Articles by Peter Suciu

The movie and music industries over the past three decades have reaped profits from their vaults. Old music recordings have been rereleased on new formats ranging from CDs to digital downloads to streaming services. Hollywood has experienced its own cash cow from the introduction of DVDs, Blu-rays and streaming movie services. Technological advances in hardware provided new revenue streams for old media...

BlackBerry on Monday announced that it will cease operations in Pakistan at the end of the year. The move is the result of a shutdown order from the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority, which in July notified the company that its BlackBerry Enterprise Service servers would no longer be allowed to operate in the country beginning in December for w...

TV manufacturers could have a very good holiday season, and the good times likely will continue through 2019 Sales of 4K or Ultra High Definition TV sets will exceed 330 million units by the end of 2019 -- a sharp increase from the 2 million sold in 2013, according to data released last month byParks Associates....

Fitbit on Monday announced the addition of PurePulse heart rate tracking and SmartTrack automatic exercise recognition to its Charge HR and Surge devices. The PurePulse monitoring will be activated whenever the devices are used in Exercise Mode, providing users with continuous, automatic tracking of heart rate trends over time without the need for...

Microsoft HoloLens on Thursday announced a partnership with Volvo Cars to develop a new holographic technology that could change the way consumers experience auto showrooms. The tech would let potential buyers stay put in the physical world while experiencing an automobile in an entirely new way, suggested Scott Erickson, senior director of Micros...

Microsoft on Sunday announced that it would retire the service for its Zune digital media players beginning immediately, and users will no longer able to stream or download content to the device from the Zune music service The device will continue to function as a music player, and any downloaded content will remain on the device. Users can transfe...

Ford on Friday announced that it will be the first automaker to test its autonomous vehicles at Mcity, a full-scale simulated urban environment that was developed as part of the University of Michigan'sMobility Transformation Center The site will allow Ford to test its autonomous vehicle fleet close to its Dearborn, Michigan, headquarters, taking a...

Microsoft on Monday announced that 104 catalog titles for the Xbox 360 will be fully compatible and playable on its "new" Xbox One video game system, which hit store shelves two years ago. The list of Xbox One backward-compatible games includes notable hits such as the complete Gears of Wars catalog, Assassin's Creed II, Fallout 3, Borderlands and Castle Crashers, among many others...

Bethesda on Thursday released a preview trailer for its postapocalyptic video game Fallout 4 The game will be released worldwide next week for Microsoft Windows and Xbox One as well as the Sony PlayStation 4. Despite the title, it's actually the fifth major installment in the series and follows 2010's Fallout: Las Vegas....

Google last week announced that it has developed technology for its self-driving vehicles that would be able to detect people in costumes -- presumably children dressed for Halloween The company is teaching its cars to drive more cautiously around children and thus be ready to adapt to sudden and even erratic movement, it said....

Rumors thatT-Mobile plans to introduce an unlimited data plan for streaming video services circulated Thursday following a Twitter post from journalist Evan Blass, who tweets under the handle @evleaks The company would allow unlimited high-speed data to be used to watch select streaming from services such as Netflix and HBO under its "Uncarrier 10"...

Dish Network on Monday launched Dish Media Sales, an automated marketplace that will let advertisers buy TV spots the same way they can buy ads online. With the initiative, Dish will give advertisers the ability to purchase targeted, linear TV ads, impression by impression, using real-time bidding technology -- similar to the way online ads are pu...

TalkTalk on Thursday announced that it received a ransom demand following a cyberattack that may have compromised the credit card and bank details of millions of its customers. The London Metropolitan Police Cyber Crime Unit has launched a criminal investigation, the company said....

The Nintendo Entertainment System turned 30 years old on Sunday, and though it no longer leads the console pack, the entire video game industry owes a lot to its three decades of development. Its predecessor, introduced in Japan two years earlier as the Famicom, or Family Computer, was massively successful there. However, retailers in North Americ...

Tesla Motors on Wednesday introduced an autopilot system featuring Tesla version 7.0 software that could aid drivers in finding parking spots making lane changes, and watching for blind spots on the road The system is not designed to do the driving just yet, but it could help relieve drivers in the most tedious and thus potentially dangerous aspect...

Southwest Airlines on Monday announced it was operating on a normal schedule after technical problems delayed hundreds of flights on Sunday A computer glitch related to the technical systems that powered its customer service operations -- specifically its reservation system -- apparently was to blame. Southwest teams worked throughout the night to ...

Tesla Motors CEO Elon Musk's recent comments to a German newspaper -- suggesting that Apple is the "Tesla graveyard" due to its hiring of fired Tesla employees -- has struck some nerves in the U.S. Musk dismissed claims that Apple had poached staff, telling Handelsblatt that those who couldn't cut it at Tesla would go to work for Apple instead -- ...

Facebook and Eutelsat Communications on Monday announced a partnership to leverage satellite technology to provide Internet access to remote parts of sub-Saharan Africa The initiative, which includes a multiyear agreement with Spacecom, will utilize the entire broadband payload on the future AMOS-6 satellite as the backbone of a dedicated system th...

Google CEO Sundar Pichai on Sunday announced a plan to provide high-speed public WiFi in 400 train stations across India. The announcement coincided with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit to the company's headquarters in Mountain View, California Modi is expected to promote his Digital India initiative during his U.S. visit. One objectiv...

BlackBerry on Friday announced that it would introduce an Android smartphone later this year. The announcement came during the company's Q2 earnings call. The device will be known as the "Priv" and will be built around user privacy, said CEO John Chen.