The Verge

Photo Illustration by Jakub Porzycki/NurPhoto via Getty Images Clubhouse is funding the creation of 50 audio shows made by creators on its platform. The concepts include everything from an interview series with Taryn Southern to a pair of shows discussing the culture of hairstyles to a game show called “Serial Killer Speed Dating.”Participants will each get a $5,000-per-month stipend for three months, plus gear and creative support, to help them create the series. The goal is to develop and pilot each show over the next three months. If shows take off, there’s a possibility Clubhouse will sign some of them to a longer-term deal.Clubhouse’s goal is to “support new voices” on its platformThis is the first round of creators to benefit from Clubhouse’s accelerator program, which it says will “help... Continue reading…

Image: Disney Loki, the upcoming Disney Plus show about the trickster god and brother of Thor, will be coming out slightly earlier than originally planned: the premiere date has moved to June 9th, from the 11th. The show will also air on a new day of the week, with new episodes airing on Wednesdays instead of Fridays.The announcement was made in a video uploaded to Marvel’s YouTube channel. The video starts with a typical Marvel montage, but then is interrupted by Tom Hiddleston talking about how Loki is always left out of superhero montages. (It’s understandable that he’d feel left out — even in articles about a show dedicated to the character, he’s typically described in relation to his brother.) “Wednesdays are the new Fridays,” he says, before... Continue reading…

Photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images Former President Donald Trump’s Facebook ban is sticking around for now, following the decision from Facebook’s Oversight Board to uphold its original ban from earlier this year. And Trump is not pleased, according to his first official statement.“Free speech has been taken away from the President of the United States,” an emailed statement from Trump obtained by The New York Times reads, calling for a “political price” to be paid not just by Facebook, but by Google and Twitter as well.Facebook’s Oversight Board is a panel of independent experts established to oversee high-stakes moderation and policy disputes on the social media platform. In its decision, the Oversight Board explained that while Facebook’s initial decision to suspend... Continue reading…

Image: Apple The new 11-inch iPad Pro with the M1 processor costs $799 to preorder at most retailers, but not at Walmart. You can reserve an 11-inch model with 128GB of storage for $749, and it’ll arrive at your door on or before June 1st. The step-up configuration with 256GB of storage is $50 off, too, costing $849 to preorder. We’ve seen similar preorder deals on the new iPad Pro from a site called Expercom, but it currently offers a vague “3-6 week” estimate for shipping your purchase.Granted, it’ll still be another handful of weeks before a purchase from Walmart ships, but at least there’s some reassurance there that it’ll arrive by early June at the latest. At the time of publishing, Walmart says that orders will ship on Monday, May 24th.W... Continue reading…

Jeff Bezos’ space company Blue Origin is aiming to launch its first crew of humans to the edge of space on July 20th aboard its suborbital space tourism rocket, New Shepard, the company announced on Wednesday. One seat aboard that flight will be auctioned off to support its Club for the Future foundation.“On July 20th, New Shepard will fly its first astronaut crew to space,” the company said in a press release. “We are offering one seat on this first flight to the winning bidder of Blue Origin’s online auction.” The auction starts today, the statement added, inviting the public to place a bid on its website. The statement didn’t include any information on how much each seat will cost going forward.Blue Origin said the auction, managed... Continue reading…

Great for gamers, good for everyone else Continue reading…

Google is today announcing a new feature on Android tablets that plays to one of their greatest strengths: media consumption. The simply named “Entertainment Space” will be a new section to the left of the home screen on tablets from Walmart starting this month, and it’ll expand globally to devices from Lenovo, Sharp, and others later in the year. It’s an all-encompassing hub that brings together video (TV shows, movies, and YouTube), games, and books. Entertainment Space is something Google has been building for a couple years, and it’s one of the more significant changes to the Android tablet experience in a long time.“You’ll save time and avoid having to hop between apps to try to figure out what to do, whether it’s to watch, play or... Continue reading…

4+7=? Continue reading…

Photo by Marcus Brandt/picture alliance via Getty Images The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) has filed a lawsuit against the remote testing company Proctorio on behalf of Miami University student Erik Johnson. The lawsuit is intended to “quash a campaign of harassment designed to undermine important concerns” about the company’s remote test-proctoring software, according to the EFF. It’s the latest legal battle for the software company, which has publicly sparred with online critics throughout the last year.The lawsuit intends to address the company’s behavior toward Johnson in September of last year. After Johnson found out that he’d need to use the software for two of his classes, Johnson dug into the source code of Proctorio’s Chrome extension and made a lengthy Twitter thread... Continue reading…

Photo by Mario Tama / Getty Images The US Department of Labor withdrew a Trump-era rule that would have made it easier for “gig economy” companies like Uber and Lyft to classify their workers as independent contractors. The reversal doesn’t change any gig workers’ current employment status, but it does signal that the Biden administration is taking a less friendly stance toward this sector of the economy.The rule was finalized in early January, before Biden took office, and would have made it more difficult for gig workers to be reclassified as employees under federal law. Over the years, some gig workers have fought to be classified as employees so they could qualify for benefits like paid sick leave, health insurance, and minimum wage.“Stop the erosion of worker... Continue reading…

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge Peloton is issuing a voluntary recall for all of its treadmill products — including both the Peloton Tread and Tread Plus — following a series of accidents that have resulted in multiple injuries and at least one death.In the recall announcement today for the Tread Plus, the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) elaborates that it’s received “72 reports of adult users, children, pets and/or objects being pulled under the rear of the treadmill, including 29 reports of injuries to children such as second- and third-degree abrasions, broken bones, and lacerations.”The two products are being recalled for different reasons: while there are concerns with the Tread Plus that people may be pulled underneath the treadmill, the regular Tread... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Snap can be sued over a Snapchat speed filter that allegedly encouraged reckless driving, despite the generally broad legal protections for social networks. The Ninth Circuit Appeals Court revived a case that was dismissed in 2020, reversing an earlier ruling that favored Snap. It concluded that even if users were populating the filter with their own high driving speeds, Snap could still be liable for implicitly rewarding that behavior.Lemmon v. Snap was filed after a 20-year-old Snapchat user crashed his car while using the filter, at one point driving over 120 miles per hour. The 2017 crash killed the driver and two teenage passengers. Two of the victims’ parents sued Snap for wrongful death, saying its combination of an opaque... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Online game subscriptions are quite common in the gaming industry. Whether it's a subscription for an online service for multiplayer gaming or Netflix-like services that provide access to a massive library of games to play, gaming subscriptions provide good incentives and a lot of value for many gamers.While sales tend to stay steady throughout the year, these subscription services will hold promotions or discounts now and then.PlayStation subscription deals PlayStation Plus is arguably the most popular subscription service available on PlayStation consoles. Subscribing comes with a few perks outside of occasional discounts on the PlayStation Store and playing (most) games online. Each month, Sony provides a rotation of games you... Continue reading…

Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge Whether you own a PS4 or PS5, you probably want to have PS Plus service to be able to play games online and to get complimentary offerings from Sony in the form of games each month. Through Sony, one year of PS Plus costs $60, but Eneba is offering Verge readers a special discount that’ll double it to two years’ worth of service for just $54.Go here and hit “Buy Now” near the top of the page. Then at checkout, make sure to double your quantity to two instead of one, then enter the offer code VERGEMAYPROMO to knock the price from around $60 down to $54. You’ll get two codes, and you can redeem each one into your console as needed when it comes time to replenish your service.With PS Plus on PS5, you’ll gain access to the PlayStation... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Facebook’s Oversight Board has upheld Facebook’s ban on former President Donald Trump, as announced by the organization on Wednesday.However, the board says that “it was not appropriate for Facebook to impose” an indefinite suspension on Trump, and calls on the company to review this decision within the next six months to “determine and justify a proportionate response that is consistent with the rules that are applied to other users of its platform.” That review opens the door to allowing Trump back onto the platform at some point this year but leaves the ultimate decision in Facebook’s hands.“Mr. Trump’s accounts remain suspended,” says FacebookIn a statement issued Wednesday, Facebook’s VP of global affairs and communications Nick... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge A new report from The Intercept has shed light on a worrying new technology that lets law enforcement agencies extract personal data from people’s cars. It reports that US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) recently made an order worth hundreds of thousands of dollars from Swedish data extraction firm MSAB which included iVe “vehicle forensics kits” made by US firm Berla. Here’s what MSAB advertises the kits can do, according to The Intercept:

Facebook, which never saw a social network it couldn’t copy, says its Nextdoor-clone Neighborhoods is now available across Canada and is coming soon to four US cities. According to CNET, the US locations being targeted are Charlotte, North Carolina; San Diego, California; Baton Rouge, Louisiana; and Newark, New Jersey.Like Nextdoor, Neighborhoods is all about corralling geographically-defined groups of users into a single space to discuss local goings-on. Facebook says users should be able to get to know neighbors, ask for recommendations for the best coffee shops or locksmiths, and organize local events. Users can also create splinter groups specific to their interests.“You can find vibrant local Facebook groups about your area, or... Continue reading…

Image: PlayStation Nike, Sony, and basketball player Paul George have collaborated on another pair of sneakers, the PG 5, with help from PS5 designer Yujin Morisawa. According to Sony, “the colors of the shoe are heavily inspired by the industrial design of the PS5” with the PlayStation’s signature circle, square, cross, and triangle shapes woven into the materials like a DualSense controller. There’s also a PlayStation logo on the tongue of the right shoe, while the left’s tongue has Paul George’s PG logo.The release comes a little over two years after Nike and PlayStation’s last sneaker collaboration, the PG 2.5, which drew inspiration from the design of the original PlayStation console. Earlier that year, the two companies worked together on the PG2,... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge One of the Epic v. Apple trial’s big keywords is “cross-wallet play.”In Epic’s Fortnite, “cross-wallet” means you can buy in-game currency (known as V-Bucks) with real money on one device, then spend it on a different device. The latter platform doesn’t get a cut of your initial, non-virtual financial transaction, which is why Nintendo and Sony don’t support cross-wallet access on the Switch and PlayStation.Apple did support cross-wallet play before banning Fortnite last year — and on the trial’s second day, that fact became a serious pitfall for Epic. Apple continued a long cross-examination of Epic CEO Tim Sweeney, whose hours of testimony included a digression on whether Fortnite counts as a true metaverse or simply a big... Continue reading…

Photo by Thomas Ricker / The Verge WhatsApp is again rolling out its payments service in Brazil, after the service was suspended by Brazil’s Central Bank in June of 2020 a few days after it launched there. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg made the announcement in a video aired in Brazil, where he spoke about how the payment information added to WhatsApp will also be able to be used on Facebook and Instagram.According to David Marcus the head of Facebook Financial, the service returning to Brazil will be part of a “gradual rollout,” but it seems like the company is serious about it returning: it’s already posted a video promoting the service, and has published a page that states the underlying Facebook Pay system has been authorized by the Central Bank (Facebook is... Continue reading…

Image: Boost Mobile In what looks to be a first in terms of subscriber perks, Boost Mobile has announced that its $60 per month Unlimited Plus cellphone plan will come with access to to 24/7 telemedicine through K Health starting this summer.Specifically, Unlimited Plus subscribers will get all of the features of K Health’s usual $9-per-month offering. That includes the ability to text chat or hop on a video call with a doctor through the K Health app, which uses the app’s AI suggestions to identify symptoms and potential ailments, and receive actual treatment, including medications and other prescriptions.The service is free and available for all Boost Unlimited Plus subscribers and offered at a discounted price of $7.99 per month for all of Boost... Continue reading…

Basecamp’s CEO published a blog post about policy changes — it may have broken the company Continue reading…

Image: Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum May Fourth is informally the Star Wars Day holiday, which random brands typically use to hawk their wares. Although it’s not as bad as the promotions that come out of the woodwork on April Fools’ Day, I think I’m drawing the line at the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum adding an X-wing Starfighter from Star Wars to its collection. The museum announced today that the famous ship would be going on display in 2022, via a prop loan from the Disney-owned production company, Lucasfilm.The Smithsonian says the X-wing in question is from Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker and will be displayed outside the museum’s Albert Einstein Planetarium after undergoing “conservation in the Restoration Hangar in the Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center.” ... Continue reading…

Photo Illustration by Pavlo Gonchar/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images An AT&T policy that bars employees from recording conversations with managers or colleagues is legal, according to a ruling from the National Labor Relations Board Monday. The board found that while AT&T violated US labor law in how it had applied the policy, the recording ban itself was not illegal.According to AT&T’s rules, “employees may not record telephone or other conversations they have with their co-workers, managers or third parties unless such recordings are approved in advance by the Legal Department.”In its decision, the NLRB overturned part of an earlier ruling which said that the policy’s potential to infringe on workers’ rights outweighed AT&T’s need to keep customer data private.The case centers on a complaint filed... Continue reading…

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge HTC is planning to unveil two Vive virtual reality headsets at its ViveCon 2021 conference that’s happening on May 11th and May 12th, according to Protocol. While the original Vive and Vive Pro headsets were associated more with gaming, the high-end Vive Pro 2 and Vive Focus 3 Business Edition will reportedly be aimed toward the enterprise sector.No specs or images of either headset have surfaced, so it’s unclear if both will be tethered headsets that require a PC to use or if one will have a standalone, wire-free design to take on the likes of the Oculus Quest 2.The report from Protocol states that both headsets were mentioned in HTC company documents and were also briefly listed on European e-commerce site Alzashop. Before those... Continue reading…

Lenovo A new Show Mode feature from Amazon is now rolling out to some Lenovo laptops. When you activate this, it will change your home screen to look like the home screen of an Echo Show smart display, in a similar fashion to the Show Mode feature on Amazon’s tablets. That means you’ll be able to do smart display things like controlling smart home devices, glancing at the weather and news headlines, and chatting with Alexa — you know, the kind of stuff you’ve always wished you could do on your ThinkPad.The feature is currently rolling out to Yoga, ThinkPad, and IdeaPad PCs that have Alexa built in, and it’s available in the US, UK, Germany, Japan, India, Ireland, Australia, Canada, France, Italy, Spain, Australia, and New Zealand. Lenovo says... Continue reading…

Apple Watch | Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge The Apple Watch Series 3 was first released in September 2017, bringing fitness improvements and a faster processor. Nearly four years later, in 2021, Apple is still selling the Series 3 as its entry-level Apple Watch model starting at $199, an $80 savings compared to the more recent Apple Watch SE. Only, as I’ve recently learned, “still selling” and “supporting in a reasonable manner” are two very different things, and updating an Apple Watch Series 3 in 2021 is a nightmare of infuriating technological hoops to jump through.Normally, updating an Apple Watch is an annoyingly long but straightforward process: you charge your Watch up to 50 percent, plug it in, and wait for the slow process of the update transferring and installing to... Continue reading…

Alex Castro/The Verge In a new blog post, Basecamp CEO Jason Fried apologized after the “policy changes” he announced last week ultimately led to a third of the company’s workforce opting to leave.“Last week was terrible. We started with policy changes that felt simple, reasonable, and principled, and it blew things up culturally in ways we never anticipated,” Fried wrote. “David and I completely own the consequences, and we’re sorry. We have a lot to learn and reflect on, and we will.”The blog post that started the software company’s terrible week was a list of new company policies that prohibited, among other things, “societal and political discussions” on internal forums.

Image: Google Google seems to be getting a little ahead of itself. This afternoon, as noticed by 9to5Google and others, the official Android account on Twitter tweeted a photo of the “Pixel Buds A-Series” and said the earbuds “have arrived.” Except... they definitely haven’t. Google has yet to properly announce the Pixel Buds A-Series, which are expected to be sold at a lower price than the standard $179 model.The tweet, which also mentioned the “quality sound and quick Bluetooth pairing” of Google’s latest buds, has since been deleted. Google has a history of, well, just tweeting out future products, but this does seem to have been an error. Google I/O 2021 is scheduled to start in two weeks on May 18th. But based on the mistaken... Continue reading…

Photo Illustration by Pavlo Gonchar/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images After months of promising his own social media network for banned posters, former President Donald Trump on Tuesday launched a new section of his website that’s essentially just a WordPress blog.The new “platform” is styled like a generic version of Twitter but hosted as a running blog of commentary from Trump. People can sign up for post alerts on the platform through their email and phone numbers and are allegedly able to like them, although that function doesn’t appear to work as of publication. Users are also allowed to share Trump’s posts on Facebook and Twitter. The Twitter sharing option doesn’t currently work, but Facebook’s does allow people to share Trump’s posts.The new “platform” is effectively a blog styled like a generic... Continue reading…

Photo by Monica Chin / The Verge Dell has released a security patch that fixes a security vulnerability affecting many Dell computers going back to 2009, along with instructions on how to install it if your computer is affected (via threatpost). The vulnerability, found by security research firm SentinelLabs, is present in a driver used by Dell and Alienware’s firmware update utilities, and it allows an attacker to gain full kernel-level permissions in Windows.If you have a Dell computer, there’s a good chance it could be vulnerable — the list of affected computers on Dell’s website has over 380 models on it, including some of the latest XPS 13 and 15 models, and the G3, G5, and G7 gaming laptops. Dell also lists almost 200 affected computers that it considers to be... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Tinder wants to give you more info on what you and a match have in common, so it’s launching a new quiz feature to help out. The quizzes, called Vibes, will pop up once a week and ask an assortment of goofy questions, from “_____ is not picnic food” to “Are you always 20 minutes early or 10 minutes late?” If another person gave the same answers as you, those answers will appear on their profile or, if you match, in your chat together.Vibes isn’t turning Tinder into a full-on OkCupid rival for endless, silly personality quiz questions. The answers are temporary, vanishing after a few days. So you’ll have to return to the app and answer new questions the following week if you want to participate again. Image: Tinder ... Continue reading…

Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney was asking Apple to open its phones to other app stores as early as 2015, according to new emails made public as part of the companies’ antitrust trial. Under the subject line “iOS as an open platform,” Sweeney emailed Apple CEO Tim Cook directly to make the case for allowing other app stores to distribute software on iOS.“The App Store has done much good for the industry,” Sweeney wrote to Cook, “but it doesn’t seem tenable for Apple to be the sole arbiter of expression and commerce over an app platform approaching a billion users.”In particular, Sweeney asked to “separate iOS App Store curation from compliance review and app distribution,” essentially suggesting that Apple could maintain its security... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Nvidia appears to be getting ready to launch its RTX 3080 Ti graphics card later this month. Over the past few weeks, RTX 3080 Ti cards have reportedly been spotted on shipping pallets, in retail boxes, and now in the hands of someone. VideoCardz has been at the center of tracking down Nvidia’s rumored RTX 3080 Ti card, and it reports the GPU will be launched on May 31st, alongside the RTX 3070 Ti.The RTX 3080 Ti will reportedly include 12GB of GDDR6X memory, a 2GB increase over what’s found on the RTX 3080. A wider 384-bit bus is rumored, matching the RTX 3090 — and an increase to the memory bandwidth over the RTX 3080. What this all means in terms of performance isn’t exactly clear yet, but it certainly looks like the RTX 3080 Ti will... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Reddit had a bit of a blip on Tuesday afternoon, going down for almost an hour. According to Reddit’s status page, the issues started around 1:56PM ET. At 2:17PM ET, Downdetector reports spiked, with around 45,000 users reporting problems connecting to its homepage and subreddits. Staff here at The Verge were also unable to load the site, with some getting a blank homepage and others experiencing slow loading times and getting kicked off of pages.The status page now indicates that Reddit has implemented a fix and is monitoring the results. While the status page still shows that there’s a partial outage, we were all able to successfully load and browse the site. Downdetector reports are also dropping, indicating that more... Continue reading…

A shopper walks down an aisle of in-wall air conditioners at a Lowe’s home improvement store August 2, 2006 in Arlington Heights, Illinois. | Photo by Tim Boyle/Getty Images “Super” greenhouse gases will soon be phased down in air conditioners and refrigerators in the US. The Environmental Protection Agency yesterday proposed new rules to cut the use of the “super” pollutants used as refrigerants, hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs), by 85 percent over 15 years. Consumers likely won’t notice much of a difference with their appliances, but lawmakers are anticipating big benefits for the planet.The EPA plans to determine a baseline for HFC production and consumption, and then set limits on companies making and importing HFCs. Those caps would become stricter over time. This is the agency’s first major new regulation taking on climate change under the Biden administration, and it makes good on a bipartisan commitment... Continue reading…

Photo by Jakub Porzycki/NurPhoto via Getty Images Uber announced that it was teaming up with delivery startup Gopuff to expand its delivery business. Gopuff, which acquired liquor store chain BevMo last year, will make its inventory of convenience and grocery store items available to Uber as part of this new deal. The companies plan to roll out their new offerings to customers in 95 cities starting this June and nationwide later in the year.Gopuff specializes in delivering “essential” or “instant need” items, which is defines as “liquor, local favorites, beauty and pet products, snacks and [over-the-counter] medication.” The company will handle the logistics and delivery of the items, with Uber taking a cut of the transaction through its app. Gopuff, which was founded in 2013,... Continue reading…

The British Royal Navy has apparently been testing using jet suits to board ships like a scene out of some scrapped Christopher Nolan film, according to a new video released by UK-based Gravity Industries. Business Insider writes that the tests were conducted over three days on the HMS Tamar, a Royal Navy Batch 2 River-class offshore patrol ship.Royal Marines used Gravity Industries’ Jet Suit to conduct a “visit, board, search, and seizure” operation or VBSS. Basically a marine launched from a fast boat tailing the HMS Tamar, flew through the air like a slightly askew Iron Man, and landed on the larger ship, dropping a rope below so their fast boat buddies could climb up and “visit” the simulated enemy vessel.The whole thing is very... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Epic pushed Microsoft to open up its Xbox network for free multiplayer gaming just weeks before the Apple and Fortnite battle. In the weeks leading up to Epic Games’ decision to circumvent Apple’s 30 percent cut on Fortnite in-app purchases, CEO Tim Sweeney sent an email to Xbox chief Phil Spencer teasing something big and asking whether Microsoft could time free multiplayer with Fortnite season 14.“Epic has certain plans for August that will provide an extraordinary opportunity to highlight the value proposition of consoles and PCs, in contrast to mobile platforms, and to onboard new console users,” said Sweeney. “While I can’t share details with any third party at this point, I give you Epic’s assurance that our efforts will be... Continue reading…

Japreece Dean of the Minnesota Lynx handles the ball against the Atlanta Dream. | Photo by Dale Zanine/NBAE via Getty Images For its upcoming 25th season, the Women’s National Basketball Association will broadcast games on Twitter, Facebook Watch, Oculus, and the Paramount Plus streaming platform, the league announced.Twelve games will air on Twitter, and tweets from fans will be included as part of the broadcast. Facebook will stream 20 WNBA games on its Watch platform and its Oculus Quest and Quest 2 VR headsets, and three games will be shown on Paramount Plus.ESPN’s platforms will show 25 regular-season games, three on ESPN, 12 games on ESPN2, and nine games on ABC. The WNBA’s All Star Game will also air on ESPN, and ESPN networks will cover 19 post-season games during the playoffs. All regular-season and post-season games that air on ESPN will also... Continue reading…

After four years of support, the S8 and S8 Plus will no longer receive security updates. | Photo by James Bareham / The Verge Four years after its launch, the Samsung Galaxy S8 has received its last security update. The Galaxy S8 was a well-timed success story for Samsung, launching in the spring of 2017 with a bold design that drew attention away from the well-documented Galaxy Note 7 battery problems of the previous six months.The S8 marked a design shift for Galaxy devices, with a wider-aspect edge-to-edge screen with minimal bezels that made it one of the best-looking phones we’d seen at that point. It wasn’t just a good-looking device, either; it offered excellent hardware and a great camera, combined with a remarkably restrained software implementation. Best of all, the batteries did not catch fire.Samsung has one of the best support policies in the... Continue reading…

A routine mammogram | Photo by: BSIP/Universal Images Group via Getty Images In the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States, as people avoided doctors’ offices and hospitals canceled nonessential appointments, routine cancer screenings plummeted. Now, we’re starting to see the consequences.ProPublica tells the story of Teresa Ruvalcaba, a factory worker in Chicago who ignored searing pain in her chest for six months. She was busy with work and afraid of catching COVID-19 at the doctor’s office, and when she finally went to the emergency room, she was diagnosed with advanced inflammatory breast cancer. It was one of the most severe cases oncologist Pam Khosla had seen in a decade.Cancer death rates have dropped over 30 percent since the early 1990s, a decline fueled by early detection and new... Continue reading…

Will Smith has a new fitness show coming to YouTube. | Image: YouTube YouTube announced a new slate of original series today that includes some huge stars at the top of the lineup. Will Smith will star in a six-part reality series about fitness and “returning his body into the best shape of his life,” and a four-part series will go behind the scenes with Alicia Keys as she records a new album.The new lineup of originals also includes a third season of Liza Koshy’s Liza on Demand; a new special focused on Asian American chefs, celebrities, activists, and creators that counts LeBron James and Michelle Kwan as executive producers; and a new special called Barbershop Medicine that explores the intersection of race and socioeconomic status that came out of the #YouTubeBlack Voices Fund that was announced last... Continue reading…

Two companies that have built their businesses on computer accessories are coming together. Targus, a company best known for its laptop cases and bags, today announced that it’s acquiring Sanho. You might not be familiar with Sanho itself, but it’s more likely you’d recognize the company’s Hyper and HyperDrive lineup of USB-C accessories that are sold on Amazon, at Best Buy, and elsewhere.Targus CEO Mikel Williams said the deal “allows for Targus to add capability and support to Hyper’s growing tech brand, and gives Hyper access to new channels, customers and a global footprint of sales and marketing resources.” Williams added that “Hyper has a strong and exciting brand that has excellent reach into the Apple community and, importantly,... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Robinhood ran into issues processing cryptocurrency trades this morning, during a spike in the price of Dogecoin that sent users flocking to the app. The website DownDetector shows the outage starting around 9:30AM ET and reducing in severity about an hour later. Robinhood confirmed that it experienced a “partial outage” in crypto trading and said the issues had been resolved as of 11:15AM ET.The outage was particularly noticeable since it came during a spike (and subsequent dip) in Dogecoin prices. Coins were priced at around $0.40 USD at the beginning of the day. Around 8AM ET, they spiked past $0.50 USD and reached as high as $0.60 USD near 10AM ET.

Image: Instagram Instagram now has a captions sticker for Stories, which will automatically transcribe speech in videos. The sticker will be available only in “English and English-speaking countries” for now but will eventually roll out to other languages and countries. Instagram says it will also start testing automated captions in Reels soon.Captions have been available in IGTV and the Threads app, and Instagram says it’s adding them to Stories and Reels to make them more efficient and inclusive to watch. The feature should be a welcome addition for people who are deaf or hard of hearing, are not native English speakers, or just generally watch videos without sound. The edit option lists each word of the captions separately. You can... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge The Epic Games v. Apple trial started on Monday, and if you wanted to follow along and listen to Epic CEO Tim Sweeney talk about the “metaverse,” your options were limited. In theory, there’s public access to the trial, like most court proceedings, but since the courthouse is still closed for lockdown, the only access was through the court’s teleconference line that was briefly overrun by screaming teens.But for anyone looking for more user-friendly options, there’s good news. A surprising, small community of streamers has decided to rebroadcast the trial on streaming platforms — places built for the people who play Fortnite rather than the antitrust policy wonks in the courtroom. For yesterday’s proceeding, I found a handful of... Continue reading…

Image: Lucasfilm Ltd. The Bad Batch has arrived today as the latest Star Wars spinoff series for Disney Plus. It’s a different, smaller show than preceding animated shows like The Clone Wars or Rebels, focusing on a single squad of clone troopers, Clone Force 99 — the titular “Bad Batch” — and its struggle to find a place in the galaxy following the rise of the Empire.Unlike the other clone troopers, the Bad Batch’s members were cloned with an emphasis on specific genetic abnormalities. Hunter, for example, has improved senses, while Wrecker is far larger and stronger than the average clone.The Bad Batch was first introduced in the resurrected seventh season of Dave Filoni’s animated The Clone Wars series (which was brought back after its original... Continue reading…

In the Earth. | Photo: Neon An unsettling film that evades the genre’s usual tropes Continue reading…

Photo Illustration by Grayson Blackmon / The Verge Shopify’s Harley Finkelstein on competing with the tech giants during the pandemic Continue reading…