The Verge

The Ratatouille TikTok musical will return for an encore performance Sunday night on the platform where it all started. TikTok is hosting another showing of the streaming musical that debuted online New Year’s Day, which has already raised more than $1 million for The Actors Fund.The musical came together on TikTok over the past few months, with composers, fans, set designers, costumers, and choreographers creating musical numbers for the fictional “show” which is built around the 2007 Disney/Pixar animated film. Then in December Seaview Productions announced it was producing the show in association with TikTok. Disney/Pixar gave its blessing, and the show attracted big Broadway names to perform the crowdsourced songs.Wayne Brady... Continue reading…

Photo by SAUL LOEB/AFP via Getty Images Clearview AI’s CEO says that use of his company’s facial recognition technology among law enforcement spiked 26 percent the day after a mob of pro-Trump rioters attacked the US Capitol. First reported by the New York Times, Hoan Ton-That confirmed to The Verge that Clearview saw a sharp increase in use on January 7th, compared to its usual weekday search volume.The January 6th attack was broadcast live on cable news, and captured in hundreds of images and live streams that showed the faces of rioters breaching the Capitol building. The FBI and other agencies have asked for the public’s help to identify participants. According to the Times, the Miami Police Department is using Clearview to identify some of the rioters, sending possible... Continue reading…

Photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images Ford will idle its plant in Kentucky for a week as the automotive industry grapples with a shortage of semiconductors, ABC News reported The automaker’s assembly plant in Louisville produces the Ford Escape and Lincoln Corsair SUVs, and employs about 3,900 hourly workers, according to CNBC. Ford said will take a planned one-week plant shutdown that had been scheduled for later in the year and move it to this week instead.Ford joins Nissan, which says it will reduce production at one of its plants in Japan, which makes the Note, a car not sold in the US. A Nissan spokesperson said the semiconductor shortage has not affected the company’s US productionVolkswagen, Fiat Chrysler, and Toyota also have reported problems with semiconductor... Continue reading…

Image: John Legere John Legere, former T-Mobile CEO and aspiring Batman, has reacted to the mob that attacked the Capitol like many other political and business leaders by calling for President Donald Trump to step down. But he’s also going a step further by considering a run for political office himself. Legere left his post as CEO and member of T-Mobile’s board after successfully negotiating the merger between the company and Sprint, so he very well could be looking far and wide for his next gig.Legere’s time as T-Mobile’s CEO turned the company into the “Un-Carrier,” a plan that came with an end to contracts, revamped mobile plans, and a variety of freebies and perks for customers designed to set T-Mobile apart from its longtime rivals AT&T and... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge In the latest blow to social app Parler, Amazon said Saturday it was suspending the company from its web hosting platform effective at 11:59PM PST Sunday. First reported by BuzzFeed News unless Parler finds another web hosting service, the site will go offline Sunday night.Parler CEO John Matze said in a post on the site Saturday evening that the site could be offline for up to a week “as we rebuild from scratch.” Matze said the company had prepared for such an event, “by never relying on amazons [sic] proprietary infrastructure and building bare metal products.”He added that “many” were competing for Parler’s business, and accused Amazon, Google, and Apple of a coordinated attack to kill competition. “We were too successful too fast,... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Apple has removed Parler from the App Store, following accusations that the social media app was fostering calls to violence ahead of, and following, the raid on the US Capitol.“We have always supported diverse points of view being represented on the App Store, but there is no place on our platform for threats of violence and illegal activity. Parler has not taken adequate measures to address the proliferation of these threats to people’s safety. We have suspended Parler from the App Store until they resolve these issues,” reads a statement from the company on Saturday evening.Apple issued an ultimatum to Parler on Friday demanding that it remove content in violation with its policies and provide a plan on how it would moderate... Continue reading…

A mob of President Trump’s supporters rioted at the Capitol | Photo by ALEX EDELMAN/AFP via Getty Images Ah, what a year this week has been! Our entire perception of time has already been skewed by the pandemic, but even by that standard the last few days have felt like a bizarre time warp, starting with a Slack outage on Monday that seemed like it would be the story of the week. Oh how naive we were. Of course, Wednesday’s attack on the Capitol as Congress was certifying the Electoral College results dominated the rest of the news cycle, and social media and other online platforms decided that by inciting the rioters, the president had finally crossed a line.Here’s a review of the tumultuous first week of 2021.Wednesday, January 6thAfter he spoke to a rally near the White House, a mob of Trump supporters marched on, and broke into the... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge When Twitter banned President Trump from its platform permanently on Friday, the thousands of tweets he put forth from his realDonaldTrump account over the past decade were wiped out. Retweets of realDonaldTrump tweets from other accounts now show a “this tweet is unavailable” message instead.But embeds of Trump’s original tweets are now displaying in articles across the internet as shadows of their former selves, some with just the text of the former tweet included, others as empty gray boxes.This effect, known as link rot, happens when images or content are deleted or otherwise broken, so links don’t point back to the original target, whether that’s a tweet, a video, or a web page. In most instances, a dead link is a visually... Continue reading…

Rioters breached security at the Capitol on Wednesday January 6th | Photo by Olivier Douliery / AFP via Getty Images Sen. Mark Warner (D-Virginia), incoming chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee, is asking mobile carriers and social media platforms to preserve “content and associated metadata” that may be connected to the attack on the US Capitol. Warner said in a statement Saturday that he contacted the CEOs of AT&T, T-Mobile, Verizon, Apple, Facebook, Gab, Google, Parler, Signal, Telegram, and Twitter.“The United States Capitol is now a crime scene,” Warner wrote in his letters. “The FBI and other law enforcement agencies are currently investigating the events of that day, and trying to piece together what happened and the perpetrators involved. The prospect of litigation on behalf of the victims of the mayhem also is highly likely.... Continue reading…

Photo credit should read Adam Gray / Barcroft Media via Getty Images / Barcroft Media via Getty Images Sports betting company DraftKings and the Drone Racing League (DRL) will now allow betting on drone races in some states, the two companies announced. DRL, which CNBC describes as a first-person view racing league, allows pilots to compete for prizes by flying their drones through courses.Residents of Colorado, New Hampshire, New Jersey, Tennessee, and West Virginia will be able to bet on the races via their phones, and regulatory approval is pending for betting on drone races in other states, the companies said. The terms of the deal and the amounts of the prize money weren’t disclosed, but drone racers in a 2017 tournament competed for $100,000.“The sky is now the limit for DRL fans to get skin in the game, and we’re thrilled to... Continue reading…

A drive-in testing site at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles, California, on January 4th, 2021. | Photo by Al Seib / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images I regret to inform you that even with all of the other news happening this week, there is still a pandemic going on. It would have been great to sweep it out the door with the old planners and dead Christmas trees. But it’s 2021, and COVID-19 is still here.More than a year after this coronavirus made its big debut, it’s bigger than ever. Days after it was sequenced on January 7th, 2020, the World Health Organization reported that there were 41 cases in China and one death. A year later, the toll now stands at 88,617,915 infected, and 1,907,608 dead.Those numbers are rising rapidly. One in 30 Londoners has COVID-19, London Mayor Sadiq Khan tweeted on Friday. New variants of the virus, which appear to be more transmissible, are... Continue reading…

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge After a brief hiatus over the holiday, we’re back with another Verge Deals dispatch. Since we last sent one of these out, many of the deals that filled our daily coverage around the holidays have come to an end, and recently, whenever a good sale comes around, it usually doesn’t last too long. Simply put, the dealscape is a little barren right now. Nevertheless, I’ve put in some of the week’s best offers for your perusal.Save on Nintendo’s fantastic Ring Fit AdventureIf you’re one of those people who makes a New Year’s resolution to get fit, there are a few deals you might want to know about. If you own a Nintendo Switch, consider picking up Ring Fit Adventure. It’s a game that requires the use of a Pilates ring to help you work out.... Continue reading…

Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge Amazon has updated Alexa in the last month with a modified version of its popular reminders skill. You can now ask Alexa to “Tell me when” an event happens and your device will give you background information and notify you when it actually occurs.You’ve been able to set a reminder for an event or task at a specific time for a while, and requesting Alexa to tell you when an event occurs can pull up relevant information. “Tell me when” is sort of a synthesis of the two tasks. Amazon provided a few examples: you could ask Alexa to “Tell me when the next Seahawks game is” and Alexa could tell you the time of the game and set a reminder to watch. Another interesting use is for email, you can now ask Alexa to tell you when an email arrives... Continue reading…

Photo by Michele Doying / The Verge Twitter permanently banned Donald Trump today. For a brief moment, he managed to tweet anyhow — not from @realDonaldTrump, his suspended account, but rather the official @POTUS account reserved for the current President of the United States, one that will be handed over to Joe Biden on January 20th.His message, before it was deleted, cryptically suggested that he will “have a big announcement soon” and that he was looking “at the possibilities of building out our own platform.” Trump is currently deplatformed from most social media.

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Google has suspended Parler from the Play Store, as first reported by Axios reporter Ashley Gold. We’ve confirmed the app is no longer on the store.Here is the full statement, which was shared with The Verge:

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Discord has banned a server called “The Donald,” a pro-Trump community linked to banned subreddit r/The_Donald and TheDonald.win. The news was first reported by Platformer writer (and Verge contributor) Casey Newton.The ban comes two days after a pro-Trump mob stormed the US Capitol, encouraged by President Trump, though Discord says that it has no evidence that the server was used to organize the riots.

Photo by Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post via Getty Images Twitter permanently banned President Donald Trump on Friday, days after a pro-Trump mob stormed the US Capitol leaving five dead.“After close review of recent Tweets from the @realDonaldTrump account and the context around them we have permanently suspended the account due to the risk of further incitement of violence,” Twitter said in a statement Friday.

Photo by OLIVIER DOULIERY/AFP via Getty Images Apple and Google are facing new pressure to deplatform Parler, a social network founded as a less moderated and more conservative-friendly alternative to Facebook and Twitter. Late Friday, BuzzFeed News reported that Apple has given Parler 24 hours to put a moderation platform into place or be expelled from its App Store.Apple wrote to Parler executives Friday telling them it had received complaints about “objectionable content,” according to BuzzFeed, “accusations that the Parler app was used to plan, coordinate, and facilitate the illegal activities in Washington D.C. on January 6, 2021 that led (among other things) to loss of life, numerous injuries, and the destruction of property. The app also appears to continue to be used to... Continue reading…

Sony’s SRS-RA5000 speaker. | Image: Sony Earlier today, Sony announced that it would be releasing two new speakers compatible with 360 Reality Audio, its spatial audio technology that replicates the feel of live music by placing different sounds and vocals in a virtual sphere around you. It said its plan is to release them this spring, but it didn’t share what the speakers would look like. We didn’t have to wait to learn more about them, though, as Sony’s UK website now has full product pages for the upcoming SRS-RA5000 and SRS-RA3000 speakers.The higher-end SRS-RA5000, pictured at the top of this post, will have three up-firing speakers, three side speakers, and a woofer. It’s also certified for High-Resolution Audio. The SRS-RA3000, pictured below, has two tweeters, two... Continue reading…

Photo by Alex Wroblewski / Getty Images Twitter has suspended prominent backers of the QAnon conspiracy theory, citing a potential for “offline harm.” NBC News reporter Ben Collins reported the ban of former Trump administration national security adviser Michael Flynn, former Trump attorney Sidney Powell, and former 8kun administrator Ron Watkins. Other major QAnon accounts have apparently been banned as well.Twitter told NBC News that the accounts were suspended under Twitter’s “coordinated harmful activity” ban. “We’ve been clear that we will take strong enforcement action on behavior that has the potential to lead to offline harm, and given the renewed potential for violence surrounding this type of behavior in the coming days, we will permanently suspend accounts that are... Continue reading…

Photo by Artur Widak / NurPhoto via Getty Images Consumers should not buy or use individual 18650 lithium-ion battery cells due to possible fire risk, according to a warning just issued by the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC). The commission says it is working with e-commerce sites like eBay to remove listings of loose 18650 cells, which are sometimes used in vapes, e-cigarettes, flashlights, and toys.“[T]hese battery cells may have exposed metal positive and negative terminals that can short-circuit when they come into contact with metal objects, such as keys or loose change in a pocket,” the agency wrote Friday. “Once shorted, loose cells can overheat and experience thermal runaway, igniting the cell’s internal materials and forcibly expelling burning contents, resulting... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge More than 300 Twitter employees have signed an internal petition calling for President Donald Trump to be permanently banned from the platform following a raid on the US Capitol on January 6th. Roughly an hour and a half after we published this story, Twitter apparently agreed — President Donald Trump has been permanently banned from Twitter.The letter said that the employees are “disturbed” by the attack and that Twitter must “permanently suspend” Trump because of his involvement, according to a copy of the letter seen by The Verge. The Washington Post first reported on the letter’s circulation.“We must examine Twitter’s complicity in what President-Elect Biden has rightly termed insurrection. Those acts jeopardize the wellbeing of... Continue reading…

Smoke from two fires in Colorado and one in southern Wyoming covers the sky in Denver, Colorado, on Wednesday. September 30th, 2020. | Photo by Hyoung Chang / MediaNews Group / The Denver Post via Getty Images The US experienced a record number of billion-dollar disasters in 2020. Twenty-two disasters cost the US a cumulative $95 billion last year, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). That smashes previous records set in 2011 and 2017, when 16 disasters caused at least a billion dollars of damage.Climate change is hitting the US hard in the pocketbookNOAA’s announcement is the latest signal that climate change is hitting the US hard in the pocketbook. It follows the release of another report by insurance company Munich Re that also tallied 2020 disaster costs and found they had nearly doubled in the US since 2019.“Climate change plays a role in this upward trend of losses,” Ernst Rauch, Munich Re chief... Continue reading…

The upcoming Galaxy Buds Pro collection. | Image: Evan Blass Samsung is widely expected to announce its Galaxy S21 lineup of phones at its upcoming January 14th event, and now it looks like we can safely assume that Samsung will launch its next true wireless headphones and its Tile competitor at the event as well. A leaked marketing render of a promotion offering either the unannounced Galaxy Buds Pro or a Galaxy SmartTag alongside a preorder of the Galaxy S21 Ultra was shared by leaker Evan Blass on Friday. Image: Evan Blass The leaked marketing image of the promotion. A lot of information about both the Galaxy Buds Pro and the Galaxy SmartTags have hit the web recently, so it’s not a big surprise that we can expect to see them announced on January 14th. Details about... Continue reading…

In 2020, more mobile users downloaded Among Us than any other game worldwide. Data released by Apptopia ranks the year’s breakout hit at 41 million downloads in the US and 264 million downloads worldwide — beating out games such as PUBG Mobile and Roblox, which both remain in the top 10 highest-grossing games of the year.Despite being released in 2018, Among Us didn’t find popular footing until the last year. The online multiplayer deduction game, in which spaceship crew members work together to complete tasks and root out imposters before they’re murdered, became a hit on Twitch late into quarantine. In November, almost half a billion people played the game, which is available on mobile, the Nintendo Switch, and PC. A release is also... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge According to CNBC’s analysis, Apple’s App Store made $64 billion in revenue in 2020, which is a 28 percent increase from the estimated $50 billion it made in 2019. This represents a good amount of growth for the App Store since the estimated increase between 2018 and 2019 was only 3.1 percent.It’s hard to tell the exact reason for the spike in growth, but it likely had something to do with the COVID-19 pandemic. I can say from personal experience that I bought quite a few more games in 2020 than I have in years past, as well as subscriptions to fitness and productivity apps to try to regain some control of my life during quarantine.When Apple reports on its financials, it lumps the money it makes from the App Store in with its... Continue reading…

The A02S offers a 6.5-inch display and 5,000mAh battery. | Image: Samsung Unlocked and carrier versions of the budget Samsung Galaxy A02S appear to be coming to the US, as spotted by SamMobile. Wi-Fi and Bluetooth certification documents appear to refer to unlocked as well as Verizon and AT&T carrier versions.The A02S was announced in November for European markets alongside the slightly higher-specced Galaxy A12. The A02S includes a 6.5-inch HD+ display and an impressive 5,000mAh battery, but it cuts costs by opting for 3GB of RAM and 32GB of (expandable) storage in the base model and a 13-megapixel main camera. It also lacks a fingerprint sensor. These sacrifices land it at an affordable €150 price point, and it will likely sell for less than $200 outright in the US.There’s no official word from Samsung... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro The Alphabet Workers Union (AWU) is calling on YouTube to permanently ban President Trump following a raid on the US Capitol on January 6th. The move shows the newly formed organization, comprised of employees and contractors at Google’s parent company, is dead set on influencing issues that go well beyond workers’ rights.On Wednesday, YouTube removed a video of Trump addressing the attack, citing its policy against content that alleges widespread voter fraud. But the union called the response “lackluster” and said the company hasn’t gone far enough. “YouTube refuses to hold Donald Trump accountable to the platform’s own rules by choosing only to remove one video instead of removing him from the platform entirely,” they wrote in a... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Twitch removed its popular PogChamp emote a couple of days ago after the person on which it was based — Ryan “Gootecks” Gutierrez — posted some tweets encouraging more mob violence after the riot at the Capitol. The spirit of PogChamp, however, will live on: today, Twitch announced that it would cycle through different versions of the emote every 24 hours, starting today.

Photo by John Moore/Getty Images Reddit has banned r/donaldtrump for encouraging and glorifying violence after Wednesday’s mob attack on the US Capitol. Axios reporter Sara Fischer first reported the news, noting that the unofficial pro-Trump forum had been given multiple warnings. A Reddit splash page says the subreddit was “banned due to a violation of Reddit’s rules against inciting violence.”“Reddit’s site-wide policies prohibit content that promotes hate, or encourages, glorifies, incites, or calls for violence against groups of people or individuals. In accordance with this, we have been proactively reaching out to moderators to remind them of our policies and to offer support or resources as needed,” a Reddit spokesperson tells The Verge. “We have also taken... Continue reading…

The new phone has an extra rear camera compared to its predecessor. | Image: Steve Hemmerstoffer / Voice Renders of what’s believed to be the Nokia 6.3 or 6.4 have leaked online, giving us our best look yet at HMD Global’s upcoming affordable handset. The renders come to us via Steve Hemmerstoffer over on Voice. New for this model is a side-mounted fingerprint sensor embedded in the power button, which replaces the rear-mounted sensor on 2019’s Nokia 6.2.Beyond this, there’s not a lot separating the Nokia 6.3 / 6.4 from the 6.2, which currently retails for $249 on Amazon. It’s still got a screen with a small teardrop-shaped notch, a headphone jack, and a circular camera array on its rear. However, Hemmerstoffer reports that the screen could be bigger at 6.45 inches rather than 6.3 inches, and it has four cameras on its rear, up from three... Continue reading…

Sci-Hub’s homepage. | Sci-Hub Twitter has suspended the account of Sci-Hub, a website that provides free access to paywalled academic papers. The account was being used by Sci-Hub’s founder to collect statements of support from the scientific community during an ongoing court case in India.

Madden now has a SpongeBob SquarePants-themed field so you can live out your dreams of playing football in a virtual Bikini Bottom. The SpongeBob Reef-Top, which will only be available in Madden’s arcade-style The Yard mode, will offer challenges that you can complete to unlock Nickelodeon-themed content as well as gear inspired by the famous yellow sponge himself.In “the coming weeks,” you’ll also be able to unlock gear themed after Patrick Star, Sandy Cheeks, Mr. Krabs, Plankton, and Squidward Tentacles. (TIL that Squidward’s canon last name is Tentacles.)Check out the field and some of the gear in this video from Madden’s Twitter account. I think the themed uniforms look really cool! I would love it if they were used in a real NFL... Continue reading…

Image: Substack Substack is adding a long-awaited new feature today: the ability to change the look of newsletters. Writers will now be able to choose their background color and accent color and set different fonts for the title and body of posts. It’s a limited set of customizations, but it should allow Substack newsletters to stand out more from one another — right now, they’re basically the same, save for profile pictures and the color of links.The feature is being called Themes, and Substack says it plans to continually add more options for writers. It’s supposed to be available starting today. Image: Substack As fun as themes are, writers may get a lot more use out of two other features that Substack is planning for release... Continue reading…

Photo by James Bareham / The Verge The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has ended a year-long review of claims that some Tesla vehicles were accelerating without warning, saying there is not enough evidence to open a full investigation. While NHTSA received 246 complaints about this “sudden unintended acceleration” phenomenon, the agency says that “pedal misapplication” was the cause of the problem in every case for which it had data to review — user error, in other words.“There is no evidence of any fault in the accelerator pedal assemblies, motor control systems, or brake systems that has contributed to any of the cited incidents,” the agency wrote in a summary published Friday. “There is no evidence of a design factor contributing to increased likelihood... Continue reading…

General Motors debuted a new logo meant to convey the automaker’s renewed commitment to the production and sale of electric vehicles. The company is also launching a new marketing campaign to underscore that commitment, as it seeks to compete with Tesla and other automakers that are rushing new EVs to market.It’s been about a decade since GM has last tweaked its logo, but this update represents the starkest change in the company’s 113-year history. The most obvious change is the use of a lowercase “gm” in the logo, after previously only using capital letters. The underline has been shortened to just the “m,” in a nod to the company’s recently announced Ultium electric vehicle battery and platform.The blue square has been rounded at... Continue reading…

Photo by Allison Johnson / The Verge The OnePlus Nord line of smartphones will debut in the US on January 15th with two cheaper, midrange entries: the Nord N10 5G and the N100. You can preorder both phones from a variety of retailers ahead of release, but if you decide to buy either directly from OnePlus, the company will throw in a pair of wireless earbuds for free.Starting today until January 14th, OnePlus will include a pair of OnePlus Bud Z wireless earbuds (white only) at no additional cost when you purchase the OnePlus Nord N10 5G on its site. If you buy the Nord N100 from the OnePlus website, you will get a pair of Bullets Wireless Z earbuds in black for free.According to my colleague Allison Johnson, the Nord N10 5G is an affordable 5G-capable phone that... Continue reading…

Photo By Tom Williams / CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images Dominion Voting Systems is suing President Donald Trump’s former attorney Sidney Powell for spreading unfounded conspiracy theories about its election equipment. The long-awaited defamation suit could test the impact of legal attacks on disinformation.As NBC News reported this morning, Dominion sued Powell for making a series of “wild” and “demonstrably false” accusations that spread across right-wing media outlets and major social networks. Powell was responsible for a series of legally dubious challenges that she dubbed the “kraken,” but she failed to substantiate their allegations — which included false claims that Dominion had rigged voting machines to favor President-elect Joe Biden as part of a plot involving deceased Venezuelan... Continue reading…

Fans in North America will be able to play League of Legends on their phones very soon. Today, at a big event detailing what 2021 will look like for League, developer Riot revealed that Wild Rift — the mobile and console version of the game — will launch in open beta in the Americas starting in March. It’s not clear what platforms the beta will be available on, but previous open betas were primarily on Android and iOS.Additionally, Riot outlined its plans to support Wild Rift throughout the year. That includes regular events like a Lunar New Year festival in February, a ranked season that kicks off in some regions this week, and the addition of around two new characters each month.The other big reveal from the event relates to Riot’s... Continue reading…

WandaVision is Marvel Studios’ first big Disney Plus release, and the show will circumvent Disney’s typical episode release structure by premiering two episodes at once.The first two episodes of the show will premiere together on January 15th, with the third episode premiering a week later on January 22nd. Normally, Disney only releases one episode per week. There are exceptions: National Geographic shows have released more episodes at once. Most notably, The Mandalorian’s first two episodes came out three days apart, but that was due to Disney Plus launching on a Tuesday and new episodes airing Friday.Why are Disney and Marvel Studios releasing two episodes at once? No idea! The company didn’t give a reason in the press release sent... Continue reading…

Plug it in, and you’re good to go. Thunderbolt 4 is here, and so is the first fully powered Thunderbolt 4 docking station. Kensington’s SD5700T includes a whopping 11 ports, 90W of power delivery, and transfer speeds of up to 40Gbps. It provides either one 8K output at 30 Hz or two 4K outputs at 60 Hz.Make no mistake: This is a fancy dock. It’s listed for $289.99 on Kensington’s site. But if you’re the kind of person who uses an elaborate desk setup with multiple monitors and peripherals, and you have the money to spend, this could be a good choice.If you look at the most recent Thunderbolt 4 laptop releases, you’ll probably notice that some of them have... sparse port selections. That’s par for the course as laptops get thinner. The Dell XPS 13, for instance, only... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Roku has acquired defunct streaming service Quibi’s library of content, the company announced today. Content from the short-form service will appear on the Roku Channel for free at some point in 2021, though the company hasn’t announced an exact date for its arrival. Roku did not disclose how much it paid for the content in its announcement, but The Wall Street Journal reports it paid “significantly less” than $100 million for the shows. The deal was rumored earlier this month in a separate report from the WSJ.Despite Quibi’s failure, its content was star-studded. Roku’s announcement says the Quibi content it has licensed will feature stars including “Idris Elba, Kevin Hart, Liam Hemsworth, Anna Kendrick, Nicole Richie, Chrissy Teigen,... Continue reading…

Amazon has announced that it’s discontinued its Amazon Pantry (originally known as Prime Pantry) service, instead rolling those household goods and shelf-stable pantry items into the main Amazon website where they can be ordered alongside the rest of Amazon’s products.Originally launched back in 2014, Pantry worked differently from most Amazon orders. Instead of following the usual Amazon delivery rules, Pantry orders charged customers a flat $5.99 shipping fee per box of groceries, which could be filled with up to 45 pounds of products or up to four cubic feet of stuff (whichever limit customers reached first). The focus of the program was to make it easier to stock up on everyday products that would otherwise be bulky or expensive to... Continue reading…

Microsoft is updating its Teams service with a new Dynamic View in March. This new view allows Teams users to share content side by side with participants. It looks ideally positioned for meetings where someone is presenting a slide deck or if participants are watching a live event together.Dynamic content like earnings reports, slide decks, or videos can be displayed alongside other speakers. Currently in Teams, video feeds of other participants are tiny when people are screen sharing or presenting decks. Microsoft’s Gallery View for Teams will optimize itself automatically with this new view and allow participants to personalize the view.It will also more clearly highlight active speakers, people who have virtually raised their... Continue reading…

(Left to right) The Moto G Play, G Stylus, and G Power. | Image: Motorola Motorola is kicking off 2021 with refreshes for its midrange Moto G lineup of phones with new versions of the Moto G Power, Moto G Stylus, and Moto G Play that promise low prices and days of battery life across the board. There’s also a new member of the Motorola One family called the Motorola One 5G Ace, which, at $399, takes the crown as Motorola’s cheapest 5G phone yet.Once again, Motorola is set on offering an almost dizzying amount of low-priced phones that differ in price by just $30 to $50. The new Moto G Play will cost $169.99; the Moto G Power will offer $199.99 (for a 3GB of RAM / 32GB of storage model) $249.99 (for 4GB / 64GB) configurations; the Moto G Stylus will cost $299.99; and the Motorola One 5G Ace will cost $399.99.... Continue reading…

Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge Roku says its Roku TV line was the top-selling smart TV OS in the US and Canada throughout all of 2020, using NPD data to illustrate the company’s powerful standing. “Roku TV held 38 percent of market share in the US and 31 percent in Canada, based on available data from January 5th through December 26th, 2020, maintaining the lead spot in both regions,” the company said in a press release today. That would signify that Samsung’s Tizen has fallen to second place. (Samsung is still the most popular individual TV maker, however, since Roku TV is divided among brands like TCL, Hisense, and others.)Roku attributes the success of Roku TV to its simple user interface, vast app catalog, and a wide range of TV sizes at appealing prices. TCL... Continue reading…

JLab is introducing a new Bluetooth audio gadget designed to be clipped onto your existing glasses or sunglasses. The JBuds Frames are two modules with downward-firing speakers you position right outside your ears. They are part of a resurgent trend of open-ear audio that has usually been the domain of Bluetooth-enabled sunglasses and bone-conducting bands.They’re retailing for just $50, which fits in with another trend: JLab’s history of offering surprisingly inexpensive headphones. Sometimes, those headphones outperform their price point and so the company is hoping it can pull that trick off again by undercutting Bose, Amazon, Aftershokz, and others. However, so far, there’s a fairly low ceiling on audio quality for open-ear... Continue reading…

Image: Kohler Kohler has revealed a new smart bath that lets you use an app, or your voice, to fill up the water. That by itself seems pretty handy to me, but depending on which model you buy, you can elevate your bathing experience by changing the color of lights around the tub or even adding some fog.You’ll also be able to establish preset routines to turn on features in a certain order so you can set your bath exactly the way you want it. For example, you can have the tub fill itself up to a specified level and a certain temperature, and once that’s done, add some fog or turn on some aromatherapy, all with a voice command to Amazon’s Alexa or Google Assistant.Take look at the Stillness Bath for yourself in this footage provided by Kohler. I... Continue reading…

The new Standard Range model sits alongside the existing Long Range and Performance versions. | Screenshot: Tesla.com Tesla is now taking orders for a cheaper Standard Range version of the Model Y. The new variant, whose availability was reported by Electrek, has a cheaper starting price of $41,990 compared to $49,990 for the Long Range model. The discount comes with a lower EPA estimated range of 244 miles rather than 326 miles, and rear-wheel rather than all-wheel drive.Alongside the new cheaper Model Y version, Tesla is also selling a new 7-seat option for a $3,000 premium. The version has a third seating row, which can be folded flat along with the second row for cargo storage.The Standard Range option was originally announced with a 230-mile rangeTesla originally announced the Standard Range version of the Model Y back at the car’s announcement... Continue reading…

Overwhelmed by life? Shove your head in a Gengar. | Image: P-Bandai.jp Pokémon has an illustrious history of beautifully bizarre merch including a human-sized Metapod sleeping bag or a Ditto chair, but this giant Gengar plushie might be the best yet. It’s cute, sure, but it’s also incredibly practical. Just roll out its roughly 170cm-long tongue and you’ve got yourself a compact futon for sleeping on. There’s even a cozy little space in its open mouth for your head.But this Gengar isn’t just a novelty mattress replacement. No, it’s capable of so much more. Tired of reality? Shove your head in the Gengar’s mouth. Need an impromptu blanket? Use the Gengar’s tongue. When you’ve got a giant Gengar with a long-ass tongue, the sky’s the limit. Image: P-Bandai.jp Be not afraid. ... Continue reading…