Chrome Windows, Virgin Network, Candy Crushed, iPhone 6 Queue [Tech News Digest]

Today in Tech News Digest, Windows is coming to Chrome OS, new Apple TV hardware is teased, Virgin America launches its own social network, the Candy Crush Saga trademark war bags another victim, IMO adds voice chat and video chat, Kik adds a Web browser, and the queue for the iPhone 6 has already begun.

Windows Comes To Chrome OS

Chrome OS users can access a Windows desktop and apps - Google is slowly but surely undermining Microsoft.

— Michael Wiebrands (@morfaine) February 13, 2014

Microsoft Windows is coming to Chrome OS, with a deal between Google and VMware bringing the latter's Desktop as a Service (DaaS) platform to Chromebooks. This effectively means that Chromebook users can now use VMware's Horizon DaaS to manage Windows desktops, applications, and data from their Google devices.

This arrangement looks to be aimed squarely at enterprise customers, and may have been timed to coincide with the impending death of Windows XP.

Businesses still using XP could conceivably switch to Chrome OS rather than a newer version of Windows. VMware Horizon View 5.3 is available on Chrome OS now as an on-premise service, but will be added as an app to the Chrome Web Store sometime in the future.

New Apple TV Hardware Incoming

Instead of giving back $40 billion to shareholders, Apple could have bought Time Warner and launched the new Apple TV tomorrow.

— Mark Gurman (@markgurman) February 13, 2014

Apple looks set to refresh its Apple TV hardware, unveiling the new set-top box in April with a release planned for the 2014 holiday season. This isn't the Apple television set that keeps being rumored, and is instead just a refresh of the existing hardware with a faster processor and improved user interface.

Apple is further rumored to be negotiating with cable companies for access to its shows; perhaps the last five episodes as happens with Hulu. This suggests that rumored plans to cut out the middleman and deliver content directly to consumers over the Internet have failed. But then Apple TV has always just been considered "a hobby" anyway.

I don't see anyone but PR people being especially thrilled by this: Virgin America launches Here On Biz in-flight app http://t.co/LdMx8YBUaS

— Ana Andjelic (@andjelicaaa) February 13, 2014

Virgin America has teamed up with Here On Biz to create a customized social network for passengers on its flights. The app focuses on business connections, allowing passengers to message one another on the same plane, other Virgin America planes, or at their destinations. This is made possible by in-flight Wi-Fi and a location-aware API. And accessing a social network while travelling has to be better than working, right?

The Candy Crush Saga Continues

It's official: http://t.co/qRSTA5Yewy is scum, however you dress it in legal terms. Candy Crush Saga players: Quit.

— Darren Gladstone (@gizmogladstone) February 13, 2014

As we have previously reported, King, the makers of Candy Crush Saga, have trademarked the word "candy." This is in itself a pretty ludicrous course of action, but if the story recounted by CandySwipe developer Albert Ransom is anything to go by, King hasn't exactly been playing fair when it comes to protecting that trademark.

The records show CandySwipe existed before Candy Crush Saga, and yet King.com is claiming it has the rights over the name. The simple solution must surely be to not let a company trademark such a commonly used word as "candy" in the first place. Or is that oversimplifying matters?

IMO: Now With Video & Voice Chat

Instant-messaging service IMO has overhauled its user interface, adding video chat and voice chat functionality in the process. This makes it something of a cross between Facebook, Google Hangouts, and Skype, which is an interesting blend to say the least.

Kik: Now With Added Web Browser

Kik has updated its iOS and Android apps, adding a built-in Web browser to the service. The Kik browser differentiates itself from standalone browsers by highlighting any webpages optimized for use on Kik. And with over 1 million people using Kik this should prove to be useful.

The iPhone 6 Queue Starts Forming

Could this be our first look at the much larger iPhone 6? http://t.co/jT7bwjulzV Woohoo! I'm hereby putting my kerchief 1st in the queue :)

— Karthik Srinivasan (@beastoftraal) February 13, 2014

And finally, the queue for the iPhone 6 has already been started, with a Japanese blogger and obvious Apple fanboy named Yoppy kicking things off. After failing to be the first to get an iPhone 5, Yoppy vowed to be first in line for an iPhone 6.

He achieved this goal by dressing up as an iPhone and sitting down outside the Apple Store in Ginza, Tokyo. He didn't last long, however, with RocketNews 24 [Broken URL Removed] showing him sloping off after a few hours. Which is unsurprising given the fact that Apple hasn't even announced the iPhone 6 yet.