It's back.

The virtual reality headset, the gizmo that was supposed to seamlessly transport wearers to three-dimensional virtual worlds, has made a remarkable return at this year's Game Developers Conference, an annual gathering of video game makers in San Francisco.

The booming popularity of play on smartphones or tablet computers in a realm once dominated by videogame consoles was a hot theme at the major Game Developers Conference that ended here Friday.

Seminars, talks and panels ran the gamut from how to get smartphone games noticed in the growing sea of "apps" to behind-the-scenes looks at the creation of blockbusters tailored for consoles or personal computers.

Facebook fueled fresh talk Friday about its own mobile phone after the leading social network scheduled a press announcement for next week.

Shortly after the Facebook invitation went out for the April 4 event, the technology news site TechCrunch reported the announcement would be a modified version of the Google Android operating system with "deep native Facebook functionality."

Internet search leader Google is taking another step beyond information retrieval into grocery delivery.

The new service, called Google Shopping Express, will initially provide same-day delivery of food and other products bought online by a small group of consumers in San Francisco and suburbs located south of the city.

Amazon.com on Thursday announced that it is buying book lovers social network Goodreads in a move that could give Kindle tablets an edge over rival electronic readers.

Goodreads is the leading website for sharing book recommendations and would complement reader reviews provided at Amazon.com's online shop for digital titles.

A videogame centered on a wordless walk across a picturesque desert walked away with top honors Thursday at the major Game Developers Conference in San Francisco.

'Journey' created by Thatgamecompany and released last year as a download to Sony PlayStation 3 consoles claimed six Game Developers Choice Awards, including Game of the Year.

Apple is to face "strengthened supervision" from China's consumer watchdog, state media reported Friday, as the U.S. computer giant faces a barrage of negative publicity in China.

The country is Apple's second-biggest market, and its iPhones and other products -- many of them made in the country -- are highly popular, although it faces fierce competition from South Korea's Samsung.

U.S. smartphone owners tend to be connected from the instant they rise until they fall sleep and revel in every minute of it, a Facebook-sponsored study showed.

"Smartphones, coupled with rich applications and mobile data services, allow us to connect with our family, friends and community from the moment we wake up until the end of our day," IDC researchers said in the report released this week.

The Egyptian military has arrested three scuba divers accused of cutting an undersea Internet cable off the coast of the northern city of Alexandria, it said on Thursday.

The three had been spotted on board a small boat and attempted to flee ashore, but the navy gave chase and eventually caught up and arrested them, the military said on its Facebook page.

Beijing branded a new U.S. spending bill barring government purchases of Chinese-made technology "biased" on Thursday, after the two powers clashed over accusations of cyber-hacking.

The bill, signed Tuesday by President Barack Obama, blocked government buying of information technology equipment "produced, manufactured or assembled" by firms "owned, directed or subsidised by the People's Republic of China".