Nintendo transformed its Mario Kart and Pokemon franchises into successful mobile spinoffs, but it looks like another title didn't fare as well. The company has announced that it's ending service of Dr. Mario World, a mobile version of its highly successful Dr. Mario NES game, on November 1st. It will also end sales of "diamonds" used to buy buy more time, pills and power-ups starting tomorrow, July 29th. 

Much like the original, Dr. Mario World is a Tetris-style game that lets you use pills to zap viruses of the same color. Unlike the original, however, everything moves upward so it's more natural to flick things around with one hand on a mobile screen. The mobile game also has a multiplayer mode so you can get friends involved. 

The game was developed by Nintendo in conjunction with Line, Japan's ultra-popular mobile messaging app. It launched on July 10th, 2019, just a hair over two years ago. Nintendo is keeping a vestige of the game on a web page called "Dr. Mario World Memories" that will allow players to look back on their history once the service ends. 

Nintendo launched another mobile, Mario Kart Tour, with multiplayer support in early 2020. That title has reportedly been downloaded 200 million times and seen relatively high earnings for the company. Its most successful mobile game by far, however, is Fire Emblem Heroes, which had reportedly netted up to $656 million as of February, 2020. Nintendo didn't say why it shut down Dr. Mario World, but it wasn't doing great compared to other titles shortly after launch, according to a SensorTower report from early 2020. 

The official World of Warcraft Twitter account has announced that it will take immediate action to "remove references that are not appropriate for [its] world." While it didn't elaborate on what those references are, they may pertain to in-game elements connected to its senior creative director Alex Afrasiabi, as Kotaku has noted. Afrasiabi was singled out in the lawsuit filed by California authorities accusing Activision Blizzard of fostering a "frat boy" culture that's become a "breeding ground for harassment and discrimination against women."

According to the lawsuit, Afrasiabi is known for hitting on and touching female employees inappropriately in plain view of other male employees who would try to intervene and stop him. He apparently has such a notorious reputation within the company that his suite was nicknamed the "Crosby Suite after alleged rapist Bill Crosby."(The lawsuit has misspelled Bill Cosby's name.) In addition, executives allegedly knew about his behavior but "took no effective remedial measures." Blizzard President J. Allen Brack talked to him a few times, the lawsuit reads, but gave Afiasiabi a slap on the wrist for the incidents.

Activision Blizzard denied the accusations in the lawsuit and said it "includes distorted, and in many cases false, descriptions of Blizzard's past" in its initial response. Executive Vice President Fran Townsend told employees in a memo that the lawsuit "presented a distorted and untrue picture of [the] company, including factually incorrect, old and out of context stories."

A group of over 800 Activision Blizzard employees decried the company's response to the accusations as "abhorrent and insulting." They wrote in an open letter: "Categorizing the claims that have been made as ‘distorted, and in many cases false’ creates a company atmosphere that disbelieves victims." At least 50 employees working in the company's main office in California are now planning a walkout on Wednesday to protest the company's actions and to demand better working conditions for women.

In WoW's announcement, it said the decision to remove inappropriate elements was made in order to rebuild trust. It admitted that it must earn people's trust with its "actions in the weeks and months to come," though it didn't say what other steps the company intends to take in response to the lawsuit's allegations. 

Twitter is testing a new way to inform individuals who may have broken its rules that their account has been suspended or locked. With the start of this latest test, a small group of users will see a banner appear at the top of their timeline informing them that they can’t tweet, retweet or like content due to their previous behavior on the platform. In the instance of a locked account, the notice currently says most users regain access within a week. Meanwhile, with permanent suspensions, the banner points the individual to the company’s appeal process.

A spokesperson for Twitter told The Verge the notices come in response to feedback the company has received from people who said they only realized their account was inaccessible after they tried to tweet or follow new accounts. Should Twitter decide to implement the banners, they could get a lot of work. In the second half of 2020, the company removed more abusive content than ever before on the back of more effective automated moderation tools and policies against hate speech.

Despite the pandemic, Apple has spent most of the last two years relentlessly upgrading its product lineup, and its moves are definitely paying off. The company just announced financial results for its fiscal year third quarter (for normal humans, the months of April through June), and the company made a shocking amount of money. All of its product segments (the iPhone, Mac, iPad, services, and wearables/home/accessories) increased in revenue year-over-year, leading to total revenue of $81.4 billion. As has often been the case, iPhone revenue of $39.6 billion made up almost half of that figure. 

Quarterly revenue was up 36 percent year-over-year, and as such profit grew in a big way, too — in fact, it nearly doubled. Apple reported $21.7 billion in net income, up 93 percent compared to a year ago.

As already mentioned, all of Apple's product categories grew last quarter, but the biggest winner was the iPhone. Revenue grew 50 percent year-over-year, making it pretty clear the iPhone 12 lineup is a major success for the company. Apple's services division continues to explode; $17.5 billion in revenue represented 33 percent growth, and the category makes more than double the money of any other division in Apple, with the obvious exception of the iPhone.

The company's "wearables, home and accessories" group lumps the Apple Watch in with devices like the HomePod mini and the new AirTags. It grew 36 percent and made $8.8 billion in revenue. The Mac and iPad had more modest gains, with Mac revenue increasing 16 percent year over year to $8.2 billion and iPad revenue climbing 12 percent to $7.4 billion. While the Mac number isn't an eye-popper like services, it's worth nothing that just a few years ago, Mac revenue was pretty flat, sitting in the $4 billion range for a while — but it seems like the M1 Mac move has helped spur some big increases.

As usual, Apple CEO Tim Cook is holding a call with investors — we'll update this story with anything we learn.

Microsoft's business continues to thrive thanks to its leadership in cloud computing and productivity apps. In its Q4 earnings report today, the company reported a 21 percent increase in revenues compared to last year, reaching $46.2 billion. But even more impressive, its profits jumped by 47 percent to reach $16.5 billion. Microsoft's success is practically a broken record by this point — last quarter it saw a 44 percent increase in profit, and before that it grew by 33 percent — but it's still managing to beat the expectations of Wall Street analysts.

The key to Microsoft's growth is the same as it has been for the past several years. Its Intelligent Cloud business is seemingly unstoppable, growing by 30 percent compared to last year. And it's still seeing plenty of growth with Office, Linkedin and its other business apps, which together have increased revenues by 25 percent. Even its More Personal Computing group, which includes Windows and Xbox, saw its business improve by 9 percent. (Thatcategory saw a few dips in the quarter though: Surface business fell by 20 percent, and Xbox content and services saw a 4 percent drop.)

Microsoft's Q4 earnings aren't really telling us anything new, as the company's entire 2021 fiscal year has been incredibly strong. The company reported an overall revenue increase of 18 percent for 2021 ($168.1 billion), as well as a 38 percent jump in profit for the year ($61.3 billion). The company's previous earnings report proved that it made out well during the pandemic, but now it seems like those gains aren't stopping anytime soon. 

After several quarters of continuallygrowingrevenue, Google's parent company Alphabet announced today that it made $61.9 billion in Q2 2021. That's a jump of 62 percent from the same period last year, when the organization's revenue dipped due to the onset of the pandemic. Last quarter, Alphabet posted $55.3 billion in revenue. Clearly, the company has long recovered from the slump it faced from the pandemic last year. 

Like it did last quarter, Alphabet's net income rose significantly, from about $7 billion in Q2 2020 to $18.5 billion in the same period this year. Most of its money continues to come from advertising and search, while Google Cloud and its "Other Bets" division saw modest revenue growth as well. 

CEO Sundar Pichai said in a statement that "a rising tide of online activity in many parts of the world" and "long-term investments in AI and Google Cloud" drove the results.

The company is hosting an earnings call at 4:30pm ET today on its YouTube channel, where CEO Sundar Pichai will make a statement regarding the results. We'll update this story with more details as we get it. 

This story is developing, please refresh for updates.

Back in 2015, before NFTs really became A Thing, the Wu-Tang Clan sold the only copy of the album Once Upon a Time In Shaolin for a reported $2 million at auction. The buyer, it later turned out, was former pharmaceutical exec and convicted dirtbag Martin Shkreli.

Perhaps better known as Pharma Bro, Shkreli became infamous for buying and jacking up the price of life-saving AIDS medication Daraprim from $13.50 to $700 per pill. He was later convicted on securities fraud and securities fraud conspiracy charges and sentenced to seven years in prison. A forfeiture judgment of about $7.4 million was also made against Shkreli, and the government later seized assets to satisfy the judgment — including the album.

All of which brings us to today. The government has soldOnce Upon a Time In Shaolin. Prosecutors didn't say who bought the album or how much they paid, but the sale covers the outstanding balance Shkreli owed the government.

So, after three years of being locked in a federal vault, and almost four years of being owned by the weaselly Shkreli (who tried to sell it on eBay before he was incarcerated), the album is once again in private ownership. Although snippets of the album have popped up online, you probably shouldn't expect it to hit Spotify any time soon, unfortunately.

One of the conditions for the auction sale was that the buyer couldn't use it for commercial purposes until 2103. It's unclear whether that stipulation is still in place, but Shkreli was allowed to play it at listening parties. Maybe the new proprietor of Once Upon a Time In Shaolin will feel generous enough to play it for Wu-Tang fans somewhere. Meanwhile, as is the way of things, Netflix is making a movie about the saga.

One day after sharing an open letter decrying the company's "abhorrent and insulting" response to a harassment lawsuit from the California Department of Fair Employment and Housing (DFEH), Activision Blizzard employees plan to hold a walkout. According to Kotaku, at least 50 employees will protest the company's recent actions in person and call on it to improve working conditions for women by at least temporarily leaving their posts on Wednesday, July 28th. The Activision Blizzard Walkout will take place in person at Blizzard's main office in Irvine, California, and online, with the former scheduled to take place between 10AM to 2PM PT.

"We are encouraging employees to take whatever time off they feel safe to do," a spokesperson for the group told Kotaku. "Most of us plan to take the full day off (without pay), but we understand some people like contractors and associates, and those who are paid less than they deserve, might not have the ability to do so."

In a statement of intent the group shared with the outlet, they call on Activision Blizzard to end the use of forced arbitration for all current and future employees, adopt new hiring policies designed to increase representation across the company, publish transparency data on compensation and hire a third-party firm to conduct a review of the studio's HR department and executive staff.

Tech and video game industry employees have increasingly turned to walkouts to advocate for change at their companies. In talking to Axios, the workers who are taking part in tomorrow's action cited the protest Riot Games employees held in 2019 to end forced arbitration. They said they're "following along people who have come before us, especially Riot, and what worked for them and what didn't."

Walkouts have shown to be effective at pushing companies to change. However, they're not without risk to those organizing them. In 2019, following a protest staged by some of its employees over its inaction on climate change, Amazon announced its first-ever climate pledge. However, in the aftermath of the announcement, the company fired the two employees who led the action, an action the National Labor Relations Board found was illegal earlier this year.

If you want to support those protesting tomorrow, you can do so by using the #ActiBlizzWalkout hashtag on social media.

Working with the US Consumer Product Safety Commission and Health Canada, Facebook has issued a voluntary recall for a component that comes with its latest VR headset. According to a blog post from Andrew Bosworth, head of Facebook’s Reality Labs, “a very small percentage” of Quest 2 owners have experienced some amount of skin irritation after using the removable foam face insert that comes with every Quest 2 headset and Fit Pack.

Bosworth says Facebook conducted a review of its manufacturing process and found no unexpected or hazardous contaminants in the insert. Still, out of a desire to create “safe and unbelievable experiences for all,” the company is introducing a new silicone cover that fits over the component. Whether you’ve had issues with the insert or not, you can request that Facebook send you the silicone cover for free. To do so, go to the “My Devices” section of your account page and click the dedicated button that’s there.

Facebook is also halting sales of the Oculus Quest temporarily while it works with distributors to add the silicone cover to every Quest 2 package. The company anticipates the headset will be back on store shelves by August 24th. As part of today’s recall, Facebook is also introducing a new 128GB variant of the Oculus Quest 2. It will replace the existing 64GB model, and feature the same $299 price tag as its predecessor. The 128GB model will go on sale on August 24th, the same day the company plans to restart Quest 2 sales.

Yet another Twitter account has been turned into a TV show. Netflix has adapted Chicago Party Aunt (@ChiPartyAunt) into an adult animated series of the same name.

Actor Chris Witaske, who's perhaps best known for his role in Netflix series Love, is behind the account. Lauren Ash (Superstore) plays the titular aunt, Diane Dunbrowski in the show. Diane "has always been and always will be the life of the party, even when the party has long since been over" and "continues to live every day like it’s a 1980s' Styx tour bus," according to Netflix. The cast also includes Rory O'Malley, RuPaul Charles and Jill Talley, as well as Chicago Party Aunt creators Witaske, Jon Barinholtz and Katie Rich.

Of course, Chicago Party Aunt is far from the first Twitter account to be turned into a TV show. $#*! My Dad Says aired on CBS for one season a decade ago. Very British Problems, based on an account that pokes fun at stereotypical British awkwardness, debuted in 2015 and ran for a couple of short seasons.