The Verge

It's pretty fast, too. | Photo by Victoria Song / The Verge The Shazam app for Wear OS just got a neat update: it can now work independently of your Android phone.The update, which was spotted by 9to5Google, basically removes the need for the wrist app to confer with the app on your phone. You don't even need the app downloaded on your Android for it to work. I downloaded it directly onto the OnePlus Watch 2 that I'm testing without doing so on the Pixel 8 Pro it's paired to. It still works! And quickly at that. It was able to correctly identify some bangers on my K-pop playlist within a second or two. (To be fair, there wasn't any background noise in my office. Your mileage may vary in a coffee shop.)Another neat update is that if your watch is offline, the app will save a clip of the song... Continue reading...

The Cross Bronx Expressway, a notorious stretch of highway in New York City that is often choked with traffic and contributes to pollution and poor air quality on November 16, 2021 in New York City. | Photo by Spencer Platt / Getty Images The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced the toughest US standards yet for greenhouse gas emissions from heavy-duty vehicles like big rigs and buses. The rules apply to model year 2027 to 2032 heavy-duty vehicles and are meant to slash emissions from a major source of the pollution causing climate change.Heavy-duty vehicles are responsible for a quarter of the nation's transportation-related greenhouse gas emissions. The EPA says its new standards will avoid a billion tons of those emissions by 2055, which would be like eliminating the pollution from 13 million tanker trucks' worth of gasoline.On behalf of everyone who breathes, thank you."Transportation makes up the biggest chunk of the country's carbon footprint and has... Continue reading...

I've never seen a performance quite like that." | Collage by Cath Virginia / The Verge | Photo by Victor J. Blue, Bloomberg, Getty Images It's his nature.' Continue reading...

Illustration by Nick Barclay / The Verge Apple is suing a former employee for leaking confidential information, including unknown details about Apple's Journal app, the development of the VisionOS headset, and more, to journalists and employees of other companies. The lawsuit, filed ten days ago in California state court (24CV433319, pdf), says Andrew Aude also leaked regulatory compliance strategies, employee headcounts, and other product hardware characteristics.As reported previously by MacRumors, in at least one message, the company says Aude claimed he leaked information so he could kill" products and features with which he took issue."Apple referenced many of the communications in the lawsuit:

Getty Algorithms might help hotels illegally collude on prices, even if no humans from those businesses actually talk to each other about them, according to US antitrust enforcers.The Department of Justice and Federal Trade Commission jointly submitted a statement of interest in Cornish-Adebiyi v. Caesars Entertainment, a case brought before the US District Court of New Jersey. The class action case was brought by New Jersey residents who rented rooms in Atlantic City hotels and alleged that several of those hotels engaged in an illegal price-fixing conspiracy through the use of a common pricing algorithm.The plaintiffs are trying to show that the hotels violated Section 1 of the Sherman Act, which prohibits conspiracy in restraint of... Continue reading...

Illustration: The Verge Sarah Bird, Microsoft's chief product officer of responsible AI, tells The Verge in an interview that her team has designed several new safety features that will be easy to use for Azure customers who aren't hiring groups of red teamers to test the AI services they built. Microsoft says these LLM-powered tools can detect potential vulnerabilities, monitor for hallucinations that are plausible yet unsupported," and block malicious prompts in real time for Azure AI customers working with any model hosted on the platform.We know that customers don't all have deep expertise in prompt injection attacks or hateful content, so the evaluation system generates the prompts needed to simulate these types of attacks. Customers can then get a... Continue reading...

Photo by Brian Rothmuller / Icon Sportswire via Getty Images Hulu's subscription TV service has added MLB Network to its core channel lineup in the nick of time for the league's Opening Day 2024. This will provide customers with access to over 100 MLB games nationally broadcast over the course of the season," along with the network's original programming and studio shows.YouTube TV, one of Hulu with Live TV's primary competitors, abruptly dropped MLB Network early last year after it was unable to reach a new carriage agreement with Major League Baseball. And with no announcement of a return ahead of today's opening games, it appears that YTTV subscribers will go without it for another year.Perhaps that shouldn't be surprising after the company shelled out $2 billion for the rights to NFL... Continue reading...

There are fewPS5-compatible gaming headsets that do everything as well as the Nova Pro Wireless. | Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales When I can't crank up the volume and bass on my Dolby Atmos system while gaming, I rely on the SteelSeries Arctis Nova Pro Wireless to inject immersive, crisp, and well-balanced audio directly into my eardrums. I own the Xbox version and would still happily buy it for $350 if I needed a replacement. Lucky for you, the version designed to work with the PS5 and PC is nearly matching its all-time low at Amazon and Best Buy, where you can grab it for about $281 ($70 off). The Xbox version is also on sale for $299.99 ($50 off) at Best Buy.I've found the Arctis Nova Pro Wireless to be well worth the money. In addition to a comfortable ski band design and satisfying 40mm drivers, the headset connects to a base station with line-in and two USB... Continue reading...

Photo by Becca Farsace / The Verge After Windows and Surface chief Panos Panay departed Microsoft last year, the software giant quickly split his two divisions into two different teams. It was a move designed to push Windows engineers to focus on more web and AI features under Mikhail Parakhin, who was previously responsible for Bing and ads. It didn't work out.Six months after that shake-up, Windows and Surface are back together under a new leader, following frustrations from the very top of Microsoft. The shuffling comes just as Microsoft gets ready for a big AI PC" push.Pavan Davuluri, who's currently in charge of Surface hardware, will now lead both Windows and Surface. Mustafa Suleyman, the DeepMind co-founder who Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella just hired, will now... Continue reading...

A wind turbine at the South Fork Wind Farm in the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Long Island, New York, on December 7th, 2023. | Photo by Steve Pfost / Newsday RM via Getty Images Labor groups inked a first-of-its-kind deal to support local hiring and union jobs with the developer of New York's first offshore wind port. It's an agreement for the South Brooklyn Marine Terminal, envisioned as a crucial onshore staging area for some of America's first commercial-scale offshore wind farms.The US gets very little electricity from offshore wind today, even though the resource has the potential to meet up to a quarter of the nation's power needs by 2050. The very first set of offshore wind farms are being built off the east coast, a key part of the Biden administration's efforts to transition the country to clean energy.Policymakers say good jobs are another pillar of that transition. And they hope this new agreement... Continue reading...

Image: Amazon Amazon now lets you sign up for its palm recognition service directly from your phone. It's launching a new Amazon One app on iOS and Android you can use to take a photo of your palm and set up your account, allowing you to start scanning your palm at locations that support the verification tech.Previously, Amazon required users to visit physical locations to enroll in Amazon One, which lets you make a purchase or verify your age based on the palm print linked to your Amazon account. The service is available at all Whole Foods stores across the US and some Panera Bread locations, as well as more than 150 stadiums, airports, fitness centers, and convenience stores.Amazon One uses generative AI to analyze your palm vein structure to... Continue reading...

FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried once bragged that he had a 5 percent chance of becoming president of the United States | Collage by Cath Virginia / The Verge | Photo by Victor J. Blue, Bloomberg, Getty Images FTX co-founder Sam Bankman-Fried was sentenced to a total of 300 months, or 25 years, in prison for seven counts of conspiracy and fraud charges stemming from the collapse of the crypto exchange he started. The judge applied a 240-month sentence for four of the charges, plus a 60-month sentence for two others, and ordered that Bankman-Fried forfeit more than $11 billion (including property) as recommended by prosecutors.Judge Lewis Kaplan's sentence was shorter than the 40 to 50 years requested by prosecutors, which he said was more than necessary, but longer than the six and a half years Bankman-Fried's lawyers asked for and far less than the maximum sentence of 110 years.Recapping the trial, he said that Bankman-Fried knew FTX was... Continue reading...

8BitDo's new keyboard draws inspiration from the Commodore 64's brown and beige color scheme. | Image: 8BitDo 8BitDo's latest mechanical keyboard riffs on the design of a 1980s computer with one of the most iconic-looking keyboards of all time: the Commodore 64. 8BitDo's Commodore 64 edition of its Retro Mechanical Keyboard series is available to preorder starting today for $109.99, with plans to ship it on May 26th.Underneath its beautifully chunky brown keycaps (ABS plastic with double-shot legends) and Commodore-style rainbow logo, this is basically the same peripheral as 8BitDo's previous NES keyboard. It comes with clicky Kailh Box White V2 switches as standard, but they're hot-swappable if you want to swap them out for something a little less loud down the line. It can connect to devices via a choice of USB, Bluetooth, or with a 2.4GHz... Continue reading...

Google Pixel 8 owners can have a little on-device AI, as a treat. | Photo by Allison Johnson / The Verge We did it, y'all. We bullied Google into letting the Pixel 8 run on-device AI. Starting with the next Pixel feature drop, the Pixel 8 will use Gemini Nano for a couple of AI features.Google announced Gemini Nano as its mobile-optimized large language model in December and said it would be a core part of Android in the future - but in its own device lineup, only the Pixel 8 Pro was able to use it. Despite using the same Tensor G3 chipset, the Pixel 8 wasn't getting on-device AI because of hardware limitations." Pixel fans and watchful Android experts asked the same question: what the heck, Google?The Pixel 8 will get support for Gemini Nano in the next Pixel feature drop as a developer preview, powering on-device recorder summaries... Continue reading...

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge One year after YouTube turned on revenue sharing for its shortform video feature, a growing chunk of creators are getting paid for it. More than 1 in 4 creators in YouTube's Partner Program are now earning money with YouTube Shorts, the company announced on Thursday. Given there are over 3 million creators in YouTube's ad sharing program, that amounts to roughly 750,000 Shorts creators in total.The company doesn't break out how much it has paid Shorts creators specifically. It has paid $70 billion to creators in total over the last three years, with the bulk of that going to longform content.By all measures, Shorts are getting more popular. The number of Shorts uploaded on YouTube has grown by 50 percent year over year, and the... Continue reading...

It's a beaut. For most people, the compact camera is long since dead; a camera is a phone and a phone is a camera. But despite all of the technological developments over the past few years, phones still leave something to be desired if you're the kind of person who likes to go take photos.Traditional cameras - especially of a certain size and shape - are still alive and kicking, partly because there's nothing that beats real buttons, dials, and a sturdy grip. They're things that phones generally don't have - except for the Xiaomi 14 Ultra. It's the camera-iest phone camera I've used in the last decade (RIP the Nokia Lumia 1020), and I dearly wish it was available in the US. We love to see an exposure comp dial. The Xiaomi 14... Continue reading...

Cath Virginia / The Verge | Photos from Getty Images All US federal agencies will now be required to have a senior leader overseeing all AI systems they use, as the government wants to ensure that AI use in the public service remains safe.Vice President Kamala Harris announced the new Office of Management and Budget (OMB) guidance in a briefing with reporters and said that agencies must also establish AI governance boards to coordinate how AI is used within the agency. Agencies will also have to submit an annual report to the OMB listing all AI systems they use, any risks associated with these, and how they plan on mitigating these risks.We have directed all federal agencies to designate a chief AI officer with the experience, expertise, and authority to oversee all AI technologies... Continue reading...

Image: Getty New York City announced a new permitting system for companies interested in testing autonomous vehicles on its roads, including a requirement that a human safety driver sit behind the steering wheel at all times.As cities like San Francisco continue to grapple with the problems posed by fully driverless for-hire vehicles, New York City is trying to get ahead of the problem by outlining what it calls a rigorous permitting program" that it claims will ensure applicants are ready to test their technology in the country's most challenging urban environment safely and proficiently."This technology is coming whether we like it or not," Mayor Eric Adams said in a statement to The Verge, so we're going to make sure that we get it right."... Continue reading...

The Dbrand Ghost Case for the iPhone 15 Pro. | Image: Dbrand Dbrand is scrapping plans to fix its anti-yellowing Ghost Case, but not because it yellows - it's that it scratches very easily. The company had promised in November to ship free replacements with scratch-resistant coatings, but now it's telling customers via email they'll have to wait. Most of its production run of those ended up unshippable," the company says, so instead it's sending a redesigned Ghost 2.0" this summer. Essentially, it's a delay.The company says that its first test runs of the newly-coated cases looked good, but when it tried to manufacture them at scale, the coatings got all gloppy at the edges:

Image: Exputer Microsoft appears to be readying a white version of its Xbox Series X console without a disc drive. Exputer has published a series of leaked images of the white Xbox Series X, showing that it's a disc-less system with the same design on the exterior as the existing black Xbox Series X.The white coating appears to be identical to the Xbox Series S robot white" that Microsoft uses on its smaller $299 console. Exputer reports that this white Xbox Series X will have some internal components upgraded, including the heatsink used to cool the console. The Verge has seen additional documents detailing changes to this white Xbox Series X that suggest these leaked photos are genuine, but we've reached out to Microsoft to comment.Exputer claimed... Continue reading...

Oregon joins Minnesota, California, and New York in giving consumers and repair shops more control over device repairs. | Image: iFixit Oregon Governor Tina Kotek has now signed one of the strongest US right-to-repair bills into law after it passed the state legislature several weeks ago by an almost 3-to-1 margin. Oregon's SB 1596 will take effect next year, and, like similar laws introduced in Minnesota and California, it requires device manufacturers to allow consumers and independent electronics businesses to purchase the necessary parts and equipment required to make their own device repairs.Oregon's rules, however, are the first to ban parts pairing" - a practice manufacturers use to prevent replacement components from working unless the company's software approves them. These protections also prevent manufacturers from using parts pairing to reduce device... Continue reading...

The red Snapdragon X Elite reference design laptop Qualcomm used to show off the games. | Image: Qualcomm If you read my scoop last week, I bet you've been wondering - how well could a Snapdragon chip actually run Windows games? At the 2024 Game Developers Conference, the company claimed Arm could run those titles at close to x86/64 speed, but how fast is fast?With medium-weight games like Control and Baldur's Gate 3, it looks like the target might be: 30 frames per second at 1080p screen resolution, medium settings, possibly with AMD's FSR 1.0 spatial upscaling enabled.That's what Qualcomm has apparently been showing influencers, according to numerous videos from YouTubers, TikTokers, and Snapdragon Insiders," many of which were uploaded over the past week after they flew down to Qualcomm's San Diego headquarters for the company's ... Continue reading...

The first-gen Superlight isn't the latest model, but it remains a standout gaming mouse at $60 off. | Image: Logitech These days, there are ample options to consider when choosing a gaming mouse - we should know, having put together a detailed guide to some of the best available. That said, not everyone needs the latest and greatest gaming peripherals, which makes the current discount on the slightly older Logitech G Pro X Superlight all the more appealing. Right now, the first-gen mouse is on sale at Best Buy in white for an all-time low of $99.99 ($60 off) and in black at Amazon for $109.95 (about $50 off).Logitech's original G Pro X Superlight was designed as a step-down version of Logitech's popular G Pro Wireless. It's not the company's most advanced mouse - that would be the newer Superlight 2 - but the right-handed mouse remains a great option... Continue reading...

Photo by Ronald Martinez / Getty Images This is Hot Pod, The Verge's newsletter about podcasting and the audio industry. Sign up here for more.Hello! I know many of you are in LA for Podcast Movement Evolutions. I am not, so feel free to reach out with gossip.Today, New York Magazine publishes a polarizing profile of podcast star Andrew Huberman, Slate takes home the award for Podcast of the Year, and Bill Maher launches a new network.New York Magazine publishes lengthy feature on Andrew Huberman and his messy personal lifeI don't begrudge you if you haven't had the time to read New York Magazine's 8,000-word cover story on Andrew Huberman. While much of the piece focuses on how he juggled multiple affairs as he was in a long-term relationship (spoiler: all the women... Continue reading...

Illustration: The Verge Now, shoppers using Google's mobile website or apps can refine their searches with tools designed to help them narrow down exactly what kind of jacket or other item they're looking for. The Style Recommendations feature is rolling out now for signed-in shoppers in the US, and it lets users rate items in their searches so it can pick up on their preferences, kind of like Tinder or Netflix ratings but with shirts.After they've found clothes they like, shoppers can specify the brands they like, which will instantly bring up more apparel from those selections. Image: Google Google's new shopping feature lets people swipe on their favorite styles. Google previously tested AI tools that help people find more of... Continue reading...

Image: Polestar The Polestar 4 is going on sale next month, and when it does, the price will be slightly different than the electric crossover coupe was originally announced.Last year, Polestar said the 4 would start at around $60,000. Today, the Swedish (by way of China) automaker is adjusting that starting price down to $56,300 (including a $1,400) destination charge) for the long-range single-motor rear-wheel drive version. Meanwhile, a dual-motor Polestar 4 with standard Pilot pack will start at $63,400 (also including the destination charge).The Polestar 4 will go into production starting late April, with the first customer deliveries expected in the fourth quarter of the year.This follows Polestar also announcing the price of its upcoming... Continue reading...

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge The question of who gets to regulate crypto has some answers, as a judge has ruled the Securities and Exchange Commission's securities lawsuit against Coinbase can continue. US District Judge Katherine Polk Failla ruled that under federal securities laws, the SEC has sufficiently pleaded that Coinbase operates as an exchange, as a broker, and as a clearing agency under the federal securities laws, and, through its Staking Program, engages in the unregistered offer and sale of securities."Despite arguments from some in the crypto community that existing laws are inadequate, the judge rejected those claims directly, writing, The crypto' nomenclature may be of recent vintage, but the challenged transactions fall comfortably within the... Continue reading...

Image: Funcom A survival game based in the world of Dune makes an awful lot of sense. Both the books and movies spend a lot of time explaining the mechanics of surviving on the harsh desert world of Arrakis, which made me pretty curious to learn more about Dune: Awakening during a recent hands-off gameplay preview from developer Funcom. The MMO does a lot of the standard survival stuff, as you craft gear, harvest resources, and explore dungeons. But what makes it interesting are the parts that are Dune-specific. That means forcing players to think a lot about water, heat, spice, and - of course - sandworms.The game puts you in the role of a prisoner aboard a transport ship that crashes onto the surface of Arrakis. Funcom is keeping the story largely... Continue reading...

Image: OnLeaks / 91Mobiles Google plans to shake up its smartphone strategy in 2024 by releasing three different models of the upcoming Pixel 9. That's according to 91mobiles, with the site now claiming that the renders published earlier this year (created by OnLeaks) were in fact of the Pixel 9 Pro and Pixel 9 Pro XL" - and not the regular Pixel 9, which it's sharing for the first time in new images today.Google used the XL branding for its bigger Pixels until around 2019, but it went away with the one-size Pixel 5 and stayed gone when the company pivoted to the Pro" name starting in 2021. Now it sounds like Google will follow more of an iPhone strategy and split the Pro tier into two different sizes, and resurrecting the XL moniker makes sense in that case.T... Continue reading...

Affinity says subscriptions will only ever be as an option alongside the perpetual model, for those who prefer it." | Illustration: The Verge After Canva's acquisition of Affinity design software sparked concern regarding the future of its one-time purchase pricing model, both companies are now promising that users won't be forced into subscribing to the service - ever.On Wednesday, Canva and Affinity published a joint pledge promising to keep Affinity software fair, transparent, and affordable," including the perpetual licenses that have made Affinity special."Affinity's design software suite is considered to be one of the few viable alternatives to Adobe's subscription-based Creative Cloud software like Photoshop and Illustrator. When the Canva acquisition was announced on Tuesday, Affinity users locked in on some vague FAQ wording that said the Affinity pricing model... Continue reading...

Same Disney Plus, new logo. | Image: Disney Disney has been hinting at some big changes in the Disney Plus branding. In recent days, lots of users checked their TV, tablet, or phone to find the streaming app had a new logo - the iconic Disney blue replaced by a glowing green background. The new logo has been controversial: some people see it as a needless simplification of a familiar design; some people appreciate that it doesn't look like every other streaming service; some people find themselves wondering if the color really changed or if they've just been looking at their TV wrong all this time.Well, it did change. Permanently. That new green color is called Aurora," both in tribute to the aurora borealis and the protagonist of Sleeping Beauty. (I don't remember much of this... Continue reading...

It's Hulu. In Disney Plus. | Image: Disney As of today, Hulu is part of Disney Plus. Hulu still exists - it still even has its own app - but it's also being bundled into Disney's primary streaming service alongside all the company's other content. Even the Disney Plus logo changed to integrate that iconic green Hulu hue.From a product perspective, the Hulu integration is roughly what you'd imagine. Hulu is now a tile inside the app, next to Marvel and Pixar and National Geographic and the rest. The price hasn't changed; it's still US-only, and the app's not going away. Hulu shows and movies will also show up in search results and recommendations; if you're subscribed to Hulu, you'll get everything seamlessly, and if you're not, the app will try to convince you to sign up.... Continue reading...

Photo by Justin Sullivan / Getty Images Independent presidential candidate and notable anti-vaccine activist Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has tapped Nicole Shanahan, a wealthy Silicon Valley lawyer, as his running mate. Shanahan previously contributed $4 million to Kennedy's super PAC, helping to bankroll a 30-second campaign ad during this year's Super Bowl.Shanahan, who was formerly married to Google co-founder Sergey Brin, has donated heavily to Democratic candidates in the past. In the campaign announcement speech, Kennedy called his running mate exactly the right person," as someone who shared my passion for wholesome healthy foods, chemical-free for regenerative agriculture, for good soils." He called her a technologist at the forefront of AI" who uses neural nets" to... Continue reading...