The base M2 14-inch MacBook Pro has an SSD downgrade
A previous-generation 14-inch MacBook Pro with a potentially faster SSD than the the latest models. | Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge
The base level 14-inch M2 MacBook Pro reportedly has a slower SSD than its predecessor, according to tests done by 9to5Mac. In BlackMagic’s Disk Speed Test, the 512GB SSD in Apple’s latest flagship achieved read speed scores of around 2,970 MB/s and write speed scores of around 3,150 MB/s, compared to 4,900 MB/s reads and 3,950 MB/s writes that the M1 Pro with a 512GB SSD was capable of.
That means the 2023 base model has around 39 percent slower reads and 20 percent slower writes than the one released in 2021.
The reason for the difference is likely down to chips. According to 9to5Mac, the 512GB SSD in the previous-gen 14-inch had four NAND storage chips, whereas the one on the M2 Pro seems to have two. Those are obviously higher-capacity chips, so the computers have the same amount of storage but with worse performance because they can’t parallelize reads and writes as much.
Building newer generations of computers with fewer NAND chips isn’t new for Apple. Both the 256GB M2 MacBook Air and 13-inch MacBook Pro had slower storage than the M1 versions of those machines. (The situation was even worse with those machines, which had a single NAND chip.) But those are relatively entry-level laptops; the 14-inch MacBook Pro is a $2,000 computer aimed at creative professionals and developers — it’s not a place you’d expect Apple to cut corners or sacrifice performance.
It’d be even more annoying if the $2,500 16-inch model with a 512GB SSD also has this setup, though, as far as I’m aware, no one has confirmed this one way or the other. We asked Apple about it, and the M2 Mac Mini with a 256GB SSD, but didn’t immediately get a response.
However, MacRumors reports that the 256GB M2 Mini does indeed only have one NAND chip, similar to Air and 13-inch Pro. Again, I’d argue that’s more acceptable on a machine that costs $599. But while it’s unfortunate that the base M2 Mini has a slower SSD than M1 one did, there is a tradeoff — the M2 model starts at $100 less than its predecessor. Given everything the computer offers in terms of real-world performance, perhaps it’s hard to complain.
Thankfully, it seems like MacBook Pro models with upgraded storage don’t come with the same performance hit. Tom’s Guide and Laptop Mag tested a 14-inch M2 Pro-equipped laptop with a 2TB SSD, as well as one with an M2 Max processor (which is only available with a 1TB SSD and up), and the storage turned out to be roughly as fast or faster than the previous-gen models. MacWorld found a similar situation with the 16-inch models.
Just for reference, Tom’s Guide notes that the 2TB SSD paired with an M2 Pro was capable of 5,293 MB/s reads and 6,168 MB/s writes, a substantial leg-up from the 512GB model (as you’d hope, given that the 2TB SSD option adds a cool $600 to the price of the computer).
This isn’t to say that newer Macs with base-level SSDs will be unusably slow. The benchmark screenshots posted by 9to5Mac show that the one in the 14-inch still has enough bandwidth to play back 12K ProRes 422 HQ footage at 60FPS. It also still handily beats the 1TB SSD in my 13-inch M1 MacBook Pro, which has been totally sufficient even when I ask it to do heavy video editing tasks, and is faster than the 256GB SSD in the M2 MacBook Air and 13-inch Pro.
Still, it’s a bit of a bummer to see that, in at least one aspect, the base-level M2 Pro machines are measurably worse than their predecessors.
Musk tells court he lacked ‘specific’ funding to take Tesla private
CEO of electric carmaker says finance was ‘not an issue’ but he did not have binding commitments from investors
Elon Musk expected strong financial support when he tweeted that he would take Tesla private in 2018, but lacked specific commitments from potential backers, according to testimony he gave on his third day of questioning in a San Francisco federal court.
Musk is accused of defrauding investors by driving up the price of Tesla stock by tweeting on 7 August 2018 that he had “funding secured” to take the electric carmaker private.
Meta’s flagship VR app is catching up to the NES by making A the jump button
I, too, am throwing my hands in the air for this change. | Image: Meta
Meta is making a big improvement to controls in its social VR platform Horizon Worlds: jump is being remapped to the A button, according to a blog post about the app’s new v94 update.
You might be surprised to hear that wasn’t the case before, especially given that the A button has been widely used for jumping in video games for decades. But before now, you jumped in Horizon Worlds by pressing the right thumbstick as if it was a button. If you ask me, that wasn’t ideal; not only is jump not where you might expect it to be but the right thumbstick is already used to rotate your character, so pushing down the stick to jump could also lead to accidental turns.
The A button as the default will be in effect for “all players and worlds” with the update, according to Meta. The update is already available for me. When I loaded into Horizon Worlds after updating, I got a notification about the change, and it was immediately in effect; I learned that by accident by pressing A without thinking about it and, well, my character jumped. If you want to switch back to the old way, you can do so from settings.
It’s a basic change, but one that could make Horizon Worlds more inviting for players, which is already struggling to keep users despite the billions Meta is investing in its metaverse efforts. As of last year, Horizon Worlds wasn’t very popular with Meta employees, either, and the company’s metaverse VP sent a memo to staff instituting a “quality lockdown” through the end of the year to fix “quality gaps and performance issues.” Earlier in January, the company also added some new moderation features to Horizon Worlds, including a way to prevent vote-to-kick spam.
Microsoft Revenue Up 2 Percent, but Profit Drops 12 Percent The company, which announced plans to lay off 10,000 workers last week, had warned that is was facing a significant slowdown in the growth of its sales.
Elon Musk is theoretically sad that Tesla investors lost money because of his tweets
Illustration by Laura Normand / The Verge
In testimony that was at times fiery and combative, Elon Musk came extremely close to expressing regret that Tesla investors lost money as a result of his tweets.
Musk took the stand for a third day of testimony in a lawsuit brought by a class of Tesla investors who claim that Musk cost them millions of dollars with his tweets about taking the electric car company private in 2018.
The jury will need to decide whether Musk is liable for potentially billions of dollars in damages to Tesla investors. Musk has already agreed to a $40 million settlement with the Securities and Exchange Commission over the tweets that required him to relinquish his position as chair of the company but not admit to any wrongdoing. (Musk has since argued that he was coerced into the settlement.)
Asked by the plaintiffs’ attorney Nicholas Porritt whether he had any regret about the harm caused by his tweets, Musk’s first response was to disparage Porritt and his law firm.
“The reality is that Tesla investors are extremely happy and you don’t represent them,” Musk said, prompting a sharp rebuke by District Court Judge Edward Chen to answer the question.
Trying again, Musk said, “I never want an investor to lose money. If he did on the basis of the tweet, obviously I would be sad about that. But investors in public markets buy and sell stock all the time. On balance, they have done extremely well.”
It wasn’t the first time that Chen had to stage-manage the petulant billionaire. Several times, Musk attempted to slip into his testimony a mention that “Tesla today is worth 10 times” what it was in 2018, despite an order from the court to refrain from commenting on the company’s present value. He also continued to jab at class action lawsuits and the law firms that bring such cases to court, even though Chen warned him that he was out of line.
Over the course of two full days of testimony (with an added 30 minutes on the stand last Friday), Musk seemed bored, stilted, often muddled, and occasionally in duress (he complained of back pain), with flashes of the abrasiveness he often displays in his tweets. He seemed annoyed to be in a situation where he was forced to answer questions about his tweets, which he maintained were in good faith and for the benefit of Tesla’s investors.
Even before Musk took the stand, Judge Chen ruled that the jury should consider Musk’s 2018 tweets to be false. With that assumption, jurors will need to decide whether Musk deceived shareholders with his tweets and caused them to lose money.
But it was easy to get lost in the swirling mass of meetings, phone calls, text messages, blog posts, tweets, and other forms of communication that make up the bulk of the evidence of the case. Neither side has done a good job of laying out the timeline of the case, which could make it difficult for the jury to parse all the details.
Some moments stuck out, such as when Alex Spiro, Musk’s celebrity lawyer, repeated over and over — likely for the benefit of the jury — that Musk had no intention of misleading or defrauding shareholders with his tweets.
Quite the opposite, Musk said. “My intention with the tweet was to make sure that all investors were aware of what the board was aware of and what the Saudi Investment Fund was aware of” — which was his plan to take the company private at $420 a share.
But in his cross-examination, Porritt grilled Musk over whether he had discussed a specific amount of funding with the Saudi Public Investment Fund or other investors that would be needed to take Tesla private. After a series of disassembling answers, Musk said, “Effectively yes.”
But when asked by Porritt to cite the specific number that he had discussed with the Saudis, Musk eventually admitted there was none — while adding that the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia was so wealthy they could “buy Tesla many times over.”
Porritt also took Musk to task for his previous claim that he also considered his stake in SpaceX, one of his other companies, when he tweeted “funding secured.” Musk made no mention of his shares in SpaceX when answering written questions from the plaintiffs about the tweet in April 2021, which he signed under risk of perjury. That prompted a rare admission of wrongdoing from Musk.
“I should have mentioned SpaceX here, I did mention it in the SEC testimony but it was an error on my part in not mentioning it here,” he admitted.
The case is expected to last through the week, with additional witnesses from Tesla’s past and present set to take the stand. If he loses, Musk could be liable for billions of dollars in damages.
Emailing Your Doctor May Carry a Fee More hospitals and medical practices have begun charging for doctors’ responses to patient queries, depending on the level of medical advice.
I’m a corporate fraud investigator. You wouldn’t believe the hubris of the super-rich
While the fraudsters I’ve encountered are often cunning, sooner or later they get carried away
FTX’s HQ, we now know, was not your typical one. CEO Sam Bankman-Fried ran his business from a $40m Bahamian penthouse named the Orchid, complete with Venetian plaster walls and a grand piano. The lot was nestled beside a championship golf course and a mega-yacht marina. Since Amazon doesn’t deliver to the Bahamas, private jets did the job instead.
It wasn’t your typical corporate HQ – but then, FTX is not your typical corporation. It’s bankrupt, dragged down by its own financial abuses, with its chief executive facing prison. Yet while FTX has made headlines, its tale is not as unusual as you might think.
Surprise, surprise: the cell carriers didn’t get rid of passwords
Remember this logo? I bet you don’t. | Image: ZenKey
Do you remember ZenKey, the app that AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile, and Sprint (gone, but not forgotten) pushed as the future of logging in to services without a password? If you do, you may be one of the only ones — as LightReading points out, it appears as though the joint venture quietly crumbled after the service started rolling out in 2019.
Originally announced as “Project Verify” in 2018, ZenKey was meant to be a single sign-on system, similar to the sign in with Google or Apple buttons that you see on various websites. The idea was that each carrier would offer an app that could verify your identity, then act as a pass whenever you went to log into a supported website or carry out something like a bank transfer. In theory, it could be more secure because it used data from your SIM card and location to make sure it was really you trying to log in.
It doesn’t seem like ZenKey got very far though, and now it’s mostly disappeared. LightReading reports that the website for it is down, AT&T stopped supporting it last year, and the “ZenKey powered by Verizon” app is no longer available in app stores (at least in the US). T-Mobile’s website seems to have almost no references to the system as far as Google can find, though there is one article from mid-2020 on its business site that mentions it.
To those who are familiar with the history of multi-carrier joint ventures, this outcome isn’t necessarily a surprise. LightReading called it when the service was announced in 2019, running the headline “Meet ZenKey: Telcos’ Doomed Single Sign-On Service.” The Verge’s Dieter Bohn called ZenKey “the right idea from the wrong companies” when he wrote about the Cross-Carrier Messaging Initiative that attempted to replace SMS with the then-burgeoning RCS. He based his opinion on past products like SoftCard, which aimed to compete with Google Wallet and Apple Pay. (It succeeded about as well as CCMI did, which is to say not at all — though it probably didn’t help that when it launched in 2013 it was called “ISIS,” a name that was about to mean something very bad to a lot of people).
In the end, the usefulness of a service like ZenKey is going to rely on how much third-party support it gets — even if your app is great, most people aren’t going to bother with it if they can only use it to log in to three or four sites. And why would developers add ZenKey to their sites when there are other options from the likes of Google, Apple, Amazon, and Meta, which all have their own single sign-on solution with accounts people already use? Those would also likely have much better brand recognition when a user hits a login page.
Case in point: here are all the sites and apps that worked with ZenKey in July 2022, according to a Wayback Machine archive of its now-defunct website:
Image: ZenKey via The Wayback Machine
Realistically, how many of these services would one person be signed up for?
A press release from late 2020 mentions that other companies like Proctorio and DocuSign had “plans to trial or go live” with support for the service, but it seems like that didn’t exactly work out.
Even if the cell carriers (predictably) weren’t able to get rid of passwords, I do hope that they eventually become a thing of the past. But getting rid of them will require a much harder push from a much bigger group; perhaps passkeys, a FIDO-powered passwordless authentication system pushed for by Apple, Google, Microsoft, and the like, will end up being the thing. But unless it becomes widely adopted (which isn’t exactly for sure), we’ll likely be stuck with the patchwork of successful single sign-on options, password managers, and scattered sticky notes we know we shouldn’t use but do anyhow.
Elon Musk gets serious about 420 at securities fraud trial
Illustration by Laura Normand / The Verge
Elon Musk insists that 420 isn’t a joke to him.
In testimony during his ongoing securities fraud trial on Monday, Musk argued that the $420-a-share price he proposed back in his infamous “funding secured” tweet from 2018 wasn’t a weed joke but actually just a coincidence — with a dash of karma.
Musk was asked about the proposed share price by Nicholas Porritt, an attorney for a class of Tesla investors who are suing the billionaire CEO for the loss of millions of dollars that they say resulted from his bungled attempt to take Tesla private. And it prompted an eyebrow-raising response from Musk regarding what he considered a serious proposal despite nearly everyone else taking it as an obvious reference to cannabis.
“You rounded up to 420 because you thought that would be a joke that your girlfriend will enjoy, isn’t that correct?” Porritt asked. “No,” Musk said, adding, “there is some, I think, karma around 420. I should question whether that is good or bad karma at this point.”
Porritt, sounding incredulous, asked again whether the $420 was meant to be a joke. “420 was not chosen because of a joke,” Musk said. “It was chosen because there was a 20 percent premium over the stock price.” He also argued that it was a “coincidence.”
Musk posted the ill-fated tweet on August 7th, 2018, based on what he argued was a “firm commitment” from Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF) to take Tesla private. At the time, the company was under “attack” from “Wall Street sharks” and short-sellers who were betting on the failure of his company, and Musk said he was simply trying to protect its future.
But Porritt pointed out that there were no signed documents with the Saudis, nothing more than a handshake really, and that Musk posted the tweet without consulting his own board and without considering how it could negatively affect Tesla’s shareholders.
“Before tweeting out ‘investor support is confirmed,’ you didn’t learn about whether investors support was actually confirmed, did you?” Porritt asked. At a later point, he stated, “By tweeting ‘investor support is confirmed,’ you meant to communicate that ‘Elon Musk support is confirmed.’”
The trial hinges on whether the jury thinks Musk should have to pay out potentially billions of dollars in damages to shareholders for the money they lost as a result of his tweets. Musk has already agreed to a $40 million settlement with the Securities and Exchange Commission over the tweets, though that settlement did not require him to admit to any wrongdoing. (Musk has since argued that he was coerced into that settlement.)
Even before Musk took the stand, Judge Edward Chen ruled that the jury should consider Musk’s 2018 tweets to be false. With that assumption, jurors will need to decide whether Musk deceived shareholders with his tweets and caused them to lose money.
Speaking in a soft, halting tone and at times complaining of “severe” back pain, Musk argued that he was not exclusively relying on a commitment for the Saudi PIF when he tweeted “funding secured.” He argued that his shares in SpaceX would also help fund the deal to take Tesla private, noting that he sold nearly $23 billion in Tesla shares to fund his acquisition of Twitter — a deal he unsuccessfully tried to get out of — as evidence of his willingness to use his various companies to finance his business deal.
“Just as I sold stock in Tesla to buy Twitter... I didn’t want to sell Tesla stock, but I did sell Tesla stock,” he said. “My SpaceX shares alone would have meant that funding was secured.”
There were some brief fireworks when Musk accused Porritt of failing to subpoena any PIF officials to get the Saudis on the record about conversations with Musk. “The interesting question for you, sir, is why did you not subpoena him? Because if you did, it would destroy your case,” Musk said. Porritt said the plaintiff’s team did send court processors to Saudi Arabia, but Judge Chen quickly shut down the brawl.
A moment of levity came when Porritt accidentally referred to Musk as “Mister Tweet,” which Musk conceded was “appropriate.”
During his testimony, Musk likened the deal to buying a house with PIF as his mortgage lender. “There were no documents signed, but they agreed to buy 5 percent of Tesla,” Musk said of the PIF.
“So you would expect less documentation for a multibillion-dollar taking private transaction of a public company than for buying a house?” Porritt responded. “Is that your testimony?”
Musk was also cross-examined by his own attorney, Alex Spiro, who sought to portray his client as a scrappy immigrant who pulled himself up by his own bootstraps to become one of the most successful businesspeople in the world. But much of that narrative may be lost on the jury, as Musk seemed uninterested in responding to questions about his childhood.
“Not good,” Musk responded when asked about his upbringing, declining to elaborate.
But when it came to grandiose statements about his own business acumen, Musk was unreserved. “I’ve done quite a few things that have been unprecedented,” he said, responding to a question from Spiro about the characterization of his scheme to take Tesla private as “unprecedented.”
“I think I’ve raised more money than anyone in history at this point by a significant margin,” Musk boasted while arguing that he has never lost any of his investors money. The plaintiffs may disagree.
Here are the best Amazon Echo deals right now
Like Amazon’s Echo speakers, its various smart displays come in a range of sizes. | Photo by Dan Seifert / The Verge
Amazon’s current Echo lineup offers a broad selection of smart speakers and displays that can fit just about anywhere in your home. Whether you want to place a voice assistant in your living room, replace the bulletin board in your office, or pick up a touchscreen-enabled device to showcase recipes in the kitchen, there's an Echo device for just about every occasion and use case.
Regardless of why you might want one, there’s always a way to save on Echo devices, from the last-gen Dot to the wall-mounted Echo Show 15. Even when they’re selling at full price, for instance, Amazon offers a 25 percent discount when you trade in select devices, meaning there are still other ways to save money when none of the models are on sale.
Below, we’ve rounded up the best deals available on each device in Amazon’s Echo lineup. The bulk of them are currently only available for their full retail price, but some models — specifically the second-gen Echo Show 5 Kids — are still available at a steep discount.
Best Amazon Echo deals
The best Echo Dot deals
In September, Amazon announced the fifth generation of the Echo Dot. It looks more like a sphere than an actual dot — much like its last-gen predecessor — but offers twice as much bass as the prior model and a temperature sensor; it also doubles as an Eero mesh Wi-Fi extender, though, said functionality will also be coming to the prior model at some point via a free over-the-air firmware update.
Despite the arrival of the new model, you can still pick up the third-gen Echo Dot, which retains the puck-like design of earlier models and is available for its full retail price of $39.99 at Amazon, Target, and Best Buy. As for the fifth-gen model, it’s currently available at Best Buy, Target, and Amazon for $49.99 with up to four months of Amazon Music Unlimited.
If you’re looking to upgrade, Amazon, Target, and Best Buy are also selling the latest Echo Dot with a built-in LED display that showcases the time, weather, and other info for $49.99, which is about $15 more than the speaker’s most recent sale price.
The best Echo Dot Kids deals
Like the fourth-gen Echo Dot Kids, the fifth-gen iteration is as spherical as the adult version but is designed to look like a variety of creatures, specifically an owl or a dragon. It also comes with a year of Amazon’s Kids Plus service, which provides access to a slew of kid-friendly content, including audiobooks and games. That said, the latest edition features better sound, a temperature sensor, and other enhancements found on the standard model.
If you want to buy the newest, kid-centric Echo Dot, it’s available at Amazon, Best Buy, and Target right now for $59.99 (about $30 more than its best price to date).
The fourth-gen Amazon Echo also received a makeover in late 2020. The latest model sports a sphere-shaped design like the newer Echo Dot models, but one that’s noticeably bigger. That said, it also touts a built-in smart home hub and produces better sound than the fifth-gen Dot thanks to a pair of 0.8-inch tweeters and a 3-inch woofer.
As of right now, the fourth-gen Echo is on sale at Amazon, Best Buy, and Target with up to four months of Amazon Music Unlimited for $99.99 — about $25 more than the speaker’s most recent sale price and a far cry from its all-time low of $49.99.
If you’re interested in an Alexa smart speaker with better audio quality and Dolby Atmos support, the Echo Studio is the Amazon product to check out. Although the speaker made its debut in 2019, Amazon recently rolled out an over-the-air software update that imbues it with new spatial audio processing technology and frequency range extension, which supposedly allows for improved clarity and a more immersive sound profile.
Unfortunately, however, Amazon’s Echo Studio is currently only available in black or white at Target, Amazon, and Best Buy for its usual asking price of $199.99. Like with other Echo devices, the latter retailer is also offering four months of Amazon Music Unlimited for free with each purchase.
If you are looking for a compact Echo device that functions more as a smart clock than an entertainment speaker, the Echo Show 5 is the Echo device to consider. The latest edition, which launched in 2021, features an always-on microphone, an upgraded 2MP camera, a 5.5-inch display, and a physical shutter, allowing you to block the camera’s view.
Right now, the second-gen Echo Show 5 is available at Amazon, Target, and Best Buy in blue, black, or white for $84.99, which is $50 more than the smart display’s best price to date.
The best Echo Show 5 Kids deals
The Echo Dot isn’t the only Echo device with a kid-friendly design. The Echo Show 5 Kids offers all of the same features as the standard, second-gen Echo Show 5, only with a vibrant print on the rear and a year of Amazon’s Kids Plus service, which grants your family access to a trove of videos, games, and other kid-friendly content. It even comes with a two-year warranty, providing a bit of protection from whatever your child might (literally) throw at it.
As far as pricing goes, the Echo Show 5 Kids is currently discounted at Amazon and Target to just $44.99 ($50 off), which nearly matches the smart display’s best price to date.
Like the Echo Show 5, the Echo Show 8 is typically available in two distinct models, both of which feature 8-inch displays and dual speakers. However, unlike the first-gen Echo Show 8, the latest model is equipped with a 13MP camera and some unique software tricks, one of which grants it the ability to keep the subject centered in the frame as they move around.
We recently saw the second-gen Show 8 drop to an all-time low of $69.99 ($60 off), which is $50 less than the smart speaker’s current price at Amazon, Best Buy, and Target. Best Buy is also offering the second-gen model with four months of Amazon Music Unlimited at no additional cost.
Two years ago, Amazon introduced a third-gen Echo Show 10. The device features a 10.1-inch HD screen and, unlike the Show 5 and Show 8, the 2021 model allows you to adjust the angle of the screen. It’s also mounted on a motorized, swiveling base that allows the display to follow you as you move. If you plan on doing a lot of video calling, this is the model to get.
Unlike other smart displays in Amazon’s Echo lineup, the new Echo Show 15 is a large, wall-mounted device with a 15.6-inch touch display. It’s designed to replace the likes of bulletin boards and calendars, and as such, it functions as a shared hub for families where everyone can see digital sticky notes, upcoming calendar appointments, shopping lists, and other reminders. It also features support for Alexa, meaning it offers the same functionality as other Echo displays and smart speakers, and you can even use it as a decent 1080p TV in your kitchen or to display photos and artwork. It’s compatible with an optional stand, too, though, we’d argue it remains a better fit for your wall than your countertop given its size.
Having launched at the end of 2021, we’ve only seen a handful of discounts on the Echo Show 15. That said, you can currently buy it at Amazon, Best Buy, and B&H Photo for $249.99, its full retail price and $80 more than its sale price during Black Friday and Cyber Monday.
Two new Wyze cameras appear to be in the works
Technologist Dave Zatz has discovered some clues about new Wyze security cameras. | Image: Zatznotfunny.com
Wyze already announced three new cameras this month, but it looks like the company has even more up its sleeves. Tech blogger Dave Zatz dug up information on two not-yet-announced cameras: a new Wyze outdoor cam and an updated Wyze Cam Floodlight.
The Wyze Cam Outdoor Pro (or possibly Wyze Battery Cam Pro) looks to be an upgrade of the Wyze Cam Outdoor v2, adding 2K video resolution. The new Wyze Cam Floodlight Pro also appears to be getting a 2K resolution bump over the original 1080p model, in keeping with Wyze’s new line of Pro cameras, as well as possibly more flood lighting.
Zatz says his info comes from details hidden in the Wyze Android app APK, filings at the Bluetooth SIG, and from other sources. The Verge was able to confirm that a filing for the Wyze Cam Floodlight Pro appears in the Bluetooth group’s qualification list.
Renderings show the new Cam Outdoor Pro with a significantly different form factor from that of the standard square Wyze Cam, possibly to incorporate a removable battery.
This would be a first for Wyze: its existing battery-powered cameras have to be charged in place. A removable battery is more convenient as you don’t need to take the whole camera down to charge it. This is a path Ring has successfully followed; it uses removable batteries in all of its wireless cameras.
Image: Zatznotfunny.com
The new Wyze Cam Outdoor Pro may have a different form factor from Wyze’s existing lineup.
Zatz speculates that, in addition to 2K video, the Cam Outdoor Pro may have an improved speaker and mics, plus a faster live view. Renderings also show a microSD card to enable local recording, and Zatz says it appears the new camera will not require a separate base station, unlike the v2. This would explain its bulkier form factor, it will need a bigger battery if it relies directly on Wi-Fi, which uses a lot of power.
Image: Zatznotfunny.com
The inside of the Wyze outdoor camera shows space for a removable battery and an SD card for local recordings.
There’s no pricing yet on this Wyze model, but the big difference seems to be a purpose-built dome-style camera rather than just adding Wyze Cam v3 onto some floodlights (as is the case with the Wyze Cam Floodlight).
Whether this will supplant the ability to add a second Wyze Cam to see around corners (which you can do with the current model), we’ll have to wait and see. Zatz posits it may be a pan-and-tilt camera and that it may come with more floodlights than the previous model.
‘It’s the opposite of art’: why illustrators are furious about AI
AI art generators may provide five minutes of fun for most users, but the blurring of creative and ethical boundaries is leaving many artists raging against the machine
‘Woman reading book, under a night sky, dreamy atmosphere,” I type into Deep Dream Generator’s Text 2 Dream feature. In less than a minute, an image is returned to me showing what I’ve described. Welcome to the world of AI image generation, where you can create what on the surface looks like top-notch artwork using just a few text prompts, even if in reality your skills don’t go beyond drawing stick figures.
AI image generation seems to be everywhere: on TikTok, the popular AI Manga filter shows you what you look like in the Japanese comic style, while people in their droves are using it to create images for everything from company logos to picture books. It’s already been used by one major publisher: sci-fi imprint Tor discovered that a cover it had created had used a licensed image created by AI, but decided to go ahead anyway “due to production constraints”.
Samsung may put its free TV Plus streaming app into other manufacturers’ TVs
Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge
Samsung TV Plus, the app that houses hundreds of free channels, could eventually make its way to other, non-Samsung TVs. That’s according to media tech reporter Janko Roettgers, who writes in his Lowpass newsletter that Samsung’s in talks to bring its streaming app to TCL TVs.
Introduced in 2015, Samsung TV Plus is a free, ad-supported streaming (FAST) service that comes preinstalled on newer Samsung TVs. The service gives viewers a way to flip through a collection of channels, much like you would with a traditional TV service.
Samsung TV Plus has a pretty strong slate of content for a free app, with Samsung adding popular shows like Top Gear, Law & Order Special Victims Unit, NCIS, and Chicago Fire last August. It also offers a range of local and nationwide news channels, along with Samsung-made channels, such as Ride or Drive and The Movie Hub. TV Plus currently has around 1,600 channels split across 24 different countries, along with 220 channels in the US.
While the company has floated the idea of licensing individual channels to other TV makers, a source tells Roettgers that these talks “don’t seem to have gone anywhere.” Because of that, Samsung has instead switched gears to offering the entire TV Plus app to third-party manufacturers. Over the years, Samsung has been expanding the reach of TV Plus, and made the service available on Galaxy devices, the web, and even on select Family Hub refrigerator models.
Other TV manufacturers, including TCL, LG, and Vizio, have free streaming apps of their own, which also compete with services that aren’t tethered to specific TVs, including Paramount’s Pluto TV, NBC’s Peacock, Fox’s Tubi, Roku, and Amazon Freevee. It looks like Samsung wants to make its TV Plus service a free-floating app as well, but it’s unclear if other manufacturers will want the app on their TVs — or if the app would even be successful.
As Roettgers points out, “the success of FAST services is closely tied to the level of promotion they receive on the platform level,” such as its inclusion in the TV’s interface, or as a button on its remote. The Verge reached out to Samsung with a request for comment but didn’t immediately hear back.
In August, Samsung said TV Plus saw a 100 percent growth in consumer viewing over the past year, and that viewers streamed 3 billion hours globally. Meanwhile, a report from Deadline attests to the growth of the FAST market as a whole, as data the outlet obtained from S&P Market Intelligence indicates that the FAST market in the US was expected to bring in about $4 billion in revenue last year, and could hit nearly $9 billion by 2026.
While I don’t have a Samsung TV myself, I have to say I enjoy the various free content I get to surf through on LG Channels. For me, it’s a lot less daunting to flick through channels and eventually settle on what I want to watch, rather than having to browse through the hundreds of shows laid out in front of me on Netflix or Hulu.
“I’m delighted to announce that Quordle was acquired by @MerriamWebster,” a post on Quorlde’s Twitter account reads. “I can’t think of a better home for this game. Lots of news features and fun to come, so stay tuned!”
Screenshot: Emma Roth / The Verge
Quordle’s now available from Merriam-Webster’s website.
Unlike Wordle, which gives you six guesses to figure out a five-letter word, Quordle quadruples the challenge by making you solve four five-letter words at once with nine guesses. Both games give you new words to solve on a daily basis.
Wordle, which was created by Josh Wardle in 2018, was acquired by The New York Times for an undisclosed seven-figure sum last year, joining the outlet’s existing lineup of crossword puzzles and games. The game became so popular that Apple had trouble keeping copycats off the App Store (Wordle didn’t have an app at the time). Even Spotify got in on the trend by creating Heardle, a Wordle-like game that gives you five chances to figure out the name of a song based on increasingly long snippets.
Finally, a solution to the Switch’s Joy-Con drift
Gulikit’s joystick replacements use Hall effect sensors that make them less likely to wear down. | Image: Gulikit
After years of dealing with Joy-Con drift and no satisfactory answers from Nintendo, we may finally have our solution. A company called Gulikit created a set of Switch joystick replacements that promise to banish stick drift once and for all (via Gizmodo).
Image: Gulikit
Take a look at these drift-free joystick replacements.
Unlike your standard Joy-Cons from Nintendo, Gulikit’s joystick replacements use something called Hall effect sensors to essentially make them drift-proof — the same technology used by Sega’s 90s-era Saturn 3D and Dreamcast controllers. As iFixit points out, the sensors use magnets to detect the joystick’s movement, which means none of the components actually rub up against each other and wear out like the sensors used on Joy-Cons do.
One of the reasons Joy-Cons drift in the first place is that they use potentiometers. This technology deteriorates over time, resulting in incorrect readings that make your controller seem like it's possessed. In 2021, Nintendo executive Ko Shiota likened the problem to car tires that “wear out as the car moves, as they are in constant friction with the ground to rotate.”
That’s where Gulikit’s joysticks come in. The sticks, which are available for $29.70 on Amazon will presumably put an end to frequent Joy-Con replacements and repair orders (that should absolutely not be the case). You’ll have to install the replacement joysticks yourself, of course, but this video from iFixit should point you in the right direction when it comes to dismantling the Joy-Cons. Gulikit’s joysticks also come with a screwdriver, replacement screws, a tweezer, and a plastic pry tool to help you get started.
While we haven’t gotten the chance to try them for ourselves, users on Amazon have left mostly positive reviews. However, there are some saying they leave a small gap between the ring that’s supposed to prevent dust and other debris from getting inside the Switch, although it’s unclear how or if this will affect the sticks (or the Joy-Cons themselves). Gulikit also has replacement joysticks for the Steam Deck, as well as a full-blown KingKong 2 Pro controller with hall effect sensors.
Keep in mind that adding the third-party sticks could void the warranty on your Switch and Joy-Cons, but is still a potential solution if you’re fed up with stick drift. It’s just sad that — in the year 2023 — we have to go through all this just to get things to work properly when the technology’s already there, and has been there for decades.
As many people have pointed out over the past week, third-party clients helped make Twitter the platform it is today, innovating parts of Twitter we take for granted and, in the early days, helping form the company’s very identity. They’ve also acted as a safe haven from unwanted changes, helping to keep people tweeting when they were ready to give up on the platform.
Image: The Iconfactory
Twitter didn’t put a bird in its logountil 2010. Here’s a screenshot from Twitterific’s site in 2007, with the bird explaining how to install the Mac app. The iPhone’s App Store wouldn’t come along until over a year later.
Take, for example, that word I just used — tweeting. The idea that a “tweet” would be what we call a Twitter post didn’t actually come from the company itself, according to a blog post from Twitterific developer Craig Hockenberry. Instead, it was suggested by Blaine Cook, a QA tester for The Iconfactory’s third-party client, and immediately adopted. It wasn’t until at least a year later that Twitter the company started using the phrase too. (Originally, Twitter preferred “twittering.”) Twitterific also led the way in using a bird logo.
Third-party apps have had a massive impact on how we use smartphone apps in general, not just Twitter. A client called Tweetie is widely credited for inventing the pull-to-refresh interaction that’s become almost ubiquitous throughout iOS and Android for refreshing all sorts of feeds. Even if you haven’t heard of Tweetie before, you may have used it; in 2010, Twitter acquired it and made it the official iPhone client. In 2015, the company also hired a developer of a different third-party client to improve its Android app.
Images: Tweetie / Twitter via The Wayback Machine
Left: Tweetie 2 in 2010. Right: Twitter for iPhone in 2011.
It’s also not the only time Twitter acquired a popular third-party client outright. TweetDeck, a part of The Verge’s newsroom to this day, was an independent app for years until the company bought it.
Screenshot: Echofon via The Wayback Machine
An Echofon screenshot from 2011.
The apps have also acted as safe havens from Twitter’s changes; they didn’t have the flood of recommended and out-of-order tweets that the official app did, and they gave us options for using a Twitter app for Macs after the official one was discontinued for a year. And, yes, people have used third-party clients to get an ad-free Twitter experience, not because they purposefully stripped out ads but because Twitter didn’t serve them through the API. (Side note: it’s hard to believe that Twitter couldn’t have made alternative apps serve ads if it wanted or needed to.)
At times, Twitter has seemingly recognized the value outside developers added. “3rd party clients have had a notable impact on the Twitter service and the products we built,” read a 2018 memo from Rob Johnson, who was the company’s developer platform lead at the time. “Independent developers built the first Twitter client for Mac and the first native app for iPhone. These clients pioneered product features we all know and love.” And in a 2010 blog post, Twitter said people who used third-party clients were “some of the most active and frequent users, noting that “a disproportionate amount of the traffic from Twitter runs through such tools.”
Despite the praise, the relationship between Twitter and outside developers was often fraught. The company’s developer agreement has had an off-and-on rule barring alternative apps that competed with its official clients, and for years the company introduced new features that it didn’t support in its API, meaning that third-party clients couldn’t have them.
Before Musk took over, however, the company appeared to be making amends. It clarified its rules with the express intent of making things easier for third-party clients, started communicating more, and its API v2 finally gave developers access to features like polls and group DMs. In late 2021, Tapbots co-founder Paul Haddad told me, “the pace of development and open-ness have been significantly improved compared to some of the darker days.” And in 2022, he called the company releasing a v2 version of its home timeline API “an indication that they’re going to continue to allow and even encourage alternative clients.”
It’s not just third-party clients that have made the Twitter experience better. There are several other outside tools that have improved the experience, such as Thread Reader, Block Party or Twitlonger. (Historically, Twitter users relied on a third-party tool called TwitPic to post pictures to the site before that feature was built-in.) Most of those apps appear to still be working, but as we’ve seen, that could change at any time, and Twitter has the ability to prevent you from posting links to them.
Of course, doing so would likely result in massive user backlash and would make the service worse. But based on Twitter’s recent actions, that wouldn’t make it out of the question.
I’m not trying to argue that Twitter has never come up with features on its own, or picked up user suggestions on its own, because it has. (The retweet, hashtag, and @ mention were famously invented by users, sometimes with the help of third-party apps, but Twitter implemented them effectively.) My point is that an ecosystem of third-party apps competing with each other and the official client is going to produce more good ideas than a single company could on its own.
Elon Musk just decided to throw all of that away. Twitter has abruptly cut itself off from that stream of ideas — the stream that produced its apps, some of its most popular features, and much of its core identity. Even if he backtracks, why would developers spend their best ideas on a company that’s burned them so badly?
The next MacBook Air and iMac could come with a 3nm M3 chip
Photo by Becca Farsace / The Verge
Apple’s working on a MacBook Air and iMac with an M3 chip built using the more efficient 3-nanometer fabrication process, according to a report from Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman. While it’s not clear when the two upgraded devices might launch, Gurman expects the M3 chip to arrive later this year or early next year.
Gurman first hinted at this in June of last year, noting that Apple’s working on an M3-equipped 13-inch MacBook Air, 15-inch MacBook Air, and a new iMac. At the time, he added that the M3 chip could appear as early as this year, but that hasn’t happened.
Instead, Apple included the new M2 Pro and M2 Max chips with the lineup of MacBook Pros it announced earlier this month, and also added an M2 Pro chip to the Mac Mini. These chips are based on a second-generation 5nm process, which is still an upgrade from the standard 5nm process Apple uses to fabricate its M1 chips.
The upcoming M3 chip, however, is expected to take things a step further. According to Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC), the company that makes Apple’s chips, the 3nm process can improve speed by up to 15 percent and reduce power consumption by 30 percent when compared to the 5nm process. TSMC began mass-producing 3nm chips at its Taiwan-based facilities last year, but this technology isn’t set to arrive at the manufacturer’s new Arizona fab until 2026.
The MacBook Air and iMac aren’t the only devices that could soon get an M3 upgrade. On the same day Apple announced its new MacBook Pros, Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo said that Apple could launch another round of MacBook Pro models with new 3nm M3 Pro and M3 Max processors in the first half of 2024. We’ll have to wait a bit longer to see if this rumor pans out, along with Gurman’s prediction that Apple could release a touchscreen Mac in 2025.
TikTok is overrun by amateur sleuths – so which clues should I leave in case I go missing? | Michael Sun
Everyone from awkward boyfriends to supposedly nefarious fiances are being held to account. The jurors? A million deranged zoomers
If I was a more dedicated podcast listener, I am certain I would be a nutter for true crime, a genre with which I share many core values: a zeal for prying into the lives of total strangers, a generally melodramatic way of talking, an overactive imagination which crafts grand, paranoid narratives from the most quotidian of events. (These are also the traits of anyone who did theatre in high school.)
TikTok, apparently, agrees. When Serial exploded the genre in 2014, the power of amateur sleuths – and the sway they possessed over the real-world results of justice – was still a novelty. Now, nearly a decade on, new mysteries sweep through TikTok at dizzying pace. Everyone from awkward boyfriends to supposedly nefarious fiances are held to account on the platform by users conducting their own frenzied investigations, hoping to catch their suspects cheating, philandering and premeditating. The jurors: a million deranged zoomers. The tone: nothing short of fever pitch – the type that accompanies all good conspiracy theories.
Marvel’s Avengers development is coming to an end
Image: Square Enix
The development of Marvel’s Avengers is coming to a close. In a blog post, developer Crystal Dynamics announced that the game won’t receive any new updates after March 31st, with support ending on September 30th (via IGN).
While you’ll still be able to play the game in both single-player and multiplayer mode, Crystal Dynamics says it “can’t guarantee that we will be able to address issues that occur” after support ends.
The last — and final — balance update will take place in March, and from then on, all cosmetics, including “every Outfit, Takedown, and Nameplate” will be available for free and without the purchase of credits. Any remaining credits “will be converted into in-game resources,” Crystal Dynamics says. It also provides a chart for the types and number of resources you’ll get based on the credits you have, which you can see below.
Over the years, Crystal Dynamics added more characters to its lineup, including Black Panther, The Mighty Thor, and Kate Bishop. Marvel’s Avengers’ last update took place in November and saw the addition of the Cloning Lab Omega-Level Threat mission and the Winter Soldier. Unfortunately, Crystal Dynamics says Spider-Man will remain a PlayStation exclusive.
“We know this is disappointing news as everyone in our community has such a connection to these characters and their stories,” Crystal Dynamics’ post reads. “We’re so, so grateful that you came on this adventure with us.”
While users will still be able to purchase used physical copies of Marvel’s Avengers for the PS4, PS5, Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, and PC after September 30th, the game will no longer be available for purchase online.
First industrial action at Amazon UK hopes to strike at firm’s union hostility
In Coventry, 300 GMB members plan to down tools over long hours, bad management and a 50p-an-hour pay rise
Amazon workers at a vast depot in Coventry will stage a historic strike on Wednesday – the first time the delivery giant’s UK operations have ever been hit by industrial action.
The immediate cause of the dispute was a 50p-an-hour pay rise offered to warehouse staff in the summer, which many felt was insulting – particularly after they had worked throughout the Covid pandemic.
Motorola’s viva magenta Edge 30 Fusion is fun, and fun is good
The special-edition phone celebrates Pantone’s vibrant color of the year.
There’s really no sensible argument for the viva magenta Motorola Edge 30 Fusion. It’s $799 and doesn’t include wireless charging, an IP68 rating, or a telephoto camera. You should get, like, at least two of those things for $800 in 2023. But here’s the thing: it’s fun, and fun is seriously underrated when it comes to smartphones.
A lot of that fun factor has to do with the Edge 30 Fusion’s best and most obvious feature: its color. I think it’s pink, but my sources (a lot of people on Twitter) tell me that it is, in fact, red. And not just any red: viva magenta, the official 2023 Pantone Color of the Year.
Pantone employs some forced alliteration when it says it “vibrates with vim and vigor.” It also apparently “galvanizes our spirit, helping us to build our inner strength.” I’ve been using the phone for a few days, and I can’t say my spirit feels any more or less galvanized, but I did recently muster up the courage to deep clean the inside of my refrigerator. Did my exposure to viva magenta help? Who can say?
In any case, this pink phone stands out from most other modern smartphones, whether or not it builds inner strength. At any point in time, there’s a small pile of phones on my desk, and roughly four out of five of them are black. Sometimes a forest green or a midnight blue will enter the mix, but never something as attention-grabbing as viva magenta. It’s a welcome change from the muted rectangles.
Photo by Allison Johnson / The Verge
Fun! What a concept!
The magenta edition Edge 30 Fusion also comes with a pair of color-coordinated wireless earbuds. When’s the last time you bought a phone that came with wireless earbuds right in the box? Probably never, that’s when. They’re not exactly top-notch, but they’re surprisingly good.
Noise cancellation is serviceable, and both the phone and buds support Dolby Atmos sound, which claims to provide “clearer dialog, crisper detail, and more engaging sound.” That sounds like some marketing gibberish, but you know what? It is pretty engaging. The sound on an episode of White Lotus felt richer and more immersive as I watched the rich people get immersed in their own problems. Color me impressed.
The Viva Magenta version of the Edge 30 Fusion comes with a color-coordinated pair of wireless earbuds. And they’re not bad!
To sweeten the deal, the back of the Edge 30 Fusion has a leather-like finish, which not only looks nice but also makes the phone easier to hold in one hand. One drawback: the porous surface seems to hang onto strong scents more willingly than an all-glass device. The loaner unit I’ve been using picked up a strong perfume smell somewhere along its path, and it took a few days of airing out to dissipate. I don’t believe that’s a multi-sensory feature of viva magenta; it’s certainly not spirit-galvanizing. Anyway, I asked Motorola about this, and the company hasn’t gotten back to me.
Outside of all the cosmetic stuff, the Edge 30 Fusion is a nice phone, too. It has a Snapdragon 888 Plus processor with snappy performance, a fancy 6.55-inch OLED with 144Hz refresh rate, and fast 68W wired charging (cable and charging brick included). There’s a 50-megapixel stabilized main camera, a 32-megapixel selfie camera with heavy face-smoothing on by default, and a 13-megapixel ultrawide. It’s all very nice, if not the best you can do for the money.
I can say with absolute certainty, though, that it is the viva magenta-est phone you can buy at any price. Carrying around a pink phone for a little while was a lot of fun, and judging from the response when I posted about it on Twitter, a lot of you thought it might be, too. And if you’re not sold on magenta, well, there’s always next year.
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Image: ZenKey via The Wayback Machine
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Screenshot: Emma Roth / The Verge
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Images: Tweetie / Twitter via The Wayback Machine
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Screenshot: Echofon via The Wayback Machine
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