The Verge

Image: The Verge; Photo by Rebecca Sapp / Getty Images for the Recording Academy Rebooting the member list, taking the show streaming - is it enough in the age of AI? Continue reading...

Image: The Verge The estate of now-defunct crypto exchange FTX has filed a lawsuit against Binance and its former CEO Changpeng Zhao in a bid to recover $1.76 billion. FTX alleges these funds were fraudulently transferred to Binance, Zhao, and other Binance executives in July 2021 as part of a shares repurchase deal with FTX co-founder Sam Bankman-Fried.According to the filing, the transaction saw Binance sell back the 20 percent stake it held in FTX's international unit and 18.4 percent in its US-based entity, which Bankman-Fried paid for using a mix of FTX and Binance-branded cryptocurrencies. The FTX estate alleges the share repurchase deal was conducted unlawfully because - following massive fraud by Bankman-Fried and other executives - FTX and its... Continue reading...

Image: Digital Eclipse For such a simple game, Tetris has a wild history. Developed in the mid-1980s by Alexey Pajitnov in the Soviet Union, Tetris' global expansion involved a complex web of software copyright, clandestine meetings, handshake deals, and someone stretching a tourist visa to the very limits. It's a story that inspired a feature film - but it might be best explored in Tetris Forever, the latest retro game collection from Digital Eclipse.The studio has made a name for itself with its interactive documentary format. The idea is that, instead of just presenting a bunch of games and supplementary material and leaving it to players to sort through it, the collections put everything into a timeline you can explore in chronological order. This... Continue reading...

Remember the race to 5G? | Image: The Verge Boost Mobile has announced it is on its way to meeting FCC coverage deadlines by the end of the year and says it has earned the title of MNO - Mobile Network Operator - rather than MVNO, which is a virtual network operator mainly reselling service from other carriers. Mission... accomplished? Sort of. It's progress, at least.Boost, you will remember, is supposed to be our nation's fourth wireless carrier thanks to a wonky deal that allowed T-Mobile to buy Sprint. Dish Network - now owned by EchoStar - bought the brand as part of the deal and is required by the FCC to hit certain milestones in its 5G network buildout to hold up its part of the bargain. Last June, it was required to cover 70 percent of the US population; by the end of the... Continue reading...

The first part of Wicked, starring Ariana Grande (left) and Cynthia Erivo (right) will arrive in theaters on November 22nd. | Image: Universal Pictures Barbie producer Mattel has issued an apology after customers spotted its Wicked edition dolls listed an adult website on the packaging. The toy merchandise mistakenly directed customers to the homepage of the Wicked Pictures pornographic movie studio, instead of the correct WickedMovie.com URL.We deeply regret this unfortunate error and are taking immediate action to remedy this," Mattel said in a statement to The Hollywood Reporter. Parents are advised that the misprinted, incorrect website is not appropriate for children."Mattel said that the dolls, which have been released to coincide with Universal's film adaptation of the Tony Award-winning musical, are primarily sold in the US" and that the error was a misprint." It's unclear... Continue reading...

Donkey Kong Country gets a Nintendo Direct showcase on Monday. | Image: Nintendo Nintendo says it's finally going to show off the long-awaited Donkey Kong Country area of Super Nintendo World in a Nintendo Direct stream on Monday at 5PM ET. It's an encouraging sign for the theme park expansion devoted to Mario's first nemesis, the opening of which was delayed earlier this year.Nintendo first confirmed that it was building the area, which will feature a mine cart rollercoaster ride, back in 2021. Nintendo and Universal Studios showed the region off - or a digital render of it, anyway - earlier this year, and confirmed that when the Orlando, Florida version of Super Nintendo World opens on May 22nd, 2025, it will have all of the same attractions as its Osaka counterpart.As for Nintendo Switch 2 news, well, don't get... Continue reading...

Photo by Howard Schnapp/Newsday RM via Getty Images Amazon's next ideas for growing its grocery business could blur the lines between Whole Foods and Amazon Fresh by enmeshing the two businesses' fulfillment networks in a new set of experiments, according to The Wall Street Journal.Amazon has reportedly started shipping Whole Foods products from 26 Amazon Fresh fulfillment centers and plans to build a microfulfillment center at a Pennsylvania Whole Foods Market and stocking it with Amazon Fresh household goods and groceries. Another part of the plan includes an experimental Amazon Grocery" inside a Chicago Whole Foods that offers brands and groceries that the upscale store wouldn't normally carry, according to WSJ.The goal of the tests is to give Amazon customers a way to buy... Continue reading...

Photo: Allison Johnson / The Verge Apple has begun selling repair parts for iPhone 16 and 16 Pro phones on its self-service repair store. That includes replacements for commonly damaged parts like cameras, displays, and back glass, and follows the release of official Apple iPhone 16 repair manuals in September, as MacRumors notes.A replacement camera assembly will run you $169 for the iPhone 16 and 16 Plus or $249 for the 16 Pro and Pro Max. And new displays range from $279 to $379, depending on the model. Batteries are either $99 or, for the 16 Pro phones, $119. And if you don't have the tools, you can always rent out one of Apple's heavy, specialized repair kits for $49.Taking on a DIY iPhone repair isn't quite as dicey as it once was, thanks to Apple's gradual shift... Continue reading...

Image: Disney Star Wars spinoff Andor is finally coming back for its second and final season on Disney Plus April 22nd, 2025, Disney announced during its D23 event in Brazil yesterday. And in a clear nod to Rogue One, the 2016 film it's setting up, it has a new logo with the subtitle A Star Wars Story."The new season will complete the so far excellent story of Cassian Andor's (Diego Luna) transformation from street rat to hard-bitten rebel alliance spy in the lead-up to the events of Rogue One. Its 12-episode run will be broken up into blocks of three episodes, each covering three-day events taking place in a four-year period, as TheWrap notes.

Was anyone asking for this? | Image: Cath Virginia / The Verge At the risk of stating the obvious, AI is absolutely everywhere lately. There's AI in your car, AI in your messaging app, AI in your glasses. I've gotten pretty desensitized to it all as a hazard of the job, but it was Spotify's AI DJ that actually got my attention.I've listened to a top 40 radio station in the past two decades, so I'm familiar with the concept of a robot picking music for me. In that context, an AI DJ doesn't seem like much of a stretch. But after using it on and off for a week, I'm convinced it's the perfect analogy for our AI-everything moment. It's eerily human, and it plays a lot of music I like. But take it from someone with access to a high-quality local indie radio station - one that employs human DJs! - there... Continue reading...

Image: David Pierce / The Verge Hi, friends! Welcome to Installer No. 60, your guide to the best and Verge-iest stuff in the world. (If you're new here, welcome, it's a lot of gaming stuff this week, and also you can read all the old editions at the Installer homepage.)This week, I've been... doomscrolling about the election, if I'm honest. But let's not talk about that. I've also been reading about shipwrecks and in-flight magazines and baseball bat influencers, making a bunch of lists in Listy, dusting off my Bluesky account as Threads becomes increasingly worse, logging a surprising number of hours in VR with Batman: Arkham Shadow, playing with tasks and notes in the Craft beta, seeing if I can replace Gmail with Thunderbird for Android, and trying really, really... Continue reading...

Image: Cath Virginia / The Verge; Getty Images There is an apparently new iOS 18 security feature that reboots iPhones that haven't been unlocked in a few days, frustrating police by making it harder to break into suspects' iPhones, according to 404 Media.404 Media, which first reported police warnings about the reboots on Thursday, writes that restarted iPhones enter a more secure Before First Unlock," or BFU state. Now, it seems Apple added inactivity reboot" code in iOS 18.1 that triggers iPhones to restart after they've been locked for four days, Chris Wade, who founded mobile analysis company Corellium, told the outlet.The code appears below in screenshots posted by Dr. -Ing. Jiska Classen, a Hasso Plattner Institute research group leader.

Illustration by Samar Haddad / The Verge Google Photos continues to get new and improved features on a regular basis, and one of the most recent Android updates has focused on video editing. Even if you don't have the latest Pixel 9 phone (which is required if you want to try out the weird new Reimagine tool), you can now speed up, slow down, and enhance your clips with a few taps as well as trim them down more easily.You can also expect what Google calls AI-powered video presets" on both the Android and iOS versions of Google Photos. After the app algorithm analyzes your clips, you get a choice of effects - trims, zooms, slow-mos - you can apply with a tap. The app takes the role of director and chooses where and how these tweaks should be applied.When the changes arrive on... Continue reading...

Netflix Arcane's final season puts an even finer point on its story about revolutionary war. Continue reading...

Paul McCartney in 2022. | Photo by Matt Cardy/Getty Images The Beatles have been nominated for two Grammys - nearly 50 years after the band officially split up. Their final song, called Now and Then," was restored last year with the help of AI, and is now up for record of the year alongside the likes of Beyonce, Charlie XCX, Billie Eilish, and Taylor Swift. It's also been nominated for best rock performance, where it goes up against Green Day, Pearl Jam, and The Black Keys.Released in November 2023, Now and Then" started as a demo recorded by John Lennon in the late 1970s. This recording, as well as Free As A Bird" and Real Love," was given to Lennon's three surviving bandmates in the 90s, with the hopes of including it in The Beatles Anthology project.However, Now and Then" was never... Continue reading...

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge YouTube's premium subscriptions are about to get more expensive for long-time subscribers with legacy plans in more places. In December, YouTube told US subscribers with legacy YouTube Premium plans (stemming from discontinued services Google Play Music or YouTube Red) they'd need to start paying the current $13.99 per month price in the new year.YouTube Music users in Europe have posted emails they received announcing a price increase for them, too, and just like the US, some report getting three more months at the current price before the hike.In an email to The Verge, YouTube communications manager Paul Pennington confirmed prices are increasing for both YouTube Premium, which removes ads on the streaming videos and includes access... Continue reading...

DJI's $199 Neo selfie drone is going to be everywhere," we wrote in September - while noting that the budget self-flying drone did have two major weaknesses over the competing $350 Hover X1. First, DJI's drone didn't shoot vertical video (a dealbreaker for TikTok and Instagram Reels influencers) and second, it couldn't track our movements nearly as quickly as the competition.But DJI is now fixing both, adding vertical video and dramatically increasing the Neo's flight speed while tracking. According to DC Rainmaker, it's now so fast it can keep up with cyclists, and surprisingly flies faster in tracking mode than it does with a controller.Before the firmware update, the drone wasn't able to keep up with him cycling at even 13 miles... Continue reading...

Image: Kristen Radtke / The Verge People across the country received racist text messages in the days after Donald Trump was elected to a second term for president, and now federal authorities are investigating.In multiple states, including Alabama, North Carolina, Virginia, and Pennsylvania, Black women, men, and students have reported receiving racist text messages from an unknown source, urging them to report to a plantation to pick cotton," the NAACP said in a press release. Messages said variations of, You have been selected to be a house slave," or You have been selected to pick cotton at the nearest plantation," according to screenshots and news reports. They also often instruct recipients on where to go or when to be ready With all of your belongings."CBS... Continue reading...

Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge We're flush with great options for noise-canceling headphones that sound good, but if you care most about sound quality (without spending pricey audiophile money) a great choice is the Bowers and Wilkins PX7 S2e - which are on sale for $279 ($120 off) in all five color options at Amazon, Best Buy, and direct from Bowers and Wilkins.The PX7 S2e may not have the most charming sounding name, but they do have a clean design and warm, detailed sound that even competes with the much pricier AirPods Max. In addition to sounding excellent and offering niceties like a transparency mode, they favor proper physical buttons and a proper on / off switch over the touch controls found on some other headphones like Sony's WH-1000XM5. Their 30 hours of... Continue reading...

That Mac Mini SSD is removable! | Image: X user @L0vetodream Apple's redesigned Mac Mini M4 has ditched the previous M2 machine's SSD that was soldered to the logic board, as confirmed by teardowns like this one posted on X showing it has a single removable SSD module. It's not Apple's first desktop computer to go in this direction, as we saw similar modules in the Mac Studio and Mac Pro.

Samsung's Galaxy S24 is just one of the many phones that use Gorilla Glass. | Photo by Allison Johnson / The Verge Corning, the maker of Gorilla Glass, is set to receive up to $32 million in funding under the CHIPS and Science Act. In an announcement on Friday, the US Commerce Department said the proposed funding will help Corning increase production of its glass products used in the chip-making process.The announcement comes just days after the European Commission opened an antitrust investigation into Corning over whether it uses exclusive supply agreements to stifle competition. Both Samsung and Apple use Corning's ultra-tough alkali-aluminosilicate glass - or Gorilla Glass - on their phones, tablets, and smartwatches.However, the proposed CHIPS Act funding doesn't have anything to do with Gorilla Glass. Corning will put the funding toward the... Continue reading...

Google Slides is getting more professionally designed templates for businesses, teachers, and students. | Image: Google Google is introducing a new collection of modern templates to Google Slides the company says have been professionally designed" to cater to a wide range of use cases." There are new templates for sales pitches, product roadmaps, lesson plans, book reports, workshop facilitation, and even team game templates" for companies looking to bolster collaboration amongst their staff.The new templates might make it easier for users moving over from Microsoft's office suite and Powerpoint, similar to recent updates that brought easier table formatting to Google Sheets and tabs that make it easier to organize information in a single Google Doc.The refreshed library of templates started rolling out to everyone this week, covering both personal... Continue reading...

Image: Palworld Palworld developer Pocketpair has revealed the patents at the center of the infringement lawsuit Nintendo and The Pokemon Company filed in Japan back in September. Pocketpair has also shared that, in addition to 5 million yen each plus late fees, they're seeking an injunction against the game and compensation for a portion of the damages incurred between the date of registration of the patents and the date of filing of this lawsuit.The Pokemon Company cites three Japanese patents, No. 7545191, No. 7493117, and No. 7528390. From the translation of the claims, they appear to describe Pokemon-style activities, with 191 focused on the act of throwing a ball at characters in a field, 117 tied to aiming, and 390 on riding characters.... Continue reading...

Photo: Vjeran Pavic, The Verge Think about how you like to play video games. Are you the type to sink into your couch, controller in hand, TV across the living room, for a few hours of Madden? If so, Sony's new PlayStation 5 Pro is not for you. But if you find yourself leaning forward, creeping ever closer to the screen, looking for every clue hidden in the grass or every tiny twitchy graphical advantage, a $700 console might not be such a silly idea.On this episode of The Vergecast, The Verge's Sean Hollister joins the show to talk about his experience with the PS5 Pro. We go through what you can expect from this super-powered new gaming machine, which games and which gamers might get the most from it, and why the PS5 Pro might have more in common with a gaming PC... Continue reading...

Illustration: The Verge Google Photos is making it easier to follow activity in your shared albums with a new Updates section. In the new section, you'll be able to see notifications like updates to a shared album and updates to a conversation within Google Photos, according to a support post from Google.The Updates section can be found by tapping a bell icon that replaces the Sharing button (the one that looks like two people). Updates are shown chronologically, and you'll be able to look at activity from today, yesterday, this week, this month, last month, and beyond." We want to streamline how you can view recent activity with an interface that makes albums, groups, and conversations more accessible."Google notes that if you want to access shared... Continue reading...

Rivian's R2 vehicles will be powered by batteries made domestically in the US by South Korea's LG Energy Solution, the company announced in its third quarter earnings report.Rivian first revealed the new batteries back in March when it announced the R2 as its more affordable electric SUV that would start at $45,000. (It also announced the sportier R3 vehicle.) The cell is called 4695" due to its diameter of 46 millimeters and height of 95 millimeters - larger than Tesla's 4680 cells.The battery packs that Rivian currently uses in its R1T and R1S vehicles are assembled at its Normal, Illinois, factory using cells manufactured in South Korea by Samsung SDI. Now, the cells will be produced in the US to better comply with tax credit... Continue reading...

The Sol 5 includes color temperature adjustments to help set a mood in a photo. | Image: Harlowe Harlowe's Sol 5 is a three-inch extending light that attaches to the MagSafe mount on your iPhone to improve the quality of your photos and selfies. It's available now for $79 or for $159 as part of a travel kit that includes a softbox diffuser to help reduce harsh shadows.The Sol 5 isn't a new idea. When the iPhone 12 debuted with MagSafe it opened the flood gates for new accessories including similar lights that could stay attached to the back of the phone - ready to improve a photo at a moment's notice. What the Sol 5 appears to do better is offer more flexibility and control.The Sol 5's glowing puck is connected to its magnetic mount with a short arm that extends its reach and lets it swivel 180 degrees and angle as needed. That... Continue reading...

Image: AOL via YouTube Elwood Edwards, the voice of AOL's You've Got Mail" greeting, has died at age 74 after a long illness, according to local Ohio news station WKYC, where he was employed for many years.During a 2016 interview, Edwards recounted how he became the voice of AOL. His wife, who worked at Quantum Computer Services (which later became AOL), heard that the company was looking to add a voice to its software. I'd been an announcer throughout my entire broadcasting career, and she volunteered me," Edwards said.In 1989, Edwards recorded the once-ubiquitous phrase, along with Welcome," Files done," and Goodbye" on a cassette tape for just $200. It started off as a test just to see if it would catch on, and lo and behold, in the mid-90s, it had... Continue reading...

Image: TikTok A new Share to TikTok" feature in Spotify and Apple Music is making it easier for users to share songs, playlists, audiobooks, and more directly in content on the video platform.Using the integrations, TikTok users can create a direct link to content on the streaming platforms, similar to how they can share songs directly on Instagram Stories. When a user shares a Spotify track, for example, they can choose whether the song will appear as a video, photo, or Story post on TikTok. Viewers of the content can then click the song and navigate directly back to their preferred music app.It creates an easy link between TikTok and content on other platforms - previously if you wanted to share a playlist you made, you'd have to send a link via... Continue reading...

The 8BitDo Retro 108 Mechanical Keyboard will be available starting on December 12th, 2024. | Image: 8BitDo 8BitDo has introduced a new version of the Retro Mechanical Keyboard it debuted last July with its original tenkeyless layout now expanded to include an integrated number pad. The new 8BitDo Retro 108 Mechanical Keyboard is available for preorder now through Amazon for $119.99 - $20 more expensive than the original - with the same NES or Famicom theming. Availability is expected to start on December 12th, 2024.The new 108-key version of the keyboard uses the same hot-swappable Kailh Box White V2 switches as the tenkeyless version, paired with dye-sub PBT keycaps. The integrated numpad includes additional Windows shortcut keys, a calculator lock button, and a screen lock button. The 8BitDo Retro 108 Mechanical Keyboard's compatibility is... Continue reading...