SLIDESHOW: Apple's Groundbreaking Patent, Ballmer's Retirement And More From The Fourth Week Of August

Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) has taken an interest in developing a system to control virtual objects.After Apple filed a patent for what could be the company's answer to Kinect (the Microsoft-developed (NASDAQ: MSFT) motion-based control system for Xbox), investors began to wonder what Apple might do next.As big as that story was, it did not have the market-moving power that accompanied Steve Ballmer's retirement. He will be leaving Microsoft in 2014.Elsewhere in tech, Sony (NYSE: SNE) announced that PlayStation 4 will be released in North America and Europe this November. Rumors claimed that the console will arrive in Japan and Asia Pacific one month later.Google (NASDAQ: GOOG) was rumored to be working on a deal to secure the NFL Sunday Ticket, but many analysts argued that it was unlikely to succeed.These were just some of the week's hottest stories in technology. Click through the slideshow to read them and several more from the fourth week of August.Disclosure: At the time of this writing, Louis Bedigian had no position in the equities mentioned in this slideshow.Louis Bedigian is the Senior Tech Analyst and Features Writer of Benzinga. You can reach him at 248-636-1322 or louis(at)benzingapro(dot)com. Follow him @LouisBedigianBZ