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Did you know that the anticipated Star Wars: The Force Awakens had released some of their heroes and villains to the public though an announcement of trading cards?

One of the characters involved looks like another addition to the series' much-loved robot collection. This spinning ball droid is named BB-8 and is seen in the teaser trailer speeding along a sandy surface, bumping and jumping around.

Well, according to Mark Hamill's interview with Yahoo Movies, this lovable robot is a real-live thing, not some kind of fancy CGI trickery:

Oculus VR has teamed up with Runtastic for some upcoming VR-based workout and fitness applications. Runtastic will reportedly use the Oculus Rift, allowing users to use the VR headset to transport them to exotic locations around the world for their workout.

Runtastic is only running with a prototype application at this time, but the developer is aiming for a totally hands-free experience. Within the VR world, users will see their virtual trainer, and a heads up display that will show them real-time stats and other details. I think the idea of a VR workout is incredible, as people could choose to work out on the Moon, on the beach at sunrise or sunset, or on the side of a cliff. It will open up a new world of app development for wearables and workout 'maps'.

Google has pushed out an update for Google Now for both iOS and Android, which provide control to Nest, the smart thermostat. You can now use your Next with over two dozen voice commands, either through Google Now, the microphone, or search box on Chrome.

Google Now will also display a card notification letting you know when your Nest is changing things in your home or office, with location-based actions delivering the right temperature, at the right time. You can pre-heat, or pre-cool your home for when you're coming home from the shops, or from work, for example.

Owners of the Nest thermostat will have to authorize your account and opt into the voice command functions before this will work. You'll also have to hit up the Google Now card too, but once you have, it's all smooth sailing.

Sony Pictures Entertainment employees heard from company CEO Michael Lynton and co-chair Amy Pascal during an open town hall meeting on Monday. The company is still painfully suffering after a major data breach led to emails stolen, employee personal information leaked, and other disruptions to its business.

"This will not take us down," Lynton said during the town hall meeting in front of employees. "You should not be worried about the future of this studio."

Lynton apologized that employee personal information and medical records were stolen - and then posted online - by the cybercriminals. During the two sessions held on Monday, there were no question and answer segments for employees to ask questions to Lynton or Pascal.

Bose has been in the headlines for all the wrong reasons lately, fighting being thrown off, and then back on Apple store shelves. Today we are hearing that the company might be launching its own music streaming service, that could compete against the likes of Spotify and Pandora.

Hybebot is reporting the news from a job listing for a Senior Designer that would help make the "next generation streaming music platform" and a matching "ecosystem of products." Engadget has asked Bose to open up about its new plans, but there's been nothing said so far. This could be bad for the company's plans of getting back onto Apple store shelves, as a music streaming service would be competing against Apple.

We should hopefully find out more soon, with CES 2015 right around the corner.

Billionaire investor Mark Cuban was caught up in the data breach suffered by Sony Pictures Entertainment, as Sony Pictures Television President Steve Mosko, Cuban, and Cuban Companies attorney Robert Hart were discussing contract negotiations for "Shark Tank." Cuban was not pleased to be offered $30,000 per episode in season 5, $31,200 per episode in season 6, and $32,488 per episode in season 7.

Cuban now speaks directly with Mosko via Cyber Dust, Cuban's free texting app, providing a secure platform in which messages and photos are purged after 30 seconds. Similar to SnapChat, however, it would appear Cyber Dust messages can be captured - but indicates a growing trend among users looking for more secure communications.

"For those following the Sony hack situation, you may have seen one of my emails about my Shark Tank salary and deal emerge," Cuban recently said via Cyber Dust. "What they don't know is that I moved all the rest of my discussions to Cyber Dust! That's why there was only one email. Moral of the story is that the 'no big deal' email you send today can easily be part of tomorrow's big hack leak. No matter who you are, someone you know is getting hacked and it could impact you."

During a recent interview with Bloomberg, 343 Industries' General Manager Bonnie Ross said that when the studio opened up seven years ago, her goal was to keep Microsoft's Halo franchise ticking along for 30... years. Ross said: "I wanted to make sure we were able to go another three decades."

Ross continued, talking about forming the studio itself, saying it was "the most challenging thing I've ever done." When it came to Halo, the 343 Industries boss said that she wanted the Halo games to have "characters that people can identify with" with both "heroic females and heroic males." Ross wanted to see more females in the games industry, where she added "It's really important for us to get young female talent, because they are the future. It's important to have leadership roles across the industry that people can aspire to."

When it comes to the Halo franchise, the next release will be in 2015 with Halo 5: Guardians. We also have Halo: Nightfall, which is the first live action TV show in the Halo franchise history. The last release, Halo: The Master Chief Collection, has been a broken mess since launch, with subsequent patches getting it into better working order, but it's not perfect yet.

Ubisoft had planned to release another patch for Assassin's Creed: Unity, which is still broken for some people, but the company has delayed the fourth patch to the game citing "additional issues that need to be corrected in the game before the update can be made available" reports Joystiq.

The company issued a community update, where it said "We are committed to delivering major performance improvements, which requires that we refurbish the Paris map and that will take a few more days to hit the high level of quality our players deserve." Ubisoft has been updating AC:U since its release, with various game-breaking bugs, performance-related issues and much more, with this latest patch being another notch in AC:U's troubled launch.

The latest version of the iCEnhancer for Grand Theft Auto IV on the PC is here, adding some very impressive in-game effects such as improved lighting, rain, color processing, texture detail, depth of field and much more. The gameplay and visual fidelity of GTA IV has been improved greatly, bringing it up to the next-gen version of GTA V on the Xbox One and PS4, and in some ways, surpassing it.

iCEnhancer is continuously updated, with the latest version dubbed iCEnhancer C, which promises a simplified system. We should expect improved stability, less fog effects, improved shaders, and much more. The modder behind iCEnhancer, Hayssam 'icelaglace' Keilany has said that the new GTA IV iCEnhancer C mod is based on two presets: the first of which is a less realistic one. The second on the other hand, adds some improved graphical effects that make the game look even better than some next-gen titles out today. A list of features, something that is quite long, can be found below:

The Anonymous hacker collective and Lizard Squad aren't happy with the Swedish government for dropping The Pirate Bay, and is launching cyberattacks to compromise government officials. Hackers provided the URL and IP addresses used by the Swedish police force, inviting other hackers to target its website. Additional attacks related to the remove of The Pirate Bay are expected to continue in coming weeks from a number of different groups.

Last week, Swedish ISP Telia also suffered cyberattacks, causing online services disruptions and connectivity issues for subscribers throughout the country. Usernames and passwords of numerous Swedish government officials were posted online by Anonymous. Hackers also targeted government email addresses for representatives in Argentina, Israel, India, Mexico and Brazil.

Trying to prevent these cyberattacks proves difficult for government agencies and companies, especially with Anonymous operating as an organized, decentralized collective of skilled hackers.

Google Android continues to dominate the smartphone OS market, with its lead continuing to expand, now controlling 83.1 percent after Q3, according to the Gartner research group. Apple iOS (12.7 percent), Microsoft Windows Phone (3.0 percent), and BlackBerry (0.8 percent) greatly trail Android. Both Windows Phone and BlackBerry lost share, as Android is able to attract a growing number of consumers worldwide.

"Microsoft needs to keep the momentum going from the third quarter, when Windows Phone-based devices grew quarter-on-quarter thanks to the introduction of more mid-range devices," said Annette Zimmerman, Gartner research director, in a press statement.

The iOS is only available on iPhones, while Android can be found on a number of smartphones from a wide variety of manufacturers. Android is expected to keep its dominant stance as the No. 1 smartphone OS for the foreseeable future, as Google continues to develop the popular OS.

Smartphone sales to end users increased 20.3 percent during Q3, while worldwide sales of mobile phones were flat, according to the Gartner research group. Samsung continues to lead the market, with 24.4 percent market share ahead of Apple, Huawei, Xiaomi and Lenovo.

Of note, three of the top five smartphone makers are Chinese companies, as Huawei, Xiaomi and Lenovo see increased sales - both in China and globally - as the smartphone market continues to intensify.

"Over the holidays we expect record sales of the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus, but we should not underestimate the Chinese vendors and local brands," said Annette Zimmermann, Gartner research director, in a press statement. "Chinese players will continue to look at expanding in overseas emerging markets. In Europe prepaid country markets and attractive lost-cost LTE phones will also offer key opportunities for these brands."

Point-of-Sale (PoS) vendors are facing an increasing number of cyberattacks, as organized hackers find new methods to compromise customer data. The Charge Anywhere payment gateway solution provider announced it was compromised, with the breach first occurring in 2009.

The PoS infrastructure, especially as more companies begin to test mobile payment services, will become a major target for criminals. In addition to Charge Anywhere, PoS system vendor Signature Systems also confirmed it suffered a data breach in September, with custom malware installed to steal data. Trying to crack down - and limit - these types of attacks will be extremely difficult, with a growing number of highly-organized cybercriminal groups trying to steal US consumer payment data.

"I would expect attacks like this to become more frequent and more widespread for the reason that seems to be underreported on this breach - the substantial increase in mobile payments due to ease of use, and the ability to accept payments equickly, especially to smaller businesses," said Tom Bain, CounterTack VP of security strategy, as noted by Dark Reading. "Users expect and have a blind trust in applications that support their business - and just expect that security measures are taken to protect them. In just a six-month span this year, mobile malware attacks have increased [by six times] globally."

Excessive use of social media in itself can be addicting, especially as access to Twitter, Facebook and other sites is readily available, but the habit also shows links to substance abuse and other impulse control disorders. In a study that was published in the "Addiction" journal, researchers from the University of Albany discovered 10 percent of users suffer from "disordered social networking use," with people addicted to social media more likely to have drinking problems.

Survey respondents who suffered from disordered social networking use also reported problems related to emotion regulation and poor impulse control. These respondents also had strong urges to browse Facebook, and became irritable when they were unable to reach the social networking website.

"Our findings suggest that disordered online social networking may arise as part of a cluster of risk factors that increase susceptibility to both substance and non-substance addictions," said psychologist Julia Hormes, who led the University of Albany study, in a statement.

Galaxy is a name associated with top-tier GPU's, but they also recently announced a new HOF PCIe SSD. The Hall of Fame (HOF) series of products from Galaxy represent their top tier products, so an SSD with blistering speed fits the bill nicely. The PCIe SSD is geared for gaming usage and comes with the requisite high performance specifications. The new SSD features a custom Heracles JMF811 JMicron controller developed specifically for Galaxy. While details are scant, we do know that the new Heracles SSD controller communicates via a PCIe 2.0 x4 connection and features sequential read/write speeds of 1,600 MB/s.

There is no word if the new SSD communicates via the AHCI or NVMe protocol. It will come in capacities of 1TB, 2TB and 4TB. These are rather large capacities that will surely command a hefty price, but for gamers looking for the bleeding edge of performance it might be worth the investment.

One prominent feature worth noting are the large capacitors present near the PCIe bracket. These provide protection during host power loss events by flushing all data in transit down to the NAND.

WD has announced the all-cash purchase of Skyera, a leading all-flash array vendor. The Skyera acquisition will be folded into HGST, which is fast becoming the flash arm of WD. The purchase of Skyera has larger implications to the world of flash storage as a whole, as it embodies the movement of HGST up the stack to delivering fully-functional storage subsystems.

HGST has been making several key moves in recent years as it solidifies its position as a flash power house. HGST recently brought in Virident and sTEC for their broad storage portfolios and IP, and Velobit was also added to increase their capabilities in the flash-based software acceleration space. These acquisitions have cost WD a whopping $1.4 billion, but solidify their position in the expanding flash market.

Skyera has powerful 1U skyHawk products on the market that pack 136TB of flash, and skyEagle is in the works to provide up to 500TB. These high-powered all-flash arrays lead the market in density and pack quite the performance punch. Skyera was co-founded by Radoslav Danilak, who also pioneered SandForce controllers. Radoslav recently stepped down to become the CTO of the company while Frankie Roohparvar stepped in as CEO. Financial details of the deal are not being disclosed, but estimates run from $200 to $500 million.

With CES fast approaching we expect an increasing number of storage-related product launches. LiteOn leads the pack with the release of their new ZETA Series of SSDs. These SSDs are being launched in the Asian market, but these products often appear later in North American and European markets. The SATA 6Gb/s ZETA comes in three capacities of 128, 256, and 512 GB, and utilizes up to 512MB of DDR3 as a cache buffer.

The drives feature 520 MB/s of sequential read speed for all capacity points, but write speeds vary by capacity and top out at 430 MB/s. The random read IOPS weigh in at 83,500, and random write speeds top 80,000 IOPS. The ZETA leverages the relatively rare Hynix 16nm MLC NAND and is geared for the value market. Current pricing is 439 yuan ($70 USD) for 128GB, 799 yuan ($129 USD) for 256GB, and 1599 yuan ($258 USD) for the 512GB capacity point. A smattering of typical SSD features, such as TRIM, NCQ, and AES 256 encryption, round out the ZETA. There is no word on the controller, but Hynix has been rumored to only sell their NAND to customers who also purchase their LAMD controllers. This has led, in part, to the relatively rare use of Hynix NAND, though Intel is utilizing it in some of their offerings.

Pantech's employees have just agreed to return 20 percent of their salaries between December 2014 and March 2015 to assist the struggling Korean mobile phone manufacturer out of it's recent debt problems. In August they filed for court receivership, which is said to be the South Korean equivalent to Chapter 11 bankruptcy, with them soon after deciding to sell the company.

However the bidding for Pantech has now closed and its been reported that not a soul placed a bid for the phone company. Determined to continue operation and climb out of debt, they asked their employees for a little trust - wanting a 20 percent return of their monthly pay over this 4 month period, seeing the staff take up the task.

CNET got hold of a Pantech 'source', with them claiming that "last month on November 28, we held an information session for our employees and asked for their consent and our employees decided to participate fully."

Much like most other equipment launched into space, the NASA rover Opportunity utilizes tried-and-true flash memory for data storage on its trek across the surface of Mars. Flash memory isn't as susceptible to vibration as other forms of data storage and operates better in temperature extremes, which works out great for equipment hurling its way through the cosmos. The rigors of spaceflight and the surface of Mars can push even the most durable equipment to the edge, as witnessed by the latest round of memory failures onboard the Opportunity rover.

Scientists reformatted the flash memory on the resilient little rover over the weekend, but things didn't go quite as planned. Now the rover is suffering from amnesia events and system resets. NAND is a persistent memory technology, it can retain data even without power, unlike RAM. The rover stores all data collected during the day in its onboard RAM memory, but when the rover 'sleeps' at night that data is typically copied over to NAND flash storage. The problems encountered during the flash formatting have placed the rover in a RAM-only mode, and data has to be beamed off to Earth each night before sleep. Scientists are working diligently to code a workaround that will avoid using one of the seven banks of NAND that is experiencing the issue.

"The mission can continue without storing data to flash memory, and instead store data in volatile RAM," said Mars Exploration Rover Project Manager John Callas or NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California. "While we're operating Opportunity in that mode, we are also working on an approach to make the flash memory usable again. We will be sure to give this approach exhaustive reviews before implementing those changes on the rover."

Go big or go home! LG Electronics plans to show off a 55-inch 8K display during CES 2015 next month, and the screen will promote a beautiful 7680x4320 resolution (33.2 million pixels). The display prototype will be used to test potential mass production of the model, and wants to see how visitors react to the screen.

"With the know-how acquired from making the prototype, if LG finds good grounds to commercialize the display for mass production, it will do so," according to a source speaking to CNET. "LG has already finished up approving the technological viability of the 55-inch, 8K display, and is now starting preparation to commercialize it to make it a product."

The consumer market is barely becoming comfortable with 4K UHD, but manufacturers are pushing ahead to make us drool with 8K models. LG showed off an insane 98-inch 8K TV prototype during IFA 2014 earlier in the year, so it looks like the Korean giant wants to make sure it has plenty of UHD displays available.