Some Google users were shocked to find the service not available this morning, which caused a small bout of mass hysteria on social networking sites such as Facebook. The outages began around 9:30 AM ET and reports began to surface on Facebook and Twitter shortly thereafter.

An hour later, around 10:30 AM ET, all of Google services had appeared to be restored and back to their full functionality. Among the services affected were Google+, Google Drive, YouTube, and Gmail. The outages appear to have only affected those living in the southeast region of the United States, however, this reporter experienced no interruptions at all.

Of course, the interruption of Google's services created quite the uproar in the online community and CNN.com managed to capture a few of these reactions for our viewing pleasure. I have listed them below for your enjoyment.

Pretty much every PC gamer on the planet was disappointed when they learned that Rockstar Games had no intentions of publishing its upcoming Grand Theft Auto V title on PC. The series began on the PC and has a following unlike any other game, not to mention an entire community based around modding the game on PC.

This morning it appears that there may be a little hope for those eagerly anticipating a GTA V PC launch. In a since-removed job advertisement, Rockstar appears to be seeking a graphics programmer to work at the company's Leeds studio "to help bring our latest titles to the PC platform." The advertisement was first spotted by fansite RockstarWatch.

The advertisement explained that the graphics programmer would be working with Rockstar Studios world-wide to port existing titles to the PC. With all of the company's previous titles being available on the PC, this can only mean that Grand Theft Auto as well as Red Dead Redemption will be coming to the PC in the future.

As typhoon season approaches, Google has expanded its Public Alerts system to include Taiwan and has launched a dedicated crisis map for the country in preparation for the rainy season. These new additions come just in time as weather agencies are currently monitoring a typhoon that can hit the island any day now.

In a blog post this morning, Google said that starting today, the Google Public Alerts page (Source #2) will feature severe weather alerts for typhoons and flood-related events in Taiwan. Additionally, these alerts will also appear on Google Search, Google Maps, and Google Now. For example, if a typhoon alert is issued, the alert will be displayed once you search for relevant information on Google Search and Google Maps. Google Now on Android or iOS will also display a card with information about any typhoon alert if the warning has been issued near your location.

Google has also launched a dedicated Google Crisis Map for Taiwan (Source #3) that provides details in the event of a crisis such as shelter locations, evacuation routes, and much more. Google has teamed up with Taiwan's Central Weather Bureau, Water Resource Agency, Soil and Water Conservation Bureau, Directorate General of Highways, and the National Science and Technology Center for Disaster Reduction to get such a project up and running.

Earlier this morning, Digital Storm unveiled its new VELOCE gaming notebook, which is being touted as the ideal balance between power and portability. The 13.3-inch gaming notebook packs a serious punch while weighing in at only a mere 4.6 pounds. Digital Storm says that the 1.26-inch thick VELOCE is ready to go to battle anytime, anywhere.

"VELOCE is the gaming notebook the industry has been waiting for," said Rajeev Kuruppu, Digital Storm's Director of Product Development. "The notebook strikes the optimal balance of power and portability without sacrificing gaming performance and is the first Haswell based slim gaming notebook to offer a stunning full 1080p HD display."

The VELOCE features an Intel Core i7 4800MQ Haswell processor, 8GB of RAM, an NVIDIA GTX 765M GPU, and a 13.3-inch full HD 1920x1080 display. Other key features include room for two storage drives (mSATA & 2.5") with RAID capability, a dedicated internal network port, SuperSpeed USB 3.0 ports, HDMI 1.4, VGA video out ports and Bluetooth connectivity.

This morning, Google announced that it will once again allow users to make phone calls from within Gmail through the use of Google Hangouts. The company says that it doesn't matter whether its users are on Gmail or on the web; all users will be able to call the US and Canada for free.

Google says that it heard the cries from many users who were disappointed that they could no longer make calls from within Gmail and this was the major factor in their decision to return the service. Calls can be made to anyone in the US and Canada for free from any country in the world where Hangouts are available. Calls can also be placed outside of North America through the use of Google Voice. A call to India will cost users $0.02 per minute while a call to Mexico will run users $0.15 per minute.

Users do not need to make calls through Gmail alone as Google+ and Chrome extensions also support the feature. The company tells us that with Hangout calls up to 10 people can converse through the video chat while up to five people can participate in voice only. This gives the ability for 15 people to be on the same call it one time.

This morning, GIGABYTE announced the arrival of a new addition to its gaming keyboard lineup. The FORCE K7 Stealth Gaming Keyboard is touted as having the embodiment of a Stealth fighter with its scissor-key structure and slim solid body. The keyboard features an extremely short actuation distance for accurate and stable key presses in addition to a switchable three-color backlighting system.

The new gaming keyboard also features anti-ghosting capabilities that surround the WASD cluster that guarantees that the general gaming combination keys are registered and executed without conflict. Just like other models in the line, the keyboard features a twin wheel design that offers prompt control of keyboard backlighting and volume levels during intense gaming sessions.

Below is a quote from GIGABYTE on the features of the new FORCE K7 Stealth Gaming Keyboard:

More details have surfaced on LG's upcoming flagship smartphone, the Optimus G2. Engadget has just posted several leaked photos of a new LG device that is said to be the company's new flagship smartphone. The phone takes some design cues from LG's Nexus 4 with rounded corners and an almost edge-to-edge screen.

The phone features no hardware buttons and looks significantly more sloped without the Nexus 4's hard edges. According to Engadget, the G2 is significantly larger than the Nexus 4 due to it featuring a 5.2-inch 1080p screen. LG has revealed in the past that the next generation Optimus G phone will feature a QUALCOMM Snapdragon 800 processor clocked at 2.3GHz.

The phone will feature 2 GB of RAM and will sport a 13-megapixel rear-facing camera. Most notable is that LG has chosen to place the volume rocker buttons on the back of the phone below the rear camera. The reasoning behind LG's decision to do this is unknown and quite frankly, I think it is a horrible idea. Rumors are circulating that we could see the G2 launched on August 7 at a press event LG has been sending out invitations for. All images are courtesy Engadget.com.

NVIDIA announced today its latest plans to compete in the ongoing bundling war with graphics rival AMD. The company has partnered with Ubisoft to bundle Splinter Cell Blacklist with the company's GeForce GTX graphics cards. Additionally, the company will include a bonus copy of the 2010 release of Splinter Cell Conviction.

NVIDIA engineers are working closely with the Ubisoft Toronto development team to incorporate an array of cutting-edge gaming technologies for Splinter Cell Blacklist including DirectX tessellation, NVIDIA HBAO+, TXAA antialiasing, and surround technologies to ensure gamers can experience smooth frame rates and awesome visuals in all of their covert missions.

Due to launch on the August 23, the game is to be made free to anyone buying an NVIDIA GeForce GTX 660, GTX 660 Ti, GTX 670, GTX 680, GTX 760, GTX 770 or GTX 780 from the usual participating retail partners from now until December 31. In Splinter Cell Blacklist, Sam Fisher returns as leader of 4th Echelon, an elite counter-terrorism unit armed with a new mandate to hunt down the masterminds behind The Blacklist, a series of deadly escalating attacks on U.S. interests. To stop the Blacklist countdown, gamers will choose the best way to face any challenge by tapping into Sam's arsenal of lethal skills and training.

Earlier today, Steam updated the page for Dota 2 to reflect that its beta program has finally come to a close. The page directed players to check out various links which did not work and featured a graphic stating "The Beta Is Over." Also listed is a launch date of July 9 for the production version of the game.

Unfortunately, Steam has since removed the page but according to Valve, the disappearing act is the result of some technical difficulties. Below is a quote that can be found on the new Steam page:

Over the last month or so, we have seen a wealth of new games announced. While they are all quite spectacular in their own right, none of them come as highly anticipated as Grand Theft Auto V. GTA V has to be the most talked about game of the year and RockStar is doing a good job at keeping the anticipation levels high.

This morning, RockStar Games released a new trailer video of actual in-game footage that takes us on a more in-depth look at the reimagined San Andreas. We learn more about the game's three leading characters, which are all playable on-the-fly during gameplay. This means that you can switch to each of the three during missions to provide new vantage points to shoot from, or even to handle different parts of the mission such as flying the escape helicopter while the other two characters hang onto a rope.

The video also shows off old and new features such as the ability to deeply customize vehicles in customization shops, a playable stock market system, investing in and selling real estate, and even playing a round of golf. Traditional features such as getting a tattoo, buying clothing, and flying planes also make a comeback for what is almost guaranteed to be the most thrilling GTA ever.

This morning, reports are coming in that Apple has began to cut production on its iPhone 5 model. The report comes from Brian Blair of Wedge Partners, an analyst who closely follows Apple's production numbers. Apple's core suppliers are said to be expecting a cut as large as 20 percent for orders of components that make up the iPhone 5.

"So, when they make a dramatic change in their forecast, they need to let their suppliers know," Blair said. "And this is coming from some of our supply-chain work out of China and Taiwan that has let us know, not exactly, but that there's been roughly this kind of a change in their forecast for the period from June to December, about a 20 percent cut in what they've been telling their suppliers to be ready for."

Industry insiders say that Apple has cut iPhone sales forecast down from 115 million units to about 90 million units. Cutting back production is usually seen as an indication that Apple is getting ready to release its next generation in the iPhone series, so maybe we will begin hearing a solid release date for the iPhone 5S as well as that low-cost, budget level iPhone as well.

Early this morning, Facebook finally switched on Graph Search for all of its English-speaking users in the US. By expanding its test program that was rolled out in January from a few thousand users to a few million users, Facebook can now see how its new search performs on a massive scale.

Graph search is a tool that allows people to search Facebook's fast database using natural language searches to find almost anything the social network has ever indexed. An example of one search would be: "Photographs of my friends taken before 2005" or "restaurants in New York City my friends have visited and liked." Facebook would then return results based on your query.

I feel the graph search, while cool, is not really useful past searching for restaurants, photos, or places. I have been a member of the beta program since the week it was released and to be quite honest, the novelty wore off very fast. In the past few months, Facebook has modified the search so much that now most results are quite broad and not a specific as they used to be.

July 5 was the deadline for all bidding proposals to buy the content streaming service Hulu. The date was set by the Board of Directors after bids were received from everyone including Yahoo, AT&T and the Chernin Group in recent weeks. Today, we found out that both DirecTV and Time Warner Cable also submitted their bids before the deadline was up.

DirecTV apparently placed a bid to acquire the company as a whole, while Time Warner Cable reportedly offered up a proposal to become an investor alongside the service's current owners: Walt Disney Co., 21st Century Fox Inc., and Comcast.

No word on how much each bid was for, but with Yahoo's bid around $1.1 billion, we can assume that similar offers were in the same ballpark. It looks like Hulu will get purchased by someone, and let's all hope that the service actually improves over the current state it is in.

This morning, I posted a report that seemed to confirm the existence of the Nokia Lumia 1020, a 41-megapixel PureView Windows Phone 8 device. The report showed off images taken by a Microsoft exec who posted them on his Twitter account. This afternoon, we are seeing even more leaks come in about the future king of the camera phone.

It appears that Nokia will be releasing the Lumia 1020 PureView in a trio of colors including a vibrant yellow, white, and black. My original guess of a Xenon flash seem to be confirmed as well as speculation about built-in optical image stabilization. Website WPCenteral is confirming specifications including 2GB of RAM, 32GB of internal storage and no SD card slot. Also present is an FM radio, Near Field Communication, Wireless Charging and Windows Phone 8 version 8.0.10322.71.

WPCenetral is also reporting that the phone will take images at 32MP and 5MP at the same time at 16:9. The 5MP image is oversampled and drops 7 pixels into each pixel of the 5MP image, thus creating a "Super Pixel." The phone is said to capture a 38MP image in 4:3 mode as well. As we learned earlier, it will feature an f/2.2 aperture and Zeiss glass. If these newly released specs are true, this just may be the most bad ass camera phone ever released.

Barnes & Noble has been facing a tough market for the past several years now. With dwindling physical book sales as well as a failed attempt at the digital market, the once heavyweight book retailer is facing yet another major setback today. William Lynch, the company's CEO, has just resigned effective immediately.

The resignation came quite unexpected and the company has not yet disclosed any reason for Lynch leaving, but industry analyst are speculating that the deal between Barnes & Noble and Microsoft to buy its Nook properties has fallen through. This would be a major blow to the company as it would lose a possible $1 billion bolster to its coffers and would ditch a division of its company that has never seen a profit.

Barnes & Noble said in a statement:

It appears that the Google Edition of HTC's One will be replaced by yet another HTC One. This morning, records have popped up on the Bluetooth SIG website that indicate a version of the HTC One running Android 4.3 Jelly Bean is in existence with the model number PN071, which is the same model number listed on the existing Google Play Store listing.

This second version of the HTC One will feature Bluetooth 4.0 LE support which is why it is making an appearance at the Bluetooth Special Interest Group. With more leaks and images of Android 4.3 popping up everywhere these days, it can only indicate that the official Android 4.3 launch is imminent. While 4.3 is mostly a backend update, there are a few features that will be sure to wow hardcore Androidians.

Most importantly, Android 4.3 will bring us yet another step closer to Android 5.0 which is supposed to bring forth a new era of smartphone and tablet innovation. The jury is still out on whether this will happen, but with every generation of Android being better than the last, we can safely say that whatever 5.0 brings, it will be amazing!

It's no secret that Apple and Microsoft both want to become king of the content delivery world. With Apple pushing Apple TV and Microsoft building its next-gen console, the Xbox One, around the home theatre experience, it is very clear that the next few years will be all about who can capitalize on this new and emerging market.

This morning, it appears that Sony has plans to toss its own hat into the content delivery market with its upcoming Playstation 4. We are learning that Sony has officially re-trademarked a new brand named "Playstation TV." This could mean that the PS4 will have similar functionality to the Xbox One or it could mean that Sony is just scooping up anything related to its IP in the event that it wants to head down that road in the future.

Additionally, this trademark is nothing new as Sony has actually held it since 2006, but let it expire earlier this year. Whether or not the lapse in ownership was intentional is still up in the air, but we are sure that Sony is planning something along the lines of content delivery.

A few months back, Yahoo announced the creation of a new menu bar that would be shared across all of its desktop website services such as mail, search, and photo sharing. Many scoffed at the idea, but others pointed out that Google has been doing the same thing for some time. This morning, Yahoo rolled out the new menu bar to its recently reinvigorated photo sharing service Flickr.

While the new menu bar is technically a useful feature, many Flickr users are not so convinced and as a result, they have taken to the Flickr help forums to vent their disdain. One user wrote "Gosh, what a design disaster...if that annoying bar would at least fit the site design wise at little. Yahoo has learned nothing in the last decade as it seems. Dropping pro account now. Sorry guys, this is just too much."

Historically, I have not been a major fan of Flickr, but have recently flipped a 180 when the service began offering 1TB of free storage to its users. As an ex-professional photographer who still does small shoots on the side, this new amount of storage was very appealing to me. The new integration of this menu bar in its current form is definitely not appealing to the eyes, nor is it in any form inline with the refined, dark theme that Flickr has been sporting since the update.

We have been hearing rumors of a PureView based Nokia Lumia for months now, and it appears today that we finally have real-world confirmation that the device actually exists. Officially named the Lumia 1020, the smartphone will feature a 41-megapixel image sensor that is backed up by a Carl Zeiss lens.

Some sample photos have popped up on Flickr by Microsoft Windows Phone manager Joe Belfiore. The series features several shots from various Lumia Windows Phones, but the interesting images are two that appear as "Nokia Lumia 1020." Looking at the EXIF info of the two photos reveal an aperture of f/2.2 and a resolution density of 240x240 dots per inch.

The images appear to be very sharp at their original resolution of 2947 x 1658 which appears to have been resized in Adobe Lightroom. I have included screen caps of the EXIF information in the News Gallery images below as well as linked to the original sized images posted on Flickr at Source #2 and #3 below.

Thanks to Disney Home Entertainment, we have two copies of the hit 2013 Wizard of Oz prequel Oz: The Great and Powerful on Double Play Blu-ray to give away!

Nickel and dime magician Oscar Diggs (James Franco) travels from precinct to precinct with his travelling act, breaking hearts and making a little cash with his carnival tricks which astounds less discerning crowds. His downtrodden, yet loyal assistant Frank (Zach Braff) stage manages his act, but when Oscar is hunted down by the burly man for his sleazy unrequited love, facilitates his quick escape to safety via hot air balloon. But when said balloon is sucked into a forming tornado, Oscar is flung into a land significantly different to Kansas--the Land of Oz.

To go into the running to win a copy of Oz: The Great and Powerful on Double Play Blu-ray, simply correctly answer the following question: