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Photo by STEFANI REYNOLDS/AFP via Getty Images The Academy Awards return this weekend to celebrate a standout year of film releases. With vaccinations now widely available, theaters saw record-breaking ticket sales as moviegoers seemed more willing to return to auditoriums to watch highly anticipated releases. But theaters haven’t completely edged out streamers — Netflix swept up a dozen nominations for its critically acclaimed drama The Power of the Dog and several more for its doomsday comedy Don’t Look Up.Folks with traditional cable bundles or an antenna are already teed up to watch the event live on ABC when it airs this evening. But if you’re short the hardware or a cable box, several services will carry the coverage as well.Who is hosting the Oscars?Wanda Sykes, Regina... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Apple Pay will no longer support Russian card payment system Mir, closing a loophole that let Russians continue to use the service amid economic sanctions put on the country, according to a report from Reuters.“Apple has informed NSPK [Russia’s National Payment Card System] that it is suspending support of ‘Mir’ cards in the payment service Apple Pay,” a translated announcement on Mir’s site reads. “Since March 24, uploading new ‘Mir’ cards to the service has been unavailable.” The company also notes any Mir cards previously added to Apple Pay will stop working over “the next few days.” Apple Pay first added support for Mir cards last year.Many Russian users have already been cut off from Apple Pay and Google PayAccording to The... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Uber has secured a 30-month — or two-and-a-half-year — license to keep its ridesharing services up and running in London, according to a report from the BBC. This marks the close of a lengthy battle with the city’s transportation agency, Transport for London (TfL), over Uber’s safety protocols.

When not in use, Samsung’s Frame TV can be used to display more than 1,400 works of art. | Image: Samsung Now that Samsung’s new Frame TVs are available for preorder, the 2021 model is selling at a new all-time low in multiple configurations until April 5th (or while supplies last). Typically $1,499.99, Woot is selling the HDR-compatible, 55-inch QLED TV for $899.99, which is $100 cheaper than the previous low we saw during Black Friday and in the run-up to the Super Bowl. The 65-inch model is also on sale for $1,399.99 instead of $1,999, and both TVs come with a one-year warranty from Samsung.While the 2021 model lacks the matte, anti-reflective display found on this year’s model, they’re both designed to display artwork when not in use, allowing them to blend in more easily with your home’s decor. When turned on, they function as... Continue reading…

US government agencies are already barred from using Kaspersky products. | Photo by Jakub Porzycki/NurPhoto via Getty Images The US Federal Communications Commission has added Russian cybersecurity company Kaspersky Lab to its list of entities that pose an “unacceptable risk to US national security,” according to a report from Bloomberg. This is the first time a Russian company has been added to the list, which is otherwise made up of Chinese companies, like Huawei and ZTE.Businesses in the US are barred from using federal subsidies provided through the FCC’s Universal Service Fund to purchase any products or services from the companies on the list. In addition to Kaspersky, the FCC also added China Telecom and China Mobile International USA to its list on Friday.Kaspersky says the decision was “made on political grounds”“I am pleased that our national... Continue reading…

Mike Frazzini has led Amazon’s gaming arm since 2009. | Photo by Andrew Burton/Getty Images Amazon Games studio head Mike Frazzini is stepping down from his role to focus on family, according to a report from Bloomberg. Frazzini has helped lead Amazon’s game division since 2009 and played a role in building the company’s game studio.“Mike was there at the beginning of Amazon Games, and his leadership and perseverance helped build the games business from the ground up,” Amazon spokesperson Ryan Jones said in a statement to Bloomberg. “Our recent successes with New World and Lost Ark are the result of the long-term, customer-focused vision for games he helped establish. We are very grateful for all his contributions, and wish Mike the very best.”Amazon didn’t immediately reply to The Verge’s request for comment.Amazon Games... Continue reading…

Collecting satellite data for research is a group effort thanks to this app developed for Android users. Camaliot is a campaign funded by the European Space Agency, and its first project focuses on making smartphone owners around the world part of a project that can help improve weather forecasts by using your phone’s GPS receiver.The Camaliot app works on devices running Android version 7.0 or later that support satellite navigation. The way satellite navigation works, phones or other receivers look for signals from a network of satellites that maintain a fixed orbit. The satellites send messages with the time and their location, and once it’s received, the phones note how long each message took to arrive, then use that data to figure... Continue reading…

Photo Illustration by Grayson Blackmon / The Verge Converting a laptop into a ‘slabtop’ is surprisingly freeing Continue reading…

Tesla has been sued by civil rights watchdogs for racial segregation at its Fremont, California factory. | Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge The Los Angeles Times has a great piece that interviews three former Tesla employees about their experiences with racism, discrimination, and retaliation at the company, which is well worth a read. The story acts as a way to contextualize a lawsuit that the automaker is currently facing, where the California Department of Fair Employment and Housing alleges that the company has a “racially segregated workplace.”While the experiences described in the lawsuit and in the Times’ story are similar (and equally disturbing), being able to read actual interviews helps connect names, faces, and individual experiences to the situation at Tesla’s facility in California.“They were waiting for me to make a mistake”The workers have unique... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Valve’s next Steam Next Fest, an event where players will be able to try out demos of upcoming PC games right from Steam, will take place from June 13th through June 20th, the company has announced.Valve is promising there will be “hundreds of demos” this year, and while it hasn’t shared what might be playable for the upcoming event, there were some notable games featured last June, including Sable and Toem. It seems likely that Valve will promote games that are great for the Steam Deck, and hopefully by that time, many more people will have gotten their highly-anticipated reservations. (Sadly, my projected Q3 order availability means I’ll very likely miss out, at least when it comes to trying games out for the handheld.)The mid-June... Continue reading…

Photo by Becca Farsace / The Verge This may sound familiar, but there’s something wrong with the latest software update for Google’s Pixel 6 phones. As Google tweaks the version of Android it distributes to phones running its custom Tensor chip, there have been some odd issues, but instead of problems with Wi-Fi or a slow thumbprint scanner, this time, it’s affecting another key feature: notifications. They still pop up on the phone just as regularly, but for some reason, the strength of the vibration is now significantly weaker than it was before.Adjusting the vibration settings has no effectI’ve had my phone’s sounds set to silent for years, so any difference in the notification buzz is immediately an issue. It’s also noticeably softer for incoming calls, and some... Continue reading…

No kidding. | Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge 2022 is going to be a big year for Wear OS. Google’s rumored to be making its own Pixel Watch (again). Older Wear OS 2 watches are expected to finally make the transition to Wear OS 3. Samsung’s promised that Google Assistant will be coming to its Galaxy Watch 4 in the “coming months.” But there’s something notably missing from this Wear OS lineup: Fitbit.Since Google and Samsung first announced their partnership at last year’s Google I/O, Fitbit CEO James Park hasn’t been coy. He’s said multiple times that a premium Fitbit smartwatch running Wear OS was in the works. This year will be the one where Wear OS 3 debuts on a wider scale. It would’ve been stellar timing to unveil a Wear OS Fitbit. However, a 9to5Google report notes that... Continue reading…

Roberta and Ken Williams, founders of Sierra and influential game designers | Photo by John Storey/Getty Images Ken and Roberta Williams, two of the most influential figures in video game history, are bringing the original 1976 text adventure Colossal Cave Adventure to virtual reality, as well as Mac and Windows PC.It sounds pretty straightforward when I put it like that, right? And then I remind you that the game in question looked like this: Photo by Autopilot (Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0) Colossal Cave Adventure running on a PDP-11/34 with a monitor. And then I remind you that Roberta and Ken have been retired for the past 25 years.And then I remind you that — while Roberta and Ken made King’s Quest and Phantasmagoria AND are credited with the first graphical adventure game ever in Mystery Quest AND founded... Continue reading…

Google contract workers voted on whether to join a union | Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge A group of workers for a Google Fiber subcontractor in Missouri has voted to unionize, the first of its kind at Google’s parent company Alphabet. The votes were counted Friday in a Zoom hearing with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB).The workers are employees of Google contractor BDS Connected Solutions, a staffing agency in Kansas City. Ten of the 11 workers signed union cards in January to organize under the purview of the Alphabet Workers Union (AWU), which is part of the larger Communication Workers of America union. On Friday, the official count found there were nine votes in favor of joining the union, with one vote against.The AWU will be a members-only union, representing those workers who join voluntarily, rather than... Continue reading…

Lilith Walther Bloodborne’s seventh anniversary was earlier this week, and even though FromSoftware lets fans languish without a PC port, Lilith Walther — creator of the popular Bloodborne PSX demake — continues to keep the community fed, watered, and loved with her new fan project: Bloodborne Kart.

The Bose QuietComfort earbuds are discounted to just $219.99 at Amazon and Best Buy right now. | Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge If you have yet to pick up a decent pair of true wireless earbuds, you can still buy the Bose QuietComfort Earbuds at Adorama and Amazon for $219.99 instead of $279.99, one of the lowest prices we’ve seen on these earbuds since Black Friday. There’s no shortage of noise-canceling earbuds available right now; however, we think these are worth your attention thanks to their excellent sound quality, impressive fit, and wireless — albeit, bulky — charging case. Even with newer options available like the Sony WF-1000XM4 and Samsung Galaxy Buds 2, we still count these among some of the best wireless earbuds you can buy, especially if superb noise cancellation is what you’re after. Read our review.If you’re looking for a solid discount on... Continue reading…

UConnn’s Paige Bueckers faces off against UCF players Tay Sanders and Alisha Lewisin in the second round of the tournament. | Photo by M. Anthony Nesmith/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images Sweet Sixteen games in this year’s March Madness tip off tonight and tomorrow — all exciting games (like reigning national champions Stanford vs. Maryland) and one that is going to be deeply stressful for me personally (Connecticut vs. Indiana — go Huskies).You’d be forgiven for thinking that the games started yesterday, though. As of this writing, searching “sweet sixteen march madness” pulls up a schedule box for the men’s tournament, which did have that round start yesterday. The women’s games are relegated to a ribbon at the bottom.This is the first year that the women’s college basketball tournament is able to use the high-profile March Madness branding. The change came after an uproar over the embarrassingly inequitable... Continue reading…

Google has announced a pilot to allow for alternative payment systems in Android apps. | Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Google announced on Wednesday that it would test letting Android developers use their own billing systems in their apps, the first step in what could lead to a dramatic reshaping of the app economy. However, Epic Games, which has been a strong proponent for opening app marketplaces and sued Google after the search giant removed Fortnite from Google Play for including direct payments, still isn’t happy. It plans to continue advocating for an app ecosystem that offers more choices, according to a statement the company shared with The Verge.“Apple and Google continue to abuse their market power with policies that stifle innovation, inflate prices and reduce consumer choice,” Corie Wright, Epic’s VP of public policy, said in the statement.... Continue reading…

Rockstar Games Rockstar Games has announced it’s offering a new subscription service to GTA Online players. Dubbed GTA Plus, the subscription service grants players exclusive perks for $5.99 a month. According to the announcement:

Spotify is the latest company to suspend its services there. | Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Spotify is suspending its services in Russia as the country’s invasion of Ukraine continues into its second month. In a statement, the company appears to reference Russia’s new law that punishes spreading fake news about the military with up to 15 years in prison as the primary reason for why it’s shutting down in the country.“Spotify has continued to believe that it’s critically important to try and keep our service operational in Russia to provide trusted, independent news and information in the region,” according to a Spotify spokesperson, who asked not to be named because of “the situation in Russia.” “Unfortunately, recently enacted legislation further restricting access to information, eliminating free expression, and... Continue reading…

A cute look can’t hide the slow processor Continue reading…

It seems likely to be a combination of PlayStation Plus and Now. | Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge Sony will reportedly announce its answer to Xbox Game Pass, a service that’s currently known as Spartacus, “as early as” next week, according to Bloomberg. Previous reports say that Spartacus could be a combination of Sony’s two current subscription services, PlayStation Plus, and PlayStation Now. Bloomberg says that the service will launch featuring popular, recent games, but that it may not include the upcoming tentpole game God of War: Ragnarok.The service is expected to have three different tiers, which will offer different games at different price points. One tier is expected to be very similar to the current PlayStation Plus subscription, while subsequent tiers would add PS4 and PS5 games (though the latter are expected to come... Continue reading…

Florida, smartphone extreme threat alert warning. | Photo by: Jeffrey Greenberg/Universal Images Group via Getty Images The United Nations wants to make sure every person on Earth can receive early warnings ahead of disastrous weather events. It set a goal of hitting that target within five years in an announcement this week. Early warning systems are needed urgently to save lives as climate change makes extreme weather even worse, UN officials said.Such systems include technology to forecast dangerous weather systems and the ability to share those forecasts with the public so that they can take precautions ahead of storms, floods, heatwaves, and droughts. One in three people in the world still aren’t protected by early warning systems, according to the World Meteorological Organization (WMO).One in three people in the world still aren’t protected“... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Apple would be forced to allow users to install apps from outside the App Store under legislation recently unveiled by the EU. This stipulation was included in the initial proposal for the bloc’s sweeping Digital Markets Act, or DMA, which came one step closer to being signed into law this week, and an EU spokesperson confirmed that the provision is still included.“We believe that the owner of a smartphone should have the freedom to choose how to use it,” said European Commission spokesperson Johannes Bahrke in an emailed statement. “This freedom includes being able to opt for alternative sources of apps on your smartphone. With the DMA, a smartphone owner would still be able to enjoy safe and secure services of the default app store on... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge American government officials told The Washington Post that the Russian military was responsible for a cyberattack on a European satellite internet service that affected Ukrainian military communications in late February.The hack affected the KA-SAT satellite broadband network, owned by Viasat, an American satellite communications company. On February 24th, the day the Russian invasion of Ukraine began, the KA-SAT network was hit by outages that affected Ukraine and surrounding regions in Europe. A few days afterward, Viasat blamed outages on a “cyber event,” but did not release further details.Though Ukrainian officials have not fully disclosed the impact, the outage is believed to have caused significant communications disruptions... Continue reading…

The first NFT from Ukraine’s “Meta History: Museum of War” collection. | Ivan Ponomarchuk / Ukraine Ministry of Digital Transformation Ukraine’s government is raising funds by selling non-fungible tokens (NFTs) based on a timeline of Russia’s ongoing invasion of the country. Ukraine Minister of Digital Transformation Mykhailo Fedorov announced the collection’s launch on Twitter, boasting that “while Russia uses tanks to destroy Ukraine, we rely on revolutionary blockchain tech.” All sales funds will go to the Ministry of Digital Transformation to support the “army and civilians” of Ukraine.The collection, titled “Meta History: Museum of War,” associates blockchain tokens with a news item about “every substantial event of the war” and an illustration from an artist. A total of 54 NFTs are currently listed, covering the first three days of the war in late February, with... Continue reading…

The new design changes up the home screen, icons, and more. (And lets you customize the UI’s colors.) Overcast, a popular podcast player for Apple devices, is getting an update that brings a major design overhaul to its main screen, as well as a new theming system that lets you pick the colors used throughout the app. For Overcast users like me, the update is a fresh coat of paint to a well-made app, and power users will likely find plenty of new tweaks and settings they can use to make the app work even better for their use case.In a blog post, the app’s developer Marco Arment says that the 2022.2 update, available to download Friday, is “the largest redesign” the app’s ever gotten, and promises some exciting future updates.The changes are obvious from the moment you open the app — there’s a new Recent carousel, which lets you... Continue reading…

From 2D to 3D with the help of AI. | Image: Nvidia Nvidia’s latest AI demo is pretty impressive: a tool that quickly turns a “few dozen” 2D snapshots into a 3D-rendered scene. In the video below you can see the method in action, with a model dressed like Andy Warhol holding an old-fashioned Polaroid camera. (Don’t overthink the Warhol connection: it’s just a bit of PR scene dressing.)The tool is called Instant NeRF, referring to “neural radiance fields” — a technique developed by researchers from UC Berkeley, Google Research, and UC San Diego in 2020. If you want a detailed explainer of neural radiance fields, you can read one here, but in short, the method maps the color and light intensity of different 2D shots, then generates data to connect these images from different vantage... Continue reading…

Ghostwire: Tokyo is a lot of different things. It’s a paranormal buddy cop drama, a high-octane action title, and a spooky exploration game from a studio known primarily for its horror titles. But according to producer Masato Kimura, none of those elements were the starting point for the game. “The entire concept stemmed from the city of Tokyo,” he tells The Verge.The game takes place in a nearly empty version of the city, thanks to a mysterious event called “the vanishing” that causes the sudden disappearance of nearly every person in Tokyo. In their place are folklore creatures and evil spirits roaming the streets. Players wield magic to fight enemies while searching every nook of the city for lost spirits to save. Ghostwire pulls... Continue reading…

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales Every Friday, The Verge publishes our flagship podcast, The Vergecast, where Verge editor-in-chief Nilay Patel discusses the week in tech news with the reporters and editors covering the biggest stories.On today’s episode of The Vergecast, Nilay is joined by managing editor Alex Cranz and deputy editor Dan Seifert to discuss a whole lot of hardware and software news from this week.Here are some of the headlines highlighted on the show:

Photo by Rich Fury / Getty Images Dan Kwan and Daniel Scheinert open up about crafting cinematic love letters Continue reading…

Image: Apple A show that redefines what a ‘tentpole’ series can be Continue reading…

If you’re running a recent version of iOS, you can use Shazam without downloading the app or unlocking your phone. | Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge When Apple released iOS 14.2 in 2020, it introduced some landmark new emoji, like the “frustrated Italian hand gesture” and bubble tea. It also snuck in a very handy feature: the ability to add Shazam song identification to your iPhone Control Center. Best of all, you don’t even have to download the Shazam app to use it. With just a couple of easy steps, you can access this feature right from your lock screen.Shazam is the song identification app that made all of us feel cool when we got our first smartphones. Suddenly, you could tell all of your friends what song was playing at the bar just by opening an app and sticking your phone in the air. In much more recent history, Apple acquired Shazam in 2018, making the app ad-free for... Continue reading…

Image: ApeCoin DAO These silly simians are going to be influential Continue reading…

A 3D view of Toronto’s City Hall. | Image: Apple Apple Maps’ more detailed, three-dimensional cities that launched with iOS 15 are coming to Canada, offering better driving navigation, transit directions, and an augmented reality walking experience. The company has announced that the new city experience is available in Montreal, Toronto, and Vancouver. The feature was previously available in a half a dozen US cities — Los Angeles, New York, Philadelphia, San Diego, San Francisco, and Washington, D.C. — as well as London in the UK.It’s a welcome expansion. When we reviewed iOS 15 last year our only real issue with the enhanced mapping experience was its extremely limited availability. But, where available, it offers a sizable improvement to how cities look in Apple’s software, and... Continue reading…

Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge Apple’s upcoming MacBook Air redesign has been extensively reported on, but new information suggests it may come in two sizes. According to Display Supply Chain Consultants’ latest quarterly report (via 9to5Mac and AppleInsider), Apple is working on a 15-inch version of the laptop to sit alongside the 13-inch model, which may itself get a slightly larger screen as well.TF International Securities analyst Ming-Chi Kuo followed up on the report, saying that mass production is expected to begin in the fourth quarter of 2023. Kuo also says that the laptop is being designed to use the same 30W adapter as the MacBook Air, which would put it well below the latest MacBook Pro machines in terms of power consumption. Finally, Kuo notes that this... Continue reading…

The Digital Markets Act is meant to let small players compete with big ones. | Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge The EU’s newly agreed-upon Digital Markets Act could require messaging app developers to make their apps work together if it ends up coming into force in October as expected. In the EU’s press release, it says that lawmakers agreed that the “gatekeeper” companies behind WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, or iMessage would have to make their apps “interoperable” with smaller messaging platforms at the developers’ request.Here’s the relevant part of the EU’s statement:

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Another sexual harassment lawsuit has been filed against Activision Blizzard. The law firm of entertainment lawyer Lisa Bloom filed the suit on behalf of a plaintiff identified as “Jane Doe” against Activision Blizzard. Jane Doe alleges she has been subject to sexual harassment and discrimination while working at the company. The suit names Activision Blizzard, Blizzard Entertainment, three former Blizzard employees, two current employees, and “Does 1 through 25” as defendants.Content warning: This story contains descriptions of sexual harassment.Many of the allegations in the lawsuit involve Mark Skorupa, a former Blizzard staffer who is one of the named defendants and a current Microsoft employee. Doe was hired as a senior... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge The EU has unveiled its biggest ever legislative effort to balance competition in the tech world. The new Digital Markets Act, or DMA, is intended to rein in the power of the largest tech corporations and allow smaller entities to compete with the mostly US-based firms. So far, the EU has tackled antitrust issues on a case-by-case basis, but the DMA is intended to introduce sweeping reforms that will address systemic issues in the whole market.Today’s announcement targets interoperability of messaging apps like WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, and iMessage, with the EU saying that vendors will have to “open up and interoperate with smaller messaging platforms, if they so request.” The EU says that this should give users more choice in how... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Netflix has added another game developer to its ranks. The company announced that it has acquired Boss Fight Entertainment, a mobile studio based in Texas. It’s the third game studio that Netflix has scooped up following Oxenfree developer Night School and Next Games, the team behind a Stranger Things puzzle game. Past games from Boss Fight include a mobile strategy game called Dungeon Boss; the studio was founded following the closure of Zynga’s Dallas studio, which developed the Facebook game CastleVille.The news comes as Netflix is making a major push into the gaming space. In addition to acquiring established studios, Netflix has also made mobile games a part of its subscription package — just this week saw the announcement of three... Continue reading…

Sony just got a restock of the PS5 | Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Update March 24th, 8:23PM ET: Sony appears to have sold out of both the PlayStation 5 and the PS5 Digital Edition for the time being. However, you can still register with Sony for a chance to buy its next-gen console at a later date.On the hunt for a PlayStation 5? We know it is still quite the challenge to get a hold of one, but don’t give up hope just yet. Sony will be hosting another round of restocked consoles up for grabs at 6PM ET, no invite necessary.You have a chance at the standard PlayStation 5, complete with a disc drive, for $500, or the PlayStation 5 Digital Edition for $400. Both come equipped with fast 820GB internal SSDs (667GB of which is usable storage), while the extra $100 for the standard model includes the... Continue reading…

Nanoleaf’s existing Essentials light bulb and light strip work with Thread, but won’t be updated to support Matter. | Image: Nanoleaf You shouldn’t be concerned about the delay of Matter, the new smart home interoperability standard, because we’re not. That’s the message from smart home device makers Eve Systems and Nanoleaf, who have been involved with developing the protocol that promises smart home nirvana since its earliest days. “I think the three-month delay might actually be a good thing,” says Gimmy Chu CEO of Nanoleaf. “I feel that now there’s more certainty across the industry that we’ll have unity at time of launch.”While there may be more certainty in the industry, current smart home owners are still in a quagmire of uncertainty around which products to buy and when. Especially now that Chu has confirmed to The Verge that Nanoleaf’s Thread-enabled A19... Continue reading…

A Frosties NFT avatar. | Frosties US government prosecutors have charged two men with fraud and money laundering over a cryptocurrency “rug pull” scheme. Ethan Nguyen and Andre Llacuna allegedly earned around $1.1 million by selling non-fungible tokens (or NFTs) based on cartoon-like characters called “Frosties.” After selling the NFTs, they shut down the project and transferred its funds to a series of separate crypto wallets, leaving Frosties owners bereft of promised rewards.According to the criminal complaint, the Internal Revenue Service, Criminal Investigation (IRS-CI), and Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) began investigating Frosties in January, shortly after receiving complaints about the scam. Frosties was a buzzy project whose 8,888 NFTs — priced at the... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Google announced Wednesday it’s making some improvements to how it decides which product reviews it shows in Search results. The idea behind these and other recent product reviews updates is to ensure that reviews you see are high quality and actually include helpful information about a product you might be considering buying.The improvements build on earlier updates “to make sure that product reviews in Search meet certain criteria,” Google’s Perry Liu said in a blog post. Here are some examples of the criteria Liu says the company is looking for:

Spotify For years, a loose coalition of companies, including Spotify and Epic Games, has been railing against the so-called app store tax — taking Apple and Google to court and spurring regulators to investigate their up-to-30 percent cut of developers’ app revenue. They argue they’re locked into grossly overpriced billing, hosting, and curation services that sometimes hurt more than they help.So it was a surprise when, on Wednesday, Google revealed a pilot program with Spotify that will let some developers bypass Google Play billing on Android — letting Spotify and potentially others use their own payment platforms instead. But if you think that means Google’s going to give up its piece of the action, think again. Reading between the lines,... Continue reading…

Blizzard Entertainment In the wake of the Overwatch 2 beta date announcement and an apologetic video from game director Aaron Keller promising the team would give more consistent updates on progress, the Overwatch 2 news floodgates have officially opened. In this latest update, we’re offered a glimpse of Overwatch 2’s overhauled ping system.“We wanted to create a system that would enhance voice communication as well as provide alternative ways to share information with your team,” systems designer Gavin Winter says in the blog post.New features include character-specific callouts in which, when a player makes a ping, their teammates hear that notification in that player’s hero’s voice. The blog gives an example: “if you’re playing Tracer and ping an enemy... Continue reading…

Spotify’s Car Mode for Android could be making a return. | Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Spotify is reportedly letting some Android users test out a new, voice-focused car mode after it removed Car View last year without any obvious replacement. According to a report from 9to5Google, which includes screenshots of the test, Car Mode is less like the hyper-simplified Car View that came before it and more like a version of Spotify’s usual interface that’s tweaked to make quick actions easier.While the current version of Car Mode that Spotify’s testing does have a tab that lets you access your recently played music, the search screen has been replaced by a voice control feature. The interface for controlling what’s currently playing has a similar layout to Spotify’s regular mode, which should let you use muscle memory (without... Continue reading…

Adrienn Szabo/Paramount+ After seeing the first episode of Halo, I’m totally on board. I’m a Halo lore hobbyist, meaning that while I’ve enthusiastically experienced the campaigns of Halo’s Combat Evolved through Guardians, go on regular Halopedia wiki dives, and own a well-loved copy of Eric Nylund’s The Fall Of Reach, I haven’t consumed everything the Halo universe has to offer. (Ghosts of Onyx, I swear I’ll get to you one day.) But based on the Halo stories I do know, I think Paramount Plus’ series offers a far more compelling look at the Master Chief than anything the games have done so far.Spoilers for the first episode of Halo below:It’s hard translating video games to film and TV. It’s only recently been done right with Arcane, Castlevania, and the S... Continue reading…

Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge Apple is reportedly working on selling iPhones and iPads themselves as part of a hardware subscription service, according to a new report from Bloomberg, whose author Mark Gurman writes the service could arrive next year.The move would fit into Apple’s ongoing push towards subscription services as a whole. Over the past several years, Apple has increasingly been emphasizing recurring subscriptions like Apple Music, Apple TV Plus, Apple News Plus, Apple Fitness Plus, and Apple Arcade as key new revenue streams for the company. Many of those services have already been bundled together into the company’s Apple One bundles, too.We’ve already seen a similar shift on the hardware front: Apple added a monthly subscription model for its... Continue reading…