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We continue our search for the ultimate sub-$100 gaming case with a photo spread of features from BitFenix's Shinobi, Enermax's Ostrog GT, Rosewill's R5, and Zalman's MS800 Plus. Stay tuned for the in-depth review of all four enclosures, coming soon!

Amazon announced a new publishing platform today called Kindle Worlds, which will give both established authors and aspiring fan fiction writers the chance to earn royalties based on their work. Fan fiction is a rather murky topic, given that it often combines beloved characters and franchises in rather unusual scenarios. Regardless, the medium has proven to be incredibly popular on the Internet and it’s clear that Amazon sees an opportunity to earn some additional profits. The company has secured licenses from Warner Bros. Television Group’s Alloy Entertainment division for Gossip Girl, by Cecily von Ziegesar; Pretty Little Liars, by Sara Shepard; and Vampire Diaries, by L.J. Smith. All three are also incredibly successful TV shows in their own right, which should add to the interest both from fans and aspiring writers. Amazon says it plans to announce more licenses “soon”. The new Kindle Worlds platform will enable any author to publish stories based on these characters and then make them available for purchase through the Kindle Store. Amazon will then pay royalties both to the author of the fan fiction and the original rights holder. The standard author’s royalty rate – for fiction that is at least 10,000 words in length – will be just over a third (35 percent) of net revenue. “As with all titles from Amazon Publishing, Kindle Worlds will base net revenue off of sales price—rather than the lower, industry standard of wholesale price—and royalties will be paid monthly,” the company said today in a statement. To coincide with the announcement, Amazon is also launching a pilot program to give additional exposure to short stories of between 5,000 and 10,000 words. For these works, Amazon promises to pay the royalties for the rights holder and authors a digital royalty of 20 percent. The Kindle Worlds store will launch in June with over 50 commissioned works from established authors such as Barbara Freethy, John Everson and Colleen Thompson. The self-service submission platform, which will allow fan fiction writers to file completed work, will also open simultaneously. Image Credit: EMMANUEL DUNAND/AFP/Getty Images

Google updated its Chrome Web browser today to include voice search, an excellent feature that lets you speak naturally to your computer to get search results. The new voice search taps into Google's "Knowledge Engine," a system that acts more like a virtual assistant than a regular search engine that returns a list of results. For example, you can now ask Google, "What is the circumference of the Earth?" and get the precise answer. Google recognizes natural language, so you can speak to your computer as if you were asking your friend a question. To use voice search you need to be running the latest version of the Chrome browser. Chrome usually updates automatically, so head to Google.com and you should see a tiny microphone in the search bar. Click it to ask a question. If you don't see the microphone icon, go to Settings, then Help and check if you have the latest version installed. Google also plans to expand voice search in Chrome to include Google Now, the voice powered assistant built into Android phones and available in the Google search app for iPhones and iPads. Google Now automatically shows you relevant information like travel information for your next calendar appointment, weather in your home town, and sports scores for your favorite teams. Please follow SAI on Twitter and Facebook.Join the conversation about this story »

jsmjr / flickr Effingo Wireless, a San Antonio company without much more than a website and a patent, decided to sue Motorola [PDF] for patent infringement on Aug. 11, 2011. Four days later, Google announced it would be acquiring Motorola, lawsuits and all. That was probably bad news for Effingo, because even with patent lawsuits sprouting up right and left and the cost of defense in the millions, Google doesn't settle many cases. So it suddenly became quite difficult for the founder of Effingo—a Texas patent lawyer named William Ryann—to get Motorola to pay him for his patents. Instead, the case went to trial in San Antonio last week, and Google destroyed Effingo's patent. A jury found it invalid [PDF] after a three-day trial. Read 6 remaining paragraphs | Comments

Are you looking for a motherboard that is waterproof? ASRock’s Z87 OC Formula motherboard features Conformal Coating that makes the board invulnerable to...

Is this the revised Nexus Q?

Wevorce, a technology platform aimed at making divorce cases more amicable, has opened up its service to the general public. Targeting attorneys, the company looks to take advantage of what it calls a $30 billion market for divorce-related services with the added goal of reducing the hostility and hurt so common during separation. Launched last March at Y Combinator’s Winter 2013 Demo Day, Wevorce says that traditionally, divorce cases were often managed by mediation attorneys who had their own checklists and ad hoc processes. With Wevorce, the family will have a standardized checklist to help set the expectation right from the beginning. Through consultations with an attorney, a family counselor, and an accountant, each family will go through a six step process that covers all aspects of the case. As families complete the divorce proceedings, Wevorce also catalogs and streamlines all related legal documents. During the YC Demo Day, company founder and CEO Michelle Crosby said that Wevorce had 110 families use its service, 109 of which opted to not pursue their case in court and forgo a traditional court procedural altogether. Furthermore, it saw an 84 percent month-over-month growth rate. Crosby says that with its current success rate so high, she’s confident in her potential for success — so much so that Wevorce will pay attorney fees when an amicable solution cannot be reached. Prior to today, Wevorce only had representatives in a few cities, including Seattle, WA, San Jose, CA, San Francisco, CA, Asheville, NC, Boise, ID, and Oakland, CA. However, assistance was also available online. Now it has opened up nationwide in the US. One of the advantages that Wevorce claims to have is its low cost. On average, the company charges less than $10,000 — traditional divorce cases can start around $27,000. Definitely not a common startup that you would normally read about, Wevorce is looking to take an unpopular subject and make it a bit more friendly. Photo credit: Thinkstock

Internet radio service Pandora is extending its partnership with Facebook through a new Timeline app which will allow users to share what they’re listening to on the social network. The integration is being rolled out for Pandora’s iOS and Android apps, as well as pandora.com, giving users the option to automatically publish their music activity to Facebook. It follows similar functionality deployed by a number of other on-demand music streaming services, such as Spotify and Rdio. Pandora’s Tom Conrad said: “While we’ve offered social features that allow you to explicitly share your Pandora stations and music discoveries to Facebook for some time, today’s update makes sharing effortless. “This means it’s easier than ever to discover new music from friends’ listening activity in your Facebook News Feed or by checking out the music section on their profile.” Pandora users will also be able to personalize what they share on the social network by choosing specific stations, tracks and artists to promote on their Timeline. Music activity will henceforth appear in the News Feed, their Activity Log and the Music section as determined by Facebook’s in-house ranking algorithms. Other Pandora users will also be able to load-up radio stations shared through Facebook by clicking on the appropriate link or image contained in the story published on the News Feed or Music section. As with all Facebook-integrated apps, users can revoke access or change what content is shared through the Application Settings Page on Facebook, and can also remove specific posts from their Timeline or Activity Log. Pandora wins, Facebook wins The extension will give Pandora’s music service some additional exposure on Facebook, thereby attracting new and former users. For Facebook, the partnership will help grow the quantity and variety of activity prevalent in the Music section of users’ Timeline and News Feed. This, in turn, should give Facebook users an extra incentive to visit the site and discover what other people have been listening to. The update follows the launch of Pandora Premieres, a new station that gives users access to previews of upcoming albums rom the likes of John Fogerty and Laura Marling. Pandora also announced recently that it has 200 million registered users in the United States, racking up 1.5 billion monthly listener hours collectively. Image Credit: Spencer Platt/Getty Images

It’s easy to see how a motion-tracking, iPhone-compatible camera dock could appeal to any gadget hound or videography geek. But since the first Swivl launched in early 2012, its biggest fans haven’t been in the consumer or even corporate markets: they’ve been in education. To build on that base, the company on Wednesday said it had raised $500,000 from Grishin Robotics, an investment company focused on supporting personal robotics. Previously, Swivl raised about $175,000 from Indiegogo and Kickstarter campaigns and less than $1 million in angel funding. Since the device’s debut, Swivl co-founder and CEO Brian Lamb said the company has shipped about 10,000 units, with uses ranging from pet monitoring to corporate videoconferencing.  But he added that 75 to 80 percent of its customers are coming from education. “There’s a very powerful ongoing discussion about using video for [several] use cases [in education] that this plugged right into,” said Lamb. “It’s a tool to open the doors of the classroom and get people participating online.” For teachers aiming to “flip” their classrooms with videos students can watch online or get feedback on their teaching styles from peers, the Swivl provides an easy way to self-record lectures and classes. The $199 device, which the company likens to a robotic “personal cameraman,” includes a sensor that tracks the subject’s movements, panning and turning the camera as necessary. (For more details on how it works, you can check out my colleague Kevin Tofel’s review of the first-generation Swivl.) Already, it’s being used in 1,000 K-12 schools and 250 universities, Lamb said. With the new funding, the company plans to accelerate the production and distribution of the company’s second version of the Swivl, which includes more classroom-friendly features like iPad compatibility and a feature for attaching additional microphones to capture audio from students. Even though it may have been unintended, Swivl’s rise in education makes sense given the surging interest in using technology to enhance and extend the classroom. In addition to the “flipped classroom” trend and growing calls for better teacher feedback systems, teachers are increasingly turning to video technology to support distance education programs and capture lectures for students to review or watch later on. For example, companies like Torsh and Edthena provide tools for teacher observation and evaluation, while McGraw-Hill’s Tegrity and Echo360 are among those offering schools lecture-capture services.  But given its focus on developing hardware and eventually offering connected cloud services (although Lamb wouldn’t elaborate too much on that), Swivl is more of a complementary rather than competitive startup. Related research and analysis from GigaOM Pro:Subscriber content. Sign up for a free trial.Crowdfunding’s rapid growth and future opportunityGigaOM Research highs and lows from CES 2013Examining the rise of crowd labor platforms in 2012

UpOut, an online guide and mobile app for discovering new and unique events in San Francisco, announced today that it has raised an $850,000 round of seed funding. Sand Hill Angels and TEEC Angels, as well as a number of other leading Silicon Valley angels, were involved in the latest batch of investment. UpOut’s online event discovery service is restricted to the Bay Area for now, but the company has big plans for expanding across the United States. The company’s algorithm sorts out thousands of local events and then ranks them for users based on their personal preferences, giving them access to new suggestions that match their personal tastes. The company is most notable, however, for taking part in Tandem Entrepreneurs, a mobile industry accelerator back in 2011. It started as a site, but UpOut also launched an iPhone app last year to help users keep track of what’s happening around them. Users can set a number of different filters, including how far away the event is happening, when it’s taking place and the associated cost. Users can also search for a particular type of event, such as outdoors, film or comedy, and also add specific events to a ‘wanted’ list for easy access. UpOut says it now influences the decisions of “tens of thousands” of Bay Area locals. “After the positive feedback of our beta service, we’re excited to bring UpOut to all the locals itching to find something interesting to do,” Martin Shen, CEO of UpOut said. “In addition to helping locals find things to do, we’re helping local business owners drive traffic to their awesome events.” UpOut started out as a weekend project by Shen and Will King while they were studying at Babson College. Prior to this, both had worked for five years at their own web design firm and previous startup; Shen started his first business in high school and had more than five years of UX design experience before starting UpOut. King, meanwhile, is a full stack developer that’s been coding since the age of seven. It goes without saying that while both started young, they’re pretty talented guys. Event discovery and planning isn’t a new concept by any means, but a single service or app is yet to take off in a meaningful way in the US. Location-based recommendation service Foursquare is moving into that space and Google seems to be adopting a similar feature set across its Google+ social network, but neither has taken off just yet. If UpOut can roll-out nationwide in a timely manner, it might just stand a chance of building a critical mass of users and positioning itself firmly in the public consciousness as the ‘go-to’ event discovery service. Image Credit: TIMOTHY A. CLARY/AFP/Getty Images