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by Chris Welch on (#6MZ2Z)
Image: Sonos Sonos is refreshing its small portable speaker, the Roam, with a second-generation model that mostly adds some minor quality-of-life improvements. It's reasonable to think of the new Roam 2, available today for $199, as more of a Roam 1.5: this is really what Sonos should've released in the first place.As I reported earlier this month, the Roam 2 can be used right out of the box like any other Bluetooth speaker. That differs from the original, which awkwardly required an initial setup process with the Sonos app - on your home Wi-Fi network, no less - before you could use it on the go. Seems silly for a portable audio product, right? Thankfully Sonos now agrees.The Roam 2 also gains a dedicated Bluetooth pairing button on the back,... Continue reading...
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The Verge
| Link | https://www.theverge.com/ |
| Feed | http://www.theverge.com/rss/index.xml |
| Updated | 2025-07-11 15:45 |
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by Chris Welch on (#6MZ2Y)
The company's app redesign fumble threatens to steal the thunder from what otherwise looks (and feels) like a strong debut in a new category. Continue reading...
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by Thomas Ricker on (#6MYXK)
The Aqara Wall Outlet H2 can trigger scenes based upon real-time power usage. | Image: Aqara Aqara just announced the 39.99 Wall Outlet H2, which offers a one-for-one smart replacement for standard 16A wall sockets used in Europe. Its party trick is the ability to monitor the real-time power usage of connected devices and appliances to initiate automations around the home.For example, if you charge your phone when going to sleep you could automatically activate a nighttime scene - arm motion detectors, lock the door, close blinds, and turn off lights - just as soon as the H2 begins pulling more than 10W of power. Or, it can detect when the laundry cycle ends to shut the machine off and send you a notification - that way you don't have to listen to it beep incessantly until you finally walk upstairs with heavy regret for having... Continue reading...
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by Jacob Kastrenakes on (#6MYN1)
Photo by Nathan Congleton / NBC via Getty Images Scarlett Johansson says that OpenAI asked her to be the voice behind ChatGPT - but that when she declined, the company went ahead and created a voice that sounded just like her. In a statement shared to NPR, Johansson says that she has now been forced to hire legal counsel" and has sent two letters to OpenAI inquiring how the soundalike ChatGPT voice, known as Sky, was made.Last September, I received an offer from Sam Altman, who wanted to hire me to voice the current ChatGPT 4.0 system," Johansson writes. She says that Altman contacted her agent as recently as two days before the company first demoed the ChatGPT voice asking for her to reconsider.
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by Andrew J. Hawkins on (#6MYPJ)
Image: Aurora Volvo revealed its first production-ready" self-driving truck that it's making with Aurora, the autonomous driving technology company founded by former executives from Google, Uber, and Tesla.The truck is based on Volvo's new VNL, which is a Class 8 semi truck built for long-haul transportation. The autonomous version of the truck features an array of sensors and cameras to power Aurora's Level 4 autonomous driving system, which enables the truck to operate without a human behind the wheel. The companies say the truck is purpose-designed and purpose-built" for Aurora's self-driving hardware and software stack.This truck is the first of our standardized global autonomous technology platform, which will enable us to introduce... Continue reading...
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by Ash Parrish on (#6MYN0)
Image: X / Belle Delphine Belle Delphine, the woman who went viral in 2019 for selling jars of her bathwater, revealed earlier this month that the stunt earned her $90K in profits. In a thread on X, the adult content creator and model also explained that because of PayPal, the payment processing system she used for the sale, she never saw a dime of that money.PayPal, without any warning closed my PayPal account and took the $90,000 that I earned from selling my bathwater," Belle Delphine wrote. Image: X / Belle Delphine Now, according to a report from Business Insider, PayPal has reversed this decision, with the company returning to Belle Delphine all the proceeds from the bathwater bonanza five years later.Mary-Belle Kirschner, known as... Continue reading...
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by Victoria Song on (#6MYJS)
Disclosure is part of a good privacy policy. | Photo by Allison Johnson / The Verge Earlier today, Apple issued a fix in iOS and iPadOS 17.5.1. Patching buggy software is a good, normal thing. But that's not the issue here. The issue is that the fix addresses a rare issue where photos that experienced database corruption could reappear in the Photos library even if they were deleted" - and that's all Apple has to say about it.On iOS, deleted photos technically spend 30 days in the Recently Deleted folder before disappearing for good, but the intent to send a photo to digital oblivion is still there. A reasonable person would expect a deleted file to stay that way. That's why it's understandable that people freaked out last week when photos deleted years ago had suddenly reappeared in their iPhone photo library. ... Continue reading...
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by Emilia David on (#6MYJT)
Image: OpenAI OpenAI says it has been in touch with representatives for Scarlett Johansson after the company pulled one of the voices on ChatGPT for sounding too similar to the actress.We've been in conversations with ScarJo's team because there seems to be some confusion. We want to take the feedback seriously and hear out the concerns," says Joanne Jang, model behavior lead at OpenAI.Johansson has since responded with a statement of her own, saying, Last September, I received an offer from Sam Altman, who wanted to hire me to voice the current ChatGPT 4.0 system... After much consideration and for personal reasons, I declined the offer. Nine months later, my friends, family and the general public all noted how much the newest system named Sky"... Continue reading...
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by Emma Roth on (#6MYJV)
Image: Intel Intel has revealed a release window for its Lunar Lake laptop processors. The new x86 chips will arrive in the third quarter of this year, and they're designed to enable the new AI experience in Copilot Plus PCs.Intel's announcement coincides with Microsoft's Surface and AI event, where Microsoft leaned on Qualcomm's Snapdragon X Elite and Plus chips for Copilot Plus PCs that promise high performance and longer battery life. However, Intel claims its Lunar Lake processors are capable of 1.4 times faster performance in Stable Diffusion 1.5 compared to the Arm-based Snapdragon X Elite.The Lunar Lake chips will feature a CPU, an integrated Xe2 GPU, and a neural processing unit (NPU). Intel says the Lunar Lake processor offers three times... Continue reading...
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by Joanna Nelius on (#6MYGQ)
The Copilot Plus PCs announced during Microsoft's Surface event. | Photo by Allison Johnson / The Verge In addition to the Surface Pro and Surface Laptop, Microsoft announced a crop of Copilot Plus PCs from all the major OEMs. Here are all the Copilot Plus PCs announced at Microsoft's Surface event on Monday.Acer Swift 14 AINot to be confused with the other Swift 14 laptops with AI chips, the Swift 14 AI is the only one with a Qualcomm Snapdragon X series processor. This one comes with either the base 12-core Snapdragon X Elite chip or the 10-core X Plus chip and goes up to 32GB of memory and 1TB of M.2 SSD storage.Asus Vivobook S 15Asus is starting its Copilot PC adventure with its Vivobook S 15. It will have two Qualcomm processor options - the base 12-core Snapdragon X Elite and 10-core Snapdragon X Plus - and both options will... Continue reading...
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by Nathan Edwards on (#6MYGR)
Image: Samsung Microsoft announced a whole passel of Copilot Plus PCs at its Surface event on Monday, and Samsung's entries are a 14-inch laptop and two 16-inch ones, known collectively as the Galaxy Book4 Edge. If you preorder them today, Samsung will throw in a free 50-inch TV! Come on down!The 14-inch Galaxy Book4 Edge starts at $1,349.99 with a 12-core 3.4GHz Snapdragon X Elite processor with 4.0GHz Dual Core Boost, 16GB of RAM, and 512GB SSD (up to 1TB). It has a 14-inch, 120Hz 2880 x 1800 AMOLED touchscreen capable of up to 500 nits brightness, with HDR and VRR and 120 percent of the P3 gamut. It has two USB 4 Type-C ports, HDMI 2.1, and a combo audio jack. It weighs 2.6 pounds. Image: Samsung That's pan-Galactic... Continue reading...
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by Quentyn Kennemer on (#6MYGS)
Microsoft's 13.8-inch Surface Laptop starts at a cool $999.99. | Image: Microsoft It feels like forever ago that we got new Surface laptops, but Microsoft has taken the wraps off a handful of 2024 refreshes at its hardware event on Monday. We're getting consumer-centric versions of the newest Surface Laptop and Surface Pro, both starting at $999.99 and launching June 18th. Microsoft calls the Copilot Plus PCs the most powerful Windows PCs ever built." They'll be first in line to benefit from Windows 11's next-gen AI features, which we expect to hear about during Microsoft's annual Build conference this week.Microsoft announced business-oriented versions of both laptops in March, each sporting an Intel Core Ultra CPU. The consumer versions come with Qualcomm's Arm-based Snapdragon X chipsets, which have a dedicated... Continue reading...
by Sheena Vasani on (#6MYDY)
Apple's 13-inch MacBook Air currently starts at just $949.99. | Photography by Amelia Holowaty Krales and Chris Welch Apple's new iPad Air and iPad Pro are impressive, but personally, I prefer laptops with built-in trackpads and keyboards for getting work done. If you feel the same way, the new M3-powered MacBook Air is our top pick for most people, and right now, you can buy the 13-inch base model with 8GB of RAM and 256GB of storage for an all-time low of $949.99 ($150 off) at Amazon. If you want a few extra years of service, you can also buy the higher-specced model at Amazon with 512GB of storage and 16GB of RAM for $1,349.99 ($150 off) when you clip the on-page coupon.Thanks to Apple's newer M3 chips, the 13-inch Air offers even better performance than its fantastic predecessor. It comes with a few minor upgrades that make it easier to use, too,... Continue reading...
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by Tom Warren on (#6MYDZ)
Photo: Allison Johnson / The Verge Microsoft has just announced a new Surface Pro, which is part of the new wave of Copilot Plus PCs. The new Pro, which is technically the 11th edition," starts at $999, comes in four colors, and is powered by Qualcomm's new Snapdragon X processors. The base model comes with a 13-inch LCD screen, but you can upgrade to an OLED in some of the higher-end models. The chip is the star of the show here: it's what enables a lot of the AI features Microsoft touted onstage, what makes possible the 14-hour battery life Microsoft promises, and more.The basic silhouette of the hardware hasn't changed much, save for the new Flex Keyboard attachment. The tablet with an integrated kickstand has been a Surface staple for years now, and Microsoft... Continue reading...
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by Wes Davis on (#6MYE0)
Photo: Allison Johnson / The Verge The Surface Laptop for non-business types is here, and Microsoft hopes that after four years of Apple Silicon, its new Arm-based Copilot Plus PC" has a shot at MacBooks.The sapphire and slightly pink dune color options are fetching in person, and the 13.8-inch screen size feels generous for the machine's small footprint. I spent a few minutes playing around with the new Recall feature, which lets you search for things you were looking at on your computer - whether they were in an email, on a website, or in a slide deck. AI-powered search helps you find the right information and presents it in a kind of everything-timeline so you can (hopefully) find the info you're after and see it in its context. Honestly, it looks like a super... Continue reading...
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by Tom Warren on (#6MYE1)
Image: Microsoft Microsoft is confident that it finally nailed the transition to Arm chips - so confident that, this time around, the company spent an entire day pitting its new hardware against the MacBook Air.On a recent morning at its headquarters in Redmond, Washington, Microsoft representatives set out new Surface devices equipped with Qualcomm's Snapdragon X Elite chips inside and compared them directly to Apple's category-leading laptop. I witnessed an hour of demos and benchmarks that started with Geekbench and Cinebench comparisons, then moved on to apps and compatibility.Benchmark tests usually aren't that exciting to watch. But a lot was at stake here: for years, the MacBook Air has been able to smoke Arm-powered PC chips - and Intel-based... Continue reading...
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by Emma Roth on (#6MYE2)
Image: Allison Johnson Microsoft just wrapped up its special event ahead of Build 2024, and it had a lot of exciting news to share. Along with updates to its Surface lineup, Microsoft made some major announcements related to AI and a new era of PCs in partnership with Lenovo, Asus, Dell, and others.Microsoft didn't livestream this event, so if you want to catch up with everything it revealed, check out our roundup below.The launch of Copilot Plus PCs Image: Allison Johnson / The Verge Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella revealed how Microsoft is bringing the AI wave to PCs," and that involves a new category of computers called Copilot Plus. These devices come with the Arm-based Snapdragon X Elite and Plus processors from Qualcomm and will later... Continue reading...
by Joanna Nelius on (#6MYE3)
Photo: Asus Following Microsoft's Windows event, Asus announced its first Copilot Plus PC laptop, the Vivobook S 15 (S5507), driven by Qualcomm's Snapdragon X-series processors. Asus says the Arm-based chip will not only improve a few current Vivobook features but also make new AI-driven programs and workloads fly with 45 TOPS of neural processing power.The new Vivobook S 15 will have the same OLED display as the previous Intel generation (15.6-inch, 16:9, 2880 x 1620, 120Hz refresh rate, and 600 nits peak HDR brightness), but this specific version will have a thinner chassis and display bezels. The S 15 is configurable with either a 12-core Snapdragon X Elite or 10-core X Plus processor, although the Elite chip will be the base version - the one... Continue reading...
by Richard Lawler on (#6MYE4)
Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge iOS 17.5 arrived last week with one of the weirder problems we've seen - users reported that deleted photos on their iPhones and iPads were suddenly reappearing. Apple has refused requests to comment on the issue publicly, but on Monday afternoon it released iOS and iPadOS 17.5.1 updates to fix the problem.According to the notes, This update provides important bug fixes and addresses a rare issue where photos that experienced database corruption could reappear in the Photos library even if they were deleted." Screenshot: iPadOS The supposedly-deleted photos popping to the top of user's recent" photos included nude pictures in some cases, and at least one person reported they reappeared on an iPad that had been... Continue reading...
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by Wes Davis on (#6MYE5)
Illustration by Cath Virginia / The Verge | Photo from Getty Images Google is pouncing on Microsoft's weathered enterprise security reputation by pitching its services to government institutions. Pointing to a recent report from the US Cyber Safety Review Board (CSRB) that found that Microsoft's security woes are the result of the company deprioritizing" enterprise security, Google says it can help.The company's pitch isn't quite as direct as Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella saying he made Google dance, but it's spicy all the same. Repeatedly referring to Microsoft as the vendor" throughout its blog post on Monday, Google says the CSRB showed that lack of a strong commitment to security creates preventable errors and serious breaches." Platforms, it added, have a responsibility" to hold to strong... Continue reading...
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by Wes Davis on (#6MYB3)
Microsoft has taken the wraps off the new Surface Laptop - an Arm-based laptop for consumers. It's got one big difference from the Surface Laptop 6 for Business announced in March - it's equipped with Qualcomm's Snapdragon X Elite chip instead of Intel's Core Ultra, leveling the playing field, the company hopes, with Apple's powerful and efficient MacBook laptops.The new Surface laptop comes in four colors and 13.8- and- 15-inch options for its 600-nit displays. The company says it's 80 percent faster than our previous generation" and offers up to 22 hours of local video playback." It's got a haptic touchpad, just as Apple's MacBooks have had for years. Unlike the MacBook Air, Microsoft said it will support three 4K monitors - on top... Continue reading...
by Elizabeth Lopatto on (#6MYB4)
Hims and Hers is the latest pharmacy to offer GLP-1 drugs from compounding pharmacies. | Illustration by Hugo Herrera for The Verge Hims & Hers Health, one of the online pharmacies that got its start prescribing dick pills, is now offering knockoff versions of GLP-1 weight loss drugs. Hims & Hers says it will offer drugs that mimic Ozempic and Wegovy, the active ingredient of which is semaglutide.The copycat versions are made by compounding pharmacies. The formulations aren't the same as the FDA-approved versions of the drug and haven't been directly evaluated by the FDA, either. But they're cheaper than the real thing: $199 a month, compared to the branded version, which can cost more than $1,000 a month without insurance.Compounding pharmacies can make knockoff versions of branded drugs when they are in shortage, as the GLP-1 drugs - prescribed for diabetes and... Continue reading...
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by Umar Shakir on (#6MYB5)
Image: The Verge Microsoft's launching Recall for Windows 11, a new tool that keeps track of everything you see and do on your computer and, in return, gives you the ability to search and retrieve anything you've done on the device.The scope of Recall, which Microsoft has internally called AI Explorer, is incredibly vast - it includes logging things you do in apps, tracking communications in live meetings, remembering all websites you've visited for research, and more. All you need to do is perform a Recall" action, which is like an AI-powered search, and it'll present a snapshot of that period of time that gives you context of the memory.As a matter of fact, everything you do on the PC appears on an explorable timeline you can scroll through. You can... Continue reading...
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by Jacob Kastrenakes on (#6MYB6)
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella introduces the Copilot Plus PC branding. | Image: Allison Johnson Microsoft is making a major push to put AI into laptops. It's introducing a new branding today called Copilot Plus PCs" that'll highlight when Windows laptops come with built-in AI hardware and support for AI features across the operating system.All of Microsoft's major laptop partners will offer Copilot Plus PCs, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said at an event at the company's headquarters on Monday. That includes Dell, Lenovo, Samsung, HP, Acer, and Asus; Microsoft is also introducing two of its own as part of the Surface line. And while Microsoft is also making a big push to bring Arm chips to Windows laptops today, Nadella said that laptops with Intel and AMD chips will offer these AI features, too.We get to reimagine the platform... Continue reading...
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by Richard Lawler on (#6MWXW)
Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge At Microsoft's big AI and Surface event on May 20th, the company takes another shot at Arm Windows PCs. Continue reading...
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by Tom Warren on (#6MYB7)
Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge Are you ready for Microsoft's latest Windows on Arm push? That's what we're expecting at today's Surface and Windows AI event.Rumors suggest Microsoft will unveil a new Arm-powered Surface Pro 10 and Surface Laptop 6 devices and a host of new AI features for Windows. Microsoft has been building up to this moment for quite some time, so expect to hear a lot about its transition to Windows on Arm.Things kick off at 10AM PT / 1PM ET. Microsoft isn't livestreaming this event, so follow our live blog for all the very latest as it happens. Continue reading...
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by Andrew Webster on (#6MY8B)
Image: Apple You won't need to travel too far into the future to see Apple TV Plus' next adventure series. The streamer just announced that Time Bandits, an adaptation of the 1981 Terry Gilliam film of the same name, will premiere on July 24th. The TV version of the story will span 10 episodes and, according to Apple, is about an unpredictable journey through time and space with a ragtag group of thieves and their newest recruit: an 11-year-old history buff named Kevin."The show has some comedy bona fides at least, with Jemaine Clement and Iain Morris serving as co-showrunners and Taika Waititi also on board as co-creator and executive producer. The cast, meanwhile, is led by Lisa Kudrow and a young Kal-El Tuck and also features the likes of Tadhg... Continue reading...
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by Nilay Patel on (#6MY5T)
Photo illustration by The Verge The head of Google sat down with Decoder last week to talk about the biggest advancements in AI, the future of Google Search, and the fate of the web. Continue reading...
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by Emma Roth on (#6MY5V)
Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge You may not have even thought about replacing your AirTag yet, but Bloomberg reports that Apple is working on a new one that could arrive in mid-2025. The new AirTag will reportedly feature an updated chip with better location tracking - an improvement it might need as competition among tracking devices ramps up.By the time Apple rolls out its refreshed AirTag, the Bluetooth tracking landscape will look a lot different on both Android and iOS. Last month, Google revealed its new Find My Device network, which lets users locate their phones using signals from nearby Android devices. Even Life360, the safety service company that owns Tile, is creating its own location-tracking network that uses satellites to locate its Bluetooth tags.In... Continue reading...
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by Jess Weatherbed on (#6MY5W)
OpenAI says AI voices should not deliberately mimic a celebrity's distinctive voice." | Photo: Warner Bros. OpenAI is pulling the ChatGPT voice that sounds remarkably similar to Scarlett Johansson after numerous headlines (and even Saturday Night Live) noted the similarity. The voice, known as Sky, is now being put on pause," the company says.We believe that AI voices should not deliberately mimic a celebrity's distinctive voice- Sky's voice is not an imitation of Scarlett Johansson but belongs to a different professional actress using her own natural speaking voice," OpenAI wrote this morning.OpenAI CTO Mira Murati denied that the imitation of Johansson was intentional in an interview with The Verge last week. Even if Johansson's voice wasn't directly referenced, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman was seemingly already aware of the similarities,... Continue reading...
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by Wes Davis on (#6MY5X)
Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge One of Microsoft's most consequential hardware events in years is about to take place. It's not Microsoft Build - the company's developer conference - which kicks off on Tuesday. Instead, Microsoft is holding a small event today, May 20th, to talk about its next Surface devices.At the event, we're expecting Microsoft to announce new versions of the Surface Pro 10 and the Surface Laptop 6, both running on Qualcomm's Snapdragon X Elite processors. It's Microsoft's latest attempt to switch to Arm - and one that the company believes is finally going to stick. The change should deliver far better battery life; and if early rumors are true, Qualcomm's chip should be powerful enough to keep up with the Intel processors it's replacing. ... Continue reading...
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by Jess Weatherbed on (#6MY5Y)
LG CEO William Cho and home entertainment company president Park Hyoung-sei met with Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg in February to discuss the collaboration. | Image: LG LG is reportedly pausing its partnership with Meta to develop an extended reality (XR) device that would take on Apple's Vision Pro headset, just three months after announcing the joint venture.While multiple Korean news outlets are reporting that the Meta partnership has broken down entirely due to a lack of synergy" between the companies, LG has denied terminating the deal. LG Electronics continues the XR partnership with Meta forged in February but is controlling its pace," LG said in a statement to Korea JoongAng Daily.Products from the collaboration, set to combine Meta's Horizon Worlds mixed reality platform with content and service capabilities from LG's TV business, were expected to hit the market next year. The potential... Continue reading...
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by Lauren Feiner on (#6MY3P)
Arizona Secretary of State Adrian Fontes led a tabletop exercise for journalists to role-play as election officials to understand the speed and scale of AI threats they face. | Photo by Ash Ponders for The Verge The job has never been harder, and the threats have never been stranger. Continue reading...
by Wes Davis on (#6MXVV)
Illustration by Carlo Cadenas / The Verge A security lapse could let millions of college students do free laundry, thanks to one company. That's because of a vulnerability that two University of California, Santa Cruz students found in internet-connected washing machines in commercial use in several countries, according to TechCrunch.The two students, Alexander Sherbrooke and Iakov Taranenko, apparently exploited an API for the machines' app to do things like remotely command them to work without payment and update a laundry account to show it had millions of dollars in it. The company that owns the machines, CSC ServiceWorks, claims to have more than a million laundry and vending machines in service at colleges, multi-housing communities, laundromats, and more in the US,... Continue reading...
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by Wes Davis on (#6MXTT)
A 2023 Mac Pro. | Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge The Mac Studio and Mac Pro aren't due for an upgrade to Apple's M4 chip until the middle of next year. That means both machines will still be on Apple's M2 generation this year, unlike all other Macs except the MacBook Air, Bloomberg's Mark Gurman wrote to Power On subscribers today.Throughout 2024, though, all of Apple's laptops (except the MacBook Air) will move to the M4 chip that the company just gave the iPad Pro, Gurman writes. Amusingly, this herky-jerky chip upgrade cycle means that the iPad Pro is currently the single-core performance champ of Apple's lineup - and it will continue to be for about another year, when compared to the Mac Studio and Mac Pro. Screenshot: Geekbench It's not even close, according... Continue reading...
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by Wes Davis on (#6MXRR)
Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Sonos is teasing, both in emails and on social media, that its most requested product ever" is coming soon" on May 21st (this Tuesday). This, of course, is almost certainly the Sonos Ace, its first wireless headphones.Sonos has been expected to launch the Ace in June, but given the company's most requested" phrasing here and the fact that the headphones recently appeared for sale by authorized dealer Schuurman, it seems they're coming sooner than that.
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by Andrew Marino on (#6MXNB)
Image: Samar Haddad / The Verge As video games and movies become more immersive, it may start to become apparent what sensations are missing in the experience. Is there a point in Gran Turismo that you wish you could smell the burning rubber and engine exhaust? Would an experience playing beer pong in Horizon Worlds not be complete unless you could taste the hops?On this episode of The Vergecast, the latest in our miniseries about the five senses of video games, we're tackling the topics of smell and taste in video games - and whether either could actually enhance the virtual experience for gamers. In other words: Smellovision is back for a new generation of media.First, we try out a product (actually available to buy today) called the GameScent, an AI-powered... Continue reading...
by Wes Davis on (#6MXNC)
Screenshot: YouTube Jeff Bezos' space tourism company flew humans to space for the first time since 2022. Continue reading...
by Jay Castello on (#6MXND)
Image: John William Evelyn I couldn't walk away from the pen and ink thing," says John Evelyn, creator of The Collage Atlas, a dreamlike storybook adventure recently released on Steam. The entire game is hand drawn, from tiny flowers and insects to huge buildings and the clouds that float over them. Exploring this world unwraps its dreamlike story, with environments folding out in response to your approach.I had been drawing for many years before that [...] and I'd always draw with ink straight away, without any kind of prior pencil work or sketching," he says. I liked all the incidental details and the accidents that come out along the way." He compares it to improv music - actually, sometimes it goes horribly wrong!" - but says that the feeling of getting... Continue reading...
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by David Pierce on (#6MXM5)
Image: David Pierce / The Verge Hi, friends! Welcome to Installer No. 38, your guide to the best and Verge-iest stuff in the world. (If you're new here, welcome, so psyched you found us, and you can also read all the old editions at the Installer homepage.)This week, I've been writing about iPads and the future of Google, watching American Fiction and Bodkin, rewatching Her because of... reasons, endlessly replaying the songs of Windows95man, learning how to make better sandwiches, testing Claude for AI stuff, and listening to the new-old Childish Gambino album.I also have for you a new AI model, literally thousands of new Lego pieces, a new way to Google, the fanciest mop you've ever seen in your life, more emulators for iOS, and much more.And I have a question: W... Continue reading...
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by Wes Davis on (#6MXCC)
Image: Blue Origin It's been over a year and a half since Blue Origin's New Shepard rocket failed mid-flight, and more than two since its last crewed flight. Now, the company is go to launch six human beings into space. The company's launch window begins at 6:30AM PT / 9:30AM ET, but will start streaming 40 minutes ahead of time on its website.Blue Origin also normally streams its launches live on its YouTube channel, so it's a pretty safe bet it will do so for its NS-25 mission tomorrow. Assuming the launch goes as planned, it will carry six passengers aboard, including the 90-year-old Ed Dwight, who was America's first Black astronaut candidate but has never been to space. The other passengers are Mason Angel, Sylvain Chiron, Kenneth L. Hess, Carol... Continue reading...
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by Wes Davis on (#6MXB6)
Is this a Game Boy Advance SP or Nintendo DS Lite? Who can say? | Image: Retrohai hai Softbank Have you ever looked at a Nintendo DS and thought it would be cooler if the top screen was swapped for the Game Boy Advance SP's? Or looked at a Super Nintendo controller and wished it had a GBA SP screen bolted onto the back? Whether you have or not, Hardware modder Hairo Satoh, aka Retrohai hai Softbank, has you covered with some truly cursed reimaginings of Nintendo's portable consoles. (Recall their portable emulated PlayStation built into the Takara Roulette Controller.)Let's go on a little journey through Satoh's Instagram account. Before we get into my favorite mutated Nintendo handhelds - frankententos, if you will - know that Satoh also does some very pretty custom jobs on the company's various portable consoles. And they're m... Continue reading...
by Wes Davis on (#6MXB7)
The 13-inch OLED iPad Pro with the screen removed. | Screenshot: iFixit Apple's newest iPad Pro is remarkably rigid for how thin it is, and apparently also a step forward when it comes to repairability. iFixit shows during its teardown of the tablet that the iPad Pro's 38.99Wh battery, which will inevitably wear down and need replacement, is actually easy to get to. It's a change iFixit's Shahram Mokhtari says during the video could save hours in repair time" compared to past iPad Pro models.Getting to it still requires removing the glued-in tandem OLED screen, which iFixit notes in the video and its accompanying blog isn't two panels smashed together, but a single OLED board with more electroluminescence layers per OLED diode. With the screen out of the way, iFixit was essentially able to pull the battery... Continue reading...
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by Sheena Vasani on (#6MX9T)
Surprisingly, Ecobee's smartest thermostat also makes for a decent air quality monitor / smart speaker. | Photo by Jennifer Pattison Tuohy / The Verge The temperatures are about to soar now that summer is almost upon us - and so are our cooling bills. If you want to keep comfy while saving money on your energy bills, it's worth investing in Ecobee's Smart Thermostat Premium now that it's down to its best price of the year. Normally $249.99, right now you can buy it at Amazon, Best Buy, and directly from Ecobee for $219.99, which is $10 shy of its all-time low.Ecobee's smart thermostat is our favorite on the market, one that goes beyond your typical heating and cooling needs. It can adjust your HVAC system based on where you are in your home (if you're home at all), and even keep your pets safe as you travel thanks to its support for various temperature alerts and reminders - a... Continue reading...
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by Jennifer Pattison Tuohy on (#6MX8K)
The GE Profile is a smart indoor smoker - designed to keep smoke inside the oven, not in your kitchen. Wi-Fi connectivity means it works the Smart HQ app for remote control, but there's no magic sauce here to make you BBQ whizz. The GE Profile Smart Indoor Smoker delivers on its promise of bringing smoking indoors, but sadly its smarts didn't make me a better pitmaster. Continue reading...
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by Andrew Webster on (#6MX76)
Image: Apple For most of its first season, Sugar on Apple TV Plus was a fairly typical if slickly produced detective story. It starred Colin Farrell as John Sugar, a private investigator with a number of charming quirks - obsessed with old movies, unable to get drunk, beloved by dogs - who was determined to solve a missing persons case involving the granddaughter of a famous Hollywood director. Then, at the end of episode six, the show introduced a twist that threatened to change it into something very different. But now that Sugar's finale is out, it's clear that the twist didn't alter what the show already was - it just added some new flavor.Spoiler warning for the first season of Sugar, including the final episode.Okay, let's get it out of the... Continue reading...
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by Justine Calma on (#6MX66)
Workers walk in Glencore's Mutanda Mine, which Tesla sources cobalt from, in southeastern Democratic Republic of Congo, on June 19th, 2023. | Photo by Emmet Livingstone / AFP via Getty Images Mining for minerals used to make EVs and batteries is plagued with allegations of abuse, the latest report from the nonprofit Business & Human Rights Resource Centre (BHRRC) shows. And automakers continue to source materials from some of the worst offenders, The Verge finds.BHRRC has documented 631 allegations of human rights abuses since 2010 for seven key minerals used in electric vehicles, rechargeable batteries, and renewable energy technologies. Many of the allegations were made against a small group of companies, which The Verge was able to link to three of the world's biggest EV manufacturers: Volkswagen Group, Tesla, and BYD.Things are not improving," said Caroline Avan, head of natural resources and just transition at... Continue reading...
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by Sean Hollister on (#6MX3T)
Image: Ayaneo The Analogue Pocket is the most advanced Game Boy to ever take actual carts, but Ayaneo has just unveiled a pair of emulator-centric pocket computers that could give it a run for its cash - including a modern take on the original DMG-01 Nintendo Game Boy that now includes a 419ppi OLED screen.Unfortunately, we've only got renders and a few details today - no prices or full spec sheets - but those renders look pretty neat! I find myself most interested in the Pocket Micro, whose sleek design, twin joysticks and horizontal layout look a bit more practical than the stick placement on the Pocket DMG. Not to mention a bit of a Sony Walkman vibe from certain angles? Take a peek:Below, you'll also see the Ayaneo AG01 Graphics Starship"... Continue reading...
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by Gaby Del Valle on (#6MWXX)
Illustration: The Verge Canada's security agency is trying to dissuade Canadians from using TikTok, telling users that their data is available to the government of China."In an interview with CBC News set to air on Saturday, David Vigneault, the director of the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, said that there is a very clear strategy on the part of the government of China ... to be able to acquire ... personal information from around the world," the CBC reports.They're using big data analytics, they have amazing computer farms crunching the data, they are developing artificial intelligence ... based on using this data," Vigneault added.The Chinese government's ability to access user data is at the forefront of US efforts to regulate - and potentially... Continue reading...
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