The Verge

The integration lets you view charging stations directly from your car’s infotainment screen. | Image: ChargePoint ChargePoint, operator of one of the largest EV charging networks across Europe and North America, is adding support for Android Auto to its app. The functionality means Android phone users will be able to find, navigate to, and start charging from a ChargePoint charging station from their car’s infotainment screen, without having to pick up their phone. Support for Android Auto follows the addition of CarPlay support in November last year.According to ChargePoint, the Android Auto experience lets you view a map with nearby charging stations, check status, filter by metrics like availability and cost, and then start a charging session once you arrive. The in-vehicle app can also be set to notify the driver once a busy charging station... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Shutting down its semiconductor plant in Austin, Texas lost Samsung over 300 billion won (around $270 million), Yonhap News reports. Speaking during a conference call, a senior vice president at Samsung’s foundry business Han Seung-hoon said that the shutdown affected around 71,000 wafers, corresponding to “around 300 to 400 billion won in damage.” The statement coincided with Samsung’s latest earnings release, in which it reported strong sales of its smartphones and other consumer electronics.The South Korean electronics giant was forced to shut down its Austin plant — which produces microprocessors like radio frequency integrated circuits and solid state drive controllers — back in February after a storm left some 200,000 Austin... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge An ongoing lawsuit pursued by Amazon against the US government and Microsoft will continue after a federal judge rejected a motion to dismiss the case. The suit concerns Microsoft’s success in securing the $10 billion JEDI cloud computing contract with the Defense Department — a decision that Amazon says was influenced by President Donald Trump’s dislike of the company and its CEO Jeff Bezos.The decision, as reported by The Washington Post and Bloomberg News, means Amazon can now argue in front of a court that Trump himself and former defense secretary Jim Mattis should testify. A motion to dismiss the case was rejected by Judge Patricia Campbell-Smith on Wednesday April 28, though her full opinion was filed under seal.Amazon and... Continue reading…

Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge The PS5 will be available to buy in China on May 15th, a little over six months after its original release in the US last year, Sony announced today. The disc version of the console will retail for 3,899 yuan (around $600), while the cheaper disc-free model will cost 3,099 yuan (around $479). Preorders open today. The launch means Sony’s next-gen console will beat Microsoft’s to release in the country, although CBNC notes that Microsoft received safety approvals to release the Xbox Series X and Series S there at the end of last year.Relative to its size and population, China isn’t considered a huge market for console gaming. Game consoles were technically illegal in the country until 2014, which meant PC and mobile gaming has become... Continue reading…

Image: Vivaldi Vivaldi announced today that it’s updating the desktop and Android versions of its Vivaldi browser with the ability to block annoying cookie preference pop-ups. Thanks to the passage of the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), you’ve probably had to click through at least one dialog box asking if you’d like to manage how a site tracks you. Vivaldi’s new update lets you avoid those notifications — with some major caveats — while theoretically still keeping you safe from tracking.Vivaldi’s logic for the new feature, affectionately called “Cookie Crumbler,” is that while giving users control over how they’re tracked is good, doing so through a pop-up “leads to clicking ‘allow’ or ‘accept’ without realizing that... Continue reading…

No matter how much web browsers improve, it feels like they can’t keep pace with everything we want to do. Open one too many tabs on a few-year-old laptop, and your fan starts spinning, your battery life dips, your system starts to slow. A faster or cleaner PC might fix it, but a startup called Mighty has a different idea: a $30-a-month web browser that lives in the cloud.Instead of your own physical computer interacting with each website, you stream a remote web browser instead, one that lives on a powerful computer many miles away with its own 1,000Mbps connection to the internet.Suddenly, your decent internet connection would feel like one of the fastest internet connections in the world, with websites loading nigh-instantly and... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge When Facebook users tried to view a hashtag calling for the resignation of Indian prime minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday, they instead saw a message saying that Facebook was temporarily hiding the posts in order to keep the community safe. Buzzfeed News reports that the posts were hidden for about three hours.Facebook has now restored the posts. The company tells The Verge that the hashtag was blocked “by mistake” and claims it wasn’t because the Indian government asked Facebook to remove it. It also says the block was the result of some of the content that used the hashtag, but did not specify what kind of content.The temporary suspension of the hashtag is likely to fuel concerns about the influence that Modi’s BJP party wields... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Amazon has announced that over 500,000 of its workers will get a permanent increase in their hourly wages starting in mid-May, from as low as an additional 50 cents an hour to as much as three extra dollars per hour (via GeekWire). That’s a substantial chunk of its 1.3 million person workforce getting at least a small pay bump, and the company shared that it’s investing over $1 billion in these pay increases. Amazon said that it’s also on a hiring spree for “tens of thousands of jobs across our operations in the US.”Amazon previously recognized its warehouse and delivery workers with a $2 pay bump last March as the company worked to meet increased demand during the pandemic, but that was a temporary raise that disappeared in May 2020,... Continue reading…

Customers already enrolled in the prepaid plan will get a data boost and a lower price when their plan renews. | Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge AT&T says it will now offer a prepaid 5G data-only plan with up to 100GB of data for $55 per month — a big upgrade from its previous offering of 40GB for $75. The new pricing extends to Cricket Wireless customers as well as AT&T’s direct prepaid subscribers, though those on Cricket won’t be able to access the 5G network. These plans allow customers to buy data for their tablet or mobile hotspot separate from their voice plan.That 100GB is a lot of data at a lower price than the other major carriers are offering; currently, T-Mobile has a prepaid data-only plan of 50GB for $50 and Verizon has a 30GB plan for $65 per month. It may be no coincidence that Verizon and T-Mobile are also eager to expand their own 5G and LTE-based fixed home... Continue reading…

NASA Michael Collins, the witty “forgotten” astronaut of NASA’s legendary Apollo 11 mission to the Moon, died of cancer on Wednesday, his family said. An icon of space exploration and an eloquent storyteller (who, arguably, had the best sense of humor among the Apollo 11 crew), Collins passionately advocated for further exploration of other worlds. Astronauts, NASA officials, and others in the space community who are heeding his advocacy mourned his death today.Collins was the Columbia command module pilot who stayed in orbit around the Moon in 1969 while his crew mates, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin, descended to the lunar surface and became the first two humans to set foot on another world. Aldrin, now the only living Apollo 11 astronaut,... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Facebook’s ad revenue was up more than 45 percent during the first three months of 2020, soaring to $25.4 billion — or about seven times what Twitter makes in an entire year. But the company sees some potential problems on the horizon that could limit continued growth: regulators are closing in on ad tracking practices, and a feature launched this week by Apple could harm its ability to target ads.“We continue to expect increased ad targeting headwinds in 2021 from regulatory and platform changes,” Facebook CFO Dave Wehner writes in the company’s Q1 2021 earnings release. Wehner specifically calls out iOS 14.5, which includes a feature that lets iPhone and iPad users easily stop apps from tracking them in certain ways. Facebook expects... Continue reading…

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge Apple’s iPhone 12 lineup maintained enormously strong demand from consumers from January through March, according to the company’s fiscal Q2 earnings posted today. Apple reported record March quarter revenue of $89.6 billion, up 54 percent year over year. The iPhone took in just under $48 billion, jumping up by 66 percent from a year ago.Sales of Mac and iPad hardware also surged for yet another quarter, up 70 and 78 percent respectively, due in part to continued remote work and schooling necessitated by the COVID-19 pandemic. That success might slow down as some regions of the world return to a sense of normalcy, so most eyes — as usual — are on the iPhone. It’s been reported that the iPhone 12 mini isn’t doing as well as Apple hoped,... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge HBO Max’s upcoming ad-support tier will cost $9.99 per month, or $5 less than the standard $14.99 per month that the regular version of HBO Max costs, according to a new report from CNBC.The upcoming ad-supported tier is still set to launch in June and will feature a few major differences from the $15 per month plan — including access to WarnerMedia’s same-day theatrical release strategy for films like Dune or The Matrix 4, which will be limited to subscribers to HBO Max’s more premium tier. WarnerMedia CEO Jason Kilar has also confirmed in a March analyst event that HBO original shows won’t get ads added in, so customers won’t have to worry about Euphoria, The Sopranos, or Game of Thrones getting interrupted by commercials.HBO, for... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Amazon workers at four different facilities near Staten Island have begun the process of unionizing with the Amazon Labor Union. The organizing effort is being led by Christian Smalls, a former warehouse worker who was fired in March after organizing a walkout to protest unsafe working conditions during the pandemic, according to Protocol.The company has responded by posting anti-union messages on TV screens at JFK8, the fulfillment center where Smalls used to work. “KNOW THE FACTS BEFORE YOU SIGN A UNION CARD,” reads one of the messages obtained by Motherboard. “If someone asks you to provide your personal information or sign a union card, do not release your personal information without knowing all the facts.”Several hundred workers... Continue reading…

Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge Next week, Epic Games and Apple will appear in court for a long-anticipated legal battle. Epic argues that Apple unfairly kicked its hit game Fortnite off the App Store last year, exercising an illegal monopoly over the ubiquitous iOS platform. Apple claims Epic is trying to break the iOS platform’s vaunted safety and security for its own gain. Both parties have laid out how they expect to win their respective cases, and this week, they’ve provided near-final lists of the people they expect to call for testimony.Apple and Epic both filed revised tentative witness lists on April 26th. The lists don’t guarantee every witness will be called, and crucially, they don’t tell us when we’ll see a given person on the stand. But with the closely... Continue reading…

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge General Motors announced a “holistic charging approach” to electric vehicle charging that it’s calling the Ultium Charge 360.Much like Ford does with its FordPass network, the Ultium Charge 360 will integrate GM’s own vehicle apps and software with a variety of third-party charging services, such as Blink, ChargePoint, EVgo, Flo, Greenlots, and SemaConnect. The goal is to create a seamless experience in which an owner of a GM electric vehicle can drive up to a station, plug in, and start charging without having to juggle multiple apps or third-party memberships.“There is a lot more to EV adoption than just buying the vehicle and just having a large connected network,” said Travis Hester, GM’s chief EV officer. “And our mission is to... Continue reading…

Netflix’s Vtuber, N-Ko. | Image: Netflix Netflix has joined the Vtuber trend, unveiling a virtual streamer this week who will host a weekly show on the company’s YouTube channel to promote its original anime series. The character is named N-ko Mei Kurono, and Netflix describes her as the company’s “anime ambassador.” She also happens to be a “sheep-human lifeform.”Vtubers, or “virtual YouTubers,” are animated hosts who often vlog on YouTube or stream on Twitch. In general, these characters are operated by a single human, who will use motion capture software (and sometimes a motion-capture outfit) to transform themselves into a cartoony character on-screen. Some Vtubers have become hugely popular over the past year, including Projekt Melody and CodeMiko.Netflix is using the... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Many Verizon customers in Southern California reported difficulties making calls on Tuesday afternoon, and the company confirmed to The Verge at the time that was a “network issue” affecting voice services in parts of the region. That issue was resolved overnight, a spokesperson told The Verge on Wednesday morning.During the outage, if you were having trouble making calls, the spokesperson recommended putting your device in airplane mode or restarting your phone, which they said should fix the issues. And in response to one person on Twitter on Tuesday, Verizon’s support account recommended using Wi-Fi “if possible.”

Image: Google Google Assistant is getting a better way to correct its name pronunciation, as well as improved contextual awareness when it comes to setting and changing timers with your voice. In the blog post announcing the changes, Google says they should be rolling out in the next few days.If Assistant has been pronouncing your name wrong, the new way to try to fix that is pretty simple: you can just say your name out loud, and Google will try to learn the pronunciation. The old way, which is still available for those who wanted it, required you to spell out the way you wanted your name pronounced.If you’re looking to try it for yourself, you can go to the Google Assistant settings, then Basic Info, then Nickname. It is worth noting that you... Continue reading…

If you’re a Windows user and you use multiple monitors, you’ve probably experienced the headache of apps randomly rearranging when you resume from sleep. There have been a variety of ways to work around this over the years, but Microsoft is finally addressing it and fixing it in a future Windows 10 update.“The technical terminology we use to describe this problem is known as Rapid Hot Plug Detect (Rapid HPD),” explains Michelle Xiong, a program manager on the graphics team at Microsoft. “This behavior impacts DisplayPort multi-monitor setups which results in unwanted desktop rearrangements.”This problem is particularly troublesome if you’re using a laptop with a secondary screen or an additional monitor goes into deep sleep and Windows... Continue reading…

Photo by BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI/AFP via Getty Images President Biden will deliver his first joint address to Congress on Wednesday. There will be an unusually small crowd in the House chamber due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, but the event will be streamed on social media platforms for viewers across the country.Biden’s speech is expected to touch on a series of administration priorities, including the pandemic, immigration, and tax reform.Here’s how to watch the address:HOW DO I WATCH THE ADDRESS?Biden’s address will be broadcast across major networks such as CNN, Fox, NBC, PBS, and C-SPAN. The White House will also be streaming the event on its YouTube channel, Facebook page, and on Twitter from @WhiteHouse and @POTUS.The Twitter stream will be accompanied by live on-screen... Continue reading…

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge Stadia is an online game streaming service from Google, a company that is practically synonymous with search engines and the general concept of searching things online. Over the past two decades, the idea of “googling something” has become a standard part of language, so dominant has Google’s search engine become in popular culture.On an unrelated note, today — 526 days after its initial launch — Google has finally added a search bar to the Stadia store to better allow customers to search through the 172 games currently available on the service. In addition to the new, revolutionary search bar (which Google says will be reaching all players this week), Stadia is also debuting a new way to sort players’ libraries to... Continue reading…

Google is turning Android phones into an earthquake detection system. | Photo by Becca Farsace / The Verge Google is expanding its Android-based earthquake detection and alert system, filling in gaps in places where there are few seismometers and no early warning systems. Starting today, the program that launched in California last year will also be available in Greece and New Zealand.Filling in gaps in places where there are few seismometersThis also marks a new step for Google; it’s the first time the company will handle everything from detecting the earthquake to warning individuals. Android devices will first sense waves generated by quakes. Google then analyzes data from the phones and sends out an early warning alert to users in the affected area. Users will get the alerts automatically unless they opt out of the service.When Google... Continue reading…

Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge Epic Games is holding back Fortnite from being available on Microsoft’s Xbox Cloud Gaming (xCloud) service, according to a new deposition made public as part of the Epic case against Apple. The Fortnite developer views Microsoft’s xCloud service as competition to its PC offerings, and the company is deliberately not offering Fortnite on xCloud as a result.Joe Kreiner, Epic’s vice president of business development, was questioned over why Fortnite isn’t available on xCloud, and confirmed it was a deliberate choice. “We viewed Microsoft’s efforts with xCloud to be competitive with our PC offerings,” says Kreiner in the deposition. The court document makes it appear like Kreiner may go on to explain why, but the next part of the... Continue reading…

I’m proud of the Milwaukee Bucks for winning their game against the Hornets yesterday, and I’m also really proud of them for setting up a mobile COVID-19 vaccination site for their next home game. On Sunday, any fan in attendance can get their first dose of the Pfizer / BioNTech vaccine through a partnership with the Milwaukee Health Department.Game attendance is capped at 3,266 people, and the arena’s general manager Dennis Williams told The Washington Post that the organization hopes to vaccinate at least a few hundred people. Facility employees will be able to get a shot as well.“It was important to try to capture as many people as possible,” Williams said, “and what better way than a Bucks game that sees 600 to 800 employees on... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Telegram CEO Pavel Durov announced today that the iOS version of Telegram will be updated to support group video calls in May (via Yahoo Finance). The company originally planned to add the video call feature to its messaging service at some point in 2020, but the feature never materialized. Telegram did at least make it into the new year with one video call addition: end-to-end encrypted one-on-one video calls were added in August 2020.Durov’s announcement of the new launch date was shared — naturally — in his personal Telegram channel. He writes that group video calls will have:

The Galaxy Book comes in silver or this sleek blue color | Samsung Samsung announced two entry-level Galaxy Book laptops at its Unpacked event: the Galaxy Book and the Galaxy Book Flex2 Alpha. The former will start at around $800 (according to Samsung, that price is subject to change) and will launch in the second half of 2021, whereas the Flex2 Alpha starts at $849 and is available for preorder now, shipping in mid-May. These round out the fleet of premium models announced today, including the Galaxy Book Pro and Pro 360 with OLED screens that start at $999, and the $1,399 Galaxy Book Odyssey gaming laptop that’s the first to sport Nvidia’s new RTX 3050 Ti graphics card.Starting with the Galaxy Book, it has a 15.6-inch 1080p TFT LCD display, and it supports up to two fast NVMe SSDs. It has two USB-C... Continue reading…

The United Auto Workers union is “laying the groundwork” to organize factory workers that will build electric vehicles for startups like Rivian and Lucid Motors, president Rory Gamble told CNBC.“That’s a given. We are formulating plans to go out to all these start-ups to give these workers a voice,” he said. “In today’s world, you have to think out of the box in how you reach people. We really have to drive home the benefits of belonging to the union.”Gamble declined to say what those plans involve, according to CNBC. The UAW did not respond to a request for comment from The Verge. Representatives for Rivian, Lucid Motors, Faraday Future, and Lordstown Motors did not respond to requests for comment.Factory workers who build cars for... Continue reading…

Photo by ANGELA WEISS/AFP via Getty Images Two shots of a COVID-19 vaccine reduced the risk of hospitalization by 94 percent for people over 65, according to a new report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.That age group is at the highest risk of severe cases of COVID-19 — that’s why it was prioritized for the early waves of vaccination in the United States. Keeping that age group out of the hospital would go a long way to drive down the hospitalization rates from the disease overall.The analysis looked at people hospitalized at 24 hospitals in 14 states during January, February, and March. It included 417 hospitalized patients, 187 of whom tested positive for COVID-19 and 230 who did not. Partial vaccination, defined in this case as having a first dose two... Continue reading…

The SyncUp uses LTE rather than Bluetooth or UWB so it doesn’t need to be within range of your phone (or someone else’s) to be located. | Photo: T-Mobile It seems that 2021 is the year of the tracker, with new options from Samsung, Apple, and now T-Mobile in the form of its SyncUp Tracker. But unlike those other Tile-type tracking devices, SyncUp uses LTE rather than Bluetooth or Ultra Wideband for real-time location information, a la Samsung’s SmartThings tracker. That means it doesn’t rely on being within a certain range of your phone (or other phones) to tell you where it is — but it does come with a $5 per month data charge on your T-Mobile phone plan.The SyncUp offers some nice tracking features: you can make the device ring to help locate it when it’s out of sight, for example, and it offers geofencing to send you an alert when it leaves a predetermined area. It’s also IP67 dust... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge You can now book a vaccine appointment — and a ride to that appointment — in the Uber app.The new feature is part of a host of product news that Uber announced today under the rubric “go anywhere, get anything.” With more people getting vaccinated, the company is banking on a big comeback to help make up for the steep losses it suffered during 2020. And it’s rolling out a series of new features aimed at enticing lockdown-weary customers back to its platform — whether to travel somewhere or to get something delivered.The vaccine appointments are being offered nationwide through the company’s previously announced partnership with Walgreens. Since February, Uber has been offering free rides to Walgreens stores for people who book a... Continue reading…

Samsung’s new Galaxy Book Odyssey. | Image: Samsung Samsung is announcing its new Galaxy Book Odyssey gaming laptop today, complete with Nvidia’s unannounced GeForce RTX 3050 Ti and 3050 graphics cards. The 15.6-inch (1080p) gaming laptop starts at $1,399 and will ship with Intel’s 11th Gen Core H i5 or i7 processors, up to 32GB of RAM, and up to 2TB of SSD storage. The big new addition is a choice between Nvidia’s RTX 3050 or RTX 3050 Ti GPU.Samsung hasn’t provided many details on the RTX 3050 or RTX 3050 Ti, and Nvidia hasn’t even announced the GPU yet, so details are slim. The RTX 3050 Ti name appeared in March on an Asus website that mentioned it would have 4GB of memory. Combined with the numbering scheme and 135-watt charger, this suggests this is more of an entry-level gaming... Continue reading…

Electric moped-sharing startup Revel is adding a new vehicle to its fleet — this time with four wheels instead of two. The Brooklyn-based company is launching its own Uber-esque ride-hailing service in New York City using only electric vehicles from Tesla. And true to its Uber-imitating ways, the company is announcing its intention to launch the service before obtaining its license to legally to operate in the city.It’s an interesting — and potentially risky — move for the three-year-old startup with thousands of shared electric mopeds in cities across the US. As it grows in size, Revel has also gotten more ambitious, launching an e-bike subscription service and unveiling plans to build the largest EV charging station in New York City.... Continue reading…

A burger in New York City. | Photo by Andrew Burton/Getty Images Lately, it seems like forgoing red meat has become an unfortunate proxy for environmental credentials. Epicurious, for example, just announced that it will no longer publish articles or recipes with beef in a decision it calls, “not anti-beef but rather pro-planet.” And then there are headlines like “Why do some green activists eat meat?”Meat-eating, meanwhile, has become a sort of symbol for climate denial. There are Twitter wars swirling around whether Biden’s climate ambitions will infringe on Americans’ right to eat burgers (his actual climate proposals would not).Diet shouldn’t be a political scorecard for how down you are for the planetBut diet shouldn’t be a political scorecard for how down you are for the planet. Shaming... Continue reading…

Photo: Pixar Animation Studios Luca, the next feature film from Pixar, is a coming-of-age story about a pair of unassuming young boys who carry a big secret, as they’re actually sea monsters. Luca and Alberto appear as human on land, where they explore a quaint Italian seaside village. Normally, though, they’re iguana-like sea creatures covered in scales. For the team at Pixar, one of the key questions was figuring out what exactly causes that transformation. And instead of relying on a magical or emotional catalyst, they chose something much more fundamental: water.That was just the start. Sorting out the transformation also meant ensuring both versions of the characters were linked in some way, as well as ensuring that the process had some kind of emotional weight.... Continue reading…

Photo by Becca Farsace / The Verge Samsung has announced two new Galaxy Book devices: the Galaxy Book Pro (a regular clamshell laptop) and the Galaxy Book Pro 360 (a touchscreen convertible). They start at $999.99 and $1,199.99, respectively. You can preorder them both today, and they’ll ship on May 14th.I got to spend some time with both devices ahead of the announcement. While they’re not the most exciting computers in the world, I think they could still be great buys — provided they deliver on the fundamentals.Samsung already sells several Galaxy Books, such as the ultra-light Galaxy Book S and the QLED display-equipped Galaxy Book Flex and Galaxy Book Ion. The Galaxy Book Pro isn’t a direct sequel to any of these older devices — Samsung told me it’s not... Continue reading…

Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge If you’ve been waiting on a good deal for the latest Apple Watch, today might be delivering that for you — if you really wanted the all-red version. The 40mm-sized Apple Watch Series 6 with a red sport band and red aluminum case costs $299 at Amazon, Walmart, and Best Buy, down from its original $399 price. At $299, it’s just a $20 jump from the $279 Apple Watch SE to get a better smartwatch with slightly faster specs. The big differences in the Series 6 include its always-on display, its ability to take blood oxygen readings, and it has the U1 ultra wideband chip.Nintendo is selling its two-pack of NES wireless controllers made for the Switch for $42, down from $60. If you’re a fan of retro games and already subscribe to Nintendo... Continue reading…

Netflix is officially rolling out its new “Play Something” feature today to all its users, adding a button across the streaming service’s UI to automatically suggest new shows and movies that you’ve never watched before.The Play Something button will appear in several places on Netflix’s app, including underneath your profile when you log in, the left-side navigation bar, and in the tenth row of Netflix’s homepage.The company has been testing the feature for months, under a variety of names (including “Shuffle Play”), but today marks its official worldwide debut for all Netflix users. To start, the company is rolling out the Play Something button on TV-based versions of the Netflix app, but it has plans to start testing it on Android... Continue reading…

The Consumer Electronics Show (CES) is officially returning to an in-person format in Las Vegas in 2022, the Consumer Technology Association (CTA) announced today, marking the return of the largest tech conference in the world next year.“We’re thrilled to return to Las Vegas – home to CES for more than 40 years – and look forward to seeing many new and returning faces,” said Gary Shapiro, president and CEO of the CTA, in an announcement.For what it’s worth, the CTA had always intended to return to an in-person CES in 2022. The group had already announced plans to do so in July 2020, when it announced that CES 2021 would be shifting to an all-digital format due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. Other major tech conferences, like IFA... Continue reading…

Virtual worlds have long been a place to escape. That was true before the pandemic, but lockdowns and stay-at-home orders across the world certainly accelerated the phenomenon. I spent an embarrassing amount of time last year gardening in Animal Crossing and going to concerts in Fortnite. They were great distractions, but never really gave that vacation-like escape I was truly searching for — turns out what I needed was a safari full of Squirtles.New Pokémon Snap launches this week as the long-awaited sequel to a fan-favorite Nintendo 64 game from 1999. The premise remains the same: you, a budding wildlife photographer, traverse beautiful landscapes while snapping photos of every critter you can find. At its core the concept is... Continue reading…

Image: Google Google has unveiled new tools to help people planning their first post-vaccination vacations, as COVID-19 restrictions and requirements still vary widely among domestic and international travel destinations.A Google search for flights, hotels, or things to do will now also bring up results for any COVID-19-related travel advisories or restrictions at the searcher’s destination. Google has added additional travel restriction details, including whether quarantine is required or if you have to show proof of immunization or a negative COVID-19 test. Users can choose to receive updates about when restrictions are lifted or added for a given destination. The updates are country-specific and state-specific within the US.Under the “explore” t... Continue reading…

Microsoft has commissioned five new fonts for Office. | Image: Microsoft Microsoft is changing its default Office font next year and wants everyone to help pick the new default. While there are more than 700 font options in Word, Microsoft has commissioned five new custom fonts for Office, in a move away from the Calibri font that has been the default in Microsoft Office for nearly 15 years.The five new sans-serif fonts feature a variety of styles, including traditional, modern, and even one inspired by German road and railway signs. Microsoft is starting to gather feedback on these five new fonts today, and it plans to set one as the new Office default font in 2022. Image: Microsoft Microsoft’s new Office fonts. Tenorite, created by Erin McLaughlin and Wei Huang, is the more... Continue reading…

Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge Google’s Messages app is getting a redesign on Samsung’s Galaxy S21 devices, bringing its appearance into line with Samsung’s other One UI software, XDA Developers reports. Screenshots posted by XDA and users on Reddit show the app’s home screen has been divided into two sections: an upper information area with an unread messages counter and a lower section with links to each conversation.The redesign follows Samsung’s decision to use Google’s messaging app as the default for its S21 lineup in select markets. With the redesign the Messages app now looks like it belongs as a default, with a look that’s similar to other Samsung software like its Notes or Settings apps. However, in the US, Samsung Messages is still the default messaging... Continue reading…

If you’re a Samsung fan — or just curious about what the manufacturer means when it announces that “the most powerful Galaxy is coming” — then you may want to drop in on today’s Galaxy Unpacked event 10AM ET / 7AM PT.There isn’t a lot of info out there about what’s in store. But those who have been following Samsung can made a few educated guesses. These include the possibility of a new line of Galaxy Book laptops — a line that is certainly due for a refresh, since the last models were first announced in 2019. Other rumors include new Galaxy Book Pro laptops with 13.3-inch and 15.6-inch OLED panels, and S-Pen support.Want to be the first to find out for sure? We’ll stream it above, so feel free to stick around, but there are other ways... Continue reading…

Spotify’s subscriber growth. | Image: Spotify Spotify now boasts 158 million premium subscribers and 356 million monthly active users, according to its latest earnings report released today. That’s a 21 percent and 24 percent year-over-year increase, respectively. It’s up from 155 million premium subscribers and 345 million monthly active users last quarter.The streaming service has continued to focus on podcasts both as a way to convert free listeners to premium subscribers, and as a way to generate ad revenue. Spotify said that ad-supported revenue outperformed its forecast thanks in part to its podcasting efforts. In particular, the company said the Joe Rogan Experience, which it now exclusively licenses, “performed above expectations.” Spotify says it’s seen a “strong increase”... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Russia’s antitrust regulator, the Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS), has fined Apple $12 million over complaints it unfairly cracked down on third-party parental control apps, the regulator has announced. The FAS started its investigation after receiving a complaint from Kaspersky Lab in March 2019, which claimed Apple had forced it to limit the functionality of its Safe Kids app shortly after Apple added the Screen Time feature to iOS 12.The fine comes in the same week that EU regulators are expected to issue charges of their own against Apple. These come in response to a complaint from Spotify in March 2019 about the 30 percent cut Apple takes for in-app purchases, which it said gives Apple’s own services an unfair advantage. As well... Continue reading…

Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge Sony has sold 7.8 million PlayStation 5 consoles as of March 31st, the company says in its latest earnings report. The number of PlayStation Plus subscribers is now 47.6 million, a 14.7 percent increase year on year. The fourth-quarter figures bring the overall PlayStation business to a total operating profit of 342.2 billion yen ($3.14 billion) for the 2020 financial year — a record for Sony.Sony’s last earnings report revealed that the company had shipped 4.5 million PS5 units worldwide through the end of 2020. That means that 3.3 million units were shipped from January to March, giving an idea of Sony’s current manufacturing capacity; it’s still very difficult to actually buy a PS5, with demand far outstripping supply. The... Continue reading…

Basecamp announced it would ban “societal and political discussions” at work. But the hardest conversations at work were about the company itself. Continue reading…

Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge If you were having issues with the PlayStation Network (PSN) this evening or afternoon, you weren’t alone. The service suffered an outage, with multiplayer, store services, and more going down for around an hour. The outage appeared to be global — the official Ask PlayStation Japan Twitter account reported the issue, and we saw many users from Europe also reporting problems.It seems like it’s resolved now, with the PSN status page showing that everything is up and running. I’ve also confirmed that I’ve been able to download a game from the PlayStation Store, and hop into a multiplayer match. The PSN status page at 6:55PM ET. The outage affected all the categories listed on the PSN’s status page — account management,... Continue reading…

Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon Eternal The Movie Part 1 and Part 2. | Image: Netflix The newest movie in the hugely popular Sailor Moon franchise, Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon Eternal The Movie (which was originally released in two parts), is hitting Netflix on June 3. The movie’s arrival on Netflix marks its premiere for the first time outside of Japan, where Part 1 debuted in January.You can watch a teaser trailer for it here:Here’s Netflix’s synopsis of the film: