The Verge

Photo by Bryan Bedder/Getty Images for Spritz Society Spotify has a brand new original topping its podcast chart, but it would probably prefer if you didn’t know about it.Last week, Spotify launched a new pop culture show, Breaking Bread, on Spotify Live. Breaking Bread’s recordings now rank at number 11 on Spotify’s top podcast chart after holding the number two spot for most of the week, putting it just behind Joe Rogan. The show’s popularity — and the reason the company might be staying quiet about its new hit — is due to its two hosts: Jackie Oshry Weinreb and Claudia Oshry (aka Instagram’s girlwithnojob), who come with a huge built-in audience. While the sisters have delivered their massive fanbase to the app, they have a controversial history that could be problematic for Spotify at... Continue reading…

It isn’t a fantastic TV or monitor, but it’s a good compromise for people who want both in the same package Continue reading…

It took a while. My review of the M2 MacBook Pro went up last Wednesday. But as soon as I got my hands on the device on the prior Thursday, it was clear that running down the battery — one of the most important things a laptop reviewer needs to do — was going to be a Whole Thing.Reader, I tried. I would use the device all evening and leave it running all night, but it would still have plenty of charge left in the morning, and I’d have to plug it in for testing, abandon it to film, or give it to our video and photo teams for shooting before I could fully drain it down. I did not have a long enough interrupted span of time to continuously use the device. That’s how absurdly long this laptop lasts.But, with the written review and the video review both... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge A sophisticated spyware campaign is getting the help of internet service providers (ISPs) to trick users into downloading malicious apps, according to research published by Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG) (via TechCrunch). This corroborates earlier findings from security research group Lookout, which has linked the spyware, dubbed Hermit, to Italian spyware vendor RCS Labs.Lookout says RCS Labs is in the same line of work as NSO Group — the infamous surveillance-for-hire company behind the Pegasus spyware — and peddles commercial spyware to various government agencies. Researchers at Lookout believe Hermit has already been deployed by the government of Kazakhstan and Italian authorities. In line with these findings, Google has... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge In the wake of the Supreme Court’s decision on Friday to overturn Roe v. Wade, Google’s chief people officer Fiona Cicconi sent a staff-wide email to employees informing them of Google’s response to the ruling. Among other things, the email highlights that Googlers can “apply for relocation without justification” and that people in charge of the relocation process “will be aware of the situation” in assessing their requests. In an email last August reported by Bloomberg, Google told employees that of 10,000 requests over the prior few months to work remotely or relocate, 85 percent were approved.The Supreme Court’s ruling does not make abortion illegal throughout the US — instead, it leaves the decision to individual state governments.... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Apple Music has raised the subscription price of its student plan in the US, UK, and Canada, as first reported by 9to5Mac (via TechCrunch). While it’s increasing the price from $4.99 to $5.99 / month in the US and Canada, student users in the UK can expect a similar jump from £4.99 to £5.99 / month.Apple hasn’t acknowledged the changes yet, but the new pricing information is currently available on Apple Music’s webpage. Students subscribed to Apple Music have also started seeing the price increase on their iPhones and iPads’ subscription pages. It’s unclear when exactly Apple implemented these changes, but, as 9to5Mac points out, it was likely rolled out sometime between June 21st and the 23rd — an archived Apple Music webpage shows the... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Intel is postponing the groundbreaking ceremony for its planned chip-making facilities in Ohio because the US government hasn’t yet provided it with funding, the company confirmed to The Verge (via The Washington Post and The Wall Street Journal). The ceremony, which was originally set to take place on July 22nd, has been delayed indefinitely in a likely bid to push the US government towards passing the CHIPS Act.Intel announced its $20 billion plan to build two semiconductor plants in New Albany, Ohio earlier this year, noting that its expansion to potentially include up to eight plants will “depend heavily on funding from the CHIPS Act.” The CHIPS Act reserves $52 billion in funding for semiconductor companies, including Intel, to... Continue reading…

Illustration by William Joel Yesterday, the Supreme Court voted to uphold a Mississippi abortion ban and overturn Roe v. Wade, ending abortion access in some states and triggering impending bans in others. The decision won’t end abortion in America, but in many places it will move the procedure underground and, based on recent history, online.Understandably, abortion advocates have focused on surveillance issues in the immediate aftermath of the ruling, concerned about states using online records for criminal prosecutions. But there’s also a fight brewing over how and where advocates will be able to share abortion information online. If a procedure is illegal, then states could claim content enabling that procedure is illegal too — raising thorny questions for... Continue reading…

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge From time to time, I’ll grab a random device out of the Verge reviews closet and spend a week or two with it. It’s mostly out of random curiosity and for the sake of comparing “old” products against the latest and greatest. Most recently, I was drawn to Google’s Pixel 5. So I gave it a factory reset, updated the phone to Android 12, and have been using it as my daily driver for the past several days.The experience has been fantastic. I’ve got very large hands — an iPhone 13 Pro Max doesn’t look out of place in them — and I prefer large screens, so I don’t think I could fully switch over to the Pixel 5. But it’s such a good “small” phone (by 2022 standards) that I’ve certainly been tempted. The Pixel 5 makes it easy to do anything I... Continue reading…

Stay connected while disconnecting Continue reading…

The company says it could suffer “irreparable harm” if it can’t sell its products while the court considers its case. | Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Juul can continue selling its e-cigarettes despite the Food and Drug Administration ordering a ban Thursday, according to the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia (via TechCrunch). In its order, the court says it’s issuing the temporary stay to give Juul time to file an emergency motion, which it can then consider along with a response from the FDA.The FDA says the reason for the ban is that there’s “insufficient evidence to assess the potential toxicological risks of using the Juul products.” Juul had petitioned for clearance to sell its tobacco and menthol-flavored vape products, but the FDA turned down the application. The regulator notes that it’s only illegal to sell the Juul device and Juul pods, not to own or use... Continue reading…

Image: Marshall B. Mathers III The last couple of weeks have had a lot of bad news for some in the “web3” space, but you wouldn’t know it by looking at announcements in and around the recently-ended NFT.NYC and ApeFest 2022 events. The Bored Ape Yacht Club’s (BAYC) annual event in particular brought in musicians like The Roots, LCD Soundsystem, Haim, Lil Baby, Lil Wayne, and others to perform for its members. On the final day of the event, guests saw the premiere of this video from two of the celebrities who’ve purchased tokens, Eminem and Snoop Dogg.The video is for a new song, From The D 2 The LBC, that isn’t the most memorable of collaborations and is mostly about smoking weed, but it constantly splices in images of the cartoon apes. Many BAYC members were... Continue reading…

T-Mobile knows what apps you’re using. | Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge T-Mobile’s advertising business is offering a new way for marketers to pry into your app-using habits. Ad Exchanger reports that the un-carrier’s new program is called App Insights, and it’s now fully operational after spending a year in beta. The program allows third-party marketers to buy T-Mobile customer data and centers around a key piece of information that it has unique access to: what apps you use.Customer data is anonymized, and it’s pooled together with others of similar interests and behaviors, so companies can’t buy a specific user’s app history. Still, it’s creepy. The company’s advertising segment touts this offering loud and clear on its website, with the phrase “Apps speak louder than words” splashed across the top of... Continue reading…

We’re gonna need a bigger desk. | Image: Samsung Samsung is getting ready to release its massive 55-inch curved Odyssey Ark monitor in August, according to a report from Korean outlet ETNews (via SamMobile). The monitor, which was announced in January at CES, has reportedly gone through a few certification programs that have to be done before it can go on sale.Details about this monitor are still scant. The company has said that it’ll have a 16:9 4K panel and that the stand will support pivot, tilt, and rotation. It also announced that it would come out in the second half of 2022 (which the reported August window falls squarely in). But let’s be honest, when you show up with a monitor that promises to physically tower over you while you’re using it, people will pay attention even if... Continue reading…

Cyberpunk 2077: Gangs of Night City is a competitive game for up to four players Cyberpunk 2077 is getting a board game courtesy of a Kickstarter campaign. Cyberpunk 2077: Gangs of Night City is a strange twist on the high-tech, low-life underbelly of the world brought to life by CD Projekt Red and Mike Pondsmith. The game is being published by CMON Games, which have put together board game adaptations of God of War and Bloodborne in addition to other existing IPs.If the slang-ridden synopsis of the game provided on its Kickstarter page is any indicator, it’s clear that its creators have some serious reverence for the source material: “Cyberpunk 2077: Gangs of Night City is a competitive game in which 1 to 4 players take on the role of ruthless gangs vying for control of the underground in the glittering hellhole... Continue reading…

Earth.fm homepage For people who love discovering new sounds, there’s an intriguing new site that collects soundscapes from around the world.The site, Earth.fm, bills itself as “Like Spotify, but for natural soundscapes.” You can listen to bird species in Malaysia or India or forest sounds in Ghana. The sounds are gathered from numerous contributors who have experience recording the natural world in places including Brazil, Spain, Norway, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom. The website features sounds from locations like national parks and the everglades.Users can create their own specialized playlists of sounds available on Earth.fm, zipping from Brazil to Egypt in a matter of minutes. You can compile a list of different... Continue reading…

Bitcoin mining units in Fort Stockton, Texas, on Friday, April 29th, 2022. | Jordan Vonderhaar/Bloomberg via Getty Images After taking a nosedive in June, the price of Bitcoin has stayed so low that it’s forcing the blockchain’s massive electricity use to similarly dip. Over the past couple weeks, Bitcoin’s energy consumption has dropped by more than a third, according to estimates of annualized electricity use by digital currency economist Alex de Vries on his website digiconomist.net.Bitcoin’s energy hunger, which has alarmed environmentalists and consumer advocates concerned about pollution and utility prices, comes from the process of mining new tokens. Bitcoin miners earn new tokens by validating transactions through an inherently energy-inefficient process, using specialized machines to solve complex puzzles. All that computing by all those machines... Continue reading…

Wait, but what did Evans take this picture with? | Image: Chris Evans I think most of us here at The Verge can agree that if we were famous celebrities who acted in some of the highest-grossing films of all time, we would always be rocking the latest and greatest tech. That’s apparently not how Chris Evans, star of Lightyear and The Avengers, rolls — on June 23rd, 2022, he posted a message on Twitter and Instagram that he’s finally upgrading his phone: “RIP iPhone 6S,” he said. “We had a good run.”In his posts, Evan says that he’ll miss the 2015 device’s home button — a photo he posted shows that he’s upgrading what appears to be an iPhone 13 Pro — but not the fact that it was a “nightly battle” trying to get the 6S to charge. (In the comments of Evan’s Instagram post, Hidden Figures and Onward actress... Continue reading…

The Mars Express. | Image: European Space Agency Engineers at the European Space Agency (ESA) are getting ready for a Windows 98 upgrade on an orbiter circling Mars. The Mars Express spacecraft has been operating for more than 19 years, and the Mars Advanced Radar for Subsurface and Ionospheric Sounding (MARSIS) instrument onboard has been using software built using Windows 98. Thankfully for humanity and the Red Planet’s sake, the ESA isn’t upgrading its systems to Windows ME.The MARSIS instrument on ESA’s Mars Express was key to the discovery of a huge underground aquifer of liquid water on the Red Planet in 2018. This major new software upgrade “will allow it to see beneath the surfaces of Mars and its moon Phobos in more detail than ever before,” according to the ESA. The agency... Continue reading…

It looks like another week of jaw-dropping runs. | Image: Games Done Quick Summer Games Done Quick (SGDQ), the annual weeklong summer speedrunning marathon for charity, kicks off on Sunday, and the schedule is chock full of potentially jaw-dropping runs.The very first event? A Shadow of the Colossus randomized boss rush that will somehow be completed in 47 minutes. On Monday, there’s a The Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening (Switch version) race that’s estimated to take just under two hours. If you’ve been meaning to check out the indie hit Tunic, one runner plans to blast through the game in 40 minutes. The final day of the marathon, July 2nd, is packed with hit after hit, with an Elden Ring run set to conclude the show.You can peruse the full SGDQ 2022 schedule right here. The first run starts on Sunday,... Continue reading…

Image: SpaceX It’s always fun to check in with SpaceX, Elon Musk’s least dysfunctional company — oh wait, what’s this? The workers at SpaceX are upset?Last week, as first reported by The Verge, a group of SpaceX workers wrote a letter to Musk about his tweets. “Elon’s behavior in the public sphere is a frequent source of distraction and embarrassment for us, particularly in recent weeks,” the letter states. “As our CEO and most prominent spokesperson, Elon is seen as the face of SpaceX — every Tweet that Elon sends is a de facto public statement by the company. It is critical to make clear to our teams and to our potential talent pool that his messaging does not reflect our work, our mission, or our values.”The plan was to hand-deliver signatures of... Continue reading…

The Liv system from Thermacell is like a force field for mosquitoes. | Photo by Jennifer Pattison Tuohy / The Verge The mercury is rising, which means most of us are spending more time outside. So, our deals post today is all about tech that lets you bring the luxury of your living room to the great outdoors — or just to the backyard. For instance, if you’re sick of mosquitoes ruining your otherwise leisurely time in your backyard, Thermacell is currently discounting its Liv Smart Mosquito Repellent System by 25 percent; just use the code FREEDOM25 at checkout.The base model of the Liv system comes with three repeller stations priced at $699.00 (around $525 with the coupon) and can accommodate up to 945 square feet. The innocuous repeller stations can be controlled with Alexa or Google Assistant and can also be programmed using your phone to operate... Continue reading…

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge Every Friday, The Verge publishes our flagship podcast, The Vergecast, where Verge editor-in-chief Nilay Patel, editor-at-large David Pierce, and managing editor Alex Cranz discuss the week in tech news with the reporters and editors covering the biggest stories.On today’s episode, Nilay and Alex chat with Verge senior reviewer Monica Chin about her review of Apple’s 13-inch MacBook Pro with the M2 chip. Though the chassis is still the same as the previous model, the changes that come with the new M2 processor are significant. Apple has yet to release their redesigned M2 MacBook Air, so should you wait before buying the Pro? Monica shares her thoughts.For the rest of the show, we change up the crew. Alex and David lead the... Continue reading…

Photo by Nathan Howard/Getty Images Today, the Supreme Court effectively overturned the right to a legal abortion established by Roe v. Wade in 1973. In a 6-3 ruling, the court voted to reverse a lower court’s decision in the case of Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, upholding a Mississippi law that banned abortion procedures after 15 weeks of gestation. More significantly, the ruling removed any constitutional restriction on laws banning abortion procedures.Authored by Justice Alito, the majority decision is direct about the implications of the ruling. “The Constitution does not confer a right to abortion,” it reads. “Roe and Casey are overruled, and the authority to regulate abortion is returned to the people and their elected representatives.”“The... Continue reading…

We haven’t seen the 2024 Cadillac Celestiq yet, but a report from The Wall Street Journal says that while the flagship Ultium-powered electric sedan will be more than just a show car, it will have about equal amounts of vapor and vehicle. Based on people familiar with the matter, the paper reports fewer than 500 built each year and a price starting at around $300,000.Production is apparently on track to begin in late 2023, featuring a massive pillar-to-pillar touchscreen that will outdo the 33-inch one seen in Cadillac’s Lyriq based on both its size and pixel density. Otherwise, we know the Celestiq is bringing all-wheel drive, four-wheel steering, and a full-glass roof that allows each passenger to set their own level of... Continue reading…

Pretty soon, you’ll be able to own digital collectibles of your favorite hockey moments. | Photo by Bruce Bennett/Getty Images Hockey-loving HODLers, rejoice: the NHL is launching an NFT program. The league is partnering with Sweet to build a marketplace of digital collectibles including everything from iconic moments in hockey history to “3D interactive trophy rooms where users can display their collections.” The league made the announcement during NFT.NYC (and also during the Stanley Cup Finals) but plans to launch the marketplace before next season.Sweet is a much smaller platform than OpenSea or SuperRare, but it’s among the more user-friendly of NFT marketplaces, allowing users to buy stuff with crypto or just with a credit card. It already has a lot of sports content, too, including collectibles from a number of Formula 1 and NBA teams.The only... Continue reading…

A launcher and search bar for power users. | Image: Raycast Most Mac users find Spotlight, Apple’s built-in tool for searching through apps and files, to suit their needs just fine. But power users who want to have near total control over their computer (as well as access to shortcuts and tools) have often looked for other alternatives. Lately, an app called Raycast has been gaining attention as one of those options, competing with one of the community’s long-standing favorites, Alfred.After trying out Raycast for a few weeks, I’ve found it to be extremely useful. Here are some tips if you want to try it out for yourself.Getting startedWhen you first open Raycast after downloading it from the company’s website, it’ll walk you through a brief overview, which prompts you to assign it a keyboard... Continue reading…

Yoo Ji-tae in Money Heist: Korea. | Image: Jung Jaegu / Netflix Part 1 offers more questions than answers Continue reading…

Polestar is the latest electric vehicle company to go public, listing its stock on the Nasdaq exchange Friday after successfully merging with a special-purpose acquisition company, or SPAC. The company plans on using the $850 million in fresh capital to fund its three-year plan to make several new electric models and become profitable.The Swedish company, which is a joint venture between Volvo and its parent company Geely, is going public amid broader uncertainty around EV stocks. Several EV startups have gone the SPAC route to becoming publicly traded only to see their stock price tank after early stumbles.Polestar is slightly different, having been selling and delivering its Polestar 2 electric fastback sedan to customers in the... Continue reading…

Photo Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge; Photos by DankPods DankPods has turned finding old MP3 players into a hit YouTube show Continue reading…

The bZ4X’s gobbledygook name is the least of its problems. Toyota’s first all-electric crossover could have been so much more Continue reading…

Photo by Mitchell Clark / The Verge Hey — remember last year when we published a bunch of essays and called it Next Gen? Well, we’re doing it again.In early August, The Verge will be running another special issue focused on young people and technology — and if you’re a young or unpublished writer, then we want you to be a part of it.In particular, we want to hear about the piece of tech that’s meant the most to you: it could be an online community, a little-known tool, or a particular piece of media that’s been a positive presence in your life. To be clear, we’re looking for stuff you like, but the tech itself is just a starting point. We want to hear what it means to you and why. Be creative; surprise us!To give you an idea of what we’re looking for, here are the four... Continue reading…

There’s a lot going on in Air Twister. The arcade-style shooter from legendary designer Yu Suzuki is out today on Apple Arcade, and it pushes players through a strange fantasy world full of armored birds, flying squids, skeletal dragons, floating cities, and evil clocks. For Suzuki, who is best known for his work at Sega on games like Space Harrier, Shenmue, and Virtua Fighter, it was a chance to build a fantasy universe full of things he loved. “It’s an amalgamation of all of the different things that I would like to see in a fantasy world,” he tells The Verge.Air Twister is a classic rail shooter — think Space Harrier or Panzer Dragoon — where players take on the role of a sci-fi princess fighting to save her home world. It has 12... Continue reading…

Sarandos onstage at the Cannes Lions advertising festival. | Photo by Eamonn M. McCormack/Getty Images for Cannes Lions Netflix’s co-CEO Ted Sarandos has confirmed that the company plans to introduce an ad-supported tier to its streaming service in an interview at the Cannes Lions advertising festival, reports The Hollywood Reporter. The New York Times reported last month that the company is aiming to roll out the new tier by the end of 2022.“We’ve left a big customer segment off the table, which is people who say: ‘Hey, Netflix is too expensive for me and I don’t mind advertising,’” Sarandos said. “We [are] adding an ad tier; we’re not adding ads to Netflix as you know it today. We’re adding an ad tier for folks who say, ‘Hey, I want a lower price and I’ll watch ads.’”The streaming service has been widely expected to launch an ad-supported subscription... Continue reading…

Photo by Paul Faith/PA Images via Getty Images Microsoft is preparing to send reminders to Windows 8.1 users that support will end on January 10th 2023. The software giant will start sending notifications to existing Windows 8.1 devices next month, as a first reminder leading up to the January 2023 support cutoff.The notifications will be similar to ones Microsoft has used in the past to remind Windows 7 users about end of support dates. Microsoft originally sunset Windows 8 support in 2016, but the Windows 8.1 update will cease support fully in January 2023. Microsoft will not be offering an Extended Security Update (ESU) program for Windows 8.1, so businesses won’t be able to pay for additional security patches and will have to upgrade or accept the risk of running software... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Apple’s long-rumored mixed reality headset, which will reportedly offer a combination of augmented and virtual reality experiences, will “likely release” in January 2023, according to respected Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo. In a new analyst note seen by 9to5Mac, Kuo notes that the headset is “the most complicated product Apple has ever designed” but that its release could help fuel “rapid growth” in the market for head-mounted displays.This is far from the first time Kuo has predicted when Apple’s headset could release, but previous predictions have had far wider release windows. Last year he said we might see the headset released at some point in 2022 (which now seems unlikely), and just this month he predicted that a release could come... Continue reading…

Decide whether you want to see captions or not. Twitter has announced that a button to toggle captions for its video player is now available for everyone on iOS and Android. The button, which shows up in the top-right corner of the video if it has captions available, lets you choose whether you want to see written descriptions. Twitter started testing this feature in April, but it was only available to a limited number of iPhone users.For years, whether subtitles show up or not on your mobile device has been determined by a variety of factors, like if you’ve turned closed captions on in your phone’s accessibility settings, or if you’re watching the video with your sound off. While those are still taken into account, now you can easily turn them on or off whenever you want, just like... Continue reading…

Chris Pratt, the voice of Mario. And Garfield. | Image: Nintendo I know it’s been nine months, but I’m honestly still reeling from the announcement that Chris Pratt will be voicing Mario in the upcoming Mario movie. What on earth is that going to sound like???Pratt, at least, seems to think it’s going to be something special. “I worked really closely with the directors and trying out a few things and landed on something that I’m really proud of and can’t wait for people to see and hear,” Pratt said in an interview with Variety. “It’s an animated voiceover narrative. It’s not a live-action movie. I’m not gonna be wearing a plumber suit running all over. I’m providing a voice for an animated character, and it is updated and unlike anything you’ve heard in the Mario world before.”Nintendo, please,... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge One thing researchers have used to track the spread of viral stories on Facebook — including ones that spread misinformation — is a tool that Meta owns called CrowdTangle. Based on anonymous sources, Bloomberg reports what many have suspected — that Facebook has largely removed development support from CrowdTangle and is making plans to shut the tool down.Removing CrowdTangle would pull access that people like Kevin Roose have used to surface data showing high engagement with right-wing news sources on Facebook, listing results that sometimes appear to be at odds with Facebook’s curated official reports. In an article last July for The New York Times, Roose described internal “data wars” about how much information the company should... Continue reading…

On Wednesday, Sen. Cynthia Lummis (R-WY) found a surprising way to develop her upcoming cryptocurrency regulation bill: she put it on GitHub.“As promised, you can now contribute comments on my bill establishing a framework for digital assets with [Sen. Gillibrand],” Lummis wrote in a tweet sharing the news. “Civil comments and criticisms welcome. Please share widely. We want to get this right. Help us iterate publicly on policy.”Best known as a repository for open-source code, GitHub includes a number of tools for that could be useful in developing public proposals — particularly the ability to publicly comment on, revise, and fork the text into different versions.As of press time, Github users have commented on 24 issues in the bill... Continue reading…

Image: Square Enix Ifrit, Shiva, and Pheonix, oh my! Continue reading…

The beloved indie game is headed to Netflix. | Image: Subset Games Into the Breach, the sci-fi turn-based strategy game from the makers of FTL: Faster Than Light, will be available on iOS and Android as part of a Netflix subscription beginning July 19th, developer Subset Games announced Thursday.Since late last year, Netflix has offered a selection of mobile games that subscribers can play for free. The company has been steadily adding titles in the months since launch, and although much of what’s available is generic-looking casual fare, Netflix seems committed to adding more notable games like Into the Breach. Earlier this month at its Geeked Week event, for example, Netflix revealed that a bunch of indie titles, including Spiritfarer and a new entry in the Reigns series, would be added to its... Continue reading…

A contractor installs hardware for a Tesla Powerwall battery unit at a home in San Jose, California. | Photo by David Paul Morris/Bloomberg via Getty Images Tesla and California utility PG&E launched a new program that will pay eligible Powerwall owners to send extra electricity to the grid when it’s vulnerable to blackouts. Working together, the Powerwalls create a “virtual power plant” that can help keep the lights on during emergencies or energy shortages.By signing up, Powerwall owners will receive $2 for every additional kilowatt-hour they feed to the grid during designated “events” when the grid is under a lot of stress. That includes any time the California grid operator, CAISO, issues an energy alert, warning or emergency.Tesla started a similar beta program with PG&E and a couple of other utilities last July, but that was a voluntary program with no payouts. Now, with a monetary... Continue reading…

He’s not laughing at them anymore. | Image: Fluf It seems like Keanu Reeves may have had a change of heart around NFTs. In December, the actor was sent into peels of laughter after my colleague Alex Heath asked him about the idea of digital scarcity and digital collectibles. Reeves commented that digital items are easily reproduced.Now, though, he’s joined a project from Non-Fungible Labs, acting as an advisor for a program called the Futureverse Foundation, which aims to improve “the digital and physical worlds through the support of diverse artists and creative communities.” According to The Hollywood Reporter, that involves introducing traditional artists to NFTs and funding their efforts. Reeves, reacting to a question about NFTs. The art connection here... Continue reading…

Solana CEO Anatoly Yakovenko with the Saga smartphone | Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge The phone previously known as the Osom OV1, built by a team consisting of former engineers and designers from Essential, is being renamed and repurposed today, and it’s all in the name of crypto. This afternoon in New York City, blockchain company Solana announced its own mobile phone, called the Saga, made in collaboration with Osom. It’s priced at $1,000, and preorders open today. A $100 deposit is required, and Solana says the Saga will ship in the first quarter of 2023.The phone will have a 6.67-inch 120Hz OLED display, 512GB of storage, and 12GB of RAM. It’ll be powered by Qualcomm’s latest Snapdragon 8 Plus Gen 1 chip and is outfitted with a 50-megapixel primary camera, plus a 12-megapixel ultra-wide shooter. But more than the... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Netflix is cutting around 300 jobs today as part of a second round of layoffs. The company previously laid off around 150 employees and dozens of contractors in May.The layoffs impact “many different teams” and mostly workers in the US, though international roles are being cut as well, Netflix spokesperson Bao Nguyen said in a statement to The Verge. Variety first reported on the job cuts.“Today we sadly let go of around 300 employees,” Nguyen said. “While we continue to invest significantly in the business, we made these adjustments so that our costs are growing in line with our slower revenue growth.”It’s the latest round of job cuts after Netflix’s rough Q1 earnings report, where it announced that revenue growth was slowing and... Continue reading…

Two consoles, both out to ruin your wallet | Photo by Sean Hollister / The Verge It seems that both Nintendo and Valve are determined to keep me indoors all summer, and that’s fine by me. Both the Nintendo eShop and Steam have kicked off their seasonal sales, discounting a number of excellent titles. While these sales tend to roll around several times a year, this is an ideal time to round out your library with some titles you may have overlooked. The Steam summer sale starts today and runs until July 7th, while the Nintendo eShop Big Ol’ Super Sale lasts until July 6th.To help you find the best deals for both of these platforms, The Verge Deals team has selected some highlights for the Nintendo Switch and PC that you might consider adding to your collection at a discounted price. Continue reading…

Illustration by Grayson Blackmon / The Verge Omicron boosters might be around the corner Continue reading…

Sadie Sink as Max Mayfield. | Netflix Thanks to the popularity of Stranger Things’ music-heavy fourth season and social media, Kate Bush’s “Running Up That Hill” has climbed up to the very top of music charts around the world 37 years after the song initially released. A number of Bush’s longtime (and generally older) fans have felt a type of way about younger people discovering her music for themselves by way of a sci-fi love letter to the ’80s. But Bush — herself a longtime Stranger Things fan — sees the sudden resurgence of interest in “Running Up That Hill” as an exciting and touching testament to the power of art.In a recent interview with BBC Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour, Bush — who generally doesn’t speak to the public — opened up about what it’s been like to watch a new... Continue reading…

Image: Bungie Bungie has sued a Destiny player who allegedly filed dozens of fake copyright strikes in its name. The lawsuit, covered by TheGamePost, says California YouTube creator Nick Minor turned a single Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) takedown notice into 96 fraudulent claims against other YouTubers.The complaint claims Bungie “brand protection” contractor CSC Global sent Minor a legitimate copyright notice in December 2021, asking him to remove music from the soundtrack of Destiny expansion The Taken King. Minor allegedly responded by creating a Gmail account that mimicked the CSC one and then filing similar requests with a bevy of other YouTube accounts — even hitting an official Bungie account. He identified himself as a CSC... Continue reading…