Exclusive leak: all the details about Humane’s AI Pin, which costs $699 and has OpenAI integration
Humane’s AI Pin is set to officially be revealed this Thursday. | Image: Humane
Humane has been teasing its first device, the AI Pin, for most of this year. It’s scheduled to launch the Pin on Thursday, but The Verge has obtained documents detailing practically everything about the device ahead of its official launch. What they show is that Humane, the company noisily promoting a world after smartphones, is about to launch what amounts to a $699 wearable smartphone without a screen that has a $24-a-month subscription fee and runs on a Humane-branded version of T-Mobile’s network with access to AI models from Microsoft and OpenAI.
The Pin itself is a square device that magnetically clips to your clothes or other surfaces. The clip is more than just a magnet, though; it’s also a battery pack, which means you can swap in new batteries throughout the day to keep the Pin running. We don’t know how long a single battery lasts, but the device ships with two “battery boosters.” It’s powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon processor and uses a camera, depth, and motion sensors to track and record its surroundings. It has a built-in speaker, which Humane calls a “personic speaker,” and can connect to Bluetooth headphones.
Since there’s no screen, Humane has come up with new ways to interact with the Pin. It’s primarily meant to be a voice-based device, but there’s also that green laser projector we’ve seen in demos, which can project information onto your hand. You can also hold objects up to the camera and interact with the Pin through gestures, as there’s a touchpad somewhere on the device. The Pin isn’t always recording or even listening for a wake word, instead requiring you to manually activate it in some way. It has a “Trust Light,” which blinks on whenever the Pin is recording.
The documents show that Humane wants the Pin to be considered a fully standalone device, rather than an accessory to your smartphone. $699 gets you the Pin, a charger, and those two battery boosters. But the real story is that it costs $24 per month for a Humane Subscription, which includes a phone number and cell data on Humane’s own branded wireless service that runs on T-Mobile’s network, cloud storage for photos and videos, and the ability to make unlimited queries of AI models, although we’re not sure which ones specifically.
Humane didn’t respond to a request for comment.
The Pin’s operating system is called Cosmos, and rather than operate as a collection of apps, Humane seems to be imagining a more seamless system that can call up various AIs and other tools as you need them. It sounds a bit like ChatGPT’s plugins system, through which you can attach new features or data to your chatbot experience — which tracks with reports that the Pin would be powered by GPT-4.
The documents we’ve seen say the Pin can write messages that sound like you, and there’s a feature that will summarize your email inbox for you. The Pin can also translate languages and identify food to provide nutritional information. There is support for Tidal music streaming, which involves an “AI DJ” that picks music for you based on your current context. It will also offer AI-centric photography features, but it’s not clear what that means.
Humane clearly intends the Pin to be a self-contained and simple wearable, but there is a way to manage the device: a tool called Humane.center, which is where you’re meant to set up and customize your device before you start wearing it. It’s unclear whether this is a website or a phone app, but it’s how you access the notes, videos, and photos you collect while you’re wearing the Pin.
Humane is set to announce the device officially tomorrow, at which point we might get more answers about when the Pin will ship, how well it will work, and whether there’s really a case to be made for a smartphone without a screen.
Google is is bringing generative AI to advertisers
Very clickable good dogs. | Image: Google
Google is rolling out new generative AI tools for creating ads, from writing the headlines and descriptions that appear along with searches to creating and editing the accompanying images. It’s pitching the tool for use by both advertising agencies as well as businesses without in-house creative staff. Using text prompts, advertisers can iterate on the text and images they generate until they find something they like.
Google also promises that it will never generate two of the same images, which can avoid the awkward possibility that two competing businesses end up with the exact same photo elements.
The step-by-step ad creator is coming to those who use Google’s Performance Max ad campaign product, and it’s capable of generating ads designed for Google spots like search and shopping. An advanced image editing solution similar to the Magic Editor abilities (like sky replacement) available on the new Google Pixel 8 is also coming.
Customers can use the editor to update existing visual ads that can retain a hero asset while making relevant changes. In one Google-provided example, a user reused a model with a skincare product but replaced the background with a Christmas tree so it's ready for the holidays. Additionally, you can generate ad variations to use in different situations.
Retailers that use Merchant Center Next, a tool that controls how products look throughout Google, will also get the AI-generative tools. According to Google, all AI-generated ad content will be subject to SynthID, a metadata watermark to help detect content that was made with AI.
Nintendo is making a live-action Zelda movie
Image: Nintendo
Nintendo’s foray into movies isn’t stopping anytime soon: the company has confirmed that it’s working on a live-action adaptation of The Legend of Zelda. The movie will be directed by Wes Ball, best known for the Maze Runner trilogy and the upcoming Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes. Zelda creator Shigeru Miyamoto will serve as a producer, much as he did on this year’s animated Super Mario Bros. movie. He’ll be producing alongside Avi Arad.
“This is Miyamoto. I have been working on the live-action film of The Legend of Zelda for many years now with Avi Arad-san, who has produced many mega hit films,” Miyamoto said in a statement posted on X, formerly Twitter. We might be waiting a while for the movie, however; Miyamoto said, “It will take time until its completion, but I hope you look forward to seeing it.”
While there aren’t many details on the movie itself, Nintendo says that it will be co-financed by itself and Sony, with Nintendo footing more than 50 percent of the bill.
“By producing visual contents of Nintendo IP by itself, Nintendo is creating new opportunities to have people from around the world to access the world of entertainment which Nintendo has built, through different means apart from its dedicated game consoles,” the company said in a statement about the Zelda film. “By getting deeply involved in the movie production with the aim to put smiles on everyone’s faces through entertainment, Nintendo will continue its efforts to produce unique entertainment and deliver it to as many people as possible.”
It was previously rumored that Nintendo was working on a live-action Zelda series for Netflix, though that project never came to pass.
Samsung launches premium S Pen to tempt iPad artists in the US
The slightly thicker shape of the Creator Edition S Pen should feel more natural to grip — like a real pencil. | Image: Samsung
The S Pen Creator Edition tablet stylus that Samsung unveiled alongside its Galaxy Tab S9 series in July is now available to buy in the US for $99.99. Designed with writing, sketching, and digital painting in mind, the S Pen Creator Edition is a more premium stylus compared to the standard $59.99 S Pen that ships with Galaxy Tab S9 devices, providing more benefits for creative professionals like additional tilt-sensitivity and a thicker shape for improved grip.
The S Pen Creator Edition is compatible with Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra and higher, Galaxy Note10 and higher, Galaxy Tab S Series, and PCs that already support the existing S Pen. It cannot be used with any Galaxy Z series of folding devices. The stylus is battery-free and doesn’t require charging, and the flat side can magnetically attach to compatible Galaxy Tab devices for storage, just like an Apple Pencil.
Image: Samsung
The silver button is a dead giveaway that this isn’t an Apple Pencil, but there are certainly similarities in the design.
Samsung claims that this latest stylus is its “most advanced S Pen yet,” though that does come with some caveats as Air Commands — an S Pen feature that allows users to quickly access various functions by pressing the stylus button while hovering over the screen— are strangely not supported. The S Pen Creator Edition is only available in white, and features a single button on the side that can be used to interact with tools in creative applications (such as switching between pen and eraser functions). It also carries an IPX4 rating — meaning it can withstand light splashes — which is less protection than the submersible IP68 rating on the cheaper S pen.
Image: Samsung
The stylus comes with two replacement nibs and a simple tool to aid in safely inserting them.
Right down to its appearance, the S Pen Creator Edition is Samsung’s real rival to the Apple Pencil which has gained a loyal fanbase of iPad creatives who prefer its combined convenience over traditional, bulkier drawing tablet setups. This popularity is largely driven by the iPad platform (owing to its well-supported catalog of iOS-exclusive apps like Procreate and Forger), but the Apple Pencil itself — particularly its $129 second generation model — has its own merits, such as creative-focused features like gesture controls for swapping between tools in drawing apps.
Samsung will need to improve its creative software offerings across the Galaxy Tab series to have any real hope of competing against the reputation Apple has already built, but the S Pen Creator Edition is certainly a start. At the very least, it’s better equipped to handle creative tasks than the $79 USB-C Apple Pencil that was announced last month, which ditches features like pressure sensitivity entirely.
How Your Child’s School Bus Might Prevent Blackouts When not driving around, electric buses and other vehicles could help utilities by storing their solar and wind energy and releasing it to meet surges in demand.
The WeWork soap opera’s latest episode includes filing for bankruptcy
Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge
Co-working office space provider WeWork has filed for bankruptcy covering its locations in the US and Canada, and in a filing, it said it had liabilities of between $10 and $50 billion.
That paperwork revealed, all in one place, the following things: that Neumann was renting his own buildings to The We Company, that Neumann had secured loans from The We Company, and that to change its name to The We Company from WeWork, the company paid for naming rights from… Adam Neumann. It kind of started to feel like the point of The We Company, lofty language about “elevating” one’s “consciousness” aside, was just to give Adam Neumann money.
The company eventually went public in 2021 via a special-purpose acquisition company (SPAC — if you’re not familiar, we can explain), and after struggling with increasing debts and hefty losses ever since, it lost almost 98 percent of its stock valuation in the last year and shares were trading at 83 cents before a halt early Monday.
In the press release announcing its Chapter 11 filing, the company says, “As part of today’s filing, WeWork is requesting the ability to reject the leases of certain locations, which are largely non-operational and all affected members have received advanced notice.” The company says it has reached restructuring agreements with creditors holding 92 percent of its debt.
An increase in remote working following the covid pandemic is credited as a contributing factor in WeWork’s fall from financial grace, as well as its massive operational costs.
On October 30th, WeWork told the US Securities and Exchange Commission that it had made agreements with creditors to temporarily postpone some of its debt payments. A Wall Street Journal report last week that WeWork intended to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy noted that since its founding, the company had amassed $16 billion in losses as of June 2023 and was still paying over $2.7 billion a year in rent and interest — over 80 percent of its entire revenue.
PS5 ‘slim’ teardown shows the clever engineering of its detachable disc drive
The new PS5. | Image: Sony
The new PlayStation 5 hasn’t come out yet — it doesn’t even have a specific release date — but a few YouTubers have gotten their hands on it, including Dave Lee from the Dave2D channel. Lee posted his teardown of the console yesterday, and if you’ve been curious about how that detachable disc drive works, this is the best look you’ll get at it without buying the $499.99 PS5 yourself later this month.
After Lee pries off the PS5’s plastic side cover, you can see the drive sitting there with three screws staring back at you. I thought they were pentalobe screws at first, but a later zoomed-in shot shows they’re just standard crosshead screws. Philips head, if you like. Okay, no surprises there. Good.
Clip: Dave2D / GIF: The Verge
It can’t be that easy. But it is!
But then it just pops right out. The screws were a red herring! Such sleek modularity!
Screenshot: The Verge
The PS5 disc drive connector.
When Lee pulls the drive aside, it reveals a port framed within an oblong hexagon where the drive’s connecter settles. This is what I loved about so much of the design of machines like the PowerMac G5. You see the part, you grab it, and you take it out — there’s no hard, angular plastic connector to stab your sweaty fingers as you wriggle it free. Very tasteful.
The drive aside, the new PS5 is a nice-looking system if you’re into the pointy Dracula collar look of the first one. And when Lee puts it next to the original, the size disparity is more drastic than past comparisons have made it seem, even if they’re really not that differently sized; it’s still larger than the Xbox Series X, after all. Lee says it feels significantly lighter, too — great for when you take your PS5 out for its afternoon walk (or over to your friend’s house).
Here’s the full video, if you’d like to check out the rest of the teardown.
And for some different energy, there’s always Linus Tech Tips.
Tech Start-Ups Try to Sell a Cautious Pentagon on A.I. Shield AI, a tech start-up, already has a drone run by artificial intelligence being used by the Israeli military. But persuading the Pentagon to embrace the technology remains a big challenge.
WhatsApp’s sticker AI is adding guns to prompts for Palestinian children
Illustration: The Verge
In Meta’s WhatsApp, users can generate stickers using AI prompts. The Guardian reported Friday that the AI model used to create those stickers sometimes generates images of children holding guns when prompted with “Palestine” and similar words. Meanwhile, according to the outlet, “Israel” prompts resulted in no such imagery.
A month ago, Meta’s AI sticker generator started rolling out with the tendency to create inappropriately violent or crass imagery, including, yes, child soldiers. According to the article, an unnamed source said some of the company’s workers had flagged and escalated the issue with prompts related to the war in Israel.
Meta spokesperson Kevin McAlister told The Verge via email that the company is addressing it, adding that Meta will “continue to improve these features as they evolve and more people share their feedback.”
ChatGPT subscribers may get a ‘GPT builder’ option soon
Illustration: The Verge
Just as OpenAI is preparing for its first-ever developer conference, a significant ChatGPT update has leaked. According to The Decoder, leaked screenshots and videos show a custom chatbot creator with many of the same features already available in ChatGPT using GPT-4, like web browsing and data analysis. OpenAI will apparently also have a new marketplace where users can share their chatbot or browse those made by others.
A user called Choi posted a summary of the rumored updates a few days ago. This morning, SEO tools developer Tibor Blaho shared a video of the UI for the feature in action, showing a GPT Builder option that lets users enter a prompt — an example reads “make a creative who helps generate visuals for new products.” — to create a chatbot.
Here is a short video preview of the new ChatGPT Prototype - Gizmo V8.
The feature previously known as "Magic Maker" for creating new GPTs is now called "GPT Builder".
It seems that the "Welcome Message" has been removed, and GPT Builder can now also generate profile pictures… pic.twitter.com/Rfbl8dIXvX
On the “Create” tab, there are options to choose a default language, tone, and writing style for the bot. Then, a “Configure” tab has fields for naming, describing, and giving instructions to the bot about what it can and can’t do. Users can also upload files for a bespoke knowledgebase and toggle capabilities like web browsing and image generation. There’s also a box for adding custom actions to your chatbot.
Finally, next to the configure options, there’s a “Preview pane” with a prompt box for testing the bot as it’s edited. Braho posted a detailed breakdown of the GPT Builder in a LinkedIn post, as well.
More than 90% rumors:
- Gizmo announcement.
- Features:
* Sandbox - Provides an environment to import, test, and modify existing chatbots.
* Custom Actions - Define additional functionality for your chatbot using OpenAPI specifications
* Knowledge… pic.twitter.com/XB1FYgliLE
In addition to the new Gizmo tool, Choi claims that OpenAI is planning to release an enterprise “Team” subscription plan with “Flexible” and “Annual” options. Choi shared a screenshot that breaks down the Team plan’s features, like unlimited high-speed GPT-4 and four times longer context. The screenshot says it’s priced at $25 per user, per month. Choi says the non-annual option will be $30 per month, and both plans have a three-user minimum.
Recent ChatGPT beta features include live web results, image generation, and voice chat. OpenAI says it will preview new tools at the developer conference on Monday, so we probably won’t have to wait long to find out if these rumors are accurate.
Fake news and ridiculing the dead — what’s wrong with Microsoft’s AI news
Image: The Verge
A new CNN report about the MSN AI model’s news aggregation kicks off with examples of questionable editorial calls, like highlighting a story claiming President Joe Biden dozed off during a moment of silence for Maui wildfire victims (he didn’t), or an obituary that inexplicably referred to an NBA player as “useless.” An editorial staff of humans probably would've spotted the problems. But Microsoft’s system, which continues to feel more like a social experiment than a helpful tool after ditching human efforts in favor of algorithms a few years ago, did not.
That these stories were picked by MSN’s AI is no better than a travel guide Microsoft said was created by its algorithm and reviewed by a human that suggested Ottawa tourists grab a meal at the local food bank, or an AI-created poll that asked readers to vote on why a young woman died.
Microsoft Start and MSN are presented as resources for finding actual news. But its automated system keeps featuring or generating content with needlessly upsetting language and outright falsehoods, and there’s little indication anyone involved in the process cares. There are no careless journalists to blame, no editors with names and faces to take (or even shirk) responsibility. It’s all just software doing what it’s made to do and spokespeople shrugging when it goes wrong and saying they’ll try to make sure it doesn’t happen in the future.
How AI brought the Beatles back together one more time
Illustration: William Joel / The Verge
Hi, friends! Welcome to Installer No. 13, your guide to the best and Verge-iest stuff in the world. (If you’re new here, welcome, so psyched you found us, and also you can read all the old editions at the Installer homepage.)
I also have for you a couple of nifty AI tools, a robot vacuum, a bunch of new stuff about the new Beatles song, a Simpsons GIF generator, a Godzilla movie, and a three-hour podcast about Facebook.
And I have a specific question I’m hoping we can figure out together this week: how do you manage your budget and money? I’m not looking for, like, wealth manager tips over here. But Mint is shutting down, and Mint was an excellent, simple way to track your money. Do you have an app you like even better, either for one small thing or for your whole financial life? Do you do it all in Excel, do you tell ChatGPT everything you buy, do you just YOLO it and hope for the best? Email installer@theverge.com or text me at 203-570-8663, and tell me how you do it.
In general, of course, the best part of Installer is always your ideas and tips. What cool stuff are you reading, watching, playing, installing, whittling, knitting, or otherwise doing right now? Tell me everything: installer@theverge.com. And if you know someone else who might enjoy Installer, forward it to them and tell them to subscribe here.
Alright, lots of good links this week. Let’s go.
The Drop
Bitwarden. If you only ever take my advice once, make it this: use a password manager. It’s the best place for all your logins, loyalty numbers, license codes, and all the other stuff you need online all the time. I’m a longtime 1Password fan, but Bitwarden’s a great choice, too — and now it does passkeys, too! Passkeys rule.
Google Keep. I am perpetually afraid Google is going to kill Keep, its excellent and useful note-taking tool, but I think instead it might be… investing in it? What a world! Its handy formatting tools have come over to Android, and Google is now putting shopping lists and Assistant notes back in Keep where they belong.
The new MacBook Pro. The M3 chip lineup is slightly confusing this year, and I really wish the space black were more black and less gray, but the outcome is still this: the new Pros appear to be faster than ever, and I can’t think of a spec that excites me more than “22 hours of battery life.” I’m still an Air user, personally, but the 16-inch Pro is a monster of a machine.
Blank Check with Griffin & David: “The Social Network.” This is not what you would call a “focused” podcast. It’s longer than the movie it’s ostensibly about. But it’s super fun and funny and does in fact talk a lot about Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg, being cool, and the legacy of one of my all-time favorite movies.
Fortnite OG.My Fortnite sweet spot was in the 2019–2020 era, which means I have fond memories of Tilted Towers and roaming the terrain in shopping carts. For its new season, the game isgoing back through its history, with some new twists along the way. I haven’t played much recently, but I’ll be dropping back in this weekend for sure.
Brave Leo. An AI assistant that doesn’t store your data, doesn’t keep a record of your chats, and doesn’t use everything you do and say to train its model? Brave’s onto something here, especially if it can make a privacy-first product that doesn’t end up as “ChatGPT but worse.” And I like having this stuff built right into the browser.
Raycast Quick AI. Speaking of cool AI things: Raycast is one of my favorite and most-used Mac apps, and it just got access to GPT-4’s real-time web results. It’s now the fastest way I have to search “Who won the Warriors game” or “Was SBF found guilty.”
The Matic robot vacuum. Ugh, it’s $1,800, which is ridiculous. But I find this thing fascinating: it has some really clever hardware to keep it from getting stuck, and it never needs to be online. It’s also just a tiny bit adorable, which never hurts.
Deep dive
I’m probably only ever going to get one chance to do this here, so: let’s talk about the Beatles.
The most important band of all time (I will not be taking questions on this) put out what is almost certain to be the last Beatles song ever, called “Now and Then,” this week. It’s based on a 50-year-old demo that the late John Lennon recorded badly onto a cassette, and while it’s definitely not by a long shot the Beatles’ best song, it’s one of the more remarkable.
The first thing you should do is watch the 12-minute mini doc about how the song came together, the AI tech that helped make it happen, and why “Now and Then” couldn’t have existed before now. It sets the scene perfectly.
You honestly should watch all 6,000 hours of Get Back, Peter Jackson’s documentary series in which the MAL tech figures prominently, but this 20-minute interview does a good job of explaining how the tech works. Jackson also has his own delightful 10-minute explanation of de-mixing. And here’s a really cool 60-second example of what it does to audio.
The music industry is speedrunning the whole AI boom, and there are so many reasons to be concerned about where it will all land. But for me, this is just unambiguously good: thanks to AI, we’re going to get to hear old music again, better than it ever sounded before. I’m in.
Screen share
Chris Plante, the editor-in-chief of our sister site Polygon, never makes me feel bad for liking Assassin’s Creed as much as I do, even though I suspect he rolls his eyes at me every time I bring it up. In addition to having excellent video game taste, Chris also loves telling everyone to watch ultra-deep-cut streaming shows, trying to make the gaming industry a better place for everyone, and frequently almost convincing me to buy a Steam Deck. (So far, only almost.)
I asked Chris to share his homescreen with us, figuring he’d have, like, 93 pages full of video games. I was wrong! For a good and fascinating reason. Here’s Chris’ homescreen, plus some info on the apps he uses and why:
The phone: iPhone 15 Pro
The wallpaper: My son! But sorry, I don’t put pictures of my kid on the internet because one time I wrote that the Batmobile shouldn’t have giant guns, and people told me to kill myself.
The apps: I had a toxic relationship with my homescreen for most of my adult life. That ended about five years ago when 1) I got diagnosed with anxiety 2) I had a kid and subsequently lost most of my free time and 3) I began to delete all of my social media apps — an exhausting process that culminated this summer with me finally saying “fuck off” to Twitter.
In place of all of these apps and games that inspired some really nasty, compulsive behavior, I started a new hobby: learning Japanese. If I’m being honest, I can’t stop myself from obsessively picking at my phone at all times, but I can choose what I obsess over.
I started with Duolingo two years ago before having the epiphany all Japanese learners have — Duolingo isn’t meant for Japanese. Since then, I’ve tried all sorts of different apps. This current group has lasted the longest: Anki helps me retain vocabulary; Bunpro covers grammar (it’s technically a test app and unavailable on the App Store); and the 日本語 folder has dictionaries, reading apps, and some kanji stuff. I also keep Google Translate ready to go at all times so I don’t spend too much time on my phone when checking the kanji in whatever children’s manga I’m struggling through.
Otherwise, it’s the usual: Signal and Authenticator for work; YNAB because I’m a dullard with finances and envelope budgeting saves me from myself; and Letterboxd, arguably the one social media app I’ve kept. Though pro tip for Letterboxd: write it for yourself and nobody else. You feel less pressure, and you have the benefit of recalling what a movie made you feel in the moments after you watched it. I can’t remember ever reading old tweets or Facebook posts, but every couple of weeks, I’ll be curious about, say, what I thought of some horror movie I watched during the pandemic. And there it is, waiting for me!
Oh, and Overcast. I use the widget so I can hit pause when I’m doing chores.
Speaking of compulsions, I keep Slack on the third screen. And video games get deleted the moment I stop enjoying them. Did I mention I have anxiety?
As always, I also asked Chris to name a few things he’s into right now. Here’s what he came back with:
Happy End. It’s hard to say one thing in particular inspired me to learn a language in my 30s, but these albums play a major part. I learned about this Japanese pop / rock / folk band in college when Rolling Stone Japan named one of their albums the “great Japanese rock album of all time.” I’m no expert in Japanese rock, but I have been chasing down Happy End’s vinyl records ever since. You won’t find them on Spotify, but you can hear their music if you make even the smallest effort on this powerful tool called Google dot com. If you’d like to know more, Pitchfork wrote a review / band history last year.
Godzilla Minus One. For the first time since 2016’s Shin Godzilla, we’re getting a new live-action Japanese Godzilla film. I’ve seen it. It rules. It should be in theaters this December.
The Bestiespodcast. Each week, these adorable four best friends talk about the best video games. It’s a great way to discover new games — especially if you aren’t reading Polygon every day. Fans of My Brother, My Brother and Me and The Adventure Zone will recognize Justin and Griffin McElroy. Plus, the show stars Polygon’s Russ Frushtick and me. Oh, I’m sorry, this isn’t a place for plugs?
Moonring. I know Baldur’s Gate 3 is the big D&D-style RPG of 2023, but let me give you two reasons to try Moonring. It’s designed by Fable co-creator Dene Carter, and it’s free. Like, free, free. No in-app purchases. No subscriptions. Just a brilliant, Ultima-style RPG that I’m positive will appeal to the older Verge readers who wasted away the late ’80s playing text adventures on their parents’ Mac II.
Crowdsourced
Here’s what the Installer community is into this week. I want to know what you’re into right now as well! Emailinstaller@theverge.comwith your recommendations for anything and everything, and we’ll feature some of our favorites here every week.
“My inbox has absolutely been saved by Shortwave — finally get to relive the glory of those Inbox by Gmail days.” – Hillary
“I find myself explaining how to use computers for a large portion of my life. At work, nothing is a better aid than CleanShot X. Nothing, nothing makes me happier than sending a 15-second GIF on how to complete a task instead of 10 bullet points in a Slack message.” – Liam
“I thought Genie was pretty cool. It lets you make 3D models with gen AI the way you would with Midjourney or DALL-E. I’ve been on their Luma Labs beta for a while, and what they have is pretty dang good.” – Matt
“Found this amazing website called Frinkiac with millions of screengrabs of the Simpsons series (till season 17). I use it all the time to make GIFs and share stills. You can search by quotes or even season and episode. It’s such a simple idea but a technical marvel.” – Priyantan
“Somehow, I ended up binge-watching Yoshua Bengio’s lectures on YouTube for hours on end. That led to books on ML, and now I’m reading neuroscience books? The connection between those is fascinating. Don’t know what got into me, but that’s been pretty much the last two weeks of my life.” – Kruti
“I’ve been enjoying Music League. We have a weekly league set up, and the winner chooses the theme for the next week. It’s been a fantastic way to find new music from the other submissions, and I’ve been using playlists to narrow down my own songs, so I have 15–20 themed playlists mostly full of favorites from my own library that I’d often forgotten about.” – Michael
“Stumbled upon Book Tracker this week. No extras, clean, basic UI, fair price.” – Zook
“I am listening to and loving Andrew Leland’s memoir, The Country of the Blind. I also want to recommend getting a laptop stand and separate peripherals for people working from home all day. I have been using a Twelve South folding thing for a couple of weeks and have a lot less neck and shoulder pain already.” – Jeanne
“The Lazarus Heist, a BBC podcast about how North Korean government-sponsored hackers nearly stole $1B.” – Dave
Signing off
It’s the daylight saving time switchover this weekend, which means people all over the US will change their clocks back an hour and grumble about it for the rest of the weekend. For me, it means dealing with my kid, who does not understand when clocks switch, trying to sync my microwave clock and my oven clock even though that’s apparently physically impossible, and forgetting the clock in my car only to panic in three days when I think I’m an hour off. Mostly, though, it means that daylight saving time jokes TikTok is all over my feed once again, and that is frankly worth the hassle. Plus, it’s always possible that we finally get our act together and get rid of DST altogether, so treasure this fun while you can.
Epic v. Google, explained
Photo illustration by Cath Virginia / The Verge
Everything you need to know about the big app store trial kicking off November 6th.
On Monday, Fortnite publisher Epic Games will drag a tech giant into court, alleging that its mobile app store is an illegal monopoly. You may be feeling some déjà vu!
After all, didn’t Epic already go to trial with Apple, resulting in a ruling where Apple (mostly) won? Didn’t Epic fail to #FreeFortnite with its Llamacorn legal gambit? Didn’t that all happen years ago? What are we doing here again?
The short answer: while Epic’s antitrust claims against Apple got their day in court, a similar lawsuit against Google never did. On November 6th, Epic v. Google will finally go to trial... a mere 1,180 days after Epic originally sued.
Hi, I’m Sean, and I’ll be your guide to this whole delightful mess.
Llamacorn what now? What is happening?
Before we get to the Llamacorn, a little background. Epic is of course the studio behind Fortnite, the extraordinarily popular free-to-play game. Fortnite makes money by selling in-game items with its virtual currency V-Bucks. Players often buy V-Bucks the same place they play Fortnite. And until August 13th, 2020, if the player used an Android or iOS device and installed the game through an official app store, that purchase triggered an in-app payment fee to Google or Apple.
Critics call such fees the “Google tax” or the “Apple tax,” and Epic definitely wasn’t a fan.
When Epic decided to take action against these respective “taxes,” it made August 13th, 2020 a very busy day for Apple, Google, Epic, and us here at The Verge. First, Epic announced it was bypassing Apple and Google’s app store fees. It deployed a hotfix update to Fortnite without either company’s knowledge, letting you purchase V-Bucks directly through its own payment processing option at a discount. Apple and Google almost immediately reacted by kicking Fortnite off their app stores for breaking the rules.
Then: surprise! Epic was ready and waiting with twolawsuits and an attack ad, depicting a Fortnite hero throwing a unicorn-llama hammer into a giant screen reminiscent of Apple’s famous “1984” Macintosh ad.
It was a striking publicity blitz followed by a lot of slow-moving court proceedings. While the Apple lawsuit went to court in 2021, the Google one was delayed again and again. A ruling came down for the Apple trial that September, and it was mostly decided in Apple’s favor, though both parties are waiting for the Supreme Court to potentially weigh in. Meanwhile, the machinations for its fight against Google continued, and now…
It is time for trial number two.
That sounds fascinating, but if I don’t care aboutFortniteor rich companies suing each other, what’s in it for me?
The future of Google’s app store could depend on this trial — both Epic and Google agree on that. Epic wants to break up Google’s alleged monopoly on Android app stores and payment methods, so developers aren’t stuck paying the “Google Tax” or passing that fee along to you.
But if Epic wins — according to Google, anyhow — it could make Android phones less safe by dismantling basic protections against sideloaded apps, and damage Android’s ability to compete with the iPhone because it (arguably) can’t run a competitive app store by giving it away for free.
What exactly is Epic claiming?
Epic argues that Google makes it so difficult for developers and users to get around its Android app store, and that app store’s standard fees, that it’s created an illegal monopoly that unjustly enriches Google while artificially driving up app prices because other stores can’t compete.
Epic also claims that Google is illegally tying its Google Play payments platform to the Google Play app store, keeping other potential app payment mechanisms from competing as well.
So, does Google have a monopoly?
A monopoly on what? That’s one of the biggest questions the court will decide. Epic claims that Google has illegal monopolies in “Android app distribution” and “Android in-app payment processing.” It’ll argue that if you buy or develop for Android phones, you’re stuck paying the Google tax.
But Google will say the real competition is from Apple, because people can choose to buy an iPhone instead. It’s pretty tough to argue Google has a monopoly on app stores in general.
This whole line of argument is called “market definition.” If the court decides the relevant market is phones and app stores, not specifically Android ones, then Google’s on the road to victory. If it accepts that Android apps are their own market, Epic will be in better shape. Or, it could pick a different market definition entirely, like the judge in the Apple case ended up doing.
Looking at this from a less academic perspective, it’s worth noting that Google charges up to ten times more per transaction than you pay with PayPal or a credit card, which does seem like a lot! And though Epic can’t argue it in court, I’ll point out that Apple wasn’t able to explicitly justify a 30 percent fee to that case’s judge.
On the other hand, it does kinda seem like Epic wants something for nothing! As far as I can tell, Epic hasn’t stated what kind of fee would actually be reasonable for Google to charge in exchange for placement in Google’s store — instead, Epic CEO Tim Sweeney seemingly suggests there shouldn’t be a Google fee at all if a developer wants to use its own payment system.
How did Epic’s argument fare against Apple?
Well… both sides lost! But Epic arguably lost more. Even though Apple has incredible power over the iPhone, Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers ruled the company didn’t have an unfair monopoly in this case – partly because she decided the relevant market for Fortnite was “digital mobile gaming transactions” rather than, say, iPhone apps. She also decided that Epic violated its developer agreement with Apple and would have to pay.
But she also barred Apple from keeping iPhone users in the dark about alternate ways they can pay for apps – and may have even allowed developers to add their own payment mechanisms. I won’t dwell on the Apple ruling, as I’m ethically bound, but my colleague Adi Robertson has a comprehensive breakdown.
How can Epic possibly have a case against Google when Apple already won?
Epic declined to answer this on the record, among other questions we asked... but three things to consider:
1) That was a different case. Also, that one’s not over till the Supreme Court weighs in or declines to take a look.
2) Google can’ttell jurors that Apple won its case, or that other plaintiffs settled. The judge in this case says so!
3) Oh, and by the way, this is a jury trial.
Wait, why does that matter?
Epic and Google have to convince a jury, not the judge, which is totally different from how the Apple case played out. (That one was a “bench trial.”)
Maybe all the evidence of tricky deals inside Google might sway a jury against the company? Maybe Google scaremongering that sideloaded apps equal gaping security holes will sway a jury against Epic instead? Who knows!
(If you’re a Epic juror reading this — stop! Judge Donato explicitly said you’re in a “news-free bubble” through mid-December, folks.)
Didn’t other parties sue Google too?
They did! And then, they all settled. All 50 state attorneys general and a number of consumers have tentatively settled with Google over app store antitrust claims, though it’s not clear what the deal might include.
Match Group, the company behind Tinder, Match.com, OkCupid and other dating apps, just reached a surprise last-minute settlement too, one that makes it sound like Match effectively gave up.
Epic stands alone.
Could we get a settlement between Google and Epic as well?
Epic seems to have no interest in settling as long as the “Google tax” exists, and the company’s repeatedly said it’s not interested in cash. So far, the company’s been willing to push these cases all the way through multiple appeals, cost be damned.
It’s not clear what Google could proactively offer that would satisfy Epic, since CEO Tim Sweeney has also publicly suggested that Google would simply circumvent any settlement it offers.
But if you do want to see a vision of a future that Epic would accept, look no further than this letter it sent to state attorneys general — laying out a settlement that would basically prohibit Google from doing the anticompetitive things that Epic claims it did.
There’s also this tweet from Sweeney:
Don't interfere with competing stores through technical countermeasures, carrier/OEM agreements, or Google Play anti-store policies; don't impede or gatekeep competing payment systems for in-app purchases; don't impose Google fees on top of third-party payment services.
Google wouldn’t tell The Verge if it’s offered Epic any kind of settlement yet.
Why if I just want thedirty laundryon both these companies?
You’re in it for the juicy dirt? It could get good.
The allegations made before trial suggest Google was playing loads of dirty tricks with names like “Project Hug,” “Project Agave,” and “Project Banyan”, with Epic claiming it’s seen evidence Google was paying off game developers and phone makers not to abandon its app store — to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars. Google allegedly even toyed with the idea of buying Epic to keep Fortnite from inspiring other game developers to abandon ship.
Plus, there’s evidence Google deleted potentially incriminating messages to keep them out of a court’s hands. Enough that the judge has decided to explicitly tell the jury we’re not seeing all the evidence, because Google employees all the way up to CEO Sundar Pichai were caught setting those conversations to auto-delete. This issue has come up in the US v. Google antitrust trial in Washington, DC — still ongoing at the start of Epic’s trial — as well.
And the dirt isn’t all on Google’s side. Epic was caught straight-up admitting it premeditated the whole plan to bypass Google’s payment systems. Since Google is countersuing over that, it could be a big deal.
When you say “straight-up admitting...”
Here is an email from Epic CEO Tim Sweeney that, I think, speaks for itself:
Image via Epic v. Apple“Here is our official plan for communicating with Google about bypassing the Google Play Store: SAY NOTHING TILL IT SHIPS”
We’ll have a whole cast of intriguing people called as witnesses during the trial who might dish even more.
Who will Epic and Google call as witnesses?
We are going straight to the top of the org chart, folks. Google CEO Sundar Pichai and Epic CEO Tim Sweeney are absolutely expected to attend. Android co-founder Andy Rubin might be deposed, and Google says we’ll hear from current Android (and Chrome, and Chrome OS) boss Hiroshi Lockheimer. Google also tells us representatives from Apple, Netflix, Motorola, and AT&T should testify as well.
How much hypocrisy can we expect in the courtroom?
I’d say quite a bit! For example:
Epic says it’s not in this for the money, it’s only suing to end Google’s monopoly — but Epic would surely profit if it doesn’t have to pay Google’s cut.
It looks like Epic’s going to argue that you’re locked into Android after buying an Android phone, but I can personally attest that switching back and forth between the platforms is easier than ever.
We caught Google trying to play the China card in a pre-briefing with press, reminding us that Epic is 40 percent owned by Chinese company Tencent — even though Google itselfallegedly considered teaming up with Tencent to eliminate the Epic threat. While the parties can’t argue it in court, Google can attempt to subtly play the China card: “Google may ask a witness once about Tencent’s domicile,” reads one of Judge Donato’s orders.
In the same press briefing, Google suggested to journalists that Epic should have joined the company’s “User Choice Billing” program if it wanted an alternative payment system, instead of suing. But that program didn’t exist until 2022, long after the lawsuit, and it only knocks 4 percent off Google’s fee.
When should we expect a jury verdict?
Judge Donato told jurors that we’re looking at roughly five weeks of trial starting November 6th and extending through early December. The schedule suggests the court will take Thanksgiving off, finish looking at all the evidence by December 4th, take a couple more days off before closing arguments, and then let jurors come to a decision.
“I fully expect we’ll have plenty of time to reach a verdict well before the December holiday period,” said Judge Donato.
Okay, I’m sold — how can I watch the trial unfold?
It’s not on Twitch or Zoom or anything like that. But I’m personally going to be in the courtroom, and we’ll have a StoryStream filled with trial coverage starting November 6th, right here at The Verge.
Sam Bankman-Fried’s shadow still looms over the crypto industry
Photo Illustration by Cath Virginia / The Verge | Photo by Bloomberg, Getty Images
Cryptocurrency advocates might believe that FTX’s collapse was an anomaly — but they could have trouble convincing the public of the same.
During Sam Bankman-Fried’s monthlong fraud trial, prosecutors presented damning evidence that the fallen crypto founder knew full well what he was doing from the beginning. He knew that Alameda Research borrowed billions in customer funds from FTX. He knew his fellow executives fabricated balance sheets to send to lenders. He knew FTX wasn’t fine when he told customers it was.
In cryptoland, the response to these revelations was largely to condemn Bankman-Fried and FTX as an aberration. When the truth about FTX came out, Binance CEO Changpeng “CZ” Zhao slammed Bankman-Fried, saying he “lied to everyone.” Similarly, Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong wrote on X (formerly Twitter) that “even the most gullible person should not believe Sam’s claim” that the missing funds stemmed from an accounting error.
But as Bankman-Fried awaits sentencing after being convicted on seven criminal counts, including wire fraud, the rest of the industry has been left to take stock of its future. FTX may have been one of the most brazen fraud operations in recent years, but it’s far from the only embarrassing crypto collapse. While some of the decisions Bankman-Fried made might have been unique to FTX, it’s one of the multiple cases where no one on the outside caught on until it was too late — and in the wake of Bankman-Fried’s trial, it may take work to convince the public he was an outlier.
Before his fall, Bankman-Fried was a poster child for an upstart industry. The 31-year-old power broker maintained the scruffy, somewhat quirky appearance of the kid in your computer science class that you would probably ask for help. (This particular look, according to his ex-girlfriend and former Alameda CEO, Caroline Ellison, was carefully crafted.) He became crypto’s golden boy, appearing on the cover of Fortune magazine and getting profiled in Forbes. He testified about his operation’s safety in front of Congress. While other firms collapsed last year, FTX appeared strong, with Bankman-Fried inviting comparisons to JP Morgan while bailing out other struggling firms.
Some media outlets continued to burnish his representation even after FTX crashed and burned. The Washington Post highlighted Bankman-Fried’s contributions to pandemic research (some of which apparently came from customer funds). Then, The Wall Street Journal focused on how Bankman-Fried’s “Plans to Save the World Went Down in Flames” and said FTX’s collapse “wiped out his wealth and ambitious philanthropic endeavors.” (The ambitions of FTX customers were presumably not headline material.) The information we know now lets us see past that persona — but it also gives the crypto-curious a lot to chew on.
Other crypto companies seem to think that picking out the one bad apple will be good for the rest of the industry. In a statement provided to CoinDesk, Paul Brody, the head of blockchain at financial consulting firm EY, calls the outcome of Bankman-Fried’s trial a “wonderful moment for crypto,” and Yat Siu, the chairman of blockchain gaming company Animoca Brands, says it marks a “new beginning” for the industry.
“Over the past year, our industry took a reputational hit in Washington, but Sam Bankman-Fried’s crimes had nothing to do with the technology underpinning digital assets,” Kristin Smith, the CEO of the Blockchain Association, tells The Verge. “The trial was about a crook — not crypto. And while the trial hasn’t been a net positive for the industry, it has refocused minds on the fundamental promise of decentralization.”
Indeed, a lot of Bankman-Fried’s misconduct is not inherently related to cryptocurrency — like falsifying his firm Alameda Research’s finances and spending other people’s money without permission.
But much of this appears to have been possible because there was so little meaningful oversight of the crypto industry and so much acceptance of companies playing fast and loose. It’s hard to say if the crypto companies left standing are free from all of FTX’s flaws, or how closely they’ve looked over their partners. And then there’s the simple, inconvenient fact that so many of them are under legal scrutiny.
Earlier this year, the Securities and Exchange Commission sued Terraform Labs, the crypto firm behind the stablecoin that vaporized billions in customer funds when it collapsed last year, for allegedly perpetuating “a fraudulent scheme.” After that, the Federal Trade Commission arrested the CEO of now-bankrupt crypto lending company Celsius over claims he made millions off the lies he spread about the firm’s token.
There’s also the crypto influencer Richard Heart, who the SEC accused of spending at least $12 million in customer funds to purchase sports cars, luxury watches, and a 555-carat black diamond. Other major firms, including Coinbase, Binance, Genesis, and Gemini, also face lawsuits from the SEC.
That I can so easily fill two paragraphs with an (incomplete) list of legal issues the crypto industry is facing doesn’t exactly inspire confidence. This uncertainty is already affecting regulations that the “good” companies in crypto want passed. The industry favors a bill that would limit the SEC’s oversight of the industry, for instance, while granting more power to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. However, the outcome of Bankman-Fried’s trial could ultimately harm its success. Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) has told Politico that the industry “has serious problems with fraud, and the public no longer has confidence that it’s on the up and up.”
Witness testimonies and a plethora of evidence have revealed a whole range of things that can and could’ve gone wrong. What would’ve happened if CoinDesk never published the article that revealed the massive hole in FTX’s balance sheet? Would Bankman-Fried continue to go about his business — doling out billions in stolen funds to save sinking crypto companies, donating to politicians, and sponsoring sports teams? Would he have kept spending FTX customers’ funds until it either all crashed for some other reason, or until one of his bets — like an investment in the AI company Anthropic — hit big enough to clear the books? Alameda’s unlimited amount of credit makes it seem like a possibility.
Sam Bankman-Fried wanted to prove the world could trust the cryptocurrency industry. Now, the industry hopes to leave him behind. But he might be far from the last bad actor cashing in on crypto — and the crypto world has yet to prove it can spot them before catastrophe strikes.
Look, Up in the Sky! Amazon’s Drones Are Delivering Cans of Soup! Amazon’s much-hyped drone project is dropping small objects on driveways. Some customers are not sure what it delivers beyond minestrone.
Sam Bankman-Fried found guilty of fraud
Photo Illustration by Cath Virginia / The Verge
Former cryptocurrency kingpin Sam Bankman-Fried has been found guilty of fraud. A New York jury delivered the verdict on November 2nd, concluding a trial that has seen Bankman-Fried defend himself against claims that he criminally mismanaged his crypto exchange FTX and trading firm Alameda Research.
After more than a month in trial, the jury took less than four hours to decide Bankman-Fried’s fate, declaring him guilty on all seven charges, including wire fraud, conspiracy to commit wire fraud, and conspiracy to commit money laundering. He is set to be sentenced by Judge Lewis Kaplan on March 28th of next year and faces decades in prison.
Bankman-Fried started FTX in 2019, and its valuation rose stratospherically during a post-pandemic crypto boom. But prosecutors charged that the operation was a fraud “from the start.” While he promoted the exchange to investors and the public as safe and secure, Bankman-Fried’s former colleagues testified that it falsified numbers and granted secret, special privileges to Alameda — including a $65 billion line of credit and a flag that let Alameda’s balance dip into the negative as it illicitly borrowed FTX customer funds.
The FTX empire collapsed after a November 2022 Coindesk article — published precisely one year before the jury’s decision — revealed the secret blurring of funds and Binance CEO Changpeng “CZ” Zhao announced he would pull out of the exchange. Bankman-Fried resigned and FTX filed for bankruptcy, but he was soon hit with civil and criminal charges of fraud and money laundering.
Bankman-Fried spent the months ahead of his trial antagonizing prosecutors and the court. Originally placed under house arrest, he was sent to jail in August for violations of his bail conditions, including using a VPN to watch a football game and leaking the diary entries of his ex-girlfriend — former Alameda Research CEO Caroline Ellison, who pleaded guilty to federal charges and testified against him in trial — to The New York Times.
His case has further tarnished the reputation of the already embattled crypto industry, thanks to Bankman-Fried’s status as a high-profile representative of the industry. Several other major companies are the subject of civil or criminal charges in the US and abroad, including a few that suffered collapses as sudden as FTX’s.
In court, Bankman-Fried’s defense argued that he had honestly failed at operating a high-risk business. He denied directly supervising the damning code updates that allowed Alameda to spend FTX funds and said he had not participated in trading or questioned employees about billions of missing dollars. His testimony was contradicted by Ellison, his former roommates Adam Yedidia and Gary Wang (the cofounder of FTX), and family friend Nishad Singh; all had worked under Bankman-Fried and later cooperated with prosecutors. Wang, Singh, and Ellison are awaiting sentencing.
Sam Bankman-Fried Is Found Guilty of 7 Counts of Fraud and Conspiracy The case against the founder of the failed FTX exchange had come to symbolize the excesses of the volatile cryptocurrency industry.
At UK Summit, Global Leaders Warn AI Could Cause ‘Catastrophic’ Harm At a U.K. summit, 28 governments, including China and the U.S., signed a declaration agreeing to cooperate on evaluating the risks of artificial intelligence.
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