The Verge

Chris Welch/The Verge Roku is slamming Comcast’s decision to pull NBC’s TV Everywhere channels from the streaming service as negotiations over distribution for NBCUniversal’s Peacock streaming service continue.Those channels allow Comcast customers to use Roku as a platform for streaming NBC’s various shows and other programming under its NBCUniversal umbrella. That includes content from channels like Bravo, E!, Syfy, USA, and NBC itself. It’s unclear what channels are going to be pulled from the service at this time, as Comcast has control over what gets pulled and what doesn’t. The Verge has learned that 11 network apps, 12 NBC-owned stationed apps, and 23 Telemundo apps will be removed from Roku, but no other specifics were given.Roku executives... Continue reading…

Samsung’s latest tablets are saddled by familiar problems Continue reading…

Photo by Alix Diaconis / The Verge LG’s Wing might be the most wild-looking smartphone in 2020 — which is saying something, given the wide array of phones released this year. But despite that unique design, after spending some time with the actual hardware and software, I suspect that LG might actually be onto something with its approach to the Wing.The device seen here isn’t finalized hardware or software — expect a full review from The Verge later on — and LG hasn’t given a price or release date, which are big question marks for any device. But for what is definitely a first-generation device, I’m really impressed by the level of polish that LG has achieved with the Wing. It’s surprisingly thin for a device that has a second screen — several family... Continue reading…

Asus partnered with Acronym to create this colorful and delightfully weird laptop. You all just need to look at this.This here is the weirdest and coolest 14-inch gaming laptop I’ve ever used. It’s called the ROG Zephyrus G14 ACRNM. If you’re wondering why it looks like that, Asus partnered with a clothing designer called Acronym, which primarily makes stuff like this $2,000 trench coat. So, yeah.The weirdest and coolest 14-inch gaming laptopIf you’ve been paying any attention to the laptop market in the past year, you probably know what the Zephyrus G14 is. It’s a monster of a gaming rig, and it can run just about any game on any settings you want. The battery life is excellent, the touchpad and keyboard are exceptional, it only weighs 3.5 pounds — almost everything about it rules. If you haven’t read my review of... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge The US Commerce Department has issued a new order to block people in the US from downloading the popular video-sharing app TikTok as of September 20th, Reuters first reported Friday.The full order was published by the Department of Commerce on Friday morning. “Any transaction by any person, or with respect to any property, subject to the jurisdiction of the United States, with ByteDance Ltd,” the order reads, “shall be prohibited to the extent permitted under applicable law.” It is set to take effect on September 20th.Over the last few weeks, TikTok’s Chinese parent company, ByteDance, has been engaged in talks with US companies like Microsoft and Oracle to create a new company, TikTok Global, that would meet the Trump... Continue reading…

There are a couple of questions I ask myself before I spend money on a game. How long is it? Can my PC run it? And if there’s a dog in it, can I pet it? In the case of Humble Bundle’s latest collection of games the answer to the last question is a resounding “Yes!” The store has partnered with the Twitter account “Can You Pet the Dog?” for its latest bundle, which includes a total of eight games which are guaranteed to include a least one virtual dog, ripe for the petting.By now you almost certainly know what the deal is with Humble Bundles, but the standard pay-what-you-want rules apply. You can pay a minimum price of $1 to unlock four of the bundle’s games (Scribblenauts Unlimited, Beyond Eyes, Dog Sled Saga, and Bulb Boy), pay more... Continue reading…

The only 10x periscope telephoto lens around Continue reading…

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge Apple has changed the rules.One month after suggesting its iOS App Store guidelines would bar cloud gaming services like Google Stadia and Microsoft xCloud from appearing on an iPhone or iPad, the company has now overhauled those rules, telling journalists last Friday that Google and Microsoft’s streaming games are actually welcome after all.But if you know how cloud game services operate, and then look at Apple’s actual written rules, you’ll see that’s only technically true. If I understand correctly, the reality is one of two things:Either 1) Apple is asking Microsoft, Google and others to turn their streaming game services into an entirely new category of standalone app which guarantees Apple a profit — a kind of app that’s rarely... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge This week was the deadline for ByteDance to divorce itself of TikTok over security concerns, but at press time no deal has been struck. Instead, we have the strangest of corporate entities now taking shape. And, thanks to journalists at the New York Times, we have perhaps the most delicious morsel of reporting to ever emerge from TikTok deal talks.Let’s take a look at the latest.The first thing to say is that we may see action from President Trump within days — and that, if he approves the deal, we could soon see a TikTok IPO. Here are Alex Sherman and Lauren Feiner at CNBC:

iOS 14 lets you change your default browser in Settings. | Photo by Jon Porter / The Verge With iOS 14, Apple finally lets you choose which browser you want to use as your default, letting you switch away from Safari if you’d rather use a third-party alternative like Chrome or Edge. Apple is also letting iPhone users change their default email app in the updated OS.To be a candidate for the default browser, developers have had to update their apps. All browsers are still required to use WebKit as their underlying browsing engine, meaning that the main differences between them will come down to their user interfaces and how they sync with other platforms, rather than how they fundamentally render web pages. At the moment there’s only a limited selection of browsers that can be set as the default on iPhone.Here’s a list of... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Google is correcting a “typo” in its Play Store “stalkerware” policy that currently suggests that apps can be used to track spouses. Stalkerware and other tracking software is dangerous, campaigners say, because it can facilitate domestic abuse and harassment of partners. As it’s written, the policy also mistakenly says parents cannot track their children.The updated developer policy, which comes into effect on October 1st, now explicitly says that Play Store apps which allow parents to track their children are acceptable, but that they cannot be used to track adults (like a spouse) without their knowledge or permission.Here’s the relevant section from the current developer policy which is due to be corrected (emphasis added):

Earlier this year, Nvidia released RTX Voice, a beta software to process audio and suppress almost all background noise, and it worked amazingly well. My colleague Jon Porter made the sound of his clacking mechanical keyboard completely disappear. Today, Nvidia has released a successor app called Broadcast, and it’s available to download now.Nvidia Broadcast is a follow-up to the RTX Voice beta and introduces two new AI-powered features: Virtual Background and Auto Frame. Nvidia says that the noise removal feature also now has a reduced performance cost and supports triple the number of noise profiles.Nvidia Broadcast is a follow-up to the RTX Voice betaThe new Virtual Background allows you to remove the background of your webcam... Continue reading…

Image: Walmart The PS5 pre-order situation has so far been a bit of a mess, and Walmart’s fresh batch of consoles at 6PM PT / 9PM ET on Thursday night did nothing to change that. They were gone in about a minute.I was able to get a Digital Edition in my cart, but I didn’t pull the trigger because I already secured a preorder yesterday. My editor said the Digital Editions were showing as out of stock for him about 10 seconds later, though, so who knows if I would have actually been able to make the purchase. And shortly after, a few of us at The Verge were seeing that preorders were no longer available.And we weren’t the only ones:

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge Apple bought music recognition app Shazam in 2018, and now it’s integrating it into iOS in another big way — a new Music Recognition feature can identify songs playing around you as well as in apps on your phone. And it even works when you’re listening to music on your headphones.The new feature is available as a toggle in Control Center, but it does require a developer beta of iOS 14.2 if you want to try it right now. That toggle will look like a little Shazam icon, and you just need to tap it for your iPhone to start listening. Image: Apple You could already use Siri to summon Shazam and identify songs playing around you, but being able to identify music in your apps could be handy too — if, say, you’re wondering... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Amazon has removed dozens of listings for peptides, drugs that can be used for doping, after an investigation from The Markup found 66 examples of such products on the site. Peptides are made naturally in the body, but synthetic versions, which can be sold in vials and then reconstituted and injected, are often used as performance-enhancing drugs since they can speed recovery from injuries.According to The Markup, in recent weeks Amazon had been carrying listings for peptides not on the US Food and Drug Administration’s list of approved drugs, months after telling the publication in May that it would start cracking down, and several of those drugs have been classified by the World Anti-Doping Agency as doping drugs. The drugs were... Continue reading…

Image: Lego If you ever purchased a Lego set, you’ll know the box comes with an uncomfortable amount of plastic bags to separate each set of pieces included. Personally, I felt it was way too much plastic for just one product, and it’s nice to now see Lego has finally come to its senses: the company plans to ditch the single-use packaging starting next year, Lego announced on its website earlier this week.Going forward, Lego plans to package its tiny bricks in recycled paper bags. The company says they are looking to make “all packaging sustainable by 2025.” Lego CEO Niels Christiansen said the company received “many letters” from kids asking the toymaker to stop using plastic bags in their packaging.Alongside its plans to use sustainable... Continue reading…

Image: Sony As part of its PlayStation 5 launch event yesterday, Sony said Final Fantasy XVI and Demon’s Souls weren’t just strictly PS5 exclusives — trailers for both games revealed they would also be coming to PC. At the time, that meant the biggest game announced during Sony’s showcase as well as one of the PS5’s most notable launch titles wouldn’t require a PS5 to play them. If you added the fact that both Spider-Man: Miles Morales and Horizon Forbidden West will also be coming to PS4, you might well have decided to wait on picking up a PS5 at launch.But shortly after the event, Sony and Square Enix went into damage control, saying that Final Fantasy XVI and Demon’s Souls actually aren’t coming to PC after all.An intriguing coincidenceIt’s... Continue reading…

Photo by Becca Farsace / The Verge Google is still trying to iron out connectivity issues with its Pixel Buds. The company has confirmed that it has identified the cause of a strange, frustrating bug that caused audio to drop out for some users every one minute and 50 seconds — on the dot. I’ve gotten numerous emails about this issue from Pixel Buds owners, so it’s good to see that Google has managed to resolve it.According to a post on the company’s support forums, a new firmware update is currently rolling out to the true wireless earbuds that will eliminate the pause after every 1:50. In case you’re unfamiliar with the update process, Google has this guide for installing Pixel Buds firmware.If you’re not using your Pixel Buds with an Android phone — well, that’s an... Continue reading…

Photo by Robert Alexander/Getty Images A bombshell report in The Washington Post today details the ongoing feud between the Trump administration and the US Postal Service, and it provides insight into just how lucrative Amazon’s business is for the agency.According to documents obtained by watchdog group American Oversight, Amazon generated $1.6 billion in profit and $3.9 billion in revenue for the USPS in fiscal year 2019, with the postal service delivering 1.54 billion packages for the e-commerce giant. That represented about 30 percent of Amazon’s total volume last year, and, according to the Post, revenue has increased this year.President Trump has complained for at least the last two years — without citing evidence — that the USPS loses “$1.50 on average for each... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro Twitter will start prompting high-profile political accounts to take heightened security measures ahead of the 2020 US election, the company announced Thursday.In a blog post, Twitter said that administration officials, members of Congress, political campaigns, major news outlets, political journalists, and other government officials will be prompted to take enhanced security measures ahead of the election. Over the next few days, Twitter will be automatically turning on password reset protection for these accounts while recommending that these high-profile users turn on two-factor authentication. These accounts will also be required to use strong passwords.“Voters, political candidates, elected officials and journalists rely on... Continue reading…

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge Apple gives you the option of picking new default browser and email apps in iOS 14 and iPadOS 14. But it’s been discovered that, at least in the 14.0 software release, this freedom of choice is only temporary: after a reboot of your device, Safari and Mail will be restored as their respective defaults until you change the setting again. 9to5Mac reported on the issue earlier today.The Verge has confirmed the behavior across several different iPhones and iPads. This is almost certainly a bug and something the company can rectify in a matter of days with an iOS 14.0.1 update. But it’s not a great look given Apple’s current predicament with ongoing antitrust probes. At least most people don’t find themselves rebooting these devices with... Continue reading…

Photo by Tom Warren / The Verge The Nvidia RTX 3080 graphics card was released at 9AM ET, and disappointment began only seconds later. All major online stores in the US are sold out, and there have been reports of brick-and-mortar stores each having as few as 10 units for sale. The end result: eBay scalpers are now trying to cash in, and very few people who want to enjoy the graphics card seem to have actually gotten their hands on a confirmed order.The card is being listed on eBay for many hundreds of dollars — in some cases, even thousands of dollars — over its $699 sticker price. And PC gaming fans are mad, claiming that Nvidia held a sloppy launch just a day after US retailers similarly botched early preorders for Sony’s upcoming PlayStation 5.A list here of... Continue reading…

Photo by Lauren DeCicca/Getty Images Warner Bros., the studio behind the latest Harry Potter video game title — Hogwarts Legacy, which will debut on next-gen consoles and PCs — has just posted an FAQ that directly addresses J.K. Rowling’s involvement with the title. “J.K. Rowling is not directly involved in the creation of the game, however, her extraordinary body of writing is the foundation of all projects in the Wizarding World,” the company writes. “This is not a new story from J.K. Rowling.”That will certainly reassure some corners of the internet. Over the last few years, Rowling, the author of the Harry Potter series, has made a name for herself as a prominent trans-exclusionary radical feminist online.Her latest book, written under the pen name Robert Galbraith... Continue reading…

Image: NASA A US production company is planning to produce a reality TV show competition, where the winner will receive a trip to the International Space Station as the ultimate prize, Deadline reports. The plan is yet another way to capitalize on the newly developed private human spacecraft, from SpaceX and Boeing, that are opening up ways for non-government astronauts to reach space.Dubbed Space Hero Inc., the production company plans to put together a televised contest called Space Hero that would select contestants from around the world to train for space, according to Deadline. The winner of the contest would supposedly receive a 10-day trip to the space station that would be televised from launch to return to Earth.“We look forward to ...... Continue reading…

Amazon van with prime logo in a logistic centre. | Photo by Marcos del Mazo/LightRocket via Getty Images In its first round of funding from its $2 billion Climate Pledge Fund, Amazon is investing in the battery and e-waste recycling company led by former Tesla executive JB Straubel, along with four other companies. It’s not clear how much money each company will receive.Amazon will need the technology being developed by the startups it’s now fundingAmazon made the $2 billion commitment in June as part of efforts to slash its greenhouse gas emissions. Last September, the retail giant said it would cut or capture all of its planet-heating pollution, achieving net-zero emissions, by 2040. To hit that target, Amazon might need the technology being developed by the startups it’s now funding.“I am excited to announce that we are investing in... Continue reading…

Image: Riot Games Riot Games has released a series of animated shorts to hype up the upcoming League of Legends World Championship tournament, including one that could be really helpful if you’ve been interested in watching competitive League.League of Legends is one of the most popular esports in the world, but the game itself can be difficult to understand if you’re a first-time viewer. I’ve been watching matches for years and still only have a basic understanding of the deeper mechanics of the game. But I think Riot did a great job explaining everything you need to know to watch a match in the animated short embedded at the top of this post, and I recommend checking it out.Riot released a short in the same animated universe giving a brief overview of... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Facebook is adding new rules intended to slow the spread of misinformation and other harmful content on its Groups feature. From now on, if a group is removed for violating Facebook’s policies, its members and administrators will be temporarily unable to create any new groups. If a group has no administrators, it will be archived. And Facebook won’t include any health-related groups in its recommendations.Facebook groups have been blamed for spreading misinformation and conspiracies, particularly when Facebook’s recommendation algorithm promotes them. And the company’s new rules expand on existing efforts to police them. Admins were already barred from creating a new group similar to a banned one, for instance.Some of the new policies... Continue reading…

Nintendo has always been a strange company. The Kyoto-based game maker turned an Italian plumber into one of pop culture’s biggest icons, and the company has experimented with everything from DIY cardboard game accessories to three-pronged controllers. This unpredictable nature is what makes Nintendo so exciting (and occasionally infuriating).Often, these concepts seem to come out of left field — but at its best, Nintendo makes the strange feel necessary. Nowhere was that more apparent than with the Nintendo DS line of dual-screened handhelds.That era is now over, as Nintendo recently discontinued the 3DS and all of its various models. The news isn’t surprising: the Switch has become a runaway success, largely supplanting the need for... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Facebook is launching a new app to let small business owners manage pages and profiles across Facebook, Messenger, and Instagram, COO Sheryl Sandberg announced in a blog post Thursday. The app, called Facebook Business Suite, will merge the back end infrastructure of the three apps so small business owners can receive messages from customers, alerts, and notifications in one unified inbox. It plans to add WhatsApp integration in the future, the company confirmed to The Verge.The app will also let small businesses post to Facebook and Instagram at the same time and provide insights about how ad campaigns are performing on the platforms. Much of this cross-posting functionality already is available for admins of Instagram business... Continue reading…

Nintendo recently revealed a huge slate of Mario games coming to the Switch (and one Zelda spinoff), but today, the company put the focus on some of the third-party titles that will help fill out the console’s lineup. The event included some big-name publishers like Capcom and Square Enix, though many of the games won’t hit the Switch until next year.If you missed the event, here are the biggest and most interesting reveals.Ori is coming back to the Switch todayThe gorgeous 2D platformer Ori and the Will of the Wisps is coming to the Switch — and it’ll be available later today. There’s even a gorgeous special edition for those who want a physical version of the game.A lot of Monster HunterCapcom announced a pair of brand-new M... Continue reading…

The Mandalorian was one of the first shows to premiere on Disney’s streaming service when it launched in November 2019, and now it’s the reason Disney Plus won its first Emmy awards.The streamer won five Creative Emmys last night for various visual and audio effects seen in a number of Mandalorian episodes. The Mandalorian won awards for Outstanding Special Visual Effects, Outstanding Cinematography for a Single Camera Series, Outstanding Sound Mixing for a Comedy or Drama Series, Outstanding Sound Editing for a Comedy or Drama Series, and Outstanding Production Design for a Narrative Program. The event can be watched on the Creative Arts Emmys website.The Mandalorian was nominated for 19 awards in total, including Outstanding... Continue reading…

The queue outside Micro Center in Brooklyn. | Photo by TC Sottek / The Verge Nvidia’s new RTX 3080 graphics card went on sale earlier today, but it seems the new $699 GPU is already sold out pretty much everywhere. In the US, Amazon, Newegg, Best Buy, and Nvidia’s own website are either listing the card as being out of stock or only with an option to be notified when a card is in stock. Even stock checking sites like NowInStock.net are coming up empty-handed.Across Twitter, reports are popping up of people attempting to buy the card in person and not having much more luck. One user reported people camping outside their local Micro Center for two days to secure one of the store’s stock of just 11 cards. Another posted a picture of people queuing up overnight outside their local store before its manager was forced... Continue reading…

Ori and the Will of the Wisps, Moon Studios’ sequel to Ori and the Blind Forest, is launching today for the Nintendo Switch. Nintendo announced the news today during a small Nintendo Direct presentation.Will of the Wisps launched earlier this year. In the Metroidvania-style platformer, players control Ori in the immediate aftermath of Blind Forest. Both games first released on the Xbox One and were only available via Microsoft platforms or PC. Moon Studios released Ori and the Blind Forest for the Switch in 2019. In an interview with The Verge, the studio explained that Will of the Wisps is an example of Moon Studios’ “iterative polish” process, in which it is constantly refining the game.A collector’s edition that includes digital... Continue reading…

Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge The Apple Watch Series 6 releases tomorrow, starting at $399 for the 40mm size and $429 for the 44mm size. If you don’t think you need the latest model, you can save $100 on the now-previous version of Apple’s smartwatch, the Series 5. Both Amazon and Walmart have the larger 44mm size with the gold aluminum case and pink sport band for $329.It’s a little confusing to shop for an Apple Watch since their specs and features change with each new model; I’ve made a comparison chart to make it easier. But on the whole, the Series 5 matches most of what the new Series 6 delivers. It has an always-on display and a more advanced heart rate sensor than the Apple Watch SE or the Series 3. Aside from the Series 6’s blood oxygen app, the Series 5 is... Continue reading…

Ford broke ground on a new manufacturing plant outside of Dearborn, Michigan, where it will build an electric version of its extremely popular pickup truck, the F-150. The new facility, located within the automaker’s historic Rouge Complex, will be completed in time to start production on the new electric truck, slated for mid-2022.That release date means the F-150 EV will likely hit the road after electric pickups from a number of Ford’s rivals. Tesla’s Cybertruck and General Motors’ electric Hummer pickup are slated to be released in late 2021. EV startup Rivian is aiming to ship its first electric pickup trucks in early 2021 (alongside an electric SUV) after production was delayed by COVID-19.Ford is spending $700 million to build... Continue reading…

With the recent discovery of a possible sign of life on Venus, it’s possible we could see a new surge of missions headed to the cloudy world in the future. Those next-generation robotic explorers may need to take extra precautions than Venusian explorers of the past.Numerous missions to Venus have been proposed throughout the years, but few have actually manifested over the last three decades. That could change now, with perhaps the most compelling reason to visit the planet again. Astronomers found a gas, phosphine, in the sulfuric acid clouds of the planet, and they can’t really explain why it’s there. It’s possible that phosphine is being produced by some tiny lifeforms since we know that it’s produced by microbes here on Earth, or... Continue reading…

A viral video can spur thousands of subs Continue reading…

Photo: Comcast Comcast is launching a program to provide free Wi-Fi in community centers as part of an effort to improve internet access for students in low-income areas, the company said Thursday. The so-called “lift zones” will provide free internet connectivity as well as “access to hundreds of hours of educational and digital skills content to help families and site coordinators navigate online learning.”The first 200 lift zones have been selected and will include BUILD in Chicago, the Harvey Johnson Community Center at Union Baptist Church in Baltimore, the Olney Recreation Center in Philadelphia, the Catholic Youth Organization of Mercer County in Trenton, and the Sanneh Foundation Distance Learning Hub in St. Paul. Other community centers in... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Google is changing how Google Drive handles trashed files and documents. Starting on October 13th, files in the trash will automatically delete after 30 days. The change means that Drive’s trash will work the same way as other Google products, like Gmail, for more consistent behavior across all of Google’s products.Previously, Google Drive would keep files in the trash indefinitely — unless you went in and emptied the trash to actually delete them for real — making it less of a “trash” and more of a way to just hide files you didn’t want to see. Administrators for G Suite will also still have the power to restore items that are deleted from the trash for up to 25 days for active users, so if you accidentally lost a critical work... Continue reading…

Also a very red smartwatch Continue reading…

Photo by Monica Chin / The Verge Earlier this month, Intel announced its 11th-Gen “Tiger Lake” laptop CPUs. The company proclaimed them the new best processor for thin-and-light laptops — but thanks to AMD’s 7nm Ryzen 400 chips, competition for that title is fierce. This week, we finally got a chance to try one out.For some background: the Tiger Lake line includes nine new processors. These aren’t what you’d find in a large gaming laptop or desktop replacement — they’re meant to power ultraportable devices. The chips feature Thunderbolt 4 support, Wi-Fi 6, and the company’s new Xe integrated graphics. They’re built on a 10nm node similar to their 10th-Gen predecessors, but Intel says that they’ll perform faster with lower power consumption thanks to a new “SuperFin... Continue reading…

Apple One, Apple’s long-awaited services bundle, has arrived — or, more accurately, three different Apple One bundles have arrived. It’s a move that highlights both how inaccurate that “Apple One” name actually is and the general confusion over Apple’s services right now.According to Apple, each of the three plans offers big monthly savings, with the cheapest Individual plan cutting $6 per month off the total compared to buying each of the four included services separately. The Family plan saves $8 per month, and the Premier plan saves $25.Those numbers are making a big assumption, though, which is that customers want and are willing to pay for all of those separate services. Look closer, and it’s less of a bargain than Apple may want... Continue reading…

There are lots of ways to play Super Mario games if you’re feeling creative. You could use a regular controller, sure, but why not a Guitar Hero guitar, Donkey Kong’s famous bongo peripherals, or even a real-life drum kit. And what about using Mario himself, turning a figurine of everyone’s favorite plumber-slash-war criminal into a physical controller?That’s what self-declared “hardware hacker” @r1ckp did, using a Mario mannequin released as part of a Lego Super Mario toy set earlier this year. As you can see in the videos below, @r1ckp tilts Lego Mario backward and forward to move around the game world of Super Mario Bros. (which is running via an emulator in a Linux virtual machine on a Mac), and with the right movements, Mario can... Continue reading…

Here’s what to expect from Microsoft’s tiny new console Continue reading…

The PlayStation 5 Digital Edition. I’m generally a person who appreciates physical media. I collect vinyl records, buy print books, and like to watch 4K Blu-ray movies. But for a variety of reasons, I switched entirely to buying digital games on each platform as soon as the option became available. Now that Sony and Microsoft have revealed their next-generation consoles in full, a lot more people may well choose to do the same.To recap, yesterday Sony announced the pricing for its upcoming PlayStation 5 — both the regular model and the disc-less Digital Edition. The standard PS5 is $499.99 and the otherwise identical Digital Edition is $399.99, saving you a full $100 if you swear off physical games for good.Microsoft, meanwhile, has gone even further to incentivize... Continue reading…

Evernote used to be the default in note-taking: the fastest, easiest way to keep track of thoughts across devices. Its fall from grace was slow then sudden (as when four executives left in a single month and the firm was declared to be in a “death spiral”), but a recovery of sorts could be on the horizon. This week, Evernote released a completely redesigned app for iOS and says new apps for Android, Windows, Mac will arrive “in the coming weeks.”The new iOS Evernote app is cleaner and simpler to look at than the old one, and comes with a whole bunch of UI changes and new features. There are now real-time search suggestions, easier ways to organize tags, a new formatting toolbar that suggests your most-used options, greater control of... Continue reading…

Processor is a digest for what’s happening in the world of consumer technology, with incisive analysis (or maybe just jokes) from Dieter Bohn. Sign up for the newsletter here and check out the Processor video series on YouTube.It is a remarkably good time to be into video games. It’s not just that we’ve got new console launches from Microsoft and Sony. It’s also that Nvidia is invigorating PC gaming with new possibilities as it brings 4K performance into a more achievable price range. And it’s that Oculus has released a new, less expensive VR headset.On top of all that, we see game companies beginning to experiment with new pricing models and methods of distribution. Microsoft has bundled its hardware into a subsidy plan with its... Continue reading…

OnePlus’ Nord handset, released internationally but not in the US. | Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge We were pretty pleased with the OnePlus Nord — a well-balanced, mid-ranger that made some compromises but generally delivered for its price. But the Nord wasn’t available in the US, which is why we’re excited to see reports that OnePlus is readying a new Nord model that apparently will be coming to the United States: the Nord N10 5G.News of this handset comes from Android Central which cites “an insider source.” The publication says the Nord N10 5G will be powered by the Snapdragon 690 which offers 5G support (the original Nord had a Snapdragon 765G), and that the base variant will have 6GB of RAM, 128GB of storage, and a 6.49-inch FHD+ display with 90Hz refresh rate. That’s a slightly larger screen than the original’s (6.44-inch) but... Continue reading…

Mozilla’s browser extension invites user input on YouTube’s algorithm | Mozilla YouTube’s recommendations algorithm can lead you down some very weird rabbit holes, suggesting videos that feel weirdly personal and off-target at the same time. Today, Mozilla will introduce a new browser extension, RegretsReporter, that aims to crowdsource research about users’ “regrettable recommendations,” to let users better understand how YouTube’s recommendation algorithm works and provide details about patterns it discovers.Mozilla started gathering stories from users last year about the videos that YouTube recommended to them; one user searched for videos about Vikings and was recommended content about white supremacy; another searched for “fail” videos and started getting recommendations for grisly videos of fatal car wrecks.... Continue reading…

Apple announced the new Safari features back at WWDC 2020. | Image: Apple Apple has released the latest version of its Safari browser for macOS Catalina and High Sierra, ahead of the release of Big Sur later this year. Safari 14 improves the browser’s tabs, adds a new privacy report feature, and offers new customization options for your start page. You can download it by heading to System Preferences app and clicking “Software Update.”One of the key improvements that’s coming with the latest version of Safari is improved tab management. The tabs themselves have been redesigned to be more space-efficient, display website favicons by default, and show a preview of each tab while hovering your mouse over them. There’s a new start page which you can customize with your own backgrounds and links, and a Privacy... Continue reading…