The Verge

Image: Cath Virginia / The Verge | Photo by STR / NurPhoto, Getty Images Elon Musk says he plans to move X and SpaceX's headquarters from California to Texas. Because of this law and the many others that preceded it, attacking both families and companies, SpaceX will now move its HQ from Hawthorne, California, to Starbase, Texas," Musk wrote in a tweet, referencing California's SAFETY Act (AB1955).Signed on Monday by California Governor Gavin Newsom, it prevents schools from imposing rules requiring teachers to disclose changes to a student's gender identity without their permission and prohibits retaliation against teachers who refuse to out a student, reports the Los Angeles Times.Another post from Musk a few minutes later said that X, which is currently headquartered in San Francisco, will move to... Continue reading...

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Netflix has discontinued its streaming app for Quest headsets, Upload VR reports. The good news for Quest owners is that Meta recently added support for Netflix in the Quest browser, complete with 1080p streaming.Netflix hadn't significantly updated its VR app since porting it to the Quest in 2019. It never gained passthrough or download support, and its resolution stayed pinned at 480p. None of that mattered when the app came out for Samsung Gear VR in 2015, but things have changed a lot in the nine years since then.I'd imagine some people will miss the cozy Netflix cabin in this YouTube Short, though.Streaming in the browser fixes two of those things - passthrough and higher-resolution streaming - but users still can't download... Continue reading...

Katie Couric (L) and Ozy CEO and Co-Founder Carlos Watson speak onstage during Ozy Fest 2017 | Photo by Bryan Bedder/Getty Images for Ozy Fusion Fest 2017 Carlos Watson and the now-shuttered Ozy Media startup he cofounded were found guilty of fraud by a federal jury on Tuesday, as reported earlier by The New York Times. Over the course of a several-weeks-long trial, the jury heard the government's claims that Ozy Media misled investors by falsifying financial records, inflating audience numbers, and even making up business deals.Watson, the former CEO of Ozy Media, cofounded the company alongside Samir Rao in 2013. The company launched an online magazine, newsletter, and an annual conference in New York City, all while striking high-profile partnerships and receiving millions in investments.But things came to a halt when a 2021 article from New York Times media columnist Ben Smith... Continue reading...

On the Utopia of the Seas you can experience train dining without the bumps and spilled drinks. | Image: Royal Caribbean The new 5,668-passenger Royal Caribbean Utopia of the Seas is docked in Florida, where sites like Cruise Critic have gotten a preview of the amenities before it enters service on July 19th. That includes a unique experience called Royal Railway Utopia Station, where passengers dine on a virtual train ride while staring at simulated scenery zipping by on giant screens.The restaurant is built to look like two full-size rail cars with a lavish interior featuring four-person booths lining the sides, each with its own giant display serving as a virtual window. What diners see out those virtual windows will rotate throughout the year. The first experience is Western-themed, with views of mountains, canyons, and gold rush towns.Murder on the... Continue reading...

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge HeHealth's AI-powered Calmara app claimed, Our innovative AI technology offers rapid, confidential, and scientifically validated sexual health screening, giving you peace of mind before diving into intimate encounters," but now it's shut down after an inquiry by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC).The app prompted daters to submit dick pics to check for sexually transmitted diseases, promising clear, science-backed answers about your partner's sexual health status," according to an FTC letter dated July 11th. The letter lays out some of the agency's concerns with the information HeHealth relied on for claims, including one saying that it could detect more than ten sexually transmitted infections with up to 94 percent accuracy. ... Continue reading...

Image: Universal Though Universal's Twisters is set to drop as the US deals with a massive heatwave, wildfires, and the aftermath of multiple deadly storms, the movie goes out of its way to avoid mentioning climate change because its director didn't want to make audiences uncomfortable.It would have made sense if Twisters - a film about storm chasers studying a spate of unusually powerful and destructive tornadoes - worked climate change into its story. But in a recent interview with CNN, director Lee Isaac Chung said that, even though he thinks cinema should be a reflection of the world," he avoided mentioning climate change in Twisters because he doesn't feel like films are meant to be message-oriented."Chung pointed to the way that some of T... Continue reading...

Image: Cath Virginia / The Verge; Getty Images The former tech investor likes the FTC's Lina Khan and wants to break up Google, citing its liberal bias. Continue reading...

An iPad version of the iPhone's StandBy mode would be a start for Apple's smart display efforts. But I'd rather see a dedicated Apple Home iPad. | Image: David Pierce / The Verge Apple's smart home efforts need a smart display. If I have to hear Siri say, I found some web results; I can show them if you ask again from your iPhone," one more time, I may throw a HomePod out the window.While smart displays - the more expensive sibling to smart speakers - haven't lived up to their potential, they can be useful and are a missing piece in Apple's smart home, which the company has largely avoided creating products for - so far, just a couple of smart speakers and a bit of help from the Apple TV.An Apple smart display with a touch-screen display, a dedicated Apple Home control panel, a smarter Siri, and the chops to be an Apple Home hub supporting Thread and Matter is something I'd put in my smart home.It appears... Continue reading...

An aerial view of the flooded neighborhood of Juana Matos in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria in Catano, Puerto Rico, on Friday, September 22nd, 2017. | Photo: Getty Images Puerto Rico filed suit against fossil fuel companies this week, alleging that the oil and gas giants have misled the public about climate change and delayed a transition to clean energy. The suit seeks $1 billion in damages to help Puerto Rico defend itself against climate disasters.In a complaint filed in San Juan yesterday, Puerto Rico's Department of Justice says that the companies violated trade law by promoting fossil fuels without adequately warning about the dangers. The defendants include ExxonMobil, BP, Chevron, Shell, ConocoPhillips, and other energy companies.It's the latest in a slew of lawsuits attempting to hold fossil fuel companies accountable for the consequences of climate change. Greenhouse gas emissions from fossil... Continue reading...

The Pixel 8 (left) and Pixel 8 Pro (right). | Photo by Allison Johnson / The Verge The Pixel 9 Pro and 9 Pro XL could help you capture clearer selfies thanks to a major upgrade to the front-facing camera. Leaked marketing materials shared with Android Authority depict the 9 Pro and 9 Pro XL with 50-megapixel autofocusing selfie cameras.The selfie cam and the rear-facing ultrawide and telephoto cameras are all rumored to use 50MP Sony IMX858 image sensors, while the primary rear camera may feature a 50MP sensor from Samsung. You can get an early look at what appears to be the Pixel 9 Pro's camera in action in this video posted to TikTok, which shows an up to 30x Super Res Zoom - just like the Pixel 7 and Pixel 8. The device used in this video appears to be the same leaked hardware the account showed off last week.

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge More than 170,000 YouTube videos are part of a massive dataset that was used to train AI systems for some of the biggest technology companies, according to an investigation by Proof News and copublished with Wired. Apple, Anthropic, Nvidia, and Salesforce are among the tech firms that used the YouTube Subtitles" data that was ripped from the video platform without permission. The training dataset is a collection of subtitles taken from YouTube videos belonging to more than 48,000 channels - it does not include imagery from the videos.Videos from popular creators like MrBeast and Marques Brownlee appear in the dataset, as do clips from news outlets like ABC News, the BBC, and The New York Times. More than 100 videos from The Verge a... Continue reading...

Image: The Verge / Fourthwall Celebrate this special day of internet sales with the latest apparel from your friends at The Verge. Continue reading...

The OnePlus Pad 2's optional Stylo 2 stylus vibrates to simulate the feeling of pen on paper. | Image: OnePlus With a larger 12.1-inch screen now powered by the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 mobile platform, the new OnePlus Pad 2 brings several performance upgrades to the company's original tablet. But the most interesting is an optional new stylus accessory that simulates the pen on paper experience using vibrations.The new Stylo 2 stylus is now made with a leather-like material, offering improved grip, a jump from 4,096 to 16,000 levels of pressure sensitivity, swipe controls, and a linear motor inside that makes the tip vibrate to give you that feeling of a pen writing on paper.There are other improvements as well. The OnePlus Pad 2's larger screen, up from 11.6 inches on the original, also gets a resolution bump from 2800 x 2000 pixels to 3000 x 2120... Continue reading...

The Bird Buddy smart bird feeder is getting an AI-powered update allowing users to name specific birds who frequently visit. | Image: Bird Buddy The Bird Buddy smart bird feeder is getting a collection of new features as part of a recently announced Nature Intelligence update. The feeder's ability to identify the species of a visiting bird is being expanded, and users will now get notifications when individual birds stop by.The company describes the Bird Buddy's new Name That Bird feature as being a noninvasive form of bird tagging - a practice that usually keeps tabs on the movements of birds using trackers or tags physically attached to their legs. The Bird Buddy instead relies on images captured by the smart feeder's camera and AI image recognition that can spot the differences between individual birds.The detail made available by the 5MP high-resolution Bird Buddy sensor... Continue reading...

Illustration by William Joel / The Verge The photos aren't blurry! As a longtime iPhone user married to a longtime Android user, I've spent years sending and receiving photos that come through both postage-stamp small and about as sharp as a pointillist painting. But a few minutes after I installed the iOS 18 beta on my iPhone 15 Pro, I asked Anna to send me a photo, and what came through was the blissfully high-res photo I'd hoped for. That, right there, is what I call an upgrade.RCS support is just one of the new things coming in iOS 18, of course. At WWDC a few weeks ago, Apple talked a lot about homescreen customization, improvements to Siri, a revamped Photos app, and more. The company seems to have added support for RCS, a more modern and powerful messaging protocol that... Continue reading...

Image: Porsche Porsche announced two new rear-wheel drive versions of the forthcoming Macan electric SUV, including a higher-powered, lighter-weight 4S model. Porsche said deliveries are expected to begin later this year.When it was announced earlier this year, Porsche said the Macan EV would come in two trims: the Macan 4 and the Macan Turbo, both of which sport dual motors for all-wheel drive. Now, the company is adding two more versions in the hopes of widening its appeal. Image: Porsche The RWD Macan will only have one motor located in the rear axle. It's the same motor as the one used in the Macan 4, with an output of 250kW, or 335 horsepower. Porsche says it will use a 480-amp pulse inverter with silicon carbide... Continue reading...

The hackers say they accessed Disney's internal systems via an employee's compromised computer. | Image: The Verge Over a terabyte of data supposedly obtained from Disney's internal messaging channels has been leaked online by a self-proclaimed hacktivist group," including login credentials, code, images, and information about unreleased projects.The anonymous group calling itself Nullbulge has claimed responsibility for the leak, alleging to have gained access to the company's Slack messaging data via the compromised computer of a Disney employee. Anything we could get our hands on, we downloaded and packaged up," the group said on X, claiming to have obtained 1.1TiB of files and chat messages" from almost 10,000 corporate Disney Slack channels. Disney has since confirmed to The Wall Street Journal that it's investigating this matter."N... Continue reading...

Image: Elgato Amazon Prime Day is just beginning, and Elgato is already dropping a sweet deal. Prime subscribers can get the limited-edition atomic purple version of Elgato's Stream Deck MK. 2 for $124.99 ($35 off) at Amazon.Normally, the standard Stream Deck MK. 2 comes in black or white and sells for $149.99 (or discounted as low as $109.99 during its biggest sales promos), so there is a bit of a premium on the limited-edition model and its aesthetics. But this is the first (and possibly only) time the atomic purple model has been discounted. Elgato only sells this variant on Amazon, and it claims the individually numbered run will no longer be available once it sells out. So you may want to consider jumping on this if you love the recent r... Continue reading...

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Powerful record labels, including UMG Recordings, Warner Music, and Sony Music, filed a lawsuit Friday accusing Verizon of intentionally ignoring its customers' copyright violations for profit, reports Music Business Worldwide.The plaintiffs say they are entitled to as much as $150,000 per violation under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), which could add up to as much as $2.6 billion.The lawsuit includes a list of 17,335 tracks from artists or bands, including Elvis Presley, Matchbox Twenty, Goo Goo Dolls, and Brandy. (Here's the list if you'd like to dive further in - it starts with Sam Cooke and ends with Wiz Khalifa.) The labels say they've sent nearly 350,000 infringement notices" to Verizon since 2020, alleging that... Continue reading...

Image: Kristen Radtke / The Verge The FBI said it gained access' to the Trump rally shooter's phone just two days after the attempted assassination. Continue reading...

The Modular Ultra face now allows you to have bezels for your training load and vitals. One thing always irked me about the Apple Watch. Rain or shine, in sickness and in health, it pushed me to close my rings. Never mind if I had covid-19, shin splints, or was mentally in a dark place. It nudged me to be a better" version of myself, so long as better didn't involve a day off. But with watchOS 11 - the public beta of which arrives today - it feels like my Apple Watch is finally cutting me some slack.This is largely due to a trio of new features: the new Vitals app, Training Load feature, and the ability to pause your Activity Rings. I waxed lyrical about the latter right after WWDC, but after spending some time with the developer beta, I'm convinced these are the smartest fitness updates Apple's rolled out in years.T... Continue reading...

Illustration: The Verge Apple lets the public in on beta testing, but Apple Intelligence is likely still months away. Continue reading...

Illustration by Nick Barclay / The Verge You can now download the public betas for iOS 18, iPadOS 18, macOS Sequoia, and watchOS 11. Apple's updated operating systems will eventually include Apple Intelligence AI features and a better Siri - if you have the right device, that is. For now, the betas will bring less exciting but still useful features to the various Apple devices.The public iOS 18 beta will bring with it key updates to the way the iPhone software works, including support for RCS messaging and new customization options that let users put apps wherever they want to on the homescreen (finally) or apply a tint to the icons and widgets. It also comes with a new layout for the Photos app, a redesigned, more customizable Control Center, and dark mode icons. Similar... Continue reading...

Image: Kristen Radtke / The Verge The FBI has successfully broken into the phone of the man who shot at former President Donald Trump at Saturday's rally in Butler, Pennsylvania.FBI technical specialists successfully gained access to Thomas Matthew Crooks' phone, and they continue to analyze his electronic devices," the agency said in a statement on Monday.

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge YouTube Music is testing a new feature that lets you use AI to generate a playlist. In a statement to The Verge, YouTube spokesperson Jessica Gibby said that Premium users in the US will be able to create a custom playlist by describing exactly what they want to hear."As shown in screenshots obtained by 9to5Google, the feature could surface a chat UI that you can use to enter a description or choose from prompts like catchy pop choruses" or upbeat pop anthems." It will then generate a playlist based on your description. Spotify has a similar feature that lets Premium users generate playlists using AI. GIF: YouTube Here's how YouTube's new sound search" will work. Gibby says YouTube Music is also rolling... Continue reading...

The purported Pixel 9 Pro XL (left) and the Pixel 9 (right). | Image: pixo_unpacking via TikTok We might not have to wait until August to get a full-on look at the Google Pixel 9 lineup. A new set of videos posted to the TikTok account pixo_unpacking shows what appears to be the Pixel 9 and 9 Pro XL, as spotted earlier by GSMArena.The videos track with the leaks we've seen so far, with the Pixel 9 and 9 Pro XL swapping out the Pixel 8's camera visor for an oval-shaped housing that protrudes from the back of the device. As shown in the video embedded below, the Pixel 9 Pro XL looks much larger than the base Pixel 9 and nearly as large as the Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra. The Pixel 9 Pro XL also seems to come with a three-camera setup when compared to the Pixel 9's two cameras.

Image: Kristen Radtke / The Verge; Getty Images After the assassination attempt on the former president, tech platforms scrambled to curb false information in what will be one of the largest content moderation problems in years. Continue reading...

Image: The Verge The person who attempted to assassinate former President Donald Trump during a rally on Saturday had a Discord account - though it was rarely used - according to the company.Discord removed the account according to our off-platform behavior policy and we are assisting law enforcement in their investigation," Clint Smith, chief legal officer of Discord, said in an emailed statement. The suspect's account was rarely utilized, has not been used in months, and we have found no evidence that it was used to plan this incident, promote violence, or discuss his political views, but with the investigation ongoing, we are not able to share any additional information at this time." Discord didn't respond to The Verge's questions about how it... Continue reading...

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Investigators are working to break into the phone of the man who shot at former President Donald Trump at a Pennsylvania rally on Saturday. The shooting is being probed as an assassination attempt.The FBI said in a statement that it had obtained the shooter's phone for examination." Officials told reporters in a conference call on Sunday, as reported by The New York Times, that agents in Pennsylvania were unable to break into the phone. It's been shipped to the FBI's lab in Quantico, Virginia, where the FBI hopes to get past the phone's password protection, the Times reported.Investigators are still looking for insight into the motives of Thomas Matthew Crooks, a 20-year-old from Bethel Park, Pennsylvania, who they identified as the... Continue reading...

The HP OmniBook Ultra features an AMD Ryzen AI 300-series processor and integrated AMD Radeon 800M graphics. | Image: HP HP's resurrected OmniBook line will soon be getting a performance boost with the new HP OmniBook Ultra, featuring an AMD Ryzen AI 300-series processor with integrated AMD Radeon 800M graphics, up to 32GB of RAM, and a pair of 40Gbps Thunderbolt 4 USB-C ports. Available starting in August for $1,449.99, the new HP OmniBook Ultra will eventually receive a free software update to make it one of the first Copilot Plus PCs not powered by an ARM-based processor.The OmniBook branding was originally revived back in May with the HP OmniBook X AI laptop, which, as with most of the Copilot Plus PCs announced at that time, is powered by an ARM-based Snapdragon X Elite processor. Its neural processing unit was rated at 45 trillion operations per... Continue reading...

Photo illustration by The Verge / Photo by OSTP Arati Prabhakar, a former DARPA chief and now director of the White House's OSTP, says the time to regulate AI is now. Continue reading...

Illustration: The Verge Google is considering spending $23 billion to buy Wiz, a cloud cybersecurity startup with partners that include Amazon and Oracle, reports The Wall Street Journal. At close to twice what it spent for Motorola Mobility in 2012, it would be the most Google has ever paid for another company.The New York City-based Wiz offers siloed security tools and scanners" for the enterprise space, according to the company. Wiz writes that it secures corporate cloud infrastructure by creating a normalizing layer between cloud environments," letting businesses rapidly identify and remove critical risks." Buying such a company feels particularly targeted at an increasingly vulnerable-looking Microsoft that's recently weathered multiple high-profile... Continue reading...