on iOS devices, according to …

HTC’s 2016 flagship smartphone won’t launch next month at Mobile World Congress, according to rumors gathered by blog IT Home. The new scuttlebutt is that the HTC One M10, which would update last year’s HTC One M9, hasn’t been finalized yet. It could instead debut at a separate event in March, followed by an April release. For the most part, …

I remember Silly Putty, that weird squishy beige substance that came in a red plastic-egg container. As kids, we used it to pull the ink off of newspaper comics. Times have changed and there are some much fancier versions of play putty on the market, including one called Liquid Glass Thinking Putty from online weird-stuff retailer Vat19. Vat19 wisely decided …

Verizon doesn’t simply want to be your wireless provider. It hopes you’ll be glued to your phone watching its videos, too. That’s the goal of Go90, the mobile video service Verizon launched in September with clips from YouTube stars like the Smosh guys, the National Football League (with which it has an exclusive deal) and old favorites such as “Mythbusters.” …

Human ears are showing up in the strangest places. There was the guy who had one surgically implanted in his forearm. Now there’s the woman who had one artistically implanted in an iPhone 5 case. That woman is Sarah Sitkin, a Los Angeles-based multimedia artist. Her custom-made ear case is creepy-looking, to say the least. But it’s also incredibly eye-catching. …

Mere days away from finding out which two teams will be going to Super Bowl 50, Facebook is gearing up to get into the action. The social networking giant announced late Wednesday the launch of Sports Stadium, a sports hub where Facebook users can get live scores and stats about games while discussing plays and players with friends watching the …

When you’re not happy with a new photo or video, you can tap the recent media shortcut in your camera and delete it. For users syncing to Google Photos, this takes several steps, since a copy will also be synced to cloud storage. To streamline this process, there’s a shortcut to jump from your camera to Google Photos. The shortcut …

If you’re looking for a wireless deal, all you need is a little patience. The last several months have seen one promotion after another, with, for instance, Sprint offering to halve your wireless bill and Verizon promising data freebies. The service providers are clambering over themselves to win your business, and for the discerning customer, there are deals to be …

Charging up your hoverboard? Keep a fire extinguisher near by. That’s one piece of advice from the US Consumer Product Safety Commission in an update Wednesday to its investigation of the self-balancing boards. It also suggests wearing protective gear, staying off roads and charging the boards away from combustible materials. The federal regulatory agency is now investigating 39 hoverboard fires …

If you pay attention, Mark Zuckerberg is remarkably consistent. For the past several years, one of the highest-profile projects he’s been focused on has been expanding Internet access around the globe. The Facebook CEO and co-founder is doing this by offering free cellular service through an initiative he started called Internet.org, and via drones that beam Internet connections to far-flung …