Tuesday’s top tech news: a new AI-powered era for Microsoft Bing – The Verge

Fitbit suffered another outage for the second time in 24 hours

2023-02-08T14:51:36-05:00

Fitbit’s services are down... again. | Image: Victoria Song / The Verge

If you've had trouble syncing your Fitbit data again today, you're not seeing things. It appears that Fitbit experienced yet another widespread outage where users couldn't sync or view their data in the mobile app.

Downdetector received more than 2,000 outage reports for Fitbit as of 8:17AM ET. On Twitter, frustrated Fitbit users also reported issues with syncing, settings changing, third-party app integrations failing, and an inability to log in to Fitbit forums. Users reported many of the same issues on the r/fitbit subreddit. Some claimed that, while they were initially able to sync, the Fitbit app has since stopped working properly.

Th …

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The new Microsoft Bing will sometimes misrepresent the info it finds

2023-02-07T15:43:02-05:00

Search engines are about to change in a very important way: when you type in a query and get an official-looking answer, it might be wrong - because an AI chatbot created it.

Today, Microsoft announced a new version of its Bing search engine that will provide "complete answers" to your questions by tapping into the power of ChatGPT. You can already try some canned sample searches and sign up for more.

But though Microsoft is taking many precautions compared to its 2016 failure with Tay - a chatbot that Twitter taught to be racist and misogynist in less than a day - the company's still proactively warning that some of the new Bing's results …

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Wyze’s security cameras and home monitoring services will go offline tonight for two hours

2023-02-07T15:12:16-05:00

Wyze’s systems will be down for maintenance tonight taking all its cloud services offline, including its security system’s connection to 24/7 monitoring. | Image: Wyze

If you have Wyze cameras or a Wyze home security system, you will need to make other arrangements to monitor your property from 12AM PT to 2AM PT tomorrow morning.

The smart home company sent an email to its customers this week stating that system maintenance on February 8th at 12AM PT will impact every feature of the system that relies on the app or website. That includes being able to alert Noonlight, the professional monitoring company Wyze uses for its Sense security system, about a potential break-in.

Not only will your security system be down, but if you use Wyze cameras to keep an eye on things going bump in the night, you'll have t …

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Users say Samsung’s latest Pro SSDs have health problems

2023-02-07T14:36:10-05:00

Something seems to be wrong with Samsung's 980 and 990 Pro SSDs. Owners of the highly regarded M.2 solid-state drives are reporting rapid degradation, with some users sending their 990 Pros back to Samsung. And for the older 980 Pro, Samsung is reportedly recommending owners to update to the latest firmware (via PC Gamer).

The issue was first reported by Neowin writer Robbie Khan, whose new, recently released 990 Pro 2TB module dropped to 94 percent health status at just over 4TB of written data. Prior to the article, Khan posted the findings on Reddit, which was met with owners voicing similar issues.

Samsung has acknowledged an issue but …

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Disney removes Simpsons episode in Hong Kong that references Chinese labor camps

2023-02-07T14:34:47-05:00

The pulled episode references “forced labor camps where children make smartphones.” | Image: Disney / 20th Television Animation

A fairly recent episode of The Simpsons that contains a reference to China's use of forced labor camps has vanished from the Disney Plus streaming service in Hong Kong. First spotted by the Financial Times and later confirmed by Axios, the episode titled "One Angry Lisa" is not available to stream on Disney Plus, even though the rest of The Simpsons' 34th season is. The episode contains a line critical of the country - "Behold the wonders of China: Bitcoin mines, forced labor camps where children make smartphones."

Though it is a punchline in The Simpsons, China has been repeatedly criticized by external governments and human rights organiz …

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Microsoft’s ChatGPT-powered Bing is open for everyone to try starting today

2023-02-07T14:32:21-05:00

A slide announcing AI chat features in Bing and Edge. | Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge

Microsoft's new ChatGPT-powered Bing experience will be available today for everybody as a "limited preview" on desktop. You'll have a limited number of queries that you can use with it, but you will be able to sign up for full access soon.

If you visit Bing.com, you may see some example searches that you can try out, if it shows you the new interface. Clicking on them will lead you to a Bing search page with traditional results on the left, and a chat window on the right with the AI-generated answer. Until you have full access, you won't be able to ask follow-up questions or clarify the results. Searching for your own query will give you B …

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Microsoft announces new Bing and Edge browser powered by upgraded ChatGPT AI

2023-02-07T13:23:11-05:00

Microsoft has announced a new version of its search engine Bing, powered by an upgraded version of the same AI technology that underpins chatbot ChatGPT. The company is launching the product alongside new AI-enhanced features for its Edge browser, promising that the two will provide a new experience for browsing the web and finding information online.

"It's a new day in search," said Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella at an event announcing the products. Nadella argued that the paradigm for web search hasn't changed in decades, but that AI can deliver information more fluidly and quickly than traditional methods.

"The race starts today, and we're …

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Zoom is laying off 1,300 employees, around 15 percent of its workforce

2023-02-07T13:01:04-05:00

Zoom is laying off about 15 percent of its staff, which means about 1,300 people will lose their jobs, according to a memo from Zoom CEO Eric Yuan that the company posted on its blog. "Each organization" at the company will be affected by the cuts, Yuan said.

The company scaled up rapidly as people shifted to remote work during the pandemic, and Zoom grew three times in size within 24 months. However, "we didn't take as much time as we should have to thoroughly analyze our teams or assess if we were growing sustainably, toward the highest priorities," Yuan wrote. "The uncertainty of the global economy, and its effect on our customers, means …

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Microsoft’s ChatGPT event live blog

2023-02-07T12:34:24-05:00

Microsoft is holding a surprise event at its Redmond headquarters today, where it's expected to focus on its OpenAI partnership and introduce a version of Bing with ChatGPT. Unlike most of Microsoft's events over the past few years, this special press event will be held in person and not livestreamed at all. You'll need to follow The Verge's live blog below for all the announcements as they happen.

Microsoft invited media to this event last week before making the details public just minutes after Google announced its own ChatGPT rival. That should tell you how important this event is for Microsoft and what's on the agenda. While Microsoft i …

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Samsung prices its super bright 77-inch QD-OLED TV at $4,500

2023-02-07T11:49:06-05:00

The 77-inch S95C starts shipping this month. | Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge

Samsung announced its second-generation QD-OLED TV lineup back at CES, with a new 77-inch model joining the 55-inch and 65-inch sizes that were offered with last year's S95B. Regardless of what size you prefer, these TVs utilize the very latest quantum dot OLED panels from Samsung Display, which promise significant brightness gains - potentially crossing 2,000 nits - and the S95B was already among the brightest OLEDs on the market. Now we know how much the 77-inch S95C will cost: it's priced at $4,499.99.

That's more expensive than LG's 77-inch G2 (the company hasn't yet announced pricing for its 2023 series yet), but not outlandishly so: t …

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