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by Jess Weatherbed on (#6GPDW)
ByteDance has not confirmed how many employees will be affected by the restructuring. | Photo by Roslan Rahman / AFP via Getty Images TikTok parent company ByteDance is planning to wind down its Nuverse gaming brand and walk away from the mainstream video game industry, according to a new report by Reuters. Four unnamed sources told the publication on Monday that the decision will likely impact hundreds of employees, some of whom were only informed about the company's restructuring efforts over the weekend.We regularly review our businesses and make adjustments to centre on long-term strategic growth areas. Following a recent review, we've made the difficult decision to restructure our gaming business," a ByteDance spokesperson told Reuters. Nuverse, a subsidiary set up by ByteDance in 2019, was focused on standalone mobile and web games, including publishing the... Continue reading...
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The Verge
| Link | https://www.theverge.com/ |
| Feed | http://www.theverge.com/rss/index.xml |
| Updated | 2025-07-07 03:17 |
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by Sean Hollister on (#6GPDX)
A pair of 15-inch M2 MacBook Air laptops at Frore Systems' HQ in San Jose, California. | Photo by Sean Hollister / The Verge Two Fridays ago, I drove down to a squat single-story Silicon Valley office building to see a MacBook Air. There was no security guard, no need to badge in, not even a PR person in my demo room. That's because I wasn't visiting Apple headquarters for an unannounced laptop. Instead, I went to San Jose to see an existing MacBook - one surgically modified to prove how far an exotic cooling tech has come.Frore Systems is a startup with $116 million in funding, and I've shown you its first product before: the AirJet Mini is a piezoelectric cooling chip that weighs just nine grams and is thinner than two US quarters stacked together. Each nominally consumes one watt and can remove 4.25 additional watts of heat. Here's the question: what... Continue reading...
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by Jess Weatherbed on (#6GPAX)
Image: OnePlus OnePlus has unveiled official images of its upcoming OnePlus 12 flagship smartphone on Weibo ahead of its December 5th launch event in China, revealing the handset will be available in three colors: white, black, and green. The design of the device appears visually similar to its predecessor, the OnePlus 11, though the Alert Slider - a fan-favorite feature that allows users to easily switch between mute, vibrate, and ringer sound profiles - is now located on the left-hand side of the phone instead of the right.According to OnePlus, the relocation was made to accommodate a new integrated antenna that's designed to boost signal performance and reduce latency for game streaming. Based on internal testing, it has been determined that the... Continue reading...
by Nathan Edwards on (#6GNR7)
Illustration by Aaron Fernandez for The Verge Black Friday used to be one day! Feels like it started mid-November this time around, and here we are on Sunday. How is this day different from Cyber Monday? How will Monday be any different than Tuesday? It's all a barely differentiated smear at this point. But the good news is that the deals are still here. They'll be here tomorrow, too, but if your Sunday plans include scanning for deals, at least you'll find plenty of them.Most of the good deals we've seen on phones, smartwatches, headphones, and accessories are holding steady through the weekend - we've checked them all to be sure. This post is where we collect the highlight deals, but our Black Friday / Cyber Monday / Undifferentiated Commerce Smear coverage goes well... Continue reading...
by Sheena Vasani on (#6GNW0)
Apple's terrific, second-gen stylus is compatible with the latest iPad Air, iPad Mini, and iPad Pro models. | Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge Let's face it: most early Cyber Monday deals tend to just be rebranded Black Friday deals, but every now and then the shopping event surprises us with a new one entirely. Today's deal on the second-generation Apple Pencil is one of those deals. Right now, the second-gen Apple Pencil has dropped to a new all-time low of $79.99 ($49 off) at Amazon, Target, and Walmart, though you'll need to sign into your Walmart account to take advantage of the latter.If you own one of Apple's latest iPad Pro, iPad Air, and iPad Mini models, this is an excellent stylus for drawing and taking notes. The pressure-sensitive Pencil recharges by magnetically attaching to the side of tablets, which is a convenient feature its predecessor lacked. It also... Continue reading...
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by Sheena Vasani on (#6GHX0)
Apple's AirTag, our favorite Bluetooth tracker for iPhone owners, is available starting at just $23.99. | Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge It's the time of year again when utter chaos descends upon airports nationwide. That means the chances of losing your luggage are higher than usual, so it's worth preparing for the commotion if you're planning to travel.Right now, you can buy a single AirTag for just $23.99 ($5 off) at Amazon and Walmart, which is a rare discount that's just $1 shy of the tracker's all-time low price. If you want to buy even more AirTags, Amazon, Walmart, and Best Buy are also currently selling a four-pack for $79.99, about $20 off, which is $5 shy of their best price yet. This is the same discount we saw last week for Black Friday - and one likely to carry through Cyber Monday - but it remains one of our favorite budget-friendly deals we've seen so... Continue reading...
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by The Verge Staff on (#6G1SG)
Illustration by Aaron Fernandez for The Verge Let's face it - Black Friday and Cyber Monday are no longer reserved for the weekend following Thanksgiving. What was often considered the single busiest shopping day of the year has evolved into something more expansive post-pandemic, with numerous retailers kicking off their holiday promos as early as October.Despite the recency of Amazon's fall Prime Day event, Amazon, Walmart, and other retailers started doling out their Black Friday deals in mid-October, slashing prices on smart displays, noise-canceling headphones, robot vacuums, and a host of other tech ahead of the holiday. The savings continued to ramp up as we got closer to November 24th, and now that Cyber Monday is near, we're seeing all-time lows on everything from AirPods... Continue reading...
by Chris Welch on (#6GN5P)
Illustration by Aaron Fernandez for The Verge Black Friday 2023 has come and gone, and we're cruising toward Cyber Monday - but that doesn't mean all of yesterday's deals are history. Quite the opposite. You can still take advantage of big savings at many retailers. Whether you're shopping for a new smartphone, the latest noise-canceling headphones, or a stylish smartwatch, a ton of popular products are still heavily discounted.Whether you're checking off everyone on your list for the upcoming holidays or you're just shopping for the best prices for yourself, we're scouring all the quality deals Black Friday has to offer and logging them right here. But keep in mind that our Black Friday and upcoming Cyber Monday coverage goes well beyond a single post. You can find it all here,... Continue reading...
by Antonio G. Di Benedetto on (#6GMFN)
Illustration by Aaron Fernandez for The Verge Black Friday is here once again - well, at least for a little while longer. Even though the recent deluge of deals in the run-up to the shopping holiday made it feel as though the big day had already arrived, today is the day when you should be able to score the very best deals of the year on wireless earbuds, tablets, OLED TVs, and all things tech.Whether you're checking off everyone on your list for the upcoming holidays or you're just shopping for the best prices for yourself, we're scouring all the quality deals Black Friday has to offer and logging them right here. But keep in mind that our Black Friday and upcoming Cyber Monday coverage goes well beyond a single post. You can find it all here, and you definitely don't want to... Continue reading...
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by Wes Davis on (#6GMMP)
The Verge Some blue check Premium" subscribers on X, formerly Twitter, who are spreading misinformation may be eligible for X's ads revenue sharing program. That's the conclusion reached by NewsGuard, a for-profit misinformation watchdog organization, in its report that followed ads appearing on 30 posts from November 13th to the 22nd. The posts made conspiratorial claims about the Israel-Hamas war that reached a collective 92 million views.Each of the 10 accounts NewsGuard referenced had over 100,000 followers - one of the metrics it uses to classify them as misinformation super-spreader" posters.NewsGuard's VP of communications, Veena McCoole, told The Verge in an email that the 30 posts from the report advanced some of the most egregious... Continue reading...
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by Mia Sato on (#6GMMQ)
Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge The Shein pop-up store in New York this month resembled the e-commerce giant's website, except picture-perfect. Neutral-toned clothing hung on neat racks, next to party dresses that cost less than the cocktail you might drink while wearing them. Bargain-priced wall art and other home decor created a fantasy of living somewhere chic and stylish, without spending thousands. Like the Shein haul videos that go viral online, the pop-up store sold not just physical items, but also a vision: shoppers could have everything they wanted, and Shein could deliver it for cheap.Shein, a retail behemoth that has reportedly been eyeing a $90 billion valuation in a US IPO, has big plans beyond living on our phone screens - the company wants shoppers to... Continue reading...
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by Emma Roth on (#6GKR7)
Image: Dbrand Dbrand, the device skin company known for trolling brands like Sony and Nintendo, is waging a legal battle of its own. The company is suing rival Casetify over claims it blatantly copied Dbrand's Teardown device skins and cases, which are made to look like the internals of whatever phone, tablet, or laptop you've purchased them for. (It's also introducing some new X-Ray skins on the same day it's revealing the lawsuit.)Dbrand first revealed its Teardown products in 2019 in partnership with JerryRigEverything (Zack Nelson), a YouTuber who breaks down new devices and sometimes even gives them transparent mods. The Teardown skins and cases make it look as if you've taken your entire device apart and slapped on a transparent backing - when... Continue reading...
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by Tom Warren on (#6GMFP)
Image: triddell24 (Reddit) Ubisoft is blaming an unspecified technical error" for a fullscreen pop-up ad that appeared in Assassin's Creed Odyssey this week. Reddit users say they spotted the pop-up on Xbox and PlayStation versions of the game, with an ad appearing just when you navigate to the map screen. This is disgusting to experience while playing," remarked one Reddit user, summarizing the general feeling against such pop-ups in the middle of gameplay.We have been made aware that some players encountered pop-up ads while playing certain Assassin's Creed titles yesterday," says Ubisoft spokesperson Fabien Darrigues, in a statement to The Verge. This was the result of a technical error that we addressed as soon as we learned of the issue." ... Continue reading...
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by Andrew Webster on (#6GM33)
Photo by Smith Collection/Gado/Getty Images Many Peloton users were unable to get into Thursday's Thanksgiving ride, prompting the company's CEO to apologize. At 10AM ET Peloton kicked off its 10th annual Turkey Burn" event, with the goal of breaking the Guiness World Record for largest live cycling class." But the company struggled with the demand, and many users were unable to participate at all. We let you down," CEO Barry McCarthy said in a statement.According to McCarthy, over 37,000 people were able to participate, while it's unclear how many couldn't get in. The number of members trying to join the ride overwhelmed our technical infrastructure and we were unable to support all those attempting to participate in the class," he said. The Peloton status page notes... Continue reading...
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by Andrew Webster on (#6GM34)
Scavengers Reign. | Image: Max Thanksgiving is a time to spend with friends and family, and also a time full of periods where you definitely don't want to move from the couch. You could spend that time mindlessly scrolling on your phone, or you could squeeze in a game or streaming show that fits nicely into a long weekend. If you aren't planning to catch up some of the big recent TV shows or video games, here are a few things that I've been digging lately.Scavengers ReignStreaming on MaxThis show manages to be silly, scary, and strange all at once. It's a story about a group of humans stranded on an alien planet, but it's the latter that's really the star here. Each episode of Scavengers Reign is packed with absolutely bizarre alien life, from hypnotic killer... Continue reading...
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by Andrew Webster on (#6GKZF)
Image: Atlus More than just about any other game studio, Vanillaware is known for its style. At the same time, the developer is constantly shifting between genres. It originally made waves with the side-scrolling action RPG Odin Sphere, and more recently released the sci-fi epic 13 Sentinels, which is part visual novel, part turn-based mech-vs-kaiju combat. Holding all of these disparate ideas together is Vanillaware's incredible 2D art, along with a clear to desire to experiment.Given how the studio loves to jump around so much, it's probably not too surprising that its next project, Unicorn Overlord, will be a grand-scale tactical RPG inspired by the classics. Ahead of the game's launch next March (it's coming to PlayStation, Xbox, and the Switch)... Continue reading...
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by Alicia Haddick on (#6GKZG)
PokeTsume. | Image: TV Tokyo The new live-action show PokeTsume is a full-circle moment for the franchise. Continue reading...
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by Ash Parrish on (#6GKTJ)
Image: Atlus Persona 5 Tactica pleasantly surprised me.I have been anxious for a good tactical RPG all year. Fire Emblem Engage failed to live up to its title, winding up as a shallower Three Houses. (Yes, friend, Engage did indeed come out this year.) And the Advance Wars reboots bored me to tears. While I wasn't exactly looking to Persona 5 Tactica to fill the hole Marvel's Midnight Suns left behind - please go play that game, just...please! - nevertheless, the first handful of hours with the game have been a delight.Persona 5 Tactica is a tactics RPG that builds upon your love of Persona 5 and its Phantom Thieves. If you've played Persona 5 / Royal / Strikers, you already know most what you're in store for: personas, fusing personas, coffee,... Continue reading...
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by Verge Staff on (#6G1SJ)
Illustration by Aaron Fernandez for The Verge It's official: the 2023 early holiday shopping season has arrived. And if you want to get a head start on your holiday shopping, major retailers like Amazon, Target, Best Buy, and Walmart have already launched their early Black Friday promos, dropping prices on tablets, wireless earbuds, laptops, smart home tech, and even OLED TVs.We may see a bunch more deals arrive once we land on November 24th, but what's discounted so far is still very much worth a look. For example, Bose's noise-canceling QuietComfort 45 headphones and its new QuietComfort Ultra Earbuds have dropped to new all-time lows. A range of other gadgets and gizmos are also on sale, from the Google Pixel Tablet and Apple's AirTags to the new PlayStation 5 slim," the... Continue reading...
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by Kate Cox on (#6GKR8)
Insight Editions/BioWare Food, fine dwarven food straight from Orzammar! Continue reading...
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by Sean Hollister on (#6GKR9)
Dbrand's Light" X-Ray skins. There are Dark" ones too. | Image: Dbrand Dbrand just sued a rival casemaker for copying its Teardown" skins that let you see under the back cover of your phone, laptop, or handheld gaming machine.It's also - purely coincidentally, I'm sure! - announcing a brand-new set of skins that take the idea even farther. No, I don't mean further"; I'm talking about going literally millimeters deeper into a device's components with a 450-kilovolt X-ray, showing details you can't get just by photographing a gadget with its back cover off. Image: Dbrand An Google Pixel with an X-ray skin. And D-Brand's new X-Ray skins aren't just for a few iPhones and Samsung Galaxys, either. The company has X-rayed 125 different devices including Dell XPS, Razer Blade and... Continue reading...
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by Tom Warren on (#6GKNK)
Image: Microsoft Every time I see a big Windows 11 update I wonder why it wasn't a Windows 11.1 or Windows 11.2 release. Instead, Microsoft has used a number of confusing ways to name Windows updates in recent years instead of a simple method like point releases.Let me illustrate my point to you:
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by Jon Porter on (#6GKKH)
Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge If you've ever embarrassed yourself by publicly sharing a part of your screen you weren't supposed to, spare a thought for Mohammad Moniruzzaman, who's alleged to have shown off the source code he stole from a former employer during a Microsoft Teams call with that same company. The incident has come to light in a lawsuit filed by Moniruzzaman's old employer, automotive technology company Valeo, which is suing Nvidia - the company Moniruzzaman moved on to - and accusing it of having benefited from these stolen trade secrets.Nvidia has spent the better part of a decade attempting to branch out into the automotive market. Valeo is alleging that Moniruzzaman downloaded without authorization the entirety of Valeo's advanced parking and... Continue reading...
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by Emma Roth on (#6GK8Z)
Illustration: The Verge The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) claims Apple denied a set of new benefits to unionized employees at its Towson, Maryland store, according to a complaint filed on Tuesday.In the complaint, the NLRB alleges Apple didn't extend enhanced benefits to Towson workers with the goal of discouraging" other employees from unionizing. Some of those new benefits include new healthcare options, a free Coursera subscription, and prepaid tuition at some colleges.The Apple store in Towson became the first Apple retail location in the US to unionize last year with a historic vote to join the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers (IAM). Apple first introduced its new benefits in October 2022. Once the workers in Towson... Continue reading...
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by Wes Davis on (#6GK6B)
The Legion Go (top) and the Steam Deck OLED (bottom), disassembled. | Images: iFixit iFixit published a dual teardown of Valve's Steam Deck OLED and the Lenovo Legion Go today, giving a nice, detailed look inside both handhelds with all of the site's usual meticulous detail. This being iFixit, the focus is on the consoles' repairability, and it gave both high marks - a 9 / 10 for the Steam Deck OLED and 8 / 10 for the Lenovo Legion.The article has a nice summary of the process, but we recommend watching the video for the full effect and some nice close-up shots of the components. It's also a great way to see how things come apart if you're interested in doing this yourself.Valve has said it made it easier to carry out DIY fixes for the Steam Deck OLED, and iFixit agrees - as did we in our review. Lenovo has made... Continue reading...
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by Allison Johnson on (#6GK3D)
Bard continues to tap into Google's constellation of services and platforms in increasingly useful ways. | Image: Google Bard, Google's AI chatbot, has steadily been getting more useful after a lackluster introduction. Now, as noted by Android Authority, the bot's YouTube integration is getting a handy upgrade so it can analyze individual videos to surface specific information for you - like key points or recipe ingredients - without ever pressing play. That's potentially a hugely useful tool, but could spell more worry about generative AI for creators.To try it out, I turned Bard on a YouTube video I regularly reference for spiritual guidance: America's Test Kitchen's recipe for an Espresso Martini. Seriously, it's really good. I often find myself in my kitchen with half the ingredients in a cocktail shaker trying to remember how much Benedictine I'm... Continue reading...
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by Umar Shakir on (#6GK3E)
Closeup of an all-electric F-150 Lightning. | Photo by Andrew Hawkins / The Verge Ford announced it is cutting production capacity on its upcoming electric vehicle battery plant, amid cooling customer demand for purchasing EVs and rising labor costs. The automaker says it will reduce its original $3.5 billion planned investments to build the Michigan plant to somewhere around $2 billion and is now only expecting to hire 1,700 workers instead of 2,500.Ford had originally announced the ambitious Michigan battery plant in February in partnership with China's Contemporary Amperex Technology (CATL), a company that makes LFP (lithium iron phosphate) batteries. The plant will now only produce about 20 gigawatt-hours of batteries per year, which is about a 43 percent cut.In order for EVs to qualify for up to $7,500 in... Continue reading...
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by Wes Davis on (#6GK3G)
The $299 WiiM Amp has outputs for passive stereo speakers and plenty of streaming support. | Image: Linkplay Technology Linkplay Technology announced a new addition to its lineup today: the WiiM Amp. The $299 device serves as a receiver with a decidedly vintage focus, even more so than the WiiM Pro Plus that the company launched earlier this year, thanks to physical outputs that let you output directly to a set of old-school passive stereo speakers.The WiiM Amp is now the priciest streaming box from the company, but it's possible it earns it for the right person. It's more versatile than most compact AirPlay 2 receivers thanks to plentiful streaming standard support and the unique set of outputs for the bring-your-own speakers crowd. That's probably a very small chunk of the population, but there just aren't that many wireless receivers like this that... Continue reading...
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by Tom Warren on (#6GK3H)
Photo by Berke Bayur/Anadolu via Getty Images In the early hours of Wednesday morning, OpenAI announced that Sam Altman is returning as CEO, following a shock firing on Friday. Over the weekend, it looked like Altman and OpenAI co-founder Greg Brockman might end up at Microsoft, leading a new AI research lab. But after days of negotiation, that's no longer the case and OpenAI has appointed a new board of directors and brought back Altman as CEO of the company.After a weekend of chaotic scenes, including hundreds of OpenAI employees threatening to quit and join Microsoft, things seem to be settling down. Microsoft CTO and EVP of AI Kevin Scott has now addressed Microsoft employees about the OpenAI turmoil. It's the first company-wide communication to Microsoft employees about the... Continue reading...
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by Andrew Webster on (#6GJZX)
The Boy and the Heron. | Image: GKIDS Longtime Evangelion animator Takeshi Honda had already signed up to work on another film when The Boy and the Heron director came calling. When Miyazaki says that to you, really there's no way to say no," Honda says. Continue reading...
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by Jon Porter on (#6GJZY)
Kodak's new Super 8 camera. | Image: Kodak Kodak is gearing up to actually sell the Super 8 film camera it announced way back at CES 2016. It's updated the camera's product page with a new sign up to buy" button to allow potential customers to register their interest. Kodak's global managing director for motion picture, Vanessa Bendetti, tells The Verge that the company expects the camera to go on sale in limited quantities in the US on December 4th, before releasing in Canada, the UK, and other European markets.When it goes on sale, the camera will cost a whopping $5,495. That's not just expensive when you consider that, as 404 Media notes, vintage Super 8 cameras can generally be had for a few hundred bucks - it's also expensive compared to Kodak's previously announced... Continue reading...
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by Charles Pulliam-Moore on (#6GJZZ)
Participants in Netflix's Squid Game: The Challenge. | Image: Netflix The most dystopian thing about Netflix's new Squid Game reality show is how much fun its contestants seem to be having. Continue reading...
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by Emma Roth on (#6GJVY)
Image: Epic Games The leaks were true: Eminem is coming to Fortnite as part of the game's Chapter 4 finale. Epic Games has confirmed Eminem will appear during the live finale, while players will get to purchase a few different skins modeled after the rapper.Fortnite's finale event, called The Big Bang, kicks off on December 2nd at 2PM ET. In an updated page on Fortnite's website, developers say you can watch Eminem... as Eminem" during the event, which marks the end of the Fortnite OG chapter that brought the game back to its roots. Fortnite is calling this event a new beginning" for the game, potentially hinting at a new island. Image: Epic Games The Rap Boy, Slim Shady, and Marshall Never More skins. Meanwhile, Fortnite is... Continue reading...
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by Jess Weatherbed on (#6GJVZ)
Niantic attempted to avoid the sexual bias lawsuit going to trial. | Photo by Sam Byford / The Verge A California judge ruled that a class-action sexual bias lawsuit against Niantic could proceed, blocking the Pokemon Go creator's attempt to move the suit into arbitration.Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Elihu Berle found that allegations raised by two female former employees regarding exposure to a hostile gender-based work environment were protected under the 2021 Ending Forced Arbitration Act.Attorney Genie Harrison described the outcome as a watershed moment for sexual harassment and gender bias cases."The ruling is a watershed moment for sexual harassment and gender bias cases, because it clarifies that the protections of the 2021 Ending Forced Arbitration Act do indeed encompass cases in which sexual overtures are not... Continue reading...
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by David Pierce on (#6GJW1)
The EP-133 KO II is a synth in the image of an old-school calculator. | Image: Teenage Engineering The Swedish tech and design company Teenage Engineering is known for lots of things - helping create the look and feel of devices like the Playdate and the Nothing Phone, creating outrageously expensive voice recorders coveted by every reporter you know, building knobs and buttons better than anyone else - but above all it's a music company. And it's now launching its latest music device: the EP-133 KO II synthesizer. (The name doesn't exactly roll off the tongue, so we're going to call it the KO II.)The KO II is something like a higher-end version of the Pocket Operator, the extremely cool and customizable $59 synthesizers Teenage Engineering launched in 2015. The Pocket Operator line has been a huge hit for Teenage Engineering, and... Continue reading...
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by Monica Chin on (#54ZWB)
Illustration by William Joel / The Verge Chromebooks are getting better, and good ones are getting cheaper. Continue reading...
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by Parker Ortolani on (#6GJRY)
The Verge / Fourthwall It's nearly Thanksgiving, which means it's time for some wild Black Friday weekend deals. And the official Verge store is no exception: today through Monday, you can save big on merch from The Verge.Here's a quick breakdown of our major offers:
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by Tom Warren on (#6GJRZ)
Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge Microsoft is allowing Windows 10 users to try out the Copilot feature that was previously only available in Windows 11. The software giant announced last week that Copilot would be making its way to Windows 10, and now there's a Release Preview version of the OS available for testers with Copilot baked in.Copilot in Windows 10 works very similar to how it appears in Windows 11, with a button on the right-hand side of the taskbar that lets you bring up the AI-powered chatbot to answer queries and generate text. There are some slight differences in features simply because some of the skills or actions available in Windows 11 don't exist in Windows 10.Windows 10 Home or Pro users that are in the Release Preview channel can test Copilot... Continue reading...
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by Jon Porter on (#6GJS0)
A row of Tesla charging stations. | Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge Tesla is using a new fee to encourage people not to charge their cars to 100 percent at busy Supercharger locations. In the US, the Supercharger Congestion Fee kicks in after a car hits 90 percent charge, at which point drivers will be hit with a $1 fee for each minute they continue to charge their vehicles. The company's support page says the fee will apply at certain Supercharging locations" when they're busy.The launch of the fee arrives ahead of Thanksgiving in the US, which is traditionally a time when lots of people travel to see family. But it also comes as Tesla is opening up its Supercharging locations for use with non-Tesla EVs, which has the potential to increase demand for its charging network (though in the longer term... Continue reading...
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by Tom Warren on (#6GJPF)
Image: Microsoft Microsoft's Windows Hello fingerprint authentication has been bypassed on laptops from Dell, Lenovo, and even Microsoft. Security researchers at Blackwing Intelligence have discovered multiple vulnerabilities in the top three fingerprint sensors that are embedded into laptops and used widely by businesses to secure laptops with Windows Hello fingerprint authentication.Microsoft's Offensive Research and Security Engineering (MORSE) asked Blackwing Intelligence to evaluate the security of fingerprint sensors, and the researchers provided their findings in a presentation at Microsoft's BlueHat conference in October. The team identified popular fingerprint sensors from Goodix, Synaptics, and ELAN as targets for their research, with a... Continue reading...
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by Nilay Patel on (#6GJHQ)
Sam Altman speaks during the OpenAI DevDay event on November 6th, 2023. | Photo by Justin Sullivan / Getty Images Sam Altman will return as CEO of OpenAI, overcoming an attempted boardroom coup that sent the company into chaos over the past several days. Former president Greg Brockman, who quit in protest of Altman's firing, will return as well.The company said in a statement late Tuesday that it has an agreement in principle" for Altman to return alongside a new board composed of Bret Taylor, Larry Summers, and Adam D'Angelo. D'Angelo is a holdover from the previous board that initially fired Altman on Friday. He remains on this new board to give the previous board some representation, we're told.People familiar with the negotiations say that the main job of this small initial board is to vet and appoint an expanded board of up to nine people... Continue reading...
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by Ariel Shapiro on (#6GJBT)
Illustration by Nick Barclay / The Verge This is Hot Pod, The Verge's newsletter about podcasting and the audio industry. Sign up here for more.Happy Thanksgiving week! I will be out tomorrow making twice baked potatoes, putting together holiday baby outfits (many tiny overalls will be worn!!), and attempting a night drive to Long Island without hitting Southern State traffic or eliciting baby rage. This is to say, there will be no Hot Pod Insider this week and I will return next Tuesday. But if you want to be able to say Yeah, I heard about that" at your own bipartisan Thanksgiving gathering, I had a piece last week for Insiders diving into the Ben Shapiro / Candace Owens feud roiling the conservative podcast space. Enjoy (?)!Got a bunch of Spotify news today, including... Continue reading...
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by Wes Davis on (#6GJBV)
Illustration: Alex Castro / The Verge Users on Reddit and Hacker News are complaining that YouTube seems to have inserted an intentional five-second delay before video pages will load in Mozilla's Firefox and occasionally some other browsers. YouTube tells The Verge that these users are right about the delay, but the browser has nothing to do with it - it's part of the company's efforts to quash ad blockers across all platforms.In the past week, users using ad blockers may have experienced suboptimal viewing, which included delays in loading, regardless of the browser they are using," YouTube communications manager Christopher Lawton wrote in an email. Lawton wrote that disabling the ad blocker should resolve the issue, though users may still experience a temporary delay... Continue reading...
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by Emma Roth on (#6GJBW)
Illustration: The Verge ChatGPT's voice feature is now available to all users for free. In a post on X (formerly Twitter), OpenAI announced users can now tap the headphones icon to use their voice to talk with ChatGPT in the mobile app, as well as get an audible response.OpenAI first rolled out the ability to prompt ChatGPT with your voice and images in September, but it only made the feature available to paying users.The release comes as OpenAI's staff struggle with the sudden ousting of their CEO and messy negotiations for him to return. The demo included in OpenAI's post on X even jokes about the ongoing drama, which has unfolded late into the night over the past few days.In the example, someone asks ChatGPT, It's been a long night for the team, and... Continue reading...
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by Amrita Khalid on (#6GJBX)
Flipboard Flipboard is the latest company to end its presence on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter. In a Medium post published Tuesday, the company said it would no longer be actively monitoring or posting updates on X," save for the occasional retweet. Instead, Flipboard will be refocusing its efforts on Mastodon and other open social platforms.The reasons for Flipboard's departure from X appear to be two-fold: X's more lax moderation policies under Elon Musk's leadership, which has led to a sharp spike in hate speech and misinformation; and Flipboard's goal of working with federated social media services. Over the past several months, Flipboard has joined a growing list of companies, including Mozilla, Tumblr, and Medium, that are... Continue reading...
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by Ash Parrish on (#6GJBY)
Image: Devolver Digital Christmas has come early for indie / solo game developers. GameMaker, the game engine software program used to make Undertale, Chicory: A Colorful Tale, Hotline Miami 2, and more, has announced that it's making significant changes to its pricing structure - but don't worry, they're the good kind of changes.Starting today, GameMaker will be free to use for noncommercial, non-console projects, and the company is eliminating its indie / creator tier monthly subscription fee in favor of a one-time paid licensing fee of $99. Additionally, if you're currently enrolled at the indie / creator tier and wish to pay the licensing fee, the subscription fees you've paid will be discounted from the price. Check out the FAQ page for details.Russell... Continue reading...
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by Emma Roth on (#6GJ6S)
Nick Barclay / The Verge Changpeng CZ" Zhao, the owner and CEO of the cryptocurrency exchange Binance, has agreed to step down and plead guilty to breaking anti-money laundering laws, according to papers filed in a Seattle court on Tuesday. This comes as part of the major settlement the Department of Justice announced this afternoon, which will require Binance to fork over $4.3 billion in fines.Zhao also agreed to pay $50 million, while sentencing will come at a later date. Under the terms of the settlement, Binance will need to appoint an independent compliance monitor. Zhao won't be allowed to have any involvement with Binance until three years after the monitor is appointed.Even though Zhao can no longer assume an executive role at Binance, The Wall Street... Continue reading...
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by Wes Davis on (#6GJ6T)
Anthropic gives Claude more abilities. | Image: Anthropic While OpenAI is in the middle of an existential crisis, there's a new chatbot update from Anthropic, the Google-backed AI startup founded by former OpenAI engineers who left over disagreements about the company's increasingly commercial direction as its Microsoft partnership went on.Anthropic has announced that the latest update of its chatbot, Claude 2.1, can digest up to 200,000 tokens at once for Pro tier users, which it says equals over 500 pages of material.
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by Chris Welch on (#6GJ6V)
As the company has strongly hinted in recent weeks, Sonos will indeed release its first-ever pair of headphones next year. That's according to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman, who pegs a release as early as April. The over-ear headphones are rumored to cost between $400 and $500 - very premium territory for a company that's brand new to the category.At least one marquee feature will be their ability to synchronize music with other Sonos products in your home. The headphones will also include Sonos Voice Control, which is already heavily focused on music-related commands, unlike other broader voice assistants from Amazon, Apple, and Google. Bloomberg says Sonos has been working on the headphones since 2019 but has canceled earlier versions of... Continue reading...
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by Jennifer Pattison Tuohy on (#6GJ6W)
Video conference service Google Meet is adding gesture recognition to make it easier to ask a question during a video call. | Image: Google Google Meet can now recognize when your physical hand is raised on camera during group video calls and alert the host. This means you don't have to fiddle with clicking the hand raise" button on the screen and accidentally send a clapping emoji to everyone in the call (I speak from experience).In a blog post published today, Google announced the feature is now rolling out to Google Workspace business and education users. It uses gesture detection to recognize when your hand is raised and alerts the meeting host that you want to speak. A hand-raised icon in your video window will also show to other participants. Essentially, it does the same thing as clicking the hand raise button, but in a more natural way.For it to work, you'll... Continue reading...