Scarlett Madison — Two Takes contributions

Speaking at a technology conference on Thursday, Netflix CEO Reed Hastings delivered some disappointing news to the company’s biggest fans. The company, which started out delivering DVDs in the mail and helped usher in the era of on-demand video streaming, won’t be offering live sports or

Beats Audio may be moving to Cupertino, but that doesn’t mean it’s giving up on the PC market. Well, at least not yet — HP says it still has rights to use the brand’s audio technology for the foreseeable future. It’s part of the company’s pre-existing contract wit

Valve has announced that it will delay the launch of its Steam Machine hardware range and the companion Steam Controller until 2015. On the company’s Steam blog, product designer Eric Hope, posting under his screen name of Axiom, said that the shift would allow Valve to improve the Steam Contr

Western Digital has added more in-home video-streaming options and file-format support to its latest WD TV Personal Edition. The $99.99 TV box, like its predecessors, can play video from streaming services Netflix, Hulu Plus and Vudu. New features include support for Miracast so users can stream vid

Following its decision to charge five Chinese officials for allegedly stealing trade secrets, the US is apparently ready to take further action. Reuters reports that the US government may impose visa restrictions on Chinese computer experts, stopping them from attending the high-profile Def Con and

Springpad, the online and app-based platform for saving and sharing web content, managing notes and collaborating on projects with others, has announced that it’ll be shutting up shop come June 25th. Despite ongoing development of the service, it’s evidently struggled to compete with the

Martha Stewart loves her iPad, and apparently she’s picked up a sweet new toy for it. Stewart says that she’s recently become taken with Parrot’s AR.Drone 2.0, a lightweight copter that’s controlled using smartphone and tablet apps. She wrote a short blurb about it in the May

Hewlett-Packard reported increased profits Thursday as its PC business turned in a strong quarter, but the company will slash thousands more jobs to reduce costs. HP has already cut 34,000 jobs as part of a plan to boost profits announced two years ago. It will now cut an additional 11,000 to 16,000

Encrypted comms firm Silent Circle has just announced a new funding round which it says has been fueled by demand in the privacy-focused smartphone, Blackphone, the security hardened Android handset it’s building with Spanish startup Geeksphone. Privacy, it seems,

Heads up gamers, if you were looking forward to new games coming from EA, you might want to check back with us during E3 2014 because according to Spike TV’s Geoff Keighley, it seems that EA will have six new games that they will be announcing during the event. The announcement will be broadcasted l

Getting a parking ticket sucks, but paying for it shouldn’t have to be. That’s what the folks at Boston’s Terrible Labs think anyway — they built an app called TicketZen to take the trouble out of giving the state your money. Here’s the gist of it: once you’ve ins

Verizon has been widening its LTE data pipes for months, and it now looks like the carrier is ready to take full advantage of that extra headroom. An early TV ad and details from both Droid-Life and @evleaks have revealed plans to offer its improved 4G speeds under the “XLTE” banner. Rep

SAP is planning a restructure that will shift approximately 2,500 roles from software programming to cloud computing. The German software giant will require fewer onsite staff as it moves its software programs to the cloud. A spokesman for the company said the cuts will be reflected across regions a

Move over Jennifer Lopez and Verizon, as Univision has just partnered with T-Mobile to create a new Spanish-language cellphone service called Univision Mobile. Underpinned by T-Mo’s network, the new partnership will target the 56 million strong Hispanic American market with “custom-built

The UK government has published a security guidance for using Samsung KNOX on select Samsung smartphones and tablets, giving the devices a stamp of approval for public sector use. The decision follows months of testing by the Communications and Electronics Security Group, a UK body tasked with addre

AT&T is in advanced talks to acquire DirecTV, the largest U.S. satellite-TV provider, for about $100 per share, according to people familiar with the matter. Under the plan being discussed, DirecTV management will continue to run the company as a unit of AT&T and DirecTV Chief Executive Offi

Sure, the invisibility cloak that has been seen in numerous science fiction as well as fantasy movies have remained elusive, although there has been strides made in that department to date. How about a more innovative method of camouflage? Mother nature leads the way again in terms of inspiration wi

Underwater travel is the next frontier of international transportation — if you are the kind of futurist who would believe a report made by a state-run Chinese news outlet. The Washington Post, citing this Bejing Times story, reports that the train of our nautical dreams is happening: “The pro