The Verge

A major Super Smash Bros. tournament is canceling plans to move online amid the coronavirus pandemic, following a legal order by Nintendo. As Polygon reports, The Big House — typically one of the year’s biggest Smash competitions — announced yesterday that it’s shutting down its early December event and offering refunds. “The Big House is heartbroken to share we’ve received a cease and desist from Nintendo,” the organizers wrote on Twitter. “We are forced to comply with the order and cancel The Big House Online.”Nintendo objected to the organizers using Slippi, a software tool that makes Super Smash Bros. Melee playable online. The 2001 GameCube title is a mainstay in competitive Super Smash Bros., and translating its hyper-fast-paced... Continue reading…

Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge Last week on The Vergecast, the crew spent some time discussing Apple’s announcement of new Mac computers with its own Arm-based processor chip, which Apple is calling the M1. This week, Vergecast co-hosts Nilay Patel and Dieter Bohn got their hands on the new MacBook Air and MacBook Pro with the M1 chips for review and brought their findings to this week’s episode.Nilay and Dieter also bring in deputy editor Dan Seifert and editor Chris Welch to discuss their experiences with the new computers in regards to performance, battery life, and running iOS apps on macOS.But before they got into all of that, The Vergecast starts the discussion with an interview with legendary tech reviewer Walt Mossberg, who was able to try out the new... Continue reading…

Photo by Tom Warren / The Verge Microsoft and Apple are working together so the new Xbox Series X and Series S controllers will work on iPhones and iPads. Currently, the new controllers are not officially supported in iOS or iPadOS, but Apple says “Microsoft and Apple are working together to bring compatibility for the Xbox Series X controller to customers in a future update.”This isn’t the first time the two companies have had to work on improving Xbox controller support. Apple worked with Microsoft to add support for the Xbox Elite 2 controller and the Xbox Adaptive Controller to iOS 14 earlier this year. The support debuted nearly a year after the Elite 2’s release, though.It’s not clear how long it will take Apple to certify the new Series X controllers, but... Continue reading…

Photo by Keith Bedford / The Boston Globe via Getty Images Shortly after midnight on March 18th, 1990, security guard Rick Abath allowed two men dressed as police officers to enter the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston. This decision may have been “the most costly mistake in art history,” according to The Boston Globe. The men stole 13 artworks worth more than $500 million and left Abath handcuffed in the basement.The mystery of the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum heist has never been solved. Today, the pilfered works are part of the National Stolen Art File, a database of looted treasures curated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.The 23 agents in charge of this effort are part of the FBI’s art crime team. Created in 2004, the team’s mandate is to track down and return stolen art.... Continue reading…

Photo by ANKUR DHOLAKIA/AFP via Getty Images A few weeks ago, Oregon voters passed Ballot Measure 110, the Drug Decriminalization and Addiction Treatment Initiative. The measure eliminates criminal penalties for the possession of small quantities of drugs such as heroin, cocaine, and methamphetamine. It was one of several drug reform victories on Election Day, but Oregon’s decision is of particular interest to public health experts and recovery advocates, many of whom have pointed to decriminalization as a necessity for any widespread reduction of substance use disorders, drug-related diseases, and overdoses.“Our drug laws are a major driver of health outcomes,” says Leo Beletsky, director of the Health in Justice Action Lab. Though existing drug laws are ostensibly about public... Continue reading…

Image: Nintendo Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp, the smartphone entry in the long-running Nintendo franchise, has been updated with a pair of new augmented reality features. The first, AR Camera, lets you place characters and furniture from the game in the real world and photograph them. Meanwhile, the AR Cabin feature lets players decorate a virtual cabin, fill it with characters, and then view it in augmented reality from their smartphone.Along with the new AR modes, Nintendo says the update means more areas of each campsite can have furniture and items placed within them. Image: Nintendo AR Cabin lets you assemble a virtual room and then explore it in augmented reality. Unfortunately, the new features have increased the... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Just a few weeks after Facebook removed a huge “Stop the Steal” group for spreading election disinformation, others have sprung up in its place and appear to be continuing the push to delegitimize the US presidential election.OneZero discovered two large groups with a total of more than 100,000 members sharing disinformation that the election was “stolen” by Democrats. We were unable to verify those two groups, which may have since been removed by Facebook. But our own research confirms the broader point: as of Friday morning, hundreds of Stop the Steal groups — some private, some public, some hyperlocal — were alive and well on Facebook. While many of the groups were new and had a few hundred members each, some were sizable: one... Continue reading…

Consider, for a moment, the career of Armando Iannucci, noted Scottish satirist. He’s famous for whip-smart and ruthless political comedies like the acidic TV show Veep and the brutally comic films In The Loop and The Death of Stalin. His latest project, out this week to rent or buy on demand, is quite different from all that. Here’s the swerve: The Personal History of David Copperfield is a relatively straightforward adaptation of Charles Dickens’ most famous novel, David Copperfield. Unlike a lot of Iannucci’s most famous work, The Personal History of David Copperfield is a warm and loving story, a period drama that, like Greta Gerwig’s Little Women, is faithful to its source material yet modern in its vision. (It does retain... Continue reading…

In the annals of video games, there are an uncountable number of products — canceled games, scrapped hardware — that feel as though they’re lost to time. But most of the time they’re only forgotten, not lost. And that’s where the Video Game History Foundation steps in. As the name suggests, the foundation is an organization that preserves the history of video games, piece by piece. Today they’ve outdone themselves: the foundation’s head digital conservationist Rich Whitehouse has written a long blog post about how he managed to resurrect a canceled game — Nuclear Rush — that was planned for the Sega Genesis VR helmet. What’s more: Whitehouse actually managed to emulate the Sega VR headset hardware so it runs on current-gen VR headsets.... Continue reading…

Image: Lucasfilm Ltd. For much of The Mandalorian, Baby Yoda has existed as the show’s ultimate MacGuffin. The Empire — particularly, Giancarlo Esposito’s Moff Gideon — has been willing to go through huge expense and effort to get their hands on the little green guy, but one of the biggest questions in the series has been “why?”Season 2, episode 4, “The Siege,” finally gives an answer — but it’s tied to one of the most controversial, even reviled, aspects of George Lucas’ prequel films.Spoilers below for The Mandalorian season 2, episode 4, and the Star Wars filmsIt’s midi-chlorians.As a recording of bespectacled Dr. Pershing (last seen taking a blood sample from Baby Yoda in season 1) reveals, Moff Gideon appears to be experimenting with injecting test... Continue reading…

Photo by Cameron Faulkner / The Verge Razer’s latest Blade 15 Advanced gaming laptop is $600 off its usual price at the Microsoft Store. Normally $2,600 (and still that price over at Razer’s site), it’s down to $2,000. That’s still a lot of money, but this configuration makes up for it with solid specs. It features a 15.6-inch FHD display with a fast 300Hz refresh rate, so your games and other content will display smoothly, and the eight-core Intel Core i7-10875H processor and Nvidia RTX 2070 Super Max-Q graphics chip are a powerful duo. This model also features 16GB of RAM and a 512GB PCIe SSD (both of which are user-upgradeable).To top it off, Razer’s chassis is still among the best that you can find in a gaming laptop. It’s thin, well-designed, sturdy, and it doesn’t... Continue reading…

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Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge One of the big selling points of next-gen consoles like the PS5 or Xbox Series X is support for games running at 120fps on TVs and monitors that include 120Hz modes. While we’ve already seen a number of new Xbox and PS5 games running at 120fps, some existing games are only being updated with 120fps for the Xbox Series X, and not the PS5.Both Call of Duty: Warzone and Rocket League, for example, only include support for 120fps on the Xbox Series X. Activision has not commented on why only Warzone on the Xbox Series X has this support, but Rocket League developer Psyonix has revealed to Eurogamer that it’s more complicated to enable on the PS5 side. 120Hz mode in DIRT 5 on Xbox Series X. “Enabling 120Hz on Xbox... Continue reading…

Photo by Deborah Feingold/Getty Images From Windows 1.0 to Windows 10 Continue reading…

Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge Last week I wrote that Apple seemed “astonishingly confident” in its new M1-based Macs. This week we know why: they are astonishingly good. I reviewed the MacBook Air, Nilay Patel reviewed the entry-level 13-inch MacBook Pro, and Chris Welch reviewed the new Mac mini.All three are equally impressive, but it’s the Air in particular that stands out as offering incredible power at its price point. I’m also impressed with battery life. And the fact that Apple’s Rosetta 2 translation layer doesn’t cause slowdown or bugs for legacy apps.Wins all around, then. Not very often that happens in consumer tech! The webcams are still terrible and there are lots of questions about what will happen with the truly pro Macs we will start seeing in the... Continue reading…

The voice assistant integrates with other Google services like Photos. | Image: Samsung Google Assistant is now available on Samsung’s 2020 TVs in the UK, France, Germany, and Italy, and will be available in 12 countries by the end of the year, Samsung has announced. This follows the launch of Google’s voice assistant on Samsung’s TVs in the US last month. Samsung says it’ll roll out in Spain, Brazil, India and South Korea by late November. The voice assistant is available alongside Amazon’s Alexa and Samsung’s own Bixby voice assistants.According to Samsung, Google’s voice assistant can be used to control the TV directly with commands like changing channels or adjusting the volume, or else it can control other Google Assistant-compatible smart home devices like thermostats or lights. You can also ask it for information on... Continue reading…

Microsoft is making a big push to entice fans of Zoom over to Microsoft Teams with a new all-day video calling option that can be used for free. While the software giant launched Microsoft Teams for consumers on mobile earlier this year, it’s now bringing Teams’ friends and family features to the desktop and web allowing you to create a Microsoft Teams meeting for up to 300 friends and family that can run all day free of charge.You won’t need a Microsoft Account or the Microsoft Teams app to join calls, as you can join free via a web browser. Microsoft Teams will also support seeing up to 49 friends or family members in a gallery view or through its Together Mode feature that puts you side by side in a virtual environment. ... Continue reading…

iFixit iFixit has gotten its hands on Apple’s new M1-powered MacBook Air and MacBook Pro, which of course is to say that its team has torn the laptops apart to find out what’s inside. And, while the Air and the Pro have set groundbreaking new standards for performance and efficiency, it turns out that this can be attributed almost entirely to the M1 chip rather than any particular design changes.Take the new MacBook Pro, for instance. Here’s this year’s Intel-based model on the left, with the new M1 version on the right:The internal layouts of the two computers are almost identical. iFixit notes that the M1 model uses exactly the same fan component as its Intel predecessor, for example, which really does drive home the M1 chip’s efficiency... Continue reading…

Image: Rocket Labe After launching one of its rockets to orbit on Thursday, small satellite launcher Rocket Lab successfully brought the vehicle back to Earth and landed it gently in the ocean underneath a series of parachutes. The maneuver was part of an intricate dress rehearsal, meant to practice nearly all of the steps Rocket Lab will take to recover and reuse its rockets in the future.Rocket Lab’s primary rocket is the Electron, aimed at launching batches of small satellites into low Earth orbit. For all of the company’s 15 launches up until now, the Electron has been expendable, with an entirely new rocket used for each new mission. But in 2019, Rocket Lab announced its plans to try to save the majority of the Electron rocket following future... Continue reading…

Image: Puffballs United The Internet Archive — the non-profit digital library known for the Wayback Machine — announced that it will now preserve Flash animations and games, ahead of Adobe’s planned demise for the defunct web software at the end of 2020. The Archive will emulate the content so it plays as it used to, preserving critical elements of early internet culture for browsers that can no longer run them.The Internet Archive says you can already browse over 1,000 games and animations that it’s saved, including classics like “Peanut Butter Jelly Time” and “All your base are belong to us”. The organization says emulation is made possible by an in-development Flash emulator called Ruffle that it’s incorporated into its system. While Ruffle’s developers... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Alan Dean Foster, author of several Star Wars novelizations, says Disney hasn’t paid him his royalties. According to Foster, Disney has also asked him to sign a non-disclosure agreement before the company will speak with him.“You continue to ignore requests from my agents,” Foster wrote in a letter published by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America. “You continue to ignore queries from SFWA, the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America. You continue to ignore my legal representatives. I know this is what gargantuan corporations often do. Ignore requests and inquiries hoping the petitioner will simply go away. Or possibly die. But I’m still here, and I am still entitled to what you owe me.”Foster ghost-wrote the... Continue reading…

Photo by Tom Warren / The Verge Why is it so hard to place an order for a next-gen console or new Nvidia graphics card? Continue reading…

Photo By Stephen McCarthy/Sportsfile via Getty Images Kevin Lin, a Twitch co-founder, is leaving the company, he announced in a Medium post on Thursday. With Lin’s departure, the only remaining co-founder at Twitch is its CEO, Emmett Shear — co-founders Justin Kan, Kyle Vogt, and Michael Seibel are no longer with the company.Lin also served as Twitch’s chief operating officer from from April 2008 to January 2018, according to his LinkedIn.Lin wasn’t specific about what he plans to do next. “I am looking forward to spending time with family and loved ones, some sleep and relaxation, some fitness, and of course, a lot of video games,” Lin said in his Medium blog. “I’m so excited to stretch my curiosity and to continue exploring a world where technology is a positive amplifier in our lives.... Continue reading…

Image: Roblox The company behind the hit kids game Roblox is going public after soaring use during the pandemic. The company now has 31.1 million daily users who have spent an average of 2.6 hours per day in the game this year, according to Roblox’s prospectus.Roblox has been around since 2004, but the game nearly doubled its daily users over the last nine months as it’s provided a social space where its players — mostly kids and teens — can hang out while stuck inside.Roblox reported revenue of $588.7 million during the first nine months of 2020, a 68 percent increase over the same period in 2019. The company has spent a lot more money as it’s grown, though. Roblox reported losses of $203.2 million for the first nine months of 2020 — an increase so... Continue reading…

Photo credit should read PAUL J. RICHARDS/AFP via Getty Images RadioShack’s shambling remains were given another jolt of life today when they were purchased by another company that plans to relaunch the once-great retailer as an online-focused brand.The store’s remains were purchased by Retail Ecommerce Ventures (REV), a startup founded in 2019 that’s been scooping up brands from other faded retail giants as well, including Pier 1, Modell’s Sporting Goods, Dressbarn, and more. REV says RadioShack’s website already has “strong existing sales and sales potential,” and the company is “confident” it can further raise awareness of the brand internationally.REV claims it’s successfully turned around other companies it’s launched as online brands. The Wall Street Journal reported that Dressbarn more than... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge PayPal announced a new fundraising service called “Generosity Network” that seems poised to take on GoFundMe, part of PayPal’s continued expansion into financial services it’s been missing until now. The service allows you to set up a fundraising page and process donations through PayPal’s payment platform. Transaction fees are waived on donations made with credit and debit cards, but according to TechCrunch, PayPal does intend to charge eventually.Generosity Network seems as easy to use as GoFundMe, but unlike the popular platform, it limits the length of campaigns to 30 days and caps the total amount of donations you’re able to collect at $20,000. The service can be used by individuals, businesses, and organizations, provided they... Continue reading…

Messaging app Go SMS Pro, which has over 100 million installs from the Google Play store, has a massive security flaw that potentially allows people to access the sensitive content you’ve sent using the app. And even though the app’s maker was informed about the issue months ago, they haven’t made updates to fix what’s going on.To give you an idea of just how much information the app leaks, here’s what TechCrunch was able to find: “In viewing just a few dozen links, we found a person’s phone number, a screenshot of a bank transfer, an order confirmation including someone’s home address, an arrest record, and far more explicit photos than we were expecting, to be quite honest,” cybersecurity reporter Zack Whittaker says. Not great.H... Continue reading…

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Jonah Peretti, founder of BuzzFeed | Photo by Bodo Marks / picture alliance via Getty Images BuzzFeed and HuffPost, formerly separate, are now one, as first reported by The Wall Street Journal. Verizon — which previously owned HuffPost, née The Huffington Post — has dumped the powerhouse digital media brand in an all-stock deal.The pairing makes sense. Jonah Peretti, now CEO of BuzzFeed, was a co-founder of what was then called The Huffington Post. In fact, BuzzFeed, which started its life as a company that abused young people to “curate” viral content for ad dollars and hoovered up tons of venture capital in the process, was founded by Peretti in his free time while he was working at The Huffington Post. (The name was changed in 2017 as part of a company-wide rebranding led by former editor-in-chief Lydia Polgreen, who’s now... Continue reading…

Asus Asus has announced its new Chromebox 4, a mini PC that runs Chrome OS.Visually, the Chromebox 4 looks fairly similar to its predecessor (the Chromebox 3). Both are black with the Asus logo in the middle and the Chrome logo in the top left corner. It’s also the same size — 5.85 x 5.85 x 1.58 inches — but Asus has made a big change under the hood. Where the Chromebox 3 was powered by 8th Gen Intel processors, the Chromebox 4 offers 10th Gen Intel processors. Asus says these will deliver “faster, smoother and more energy-efficient performance.” Image: Asus The Chromebox 4 comes with a new lockable VESA mount and a 65W power adapter. The new Chromebox can include an Intel Celeron 5205U or one of three Intel Core... Continue reading…

Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge Apple has released iOS 14.2.1 with a number of fixes, including for one that the company says will address problems with the lock screen becoming unresponsive on the iPhone 12 mini.The iPhone 12 mini was officially released on Friday, but users reported sensitivity issues with the lock screen shortly after. Some users had problems swiping up from the bottom of the lock screen when trying to unlock their phone as well as issues pressing the flashlight or camera buttons.It’s unclear exactly what caused the lock screen problems, and I haven’t run into any on my iPhone 12 mini that I got on Friday. Apparently, Apple found something it could fix, though, and hopefully this update resolves the issue for those who were having problems.Apple... Continue reading…

Lime unveiled its fourth-generation electric scooter with a swappable battery and enhanced safety features. The company also announced it was “cash flow positive” in the third quarter of 2020 — a sign that the scooter sharing giant is getting closer to becoming profitable for the first time.In an appearance at The Wall Street Journal’s “Future of Everything” conference, Lime CEO Wayne Ting claimed to be the first mobility company to have a cash flow-positive quarter.Being cash flow positive means Lime has more money going into the business at a given time than going out. But it’s not the same as having net income or being profitable after adjusting your earnings for interest and taxes, also known as EBIT. Lime expects to be... Continue reading…

Photo by Michele Doying / The Verge Facebook says it is proactively detecting more hate speech using artificial intelligence. A new transparency report released on Thursday offers greater detail on social media hate following policy changes earlier this year, although it leaves some big questions unanswered.Facebook’s quarterly report includes new information about hate speech prevalence. The company estimates that 0.10 to 0.11 percent of what Facebook users see violates hate speech rules, equating to “10 to 11 views of hate speech for every 10,000 views of content.” That’s based on a random sample of posts and measures the reach of content rather than pure post count, capturing the effect of hugely viral posts. It hasn’t been evaluated by external sources, though. On a... Continue reading…

Image: Eero Amazon-owned Eero is adding new features to its $2.99-per-month Eero Secure subscription plan, including new ways to give users more control over what content is accessible on Eero networks.One of the changes is to Eero’s content filtering system, which already let you restrict access to certain types of content on a per-person basis. (That means you could set different content filtering profiles for a grade-school child and a teenager, for example.) Eero has added new filters you can select, including for social media, YouTube, and streaming. And if you want more granular control over what certain people can or can’t see, you’ll now be able to block or allow specific websites from being accessible on individual devices.You can also... Continue reading…

General Motors announced Thursday that it was dumping more money into its electrification plans and would also be accelerating its production to release more electric vehicles sooner than expected.Speaking at a conference hosted by the British bank Barclays, GM CEO Mary Barra said the company would spend $27 billion on electric and autonomous vehicles through 2025 — up from the $20 billion it announced before the COVID-19 pandemic. Also by 2025, GM will launch 30 new electric vehicles around the world, more than two-thirds of which will be available in North America. The vehicles will span GM’s entire brand portfolio, including Cadillac, Buick, GMC, and Chevrolet, and will come in a range of prices.Previously, the company said it... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Officials at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said that people should not travel for Thanksgiving, citing the rapid increases in COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations around the country. “It’s a strong recommendation,” said Henry Walke, COVID-19 incident manager at the CDC, during a press briefing.The United States is averaging over 160,000 COVID-19 cases per day, and the coronavirus is spreading out of control in most states. “We all need to consider the safest way to celebrate this holiday amidst this critical phase of the COVID-19 pandemic,” Walke said.The US saw spikes in cases after the Memorial Day and Labor Day holidays, and Thanksgiving poses an even larger concern: celebrations usually happen indoors (where the... Continue reading…

The tailpipe of a vehicle pumping out greenhouse gas emissions is seen next to another car in Los Angeles, CA. | Photo by David McNew/Getty Images Carbon dioxide emissions from the US economy are nose-diving this year to a level not seen since 1983, according to new estimates by BloombergNEF. The planet-heating pollution is on track to fall by 9.2 percent from last year, which the private research organization says would be the biggest reduction on record.The steep drop is mostly the result of the COVID-19 pandemicThe steep drop is mostly the result of the COVID-19 pandemic upending business as usual. With many Americans working from home or no longer working, transportation — the most polluting sector in the US — had its biggest year-on-year drop ever. The sector also contributed the most to the country’s overall reduction in emissions. Power sector emissions will probably see... Continue reading…

The Calendar widget will show an outline of upcoming appointments. | Image: Google Google has detailed a handful of new iOS widgets it has on the way, following the launch of its new Gmail widget this week. In a blog post, the company says it’s adding widgets for Drive and Google Fit, which appear to be available now, and that it has a Calendar widget planned to launch “in the coming weeks.” A widget for Chrome is due to officially launch next year and is available in beta now.The widgets vary from providing simple shortcuts to their app’s most commonly used features to showing important information at a glance. The Chrome widget offers quick links to web and voice searches, QR code scanning, and a shortcut to open new incognito mode tabs, while the Drive widget similarly offers shortcuts to your files and a search... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Microsoft is adding a new coupons feature to its Edge browser today. Coupons and promo codes will appear inside Edge as an alert when you’re shopping online, and they can be automatically applied to a basket when you’re ready to check out. The coupons feature also includes price comparisons, so if you’re shopping online, Edge can surface different retailers that might offer items at lower prices.Microsoft introduced price comparisons in Edge just weeks ago as part of its Collections feature, but this new coupon experience goes even further. It’s part of a big push by Microsoft to position Edge as the browser for online shopping, but the comparisons and coupons only work for US users of the browser right now. Image:... Continue reading…

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge Google on Thursday announced iOS support for its Stadia cloud gaming service, following in the footsteps of Microsoft in turning to the mobile web to circumvent Apple’s App Store restrictions. Google says it has been building a progressive web app version of Stadia that will run in the mobile version of Apple’s Safari browser, similar to how Microsoft intends to deliver its competing xCloud service on iOS sometime next year.But Google intends to beat Microsoft to the punch with public testing of its version in the coming weeks. Nvidia also announced today that it a beta web app version of its GeForce Now cloud gaming service on iOS is available today.Apple in late August clarified its rules around cloud gaming, telling providers like... Continue reading…

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge Google is going head-to-head against next-gen consoles during a fiercely competitive holiday season Continue reading…

Image: CD Projekt Red Google really wants you to buy Cyberpunk 2077 on Stadia — so much, in fact, that it’s giving away a Stadia Premiere kit to each person who preorders (or who has already preordered) the game on Stadia or buys it after launch until December 17th. The promotion runs “until supplies last,” though Google declined to say how many units it will be giving out.The hardware bundle that usually costs $100 includes a white Stadia controller, a Chromecast Ultra, and, for new users, a one-month trial subscription to Stadia’s Pro-tier service. Stadia Pro includes 4K streaming and a growing collection of free games similar to Sony’s PlayStation Plus and Microsoft’s Xbox Live Gold subscriptions.To redeem the deal, you’ll need a Stadia account, though... Continue reading…

Photo: Universal Images Group via Getty Images The world-famous Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico, known for helping scientists peer into deep space and listen for distant radio waves, is set to be decommissioned and demolished after engineers concluded that the facility’s structure is at risk of a collapse. While teams will try to salvage some parts of the observatory, the decommission will bring an end to the popular 57-year-old telescope, which has been featured in numerous films and television shows.The decision comes after two major cables failed at the facility within the last few months, causing significant damage to the observatory. The National Science Foundation (NSF), which oversees Arecibo, assessed the impact of the cable breaks and found that the facility’s other... Continue reading…

Image: Amazon Amazon has announced an upgraded model of its Echo Frames smart glasses, adding better sound quality, longer battery life, and new colors. Furthermore, the new Echo Frames are now available for anyone to buy, as the company transitions the Alexa-equipped glasses from a “Day One Edition” invitation-only device to a full-fledged product.The second-generation Echo Frames will cost $249.99 — a $70 price increase over the original models, which sold for $179.99. (Existing Day One Edition Echo Frames customers will be able to upgrade their pair to the new model for $70, however.)Like the original model, the new Echo Frames are designed to offer a simple, discreet way to use Amazon’s Alexa voice assistant during your everyday outings.... Continue reading…

Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge Apple’s first M1 MacBooks are here, and the world of laptops has changed overnight.When Apple first announced that it would be transitioning its computers — specifically, the MacBook Air and entry-level 13-inch MacBook Pro, its most popular PCs — to a new and wildly different type of processor, there were plenty of reasons to be skeptical. Apple was making huge claims for battery life and performance, things that the first wave of Arm-based laptops from Qualcomm and Microsoft failed to deliver.But deliver Apple did, with computers powered by a new M1 processor that aren’t just close to their previous Intel counterparts, but crush them in nearly every respect — and not just the base model Intel chips that the M1 purports to replace,... Continue reading…

Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge The UK’s biggest game retailer, Game, is blaming the size of the PS5 and the number of consoles in the UK market for delivery delays. Sony launched its PS5 in the UK and across Europe today, but the launch hasn’t gone smoothly for all Game customers.“Due to the volume of PlayStation 5’s in the UK market and the size of the product, the launch has led to UK wide delivery challenges for all retailers and couriers,” says Game in a statement to affected customers. Game lays the blame on its delivery partner, Yodel, for having capacity issues in its delivery network. Game’s message to some PS5 customers. The PS5 is the biggest game console in modern history, and the packaging for the console isn’t small, either. While... Continue reading…

Photo by Brennan King / The Verge Samsung’s entire range of S20 series phones is available at all-time-low prices at a few retailers, including Amazon, B&H Photo, and eBay (sold by Microsoft). We covered discounts from eBay a few weeks ago, but today’s prices are significantly better. Each phone below is unlocked, with support for GSM and CDMA carriers, so you can get service from T-Mobile, AT&T, and Verizon as well as MVNOs and global carriers. If you want to add 5G to your monthly bill, the S20 FE and the standard S20 offered below support sub-6GHz but not Verizon’s UWB mmWave 5G. However, the S20 Plus and S20 Ultra support both types of 5G networks out of the box. Photo by Dieter Bohn / The Verge The Galaxy S20 FE (left) and the Galaxy S20... Continue reading…

Apple Apple is giving more people access to Peanuts holiday specials. The company announced yesterday that it’s partnering with PBS for broadcast airings of A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving and A Charlie Brown Christmas. A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving will air on PBS and PBS KIDS on November 22nd at 7:30PM local time / 6:30PM CT, and A Charlie Brown Christmas will air on those same channels on December 13th at 7:30PM local time / 6:30PM CT. You can check your local listings here.This is a somewhat return to normalcy for the specials, which typically aired during the holiday season over broadcast TV. Apple gained the rights to the programming, however, and said non-paying users would only be able to access the show for a limited set of time on Apple... Continue reading…

Image: DoorDash DoorDash, the contentious delivery platform that recently filed for IPO, is launching a new gifting feature for its own app and Caviar to make it easier to send personalized gifts during the holidays and beyond.You could technically already “gift” something to friends and family just by changing the address of a delivery order, but through the new Gifting feature, you’ll get a formal interface and ways to personalize your gift with digital cards you can send in advance.Ordering works the same way it traditionally does on mobile and the web, only now at checkout, you can select to “send as a gift,” launching the new interface. From there, you can schedule the delivery, select from a collection of cards to personalize with a message,... Continue reading…

Chat is Google’s next big fix for Android’s messaging mess. | GIF by Garret Beard and William Joel / The Verge After two long, complicated years, every Android user worldwide (outside China and Russia) now has access to the next-gen texting standard that is replacing SMS. Google is directly offering RCS chat services through its Android Messages app to anybody who installs it and uses it as their default texting app, which partly bypasses a carrier rollout that, at times, has ranged from sluggish to incoherent to broken.Just as importantly, Google has announced that it’s finally beginning to enable a key privacy feature: end-to-end encryption. For Android users who use Android Messages, one-on-one chats will eventually be end-to-end encrypted by default, meaning neither carriers nor Google will be able to read the content of those messages.Even... Continue reading…