The conservative backlash is about jobs, the environment, quality of life — and China.
How you feel about AI’s energy use might change how you feel about computers entirely.
Ads, rate limits, feature restrictions, price hikes. The AI free ride is over.
The company promises to replenish more water than it uses by 2030.
The company’s annual sustainability report also says sustainability solutions aren’t keeping up with AI demands.
But $1,900 is a hell of a lot for a phone with no telephoto camera.
The watches sport a new chip, bigger batteries, and new health metrics. But the updates come with another price hike.
Plus the first specs, including a battery life better than Meta’s.
One small step for phones, one giant leap for foldables.
Index funds are supposed to be the safest way to invest — does SpaceX change that?
It’s not quite a dumbphone, but it’s definitely not a smartphone. And that’s kind of the whole point.
No amount of clever editing can make this Seedance-generated mess interesting.
Kimi K3 and Qwen3.8 should come as no surprise.
6
Verge Score
The new entry-level Surface Laptop 13-inch is last year’s same great hardware with less memory and a higher price.
I tested four locks that unlock with a look, and while hands-free with UWB is better, if you want a sci-fi experience for your front door, facial recognition is worth considering.
Glorious made swapping batteries faster and easier (and more fun) in a $230 headset than its $400 competitors.
The best (and my favorite) high-res audio player has improved its UI. The Qobuz player has more targeted recommendations, dynamic lyrics that follow along as you listen, and expanded song information. I’m loving the improvement so far, and find it’s also more intuitive to change bitrate and audio output.
The company claims its AI models can reason ‘better than clinician level.’
It looks and acts like Geekbench 6, but under the hood are larger datasets, new audio / video tests, and more tweaks.
In ReStory you’re tasked with growing your “quaint electronics repair shop in mid-2000s Tokyo” by dismantling, repairing, cleaning, and restoring devices like cellphones, consoles, and cameras. Developed by Mandragora Studio the game launches on Steam on August 6th
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Usually, the CPSC works with companies to voluntarily recall dangerous gadgets — but it’s making an exception for these Chinese water heater sticks sold at Amazon and eBay. For the first time since 1987, it writes, it’s using its power to sue over an “imminently hazardous consumer product” after confirming these ones catch fire. It says more such exceptions are coming.
Now Prime Video has a games section, with Amazon’s cloud gaming platform Luna built in to let you start playing right away.
Apple announced that one of its biggest early hits will be coming back for a fifth and final season in 2027. The Morning Show premiered alongside Apple TV as one of its prestige plays, with a notably star-studded cast. The news comes the same day Apple announced a new dating series.
The new $149.99 VelocityOne Flightstick II upgrades the original with a new full color screen at the top of the joystick, 38 mappable inputs, and Hall effect sensors. It’s joined by the $149.99 VelocityOne Dual Throttle featuring two levers with adjustable tension, 35 programmable inputs, and an LED throttle indicator.
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The free streaming option is still in testing, and limited to one-hour sessions for ‘select’ games.
An Uber spokesperson tells Bloomberg that the move comes as the company works “to simplify operations, strengthen in-person collaboration, and continue to embrace AI.” Uber is also asking remote customer service employees to return to the office, Bloomberg reports.
Someone had to do it, I guess? BMX, the charger company launched last year by the founder of Hyper, launched a lineup of gallium nitride-equipped chargers called…GaNsta. It sells multi-port wall chargers with different output speeds starting at 70W for $60, going up to 140W for about $90 (it has similar specs to Ugreen’s $65 model).
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404 Media, which has been all over ICE’s spying ways, has two pieces worth reading this week. Yesterday, it documented how the agency is gleaning personal information from credit card applications. Today, it has a an eye-popping piece on the scale of the agency’s surveillance tools. As always this stuff reminds me of Glenn Grohe’s 1942 poster: “He’s Watching You.”
The internet’s favorite dictionary just dropped a new word game, Tagline — and, surprisingly, there’s not a definition in sight. The game consists of three increasingly difficult clues with hangman-style answers to guess. The twist is that all the solutions are made up entirely from the same seven letters.
[Tagline | Merriam Webster]
Plus, we’ve found deals on a portable power bank with a built-in USB-C cable and a self-cleaning robovac / mop hybrid.
The final Coyote vs. Acme trailer underlines how much the movie’s really about consumer safety — a very topical subject that David Zaslav apparently didn’t think would resonate with audiences. The movie’s out August 28th.
The streamer announced its first dating show, called The Last Person on Earth, which it describes as an “eight-episode dating documentary series” about how opposites attract. No word on when it will release, but it’s part of a steady push from Apple to make its streaming service more mainstream.
Like Sergey Brin going hands-on with Google’s AI push (and in addition to a rumored bid for Liverpool), Reuters reports Bezos has made an unusual move to become personally involved in the “Lighthouse” project updating Prime Video’s homepage, recommendations, and voice control.
Sources said Bezos felt an initial plan “failed to sufficiently highlight the service’s capabilities in AI and personalization.” Not sure why he may have felt that way, but here’s the apparently AI-generated image Prime Video is using to promote Death Race 2000.
The legislation would force tech companies to build controls to shut down or throttle powerful AI systems.
A typical account on the prediction market platform also tended to primarily bet on a single topic, according to research from Pew. Sports are huge categories for both Polymarket and its competitor, Kalshi.
Over the last few years, the two companies have sought to differentiate themselves from traditional sports betting — and have tried to undercut one another as they fight for market share in the US.
[Pew Research Center]
Apple Maps will be embedded into Ford’s ‘universal’ EV platform.
That’s the sound of the Splatoon series exploring a new genre with Splatoon Raiders, which is Nintendo’s take on looter shooters. I quite enjoyed my time with the game, but you can check it out for yourself now, as it launches today on the Switch 2.
Mattel’s older Mega line of building sets included a couple of Halo sets featuring the Warthog, but Amazon Australia leaked a larger and more detailed 935-piece buildable UNSC M12 Warthog that’s part of Mattel’s recent Brick Shop line. There’s no pricing, but the model includes working independent suspension and customizable detailing.
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It’s already been a pretty great year for horror, and that looks to continue with the new Resident Evil, helmed by Weapons director Zach Cregger. The latest trailer makes the movie seem both like a new twist on the franchise, and also like it’s pulling inspiration from the most recent games.
The 15-inch Key Light Air MK.2 is available for $139.99, providing creators with up to 2100 lumens of illumination for filming and streaming. It’s USB-C powered, but the MagSafe ring on the back also snaps onto any compatible holder or power bank for cable-free lighting on the go.
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The smart wearables company has a new feature for its companion app called “UltraSphere,” which provides over 60 suggested actions to improve rest, wellness, and recovery. The actions are location- and weather-aware, and tailored to the user. Suggestions can include things like “get light,” “cut caffeine,” and “wind down.”
Another byproduct of Framework’s new RAM pricing is that preorders for the Ultra X7 358H version of the Framework Laptop 13 Pro jumped from $2,099 to $2,899. Framework’s announcement didn’t specify this config, but the Wayback Machine shows it.
People who got their 32GB preorders bumped down to 16GB also have to pay more if they want to maintain 32GB from Framework, or source their LPCAMM2 RAM elsewhere.
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Despite being out on parental leave, LG’s willingness to force ads onto its monitors and televisions has Tom Warren in a fighting mood when he should be making coo coo sounds at his new son.
Sure, it’s just a poster, but should Ryan Gosling’s “La La Hand” been kept as it was?
.catalyst_:
I know it doesn’t matter, and he has expressed that he’d like it changed, but in a world where AI can change anything you want in a second, it feels like an actor’s intentional choice at the time of production is important. That hand being wrong takes away from the moment that this piece of art was made in.
Again probably doesn’t matter, I’m sure all parties are consenting. It is okay to make a mistake and have that mistake live and breathe, it makes the art just a little more human, and that is so important.
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Google is required to change its policies for both Search and the Play Store.
The extending roof panel on the Solarky SunV provides up to 300W of solar charging for its 10.2kWh LFP battery. And its aluminum chassis and plastic panels make it so lightweight, that it can go about 150km (93 miles) before a recharge — or up to 200km (124 miles) with enough sunshine, according to the company. It’s already on sale in markets including Thailand and Indonesia.
You can prove you’re the account owner by capturing a short video of you turning your head.
The company said prices from its memory supplier have more than doubled.
Nintendo had one special request, too.
While Paramount’s $110 billion WBD merger is suddenly on hold in the US, in Europe, the European Commission is ready to allow it after Paramount agreed to concessions including giving up its stake in United International Pictures within 13 months of the deal closing.
[European Commission]
After settling with other social media companies, the plaintiff dropped his case.
The OneBGS union said in a post that Bethesda laid off some of its Canadian employees on July 17th, weeks sooner than employees were warned the layoffs would happen, PC Gamer reports. That same day, Bethesda announced it’s working on Fallout 5.
