The Verge

Crytek has teased a new entry in its long-running Crysis series in a short trailer posted from its Twitter account. “Join the journey. Become the hero,” the trailer reads as it displays a large “4.” The announcement comes almost nine years after the release of the last numbered entry in the Crysis series, Crysis 3, which was released on February 19th, 2013.The official Crysis 4 teaser comes just hours after Crytek China appeared to confirm news of the game early in a post on Chinese social media site BiliBili. Its post, which now appears to have been deleted, said “The ‘Crysis 4’ project is confirmed, opening a new nano battlefield!” when translated into English, according to Eurogamer.

Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge So long, Self-Driving Coalition for Safer Streets; hello, Autonomous Vehicle Industry Association!The AV industry’s top lobbying group in Washington, DC is rebranding, dropping the reference to “self-driving” in exchange for a more straightforward moniker. The group, which was founded in 2016 by Waymo, Ford, Lyft, Uber, and Volvo, lobbies lawmakers to pass legislation favorable to its members. It has since grown to include the top AV operators in the country, including Cruise, Aurora, Argo AI, Motional, Nuro, and Zoox.It’s the latest move by the AV industry to distance itself from the term “self-driving”It’s the latest move by the AV industry to distance itself from the term “self-driving,” which many observers interpret as an... Continue reading…

Huawei’s P50 Pocket. | Image: Huawei Huawei, the embattled Chinese tech giant that continues to be the target of strict US sanctions, has announced that its flagship P50 Pro and foldable P50 Pocket will be sold outside of China. The P50 Pro will cost €1,199 (around $1,353), while the P50 Pocket will start at €1,299 (around $1,466). Huawei’s press release says the two phones will be available in “key markets across Asia Pacific, The Middle East & Africa, Europe and Latin America,” but declined to say exactly when and where.Nevertheless, at those prices, and without access to key Google apps and services like the Google Play Store, both devices will represent interesting curios rather than anything you should seriously consider buying. Sanctions have also impacted Huawei’s... Continue reading…

Illustration by William Joel / The Verge More than two years after it was first announced, the Facebook-sponsored cryptocurrency formerly known as Libra appears to be coming to an end. The Diem Association set up by Facebook to manage the digital token is exploring a sale of its assets after meeting resistance by regulators who opposed the initiative, according to a new report by Bloomberg.The U.S. Federal Reserve “dealt the effort a final blow” by putting pressure on Silvergate, the banking partner that Diem said it was partnering with last year to launch the token, Bloomberg reports. I’ve also heard from someone involved that the Fed threatened Silvergate, putting the launch on ice.A Diem Association spokesperson, Michael Crittenden, told The Verge that Bloomberg’s story... Continue reading…

Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge Activision plans to release at least the next three Call of Duty games on both Sony and Microsoft consoles, Bloomberg reports. The new report should be a sigh of relief to fans who were worried Microsoft would immediately make new Call of Duty games Xbox exclusive if its blockbuster acquisition of Activision goes through.According to Bloomberg, Activision had already committed to bring “the next few” Call of Duty titles to PlayStation sometime before Microsoft’s acquisition was announced. Last week, Microsoft Gaming CEO Phil Spencer said he told Sony that Microsoft wants to “keep Call of Duty on PlayStation” and that the company intends to honor existing agreements, so it seems like Activision’s commitment with Sony will stay in place.... Continue reading…

The Galaxy S22 leaks are coming in hot ahead of the upcoming Unpacked event scheduled for February. | Image: Samsung Samsung has confirmed a date and time for its next Galaxy Unpacked event: Wednesday, February 9th at 10AM ET / 7AM PT. The invitation features a large letter “S” with the words “The Epic Standard,” indicating that we can expect to see the Galaxy S22 series debut on the livestream, to nobody’s surprise. Samsung itself had already hinted that a new S-series Ultra device would be coming in February — one that will likely absorb the Note series.As they tend to, the S22 leaks have been coming in strong over the past month. From the looks of it, the S22 Ultra will indeed have a silo for the S-Pen stylus, like the Note does (did?), and the S22 is rumored to have a slightly smaller 6.1-inch display compared to the S21’s 6.2-inch panel. The... Continue reading…

The FTC fined a fashion website for allegedly blocking negative customer product reviews | Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has fined Fashion Nova, a California fast-fashion retailer, $4.2 million to settle allegations that it blocked negative product reviews from being posted on its website. The agency says this is its first case to challenge the practice of suppressing negative customer reviews.The FTC said in a complaint (pdf) that between 2015 and 2019, Fashion Nova used a third-party tool that allowed it to automatically post four- and five-star customer reviews but withheld “hundreds of thousands [of] lower starred, more negative reviews,” which was misleading to customers. “Suppressing a product’s negative reviews deprives consumers of potentially useful information and artificially inflates the product’s average... Continue reading…

Raven’s QA workers have formed a union — now what? Continue reading…

Image: Netflix | NIKO TAVERNISE/NETFLIX Don’t Look Up is Netflix’s second most popular film debut to date, coming in around 4 million viewing hours short of Netflix’s crown jewel Red Notice.The new film racked up nearly 360 million hours of viewing during its first 28 days on the service, per Netflix’s Top 10 portal for tracking its most successful titles. Red Notice, meanwhile, tallied 364 million hours during its first four weeks on Netflix, while Bird Box holds third place with 282 million hours viewed.While it narrowly missed its opportunity to overthrow Netflix’s biggest film success to date — it looked like it still had a chance last week — Don’t Look Up is still a monumental win for the streamer. It’s the second major film release in a matter of months to topple... Continue reading…

El Salvador introduced Bitcoin as a legal tender alongside the US dollar in 2021. | Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge The International Monetary Fund’s executive board has recommended El Salvador no longer use Bitcoin as a legal tender, citing potential risks to financial stability and consumer protection. The country’s use of Bitcoin could make it difficult for it to get a loan from the IMF, according to Bloomberg.The recommendation comes as part of the organization’s consultation, where staff members visit a country and prepare a report that’s discussed by the IMF’s executive board. The summary from the board looks at and discusses El Salvador’s economic policies as a whole, but the country’s 2021 adoption of Bitcoin as a legal tender got a lot of attention.The IMF’s board agrees with its staff’s recommendations from November that the country... Continue reading…

Photo by Sam Byford / The Verge Microsoft posted the second quarter of its 2022 financial results today, reporting revenue of $51.7 billion and a net income of $18.8 billion. Revenue is up 20 percent, and net income has increased by 21 percent.The PC market just had another big year thanks to continued pandemic demand, with around 340 million PCs shipped in 2021. This is now Microsoft’s second quarter of Windows 11, and Windows OEM revenue has increased by 25 percent in Q2, year over year. Windows Commercial products and cloud services revenue also increased 13 percent. Photo by Becca Farsace / The Verge Microsoft’s Surface Pro 8. Despite a healthier PC market, Microsoft did warn that Surface might take a hit this quarter, and it... Continue reading…

Ryan Wyatt is leaving YouTube to join Polygon Tech. | Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Ryan Wyatt, YouTube’s head of gaming who oversaw some of its big deals to bring Twitch streamers to YouTube, is leaving to join the crypto company Polygon Technology, where he will be leading its Polygon Studios organization.Polygon is a “protocol and a framework for building and connecting Ethereum-compatible blockchain networks,” according to its website. Said another way, it can help people build decentralized apps that aren’t as tied to one blockchain’s fees, hurdles, or performance. In one description Polygon compares itself as the “broadband” to Ethereum’s internet, with faster transaction speeds and fees that are “10000x cheaper.”Wyatt will be focused on leading Polygon’s non-tech-related efforts, he said to The Verge in a... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Facebook partners with mobile carriers in developing countries like Indonesia, the Philippines, and Pakistan to give users free access to Facebook and a few other websites, but users have been unknowingly getting charged by their cellular providers, according to a report from The Wall Street Journal.The service, called Free Basics, is offered through Meta Connectivity (formerly Facebook Connectivity) and is supposed to provide users with “access to communication tools, health information, education resources and other low-bandwidth services” at no charge. The program has been around since 2013, and as of last October, it serves more than 300 million people.Pakistan has been charged the most for using Facebook’s “free” internet at a... Continue reading…

NASA’s next-generation James Webb Space Telescope may have reached its final parking spot in space, but there’s still a long road ahead for the observatory before it can start taking the dazzling pictures of the cosmos that scientists have been eagerly awaiting. Over the next five months, mission engineers will meticulously tweak and test the telescope in order to prepare the spacecraft for its lifelong mission of observing the Universe.Yesterday at around 2PM ET, the James Webb Space Telescope, or JWST, fired its onboard thrusters for a little less than five minutes, putting the vehicle into its final orbit in space. It was a crucial last step for JWST’s journey through the cosmos, capping off a 30-day voyage from the launchpad to its... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Google is walking back plans to replace third-party cookies with FLoC by instead proposing the Topics API, a new system for interest-based advertising. Topics works by pinpointing five of your interests, such as “Fitness” or “Travel & Transportation,” based on your web activity, as measured by participating sites, for one week.Your browser will store these topics for three weeks before deleting them. Google says that these categories “are selected entirely on your device” and don’t involve “any external servers, including Google servers.” When you visit a website, Topics will show the site and its advertising partners just three of your interests, consisting of “one topic from each of the past three weeks.”As noted on the Topics API... Continue reading…

Hyperion Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief author Rick Riordan will be the first person to tell you how much he didn’t care for 20th Century Studios’ 2010 adaptation of the novel from director Chris Columbus. For years, Riordan’s been insisting to his fans how he’s been longing to see his work transformed into a live-action story that squares with the grand vision in his mind, and now, Disney Plus plans to make that happen.Though Riordan already announced almost two years ago in a series of now-deleted tweets that Disney Plus was moving forward with a new show based on the book series, the prolific author reiterated today the studio’s plans and shared some new details about the project in a new video posted to Twitter. Along with Riordan,... Continue reading…

A week after the news Microsoft will acquire Activision Blizzard, and amidst news of alleged union-busting, labor strikes, unionization and the continuing investigation of allegations of discrimination and abuse, Blizzard has announced it’s working on a new IP.

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Today, the White House is saying out loud what you’ve likely already heard: the chip shortage won’t end anytime soon. “We aren’t even close to being out of the woods,” said US Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo in a briefing with reporters today, according to Bloomberg, The Washington Post, and others.Her comments come alongside a new Department of Commerce report that cites chipmakers who “did not see the problem going away in six months,” which also isn’t exactly news: chipmakers like Nvidia and AMD have repeatedly suggested the shortage wouldn’t ease until the second half of 2022, while Intel has said it might not end until 2023.But the report, based on 150 responses from “nearly every major semiconductor producer and from companies... Continue reading…

Recently, I got Slacked by a colleague who was really annoyed and had to let off a bit of steam. It seems that a writer had shared a new Google Docs article with them (a usual way of submitting a freelance piece), and when my colleague opened the article, they found another, unknown person was already reading it — somebody who was definitely not on our staff.What had happened? The writer, probably in too much of a hurry to share the document with specific people, had simply made it public so that anybody could have access to it. This not only made the article available to anyone before it had been properly edited and published — something no publication wants — but opened it up to all sorts of mischief.Mischief like what happened... Continue reading…

Exactly Right Media Hello, hello. I’m back! Welcome to the week from sunny Los Angeles. My trip through California had me disconnecting from the internet, spotting Michael Keaton at a Santa Barbara restaurant inside a furniture store, and, naturally, ending up in multiple conversations about Joe Rogan. Just the R&R I needed :~). Anyway, I’m happy to be back with you and the podcast news. Let’s get into it.Hot Pod Summit is returning on February 24th to start On Air Fest. Hot Pod Summit is the invite-only industry conference for the people building the future of the audio industry. It will kick off On Air Fest, the audio industry’s premier cultural festival, featuring Jad Abumrad, Chuck D, Dr. Jane Goodall, and more. Buy your tickets here.If you’re... Continue reading…

Photo by Nic Antaya/Getty Images General Motors announced a $7 billion investment in growing its electric vehicle manufacturing capabilities in Michigan, calling it “the single largest investment announcement in GM history.”The company will spend the money on four manufacturing sites, with plans to create 4,000 new jobs and retain another 1,000 in the state. The investment includes construction of a new battery cell plant in Lansing and the conversion of GM’s assembly plant in Orion for production of the Chevy Silverado EV and the electric GMC Sierra. The latter will be GM’s second assembly plant scheduled to build full-size electric pickups, the first being the company’s Factory Zero in Detroit.GM has said it will spend $35 billion by 2025 on electric and autonomous... Continue reading…

Photo Illustration by Grayson Blackmon / The Verge Featuring the CEOs of Volkswagen, Ford, and Jeep Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge The chairman of NSO Group, the Israel-based company whose spyware has been used to surveil journalists and human rights defenders around the world, has stepped down following allegations that it was also used to monitor Israeli citizens.News of former NSO chairman Asher Levi’s resignation was reported by Haaretz on Tuesday, although Levi told the Associated Press that his departure had been planned months in advance and was unconnected to current news.NSO has been embroiled in a domestic scandal since last week when the Hebrew-language business newspaper Calcalist reported that police in Israel had possessed Pegasus spyware since 2013. Calcalist alleged that the spyware had been used to monitor protest leaders and other anti-government... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Pfizer and BioNTech are launching a clinical trial to test an omicron-specific version of their COVID-19 vaccine, the companies announced today. They’re moving forward with studies of a new form of the vaccine in response to concerns that the original shot isn’t preventing infection with the newest variant of coronavirus or mild COVID-19 illness — even though it appears to be holding up well in terms of preventing hospitalization and death, especially for people who received a booster.The original two-dose series of the gene-based COVID-19 vaccines, made by Pfizer / BioNTech and Moderna, don’t appear to offer much protection against infection with the omicron variant with the virus. A third booster dose restores some of that... Continue reading…

Photo by Tom Warren / The Verge Not all M.2 SSDs are PS5-compatible. They need to be PCIe 4.0-ready and boast a 5,500MB/s read speed (though some slower drives may work, according to our testing), and Adata’s XPG Gammix S70 Blade meets those requirements. The reason why I’m telling you about this one, in particular, is that it’s selling for just $129.99 at Best Buy and Amazon, a $30 price cut. At that price, it’s one of the fastest yet most affordable ways to add storage to your PS5. Similar models from brands like Samsung often sell for about $50 more than this.Whether you plan to use it inside of a PC that has a PCIe 4.0-ready motherboard (it’s backward compatible with PCIe 3.0, just a slower speeds) or a PS5, it’ll be ready to install the moment you open the box.... Continue reading…

Elgato is launching a new Stream Deck Pedal today, alongside official Discord integration. The Stream Deck Pedal is an $89.99 pad that has three pedals that can control software, hardware, and more. It looks ideal for streamers wanting to trigger effects, switch scenes, or even toggle cameras.The Stream Deck Pedal is also great for accessibility, opening up streaming to those unable to use a traditional Stream Deck. As the Pedal extends the power of Stream Deck to more locations, it will likely be used by DJs and musicians to control their streams away from their PC. Image: Elgato Elgao’s new Stream Deck Pedal. Elgato says the Stream Deck Pedal supports multiple actions, so you can string together a bunch of... Continue reading…

Respawn, the studio behind games like Apex Legends and Titanfall, is making a big push into the Star Wars universe. The developer announced that it’s working on three new Star Wars titles, including a sequel to 2019 action-adventure game Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order.The studio will also be making a currently untitled Star Wars first-person shooter and is partnering with Bit Reactor — a recently announced team founded by former developers from XCOM studio Firaxis Games — on a strategy game. “We are huge fans of Star Wars here at Respawn and we’re thrilled to work with Lucasfilm Games on new titles that we have wanted to make for years,” Respawn founder Vince Zampella said in a statement.Other than that, there are few details on any of... Continue reading…

How is he doing that!? Good. Clean. Honest. Fun.That’s what the iBeer app represented to a generation of early iPhone users, and that, I’m afraid, is very much what’s missing in today’s world of “non-funkable tokens” and “idle orangutans.” Not only was the app a lighthearted parlor trick that brought smiles to the faces of millions, but it was an industrial juggernaut, earning its creator — a struggling 37-year-old magician by the name of Steve Sheraton — up to $20,000 a day. And okay, sure, you might be one of those raking in millions from cryptographical currencies at the expense of others’ financial negligence, but where’s the joy in that? Where’s the magic?Sheraton revealed these earnings in a recent interview with Mel Magazine (which we spotted via the... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge YouTube NFTs may be in the works. In a letter published today, YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki suggested the company is looking to branch into NFTs in the future as another source of revenue for creators.“We’re always focused on expanding the YouTube ecosystem to help creators capitalize on emerging technologies, including things like NFTs, while continuing to strengthen and enhance the experiences creators and fans have on YouTube,” the letter reads.The detail was part of Wojcicki’s latest letter to the YouTube community, which outlines areas the company plans to invest in, like gaming and shopping, and how it plans to support creators. Wojcicki said YouTube is looking to Web3 “as a source of inspiration,” specifically noting the... Continue reading…

A triumph for Intel, but a shrug from us Continue reading…

Image by Plaid Plaid, a go-between for financial apps like Robinhood, Venmo, and Betterment and bank accounts, has created a privacy hub where you can manage all of your financial connections. The hub is a requirement of a lawsuit Plaid settled about its handling of user data.The hub, called Plaid Portal, shows users exactly which apps they’re connected to by Plaid. It can be found by accessing my.plaid.com, where the service will prompt users to set up an account. Then, it’s possible to browse connections and disconnect unused apps from bank accounts. The portal details the kinds of data users sharing through Plaid, as well as which bank accounts are connected. It’s also possible to wipe all of a user’s linked data through the portal.If you don’t... Continue reading…

A render of Amazon’s upcoming store in Mill Creek. | Image: Amazon Amazon is bringing its cashierless Just Walk Out technology to a new format of stores aimed at suburbs, the company announced today. The new stores will use the Amazon Go branding that the company already uses for its locations in city centers, but will instead be located further afield where they’ll sell food, snacks, alcohol, and “a few every day essentials.”They’re convenience stores, basically, and come at a time when a shift to home working means that people are spending more time in the vicinity of their homes rather than commuting into city-based offices. Like its other Just Walk Out stores, Amazon says customers will be able to browse the store, pick up items, and then leave without having to interact with a cashier or... Continue reading…

Photo by Kevin Winter/Getty Images After the gold rush of signing Joe Rogan, Spotify now has to deal with the harvest.The latest difficulty in reaction to Spotify’s controversial star turn comes from singer and songwriter Neil Young, who says he’s extremely unhappy to be sharing a platform with Rogan. “I want you to let Spotify know immediately TODAY that I want all my music off their platform,” Young wrote in an open letter to his manager and record label (which has since been deleted from his website). “They can have [Joe] Rogan or Young. Not both.”The reason? Rogan’s hand in spreading vaccine misinformation. As first reported by Rolling Stone, Young writes: “I am doing this because Spotify is spreading fake information about vaccines – potentially causing death to... Continue reading…

Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images Nvidia is reportedly preparing to give up on its $40 billion purchase of chip designer Arm, according to Bloomberg News. The deal has faced intense scrutiny from regulators and vocal opposition from rivals, forcing Nvidia to adjust its original timeline for the purchase.Now, Bloomberg says Nvidia is telling partners it doesn’t expect the deal to go through at all, while Arm’s current owner SoftBank is reportedly “stepping up preparations” to take Arm public via an initial public offering — which could be an alternative way to profitably rid itself of the firm.Both Nvidia and SoftBank remain publicly committed to the deal, and Bloomberg notes that no final decision has been made. But such rumors are not surprising given it’s long been... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge The Dutch competition regulator, the Authority for Consumers and Markets (ACM), has fined Apple €5 million (around $5.6 million) for failing to let dating app developers use third-party payment methods, the ACM has announced. The regulator says that Apple will continue to be fined €5 million a week until it properly complies with the order, which was publicly issued on December 24th.With a market cap of well over $2 trillion and revenues last quarter of $83.4 billion, Apple’s bottom line is unlikely to be impacted by these €5 million fines. But the Dutch regulator’s actions, like South Korea’s before it, could embolden others to take action against Apple’s App Store policies, as well as Google’s which are also being scrutinized.Apple... Continue reading…

Mission: Impossible Fallout | Photo: Paramount Pictures The release dates of the seventh and eighth installments of the Mission: Impossible series have been pushed back again due to pandemic-related delays, Deadline reported. The two flicks are the latest in a long list of movies to be delayed by the pandemic, which upended Hollywood as it has struggled to deal with closed movie theaters and halted or scaled back productions.The films Mission: Impossible 7 and Mission: Impossible 8, both co-produced by Paramount Pictures and Skydance, are the latest installments in the film series that began in 1996, starring Tom Cruise as Ethan Hunt, an agent for Impossible Mission Force.Mission: Impossible 7 was supposed to be released last year on September 30th but is now set for July 14th, 2023, and M... Continue reading…

When you put your Steam Deck into sleep mode, Dynamic Cloud Sync will upload modified save data to the cloud. | Image: Valve Ahead of the Steam Deck’s launch, Valve has detailed a new feature for Steam’s cloud saves that should carry over your progress from your Steam Deck back to your PC (or another Steam Deck) even when you put your Steam Deck into suspend mode without fully exiting a game. Valve has talked about this intriguing idea before, but now it has a name — Dynamic Cloud Sync.Here’s how it should work: when you put your Steam Deck into sleep mode, Dynamic Cloud Sync will automatically upload “all modified save game data” to the cloud, Valve explained in a blog post published Monday. That way, you can pick up your save when you sit down at your PC or another device with Steam. The Steam Deck will also automatically download save updates when you... Continue reading…

Image: British Antarctic Survey/Povl Abrahamsen An iceberg that was once the largest on the planet, dubbed A68a, recently released 152 billion tons of fresh water close to the sub-Antarctic island of South Georgia, potentially impacting the region’s ecosystem, a study published earlier this month found.A68a captured the world’s attention in 2017 when it broke off the Larsen-C ice shelf, located near the tip of the Antarctic Peninsula. The largest iceberg in the world at the time of its formation, it initially floated around the Weddell Sea close to Antarctica before making its way its way across the Drake Passage between southern South America and the northern reaches of Antarctica. As it approached the southern Atlantic island of South Georgia in December 2020, researchers became... Continue reading…

Photo by Sean Hollister / The Verge We’re not out of the woods yet — not even close — but it looks like the prices of Nvidia and AMD GPU prices may finally be coming down. Tom’s Hardware in the US and 3DCenter.org in Germany have been charting eBay and local retail prices, respectively, and they’re each seeing the same thing: a substantial dip for nearly every new graphics card that Nvidia and AMD make.Want an Nvidia RTX 3080? Just two months ago, that might have cost you $1,773 on the street — over two and a half times the manufacturer suggested retail price. As we reported in November with our own chart, that was typical of the hottest graphics cards, and Tom’s Hardware shows things got slightly worse in December. But in January, those prices have dipped 11 percent to... Continue reading…

Stranger of Paradise Final Fantasy Origin looks like Square Enix’s biggest departure yet for the long-running Final Fantasy series. Though the name Final Fantasy has been synonymous with RPG for the last 35 years, Stranger of Paradise is an action game focused on challenging and fast-paced combat. With only two months to go before launch, The Verge spoke with its developers to talk about Stranger of Paradise and the unique place it occupies in the Final Fantasy family.More than setting itself apart by being an action game, Stranger of Paradise looks and feels vastly different from its numbered siblings with its bloody aesthetic. Most Final Fantasy games entice by offering a bright world to explore with beautiful people to befriend. S... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Twitter appears to be working on a feature that lets you share tweets with a specific group of people (via Input). If this sounds familiar, it’s because Instagram’s Close Friends feature lets you do the exact same thing — but in Twitter’s case, you’ll be limiting your tweets to your “Flock.”Twitter first gave us a glimpse of the feature last July, which it called “Trusted Friends” at the time. Since then, mobile developer Alessandro Paluzzi has been keeping track of Twitter’s progress, and it’s really starting to take shape.

Netflix After years of being trapped in different circles of development hell, co-director Guillermo del Toro’s long-awaited take on Pinocchio is finally happening, and the stop-motion feature’s first teaser trailer is here to introduce the world to the story’s minuscule moral center.Set during Benito Mussolini’s fascist reign over Italy in the 1930s, del Toro’s Pinocchio once again tells the tale of a wooden puppet who suddenly comes to life, much to his woodcarver “father’s” surprise. Unlike some of the other Pinocchio tellings you may be familiar with, though, this film’s Pinocchio (Gregory Mann) quickly gets into the sorts of cruel mischief that put him at odds with Geppetto (David Bradley), who loves his son but can’t help but see that he... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro The attorneys general of three states and the District of Columbia are suing Google for the allegedly deceptive collection of location data on Android. The complaints, which build on a 2020 lawsuit filed by the Arizona Attorney General, allege that Google’s “complex web” of settings obfuscated whether users were sharing their location at a given moment. Furthermore, they allege Google pushed Android users with “repeated nudging, misleading pressure tactics, and evasive and deceptive descriptions” to share more information either “inadvertently or out of frustration.”“Google falsely led consumers to believe that changing their account and device settings would allow customers to protect their privacy and control what personal data the... Continue reading…

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge Did you think the season of giving was over? Not at The Verge! Not only are we continuing to give you a heads-up regarding discounts and sales on the latest gadgets, but we have another mystery bag stuffed full of freebies to give away to one lucky reader.This time, we’ve filled an Alienware M17 Elite Backpack (which typically retails for $99.99) with a whole bunch of goodies. In total, the combined value of the bag and its contents is about $623. We’d be remiss to keep all of these gadgets to ourselves, so we’re offering them to one of you. Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge Just where did we get all this stuff? Well, The Verge is always trying out and reviewing the latest tech, and sometimes we end up... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Panasonic is due to start mass producing next-generation lithium-ion batteries for Tesla with five times the energy capacity of existing models as early as 2023, according to a report from Nikkei Asia. Although the batteries are being manufactured primarily for Tesla, a Panasonic executive didn’t rule out supplying them to other companies in a November interview. The new batteries promise to boost the range of electric cars, and make them more affordable to produce and sell.In a statement given to Reuters, Panasonic declined to confirm Nikkei’s report. “We are studying various options for mass production, including a test production line we are establishing this business year,” the company said. “We don’t, however, have anything to... Continue reading…

Wisk Aero, the electric air taxi startup, raised $450 million from Boeing in a new funding round that it claims will make it “one of the most well-funded [advanced air mobility] companies in the world.”In its announcement, Wisk highlights the fact that its “a privately-backed AAM leader,” setting up a contrast with a slate of similar startups that have gone public in recent months by merging with special purpose acquisition companies, also known as SPACs or “blank check” companies. Wisk Aero was formed in 2019 as a joint venture between Boeing and Kitty Hawk, the flying taxi company bankrolled by Google co-founder Larry Page.Wisk says it will use the new funds to undertake a period of rapid growth, adding new employees to its current... Continue reading…

The United Arab Emirates (UAE) has banned the flying of consumer drones by hobbyists. The news comes after a suspected drone attack hit an oil facility and airport in the country’s capital, Abu Dhabi, last week.The ban was announced by the Ministry of the Interior on Saturday and also applies to light aircraft like gliders. The ministry did not mention the recent attacks in its statement, but referenced “misuse spotted recently,” incidents of drone pilots “trespassing into areas where these types of activities are prohibited,” and a need to “ensure the safety of lives and property.”The attack involved ‘ballistic missiles and explosive-laden drones’The recent attack on the oil facility and airport in Abu Dhabi reportedly involved both... Continue reading…

Toshihiro Nagoshi, former chief creative officer at Sega, where he led development of the Yakuza series as general director of Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio, has announced his next move. He’s started up his own studio, simply titled Nagoshi Studio, which is being wholly funded by Chinese internet and gaming company NetEase.Nagoshi announced his departure from Sega last October, but today’s news also follows a report from Bloomberg back in August that named NetEase as his prospective future partner. Masayoshi Yokoyama, who The Verge interviewed last year about his work on the most recent Yakuza game Like a Dragon, is the new head of Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio and is currently working on the next game in the series.Nagoshi Studio will be headquartered... Continue reading…

Venmo is just one of the many apps that uses Plaid to link your bank account. | Photo Illustration by Rafael Henrique / SOPA Images / LightRocket via Getty Images If you’ve connected your bank account to financial apps like Robinhood, Acorns, Venmo, American Express, Coinbase, and Credit Karma, you may be entitled to some cash, according to a report by Fast Company.Plaid, the financial service these apps (and 5,500 others) use to link your bank account, has settled a class-action lawsuit accusing the company of collecting more financial data from users than necessary. The suit also alleges Plaid obtained users’ bank login information “through its user interface, known as ‘Plaid Link,’ which had the look and feel of the user’s own bank account login screen.” In reality, users were inputting their information “directly to Plaid.” Plaid denies these claims and says it was transparent with its... Continue reading…