The Verge

Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge Sony is reportedly working on a PlayStation 5 Pro model that may well include a far more powerful GPU that's up to three times faster than the existing PS5 models. YouTuber Moore's Law is Dead claims to have gotten access to a technical overview document for the PS5 Pro, codenamed Trinity, and now Tom Henderson at Insider Gaming reports that the leaked specifications are accurate and the console is currently set to release during the holiday 2024 period.Screenshots from the technical document include a mention of 67 teraflops of 16-bit floating point calculations, which works out to around 33.5 teraflops of single-precision compute. That reportedly works out to a 45 percent rendering performance improvement over the PS5. The existing... Continue reading...

Image: Google Google Meet is rolling out filters you can use to lightly" touch up your complexion before you head into a meeting. The company first launched the feature on mobile last year, but now it's coming to Google Meet's web app.You can choose from two different filters: subtle and smoothing. While Google says the subtle filter applies very light" complexion smoothing, under-eye lightening, and eye whitening, the smoothing filter makes all three effects slightly more noticeable. GIF: Google Judging by the GIF provided by Google, it doesn't look like either option dramatically changes your appearance like some of the filters you'll find on Snapchat. Instead, it seems to apply much lighter effects that make it look like... Continue reading...

Cath Virginia / The Verge | Photos via Getty Images In an opinion signed by Justice Amy Coney Barrett, the Supreme Court established a test to determine when a public official can be considered to be engaging in state action in blocking someone from their social media account. The official must have both (1) possessed actual authority to speak on the State's behalf on a particular matter, and (2) purported to exercise that authority when speaking in the relevant social-media posts."The court issued a unanimous decision in Lindke v. Freed, a case about whether Port Huron, Michigan city manager James Freed violated the First Amendment by blocking and deleting comments on his Facebook page from resident Kevin Lindke, who critiqued Freed's pandemic policies. The test creates a new way to... Continue reading...

From AAA blockbusters to indie cult classics, there are tons of games up to 95 percent off. | Valve / Steam You'd think most gamers would have indulged enough over the long winter season that they wouldn't want to spend the first moments of spring doing the same, but rainy days are still a thing, yeah? And the grind never truly stops for many of us. That's why I can appreciate the Steam spring sale, happening now through March 21st. It happens around this time every year and offers up to 90 percent off thousands of titles. You can find deals on game-of-the-year-worthy titles like Baldur's Gate 3 for $53.99 ($6 off), for example, while Diablo IV is 50 percent off no matter which version you buy, whether it's the base game going for $34.99 or the Ultimate Edition for $49.99.It's also a great chance to check out older titles you may have passed... Continue reading...

Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images Until relatively recently, Rep. Jeff Jackson, a freshman Democratic congressman from North Carolina, had more than 2.5 million followers on TikTok. Jackson's follower count dropped by over 100,000 virtually overnight - as did his esteem among some of TikTok's young users - after he voted to ban the app.The bill passed with 352 votes, but to the legions of TikTokers who called their representatives to urge them not to ban the app, Jackson's vote feels like a unique betrayal.

Image composite: Reddit (TheDyslexicCow) / Tom Warren / The Verge Microsoft is once again injecting pop-ups into Google's Chrome browser in a bid to get people to switch to Bing. The software giant first introduced malware-like pop-up ads last year with a prompt that appeared over the top of other apps and windows. After pausing that notification to address unintended behavior," the pop-ups have returned again on Windows 10 and 11.Windows users have reported seeing the new pop-up in recent days, advertising Bing AI and Microsoft's Bing search engine inside Google Chrome. If you click yes to this prompt, then Microsoft will set Bing as the default search engine for Chrome. These latest prompts look like malware, and once again have Windows users asking if they are legit or nefarious. Microsoft has... Continue reading...

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Uber and Lyft are pulling their services out of Minneapolis after the city council passed an ordinance that will increase drivers' pay. Both companies say they will no longer offer ridesharing services in the city when the ordinance goes into effect on May 1st.The ordinance, which guarantees drivers a minimum rate of $1.40 per mile and 51 cents per minute while carrying a rider, was first passed last week but later vetoed by Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey. The City Council voted 10-3 to override the veto on Thursday.Lyft spokesperson CJ Macklin calls the ordinance deeply flawed," as the rates were determined before the state released a study detailing how much drivers would have to be paid to earn Minneapolis' $15.57 per hour minimum... Continue reading...

Samar Haddad for The Verge | Photo by Apple Now that you've got your $3,500 Apple Vision Pro, gone through the tutorial, and gotten the hang of things, it's time to do the next best thing: make a Persona.Personas are Apple's name for a digital avatar of yourself for video calls. Or, in Apple's words, a natural representation of you that you can use to connect with others." Aside from FaceTime, your Persona is also used with the EyeSight feature - you know, the ghostly eyes that appear on the Vision Pro's front display. It's created using image captures and 3D measurements of your head, face, upper body, and facial expressions.But before you go run off and make a Persona, there's one thing to keep in mind. Right now, Personas are in beta which means... they look kind of cursed.... Continue reading...

Mercedes also eventually plans to assess how Apollo handles delivering totes of kitted parts. | Image: Apptronik Mercedes-Benz is the latest automotive company to trial how humanoid robots could be used to automate low skill, physically challenging, manual labor." On Friday, robotics company Apptronik announced it had entered into a commercial agreement with Mercedes to pilot how highly advanced robotics" like Apollo - Apptronik's 160-pound bipedal robot - can be used in manufacturing. The news follows a similar pilot announced by BMW in January.Apptronik says that Mercedes is exploring use cases like having Apollo inspect and deliver components to human production line workers. Neither company has disclosed any figures for the agreement or how many Apollo robots are being trialed.According to Apptronik, humanoid robots would allow vehicle... Continue reading...

The ruling aims to make it easier to accurately compare subscription prices against other providers. | Illustration by Hugo Herrera / The Verge Cable and satellite TV providers will need to ensure they show the total price of subscription plans as a prominent single line item" - including costs described as extra fees - under a rule adopted by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) on Thursday. The FCC says the new rule (pdf) for all-in" pricing will make it easier for customers to compare prices against competing providers and streaming services by eliminating the misleading practice of describing video programming costs as a tax, fee, or surcharge."No one likes surprises on their bill," said FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel in a separate statement (pdf). The advertised price for a service should be the price you pay when your bill arrives. It shouldn't include a... Continue reading...

Image: Alex Parkin / The Verge The TikTok ban might be for real this time. Nearly four years after the first attempt to get the ByteDance-owned company either sold or barred from the US, a new bill is flying through congressional votes, and President Joe Biden has already said he'll sign it if it comes to his desk.On this episode of The Vergecast, we talk about what's inside the Protecting Americans From Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act (everybody calls it PAFFACAA, just kidding; nobody calls it that, everybody just calls it The TikTok Ban") and what we know about TikTok's connection to China. The answer: not a lot! But four years in, Congress seems more convinced than ever, and that might mean something. Or it might not. We spend a long time debating... Continue reading...

Cath Virginia / The Verge | Photos via Getty Images On Monday, the Supreme Court will hear a case that could upend how social media platforms deal with posts containing anything from vaccine misinformation to election threats.At the moment, various arms of the US government will communicate directly with platforms for all sorts of reasons. For example, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) might email directly with someone at Facebook during a global pandemic, especially if Facebook wants to set up an information hub for its users. (You can imagine similar scenarios for voter misinformation, election integrity, and all kinds of public emergencies.)The core question at issue in Murthy v. Missouri is whether the government can flag potentially harmful posts to social... Continue reading...

Image: The Verge The CIA allegedly launched a secret operation to troll Chinese officials and turn public opinion against them through leaked intelligence and negative news on social media.Reuters reports the operation began in 2019 and was also aimed at causing paranoia within Xi Jinping's government. CIA agents reportedly made fake social media accounts to spread rumors, such as allegations that Communist Party members hid ill-gotten wealth outside the country, and criticize Chinese government initiatives, like saying a program financing infrastructure projects in other countries was corrupt.The CIA declined to comment to Reuters, which could not confirm whether the program is still in place. Reuters said the operation, authorized by then-President... Continue reading...

Photo Illustration by Adrien Fillon/NurPhoto via Getty Images Pornhub has disabled its site in Texas in response to the state's online age verification law. The site now displays a message to users in the state that says having to provide an ID when accessing an adult website is not an effective solution for protecting users online."Last year, Texas enacted a previously blocked age verification law (HB 1181) that requires users to upload photos of their government IDs (or use another third-party verification service) before accessing a pornographic website. The law also requires porn sites to display health warnings that claim porn impairs human brain development," among other unproven issues. Texas sued Pornhub's parent company Aylo in February, alleging that Pornhub failed to comply with the... Continue reading...

The third Starship test flight has fared far better than SpaceX's previous two attempts. | Image: SpaceX SpaceX's massive Starship took off from the company's Starbase launch facility in Boca Chica, Texas, at 9:25AM ET on Thursday morning.This test flight was far more successful than its two predecessors, as the vehicle became the first Starship to complete its full-duration ascent burn" after the six Raptor engines powered it to its expected orbit. It completed the hot-staging separation from its Super Heavy booster and opened a payload door to demonstrate how it could be used for missions like delivering Starlink satellites into orbit.The vehicle remained in one piece until contact with the Starship spacecraft was lost shortly before its anticipated splashdown in the Indian Ocean. According to SpaceX, The flight test's conclusion... Continue reading...

With Max, you can stream sports as well as shows and movies like Wonka and The Last of Us. | Image: Cath Virginia / The Verge Whether you're looking for cheap cable-free ways to watch the NCAA championship games or are simply worried about Max's forthcoming password-sharing crackdown, today's Max deal arrives at the perfect time. Right now, Max is taking an additional 30 percent off of its annual subscription for one year, for a total 40 percent discount compared to the cost of a monthly subscription. The annual plans start at $69.99 ($30), which is like paying $5.83 per month, but you can go ad-free for $104.99 ($50 off) while the Max Ultimate Ad-Free tier is down to $139.99 ($60 off). Even better, new, returning, and existing subscribers are eligible for this deal, so everybody can save.The main difference between the plans is that the ad-free tiers let you... Continue reading...

Image: Netflix A seventh season of Black Mirror is on the way. Netflix has confirmed that Charlie Brooker's sci-fi anthology will return in 2025 and that the new season will be six episodes long.There aren't many details yet, of course. But the company does say that, while it'll otherwise consist of new stories, one of the episodes will be a sequel to USS Callister" from season 4, which starred Jesse Plemons. Robert Daly is dead, but for the crew of the USS Callister, their problems are just beginning," the description reads.The show's return will mark a relatively brief hiatus, at least by Black Mirror standards. Season 6 premiered last year and included some strong episodes, covering everything from space-themed horror to a paparazzi thriller to... Continue reading...

The SpyraGo electric water blaster | Image: Spyra Would you pay $180 for a USB-C water blaster that blasts an entire shot glass full of liquid every time you pull the trigger? That's been Spyra's pitch for the past six years, but today it's revealing a new toy that costs (and weighs) less than a third of its previous products.The new SpyraGo will cost just $54 when it arrives on March 26th, a price finally low enough to tempt me! It's five inches shorter, between one and two inches slimmer, and importantly weighs just three pounds fully loaded. (The SpyraThree weighs nearly nine pounds at full capacity.) Image: Spyra The catch, unfortunately, is it's also far less powerful: instead of firing shot-glass-sized 30 milliliter water bullets," the new SpyraGo will... Continue reading...

Image: Microsoft Microsoft is expanding its $20 monthly Copilot Pro subscription to more markets today, after launching the AI-powered assistant for consumers in January. The expansion sees Copilot Pro available in 222 countries in total, and Microsoft is launching a free one-month trial to entice consumers to subscribe to its AI vision of the future.Copilot Pro includes priority access to the latest OpenAI models, the ability to build your own Copilot GPT, and access to Copilot inside Office apps if you're already a Microsoft 365 Personal or Home subscriber. Now, Microsoft is also unlocking Copilot Pro inside the Office web apps, so you don't need a separate Microsoft 365 subscription to use the chatbot inside Word, Outlook, and other free web apps.T... Continue reading...

In his State of the Union address last week, President Joe Biden urged Congress to pass a bipartisan immigration bill with the toughest set of border security reforms we've ever seen." The bill would have, among other things, funded 100 more high-tech drug detection machines to significantly increase the ability to screen and stop vehicles from smuggling fentanyl into America."The high-tech drug detection machines are actually just X-rays - really high-res ones, but X-rays all the same. The idea isn't just to get better machines but to scan more vehicles at ports of entry, with an end goal of 100 percent. And to achieve that, Customs and Border Protection (CBP) will eventually deploy artificial intelligence so officers can scan and... Continue reading...

Image: Wooting Wooting's 60HE is widely regarded as one of the best, if not the best, gaming keyboard on the market. That's all thanks to Rapid Trigger, a feature that speeds up how quickly you can activate a key to respond in games like Valorant or Counter-Strike 2. Now, Wooting is launching the 80HE, a larger keyboard with an 80 percent layout. It comes with a new Rappy Snappy" feature that combines with Rapid Trigger to make it even faster to pull off moves like strafing and bunny hopping in games.Rappy Snappy is our new spin on Rapid Trigger, so it compares two keys together and the one that gets pressed the furthest is prioritized," explains Wooting CEO Calder Limmen. You could, for example, use it on your A and D keys to make counter strafing... Continue reading...

Illustration: The Verge Google has added real-time browsing protection to Chrome that it claims should protect your privacy. The feature, which Google says hides your visited URLs, is now available on the default Standard mode of Safe Browsing on Chrome.For years, Chrome's Safe Browsing feature has automatically added potentially unsafe URLs to a list Google stores on your device. Every time a user visits a site, Google checks the URL against that list and issues a warning. The problem is that Google only updates this locally stored database every 30 to 60 minutes. Given most dangerous sites exist for less than 10 minutes nowadays, a lot of unsafe sites slip through the cracks.Safe Browsing's opt-in Enhanced protection mode deals with this by using Google's... Continue reading...

You can buy Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown for just $30. | Image: Ubisoft What's with all the good PlayStation deals lately? First, the disc-based and discless versions of the PS5 slim" dropped to an all-time low (with a digital copy of Marvel's Spider-Man 2, no less). Now, Sony is taking up to 80 percent off a ton of PlayStation games through March 27th as part of its Essential Picks sale, which drops digital copies of newer hits like Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown to $29.99 ($20 off) and both Final Fantasy XVI and Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora to $41.99 ($28 off).Hundreds of other older games are on sale, too, so you'll likely find something that'll strike your fancy if none of the newer games do. Right now, for example, you can challenge yourself for hours on end with either Returnal or Demon's Souls,... Continue reading...

Image: Intel Intel is launching its flagship Core i9-14900KS processor today, with clock speeds that boost all the way up to 6.2GHz. That's 200MHz more than the previous Core i9-13900KS that launched last year and was the first desktop processor to break the 6GHz barrier at stock speeds.This new Core i9-14900KS will be priced at $689, $10 less than the previous 13900KS, and will be available in stores today. The 6.2GHz max turbo frequency is an out-of-the-box boost, so there could be room for overclocking to push these speeds even further. The 14900KS has the same 24 cores found on the 14900K, with eight performance cores and 16 efficiency ones. It does run at a 150-watt base power, though, instead of the 125 watts found on the 14900K.Other than... Continue reading...

Image: SpaceX The first two Starship flight tests ended in an explosive fashion. On its third attempt, the spacecraft lasted much longer. Continue reading...

You can get your home theater ready for viewing parties before you start filling out your brackets. | Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge If you're looking for a home theater upgrade to amplify the screaming crowds, court squeaks, and other signature sounds of NCAA basketball throughout March Madness, you should check out the sale going on at Sonos right now. Through March 25th, you can save 20 percent on select soundbars and speakers.For example, the entry-level soundbar in its lineup, the Sonos Ray, is down to around $223 (about $57 off) at Amazon, Best Buy, and Sonos. If you need a little bit more power, you can go for the Sonos Beam (Gen 2), which is also on sale for around $399 ($50 off) at Amazon, Best Buy, and Sonos. Both are compatible with the Sonos Sub Mini, which is down to about $343 ($86 off) at Amazon, Best Buy, and Sonos. The Sonos Move 2 is also on sale... Continue reading...

The new Blink Mini 2 wired security camera is a worthwhile upgrade to the Blink Mini, adding weather resistance, a wider field of view, and person detection for around $40. Continue reading...

SpaceX Starship on a Super Heavy rocket booster | Image: SpaceX Now that the Federal Aviation Administration has granted SpaceX a license (pdf), the third test flight of its Starship Super Heavy vehicle could take place as soon as Thursday morning. SpaceX's 110-minute launch window opened at 7AM CT / 8AM ET / 5AM PT on March 14th.The launch attempt took place after it was rescheduled for 9:25AM ET, and the Starship successfully reached orbit velocity.

It's bigger for sure, but is that really better? Continue reading...

New big Android phone just dropped. The days of the small Zenfone are over - maybe? Asus has officially unveiled the Zenfone 11 Ultra, and it is anything but the small-ish device that its last few predecessors were. It comes with a 6.78-inch screen, a huge 5,500mAh battery, and a sizable $899 starting price.You don't have to look too hard to identify that the Zenfone 11 Ultra is basically a rebadged ROG Phone 8, minus the gamer lights. Like its gaming-focused sibling, the 11 Ultra uses a Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chipset and comes with 12GB of RAM / 256GB of ROM in its base configuration. A 16GB / 512GB model will be sold outside the US. Like previous Zenfones, the 11 Ultra won't work on Verizon in the US - only AT&T and T-Mobile.The 11 Ultra uses an LTPO display, so it can... Continue reading...

Cath Virginia / The Verge | Photos from Getty Images, The Verge The leading Nintendo Switch emulator is a smoking crater. Others are wary - but hopeful - for the future. Continue reading...

The Microlino Dolce is a throwback to mid-century bubble cars. Fun, fun, fun till a trailer towed my baby away. Continue reading...

Image: Turtle Beach Gaming accessory company Turtle Beach has announced it's getting into the controller collecting game and buying PDP for a cool $118 million. PDP getting bought could be a good thing, depending on how you feel about its slate of generally affordable and fun-colored controllers.Turtle Beach has added a lot of accessory irons to the gaming fire in the last couple years, including forays into flight yokes and the recently-announced Velocity One racing wheel. It sells controllers too, but it only began doing so in 2021, and doesn't sell any for PlayStation or Nintendo consoles. Image: PDP Correct layout, best fighter. Gamepads are PDP's bread and butter - and it's got licenses to sell them for every major... Continue reading...

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Sellers on Amazon will soon be able to make product pages with just the copy-and-paste of a link.Amazon is releasing a new generative AI feature that takes information from a seller's external website and then generates an Amazon product page for the item, complete with a written description and images. The goal is to help sellers reduce the time it takes to bring the product from a different website onto Amazon, says Mary Beth Westmoreland, Amazon's VP of worldwide selling partner experience, in a blog post. Image: Amazon Amazon's AI will parse through a separate link to generate product pages. Amazon warns sellers that if they choose to paste a URL to create the product page, they must be the owner, rights... Continue reading...

Yikes! | Photo by Paul Ellis / AFP via Getty Images How a bad Photoshop job turned into an existential crisis for the British monarchy. Continue reading...

Illustration: Alex Castro / The Verge Epic Games isn't done with Apple. A 2021 ruling forced Apple to allow developers of App Store apps to link to outside payments, and Epic has now filed a motion asking Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers to enforce her original order.Epic says Apple's updated developer policy that still reserves 27 percent of outside payments (or 12 percent for small developers) for Apple itself is still unjustified. Epic argues these fees are essentially the same" as those the company charges for using its payments system.Christian Owens, who founded payments processor Paddle, and Benjamin Simon, the founder behind the Down Dog fitness apps for iOS, agreed in declarations also filed by Epic. Owens called the choice offered by Apple illusory," while Simon... Continue reading...

With a new update you can now view recorded footage from cameras like the Google Nest Cam (indoor, wired) on Google Home's web interface. | Photo by Jennifer Pattison Tuohy / The Verge Google has announced that in the next few days, Nest Cam users will finally be able to view and download recorded clips and scroll through their event timeline on its new home.google.com web portal. While you've been able to view livestreams from here, if you want to see what happened earlier, you need to go to the Google Home app.The company also says it's bringing the ability to create custom clips from recorded footage both on the web and in the app, finally bringing the full functionality of its Nest cameras to its own platform. These features will require a Nest Aware subscription, starting at $8 a month.Google first promised to bring a web view to its cameras in 2021, but it didn't materialize until 2022. Then, it was limited... Continue reading...

Leaks of the DJI Avata 2 drone show it with a sleeker battery housing and updated triple-bladed propellers. | Image: @Quadro_News DJI's unannounced Avata 2 drone and Goggles 3 have leaked, showing some exciting updates over their predecessors - such as a bigger battery and sensor and cameras that might let you see through the first-person view (FPV) headset.The image atop this story, via @Quadro_News, shows the new drone is ditching much of the original skeletal design and uses brand-new triple-bladed propellers and batteries, which now appear to be fully encased within the frame. More intriguing are the new alleged Goggles 3, though: they appear to feature two cameras on the front that could possibly be used for passthrough vision and what appears to be a hinged forehead rest for flipping the goggles up when not in use. The leak doesn't explicitly say what... Continue reading...

Cath Virginia / The Verge | Photos from Getty Images The fate of TikTok in the US now lies with the Senate after House lawmakers voted overwhelmingly to pass a bill that would ban the app unless Chinese parent company ByteDance sells it.President Joe Biden has already said he would sign the bill, the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act, if both chambers advance it.But even though the bill sailed through the House only about a week after it was first introduced, the Senate will present a whole different set of challenges.To start, there's no companion bill yet, so the legislation is barely at the start line in that chamber. And even if one is introduced, Senate rules could make it tricky to maintain enough support (60 out of 100 members) to clear it.... Continue reading...