The Verge

Gran Turismo 7 is full of gorgeous, true-to-life re-creations of cars, both new and classic. Having an obsessive eye for the details of automobiles has always been a hallmark feature of Polyphony Digital’s storied racing sim since its debut on the original PlayStation. (My colleague Sam Byford has a full review of the game here.)The latest iteration — which launches on March 4th on the PS4 and PS5 — includes an even more deeply satisfying photo mode than before, offering countless ways to make your ride look even more phenomenal. But I can’t stop turning the camera to look at the low-poly people.Sure, you can pause any second of any race replay, walk around your car, angle the camera just right, and adjust numerous other nerdy settings... Continue reading…

Here’s the keyboard/ | Image: Dynabook Dynabook has announced its newest 14-inch flagship, the Portégé X40L-K. The device will start at $1,799.99 and hits shelves in April. I haven’t seen a full breakdown of the configurations that will be offered, but I’m certainly curious how expensive it will go.Dynabook is known for making mind-blowingly light laptops. Its Portégé line regularly includes some of the lightest models in the world. At 2.3 pounds, the X40L-K won’t quite be the lightest 14-inch laptop on the market, but it’ll likely be close. Currently, there are a handful of 14-inchers that weigh less than 2.2 pounds — off the top of my head, the list includes the Asus ExpertBook B9 and the LG Gram 14 — but that’s such a smidge of a difference I doubt it will impact anyone’s... Continue reading…

Dell is pushing the limits of the XPS 15’s slim chassis Continue reading…

At ETHDenver, developers want a utopian future Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Spotify has closed its office in Russia and removed content from Kremlin-backed outlets RT and Sputnik, Variety reports. In addition, it’s also restricting the discoverability of content from other outlets affiliated with the Russian government. Reuters reports that RT and Sputnik’s content has been removed in several markets including the United States and European Union, but not in Russia itself. In total, Spotify says it’s reviewed thousands of pieces of content since the start of the war.Closing Spotify’s Russian office means that the company is no longer in compliance with a Russian law from July 2021 which obliges foreign social media companies with over 500,000 daily users to have a local office in the country. Failing to comply... Continue reading…

Electric boat startup Arc revealed new images and a video of the pre-production version of the Arc One, a 24-foot-long vessel with a massive battery pack and an elegant design. The company has raised $30 million from a group of prominent investors that include Will Smith, Kevin Durant, and Sean “Diddy” Combs.The company has already tested an early prototype, and the reveal of its pre-production version is meant to send the signal that the company is getting closer to customer deliveries, which are on schedule for this summer.The specs of the Arc One have changed slightly since the company first came out of stealth last year. The boat will still have a top speed of around 40 miles per hour and can last about four hours under power... Continue reading…

There are conflicting reports about whether Samsung’s S22 series devices are affected. | Photo by Allison Johnson / The Verge Some of Samsung’s smartphones include software that appears to be artificially limiting, or throttling, the performance of thousands of popular apps, Android Authority reports. Reports about the behavior have been gathering steam on Twitter, as well as Samsung’s Korean community forums.At the core of the issue is Samsung software called Game Optimizing Service (GOS), which is reportedly throttling the performance of 10,000 apps. This list includes popular apps like Instagram, Netflix, TikTok, and even Samsung’s own apps like Secure Folder and Samsung Pay. Crucially, however, it doesn’t appear to include benchmarking apps like 3DMark and GeekBench, which means they might not give an accurate picture of the performance of a phone. So a... Continue reading…

Photo by JIM WATSON/AFP via Getty Images Elon Musk has invited the United Auto Workers (UAW) labor union to hold a vote to unionize at Tesla’s Fremont factory in California.Musk tweeted the challenge after President Joe Biden, speaking in his State of the Union Address, mentioned rival automakers Ford and General Motors — both of which have a strong union presence, a key component of Biden’s political base — but not Tesla.Gene Simmons, bassist and singer from iconic rock band Kiss, noted on Twitter that the snub from pro-union Biden may have been “because Tesla is non-union and moved to Texas, a ‘right to work’ state.”Musk apparently agrees, and responded: “I’d like hereby to invite UAW to hold a union vote at their convenience. Tesla will do nothing to stop them.” Musk’s... Continue reading…

Two other Amazon warehouses are involved in union elections. | Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Amazon employees at the Staten Island LDJ5 warehouse have reportedly gotten the National Labor Relations Board’s (NLRB) permission to continue with unionization efforts, according to the Amazon Labor Union, after the workers filed a petition to unionize in February. According to a screenshot posted by Vice reporter Lauren Kaori Gurley, Amazon has acknowledged the decision in a message sent to employees through its A to Z app.The Amazon Labor Union, or ALU, has been working to unionize the facility for a while — in October it filed a petition to unionize Amazon’s facilities on Staten Island, but later refiled that petition to focus on a single warehouse, JFK8. Workers at JFK8 have since gotten approval to hold an election starting on... Continue reading…

Several state attorneys generals are looking at TikTok’s methods of keeping kids on the platform. | Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge A coalition of state attorneys general from California, Florida, Kentucky, and more is investigating TikTok for its potential effect on young people’s mental and physical health (via CNBC). The group of AGs is looking to see if the way TikTok designs, operates, and markets its platform has a negative effect on children, teens, and young adults’ health, according to a press release from Attorney General Maura Healey of Massachusetts.TikTok’s algorithm determines what content users see, and has proven remarkably effective at keeping users engaged on the app. While the company has offered some insight into how it works, it’s hard to get a grasp on exact details outside of leaks and educated guesswork. The attorneys general may be looking... Continue reading…

Image: Stüssy Beats is releasing a limited-edition model of its discontinued Beats Pill Plus in collaboration with fashion brand Stüssy. The release comes not long after Apple discontinued the Beats Pill Plus in January.Apple released the original Beats Pill Plus speaker, which measured a bit larger than the first Beats Pill, in 2015. It was the first speaker Apple released following its 2014 acquisition of Beats for $3 billion. This new version of the Pill Plus will only be available for a limited time. Image: Stüssy Image: Stüssy The new Pill Plus will keep the original design and come in a sleek black with a white skull and crossbones design on the front of the speaker. One side of the speaker reads “the... Continue reading…

The Wordle clones are back on the App Store, just a few weeks after Apple wiped out nearly all the copycat games in January.A quick glance at the top free apps on the App Store reveals at least two prominently placed Wordle-alikes, while diving into Apple’s more specific word games category (or simply searching “Wordle”) surfaces plenty of other copycats, many of which appear to have been part of Apple’s first wave of takedowns a few months ago.None of the new games are actively passing themselves off as Wordle — at least, not in name. Instead, the clones have creatively rebranded to “Wordus,” “Word Guess,” “Wordl,” and other thinly veiled references to the original game. But all of them offer some variant on Wordle’s gameplay, down... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge It looks like Twitter’s building a tab dedicated to podcasts, as shown in a screenshot posted by reverse engineer Jane Manchun Wong. The image shows a microphone icon in the Twitter app’s bottom menu bar, which appears to lead to a page titled “Podcasts.”

Zirconium is a key part of the IE 600 earbuds. | Image: Sennheiser Sennheiser’s new earbuds are 3D printed with the same material used in the drill bits for the Mars rover. The IE 600 earbuds have a shell that’s composed of ZR01 amorphous zirconium, lending it a unique aesthetic and remarkable durability.What the hell is zirconium anyway? Without going into too much detail, zirconium is a shapeable metal that's highly resistant to corrosion. This is why zirconium is frequently used for a variety of industrial and medical applications and is commonly used in steel alloys. So why is Sennheiser using zirconium in its headphones?One might assume that using this uncommon material would somehow provide you with otherworldly sound quality, but that’s not what Sennheiser seems to be pitching here. Rather,... Continue reading…

Photo by Mitchell Clark / The Verge Rivian increased the estimated prices of its R1T electric pickup and R1S electric SUV this week by up to 20 percent, as reported by TechCrunch. The company is applying the new estimates to new orders and changing them for reservation holders who don’t yet have a vehicle entering production.This is the first significant change in pricing Rivian has revealed since orders opened, and while customer preorders all stated “prices are subject to change as they get closer to production,” it seems like no one was ready for a change this big. Prospective EV buyers are used to fluctuations in the pricing of cars from Tesla, but in that case, prices are usually locked in from the time they put in their orders.Many customers shared they have... Continue reading…

Photo by Erin Chang/ISI Photos/Getty Images HBO Max is adding more sports coverage to its programming slate. Turner Sports, an arm of WarnerMedia, has reached a deal with the US Soccer Federation to air matches exclusively on TNT, TBS, and HBO Max.As part of the eight-year agreement that will begin in 2023, HBO Max will stream more than 20 matches for the men’s and women’s national teams each year, WarnerMedia announced Tuesday. WarnerMedia-owned linear channels TNT and TBS will simultaneously air roughly half of those, while the other half will stream exclusively on HBO Max.Turner Sports and its division Bleacher Report will have exclusive rights to live coverage of the matches as part of the agreement. Additionally, the deal positions Turner Sports as the exclusive... Continue reading…

Opening day at the Amazon 4-Star brick and mortar store located in Soho in New York City. The cashless enterprise offers a variety of items that have been rated 4-stars or higher. | Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge Amazon is closing most of its physical stores, the company announced today, with all 68 of its Amazon Books, Amazon 4-Star, and Amazon Pop Up locations across the US and the UK set to close while the company refocuses on its grocery and fashion stores, Reuters reports.Amazon Books was one of the primarily online storefront’s first physical retail experiences when the first location opened in Seattle in 2015. Amazon has since expanded to 24 bookstores across the US, all of which are now slated to be closed down.Amazon is ending most of its retail experiments to focus on grocery storesThe company would go on to expand its retail efforts with Amazon 4-Star in 2018, with a more generally focused store that sold products with a four-star... Continue reading…

Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge One promised benefit of the Apple Watch is early detection of a heart condition called atrial fibrillation, a type of irregular heart rhythm. But most people who wear the watch are in a demographic that wouldn’t actually be able to do much with that information, according to a new study — most doctors wouldn’t prescribe them the medication usually given for that condition, which is usually detected in older people.Getting an alert about a heart rhythm, then, doesn’t help the typical Apple Watch user’s overall health, says study author Josh Pevnick, co-director in the division of informatics at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles. “It can cause anxiety for people who it identifies, and if there’s no treatment, then you’re maybe... Continue reading…

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge Ford’s decision to divide its business into two separate entities — one focused on electric vehicles and the other on gas-powered ones — may complicate the automaker’s efforts to recruit top-tier talent and could risk upsetting dealers already chafing under the shift to electrification, auto analysts and experts said Wednesday.Ford also isn’t going so far as to spin off its EV divisions entirely as a separate business, as some major Wall Street banks advised. The automaker’s share price could suffer as a result. By keeping both divisions within the same company, Ford is entwining their fates. Ford Model E won’t succeed without the profits and efficiencies created under Ford Blue.On Wednesday, Ford announced the creation of two... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Over the past year or so, Google has been buying up several audio hardware startups, according to a recent report from Protocol. The fact that Google’s estimated to have spent tens of millions on startups and patent portfolios of companies working on audio hardware, 3D audio, noise cancellation, and Bluetooth tech could hint that it’s planning on expanding its lineup of audio products. In many cases, it’s reportedly brought on employees from the companies as well.Google is no stranger to the world of audio products. It’s sold multiple models and generations of wireless earbuds, and it brands its Nest Audio smart speaker as being “all about sound.” But at the moment, it doesn’t have the same range of offerings as competitors like Apple... Continue reading…

Netflix Though Netflix was likely on higher alert than usual after the set of its series The Crown was recently robbed to the tune of $200,000 in antiques and props, Lupin, another one of the streaming platform’s shows, was similarly — albeit more ironically — hit by thieves the very next day.Variety reports that production on the third season of Netflix’s Lupin, the series inspired by author Maurice Leblanc’s fictional master thief Arsène Lupin, has resumed after halting last week following an on-set robbery in the city of Nanterre where the series has been shooting. Though no members of the cast or crew were hurt when some 20 or so individuals reportedly hurled fireworks onto the set, the thieves were able to make off with about $333,000... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Google announced Wednesday that employees at its Bay Area offices and several other US locations will officially return to the office on April 4th. Starting that date, the company will kick off its previously announced hybrid work approach, where it expects most staffers to be in the office approximately three days per week.In December, Google delayed a planned January 10th return to office until sometime in 2022, and now we know when that return will be. The company will use the month of March to help transition to the new hybrid model, according to Google spokesperson Lora Lee Erickson.Depending on their job, some employees may need to be onsite more than three days a week. Workers who want more time before they return to the office... Continue reading…

Facebook is shutting down Campus | Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Less than two years after its launch, Facebook is shutting down Campus, a section of its app designed for college students, the latest blow to the company’s efforts to retain younger users. Campus users could access a special news feed and join groups, events, and chat rooms focused on college life. It also included a directory where users could find and friend other students on the app.“We’ve decided to end our pilot of Facebook Campus,” Facebook spokesperson Leah Luchetti said in a statement emailed to The Verge. “We learned a lot about the best ways to support college students, and one of the most effective tools to help bring them together is Facebook Groups. We’ve notified students in the test schools that Campus will no longer be... Continue reading…

A single household can now order a total of two sets of COVID-19 tests from the US government. | Photo Illustration by Toby Scott/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images Starting next week, you’ll be able to order four more free COVID-19 tests from the US government. A notice on the USPS COVID test kit order page states US households “will be able to place a total of 2 separate orders for free at-home COVID-19 rapid tests (4 tests per order)” sometime next week. If you’ve already ordered your first round of tests from the government, you’ll be eligible to order to place a second order as well.To order a second set of tests (or place an order for the first time), simply head to the USPS website, fill out your name and address, and hit “Check Out Now.” Your tests will ship for free. If you’ve never placed an order before, note that you can only place two “separate” orders, meaning you won’t be able to get... Continue reading…

Elden Ring developers, FromSoftware, have rolled out a fix for the bug that caused the loss of game save data on PS5 (via Polygon). In a tweet, developers confirmed that they’ve made “changes to save progression even when the game is not terminated” on PS5, in addition to issuing a few other patches on PC.

Image: Spin Ford is selling its electric scooter operation Spin to one of Europe’s top shared mobility companies. Tier Mobility will take over all of Spin’s operations, marking the first time the Berlin-based scooter company will have a foothold in North America. The companies declined to disclose the sale price, though the CEO of Tier said it was an all-stock deal.Spin first launched in March 2017 in Seattle after working with the city to create a policy framework for regulating dockless bikes. The founder, Euwyn Poon, was inspired to create a dockless bike company after visiting Beijing and seeing the growing interest in micromobility services in that city. The company soon pivoted to electric scooters after Bird’s success in Southern California.... Continue reading…

Six reactors generate 40-42 billion kWh of electricity, making the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant the largest in Ukraine. Russian officials told the IAEA that it has “taken control of the territory around” Zaporizhzhia. | Photo credit should read Dmytro Smolyenko / Barcroft Media via Getty Images Nuclear experts are increasingly worried about the safety of Ukraine’s nuclear power plants as Russia’s invasion of the country continues. The conflict has the grim distinction of being the first time warfare has exploded in a region so heavily reliant on nuclear energy.“The situation in Ukraine is unprecedented and I continue to be gravely concerned,” International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi said in an introductory statement to the agency’s Board of Governors meeting today and shared with the press. “I have called for restraint from all measures or actions that could jeopardize the security of nuclear and other radioactive material, and the safe operation of any nuclear facilities in Ukraine,... Continue reading…

That $30 monthly subscription is hard to swallow Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Epic Games is acquiring independent music storefront Bandcamp. The companies announced the news today, saying that Bandcamp would “keep operating as a standalone marketplace and music community” but use Epic’s resources to expand internationally and continue adding new features.An Epic blog post says Bandcamp will play “an important role in Epic’s vision to build out a creator marketplace ecosystem for content, technology, games, art, music and more.” An announcement from Bandcamp co-founder and CEO Ethan Diamond, meanwhile, emphasized that the core deal for artists won’t change in the near future. “The products and services you depend on aren’t going anywhere, we’ll continue to build Bandcamp around our artists-first revenue model,”... Continue reading…

Nothing’s first product was a pair of true wireless earbuds. | Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge Nothing, the consumer tech brand led by OnePlus co-founder Carl Pei, is planning to launch its debut smartphone by next month, according to a report from TechCrunch. The company has reportedly been working on the phone for over a year, and Pei is said to have shown off a prototype to executives from companies including Qualcomm at this week’s Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.An April launch would come a little under a year after the company released its debut product, a pair of wireless earbuds called the Ear 1. The phone will reportedly contain similar design elements to the earbuds, such as using transparent components, although other details on the new device are limited. TechCrunch cites a source with direct knowledge of the... Continue reading…

FIFA 22. Electronic Arts has announced that it’s in the process of removing both Russian national teams and the country’s professional clubs from some of its biggest sports games.That will include NHL 22, FIFA 22, FIFA Online, and FIFA Mobile; it’s not clear when the teams will be pulled from the game, but the publisher says that it has “initiated processes” for their removal. EA says that the decision was made “in line with our partners at FIFA and UEFA,” as well as the IIHF. Those governing bodies — which manage global and European soccer and international hockey, respectively — recently banned Russian teams from all competitions “until further notice.” In addition to the Russian teams, NHL 22 will also be removing Belarusian clubs as well.... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge The world’s biggest chipmakers are coming together to create a new Universal Chiplet Interconnect Express (UCIe) system for integrating chiplets together in future semiconductor designs.Virtually every major name in processor technology is onboard with the standardization effort, including foundry owners like Intel, TSMC, and Samsung and major players in semiconductor-adjacent spaces, like AMD, Arm, Qualcomm, Meta, Google Cloud, and Microsoft. As the name alludes, UCIe is aiming to take the same broad ecosystem model PCIe (peripheral component interconnect express) has used for years, expanded over to chiplets— tiny, more specialized chips that only do a few specific functions.The goal with UCIe is to create a standard... Continue reading…

Apple will be holding its next event online on March 8th, the company announced today with an invite featuring the “peek performance” tagline, and multicolored Apple logo that could hint at the colors of new devices.The company didn’t disclose further details about what the virtual event will entail, beyond the timing set for 1PM ET / 10AM PT.

Capcom Later in 2022, Capcom will release free graphical updates for its remakes of Resident Evil 2 and Resident Evil 3, along with Resident Evil 7, that introduce ray tracing, a high frame rate mode, and 3D audio on the PS5, Xbox Series X / S, and PC.If you own copies of these games already on the PS4 or Xbox One, you’ll be able to get these updates for free. On PS5, there will be a digital upgrade option, whereas Xbox offers its Smart Delivery feature that will automatically play the current-gen version of each game once it’s available. On PC, these upgrades will simply come in an update.For PS5, Capcom is implementing DualSense support for all three games, complete with haptic feedback and adaptive triggers. Capcom ... Continue reading…

There are few things quite as relaxing as settling into the comfortable soundlessness of a high-speed train’s quiet car, but silence is a luxury none of the assassins at the center of Sony’s Bullet Train from Atomic Blonde director David Leitch can afford. Based on Kotaro Isaka’s novel Maria Beetle, Bullet Train follows as five hired killers unknowingly board the same high-speed train where they’ve been sent to carry out different assignments. In the novel, it isn’t long before the assassins’ respective jobs expose the killers to one another, and the trailer makes it seem like the movie’s story will follow a similar arc.As soon as Ladybug (Brad Pitt) gets his hands on the briefcase, he’s been sent by Maria Beetle (Sandra Bullock) to... Continue reading…

The best work from home companion besides your cat | Photo by Jay Peters / The Verge If you’ve been working from home, but haven't invested in a standing desk yet, you’re in luck. Right now, Fully is running a promotion until March 21st that knocks 15 percent off the price of many of its popular standing desks. The Jarvis bamboo-topped standing desk, its most popular model and a favorite among several staffers here at The Verge, is currently discounted to $509.15, compared to its typical starting price of $599.99.Fully’s Jarvis whiteboard standing desk is also discounted to the same $509.15 price, replacing the bamboo desktop with an erasable whiteboard for jotting down notes or just doodling. At the prices mentioned above, both models measure 24 inches deep and 30 inches wide, and both can be adjusted to be as low as... Continue reading…

The Russian Soyuz rocket slated to launch OneWeb’s satellites on March 5th from Kazakhstan | Photo by Roscosmos press office/TASS via Getty Images In its latest response to international sanctions and growing geopolitical tensions, Russia’s state space corporation, Roscosmos, is making a list of demands of its customer OneWeb before it agrees to launch the company’s upcoming mission this week. OneWeb’s satellites were scheduled to take off on top of a Russian Soyuz rocket on March 5th in Kazakhstan, but in light of these new demands, it seems likely that launch will not take place.In a video posted to Twitter, the head of Roscosmos, Dmitry Rogozin, outlined in an interview that he wants assurances from OneWeb that the company’s satellites will not be used for military purposes. Roscosmos also demanded that the British government, which is a primary shareholder in OneWeb, divest... Continue reading…

Photo by JOHN MACDOUGALL/AFP via Getty Images From face swaps to information drops Continue reading…

The handheld-only Nintendo Switch Lite in its yellow, gray, and turquoise colorways. | Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge The Nintendo Switch Lite is seeing a very rare discount today. The handheld-only variant of the popular Switch normally sells for $199.99, but Woot is offering it today for $189.99 if you’re an Amazon Prime subscriber. That $10 discount may not sound like much, but Nintendo hardware sales are quite uncommon, with sales on the Switch Lite being even rarer. This deal is only for today or until it sells out.What’s even sweeter with this deal is that all five colors are on offer: turquoise, yellow, coral, blue, and gray. So you can pick whatever vibrant Switch Lite fits your fancy and kick back with some excellent portable games.While sales of the Nintendo Switch have continued skyrocketing during the pandemic, it may be easy to overlook... Continue reading…

The Ionic is being recalled as its battery may overheat and cause burns. | Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge Fitbit announced today that it’s working with the Consumer Product Safety Commission to voluntarily recall its Ionic smartwatch. The company says it’s received over 100 reports of the watch’s lithium-ion battery overheating, as well as 78 reports of burn injuries to customers.“Customer safety is always Fitbit’s top priority and out of an abundance of caution, we are conducting a voluntary recall of Fitbit Ionic smartwatches,” Fitbit said in a statement. It went on to say that the reported cases represent less than 0.01 percent of units sold. Roughly 1 million Ionic smartwatches were sold in the US, with an additional 693,000 sold internationally.If you have an Ionic smartwatch, Fitbit recommends you stop using it immediately. The... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Confirming rumors that have swirled for months, Ford announced that it was splitting into “two distinct, but strategically interdependent, auto businesses” called Ford Blue and Ford Model E. While Ford Blue will manage all of the legacy internal combustion engine vehicles, Ford Model E represents its push into electric vehicles, with products like the Mustang Mach-E and Ford F-150 Lightning.Ford Model E is trying to match Tesla with transparent pricing and online orderingThe company’s executives described the split as “how we’re going to win as a company” while executing Ford’s plans for its EV push that were originally unveiled last May. The automaker decided against trying to spin off the new EV-only unit as a special acquisitions... Continue reading…

Next Games is a developer based in Finland. | Image: Netflix Netflix has made an offer to acquire Next Games, the Finland-based developer behind mobile puzzle RPG Stranger Things: Puzzle Tales. In a blog post, Netflix’s VP of games Mike Verdu said that the acquisition was to help the company “build a library of great games for our members to enjoy.” Next Games has also developed a pair of Walking Dead-themed mobile games.The acquisition comes as Netflix is building a mobile gaming service into its regular subscription service. Netflix Games launched on iOS and Android last year, and consists of a handful of mobile games that are available free to download from app stores for Netflix subscribers, with no ads or in-app purchases.“We will be able to build a portfolio of world class games that will... Continue reading…

Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge There’s no reason to settle for built-in TV speakers Continue reading…

An Aether diamond | Aether Aether’s diamonds are pulled from the air, literally Continue reading…

Image: Warner Bros AMC is experimenting with charging more for tickets to The Batman compared to other films showing at its cinemas, Deadline reports. The move appears to be an attempt to capitalize on the heightened anticipation for the new superhero movie, which sees Robert Pattinson take on the role of the caped crusader for the first time. Deadline reports that tickets to see The Batman currently cost a dollar more than other films like Uncharted and Dog at the AMC Empire 25 in Times Square.“Currently, our prices for The Batman are slightly higher than the prices we are charging for other movies playing in the same theaters at the same time,” AMC Entertainment CEO Adam Aron said during an earnings call. “This is all quite novel in the United States,... Continue reading…

DiMaggio with his character Bender. | Image: Getty John DiMaggio is officially set to return to voice Bender in Hulu’s revival of Futurama, meaning all key cast members will reprise their roles in the sci-fi cartoon. The show’s return was announced early last month, with Billy West (Fry), Katey Sagal (Leela), Tress MacNeille (Mom, many others), Maurice LaMarche (Kif), Lauren Tom (Amy), Phil LaMarr (Hermes), and David Herman (Scruffy) all set to come back in their original roles.At the time, Deadline reported that DiMaggio’s role was in the process of being recast. The actor had reportedly turned down the initial offer, which he felt “was not competitive based on the success and name recognition of the original series.” Fans were outraged (obviously), and a #Bendergate hashtag emerged... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Tim Cook sent out an email to employees this morning addressing the Russian invasion of Ukraine and explaining the actions Apple has taken in reaction to the events of the past two weeks. The email also tells employees that Apple will be matching donations they make to certain humanitarian relief funds two to one, and will do so retroactively for donations made since February 25th.A copy of this email was obtained by The Verge, and you can read it below in full (with the exception of an internal Apple email address being redacted):