The new consoles from Microsoft, Nintendo and Sony

Microsoft and Sony offered new details this week on the game consoles they will start selling before the holiday shopping season. The Xbox One and the PlayStation 4 will join Nintendo's Wii U, which came out last year, in vying for shoppers' attention and dollars at a time many people are turning to phones and tablets for gaming.

Microsoft brings Office to iPhone, but not tablets

Even as a pared-down version of Microsoft's Office software package arrived on the iPhone, the company is holding out on extending that to the iPad and Android devices as it tries to boost sales of tablet computers running its own Windows system.

Google launches Internet-beaming balloons

Wrinkled and skinny at first, the translucent, jellyfish-shaped balloons that Google released this week from a frozen field in the heart of New Zealand's South Island hardened into shiny pumpkins as they rose into the blue winter skies above Lake Tekapo, passing the first big test of a lofty goal to get the entire planet online.

Forecast sees big payoff for Google's mobile ads

Google will sell more mobile advertising than the rest of its rivals combined for the second straight year, according to a new forecast that highlights the expansion of the Internet search leader's moneymaking prowess from personal computers to smartphones and tablets.

Prosecutors push for anti-phone theft measures

Law enforcement officials nationwide are demanding the creation of a "kill switch" that would render smartphones inoperable after they are stolen, New York's top prosecutor said Thursday in a clear warning to the world's smartphone manufacturers.

Court says human genes cannot be patented

The Supreme Court ruled Thursday that companies cannot patent parts of naturally-occurring human genes, a decision with the potential to profoundly affect the emerging and lucrative medical and biotechnology industries.

Lawmaker accuses Google of dodging taxes

An influential committee of British lawmakers accused search company Google of dodging its taxes on Thursday in a scathing report that said the U.S. Internet company took on highly contrived arrangements serving no purpose other than to avoid paying its fair share.