It’s difficult to rein in skepticism when faced with a new search engine, but the mysterious Volunia tempers that by having an interesting pedigree. It was developed by Massimo Marchiori, who among other achievements created HyperSearch, the precursor to Google’s PageRank.

Scherlis reports, "Even if you’re not certain what’s meant by the buzzwords “Virtual Reality” and “Augmented Reality”, you have surely heard their growing buzz. This year’s Game Developers Conference includes a two-day VR Developers Conference, and GDC’s Expo will feature at least 4 VR headsets and 70 VR games. While the game industry is consistently an early adopter of new interactive technologies, VR is already a multi-media phenomenon: a "virtual reality experience within Amazon Video" is in development, film festivals are featuring VR movies, and there’s a VR broadcast of the Coachella Music Festival. VR & AR are enjoying rapt attention from both industry press and general news media."

Las Vegas - Jay Park has been named winner of the Best Web Video category for the Mashable Awards. The announcement was made moments ago...

Tagged has purchased hi5, a transaction that brings together two companies that each have a different spin on social networking: Tagged is designed for meeting new people based on shared interests, while hi5 integrates games and highlights premium content.

SnagFilms intends to be the go-to brand for independent films, and it just took further steps in that direction with newly unveiled distribution platforms, the launch of new social media and mobile applications, and several new executive hires.

Zynga today outlined its plans to retain its market dominating position by releasing its unified Zynga With Friends network and by unveiling some of the new titles it has in the works.

Wattpad, the Toronto-based online community of readers and writers, has secured $17.3 million in its Series B round of financing led by Khosla Ventures.