brin

When you work at one of the world's most successful -- and occasionally silliest -- companies, it's hard to create wonderful April Fool's pranks.

After all, you're supposed to contribute your best ideas to the company, so that they might be selected as one of the 15 or so that are used to fool the world on April 1.

It's astonishing that any Googlies have time left over for personal japes. You know, like punking the boss, for example.

And yet, evidence has emerged that members of the Google(x) team -- which I believe … Read more

AUSTIN, Texas--Did you see the hundreds of people walking around SXSW this week sporting Google Glass and promoting the search giant's much-hyped new augmented reality product?

Don't be disappointed if you missed them. It didn't happen.

Google was in town this week, showing off its hot high-tech eyewear, both at a branded booth alongside a series of other prototype products, and later at a panel. But it didn't avail itself of the chance to give the vast majority of the thousands of geeks at SXSW a peek at Google Glass. If the company was hoping to … Read more

Bill Gates is now worth $67 billion. But he's still only No. 2 among the world's wealthiest people.

Released today, Forbes' ranking of the richest people on the planet found Gates' fortune up $6 billion this year. The increase came not so much from Microsoft stock, which has shown little sign of life recently, but from other financial holdings and private investments.

More importantly, Forbes dubbed Gates the world's most generous person. Microsoft's chairman continues to devote a large amount of his fortune to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation with the goal of wiping out … Read more

In business, meaning what you say is unnecessary. It can also have consequences.

Was a Beijing restaurant really serious when it posted a sign that read: "This shop does not receive the Japanese, the Philippines, the Vietnamese and dogs"?

It was. Its owner takes China's territorial rights against various nations (and, presumably, dogs) very seriously.

And what should one make of the highly territorial bosses at Google when they say things in public?

Last week, they surpassed themselves in uttering words of moving peculiarity.

First, Android chief Andy Rubin told the Mobile World Congress that Google has … Read more

Facebook co-founder Mark Zuckerberg and his wife Priscilla Chan, 2012's second-most generous donors, are lending their considerable social-network fortune to help extend human life.

The newlywed couple joins Google co-founder Sergey Brin and his wife Anne Wojcicki, along with famed venture capitalist Yuri Milner, as founding sponsors of the Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences, a substantial $3 million financial reward that will be doled out annually to ambitious scientists working to cure complex diseases.

"Our society needs more heroes who are scientists, researchers, and engineers," Facebook's chief executive wrote in a status update this morning. "… Read more

In recent times, Google's Sergey Brin has become an ambulating, flying billboard for his company's next great invention, Google Glasses.

These things will project all the information you need to know (Mariah Carey just kissed someone!) straight into your eyes, as you bump into another fellow human, who is trying to take in the winner of the 3:30 race at Belmont Park.

Yesterday, though, Brin took his glasses for a very curious roam into the depths of New York's subway.

In this place where drunks commune with priests, strippers, Wall Street fiends and administrative associates, Brin … Read more

It's said that the rich get richer. And that's certainly true at the moment in the tech world.

Grabbing Bloomberg's No. 2 spot among the world's top billionaries, Microsoft chairman Bill Gates has an estimated worth of $63.4 billion as of yesterday. Despite donating a hefty amount of money to charitable causes, Gates' net worth managed to rise 1.1 percent over the past year, making him the richest tech mogul on the list.

Worth $40.7 billion, Oracle CEO Larry Ellison saw a 3.6 percent gain in his fortune last year. The largest … Read more

Last year Sergey Brin and Larry Page took on new roles at Google, the company they founded together in 1998. Page took over as CEO while Brin took a more nebulous role as "director of special projects."

But this year Brin's efforts saw the light of day in spectacular fashion. At the Google I/O developer conference in June, Brin bounded onstage during a keynote presentation about Google+ to show off one of those special projects: namely, Project Glass, the futuristic heads-up display that Brin's team has been building in secret. As a zeppelin circled above … Read more

Wielding both wealth and influence, Bill Gates is the world's fourth most powerful person, as ranked by Forbes.

Rising to fourth place from fifth last year, Gates was cited by Forbes for his vast fortune. The Microsoft co-founder is worth $65 billion even after donating more than $28 billion toward various causes.

But it's also his mission and his influence that make Gates a powerful man.

As co-chair of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, he's been on a quest to stamp out a variety of diseases around the world. As Forbes notes, Gates estimates that the … Read more