The Verge

Screenshot by Jay Peters / The Verge Reddit added more space to the r/Place collaborative canvas on Friday, giving users additional room to collaboratively draw pixelated art. Almost immediately after the space was added, users started to write in their protests against the site and CEO Steve Huffman.The expanded canvas now stretches further in both directions. When I first wrote this, there was a massive land grab taking place, including a spot memorializing the YouTuber Technoblade, the continuation of the German flag at the top of the canvas, a vertical French flag on the right side, and many iterations of the phrase fuck spez," a reference to Huffman's username.More than three hours later, those fuck spez" messages were covered up. Outside of a a message from a... Continue reading...

Image: Dotemu The team over at Capy Games has a real knack for inventive takes on seemingly simple puzzle games. I first realized this when playing the colorful Critter Crunch way back in 2009, and nowadays, I'm reminded of it whenever I squeeze in a few rounds of Grindstone on my phone. Tucked away in between those two releases was Might & Magic: Clash of Heroes - which originally debuted on the Nintendo DS - an often overlooked game that might just be the most engrossing puzzle RPG I've ever played. Now it has a new lease on life with a rerelease for modern platforms.Clash of Heroes is a match-three game, but in practice, it's quite different from something like Candy Crush or even Puzzle Quest. Basically, the things you are matching are soldiers... Continue reading...

The iRiver iHP-120 multi-codec jukebox. Nineteen years old and still going. The iRiver iHP-120 was a gadget nerd's MP3 player. It had a wired remote, a radio, a voice recorder, two optical ports, and loads of physical buttons. I've had it for half my life. Continue reading...

San Diego Comic-Con 2023 | Image: San Diego Comic Convention San Diego Comic-Con is one of the biggest comics conventions of the year, though it's quieter than usual as Hollywood strikes continue. Continue reading...

Do you ever wonder what the internet would be like if we let Big Tech burn? | Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge Get in, loser, we're going back to Web 1.0. We have the opportunity to get out from under the algorithms. So maybe it's time to think about what a web of people looks like now.I've been thinking about this for a while now - the decay of Google Search and, with it, the findability of archive material; the destruction of Twitter by the coward Elon Musk; the AI glurge polluting the open web; the needless login prompts. The era of Web 2.0 is ending.One of the key markers of Web 2.0, in retrospect, was not the adoption of mobile, though that is certainly part of it. It was, instead, the intermediation of most interactions by algorithm. Before social media, going viral was much harder; actual people had to pass your site or video along, via... Continue reading...

Illustration by Samar Haddad / The Verge As your console game collection grows, you're going to need more space to store it - and the internal storage inside your PlayStation 5 or Xbox Series X / S isn't going to last forever. That may leave you in a situation where you're regularly uninstalling and reinstalling games, juggling them around to fit the available space.You have options. The PlayStation 5 has an internal slot for expanding the onboard storage that's pretty easy to access by popping off a couple of panels and turning a single screw. On the Xbox side, you can buy storage expansion cards that plug into a designated slot on the back of the console for a quick and easy (if often expensive) upgrade.Adding external storage drives can help ease the pressure, too, giving... Continue reading...

The Bose QuietComfort Earbuds II have yet to be beat in the ANC department. | Image: Chris Welch / The Verge The Bose QuietComfort Earbuds II, the noise-canceling champs of the wireless earbud world, are once again on sale for $249 ($50 off) at Amazon and Best Buy. Alternatively, you can pick up a refurbished pair from Bose for an additional $50 off, complete with a one-year warranty.If you really value peace and quiet while listening to music or podcasts, Bose's latest pair of wireless earbuds are for you. The QC Earbuds II do an impressive job of blocking out the outside world, whether you're walking on the street or nodding off on a plane. Because of this, they make for a terrific pair of travel earbuds - even if they do lack of wireless charging.Read our Bose QuietComfort Earbuds II review.Amazon's Fire TV Omni QLED TVs are on sale in... Continue reading...

The Climate Clock in New York City's Union Square in early July 2023. | Image: Climate Clock An ominous, 62-foot-long clock looms over New York City's iconic Union Square, and it's about to tick past a worrying milestone. It's called the Climate Clock, and it counts down how much time the world has left to stop climate change from becoming exponentially worse.As anyone who's experienced the weather lately knows, the situation is already bad. The world had its hottest week on record at the start of the month, according to preliminary data, with heatwaves still smashing local records across the Northern Hemisphere. And that's just one way climate change is bringing on dangerous new extremes.Today, the planet is about 1.1 degrees Celsius hotter than it was before the Industrial Revolution, thanks to carbon dioxide emissions from... Continue reading...

Illustration: The Verge Since launching in November, OpenAI's ChatGPT tool has reached a number of users at a rate that's astounding for anything outside of Threads - now the company says it's ready to release an app for Android.The ChatGPT for Android app is launching a few months after the free iOS app brought the chatbot to iPhones and iPads.

Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge The Analogue Pocket is a fantastic way to play Game Boy games, but preorders have taken a long time to ship out. If you're still waiting for your device, Analogue shared a promising update on Friday: any preorders made before July 20th, 2023, will begin shipping in August," according to an announcement from the company.Note that the quote says the handhelds will begin shipping in August; that language doesn't necessarily guarantee that you'll get your Pocket in August. Still, the announcement likely comes as good news for people who have been eagerly waiting for any sort of information on their order. (Based on a thread on Reddit, some people have been in limbo for more than a year.)The Analogue Pocket launched in December 2021, but... Continue reading...

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Disney wants to transition ESPN from linear TV to streaming - and the NBA and NFL might be the partners that help the company do that. According to CNBC, Disney CEO Bob Iger and ESPN leader Jimmy Pitaro held talks with both leagues about bringing them on as minority investors in the sports network.Sources tell CNBC that ESPN spoke with the NFL and NBA about a variety of new partnerships and investment structures." That could involve either sports league owning a stake in ESPN, which could help bolster the package of exclusive content on Disney's vision of a streaming-only version of the sports network.In an interview with CNBC last week, Iger hinted at selling some of Disney's linear TV assets like ABC but noted sports content on ESPN... Continue reading...

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge T-Mobile has started charging customers who pay phone bills in-store a new $5 Payment Support Charge," plus tax. According to The Mobile Report, the new fee went into effect on July 19th, though prepaid customers will be charged the fee later on.In a flier shared with The Mobile Report announcing the change to its employees, T-Mobile implies the reason behind the fee is to help enable a digital-enabled future." Yet, as Droid Life points out, employee time spent processing payments may mean less time for more profitable endeavors - like selling phones or add-ons to plans.Plus, it's a sneaky way to encourage more customers to sign up for AutoPay, which conveniently also offers a $5 per line discount if you pay your bill online - and... Continue reading...

Photo by Kevin Dietsch / Getty Images Seven of AI's top companies attended a White House summit Friday, reaching a deal with the Biden administration to roll out new guardrails to enhance the safety and security of their systems and users, like watermarking AI-generated content.These commitments are real, and they are concrete," President Joe Biden said in remarks at the White House Friday following the meeting. Artificial intelligence is going to change the lives of people around the world. The people here will be critical for shepherding that innovation with responsibility and safety by design."Earlier in the day, the seven companies - including Amazon, Anthropic, Meta, Google, Inflection, and OpenAI - made voluntary, sometimes vague, commitments to invest in research... Continue reading...

Image: The Verge OpenAI's head of trust and safety, Dave Willner, is stepping down from the company as the AI industry faces more scrutiny around privacy and security from policymakers.Willner has been working in trust and safety for nearly a decade. Before joining OpenAI, Willner was head of trust and safety at childcare startup Otter and led trust and community policy at Airbnb.The FTC launched an investigation into OpenAI last week to determine if its training data collection methods violated consumer rights. The Securities and Exchange Commission also expressed concern that large AI models could centralize data and decision-making in finance, leading to a sort of groupthink akin to the events preceding the 2008 financial crisis. OpenAI, Meta,... Continue reading...

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Telegram's new Stories feature that lets users share time-limited videos and photos is now live after CEO Pavel Durov shared last month that the feature was in testing (via 9to5Mac). For now, the company is only allowing its paid Premium subscribers to post Telegram Stories.The Telegram Stories launch comes after rival messaging apps WhatsApp (with statuses) and even Signal have launched their own versions. Durov admitted there was some internal skepticism on whether Stories is a good idea - but shared that the team now can no longer imagine Telegram without it."Snapchat popularized the Stories format before Meta swiped the idea, building them into Facebook, Instagram, Messenger, and WhatsApp. The NBA, TikTok, and, for a while, T... Continue reading...

Image: The Pokemon Company It makes a lot of sense that Pokemon Sleep is a simple game - it's something that you play in part by sleeping, after all. There's only so much complexity you can embed in an experience where players aren't conscious much of the time. Even still, after spending most of the past week with the gamified sleep tracking app tucked under my pillow, I can't help but wish there were something more beyond looking at dozing Eevees and feeding berries to a Snorlax. It's neither encouraging me to sleep more nor giving me much to do. It's a bit of a snooze.The premise in Pokemon Sleep, as with pretty much every other game in the series, is centered on research. Early on, you'll meet a charmingly rumpled professor named Neroli who is researching... Continue reading...

The MTA is cracking down on subway fare evasions after revealing the issue cost the authority $285 million last year. | Photo by Gary Hershorn / Getty Images The persistence of fare evasion on the New York City subway system has prompted the Metropolitan Transit Authority to install AI-powered surveillance software at several subway stations to track riders who avoid paying for a ticket. As reported by NBC News, the MTA disclosed in a fare evasion report that the tracking software was being used at seven undisclosed subway stations and eight physical fare barriers in May 2023, with plans for approximately two dozen more stations" by year's end and more to follow."The MTA estimates it lost $285 million to subway fare evasion in 2022, according to the report, which didn't contain the name of the third-party tracking software being utilized by the authority. MTA spokesperson Joana Flores... Continue reading...

Photo by John Lamparski / Getty Images For the first time in over 60 years, the unions representing actors and Hollywood writers are staging a strike at the same time, protesting low pay and studios' proposals for using artificial intelligence tools in production. More than 175,000 union members are out of work until a deal is made.But the ripple effects of the strikes are also reaching another group: influencers and digital content creators who are far from a household name but work in an industry that is, at times, synonymous with fast-track fame. Most of them are non-union influencers, leading to confusion. How can creators keep making money while their peers in Hollywood strike? What rules are they required to follow? What's their role in all of this?This guide will... Continue reading...

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Here's all the news from Samsung's second Unpacked event of the year. Continue reading...

watchOS 10 is all about the widgets - and you can try them out for yourself by downloading the public beta. | Illustration by Samar Haddad / The Verge If you were intrigued by the idea of widgets on your Apple Watch at this year's WWDC, good news! The watchOS 10 public beta is live.That said, before I tell you how to install it, there are a few things you should keep in mind. First off, watchOS 10 is a substantial update. Not only does it reintroduce widgets to the platform, but it also completely redesigns Apple's native watch apps and reimagines how you interact with the device. The controls you're used to have changed. Pressing the side button, for instance, now brings up Control Center while swiping up is how you access widgets.I mention this because once you install the watchOS 10 beta, you cannot downgrade to watchOS 9. So if you're not keen on relearning how to use the watch... Continue reading...

The original data breach may date as far back as December 2020. | The Verge Sensitive information identifying thousands of Roblox creators has been exposed following a data breach impacting attendees at a conference for Roblox developers, which allegedly remained undisclosed by the company for at least two years. As reported by PC Gamer, the leak contains personal information from people who attended the Roblox Developer Conference between 2017-2020, including names, usernames, date of birth, physical addresses, email addresses, IP addresses, phone numbers, and even T-shirt sizes.Roblox is aware of a third-party security issue where there were indications of unauthorized access to limited personal information of a subset of our creator community," said a Roblox spokesperson to PC Gamer. We engaged... Continue reading...

Samuel L. Jackson in Marvel's Secret Invasion. | Image: Marvel Studios Ahead of the release of the sixth and final episode of Secret Invasion on Disney Plus, Marvel is bringing the first three episodes of the series to Hulu. The episodes, which star Samuel L. Jackson as Nick Fury as he attempts to fend off an invasion of Earth by a faction of shapeshifting Skrulls, is now available to stream on Disney's other US streaming service until August 17th. Any viewers wanting to watch the final three episodes will have to watch them on Disney Plus, where the season's final episode will be released on July 26th.Deadline notes that this isn't the first time an original Disney Plus series has streamed on Hulu. American Born Chinese and Star Wars spinoff Andor both saw select episodes appear for a limited time. The... Continue reading...

The White House is bringing in AI's top seven companies Friday to make a series of voluntary promises to protect users.The companies - Amazon, Anthropic, Google, Inflection, Meta, Microsoft, and OpenAI - have all agreed to a series of asks from the White House to address many of the risks posed by artificial intelligence. The promises consist of investments in cybersecurity, discrimination research, and a new watermarking system informing users when content is AI-generated.The companies have entered into these agreements voluntarily, so there are currently no consequences if they fail to live up to their promises. Many of these commitments are not expected to roll out on Friday, but the companies are expected to work on... Continue reading...

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Reddit is now in charge of r/malefashionadvice, which for a time was the biggest subreddit still closed in protest of the platform's API pricing changes. The subreddit is now open, meaning Reddit users can browse content in the community once again, though in a restricted mode, meaning only certain users can make new posts.As we reported last week, the moderators of r/malefashionadvice, a subreddit with than 5 million subscribers, had taken the community private and were pushing its users toward Discord and Substack instead. At the time, the moderators expected to be removed after receiving a message from a Reddit admin (employee), ModCodeofConduct, telling them they would be replaced if they didn't reopen.Three former moderators of... Continue reading...

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is suspending its administrative challenge (PDF) seeking to block Microsoft from buying Activision Blizzard. The FTC had taken a two-pronged approach against the $68.7 billion deal, filing this case last December that was scheduled to go before its own administrative judge on August 2nd.The other part was its pursuit of a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction that would have stopped Microsoft closing its deal while the FTC's administrative process continued. A US federal judge denied the injunction request earlier this month, and an appeals court also turned down its request to put an emergency hold on the deal. The FTC is still appealing the preliminary injunction denial, though.M... Continue reading...

The summer promos just keep coming. | Image: Epic Games If you were looking to stock up on some PC games, you might want to head on over to the Epic Games Store. That's because from now until August 3rd at 11AM ET, Epic Games is taking 75 percent off hundreds of titles as a part of its annual summer sale. What's more, you can earn 10 percent back - double the usual amount - from both game and app purchases, which you'll receive 14 days after making your purchase.The sale offers a fantastic opportunity to pick up some older games you may have been curious about but perhaps missed. This includes Alan Wake Remastered, the predecessor to the forthcoming Alan Wake 2, which is on sale for just $11.99 ($18 off). Other older titles worth considering include Far Cry 6 for $14.99 ($45 off) and Red... Continue reading...

We knew Peter Parker and Miles Morales would return to fight Kraven and Venom on October 20th, but we had very little hint as to the plot. Now, Sony and Insomniac have released the first full story trailer for Marvel's Spider-Man 2 - and it's an epic one.You can watch it above.Also, Sony has revealed a limited-edition PS5 bundle you can buy alongside the game, which comes with its own controller, both featuring the symbiote consuming Spider-Man's shiny red and turning it pure black:If you've already got a PS5, Sony will sell the same console covers and controller separately, too, though it hasn't shared prices yet. (Previous console covers have cost between $55 and $65 for a set.)They'll all go up for preorder next Friday, July... Continue reading...

I've hosted this image on Imgur as well, but you can also get to the latest canvas from r/Place. | Screenshot by Jay Peters / The Verge Reddit officially launched the 2023 edition of its r/Place collaborative art project on Thursday morning, and it's littered with messages protesting Reddit and Reddit's CEO. You can see the current iteration of the canvas on the r/Place subreddit or by following the prompt at the top of the app. (Note that you can't access r/Place on Old Reddit; you'll need to be on New Reddit or one of the company's mobile apps.)In r/Place, individual users can drop a single pixel of color every five minutes on a huge canvas, including overriding other pixel placements if you want to try and claim some turf. In the utopian version of this idea, r/Place becomes an ever-changing piece of art where users work together to draw all sorts of pixelated images... Continue reading...

Illustration: The Verge No, getting seats in AMC Theaters will not be like booking tickets for flights, sporting events, or the theater. As previously reported by Bloomberg, the company is done testing ways to offer tiered pricing that would have customers paying extra for more desirable seats at the cinema and less for the ones no one wants.The now-canceled Sightline plan was being tested in three US markets, and AMC notes customer response clarified" things enough to end the pilot. The company stated that it saw little or no incremental lift in front-row attendance, even with a price reduction applied to those seats" in the testing markets.AMC notes, probably most importantly, that its competitors didn't try to match the scheme, and so it will go in... Continue reading...

A screenshot from Ocasio-Cortez's October 2020 Twitch stream. | The Verge Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) is going to stream on Twitch again this weekend. On Thursday, she announced that she'll be streaming with Hasan HasanAbi" Piker and special guests" on Saturday, July 22nd at 7:30PM (presumably ET).Ocasio-Cortez's debut Twitch stream, which took place in October 2020, peaked at more than 426,000 viewers, according to TwitchTracker, instantly making it one of the highest-viewed streams on record at that time. Although some Twitch streams have since gone on to hit millions of peak simultaneous viewers, Ocasio-Cortez's stream still ranks highly in TwitchTracker's records.Ocasio-Cortez's first stream was packed with special guests, including Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN), HasanAbi, and Pokimane, who all... Continue reading...

Image: Federal Reserve via Flickr Your paycheck could arrive even sooner, thanks to the Federal Reserve's newly launched payment system. The system, called FedNow, is an instant-payment service that operates on a 24/7 basis - even on holidays.First announced in 2019, FedNow acts as a common network" between banks and credit unions, making it easier for them to route funds across different institutions. So far, there are only 35 participating banks and credit unions, along with the US Department of the Treasury's Bureau of the Fiscal Service.Once it's widely adopted, though, it will let you transfer funds between different bank accounts instantly or even pay your credit card bill on a bank holiday without worrying about it being late. And, if you have direct deposit,... Continue reading...

TSMC is also predicting a 10 percent decline in revenue for 2023 amid falling demand for consumer electronics. | Photo by VCG via Getty Images The world's biggest chipmaker is pushing back the start of 4nm chip production at its new facility in Phoenix, Arizona, to 2025, blaming labor shortages. Apple has said that it intends to eventually source chips for its iPhones and MacBook models from the Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) plant in the US, while Nvidia and AMD have also committed to using its production capacity.The chipmaker's first Phoenix-based fab, which began construction in 2021, was originally projected to start producing 4nm chips next year. A second fab that will produce smaller, more complex 3nm chips is scheduled to open in 2026.During the company's Q2 earnings call on Thursday, TSMC chairman Mark Liu said that the company was encountering... Continue reading...

Samsung Wallet can now be used to access things around campus without needing a physical card. | Image: Samsung Samsung's now offering new digital student ID support in its own Wallet app. Galaxy users, specifically those who have recent A, S, or Z series devices, will be able to pull up their campus card to access facilities and food at a tap around supported institutions just as easily as using Samsung Pay.The news comes as Samsung gets ready to announce new devices, including its latest foldable phones, at its yearly Unpacked event next Wednesday.Back in my day, we had to carry around ugly plastic student ID cards to tag ourselves into smelly weight rooms and grab dry burgers on a meal plan. Today, some students have gone through school and earned a four-year degree without ever needing to carry a physical card.Early on, Android phones... Continue reading...

Image: The Animation Guild A group of Cartoon Network and Warner Bros. Animation production workers - the staff of different managers, assistants, IT specialists, and coordinators who play vital roles in bringing the studios' projects to fruition - have announced their intention to form a union with The Animation Guild.Per The Hollywood Reporter, 66 of the production workers behind Cartoon Network and Warner Bros. Animation shows including Harley Quinn, Teen Titans Go!, Craig of the Creek, Adventure Time: Fionna and Cake, Batman: Caped Crusader, and We Baby Bears have filed a petition to the National Labor Relations Board asking for it to hold and oversee a union election. The staffers are also requesting that Warner Bros. Discovery voluntarily recognizes their... Continue reading...

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge Meta's newest update for its Quest VR headsets, v56, will add a lot of welcome upgrades, including improved hand tracking, system-level live captions, and the return of livestreaming to Facebook.The improved hand tracking, which Meta is calling Hand Tracking 2.2, focuses on hands responsiveness" to bring the experience closer to controllers," and to help show it off, the company released the Move Fast demo app as part of its App Lab. Meta is also adding swipe typing on its virtual keyboard, which could be an easier way to spell things out than hunting and pecking on virtual keys midair.I tried out hand tracking and Meta's Direct Touch technology on the Quest 2 earlier this year, and while it was quite finicky, I thought it was still... Continue reading...

The Sennheiser Momentum 4 (right) offer improved noise cancellation and better comfort than the prior model (left). | Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge With more people working from home than they used to, owning a good pair of noise-canceling headphones has become more appealing than ever. However, they can be expensive and difficult to shop for due to the range of available models, many of which cater to different lifestyles and priorities. Some are better suited for long-haul flights, for instance, while others are ideal for multitasking and marathon listening sessions.That's why we've curated this list of the best deals on noise-canceling headphones. Here, you'll find sales on all kinds of on-ear and over-ear headphones, all of which are designed to eliminate outside noise but come with their own strengths and weaknesses. And if you want to do even more research before making a... Continue reading...

This is what the Watch 6 Classic could look like. | Image: OnLeaks / MySmartPrice The upcoming Galaxy Watch 6 could come with a larger display thanks to its slimmed-down bezels. A specs list posted by leaker SnoopyTech (via 9to5Google) suggests that the 40mm Watch 6 will come with a 1.31-inch OLED display, while the 44mm version will feature a 1.47-inch OLED display.The specs sheet indicates that the Galaxy Watch 6 Classic will get a similar upgrade, featuring the same display sizes across its rumored 43mm and 47mm options. According to the specs sheet, the 1.2-inch display might come with a 432 x 432 resolution, while the 1.47-inch screen may have a 480 x 480 resolution. That's a slight upgrade from the 1.2-inch and 1.4-inch displays on its Galaxy Watch 5 predecessor.

Image: Dolphin Don't wait around for Dolphin to help bring Nintendo GameCube and Wii games to Steam - it's officially no longer happening. Nearly two months after postponing the release indefinitely," the Dolphin Emulator team now says it's completely given up on the idea. We are abandoning our efforts to release Dolphin on Steam," they write.Remember when we showed you the receipts where Valve torpedoed the launch, telling Dolphin it would have to get permission from Nintendo if it wanted a place in the store? Today's Nintendo was never going to give that permission, and Dolphin is now coming to terms with that: