As most people know, many of the electronic components sold in the US are manufactured overseas because of cheaper labor costs. This has always been a mixed blessing as it provides more affordable products, but also prevents more jobs from coming to American shores. Though from the look of things, not many American laborers would be lining up for a job at Foxconn.

Foxconn, one of the world’s largest electronic component manufacturers for companies such as Apple, Dell, HP, Sony, Nintendo and Microsoft, reportedly dealt with the threat of a mass suicide from some 300 workers from the Foxconn Technology Park in Wuhan, China from the WantChina Times. Gameplanet also reports that these workers were specific to the XBox 360 line.

The dispute reportedly began after workers went to company officials looking for wage increases. Foxconn denied the request and offered employees the option to either continue working at the current wage or be given a dismissal package. Many opted for the latter. Upon this, Foxconn reneged on the offer.

Microsoft’s Phil Spencer, in response to the situation was quoted, “Foxconn has been an important partner of ours and remains an important partner. I trust them as a responsible company to continue to evolve their process and work relationships… That is something we remain committed to – the safe and ethical treatment of people who build our products. That’s a core value of our company.”

Later, Microsoft released a general statement regarding the incident stating, “Microsoft takes working conditions in the factories that manufacture its products very seriously, and we are currently investigating this issue… We have a stringent Vendor Code of Conduct that spells out our expectations, and we monitor working conditions closely on an ongoing basis and address issues as they emerge. Microsoft is committed to the fair treatment and safety of workers employed by our vendors, and to ensuring conformance with Microsoft policy.”

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TNT will preempt it’s primetime lineup tonight at 8PM and 10PM E/P to run back-to-back airings of it’s 1999 original movie Pirates of Silicon Valley. This is the only movie, so far, to depict the rise of Apple co-founder and visionary Steve Jobs, who tragically died yesterday at the age of 56.

The film follows the race between computer rivals Apple and Microsoft and stars Noah Wyle as Jobs, Anthony Michael Hall as Microsoft founder Bill Gates and Joey Slotnick as Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak.

I haven’t watched the film in quite some time but I’m sure I will be tonight.

Since its release back in 2006,  the Gears of War series has been met with both fanatic praise and scornful rejection. Some boast that it “redefined the third-person shooter,” while others claim it only furthers the stereotype of gamers as meat-headed blood junkies. Whatever your stance on the franchise is, the third and (possibly) final chapter of the trilogy is here – and credit must be given where it’s due.

The development team at Epic Games end the story of Marcus Fenix and the rest of Delta Squad with a bang – both in the single-player / co-op campaign and across the online battlefield. From graphic updates to fine-tuning combat controls to completely redesigning one of the most popular multiplayer modes in recent history, all of the pieces of this blood-spattered puzzle fall gloriously into place.

Keep reading to find out how Gears of War 3 stomps on the juicy insides of its predecessors, while also managing to deliver one of the most satisfying ends to a gaming franchise.

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According to Bloomberg, struggling Internet-based film and TV streaming service Hulu is looking for a buyer. One of the companies supposedly in the running for the service and considering a purchase is Apple.

In case you’re not up on the current Hulu situation, in July the company announced that it had hired Morgan Stanley and Guggenheim Partners to assist with a the sale and rumor was that Yahoo! and, possibly Microsoft and Amazon, were interested.

However, it seems Apple may be the frontrunner now. Although, at this time, no company has made an actual bid for Hulu.

A Hulu purchase may seem like a good thing for Apple. They’ve already got iTunes but Hulu would allow them a better way to compete with streaming services like Netflix since, at the moment, you can only purchase or rent videos from within iTunes.

Something to keep in mind, though, is that Apple isn’t really know for acquiring companies. They are just as likely to take an idea and spin it and launch a new service of their own as an addition or enhancement of their existing service. Plus, Hulu only has about 1 million subscribers at the moment and that’s not really all that many.

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Early Tuesday, Microsoft officially released Office 365, its new cloud-based Office product designed to compete directly with Google Docs and whatever Apple might decide to put up in conjunction with iCloud and the revamped Mobile Me expected later this year. The Office 365 suite, which has been in public beta for a while, is being mostly targeted at small business and the enterprise with plans for the entire suite costing between $6 and $24 per user per month, depending on features.

The small and medium-sized businesses that choose the more cost effective $6 option will only get Office Web Apps and Microsoft Exchange. Of course, any option you choose with Office 356 is still more expensive than the $50 annual fee Google charges each corporate user for access to its Google Docs suite. The service also included integration with devices such as Windows smartphones and iPhones.

I guess Microsoft must feel that people will be willing to pay a bit more for its suite of products that include Word, Excel and Powerpoint as well as Exchange. In truth, some companies pay quite a bit just for hosted Exchange so this may end up being a bargain for many businesses, especially those who want to stay in the Microsoft world but still try to cut costs.

We’ll see if this one takes off.  For more, check out the full press release from Microsoft after the jump.

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With E3 coming to a close today it’s time to take a look at the rest of the photos we took over the last three days. Well, we can’t actually show you all of the photos due to several factors: we shot way too many and some of them contain embarrassing moments best left for a night of cocktails at Trader Vic’s.

However, we do have quite a few we can share so in this gallery we’ve included those. Yes, they contain more booths, some gameplay, cool cars and, of course, a selection of beautiful booth babes.

What E3 would be complete without them? A less beautiful experience to say the least.

Click through for all the pics. See you next year!

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That’s right boys and girls it’s E3 time again. So, you know what that means, right? It means we will have a bunch of game trailers, videos and more to share over the next couple days.

It also means photos. Lots of photos. We like photos. Photos tell a story. They tell a story of E3 full of exotic booths, exotic games, exotic trips to far off lands and exotic booth babes.

That’s right, the booth babes are back this year and we’ve got pictures to prove it. So, click on through for what will probably be the first of at least a couple more galleries of photos showing off the sights, sounds and even smells of E3 in Los Angeles.

Well, maybe not the smells. That would be a little difficult. Click through for all the excitement.

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As if we weren’t excited enough for Bioshock Infinite after what we were shown at PAX East, Irrational Games showed off a new trailer at E3 yesterday.

While short and a bit frenetic, the trailer gives us a taste of everything Bioshock Infinite has to offer, from the weapons and powers you’ll be wielding, the chaos and violence consuming the city of Colombia, and the fraught relationship between you and Caroline.

After the trailer was shown, Irrational Games’ Ken Levine announced that Bioshock Infinite will have some Playstation Move support, though he did not say how. He also revealed that a Bioshock game is in the works for the recently revealed PS Vita.

Bioshock Infinite will be released on the Xbox 360, Playstation 3, and PC sometime next year. You can watch the trailer after the jump.

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Even if you can’t be at E3 this year, don’t worry. It’s Monday and we’re not even there yet either. Oh the benefits (and hindrances) of working on a site that doesn’t just cover games. We’ve also got Apple’s WWDC announcements today and a bunch of other stuff for a Monday.

But getting back to Microsoft, our pals over at Geek Week have put together a nice list of the highlights of this year’s Microsoft News briefing at E3. And being the nice guys that we are, we’ve gone ahead and listed it right here for your use and enjoyment (with a few added bits and comments as wel).

Also, be sure to click through for the Halo 4 trailer as well! Okay, here’s the highlights’ of what Microsoft announced this morning:

• PGA, MADDEN, and FIFA will support the Kinect later this year – Nice

• MASS EFFECT 3 will support Kinect voice recognition; you will be able to speak the dialogue choices and voice combat commands to party members

• GHOST RECON: FUTURE SOLDIER will utilize Kinect for weapon customization

• YouTube, Bing, and live television are coming to Xbox Live

• Announcement of remastered HALO: COMBAT EVOLVED ANNIVERSARY

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With all the news and hype surrounding Apple’s iPhone and Google Android-powered smartphones we sometimes forget the Microsoft has smartphones powered by its Windows Phone OS too. In fact, Microsoft just had a big even yesterday to talk all about the coming update to their phone OS.

The next generation, dubbed Windows Phone 7.1 “Mango” has a host of new features and enhancements that I hate to say look pretty darn good. Mango goes a long way to bring the platform up to date, and Microsoft has named HTC, LG, Samsung, Dell, Acer, Fujitsu Limited, ZTE Corporation and of course Nokia as partners moving forward.

Mango will add more robust multitasking support, messaging threads, deeper social integration, a unified email inbox, voice-to-text and text-to-voice support, and about 500 other enhancements to the Windows Phone platform when it launches this fall.

Click through for the full press release from Microsoft as well as a video of some of the new features of Mango.

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In what may be a good thing or a bad thing, today Microsoft  announced it will buy Skype for $8.5 billion in cash. This news comes just days after reports cam out that Facebook and Google were both interested in purchasing the online video chat company.

Microsoft said Skype will be used to support Xbox and Kinect, Windows Phone and other Windows devices. Microsoft also said it will connect Skype users with Outlook, Xbox Live and other software platforms.

“Together we will create the future of real-time communications so people can easily stay connected to family, friends, clients and colleagues anywhere in the world,” Microsoft’s CEO Steve Ballmer said in a statement.

Skype, which currently has 170 million users, will become a new business division at Microsoft with Skype’s current CEO Tony Bates taking on the role of president of the Microsoft Skype Division.

Click through for the full press release from Microsoft. So, is this a good thing or a bad thing?

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In a world where branding is extremely important, one company has risen to the top — at least according to a recent study. What is this top company? Why, it’s Apple of course.

According to a study conducted by advertising firm WPP and published in their “BrandZ Top 100 Most Valuable Global Brands,” Apple’s brand value has increased 859% since 2006, and jumped 84% to $153.3 billion this year. Yes, that’s a lot.

Apple isn’t alone, however, as tech companies are predominate on the list with AT&T, China Mobile, IBM, and Microsoft all having spots in the top-10 most valuable brands list. McDonald’s is the only non-tech brand in the top-5. Google had reigned supreme for the past four years before being displaced by Apple, and Amazon surpassed Walmart to become the No. 1 retailer.

Not bad for a company that was thought to be dead not that long ago. Click through to read the full press release from WPP.

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