TechBiz

By Robert Weinstein

 

How can you make $1 billion selling tablets? Start out with $2 billion and compete against Apple (AAPL). iPad victims to date include computer heavyweight Hewlett-Packard (HPQ), and BlackBerry maker Research In Motion (RIMM). Apple entirely dominates the tablet market with more than six out of 10 tablets displaying the Apple logo.

 

Microsoft (MSFT) appears ready to step up to the plate to see if it has what it takes to go against Apple in the tablet-space war. Microsoft will need to put everything they have into it, including a few Windows 3.11 machines back in the shed. (Microsoft owns and publishes TechBiz, an MSN Money site.)

 

By Dieter Bohn

 

Microsoft (MSFT) has a mysterious and somewhat secretive event planned for Monday, and rumors about just what the company will be announcing are starting to fly. They began with The Wrap reporting that it heard the company would be announcing a Microsoft-manufactur​ed tablet, All Things D followed with its own sources saying Microsoft wanted to take on the iPad directly, and finally we have analysis from Mary Jo Foley pointing in a slightly different — but still intriguing — direction. She suggests that Microsoft may aim not for Apple (AAPL), but Amazon (AMZN). There's quite a lot of smoke here, but is there fire? More to the point, is there a competitor not to the iPad, but to the Kindle Fire? (Microsoft owns and publishes TechBiz, an MSN Money site.)

 

By Chris Ciaccia

 

Despite Zynga's (ZNGA) recent sharp share price decline, the company is "rolling the dice" on its future: online gambling.

 

The San Francisco-based social gaming company is exploring the potential online gaming market, according to Mike Gupta, Zynga's vice president of finance and treasurer.

 

Apple's (AAPL) new MacBook Pro is inspiring a noisy chorus of superlatives: Apple's Phil Schiller called it the "most beautiful MacBook Pro" ever made. Sam Biddle at Gizmodo one-upped that with "[it's] the most amazing laptop we've ever seen." And over at Slate, Farhad Manjoo says it's "the greatest, and perhaps final, version of the personal computer."

With a host of new features like a super-lean chassis, dazzling innards, and a startlingly crisp Retina display, the new MacBook Pro sparkles brightly enough to give even curmudgeonly anti-Apple folks gadget-lust. But the groundbreaking laptop does have its share of downsides. 

Here, five things you should know before you hit your local Apple Store (and endure a four-week waiting period for the in-demand machine). 

By Nathalie Pierrepont 

 

Despite all the concerns about Facebook's (FB) business model, the social network will deliver significant results for advertisers, according to a research report released this week by comScore, a digital marketing research company.

 

"We found Facebook fans had significantly higher percentages of purchasing," Andew Lipsman, comScore's VP of industry analysis, told Forbes on Tuesday. "It proves Facebook earned media and advertising are driving purchase behavior."