
Folks who ordered an HTC One direct from HTC earlier this year will want to check their inbox, as there could be $25 worth of Google Play credit there waiting. Component shortages and supply issues caused a slight delay for shipping the first round of HTC One phones, and while all that seems to have been corrected, HTC still wants to compensate folks for the delay.
Read more on HTC offering $25 Google Play credit to compensate for One shipping delays…

The Ottawa International Game Conference kicks off in just about a week. If you’re not familiar, the three-day conference takes place May 29th-31st and features new innovations and trends in the Canadian gaming industry and will host speakers all across the board including, Anders Jeppsson, Global Head of Gaming at BlackBerry. Mobile Nations own gaming geek Simon Sage will be on site to take in all the news from the conference including speakers, developers, panels and more.
Read more on Register now for the Ottawa International Game Conference and save 50%…

LG announced a new waterproof phone today, the Optimus GJ. They certainly weren’t very subtle either, as they had girls presenting the phone in bikinis. It differs from past waterproof devices because this one is high-end. The specs are as follows:

Audio-only stream below
We’re live from CTIA in Las Vegas. It’s been a relatively slow show, but we managed to eke out a little bit of hardware news, Jennifer Lopez launches her own smartphone service (sort of), and we await the appearance of Ashton Kutcher. No, really.
Read more on Android Central 136: CTIA, Jennifer Lopez and Ashton Kutcher…

After a slew of high-profile account hacks, Twitter has finally launched a two-step verification system to keep your account from falling into the wrong hands. Once enrolled, each time you sign in to Twitter.com you will be asked to enter a six digit verification number sent by SMS to your phone. If you don’t have your number, you can’t log in.
We all know that the PC industry is in dire straits at the moment, which has naturally led to speculation that Microsoft could also soon find itself in big trouble. But while Microsoft’s struggles to establish itself in the mobile consumer device market are well-documented, the company still has an ace up its sleeve in the form of enterprise cloud services. Barron’s points us to a new note from UBS analyst Brent Thill, who makes the case that Microsoft cloud offerings such as Office 365 and SkyDrive have the potential to give the company a more predictable revenue stream and make the company more like IBM, which for years has raked in high earnings despite being out of the consumer electronics spotlight.
Read more on How cloud services could save Microsoft from sinking PC sales…
Japanese carrier SoftBank has granted Sprint a waiver allowing it to consider Dish’s $25.5 billion bid for the company. The waiver gives Sprint permission to disclose non-public information and engage in negotiations with Dish regarding its buyout proposal. The Sprint Board of Directors has the right to terminate the existing merger agreement with SoftBank to accept a superior offer, however it has not yet changed its recommendation. SoftBank offered to pay $20.1 billion for a 70% stake in the wireless provider last October. Sprint will conduct due diligence with Dish and make a final decision in early June when shareholders vote to approve or reject SoftBank’s offer. Sprint’s press release follows below.
Read more on SoftBank grants Sprint permission to consider Dish buyout…
In effort to curb ongoing market loss to Qualcomm and Samsung, NVIDIA has continued to aggressively upgrade its quad-core Tegra 4 mobile processor. The company on Tuesday announced that its Tegra 4i CPU, a variant of the Tegra 4 that includes an integrated LTE modem, has been updated to support LTE-Advanced networks with speeds of up to 150Mpbs, an increase from traditional LTE speeds of 100Mbps. NVIDIA notes that because of its “software defined radio technology” it can add support for new technologies with a simple software update, making the chip more future-proof than its competitors’. In the future, the company is also planning to update the processor to be compatible with voice-over-LTE technology. NVIDIA’s press release follows below.
Read more on NVIDIA updates Tegra 4i processor, adds LTE-Advanced support…
Yahoo turned some heads this week when it announced that it was paying $1.1 billion to buy blogging platform Tumblr, but this isn’t the first time it has spent at least $1 billion to acquire another company. As NPR points out, Yahoo has bought several companies over the past 15 years that it has valued at $1 billion or higher, including most famously its $3.7 billion acquisition of GeoCities in 1999. Other failed Yahoo acquisitions include the $5.7 billion it paid for multimedia website Broadcast.com and the $1.63 billion it paid for search advertising pioneer Overture. In fact, all of these acquisitions make the $30 million that Yahoo paid for Flickr back in 2005 seem like a relative success story, since Flickr is still an operational service that the company is still pouring resources into. That said, when Flickr is seen as the best-case scenario for a Yahoo acquisition, it’s easy to see why Tumblr users are nervous.
Read more on One bad sign for Yahoo’s Tumblr buy: Its history of $1 billion duds…
BGR took an in-depth look at Leap Motion’s revolutionary motion-control PC accessory last year, and we loved the accuracy and shocking reliability of Leap’s technology. The controller was only compatible with Mac computers at the time, however. In a recent post on the company’s blog, Leap showed off its upcoming Windows 7 and Windows 8 integration, which it plans to launch on July 22nd. An accompanying video shows how well Leap’s controller works with Windows for swiping, scrolling, zooming in and out, flipping through photos, drawing and more. It’s not quite Minority Report, but we’re getting there. Leap Motion’s full video follows below.
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