The Verge

Lincoln is ending production of the famed Continental sedan at the end of 2020, just four years after reintroducing the vehicle following a 14-year hiatus. Why? Because Americans have fallen irretrievably in love with SUVs and trucks over the last few years.As Automotive News first reported, Lincoln will continue to sell the car in the US and Chinese markets into next year. Lincoln has long been rumored to be interested in building vehicles in China but would not say if it plans to shift production of the Continental there. “Sedans continue to be important to the luxury market in China, and we will have more to say about our plans in the future,” a company spokesperson told The Verge on Wednesday.Lincoln will soon only sell SUVsThe... Continue reading…

FG Trade / Getty Images Even a favorite stay-at-home activity like watching TV can get lonely sometimes, especially if you’re used to hanging out with your friends and watching together. Although you can stream and text, FaceTime, or share your screen on Zoom, sometimes that just doesn’t cut it. If you’re looking for a way to make your social-distancing series binge more, well, social, there are browser extensions that let you host watch parties digitally.Here are several apps you can use to host movie nights with friends online, along with step-by-step instructions on how to start watching.To use these apps, you will need your own subscription for each service, and everyone watching will have to be signed onto their own account. These extensions work on... Continue reading…

Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge One day after YouTube TV announced a $15 price hike that had customers crying out “enough already,” Dish’s Sling TV service is promising that it won’t raise prices on existing customers until at least August 2021. The company seems keen on using the frustration toward YouTube to help boost its own subscriptions; this offer is extended to anyone who signs up for Sling by August 1st and maintains service. (That, of course, leaves open the possibility that new customers who come on board after August 1st will start off with higher pricing...)Right now, Sling’s two channel tiers, Sling Blue and Sling Orange, each cost $30. You can get them individually if only one covers the channels you want, or get both for $45 monthly for maximum... Continue reading…

Autonomous trucking startup TuSimple is joining forces with big logistics providers as it seeks to bolster its delivery capabilities. The company announced it will be working with UPS, Xpress Enterprises, Penske Trucking, and Berkshire Hathaway-owned grocery and food-service distributor McLane to lay the foundation for a coast-to-coast autonomous trucking network.TuSimple aims to be making nearly 100 delivery runs a week, doubling its current number of freight hauls, but the ramp-up will take place over the next four years. The company will start by building on its existing partnership with UPS hauling cargo for it between Phoenix and Tucson, Arizona, adding cities in Texas like El Paso, Dallas, Houston, and San Antonio. This fall,... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Zoom committed to sharing its first transparency report later this year in a blog by CEO Eric Yuan tracking the progress of its 90-day feature freeze to address privacy and security issues. The freeze, which was announced on April 1st, was put in place after Zoom usage went up dramatically during the COVID-19 pandemic, which revealed numerous privacy and security flaws in the videoconferencing software.“We have made significant progress defining the framework and approach for a transparency report that details information related to requests Zoom receives for data, records, or content,” said Yuan in today’s blog. “We look forward to providing the fiscal Q2 data in our first report later this year.” A Zoom spokesperson declined to... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Apple is reclosing even more of its US retail network in response to COVID-19 spikes in states throughout the country, CNBC reports. On Wednesday, the iPhone maker said it would reclose an additional 30 locations across seven states, bringing the total number of closed stores to 77, or more than 25 percent of its US operation.The states hit by this wave of closures include Alabama, California, Georgia, Idaho, Louisiana, Nevada, and Oklahoma. Some, if not all, stores in Arizona, Florida, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Texas, and Utah remain closed as part of Apple’s earlier wave of closures. Apple has also reclosed some locations overseas, 9to5Mac reports.Apple operates 271 retail locations in the US, its physical retail... Continue reading…

Image: Lego Lego’s next line of sets offers builders multiple ways to recreate pop culture icons, including Darth Vader and Marilyn Monroe.Lego Art is a lineup of portrait creations designed for adult builders. Each set features small, bead-size pieces and a canvas that you use to piece together a pop art poster.There are four sets currently in the Lego Art lineup: Andy Warhol’s Marilyn Monroe, portraits of the members of The Beatles, a set featuring various versions of Iron Man’s suit, and a Star Wars set based on popular villains.There isn’t just one way to create these portraits, either — Lego says each set can be reimagined “in a number of different ways.” For example, if you purchase The Sith set, you can recreate one of three members... Continue reading…

Microsoft is improving its OneDrive upload limit and sharing integration with Microsoft Teams for businesses and finally bringing a dark mode to the web version. The software giant is increasing the upload file size limit from 15GB to 100GB for all OneDrive and SharePoint users today. It’s a useful addition for business users of OneDrive who have been restricted to 15GB files, making it difficult to sync some large file types like CAD or video files.OneDrive for Business users will also soon be getting better Teams sharing integration. You’ll be able to share a file within Teams and be presented with an option to create a shared link that allows files and documents to be shared strictly within a company or to anyone. Microsoft will also... Continue reading…

Image: Samsung Russia Samsung may have just leaked its next flagship phone, the Galaxy Note 20 Ultra, with renders of an unreleased Galaxy Note device appearing on the company’s official Russian website, via Ishan Agarwal on Twitter.While it’s not confirmed yet that the images of the copper-colored phone are actually of Samsung’s new flagship, they definitely do depict an unreleased Galaxy Note phone, with a camera array that features a folded zoom lens and a very similar design to the Galaxy S20 Ultra released earlier this year. The Verge has confirmed that the images do currently appear on Samsung’s Russian website for the Galaxy Note 8, as the background for a section that reads “Discover the next generation Note” — which links out to the... Continue reading…

It’s been three years since Search Party last aired on TBS, where tragically few people watched it. An immediate cult hit, Search Party won ardent fans across its brief two-season run by being an unexpected mix of thriller and satire. The series was a bait-and-switch: it begins with a mystery about a missing woman, but mostly used that in the service of a withering takedown of white millennial life. Now, the show has returned with a third season on a new platform, HBO Max, where it is one of the few must-watch original series and a terrific weekend binge.In its new third season, now available to stream in its entirety, Search Party gets meaner than ever while maintaining the relentless pacing of both thrills and comedy. This remains as... Continue reading…

NBCUniversal and ViacomCBS have struck a new deal that allows a number of TV shows and movies from ViacomCBS’s library to stream on NBCUniversal’s new streaming service, Peacock.Ray Donovan, The Affair, Undercover Boss, The Game, Everybody Hates Chris, Real Husbands of Hollywood, and more will be available to stream on Peacock when the streaming service fully launches on July 15th.This part isn’t an exclusive deal. The aforementioned shows, along with other ViacomCBS series that land on Peacock, will also stream on their respective ViacomCBS streaming services, including Showtime and CBS All Access. ViacomCBS, a direct competitor to NBCUniversal, will keep its best IP — like Star Trek shows, CSI, NCIS, and The Good Wife — for its... Continue reading…

NASA is pushing back the launch of it next Mars rover, called Perseverance, by a week, due to a problem with the rocket that’s supposed to send the spacecraft to the Red Planet. The rover is now slated to launch no earlier than July 30th out of Cape Canaveral, Florida.That puts the launch of Perseverance perilously close to the end of its limited launch window, which originally spanned from July 17th to August 11th. NASA and other space agencies only have a small window of time every two years to send spacecraft to Mars, when the Red Planet comes closest to Earth on its orbit around the Sun. NASA has already pushed back the launch a few times before, to July 20th and then to July 22nd, due to issues with the ground equipment that... Continue reading…

Photo by Anne Farrar/The Washington Post via Getty Images Employees at Cards Against Humanity (CAH) are unionizing. In a statement posted today on Twitter, workers said that they have sent a letter to CAH’s owners to voluntarily recognize their union under CMRJB Workers United. “The time has come for us to follow in the footsteps of our comrades at The Onion, Gawker, and Kickstarter,” a statement from CAH Workers United reads.Cards Against Humanity employees have come forward over the past few weeks to talk about a long office culture of racist and sexist behavior, as well as sexual assault allegations against co-founder Max Temkin. The Verge’s sister site Polygon spoke with dozens of current and former employees; many shared stories of how Black writers’ concerns and ideas were often ignored,... Continue reading…

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge Earlier this year, Apple reportedly canceled several contracts for games that were set to launch on Arcade, the company’s game subscription service known for its library of high-quality titles that don’t have ads or in-app purchases. It allegedly canceled each of them for the same reason: Apple wants new games that will keep players coming back to the service.A report from Bloomberg notes that an Arcade executive told some developers who were on contract that Apple is seeking out games that have a high level of “engagement,” as it was put by one of the publication’s sources. For developers wondering where Apple’s bar for engagement currently lies, the report mentions that an Apple Arcade representative cited Grindstone, Capybara Games’... Continue reading…

Netgear Orbi RBK752. | Image: Netgear Netgear is launching a second model of its Orbi mesh router with support for Wi-Fi 6, following up on a high-end model released last fall. This new version, eloquently named the RBK752, is more of a midrange model, offering slightly decreased performance at a slightly decreased price. This is still an Orbi router, though, so it’s still expensive: $450 for a router and satellite. The high-end model, the RBK852, offers the same bundle for $700.While cheaper, this new model is still a fairly capable mesh system. The RBK752 is a tri-band system, meaning it has a radio dedicated to serving as a wireless link between the units, and it offers four user-facing streams of connectivity with a theoretical maximum speed of 4.2Gbps. That’s down from... Continue reading…

ESPN Plus is getting a $1 price hike in August to $5.99 a month, making the baseline price for Disney’s sports streaming app the same as Hulu’s basic tier.The price hike is only being applied to ESPN Plus’ monthly fee, according to internal documents viewed by The Verge. The annual price of $49.99 will remain untouched. Existing monthly subscribers can keep the $4.99 subscription fee for a period of one year before being switched to the $5.99 price point, documents show. Disney declined to comment to The Verge.ESPN Plus launched in April 2018, carrying an assortment of college games and various sports leagues, albeit none of the big ones like NFL or NBA games. ESPN Plus has also carried UFC title matches, which have performed well... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Facebook has removed a network of anti-government accounts associated with the fringe “boogaloo” movement after designating the group as a dangerous organization, the company said. The network, which represents a subset of the broader movement, actively planned violence, Facebook said, though it declined to share additional details, saying it did not want to interfere with ongoing law enforcement investigations.On Tuesday afternoon, the company removed:

Nest Thermostat E smart thermostat | Photo by Jake Kastrenakes / The Verge Google is making it easy for people to conserve energy this summer by rolling out a free version of Seasonal Savings for all Nest thermostat owners. Previously, the feature was only available for customers of utilities with Seasonal Savings programs, according to a Google blog post.Seasonal Savings works as an “energy monitor,” making slight schedule changes to help people automatically conserve energy without noticing major temperature fluctuations. “By adjusting your schedule just a fraction of a degree each day, users save energy while staying comfortable,” wrote Krishan Gupta, a Nest product manager. “These little changes can really add up—the average customer sees 3 to 5 percent in energy savings on their home’s heating and... Continue reading…

Image: Amazon Game Studios Amazon-owned game studio Relentless is putting its free-to-play shooter Crucible back into a closed beta state after admitting it launched the game before it was ready. In a blog post published Tuesday, franchise lead Colin Johanson says the focus is now on ”providing the best possible experience for our players as we continue to make the game better,” and so the game will be reverting back to a pre-release state to give the studio the space to make changes and plan a more robust launch.“We’ll continue following the roadmap we laid out previously and working on map, combat, and system changes to improve the Heart of the Hives experience as well as implementing other improvements based on your feedback and what we think the game needs... Continue reading…

Photo by Tobias Hase / Picture Alliance via Getty Images It’s about more than banning a few accounts Continue reading…

Chinese EV startup Byton is halting operations for at least six months due to financial problems that have been exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic, the company has confirmed to The Verge, following reports from The Detroit Bureau and local media. This comes after employees in China have complained they are collectively owed millions of dollars while the company struggled to complete a $500 million funding round.Byton already furloughed hundreds of workers at its North American headquarters in Silicon Valley in April and all but admitted that its first vehicle — an all-electric SUV with a massive dashboard screen called the M-Byte — would be delayed again due to the impact of the pandemic. This is all despite Byton being backed by... Continue reading…

Dieter Bohn After months of rumors, Google has finally confirmed that its “Nearby Share” feature is on the way. Some Android users are already testing a beta version.“We’re currently conducting a beta test of a new Nearby Share feature that we plan to share more information on in the future,” Google told Android Police. “Our goal is to launch the feature with support for Android 6+ devices as well as other platforms.”The feature started showing up in Chrome OS Canary builds earlier this month, indicating that it will work on Chromebooks as well.“Our goal is to launch the feature with support for Android 6+ devices.”Nearby Share looks to function as an Android version of Apple’s AirDrop. You can use it to quickly and wirelessly transfer files... Continue reading…

French game studio Dontnod loves the supernatural. The team’s breakout hit was the original Life is Strange, which starred a teenage girl who had the ability to rewind time. The sequel featured a young boy with telekinetic powers, and in 2018, the studio dabbled in roleplaying games with Vampyr, which put players in the role of a bloodthirsty denizen of the night. But around 2016, the team decided they wanted to create something a little more grounded.They eventually landed on the idea for Twin Mirror, an adventure game about a former investigative journalist named Sam who ventures back to his hometown following the death of his best friend. Naturally, he gets wrapped up in a much bigger mystery involving the entire town. Sam does have... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge On Tuesday, the Federal Communications Commission officially designated telecommunications companies Huawei and ZTE as threats to national security.“With today’s Orders, and based on the overwhelming weight of evidence, the Bureau has designated Huawei and ZTE as national security risks to America’s communications networks — and to our 5G future,” FCC Chairman Ajit Pai said in a statement Tuesday. “Both companies have close ties to the Chinese Communist Party and China’s military apparatus, and both companies are broadly subject to Chinese law obligating them to cooperate with the country’s intelligence services.”By designating Huawei and ZTE as threats to US national security, the FCC bars telecommunications providers from using... Continue reading…

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge Discord on Tuesday announced it’s making a number of changes to expand its service beyond the gaming community. The company says the change is one its users have requested as Discord has become more of a tool for “day-to-day communication.”“Games are what brought many of you on the platform, and we’ll always be grateful for that,” reads a blog post by Discord CEO Jason Citron and CTO Stanislav Vishnevskiy. “As time passed, a lot of you realized, and vocalized, that you simply wanted a place designed to hang out and talk in the comfort of your own communities and friends. You wanted a place to have genuine conversations and spend quality time with people, whether catching up, learning something, or sharing ideas.”“Your place to talk”T... Continue reading…

Google’s Stadia controller. | Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge It has taken more than six months, but Google’s Stadia controller now finally works wirelessly with Android devices. Google originally launched its Stadia service back in November as a subscription to stream games to TVs, Android phones, and the web. Wireless controller support was strangely missing at launch for Android devices, which meant you had to awkwardly connect the Stadia controller using USB.Google is issuing a Stadia update to its Android app today that will enable the wireless support. It will also be a good opportunity for Stadia subscribers to test how well the Stadia controller roams between a Chromecast, the web, and Android devices. Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge Google Stadia. W... Continue reading…

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge Google has bought North, a company focused on building augmented reality glasses. The companies announced the news earlier today, saying that North’s “technical expertise” will help Google invest in its “hardware efforts and ambient computing future.”The details of the deal, including how much Google paid, weren’t revealed. With the acquisition, North says it’ll wind down its Focals smart glasses functionality, meaning wearers who spent up to $1,000 on a first-gen pair last year will soon be unable to use them.North launched the Focals 1.0 in January 2019, and within a month of launch, it dropped their price nearly in half to $599.99. The glasses feature a tiny laser in the arm that projects images in front of users’ eyes. The Focals... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Netflix is pledging 2 percent of its cash holdings to provide “economic opportunity for Black communities.” The company plans to initially commit up to $100 million, but the quantity could grow alongside its cash holdings over time.The streaming behemoth announced the first $35 million of that money would be allocated into two areas: $25 million will be used to establish the “Black Economic Development Initiative,” a fund that will invest in Black financial institutions and aid Black community development corporations. The other $10 million will be administered to Hope Credit Union to help provide new economic opportunities to underprivileged communities in the Deep South. Netflix has yet to detail how it will disburse the other $65... Continue reading…

Illustration by William Joel / The Verge Don’t make a video game until you can make a good company Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Spotify is launching a new real-time lyrics feature in 26 markets today, including India and countries in Southeast Asia and Latin America, TechCrunch reports. Where available, users can access them by tapping the “lyrics” card at the bottom of the service’s “Now Playing” screen. The new feature uses lyrics provided by Musixmatch, and will be shown in the song’s language.Lyrics have a complicated history on Spotify. The service has actually worked with Musixmatch previously, before breaking ties with the company in 2016. That same year, Spotify started working with Genius on its “Behind the Lyrics” feature, which gives background information about select tracks, alongside the lyrics themselves. It’s an interesting feature, but this... Continue reading…

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales It was a big news day for bans: Twitch temporarily banned Donald Trump, Reddit banned The_Donald, YouTube banned a group of far-right creators, and India banned TikTok. But I still haven’t written about the Facebook ad boycott, which accelerated since last I wrote — so let’s talk about that today, and we’ll get to the rest later this week.I.A social media advertising boycott that began with some outerwear brands picked up steam over the weekend, and has been joined by some of the giants of consumer brand advertising. Unilever, Verizon, Starbucks, Coca-Cola, and Clorox are among those who have pulled their ads. (Microsoft did so quietly in May.) Some pulled their ads for a month; some put their ads on an indefinite “pause.” Some pulled... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Google is hosting a virtual smart home developer event on July 8th in lieu of its cancelled Google I/O conference, the company has announced, promising to cover “new and upcoming features for smart home developers and users.” The online Works with “Hey Google” Smart Home Summit, as the event is catchily titled, includes a 45 minute keynote, a series of developer sessions and a panel featuring Google and other companies in the smart home industry.The keynote, which will be presented by Google’s Product Management director of the Smart Home Ecosystem Michele Turner, will go over Google’s new smart home API features along with their benefits for developers and users. Although it’s developer-focused, previous Google I/O keynotes have... Continue reading…

Photo by Horacio Villalobos#Corbis/Corbis via Getty Images Uber has made an offer to buy food delivery company Postmates, according to a report in The New York Times and later corroborated by The Wall Street Journal. The deal could be for about $2.6 billion, according to the WSJ, and it could be finalized as soon as this week; discussions are said to be ongoing.Demand for Uber’s ride-hailing business has plummeted during the coronavirus pandemic as people stay at home, but the same circumstances have driven a huge increase in food delivery orders. Uber has been looking for ways to boost its food service, Uber Eats, after laying off more than a quarter of the company’s overall workforce.Uber attempted to buy GrubHub earlier this year, but the deal fell apart amid reported antitrust scrutiny and... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge AT&T’s low-band 5G network is expanding to 28 new regions today, including Austin, Miami, Dallas, and Salt Lake City. If you’ve been waiting for a slight speed boost over your current LTE connection and have a 5G-compatible phone, you might want to check if your neighborhood is part of this latest expansion.Technically, we’re talking about AT&T’s low-band 5G network, which has slightly better speeds and latency compared to 4G LTE. When OpenSignal tested 5G speeds from major phone carriers in downtown cities over the winter, it found AT&T’s low-band download speeds averaged 59.3Mbps. The low-band network is not to be confused with AT&T’s 5G Plus, a high-band network with mmWave frequencies, which offer far faster internet speeds than... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Watching 4K Netflix video on a Mac seems like it’s about to get much easier, as the forthcoming macOS Big Sur includes a Safari update that reportedly lets you watch Netflix in 4K, along with Dolby Vision HDR, according to a tweet from Ishan Agarwal (via 9to5Mac).This may mark the first time that macOS users will be able to stream Netflix in 4K. Previously, streaming 4K Netflix on a computer at all required you to be on Windows and using Microsoft’s Edge browser or the Netflix Windows 10 app. That means, in theory, you could watch Netflix in 4K on a Mac via Windows in a Boot Camp partition — but just loading up Safari, which is installed with macOS Big Sur, could be a far easier option once Big Sur is released (it’s scheduled to come... Continue reading…

Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge Google Photos will no longer backup images and videos saved from folders created and managed by social media apps by default (via Android Police). Previously, Google’s photo backup platform would automatically upload all images saved to your Android or iOS device, including those files stored in folders created by apps like Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp. Now, Google says that feature is turned off, and you’ll have to toggle it on for specific apps or run manual backups on specific folders.Google is citing the surge in image sharing happening since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. “People are sharing more photos and videos due to COVID-19. To save internet resources, backup & sync has been turned off for device folders created by... Continue reading…

Amazon is giving its Prime members the ability to watch TV shows and movies on Prime Video with friends using its new Watch Party feature.The feature is slowly rolling out, according to the company, and is only available in the US right now. Watch Parties will accommodate up to 100 viewers in one group, but each person must have a US-based Prime subscription. Once inside the Watch Party, people can choose from thousands of titles, according to Amazon, including originals and licensed shows and movies.Anything from the service’s US streaming video on demand catalog is featured. This includes originals like Fleabag, The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, Jack Ryan, The Big Sick, The Boys, Homecoming, and My Spy, as well as licensed titles available... Continue reading…

Mirror Lululemon, the company behind trendy fitness apparel, is getting into the hardware business with Mirror. The fitness lifestyle company announced on Monday it would spend $500 million to acquire the startup, which sells a $1,495 reflective display so subscribers can exercise while simultaneously streaming workouts and watching themselves.The apparel company’s CEO Calvin McDonald tells The New York Times the purchase is about “strengthening our community and our loyalty and our relationship with our guests and memberships.” He also noted that Mirror comes with its own revenue model, which he and the team are “excited about.”Mirror sells a $1,495 reflective display for streaming workoutsThe Times says Mirror expects to bring in over... Continue reading…

Photo by Stephen Brashear/Getty Images Boeing and the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) began a series of test flights on Monday to determine whether the 737 Max should be allowed back in the air, after it was involved in two deadly crashes that killed 346 people in 2018 and 2019. The tests are expected to last around three days.“While the certification flights are an important milestone, a number of key tasks remain,” the FAA said in a statement. “The FAA is following a deliberate process and will take the time it needs to thoroughly review Boeing’s work. We will lift the grounding order only after we are satisfied that the aircraft meets certification standards.”Part of Monday’s test flights, which happened in the Seattle area, reportedly involved taking the plane... Continue reading…

A blood drive in Chicago at the Field Museum of Natural History. | Photo by Scott Olson/Getty Images The American Red Cross is testing all donated blood for novel coronavirus antibodies and will use that information to learn more about the spread of COVID-19. They’ll also check back in with donors to find out how long their antibodies last.If someone has antibodies to the novel coronavirus, it’s a sign that they were, at one point, infected with the virus. While the tests on the market now aren’t perfect, many people are still interested in getting them — including people who thought they had COVID-19, but weren’t able to get tested when they were sick.One goal of the antibody testing initiative is to encourage more people to donate blood, says Susan Stramer, vice president of scientific affairs at the Red Cross. Stay-at-home orders... Continue reading…

‘Xbox Series S’ concept. | jiveduder on Reddit A leaked Microsoft document recently hinted at the company’s second next-gen Xbox, and now rumors suggest it will be fully revealed in August. Eurogamer reports that Microsoft had originally planned to unveil the console, codenamed “Lockhart,” in June. Microsoft has now reportedly moved these plans to August, and Eurogamer claims the console will be named the Xbox Series S.Microsoft has been working on this second cheaper next-gen Xbox console for months. A Microsoft document, leaked last week, shed some further light on the company’s plans. Microsoft’s Xbox Series X devkit, codenamed “Dante,” allows game developers to enable a special Lockhart mode that has a profile of the performance that Microsoft wants to hit with this second... Continue reading…

Photo by James Bareham / The Verge The New York Times has announced that, as of today, it will no longer be distributing articles in the Apple News app, making it one of the largest publishers to end its association with Apple’s publishing platform.In a memo announcing the change, Meredith Kopit Levien, chief operating officer at the Times, said the company wants “a direct path for sending those readers back into our environments, where we control the presentation of our report, the relationships with our readers, and the nature of our business rules.” She added that the paper’s “relationship with Apple News does not fit within these parameters.”While Apple has had a tougher time getting publishers (including the Times) to sign on for its monthly News Plus subscription... Continue reading…

The 2021 Geneva Motor Show has been canceled because of the “financial consequences” of this year’s event getting the axe, but also because of concerns about the pace of the COVID-19 pandemic. The foundation behind the show announced on Monday that a “majority” of exhibitors recently said they would “probably not participate in a 2021 edition in and that they would prefer to have [the next show] in 2022” instead. The show itself is also now up for sale.The Geneva Motor Show was the first major automotive event to be canceled outside of China earlier this year, with organizers pulling the plug about two weeks before the World Health Organization officially declared the COVID-19 outbreak a pandemic. It would have been the 90th edition of... Continue reading…

Image: Activision Popular battle royale shooter Call of Duty: Warzone is upping its already large 150-person lobbies to let 200 people compete in Quad mode contests, publisher Activision announced today. The new lobby size will arrive with an update releasing at 2AM ET tomorrow, June 30th.Warzone’s large lobbies are one of many ways the game tries to differentiate itself from the increasingly crowded battle royale market. But after this update, if you’re playing in a full Quad mode lobby of 200 people, you’ll be competing against 49 other teams of four, which could make Warzone’s already hectic games even more of a wild ride. Image: Activision It seems the mode will only be available for a limited time, according to an image from... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge India’s Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology has banned TikTok, WeChat, and several dozen other China-based apps it views as “engaged in activities ... prejudicial to sovereignty and integrity of India,” according to a press release. A total of 59 apps are on the banned list.India is a huge market for TikTok, which is owned by Chinese company ByteDance. According to SensorTower data from April, 30 percent of TikTok’s 2 billion downloads came from India. Messaging app WeChat, owned by Chinese internet company Tencent, has more than 1 billion users worldwide.TikTok and WeChat did not immediately reply to requests for comment Monday.It’s not the first time India has banned TikTok. Last year, the government instructed... Continue reading…

Photo by Drew Angerer / Getty Images Twitch has temporarily banned President Donald Trump, in the latest surprise and high-profile suspension from the streaming service. Trump’s account was banned for “hateful conduct” that was aired on stream, and Twitch says the offending content has now been removed.One of the streams in question was a rebroadcast of Trump’s infamous kickoff rally, where he said that Mexico was sending rapists to the United States. Twitch also flagged racist comments at Trump’s recent rally in Tulsa.“Like anyone else, politicians on Twitch must adhere to our Terms of Service and Community Guidelines. We do not make exceptions for political or newsworthy content, and will take action on content reported to us that violates our rules,” a Twitch... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Reddit will ban r/The_Donald, r/ChapoTrapHouse, and about 2,000 other communities today after updating its content policy to more explicitly ban hate speech. The policy update comes three weeks after Black Lives Matter protests led several popular Reddit forums to go dark temporarily in protest of what they called the company’s lax policies around hosting and promoting racist content. It marks a major reversal for a company whose commitment to free expression has historically been so strong that it once allowed users to distribute stolen nude photos freely on the site.“I have to admit that I’ve struggled with balancing my values as an American, and around free speech and free expression, with my values and the company’s values around... Continue reading…

Image: Universal Studios Japan Universal Studios Japan is delaying the opening of Super Nintendo World, the new Mario-themed expansion of its Osaka amusement park, NHK reports. Universal said the delay was due to concerns about the coronavirus. A new opening date has yet to be announced.The video game-themed area was originally set to open in July ahead of the 2020 Summer Olympics. However, the international sporting event was pushed back to 2021 as a result of the pandemic.Super Nintendo World will be based on Mario and other Nintendo propertiesUniversal fears that Super Nintendo World is likely to be so popular it could be a health hazard, allowing the coronavirus to spread, according to NHK. Universal Studios Japan reopened on June 8th but at limited capacity... Continue reading…

With longer continuous battery life than the 1000XM3s — and proper sweat resistance Continue reading…

How close are deepfakes to being used in big-budget films and TV shows? Pretty damn close, if a new demo from Disney is anything to go by. In a video and paper being presented at a computer graphics conference this week, researchers from the House of Mouse show off what they say is the first photo-realistic deepfake at a megapixel resolution.And the results are... pretty good! They’re not mind-blowing, certainly, and not good enough to be used in the next Marvel movie, but it’s a solid step up from deepfakes we’ve seen in the past.As the researchers suggest, what’s new here is the megapixel resolution. Megapixels may no longer be the byword for high-quality images that they used to be. (The camera on your phone probably has a... Continue reading…