Weekend Wrap-Up: Facebook Acquires Oculus; Microsoft Brings Office to iPad
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Facebook Acquires VR Company Oculus for $2 Billion
Facebook shocked the world this past week by buying VR company Oculus for $2 billion. Oculus is the company behind the Oculus Rift headset, a Kickstarter project that has also taken on venture capital. While those who invested money in the firm have seen pretty healthy returns on their investments, some who funded the company through Kickstarter are angry that they essentially helped build up value for the company before its founders sold it. We’re still in the midst of the fallout from this deal, so we’ll likely have more on this story in the future.
Microsoft Brings its Office Suite to iPad
Is Satya Nadella committed to a brand-new Microsoft? It’s hard to argue that he’s not after the company’s event this week. Microsoft introduced Office for iPad as well as several other applications, and the message throughout the entire presentation was “a cloud for everyone, on every device.” It appears that the new Microsoft is really taking this software and services thing to heart, and will work to support all platform, not just Windows.
Obama Proposes Plan to End Government Collection of Phone Metadata
The government’s collection of phone metadata isn’t all that popular with citizens, if you can believe that. And now it appears that President Obama is responding to criticisms of the program with a new plan: let phone companies store the metadata themselves, and keep the government out of it. This is just a proposal, mind you; the idea would still have to make it into legislation and become law before such a change occurred. We’ll keep an eye on this story and update with any new developments.
Amazon’s Having a Video-Business-Related Event on April 2
Members of the press received invites from Amazon this past week for an April 2 event. On the invitation itself, Amazon states the event will discuss the company’s video business, which could include digital video sales as well as the Amazon Prime Instant Video service. But there’s also the possibility that the company could unveil its rumored streaming video device, which could be an Apple TV-like box or a Chromecast-like HDMI stick. April 2 is just a few days away, so stay tuned.