The Verge

Image: The Verge Microsoft just posted the third quarter of its 2023 fiscal financial results. The software maker made $52.9 billion in revenue and a net income of $18.3 billion during Q3. Revenue is up 7 percent, and net income has increased by 9 percent. While Windows, Xbox, and devices revenue have all been hit hard this quarter, Microsoft’s cloud, office, and server businesses have made up for weaknesses elsewhere.Microsoft had a tough quarter for Windows and devices revenue last quarter, and Q3 isn’t much different. Windows OEM revenue, the price that PC manufacturers pay Microsoft to put Windows on laptops and PCs, fell by 28 percent in Q3. Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge Microsoft’s devices revenue has dropped... Continue reading…

Image: Broke Studios Despite the final officially licensed cartridge for the NES being released back in 1995 (the PAL-exclusive The Lion King, for those curious), indie developers have continued to breathe some modern innovation into the retro gaming platform through homebrew titles. One particularly recent and notable example — Broke Studio’s Super Tilt Bro., previewed by Gizmodo — introduces Wi-Fi-enabled online multiplayer to the NES almost 30 years after the console was discontinued.Super Tilt Bro. is an open-source eight-bit fighting game with platform mechanics. It’s essentially just a demake of Nintendo’s Super Smash Bros. series, albeit without any of its recognizable characters — probably best not to poke the Nintendo copyright lawsuit dragon after... Continue reading…

Image: The Verge Apple is working on a paid AI-powered health coach that could help you improve your exercise, sleep, and eating habits, according to Bloomberg. Codenamed “Quartz,” the service will apparently “use AI and data from an Apple Watch to make suggestions and create coaching programs tailored to specific users,” Bloomberg reports. However, Quartz won’t be announced this year and is instead set to come out next year.The new Quartz service (and app) are just one of a few new health initiatives outlined in Bloomberg’s report. The iPad, for example, will finally be getting a dedicated version of the Health app as part of iPadOS 17. Apple is also apparently working on an emotion tracker (which Bloomberg says is different from Apple’s rumored... Continue reading…

Daniel Ek from Spotify It’s the last week of the cruelest month and sure to be an eventful one for the audio world. Spotify posted its first quarter earnings this morning, reporting that the service in April finally reached over half a billion (or 515 million) monthly users. But first quarter revenue fell short of expectations — even though the platform’s podcast ad revenue saw a significant (20 percent) boost from this time last year. Still, the era of big spending by Spotify on podcasts is likely done, CEO Daniel Ek explained during the call. I’ll dive into more detail below.We can expect even more financial news from the podcast industry on Thursday, with both SiriusXM and Cumulus Media scheduled to hold earnings calls.Hot Pod can also exclusively... Continue reading…

Photo by Prince Williams/Wireimage AI Drake has struck again, and the latest track shows just how easy it is for someone to use a familiar celebrity voice to make a song go viral. The track, called “Not a Game,” first emerged on SoundCloud and YouTube late last week and arrived only days after a song from someone named Ghostwriter went viral for featuring Drake’s AI-generated voice. “Not a Game” got mentions in both TMZ and the Daily Mail, shining even more of a spotlight on the track.But it turns out, “Not a Game” isn’t exactly a brand-new song. The Verge found that the track is composed of multiple preexisting elements, with the primary new addition being the Drake voice.The fakers took the vocals from this a cappella rap posted to Looperman, a site that hosts audio... Continue reading…

Image: Speedrookie (Reddit) Some owners of AMD’s latest 7000X3D series CPUs have reported that their processors have burnt out randomly. Reports across Reddit and on YouTube suggest that a number of 7950X3D and 7800X3D owners have experienced burn damage to both the CPU and the AM5 socket, killing the processors and motherboards.It’s a nightmare situation for any PC owner, particularly since, in many cases, these are new CPUs and motherboards that have only been on the market for a matter of weeks.“Came home to my system idling full fan and QCode of 00,” said Reddit user Speedrookie. “Reset BIOS, play[ed] with memory, then took it apart to find the 7800X3D bulged out and took the socket with it.” Speedrookie posted a photo of the affected CPU with a visible... Continue reading…

Screenshot: UDC via YouTube Daniel Shin, the co-founder of Terraform Labs, was indicted in South Korea in connection with the collapsed Terra and Luna cryptocurrencies. According to reports from Bloomberg and the local Yonhap News Agency, Shin was charged on Tuesday with offenses including fraud, breach of duty, and embezzlement.Prosecutors at Seoul Southern District Court also indicted nine other people with ties to Terra, some of whom had roles in marketing, systems development, and management, as reported by Bloomberg. The outlet also reports that prosecutors have frozen a total of 246.8 billion won (about $184.7 million) in assets from the individuals they charged.Shin created Terraform Labs with co-founder Do Kwon in 2018. The company released its Luna... Continue reading…

Image: Getty Images Two major automakers announced separate plans to build electric vehicle battery plants in the US, a sign that the fast-paced expansion of EV manufacturing in the country has yet to slow down.General Motors announced it will pair up with Samsung SDI to jointly invest $3 billion in an electric vehicle battery plant in the US. Separately, Hyundai said it would form a joint venture with another South Korean battery maker, SK On, for a $5 billion investment in a battery factory in Georgia.A sign that the fast-paced expansion of EV manufacturing in the country has yet to slow downExpected to start in 2026, the GM-Samsung factory will have more than 30GWh of capacity, bringing GM’s total US battery cell capacity to about 160GWh when it is... Continue reading…

Samsung’s Galaxy Watch 5 is on sale in all configurations starting at $219.99. | Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge We’re in the heart of spring, which means sunny skies, super blooms, and... good smartwatch sales? Perhaps it’s because more people are working out outdoors, but in the past month, we’ve seen a number of wearable deals that are as good as the ones we saw around the new year.Today, for instance, you can buy Samsung’s latest Galaxy Watch 5 at an all-time low in various sizes. The LTE-equipped 40mm wearable is available for $249.99 ($80 off) at both Amazon and Best Buy, or, if you prefer the Bluetooth-enabled configuration, it’s on sale at Amazon and Best Buy starting at around $219 ($61 off).Along with a more durable sapphire crystal glass cover, the Galaxy Watch 5 offers a few extra capabilities over the Galaxy Watch 4, including the... Continue reading…

A resident walks through a temporary misting station on Abbott Street during a heatwave in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, on Monday, June 28th, 2021. | Image: Trevor Hagan / Bloomberg via Getty Images Every region of the world needs to prepare for unprecedented heatwaves, warns research published today in the journal Nature Communications. The study also pinpoints which places are most at-risk of record-breaking heat in the future and urges people to start preparing now for weather events they might not have thought possible in the past.The researchers identified which locations are probably past due to seeing their temperature records shattered. They also considered factors that make certain communities more vulnerable than others, like booming population growth and limited access to air conditioning or healthcare.Crucially, they find that communities facing the most risk have never dealt with such extreme heat in the past. That... Continue reading…

Image: Cruise Cruise, the autonomous vehicle division of General Motors, is now operating a “small” fleet of driverless robotaxis in San Francisco during daylight hours for the first time. The news comes as Cruise continues to operate in the red, losing $561 million in the first quarter of 2023.The company earned just $30 million in revenue for GM, though most of that money comes from interest and other non-operating sources. Cruise, which operates robotaxis in San Francisco, Phoenix, and Austin, says it remains on track to hit $1 billion in revenue by 2025 and $50 billion by 2030.Cruise CEO Kyle Vogt said the company expanded its driverless fleet size by 86 percent, from 130 to 242 “concurrently operating AVs.” The vehicles have since passed the... Continue reading…

AI language models can be used to generate convincing text — as long as you remember to remove the label. | Image: The Verge A big worry about the rise of AI language models is that the internet will soon be subsumed in a tidal wave of automated spam. So far, these predictions have not yet come to pass (if they prove true at all), but we are seeing early signs that tools like ChatGPT are being used to power bots, generate fake reviews, and stuff the web with low-grade textual filler.If you want proof, try searching Google or Twitter for the phrase “as an AI language model.” When talking to OpenAI’s ChatGPT, the system frequently uses this expression as a disclaimer, usually when it’s asked to generate banned content or give an opinion on something subjective and particularly human. Now, though, “as an AI language model” has become a shibboleth for machine... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Apple, Meta, Google, and more report how their companies are performing. Continue reading…

Image: Netflix Season 3 of The Witcher finally has a premiere date. Netflix announced that the fantasy series will return in June, though not all episodes will be available at once.Similar to how Stranger Things 4 was split in two halves, The Witcher’s third season will be released in two batches: episodes 1-5 will start streaming on June 29th, while 6-8 will be available on July 27th. The third season was previously pegged for a summer 2023 timeframe. We also got a first look at the season via a brief minute-long teaser trailer.The show’s second season debuted at the end of 2021, and since then, Netflix has attempted to expand the Witcher universe through spinoffs like 2022’s Blood Origin, which starred Michelle Yeoh and was set 1,000 years before... Continue reading…

Illustration: The Verge WhatsApp users are no longer restricted to using their account on just a single phone. Today, the Meta-owned messaging service is announcing that its multi-device feature — which previously allowed you to access and send messages from additional Android tablets, browsers, or computers alongside your primary phone — is expanding to support additional smartphones. “One WhatsApp account, now across multiple phones” is how the service describes the feature, which it says is rolling out to everyone in the coming weeks.Setting up a secondary phone to use with your WhatsApp account happens after doing a fresh install of the app. Except, rather than entering your phone number during setup and logging in as usual, you instead tap a new “link to... Continue reading…

Image: Andrew J. Hawkins / The Verge The end is nigh for the Chevy Bolt.General Motors plans to end production of the Chevy Bolt EV and EUV at the end of 2023, GM CEO Mary Barra announced in an earnings call Tuesday. The company plans to use the capacity at its Orion Township, Michigan, assembly plant to build electric trucks starting in 2024.The end of production of the Chevy Bolt EV and EUV is a huge blow to affordable EV ownership. The Bolt is one of the cheapest EVs currently on the market, with a starting price of around $24,000. The price could be even lower when applying the $7,500 EV tax credit.The Bolt was always at a disadvantageBut the Bolt EV and EUV were always at a disadvantage, built on GM’s older and soon-to-be-obsolete BEV2 platform. The automaker... Continue reading…

Seyka in Horizon Forbidden West: Burning Shores. | Screenshot by Jay Peters / The Verge I was relieved when I first looked at the small map in Horizon Forbidden West’s new expansion, Burning Shores.Sony’s Horizon series is renowned for its expansive open worlds that are littered with things to do. When you look at the huge maps in both Zero Dawn and Forbidden West, they’re covered with tiny icons pointing you to quests to help your fellow humans, battle with fearsome robot dinosaurs, and even just interesting places to see. You can easily spend dozens upon dozens of hours in each game and not see everything they have to offer.But for me, both games just had too much. With each, I’ve tried to be open to exploring at my own pace and letting my curiosity lead the way, but I’d inevitably get tired of the busywork of trying to... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge The best thing about Slack’s new Canvas feature is that I barely need to explain it to you. It’s like Google Docs but inside of Slack. Make a canvas, add some stuff, and share it with whoever you want. Every channel in your Slack now has a canvas attached to it, and you can also make and share as many as you want. That’s it!Slack first announced Canvas last year, and it’s starting to roll out to all Slack users today. I’ve been testing an early version over the last few days, and they’re definitely going to be one of my more-used Slack features going forward. They’re maybe the most useful organizational tool Slack has ever created.See, the problem with Slack is that it’s chaos. Since it’s primarily a messaging app, everything that... Continue reading…

Illustration by The Verge Substack CEO Chris Best may have not really answered Nilay Patel’s Decoder questions about whether racist speech would be allowed on its new Twitter-like Substack Notes platform. But last Friday — more than a week after Best’s interview on the Decoder podcast — co-founder Hamish McKenzie shared a firmer statement in (where else?) a Substack Note.“Last week, we caught some heat after Chris didn’t accept the terms of a question from a podcast interviewer about how Substack will handle bigoted speech on Notes,” McKenzie said. “It came across poorly and some people sternly criticized us for our naivety while others wondered how we’d discourage bad behaviors and content on Notes. We wish that interview had gone better and that Chris had... Continue reading…

Illustration: Alex Castro / The Verge “Thousands” more of Disney’s employees are being fired this week in the second of three rounds of company-wide layoffs meant to help get the entertainment giant back on solid financial footing.Following CEO Bob Iger’s announcement back in March that Disney was seeking to lay off some 7,000 of its employees, Reuters reports that the second round of firings began today and is projected to continue through Thursday before picking up again later this year. While the frontline hourly workers at Disney’s parks and resorts aren’t expected to be affected by the layoffs, cuts are being made across a number of the company’s corporate arms, like ESPN, Disney Entertainment, the products division, and Disney Parks’ corporate leadership.“The senior... Continue reading…

Along with cloud syncing, Google Authenticator is also getting a new logo. | Image: Google Google Authenticator is adding a long-standing customer request: you can now sync your two-factor authentication codes to your Google account. So when you set up a new phone and log in to your account, Authenticator will be ready to go without requiring its own setup process. This also means that if you lose your phone or it’s stolen, getting back into your accounts from another device will be less of a nerve-racking ordeal.Cloud syncing has become relatively common across other two-factor tools like Authy, but Google really dragged its feet bringing it to Authenticator, which launched all the way back in 2010.“One major piece of feedback we’ve heard from users over the years was the complexity in dealing with lost or stolen devices... Continue reading…

Illustration: The Verge An appeals court has upheld the status quo in Epic’s antitrust lawsuit against Apple, affirming a decision that was largely a victory for Apple. In a ruling delivered on Monday, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals found that Apple’s closed App Store and security restrictions didn’t violate antitrust law but that Apple couldn’t maintain anti-steering rules that prevent users from learning about alternate payment options.Apple spokesperson Marni Goldberg provided The Verge with the following statement:

Photo by Daniel Slim / AFP via Getty Images The Supreme Court is set to hear two cases that could decide if the First Amendment allows government officials to block users on personal social media accounts where they post about their work.The cases are O’Connor-Ratcliff v. Garnier and Lindke v. Freed, both concerning public officials who use social media. The first involves two elected school board members who blocked parents who left repetitious comments on their posts. The second involves James Freed, the city manager of Port Huron, who blocked accounts and deleted comments from his Facebook page. Neither case applies to whether platforms can ban or otherwise moderate users, an issue that the Supreme Court is likely to take up at a later point.Public officials blocking users... Continue reading…

Allied Employees Guild Improving Sega Today, workers at Sega of America’s Irvine, California, office have filed for a union election with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB). The new union, Allied Employees Guild Improving Sega (AEGIS), is partnered with the Communications Workers of America and consists of a supermajority of 144 employees across Sega’s QA, localization, live service, marketing, and product development departments, making AEGIS the largest video game union in the United States made up of workers across numerous departments.The Verge had the opportunity to speak with workers ahead of the filing who talked about their experience with Sega, the organizing process, and what it means to be a part of a small but growing unionization force in the video game... Continue reading…

Image: Yuga Labs A judge has ruled in favor of Bored Ape Yacht Club creator Yuga Labs in a lawsuit against conceptual artists Ryder Ripps and Jeremy Cahen, whom Yuga Labs accused of trademark infringement over a parody of BAYC’s non-fungible token (NFT) collection. On Friday, a California court said that Yuga was entitled to protect the BAYC trademark and that Ripps and Cahen’s project, known as RR/BAYC, isn’t artistic expression protected by the First Amendment. “Defendants’ sale of RR/BAYC NFTs is no more artistic than the sale of a counterfeit handbag,” wrote US District Judge John Walter in a summary judgment.Ripps and Cahen released a set of RR/BAYC NFTs last May featuring duplicates of BAYC artwork and selling them for less than a high-priced... Continue reading…

Photo by Andrew Hawkins / The Verge Rad Power Bikes is partnering with Redwood Materials, a battery company founded by a former Tesla executive, to recycle e-bike batteries when they reach the end of their lifespan.Customers will be able to bring in their depleted batteries to Rad Power Bikes’ retail locations, after which the company will send them to Redwood Materials for processing and recycling. (Rad currently operates 10 retail and service locations in North America.) Select Rad stores in California and Washington will also serve as drop-off locations for old smartphones, laptops, and tablets, for Redwood’s growing consumer e-waste collection program.It’s a noteworthy deal considering that Rad Power Bikes is the number one seller of electric bikes in North... Continue reading…

Runway’s new iOS app is its first available for mobile. | Image: Runway AI startup Runway has launched its first mobile app on iOS, letting people use the company’s video-to-video generative AI model — Gen-1 — directly from their phones. You can download the app here, with free users offered a limited number of credits.Gen-1 allows you to transform an existing video based on a text, image, or video input. Functionally, it works a lot like a style transfer tool (though, unlike style transfer, it generates entirely new videos as an output rather than applying filters). You can upload a video of someone cycling in the park, for example, and apply an aesthetic or theme. You can give the video the look of a watercolor painting or charcoal sketch, and so on.Of course, because this is a generative AI, the output... Continue reading…

Photo by Jeff Kravitz/FilmMagic While major record labels have been trying to fend off songs using AI voice tracks of famous artists, Grimes has other ideas.“I’ll split 50% royalties on any successful AI generated song that uses my voice,” Grimes posted on Twitter Sunday night. “Feel free to use my voice without penalty,” she said, claiming she has no label and “no legal bindings.”At this point, Grimes’ Sunday night tweet seems to be just that — a late-night tweet that maybe, possibly, potentially could become something in the future. Grimes didn’t add much detail as to how arrangements like this would work but said the profit sharing could apply to “viral” or “super popular” tracks made using her voice that are already floating around.Grimes isn’t the first artist... Continue reading…

Honkai: Star Rail. | Image: HoYoverse The studio behind the massively popular online fantasy RPG Genshin Impact is back this week with its next game. Called Honkai: Star Rail, the game looks similar to Genshin but with more of a sci-fi twist. That means slick anime visuals, large worlds to explore, and a seemingly never-ending list of things to do, thanks to its live-service nature.Here’s the basic premise: