The Verge

Cyberpunk 2077’s listing on Microsoft’s digital games store now includes a label warning of potential performance issues on Xbox One. “Users may experience performance issues when playing this game on Xbox One consoles until this game is updated,” the warning reads.Players have observed numerous bugs and performance issues with Cyberpunk 2077 since its launch last week, especially on the Xbox One and PlayStation 4. The dissatisfaction led the company to quickly issue a statement suggesting that unhappy players try to get refunds for the game. Many players had trouble actually getting refunds, though, given Sony and Microsoft’s typically strict policies for issuing refunds of digital games.Since Thursday evening, though, that has... Continue reading…

Image: CD Projekt Red Cyberpunk 2077’s second promised hotfix is out for Xbox and PlayStation platforms. The PC version will follow “soon,” according to developer CD Projekt Red. You can read the extensive list of fixes here.While there doesn’t seem to be anything quite as significant as the changes to reduce epilepsy risk made in last week’s 1.04 hotfix, hopefully this new update will make what has been a very buggy game have a few less issues.The game has been out for a little more than a week, and players have been criticizing the game for its numerous bugs and performance issues, particularly on older consoles. The outcry led to Sony offering full refunds of digital copies of the game and taking the unprecedented step of yanking the game from the... Continue reading…

Image: United States Space Force Members of the United States Space Force will officially be called “Guardians”, according to an announcement Vice President Mike Pence made at an event celebrating the military branch’s one year anniversary.The organization traces the name “Guardians” back to an old Air Force Space Command motto from 1983, “Guardians of the High Frontier,” according to a short post on the US Space Force website. While a distinct entity, Space Force is part of the Air Force per its establishment with the National Defense Authorization Act.As it exists today, Space Force is mostly a rebrand of Air Force Space Command, but with the authority to make decisions independent from the Air Force. Space Force personnel also mostly come from the Air Force, but... Continue reading…

Photo by Nicolas Economou/NurPhoto via Getty Images The Food and Drug Administration authorized the COVID-19 vaccine developed by Moderna, which joins the Pfizer and BioNTech product as the second shot available for use in the United States.The vaccine can now be given to adults 18 years of age and older in the US. It was 94 percent effective against symptomatic COVID-19 in clinical trials. The Moderna vaccine also protects against cases of severe disease: there were 30 cases of severe disease among trial participants, and all were in the placebo group. Initial data on the Pfizer and BioNTech vaccine also indicated that it could protect against severe disease, but data was too limited to reach a definite conclusion.“With the availability of two vaccines now for the prevention of... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge 90,000 Google employees have just received access to free weekly COVID tests. The Wall Street Journal first reported the news that every US Google employee (and its subsidiaries, including YouTube) will be eligible to sign up for a free at-home test. This differs from other companies, like Amazon, which are only offering tests to employees who still have to work in a physical location, like a retail location or warehouse.This is apparently something Google employees are interested in, as the vendor’s website crashed after going live. Employees are promised that they’ll receive the test within two to four days of requesting one, and that they’ll get the results back within two days of the lab receiving it.According to the Wall Street... Continue reading…

Image: Nintendo Nintendo’s Shigeru Miyamoto led a video tour of the company’s Mario-themed Super Nintendo World attraction at Universal Studios Japan in Osaka during the company’s latest Direct livestream.The theme park looks to be packed with Mario iconography that will be familiar to Nintendo fans. Even the entrance Mario-themed: you enter the park by walking through a giant pipe that spits you out in the atrium of Princess Peach’s castle that first debuted in Super Mario 64.A smart wristband lets you interact with elements of the parkMiyamoto showed how you can you use a special smart wristband, called the “Power-Up Band,” to interact with different parts of the zone. In one example, he punched a question mark block with the hand wearing the... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge When signing up for an Instagram account, the service promises that your email and birthday won’t be publicly visible. A bug discovered by security researcher Saugat Pokharel, however, made it so that an attacker could easily get that private information. The bug, which was patched after being reported to Facebook, was exploitable by business accounts that were given access to an experimental feature the company was testing.The attack worked on private accounts, and ones that don’t accept public DMsThe attack used Facebook’s Business Suite tool, available to any Facebook business account. The experimental upgrade meant that if a Facebook business account was linked to Instagram and was included in the test group, the Business Suite... Continue reading…

The upcoming Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra. | Photo: WinFuture Today, we have another Galaxy S21 leak, which seems to confirm some of the specs that have been floating around, published by WinFuture. Information about and images of Samsung’s upcoming Galaxy S21-series phones have been landing almost daily in the run-up to Samsung’s January event. With this newest leak, we now have a better idea of what to expect — especially in the camera department. In short, the hardware appears to be a big part of Samsung’s plan to take on the highly capable iPhone 12 Pro Max.The S21 Ultra will reportedly offer 3x and 10x telephoto cameras (72mm and 240mm equivalent focal lengths, respectively), both with optical image stabilization. That’s one additional rear-facing camera compared to the S20 Ultra’s three rear... Continue reading…

Photo by Mike Siegel / Pool / Getty Images Boeing and the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) worked together to manipulate 737 Max recertification tests following two fatal crashes in 2018 and 2019, according to a damning new Senate report. Boeing “inappropriately coached” some FAA test pilots to reach a desired outcome during the recertification tests, and some were even performed on simulators that weren’t equipped to re-create the same conditions as the crashes.In doing this, the Senate report’s authors say the “FAA and Boeing were attempting to cover up important information that may have contributed to the 737 MAX tragedies.”The FAA is also accused of retaliating against whistleblowersThe FAA is also accused of retaliating against whistleblowers, possibly obstructing... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge A China-based former Zoom employee is being charged with harassment for allegedly disrupting video calls commemorating the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre. Brooklyn federal prosecutors unsealed a case against Xinjiang (also known as Julien) Jin today. The complaint doesn’t identify Jin’s employer, but Zoom published a blog post acknowledging that it employed him.According to the complaint, Jin was a liaison between Zoom and Chinese law enforcement and intelligence services. He allegedly used this position to target dissidents and activists both inside and outside the People’s Republic of China, collecting account information and disrupting meetings. “The allegations in the complaint lay bare the Faustian bargain that the PRC government... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge The New York Times’ Caliphate podcast was a hit — until it wasn’t. The 2018 show, which chronicled the radicalization of a man who joined the Islamic State, was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, won a Peabody, and was widely regarded as a feat of narrative nonfiction storytelling. The Times’ head of film, TV, and audio, Sam Dolnick, described the show as a “cinematic experience” that “absolutely lends itself to TV” and came with “a lot of interest from Hollywood.”Today, however, those days seem far away. The Times appended a lengthy and apologetic editor’s note to the show’s landing pages after doubts about the central character’s story surfaced. The Times reassigned the show’s star reporter and host, Rukmini Callimachi, and dropped a... Continue reading…

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge Microsoft is designing its own ARM-based processors for servers and possibly a future Surface device, according to Bloomberg News. The processors will be used in servers for Microsoft’s Azure cloud services and be based around ARM designs, according to the report. Microsoft is also reportedly “exploring” using another chip for some of its Surface devices, but it’s not clear if this will progress into a final product.Microsoft currently uses Intel-based processors for the majority of its Azure cloud services, and most of the company’s Surface lineup run on Intel chips, too. Microsoft has worked with AMD and Qualcomm for custom chips for its Surface Laptop 3 and Surface Pro X devices, showing a willingness to move away from just Intel. ... Continue reading…

I like to end each year by surveying you all about your predictions for social networks and the broader consumer internet in the 12 months to come. One, it’s a lot of fun. And two, a year later I get to read the predictions back and feel extremely dumb. Our collective guesses for 2020 weren’t terrible, exactly — we nailed Libra (er, Diem) failing to launch, the rise of Discord, the splinternet accelerating, and a total stalemate on Section 230 reform.But we missed a lot, too: a rise in curated experiences did not cause algorithms to “fade into the background”; a deepfake app did not go mainstream in the United States; and Twitch streaming did not power the rise of Oculus. (But the pandemic sort of did? It powered the rise of Twitch,... Continue reading…

Image: CD Projekt Red CD Projekt Red (CDPR) has issued yet another statement regarding the ongoing Cyberpunk 2077 debacle, this time clarifying its stance on retail refunds for the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One versions of the game that have been riddled with bugs and performance issues since launch last week. The developer now says it will honor every refund request it receives between now and December 21st out of its own pocket.“We’ve just started reaching out to people who sent us a message with a confirmation of receipt. We send these emails out in waves, so don’t worry if you don’t receive an answer immediately,” CDPR writes in its new statement, issued via the official Cyberpunk 2077 Twitter account on Friday afternoon. “At the same time, we’d like you... Continue reading…

FDA headquarters in Maryland. | Photo by Sarah Silbiger/Getty Images In most contexts, it’s perfectly acceptable to use “approval” and “authorization” interchangeably. But not at the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), and definitely not when it comes to COVID-19 vaccines. If the topic comes up at your Zoom holiday party, here’s a cheat sheet for the specific uses of these similar terms.Approval — No COVID-19 vaccines have been approved. Approval means the FDA has officially decided that a product is safe and effective for its designated use. The process for approval involves rigorous reviews of all available data on the product and can take several months.Authorization — To speed things up in an emergency like a pandemic, the FDA can grant an Emergency Use Authorization (EUA). An EUA, as its name... Continue reading…

Getty Images/Getty Images for EIF & XQ Hulu has ordered a new reality series based around TikTok’s royal family — Charli, Dixie, Marc, and Heidi D’Amelio — seemingly hoping to capture a little bit of what Keeping Up with the Kardashians did for E! back in 2007.The D’Amelio Show is an eight-part documentary series that will follow the four family members as they go about their day-to-day lives. Expect TikTok dancing, TikTok drama, meetings with executives all over Hollywood, and the types of goofs that worked for other reality shows that followed popular families. It will debut sometime in 2021.For the D’Amelio family, this is just another project they’re adding to their list, which includes podcasts, a YouTube channel, commercials, television specials, and more. Like the... Continue reading…

Image: CD Projekt Red Best Buy has joined the list of retailers offering returns for copies of Cyberpunk 2077, with the company announcing (in a forum post) that it’ll be accepting returns through December 21st.The move is an unusual one for Best Buy, which typically excludes opened video games from its usual return policy — in most circumstances, “opened physical copies of computer software, movies, music, video games, books, video game guides and sheet music can only be exchanged for an identical item.”However, in light of developer CD Projekt Red’s own acknowledgement of issues with the game — and its offer to supply refunds through December 21st — Best Buy will be offering a similar opportunity for disappointed buyers to return their copies.Per the... Continue reading…

Image: Riot Games League of Legends developer Riot Games is working on a massively multiplayer online (MMO) roleplaying game in the League universe, Riot’s VP of IP and entertainment, Greg Street, tweeted on Thursday.“My recent job at Riot has been to help develop the League universe, which we’re going to need!” Street said. “My new job is to kick off a big (some might say massive) game that many of you, and many Rioters, have been asking us to create.” If the deliberate use of the word “massive” in that quote wasn’t enough of a hint, in a reply to another Twitter user, Street confirmed the game is an MMO.

Image: CD Projekt Red Microsoft says it’s now offering Cyberpunk 2077 refunds to anyone who has purchased the game via its Microsoft Store. While the company has been offering refunds to some customers already, Microsoft is now expanding this to cover anyone who has purchased the game digitally.“We know the developers at CD Projekt Red have worked hard to ship Cyberpunk in extremely challenging circumstances,” explains a Microsoft spokesperson in a statement to The Verge. “However, we also realize that some players have been unhappy with the current experience on older consoles. To date, we have granted refunds to the vast majority of customers who have requested one. To ensure that every player is able to get the experience they expect on Xbox, we will be... Continue reading…

Skype’s new Together Mode option featuring Verge staff. Microsoft is bringing one of its best Teams video calling features over to Skype this week. Together Mode, which uses AI to segment your face and shoulders and place you together with other people in a virtual space, is now available in Skype. You’ll need at least five people all with webcams to enable the feature, and it will place everyone into a virtual environment as if they’re sitting next to each other.You don’t even need the Skype app to take advantage of Together Mode, as it works through the web version of Skype without the need for an account. Skype users can create a Meet Now meeting and share the link with anyone to join. GIF: Microsoft Together Mode in Microsoft Teams. Microsoft first launched... Continue reading…

For the last eight weeks, waking up on Friday morning has come with a gamble for many Star Wars fans: check Twitter to see the latest headlines or watch the new Mandalorian episode before anyone has a chance to spoil it?This week’s episode of The Mandalorian is a perfect example. The second season finale includes some moments that Twitter’s trending tags and “news for you” curated topic sideline are already ruining. Without getting into spoiler territory here (and use this as a warning to stay away from Twitter if you haven’t seen the finale yet), one of the proposed solutions to this problem seems simple: release the episodes at a later time. Instead of dropping episodes at 3AM ET, why not pivot to 8 or 9PM ET, similar to how Game of... Continue reading…

Illustration by Grayson Blackmon This year, millions of people turned to bicycles as a safe and socially distanced way to get out of their homes, shake off that cabin fever, and get some fresh air, and suddenly — thanks to COVID — bikes were in. But unless concerted efforts are made to ensure people can continue to cycle safely and in great numbers, all those bikes may soon be gathering dust.Things looked grim at first, with bike sales plummeting as cities went into lockdown. But as the year plodded along, bike sales started really getting up to speed. Popular bikes went on backorder. Local shops and big-box retailers struggled to keep up with demand. The humble bicycle emerged as one of the rare winners of the pandemic.For the first time in, well, a century, the... Continue reading…

Photo by Nilay Patel / The Verge It seems like there’s no sign of tech news stopping for the holidays. In The Vergecast’s last regular episode of 2020, The Verge’s Dieter Bohn and Nilay Patel bring on senior reporter Adi Robertson and editor Chris Welch to explain the biggest stories in tech from this past week.In the first half of the show, Adi explains two (!) more antitrust cases brought against Google this week: one from the Texas attorney general and the other from a coalition of 38 states. The Vergecast breaks down their arguments about Google’s alleged anti-competitive behavior around ad tech and search manipulation.In the second half of the show, The Vergecast shift gears to a review of the latest product announcement from Apple: the AirPods Max. Chris... Continue reading…

Animal Crossing: New Horizons for the Nintendo Switch offers some much-needed joy. The holidays are upon us, and we’re just about to enter crunch time for gift-getting. If you haven’t made your selections, it’s possible that gifts might not get where they need to go on time — unless you pay for rush shipping or you take advantage of curbside pickup services. I know that’s a lot of pressure, but if you’re ready to make a few purchases for tech fans in your life, we have a few last-minute suggestions that also happen to be good deals. Depending on the retailer, these might not arrive in time for the holidays, but it’s the thought that counts, right? You’ve got this! Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge Google’s latest Pixel Buds wireless earbuds rarely see a discount, but they’re $35 off at online store... Continue reading…

Fortnite’s annual holiday event is back, and this time, it brings a surprise: the return of airplanes. “Operation Snowdown,” as it’s called, lasts from December 18th to January 5th, and it adds the expected to the game, including a snowy map and free unlockables like a soldier snowman called Snowmando. Everyone who logs in before January 5th will also get a free caroling emote.The biggest feature, though, is the return of airplanes. The timing is perfect: planes were first introduced in season 7, back in 2018, which was also a winter-themed update for the game. (There was even a militarized Santa character.) They were later removed, and it sounds like their latest appearance will be short-lived as well.In addition to the new missions... Continue reading…

Photo by Justin Lubin / Lucasfilm For a show about a tiny alien, The Mandalorian sure had a huge impact. The first season of the series helped sell millions on Disney Plus, the company’s Netflix-style streaming service, while simultaneously showing how the Star Wars universe could translate to prestige television. It was, to put it succinctly, a hit — one that became even more popular thanks to the adorable Baby Yoda. Er, I mean, The Child.The second season, meanwhile, faces a very different challenge. Not only does it have to live up to the hype generated by season 1, but it’s also releasing at a time when many of the biggest movies and TV shows have been indefinitely delayed due to the ongoing pandemic, making it arguably the biggest entertainment release of 2020.To... Continue reading…

Image: Lucasfilm Ltd. As expected, The Mandalorian’s finale culminated in a dramatic showdown between Din Djarin (Pedro Pascal) — aka, Mando — and Moff Gideon (Giancarlo Esposito) over the fate of Grogu (née Baby Yoda). But “The Rescue” didn’t just run into the expected complications for an assault on a massive Imperial cruiser: it also ran into the mainstream Star Wars universe in the biggest way yet.Warning: Spoilers for the entirety of The Mandalorian season 2 and Star Wars: The Last Jedi follow.Par for the course for Mando, though, things didn’t go quite as planned. While the armored hero did succeed in saving his adopted son, it came at a bittersweet cost: Grogu’s earlier callout for any other Jedi was answered by none other than Luke Skywalker (Mark... Continue reading…

Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge DJI — one of the largest and most popular drone companies in the world — has been added to the US Department of Commerce’s Entity List, designating the Chinese company as a national security concern and banning US-based companies from exporting technology to the company. Reuters first reported the news, citing a conference call with a senior commerce official. The Department of Commerce did not immediately respond to a request for further details.The ban was put in place through the same mechanism as the US government’s ongoing ban on Huawei products, and is primarily focused on blocking the export of US technology to the drone-maker. However, the ban will make it difficult for US businesses to provide parts or components for DJI to use... Continue reading…

Photo by Nilay Patel / The Verge After some initial confusion around how the AirPods Max handle power management, Apple has tried to clarify the issue with an updated support page outlining how and when its new $550 headphones automatically conserve battery life.Originally, the company said that “when stored in their soft, slim smart case, AirPods Max enter an ultra‑low‑power state that preserves charge.” But there was uncertainty about what happens when they’re left outside the case. In my review, I found that the headphones lost only a few battery percentage points when left out overnight with no case — nothing close to a worrying level of drain. But not everyone had that experience; Marques Brownlee observed a greater amount of battery loss when the AirPods Max... Continue reading…

NASA’s Orion capsule attached to its adapter and service module. | Photo by Ben Smegelsky / NASA NASA is opting to fly its future deep-space crew capsule Orion “as is” next year, after the agency discovered that one of the spacecraft’s power instruments had suffered a failure. Engineers had been mulling over whether to replace the instrument before the vehicle’s flight but ultimately decided that there was enough redundancy in the system to withstand the failed component.“NASA has confidence in the health of the overall power and data system, which has been through thousands of hours of powered operations and testing,” the agency wrote in a blog post announcing the decision. “Engineers will perform additional testing and continue to monitor the health of the spacecraft while Orion is powered on to provide continued confidence in... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge US Customs and Border Protection has filed for a significant expansion in its authority to conduct facial recognition at airports. On November 19th, the agency submitted a filing to the Federal Register seeking to expand the ongoing biometric exit program, broadening the program’s scope to include all air and land ports. The filing also shifts the program’s focus entirely to facial recognition, at the expense of alternate methods like fingerprinting.The filing is subject to public comment for a brief time after its submission. That comment period will end on Monday, December 21st.“All aliens may be required to be photographed upon entry”First deployed in 2017, biometric exit has operated as a pilot program, limited to a handful of... Continue reading…

I spent a lot of time in Final Fantasy VII Remake looking up. In Midgar, the sky is obstructed by metal plates, physical barriers that separate downtrodden citizens from their wealthy counterparts. It’s a quiet reminder that in this place, no one is free. People’s paths are already written.Final Fantasy VII Remake is just that: a retelling of the iconic 1997 Japanese roleplaying game that made Final Fantasy a household name. Cloud Strife, a brooding mercenary with a spotty past, becomes entangled with Avalanche, a radical group fighting against an evil corporation with aspirations that are destroying the planet. It’s a journey from Midgar, the bustling metropolis in which the game is initially set, to a globe-trotting adventure that... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge In a year when the spread of COVID-19 made bringing large crowds together impossible, companies around the world had to reevaluate their love affair with the live product launch. Packing hundreds of attendees into extravagant venues to hang on every word of company executives was never going to be possible in an era of social distancing. Instead, events moved online, and many changed completely in the process as companies dropped risky product demonstrations in favor of slick prerecorded video segments. These events effectively turned from live launches into infomercials, and it makes me wonder how the likes of Apple, Amazon, Google, Sony, or Microsoft will be able to go back.It’s a striking change, thanks in part to how consistent the... Continue reading…

While The Verge is a place where stories are told, they wouldn’t be nearly as interesting if it weren’t for the artwork that accompanies them. Alex Castro is the illustrator for The Verge, and he is the best person to describe how his work complements our reporting.What follows are Alex’s thoughts about the tools he prefers to use.IllustrationI’ve heard illustrations described as “visual metaphors” that reflect the meaning of the words. I create artwork for Verge articles that communicates the sentiments of a story and catches the reader’s eye. Sometimes, it’s creating batches of simple graphics that could be used for a number of stories. Other times, it’s reading and rereading reports and features trying to dissect what the main... Continue reading…

Group calling on an Echo Show. | Photo: Amazon Amazon is launching a new group video or audio calling feature for Echo devices today, just in time for the holidays. Originally announced back in September, group calling will allow up to seven participants to join an audio or video call on supported Echo devices like the Echo, Echo Dot, and Echo Show.Echo owners will be able to create and name groups using the Alexa app, and Amazon is also planning to support group calling through its Alexa app soon. You’ll be able to add adult contacts into groups, and friends and family will have to opt in to be part of group calling. This new feature also supports Alexa commands like “Alexa, call my family” to connect to a group you’ve created.Echo group calling could be a good alternative to Zoom... Continue reading…

Lucasfilm, Ltd. 2020 has been a strange year, by nearly any metric you choose to use. And that weirdness has bled over to pop culture, as the seemingly endless news cycles of disasters, the ongoing global pandemic, the turmoil of the US elections, the rise of TikTok, the dearth of traditional releases of big movies, and just so many memes resulted in a year of cultural moments that awed, amazed, and just straight-up confused us.It was a year that seemed almost determined to constantly one-up itself on nonsensical events, each headline more impossible than the last. And faced with all that frightening reality, is it any wonder that the weirdness of 2020’s culture became almost a mirror reflection of the year itself? When the world gets strange,... Continue reading…

Sarah Cooper in her Netflix special, Everything’s Fine. | Photo by Lacey Terrell / Netflix Here’s what happens when a product designer becomes a creator Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Microsoft president Brad Smith warned that the wide-ranging hack of the SolarWinds’ Orion IT software is “ongoing,” and that investigations reveal “an attack that is remarkable for its scope, sophistication and impact.” The breach targeted several US government agencies and is believed to have been carried out by Russian nation-state hackers.Smith characterized the hack as “a moment of reckoning” and laid out in no uncertain terms just how large and how dangerous Microsoft believes the hack to be. It “represents an act of recklessness that created a serious technological vulnerability for the United States and the world,” Smith argues.He believes that it “is not just an attack on specific targets, but on the trust and reliability of... Continue reading…

Sony is pulling Cyberpunk 2077 from the PlayStation Store and offering full refunds for anyone who bought the game from the digital storefront, the company said on Thursday. If you want to start the refund process now, Sony says to visit this site and sign into your PlayStation account to submit a request.However, later on Thursday evening, Sony said it is “aware some users are experiencing issues” accessing the refund form. If you’re seeing issues, you may want to try again later.Cyberpunk 2077 has already been removed from the PlayStation Store for a few Verge staffers on their PS5s, and the game doesn’t come up in a search for “Cyberpunk 2077” on the web version of the store. Following older, online listing links to the game will... Continue reading…

Grogu’s face upon realizing he lives with me. | Image: Lucasfilm Ltd. Google has added Grogu (formerly Baby Yoda) to its augmented reality search results, so some quick typing can drop an AR version of the little guy straight into your bedroom or home office, no spaceship required.Searching “Grogu”, “The Child”, “The Mandalorian”, or “Baby Yoda” on mobile or in the Google app will return the usual Knowledge Panel with a Wikipedia summary of the character. But now you can click “View in 3D” to check out a model, and if you’re really feeling like noted Baby Yoda fan Werner Herzog, “View in your space” to get up close and personal in AR. Interactions are limited to zooming in and out, but he’s a really cute alien. Maybe that’s enough for you. Conveniently, Grogu is only slightly bigger than... Continue reading…

If you’ve been waiting anxiously for your radio-controlled Cybertruck, you’re going to have to wait a little longer: Mattel has had to delay it until May 2021, according to Bloomberg.The RC cars, announced in February, were supposed to ship this month, but have been delayed because of “unforseen production issues.” Mattel appears to be experiencing “manufacturing hell,” though the company did not release details on the delay.Just another way that the model imitates realityThese toys are scaled-down versions of the real Cybertruck, and come in two models: an 1:64 scale model, which costs $20, and an 1:10 scale model that costs $400. Both models went out of stock after pre-orders.Tesla’s Cybertruck, unveiled in November 2019, is a... Continue reading…

Diablo Immortal didn’t make a great first impression. It was announced at Blizzcon in 2018 when most fans were expecting the next mainline Diablo title, not a free-to-play spinoff for smartphones. Since then, Blizzard has been very quiet about Immortal (though Diablo IV was eventually announced).That’s starting to change. Ahead of a technical alpha that’s set to kick off soon, I was able to play through the early stages of the game. And while I can’t speak to every aspect, one thing was immediately clear: this feels like a proper Diablo game.A mobile version of Diablo makes a lot of sense. There are already countless clones and Diablo-inspired titles on smartphones, while the Nintendo Switch version of Diablo III proved just how fun... Continue reading…

Photo Illustration by Pavlo Gonchar/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images An independent committee of experts recommended that the Food and Drug Administration authorize the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine for people 18 and older. This is the second COVID-19 vaccine to go before the committee — the first, made by Pfizer and BioNTech, was authorized last week. The agency is expected to issue an authorization for Moderna’s vaccine within a day or two.“This is a really opportune time for us to move science forward,” said Hayley Gans, a committee member and professor of pediatrics at Stanford University Medical Center, during the committee’s deliberations. The evidence available for benefits of the vaccine outweighs any issues, she said. “That really supports us being able to, with the pandemic in the background,... Continue reading…

Twitter has begun testing its Spaces feature, the voice-based chat rooms it first announced last month. In the thread announcing the test, the company said a very small group of users would be given the ability to create Spaces, but that in theory anyone could join them — though who would be allowed into any given space depends on the user who created it.Twitter outlined last month how the first people to be given access to Spaces would be women and people from other marginalized communities, groups who are more likely than others to be subjected to abuse and harassment when trying to engage in conversations in regular, comment-based discussions on the platform.

Image: Shutterstock A stunning new report from the Los Angeles Times details how toxic jet engine fumes can leak into airplanes’ air supplies, sickening passengers and crew — and the airline industry has known this was a problem for several decades.The Times reports that one pilot told colleagues the situation was “the tobacco and asbestos of aviation.”

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Google plans to shut down Android Things, a stripped-down version of Android designed for smart home devices. The OS never really got off the ground, so this isn’t all that much of a loss, but it is yet another entry in Google’s expansive graveyard of shut-down projects.The smart home project got its start in 2015 under the name Brillo, which was meant to provide the “underlying operating system for the internet of things.” In 2016, Google revamped Brillo and relaunched the initiative as Android Things, which was likewise meant to run on products like connected speakers, security cameras, and routers. By relying on Android, the OS was supposed to be familiar to developers and easy to get started with.The system will shut down in... Continue reading…

Photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images A text message program designed to track side effects in COVID-19 vaccine recipients is currently only available in English, which could limit the data it is able to collect.The program, called v-safe, is one way the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention will follow up with people who take the vaccine. It was rolled out with the first wave of vaccinations last week.“When you’re talking about technology, literacy and language are usually second tier,” says Jorge Rodriguez, a health technology equity researcher at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston. “Version one is English-speaking, and the Spanish version will come later, the Mandarin version will come later.”The CDC plans to roll out a Spanish version of v-safe “fairly... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Twitter’s revamped verification policy is launching on January 20th, 2021, after Twitter pressed pause on the formal application process for more than three years. The new policy was refined with input from tens of thousands of user responses after Twitter confirmed in November it would be relaunching verification next year.That January date isn’t when the formal application process will relaunch, so you’ll have to wait a little bit longer if you’re itching to try and get a blue checkmark. Applications will open at some point in “early 2021,” a Twitter spokesperson tells The Verge. But January 20th is when the new policy takes effect and when the company says it will begin removing verification badges from inactive accounts and those... Continue reading…

Image: Warner Bros. Christopher Nolan’s success is the sort of paradox that would be at the center of a Christopher Nolan movie. His films — often characterized as puzzle boxes — are meticulous works that walk the line between indulgent labyrinths and satisfying spectacle. They’re brainier than any superhero movie would dare to be, but they still find comparable success. This blue chip status has made Nolan the patron saint of guys who say, “I like movies that make you think,” even if said thinking is just a question with an extremely clear answer — like “Was the Joker right?”Nolan’s films occupy a unique space in pop culture. The director of The Dark Knight is one of the only filmmakers in Hollywood who is able to make an original nonfranchise film and... Continue reading…

Image: WinFuture Samsung’s new Galaxy S21 line will come in several new colors, according to leaked press renders acquired by WinFuture. Based on the images, the new colors will include light purple / violet, gray, black, white, and rosy pink.Some of the colors will be limited to specific phones in the S21 line, according to Android Police. Samsung will also apparently add the word “Phantom” to the front of each color, maybe to reflect their more muted look. It’s rumored that the base 6.2-inch S21 will be available in phantom violet, phantom pink, phantom gray, and phantom white. Meanwhile the 6.7-inch S21 Plus will offer phantom gray, phantom black, and phantom violet. Finally, the high-end 6.8-inch S21 Ultra will come in just two colors, phantom black... Continue reading…