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by Jacob Kastrenakes on (#6GEDB)
Photo credit should read ROBYN BECK/AFP via Getty Images IBM has pulled its advertising presence from X, formerly Twitter, as Elon Musk continues to endorse far-right talking points - agreeing with posts this week that promoted antisemitism and pushed support for white pride. The nonprofit Media Matters drew attention to those statements and noted that IBM, Apple, Comcast, and other companies all had ads placed next to pro-Nazi and pro-Hitler content (not posted by Musk) on X. IBM told the Financial Times and confirmed to The Verge that IBM has zero tolerance for hate speech and discrimination and we have immediately suspended all advertising on X while we investigate this entirely unacceptable situation."On the platform today, Musk called it super messed up" that white people are not, in... Continue reading...
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The Verge - All Posts
| Link | https://www.theverge.com/ |
| Feed | http://www.theverge.com/rss/index.xml |
| Updated | 2024-11-25 06:30 |
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by Jess Weatherbed on (#6GDCE)
Here's hoping this Starship test flight ends better than the first attempt. | Image: SpaceX The second test flight for SpaceX's Starship rocket has now been given the all clear by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). The FAA said in a statement that it has given license authorization for the second launch of the SpaceX Starship Super Heavy vehicle. The FAA determined SpaceX met all safety, environmental, policy and financial responsibility requirements."SpaceX was originally targeting November 17th for the test, but according to a post by Elon Musk, it has been postponed until the 18th, which is Saturday, apparently with a two-hour launch window starting at 8AM ET.The launch was initially grounded following an investigation into the first orbital launch test for the Starship and Super Heavy booster in April, which... Continue reading...
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by Ash Parrish on (#6GEA6)
Image: Larian Studios Larian Studios has announced that a physical deluxe edition of Baldur's Gate 3 is available for preorder now, and just like my bear boyfriend, it's friggin' huge. Image: Larian Studios On both PS5 and Xbox, the game will be playable on disc, with the PS5 version sporting two discs, and Xbox a whopping three discs to house the chonky epic," reads the press release.Knowing just how massive the game is, I'm pretty sure one of those discs houses Act 3 alone. Massive size aside, the developers at Larian Studios understand that now more than ever, it's worth offering players physical versions of games.We understand the value of physical media, and while there are clearly increasingly significant challenges when it... Continue reading...
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by Umar Shakir on (#6GEA7)
The 2025 Kia Sorento PHEV. | Image: Kia Kia is stationing its latest concept EV3 and EV4 electric vehicles at the LA Auto Show and is launching all-new 2025 Sorento hybrid and plug-in hybrid SUVs that will hit dealerships next year.Kia's EV3 crossover and EV4 sedan were first announced in October only as concept vehicles, and that hasn't changed today. The EV3 is inspired by the Kia's soon-to-launch EV9 three-row electric SUV but is smaller. The EV3 also gives off that boxy Soul-ful essence, complete with the high and slightly sloping roof.The EV4 concept, meanwhile, is a sedan that you could totally mistake for an EV6 when looking at it from the front. The EV4 has a cocoon-like" interior, but really, both concepts have cabins styled in sci-fi-minimalism, with a Tesla... Continue reading...
by Andrew J. Hawkins on (#6GEA8)
Image: Amazon Starting next year, you'll be able to buy a car on Amazon for the first time. The company announced a deal with Hyundai that will allow dealerships to sell cars through the site.Previously, customers could browse car showrooms and compare prices on Amazon but not actually buy a car. That will change next year when several Hyundai dealers start to list models for sale on the site.Customers can browse cars on the site and make a purchase using their preferred payment methods. They can then choose to pick the car up at a nearby dealership or have it delivered to their home at their convenience.Importantly, the end seller is still the dealerImportantly, the end seller of the vehicle is still the dealer; Amazon's platform will be the... Continue reading...
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by Jay Peters on (#6GE6K)
Photo by The Verge If you've had trouble ordering Valve's new Steam Deck OLED, you're not alone. Orders opened at 1PM ET on Thursday, and many people ran into issues actually completing a purchase. Some Verge staffers who tried to purchase a Steam Deck OLED got stuck with the device in their cart but were unable to check out.As of this writing - more than two hours after orders went live - things seem to be settling down. One Verge employee who had been trying to get one of the new models was finally able to check out. And I've seen many people report successful purchases on the Steam Deck subreddit.Within minutes of orders opening up, Valve acknowledged that there are problems with checkout and said it was trying to address them. About two hours later,... Continue reading...
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by Emma Roth on (#6GE6M)
Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge The blue versus green bubble debate may finally be winding down. Apple says the iPhone will add support for RCS messaging, the messaging standard used by most Android phones, in 2024, according to a report from 9to5Mac.Later next year, we will be adding support for RCS Universal Profile, the standard as currently published by the GSM Association," an Apple spokesperson tells 9to5Mac. We believe RCS Universal Profile will offer a better interoperability experience when compared to SMS or MMS. This will work alongside iMessage, which will continue to be the best and most secure messaging experience for Apple users."As noted by 9to5Mac, the iPhone adopting RCS could enable support for read receipts, typing indicators, high-res images... Continue reading...
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by Tom Warren on (#6GE6N)
Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge Microsoft is bringing its AI-powered Copilot to Windows 10. In a surprise move, the software giant will soon release Copilot for Windows 10 to Release Preview testers, just months after signaling an end of major Windows 10 updates.It's a key opportunity for us to bring Copilot value to more customers," explains Aaron Woodman, vice president of Windows marketing, in a briefing with The Verge. While Windows 10 end of support is less than two years away, Microsoft is seeking to capitalize on its AI ambitions with a base of millions of PCs that haven't yet upgraded to Windows 11 to access features like Copilot. Image: Microsoft Copilot running in Windows 10. Copilot in Windows 10 will work very similar to how it... Continue reading...
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by Tom Warren on (#6GE6P)
Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge Microsoft will soon let Windows 11 users in the European Economic Area (EEA) disable its Bing web search, remove Microsoft Edge, and even add custom web search providers - including Google if it's willing to build one - into its Windows Search interface.All of these Windows 11 changes are part of key tweaks that Microsoft has to make to its operating system to comply with the European Commission's Digital Markets Act, which comes into effect in March 2024. Microsoft will be required to meet a slew of interoperability and competition rules, including allowing users to easily un-install pre-installed apps or change default settings on operating systems, virtual assistants, or web browsers that steer them to the products and services of... Continue reading...
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by Jess Weatherbed on (#6GE6Q)
Meta says Emu Edit precisely follows instructions" to avoid altering anything besides user-specified changes. | Image: Meta Facebook and Instagram are getting some new AI-powered creative tools that will allow users to edit their photographs and produce high-quality videos" using text descriptions. On Thursday, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced two new capabilities built on Emu - the company's foundation model for image generation - that are being integrated into Facebook and Instagram.The first, dubbed Emu Edit," will allow users to precisely alter images based on text inputs." The video demonstration for this looks similar to existing tools provided by Adobe, Google, and Canva, providing a way for users to remove or replace objects and people from photographs without any professional image editing experience. Image: Meta It... Continue reading...
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by Victoria Song on (#6GE6R)
Fitbit's having issues with its servers again. | Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge It appeared that Fitbit suffered from another server outage that affected syncing data from devices.The news was first spotted by 9to5Google, and Downdetector shows a spike in outage reports starting at about 11AM ET. Some users also posted on Reddit and social media that they experienced issues. I tried syncing my Fitbit Charge 6, and while I was able to pull up the app and initiate a manual sync, the data did not show up within the app itself. Another colleague tried to download the app and was unable to log in. And unlike the last outage - which happened just a month ago - this may not have to do with whether you've migrated your Fitbit data over to a Google account. Another colleague who hasn't migrated their data confirmed that... Continue reading...
by Emma Roth on (#6GE3E)
Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge Apple might've solved the iPhone 15's wireless charging issues in BMWs, but now GM says it's looking into complaints about another problem. Numerous iPhone 15 owners across Reddit, Apple's website, and Chevy forums say they can no longer properly charge the phone inside Chevrolet, Cadillac, and Buick vehicles.One user on a GM truck forum says their iPhone 15 Pro Max worked flawlessly" in their 2022 Chevy Silverado 2500 High Country until they updated their device to iOS 17.1. After the update, their phone will only charge for around 5 to 10 seconds" before stopping.Other iPhone 15 owners have the same complaint across the many vehicles made by GM, including the 2023 Chevy Bolt EUV, 2023 Chevy Traverse, 2024 Buick Encore GX Avenir,... Continue reading...
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by Andrew Webster on (#6GE3F)
Prey premiered on Hulu in the US but is available elsewhere through Disney Plus. | Image: David Bukach / 20th Century Studios Starting in December, Disney will begin testing a new version of its streaming services by combining Hulu and Disney Plus into a single app. The news (which follows Disney's recent acquisition of Hulu) has led to a lot of questions. Is Hulu going away? What will the app experience be like? Do violent movies like Prey or No One Will Save You really fit with the Disney Plus brand? The good news is that the answer to most of those questions likely already exists outside of the US, which I know because I've been using it for more than two years. It's not confusing at all. In fact, it looks a lot like traditional TV.At the beginning of 2021, Disney launched a new content hub called Star, which is currently available in a whole bunch of... Continue reading...
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by Mia Sato on (#6GE3G)
Image: TikTok TikTok users will now be able to create video effects right in TikTok without downloading another app. The company announced the new mobile editing feature, available now globally, in a blog post today.AR effects are a big part of TikTok culture - they spawn challenges, viral games, and essentially a whole genre of content. But up until now, creators had to use a separate program called Effect House to make filters for the app.In the TikTok mobile app, users can work off of filter templates and experiment with more than 2,000 assets to use in their effects. They'll also be able to add interactivity in filters that's triggered through movements like tapping the screen, winking, smiling, and more.Though filters have always been... Continue reading...
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by Tom Warren on (#6GE3H)
Image: Chris Welch / The Verge Sonos is issuing a software update to its Arc and Beam (Gen 2) soundbars to fix a loud popping issue that has plagued the devices for years. The issue led to a number of Sonos customers having to disable Sonos Atmos on their hardware to avoid a startling loud bang and series of audio pops that occurred for some after playing Dolby Atmos content. The Verge reported on the issue earlier this year after discovering that Sonos owners had been complaining about the problem for nearly three years.We are pleased to share that our team has identified a fix for the popping sound on Arc and it will be shipped to all customers as part of a software release today," says Sonos in a statement posted to the company's support forums. You can hear the... Continue reading...
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by Victoria Song on (#6GDZQ)
Google's fingerprints are all over this casual fitness tracker. Continue reading...
by Umar Shakir on (#6GDZS)
Nook Simple Touch with GlowLight from 2012. | Image: The Verge Barnes & Noble is sunsetting support for some of its oldest e-readers. It'll start by disabling the devices' services starting in April 2024; afterward, the company will disable access to the Barnes & Noble bookstore, removing the ability to buy new books on the devices beginning in June 2024. The news impacts the following devices: the 2011 Nook Simple Touch; the 2012 Nook Simple Touch with GlowLight (oh hey, we reviewed this); and the 2013 Nook GlowLight.In June 2024, Barnes & Noble will disable the ability to register the devices with a bn.com account and won't allow users to sign in with a Nook account. This effectively time-capsules otherwise functional e-readers and locks them with the current owner so they can't really hand them... Continue reading...
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by Tom Warren on (#6GDZT)
Image: Nvidia Nvidia is rolling out a new update for GeForce Now that allows members to sync their Xbox accounts to the cloud gaming service. Syncing up an Xbox account will allow GeForce Now members to access any PC Game Pass titles on Nvidia's service, alongside their existing library of game purchases from the Microsoft Store.Nvidia has completed the work needed to make the Microsoft Store work with GeForce Now, following the first Xbox PC games arriving on the service earlier this year. Nvidia also started rolling out the ability to stream first-party Microsoft games like Deathloop and Grounded as well as third-party titles like No Man's Sky and Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord through a PC Game Pass subscription in August. Image:... Continue reading...
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by Emma Roth on (#6GDZV)
Illustration by Will Joel / The Verge Apple has finally made its classical music app available for the iPad. Now, you can download Apple Music Classical, which is included with an Apple Music subscription, directly from the App Store.Apple first launched its long-awaited classical music app on the iPhone in March, offering a library full of recordings you can search through by composer, work, conductor, and more. The app comes out of Apple's 2021 acquisition of classical music streaming service Primephonic and allows you to listen to recordings with up to 192 kHz / 24-bit lossless audio. Image: Apple Apple Music Classical for the iPad comes with some optimizations for the larger display, including a full navigational sidebar that lets you quickly jump... Continue reading...
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by Abigail Bassett on (#6GDZW)
Illustration by Nico H. Brausch for The Verge The effort to climate-proof our housing is running into a mess of problems, including aging housing stock, out-of-date zoning laws, and NIMBY-ism. Can we build our way to a better future? Continue reading...
by Jess Weatherbed on (#6GDWH)
The deal is available across all PS5 consoles, including the recently announced PS5 Slim. | Photo by Antonio G. Di Benedetto / The Verge Apple and Sony have put together a promotional offer for PS5 owners that allows them to enjoy ad-free access to the Apple Music streaming service for up to six months. The offer is available for new and qualified returning" Apple Music customers until November 15th, 2024, and can be activated by simply downloading and signing into the Apple Music app on any PS5 model. After the initial six months is up, users in the US will be charged $10.99 per month - the standard price for an Individual Apple Music membership - to continue the service.PS5 owners who take up the offer aren't limited to just streaming Apple Music from their console. Once the six-month trial has started you can listen to tunes across any supported devices, including on... Continue reading...
by Emme Hall on (#6GDWJ)
Photos by Tim Sutton, Mayfield Media, courtesy of Rebelle Rally Sustainably charging electric vehicles and providing power to over 250 people for eight days in the middle of the desert is no easy task. Renewable Innovations has the answer. Continue reading...
by Jess Weatherbed on (#6GDWK)
It doesn't quite bring the products you've been imagining to life, but it'll find you a pretty close match. | Image: Google / The Verge Google's AI-powered Search Generative Experience (SGE) is behind a bunch of new shopping features that aim to help users find niche or otherwise unique products for a friend or themselves. These include using AI to generate gift ideas or fashion items you can then shop for. Google is also expanding virtual try-ons to men ahead of the holiday season.Starting today, users in the US who have already opted into SGE via Search Labs will be presented with a selection of suggested subcategories when searching for gift ideas, alongside links to helpful content to learn more about a product or gift category. For example - searching for great gifts for home cooks" will provide explorable subcategories like specialty tools, artisanal ingredients,... Continue reading...
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by Jon Porter on (#6GDWM)
SynthID works by converting audio into a visual spectogram and adding a visual watermark. | Image: Google Audio created using Google DeepMind's AI Lyria model, such as tracks made with YouTube's new audio generation features, will be watermarked with SynthID to let people identify their AI-generated origins after the fact. In a blog post, DeepMind said the watermark shouldn't be detectable by the human ear and doesn't compromise the listening experience," and added that it should still be detectable even if an audio track is compressed, sped up or down, or has extra noise added.Watermarking tools like SynthID are seen as an important safeguard against some of the harms of generative AI. President Joe Biden's executive order on artificial intelligence, for example, calls for a new set of government-led standards for watermarking... Continue reading...
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by Tom Warren on (#6GDT1)
The new Windows App. | Image: Microsoft Microsoft has created a Windows App for iOS, iPadOS, macOS, Windows, and web browsers. The app essentially takes the previous Windows 365 app and turns it into a central hub for streaming a copy of Windows from a remote PC, Azure Virtual Desktop, Windows 365, Microsoft Dev Box, and Microsoft's Remote Desktop Services.Microsoft supports multiple monitors through its Windows App, custom display resolutions and scaling, and device redirection for peripherals like webcams, storage devices, and printers. The preview version of the Windows App isn't currently available for Android, though. Image: Microsoft The Windows App acts as a hub to connect to remote and cloud PCs. The Windows App is also limited to... Continue reading...
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by Jon Porter on (#6GDT2)
Photo by: Trae Patton/NBCU Photo Bank/NBCUniversal via Getty Images via Getty Images Google is testing new generative AI features for YouTube that'll let people create music tracks using just a text prompt or a simple hummed tune. The first, Dream Track, already seeded to a few creators on the platform, is designed to auto-generate short 30-second music tracks in the style of famous artists. The feature can imitate nine different artists, who've chosen to collaborate with YouTube on its development. YouTube is also showing off new tools that can generate music tracks from a hum.The announcement comes as YouTube attempts to navigate the emerging norms and copyright rules around AI generated music, while also protecting its relationship with major music labels. The issue was brought into sharp relief when an AI-generated... Continue reading...
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by Jay Peters on (#6GDT3)
Image: Epic Games Epic Games is adding a new voice reporting feature into Fortnite to help catch players who break the company's community rules.If the feature is on - if you're under 18, the feature is always on when using voice chats - the device you're playing the game on will securely capture the past five minutes of audio on a rolling basis," according to Epic's blog post. (Epic stresses that it does not store voice recordings on its servers unless you file a report.) Audio after five minutes is deleted.When you report a conversation, the voice chat audio captured from the last five minutes will be uploaded with the report and sent to Epic moderators for review," Epic says. (Reports are anonymous.) Then, the company says it will auto-delete clips... Continue reading...
by Amrita Khalid on (#6GDR6)
Illustration by Nick Barclay / The Verge It's a cliche at this point to say that podcasts (and, to a less publicized extent, audiobooks) have a discovery problem. To help fix that, Spotify announced it's using Google Cloud's AI tools to improve both content discovery and personalized recommendations for its audio offerings.With this latest move, Spotify is using Google Cloud's LLMs (large language models) to analyze the roughly 5 million podcasts and 350,000 audiobooks in its content library with a goal of trying to augment" the metadata, according to a press release. (The Verge has reached out to Spotify to clarify exactly what augment" means in this case). A podcast or audiobook's metadata includes information like the title, the name of the host or author, show notes,... Continue reading...
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by Umar Shakir on (#6GDJX)
The 2025 Hyundai Ioniq 5 N has a soul patch. | Image: Hyundai Hyundai showed off its production performance-variant Ioniq 5 N" at the LA Auto Show this week, releasing final specifications of the electric crossover and announcing its availability at US dealerships in March 2024.As previously announced in July, this new version of the Ioniq 5 was built by Hyundai's performance tuning teams under its N sub-brand. The engineers behind the 2025 Ioniq 5 N used Hyundai's base E-GMP electric vehicle platform, adding motorsport tech learned from the automaker's rolling labs" experiment vehicles like the N Vision 74, RM20e, and the RN22e.Hyundai includes features for habitual motorheads like the N e-shift, which mimics the feeling of simulating an eight-speed dual-clutch transmission gas car, and the N... Continue reading...
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by Jay Peters on (#6GDJY)
Illustration: The Verge Google is going to allow teens to use Bard beginning Thursday, though the AI chatbot will have some guardrails in place, according to a blog post from Google's Tulsee Doshi.Bard will be available for teens in most countries around the world" as long as they meet Google's minimum age requirement to be in charge of their own account, Doshi says. (For many countries, that age is 13; Google lists the exceptions in a support document.) To start, teens will only be able to use Bard in English, but Doshi says Google will add more languages over time."Google has a few safety measures to help teens understand how generative AI works and prevent them from seeing unsafe content.
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by Wes Davis on (#6GDH9)
Threads is adding trending topics and hashtags. | Image: Meta Mark Zuckerberg revealed Meta is testing a new tagging feature for Threads that's like hashtags, but not exactly. Yes, you'll use a hashtag to create or add to a topic's conversation, but instead of showing up as a hashtagged word, Threads converts it to a blue-text hyperlink. Australian users will get the first crack at it in the initial limited test" before it gets a wider release.Typing a #" into the post text field brings up a card with the topic you're tagging or other, similar ones. Underneath that, each of the topics comes with a count of posts about it, just like Instagram does.Those with Threads' new tagging feature can only add a single topic to a post at a time, which will probably limit anyone hoping to spam their... Continue reading...
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by Emma Roth on (#6GDEQ)
Illustrator by Alex Castro / The Verge The Federal Communications Commission has approved a new set of rules aiming to prevent digital discrimination." It means the agency can hold telecom companies accountable for digitally discriminating against customers - or giving certain communities poorer service (or none at all) based on income level, race, or religion.The new rules come as part of the Biden Administration's 2021 Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, which requires the FCC to develop and adopt anti-digital discrimination rules. Many of the communities that lack adequate access to broadband today are the same areas that suffer from longstanding patterns of residential segregation and economic disadvantage," FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel said following today's vote.... Continue reading...
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by Sheena Vasani on (#6GDER)
Illustration: The Verge Microsoft is working on offering a better customer service experience powered by OpenAI's ChatGPT-4 for its visually impaired users through a partnership with Be My Eyes, a company that helps visually impaired individuals tackle everyday tasks with the help of sighted volunteers.Microsoft is integrating a digital visual assistant tool Be My Eyes created - Be My AI - into its Microsoft Disability Answer Desk, allowing visually impaired Microsoft users to resolve technical issues or perform tasks like updating software without needing the assistance of a call center agent. After testing the tool earlier this year on Microsoft users, Be My Eyes said the tool resolved inquiries in four minutes on average, which is less than half the average... Continue reading...
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by Wes Davis on (#6GDES)
It's fine to say aspartame is safe - but not to obscure that you're being paid to do it. | Photo by Long Wei/VCG via Getty Images The first rule of sponsored content: You have to tell people it was paid for.Today, the Federal Trade Commission publicly admonished over a dozen health influencers for publishing videos on TikTok and Instagram about sugar and the artificial sweetener aspartame without disclosing that the posts were paid for by the American Beverage Association and The Canadian Sugar Institute.The FTC says this makes each of them potentially on the hook for fines over $50,000 if they continue posting without disclosures. Samuel Levine, who heads the FTC's Bureau of Consumer Protection, called it irresponsible for any trade group to hire influencers to tout its members' product" without making sure content creators are clear about the deal. The FTC... Continue reading...
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by Chris Welch on (#6GDET)
Illustration: The Verge Sonos is in a bit of a rough patch with its consumer hardware business. Demand isn't nearly on the same level that it was a few years ago, and CEO Patrick Spence has used the word challenging" more than once when discussing the company's last several financial quarters. Today's earnings, which saw revenue decrease by 5.5 percent year over year, are another example.While it was a challenging year in the categories in which we play, the strength of the Sonos brand and product portfolio enabled us to retain a strong market share position," Spence said in Sonos' press release.But Spence and the Sonos team predict big things ahead in 2024. Namely, some sort of significant new product is on the roadmap for later next year that Sonos... Continue reading...
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by Emma Roth on (#6GDCF)
Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Adobe is working on a new audio tool designed to break apart different layers of sound within a single recording. The tool is called Project Sound Lift, and it can use AI to separate elements like applause from the sound of someone's voice.As shown in a demo sent to The Verge, all you have to do is import an audio file into the application, then choose which sound you want the tool to filter out. There are quite a few options to choose from, including applause, laughter, alarms, speech, crowds, traffic, typing, and more. Project Sound Lift will automatically detect each sound and spit out separate files containing the background noise and the track you want to prioritize, like someone's voice or the sound of an instrument.You can... Continue reading...
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by Umar Shakir on (#6GDCG)
The Bluetooth headphones feature is coming to just the new Model 3, at least for now. | Image: Tesla A Tesla software update is adding the ability to connect Bluetooth headphones so kids in the back seat can enjoy streaming movies and shows without disturbing their parents in the front. As Not a Tesla App notes, so far, the 2023.38.8 software update with the new feature for content viewed from Tesla's Theater app is rolling out only for the redesigned Model 3 that offers an infotainment screen for back seat passengers. The new vehicle launched in Europe in September but has not yet reached the US market. The latest Model S and Model X vehicles in the US do have rear screens, but we have not heard about the update becoming available for them yet.For now, those who own a redesigned Model 3 can connect up to two Bluetooth headphones by... Continue reading...
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by Charles Pulliam-Moore on (#6GD9Y)
It was basically a foregone conclusion that Marvel's animated What If...? series would return to Disney Plus with even more stories from far far corners of Marvel's ever-expanding cinematic universe. But the show's new season 2 trailer also makes it seem like its next chapter is going to jack directly into the big multiverse moment that most of the studio's recent live-action films and series have become entangled in, which suggests some interesting things about the future.Though tinkering with people's lives in season 1 damn near led to reality falling apart, The Watcher (Jeffrey Wright) is up to his old tricks in the new season 2 trailer. And he's once again keeping a close eye on unique variants of characters from films like Black... Continue reading...
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by Jay Peters on (#6GD9Z)
Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Beginning in December, the Comixology app won't work anymore - you'll have to read your comics in Amazon's Kindle app instead. Amazon announced that the apps will merge on December 4th, meaning that, from that point on, you can continue to access your Comixology comics, graphic novels, and manga titles in the Kindle app," the company says in a support document.You will need to download any Comixology books you were reading into the Kindle app, but Amazon says that any progress in a book you read in Comixology will automatically sync over to Kindle. You can also continue to buy comics from Amazon's Comixology section on its store. But after December 4th, you won't be able to read comics in the Comixology app anymore.In an email,... Continue reading...
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by Jacob Kastrenakes on (#6GDA0)
Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Meta is challenging the European Commission's decision to regulate two of its services, Messenger and Marketplace, as gatekeepers under the bloc's tough new restrictions on tech platforms. The company filed an appeal over the two services today arguing that neither should qualify, Meta spokesperson Chris Sgro told The Verge.Reuters reported earlier Meta will not fight the European Commission's gatekeeper designation from being applied to Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp.Being designated as a gatekeeper under the Digital Markets Act means that tech platforms have to abide by certain neutrality and openness rules. Messaging services like Meta's Messenger need to be made interoperable with other messaging services; sales platforms like... Continue reading...
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by Chris Welch on (#6GDA1)
Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Instagram is changing a lot these days, especially when it comes to the ways in which we can share our content with others and segment different audiences. But today, the Meta-owned app is bringing the focus back to its creative tools - adding a handful of features including Instagram's first new filters in ages. And there are a ton of them: I count 25 new filter additions on iOS before you reach the ones that were present before.From subtle color edits to options for expressive styles, these updates make it easy for you to try various looks for your posts," Meta's blog post reads. As always, you can adjust the intensity of any filter with a slider. For the first time, some of these filters (like wide angle" and wavy") make... Continue reading...
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by Allison Johnson on (#6GDA2)
Honestly? Unlimited storage is tempting. | Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Verizon's cloud storage options are growing: today the company unveiled a new individual plan for its unlimited storage tier. It's an add-on available for existing Verizon subscribers and costs $13.99 per month. It is - I'll repeat - unlimited, so you can upload all the photos, videos, documents, PDFs, and PNGs that your heart desires, from your phone and your computer. That's an unusual offering when most other cloud storage services come with data caps, but this is a wireless carrier after all, so it's worth considering a couple of words of caution.Carriers, including Verizon, often have funny definitions of unlimited," and there are indeed a few limitations. Individual files can't exceed 10GB, and you can only upload 50GB per day.... Continue reading...
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by Nathan Edwards on (#6GD3M)
Okay, this is a MagSafe charger, not Qi2, but it's the same idea, and there's a skeleton for some reason. | Photo by Antonio G. Di Benedetto / The Verge Qi2 - the next version of the wireless charging standard, now with more magnets! - is more almost-here than ever. The Wireless Power Consortium (WPC) announced today that the first Qi v2.0 devices are nearly through the certification process, with the first available in time for the holiday season" and more than 100 either in certification testing or waiting in line. The iPhone 15 series will be the first Qi2-certified phones.Qi is the open wireless charging standard that pretty much everyone uses. It's in Androids and iPhones, and MagSafe is built on top of it. Version 2.0 includes updates to the non-magnetic Qi standard, which we'll get to, but it also introduces Qi2.Qi2 promises faster, less finicky wireless charging using... Continue reading...
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by Richard Lawler on (#6GDA3)
Google Titan security keys (2023) | Image: Google The latest iteration of Google's Titan Security Key is here, ready to work alongside the new passwordless passkey technology that's rolled out with support from Apple, Microsoft, Google, and many others. Two new versions of the key are available in the Google Store starting today with either a USB-C connection ($35) or USB-A connection ($30), and - like the previous versions released in 2021 - both also have NFC to connect wirelessly to phones and other mobile devices.I've been using the USB-C version for a few days, and it works just as well as other keys I have, like the older Titan hardware and other FIDO2 keys from Yubico. Having NFC support on both versions is convenient so that you don't have to choose, especially since when... Continue reading...
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by Jay Peters on (#6GD71)
Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge YouTube has officially rolled out its YouTube Premium-exclusive enhanced bitrate" 1080p resolution option on Android and TVs, the company announced on Wednesday. The improved video quality launched on iOS first earlier this year and became available on the web in August.I don't subscribe to Premium, so I can't vouch for whether the enhanced bitrate makes much of a difference. But YouTube says that the improved video quality is turned on automatically based on your connection and viewing settings," so if you pay for Premium and your videos now look a little bit nicer, that might be why.YouTube also detailed a few other improvements that are now available to Premium subscribers. You can now pick up videos where you left off when... Continue reading...
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by Ash Parrish on (#6GD72)
Image: Niantic Peridot, Niantic's original augmented reality pet game, will start using generative AI designed to make the game's cute technicolor aliens behave more like your cat.Here's how it works. Starting with today's update, Niantic's algorithm will analyze real-world objects captured in game with your phone's camera and then convert those objects into words to be parsed by a large language model (LLM) - in this case, a customized version of Meta's Llama 2 program.Additionally, each pet, called Dots, will have their personality profile - which is similar to the different natures of pokemon - also fed to the LLM. Peridot will then ask the LLM how a dot with its specific personality type would interact with the objects around it. Its answers... Continue reading...
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by Andrew J. Hawkins on (#6GD73)
Image: Mercedes-Benz Mercedes-Benz cut the ribbon on its first EV fast-charging hub in the US, complete with a swanky waiting area and 400kW charging speeds courtesy of ChargePoint.The hub is located at the automaker's US-based headquarters in Atlanta, Georgia, meaning most of the early users are likely to be Mercedes employees. But the company says that owners of non-Mercedes EVs are welcome to use the chargers as well.The charging station is the first of a proposed 2,000 hubs that Mercedes plans on installing worldwide as part of a $1 billion, multiyear plan. But the company isn't shouldering the whole cost itself; 50 percent will be covered by MN8 Energy, an offshoot of Goldman Sachs Asset Management focused on solar power and energy storage.The new... Continue reading...
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by Chris Welch on (#6GD3E)
Photo by Victoria Song / The Verge iPhone 14 and 15 buyers won't need to pay for Apple's satellite-powered Emergency SOS safety feature anytime soon. This morning, the company announced that it's extending the free phase of Emergency SOS for an additional year for iPhone 14 owners. That means that the service will now lapse at the same time for both iPhone generations in November 2025.Emergency SOS makes it possible to reach emergency services via a satellite connection in areas where Wi-Fi or a regular cellular signal are unavailable. Apple says the feature has helped save lives around the world."From a man who was rescued after his car plummeted over a 400-foot cliff in Los Angeles, to lost hikers found in the Apennine Mountains in Italy, we continue to hear... Continue reading...
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by Tom Warren on (#6GD3F)
Image: Microsoft Microsoft launched its big AI push earlier this year as part of its Bing search engine, integrating a ChatGPT-like interface directly into its search results. Now less than a year later, it's dropping the Bing Chat branding and moving to Microsoft Copilot, the new name for the chat interface you might have used in Bing, Microsoft Edge, and Windows 11.Microsoft initially talked up the Google search competition for its AI ambitions earlier this year, but it now looks like it has its sights set on ChatGPT instead. The Bing Chat rebranding comes just days after OpenAI revealed 100 million people are using ChatGPT on a weekly basis. Despite a close partnership worth billions, Microsoft and OpenAI continue to compete for the same customers... Continue reading...
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by Umar Shakir on (#6GD3G)
Unified Microsoft Defender dashboard with analytics and Sentinel on the sidebar. | Image: Microsoft Microsoft is combining its Sentinel security analytics and Microsoft Defender XDR platforms into an industry first" unified security operations platform - with the company's Security Copilot chatbot stationed centrally for IT and security personnel to administer everything easily. During the company's enterprise-focused Ignite conference today, Microsoft is announcing expanded conversational AI abilities to better centrally manage its security platforms.Microsoft originally announced Security Copilot in March, demonstrating how its generative AI system can summarize all the alerts and data points that typically inundate security professionals. At the time, it had not been made available beyond a few customers" to test. Microsoft... Continue reading...
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