HexBright is a hackable, open-source flashlight that will blind your foes (and friends if you point it at them)

Christian Carlberg raised money for the HexBright on Kickstarter and is now shipping it.

Gizmox closes $7.5M round for enterprise-class mobile web tech

The mobile web shift is happening rapidly for all kinds of consumer apps, but business apps have been left a bit out in the cold. Gizmox hopes to fix that.

Google Earth gets Leap Motion, now your hand can fly over the world like Superman

This morning Google announced that the next major version of Google Earth, available today, will support input from Leap Motion's innovative new gesture control technology. In other words, you'll be able to fly virtually around the planet, using your hand to guide and direct the software.

Google Now for the web: Google testing a much more data-heavy home page

In the early 2000's, then-Google VP of user experience Marissa Mayer used to get mysterious emails from a complete stranger, each containing only a single number: 45, 52, 56.

Video games are the new Thin Mints: Girl Scouts add new badge for game design

The Girl Scouts of Greater Los Angeles and Women in Games International (WIGI) have joined forces to create a video game developer badge.

_why resurfaces, posts a programmer’s ‘House of Leaves,’ disappears again

Essays, both typed and handwritten, drawings, explanations, photo-copied book pages, manifestos, scribbled side notes -- It's not an easy read, and it's even a bit unsettling in places, but it's worth reading.

Chinese ‘app store’ lets you install pirated iPhone apps — without jailbreaking

Chinese "app store" 7659.com is using Apple's own bulk enterprise licensing system to distributed pirated apps to Chinese iPhone and iPad users, completely free.

Kaazing! ‘Living web’ startup pulls $15M from investor hats

Kaazing has raised $15 million to enable the "living web," which it describes as the "dynamic, interactive online world populated by applications that are always on, always connected, and always real time."

Startups and immigration: 500 Startups, Google, and Creative Commons-backed Engine speaks to Congress

Silicon Valley has been prominent in the fight -- particularly around the Startup Act -- to admit immigrants who want to start businesses and create jobs.

Yahoo exec: We’d be crazy not to make a Google Glass app

When Yahoo talks about mobile, it's not just referring to tablets and smartphones. It's also talking about the smartwatches, visors, and God knows what else you'll be using next year and the year after that.

Yahoo’s future is mobile, wearable, & gorgeous, execs say

Get ready for a resurrection: Mayer has brought Yahoo back from the dead, this time with gorgeous apps, cutting-edge devices, and a bright outlook for the future.

Here’s a real-time view of what your Facebook clicks are doing to the environment

Every like and comment and photo shared on Facebook has some ecological cost. The machines that process and store them use power, which still mostly comes from coal; and they need to be cooled.

Facebook goes mobile-first with its latest developer tools

The new tools should, the company says, make it easier for mobile developers to play around with Open Graph features on smartphones and tablets. The SDKs also bring better tools for implementing Facebook Login.

Hubbl uses contextual ads to save apps from incentivized download hell

Hubbl (still) says app discovery is broken but that contextual advertising could fix it.

Why LinkedIn dumped HTML5 & went native for its mobile apps

"There are a few things that are critically missing. One is tooling support. The second is operability. Because those two things don't exist, people are falling back to native. It's not that HTML5 isn't ready; it's that the ecosystem doesn't support it."

Here are 5 mobile startups that build businesses, not apps

During the mobile platforms session at Demo Mobile, 5 startups pitched their technology to "build your mobile business on."