Technology | The Guardian

Music industry sources say Apple has yet to convince labels that it should undercut streaming rivals on priceHere’s one hard fact about Apple’s plans to relaunch its Beats Music streaming service later this year: there will be an endless stream of rumours about those plans until it happens.Why? Because if there’s one thing leakier than the hype cycle leading up to new Apple products, it’s the music industry when digital licences are being hammered out.Related: Streaming music: what next for Apple, YouTube, Spotify… and musicians? Continue reading...

This video app might be late to the party, but its extra features makes it worth the waitIt’s fair to say that Periscope, Twitter’s live-streaming video app, is late to the game. Not just the three-weeks-and-counting between its launch and that of tech press darling Meerkat, but the two and a half years between it and YouNow, which has grown to 100m user sessions every month by offering performers a share of the revenue.

With the return of epic space shooters and the rise of virtual reality, elaborate game controllers are on the way backI can remember my first proper joystick. It was the mid-80s and my dad had brought us a Commodore 64, “to do homework on and stuff”. He wasn’t fooling anyone, least of all himself; this sexy chunk of brown plastic was for gaming and we all knew it. Soon though, we got fed up of playing Chuckie Egg with keyboard controls, so using my birthday money, I bought a Quickshot II – the 1980s computer peripheral equivalent of a Ford Escort GTI: slightly naff, but showy and desirable.The Quickshot II looked sort of like a real flight stick, with its gigantic red trigger buttons on the shaft, and its chunky base, complete with four sucker pads so you could stick it to the ugly MDF computer desk that you bought from Do It All. I spent countless hours playing Elite with that thing, pretending I was Han Solo, outsmarting pirate vessels throughout the galaxy. It was, to be honest, a crap joystick, really. It was brittle and insensitive, a bit like me at that age – and if you got carried away, it was easy to wrench the shaft off. And, anyway, real gamers preferred an arcade-style stick, like the Competition Pro, with its squat, sturdy build and micro-switches for precise control.

Social network makes its move into live-streaming video with free app that allows public and private broadcasts from celebrities and regular users alike Continue reading...

Oscar-winning director will take on cult sci-fi book after making Roald Dahl’s The BFG Continue reading...

Pop singer directs fans to social video messaging app where users can stream snippets of single Bitch Better Have My Money Continue reading...

Tech executive’s lawyer tells jury to look to their ‘conscience’ in decision on $16m lawsuit that is the most high-profile of its kind ever to reach court Continue reading...

Tymon was attacked by Clarkson in the incident that led to the Top Gear presenter’s sacking by the BBC Continue reading...

This week on the podcast we're talking apps and the generation of creatives using them for work and play Continue reading...

Justice department says it is ‘troubled’ that the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives spent money on drones that were rendered unsuitable Continue reading...

Author has penned a furious blog accusing the Clean Reader app of promoting a biased agenda and fundamentally misunderstanding the nature of fiction Continue reading...

As ardent fans continue to rail against Ultimate Team price ranges, the publisher says its motivation for change was players rather than pound signsFifa 15 publisher Electronic Arts has launched a stern defence of its decision to reconfigure the transfer market within the game’s popular Ultimate Team mode. In a blog post seen by the Guardian before publication, the company insists that fans who have taken to social media and games forums to declare the game fundamentally broken are wide of the mark.

As ardent fans continue to rail against Ultimate Team price ranges, the publisher says its motivation for change was players rather than pound signsFifa 15 publisher Electronic Arts has launched a stern defence of its decision to reconfigure the transfer market within the game’s popular Ultimate Team mode. In a blog post seen by the Guardian before publication, the company insists that fans who have taken to social media and games forums to declare the game fundamentally broken are wide of the mark.

Crowdfunding website’s new feature gives creators who have passed their funding goal full control over permanent pages for their projectsKickstarter is introducing a new feature to help its successful creators showcase what happens after they raise money on the crowdfunding website.Spotlight takes the form of a webpage for each successfully funded project, replacing the pitch page that until now has remained online permanently once a project’s campaign ends.Related: Why brands like Pebble keep coming back to Kickstarter Continue reading...

Educational block-building game set to be distributed to schools in project devised by CultureTECH innovation festivalMinecraft will be given to secondary schools in Northern Ireland as part of a project organised by the annual CultureTECH festival and funded by the Department of Culture, Arts and Leisure.The hugely popular building-block game will be supplied to 200 schools and 30 libraries and community organisations, which will all receive download codes for MinecraftEdu, the educational version of the game.

Phone app developed by firm with grant from retailer’s JLab programme could reduce waiting times for picking up purchases from storesGroundbreaking technology that would use sensors to track customers in and around stores is being trialled by John Lewis in an attempt to help shoppers avoid queues to pick up click & collect parcels.

Distractions cause nearly 6 of 10 moderate to severe car crashes – four times the rate of previous estimates – for teen drivers, according to a new study Continue reading...

Mark Zuckerberg expected to unveil plans to open up social network’s messaging app, much like it did its websiteFacebook may have paid $19bn for WhatsApp last year, but its Messenger app is expected to take centre stage at the social network’s F8 conference on Wednesday.Chief executive Mark Zuckerberg will deliver the keynote address, and is expected to announce plans to turn Facebook Messenger into a platform for apps created by other companies.Related: Facebook helps its users hop back in time with On This Day feature Continue reading...

Google-owned video site is recruiting streaming experts and may make an announcement in June, reports suggest Continue reading...

Shortform video service doesn’t want to replace Google’s video site, but rather offer its big stars ‘first window’ to make more money from their videos Continue reading...

Social network’s latest addition is all about digital nostalgia – highlighting status updates and photos from the past from you and your friends Continue reading...

China's first 3D-printed sedan car is unveiled in south China's Hainan Province. The 3.6-metre-long, 1.63-metre-wide vehicle was printed with low-cost composite materials in five days and then assembled for a test drive. The vehicle is powered by rechargeable batteries and can travel at a maximum speed of 25mph Continue reading...

Telecoms company will not offer handsets but sim cards and subscriptions, to act as a lure for its broadband service and TV servicesBT has returned to the consumer mobile market after a 13-year absence by offering 4G subscriptions with prices starting at a budget £5 a month.Designed as a lure for BT’s broadband service – the group’s main moneyspinner – mobile subscriptions will come at up to half price for BT broadband customers. Mobile customers who do not take broadband will still get access to live premier league matches for free, via the BT Sport app. Continue reading...

The place to talk about games and other things that matterIt’s Wednesday – is it sunny where you are? Continue reading...

The online retailer complains that slow and excessive regulation by the FAA is forcing it to develop potentially lucrative unmanned aircraft technology abroadThe US economy could lose out on hundreds of millions of dollars of investment if federal regulators continue to stymie plans for delivery drones, Amazon has warned lawmakers.Related: Amazon to begin testing same-day delivery drones in Cambridge Continue reading...

Attorney for Ellen Pao, who is suing a Silicon Valley venture capital firm for gender discrimination, makes claims during trial’s closing argumentsAn attorney for a woman suing a prestigious Silicon Valley venture capital firm for gender discrimination said on Tuesday the firm judged men and women by different standards.

Ruth Porat swaps Wall Street for Silicon Valley after almost three decades at Morgan Stanley, prompting Google shares to rise 1.8%Ruth Porat, the Morgan Stanley chief financial officer often called “the most powerful woman on Wall Street”, is joining Google as its finance chief.Porat, 57, who has been at Morgan Stanley since 1987 and advised the US government on its rescue of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac during the 2008 financial crisis, will join Google on 26 May. She will report directly to Google chief executive and co-founder Larry Page. Continue reading...

The smartwatch developer is just one creator returning to the crowdfunding site long after they’ve been kickstartedWhen the Pebble smartwatch returned to Kickstarter to raise funds for a third iteration, the Pebble Time, it rapidly broke every record the crowdfunding site had going, hitting its funding goal 17 minutes after launch.The fundraising period isn’t even over for the watch, and yet it’s already the highest-funded project on the site, by a comfortable margin. As I write this, it’s raised $19m; by the time you read it, it will be more again. And with every one of those dollars, Pebble is demonstrating why creators come back to Kickstarter again and again, long after they’ve already been kickstarted.Related: Kickstarter crowdfunding in 2014: $529m of pledges from 3.3m backersRelated: Pebble Time: smartwatch maker returns to Kickstarter with colour-screen model Continue reading...

US backer of Facebook and Twitter puts $20m into British company established by Cambridge computer science graduates developing virtual reality systemAndreessen Horowitz, the US venture capital firm that backed Facebook and Twitter, has invested $20m (£13m) in a startup creating virtual reality from London’s “silicon roundabout” area.Improbable was founded three years ago by a group of computer science graduates from Cambridge, led by Herman Narula. Continue reading...

Revenues triple for Finnish mobile games maker as advertising and in-app purchases soar in its three titlesClash of Clans maker Supercell has posted annual revenues of €1.55bn (£1.13bn) from its three titles.The mobile games maker reported earnings (profits) before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (ebitda) for 2014 of €515m, fuelled by in-app purchases and advertising in its Clash of Clans, Hay Day and Boom Beach games for iOS and Android.Related: Clash of Clans maker Supercell: 'You can't design fun on a spreadsheet' Continue reading...

Bengal Mangle productions concede that ‘Ted character was independently created by Seth MacFarlane using his own efforts and creativity’ Continue reading...

Game designer Hidetaka Miyazaki returns with another obtuse but enthralling masterpiece that both mirrors and subverts his previous classicsBloodborne’s horror, at a glance, approaches cliché. Yharnam, the city in which Hidetaka Miyazaki’s latest game is centered, is beleaguered with plague, its streets all grime and squalor. Bodies pile in sodden sacks, flies buzz around horse carcasses, while a pram, that beloved prop of the Hollywood set designer, lays on its side at the doors to a forsaken church. There are few places of sanctuary any more for the remaining healthy locals, who tremble and pace inside their homes, under an everlasting curfew, away from the terrors that roam outside their doors.We’ve seen many of those freaks and mutants before too. There are the rabid Doberman and hoe-wielding peasants of Resident Evil. There are the fat crows of Hitchcock’s The Birds. Even the soul-sucking Death Eaters of Harry Potter are hinted at. Jack the Ripper would certainly be at home here in the nooks and crannies of Yharnam’s Gothic sprawl; its cobblestones are ever slicked with Saw-like gushes of blood.Related: Bloodborne review round-up – bringing mystery back Continue reading...

Dance event will be streamed on Amazon’s gaming-focused live video subsidiary, with sets from Avicii, Skrillex and Steve Aoki Continue reading...

New, smaller version is the size of a USB stick, plugs directly into a TV’s HDMI port and costs £35Amazon has revealed a new, portable version of its streaming box the size of a USB stick that plugs directly into a TV’s HDMI port.

The first reviews of From Software’s latest fantasy adventure are in already, and they hint at another masterpiece from creative genius, Hidetaka Miyazaki Continue reading...

Decision ends ‘section 66A’ law that made posting information of ‘grossly offensive or menacing character’ punishable by up to three years in jail Continue reading...

Maximilian Schrems battling existing EU laws, which allow companies to transfer information to US intelligence agencies

New York Times, BuzzFeed and National Geographic in the frame for deals to let publishers share revenues from advertising around their stories on the social network Continue reading...

Follows rival social networks Facebook and Instagram with trial of videos that play as they scroll onto the screen in iOS appsMobile internet army, prepare to lift up your virtual pitchforks once more: Twitter is the latest social network to test videos that play automatically in its mobile apps.The company follows Facebook and Instagram in its desire to see whether users will tolerate videos that play without being tapped on - including advertisements.“This autoplay video test will apply to Promoted Video ads, videos that users upload through Twitter’s mobile app and clips that are part of its Amplify program, which lets companies like ESPN and the NFL post videos with pre-roll ads, according to a person familiar with the matter. Videos that originate in Vine, Twitter’s company’s six-second-video app, will not play automatically on Twitter as part of this test.”Related: Yes, Twitter is putting tweets in your timeline from people you don't follow Continue reading...

Facebook’s photo and video-sharing subdisiary debuts its second spin-off app following HyperlapseInstagram has launched a new spin-off app, Layout, to help people create collages of their images before sharing them on social networks.The app is initially only available for iPhone, although an Android version will launch “in the coming months”, according to Facebook’s photo and video-sharing subsidiary.Related: The top 50 apps for creative minds Continue reading...

The place to talk about games and other things that matter Continue reading...

Crossbench peer urges UK to set up institution countering rise of commercial concerns that dominate our relationship with the internet

Along with .porn, .adult and now more than 500 others, in June .sucks will become another new internet domain. And what’s to stop someone from registering yourname.sucks before you do? Taylor Swift wouldn’t let that happen Continue reading...

The small Midlands studio is building the “spiritual successor” to Nintendo 64 classic Banjo-Kazooie. But the team still has one eye on its old employer, RareFledgling game studio Playtonic, currently working on a “spiritual successor” to classic Nintendo 64 platformer Banjo-Kazooie, says it knows what Rare is working on – and that fans will be satisfied.Purchased by Microsoft in 2002, the legendary developer had been creating titles in the Kinect Sports series, but many gamers have been desperate to see Rare return to its glory days, when it produced lively platform adventures such as Donkey Kong Country, Banjo-Kazooie and Conker’s Bad Fur Day. Playtonic, formed by six ex-employees of Rare, still has contact with its old employer, which is based only a few miles away.Related: Rare talent: inside the studio building Banjo-Kazooie's spiritual successor Continue reading...

Actor says Facebook and Twitter have helped tackle issues such as domestic violence and age discrimination - and takes her first selfie Continue reading...

PS4 and Xbox One have been great, says Twitch TV co-founder Emmett Shear – but the future is more likely to be about set-top boxesThe PlayStation 4 and Xbox One are likely to be the last dedicated games consoles as we know them, according to the boss of Twitch TV.Speaking to the Guardian at the Changing Media Summit in London, Emmett Shear predicted that the long life cycles of the machines is at odds with the rest of the consumer technology industry. Continue reading...