The Verge

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Sony and Nintendo are making changes to their gaming subscriptions in the UK after working with a regulator in the country (via Engadget). The UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has raised concerns about how people may be charged for subscriptions indefinitely until they proactively end them, which could mean they’re paying for services they don’t use.For PlayStation Plus, “Sony has agreed to put in place measures to protect customers who haven’t used their memberships for a long time but are still paying,” the CMA said. “Sony will contact these customers to remind them how to stop payments and, if they continue not to use their memberships, Sony will ultimately stop taking further payments.” We’ve reached out to Sony to ask... Continue reading…

Use your phone’s screen saver feature to show off your favorite images saved to your Google Photos. | Photo by Allison Johnson / The Verge If you have more images in your Google Photos app than you know what to do with, why not put your phone to work displaying them? With a few simple steps, you can use your Android phone’s screen saver feature to turn your phone screen into a digital picture frame while it charges.This works especially well for phones with wireless charging (so you can see your photos with the phone propped up on a charger), but it will work with any kind of charging mode or if you connect your phone to a dock. It’s built right into the operating system, and it’s a neat, easy way to show off some of your favorite photos.I used a Motorola Moto G Stylus (2022) for the steps below, but the process is very similar on a Samsung or Pixel phone. You’ll need to... Continue reading…

Illustration by Kristen Radtke / The Verge An attack on Ukraine’s power grid was foiled by cybersecurity analysts and officials, as reported by Reuters. After investigating the methods and software used by the attackers, cybersecurity firm ESET says that it was likely carried out by a hacking group called Sandworm, which The Record reports allegedly has ties to the Russian government.The group planned to shut down computers that controlled substations and infrastructure belonging to a particular power company, according to the Computer Emergency Response Team of Ukraine (or CERT-UA). The hackers meant to cut off power on April 8th while also wiping the computers that would be used to try and get the grid back online.The attack involved malware that hasn’t been seen in the wild... Continue reading…

Photo by Camilo Freedman/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images The mask mandate for air travel and public transportation has been extended once again, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Wednesday. The mandate, which was set to expire on April 18th, will be extended another two weeks as officials continue to monitor the number of COVID-19 cases across the country. The mandate was previously extended last month.All airline passengers and public transportation riders will be required to wear a face covering at least through May 3rd after the Transportation Security Administration told the CDC they would be extending the mandate, NBC reports.Airplanes and public transportation are some of the last places where Americans are still required to wear masks. Most states have lifted their... Continue reading…

Image: ETA Prime The $400-plus Steam Deck gaming handheld does not support external graphics cards. Valve has been clear on this point for months — you can’t magically plug in a dock and run Cyberpunk or Elden Ring at 4K. But ever since the company revealed that the Steam Deck’s storage plugs into a (relatively) easily accessible M.2 PCI-Express x4 socket, the PC gaming community has speculated that an eGPU module could totally fit there instead.Now, YouTuber ETA Prime has actually done it, adding an AMD Radeon RX 6900 XT, one of the highest-end graphics cards on the market.It works, it runs, it plays games at 4K with maxed-out settings at framerates a vanilla Steam Deck could only dream of. But no, you probably shouldn’t do this at home! Not only... Continue reading…

It seems we’ll be waiting a little while longer for the next-gen update. | Image: CD Projekt Red CD Projekt Red (CDPR) has once again delayed the release of its next-gen update for The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt. CDPR originally targeted a late-2021 release date for the free next-gen upgrade for the game, but the developer later pushed that to Q2 2022, and now, it’s unclear exactly when we might be able to play it.“We have decided to have our in-house development team conduct the remaining work on the next-gen version of The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt,” CDPR said via the official The Witcher Twitter account. “We are currently evaluating the scope of work to be done and thus have to postpone Q2 release until further notice.” The change was made “based on recommendations from persons in charge of development,” according to a note for investors.... Continue reading…

Freevee After launching as “IMDb Freedive” back in 2019, IMDb TV quickly faded into the background of the ongoing streaming wars that parent company Amazon had already established a respectable foothold in. While that initial rebrand never quite managed to put the fledgling platform and its content on the map, Amazon’s just announced its plan to reintroduce the streamer yet again under new branding ahead of a massive content push.Going forward, IMDb TV will be known as “Amazon Freevee,” a name meant to emphasize that the ad-supported platform is free to viewers. In a press release detailing its vision for Freevee’s future, director Ashraf Alkarmi framed the service as a supplemental platform meant to appeal to consumers interested in watching... Continue reading…

Brontë Wittpenn/The San Francisco Chronicle via Getty Images The state of California’s case against Activision Blizzard just took another blow. A report in Bloomberg alleges that the office of California Governor Gavin Newsom sought to “interfere” in the lawsuit between the state’s Department of Fair Employment and Housing and Activision Blizzard for sexual harassment and discrimination. When the suit’s head counsel Janette Wipper tried to maintain the department’s autonomy, she was allegedly fired by Newsom, which prompted assistant chief counsel for the DFEH Melanie Proctor to resign in protest.According to the Bloomberg report, Proctor sent an email to staff saying, “The Office of the Governor repeatedly demanded advance notice of litigation strategy and of next steps in the litigation. As we... Continue reading…

Niantic, the developer behind the blockbuster success Pokémon Go, has announced its next augmented reality game — and once again, it’s full of adorable creatures. Called Peridot, the game is all about caring for and breeding magical critters. Think of it like Pokémon Go crossed with a Tamagotchi, with some real-world and AR elements tossed in.Here’s the basic premise, according to Niantic: “After thousands of years of slumber, Peridots are waking to a world vastly different from the one in which they used to roam, and they’ll need your help to protect them from extinction.” Practically speaking, this means you’ll be caring for creatures by training, feeding, and playing with them, helping them grow from cute little babies to full-grown... Continue reading…

While voice commands worked, it was easier to adjust the weights myself Continue reading…

It’s available in black or white. Glorious PC Gaming Race has announced the Model I, a lightweight wired mouse that’s both comfortable and capable. It costs $59.99, and it’s available in matte black or white. This new mouse is made for medium-to-large hands, and unlike the fan-favorite Model O and D, the Model I feels a little more ergonomic in my palm, with a thumb rest that widens the footprint of its bottom. Its design fills my hand in a similar way to Razer’s Basilisk mouse, and its size doesn’t get in my way of reaching its buttons. It feels wonderful to use.Speaking of buttons, the Model I mouse features three thumb buttons nestled up against a semi-translucent strip where RGB LEDs shine through. Below that row of buttons, there’s a DPI clutch. The DPI clutch and... Continue reading…

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge Ford has made a lot of promises about its first electric F-150, and now the battery-powered pickup truck will begin deliveries in a couple of weeks. Ford CEO Jim Farley tweeted “it’s time,” announcing that the F-150 Lightning “strikes” on April 26th at 1:30PM ET.As you’d expect for an electric vehicle launch, there is a countdown timer, but the question that anyone who pre-ordered will want to be answered is “when will I get my truck?” We know that Ford has already taken steps to prevent dealers from jacking up prices and to keep buyers from quickly reselling them to the highest bidder, but the supply will likely be tight, at least until it can reach production goals of 150,000 trucks per year.

Devin was as Brodie in Peacock’s Queer as Folk. | Peacock When Russell T. Davies’ original Queer as Folk first premiered on Channel 4 back in 1999, it made a name for itself with its frank and often joyful depictions of queer lives with a particular focus on sex. Showtime’s 2000 adaptation led with a similar focus that established its spin on Queer as Folk as a cultural phenomenon and changed the landscape of American TV. Now, Peacock’s banking that the Queer as Folk brand still has enough of that old magic to make its upcoming reboot stand out in an era when networks and streaming services have long since come around to the idea of telling sexy stories about queer club goers.Today, Peacock released a new teaser along with details and a series of images from Stephen Dunn’s Queer as Folk, a... Continue reading…

Image: Wizards of the Coast Hasbro, the parent company of Dungeons & Dragons publisher Wizards of the Coast, is acquiring D&D Beyond for $146.3 million in cash. The popular tabletop role-playing game has licensed D&D Beyond as its official subscription-based digital toolset since 2017.D&D Beyond is the digital toolset for Dungeons & Dragons, where users can create characters and run campaigns with fellow players. It’s also where players can buy digital versions of Dungeons & Dragons books, in addition to the subscription fees. Wizards of the Coast is promising that all purchases made, characters created, and campaigns run are not going anywhere. The all-cash acquisition is, however, still subject to regulatory approvals.You may have assumed that D&D Beyond was... Continue reading…

Photo by: Geography Photos/Universal Images Group via Getty Images Consumer genetics and genealogy company Ancestry announced a new feature, called SideView, that will give customers information about which bits of their DNA — and which parts of their ethnicity — were inherited from each parent. The tool can do that without having genetic information from the parents, which Ancestry says is a first in the industry.Separating out which parts of someone’s genome came from which parent has been a challenge for researchers, says Barry Starr, the director of scientific communications at Ancestry. “It’s a really big breakthrough for science in general,” he told The Verge. “That’s really something that no one else has been able to do without having a parent tested as well.” The feature will be automatically... Continue reading…

Photo Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Photo by Kevin Dietsch / Getty Images Meta is racing to release its first AR glasses in 2024, but sources believe it’ll take a lot longer for them to become mainstream Continue reading…

The aluminum stand was inspired by Porsche steering wheels. Gadgets with any attachment to Porsche Design tend to have a lousy track record, but its latest collaboration is tough to knock. It partnered with AOC (the accessory company, not the US representative) to Porsche-fy this high-end Agon Pro PD32M gaming monitor that’s available for preorder now and shipping in June for $1,799. Beyond the frameless 32-inch panel, which has Mini LED backlighting for better contrast and light control, its minimalist, sturdy-looking aluminum stand mimics the style of Porsche steering wheels.After looking up what Porsche steering wheels look like, I’m not exactly sold on this homage. But even so, it certainly makes for a more elegant-looking gaming monitor than most — at least from the front. Its rear is... Continue reading…

Unique in ways both good and not-so-good Continue reading…

Thrustmaster’s T248 racing wheel is selling for $299.99 on Amazon today. | Image: Sam Byford / The Verge If you’re a fan of racing games, Thrustmaster’s T248 steering wheel and pedal setup is a nice way to make the experience feel more immersive. Designed for both PlayStation consoles and PC, it’s a great all-in-one package that can help beginners get started with a racing setup, one that requires little in the way of preparation. It’s an even better buy today given it’s currently on sale at Amazon, Best Buy, and B&H Photo for $299.99 instead of $399.99, a new all-time low.Thrustmaster’s T248 is an excellent force feedback wheel, which means it offers a strong level of resistance while duplicating the effects of the track on your car in great detail. As an added perk, the wheel also comes with a handy LCD screen, which can display your... Continue reading…

Hello Games Hello Games has released yet another large free update to No Man’s Sky. This one’s called Outlaws, and it delivers a set of missions where the player can acquire black market tech and other essential goods from other ships in a less-than-savory manner — and then smuggle it for a profit. There are also bounty missions and planetary raids. There will be high-conflict zones in areas where outlaws have captured space stations where you’ll have plenty of chances to engage in dogfights. Oh, and there are now capes and hoods that you can unlock for your character.The studio says that combat has been improved with “speed and excitement” being the focus. Ships should handle better, but for those who want more accessibility during fights, there’s... Continue reading…

Natasha Lyonne as Nadia Vulvokov. | Netflix The ‘M’ in MTA stands for ‘metaphysical’ Continue reading…

You’re 1.6 times more likely to end up in the emergency room on an e-bike, compared to a regular bike, says report (translated by The Verge). | Image: VeiligheidNL A new study from VeiligheidNL, a Dutch organization focused on the prevention of injuries, concludes that e-bike riders have a greater risk of injury than riders on ordinary bicycles. It concedes, however, that more research is needed to identify the underlying causes.The Netherlands is perhaps one of the safest countries to ride a bicycle due to a preponderance of infrastructure designed to keep riders separated from other vehicle traffic. Bicycle safety is also taught to children in school, and many cities have enjoyed bicycle-first cultures for decades.Nevertheless, the report says that e-bike riders in the Netherlands were 1.6 times more likely than an ordinary bicyclist to end up in the emergency room, compared to twice as likely... Continue reading…

The Polar Pacer Pro is available today for $299.90 | Image: Polar The pandemic sparked a running boom, with one study finding that roughly 28 percent of current runners got their start during quarantine. To cater to this new crowd, Polar announced today that it’s launching two new GPS watches designed to help runners get better at the sport. The $199.90 Pacer is aimed at novices, while the $299.90 Pacer Pro is meant to help serious runners up their game.Polar says that both smartwatches will feature faster processors than their predecessors, with 5MB of RAM. It’s an upgrade that’s meant to improve performance and deliver a better user experience. That’s been sorely needed in Polar watches, which sometimes lag during syncing and occasionally struggle with menu transitions. Both watches also have... Continue reading…

If you have a relatively recent phone, you probably have a dedicated night mode in your camera app. These features have transformed the possibilities for night-time photography, blending multiple images together to create a single bright exposure. But there are limitations to this approach — you have to stay still, for example, and it doesn’t work with video.The makers of a new camera called the Duovox Mate Pro, which just launched on Kickstarter, are betting that there’s still a place for dedicated low-light hardware. The Mate Pro is a compact camera with a Sony STARVIS 2 CMOS sensor that Duovox claims is a thousand times more sensitive than the sensor in an iPhone 13 Pro and has 148 percent more dynamic range than a Sony A7S III.S... Continue reading…

FIFA Plus launches globally today. | Image: FIFA FIFA launched its free streaming service — named FIFA Plus, of course — that includes a mix of live soccer matches, archived content, original features, and much more. It’s available globally on the web and mobile devices, in five languages (English, French, German, Portuguese, and Spanish) with more to follow.The service will stream over 40,000 live matches per year from 100 Member Associations across all six confederations, including 29,000 men’s games and 11,000 women’s matches. FIFA promises to cover a wide range of games from “Europe’s top-flight leagues to previously unserved competitions.” Today, for example, you can stream matches from the Mongolian 2nd League, Nepal Women’s Football League, and 3F Superliga. FIFA says 1,400... Continue reading…

UKRAINE - 2021/11/22: In this photo illustration, the MoonPay logo is seen on a smartphone screen and in the background. (Photo Illustration by Pavlo Gonchar/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images) | Photo Illustration by Pavlo Gonchar/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images MoonPay, the company that lets consumers pay for digital assets with credit cards, has raised $86.7 million from a who’s who list of celebrities, including Justin Bieber, Jason Derulo, Bruce Willis, Paris Hilton, Gwyneth Paltrow, and Matthew McConaughey. The new round of investment is meant to help propel the company toward its goal of being the PayPal of cryptocurrency. The new investment brings MoonPay’s valuation to $3.4 billion, the company says.“I realized that the creator economy was going to be a really important part of our business.”MoonPay is probably best known for its concierge service. To put it simply: MoonPay streamlined the process of buying an NFT ape. Stars who want a Bored Ape Yacht Club NFT will often go to MoonPay... Continue reading…

Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge PlayStation Network had a bit of a rough patch Tuesday evening. For about 45 minutes, Sony’s PlayStation Network status page showed that all of its services were experiencing issues in some way, which affected things like signing into your account and connecting to PlayStation Now and the PlayStation Store. Now, however, the site is showing that everything is “up and running.”It’s unclear exactly how widespread the issues were. I personally was able to connect online in Bloodborne and send a message to a colleague, but the PS5’s PlayStation Store was having trouble loading a lot of content. Some others were having more serious issues connecting online, including “error code WS-37469-9,” as shown in this thread on the r/PS5 subreddit. D... Continue reading…

If you logged onto YouTube today, you may have noticed that something was off with the homepage: the sidebar that lets you access things like your subscriptions feed, trending videos, and “Library” that keeps your Watch Later list and video history, was missing (though you can access some of the pages by clicking on the links we’ve included). The issues plagued the site for a few hours on Tuesday, according to reports from users on Twitter.Some users were also cut off from trying to cast videos to a smart TV or watch streams from a game console.The account menu, which lets you switch accounts, manage settings, and view your channel, was also broken. Users could still watch videos from your homepage or search, but people who like to... Continue reading…

Photo by Smith Collection/Gado/Getty Images Starting next month, Yelp says it will cover the costs of travel if an employee or their dependent needs to leave the state to access abortion services, as first reported by The New York Times. The company employs around 200 people in Texas, where legislators passed the strictest abortion law in the country last September.The law, called SB 8, outlaws abortions after six weeks, and provides no exception for rape or incest. It also allows private citizens to sue abortion providers, as well as anyone who “aids or abets” an abortion. In line with the new law, a Texas woman was charged with murder over a self-induced abortion earlier this week, although charges have since been dropped.Yelp says its health insurance already supports... Continue reading…

Lucid Air Grant Touring Performance with “Aero Sport” rims. | Image: Lucid Lucid has a new high-performance version of its luxury all-electric sedan. The new Lucid Air Grand Touring Performance announced today (via CNBC) can be selected as a variant via the company’s online configurator, which tops the standard Grand Touring’s 819 horsepower with 1,050.This new model is actually not the most powerful of Lucid’s Air vehicles — that crown goes to the company’s 1,111 horsepower “Dream Edition” performance model, which is now sold out after a limited edition run. That performance Dream Edition model was touted as the only production electric vehicle to achieve a quarter-mile time under 10 seconds in 2020, which bested Tesla’s quickest Model S available at the time.This performance model can’t quite beat the Tesla... Continue reading…

If you’re a ultimate Transformers fan with deep pockets and the willingness to forgive a few big flaws, your dream toy has arrived. One year after introducing a 19-inch tall Optimus Prime robot that can transform itself, pose and even drive thanks to 27 servo motors, its makers at Hasbro and Robosen have made their vision complete — with a brand-new trailer that can also open up, transform, and reveal its own miniature motorized vehicle that rolls right down the ramp. Image: Robosen The trailer, all buttoned up. Let me be clear: it costs $750 for the robot and $750 for the trailer. This is a $1,500 toy all told, and while I greatly enjoyed playing with a walking, talking, posing Optimus Prime with the voice of... Continue reading…

Climeworks factory with it’s fans in front of the collector, drawing in ambient air and release it, as largely purified CO2 through ventilators at the back is seen at the Hellisheidi power plant near Reykjavik on October 11, 2021. | Photo by HALLDOR KOLBEINS/AFP via Getty Images Big names in tech and consulting just made a $925 million commitment to purchase captured carbon between now and 2030. The pledge — made by Stripe, Alphabet, Meta, Shopify, and McKinsey — marks a big investment in carbon removal technologies.Their new initiative, called Frontier, is supposed to scale up deployment of the still-emerging tech, while making it more affordable for other companies who are also looking to purchase captured carbon as a way to make up for some of the planet-heating pollution they produce.The technology is still prohibitively expensiveThere are already facilities that can filter that CO2 out of the air, as well as efforts to store CO2 in rock formations or in the ocean once it’s been captured. But the... Continue reading…

Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge Pegatron, a Taiwanese company that is one of a few companies that assemble the iPhone, has halted production at two plants in Shanghai and one in Kunshan to comply with the Chinese government’s stringent COVID-19 regulations, according to Nikkei Asia. China has put strict policies in place in response to a recent resurgence of COVID-19 in the country.The shutdown could have a significant impact on both Pegatron and Apple. Nikkei Asia reports that those Pegatron plants are its only iPhone manufacturing hubs, and Pegatron is responsible for making “roughly” 20 to 30 percent of all iPhones. Pegatron “hopes to resume production soon,” the publication said, though it’s unclear exactly when that might happen.Apple didn’t immediately reply... Continue reading…

CNN/Warner Media CNN Plus is reportedly struggling to gain viewers just two weeks out from its launch, according to a report from CNBC. People familiar with the matter told the outlet the platform is only raking in fewer than 10,000 viewers per day.As CNBC notes, this is a huge dip from the daily viewership of CNN’s cable network, which saw an average of 773,000 viewers per day last year. But, obviously, CNN Plus is still new — CNN’s TV channel has been around for many years, plus it’s (usually) free for anyone with cable or satellite service.A recent report from Insider doesn’t make these numbers look any better, though. Using data compiled by SensorTower, Insider discovered that the CNN app, which users must download to use CNN Plus, gained just... Continue reading…

When the power goes out or you’re visiting the great outdoors with gadgets in tow, you might carry a portable power station — and Anker might have just released the most advanced one yet. The new $1,400 Anker 757 Powerhouse offers 1500W of power and 1229Wh of capacity from a Lithium Iron Phosphate (LiFePO4) battery, which it promises is faster to charge, longer-lasting, and might even be safer than the lithium-ion battery packs you’ll typically find in the market.LiFePO4 FTW?LiFePO4 batteries aren’t anything new in the battery space. You’ll find them in some electric cars because they don’t need to be replaced as often and because they don’t turn into a raging inferno when hundreds or thousands of them are badly damaged in an... Continue reading…

The Memento Sessions digital album art, by artist Stephanie Sybydlo. | Image: Scarlet Moon Productions If there’s one thing fans of Atlus’ RPG series Persona always want, it’s more Persona. Thankfully for them, Arizona-based musician and video game music producer Sean Scharfianski is today releasing a five-song EP of Persona 5 songs to celebrate the five-year anniversary of the game’s worldwide launch.The collection of songs from Shoji Meguro’s soundtrack is titled The Mementos Sessions: Music from Persona 5, and it features around 19 minutes of 1970s-inspired funk arrangements performed by a variety of session players and vocalists. The tracklist is bookended by “Last Surprise” and “Beneath the Mask,” some of the most beloved songs from the game. Scharfianski also chose some lesser-known tracks that he felt could use more attention and... Continue reading…

A new 2TB Google One plan from T-Mobile includes unlimited original resolution photo and video backup. | Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge T-Mobile is introducing a new Google One membership option for its customers that revives Google’s unlimited photo storage backup service... for a price, of course. For $15 per month, it includes 2TB of cloud storage, all of the benefits of Google One membership, and unlimited original resolution photo and video backups to Google Photos.When Google brought its gravy train of free photo storage to a halt in 2021, a weary world sighed and looked for new storage options. Sure, the included 15GB of free storage would be enough for many people, but those of us who take a lot of photos and liked the “set it and forget it” nature of unlimited Google Photos backup would need to pony up for a paid Google One membership sooner or later.For a... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Amazon workers only make up a third of US warehouse employees, but in 2021, they suffered 49 percent of the injuries for the entire warehouse industry, according to a report by advocacy group Strategic Organizing Center (or SOC). After analyzing data from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), the union coalition found that Amazon workers are twice as likely to be seriously injured than people who work in warehouses for other companies.The report considers “serious injuries” to be ones where workers either have to take time off to recover or have their workloads reduced, following OSHA’s report classification (pdf) of “cases with days away from work” and “cases with job transfer or restriction.” The data shows that,... Continue reading…

Image: Bandai Namco The latest Elden Ring speedrun world record is less than 10 minutes now. It involves a metronome, absolutely no fighting, and, in the final seconds of the run, a player torn apart by one of the game’s final bosses. It is deeply silly, and I love it.Distortion2, a popular Soulsborne speedrunner, has claimed the world record in Elden Ring’s any% unrestricted category with a time of 8 minutes and 56 seconds. I’ve been paying decently close attention to Distortion2 and his Elden Ring speedrunner colleagues, fairly certain of what to expect in this nearly 9-minute speedrun. But I started screaming excitedly in the first seconds of the speedrun when Distortion2 shot out of the starting area and bypassed the grafted scion boss, the mandatory... Continue reading…

iMovie 3.0 is available now for iPhone and iPad. | Image: Apple Apple’s new iMovie 3.0 update for iPhone and iPad has a major new Storyboards feature that’s designed to make it easier to create videos in the app with pre-built templates.The app will offer 20 different templates covering many video types, “including cooking tutorials, Q&As, product reviews, news reports, and more,” Apple says in a press release. Storyboards will have shot lists, an “illustrative thumbnail,” and suggestions on how to shoot a clip, according to the release.The new update also adds a feature Apple is calling Magic Movie, which can create videos from photos or images on the fly. “To create a Magic Movie, a user simply selects an album, or any group of photos or images from their library, and Magic Movie instantly... Continue reading…

Photo by TIM VIZER/AFP via Getty Images The Amazon warehouse that collapsed with employees inside during a December tornado outbreak might have harbored a “grave violation” of building code that made the structure extremely vulnerable, according to an attorney representing the family of a worker who died there.A tornado outbreak tore through the Amazon distribution center in Edwardsville, Illinois, on December 10th, leveling parts of the building and killing six people. Supporting columns in parts of the warehouse that collapsed might not have been properly secured to the ground, according to a newly unearthed report filed by a structural engineer who was asked by local officials to assess the damage after the tornado.“A peg coming out of a hole”“I became concerned when I... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Twitter announced Tuesday that it has acquired OpenBack, a push notifications company. OpenBack offers “device-side control of push notifications,” according to Twitter’s head of consumer product Jay Sullivan, and Twitter could use the team to pull up timely information even when you're away from the app.“The best push notifications bring people to the conversations they care about on Twitter,” Sullivan said as part of a Twitter thread. “But irrelevant notifications are a distraction. With millions of people visiting Twitter via notifications every day, we want them to be timely, relevant and engaging.”“OpenBack and their talented team joining Twitter will help us improve our ability to deliver the right notifications at the right... Continue reading…

When you flip your monitor, you don’t want your content to be sideways. | Photo by Kaitlin Hatton / The Verge Most of us probably use monitors that are placed in a landscape, or horizontal, configuration — in other words, the top and bottom are wider than the sides. This works fine for most people who are using two or more windows side by side or who are watching videos. But if you’re working on a long document or spreadsheet, or want to keep your Twitter or Slack feed running on a secondary screen, then you may want to try using your monitor in a portrait, or vertical, configuration instead.If you’re lucky enough to have a monitor on a stand or arm that flips from landscape to portrait, you can have the best of both worlds. But when you flip that monitor, you may find that you’re looking at your Twitter feed sideways. Rather than try to twist... Continue reading…

A new feature from Snap will let publishers on Snapchat automatically create posts based on stories published to a website. According to Axios, more than 40 publishers from the US, the UK, France, and India will begin using Dynamic Stories to automatically share published content to Snapchat.Dynamic Stories uses a publisher’s RSS feed to create posts that go directly on a newsroom’s Snapchat Stories. Early partners include CNN, ESPN, The Washington Post, British Vogue, and more.“By tying publishing on Snapchat into our partners’ existing workflow, we’ve created an easy way for them to create daily content and significantly lower costs,” Snap says in an announcement. “This new format will also play a significant role in supporting our... Continue reading…

Image: Beats Beats has announced new colors of its Studio Buds earbuds that will go on sale beginning tomorrow: blue, gray, and pink. They join the existing black, white, and red options that have been available since last year. The price remains unchanged at $149.99.All colors of the Studio Buds can be purchased from Apple, but they’re being divvied up among third-party retailers: Amazon gets gray, Best Buy will have the blue, and Target is selling the pink buds. Beats says the Studio Buds have become “the fastest-selling Beats product to date, globally” in their first year on the market. Alongside some new hues, Beats is also adding new features for Android phone owners. Image: Beats The Studio Buds also remain available... Continue reading…

Spotify is relaunching Greenroom as Spotify Live. | Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Spotify is rebranding its Greenroom live audio app as Spotify Live and will bring its features into the main Spotify app, the company announced Tuesday. Spotify Live will be available as both a standalone app and a livestream feature in the main app. At present, the main app will include select live content from original programming, and the standalone Spotify Live app will be open to all independent creators.“Listeners will be able to tune in to live programming on Spotify via the creator’s podcast or artist page, and if they want to participate in the chat or join the host onstage, they can head to the Spotify Live app to do so,” according to a blog post on the company’s website.

Nomad’s Base One Max is better-looking than most wireless chargers. | Image: Nomad Nomad is expanding the range of its MagSafe charging accessories with the new Base One Max. The Max follows the Base One from March and adds an Apple Watch charger to the heavily weighted MagSafe pad. It retails for a similarly heavy $149.95 and is available to purchase starting on April 12th.The Base One Max effectively looks like what happens when you double the width of the Base One and add an integrated Apple Watch charger. Unlike the MagSafe section, which remains flat, the Apple Watch charger sits vertically so your Watch can display its nightstand mode and show the time. Made out of aluminum, glass, and soft-touch rubber, the Base One Max weighs a beefy 900 grams (just under two pounds). Image: Nomad The... Continue reading…

Chris Dixon | Photo Illustration by Grayson Blackmon / The Verge Plus, why a16z has spent $3 billion on web3 startups Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge TikTok is rolling out its augmented reality effects tool to all creators and developers after launching a closed beta test last fall.Effect House allows creators to make their own AR camera effects that can be used by other TikTok users in videos. In an announcement, the company says the effects platform will be open to “all creators, designers, and developers from around the world” and will include tools and learning resources.“Whether you’re teleporting into new worlds with Green Screen or freeze-framing with Time Warp Scan, creative effects empower creators to express themselves, entertain, and share stories through a wide array of engaging and immersive formats,” the company wrote. TikTok says submitted effects... Continue reading…