dimanche 5 mars 2023

Meet the companies trying to keep up with ChatGPT

Illustration: The Verge

With all the hype surrounding ChatGPT, it’s no wonder other companies are vying for a piece of the AI-powered chatbot game. Companies are betting that we’re at a decisive moment in the artificial intelligence industry, where products that adopt and build upon the budding technology could have the potential to reshape technology as we know it — not to mention shake up the Big Tech hierarchy.

The stakes are high, and technology’s biggest players don’t want to be left behind as breakthroughs in AI make it more accessible — and much more interesting — to users. While tech giants like Microsoft and Google have already introduced their versions of conversational AI tools built using large language models (LLMs), other lesser-known companies have thrown themselves in the mix, setting the stage for an AI showdown.

Here, we’ve rounded up a list of all the companies and AI chatbots that are looking to challenge ChatGPT — or build on top of its success.

Microsoft

Let’s start with Microsoft. The company made its chatbot debut with its launch of the “new” Bing, which promises to upend the way we search for things online. It also built AI-powered tools into the Edge browser.

Microsoft — a big investor in OpenAI — leveraged the technology behind ChatGPT to build an AI tool it says is “even more powerful.” So far, the results have oscillated between impressive and truly off the rails.

The company made the “new” Bing available for beta testers, who have been able to ask questions like “Can you suggest places to visit in Paris?” or “What’s the best apple pie recipe?” and then receive annotated responses describing various tourist destinations or outline the ingredients and steps that go along with a recipe.

But Microsoft may have made Bing a bit too flexible. Users quickly found exploits with the system, including a now-disabled prompt that triggers the Bing bot to divulge its internal nickname, Sydney, and some of the parameters its developers set for its behavior, such as “Sydney’s responses should avoid being vague, controversial, or off-topic.”

Other users toying with the system have found pleasure in pushing the bot’s buttons, triggering wacky — and sometimes unhinged — responses. Microsoft introduced a five-answer limit and a 50-question cap to help curb some of Bing’s more outlandish replies, but the company later loosened some of these restrictions after receiving complaints from users.

As for Edge, Microsoft plans on adding AI enhancements that let you summarize the webpage or document you’re reading online, as well as generate text for social media posts, emails, and more.

Google

Google couldn’t let Microsoft get away with launching an AI chatbot that has the potential to challenge the company’s core business: search. That’s why it rushed to announce its own AI chatbot, Bard, though we still don’t know much about its capabilities.

A screenshot of Bard’s interface, saying “Introducing Bard, an experimental conversational AI service powered by LaMDA.”

According to Google CEO Sundar Pichai, the company is using its in-house large language model, LaMDA, to power the conversational AI service, which “draws on information from the web to provide fresh, high-quality responses.” Google says you’ll be able to use the chatbot for a range of tasks, like planning a baby shower, comparing two Oscar-nominated movies, and getting recipe ideas based on the ingredients you have in your fridge.

The company’s announcement was considerably more haphazard than Microsoft’s, so much so that Googlers reportedly criticized the company for it in internal messages. Bard made a factual error in the very first demo Google posted to Twitter, and a presenter showing off the chatbot during a search event in Paris forgot the phone they were supposed to use during the presentation. Bard is currently only available to a limited test group, with wider availability arriving in the “coming weeks.”

Anthropic

Anthropic, an AI research company founded by former OpenAI employees in 2021, is working on a Chat-GPT competitor of its own called Claude, which has yet to get a full public release. Google invested $300 million into Anthropic in late 2022.

We’ve trained language models to be better at responding to adversarial questions, without becoming obtuse and saying very little. We do this by conditioning them with a simple set of behavioral principles via a technique called Constitutional AI: https://t.co/rlft1pZlP5 pic.twitter.com/MIGlKSVTe9
— Anthropic (@AnthropicAI) December 16, 2022

The company developed the chatbot using a methodology it calls Constitutional AI. There’s a whole research paper about the framework here, but, in short, it involves Anthropic training the language model with a set of around 10 “natural language instructions or principles” that it uses to revise its responses automatically. The goal of the system, according to Anthropic, is to “train better and more harmless AI assistants” without incorporating human feedback.

Scale, an AI data platform, was given access to Claude and outlined some of the differences between Anthropic’s bot and Chat-GPT. It found that the service could serve as a “serious” competitor to the OpenAI-made system and that the bot was “more inclined to refuse inappropriate requests.” It does come with some drawbacks, however, as Claude still appears to be prone to making factual errors and mathematical mistakes. For now, the general public can’t access Claude, and it’s only available to companies as an early-access product.

You.com

You.com, a company built by two former Salesforce employees, bills itself as the “search engine you control.” At first glance, it may seem like your typical search engine, but it comes with an AI-powered “chat” tool that works much like the one Microsoft’s piloting on Bing.

You.com first introduced the chatbot, called YouChat, in December 2022 and says it’s built on the company’s C-A-L model, which is “blended with AI-powered conversations, You.com apps, web links and citations.” Just like Microsoft’s AI, YouChat can provide annotated answers to various types of queries, create summaries of articles from the web, generate code, write essays, and more.

In addition to giving users access to an AI-powered chatbot, You.com recently added built-in AI image generator models, including Stable Diffusion 1.5, Stable Diffusion 2.1, and Open Journey, that you can use to generate images based on a written description. The engine also breaks down your search results based on relevant responses on sites like Reddit, TripAdvisor, Wikipedia, and YouTube while also providing standard results from the web.

Alibaba

Alibaba, the China-based e-commerce giant, has caught onto the AI chatbot trend as well. In early February, a company spokesperson told CNBC that the company is testing a Chat-GPT rival internally. Alibaba has reportedly been experimenting with generative AI since 2017, but the company hasn’t provided any sense of when it could announce the tool it’s working on or what it might be capable of.

Alibaba may have to overcome some hurdles before it gets its own version of ChatGPT off the ground, however. A report from Nikkei Asia indicates that Chinese regulators have already told the Alibaba-owned Tencent and Ant Group that they should restrict access to ChatGPT over concerns the bot could espouse uncensored content. The companies will also have to confer with the government before making their own bots available to the public.

Similar rules will likely apply to all of the other Chinese companies developing AI chatbots, calling into question whether they'll even be able to launch their products or if their utility will be held back by China’s strict censorship rules.

Baidu

Another Chinese company, Baidu, is getting ready to launch an AI tool it calls “Ernie Bot” as soon as March. Baidu is best known for its search engine of the same name, along with a cluster of other internet-related services, such as mapping platform Baidu Maps, online encyclopedia Baidu Baike, cloud storage service Baidu Wangpan, and more. It’s also leveraging AI technology to develop a self-driving car.

We are proud to announce our ongoing development of the AI chatbot project, ERNIE Bot (文心一言). First proposed as a language model in 2019, ERNIE has made significant progress since then.

Stay tuned for further updates. pic.twitter.com/J1F81VZz5i
— Baidu Inc. (@Baidu_Inc) February 7, 2023

Ernie, which stands for Enhanced Representation through kNowledge IntEgration, first appeared in 2019 and has since evolved into a ChatGPT-like tool that can generate conversational responses. In late 2021, Baidu said it trained the model on “massive unstructured data and a gigantic knowledge graph” and that it “excels at both natural language understanding (NLU) and generation (NLG).”

Just like Microsoft and Google, Baidu is also planning to integrate the chatbot into its search engine and will even build the tool into the interface of the forthcoming electric vehicle made by Chinese startup Jidu. In addition to this Chat-GPT-style tool, Baidu is also developing a text-to-image model, called Ernie ViLG, to create images based on Chinese text, similar to OpenAI’s DALL-E 2 system and Stability AI’s Stable Diffusion’s AI image generator.

Other possible contenders

Aside from companies making standalone chatbots for search, there are a few other companies using generative AI in slightly different ways.

Snapchat, for example, is working on a “My AI” chatbot that essentially works as an in-app version of ChatGPT, allowing users to ask for recipe suggestions or plan trips. It’s more limiting than ChatGPT, however, as it’s been trained to avoid breaking Snapchat’s trust and safety guidelines. The service is only available as part of Snapchat’s $3.99 per month Plus subscribers for now, but CEO Evan Spiegel plans on eventually bringing it to all users.

*Snap’s My AI chatbot is basically a mobile version of ChatGPT.*

Character.AI is another one of these tools and comes from the developers of Google’s LaMDA technology. The site lets you create or browse chatbots modeled after real people or fictional characters, such as Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg, or Tony Stark. When “conversing” with these bots, the AI attempts to respond in a manner similar to that person or character’s personality. However, that’s not the only thing these bots are capable of, as some are designed to help generate book recommendations, brainstorm ideas, practice a new language, and more.

Meanwhile, Chinese gaming firm NetEase has announced that its education subsidiary, Youdao, is planning to incorporate AI-powered tools into some of its educational products, according to a report from CNBC. It’s still not clear what exactly this tool will do, but it seems the company’s interested in employing the technology in one of its upcoming games as well.

With Generative AI being all over the headlines these days, NetEase says it'll launch launch the first game version of ChatGPT in Justice Online Mobile, its upcoming MMO title.

It'll allow players to chat with NPCs and have them react in unique ways that impact the game. pic.twitter.com/JBiFy3J5dV
— Daniel Ahmad (@ZhugeEX) February 16, 2023

Daniel Ahmad, the director of research and insights at Niko Partners, reports that NetEase could bring a ChatGPT-style tool to the mobile MMO Justice Online Mobile. As noted by Ahmad, the tool will “allow players to chat with NPCs and have them react in unique ways that impact the game” through text or voice inputs. However, there’s only one demo of the tool so far, so we don’t know how (or if) it will make its way into the final version of the game.

Then, there’s Replika, an AI chatbot that functions as a sort of “companion” that you can talk to via text-based chats and even video calls. The tool combines the company’s own version of the GPT-3 model and scripted dialogue content to build memories and generate responses tailored to your conversation style. But the company that owns the tool recently ruled out erotic roleplay, devastating dedicated users.

We’re still at the beginning of what conversational AI can do, and with major players like Microsoft and Google getting on board, we’re bound to see some progress. It’ll be interesting to see how all of these tools evolve over the coming years, as well as which ones manage to make their way into our daily lives.

Apple will reportedly launch an M3-equipped iMac later this year

An image showing an iMac with a galaxy screensaver — *The M1-equipped iMac released in 2021.* | Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge

Apple’s readying a new iMac that could launch as early as the second half of this year, according to a report from Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman. While the new iMac will reportedly feature the same 24-inch display size as the previous model, it’s expected to come with a more powerful M3 chip made with a 3nm process.

The new iMac isn’t expected to enter mass production until at least three months, Gurman notes, but could still start shipping in the latter half of this year in the same colorways as its predecessor, including blue, silver, pink, and orange. Gurman says the new iMac is at “an advanced stage of development” and that Apple’s currently “conducting production tests of the machine.” This tracks with previous rumors from Gurman, which also hinted at a 2023 iMac launch.

Other details disclosed by Gurman indicate that some of the iMac’s internal components might get “relocated and redesigned,” and that the production process for mounting the iMac’s stand to the display is “different.” The iMac is overdue for an upgrade. Apple hasn’t refreshed its lineup in two years, with the 2021 model being the first to come with the company’s in-house silicon, along with a larger display size and an array of new colors.

In addition to a new iMac, Gurman says Apple’s also getting ready to launch the new 15-inch MacBook Air, an upgraded 13-inch MacBook Air, and a Mac Pro equipped with an M2 Ultra chip. Gurman speculates that it might make sense for Apple to include an M3 chip in the 13-inch MacBook Air as well, given that the company just released an M2-equipped one last year, while reserving the M2 chip for the larger 15-inch model.

It’s shaping up to be a busy year for Apple. The company’s expected to showcase its new M3 chip at its Worldwide Developers Conference in June, where it could also take the wraps off of its highly-anticipated mixed-reality headset.

‘They’re more concerned about profit’: Osha, DoJ take on Amazon’s grueling working conditions

The federal workplace safety agency has issued citations against the company at multiple warehouses for various violations

The US’s top workplace safety regulator and the justice department are pressuring Amazon to explain safety practices that have led to injury rates for warehouse workers that are on average close to twice as high as the company’s competitors and in one case five times higher.

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (Osha) issued citations against Amazon at six warehouses in December 2022, January 2023 and February 2023 over unsafe working conditions, ergonomic hazards and failure to properly report injuries.

How A.I. Is Being Used to Detect Cancer That Doctors Miss

How A.I. Is Being Used to Detect Cancer That Doctors Miss Hungary has become a major testing ground for A.I. software to spot cancer, as doctors debate whether the technology will replace them in medical jobs.

samedi 4 mars 2023

Facebook’s willing to reform its controversial cross-check program — but only parts of it

Illustration by Nick Barclay / The Verge

Meta has agreed to modify Facebook and Instagram’s cross-check program, which exempts high-profile users from the company’s automated moderation system. In an updated blog post published Friday, the company shared its response to the Oversight Board’s recommendations, stating it will make the cross-check system “more transparent through regular reporting” as well as tweak the criteria it uses to add people to the program “to better account for human rights interests and equity.”

The Oversight Board, or the “independent body” that reviews Meta’s content moderation decisions, made a total of 32 recommendations on how Meta can improve its cross-check program last December. Meta has opted to fully implement 11 of those recommendations, while partially adopting 15.

Several aspects of Meta’s response haven’t gone as far as we recommended to achieve a more transparent and equitable system. Meta declined the Board's suggestion that deserving users be able to apply for the protections afforded by cross-check.
— Oversight Board (@OversightBoard) March 3, 2023

Facebook and Instagram’s cross-check program came under fire after a 2021 report from The Wall Street Journal revealed that Meta’s been using it to shield politicians, celebrities, and popular athletes from its automated moderation system. According to Meta, the system lets the company apply “additional levels of human review” to posts shared by high-profile figures in an attempt to avoid wrongly removing them.

The Oversight Board criticized the program, stating it “appears more directly structured to satisfy business concerns” rather than as a way to further the company’s “human rights commitments” as it previously claimed. As part of its response, Meta agreed to implement recommendations that require it to take immediate action on cross-checked content “identified as potentially severely violating.” It also committed to reducing the cross-check program’s backlog, an issue the Oversight Board found could cause harmful content to stay online longer than it should.

However, Meta’s still “assessing the feasibility” of a rule that would allow figures to opt out of the cross-check program, and isn’t going through with five recommendations, including a suggestion to “publicly mark” some of the figures benefitting from the program. It also rejected the Oversight Board’s recommendation to notify users that it might take longer for Meta to take action when they report a post from someone in the cross-check program. You can read the full list of recommendations and Meta’s response to each here.

While the Oversight Board calls Meta’s response a “landmark moment” in a thread on Twitter, it isn’t completely satisfied with the changes the company’s willing to make. “Several aspects of Meta’s response haven’t gone as far as we recommended to achieve a more transparent and equitable system,” the Oversight Board writes. “Meta declined the Board’s suggestion that deserving users be able to apply for the protections afforded by cross-check... We will continue to react to Meta’s specific responses in the days and weeks to come.”

Amazon’s sleep-tracking Halo Rise smart alarm drops to a new all-time low price

Amazon Halo Rise on a nightstand with a plant, while a person sleeps in the background. — *The Amazon Halo Rise is on sale for $99.99 ($40 off) at multiple retailers.* | Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge

Welcome to the weekend — and the last one where you’ll be able to enjoy an “extra” hour of sleep before you lose it next Sunday. That’s right: Daylight Saving Time begins in the US next Sunday, March 12th, which means the clocks will spring forward one hour, the days will get brighter, and we’re all going to wake up the following Monday morning even sleepier than usual.

That sucks, but today’s deal on Amazon’s Halo Rise might help make the adjustment to the change in time go a little smoother. Right now, you can buy Amazon’s latest wellness gadget at a new all-time low of $99.99 ($40 off) at Amazon, Best Buy, and Lowe’s. Part smart alarm clock, the Rise will gently wake you up during your lightest sleeping stage with a natural morning light so getting up earlier feels less disorienting. At the same time, the Rise is a noninvasive sleep tracker that helps you improve your sleep habits as you adjust by generating daily reports and monitoring potential disturbances, like room temperature.

Oh, and just in case you find it hard to actually get to sleep, you can also use the Rise as a soothing warm smart table lamp you can use to read before bed. It’s also compatible with Echo devices, so you can ask Alexa to play some relaxing music. Read our review.

Shopping for an excellent pair of noise-canceling headphones? Good news: today we’ve found deals on two of the best on the market: Bose’s QuietComfort 45 and Apple’s AirPods Max. First up, Bose’s QuietComfort 45 are on sale at Amazon and Newegg for $279 ($50 off) in various colors. Not only do these over-ear headphones boast excellent noise cancellation, but they are also some of the most comfortable we’ve ever tested. As a result, you won’t suffer from ear fatigue when you want to tune out loud passengers while, say, flying out of town for spring break. You won’t need to fear running out of battery either as they can last 24 hours, and fitting them into your luggage won’t be a problem as the ear cups can even swivel and fold. Read our review.

If you’re more of an Apple aficionado, though, you can alternatively buy Apple’s AirPods Max for $449.99 ($100 off) in all colors at Best Buy, which is the lowest price we’ve seen this year. Compared to their plastic Bose and Sony rivals, the aluminum and steel AirPods Max feature superior build quality, albeit with a heavier weight. While their bass response isn’t quite as good, their sound quality is still phenomenal, thanks to nice features like spatial audio support. Plus, the Bluetooth headphones pair well with other Apple devices, making them a particularly good pick for iPhone owners. Read our review.

If you’re looking for a powerful Chromebook, you might want to take a look at today’s deal on Acer’s Chromebook Spin 714. With Intel’s fast 12th Gen processors and Thunderbolt 4 support, it’s our favorite Chromebook for power users and even comes with an included stylus to boot. Yet at the same time, it’s relatively quiet and produces very little heat in comparison to its predecessor. There’s also an HDMI port, which is rare to find in a thin Chromebook. While it’s a shame its battery life is slightly worse than its predecessor’s and its speakers aren’t that great, it’s an otherwise good Chromebook capable of handling more intense workloads than many of its rivals. You can buy it with 8GB of RAM, 256GB of storage, and an Intel Evo Core i5 processor for $499 ($230 off) at Best Buy, which is just $20 shy of its all-time low price. Read our review.

Just a few more deals to wrap up the week...

Sonos is discounting a few of its refurbished speakers and soundbars for a limited time. You can, for instance, purchase the portable and water-resistant Sonos Roam smart speaker for $139 in black instead of $179, the price it sells for new. For more information about the sale, check out our full list of the best deals available. Read our review.
You can buy the Dart Zone Pro MK-3 foam blaster for $59.99 ($25 off) in red from Amazon. The well-designed blaster is powerful to use and capable of firing darts at up to 150 feet per second. Read our review.
All colors of the Beats Fit Pro have dropped to $159.95 ($40 off) at Amazon, including the yellow, coral pink, and blue models (a new all-time low for those colors that launched last month). The Beats Fit Pro are our favorite wireless buds for working out, sporting IPX4 water resistance and built-in wingtips for a more secure fit while running. Read our review.
Amazon’s offering its first cash discount on unlocked Samsung Galaxy S23 phones. You can, for example, buy the 256GB Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra with its stylus for $1,099.99 when you clip the on-page coupon for $100 off. Alternatively, you can buy Samsung’s Galaxy S23 in pink with 128GB of storage for $749.99 ($50 off) by clipping its on-page coupon. Read our reviews of Samsung’s Galaxy S23 / Galaxy S23 Ultra.
The Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening for Nintendo Switch is $39.99 ($20 off) at Target. The Switch reimagining of the 1993 Game Boy classic offers a whole new take on the original, with an adorable miniature-like aesthetic to its graphics. Read our review.

Sick of hunt-and-peck? Here’s how to touch-type like a pro

Illustration featuring a keyboard and various animated people typing on various computers — Illustration by Samar Haddad / The Verge

As a kid, I started typing by tapping in cheat codes on ’90s PC games like Doom and Rise of the Triad, but it wasn’t until the covid pandemic that I finally ditched my awkward hunt-and-peck technique and learned touch typing.

If you don’t know how to touch type, there are very approachable ways you can learn on your own. You may think you do just fine ham-fisting your way through the keys, but with a little effort, you can learn to type faster, use your fingers more ergonomically, and rarely have to take your eyes off your screen as you clackity-clack-clack-clack along.

If you’ve been relying on only a few fingers to type, it’s going to take some time to adjust and get those idle digits cracking along. At first, you may type as slow as molasses while you learn what fingers are responsible for what keys, but that’s okay. Even if you start off at 20 words per minute, it’s key to focus on accuracy and building that new muscle memory from the ground up. Just like playing a musical instrument, hit the right notes first — then do it faster.

*The home row resting position and the corresponding keys for each finger.*

Touch typing begins with anchoring your fingers on the home row. On a QWERTY layout keyboard, that involves resting your left fingers on A, S, D, and F while your right digits are on J, K, L, and semicolon. Both thumbs should hover over / rest on the space bar. Do you feel a little raised bump, nub, or other signifier on the F and J keys? Most keycaps have some tactile accent making these two keys feel different. That’s how you find these important keys to anchor your index fingers and let the rest fall into place, even without looking.

It’s easy to get started with different kinds of training apps (the majority of which are free) that simplify the typing experience and even make it fun. In this article, I’ll first walk you through a variety of options for you to try and then add some dos and don’ts that should get you learning new finger muscle memory to make you much, much faster.

My favorite typing apps

Keybr

When it comes to free resources for learning how to touch-type, I highly recommend using Keybr on a desktop browser. This site automatically builds typing lessons for you by measuring your initial skill (accuracy and speed) and generates practice lessons that focus first on the most frequently used letters. It then slowly ramps up with more letters to type and fingers to use. You’ll be typing a mix of real words and fake words that follow familiar-looking phonetic structures, so it works your fingers without abstracting away all semblance of language.

By making an account with Keybr (via email, Google, or Facebook sign-ins), you can save your progress and pick up where you left off. Keybr also offers a premium account for a one-time $10 purchase that removes ads and disables ad trackers, though the on-page ads are not very invasive.

The key to using Keybr, just like any typing tool, is consistency. Keep practicing daily and the program will work you through all the keys before you know it. Once you’ve “unlocked” all the keys, keep forging ahead and focusing on accuracy. Your speed will slowly go up over time.

You can see from my practice calendar that my prime learning time was about six weeks of fairly consistent practicing. Keybr also saves other nifty data about your progress in your profile, like your best and worst letters.

And then, just when you start to get some confidence, try turning on capital letters and punctuation in Keybr’s settings. I assure you, it will suck at first, but you gotta learn those shift keys eventually. Best practice dictates that you should use the pinky finger of the opposite hand that’s typing the capital letter, but in reality, I’m sure many of us slip on that fine detail.

I don’t love that Keybr adds capitalization and punctuation to every single word when you enable those settings, but you can always switch it off when you want to pivot back to focusing on character speed. Plus, once you start feeling generally comfortable touch typing without looking, you can always switch from Keybr to another program that incorporates more real-world use of caps and symbols.

Monkeytype

Once you start getting the hang of touch typing, the site that I continuously return to is Monkeytype. Monkeytype is the sleekest, most customizable type tester I’ve come across. Its clean interface allows you to load it up and hammer out some phrases in a matter of seconds, or you can dive into the options and custom-tailor something unique. The site has all kinds of cool templates and styles for you to customize. You can test based on time or phrase length, and you can also choose to incorporate punctuation, capitalization, longer or shorter passages, or extra-hard parameters — like failing if you make a single mistake or dip below a words-per-minute threshold. You can even load up randomly generated tests that pull from movie, book, and TV quotes.

Really, there’s a lot of fun stuff to tinker with on Monkeytype, ranging from the color layout to weird graphical effects that may test your threshold for motion sickness as much as your typing.

TypeLit.io

Little Women *isn’t just a timeless American coming-of-age novel — it makes for a fun typing exercise.*

Want to practice typing while reading classics by George Orwell, Dante Alighieri, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and more? TypeLit.io has dozens of books for you to practice typing with, like The War of the Worlds or Sense and Sensibility. There’s even William Strunk Jr.’s The Elements of Style, so you can learn 1920s-era American-English writing style while you type.

This may be a bit of a novelty, but it’s a charming take on typing practice. It offers thousands of pages of actual literary text, which makes for some good exercises.

Typing Trainer

Brace yourself for some antiquated design and graphics. Typing Trainer may look like the cheesy programs we used as kids, but it’s still an effective learning tool. You can work your way through a series of courses from the very beginning or jump into some timed tests.

Typing Trainer also has some browser games you can play, where you can race a car or blast alien spaceships by, you guessed it, typing. They’re pretty basic, with an early-2000s flash game aesthetic, but they’re a fun distraction to practice with.

Mario Teaches Typing

*Mamma mia! What the hell is going on with Toad’s face in this title screen?*

Many of us olds might remember the 1992 DOS classic Mario Teaches Typing, made for Nintendo by Interplay. You can now play the whole game free in your browser courtesy of the Internet Archive. It’s very dated and probably not the best way to learn today since it’s stuck in the old ways of grueling and unrelenting repetition using lots of individual letters and repeated sequences, but it’s worth it for a laugh and the nostalgia trip. Fun fact: this was the first game where Mario spoke, and the voice lines are hilariously bad, sounding like they’re trying the Italian-American accent thing way too hard.

Plus, there’s a writing prompt about the American Civil War that seems to downplay the significance of slavery in the cause of the war. So, yeah, be prepared for some problematic stuff buried in there.

Epistory - Typing Chronicles

*Not only do you type your way through battles in* Epistory, but the movement keys are situated on the home row to keep your hands in the right position. It takes a little getting used to, but in this case, it’s better than using traditional WASD controls.

Epistory - Typing Chronicles is a charming Steam-based action-adventure game with a papercraft aesthetic that uses typing to activate the powers of your fox-riding protagonist and fight monsters while exploring a fantasy world. I find Epistory to be a little dry at times, but it’s a pretty game, and I admire its fun twist on the typing genre. It’s a novel way to practice once you’ve started getting the hang of touch typing, and if you enjoy it, there’s even a sequel due out soon.

The Typing of the Dead: Overkill

*Putting down zombies with a rat-a-tat-tat as you feverishly tap away on your keys just somehow feels right.*

This is an on-rails shooter spinoff of the House of the Dead games, where typing words fires bullets at zombies. The Typing of the Dead: Overkill is a visceral experience that’s good for a cheap thrill while typing, though it shows some of its 2010s-era cringe with campy jokes and characters that lean on tired stereotypes. It’s like a C-movie video game with B-level typing, but I can’t help myself from enjoying it and recommending it.

More tips for learning touch-typing skills

Having gone through this learning process myself and being a bit of a nerd for mechanical keyboards (the two often go hand-in-hand), here’s some further advice and best practices on developing your touch-typing expertise.

Dos:

Practice regularly. Ideally, once a day.
Turn practicing into a regular routine or habit, like starting your day with it while drinking your morning coffee.
Test yourself with capital letters, punctuation, and even numbers. Real-world typing isn’t just lowercase letters!
Look ahead to the next word on a typing prompt. You type faster when you know what’s coming next. Think of it like Tetris.
Use the same methods for learning alternate keyboard layouts like Dvorak and Colemak. Sites like Keybr and Monkeytype offer training in all of them, though QWERTY is the default.
Use your newfound love of typing as an excuse to get into mechanical keyboards. Sure, they won’t help you type faster, but they sound and look cool, and it’s a fun rabbit hole to dive into.

Don’ts:

Don’t get impatient about getting faster.
Don’t ignore your typos. If a type trainer allows you to backspace and fix mistakes, you should do that to build the habit.
Don’t overdo the training. Your fingers can get overworked, and practicing too much in one sitting yields diminishing returns. Just like when you exercise, recovery and rest are important, too. You’ll probably be slightly faster when you pick it up the next day.
Don’t be elitist about typing. Just because you know how to touch-type doesn’t mean you get to judge others for not knowing or for typing slowly. Sometimes people online use Words Per Minute (WPM) as a measure of people’s worth or as a way of gatekeeping, and that’s just not cool. Instead, be welcoming and encourage others to get into it if they’re interested.

Uh oh! The crypto collapse has reached the real financial system

Liquidity trouble? | Illustration by William Joel / The Verge

Silvergate, one of the most important banks in crypto, is in big trouble. Maybe existential trouble.

Silvergate didn’t start in crypto. It started in real estate. But in January 2014, the bank jumped into Bitcoin, a volatile year — Bitcoin started the year at $770 and closed above $300 in December. “Some of the companies that were being formed at the time to provide services to this budding Bitcoin space, many of them were struggling to find and maintain bank accounts,” said Silvergate CEO Alan Lane in a June 2022 episode of the Odd Lots podcast. “So that was really where we started.”

The focus at the bank was institutions — other companies, some of which work with consumers. For instance, Genesis, the now-bankrupt crypto-lending subsidiary of DCG, was among Silvergate’s early clients. The bank developed the Silvergate Exchange Network, which was a way for crypto institutions such as Coinbase, Gemini, and Kraken to transact in dollars 24/7. “We’ve got all of them,” Lane said in 2022. “All of the major ones. Anybody who is serious about regulation.”

Also among Lane’s clients: FTX. Federal prosecutors are now examining Silvergate’s role in banking Sam Bankman-Fried’s fallen empire. The more pressing problem is that the collapse of FTX spooked other Silvergate customers, resulting in an $8.1 billion run on the bank: 60 percent of its deposits that walked out the door in just one quarter. (“Worse than that experienced by the average bank to close in the Great Depression,” The Wall Street Journal helpfully explained.)

In its earnings filing, we found out that Silvergate’s results last quarter were absolute dogshit, a $1 billion loss. Then, on March 1st, Silvergate entered a surprise regulatory filing. It says that, actually, the quarterly results were even worse, and it’s not clear the bank will be able to stay in business.

In response, Coinbase, Galaxy Digital, Crypto.com, Circle, and Paxos have said they will stop using Silvergate — as did other, less notable clients. Tether, the controversial stablecoin that has had its own problems with banking, helpfully popped up to remind us it was not using Silvergate.

The laundry list of customers helps to explain why Silvergate’s woes are frightening. Very few banks will touch crypto because it’s so risky — and most traditional banks don’t let crypto clients transact in dollars 24/7. Access to banking that moves at the pace crypto does is rare, and only one other US bank can do it.

“If Silvergate goes out of business, it’s going to push funds and market makers further offshore,” Ava Labs president John Wu told Barron’s. The issue is how easy it is to get into actual cash dollars, which in finance-speak is called liquidity. Less liquidity makes transactions more difficult. Already there is a broader gap between the price at which a trade is expected to go through at and the actual price at which it executes, Wu said.

So Silvergate’s troubles are a problem for the entire crypto industry.

Stablecoins

Silvergate’s SEN was an important on- and off-ramp from the almighty dollar (and the almighty euro) into crypto. In 2022, Lane said all the “regulated, US-dollar backed stablecoin issuers” banked at Silvergate.

But for stablecoins issued by Circle, Paxos, and Gemini, among others, the SEN was important for making and burning their tokens, which were issued when someone deposited a dollar in their Silvergate bank accounts, Lane said.

Silvergate was a pass-through point for crypto. Stablecoins that are backed by dollars at least theoretically have cash or cash-like assets sitting in reserve somewhere. (The reason Tether is controversial is that there are questions about the existence and value of that reserve.) Silvergate’s job was to create a token when someone put a dollar into, say, USDC and to burn a token when someone took a dollar out. “We are this critical piece of infrastructure where folks, as they’re exiting the ecosystem and wanting to go to cash — those dollars pass through Silvergate,” Lane said in 2022.

You’ll notice I’m saying “was.” That’s because on March 3, Silvergate announced it was suspending SEN, effective immediately.

The dollar side of the transaction meant that Silvergate’s clients had to keep a bunch of cash on hand at the bank in order to pay each other and anyone who wanted to cash out. To make money here, Silvergate could do a few things. The safest is to buy, like, one-month Treasury bills at the Fed and call it a day.

Now, this being finance, taking more risk also may mean more profit. So Silvergate seems to have bought bonds. (Verge favorite Matt Levine at Bloomberg has a more in-depth analysis of how this worked if you want the gory details.) The problem is not that the bonds were super risky — it is that FTX sparked a mass exodus into dollars, and Silvergate suddenly had to come up with a bunch of money. Unfortunately, that meant selling its bonds at a loss in order to pay its obligations. Ironically, the bonds were pretty safe — “if its depositors had kept their money at Silvergate, its bonds would have matured with plenty of money to pay them back,” notes Levine.

Silvergate has another way of touching stablecoins besides serving as the on- and off-ramp for their transactions. It bought assets from Facebook’s doomed stablecoin attempt Libra, later renamed Diem, in January 2022. At the time, Silvergate said it would start making Diem available by the end of the year. The goal was a digital payments network.

Of course, that was before FTX blew up, and the Enron guy said it was worse than Enron. That’s the kind of thing that tends to change the regulatory environment.

Lending against Bitcoin

One of the other services Silvergate offered was the ability to lend dollars against Bitcoin. Now, Silvergate said in January on its fourth quarter earnings call that “all of our SEN Leverage loans continued to perform as expected, with no losses or forced liquidations.” Maybe these loans are fine! Silvergate doesn’t appear to have done anything exceptionally risky elsewhere.

But if you want to use your Bitcoin to take out a dollar loan, I think that just got harder.

Real estate

Silvergate had a life before crypto: it was a tiny bank focused on real estate deals in southern California. During that time, it never had more than $1 billion in deposits, according to The Financial Times. And Silvergate needed deposits. When Lane steered the company into crypto, its business ballooned. By 2021, Silvergate had more than $10 billion. The bank went public in 2019 at $12 a share and peaked at over $200 a share in 2021. (Shares closed at $5.77 on March 3.)

Real estate became less and less of a focus because crypto was a rocket ship for the bank. But that real estate connection proved useful for Silvergate in 2022, though. In the last quarter of the year, Silvergate got at least $3.6 billion in funds from Federal Home Loan Banks, a 1930s-era system that also originally dealt in mortgages.

To pay that off, Silvergate sold off more bonds. This is not ideal, and it is part of the reason Silvergate is in trouble. “If you are a bank you do not want to be pointing in the wrong direction, because that becomes self-fulfilling,” writes Bloomberg’s Levine. And indeed, this is why many of Silvergate’s major customers are spooked. Levine thinks that this may get some regulators interested in crypto banking.

Bizarre transactions

In fact, the Justice Department is already interested. There are some questions around bizarre transactions that took place at Silvergate.

For instance, Binance. Its supposedly independent arm, Binance.US, transferred more than $400 million to a trading firm called Merit Peak Ltd, Reuters reported. That firm is managed by Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao. “The CEO of Binance.US at the time, Catherine Coley, wrote to a Binance finance executive in late 2020 asking for an explanation for the transfers, calling them ‘unexpected’ and saying ‘no one mentioned them,’” Reuters wrote. Those transfers took place on Silvergate’s special network, SEN.

This is similar to some of the problems Silvergate faces around FTX. Alameda Research, the trading firm also owned by Bankman-Fried, opened an account with Silvergate in 2018. Bankman-Fried admitted he used Alameda accounts for FTX funds, commingling customer funds with those for the trading firm.

I don’t know if Silvergate did anything wrong. Possibly it didn’t! But having the Feds start poking around, asking questions? That is a headache and a distraction. It is the last thing a troubled bank needs.

What to expect

A lot of companies that banked with Silvergate have been out here talking about how they have minimal exposure to it, which is historically not a great sign. (See: Bankman-Fried’s notorious “FTX is fine. Assets are fine” tweet.)

But you know what? In this specific case, I’m inclined to believe them. First of all, just a fuckload of money has already left Silvergate. But second, SIlvergate was a pass-through bank for crypto; it didn’t hold onto reserves, and it didn’t pay interest. The problem here is less that some exchange or stablecoin is going to suffer a massive loss of customer money and more that it is now even harder for crypto companies to get banking.

The crypto industry desperately needs banks. But both of Silvergate’s competitors, Metropolitan and Signature, were pulling away from the sector even before this debacle. Metropolitan said in January that it was getting all the way out of crypto. And in December, Signature said it was going to get rid of $8 billion to $10 billion in digital asset-related funds.

I don’t know whether Silvergate is going to come through this. But I strongly suspect it has just gotten a lot harder to get into dollars from crypto and out of crypto into dollars. Silvergate dealt in liquidity, and a liquidity problem can become a solvency problem real fast. The entire crypto industry just got a lot more fragile.

vendredi 3 mars 2023

TikTok ‘acting too slow’ to tackle self-harm and eating disorder content

Organisations including NSPCC say app has chosen to deny the problem and must take meaningful action

TikTok has been urged to strengthen its content moderation policies around suicide and eating disorder material by organisations including the NSPCC and the Molly Rose Foundation.

The groups claimed TikTok had not acted swiftly enough following the publication of research suggesting the app’s recommendation algorithm pushes self-harm and eating disorder content to teenagers within minutes of them expressing interest in the topics.

In the UK, the youth suicide charity Papyrus can be contacted on 0800 068 4141 or email pat@papyrus-uk.org. In the UK and Ireland, Samaritans can be contacted on 116 123 or by emailing jo@samaritans.org or jo@samaritans.ie. In the US, the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline is 1-800-273-8255. In Australia, the crisis support service Lifeline is 13 11 14. Other international helplines can be found at www.befrienders.org. You can contact the mental health charity Mind by calling 0300 123 3393 or visiting mind.org.uk.

UK chip designer Arm chooses US-only listing in blow to Rishi Sunak

PM had held talks with firm’s owner SoftBank in effort to make London first choice for tech flotations

The Cambridge-based chip designer Arm is to pursue a US-only listing this year, dealing a major blow to Rishi Sunak’s ambitions to make London the first choice for tech company flotations.

The company, which is owned by the Japanese conglomerate SoftBank, confirmed its preferred plan of seeking a US-only main listing later this year, spurning the UK despite heavy lobbying by successive prime ministers.

Labor board decision could force Google to negotiate with YouTube contractors

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

The National Labor Relations Board has ruled that Alphabet, Google’s parent company, should be considered a joint employer for a group of YouTube Music contractors. The workers are currently attempting to organize with the Alphabet Worker’s Union, and the NLRB’s decision could mean that the tech giant has to negotiate with them if they vote to unionize in an upcoming election.

The workers are directly employed by a company called Cognizant, which acts as an Alphabet subcontractor. However, the NLRB believes that Google has enough control over their “benefits, hours of work, supervision, and direction of work” that it counts as a partial employer, according to Bloomberg.

“We are proud to win a precedent setting victory not just for ourselves, but also for workers across the country,” said Sam Regan, a union organizer and YouTube Music contractor, who was quoted in a press release from the AWU. “Technology companies in particular have innovated new ways to deny responsibility for their workers’ livelihoods through subcontracting, gig work, and other poor employment practices.”

For its part, Alphabet intends to appeal the NLRB’s decision. “We simply don’t control these workers’ employment terms or working conditions,” spokesperson Courtenay Mencini told Bloomberg.

In addition to the union drive and fight to get Alphabet recognized as a joint employer, the contractors went on strike in February to protest return to office orders — the first strike at the company, according to the AWU. The dates for the union election haven’t been publicly announced yet.

Apple’s business-oriented ‘Mac notebook upgrade program’ has been discontinued

An Apple ad highlighting its $30 per month Mac upgrade program — Image: @MaxWinebach

Apple partnered with a bank in 2021 to let small businesses lease new M1 Macs for as low as $30 per month, with easy options to upgrade if and when more powerful devices are released. Now that’s no longer being offered, and businesses that had signed up will now have to sign up for a different program from CIT Group, the bank Apple partnered with, or go another route to get their computers.

A business that reached out to The Verge shared an email from CIT Group (aka First Citizens Bank) confirming the Mac Upgrade Program has ended. Now the bank is requesting the business to switch to its FMV lease or continue to lease the equipment at the same monthly rate — though it would run indefinitely with no buyout option. The Verge contacted both CIT and Apple to confirm the program’s status, but neither has responded at time of publication.

While the Mac Notebook Upgrade Program is no more, CIT Group still has Apple hardware leasing options that include a “$1 buyout lease.” Although the terms are not fully disclosed on the page, Apple has an active business financing page that seems to describe CIT’s offering.

The current offering includes “flexible” leasing options, 12 / 24 / 36-month terms, a $4,000 order minimum, financing for up to 25 percent of the value on accessories, and buyout options. The now-defunct program offered low monthly payments starting with the 13-inch MacBook Air for $30, 13-inch MacBook Pro for $39, 14-inch MacBook Pro for $60, and 16-inch MacBook Pro for $75. Immediate upgrades were available if a new MacBook Air or Pro with newer chips were released at any time after the first 90 days of the lease.

It also seemed like a part of Apple’s overall service-oriented shift, following the iPhone Upgrade program that has existed for consumers for several years, bundling AppleCare Plus and the ability to swap your phone annually, or the also consumer-aimed Upgrade Plus financing setup Apple offers for laptops purchased from Best Buy. It’s unclear if this program has shut down due to a lack of interest or a change in strategy, but there was a rumor that Apple might launch a full subscription program for the iPhone, perhaps by the end of this year.

Although Apple and CIT Group aren’t offering the Mac Upgrade Program anymore, Apple is still supporting small businesses on the services side with its Business Essentials IT management package. Businesses (and K-12 / High Ed) can also still order hardware directly from Apple’s special Business or Education store site and build POs — but normally for the full price.

Apple is also expected to launch its buy now, pay later service this year. Whether it launches or not, individuals — and perhaps individuals that own a small business — could always use an Apple Card and pay 0 percent financing on new Apple computers.

From Ghostbusters and Aliens to Lego Star Wars: 10 great video games based on movies

As Oscars night approaches, we pick out some of the rare movie tie-ins that don’t make you want to throw popcorn at your screen

Designed by ex-Atari luminary David Crane (Pitfall, Decathlon), Activision’s wonderful tie-in captured the humour and spirit of the classic comedy. Players set up their own ghostbusting franchises, buying equipment before setting out to capture spooks. With its use of digitised speech and a jaunty reproduction of the film’s soundtrack, it showed that games really could provide an authentic movie experience.

Sony might be forced to reveal how much it pays to keep games off Xbox Game Pass

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Sony might be forced to detail its PlayStation exclusivity deals and how much it pays for “blocking rights” to keep games off rival services like Xbox Game Pass. The FTC has sued to try and block Microsoft’s Activision Blizzard acquisition and kicked off a legal discovery process with Microsoft sending subpoenas to Sony to force it to reveal records, internal documentation, and emails from the company’s PlayStation unit.

Kotaku spotted that the FTC’s chief administrative judge D. Michael Chappell has now sided with Microsoft’s request for details of Sony’s PlayStation exclusivity deals. The request cover deals made after January 1st, 2019, including fees or agreements that prevented publishers from placing games on Xbox Game Pass. The judge’s decision comes after Microsoft previously accused Sony of paying for “blocking rights” to stop developers from adding their content to Xbox Game Pass.

Here are Microsoft’s latest claims, summarized in the word’s of Judge Chappell:

Microsoft argues that the Complaint in this case makes a number of allegations regarding high-performance video game console developers’ exclusivity arrangements with video game publishers. Microsoft states that it is aware that SIE requires many third-party publishers to agree to exclusivity provisions, including preventing the publishers from putting their games on Xbox’s multi-game subscription service, and that understanding the full extent of SIE’s exclusivity arrangements and their effect on industry competitiveness will assist in its defense.

“The nature and extent of SIE’s content-licensing agreements are relevant to the Complaint’s allegations of exclusivity arrangements between video game console developers and video game developers and publishers,” said Judge Chappell.

Microsoft had also been trying to get details on Sony’s deals dating back to 2012, but Judge Chappell labeled this “excessive,” and granted Sony’s request to limit the applicable time for document requests to 2019 instead.

It’s incredibly rare for details on such exclusivity deals to be made public, but the FTC case could open up some of the secrecy of the games industry in court hearings. The last time we saw similar details revealed by a court case was Epic Games vs. Apple in 2021. That case showed how Microsoft had explored reducing its Xbox store cut to shake up console gaming, how Sony had implemented cross-play platform fees, and that Fortnite was a PS4 cash cow.

The FTC case is still at the document discovery stage, with an evidentiary hearing scheduled for August 2nd, so we’re months away from seeing any potential new details.

Elsewhere, Microsoft’s Activision deal is likely to be approved by EU regulators. The combination of a binding 10-year agreement with Nintendo to bring Call of Duty to Nintendo platforms and a similar deal with Nvidia has reportedly convinced the European Commission to approve the acquisition. Microsoft still faces scrutiny from UK and US regulators though, with Britain’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) offering possible remedies last month that include forcing Microsoft to sell off Activision Blizzard’s business associated with Call of Duty.

As A.I. Booms, Lawmakers Struggle to Understand the Technology

As A.I. Booms, Lawmakers Struggle to Understand the Technology Tech innovations are again racing ahead of Washington’s ability to regulate them, lawmakers and A.I. experts said.

jeudi 2 mars 2023

CNET editor-in-chief Connie Guglielmo will step down to work on AI-generated content

A graphic showing a robot performing multiple functions — Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Following monthslong questions about how CNET uses artificial intelligence tools, longtime CNET editor-in-chief Connie Guglielmo will step down from her role and take on a new job: senior vice president of AI content strategy and editor-at-large, according to an internal draft memo circulated today, a copy of which was obtained by The Verge.

In her new role, Guglielmo will work on machine learning strategy at Red Ventures, the private equity-backed media company that acquired the tech news site in 2020. Adam Auriemma, the former editor-in-chief of a different Red Ventures outlet, NextAdvisor, will become editor-in-chief. NextAdvisor, a personal finance outlet, appears to no longer be active — the site’s Twitter account hasn’t posted since January, it no longer appears on Red Ventures’ list of brands, and its website redirects to CNET.

Guglielmo’s move to her artificial intelligence role comes just hours after The Verge reported that mass layoffs were underway at CNET. At least a dozen employees lost their jobs, including some longtime figureheads at the company, according to sources with knowledge of the layoffs. The full extent of the layoffs is not yet clear as staff work to figure out which colleagues are affected — the number could be as high as 26 or more, sources say.

After Futurism revealed in January that CNET had been quietly publishing dozens of articles generated using AI, Guglielmo and other Red Ventures leaders defended the use of automation tools despite public concern around how the practice was implemented. The tool’s use was temporarily paused while Red Ventures conducted an internal audit of all AI-generated content across its sites. Soon after, more than half of the articles were updated with corrections.

Guglielmo, who has been CNET editor-in-chief for nine years, has defended the use of AI tools at the outlet. In late January, she said in a blog post that though the AI-generated stories were halted, the newsroom would continue testing AI tools that would “help [CNET’s] teams.”

Multiple former CNET staff told The Verge that editorial independence was chipped away under Guglielmo’s leadership and Red Ventures’ ownership. Former staff recounted multiple instances of employees being pressured to change their work to appease advertisers, and other team members were repeatedly asked to work on ads and prioritize work that served marketing purposes and ranked highly in Google search.

The latest round of layoffs is far from the first: former CNET staff told The Verge that some teams have been decimated by past cuts to the workforce, while other staffers have been pushed out over time.

Red Ventures didn’t immediately respond to The Verge’s request for comment.

Here are the best Kindle deals right now

The Kindle Paperwhite lying on a bunch of physical books while turned on. — *The 2021 Kindle Paperwhite Kids is on sale at Amazon and Best Buy starting at just $104.99.* | Photo by Chaim Gartenberg / The Verge

When it comes to finding a device to use to read your ebooks, you have a few options to choose from. You can always buy a tablet or use your phone, but those devices are multipurpose and can be used for a ton of things, like surfing the web or doom-scrolling on Twitter. If you are looking for something to strictly read books, e-readers, while niche, are designed to store all of your books in a virtual library with limited functionality.

Amazon, one of the pioneers of the e-reader, has dominated the space for years with its ever-expanding Kindle lineup, which consists of several unique models with their own pros and cons. The bulk of the devices function as simple ebook readers; however, with the Kindle Scribe, Amazon looks to be moving beyond books and into the realm of writing — something that should make future Kindles function more akin to physical paper.

Below, we’ve listed each model currently available. Sometimes, there isn’t a deal for one or any of the products, but we’ve mentioned the most recent sale price in those instances. Also, keep in mind that Amazon offers 20 percent off all of its Kindles when you trade in select devices, as well as $20 off when you purchase two (at least in some cases), so there are still other ways to save money when none of the models are available at a discount.

Best Kindle deals 2023

The best Kindle (2022) deals

In case you missed it, Amazon announced a new entry-level Kindle last year, one that’s designed to replace the 2019 model. The latest Kindle — which starts at $99.99 — puts Amazon’s base e-reader more in line with the most recent Kindle Paperwhite, providing a number of quality-of-life improvements in the process. The new model features longer battery life, a 300ppi screen, and now charges via USB-C instead of Micro USB. It also touts 16GB of storage by default and comes in a new “denim” color, which resembles the soft blue you might associate with jeans.

Although the new Kindle recently dropped to $74.99 in the run-up to Valentine’s Day, it’s currently only available at retailers like Amazon, Best Buy, and Target with ads and up to four months of Kindle Unlimited for $99.99, its standard retail price. It’s also available in its ad-free configuration at Amazon for $119.99 or with a power adapter and a fabric cover starting at $149.97, neither option of which is discounted. Regardless of whether you choose the standalone model or the bundle, however, the new Kindle remains a worthwhile option if you’re looking to pick up an e-reader for $40 less than the current price of the latest Paperwhite.

The best Kindle Kids (2022) deals

The new base Kindle wasn’t the only e-reader Amazon introduced in September. The new entry-level model has arrived alongside a new Kindle Kids, which is identical to the standard model but comes with a handful of accessories and provides age-appropriate content for younger readers who prefer digital books. Like the last-gen Kindle Kids, the new model retails for $20 more than the base model, bringing the MSRP to $119.99.

In terms of add-ons, the new Kindle Kids edition consists of four items: the device, a case, a two-year extended replacement guarantee (in the event the device breaks), and one year of Amazon Kids Plus. The latter is the biggest selling point of the device aside from the kid-friendly patterns, as it allows parents to grant their child access to a digital library of kid-friendly books like Percy Jackson and the entire Harry Potter series at no additional cost.

On the discount front, we recently saw the 2022 Kindle Kids drop to $84.99 ($30 off), which remains the e-reader’s all-time low. Right now, however, it’s only available at Amazon, Best Buy, and Target for its full retail price of $119.99.

*The Kindle Paperwhite Signature Edition is identical to the standard model but features wireless charging and a sensor to automatically adjust the backlight.*

The best Kindle Paperwhite (2021) deals

Amazon’s latest Kindle Paperwhite is its 11th-gen model, which comes with USB-C support, longer battery life, and a larger 6.8-inch display. The e-reader launched more than a year ago, and it's starting to receive steep discounts at retailers like Amazon and Best Buy. That said, you can also still occasionally pick up the last-gen model from 2018 at a discount.

The 2021 Kindle Paperwhite comes in three main configurations: an 8GB model with ads for $139.99, an 8GB model without ads for $159.99, and a 32GB ad-free Signature Edition for $189.99. The latter is identical to the standard Paperwhite except it also features Qi wireless charging and a sensor that will automatically adjust the backlight when needed. Amazon has also rolled out a Kindle Paperwhite Kids Edition for $159.99, which comes bundled with a kid-friendly cover, a two-year extended replacement guarantee, and a year of Amazon Kids Plus, much like the aforementioned Kindle Kids. All 2021 models are also similar to the 2018 model in that they feature a waterproof design and Audible audiobook support.

Amazon’s latest Paperwhite recently dropped to an all-time low of $104.99 in the run-up to Valentine’s Day. As of right now, though, the e-reader is only available in the ad-supported configuration at Amazon, Target, and Best Buy starting at $139.99, or in its ad-free variant at Amazon starting at $159.99.

As for bundles, Amazon is offering the base Paperwhite from 2021 as part of a package that contains a power adapter and your choice of a fabric cover for $169.97, a leather cover for $179.97, or a “cork” cover for $189.97, all of which are $20 off.

As for the 32GB ad-free Signature Edition, it’s available at Amazon and Best Buy right now for its full retail price of $189.99, or about $60 more than the e-reader’s all-time low. If you prefer a bundle, Amazon is currently selling it in three configurations: one with a cork cover and a wireless charging dock starting at $239.97 ($20 off), one with a fabric cover and a wireless charging dock starting at $219.97 ($20 off), and one with a leather cover and a wireless charging dock starting at $229.97 ($20 off).

Lastly, if you’re looking for the Kindle Paperwhite Kids Edition, it’s available at Amazon and Best Buy starting at $159.99, which is the e-reader’s standard retail price and $55 more than its most recent low. If want to outfit your child with additional storage, the 16GB model is also available at Best Buy, Amazon, and Target for $169.99 (its full retail price).

The best Kindle Oasis (2019) deals

The Kindle Oasis is the most expensive of the lineup, starting at $250. The device comes in two storage configurations, 8GB or 32GB, and like the other models, you can get it with or without ads on the lock screen.

The 2019 Kindle Oasis looks very similar to the previous model. It retains its waterproof 7-inch 300ppi E Ink display and supports Audible audiobooks via Bluetooth. However, unlike previous models, it can adjust the color temperature to a yellow-toned display, making it easier to read at night.

In the past, we’ve seen the 8GB Kindle Oasis drop to as low as $174.99, which remains the lowest price to date for the standalone configuration. Unfortunately, the ad-supported Oasis is only retailing at Amazon and Best Buy right now starting at $249.99. If you prefer the model without ads, you can pick it up on Amazon for $269.99 with three months of Kindle Unlimited. Lastly, if you need additional storage, the 32GB model is available on Amazon with ads for $279.99 or for $299.99 without.

As for bundles, the 8GB Kindle Oasis is currently on sale in its ad-supported configuration at Amazon with a power adapter and a fabric cover for $279.97, a leather cover for $289.97, or a “premium” leather cover for $304.97, all of which are $30 off.

The best Kindle Scribe deals

The ad-free Kindle Scribe is Amazon’s biggest e-reader to date — one that also represents a departure from past Kindle models. It packs a 10.2-inch display with 300 dpi, along with the same great battery life for which Kindles have become known. What separates the Scribe from other models, however, is that it comes with one of two styli, which can be used to annotate books, doodle, or jot down notes. We found the e-reader’s note-taking capabilities lacking in our testing, but Amazon has already started to improve the software via free OTA software updates, helping bring it up to speed with other E Ink competitors.

Although we recently saw the Kindle Scribe drop to $194.99, the 16GB base model is currently only available at Amazon and Best Buy with up to four months of Kindle Unlimited and a Basic Pen starting at $339.99, its typical retail price. The 16GB base model with the Basic Pen is also available on Amazon bundled with a fabric cover and a power adapter for $379.97 or with a leather cover and a power adapter for $399.97, both of which are $40 off.