its ur expert

Coral fragments of wild Florida elkhorn and staghorn in the living gene bank at The Reef Institute. | Image: NOAA; courtesy of  The Reef Institute . Federal authorities and scientists are scrambling to relocate corals from Florida’s coastlines before a killer heatwave wipes them out. The water is unbearably hot for corals, animals whose bodies form the reefs that coastal communities and other marine life depend on. Corals get their color from a symbiotic relationship with photosynthetic algae that provide them with the nutrients they need to survive. Unusually high temperatures, as the Atlantic Ocean is experiencing this summer, drive that colorful algae away. It’s a problem called coral bleaching that, if it lasts too long, ultimately kills corals. “Our hands-on restoration work is now all that stands between these animals and their extinction.” Anticipating a mass die-off,... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/akhvKBg

SAG-AFTRA’s striking logo. | Image: SAG-AFTRA When the Screen Actors Guild began giving independently produced projects clearance to continue production during Hollywood’s two ongoing labor strikes earlier this month, there was a sizable amount of confusion about how the process worked and why the union was doing it, given that it had called for an industrywide work stoppage just days earlier . Now, as more people have begun to question the logic behind the interim agreements being granted, SAG-AFTRA says they’re very much a part of its plan to help its members survive a strike that’s already taken some particularly ugly and telling turns. On Sunday evening, SAG-AFTRA posted a lengthy statement to its website explaining what its interim agreements are and how they’re being handed out... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/NBES5Ri

Illustration by Laura Normand / The Verge Twitter — now called X — is threatening to sue the Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH) for its research into hate speech on Twitter that the company claims is driving away advertisers. In a letter to the CCDH , which was first reported by The New York Times , Twitter lawyer Alex Spiro claims that the CCDH “regularly posts articles making inflammatory, outrageous, and false or misleading assertions” about Twitter with the goal of harming its reputation. The CCDH is an organization that aims to hold social media companies accountable for the spread of hateful material online. Since Elon Musk’s takeover of Twitter, the CCDH has published numerous reports that suggest the platform is failing to protect users from hate speech. In its... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/Q4yl6Ax

Illustration by William Joel / The Verge Microsoft has submitted a new change of circumstances document to the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) in the UK, arguing its case for its proposed Activision Blizzard deal to be reconsidered for approval. The CMA first blocked Microsoft’s proposed acquisition of Activision Blizzard in April, with the regulator making it clear it had concerns over the effect Microsoft’s acquisition could have on the emerging cloud gaming market. Weeks later, the European Commission then approved the deal thanks to Microsoft’s cloud gaming agreements with Nvidia, Boosteroid, and others and a commitment to the EU to open up cloud licensing access to Xbox and Activision Blizzard games. Microsoft now argues the UK regulator should take into... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/qMoeEzX

Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge Sony has started testing a new PlayStation 5 software beta that includes Dolby Atmos support, up to 8TB of M.2 SSD storage support, and a variety UI improvements. The beta is rolling out in select countries today and Sony typically makes beta features available to all PS5 consoles within a few months. The biggest addition is Dolby Atmos support. In PS5 games it looks like Sony’s 3D Audio implementation (Tempest 3D AudioTech) will be compatible with Dolby Atmos devices like sound bars, TVs, or home theater systems. Media apps like Netflix can also update their apps on PS5 soon to support Dolby Atmos audio. “Tempest 3D AudioTech specifically renders to the Dolby Atmos audio devices in use – including overhead channels – allowing for even... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/mcHoIE3

mobile news

Illustration: The Verge If your kid has been mysteriously busting through the Screen Time limits you set on their Apple device, the Wall Street Journal might know why: the publication found that a bug has been preventing certain Screen Time limits set via the Family Sharing system from saving correctly for months. Apple was supposed to fix the issue back in May, but apparently the problem has persisted. Apple’s Family Sharing system allows parents to put usage limits on their kids’ devices, with one of the key controls being the ability to monitor and limit their usage of specific apps and the device as a whole through a feature called Screen Time. The Journal reports finding that a specific setting known as Downtime, which blocks access to the entire device,... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/RLV9WaN

An iPhone 14 Pro Max. | Image: Nilay Patel / The Verge Some big changes are expected to come to this year’s iPhone 15 Pro lineup — but they might come alongside a price hike, too. In Bloomberg this morning , reporter Mark Gurman confirmed a handful of details that have been floating around all year about what to expect when the next iPhone lineup is announced in just over a month. The new Pro models will both come with titanium frames, instead of stainless steel, making them stronger and lighter, according to Gurman. Their screens will also have thinner bezels, thanks to a new display technology, shrinking the size of the black border by about a third. (Earlier leaks show what that might look like .) And as previously reported, expect the mute switch to be swapped out for a customizable button... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/9reFg6K

X is coming for every last mention of Twitter. | The Verge Last week Elon Musk announced the death of Twitter as a brand . He had the sign on the HQ taken down and replaced with a garish X , he axed the logo on the website and in the app too. Lingering longer was the “Tweet” button itself. Today the Tweet button briefly changed to Post , hinting that soon every evidence of the little blue bird and its associated twitter will scrubbed from the every place X, the company formerly known as Twitter, can touch. But that’s not why I think it’s time to retire the “tweet.” I wanted to save it . I felt that it was clearly becoming independent of the brand that had adopted it. I argued we should call all microblog posts tweets to avoid this goofy cycle of toots, skeets, threets, and now xeets. But with every... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/uxwv19d

A 1970s-era model of the Zenith Space Command. | Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge The Space Command didn’t rely on infrared — or batteries. Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/G2mY5WV

The Nook Glowlight 4e struggles to stand out, but at least it’s got buttons to turn the page. | Photo by Sheena Vasani / The Verge The company is looking to give its stores an indie bookstore vibe, but its e-readers have more of an Amazon Kindle in the early 2010s vibe. Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/TLIPJSB

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge D., a carpenter and Etsy seller of several years, recently sold a piece of custom, made-to-order furniture for around $150. The sale itself was business as usual for their shop — but it came with a sense of exasperation. Their earnings would be tied up for weeks while bills, rent, and expenses pile up. Since late June, Etsy has had D.’s account under restrictive settings, putting a hold on the bulk of money that’s coming in as customers place orders. In D.’s case, 75 percent of earnings from a $150 order, as an example, are being held by Etsy — in what’s known as a “payment reserve” — for anywhere between two weeks and 45 days. After Etsy fees, taxes, and other expenses are pulled from the remaining 25 percent D. has access to, they’re... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/HTUsRht

You can buy four AirTags for $84.99, or about $21 each. | Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge Now we’ve reached the end of July, back-to-school season is officially upon us. If you’re starting to shop for supplies to help kick off the new school year on the right note, we curated a guide to a range of helpful gadgets . We also found a number of good deals this week that’ll help you prepare. Right now, for example, you can buy some of the best item trackers from Tile and Apple at some pretty notable prices. First off, the latest Tile Mate in black with a pack of lost and found labels for $19.99 ($10 off) from Amazon , which is an all-time low. The platform-agnostic Tile Mate will help you or your children keep track of backpacks, lunch boxes, tote bags, keys, and other belongings up to 250 feet away. That might be 150 feet less than... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/t2o0EmS

A screenshot from the Horizon Worlds game Super Rumble . | Image: Meta Meta’s long-in-the-works mobile version of Horizon Worlds , its VR metaverse social platform, may finally launch soon, according to Friday’s Lowpass newsletter from Janko Roettgers . We’ve been aware of Meta working on a mobile version of Horizon Worlds , the company’s metaverse social platform that is currently only available on its Quest VR devices, for quite some time , but it’s still not here. Apparently, the company had built a working version last year, but “we ended up not shipping it,” Vishal Shah, Meta’s metaverse VP, said in an interview with Roettgers. “It was a little bit too much of a VR game on mobile as opposed to a mobile-native experience.” Shah didn’t tell Roettgers exactly when the app will be available on mobile, though.... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/q4318XB

AMD and Asus have announced the ROG Strix Scar 17 X3D, a beefy 17-inch gaming laptop with an RGB lightstrip on the bottom. Which, sure, whatever. The exciting news is what’s inside this device. This Strix is powered by AMD’s 7945HX3D mobile laptop, which could , if the stars align, provide gaming performance that we haven’t seen in AMD’s current laptop landscape and fulfill last year’s “extreme gaming laptop” promise . The chip has 16 cores and 32 threads with boost clock up to 5.4GHz, with “55W+” TDP — those things alone put it at the top of AMD’s laptop processor stack. But it’s also the first mobile processor to feature AMD’s 3D V-Cache (144MB of it, to be specific), which allows AMD to place additional layers of cache directly onto the... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/ZYW5pcL

Verizon would very much like you to switch to its new Unlimited Welcome plan. | Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge The carriers are at it again: Verizon and AT&T are both notifying customers on older unlimited plans to expect a new fee on their bill soon. Customers on Verizon’s 5G Start and AT&T’s Unlimited Elite plans are affected, and the fees go into effect in August. It’s a classic move from the “wireless carrier shenanigans” playbook designed to push customers to newer, more profitable plans. Verizon customers on Reddit and Twitter report that the company has just sent notice of a new monthly “Plan Rate Adjustment” charge of $3 per line. Older plans are affected, including 5G Start, which Verizon introduced as Start Unlimited four years ago and costs $70 per month for a single line. Verizon would very much like customers on that legacy plan to s... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/tHSq6Dr

Image: Intel Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger was very bullish on AI during the company’s Q2 2023 earnings call — telling investors that Intel plans to “build AI into every product that we build.” Later this year, Intel will ship Meteor Lake, its first consumer chip with a built-in neural processor for machine learning tasks. (AMD recently did the same , following Apple and Qualcomm.) But while Intel previously suggested to us that only its premium new Ultra chips might have those AI coprocessors, it sounds like Gelsinger expects AI will eventually be in everything Intel sells. Gelsinger often likes to talk up the “four superpowers” or “five superpowers” of technology companies, which originally included both AI and cloud, but today, he’s suggesting that AI a... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/lh9d4wX

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge At a recent House of Representatives subcommittee hearing on self-driving cars, Rep. Kat Cammack (R-FL) kicked off her five minutes of questions for the panelists with a quick appraisal of the toaster-shaped autonomous shuttle that has puttered around her district in Gainesville, Florida, for the past three years. “It moves not very fast,” Cammack said with a grimace. “So there’s a lot of frustrations with it, I’ll say that.” That’s something that the Gainesville Autonomous Shuttle has in common with Congress: neither seems to be much in a hurry. “So there’s a lot of frustrations with it, I’ll say that” The hearing on Wednesday, entitled “Self-Driving Legislative Framework: Enhancing Safety, Improving Lives and Mobility, and Beating... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/n32T84u

Image: Getty Images So, it looks like Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg isn’t going to be held in contempt of Congress after all — at least for now. The House Judiciary Committee was supposed to vote to hold Zuckerberg in contempt of Congress on Thursday, but chair Jim Jordan (R-OH) canceled the vote shortly before it was scheduled to take place, as first reported by Bloomberg . The vote was originally a play to get Meta to hand over additional documents as part of a committee investigation into alleged collusion with the White House to censor conservative speech. But according to a tweet from Jordan on Thursday, Meta must have provided enough new material to calm his concerns. “Based on Facebook’s newfound commitment to fully cooperate with the Committee’s... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/mo0zvtX

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Microsoft revealed the final games you’ll be able to claim with an Xbox Live Gold subscription before Gold is replaced with the Xbox Game Pass Core, and, well, they’re games you may not have heard of before. Throughout the month of August, Xbox Live Gold subscribers will be able to snag Blue Fire , a 3D platformer, and Inertial Drift , an arcade racer, according to an Xbox Wire blog post . If you claim the games, you’ll be able to play them and others you’ve grabbed from the Games with Gold program as long as you have an Xbox Game Pass Core or Ultimate subscription. Image: Microsoft Xbox Live Gold will be discontinued on September 1st, and current subscribers will be moved to Xbox Game Pass Core on September 14th. Xbox... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/bOeNhnF

Image: Neopets Neopets is back in a big way. I don’t mean the revamped website or even the weird bit of news where Arthur lookalike John Legend has become Neopets ’ first influencer . I’m talking about the games. Over 50 web browser games from the site’s past have been restored via an emulator and are playable right now . The Neopets Team / Neopets.com These games’ triumphant return is a part of Neopets ’ “new era” that began when Neopets ’ parent company, NetDragon, allowed the site to spin off into its own fully independent company . Under this new leadership, The Neopets Team began working immediately to revive the flagging site that’s been around since — brace yourself, elder millennials — 1999. The team worked on fixing bugs,... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/S1MKka9

Screenshot: Wes Davis / The Verge Former Twitter Blue lead Esther Crawford just published a very long post on Twitter about her time at the company, working under Elon Musk, and that incident where a picture of her sleeping on the floor went viral. Crawford joined the company after it acquired her startup, Squad, in 2020 and was part of Musk’s Twitter, which he is currently rebranding to X , in its early months before being laid off . Twitter’s environment pre-Musk: As someone with a maniacal sense of urgency built into me, Twitter often felt siloed and bureaucratic. Dumb power plays, reorgs and team name changes for the sake of someone’s ego were distractions that occurred too regularly. You couldn’t just be a builder — you also needed to be a politician. Though she did... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/FyigLmc

Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge Sony is acting quickly to make sure owners of its WH-1000XM5 headphones don’t feel left behind after seeing the just-released WF-1000XM5 earbuds gain several new features. (Putting both of those products in the same sentence really hammers home the madness of Sony’s product names, eh?) The company has released a firmware update for the headphones that brings them to parity with the wireless earbuds by introducing support for head-tracking spatial audio. As with the buds, you’ll need a phone running Android 13 or later, and dynamic head tracking only works with compatible video apps. Better still, Sony is no longer making WH-1000XM5 owners choose between multipoint and LDAC. Once you’ve installed the latest update, you can listen to... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/2QlB0Xe

The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. | Image: Paramount Director Jeff Rowe’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem hasn’t even had a chance to test its mettle at the box office yet, but Paramount is already gearing up on a sequel and a streaming series destined for Paramount Plus. Variety reports that Paramount Pictures and Nickelodeon Movies are planning to produce a Mutant Mayhem follow-up film as well as an all-new streaming series that will serve as the connective tissue between the two movies. The 2D series — Tales of The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles — has already been greenlit for two seasons, produced by Nickelodeon Animation and Point Grey Pictures, and will be co-showrun and executive produced by Chris Yost and Alan Wan. Actors Micah Abbey, Shamon Brown Jr., Nicolas Cantu, and... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/fLgPnu6

Emma Roth / The Verge After replacing Twitter’s little blue bird with an X logo, Elon Musk is now changing it again — well, kind of. In a video Musk reposted from @DogeDesigner , Musk shows off a version of the logo with slightly thicker lines. You can see the differences between the two in the image embedded above. The new version of the logo has already made its way to Twitter’s homepage, and Musk has changed his profile picture to match. We’re still not seeing the X branding anywhere on Twitter’s mobile app, however. pic.twitter.com/dxbsqwcYv7 — Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 25, 2023 While the new logo is only slightly different, it looks closer to the design included in a follow-up tweet from Twitter user Sawyer Merritt, who Musk got the new logo from... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/JbXZQkC

Image: The Verge The brand-new Following feed in Meta’s Threads won’t always stick around if it’s your preferred way to use the app. The much-needed Following feed is unfortunately a bit hidden: you can make it appear by tapping the home icon at the bottom of the screen or the Threads logo at the top. Once you see it, you can switch between “Following,” which shows posts in reverse-chronological order, and “For You,” which is the algorithmically sorted feed the app has offered since launch. But a few of us at The Verge noticed that Threads will occasionally rehide the Following feed and bring you back to the For You feed after you open the app. (You can test it for yourself by force closing and reopening the app.) Unfortunately, it sounds like that’s by... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/fX3DmdH

Tab Groups live here. | Illustration by Samar Haddad / The Verge If you’re using Safari but you’re not using Tab Groups, well, it’s time to change that. Tab Groups, as the name implies, allows you to group a selection of tabs together and essentially set them aside for future use. For example, if you have a bunch of tabs you use for work and a bunch of tabs you use after work, you can cordon these tabs off into batches so that they don’t get in each other’s way. You can use your work tabs at work and, when you’re finished, swap them for your “after work” tabs with just one click. You might also have different Tab Groups for different assignments at work or different school projects. Folks who share a computer might have different Tab Groups for each user. The possibilities are endless. Here’s how... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/0AUbEiL

Screenshot: Wes Davis / The Verge Wayfair has launched a free “virtual room restyler” called Decorify . It employs generative AI to show you a redecorated version of the room you want to zhuzh after you upload a picture of it and choose the visual style you want. Then, if you like what you see, you can pick from a grid of furniture recommendations presented to the right of your AI-remodeled room. Shrenik Sadalgi, R&D director at Wayfair, says, “Decorify creates a discovery experience that provides endless inspiration and powers the home personalization journey.” Remember those augmented reality shopping app features that let you plop furniture down in your house using your smartphone’s camera? This ain’t that — Decorify won’t show you renders of actual, existing furniture... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/igmLMwn

Nick Barclay / The Verge Spotify had 220 million Premium subscribers and 551 million monthly active users as of June 30th, the company announced today in its latest earnings report. That represents a 27 and 17 percent increase, respectively, compared to the same period last year and is above its outlook released last quarter. But while listener numbers were up, Spotify reports that it’s making less revenue on average from each of them. In today’s release, Spotify says its average revenue per user currently sits at €4.27 (around $4.72), a 6 percent decline year-on-year and a slight fall compared to €4.32 (around $4.79) last quarter. Today’s second quarter earnings report comes less than 24 hours after Spotify announced it would be raising its prices in the US... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/JVotbBY

A typical scene at ultra-fast charging stations in Europe: everything working and lots of availability. This one had a long protected walking path for the dog along the right-hand side bordering a creek. | Photo by Thomas Ricker / The Verge The Council of the EU has adopted new rules intended to make it much easier for EV owners to travel across Europe, while simultaneously helping to reduce the output of harmful greenhouse gases. The new regulation is set to benefit owners of electric cars and vans in three ways: It reduces range anxiety by expanding the EV charging infrastructure along Europe’s main highways, it makes payments “at the pump” easier, and ensures pricing and availability is clearly communicated to avoid surprises. From 2025 onward, the new regulation requires fast charging stations offering at least 150kW of power to be installed every 60km (37mi) along the EU’s Trans-European Transport Network, or (TEN-T) system of highways, the bloc’s main transport... Contin

Photo by Chip Somodevilla / Getty Images Republicans on the House Judiciary Committee may vote to hold Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg in contempt later this week, according to a new report from Punchbowl News Monday. The potential contempt vote hinges on a February subpoena from the committee demanding Meta produce documents and communications related to content moderation discussions it has had with executive branch officials. Members of the committee have accused Meta of failing to cooperate with the investigation by withholding documents. Sources told Punchbowl the vote plans to hold the vote on Thursday. Responding to the possible vote, Meta spokesperson Andy Stone directed The Verge to a statement the company gave to Fox Business saying that Meta had “shared over 50,000 pages... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/Aq1WDrG

Illustration: The Verge Watch out Bard — Bing’s AI chatbot is now available in Google Chrome and Safari. As first spotted by Windows Latest ( via 9to5Google ), you can now access the chatbot from Bing.com in both browsers. There are some limitations to using Bing Chat on Chrome and Safari, though. For one, you can only type 2,000-word prompts, as opposed to the 4,000-word limit that you get when using Bing Chat on Edge. Your conversation with the chatbot will also reset after five turns instead of 30 , and you’ll see some annoying pop-ups that prompt you to download Edge. Screenshot by Emma Roth / The Verge You’ll still get prompted to download Edge. In addition to a wider rollout across different browsers, Windows Latest and 9to5Google... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/qHsIDTN

Image: Microsoft I’m fairly sure most Xbox controllers give off a bit of a sweaty pong after hours of gaming, but Microsoft has now created one that’s supposed to smell like pizza from the get-go. The “world’s first ever pizza-scented controller” is part of a marketing effort for the upcoming Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem movie. Microsoft has designed custom TMNT Xbox controllers that have a scent diffuser strapped to the back in the shape of a slice of pizza. There are four variations in total, and thankfully, they’re just part of a sweepstakes giveaway, so we won’t be seeing or sniffing these controllers everywhere. If you want to try and win a pizza-scented controller, you’ll need to enter by retweeting a post on the Xbox Game Pass... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/oCRdsv7

It’s your time to shine, little guys. | Photo by Allison Johnson / The Verge What’s old is hot again, and flip phones are so very hot right now. These phones are a far cry from the phone that you mastered T9 texting on in college. Today’s flip phones are garden-variety 2023 smartphones that happen to fold in half — plus a screen on the front cover. They’ve been making a kind of comeback over the past few years, but until now, they’ve existed in the shadows of their bigger, pricier fold-style counterparts. That’s understandable, considering that their small cover screens haven’t been good for much more than checking the weather and pressing pause on a podcast. But that’s all changing this year: in a round of updates from Motorola , Oppo , and very likely Samsung next , cover screens are getting much larger and way... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/HJ9zsKt

mobile news

Yep, $155 million seems Kenough to me. | Image: Warner Bros. Pictures Legions of Barbie-core and biopic fans descended onto theaters this weekend for the “Barbenheimer” box office phenomenon, but one pink-plastered performance, in particular, came out on top. Greta Gerwig’s Barbie has already smashed several records, raking in $155 million domestically over the weekend — the highest US opening ever for a film directed by a woman — beating the previous $153 million achieved by Anna Boden’s Captain Marvel . “The massive, overwhelming response we’ve seen out there proves what we’ve known from the beginning: that ‘Barbie’ is not only an incredibly special film, but clearly the theatrical event of the summer, if not the year,” said Jeff Goldstein, Warner Bros. Pictures president of domestic distribution in a... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/rQ7a06B

The new logo, shown via Twitter / X’s web interface. | Screenshot by Jon Porter / The Verge Twitter is transforming into X, as the site’s former bird logo has now been replaced by an official new X logo. Elon Musk, who owns the transformed social media site, began signaling the change early Sunday morning with a series of tweets, starting with one that said, “and soon we shall bid adieu to the twitter brand and, gradually, all the birds.” Now X has replaced the Twitter logo on the web version, signaling a change to Musk’s “everything app” that he originally envisioned shortly after purchasing Twitter for $44 billion in November. The X logo will presumably replace the bird logo in mobile versions of the apps once they’re updated. References to Twitter still remain on the main web login prompt, though. Twitter employees were... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/RWpim65

Image: Vjeran Pavic / The Verge Netflix isn’t planning to make a native version of its app for the Vision Pro, according to Bloomberg ’s Mark Gurman in today’s Power On newsletter . Instead, he says, the company will allow its existing iPad app to run, unmodified, on Apple’s forthcoming mixed reality headset. As Gurman’s piece points out, developers who don’t want to build Vision Pro software from the ground up have two choices: let their iPad apps run as is on the device or tweak them for the Vision Pro. Netflix has chosen the former, though whether pointedly or not, we don’t know. Of course, very few companies have actually pledged dedicated software for the Vision Pro at this point, but Netflix’s reticence carries some baggage. The streaming giant was one of the most... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/jKzE6sd

Illustration by Kristen Radtke / The Verge; Photo: Getty Images Around 12AM ET last night, Twitter owner Elon Musk started tweeting — and did so for hours — about the Twitter rebrand to X, the one-letter name he’s used repeatedly in company and product names forever. It started with a tweet saying “soon we shall bid adieu to the twitter brand and, gradually, all the birds,” followed by a second tweet adding that “if a good enough X logo is posted tonight, we’ll make go live worldwide tomorrow.” Musk then, over the next several hours, gestured at the change in between other posts and replies, tweeting things like “Deus X,” or replying to other users talking about it. At one point, he joined a Twitter Spaces session called “No one talk until we summon Elon Musk,” and sat silently for almost an hour... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/ZoVEPW3

This Ecobee smart thermostat alerted me to a potentially catastrophic scenario in my home while I was on vacation. But there was little I could do about it from afar. When my HVAC unit failed while I was out of town, my smart thermostat warned me, and the rest of my connected home helped me figure out what was going on. Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/JEamFqN

Photo by Allison Johnson / The Verge Sometimes you’ve just gotta break the rules and go for it. I attended Nothing’s New York City product drop last week and got my hands on the Nothing Ear 2s and the Nothing Phone 2 . Now, I’m a longtime Verizon customer, which seemed like a major hurdle for actually testing out this phone and its flashing glyphs. At one point, Nothing had mentioned “limited” support for Verizon on its website, but the company has since removed the carrier from its tech specs altogether — never a good sign. But as I’ve come to find out, as long as you’ve got an active SIM that was already in another Verizon-certified phone, you can toss that into the Nothing Phone 2 and get going without any immediate headaches. When I tried doing so, the phone’s mobile... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/vu3iCz7

Image: Paramount Star Trek: Strange New Worlds had a pair of surprise announcements at San Diego Comic-Con today. First, the show is stepping out of its weekly release schedule with a new episode tonight — a crossover with Star Trek: Lower Decks will debut on Paramount Plus in a few minutes, at 7PM ET, Deadline reports. And that’s not all — the series is also getting a musical episode in early August called “Subspace Rhapsody.” Deadline points out that this is the first musical episode in Star Trek history, and the publication isn’t wrong, but the franchise has boldly gone there before... sort of. There was a Deep Space Nine episode, called “Chrysalis,” where a group of eccentric, genetically-engineered people break out into an a capella song after one... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/xTPhXdU

Image: Google Adding alt text to an image in a Google Workspace project is getting much easier after an update included the accessibility improvement. Until recently, adding alt text to images was hidden behind a right-click menu. Now, the option will show up in the “Image options” sidebar — not only that, but the option now comes with an explanation for the feature, telling users what the purpose of alt text is. Alt text is used in media and beyond to describe to people who have difficulty seeing what an image is showing, giving them access to important contextual information sighted people may take for granted. But where alt text is available in software, it’s sometimes not explained, and when people who can clearly see and read their screen are... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/YJ0BiH6

A Campfire Chat about Diablo IV ’s 1.1.0 update. | Screenshot: Wes Davis / The Verge Three directors working on Diablo IV held a campfire chat livestream yesterday saying they will change how they roll out patches, after an incremental verison 1.1.0 patch for the game abruptly nerfed players’ builds (via IGN ). And they promise updates like that won’t happen in the future — at least, not the way it went down this week. In the livestream, associate director Joe Piepiora, game director Joe Shely, and community chief Adam Fletcher acknowledged complaints about the patch, which massively reduced player power for some builds. Fletcher said of the reduction that, “we know it is bad, we know it is not fun,” and added, “we don’t plan on doing a patch like this ever again.” In the short term, there is at least one quick fix... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/HvYMrzf

The Climate Clock in New York City’s Union Square in early July 2023. | Image: Climate Clock An ominous, 62-foot-long clock looms over New York City’s iconic Union Square, and it’s about to tick past a worrying milestone. It’s called the Climate Clock, and it counts down how much time the world has left to stop climate change from becoming exponentially worse. As anyone who’s experienced the weather lately knows, the situation is already bad. The world had its hottest week on record at the start of the month, according to preliminary data , with heatwaves still smashing local records across the Northern Hemisphere. And that’s just one way climate change is bringing on dangerous new extremes. Today, the planet is about 1.1 degrees Celsius hotter than it was before the Industrial Revolution, thanks to carbon dioxide emissions from... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/QlG0sKv

Illustration by Kristen Radtke / The Verge; Getty Images Twitter will “soon” implement daily limits on the number of direct messages unverified accounts will be able to send in “an effort to reduce spam,” the company announced on Friday via its Twitter Support account . In other words, to send unlimited DMs, you’ll need to pay for a Twitter Blue subscription. In its tweet, Twitter didn’t specify what the daily DM limit may be. On a support page , the company said the changes would be implemented beginning Friday. When reached for comment, Twitter’s press email didn’t auto-reply with a poop emoji ; instead, it sent an automated message promising that “we’ll get back to you soon,” a change Twitter owner Elon Musk announced on Thursday . Screenshot by Jay Peters / The Verge T... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/0W5nutK

Illustration: The Verge Since launching in November, OpenAI’s ChatGPT tool has reached a number of users at a rate that’s astounding for anything outside of Threads — now the company says it’s ready to release an app for Android. The ChatGPT for Android app is launching a few months after the free iOS app brought the chatbot to iPhones and iPads . Announcing ChatGPT for Android! The app will be rolling out to users next week, and you can pre-order in the Google Play Store starting today: https://t.co/NfBDYZR5GI — OpenAI (@OpenAI) July 21, 2023 In a tweet , the company announced ChatGPT for Android is rolling out next week without listing a specific day and linked to a preorder page in the Google Play Store where you can register to get it installed once... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/VeZCn5D

Tesla Full Self-Driving in action. | Image: Owen Grove / The Verge Tesla is starting to offer customers a one-time transfer of their purchased Full Self-Driving (FSD) software to a new vehicle, Not A Tesla App reports . Tesla CEO Elon Musk revealed the company would be offering it as a “one-time amnesty” during an earnings call on Wednesday, though he did not provide full details at the time. Now, official terms on Tesla’s FSD transfer offer are in the wild thanks to Twitter user @Kdahlenburg, who shared the details sent to them by the automaker yesterday. Those who would like to take advantage of shifting their FSD will need to purchase a new Tesla and take delivery between now and September 30th, 2023. Tesla says it does not guarantee delivery within the program end date and will not apply this offer... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/UlKVYby

Photo by Kevin Dietsch / Getty Images Seven of AI’s top companies attended a White House summit Friday, reaching a deal with the Biden administration to roll out new guardrails to enhance the safety and security of their systems and users, like watermarking AI-generated content. “These commitments are real, and they are concrete,” President Joe Biden said in remarks at the White House Friday following the meeting. “Artificial intelligence is going to change the lives of people around the world. The people here will be critical for shepherding that innovation with responsibility and safety by design.” Earlier in the day, the seven companies — including Amazon, Anthropic, Meta, Google, Inflection, and OpenAI — made voluntary, sometimes vague, commitments to invest in research... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/ngKZwvq

Image: Federal Reserve via Flickr Your paycheck could arrive even sooner, thanks to the Federal Reserve’s newly launched payment system . The system, called FedNow, is an instant-payment service that operates on a 24/7 basis — even on holidays. First announced in 2019, FedNow acts as a “common network” between banks and credit unions, making it easier for them to route funds across different institutions. So far, there are only 35 participating banks and credit unions, along with the US Department of the Treasury’s Bureau of the Fiscal Service. Once it’s widely adopted, though, it will let you transfer funds between different bank accounts instantly or even pay your credit card bill on a bank holiday without worrying about it being late. And, if you have direct deposit,... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/XfbwAQJ

Liko and her partner, Sprigatito. | The Pokémon Company Ahead of its premiere at some point in the near future, The Pokémon Company’s just released a lengthy preview of Pokémon Horizons: The Series , the new anime inspired by Pokémon Scarlet and Violet that introduces a pair of new protagonists to replace Ash Ketchum , in addition to a cavalcade of new pokémon. Today, during its panel at this year’s San Diego Comic-Con, The Pokémon Company revealed an all-new trailer for Pokémon Horizons: The Series as well as an 11-minute-long video featuring basically half of the first episode of the series, which introduces Liko, a young student from the Paldea region who becomes partners with an ornery Sprigatito . Along with the new looks at Pokemon Horizons , The Pokémon Company also announced that Pokemon... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/w9ERWUj

TSMC is also predicting a 10 percent decline in revenue for 2023 amid falling demand for consumer electronics. | Photo by VCG via Getty Images The world’s biggest chipmaker is pushing back the start of 4nm chip production at its new facility in Phoenix, Arizona, to 2025, blaming labor shortages. Apple has said that it intends to eventually source chips for its iPhones and MacBook models from the Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) plant in the US, while Nvidia and AMD have also committed to using its production capacity. The chipmaker’s first Phoenix-based fab , which began construction in 2021, was originally projected to start producing 4nm chips next year. A second fab that will produce smaller, more complex 3nm chips is scheduled to open in 2026. During the company’s Q2 earnings call on Thursday, TSMC chairman Mark Liu said that the company was “encountering... Continue reading… from The Verge - All Posts https://ift.tt/jRIfdKx