T.C. is a Senior Editor at The Verge, where he has obsessed over headlines and internet speeds since 2011. Prior to The Verge, he worked in the nation’s capital as an advocate for the National Park System, which continues to be America’s best idea. (The internet is a close second.) Ethics statement: T.C. is the creator of Quest, a tabletop roleplaying game. As such, he is not involved in any kind of coverage of tabletop games for The Verge.
The state’s recently-passed “Fair Price Protection Act” targets “discriminatory surveillance pricing”; something the FTC is investigating and that New York is also looking at. The law puts a one-year halt on new electronic shelf labels while NJ investigates “the effects and impact” of the technology.
[State of New Jersey Governor’s office]
I love this map project that documents the world’s historical strongholds, which I usually only come across when someone posts a decrepit European castle going up for sale on Zillow. Historical maps are getting more popular these days and Castle Map is a good one. Tell us which fortress you’d choose in the comments. (h/t BoingBoing)
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.”
Felicia Day’s shortform web series, The Guild, is about to celebrate its 20th anniversary. Now the cast has something else to celebrate: its new movie getting funded on Kickstarter. As of writing, Codex & company are about to hit $2 million on the first day. Not bad for the “Knights of Good!”
[Felicia Day (Kickstarter)]
Joel Feder at The Drive reported a frightening story about how Flock cameras, recently suspended by the LAPD, tracked him in Minnesota and sent police after him over “stolen plates.” (They were not.) Flock says its cameras worked “correctly” in the lead-up to a potentially deadly incident. But here we are in our new era of computer policing.
As reported by The Wrap, A24 says it won’t, after all, go after a creator for using a Backrooms-adjacent wallpaper. You know, the generically yellow one. Smart move. After a Reddit user reported getting a complaint on behalf of A24, Backrooms director Kane Parsons said it “should not be happening.” A24 then said in a statement it “makes no claim over ownership over the yellow wallpaper.”
the need for speed brand partnerships. EA’s original live-action trailer for Battlefield 6 immediately killed off celebrities like Zac Efron as a joke, but now the game is embracing Hollywood. Battlefield is partnering with Paramount to include Top Gun heroes (Tom Cruise excluded) as part of its upcoming season 4 update. I might just hop back in to fly the F-14 Tomcat.
I love that we’ve got dueling MMO stories on The Verge this week. First, from Kallie, about the EverQuest revival: a wild comeback for one of the biggest and most important MMOs ever. Then, from Andrew, about the world’s tiniest MMO, called PointlessQuest. Are the quests endless or pointless? You decide.
Buying a home in the US has been wild for years, with buyers in incredibly competitive markets offering all-cash transactions well above asking prices. Now there’s a new twist: sellers tempting people who have AI stocks to offer. Definitely still a better trade than giving up bitcoin for pizza.
[The New York Times]
