The Verge

Image: David Pierce / The Verge Hi, friends! Welcome to Installer No. 61, your guide to the best and Verge-iest stuff in the world. (If you're new here, welcome, happy Hallmark season, and also you can read all the old editions at the Installer homepage.)I missed you all last week - thanks to everyone who told me you missed Installer, too! Warms my heart, and also makes me feel terrible for not being there, but mostly warms my heart. Let's get back at it. This week, I've been reading about venom and deadly car races and hockey phenoms, setting up the new Mac Mini I finally caved and bought, watching The Day of the Jackal (which is spectacular) and Wolfs (which is fine), devouring the Dark Matter and Say Nothing books before I watch the shows, seeing if Google's... Continue reading...

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Microsoft has stopped offering updates to Windows 11 version 24H2 on PCs that have certain Ubisoft games installed, Bleeping Computer reports. The company made the move after complaints that Star Wars Outlaws and games in the Assassin's Creed series were crashing after installing the new Windows update.Microsoft confirmed the compatibility hold" in a status update yesterday evening, and says it's working with Ubisoft to find a fix. In the meantime, the company recommends against installing the Windows 11 24H2 update manually.Here is Microsoft's description of the issue and games affected:

Illustration by Lille Allen / The Verge Elon Musk is, in addition to many other things, now the co-lead of the currently nonexistent Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) advisory group. Now, before it even gets rolling, he has begun singling out individual government employees he says are emblematic of the government's bloat and posting about them to his hundreds of millions of followers on X.Earlier this week, as first reported by The Wall Street Journal, the X user datahazard" shared a screenshot on X highlighting the role of Ashley Thomas, the Director of Climate Diversification at the US International Development Finance Corporation, saying, I don't think the US Taxpayer should pay for the employment" of that role. Musk reposted it, adding the comment so many... Continue reading...

Illustration by Cath Virginia / The Verge | Photos via Getty Images The Supreme Court agreed to hear arguments on a case involving funding for a major broadband subsidy program, the Universal Service Fund (USF).SCOTUS granted cert in a pair of cases called Federal Communications Commission v. Consumers' Research, and Schools, Health & Libraries Broadband Coalition v. Consumers' Research, which were consolidated for oral arguments. They center around whether Congress inappropriately delegated lawmaking function to the FCC by letting it set contribution rates for telecommunications companies to pay into the nonprofit Universal Service Administration Company, which manages the USF. It also asks whether the FCC delegated too much authority to a private entity by letting USAC manage the subsidy program.The... Continue reading...

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge DirecTV has dropped its plans to acquire Dish, the company announced Thursday. The deal would've created a TV service megamerger, but it fell through after Dish bondholders rejected the takeover.In September, DirecTV reached an agreement to acquire Dish, Sling TV, and EchoStar's TV business for just one dollar, while also taking on Dish's $9.75 billion in debt. However, Dish bondholders - or the investors who lend money to a company (and expect to be paid back) - weren't happy about the decision, as the transaction would've cut the value of their holdings by $1.5 billion.While we believed a combination of DIRECTV and DISH would have benefitted all stakeholders, we have terminated the transaction because the proposed Exchange Terms... Continue reading...

The Spectra smartwatch is now available for preorder through a Kickstarter crowdfunding campaign. | Image: Pocuter The Spectra is a new smartwatch designed from the ground up to be hackable and easy to repair. It was created by Pocuter, a company that has spent the last few years honing an expertise in building small electronics like its tiny Pocuter One computer. What makes the Spectra unique is that it's repairable, yet with a design that mirrors the Apple Watch which is much harder to get into.The wearable is now available for preorder through a Kickstarter crowdfunding campaign with delivery expected as early as July 2025. Early backers can preorder one discounted to around $209, while full pricing is closer to around $272. The Spectra is the company's seventh Kickstarter campaign, but also appears to be one of its most ambitious. Three years... Continue reading...

Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge Sling TV is increasing its monthly subscription prices by $5.99 for all of its plans starting in December. The streaming TV provider said rising costs" are to blame for the price hikes without specifying why - presumably, not all six of those bucks are intended to pay for its arcade" library of interactive games that just added Pac-Man and Trivia Crack.There are two packages: Sling Orange, which includes Disney and ESPN networks, and Sling Blue, which includes Fox and NBC programming that previously cost $40 per month, individually. Now, they will cost $45.99 per month. There's also the combo Sling Orange plus Blue, which offers a mix of both packages for $55 per month - but will go up to $61. Current subscribers will see the price... Continue reading...

Strava is the de facto fitness data middleman. | Photo by Victoria Song / The Verge A few days ago, Strava upset its users over some restrictive API changes. It might seem odd for one app's users to fume over an API, but at the heart of the matter is the inherent messiness of fitness data.Here's a typical scenario. Say you're all in on Garmin's platform. You use their watches for running and strength training. Then, you pick up a Peloton bike for indoor cycling. Well, Garmin devices aren't compatible with Peloton bikes because the two companies haven't struck a direct deal with one another for data sharing. So, to get your heart rate on the Peloton bike, you buy a chest strap. And then you decide to train for a race, so you sign up for one of those digital coaching platforms - the kind where a personal trainer reviews... Continue reading...

Gemini could spring into action soon. | Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Google released the first Android 16 developer preview earlier this week and keen-eyed observers are already uncovering interesting tidbits, including one that hints about a much more useful future for Google's AI assistant. In Android Authority, Mishaal Rahman writes about a mysterious new API in Android 16 called app functions," which appears to give Gemini Assistant agentic-like abilities to take action in apps. It sounds awfully similar to the upgraded app intents" Apple supports in iOS 18, and it's exactly the kind of thing that could make AI assistants much more useful than they are in their current state.A page on Google's developer site describes an app function as a specific piece of functionality that an app offers to the... Continue reading...

Image: Getty Baidu's robotaxi division, Apollo Go, just rolled out its latest robotaxi across multiple cities in China, and if stakeholders in the US aren't nervous yet, they should be.The RT6 is the sixth generation of Apollo Go's driverless vehicle, which made its official debut in May 2024. It's a purpose-built, Level 4 autonomous vehicle, meaning it's built without the need for a human driver. And here's the thing that should make US competitors nervous: adopting a battery-swapping solution, the price for one individual RT6 is under $30,000," Baidu CEO Robin Li said in an earnings call.All the strengths just mentioned above are driving us forward, paving the way to validate our business model," Li added.Adopting a battery-swapping solution,... Continue reading...

Image: Microsoft Microsoft is releasing the first preview of its Recall AI feature for Copilot Plus PCs today. After a series of delays, Windows Insiders in the Dev Channel can now install a new build of Windows 11 that includes Recall and Click to Do - a feature that's very similar to Google's Circle to Search.Recall takes screenshots of almost everything you do on a Copilot Plus PC to make it searchable and easy to recall a memory or retrace your steps. If you enable snapshots to be recorded by Recall, then you can use the Recall app to search for what you were working on previously with natural language queries. There is also a scrollable timeline so you can skip back to a specific date and find the apps or websites you were using. Recall's search... Continue reading...

Image: Plex Plex is beginning to test its newly reimagined Plex experience," which will be available first on mobile and is coming to TV platforms very soon." Plex says the new experience has been in development for almost two years and is designed to bring everything you love into one seamless interface." But don't worry - while the new version of the app is currently missing some features, Plex says it will be closing those gaps" and will keep the current app available during the preview, which will hopefully prevent a Sonos-like debacle.A big change for the new app is redesigned navigation that more clearly delineates between media you might have on your Plex server and the company's streaming and on-demand offerings. The bottom bar has... Continue reading...

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge The young streamer behind a viral meme coin called Quant was doxxed by the crypto community after he ripped off investors, as reported by Decrypt and The Crypto Times. During a livestream earlier this week, the kid giddily watched the price of his meme coin go up before selling his stake for $30,000 and flipping off viewers, causing its price to plummet.The young investor, who reports claim is 13 years old, started gaining attention after his post on X went viral. Just made 2k before school. Lock in," the post said, alongside a photo of the kid holding up his phone to show off his gains. When the boy later launched his token Quant during a livestream, investments quickly started coming in - until he pulled all of the money out of the... Continue reading...

The SonarPen 2 includes upgraded features like USB-C and finer pen tips. | Image: Greenbulb In 2018, the SonarPen debuted as a cheaper alternative to the Apple Pencil by using audio signals transmitted to the iPad over a cable instead of Bluetooth. Its creators are back with an upgraded USB-C version that introduces additional functionality, including tilt detection and an improved tip that now closely resembles the Apple Pencil's.The SonarPen 2 is currently available for preorder through a Kickstarter crowdfunding campaign, with shipping estimated to start as early as April 2025. If you preorder early, the SonarPen 2 is discounted to around $32, with full retail pricing expected to be closer to $45. Image: Greenbulb The SonarPen 2 includes integrated cable management. The SonarPen 2 still supports... Continue reading...

Image: Cath Virginia / The Verge, Getty Images Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy have laid out their plans for the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), a currently nonexistent entity they say will cut the federal government down to size." Though DOGE isn't a real department - and may in fact just be President-elect Donald Trump's way of placating Musk by giving him the appearance of a real job - it represents a long-running right-wing attempt to gut the civil service, a plan the incoming administration fully supports.DOGE could be a mechanism for a Musk shadow presidency, a nonsense job designed to keep Musk busy without giving him real power, or a curious mix of the two. In any case, Musk and Ramaswamy have proposed cutting thousands" of federal regulations and determining the... Continue reading...

Image: The Verge Meta is promising long-overdue improvements" to its X competitor, Threads, including more precise search features and expanded trending topics.First, users will be able to search for posts within a specific date range or from a single account - similar to what X's search allows. Threads is also testing a new trending page in the US that includes additional topics to follow as well as AI-generated summaries of what other users are talking about.Instagram head Adam Mosseri, who led the launch of Threads, wrote in a post that the tests begin today.This week has been full of updates on Threads, which is facing increased competition from Bluesky, the decentralized text-based platform that people have been flocking to in recent weeks.... Continue reading...

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Amazon announced today that it's pumping another $4 billion into Claude AI maker Anthropic, bringing its total funding amount to $8 billion. This latest round follows $1.25 billion last September and another $2.75 billion in March.Along with the money, Amazon wrote in its blog post that Amazon Web Services (AWS) would be named Anthropic's primary training partner" and that the OpenAI rival would use Trainium and Inferentia chips for future models.The investment and deeper partnership align with previous reporting by Reuters that Claude will power Amazon's new Alexa voice assistant. The improved Alexa - the release of which has been delayed - reportedly performed better with Claude than it did when using Amazon's in-house model. The... Continue reading...

Image: Alex Parkin / The Verge For two decades, Google Search has been unstoppable. Invincible. So thoroughly dominant that would-be competitors often couldn't even get funding, because investors didn't see the point in trying. But earlier this year, a judge declared that Google's power, and the way the company wields it, was an illegal monopoly. And so now the US Department of Justice has to figure out how to undo it.On this episode of The Vergecast, we dig into the DOJ's first attempt at a plan. The Verge's Lauren Feiner joins the show to talk through the recently filed proposal, which includes selling Chrome, possibly selling Android, and requiring Google to give vast quantities of its search tech and data to anyone wanting to compete.We try to figure out... Continue reading...

Some Apple Home users have shoehorned iPads into wall-mounted home controllers. However, reports indicate Apple is developing a dedicated home control device. | Photo By Carlos Avila Gonzalez / The San Francisco Chronicle via Getty Images The smart home has an interface problem. Searching for an app on your phone, fighting with a confused voice assistant, and fiddling with a smart" display to turn off a light is enough to send anyone running back to the wall switch. But now, Apple is taking a crack at solving the frustrations of smart home control - and it has the opportunity to actually make the smart home work.Next year, the company will reportedly launch an AI wall tablet for home control," and it's said to be developing more devices for the home (including cameras, a tabletop robot, and maybe even a TV). Among other features, such as video calling, this new smart display will reportedly be a hub for Apple's home automation platform, Apple Home, providing a communal... Continue reading...

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Snap says the basis of a scathing lawsuit suggesting it systematically recommends teens' accounts to child predators is backwards - the company is now accusing the New Mexico attorney general of intentionally seeking out such accounts before recommendations were made. The company says the AG's case is based on gross misrepresentations" and cherry picks from Snap's internal documents.In a motion to dismiss filed Thursday, Snap says AG Raul Torrez's complaint makes patently false" allegations, and particularly misrepresents its own undercover investigation, in which the AG's office created a decoy 14-year-old account. Torrez alleges Snap violated the state's unfair practices and public nuisance laws by misleading users' about the... Continue reading...

Image: Department of Transportation The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has voted to finalize new spectrum rules that will push cellular vehicle-to-everything (C-V2X) communications technology forward.C-V2X will use existing cellular networks to send messages from vehicle to vehicle, vehicle to infrastructure, vehicle to cyclists, or vehicle to pedestrians to warn of each other's presence for safety purposes. It could cross-alert for hazardous road conditions, including speeding cars, weather, or traffic congestion.FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel said the agency's efforts will drive innovation in wireless and transportation economies and keep us safe on our roadways when we walk, ride, and drive." The decision on the proposed rule promotes efficient use of... Continue reading...

Photo: David Pierce / The Verge Rabbit is rolling out teach mode" to its R1 devices, allowing you to create an AI agent that can perform tasks for you. The feature works by learning" a task you demonstrate, such as retrieving updates from a content creator you follow, or helping you draft a post on social media.You can access the feature by logging into the Rabbithole, the web interface for managing an R1 device. From there, you'll create a lesson" by describing a task and then recording yourself performing it. Once you show the AI agent what you want it to do, you can then ask it to recall what it's learned and have it complete the task. It seems straightforward, but Rabbit acknowledges that teach mode is experimental and results may not always be what you expect.... Continue reading...

Image: Cath Virginia / The Verge Apple is planning a major AI overhaul of Siri that will make the digital assistant more like OpenAI's ChatGPT and Google's Gemini Live, according to a report from Bloomberg's Mark Gurman. The assistant, reportedly called LLM Siri," will be powered by Apple's AI models and will let users have more conversational, natural-sounding interactions with Siri.As part of Apple's plan to infuse its iPhones with AI, Bloomberg says the company will make Siri better at handling more advanced tasks. The assistant will have an expanded" ability to use App Intents to interact with third-party apps, while also using Apple Intelligence to summarize and write text, too.Though Apple could announce these plans as soon as next year, the company intends... Continue reading...

Image: The Verge In a stunning misstep, OpenAI engineers accidentally erased critical evidence gathered by The New York Times and other major newspapers in their lawsuit over AI training data, according to a court filing Wednesday.The newspapers' legal teams had spent over 150 hours searching through OpenAI's AI training data to find instances where their news articles were included, the filing claims. But it doesn't explain how this mistake occurred or what precisely the data included. While the filing says OpenAI admitted to the error and tried to recover the data, what it managed to salvage was incomplete and unreliable - so what was recovered cannot help properly trace how the news organizations' articles were used in building OpenAI's AI models.... Continue reading...

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Transferring your data from your old Android device to a new one will soon be less daunting, thanks to Restore Credentials," a new developer feature for Android which can keep you logged into your apps when you make the switch. While some apps already did this, Google is making it easier for developers to include this experience by implementing a restore key" that automatically transfers to the new phone and logs you back into the app.The change should help make going from one Android phone to another more like upgrading an iPhone. Apple users who move from one iPhone to another are used to having everything from email accounts to app credentials transfer to the new phone, but it hasn't always been so seamless for Android users.Verge... Continue reading...

The Google Pixel 9 Pro and Pro XL have never been cheaper than they are today. | Photo: Allison Johnson / The Verge Google's Black Friday sale has kicked off with sizable discounts on Pixel phones, wearables, earbuds, tablets, smart home gear, and more.You'll notice the base 128GB Pixel 9 is down to $649 ($150 off) at Google and Best Buy, for example. But some colors of the flagship Tensor G4 smartphone are actually even cheaper in Amazon's Black Friday sale right now, with its porcelain and peony pink models going for $548.98 there. That's beating the all-time low by a significant margin of about $49.The Pixel 9 Pro and Pixel 9 Pro XL - which have larger screens, bigger batteries, more cameras, and more RAM compared to the Pixel 9 - are also $150 off at Google, starting at $849 and $949 for their base 128GB configuration. Again, you'd probably... Continue reading...

Image: The Verge Steam is building support for season passes into its platform and setting up rules to help protect buyers from buying ones with unclear promises. Steam published new guidelines urging developers to think about whether there's a customer benefit" for purchasing season passes, as reported by SteamDB creator Pavel Djundik.Season passes have really picked up in popularity and are used mainly in free-to-play or other multiplayer video games that promise digital updates like special costumes and weapons for a fee.As part of Steam's new rules for season passes, developers must share a list of items with descriptions customers can expect to receive with the pass. If a DLC drop gets delayed, Steam will let developers reschedule it up to 3... Continue reading...

The new 2025 Kia EV9 GT Kia came to the LA Auto Show with not one but two revamped electric vehicles, a sign that the South Korean automaker is still feeling bullish about its momentum in the plug-in car market.First off, the 2025 Kia EV9 GT is a performance version of its three-row SUV, which we first tested earlier this year. This one promises more power and a sportier feel than the version we drove, which bore the GT Line badge but wasn't specifically tuned for performance. The new GT trim comes with over 500 horsepower (compared to 379hp in the 2024 model) and a zero to 60mph acceleration of 4.3 seconds. Kia is calling it the most powerful" three-row SUV it's ever created. The dual-motor EV9 GT will also be the first Kia vehicle to feature... Continue reading...

The Sonos Era 100, our go-to smart speaker, is down to an all-time low of $199 right now. | Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge Good news: Black Friday has come early for Sonos fans. Now through December 2nd, you can potentially save hundreds on a variety of Sonos products, including soundbars, smart speakers, and headphones. There are a lot of things on sale - and the Sonos app is in better shape than it was a few months ago, thankfully - which means now is a great time to buy if you've been looking to upgrade your home theater setup.First up is the Sonos Ace, the company's first pair of wireless headphones. Right now, they're down to a new low of $349 ($100 off) at Amazon, Best Buy, and Sonos' online storefront. They're comfortable and stylish, with stellar noise cancellation, an exceptionally natural-sounding transparency mode, and excellent sound. However,... Continue reading...

Image: Cath Virginia / The Verge; Getty Images A new cell phone carrier is launching with an interesting pitch: it says it will offer secure cell service that limits how much personal data users give up, as reported earlier by 404 Media. The service, called Cape, is geared toward high-risk" individuals like politicians, journalists, activists, and others.Cape is a mobile virtual network operator (MVNO) that uses UScellular's network. But since it runs its mobile own core, Cape says it can control the technology powering the mobile network and implement protections over what data enters and leaves your phone." When signing up for the service, Cape says it will ask users for the minimum amount of personal information" and will store it for as little time as possible."The carrier... Continue reading...

Illustration: The Verge WhatsApp is introducing a new transcription feature that makes it easier (and more convenient) to communicate using voice messaging. The feature is rolling out globally to Android and iOS users in the coming weeks" according to WhatsApp, and will automatically create a text version of voice clips under the message for moments when you're unable to listen to them.This finds a great balance between the pros and cons of voice messages, which are easier to record than typing out lengthy conversations but can be cumbersome to listen to, especially on the go or in loud environments. Now you get the best of both worlds, but only voice message recipients who have the feature enabled can see the transcripts. Image: WhatsApp ... Continue reading...

Illustration: The Verge A federal lawsuit over Minnesota's Use of Deep Fake Technology to Influence An Election" law is now directly dealing with the influence of AI. In a recent filing, attorneys challenging the law say an affidavit submitted to support it shows signs of containing AI-generated text. The Minnesota Reformer reports Attorney General Keith Ellison asked Stanford Social Media Lab founding director Jeff Hancock to make the submission, but the document filed includes non-existent sources that seem to have been hallucinated by ChatGPT or another large language model (LLM).Hancock's affidavit cites a 2023 study published in the Journal of Information Technology & Politics titled The Influence of Deepfake Videos on Political Attitudes and Behavior."... Continue reading...

Illustration: The Verge We are rebalancing ranking to prioritize content from people you follow, which will mean less recommended content from accounts you don't follow and more posts from the accounts you do starting today," Threads boss Adam Mosseri announced on Thursday.This is another significant change to Threads since many people started flocking to Bluesky. It lets people default to seeing their Following feed when they open the app and offers lots of customizability, including custom feeds. Threads just yesterday rolled out its take on custom feeds less than a week after it started testing them.The change could make the For You feed include more accounts you care about, but we'll have to wait and see if the update addresses the problem of the... Continue reading...

Image: Universal Jon M. Chu's Wicked adaptation gets at the heart of what makes musicals such a spectacular form of storytelling. Continue reading...

Illustration: Hugo Herrera / The Verge Major digital payment providers will soon be subject to bank-like supervision from the US Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB). On Thursday, the CFPB issued a final rule that will regulate digital payment apps that process over 50 million transactions each year, covering services like Apple Pay, Google Wallet, PayPal, Cash App, and others.The new rule is meant to ensure digital payment providers adhere to the same laws as credit unions and large banks. It will give the CFPB the authority to oversee their compliance with federal laws surrounding privacy, fraud, and other rules through proactive examinations." This follows the CFPB's initial proposal to regulate digital payment providers last year, which would've covered a wider... Continue reading...