The Verge

(Left) Badring water leak sensor; (Right) the Parasoll door and window sensor pair. | Image: Ikea Ikea's push to democratize the smart home continues with the introduction of three new Zigbee sensors that won't break the bank. There's Parasoll, the door and window sensor; Vallhorn, the motion sensor; and Badring, the water leakage sensor. They'll all be priced less than $10 when they go on sale globally in the first half of next year.Parasoll is a typical window and door sensor that can be discretely mounted to trigger an automation when an open / close event is detected. It can also be paired directly with an Ikea light bulb right out of the box without needing to buy and configure an Ikea Home smart hub. It's priced at 9.99 in Europe, but exact US pricing is yet to be confirmed for it or any of Ikea's three new sensors. ... Continue reading...

Illustration: The Verge If you've got an old Google account that you want to keep but haven't used in the past couple of years, you'll want to sign into it soon to prevent its deletion under Google's inactive account policy. The new rules were announced in May, when Google said that the earliest it would begin deleting accounts was in December 2023. Google has since started emailing affected users saying accounts will be eligible for deletion from December 1st.To be clear, Google hasn't said it would delete every eligible account starting on Friday. The company says it plans to take a phased approach, starting with accounts that were created and never used again." But now seems like as good a time as any to make sure your old accounts are in order so you... Continue reading...

Photo by Jaap Arriens / NurPhoto via Getty Images AWS added new languages to its Amazon Transcribe product, offering generative AI-based transcription for 100 languages and a slew of new AI capabilities for customers.Announced during the AWS re: Invent event, Amazon Transcribe can now recognize more spoken languages and spin up a call transcription. AWS customers use Transcribe to add speech-to-text capabilities to their apps on the AWS Cloud.The company said in a blog post that Transcribe trained on millions of hours of unlabeled audio data from over 100 languages" and uses self-supervised algorithms to learn patterns of human speech in different languages and accents. AWS said it ensured that some languages were not overrepresented in the training data to ensure that lesser-used... Continue reading...

The Yeedi Cube is the cheapest robot vacuum / mop that has a self-empty / self-clean dock, and it's $200 off today. | Photo by Jennifer Pattison Tuohy / The Verge The robots are coming... for your floors. If all you want for Christmas are clean carpets, check out some of the bargains you can grab during Cyber Monday on the best robot vacuums and mops you can buy. Even though Cyber Monday doesn't technically happen until tomorrow, you can get all of these deals now.From simple suckers like the Roborock's Q5 Pro that will best pet hair, to the all-singing, all-mopping DreameBot L20 Ultra, the prices are falling as hard as these robots can suck up dirt.Here's my pick of the best deals out there this holiday shopping week.Best robot vacuum deals under $450

Illustration: The Verge Tumblr is doing away with Post Plus, the feature that lets creators charge users a subscription to access their content. Starting on December 1st, creators will no longer be able to enable Post Plus on their blogs.The discontinuation of Post Plus comes just weeks after a leaked memo revealed the platform's plans to downsize after struggling to meet usage and revenue targets. At the time, Matt Mullenweg, the CEO of Tumblr's parent company Automattic, said the company had plans to focus on the core functionality" of Tumblr going forward.It appears Post Plus, which launched in 2021, is the first feature on Automattic's chopping block. In a post on Tumblr, the platform's staff members say they originally introduced Post+ to uplift and... Continue reading...

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Google says it's investigating Google Drive users' reports claiming that their personal files have unexpectedly vanished from the cloud service. The company acknowledged the issue today in a new Google community support thread and believes it involves a limited subset" of Google Drive for desktop app users. Google notes it's a sync issue for Google Drive desktop versions 84.0.0.0 through 84.0.4.0.One of the users, who lost all of their Google Drive data going back to May, discovered the unwelcome surprise last week and took their grievances to Google's community support site, as reported by The Register. Google's support team, as the user explains, walked them through a data recovery process, including attempting to backup and restore... Continue reading...

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge YouTube is branching out into games - at least for its paid subscribers. The platform is giving Premium users access to a set of online games that can be directly played on either the mobile app or desktop app. Known as Playables," the company first debuted the experimental feature to select users in September. As noted by Droid-Life, YouTube sent a notification last week to Premium subscribers informing them of Playables and allowing them to try it out. Those who opt in will be able to play a total of 37 mini-games that effectively live inside YouTube - there's no need to download or install them.The selection of games isn't too challenging or out there" - they include crowd-pleasers like Angry Birds Showdown, Brain Out, Daily... Continue reading...

Image: The Verge ffSports Illustrated published articles that were attributed to fake AI-generated authors, according to reporting by Futurism. The authors include Drew Ortiz," who's spent much of his life outdoors," and Sora Tanaka," who is a fitness guru, and loves to try different foods and drinks."Futurism found the associated author headshots for sale on an AI-generated image website, and someone involved in the creation of the content told the outlet that there are a lot" of similar fake writers. Rachael Fink, a spokesperson for The Arena Group, which publishes Sports Illustrated, disputed the suggestion that the stories themselves are AI-generated. Drew Ortiz" grew up in a farmhouse. His face is also for sale on an AI... Continue reading...

Google's HD Chromecast may not go up to 4K resolution, but it's still a great 1080p streamer that's just $20. | Image: Google Every Black Friday and Cyber Monday, there's always a ton of hype about the discounts on big-ticket items - you know, the deals on the OLED TVs, game consoles, and tablets of the world. But it never fails that many of the ultra-cheap items make for some of the most clutch deals, namely because spending very little on a small accessory you end up using all the time can be the most gratifying.This year, throughout the annual shopping weekend, we're once again keeping an eye out for the best tech deals on those little gadgets and gizmos under $25. We've also got roundups for those working with $50 or $100 budgets, but the items below are pretty much as cheap as you can get in the tech world without simply buying absolute crap that's... Continue reading...

Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge There's no better time to stock up on games and gaming accessories than Cyber Monday, and this year, we're seeing sizable discounts on some of the biggest titles released this year - a year, need I remind you, that's been inundated with many excellent games.While not all of this year's biggest games are getting significant discounts, titles like Final Fantasy XVI and Star Wars Jedi: Survivor are. And when it comes to slightly older games, many, like Doom Eternal, can be had for a pittance, making this a great time to stock up on the releases you might have missed months or even years ago.As for gaming accessories and peripherals, Cyber Monday always presents a cornucopia of worthwhile discounts on things like controllers, headsets,... Continue reading...

Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge The hard-to-resist holiday sales have officially arrived, with many headphones and earbuds from the biggest tech brands discounted to their lowest prices ever for Black Friday and Cyber Monday. And if you've been holding off for the best possible savings on something from Apple, Sony, Samsung, Google, and other brands, you're likely not going to do better than these early Cyber Monday 2023 offers.I'm not expecting any major new products from the biggest headphone makers anytime soon, so you don't need to worry about buyer's remorse should you decide to jump on any of the deals below. Heading into the colder months, it's always worth factoring in that headphones can double as earmuffs on a morning commute. But at the same time, it's... Continue reading...

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge European Union regulators have sent a statement of objections to Amazon about the company's proposed $1.7 billion acquisition of Roomba maker iRobot. In a press release, the European Commission says that it has informed Amazon of its preliminary view that its proposed acquisition of iRobot may restrict competition in the market for robot vacuum cleaners."Amazon announced in August 2022 that it planned to acquire iRobot. The proposed acquisition has since come under regulatory scrutiny, with the European Commission revealing an investigation in July 2023. British regulators looked at the deal but cleared it in June. The Federal Trade Commission requested information about the deal from Amazon and iRobot in September 2022.The European... Continue reading...

The Ecobee Smart Thermostat Premium is down to $220 for Cyber Monday. | Photo by Jennifer Pattison Tuohy / The Verge If you missed out on grabbing a bargain on smart home gear this Black Friday, Cyber Monday is here to save you. There are still plenty of deep discounts to be found on smart speakers and smart displays as well as robot vacuums that you can control with a command and smart speaker and video doorbells whose live feeds you can see through one of those smart displays.There are also some excellent deals on smart door locks, smart lights, and smart plugs, including some of the first discounts we're seeing on Matter-compatible devices. So, read on for my picks of the best smart home gear bargains out there.Best deals on smart speakers and smart displays

A November 1920 issue of Popular Science. | Image: Popular Science via Wikimedia Commons After 151 years, Popular Science will no longer be available to purchase as a magazine. In a statement to The Verge, Cathy Hebert, the communications director for PopSci owner Recurrent Ventures, says the outlet needs to evolve" beyond its magazine product, which published its first all-digital issue in 2021.PopSci, which covers a whole range of stories related to the fields of science, technology, and nature, published its first issue in 1872. Things have changed a lot over the years, with the magazine switching to a quarterly publication schedule in 2018 and doing away with the physical copies altogether after 2020.In a post on LinkedIn, former PopSci editor Purbita Saha commented on the magazine's discontinuation, stating she's... Continue reading...

Photo by JOHAN NILSSON/TT News Agency/AFP via Getty Images Tesla sued Sweden's postal agency after mail workers in the country refused to deliver license plates in solidarity with striking service autoworkers.As CNBC reports, the company calls postal workers' refusal to deliver license plates a discriminatory attack" and says that the Swedish government has a constitutional obligation" to get plates to vehicle owners.About 130 workers at seven Tesla repair shops in Sweden have walked out in the past month as ordered by their labor union, IF Metall, the largest union for manufacturer workers in the country. Tesla has refused to negotiate a collective bargaining agreement with the striking workers. Other unions have thrown in their support, including dock workers who won't take Tesla vehicles... Continue reading...

Image: Bungie Bungie officially confirmed on Monday that Destiny 2: The Final Shape is delayed until June 4th, 2024. Reports of a delay to the expansion emerged last month after Bungie started making layoffs at the studio amid a drop in Destiny 2 players after the poorly received Lightfall release.Bungie reportedly laid off around 8 percent of Bungie employees, affecting roles in community management, engineering, social media, QA, and more. Now, the Halo creator is taking its time to get things right with The Final Shape after negative reviews and player sentiment from the Lightfall expansion.The Final Shape is an ambitious expansion that's meant to conclude Destiny's light and darkness saga. Bungie has shown very little about the expansion so... Continue reading...

iRobot's flagship robot vacuum and mop the j9 Combo Plus is $400 off for Cyber Monday. | Photo by Jennifer Pattison Tuohy / The Verge With a new owner looming, iRobot is already getting into the Amazon discounting game by dropping the prices on its brand-new vacuums this Cyber Monday. On Friday, it started with its new budget and midrange lines, the Roomba Combo i5 Plus and Combo j5 Plus, and on Sunday, iRobot slashed $400 off its new top-of-the-line models, the j9 Plus and Combo j9 Plus.The Roomba j9 Plus is the company's new flagship robot vacuum and is on sale for $599, down from $899 at Amazon, Best Buy, and Wellbots. It comes with a self-empty dock and all the smarts of the Roomba j7, including AI-powered obstacle avoidance to steer clear of household clutter such as cords, clothes, shoes, and pet poop, plus higher suction power than the previous... Continue reading...

Google's Pixel 7A is down to just $374, matching the best price we've seen on the excellent midrange phone. | Photo by Allison Johnson / The Verge If you've been putting off a new phone purchase all year, then I have great news: your procrastination is about to pay off. Cyber Monday is here, and there are already plenty of excellent deals to be had on Pixels, iPhones, and Galaxy devices, many of which are selling for hundreds of dollars below MSRP. And even if you picked up a new phone recently, it's a great time to stock up on some new cases, chargers, and accessories. And when you're done looking at phones, be sure to check out our roundup of the best Cyber Monday deals for a whole host of other discounted tech.The best deals on phone chargers, cases, and accessories

This Amazon Smart Thermostat deal will also help your loved ones save money on their energy bills this season. | Photo by Jennifer Pattison Tuohy / The Verge Do you know what's even better than scoring a good deal on a cool holiday gift? Getting a second gift for free. Right now, you can buy an Amazon Smart Thermostat bundled with Amazon's Echo Pop smart speaker from Amazon for $69.98 ($50 off). By itself, the Echo Pop costs $39.99 and the Amazon Smart Thermostat is $79.99, so you're essentially getting a free Echo Pop you can gift to another person on your list - we won't tell!We featured both gadgets in our gift guides because they're budget-friendly presents that'll make your giftee's life easier. Amazon's Smart Thermostat makes it easy for your loved ones to keep warm during the winter, and even adapts to their habits and preferences. It can also help them save money on their energy... Continue reading...

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...

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...

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...

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...

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...

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...

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...

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...

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...

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...

Insight Editions/BioWare Food, fine dwarven food straight from Orzammar! Continue reading...

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...

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:

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...

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...

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...