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Razer is back with a refresh of the Blade 14 laptop and it's the thinnest 14-inch model in the company's history. It measures just 15.7mm at its slimmest point and weighs just over three pounds. This makes it an ideal computer for on-the-go gaming.To that end, these laptops feature the new NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5000 series GPUs. Buyers can spec the Blade 14 out with up to the RTX 5070. This pairs with NVIDIA DLSS 4 tech to provide "the highest quality gaming experience possible in a 14-inch" laptop.They are also outfitted with the AMD Ryzen AI 9 365 processor that can achieve up to 50 TOPS. It comes with a bunch of AI applications that take advantage of that processor, like Copilot+, Recall, Live Captions and Cocreate.The Blade 14 goes up to 64GB of RAM and includes a 72 WHr battery that should last around 11 hours before requiring a charge. That's a pretty decent metric for a laptop this powerful. The 3K OLED display offers a 120Hz refresh rate and a 0.2ms response time.RazerThere's a MicroSD slot, two USB-C ports and a traditional HDMI 2.1 port. The Razer 14 integrates with wireless standards like Bluetooth 5.4 and Wi-Fi 7. The laptop even includes a newly designed ventilation system for better performance. The exterior is made from T6-grade aluminum and features a sand-blasted texture and an anodized matte finish.It's available for purchase right now and comes in black and gray colorways. Pricing starts at $2,300, but that one comes with just 16GB of RAM and the RTX 5060 GPU.RazerThe Blade 16 laptop is now available in a new configuration that features the RTX 5060 GPU. The company also recently revealed the biggest sibling of the bunch, the Blade 18. That one goes all the way up to the RTX 5090.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/computing/laptops/razers-new-blade-14-laptops-are-outfitted-with-rtx-5000-series-cards-185517669.html?src=rss

President Donald Trump is set to sign the Take It Down Act today, according to CNN. The act is a piece of bipartisan legislation that criminalizes the publication of "nonconsensual intimate visual depictions," including AI deepfakes. The law made it through the US House of Representatives in April 2025, prompting concern from free speech advocates that believe parts of the law could be easily abused to curtail speech.The Take It Down Act was created to address the spread of nonconsensual, sexually exploitative images online. Laws exist addressing the issue at the state level, and some online platforms already have methods for requesting a nonconsensual image or video be taken down. This new law would set a federal standard, though, making taking down posts mandatory and directing companies to create a system for requesting images or videos be removed, under the supervision of the Federal Trade Commission.The issue with the law as written, according to the Electronic Frontier Foundation, is that its takedown provision "applies to a much broader category of content...than the narrower NCII [nonconsensual intimate image] definitions found elsewhere in the bill." The EFF also suggests that the short time-frame of 48 hours that the Take It Down Act requires means that smaller online platforms will probably just remove posts when they receive a complaint rather than verify that the post actually violates the law.Trump has expressed interest in taking advantage of the new law, as well. "I'm going to use that bill for myself, too, if you don't mind. There's nobody gets treated worse than I do online. Nobody," Trump said during a joint session of Congress in March. Given the lopsided composition of the current FTC and the Trump administration's already loose interpretation of existing laws, it's not hard to imagine how the original intentions of the Take It Down Act could be twisted.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/trump-will-sign-the-take-it-down-act-criminalizing-ai-deepfakes-today-184358916.html?src=rss

Bluesky doesn't have its own live streaming capabilities, but the service testing out a new feature to boost users' streams off the platform. The company is allowing "select" accounts to link their Twitch or YouTube accounts to their profiles, which will display a red indicator and "live" badge when they're actively streaming.In an update, Bluesky described the feature as an "early test" that will initially only be available to a "handful of accounts" before it's ready for a wider launch. "Bluesky is the place for breaking news and real-time updates," the company said. "This tool supports streamers, journalists, and anyone sharing live moments as they happen."The update comes one day after the service showed off a similar badge for the NBA's official Bluesky account. The league will apparently direct fans on Bluesky to "live content they are promoting," Bluesky COO Rose Wang said. Partnering with the NBA on the feature is an interesting move for Bluesky. Sports fans, and NBA fans in particular, have had an outsized impact on Twitter's culture. And the company now known as X has inked several high-profile deals with the NBA and other major sports leagues over the years to promote their content.Notably, Bluesky doesn't have advertising. It's using the "live" indicators to direct users to off-platform content, so it's unclear if there are any business opportunities for the upstart platform that come with this feature. But it shows that Bluesky wants to play a bigger role in the kinds of conversations that once shaped Twitter's culture, and make a name for itself as a destination to follow live events.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/social-media/bluesky-is-testing-a-live-now-feature-with-streamers-and-the-nba-174443865.html?src=rss

It has been nearly two months since 23andMe declared bankruptcy and the company has officially been sold. The US biotech company Regeneron has agreed to buy 23andMe and all of its assets for $256 million (even though it was valued at $50 million in March). This purchase marks the end of former 23andMe CEO Anne Wojcicki's bid to buy the company, which included resigning in order to make an independent offer.According to Mark Jensen, Chair and member of the Special Committee of the Board of Directors of 23andMe, Regeneron is offering to keep all of the former company's employees. This decision, "will allow us to continue our mission of helping people access, understand and gain health benefits through greater understanding of the human genome," he said in a release.The announcement also tries to emphasize data protection following 23andMe users' concerns about where their information might end up and, in some cases, deleting their data from the site. We are pleased to have reached a transaction that maximizes the value of the business and enables the mission of 23andMe to live on, while maintaining critical protections around customer privacy, choice and consent with respect to their genetic data," said Jensen.The sentiment was echoed by its soon to be new owner. "Through our Regeneron Genetics Center, we have a proven track record of safeguarding personal genetic data, and we assure 23andMe customers that we will apply our high standards for safety and integrity to their data and ongoing consumer genetic services," said George D. Yancopoulos, MD, PhD, co-founder, board co-chair, president and chief scientific officer of Regeneron in a statement. "We believe we can help 23andMe deliver and build upon its mission to help people learn about their own DNA and how to improve their personal health, while furthering Regeneron's efforts to improve the health and wellness of many."How exactly 23andMe will shake out after the Regeneron purchase is to be seen. The company has taken a dramatic fall in recent years, since going public. Hackers accessed the information of 6.9 million people in 2023 and 23andMe laid off over 200 people last year.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/23andme-bought-by-regeneron-in-court-auction-174003286.html?src=rss

Dell just announced the new Pro Max Plus laptop, which the company has stuffed with an enterprise-grade NPU. This makes it a top-tier choice for on-device AI applications.The Pro Max Plus features the Qualcomm AI 100 PC Inference Card, making it the "world's first mobile workstation with an enterprise-grade discrete NPU." This NPU offers 32 AI-cores and 64GB of memory. This is enough to directly handle the type of large AI models that typically require the cloud to run.DellWe don't know anything else regarding traditional specs, but we do know that this will be one of many Pro Max Plus designs. The other models won't be quite as focused on advanced AI applications.Dell says this laptop is primarily intended for "AI engineers and data scientists," and so it's held off on announcing pricing. Given the specs, it's likely to be way too expensive for traditional consumers. It's coming out later this year.DellThe company also revealed new server designs and a new cooling system for these servers. Dell's PowerCool Enclosed Rear Door Heat Exchanger (eRDHx) is an alternative to standard rear door heat exchangers. Dell says it captures 100 percent of heat generated via a "self-contained airflow system." It also suggests it can reduce cooling energy costs by up to 60 percent when compared to current alternatives.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/computing/laptops/dell-stuffed-an-enterprise-grade-npu-into-its-new-pro-max-plus-laptop-170043379.html?src=rss

ASUS has revealed several new laptops at Computex, including the impressive-looking ROG Zephyrus G14. This high-spec computer looks perfect for on-the-go gaming and just about anything else.First of all, this thing is pretty small. The 14-inch screen allows it to fit in just about any to-go bag. The 16:10 panel boasts a 3K display, a refresh rate of 120Hz, 500 nits of peak brightness and Dolby Vision integration. The bezels are slim, with an impressive 87 percent screen-to-body ratio.ASUSIt's also stylish, which is expected from the Zephyrus brand. The G14 features a CNC aluminum unibody that adds to the overall durability. It's available in two colorways. There's Eclipse Gray and Platinum White.As for specs, the G14 can be outfitted with up to an AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 processor with 12 cores and 24 threads and an AMD XDNA NPU with up to 50 TOPS. The graphics card maxes out with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5080. RAM options go up to 64GB and on-board storage up to 2TB.The base model starts at $1,800, but won't be available until June 25. The other variations are already available for purchase.ASUSThe ROG Zephyrus G16 is bigger, obviously, but the screen ups the refresh rate up to 240Hz. These models boast the Intel Core Ultra 9 processor and up to the NVIDIA RTX 5070 GPU. It boasts a similar aluminum chassis to the G14 and a six-speaker system for increased immersion.The base model here costs $2,150 and will be available on June 25. Other versions are already available for purchase.ASUSThe company has also revealed refreshes of the ROG Strix G16 and G18. These gaming laptops can be outfitted with either AMD or Intel CPUs, with support for up to 32GB of RAM. Both models include the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060. All models include 1TB of on-board storage. The G18 starts at $1,700 and the G16 starts at $1,500.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/computing/laptops/asus-unveiled-new-rog-zephyrus-g14-and-g16-laptops-at-computex-163058281.html?src=rss

PBS, alongside NPR, is facing an unprecedented attempt from the executive branch to cut its federal funding and potentially reduce what it can offer. But, in good news, one of its mainstays will be widely available - at least for the time being. New episodes of Sesame Streetare coming to both Netflix and PBS.The 56th season of Sesame Street will be available worldwide on Netflix and on PBS in the US. New episodes will come out the same day on the streamer, PBS Stations and PBS KIDS. "This unique public-private partnership will enable us to bring our research-based curriculum to young children around the world with Netflix's global reach, while ensuring children in communities across the US continue to have free access on public television to the Sesame Street they love," Sesame Workshop stated in a release.The deal also entitles Netflix to 90 hours of previously aired Sesame Street episodes. However, the new releases should look a bit different. Now, each episode will feature an 11-minute story, meant to allow for a deeper dive. There will also be a new animated bit called "Tales From 123," which takes place inside the characters' apartment building. Old segments will also return, like Elmo's World and Cookie Monster's Foodie Truck.

Surprising no one, Microsoft's Build 2025 conference is mostly centered around its Copilot AI. Today, the company announced that it has begun rolling out its "Wave 2 Spring release," which includes a revamped Microsoft 365 Copilot app. It's also unveiled Copilot Tuning, a "low-code" method of building AI models that work with your company's specific data and processes. The goal, it seems, isn't to just make consumers reliant on OpenAI's ChatGPT model, which powers Copilot. Instead, Microsoft is aiming to empower businesses to make tools for their own needs. (For a pricey $30 per seat subscription, on top of your existing MS 365 subscription, of course.)Microsoft claims that Copilot Tuning, which arrives in June for members of an early adopter program, could let a law firm make AI agents that "reflect its unique voice and expertise" by drafting documents and arguments automatically without any coding. Copilot Studio, the company's existing tool for developing AI agents, will also exchange be able to "exchange data, collaborate on tasks, and divide their work based on each agent's expertise." Conceivably, a company could have its HR and IT agents collaborating together, rather than being siloed off in their own domains.With the new Microsoft 365 Copilot app, Microsoft has centered chatting with its AI to accomplish specific tasks. The layout looks fairly simple, and it appears that you'll also be able to tap into your existing agents and collaborative pages as well. As Microsoft announced in April, you'll also be able to purchase new agents in a built-in store, as well as build up Copilot Notebooks to collect your digital scraps. Like an AI version of OneNote or Evernote, Notebooks could potentially help you surface thoughts across a variety of media, and it can also produce two-person podcasts to summarize your notes. (It's unclear if they'll actually sound good enough to be useful, though.)This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ai/a-new-microsoft-365-copilot-app-starts-rolling-out-today-160002322.html?src=rss

Microsoft's annual Build developer conference kicks off today and, as always, it starts with a keynote. You can watch the opening event live starting at noon Eastern time right here, with the embedded YouTube stream below. (It's also available on Microsoft's website, though you'd have to register and sign in.) Just like last year, the event will be hosted by Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, along with the company's Chief Technology Officer, Kevin Scott. According to the keynote page, the executives will be sharing how "Microsoft is creating new opportunity across [its] platforms in this era of AI."The company has been introducing new AI features at Build over the last few years, even as the company's close relationship with OpenAI continues to evolve. We expect Microsoft to add more AI agents to Windows 11 to automate more tasks for you on the operating system. It could also give us an in-depth look at Copilot Vision, a feature that allows the AI assistant to see what you're doing on your computer so it could talk you through various tasks. Microsoft likely wouldn't be announcing new hardware at the event, however, seeing as it has only recently launched a 12-inch Surface Pro tablet and a 13-inch Surface Laptop.The Build conference will also have a day 2 keynote streamed live that is scheduled to feature Scott Guthrie, Jay Parikh, Charles Lamanna and other key Microsoft executives, according to the summary on the event's YouTube page.Microsoft's Build conference will take place from May 19 to May 22. Two other tech events are also taking place around that time: Google's I/O conference from May 20 to 21 and the Computex computer expo in Taiwan from May 20 to 23.Update, May 19, 11:21AM ET: Updated to include link and basic information for the day 2 keynote.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/microsoft-build-2025-how-to-watch-and-what-to-expect-including-copilot-ai-windows-11-and-more-025928415.html?src=rss

NVIDIA and Foxconn have teamed up to build what they are calling an AI factory supercomputer in Taiwan. The project, which NVIDIA announced at Computex, will "deliver state-of-the-art NVIDIA Blackwell infrastructure to researchers, startups and industries," according to the company. NVIDIA is building a new local headquarters in Taiwan as well.The supercomputer will be powered by 10,000 NVIDIA Blackwell GPUs. NVIDIA says the project will greatly increase the availability of AI computing and bolster local researchers and businesses. As it happens, the Taiwan National Science and Technology Council is investing in the project. It will offer the supercomputer's AI cloud computing resources to those in its tech ecosystem."Our plan is to create an AI-focused industrial ecosystem in southern Taiwan," Minister Wu Cheng-Wen of the council said in a statement. "We are focused on investing in innovative research, developing a strong AI industry and encouraging the everyday use of AI tools. Our ultimate goal is to create a smart AI island filled with smart cities, and we look forward to collaborating with NVIDIA and [Foxconn] to make this vision a reality."Foxconn, which is providing the supercomputer's AI infrastructure through its Big Innovation Company subsidiary, will also use the system to further its work in smart cities, electric vehicles and manufacturing. For instance, it aims to optimize connected transportation systems and other "civil resources" in smart cities, and develop advanced driver-assistance and safety systems.TSMC is looking to benefit from the project as well. The company's researchers will tap into the supercomputer's power in the hope of accelerating their R&D work.NVIDIA made the announcement on the same day that it released its GeForce RTX 5060 GPU. We gave the RTX 5060 Ti a score of 85 in our review.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ai/nvidia-and-foxconn-are-building-an-ai-factory-supercomputer-in-taiwan-145535818.html?src=rss

ProtonVPN subscriptions are available at a steep discount right now as part of an exclusive sale for Engadget readers. A 12-month subscription is down to $48, which is a discount of around $72 and works out to $4 per month. A 24-month plan now costs just $81. This represents a massive discount of $158 and works out to $3.39 per month.Proton topped our list of the best VPN services, and with good reason. It's incredibly powerful and easy to use, which is a boon for those new to the space. The end-to-end encryption is solid and everything's based on an open-source framework. This lets the company offer an official vulnerability disclosure program.A subscription includes an IP-masker, so websites can't track you online, and a built-in ad blocker. We found in our tests that browsing the web and watching streaming content were both speedy while using this VPN, which isn't always the case with this type of service.The only caveat? The company will automatically bill you at the normal price when the discounted subscription runs out. Be sure to cancel before that if you aren't vibing with the platform.Follow @EngadgetDeals on X for the latest tech deals and buying advice.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/deals/get-66-percent-off-a-two-year-subscription-to-protonvpn-191045544.html?src=rss

LG's 27-inch 1440p UltraGear OLED monitor (model 27GX790A) is as close to gaming nirvana as fps-hungry players can get - for now, anyway. It has a 480Hz refresh rate, allowing it to actually display up to 480 fps for insanely fast-paced shooters, along with a low 0.03ms response time. And it supports DisplayPort 2.1, which offers higher bandwidth than typical DisplayPort 1.4 ports, so it doesn't need to use Display Stream Compression (DSC) like most other gaming displays. Together with NVIDIA G-Sync and AMD FreeSync Premium Pro technology, both of which will help to reduce screen tearing, the UltraGear 27 has pretty much everything you'd want in a high-end gaming display. But given its high $1,000 retail price (though it's currently on sale for $800), the UltraGear 27 clearly isn't meant for most people. You'll absolutely need a powerful GPU and CPU to get close to seeing 480 fps in 1440p. And, let's be honest, very few people will even see the difference between 480Hz and more affordable 120Hz to 240Hz screens. The LG 27GX790A is for the true sickos. I've tested plenty of high refresh rate screens in my time, from gaming laptops to a wide variety of monitors. I distinctly remember the excitement around 120Hz LCDs at CES 2010, and I definitely noticed the difference between those screens and standard 60Hz displays at the time. Shooters just looked smoother and felt more responsive. Then there was the leap to 240Hz screens, which was noticeable but not nearly as impressive as the arrival of OLED gaming displays with better black levels and astounding contrast. Then came 360Hz screens, which, to be honest, didn't feel like a huge leap over 240Hz. Our eyes can only see so much after all, especially if you're moving beyond your peak gaming years. So I didn't really expect to be wowed by the UltraGear 27 - I figured it would be yet another solid OLED monitor, like the 27-inch 4K Alienware we recently reviewed. But after spending plenty of time with the UltraGear 27 on my gaming PC, powered by an NVIDIA RTX 5090 and AMD's Ryzen 9 9950X3D, I noticed something strange. While I couldn't really see a major difference between its 480Hz screen and my daily driver, the 240Hz Alienware 32-inch QD-OLED, I could feel it. Devindra Hardawar for Engadget What's good about the LG UltraGear 27? The first time the UltraGear 27 truly clicked for me - the point where I finally understood the hype around 480Hz displays - was during a Rocket League match.I noticed that the longer I played, the more I reached a flow state where I could easily read the position of the ball, re-orient the camera and zip off to intercept. It almost felt like there was a direct connection between what my brain wanted to do, and what was actually happening on the screen. I forgot about the Xbox Elite controller in my hand, and the desk clutter in my office. The real world melted away - I was fully inside Rocket League's absurdsoccer arena. When the match ended, it took me a few minutes to reacclimatize to reality. Rocket League's fast motion and lack of downtime made it the ideal introduction to super-high frame rates. I was also easily able to reach 480 fps in 1440p with my system's hardware, but you'll still easily be able to see upwards of 300 fps with older GPUs, especially if you bump down to 1080p. To be clear, this monitor is pretty much wasted on older and budget video cards. I noticed a similarly transcendent flow state as I got back into Overwatch 2, a game I gave up on years ago. The UltraGear 27 shined best when I was playing fast-paced characters like Tracer, Genji and Lucio, since I had a better sense of space during heated matches. But it also helped with more accurate shots when sniping with the likes of Hanzo and Widowmaker. Beyond the seemingly metaphysical benefits of its 480Hz screen, the UltraGear 27 is also simply a great OLED monitor. Black levels are wonderfully dark, and it can also achieve slightly brighter highlights (up to 1,300 nits) than most OLEDs in small areas. Graphically rich games like Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 practically leap off the screen, thanks to its excellent 98.5 percent DCI-P3 color accuracy. The UltraGear 27 doesn't use a QD-OLED screen like Alienware's latest models, but its color performance doesn't suffer much for it. Devindra Hardawar for Engadget If you've got a PlayStation 5 or Xbox Series X around, the UltraGear 27's two HDMI 2.1 ports will also let them perform at their best. While there are no built-in speakers, the display does include a headphone jack with support for DTS technology for spatial audio like most gaming monitors. It's also a 4-pole connection, so you can plug in headphones with microphones as well. For accessories, there are two USB 3.0 Type A ports, along with an upstream USB connection for your PC. The UltraGear 27 doesn't look particularly distinctive when it's turned off, but it's hard to ask for much flair when it does so much right. Its nearly borderless bezel makes the screen practically float in the air, and you can also easily adjust its height and angle to suit your needs. Devindra Hardawar for Engadget What's bad about the UltraGear 27? The biggest downside with the UltraGear 27 is its $1,000 retail price. While it's nice to see it already falling to $800, it's still absurdly high compared to most 27-inch 1440p monitors. If you want to save some cash, LG's 27-inch 240Hz UltraGear is still a very good option. But if you're in the market for a 480Hz display, you'll basically have to live with paying a ton. For example, ASUS's ROG Swift 27-inch OLED is still selling for $1,000. Should you buy the UltraGear 27? If you're an esports player, or a gamer who demands the highest framerates no matter the cost, the UltraGear 27 is an excellent OLED monitor. But I think most players would be perfectly fine with a cheaper 240Hz screen. Even if you can easily afford the UltraGear 27, it's also worth considering larger screens like the Alienware 32-inch 4K QD-OLED. You'll still get decently high frame rates, but you'll also get a screen that's more immersive for ogling the graphics in Clair Obscur. Devindra Hardawar for Engadget Wrap-up With Samsung teasing a 500Hz OLED gaming screen, there's clearly still a demand for insanely high refresh rates. If you absolutely must have that fix, the UltraGear 27 was made for you. It has all of the benefits of OLED, and with the right title, it might help you achieve a new level of gaming transcendence.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/lg-27-ultragear-oled-review-i-finally-get-the-480hz-gaming-hype-123042162.html?src=rss

NVIDIA's G-Sync will soon work with the latest Samsung OLED TVs for a better gaming experience on the big screen. The S95F series TVs, which the company introduced at CES, will be the first to get the update, and the rest of the 2025 OLED models will follow later this year. G-Sync compatibility is meant to help games run more smoothly on the TVs, making their refresh rates match the GPU's frame rate.In the announcement, Kevin Lee, Executive VP of Samsung's Visual Display Customer Experience Team, said it'll bring "elite-level performance for even the most competitive players." Samsung started shipping its flagship S95F TVs in April alongside its other new OLED models, the S90F and S85F. Each comes in a handful of sizes, going up to 83 inches. The OLED lineup also offers AMD FreeSync Premium Pro support, Auto Low Latency Mode and AI Auto Game Mode, which is designed to tweak the picture and sound to best fit whatever game you're playing.The announcement comes as Computex 2025 gets underway in Taiwan. The expo runs from May 20-23, and will focus heavily on AI this year.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/samsungs-2025-oled-tvs-are-getting-nvidia-g-sync-compatibility-120033237.html?src=rss

Smart speakers have come a long way from being simple housings for voice assistants. Today's best smart speakers can tee-up your favorite playlists, control your smart home devices, answer questions, set reminders and even act as intercoms around the house. Whether you're deep into the Alexa, Google Assistant, or Siri ecosystem, there's a speaker out there that fits your setup and lifestyle.

HP is giving a much-needed power-up to its OmniBook 5 Series laptop lineup. As part of Computex 2025, HP debuted the laptops equipped with Qualcomm's Snapdragon X and X Plus chips for better energy efficiency and performance. The 14-inch version of the new OmniBook 5 Series starts at $799, while the 16-inch variation costs at least $849.Previously, if you wanted the benefits of a Snapdragon chip in an HP laptop, you were stuck with the more expensive OmniBook X options that retail for at least $1,000. Now, there are more affordable options from HP that still have the benefits of ARM processors. The OmniBook 5 series may not be as powerful as the OmniBook X, but it still gets access to Copilot+'s AI features, like Recall, Click-to-Do and an improved Windows Search experience.All that comes in a laptop with a 2K OLED display that gets 34 hours of battery life and recharges up to 50 percent in 30 minutes. If the laptop's singular display isn't enough, the OmniBook 5 can hook up to a single external 5K monitor or two 4K displays. For all your virtual meeting needs, HP's newest laptops have an 1080p IR camera that's paired with its Audio Boost 2.0 feature to offer better sound quality and AI-powered noise removal.HP said the OmniBook 5 with Snapdragon in its 14-inch configuration will be available first on Amazon and Microsoft, starting in June. In July, the 14-inch OmniBook 5 will make its way to HP's own site, Best Buy and Costco. The 16-inch version will also be available in July through HP directly and its retail partners.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/computing/laptops/hp-is-bringing-snapdragon-chips-to-its-more-affordable-laptops-060019642.html?src=rss

Computex 2025 is about to kick off, and the cavalcade of announcements about the latest chips, laptops, gaming devices and more from leading brands has already begun. The event in Taiwan will kick off Sunday night (US time) with a keynote at the Taipei Music Center from NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang. There will be a livestream for anyone not attending in person, so you can watch along right here (see NVIDIA YouTube stream embedded below).Huang's keynote is scheduled for 11PM ET/ 8PM PT on May 18 (11AM on May 19 in Taiwan Time), and we can expect to hear all about the company's developments in the AI space. It'll be followed that same day by a keynote from Qualcomm CEO Cristiano Amon. Computex this year will, perhaps unsurprisingly, focus heavily on AI, with the overall theme being "AI Next." It'll also highlight products in three categories: AI & Robotics, Next-Gen Tech and Future Mobility.For Huang, the Computex keynote is a return home: He was born in Taiwan before eventually emigrating to the US, where he was instrumental in co-founding NVIDIA and guiding it to its current domination in the AI space. His appearance also caps off a busy week that saw him balancing the increasingly challenging diplomatic side of the AI landscape. After participating in President Trump's tour of Middle East nations - during which NVIDIA inked deals with Saudi and UAE-linked tech firms to sell its AI chips - NVIDIA downplayed its reported expansion plans in China.An estimated 1,400 exhibitors will be in attendance at Computex, including ASUS, Acer and AMD, all of which have previously made big announcements at the annual expo. In fact, as of Friday (May 16), Acer has already gotten a jump on the others by making some announcements for the show, including the new Swift Edge AI laptop and five gaming monitors. Our senior reviewer Sam Rutherford has also managed to get his hands on the new Acer Predator Triton 14 AI, and he liked it so much he called it his new "most anticipated gaming laptop of the year."Computex 2025 will run from May 20 to May 23, and we expect even more PC news in the next few days.Update, May 18, 6:22PM ET: Added additional background info on Jensen Huang and NVIDIA China news.Update, May 15, 1:50PM ET: Added YouTube embed, and details on Jensen Huang's recent travels.Update, May 16, 4:45PM ET: Added details on Acer's Computex announcements, which were unveiled today.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/computing/computex-2025-watch-nvidia-ceo-jensen-huang-deliver-the-opening-keynote-today-205326666.html?src=rss

Meeting an online friend in person for the first time can be pretty awkward. If only there were a way to skip the weird small talk part and get right into the flow of real conversation - like, say, getting shrunk down to the size of a chess piece and trapped in a series of board games, forcing you to communicate so you can find your way out. That's exactly the scenario in which characters Alex and Sarah find themselves in the Playdate game Escape the Boardgame, and it's incredibly charming. Escape the Boardgameis kind of like an interactive comic, and it's the second such game by Julie and Anders Bjornskov, following 2024's Escape the Arcade. You use the crank and sometimes the D-pad to move the story forward panel by panel, running into puzzles along the way that will serve as temporary roadblocks until you've come up with the solution. While it is an escape room of sorts, this isn't a high-tension situation; Alex and Sarah are stuck in a cozy boardgame cafe, not Jumanji. As they try to make their way out the door by traversing various game boards, they encounter a bunch of quirky but ultimately harmless characters. Just because it's casual doesn't mean it'll be a breeze to solve the puzzles, though. They're really creative, sometimes requiring you to pay close attention to every little detail on the screen in order to crack some obscure code, and other times forcing you to zoom out and consider the whole picture to see what's hidden in plain sight. The games within the game, like one in which you need to match pets with their correct owners, are a delight to take in. There are multiple hints for each puzzle, which you can access in the menu, so you can have varying degrees of assistance depending on how stuck you are. Savvy puzzle solvers will probably finish Escape the Boardgame in under an hour, so this one is perfect for when you just want to play something easygoing that can be wrapped up neatly in one sitting. Instead of leaving you frustrated, it's a brain teaser you're likely to walk away from feeling all warm and fuzzy. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/if-you-like-puzzles-check-out-this-trippy-comic-style-escape-room-game-for-playdate-200003217.html?src=rss

Netflix will embrace AI-generated ads, whether we like it or not. The streaming service will roll out AI-generated ads in 2026 that will play in the middle of a show or whenever users hit pause for its ad-supported plans. During Netflix's Upfront event for its advertisers, Amy Reinhard, the company's president of advertising, showed off the upcoming feature for interactive midroll and pause ads that use generative AI for custom content.We've come a long way since Netflix's origin story of mailing out DVDs starting in 1997 and transitioning to an ad-free streaming service. Now more than ever, it feels like Harvey Dent's famous quote from The Dark Knight about living long enough to become the villain rings true for Netflix. The streaming service's longevity in the industry could be attributed to making compromises, like including ads, that take away from its initial glory. In a poetic turn of events, The Dark Knight trilogy was added to Netflix's library on April 1.This won't be the first time Netflix dabbled with AI. Last month, Netflix offered regional users a new search feature that uses OpenAI to find something to watch. Looking beyond AI-generated ads in 2026, it's not likely that the company will slow down on finding new ways to generate revenue."So if you take away anything from today, I hope it's this: the foundation of our ads business is in place," Reinhard said during the Netflix event. "And going forward, the pace of progress is going to be even faster."The golden age of binge-watching an entire season of a Netflix show without ads could be a long-forgotten memory. Next year, don't be surprised if Netflix tempts you with a Baconator while you watch people succumb to the deadly consequences of Squid Games. If this eventual change has you rethinking your Netflix subscription, you can always cancel it or begrudgingly upgrade it to the Standard or Premium plans to avoid ads. Don't forget, Netflix has been steadily increasing subscription costs for its ad-free plans, which could push more users towards the standard plan with ads as the most accessible option.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/entertainment/streaming/netflix-has-figured-out-a-way-to-make-ads-even-worse-using-ai-180623064.html?src=rss

Activision announced on the official X account of its Call of Duty: Warzone Mobile title that it would sunset updates and delist it from the Google Play store and the App Store. Activision is giving players a last chance to download the departing game, which will be removed by the end of today.According to Activision, Call of Duty: Warzone Mobile "has not met our expectations with mobile first players like it has with PC and console audiences." Considering the game's troubled launch, this discontinuation doesn't come as a surprise to its player base. Activision's mobile adaptation of its battle royale title launched in March 2024, which was two years after it was first announced. Looking at the overall timeline of Call of Duty: Warzone Mobile, fans spent more than two years waiting for its release, only to get roughly a year's worth of gameplay that had poor optimization and serious battery life demands.If you install Call of Duty: Warzone Mobile before May 19, 2025, you'll still have access to the game with "continued cross-progression of shared inventories using existing content," Activision wrote on the X post. The publisher added that servers will stay online and that it'd notify players of any changes. For diehard fans, that's not much of a guarantee that the Warzone Mobile servers will remain active in perpetuity.To incentivize existing players to migrate to its other titles, Activision said that you can log into Call of Duty: Mobile with your Activision account to claim two times amount of COD points you had in your Warzone Mobile account, along with "other awesome rewards." However, Activision added that any unused COD points and whatever you have already purchased in Call of Duty: Warzone Mobile can't be refunded.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/activision-is-abandoning-call-of-duty-warzone-mobile-161023019.html?src=rss

You'll soon be able to get into your favorite games even faster with the updated Xbox home screen. According to Microsoft, Xbox Insiders are due to get three new customization options later this week that will make their dashboard feel a little more personal. As detailed in Xbox Wire, certain Xbox players will have options to reduce clutter and allow them to pull their favorite games to the front of the list.The first major change lets you pin up to three of your favorite games or apps to the recently-played list. Pinning these means that they'll stay near the front of your list even when you launch other apps occasionally. Beyond that, your Xbox will get the option to "Hide System Apps" which should reduce the clutter and tuck those less important shortcuts away. To further streamline your home screen, Xbox will introduce the "Reduce Tile Count" feature that lets you set how many visible tiles are in the recently opened games and apps list. With more control thanks to these new features, Xbox players should get a cleaner homepage that lets their dynamic backgrounds shine more."We've heard from many of you that Home should feel more like your space," Eden Marie, principal software engineering lead of Xbox Experiences, wrote on Xbox's blog. "Whether it's surfacing your favorite games, hiding what you don't use, or simply making Home feel less crowded, this update is a direct response to that feedback."According to Microsoft, these features will arrive on Alpha Skip-Ahead and Alpha users' consoles first. However, the company is still tweaking the Reduce Tile Count feature, adding that it "will be coming soon." Now, if only there were a way to hide those ads on the homescreen.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/xbox/xbox-will-let-you-pin-up-to-three-favorite-games-to-your-homescreen-200051956.html?src=rss

These are some recently released titles we think are worth adding to your reading list. This week, we read Apocalypse: How Catastrophe Transformed Our World and Can Forge New Futures, a compelling new history book by science journalist Lizzie Wade, and Behemoth, a riveting mini-series for Dark Horse that explores the classic idea of a kaiju attack from a horrifying... inside perspective. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/entertainment/what-to-read-this-weekend-a-brief-history-of-humankinds-many-apocalypses-203451036.html?src=rss

Spoilers for The Interstellar Song Contest."No, really, spoilers from here on out.Much like Eurovision itself, that was a lot, wasn't it?And much like every other episode this season, The Interstellar Song Contest" was overstuffed, excessive and brutally short. It was also a lot of fun, even if the sheer volume of plot that I wish we'd had more time to explore remains frustrating. Unfortunately, it looks like the great qualities of this episode will be overshadowed by all of the dramatic lore reveals. As usual, head to Mrs. Flood Corner for the analysis, but let's talk about the rest first.Eurovision?James Pardon/BBC Studios/Bad WolfIf you're in the US, you may not be familiar with the Eurovision Song Contest, even if Netflix did make a movie about it. It's an annual music competition that began in the post-war years that saw the major nations of Europe select an act and a song to compete. Judges from each nation would then rank each performance, with the winning act's nation going on to host the event the next year. Despite the name, participation isn't limited to Europe, with entries from Oceania, Africa and the Middle East. And the event, to use a technical term, is Extremely Gay, playing up its camp excesses and offering a space for queer performers.Did you just fly through space on a glitter cannon?"Lara Cornell/BBC Studios/Disney/Bad WolfThe Doctor and Belinda arrive in a VIP box in the Harmony Arena, a large open-air (given it's in space, should that be an open-space?) venue. They're just in time to see the start of the 803rd Interstellar Song Contest, presented by (actual British TV presenter) Rylan Clark, who has just emerged from a cryogenic chamber. The Doctor takes the Vindicator reading, and has enough data to force the TARDIS back to Earth on May 24, 2025 - but the pair decide to stay and enjoy the show. Watching from afar, Mrs. Flood delights that the Vindicator is now primed and ready, but will stay around to watch the show as well.It's a popular event, with three trillion viewers from around the universe watching the show, as it's broadcast much like a TV show. Unfortunately, the production gallery is stormed by Kid, a terrorist who has hijacked the arena's security drones with help from Wynn, someone from the production crew. Kid and Wynn are both Hellions, a race of beings with prominent devil horns that are reviled across the galaxy for how they look. People assume they are evil, engage in cannibalism and witchcraft, and it's hard for them to get jobs. The show's director even says that they were advised against hiring Wynn because she's a Hellion.Kid switches the broadcast to the rehearsal feed, which didn't feature Rylan, which piques the Doctor's interest as there's a TV in their VIP box. He pulls out his sonic screwdriver and starts fiddling with the equipment, but as he's doing so, Kid opens the air bubble separating the arena from the void. And instantly, almost 100,000 people in the audience are blown into space, including the Doctor and the TARDIS, while Belinda is saved by the canopy's roof closing. Wynn closes the canopies to protect the life of Cora, the odds-on favorite to win and the show's star act. The director notices that the people may be frozen, but they're trapped within the station's mavity bubble and could therefore be rescued.The Doctor, knocked out and frozen, floating in the void of space, is awoken with a vision of Susan (!) in the TARDIS telling him to find me." He opens his eyes, spots a glitter cannon floating nearby, and propels himself toward the station's airlock, Wall-E style. It's there he meets Mike and Gary, the couple whose VIP box he inadvertently stole. They were thankfully safe in the corridor outside when the roof was opened. The Doctor, aided by his new friends, starts working out what the next part of Kid's plan is - to push a delta wave via the broadcast to all three trillion of its viewers. The wave was powerful enough to knock the Doctor to the floor and give them a nosebleed, and will likely kill every single viewer.Kid and Wynn are doing this because their home planet, Hellia, was bought by the corporation that sponsors the song contest. It was the home of a poppy that could make honey flavoring, and when the corporation bought the planet, it took the poppy and burned the rest, including its people. The Hellions were scattered, victims of a genocide, looked down upon by the rest of so-called respectable society. Wiping out both the audience and the viewers at home at an event sponsored by the corporation will, Kid hopes, balance the books.James Pardon/BBC Studios/Bad WolfBelinda winds up with Cora, the show's star act (and her partner). The trio hack the system to work out what is going on. Belinda, believing the Doctor is dead, is full of remorse at having never told him how wonderful she thinks he is. Thankfully, they're able to access the station's video calling software to see the Doctor and Kid meet via an intra-station call, where the Doctor is giving Kid a glimpse of how furious the Time Lord can get, much to Belinda's surprise. Cora has skin in the game here, too, revealing after the call that she is also a Hellion, but cut her horns off in order to fit in with the rest of polite society, becoming a star in the process.The Doctor is able to use the station's holographic technology to project himself into the production gallery. Kid shoots the hologram, giving the real Doctor enough time to walk in, casually destroying Kid's gun and the delta wave box. The Doctor then starts channeling the station's power through his hologram body to shock Kid. The Doctor said that Kid had put ice in his heart," and now he would pay back the attempted murder of three trillion people by giving him three trillion shocks. Beinda walks in, to see the Doctor essentially torturing Kid, and even the Doctor himself is plagued by visions of Susan telling him to stop.With Kid and Wynn locked away, the Doctor works out another way to use the holograms - as a tractor beam. We see a montage of people being pulled in from the void and reactivated, first using Rylan's cryogenic chamber, then on a larger scale in a VIP booth. It's not long before the whole crowd is returned, and with it, Cora takes to the stage. She tells them her story and sings a song from Hellia, and while the audience is initially hostile, she wins them over by the end. To the applause, the Doctor and Belinda head back to the TARDIS, but not before a holographic Graham Norton - talk show host and the BBC's face of Eurovision - tells them the Earth was destroyed in mysterious circumstances on May 24th, 2025.The Doctor and Belinda sprint back, determined to push the TARDIS to that date and solve whatever issue is coming. But even with the Vindicator plugged in, the TARDIS refuses to co-operate, ringing the Cloister Bell and switching to the all red lighting scheme. There's a sinister noise from outside the doors that the Doctor identifies as the "sound of May 24th," before the TARDIS doors explode. And the credits roll...... only to be interrupted after the first crew card to cut back to Mike and Gary on Harmony Arena as they revive the last person blown into space. It's Mrs Flood, who reveals her double brainstem froze while out in space, "lethal for a Time Lady, but I've got my own knack for survival." Breaking the fourth wall, she says "let battle begin," and then bi-generates, splitting herself into Mrs. Flood and The Rani (Archie Panjabi), with Mrs. Flood becoming the subordinate to her newer self. As the pair walk off, the Rani says she will bring "absolute terror" to the Doctor, telling Mrs. Flood to shut up when she points out she's already done that.I'll do anything for you, Doctor"James Pardon/BBC Studios/Bad WolfHonestly, Doctor Who can sometimes be a bit like a teddy bear with a razor blade hidden under its palm. Sure, it may look lightweight and cuddly, disarming you with its charm, but then it'll cut you so deep you won't even realize. The Interstellar Song Contest" is, without a doubt, one of the most affecting episodes in the run. This episode comes less than a decade after the Manchester Arena bombing that killed 22 people and injured more than a thousand. The visual of the 100,000 people being blown into space was staggering in its brutality. Juno Dawson's already written for Doctor Who's wider world, but her debut script for the TV series goes hard.But even if it's a harrowing watch at times, it's also filled with enough moments of levity. The Doctor's flirting with married couple Mike and Gary at various points in the episode is delightful as they're both increasingly smitten with him. The music is delightful, and Cora's final song was designed to melt people's hearts, plus there's a few background gags for the more novelty act songs that appear every year.Once again, I'm compelled to say the 45-minute format does nothing for Doctor Who when it's treading this high a wire. The themes of this episode include indifference to evil, pinkwashing, passing privilege, cultural identity, commodification, the inhumanity of replacing customer service with computers, the perpetuation of abuse and the value of revenge. Given Eurovision presents itself as an explicitly queer event, I'm sure better-qualified writers can speak more authoritatively on the episode's deeper subtext and political themes. And possibly explain in better detail where its sympathies lie.Every episode this season feels like it had enough material to fill three half-hour episodes of late 80s Who. Much like last week reminded me of 1989's Ghost Light," this episode put me in mind of 1988's The Happiness Patrol." That episode is, on its surface, about a planet where you'll be killed on the spot if you show any signs of visible unhappiness. Of course, it's really about the UK under Margaret Thatcher, Operation Condor and the gay rights movement. If you're curious, read Elizabeth Sandifer's essay on the episode.Hopefully, too, you'll notice the thematic parallels that are running through many of these episodes. Conrad in Lucky Day," The Barber in The Story and the Engine" and Kid here are all presented as characters looking for revenge. But while the middle member of that trio has been ostensibly redeemed, the other two crossed the Doctor and made him angry. If his speech to Conrad was full of vitriol, then Kid is the first time we've seen Gatwa's Doctor in full vindictive mode. This has been a recurring theme for most of the post-2005 series, that the Doctor needs to hold themselves back from unleashing their full power and fury.Mrs. Flood CornerDan Fearon/BBC Studios/Disney/Bad WolfDoctor Who was born before the home media age, where episodes were broadcast on a more or less one-and-done basis. If you were a fan looking to revisit an old episode, you had to read the novelizations that started coming out when the show became a hit. But Doctor Who wasn't originally built to support a six decades-long global multimedia franchise, and that's an issue. When it started, the Doctor was joined on his adventures by his granddaughter, Susan (Carole Ann Ford), and two of her teachers who followed her home one night. Long before any talk of Time Lords or Gallifrey, Susan was just the kid who needed to be rescued every third or fourth week.Carole Ann Ford wasn't happy with how poorly served her character was, and so opted to leave in 1964, a year after the show started. During The Dalek Invasion of Earth," the Doctor exiles his own granddaughter to 22nd century Earth because she wants to kiss a boy. He doesn't even grant her a real goodbye, locking the doors of the TARDIS and giving a speech that only shorn of its context sounds noble. But Susan's mistreatment isn't just about the casual way she was dumped off the show, but how her existence does (or does not) fit with the show's lore. If she is a Time Lord, a quasi-immortal shape shifter, then dumping her in one time and place because she fancies a boy is quite the outrageous act.Susan's existence also raises questions about the Doctor's other familial relationships that have never been directly addressed on screen. The show's unspoken modus operandi was summed up by producer John Nathan-Turner as No hanky-panky in the TARDIS." But if he has a granddaughter, does that mean the Doctor also has a partner/s or children waiting for them to return to Gallifrey for thousands of years? As much as the character, especially in recent years, has implied they're happy to screw around the cosmos, they're not looking to settle down. And aside from one small appearance in a 1983 anniversary special, and a picture in the Doctor's study in The Pilot," Susan's existence has more or less been swept under the rug.That was, until an actress called Susan Twist was cast in Wild Blue Yonder" and then again in The Church on Ruby Road." Twist would go on to appear in every episode of Ncuti Gatwa's first season in a series of cameos that the characters became increasingly aware of. The Devil's Chord" even ends on a fourth-wall breaking musical number called "There's Always a Twist at the End." The show was very loudly hinting Twist was playing a regenerated version of Susan, who was explicitly discussed at the start of that same episode. By last season's finale, however, Twist's inclusion was a double bluff - part of Sutekh's plan to trap the Doctor.Now, it appears that showrunner Russell T. Davies has been playing the longest of long games with the fans. The season-long and highly-visible fakeout means I was actually surprised when Carole Ann Ford's face appeared on screen. She appears twice, the first time when the Doctor is at death's door, with her urging him to find me" (harkening back to what Reginald Pye's ghost wife told him before he blew up the film canisters in Lux.") The second time, she admonishes him for torturing Kid for his would-be genocide.Who is Mrs. Flood?In many ways, Susan's appearance completely overshadows the reveal that Mrs. Flood is none other than the Rani. That's the (classic) series' far less well-known Time Lord foe, who appeared in only two official stories during its original run. But the Rani gained an outsize reputation among fans as she was played by Kate O'Mara (perhaps best known in the US for her role in Dynasty) who imbued the character with high camp excess. Which maybe blunted the idea that she was a sort of Time Lord Mengele, carelessly using people as fodder for her grisly experiments. Unfortunately, the Rani was created so late in the original series run that she only returned once in an episode most people would prefer to forget.It appears that Russell T. Davies' hidden mission for the streaming era was to rehabilitate some of the concepts that didn't work back in the 80s. After bringing Mel back as a UNIT employee last year, now he's doing the same for the Rani. Interestingly, both of those were created by Pip and Jane Baker - writers who are as emblematic of the series' wider decline before its dramatic revival under Andrew Cartmel. It's also notable, perhaps, that the name Rani is a Sanskrit word that broadly translates to Queen," but Panjabi is the first actress of South Asian descent to play the character.I'll be honest, if nothing else, I'm relieved that Mrs. Flood has turned out to be the Rani if only to stop people going on about that character. It's not that she's a bad character per-se, but when the series already has the Master, a renegade Time Lord who concocts elaborate traps for the Doctor, it's hard to see the Rani as anything other than a will this do?" alternative. Hopefully the finale can establish a real distinction between the Rani of the classic series and the new one beyond breaking the fourth wall.... and the restNow, I have to apologize last week for not clocking the child Belinda saw in the alleyway was Poppy (Sienna-Robyn Mavanga-Phipps) from Space Babies." Obviously, some fan theories have suggested it was a sign that the stories from The Story and the Engine" were leaking out of the pocket dimension. But at Comic Con Cardiff at the end of last year, Anita Dobson (Mrs. Flood) said that the second season would tie into Space Babies," which was another episode with a similarly fairytale premise.If that is the case, and everything that has unfolded in the last two years is all part of some grand plan then it must have started at Wild Blue Yonder." It's the second of the three 60th anniversary specials, and the episode that saw David Tennant's Doctor disrupt Isaac Newton's discovery of gravity. It's been a running joke ever since that the force is known as Mavity," and that episode is also the one that allowed the pantheon of gods to enter this universe. Given Susan Twist was playing Isaac Newton's maid, perhaps the series shifted into the Twistverse at that point. Or, you know, the prevailing fan theory that this era takes place in the Land of Fiction, a pocket fantasy universe depicted in 1968's The Mind Robber."One subtle running thread this season has been the Doctor's almost insistent urging that Belinda enjoys their travels. He's made more than a few references to Belinda getting the hang of traveling with him in the TARDIS and starting to loosen up and enjoy things. If the only reason he met her in the first place was because of Conrad, then perhaps he's unwittingly building his own bootstrap paradox. Which would be, you know, a bad thing.Finally, it does appear that every episode of this season is going to share thematic parallels with its equivalent from last year. Dot and Bubble" and The Story and the Engine" both explicitly engage with ideas around how the Doctor's changed racial identity affects his life. Rogue" and The Interstellar Song Contest" both deal with queer themes through the lens of a pop culture phenomenon. If true, then Wish World" will likely be an episode where the story gets picked apart and the tension rises to another grand cliffhanger, followed by The Reality War," which can't possibly hope to live up to the promise of its first half. You know, just like last year.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/entertainment/tv-movies/doctor-who-the-interstellar-song-contest-review-camp-190032125.html?src=rss

Access to Amazon's new AI-enhanced voice assistant, Alexa+, is expanding. The company has started notifying users who signed up for the Early Access program that they can now activate Alexa+. It's been a few months since Amazon first demoed the smarter version of Alexa, saying at the time that it would begin rolling out to the first batch of users in March before coming to more people in waves over the subsequent months, prioritizing Echo Show 8, 10, 15, and 21 owners.According to an Amazon spokesperson, "hundreds of thousands" of customers have tried out Alexa+ so far. For those who got Alexa+ in the initial Early Access phase, though, the assistant arrived without many of the features the company touted during its February announcement. The Washington Post, citing internal company documents, reported that this is because those tools didn't "yet meet Amazon's standards for public release." In a footnote on its Early Access signup page, Amazon notes that some of the features shown are still in development.Per Amazon's email on Friday to the latest wave of users, you'll only need to activate and set up Alexa + on one device. From there, any other compatible devices you own will automatically be upgraded. Alexa+ is said to be more conversational and capable of handling more complex tasks than the original assistant.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/home/smart-home/amazon-rolls-out-alexa-to-more-early-access-users-183017242.html?src=rss

When the world needed him most, he got delayed once again. Paramount Pictures announced the second delay for The Legend of Aang: The Last Airbender, the upcoming movie that follows the journey of Aang and Team Avatar after the events of the beloved animated series that was released in 2005. Instead of January 30, 2026, the new film will make its way to movie theaters on October 9, 2026, as first reported by Variety.Paramount Pictures didn't provide a reason for the delay, but this setback follows a previous postponing that bumped it from its original release date on October 10, 2025. However, there are no changes to the already-announced cast and crew, which includes Dave Bautista, Steven Yuen and Eric Nam, with Lauren Montgomery and William Mata as co-directors.This delay could be good news, though. Paramount Pictures also revealed that it's pushing back the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem 2 sequel from its October 9, 2026 opening date to September 17, 2027. This move frees up the slot for The Legend of Aang to make a fall release, which could attract more attention than being premiered in January.To keep us from breaking out the pitchforks, the film studio at least revealed the new logo for the film on its Instagram. If you're itching for Avatar content, Netflix renewed its live-action version of Avatar: The Last Airbender for two more seasons, the next of which is expected to release in early 2026. If you're only interested in new material, the next avatar is expected to make her debut in 2027 in a series titled Avatar: Seven Havens.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/entertainment/tv-movies/the-legend-of-aang-the-last-airbender-gets-hit-with-its-second-delay-175913128.html?src=rss

Forget the joystick and forgo the D-pad. 8BitDo introduced an all-button arcade controller with an ultra-slim profile that's built for competitive fighting games. The company is known for its wide range of affordable handheld controllers, but it's been venturing more into fight pads following its Arcade Stick release. The latest Arcade Controller comes in two versions: a blacked-out variation that's officially licensed by Xbox and a retro-styled counterpart that's compatible with PC and Nintendo Switch. For fighting game fans, the Arcade Controller offers a ton of features to provide a more competitive edge. 8BitDo's newest fight pad has 20 hours of wireless battery life, but also supports a wired mode for better latency performance. For quick adjustments mid-game, the Arcade Controller has a control panel at the top-left that lets you turn up the volume, switch between PC and Switch modes on the standard version, and even activate a tournament lock that prevents accidental misclicks that could distract or disqualify you during high-stakes matches. 8BitDo added four programmable kidney-shaped buttons and lets you hot-swap each button's mechanical switches for extra customization. If you prefer RGB lighting, 8BitDo only included it on the Xbox version. All of these elements are jammed into a controller that's 1.6 cm thick, which is just thicker than a MacBook Pro that measures 1.55 cm. The standard version is up for pre-order on Amazon for $89.99, while the Xbox version is also available for $99.99. 8BitDo said that the first Arcade Controllers will ship across North America starting July 15, while European customers will get theirs starting August 15. It's worth noting that 8BitDo's website previously said that it would halt orders to U.S. customers coming from its warehouse in China, but has since resumed shipping to the U.S., only adding that "shipping fees may vary due to tariffs." This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/8bitdos-all-button-arcade-controller-is-almost-as-thin-as-a-macbook-pro-161712267.html?src=rss

Microsoft has introduced the successor to PowerToys Run, its quick launcher for power users, called the Command Palette. As The Verge notes, it now functions pretty much like Mac's Spotlight and will now let you search for apps, whole folders and single files, let you perform calculations just by typing on the search bar and let you do web searches without having to open a search engine. You can launch websites straight from the results it gives you, and it also lets you run system commands. The company has rolled out the new launcher ahead of this year's Build developer conference.In addition, Microsoft will let you add commands and features for your favorite apps to Command Palette, thanks to its support for extensions. XDA Developers recently took the launcher for a spin and said that you can search for extensions for it from WinGet and the Microsoft Store through its own search function. There's even an option to create a project for a new extension that you're building yourself.You can access the Command Palette on Windows by pressing Win + Alt + Space. From within the Command Palette window that pops up, you can see the various actions you can do within the launcher. It's also where you can access its Settings, which allow you to set the keyboard shortcut to show or hide the Palette, program the Backspace key to take you back to the previous page and set list items to activate on a single click, among other things.MicrosoftThis article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/apps/microsoft-gets-its-own-spotlight-like-feature-with-the-command-palette-launcher-150006977.html?src=rss

Epic has filed a "second motion to enforce injunction," asking the US District Court for the Northern District of California to force Apple to do a timely review of its Fortnite app and to approve its submission if it's compliant. The company recently accused Apple of blocking Fortnite's return to the App Store in both the US and the EU. Epic submitted the app for approval after winning its case against the iPhone-maker. Specifically, after the court ordered Apple to stop collecting commissions on purchases that weren't paid through the App Store and to allow external payment links in-app.After Epic said that Apple was blocking Fortnite's return to the App Store, the tech giant wrote a letter addressed to the video game developer. In it, Apple said it will not take action on Epic's submission "until after the Ninth Circuit rules on [its] pending request for a partial stay of the new injunction." It told Epic to resubmit the app to the EU storefront separately from its US submission. Apple, of course, filed an appeal against the court's order to stop charging commissions for payments made outside the App Store. It also filed an emergency motion to put a pause on the order prohibiting it from charging commissions, telling the court that it will cost the company "substantial sums annually."In a post on X, Epic said that Apple's suggestion to submit two different versions of Fortnite for review is in violation of its own guideline that prohibits developers from submitting multiple versions of the same app. "That's not the standard Apple holds other developers to and it's blocking us from releasing our update in the EU and US," it wrote. Epic also asserted that its submission didn't break any rules this time. Apple's denial, the video game developer claimed in its filing, is a "blatant retaliation against Epic for challenging Apple's anticompetitive behavior and exposing its lies to the Court, culminating in the Injunction and the Contempt Order."

Two of the largest cable companies in the US are intent on merging. Charter Communications' proposed acquisition of Cox Communications - the largest division of Cox Enterprises - will value the former at over $34 billion inclusive of debt.In Cox Communications, the Cox family, which acquired its first cable business in 1962, already operates the largest private broadband company in America, supplying homes in more than 30 states, and it will be the majority shareholder in the acquisition with a stake of around 23 percent. In a press release, Charter said it will inherit Cox Communications' commercial fiber and managed IT and cloud businesses, while Cox Communications' residential cable business will move to Charter's Charter Holdings subsidiary."Cox and Charter have been innovators in connectivity and entertainment services - with decades of work and hundreds of billions of dollars invested to build, upgrade, and expand our complementary regional networks to provide high-quality internet, video, voice and mobile services," said Chris Winfrey, President and CEO of Charter. "This combination will augment our ability to innovate and provide high-quality, competitively priced products, delivered with outstanding customer service, to millions of homes and businesses."The new combined company will continue to operate its cable, broadband and mobile consumer businesses under Charter's Spectrum brand, and said it will offer existing customers the choice to stick with their current plans or pay less for new bundled services it intends to offer.Of course, such mega-mergers are rarely cut and dried. Rivals, like Comcast, might attempt to scuttle the deal, while government antitrust enforcers may also not allow the transaction to go through.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/cable-giants-cox-and-charter-agree-to-34-billion-merger-140652859.html?src=rss

Indie games! They're rad, aren't they? We're keeping closer tabs on what's going on in that scene with our new weekly roundup. We've got a jam-packed edition for you this time with a little something for everyone, from lo-fi horror and Eldritch terror to cosy train dioramas and a vaporwave driving game.Before we get started, a quick word on a recent game I enjoyed. Idle games aren't usually my kind of thing - I'd rather be actively doing things - but one I spotted on Itch.io offered some temporary respite from a virus I was dealing with. The DvD idle game from Cybo3D is all about watching a version of the classic DVD logo bouncing around your screen, buying upgrades and seeing numbers go up. Pleasantly relaxing stuff. I swear I even saw the logo go exactly into the corner a few times.New releasesThe Sinking City has a history that's even odder than some of the Eldritch horrors that lie within. Now, developer Frogwares has remastered its self-published detective thriller in Unreal Engine 5 for PC, PS5 and Xbox Series X/S. Existing owners get a free upgrade to The Sinking City Remastered, which Frogwares shadow dropped this week. Along with 4K textures, lighting upgrades and support for upscaling tech, there are quality-of-life enhancements, accessibility improvements and a photo mode.Free-to-play fantasy adventure life sim Palia (which is what you might get if you smushed together Animal Crossing and World of Warcraft) landed on PS5 and Xbox Series X/S this week. It's been out on PC and Switch since 2023. There's a new free expansion for all platforms too.If you've ever looked at a Grand Theft Auto game and been mildly interested before deciding a life of virtual crime is not for you, then The Precinct might be up your alley. In this action sandbox title from developer Fallen Tree Games and publisher Kwalee, you'll play as a rookie officer who tries to restore order in his city while trying to solve his father's murder. How very '80s!Reviews have been mixed, but the art style is compelling and the isometric perspective with twin-stick controls make for an intriguing wrinkle. The Precinct is out now on PS5, Xbox Series X/S and PC.UpcomingCopycat, the debut game from the small team at Spoonful of Wonder, is another strong entry in the cat game canon. You play as a kitty who an elderly lady adopts from a shelter. Needless to say, things don't entirely go smoothly.I enjoyed Copycat - which debuted on PC last year -and its short but affecting story. The game has already sold over 50,000 copies and it's now set to find a new audience. Copycat is coming to PS5 and Xbox Series X/S on May 29 for $15.Folks who like last year's very good and creepy walking sim Pools but yearn for more intensity from their liminal space horror might be interested in Backrooms Level X. This one is a mazy first-person survival game that has puzzles, "oppressive soundscapes" and things watching from the shadows. Backrooms Level X, from publisher Firenut Games and solo developer Jose Manuel Conesa Hernandez, will hit Steam on May 29 and consoles at a later date.Okay, maybe horror's not your thing. Totally understandable. Perhaps what you'd rather do is chill out and build little railway dioramas without being beholden to timers or rules.You can do just that in Islands & Trains, from developers Akos Makovics and Fabi Smith and publisher Future Friends Games. It's rolling onto Steam on May 29.It's probably a little (okay, a lot) because of the laidback synthwave tune that soundtracks the trailer, but I'm into the whole aesthetic of Adrift. This is a "chill, offroad driving game" and it's the first title from both car mechanic turned game developer Stefan Kwak and co-publisher Secret Sauce.Your goal is to transport a fragile energy core across an '80s-inspired, vaporwave landscape. Adrift is coming to Steam later this year and you can check out a demo now.How about another Steam demo? One just dropped for Flick Shot Roguesfrom three-person studio Butter by the Fish and publisher Noodlecake. Turn-based tactics games usually aren't my cup of tea, but the gameplay here reminds me a bit of Subpar Pool, a game I love very much.In this roguelike, you flick your character across the screen to damage opponents (or evade their attacks) and try to pull off combo moves. Getting the angles just right is as important as piecing together effective builds.I fired up the demo and suddenly 50 minutes had vanished as my first run ended. Yep, I'm liking what Flick Shot Rogues is putting down. I can see myself sinking dozens of hours into this one after it lands on Steam later this year.An open beta for Splitgate 2, the followup to the Portal-with-guns multiplayer arena shooter, starts on May 22. You'll be able to hop in on Steam, PS5 and Xbox Series X/S.A new trailer shows off the map creator tool, The Lab. You can build maps with up to 15 of your friends in real-time collaboration.I'm sure plenty of folks who are into miniature wargaming and other types of tabletop games have wondered what it might be like to run their own store that sells such wares. And hey, guess what? You'll be able to get a taste of that in Tabletop Game Shop Simfrom Knight Fever Games.You'll do everything from deciding on the layout and managing finances to hosting game nights and playing with customers. This one's coming to Steam in 2025.Let's close things out on another cozy note. We love a chill puzzle game around here and Umami might just fit the bill. The idea here is to fit wooden blocks together to create dioramas of food towers. This 3D puzzler from Mimmox will hit Steam later this year. A demo will be available during the Steam Next Fest in mid-June.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/remastered-eldritch-terror-a-fantasy-life-sim-and-other-new-indie-games-worth-checking-out-110015794.html?src=rss

The bright, glitched-out, typography-forward look of Bungie's upcoming extraction shooter Marathon is one of its defining features. As it turns out, it's also partially plagiarized, according to posts shared on the official Marathon X account. The announcement comes after artist Fern Hook, who goes by @4nt1r34l on X, initially accused Bungie of using in-game textures that looked similar to her original artwork on May 15."Bungie is of course not obligated to hire me when making a game that draws overwhelmingly from the same design language I have refined for the last decade," Hook wrote on X, "but clearly my work was good enough to pillage for ideas and plaster all over their game without pay or attribution."

The FTC just rested its case following weeks of testimony in a landmark antitrust case against Meta. But before Meta can begin its defense, the company's lawyers have opted for another move: asking the judge to throw out the case entirely.The company filed a motion on Thursday asking US District judge James Boasberg to toss out the FTC's case, arguing that the regulator has not proved that Meta acted anticompetitively. "Meta has made two promising mobile apps with uncertain prospect: two of the most successful apps in the world, enjoyed by approximately half of the planet's population (including hundreds of millions of U.S. consumers) on demand, in unlimited quantities, all for free," the filing says, "The FTC has not carried its burden to prove that Meta 'is currently violating the antitrust laws.'"The company's reasoning is similar to past arguments it's made about the FTC's case. Meta has said that Instagram and WhatsApp were able to grow to one-billion-user services because of the company's investments. The company also takes issue with the FTC's claim that there is a lack of competition for "personal social networking services." (The FTC has argued that Meta's only competitors for social networking are Snapchat and MeWe, a small privacy-focused social app that runs on decentralized protocols.)So far, the month-long trial has seen a number of prominent current and former Meta executives take the stand, including CEO Mark Zuckerberg, former COO Sheryl Sandberg and Instagram cofounder Kevin Systrom. Their testimony has revealed new details about the inner workings of the social media company and its tactics to stay ahead of potential competitors.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/meta-is-trying-to-get-its-antitrust-case-thrown-out-in-the-middle-of-the-trial-204656979.html?src=rss

There's a new way to screen for early detection of Alzheimer's disease. On Friday, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) cleared the first blood test for the disorder. Fujirebio Diagnostics' Lumipulse measures the ratio of two proteins that correlate with the presence or absence of Alzheimer's. Previously, patients being screened for Alzheimer's were limited to more invasive options: a PET Scan or spinal tap.Lumipulse is intended for use in clinical settings with patients exhibiting signs of cognitive decline. At least in its current form, it isn't something the general population can ask for as a standard screening.The test works by measuring two proteins: pTau217 and -amyloid 1-42. The blood test calculates their ratio, which correlates with the buildup of amyloid plaques in the brain. People with Alzheimer's have elevated pTau217 and lower -amyloid 1-42.In a clinical study, the test performed better with negative results than positive ones. As such, Reuters reports that the test will likely be used initially to rule out Alzheimer's. Over 97 percent of negative results corresponded with a negative PET scan or CSF test result. Results for positives were a bit lower: a 91.7 percent correlation. So, positive results will need to be confirmed with more advanced diagnostic tests.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/science/the-fda-clears-the-first-blood-test-for-diagnosing-alzheimers-disease-201209676.html?src=rss

Last August, my best friend asked me how she could help her neighbor set her iPhone so she could answer it without picking it up. The neighbor had Multiple Sclerosis (MS), and had lost dexterity in both hands over time. Some Google searches revealed I was far from alone in my confusion. So I asked Apple for some advice. Here's what I said:Q: My friend has advanced MS and has some (very little) control of one of her hands. She can't really swipe a screen or tap buttons. She wants it so that when she receives a call, she can just ask Siri or tell her iPhone to answer or reject it. But based on my research, the only way that's possible is if a user has AirPods or Apple Watch connected, so Siri can announce incoming calls and listen for commands like "Answer" or "Dismiss."I also looked in the accessibility settings for Voice Control and there's a way to answer all incoming calls after a set amount of time. But due to privacy concerns and spam calls, that's not an ideal solution.I was wondering if you knew any way for incoming calls to be answered with a voice command?"A: Apple did respond, but unfortunately the solution is... complicated. I'll lay out the steps on how to use your iPhone with Voice Control first, since that does provide a somewhat effective workaround. But you should read past the steps for some of the caveats.How to use Voice Control on iPhone to answer callsBefore we get started, make sure your phone is running iOS 13 or later. You can also use Voice Control on iPads or iPod Touch (if you still have one). When setting up Voice Control, make sure you're connected to the internet to download the necessary files, and Apple recommends you connect to Wi-Fi before you turn on Voice Control to use it for the first time. When all that is done, proceed with the following steps.

Whether you're jamming out at the beach, setting up a backyard movie night or just want some tunes while you work, a great portable Bluetooth speaker is a must-have. The best options today go beyond just playing music - they deliver punchy bass, crisp vocals and even customizable sound modes to match whatever you're listening to. Some models even pack extras like a built-in LED light for a cool light show, making them perfect for parties or late-night hangs.

Iconic video game maker Hideo Kojima has left behind a USB stick filled with game ideas in the case of his death, as indicated in an interview with Edge Magazine that VGC reported on. Kojima says it's "kind of like a will" and that he hopes that his staff will continue to make games after he passes.Don't worry. He isn't going anywhere anytime soon. This was spurred on by the pandemic. "Until then, I didn't think I was old, you know? I just didn't feel my age, and I assumed I would be able to create for as long as I live," he told the magazine. Kojima is 61 years old, which is a spring chicken when compared to luminaries like Shigeru Miyamoto (72) and Sid Meier (71.)

More original Switch games are getting the Switch 2 treatment. Although their enhancements are subtler than the Switch 2 editions of Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom, at least these will be free updates.On Friday, Nintendo detailed the legacy Switch titles that will receive upgrades for the Switch 2. They include some of the console's best games from the company's biggest franchises.Most of the platform's big Mario games are included: Super Mario Odyssey, Super Mario 3D World + Bowser's Fury and New Super Mario Bros. U Deluxe. You'll also find the platform's top-down Zelda titles: Echoes of Wisdom and Link's Awakening. A pair of Pokemon games makes the cut: Pokemon Scarlet and Pokemon Violet. Even Captain Toad's Treasure Tracker gets in on the action.The enhancements vary by title. They range from various visual upgrades to multiplayer GameShare functionality.Here's the complete list:

The FCC has announced its approval of the merger between communications giants Verizon and Frontier, after a deal was made last year. Verizon will acquire Frontier Communications for $9.6 billion in cash, in addition to absorbing $10 billion of debt.Key to earning approval from the FCC was Verizon's commitment to ending all DEI-related practices, in line with the Trump administration's aim to dismantle all diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives from both public organizations and private companies.The statement from the FCC said the approval "ensures that discriminatory DEI policies end," and that Verizon "has reaffirmed the merged entity's commitment to equal opportunity and nondiscrimination.""By approving this deal, the FCC ensures that Americans will benefit from a series of good and commonsense wins. The transaction will unleash billions of dollars in new infrastructure builds in communities across the country-including rural America. This investment will accelerate the transition away from old, copper line networks to modern, high-speed ones. And it delivers for America's tower and telecom crews who do the hard, often gritty work needed to build high-speed networks," said Brendan Carr, FCC chairman.Verizon plans to upgrade and expand Frontier's existing network across 25 states and expects to deploy fiber to more than one million American homes annually.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/fcc-approves-verizons-20-billion-merger-with-frontier-181434890.html?src=rss

After claiming that Apple was blocking Epic from offering Fortnite in both the US App Store and the Epic Games Store in the European Union, Apple now says it wasn't, according to a report from Bloomberg.A spokesperson told Bloomberg that Apple "did not take any action to remove the live version of Fortnite from alternative distribution marketplaces," and that the company wants Epic's European branch to resubmit the latest gameupdate for publishing, "without including the US storefront of the App Store so as not to impact Fortnite in other geographies."

The European Commission (EC) has been firing on all cylinders in holding big tech to account through various fines and enforcement actions, attempting to create a more competitive landscape in a space that has become increasingly monopolized.Microsoft has been in a years-long dispute with the EC, which opened an antitrust probe in 2023 after Slack filed a complaint in 2020 alleging that Microsoft's bundling of Teams and Microsoft 365 was anticompetitive.The company unbundled the two products in the EU shortly thereafter in a bid to avoid antitrust fines, but it wasn't enough to appease the EC. In 2024, the Commission found that Microsoft did not go far enough and was still in violation of antitrust laws, risking massive fines.This week, Microsoft responded with a more robust set of commitments. Its productivity software suites will continue to be offered without Teams in the European Economic Area (EEA) for at least seven years. Minimum price deltas will be set between versions of the suites that include Teams and those which do not.Microsoft has also offered to align these options and pricing structures for its suites and Teams globally should the EC accept its proposal. Interoperability enhancements that make it easier to use third-party competitors to Teams were also included in the proposal."The proposed commitments are the result of constructive, good-faith discussions with the European Commission over several months. We believe that they represent a clear and complete resolution to the concerns raised by our competitors and will provide European customers with more choices," said Nanna-Louise Linde, Microsoft's VP of European Government Affairs.The EC has begun an open feedback period, seeking comments from competitors and citizens on whether the proposed commitments by Microsoft are adequate and place the company back within the bounds of the EU's antitrust regulations.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/microsoft-attemps-to-avoid-eu-fines-by-further-decoupling-teams-and-office-170519085.html?src=rss

Third-party support was a big theme of the Switch 2 reveal earlier this year, with many publishers seemingly keen to capitalize on both the popularity of the outgoing Switch and the significantly increased horsepower of its imminent successor. And if you're looking to get third-party games on your new system, they don't come much much bigger than Red Dead Redemption 2, which could be making its way to Nintendo's new console later this year.Gamereactor says it has heard from sources close to Rockstar (which it then corroborated with other sources) that the enormous open-world Western that first released in 2018 is bound for Switch 2, and could arrive either at the same time, or after, a long-rumored next-gen update for the PS5 and Xbox Series X. Red Dead Redemption 2 is of course currently playable on both of those platforms, but unlike GTA 5, it's never been patched to support the higher frame rates and fidelity afforded by the newer hardware.This should by no means be taken as an official announcement, but Rockstar has supported the current Switch pretty well throughout its life cycle, releasing ports of L.A. Noire, the original 3D Grand Theft Auto trilogy, and most recently the first Red Dead Redemption. If the Switch 2 can run its sequel, it's a pretty safe bet to assume that Rockstar would want to do it, and the console is likely to be roughly equivalent in power to the base model PS4, according to Digital Foundry. It goes without saying that we'll know a lot more about how the Switch 2 performs when the console is in the wild and put through its paces.Both a Nintendo Switch 2 port and current-gen patch for Red Dead Redemption 2 would be a good way for Rockstar to bridge the gap between now and the release of GTA 6, which was recently delayed until May 2026. With a 97 percent score on Metacritic, RDR2 is one of the developer's most acclaimed titles to date, and you can be sure that a lot of people would happily hop back into the cowboy boots of Arthur Morgan while they wait to return to Vice City.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/red-dead-redemption-2-could-be-coming-to-switch-2-this-year-161043422.html?src=rss

In February, Sigma announced the Sigma BF. It's a full-frame, interchangeable lens camera with just a shutter release, a dial and three buttons. That minimalism speaks to me, and I felt the BF was potentially transformative. Photography is one of my favorite hobbies, and I've always felt modern cameras are too complicated. When I received a unit of the Sigma BF to test, I wanted to love it. Unfortunately, it might be too simple.It all starts with the design. The Sigma BF is one of the industry's few unibody cameras. It's carved from a single slab of aluminum, a process Sigma says takes seven hours to complete. The result is a camera unlike any I've used before, with build quality that surpasses either of my current Fujifilm models, the X-E3 and X-S20. Now, I know what you're thinking: The BF looks like an ergonomic nightmare. Surprisingly, it's not too bad, thanks to the inclusion of two beveled edges where your hands meet the bottom of the camera body.Igor Bonifacic for EngadgetStill, it's missing a few features that would have made it more comfortable to use, likely due to the limitations of its unibody design. For one, a proper grip would have been nice, especially when you're using a heavy 50mm lens like the one Sigma sent me for testing. The BF is also missing a hot shoe mount, so third-party thumb grips are off the table. Most annoying of all, it only has a single strap eyelet, so if you don't want to use a neck strap, you'll need one that attaches to the camera's tripod mount. I don't own one of those, so I had to carry around the $2,000 BF in my hand the entire time I was using it. You can imagine how that felt.The BF offers a very different shooting experience from your typical digital camera. As I mentioned, it has only a shutter release, a single dial and three buttons (one for powering the camera on and off, one for reviewing your photos and footage and one for accessing the overflow menu). There's also a touchscreen, but you wouldn't know it at first, because other than when selecting a focus point and toggling some options, you won't be using it much while shooting.The BF's one dial is the primary way to interact with the camera. To adjust your exposure, you first press left or right on the dial to cycle to a specific setting, and then spin it to tweak the levels as desired. A second smaller screen above the dial allows you to adjust those parameters without interacting with the main display.Igor Bonifacic for EngadgetAlternatively, you can press down on the center of the dial to open the BF's "dual layer" menu system. As the name suggests, Sigma has organized most of what you might need across two levels of menus. For example, say you want to switch the camera from matrix to spot metering. That involves pressing down on the dial, scrolling over to one of the exposure settings, tapping the center of the dial again, and then using your thumb to press the touchscreen and enable spot metering. Accessing most of the settings you'll need won't be as tedious, but this worst case scenario demonstrates where the experience of shooting with the Sigma BF falls short.The BF isn't great for capturing fleeting moments. In ditching most of the physical controls modern cameras are known for, the Sigma BF makes it difficult to change multiple settings simultaneously. I was most annoyed by the BF whenever I wanted to shoot a fast-moving scene.On one of my photo walks with the Sigma BF, I saw a father riding a bike with his son in the seat behind him. With my X-E3 or nearly any other camera, capturing that moment would have been simple. I could have changed the drive mode, focus system and shutter speed independently of one another. On the BF, I had to adjust each setting consecutively. By the time I was done, the father and son were long gone.Some of the BF's shortcomings could be addressed if Sigma at least allowed you to edit the quick settings screen to show fewer options. I don't need easy access to change things like the aspect ratio, for example. In 2025, every new camera ships with an overly bloated menu system, and in that regard the Sigma BF is a breath of fresh air. However, allowing the user to make their own tweaks would have made for a much better experience.And that's the thing: With the BF, Sigma breaks camera interface conventions that are conventions for good reason. Let me give you one of the more frustrating examples: The camera inexplicably doesn't offer an easy way to measure the exposure of a scene. There was no meter to indicate whether I was about to under- or overexpose a shot, and I couldn't add one to the main screen.Igor Bonifacic for EngadgetThe only way I could see a histogram, my preferred method for nailing exposure, was to access the second layer of the interface from one of the capture settings. This is an especially confounding decision because you can half press the shutter to make quick exposure compensation adjustments with the control dial, but as soon as you do, the BF jumps out of whatever menu you were looking at. If digging through menus isn't your thing, there are two live view overlays you can enable to see if you've clipped your shadows or highlights. The first is your usual zebra pattern. The second, which Sigma calls False Color, turns most of the screen grayscale and uses warning colors. Neither felt as precise as a proper exposure meter or histogram.On paper, the BF is a decent camera for video, with support for 6K recording, HEVC encoding and L-Log. Unfortunately, the BF's minimalism is a weakness here too. To start, framing a shot is a challenge since the camera has a fixed screen. Getting usable footage is also tricky. The BF doesn't offer in-body image stabilization, and while there are a few L-mount lenses with built-in stabilization, most wouldn't be practical to use with the BF due to their size and weight.Igor Bonifacic for EngadgetIf you've gotten this far, you're probably wondering if I have something positive to say about the BF. Well, the best thing about the camera is that it takes genuinely great photos, which is what makes all its shortcomings all the more frustrating. The 24-megapixel, backside illuminated sensor and Sigma's lenses capture and render detail beautifully without being clinical. The BF also has great subject detection autofocus that makes shooting portraits of people and pets easy.The Sigma BF has some interesting ideas about what a camera can look like in 2025, but those ideas are often marred by poor execution. As a first stab at a minimalist camera, the BF has enough going for it, and with refinement, I could see future versions evolving into something special. For example, I'd love to see Sigma find a way to include a flip-out screen in the BF's unibody frame. Until then, $2,000 is a lot to ask for a camera that could be so much more.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/cameras/sigma-bf-hands-on-minimal-to-a-fault-144024445.html?src=rss

For Paul and Chris Weirtz, Murderbot - the upcoming TV adaptation of Martha Wells' sci-fi novella All Systems Red - was an experiment: Can you have a hero who tries to do nothing?The 10-episode sci-fi series, whichdebuts May 16 on Apple TV+,follows an anxious security robot (Alexander Skarsgard) assigned to protect a survey group on a planetary mission. As the mission progresses and deadly surprises emerge, Murderbot grapples with concealing its capacity for free will - an ability enabled when it hacked its governor module - and its insecurities around humans, all while navigating existential questions about its purpose in the universe. Above all, though, Murderbot wishes it could spend its days simply viewing the 7,532 hours of video content it secretly squirreled away in its system for entertainment - a true media junkie, like most of the show's viewers.AppleBringing All Systems Red to TV took years, delayed by the COVID-19 pandemic and the Writers Guild of America strike in 2023. But with support from Apple TV+'s head of worldwide video Jamie Erlicht, a fan of Wells' work, Paul and Chris chipped away at the show's scripts, sending every version to Wells for feedback. (Wells, as a consulting producer, ultimately weighed in on other aspects of the project, including design and casting.)The seriesstays faithful to All Systems Red - the first of several books and short stories comprising The Murderbot Diaries - in most of the ways that count. The plot largely follows that of the novella, but also makes substantial additions. Members of the PresAux survey group which Murderbot protects, including Dr. Mensah (Noma Dumezweni), Gurathin (David Dastmalchian), Pin-lee (Sabrina Wu), Ratthi (Akshay Khanna), Arada (Tattiawna Jones) and Bharadwaj (Tamara Pdoemski), now have more nuance and deeper backstories.The Preservation Alliance, an independent group of planets which the PresAux survey group hails from, is now eccentric, even downright bohemian. During Murderbot's season premiere, PresAux holds hands in a meditative circle, eyes closed, deliberating over whether to rent the refurbished Murderbot for their mission. Soon after landing on the planet, they dance in the desert, their bodies heaving, arms waving to the music's beat - little touches inspired by aspects of Chris's two decades of experience with Burning Man. (Several members of the mission also find themselves navigating the particular dramas of polyamory.)We also wanted a sense of these people being out of their element and out of their social setting," Chris told Engadget. They're in the corporation rim, which is a really brutal, extractive capitalist world, but these people are egalitarians from outside of that system. They are [seen as] freaks not just to Murderbot, but to the corporation flunkies who are upselling them."While Murderbot's favorite TV series, The Rise & Fall of Sanctuary Moon, is referenced in Wells' novel, in Murderbot, the futuristic soap opera is its own fleshed out universe - a bonafide show-within-a-show. Intended as a parody of classic sci-fi, most obviously the original Star Trek series, Sanctuary Moon's scenes are rife with heavily saturated sets and gaudy costumes. John Cho, as the captain of a starship, falls madly in love with a navigation systems robot (DeWanda Wise); Jack McBrayer portrays a navigation officer out of his depth. Their performances are comically over-the-top, but that's the point.I have a theory that people think of good acting as being very restrained, and that is the case often, but my theory is that humans are emoting maniacs all the time. They're hamming it up in front of the mirror, in their bathroom," Paul said. There was something great about being able to enter a David Lynch-like telenovela world and do the sci-fi version of those things."Casting the droll but irreverent character of Murderbot took time. Part-human, it experiences a full range of emotions but struggles with deep-seated social anxiety, and detests showing its face to humans - which may help explain why the character has become popular with members of the neurodivergent community. Skarsgard, whose diverse acting resume includes a Viking prince in The Northman, a ruthless tech CEO in Succession, the titular character in The Legend of Tarzan and a physically abusive husband on Big Little Lies, had traits and experiences Paul and Chris felt were essential for effectively playing the show's central character.As one might expect for a security robot, Paul Weisz noted Skarsgard is "physically imposing." "You get the sense maybe he could kill somebody," said Paul. But much like the titular character Paul felt this sometimes terrifying exterior belied something much more nuanced. "Alexander also has a really quirky sense of humor. His mind is very different from his body. He's really unique."Bringing in Cho and McBrayer for their roles in the Sanctuary Moon scenes wasn't nearly as intensive a search; Cho and the Weitz brothers had worked on several projects together over the years.It's like a Faustian bargain when you work with us once, that we're probably going to get your home cellphone," Paul mused. Jack McBrayer is best friends with Alexander, so that was the route to [him]. In terms of John, we worked with him first on American Pie, and I think we've done 12 things in different ways with him over the years. So it's a little like The Godfather where it's like, someday, I'm going to ask you for a favor."AppleFilmed in Ontario, production started in 2024, lasting six months. Shooting the show's planetary scenes meant scouring for locations like mining quarries, slag heaps and abandoned factories. Interior shots for scenes at Port Freecommerce, a vast star base, in the season premiere were filmed on soundstages in Toronto.All along, Paul and Chris set out to present a far-flung universe seen less often on screen in recent years. Shirking the dark, grim aesthetic heavily favored in many more recent sci-fi TV and film projects, they worked with production designer Sue Chan to create a universe dominated by bright lighting, white and gray sets, light-colored fabrics and colorful patterns.We drew on the wellspring of science fiction we read when we were kids and on science fiction paperback covers of the 1980s, which always seemed to have such great concept design and a bright, interesting world in which to lose yourself," Paul recalled. Specifically, it seemed like since this was a world that was dominated by corporations, there'd be a lot of logos everywhere. There'd be a cheapness to a lot of what was manufactured. Also, if you look around, there are a lot of things that seem to have been extruded by giant 3-D printers. Even the food is extruded by 3-D printers."Designing Murderbot's armor was a collaborative process with the costume department, led by costume designer Carrie Grace and specialty costume designer Laura Jean Shannon. To start, they looked at helmets from virtually every well-known robot depicted in military and sci-fi movies from the last 50 years. Initial designs resembled Star Wars stormtroopers, but Skarsgard really pushed" for the robot's look to be something unique," according to Paul. Drawing inspiration from The Little Rascals' Petey, who had a large black circle around one of his eyes, the team built a large, distinctive black eye piece into Murderbot's helmet visor.AppleMurderbot spends much of its time clad in armor, but it also has downtime when the armor comes off, revealing an impossibly smooth humanoid form resembling Mattel's Ken dolls. To achieve that look, Skarsgard regularly waxed his entire body during filming.Alexander actually volunteered to have his body waxed, because he thought it was what would be best for the character," Chris recalled. I remember discussing it with him, and I said, Listen, man, I don't know if people are even going to notice, but it might make just a tiny bit of difference in terms of the believability of the character.'"[Alexander's] like, Yeah, I should wax myself,'" Chris continued. Then for the next five, six months, he had to do that every week until he realized eventually that his next role was to play a hairy biker [in the romance drama Pillion]."In Murderbot, Paul and Chris saw more than a quirky sci-fi novella - they saw a deeply human story wrapped in armor and deadpan humor. Their TV adaptation doesn't just bring Wells' world to screen with panache, it leans into the quiet radicalism of a character who resists heroism, craves isolation and struggles to navigate the messiness of human connection.That emotional core - unexpected, thoughtful, and entirely sincere - is what makes Murderbot more than just another sci-fi romp. It's a mirror for our most vulnerable selves, disguised as a robot who'd really rather be watching TV.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/entertainment/tv-movies/how-murderbots-chris-and-paul-weitz-adapted-all-systems-red-for-tv-130034113.html?src=rss

After winning a court case pretty decisively against Apple, developer Epic submitted Fortnite to the US App Store and suggested it would soon be back on iOS. However, according to the Fortnite team, Apple has blocked the game on both the US App Store and the EU's iOS version of its own Epic Games Store.Fortnite had been available on iPhones in Europe since August last year due to EU rules that allow third-party iOS stores.Epic CEO Tim Sweeney suggested that Apple didn't have any particular reason to refuse the application. "Apple's App Review team should be free to review all submitted apps promptly and accept or reject according to the plain language of their guidelines," he tweeted. "App Review shouldn't be weaponized by senior management as a tool to delay or obstruct competition, due process, or free speech." Apple has yet to comment on the matter.To recap: this entire kerfuffle between Apple and Epic has been over, essentially, rent-seeking, and who gets to profit from it. Apple thinks it should keep getting a cut of sales through its App Store; Epic, naturally, would like to keep lining its own pockets. This fight initially opened up the option for developers to use third-party app stores for iOS apps, though a portion of their sales were still flowing back to Apple's coffers. The most recent court ruling attempted to close that apparent loophole.The latest Fortnite version submitted by Epic included payment systems for Apple along with external payment via Epic's own store. Fortnite was originally banned from the App Store in 2020 after it submitted a version that included an external payment system that violated Apple's rules at the time - a decision subsequently backed by a court decision in 2021. To that end, Apple may not be legally obligated to reinstate Epic, despite the fact that the rule originally broken by the developer no longer existed.This fight is, of course, ongoing. Apple appealed the most recent ruling and asked the court to halt App Store changes until a final decision is made.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/fortnite-is-offline-on-ios-around-the-world-131535163.html?src=rss

Acer has unveiled a group of new gaming monitors, including a pair of 26.5-inch QD-OLED screens under its Predator label. The Predator X27U F5 has peak refresh rate of 500Hz and a resolution of 2560x1440, while the Predator X27 X has a 4K screen and a 240Hz refresh rate. Both monitors offer AMD FreeSync Premium Pro technology to prevent screen tearing and support true 10Bit color. They are slated to be available in the third quarter for the EMEA region and China. The X27U F5 will start at 899 and the X27 X starts at 1,099.The high refresh rate on the Predator X27U F5 is particularly notable. Samsung just opened limited pre-orders of its own 500Hz monitor over the weekend, which the company claimed was the first product to pair that refresh rate with OLED visuals in a gaming monitor.Other Acer monitors in the lineup are part of its line of Nitro Google Smart TV monitors. The Acer Nitro GA321QK P is a 31.5-inch 4K screen with a 165Hz refresh rate, while the Acer Nitro GA341CUR W0 has a 34-inchultra-wide QHD curved display that refreshes at 240Hz. There's also a portable option in the lightweight Acer Nitro PG271K, which has an adjustable kickstand. This 27-inch monitor can be a 4K display with a 72Hz refresh rate or a full HD one with a 144Hz refresh rate thanks to Dynamic Frequency and Resolution technology. No prices or timeline has been shared yet for the first two Nitro monitors, but the PG271K is projected to cost 499 when it arrives in the EMEA region.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/computing/accessories/acer-introduces-five-new-gaming-monitors-130041537.html?src=rss

Summer is right around the corner, and while it is the perfect season for being outside in the sunshine, there's nothing quite like returning home to a perfectly climate controlled space to cool off. The fourth generation Nest Learning Thermostat from Google can help you beat the heat with even more efficient air conditioning, and it's on sale right now ahead of the Memorial Day holiday. You can snag this smart home gadget for $50 off with the code ENGAD50 at Wellbots. That means you'll pay just $230 for this tool to control the temperature in your house, because the deal also includes free shipping. Google did an update to its Nest thermostat last August that increased the LCD display size of the gadget by about 60 percent. You can also customize the display with this version so that it will blend in with your own home decor, and the chassis is available in black, silver or gold options. As with so many Google products these days, the Nest uses AI to help take more accurate readings and make predictions to increase your energy savings. It can automatically adjust to your individual habits to create a temperature schedule if you don't want to program it all manually. This version of the gadget is a particularly good option if your home has issues with cold spots, because the Nest Learning Thermostat comes with a wireless temperature sensor that you can place in that hard-to-heat area. If you need more, you can separately buy additional sensors for monitoring those hot or cold pockets of your house. Follow @EngadgetDeals on X for the latest tech deals and buying advice.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/deals/googles-latest-nest-learning-thermostat-is-50-off-ahead-of-memorial-day-130027461.html?src=rss

Acer is updating its lineup of Swift Edge, Go and X laptops at Computex with the latest Intel chips, and in of one of these Copilot+ PCs, a unique matte display treatment developed by Corning, the glass manufacturer behind the Gorilla Glass covering millions of smartphones.The beneficiary of that new display is the Swift Edge 14 AI. The laptop's display has an anti-glare Gorilla Matte Pro finish that's the first of its kind on a laptop, and is supposed to "reduce screen reflection by 95 percent" compared to alternative anti-glare glass. Acer introduced the original Swift Edge 14 AI alongside the parade of Copilot+ PCs that accompanied Microsoft's big push into AI last year. The new Swift Edge 14 AI benefits from those same AI features like Recall or Click to Do thanks to its updated internals. You can spec the Swift Edge 14 AI with up to an Intel Core Ultra 9 processor with Intel Arc graphics, up to 32GB LPDDR5X RAM and up to 1TB of storage. All of this components are packed into a white and relatively light (2.18 lbs) magnesium-aluminum alloy body, with a 14-inch OLED screen and a "soft-touch" stain-resistant keyboard.For the new Swift Go 14 AI and Swift Go 16 AI, Acer lets you build the laptop with up to an Intel Core Ultra 7, up to 32 GBLPDDR5X RAM and up to 2TB of storage. On the Swift Go 14 AI you can opt for a 16:10, 1,920 x 1,200 resolution OLED and a similarly laid out 2,048 x 1,280 resolution OLED on the Swift Go 16 AI. Neither laptop is as sleek as the Swift Edge 14 AI - in terms of appearance, the Swift Go laptops seem like the kind you'd be assigned for work. Case in point, both Go models have 1080p, Windows Hello-compatible webcams and touchpads with built-in video conferencing controls.Acer is also updating its Swift X laptops, the company's go-to option if you're looking for more graphical oomph. Both the Swift X 14 AI and the plain Swift X 14 include a NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 laptop GPU, which should power you through all sort of video editing and 3D rendering tasks. You can pair the GPU with up to an AMD Ryzen AI 9 on the Swift X 14 AI or up to an Intel Core Ultra 9 on on the Swift X 14. Both laptops can include up to 32GB of LPDDR5X RAM and up to 2TB of storage. This year's Swift laptops also feature a 14.5-inch 3K OLED displays and larger haptic touchpads that support tilt-enabled styluses for drawing and photo retouching.Likely due to the unpredictable nature of global trade, none of Acer's new Swift laptops have finalized pricing or availability in the US, though we can share the info Acer has for Europe. The Swift Edge 14 AI is expected to be available in June for 1,599, the Swift Go 14 AI a little bit later in July for 1,199 and the Swift Go 16 AI in August for 1,299.The story is the same for Acer's Swift X laptops. Both the Swift X 14 AI and Swift X 14 will be available in July for 1,799.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/computing/laptops/acers-new-swift-edge-14-ai-laptop-packs-in-a-matte-display-and-ai-features-130010112.html?src=rss

Acer is announcing a boatload of PCs and gadgets for Computex 2025. But among the sea of new tablets, monitors, productivity machines and more is the Predator Triton 14 AI, which just became my most anticipated laptop of the year.The Predator Triton 14 AI tops out with an RTX 5070 GPU, but that's understandable given its compact size (3.5 pounds and 0.68 inches thick). Aside from that limitation, this thing has practically everything I look for in a premium notebook. It sports a slick design, a bunch of fancy features and a gorgeous display - all in a surprisingly portable chassis. In some ways, calling it a gaming laptop is kind of a disservice, because it's clear Acer designed this thing to do a whole lot more.Sam Rutherford for EngadgetFor performance, the Predator Triton 14 AI features up to an Intel Core Ultra 9 288V chip, 32GB of RAM and 2TB of SSD storage. Acer then turned things up a notch by equipping it with its latest sixth-gen AeroBlade fans (which are made of metal instead of plastic) and a vapor chamber. But the potential cherry on top is that Acer says the Triton is the world's first laptop to use graphene thermal interface materials. The company claims this increases thermal capacity by as much as 14.5 percent over more traditional pastes.Meanwhile, the Triton 14 AI also comes with a 2,880 x 1,800 OLED display with a 120Hz refresh rate and Calman Verified certification. So not only is it accurate, it also has a wide gamut that covers 100 percent of the DCI-P3 color spectrum. And unlike a lot of rival gaming machines, the Predator's display is touch-enabled. For content creators, the laptop comes with a new haptic touchpad covered by Gorilla Glass with native stylus support (and the pen comes included). This means artists can use the track area as a mini Wacom pad (with 4,096 levels of pressure sensitivity) while traveling.Sam Rutherford for EngadgetHonestly, the closer you look, the more impressive this laptop gets, because it feels like Acer paid attention to every little detail. Thanks to some help from AI, the Triton's 1080p IR webcam offers human presence detection, which allows it to automatically lock itself when you walk away or dim the display when you're looking elsewhere to prevent Peeping Toms from spying on your work. Acer even coated both the screen and the laptop's deck with an anti-fingerprint finish to prevent it from looking greasy.Despite its slim dimensions, the Triton also has great connectivity. There's support for Wi-Fi 7 along with two USB-C ports (one of which is Thunderbolt 4), two Type-A jacks, 3.5mm audio, a microSD card reader and a full-size HDMI 2.1 connector. And because it's a gaming laptop, it naturally comes with per-key RGB lighting.Sam Rutherford for EngadgetUnfortunately, Acer has yet to release official US pricing for the Predator Triton 14 AI, which is almost certainly due to the ever-shifting tariff situation. But if European info is anything to go by, this thing won't be cheap with a listed starting price of 2,999 euros. That's steep, but it makes sense given the laptop's impressive specs.On the bright side, if you like the Predator Triton 14 AI, Acer is also making a more affordable sibling in the Predator Helios Neo 14 AI. It features the same display, a similar Intel Core Ultra 9 285H chip and up to an RTX 5070, but with a different (and less elegant) chassis, Wi-Fi 6E and older fifth-gen AeroBlade fans. Like the Triton, there isn't official pricing for this one yet either, but with it starting at 1,699 euros overseas, it doesn't present nearly as big of a hit on your wallet.The biggest change for the Helios Neo 14 AI compared to the Predator Triton 14 AI aside from price is that it has a bulkier chassis with a large thermal shelf in back.Sam Rutherford for EngadgetBesides gaming, the Triton 14 AI looks like it could be a great video editing station, featuring enough performance to blast through practically everything else you can throw at it. I'm going to be eagerly awaiting its release (along with the Helios Neo) sometime later this summer.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/computing/laptops/the-acer-predator-triton-14-ai-is-now-my-most-anticipated-gaming-laptop-of-the-year-130007910.html?src=rss

When it comes to headphones, we can't shut up about Sony's top-tier buds and over-the-head options. In each iteration, the company adds new features, develops better technology and hones its strengths in portable audio, and three years on from the WH-1000XM5, the sixth-gen model does it yet again.Sony's overhauled its flagship headphones in all the right ways. The WH-1000XM6 sound better, with improved active noise cancellation and convenient features that match the best-sounding and the most feature-packed rivals.You should definitely check out Billy Steele's full review. The headphones' only major challenge remains a non-clunky naming convention.- Mat SmithGet Engadget's newsletter delivered direct to your inbox. Subscribe right here!Even more tech news you might have missed

In the early hours of May 14, xAI's chatbot Grok repeatedly gave X users responses that referred to claims about a "white genocide" in South Africa even if their inquiries had nothing to do about the subject. Now, in a statement posted on the social network, Elon Musk's AI company has explained that "an unauthorized modification" to Grok's prompt on X caused it to "provide a specific response on a political topic." It didn't say what had happened to the personnel involved in rolling out the rogue update. But it added that the modification violated its "internal policies and core values" and that it has conducted a thorough investigation about the incident.The website's various users had posted several instances wherein Grok included references to the controversial claims that white South African farmers are facing racial discrimination and land seizures in their country. Their questions? Well, in one tweet, someone asked how many times HBO has changed its streaming service's name. In another, the user asked a baseball player's salary history. In yet another one, someone asked for more information about a WWE match. CNBC was able to replicate the chatbot's responses with white genocide references. When the news website asked if it was specifically programmed to promote "white genocide," Grok said that it wasn't and that its "purpose is to provide factual, helpful, and safe responses based on reason and evidence."Before xAI issued a response, OpenAI chief Sam Altman posted a snarky response on X. "I'm sure xAI will provide a full and transparent explanation soon," he wrote, and then mimicked Grok's responses by segueing into talking about white genocide. xAI said that from now on, it will be publishing its system prompts on GitHub so that the public can give feedback on every alteration. The company also said that it will put additional checks and measures to ensure xAI employees can't modify Grok's prompt without a review. Whoever edited it recently was able to circumvent its current review process in this case. In addition, the company said it's putting together a team that can monitor incidents related to Grok's answers not caught by automated systems 24/7.As TechCrunch has noted, this isn't the first time xAI had blamed a contentious Grok behavior to an unauthorized change. Back in February, the chatbot briefly censored sources that talked about how Musk and President Donald Trump are spreading misinformation. xAI co-founder Igor Babuschkin said at the time that a rogue employee had pushed an unapproved modification to Grok's prompt.

It looks like we're entering the era of crazy-thin phones. This week, Samsung finally announced the Galaxy S25 Edge, its slimmest smartphone yet. Is there actually a point to it, or is Samsung just trying to beat Apple to its rumored super-thin iPhone? Engadget's Sam Rutherford joins us to dive into the S25 Edge, as well as some pre-Google I/O news from the Android Show.Subscribe!