The best new browser for Windows

The best new browser for Windows

Image: David Pierce / The Verge

Hi, friends! Welcome to Installer No. 36, your guide to the best and Verge-iest stuff in the world. (If you’re new here, hello, I’m thrilled you found us, the Installerverse loves you, and also you can read all the old editions at the Installer homepage.)

I missed you all last week! I was at a friend’s bachelor party in South Carolina, playing golf and eating burgers and mostly staying offline. Thanks to everyone who reached out to say you missed the newsletter! But I’m back now, and so is Installer. We are so back. This week, I’ve been writing about AI gadgets and iPads, watching Baby Reindeer and The Fall Guy, reading A Drink Before the War, and listening to the excellent Challengers score.

I also have for you a new browser for Windows, some new mobile audio options, a couple of fun things to watch this weekend, apps for coffee nuts, and much more. Let’s dig in.

(As always, the best part of Installer is your ideas and tips. What are you into right now? What should everyone else be into right now? Tell me everything: installer@theverge.com. And if you know someone else who might enjoy Installer, tell them to subscribe here.)

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The Drop

• Arc for Windows. Arc is still my favorite browser, and even in this first version, it’s surprisingly solid on Windows. (Though it is missing a couple of Arc’s more advanced features and some of the AI stuff.) If you try it, give it time — it’s a really big change from Chrome, but I’m still sold on it. (The iOS app also got some big and much-needed updates this week.)
• Claude for iOS. I’m sure there’s a good rubric out there for which AI model is good for which purposes, but mostly I just gravitate toward whichever app is nicest? The new one from Anthropic is nice: clean, simple, faster than the web app for sure. I also really like the icon.
• “‘No CGI’ is really just invisible CGI.” The fourth and final installment in a really cool series about CGI, from the great The Movie Rabbit Hole YouTube channel. I learned so much about moviemaking and the good and bad tricks filmmakers use from these videos.
• Sofa 4.0. A huge update to one of my favorite movie / book / show trackers. Sofa now lets you collect and organize anything, any way you want — MacStories has a great rundown of all the stuff you can do, and I’m already using it to plan summer trips.
• The Bose SoundLink Max. $399 is steep for a Bluetooth speaker, but I’m very into this one. Super-long battery life; an AUX port; a fun little handle; presumably excellent sound. I’ve been a UE Wonderboom believer for years, but I’ll be trying this one out this summer.
• The Beats Solo 4. I agree with Chris Welch that it’s weird to not have ANC in these headphones. But I’m still into the look, love how light they are, and am stoked about the wired options as well.
• Hacks season 3. I was late to this show about the lives and relationships of two comedians, but it’s funny and weird and extremely worth your time. Only 18 episodes to catch up on! You can do it this weekend!
• The Idea of You. I’m currently biased toward Anne Hathaway because I just found out she’s also an Arsenal fan, which makes her cool and smart and great. But I keep hearing good things about this movie on Netflix about modern life and fame and the weirdness of both.
• “Phone Apps for (Weird) Coffee People.” James Hoffmann is a must-subscribe for all things coffee, but I especially loved this look at all the apps for coffee drinkers. I’ve become a huge Filtru fan in particular, and my coffee process is now fussier than ever. I love it.

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Screen share

Riley Testut has had a busy couple of weeks. Couple of months, really. Years, honestly. He’s the developer behind Delta, the game emulator that has taken over the App Store over the last few weeks and that might also be the signal of a new app era entirely. He’s been working on bringing his app store, AltStore PAL, to users in the EU, while also just trying to get some Pokémon playing in.

I asked Riley to share his homescreen, in part just to see if I could snoop on his Delta and ROM setups. I got my wish! Here’s Riley’s homescreen, plus some info on the apps he uses and why:

The phone: Purple iPhone 12 Mini. I absolutely LOVE this phone, and I’m dreading having to upgrade to a larger one eventually. (I would’ve gotten the 13 Mini, except it doesn’t come in purple.)

The wallpaper: A photo of a Pokémon drone show in the shape of Mew, originally taken by Joe Merrick (of Serebii fame), then slightly edited.

The apps: Phone, FaceTime, Photos, Camera, Notes, Maps, Calculator, Find My, Files, Pokémon Sleep, Settings, 1Password, Alamo Drafthouse, Messages, Mail, Safari.

My co-founder / roommate Shane and I are obsessed with Pokémon Sleep (we compete to see who gets the most shinies), so that’s earned a spot front and center. My social folder contains my most heavily used apps (Ivory and Threads), and then below it is the Alamo Drafthouse app, which I use a LOT because I love going to the movies and have the annual pass ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

1Password contains literally everything important in my life, so it’s also a staple, but I only made the Delta folder recently once it was released in the App Store. It contains the app itself as well as launchers for Pokémon Emerald and Pokémon HeartGold as well as the amazing Ketchup pokédex app so I can easily look up Pokémon stats.

And because I can’t use AltStore PAL outside the EU, I have the regular AltStore widget to remind me to refresh my apps every week!

I also asked Riley to share a few things he’s into right now. Here’s what he shared:

• I bought myself a Steam Deck a few months ago and have been absolutely loving it! In fact, it’s the main way I kept myself entertained while we were stuck in Europe trying to launch AltStore PAL (god bless Dolphin emulator and Super Mario Galaxy 2).
• I’m also a sucker for super nerdy science YouTube videos, and the History of the Universe channel is literally the perfect thing to put on in the background while I build some Legos or something. I also recently discovered Technology Connections’ channel, which basically scratches the same itch but for tech. I’ll also forever be a fan of Nirvanna the Band the Show, and Shane and I love their “Update Day” video so much we even used it to tease AltStore PAL’s launch.
• At the same time… I’m also deeply invested in the ongoing UFO discourse. Exciting to see something that was dismissed for so long being taken seriously by Congress and others because that’s how science makes progress!

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Crowdsourced

Here’s what the Installer community is into this week. I want to know what you’re into right now as well! Email installer@theverge.com or message me on Signal — @davidpierce.11 — with your recommendations for anything and everything, and we’ll feature some of our favorites here every week. If you want even more good stuff, check out the replies to this post on Threads.

“Neal Brennan’s Crazy Good is the funniest stand-up on Netflix since Ali Wong’s Baby Cobra.” – Christopher

“I’ve been obsessing over note-taking apps again because I am insane. Recently tried Tana, and it’s incredible. Feels like the most natural way for me to take notes (bullet journaling, tasks, project management) and is probably going to convince me to ditch Logseq and Obsidian and everything else.” – Rin

“Voiijer. This interesting social media app is focused on posting trips. From day hikes to overnight adventures abroad. I’ve tried it out a little bit, but it seems geared toward being a travel journal. Seems new and interesting.” – Nicholas

“3Blue1Brown. Really like this YouTube channel in general and have thoroughly enjoyed watching this playlist. He breaks down super complicated mathematical concepts into easy-to-digest, bite-size chunks using examples and excellent visualizations. This playlist feels particularly relevant for anyone who wants to dive a little deeper into the technologies and algorithms that are driving this wave of AI hype.” – Abie

“The new video from David Imel about how the ✨ emoji became the symbol for AI is about 1,000 times more interesting than I thought it would be. I don’t want to spoil anything, which is weird to say about a video like this, but honestly, the name of the video is just scratching the surface of how cool it is.” – Luke

I’ve been playing Bonk’s GameBoy games using Delta and writing about games on Backloggd, which is a fun video game-focused review site built very similarly to Letterboxd.” – Sawyer

“My latest rabbit hole is comics and graphic novels, and as someone who strips his ebooks of DRM, I’m still trying to find the Calibre of comics. I landed on YACReader and YACReader Library. It’s good enough, but I feel there’s still space for a really good app.” – Kevin

“Starting to pay more attention to healthy eating, and I remember hating MyFitnessPal. Found the app Cronometer, which is a great freemium alternative. Highly recommended!” – Jonathan

“I just wanted to share how much I’ve been loving the new AppleTV Plus series Sugar starring Colin Farrell as private detective John Sugar, that’s on a case of a missing daughter. It has a great camera, vibe, and overall, the aesthetics are amazing. The plot is even better, with subtle details all around the show. I’ve just rewatched it for the third time (there are only four episodes so far), and I noticed many clues for later development that I hadn’t noticed before. I feel like the showrunners must’ve spent ages on developing this show.” – Vojtěch

“Just got back on the Castro podcast app bandwagon. It’s under new management and they are iterating. The queue system is .” – Advay

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Signing off

For the last few weeks, I’ve been reading and hearing a lot about how much people like the Boox Palma. It’s basically just an Android phone, but it has a Kindle-style E Ink screen, which means it’s awful at a lot of things but can download all your reading apps and news apps. I have a lot more testing to do with it, but so far, I love this thing. It’s kinda slow and a little wonky, but it fits in my pocket and is a perfect device for reading and taking quick notes. For years, I’ve cycled between carrying a notebook everywhere, relying on my phone for everything, trying to shove some other device into my workflow, and even occasionally being a weirdo who carries around an iPad. The Palma’s not perfect, but this form factor — Android device with an E Ink screen — might be. I’ll have a bigger piece on this thing in the next couple of weeks, but if you’re intrigued, I love it so far.

See you next week!

Tesla Pullback Puts Onus on Others to Build Electric Vehicle Chargers

Tesla Pullback Puts Onus on Others to Build Electric Vehicle Chargers The automaker led by Elon Musk is no longer planning to take the lead in expanding the number of places to fuel electric vehicles. It’s not clear how quickly other companies will fill the gap.

As Google’s antitrust trial wraps, DOJ seeks sanctions over missing messages

As Google’s antitrust trial wraps, DOJ seeks sanctions over missing messages

Illustration: The Verge

The fate of Google’s search business is now in the hands of Judge Amit Mehta, as closing arguments concluded in the landmark trial on Friday.

The Department of Justice and plaintiff states made their last arguments Thursday on Google’s alleged anticompetitive conduct in the general search market, and on Friday focused on its allegedly illegal conduct in search advertising. Google was also under fire (separately) for failing to retain chat messages that the DOJ believes could have been relevant to the case.

The government is trying to show that Google locked up key distribution channels for the general search engine market, so that would-be rivals could not grow into significant threats. It says it did so through contracts with phone manufacturers and browser companies to be their exclusive default search engine. If the judge agrees that Google successfully foreclosed competition in that market, he can consider the government’s arguments about the search advertising market as evidence of anticompetitive conduct.

In his summary, DOJ attorney Kenneth Dintzer said that the last major tech monopoly decision, US v. Microsoft, “fits like a glove” on Google. Google’s lead litigator in the case, John Schmidtlein, disagreed. In Microsoft, he said, manufacturers were coerced into deals and customers were spoon-fed an inferior product they didn’t want. “Google has won with a superior product,” he said.

“The importance and significance of this case is not lost on me,” Mehta said as he concluded Friday’s court proceedings. “Not only for Google, but for the public.”

An adequate substitute for Google ads

If Google charges higher prices for advertising, are there suitable substitutes that advertisers would flee to? The answer to that question can say a lot about whether or not Google has the monopoly power that the DOJ alleges it has created through the contracts it has to be the default search engine on various browsers and devices. Google says there’s plenty of alternatives for advertisers; the government disagrees.

Mehta seemed sympathetic to the government’s arguments, though he acknowledged that alternatives to Google are robust ad companies in their own right. Amazon, for instance, isn’t exactly an inferior substitute to Google for ads, said Mehta. Unlike wrapping a sandwich in newspaper instead of cellophane, Mehta said, “If you move your ad money from Google to Amazon, you’re not wrapping your ad in newspaper.”

But Mehta later differentiated ad platforms like Facebook and TikTok from Google. Users searching on Google come with a strong idea of what they’re looking for, pretty much spelling it out in the query. Social media platforms often have to infer that intent from indirect signals.

In 2017, Google ran an experiment over several weeks and found it could increase prices five to 15 percent while still growing revenue

In 2017, Google ran an experiment over several weeks and found it could increase prices five to 15 percent while still growing revenue. “Google is able to decide on what the margin that they are going to acquire is. And that’s why they’re running experiments to say, ‘well if we up it by 15 percent, how much are we going to lose in revenue?’” Mehta said to Schmidtlein. “That’s something that only a monopolist could do, right?” Schmidtlein disagreed, saying it’s fair to run pricing experiments to figure out if they’re charging the right price.

Mehta pointed out that there was “no evidence that Google ever looks at a competitors’ pricing” for that purpose. Schmidtlein responded it wasn’t that simple. Because ads are sold through a complicated auction, not even Google has total insight into the pricing mechanism behind it. It simply isn’t the same as a Coca-Cola rep walking through a grocery store to see Pepsi’s prices.

Sabotaging ads on Bing

The plaintiff states — the attorneys general for 38 states led by Colorado and Nebraska that brought the suit alongside the DOJ — are also arguing that Google intentionally dragged its feet when building certain features for SA360, its search engine marketing tool. SA360 helps advertisers manage ads through different platforms — not just Google, but competitors like Microsoft’s Bing.

The states say that Google lagged behind in building a SA360 feature for Bing ads when it had already implemented it for Google search ads.

“The evidence here is a little bit tricky for Google,” Mehta said, noting the significance of Google having said rather publicly at the start that it was “not going to play favorites” when it came to SA360. While Google could have chosen to exclude Microsoft from the tool at the outset, “that’s not the choice they made,” Mehta said.

The tool was not delivered for nearly five years after Microsoft asked for it. “How can that not be at least inferred to be anticompetitive?” Mehta asked.

Deleted chats

Hanging over the whole case is an issue about whether Google intentionally deleted or failed to retain documents that might have been used as evidence in this trial.

Google had a policy of having “history off” on its chats by default, leaving it to employees to determine when to turn it on for relevant conversations. DOJ’s Dintzer called the alleged destruction of documents “unequivocal and honestly breathtaking.” He added that “there’s no question” executives “intentionally had conversations with history off.”

“Google’s retention policy leaves a lot to be desired,” said the judge, adding disapprovingly that it was “surprising to me that a company would leave it to their employees to decide when to preserve documents.”

“Google’s retention policy leaves a lot to be desired”

Soon after, Dintzer’s slide deck paused on a slide that simply read “This is Wrong,” as the DOJ attorney pointed out Google never apologized for the unretained documents nor promised not to do it again in the future. He said it’s imperative that the court impose sanctions that show the risk of destroying documents is not worthwhile. The DOJ is asking Mehta to make an adverse inference about Google for any element of the case where he doesn’t think plaintiffs have sufficient evidence. That would mean the judge would assume that any deleted chats would have been bad for Google and showed their anticompetitive intent behind their contracts with manufacturers and browsers. The DOJ also wants Mehta to take the destroyed chats as a signal of its anticompetitive intent.

Google attorney Colette Connor said the company’s lawyers had informed the state of Texas (one of the plaintiffs) early on about their retention policies. Dintzer said even that disclosure came months after the litigation hold and that the DOJ “clearly” would have acted had they known.

Mehta didn’t seem to buy Google’s defense. “It’s interesting to me that Google has been very deliberate — and perhaps after seeing what’s happened with Microsoft – very deliberate in advising employees in what not to say,” he said. In a training for employees, the company advised avoiding terms like “market share.” (Bloomberg Law has noted this is a common practice in large companies.)

It’s now up to Mehta to decide how those absent chats should be accounted for. He hasn’t provided a timeline for his decision, but in the meantime, Google and the DOJ will be preparing for their second antitrust face-off over advertising technology in the fall.

Microsoft needs some time to ‘refine’ updates for Copilot AI in Windows

Microsoft needs some time to ‘refine’ updates for Copilot AI in Windows

The Verge

Microsoft’s latest Windows Insider blog posts say that when it comes to testing new Copilot features in Windows 11, “We have decided to pause the rollouts of these experiences to further refine them based on user feedback.” For people who already have the feature, “Copilot in Windows will continue to work as expected while we continue to evolve new ideas with Windows Insiders.”

Microsoft is holding an AI event on May 20th which would be a good time to show more of what’s next, and after setting up 2024 as “the year of the AI PC,” with a new Copilot key on Windows keyboards, there’s a lot to live up to.

We’re expecting to see new Surface laptops powered by Qualcomm’s Snapdragon X Elite processors that run Windows on Arm and compete with Apple’s M3-powered MacBook Air. Meanwhile, new features for Windows are expected to include an AI Explorer app that resembles the old Windows 10 Timeline feature that remembered what you were doing and allowed users to pick up tasks across different devices, and play up the idea of a “Copilot for every person.”

Screenshot by Tom Warren / The Verge

The animated Copilot icon at work

Copilot features Microsoft recently tested in the preview include one where the Copilot taskbar icon animated to show when the AI assistant could help. You could then hover the mouse icon over it to see your options, like getting an AI-generated summary of text.

Image: Microsoft

Copilot in its own app window

Another allowed Copilot in Windows to pop out of the sidebar and into a normal application window, which users could resize and move around. This feature started rolling out to the Canary channel in March.

New builds going out to both the Dev and Beta channels include a fix for Copilot unexpectedly auto-launching after a restart. There’s also a new shortcut in the right-click menu for tabs in File Explorer, allowing users to duplicate the current tab. But for those who keep a close eye on Task Manager, the most important note of all is that Microsoft has updated the units to correctly reflect memory speed, going from the MHz of yesteryear to a DDR-ready MT/s count.

Google bans advertisers from promoting deepfake porn services

Google bans advertisers from promoting deepfake porn services

Illustration: The Verge

Google has had a longstanding ban on sexually explicit ads — but until now, the company hasn’t banned advertisers from promoting services that people can use to make deepfake porn and other forms of generated nudes. That’s about to change.

Google currently prohibits advertisers from promoting “sexually explicit content,” which Google defines as “text, image, audio, or video of graphic sexual acts intended to arouse.” The new policy now bans the advertisement of services that help users create that type of content as well, whether by altering a person’s image or generating a new one.

The change, which will go into effect on May 30th, prohibits “promoting synthetic content that has been altered or generated to be sexually explicit or contain nudity,” such as websites and apps that instruct people on how to create deepfake porn.

“This update is to explicitly prohibit advertisements for services that offer to create deepfake pornography or synthetic nude content,” Google spokesperson Michael Aciman tells The Verge.

Aciman says any ads that violate its policies will be removed, adding that the company uses a combination of human reviews and automated systems to enforce those policies. In 2023, Google removed over 1.8 billion ads for violating its policies on sexual content, according to the company’s annual Ads Safety Report.

The change was first reported by 404 Media. As 404 notes, while Google already prohibited advertisers from promoting sexually explicit content, some apps that facilitate the creation of deepfake pornography have gotten around this by advertising themselves as non-sexual on Google ads or in the Google Play store. For example, one face swapping app didn’t advertise itself as sexually explicit on the Google Play store but did so on porn sites.

Nonconsensual deepfake pornography has become a consistent problem in recent years. Two Florida middle schoolers were arrested last December for allegedly creating AI-generated nude photos of their classmates. Just this week, a 57-year-old Pittsburgh man was sentenced to more than 14 years in prison for possessing deepfake child sexual abuse material. Last year, the FBI issued an advisory about an “uptick” in extortion schemes that involved blackmailing people with AI-generated nudes. While many AI models make it difficult — if not impossible — for users to create AI-generated nudes, some services let users generate sexual content.

There may soon be legislative action on deepfake porn. Last month, the House and Senate introduced the DEFIANCE Act, which would establish a process through which victims of “digital forgery” could sue people who make or distribute nonconsensual deepfakes of them.

Why Google Employees Aren’t Reacting to US Antitrust Trial

Why Google Employees Aren’t Reacting to US Antitrust Trial They shrugged off concerns about the company’s fate ahead of closing arguments in the Justice Department’s lawsuit this week.

Microsoft says it did a lot for responsible AI in inaugural transparency report

Microsoft says it did a lot for responsible AI in inaugural transparency report

Illustration: The Verge

A new report from Microsoft outlines the steps the company took to release responsible AI platforms last year.

In its Responsible AI Transparency Report, which mainly covers 2023, Microsoft touts its achievements around safely deploying AI products. The annual AI transparency report is one of the commitments the company made after signing a voluntary agreement with the White House in July last year. Microsoft and other companies promised to establish responsible AI systems and commit to safety.

Microsoft says in the report that it created 30 responsible AI tools in the past year, grew its responsible AI team, and required teams making generative AI applications to measure and map risks throughout the development cycle. The company notes that it added Content Credentials to its image generation platforms, which puts a watermark on a photo, tagging it as made by an AI model.

The company says it’s given Azure AI customers access to tools that detect problematic content like hate speech, sexual content, and self-harm, as well as tools to evaluate security risks. This includes new jailbreak detection methods, which were expanded in March this year to include indirect prompt injections where the malicious instructions are part of data ingested by the AI model.

It’s also expanding its red-teaming efforts, including both in-house red teams that deliberately try to bypass safety features in its AI models as well as red-teaming applications to allow third-party testing before releasing new models.

However, its red-teaming units have their work cut out for them. The company’s AI rollouts have not been immune to controversies.

When Bing AI first rolled out in February 2023, users found the chatbot confidently stating incorrect facts and, at one point, taught people ethnic slurs. In October, users of the Bing image generator found they could use the platform to generate photos of Mario (or other popular characters) flying a plane to the Twin Towers. Deepfaked nude images of celebrities like Taylor Swift made the rounds on X in January, which reportedly came from a group sharing images made with Microsoft Designer. Microsoft ended up closing the loophole that allowed for those pictures to be generated. At the time, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said the images were “alarming and terrible.”

Natasha Crampton, chief responsible AI officer at Microsoft, says in an email sent to The Verge that the company understands AI is still a work in progress and so is responsible AI.

“Responsible AI has no finish line, so we’ll never consider our work under the Voluntary AI commitments done. But we have made strong progress since signing them and look forward to building on our momentum this year,” Crampton says.

Peloton announces new round of layoffs as CEO quits

Peloton announces new round of layoffs as CEO quits

Another dark day for Peloton. | Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Peloton’s CEO Barry McCarthy is stepping down after announcing yet another round of layoffs, this time affecting about 15 percent of its remaining workforce, or roughly 400 global team members. It’s the fifth round of layoffs to hit the pandemic darling and comes after McCarthy said on its Q1 2023 earnings call that the company was done with layoffs and that the “ship was turning.”

“Hard as the decision has been to make additional headcount cuts, Peloton simply had no other way to bring its spending in line with its revenue,” said McCarthy in his outgoing message, noting that it’s a crucial step as the company seeks to refinance its debt. The layoffs are part of a 12-month restructuring program meant to reduce annual expenses by more than $200 million.

Board members Karen Boone and Chris Bruzzo will take on the role of interim co-CEOs.

Back in 2022, Peloton shed 500 jobs in October, 800 in August, 500 in July, and around 2,800 employees in February. The company’s workforce now sits at just over 3,000 employees globally after today’s cuts. That’s a big drop from Peloton’s peak of 8,600 employees in 2021.

The move is the latest chapter in the company’s volatile history. Peloton thrived during quarantine and had invested hundreds of millions in its supply chain to address pandemic-related shipping delays. However, it failed to foresee how demand would shift once the world reopened after the covid-19 vaccines.

Google Antitrust Trial Concludes With Closing Arguments

Google Antitrust Trial Concludes With Closing Arguments The first tech monopoly trial of the modern internet era is concluding. The judge’s ruling is likely to weigh heavily on a pipeline of similar antitrust cases.

TikTok and Universal Music Group end feud with new agreement

TikTok and Universal Music Group end feud with new agreement

Taylor Swift’s label is returning to TikTok’s one billion-plus users. | Photo by DAVID GRAY/AFP via Getty Images

Universal Music Group has inked a “multi-dimensional” deal with TikTok that will see its roster of artists — which includes Taylor Swift, Drake, and Olivia Rodrigo — return to the social media platform’s one billion-plus users. UMG began pulling its music from TikTok on February 1st after the old contract expired.

Notably, the deal will address concerns that UMG and its artists have with generative AI. “TikTok and UMG will work together to ensure AI development across the music industry will protect human artistry and the economics that flow to those artists and songwriters,” reads a press release announcing the deal. “TikTok is also committed to working with UMG to remove unauthorized AI-generated music from the platform, as well as tools to improve artist and songwriter attribution.”

“We are delighted to welcome UMG and UMPG back to TikTok,” said Ole Obermann, TikTok’s Global Head of Music Business Development. “In particular, we will work together to make sure that AI tools are developed responsibly to enable a new era of musical creativity and fan engagement while protecting human creativity.”

The deal also includes “new monetization opportunities” that stem from TikTok’s growing e-commerce capabilities. TikTok also commits to continue building tools to help artists better leverage the platform in areas like analytics and integrated ticketing.

The companies say they are “working expeditiously” to return artists to the platform.

Asus won’t say if the ROG Ally’s SD card reader will ever be truly fixed

Asus won’t say if the ROG Ally’s SD card reader will ever be truly fixed

The Asus ROG Ally. | Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge

What is Asus hiding?

Two weeks ago, I told you how Asus has officially extended its warranty on the ROG Ally gaming handheld’s SD card reader to two full years in the United States, presumably to give you more time to get it fixed. But Asus refuses to confirm to The Verge that it’s actually identified a fix for the issue. If you ship your Ally back to Asus, there’s no guarantee the problem won’t reappear.

Early on, some ROG Ally buyers discovered the SD card readers had a tendency to fail and possibly damage your SD cards in the process. One law firm, CSK&D, even threatened to pursue a class-action lawsuit on behalf of owners, though I haven’t yet found record of an actual suit being filed, and its class-action website has since been removed.

Last July, Asus confirmed the SD card reader issue and suggested it might be due to a temperature problem, writing that “under certain thermal stress conditions the SD card reader may malfunction.” It released an update that increased the speeds of the gadget’s fans to compensate, but that doesn’t seem to have solved the problem.

Nine months later, the company’s new warranty announcement seems to confirm the worst — Asus is now even offering to reimburse you for damaged SD cards if you return them alongside a ROG Ally that needs service.

But on the r/ROGAlly subreddit, a moderator pointed out that there’s no guarantee of a fix, writing that “we still advise against using an SD card” because “devices returned from RMA as recently as this month still have the issue.” And the offer’s only good in the United States.

Anecdotally, I’m definitely seeing some alleged owners on Reddit and Discord say that Asus came through for them with fixed SD card readers, and some say Asus customer support confirmed there was some sort of fix.

But if that’s true, why wouldn’t Asus confirm that to me? When I asked whether there was a fix, and what percentage of ROG Ally systems have this issue, the company completely dodged my questions.

Here’s an email conversation I had with Asus rep Anthony Spence:

1) Has Asus actually found a hardware fix for the faulty SD card readers? If someone RMAs their Ally to Asus this way, will they get an SD card reader that no longer fails?

Our commitment is to assist all customers effectively. If any user suspects they’re encountering issues with their products, we encourage them to reach out and make use of our RMA process as needed. They can expect us to provide a suitable resolution.

2) What percentage of ROG Ally systems have this issue?

We cannot comment on this at this time.

3) Assuming there is no hardware fix yet, why has the warranty only been extended by one year?

Apologies Sean, but we cannot comment on assumptions.

4) What does Asus plan to do for customers in territories outside the US? Will we see warranty extensions and SD card reimbursement elsewhere?

Service policies vary from region to region and are subject to local laws and regulations. While I cannot provide you a blanket statement that encompasses all global operations, you can rest assured that our focus is quality and our objective is to effectively answer our users concerns, regardless of location.

After I explained to Asus that it hadn’t answered the questions, it considered that for two days — then replied that “we won’t further comment beyond what has been stated and is contained in the statement.”

The SD card reader isn’t a must-have for the ROG Ally. You can fit a decent number of games in its internal storage, and it has one of the easiest handheld SSDs to replace with a larger one.

The Ally has improved in many other small ways since last year: while my biggest original complaints remain, the company’s Armory Crate SE software is snappier and more reliable than it was at launch. It just got a hotly anticipated framerate boosting AMD driver feature, too.

TikTok seems to be dodging App Store commissions in Epic fashion

TikTok seems to be dodging App Store commissions in Epic fashion

It’s unclear how many TikTok users are being prompted in-app to visit its website for cheaper TikTok Coins. | The Verge

TikTok appears to be probing App Store rules that require it to pay the “Apple tax” on in-app purchases. According to Sendit app co-founder David Tesler, some TikTok users are being directed to purchase TikTok coins — digital tokens used to tip creators during live streams — on the company’s website via an in-app link, effectively dodging the 30 percent commission Apple takes on digital purchases.

Screenshots acquired by Tesler show at least two instances where iOS users are encouraged to “recharge” their TikTok coins on TikTok.com to explicitly “avoid in-app service fees.” Tapping the “try now” link on these notifications opens an embedded web view where users can access payment options like Apple Pay, PayPal, or credit/debit cards to bypass App Store fees. A message on this page informs users that they can save “around 25 percent with a lower third-party service fee” compared to purchasing coins in the TikTok app.

TikTok might get banned from the app store next week

Why? It looks like they’re circumventing apple fee by directing users to purchase coins via external payment methods pic.twitter.com/VG8ihvsRmv

— David Tesler (@getdavenow) April 30, 2024

Tipping has fallen under the same category as other in-app purchases on the App Store since 2017 after Apple demanded its 30 percent cut from popular Chinese social network WeChat. And while Epic Games didn’t direct users to its website, TikTok’s decision to dodge Apple’s commission fees holds similarities to the direct payment option added to Fortnite in 2020 that led to a multi-year legal battle after the game got booted from the App Store.

The alternative payment feature is only being shown to a select group of TikTok users, according to Tesler, noting the account that provided the screenshots had previously purchased a large amount of coins. It’s unclear how many users have been presented with these in-app web links, though the purchasing options could suggest TikTok is targeting users who typically purchase large quantities of TikTok coins. Coin options range from packs of 70 (priced at 74 cents) to custom quantities that state “large amount supported.”

Image: TikTok / The Verge

These promotional messages arent exactly subtle, even if only a handful of TikTok users may be seeing them.

TikTok’s support page makes no mention of the ability to buy TikTok coins via its website, listing just the App Store and Google Play as locations where coins can be purchased. Neither TikTok nor Apple have responded to our request for comment at this time.

It’s likely that TikTok is violating Apple App Store rules with this feature. Apple started allowing select services to include in-app website links back in 2022, though this was limited to “reader” apps like Kindle, Netflix, and Spotify, and could only be used for things like account management or creation. And as noted by TechCrunch, only apps that don’t offer in-app purchases (which TikTok certainly does) are permitted to make use of this External Link Entitlement.

These violations seem like something that Apple would swiftly (and typically, aggressively) seek to rectify, though the company doesn’t appear to have taken any action yet. Apple is currently stonewalling Spotify from implementing similar in-app weblinks in the EU despite being fined about $2 billion for its App Store practices. And TikTok’s immense user base — last reported to be over a billion monthly active global users — makes it trickier to simply evict from the App Store, with Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman claiming “the only way Apple removes TikTok over this is if it wants to destroy itself.”

Meta and Google Are Betting on AI Voice Assistants. Will They Take Off?

Meta and Google Are Betting on AI Voice Assistants. Will They Take Off? Meta, Google and others are driving a renaissance for voice assistants, but people have found the technology uncool for more than a decade.

Turns out the Rabbit R1 was just an Android app all along

Turns out the Rabbit R1 was just an Android app all along

I mean, at least it’s just $200? | Image: David Pierce / The Verge

Since it launched last week, Rabbit’s R1 AI gadget has inspired a lot of questions, starting with “Why isn’t this just an app?” Well, friends, that’s because it is just an app.

Over at Android Authority, Mishaal Rahman managed to download Rabbit’s launcher APK on a Google Pixel 6A. With a little tweaking, he was able to run the app as if it were on Rabbit’s own device. Using the volume-up key in place of the R1’s single hardware button, he was able to set up an account and start asking it questions, just as if he was using the $199 R1.

Oh boy.

Rahman points out that the app probably doesn’t offer all of the same functionality as the R1. In his words: “the Rabbit R1’s launcher app is intended to be preinstalled in the firmware and be granted several privileged, system-level permissions — only some of which we were able to grant — so some of the functions would likely fail if we tried.” But the fact that the software runs on a midrange phone from almost two years ago suggests that it has more in common with a plain ‘ol Android app than not.

The R1 isn’t alone; Humane’s AI pin appears to run on a version of Android’s open-source software, too. But it’s the R1 in the hot seat right now as the first reviews have started to trickle out — and they’re not great, Bob. Rabbit issued its first software update earlier today to address some complaints, including a fast-draining battery. That issue seems to be better controlled post-update; my R1’s idle battery performance is vastly improved after downloading the update this morning.

But the bigger problem is that the R1 just doesn’t do enough useful things to justify its existence when, you know, phones exist. We’ve reached out to Rabbit for comment on this, and we’ll update this article if the company has a statement. In the meantime, it looks like this AI gadget could have just been an app after all.

Erling Haaland becomes the first ‘real person’ in Clash of Clans

Erling Haaland becomes the first ‘real person’ in Clash of Clans

Image: Supercell

Manchester City superstar Erling Haaland is becoming a playable video game character in Clash of Clans this week. It’s the first time a real person has been added to the game, and footballer Haaland will become the Barbarian King character during a month-long football-themed seasonal event.

Clash players will be able to recruit the Norwegian striker or raid his village and ruin it — perfect if you’re an Arsenal fan like me.

Haaland has played Clash of Clans for more than 10 years and reached out to Supercell, the Finnish game developers behind the popular mobile game, to make a partnership happen. Supercell jumped at the opportunity. “When we heard Erling Haaland was a fan of our game and that he wanted to partner with us, it was really a dream scenario,” says Stuart McGaw, general manager of Clash of Clans.

Image: Supercell

Haaland in Clash of Clans.

Haaland was around 10 years old when he first discovered Clash, and has built up an in-game village in the fantasy-theme world. “I’ve been a huge fan of the game for a long time and know everything about it, so to appear as an in-game character is really cool,” says Haaland.

The special Haaland season starts tomorrow and runs until May 31st, and if you take down Haaland in the battlefield you’ll win additional rewards and a place on the leaderboards.

Still, it’s not as cool as having your own PERi-PERi Saka sauce in Nando’s, because everyone loves a cheeky Nando’s.

From Baby Talk to Baby A.I.

From Baby Talk to Baby A.I. Could a better understanding of how infants acquire language help us build smarter A.I. models?

Binance’s Founder Plans a Comeback Even as He Faces Prison Time

Binance’s Founder Plans a Comeback Even as He Faces Prison Time Since pleading guilty to violating money-laundering rules, Changpeng Zhao, who ran the giant crypto exchange Binance, has networked across the United States to set up his next act.

Maybe go look at Google’s AR animals before they enter the grave

Maybe go look at Google’s AR animals before they enter the grave

The shark still looks fake. | Image: Wes Davis / The Verge

Remember Google’s AR search, which can make augmented reality bugs, dinos, neat objects, and buildings appear atop the real world through the lens of your phone? Now might be a good time to take it in because it seems to be vanishing.

According to 9to5Google, the number of animals that will give you AR renders when you search for them has shriveled to just a few. My editor, Richard Lawler, saw the same thing on his Pixel 8 Pro, as did I when I checked my Pixel 6. But when I searched in Safari on my iPhone 15 Pro, there they were: Tyrannosaurus Rex, Spinosaurus, Rhinoceros Beetle, Jewel Beetle, and a Giant Panda!

Perhaps it’s just a bug? Or perhaps Safari is a temporary workaround.

Screenshot: Wes Davis / The Verge

Hey Stillwater, mind not sitting on my guitar?

It wouldn’t be surprising if AR search is shuffling off to the graveyard. Earlier this year, Google jettisoned hundreds of AR hardware employees. The company also lost key leaders of its AR team last year and reportedly shuttered its Project Iris AR glasses in June.

When it rolled out in early 2020, Google’s AR search feature was a boon for some folks stuck in covid lockdown — particularly those of us with children to entertain. It started with animals like tigers, alligators, and mallard ducks, but Google steadily added more creatures, including dinosaurs and bugs. Eventually, the collection grew to include NASA artifacts and fictional characters like Pac-Man, Hello Kitty, and even Pedro Pascal’s son, Baby Yoda.

We asked Google to explain what’s happening, but it didn’t give us an answer by press time. We’ll update if that changes. In the meantime, maybe now is a good time to go look at some AR animals — if they’re still showing up for you. Just in case.

Fiido Air review: so lightweight you’ll forget it’s an e-bike

Fiido Air review: so lightweight you’ll forget it’s an e-bike

‘The world’s lightest city e-bike’ claim is worth a test, if not your $1,799.

Yes, that’s an electric bike, though you wouldn’t know it from looks alone, or from hoisting it up some stairs since it weighs as much as a regular city bike at just 30 pounds (about 14kg).

What you’re looking at is the Fiido Air, a carbon fiber e-bike from the Chinese company I tested on a whim once, just to see what a $999 direct-to-consumer electric bike was like. Not great, it turned out, and its follow-up had a habit of breaking in two.

But hey, I’m a forgiving type and the company did make amends to those affected. And Fiido says the Air is “the world’s lightest city e-bike” with a “super early bird” price tag of just $1799 at launch (or €1799 in Europe) — rising to $1999 and then $2799 later, ahead of August shipments. That’s just too tempting not to test, especially when it costs half that of the comparable Gogoro Eeyo.

And after spending more than a month with a Fiido Air as my daily rider, I gotta say — I’m impressed... so long as you ignore the app and the silly smartwatch it ships with, and aren’t afraid of doing a little wrenching and troubleshooting yourself.

The first thing you’ll notice about the Fiido Air is the battery — or lack of any visible trace because it’s integrated into the slender frame. Normally that’s a problem but this bike, unlike VanMoofs and some Amplers, is something that many can still haul into an elevator or up a flight of stairs in a pinch due to the liberal use of rigid and lightweight carbon fiber in the bike frame, front fork, handlebar, and seat post stem.

In fact, you wouldn’t know it’s an e-bike at all if it wasn’t for the giant ON / OFF graphic that Fiido inexplicably chose to blaze across the frame as if its owner needs to be forever reminded of where that button is. The otherwise clean design is helped by internally routed cables.

The 250W Mivice rear-hub motor is paired with a Mivice torque sensor for an intuitive assist.

My bike arrived partially assembled in its shipping box. A spacer for my front axel assembly was jammed into the packing materials, however, causing me to overlook it when I assembled the front wheel and handlebars. I could tell something was wrong, and eventually sorted it out with the help of Fiido support, but less experienced bicycle owners might have just lived with the slightly noisy, slightly wobbly, and potentially dangerous assembly.

My European Fiido Air is fitted with a 250W Mivice rear-hub motor and Mivice torque sensor (as you’d expect in this price range) to make the pedal-assisted power feel more natural. It also features plenty of off-the-shelf parts that should help make it easy to service at any local bike shop. That’s not always the case with Fiido’s cheaper e-bikes that use parts not widely available outside of China (I once had a terrible time finding brake pads). The Fiido Air uses Shimano BR-MT410 hydraulic brakes, a Velo saddle, and a Gates Carbon Drive CDX belt drive, with the latter rarely needing servicing unless your bike was shipped with a loose belt, like mine was.

Tightening the belt isn’t difficult, but it’s also not intuitive. Nevertheless, it’s never nice to spend $2000 and find that your transmission slips with a loud clunk when stepping hard on the crank to quickly cross the street against oncoming traffic. I also had to recently lubricate the bottom bracket (where the crankset attaches to the bicycle) after the pedals began making a horrible creaking sound on each downward stroke. Both of these fixes were relatively simple to do, but not something that’s usually required after just a few weeks of riding.

The Air is equipped with a fingerprint sensor that’s surrounded by a colorful light ring. To prevent people from riding off with the e-bike after hitting the well-labeled ON/OFF button, the motor can be configured to unlock with the fingerprint sensor. This worked surprisingly well 99 percent of the time. It worked fine in light rain, so long as I was able to dry it off and shield it, but I once tried to unlock it in a heavy downpour, and no amount of wiping allowed the sensor to recognize my finger. That meant opening the app to unlock the motor.

The app is... terrible, and should be avoided at all cost. Fortunately, it can be abandoned for day-to-day use, but not until you suffer through it for initial setup, and then occasionally to check the battery level — which seems to be off by as much as 20 percent — since there’s no indication of it on the bike itself. It’s a shame Fiido didn’t repurpose the colored ring around the fingerprint sensor for some kind of battery indicator.

After the fingerprint sensor unlocks the bike, more taps will steadily increase the power assist with corresponding rings of color — yellow, blue, a slightly brighter blue, and green — to show the current selection. A quick double tap on the sensor turns the integrated running lights on and off. Unfortunately, the bike doesn’t remember your preferred setting when turning it on and off.

Fiido ships the e-bike with a cheap plastic-y Fiido Mate smartwatch, which is just laughably bad. It can be used to unlock the motor or as a dashboard on your wrist — but can’t be easily attached to the frame. After testing it once I never used it again. I already wear an Apple Watch, but there’s no app for that.

The Fiido Air puts the rider in a very aggressive and sporty position, which creates an awkward hand position that’s less than ideal for long commutes or casual city riding. But it is fun! The pedal assist is delivered smoothly, intuitively, and very quietly, but the motor’s modest 40nm of torque makes this single-speed e-bike best suited for mostly flat commutes. Out of the box the Fiido Air has a 15.5mph (25km/h) top speed that shoots up to 18.6mph (30km/h) with a simple (and often illegal) software setting.

Fiido says the Air can go up to 80km (about 50 miles) on a single charge which is wildly optimistic for its 209Wh non-removable battery, but may be doable in the lowest power setting (I always tested in max). In my testing, pedal assist was already noticeably degraded after around 40km (25 miles) of riding. Fiido also sells an optional bolt-on range extender that can you take inside to charge from Fiido’s relatively small charging brick.

For what’s supposed to be an e-bike for cities, it ships without a kickstand, bell, or any mudguards which means a rooster tail of spatter on your back if you get caught in the rain. It does have attachment points for front and rear fenders though, if you decide to go that route. It also comes with Kenda 700*40C tires that look better suited for gravel than city streets.

Overall, I’ve really enjoyed using the Fiido Air as my primary city ride for the last six weeks and change. For $1799 it’s a good deal for anyone looking for a nicely designed and lightweight e-bike. For $1999 it’s still worth a hard look, but for $2799 I’d consider other options first.

All photography by Thomas Ricker / The Verge

Financial Times signs licensing deal with OpenAI

Financial Times signs licensing deal with OpenAI

Illustration by Cath Virginia / The Verge | Photos by Getty Images

The Financial Times has struck a deal with OpenAI to license its content and develop AI tools, the latest news organization to work with the AI company.

The FT writes in a press release that ChatGPT users will see summaries, quotes, and links to its articles. Any prompt that returns information from the FT will be attributed to the publication.

In return, OpenAI will work with the news organization to develop new AI products. The FT already uses OpenAI products, saying it is a customer of ChatGPT Enterprise. Last month, the FT released a generative AI search function on beta powered by Anthropic’s Claude large language model. Ask FT lets subscribers find information across the publication’s articles.

Financial Times Group CEO John Ridding says that even as the company partners with OpenAI, the publication continues to commit to “human journalism.”

“It’s right, of course, that AI platforms pay publishers for the use of their material,” Ridding says. He adds that “it’s clearly in the interests of users that these products contain reliable sources.”

OpenAI has made several deals with news organizations to license content to train AI models. Axel Springer, which publishes Business Insider, Politico, and the European publications Bild and Welt, signed a similar agreement with OpenAI to pull data from its articles. The Associated Press also allows OpenAI to train its models on their data. However, OpenAI reportedly offers between $1 million and $5 million to license content from publications, significantly less than what other companies like Apple are offering.

Other news organizations have a much different relationship with OpenAI. The New York Times sued OpenAI and Microsoft for copyright infringement in December 2023, alleging that ChatGPT “recites Times content verbatim.” The Intercept, Raw Story, and AlterNet filed a separate lawsuit against OpenAI and Microsoft with similar allegations in February.

Friends From the Old Neighborhood Turn Rivals in Big Tech’s A.I. Race

Friends From the Old Neighborhood Turn Rivals in Big Tech’s A.I. Race Demis Hassabis and Mustafa Suleyman, who both grew up in London, feared a corporate rush to build artificial intelligence. Now they’re driving that competition at Google and Microsoft.

Meta’s ‘set it and forget it’ AI ad tools are misfiring and blowing through cash

Meta’s ‘set it and forget it’ AI ad tools are misfiring and blowing through cash

Image: Cath Virginia / The Verge

It was Valentine’s Day when Meta’s ad platform started going off the rails. RC Williams, the co-founder of the Philadelphia-based marketing agency 1-800-D2C, had set one of Meta’s automated ad tools to run campaigns for two separate clients. But when he checked the platform that day, he found that Meta had blown through roughly 75 percent of the daily ad budgets for both clients in under a couple of hours.

Williams told The Verge that the ads’ CPMs, or cost per impressions, were roughly 10 times higher than normal. A usual CPM of under $28 had inflated to roughly $250, way above the industry average. That would have been bad enough if the revenue earned from those ads wasn’t nearly zero. If you’re not a marketer, this might feel like spending a week’s worth of grocery money on a prime cut of wagyu at a steakhouse, only for the waiter to return with a floppy slider.

The Verge spoke to several marketers and businesses that advertise on Meta’s platforms who tell a similar story. Meta’s automated ad platform has been blowing through budgets and failing to deliver sales. Small businesses have seen their ad dollars get wiped out and wasted as a result, and some have said the bouts of overspending are driving them from Meta’s platforms.

“Meta’s unwillingness to be transparent or accountable with the performance issues and glitches is causing mass uncertainty.”

“Meta’s unwillingness to be transparent or accountable with the performance issues and glitches is causing mass uncertainty,” Karl Baker, founder of meditation startup Mindfulness Works, wrote in a message to The Verge.

The faulty ad service in question, known as Advantage Plus shopping campaigns, is part of a full suite of AI-enabled ad tools that Meta pitches to businesses as a faster and more efficient alternative to manual ad campaigns. To create an ad campaign, advertisers upload their creative assets, pick their conversion goals (e.g., getting more customers to make purchases on Instagram), and then set their budget caps. Meta hyped Advantage Plus shopping campaigns during earnings calls as a carefree, “set it and forget it” automated solution to online ads. But that hasn’t been the case, marketers say.

Advantage Plus shopping campaigns have been unpredictable, seemingly working well on some days and then not so well on other days. The subreddit r/FacebookAds has become a sort of 24/7 help desk for Advantage Plus. Recent headings discussing the issues include “Advantage+ sucks,” “Is Facebook broken rn,” and “Is it just me?”

“People are always saying, ‘Is it me?’ or ‘Is it Meta?’” Baker said.

What Williams and many other marketers thought was a one-time glitch by Advantage Plus ended up becoming a recurring incident for weeks. “Since February 14th, [Advantage Plus] has overspent on numerous occasions and ignored the cost caps we have in place on it,” he said.

How is your Meta performance over the last 7 days?

— RC Williams (@thercwilliams) March 6, 2024

Problems have persisted into April. “We have a couple of clients for whom we completely stopped Advantage Plus due to these anomalies,” said Aniruddha Mishra, director of growth at Miami-based digital marketing agency Node Media. He noted that for some clients, CPMs on Meta were anywhere from three to four times more expensive than they were last year.

Advertisers say getting support from Meta has been a challenge, too. Meta laid off thousands of employees over the past year and gutted many of its customer support teams. As Digiday reported, Meta’s ad accounts teams were downsized, and many client inquiries are now being directed to AI chatbots. Several of the marketers that The Verge spoke to said that there’s been a noticeable decline in responsiveness from Meta since the transition.

“The only thing [Meta] acknowledged was there was a platform bug on February 14th and apologized for the inconvenience.”

“The only thing [Meta] acknowledged was there was a platform bug on February 14th and apologized for the inconvenience,” said Williams. “They didn’t tell us what actually happened.”

Meta eventually refunded 1-800-D2C for the incident, but Williams said it took him several tries to finally get someone from the company to acknowledge him. The company issued the refund almost a month after the incident.

While some users speculate that Advantage Plus is “glitching” or “broken,” Meta’s response has been to insist that the tool is functioning as it should.

“I’ve reached out to representatives at Meta, and I’ve been told that they’re not aware of any sort of glitch, which is truly shocking, because all my co-founder friends who work in e-commerce share this sentiment. They’re dealing with the same thing,” said Adriel Darvish, the CEO of a luxury handbag and jewelry service called Switch, in a phone interview with The Verge. “This is something universal that everyone is experiencing.”

pic.twitter.com/RZuulnWz8R

— Karl Baker (@KarlMindfulness) April 2, 2024

With the problems continuing to pile on, Williams said his marketing firm completely halted its use of Advantage Plus in early April. Instead, they’ve gone back to the old-fashioned method of buying Facebook and Instagram ads manually. Notably, going back to the pre-AI, pre-automated way of doing things hasn’t really taken a toll on the firm’s human labor force.

“Maybe an extra 10 to 20 minutes or so to build out the ad sets, but nothing crazy,” said Williams.

Meta first launched Advantage Plus shopping campaigns globally in the fall of 2022, when the state of online advertising was in an uncertain place. Just a year before, Apple had launched its App Tracking Transparency feature with iOS 14.5, giving users an easy way to opt out of the third-party app-based tracking that powers many online ads. Meta opposed the change, saying it would “change the internet as we know it” and threaten the future of many online businesses.

But Meta’s real concern was no doubt the threat to its own ad business, which chalked up a $10 billion dip in ad revenue in 2021 due to Apple’s changes. Targeted ads were no longer as effective since brands no longer had access to as much data, and they were becoming more expensive to boot. As a consequence, brands cut back on their online ad spend.

With Advantage Plus shopping campaigns, Meta promised that AI and machine learning models could effectively replace the big gaping hole left by Apple’s privacy update.

In lieu of tracking users, Advantage Plus uses the advertiser’s own first-party sales data to help target ads. But online advertisers would be effectively handing the reins over to Meta and no longer have access to the granular targeting controls and detailed analytics they did prior to Apple’s privacy changes.

Although there was a bit of a “learning curve” with Advantage Plus shopping, the tool gradually began to improve. Brands noticed their AI-driven Meta ad campaigns were performing well and poured more of their budgets into the platform. Adweek reported that by April 2023, marketers who had ditched Meta for TikTok ads and newer opportunities like connected TV were starting to come back.

Advertisers had a honeymoon period with Advantage Plus last year, especially as Meta began packing it with new features. “Advantage Plus was working so well at this point, for most of the clients, that almost 50 to 70 percent of their ad budget is on Meta’s Advantage Plus campaigns. There are so many targeting and evolutions they’ve done in the past year and a half. It delivers a really strong performance if you know how to tweak the right parameters,” said Mishra.

In an email to The Verge on April 15th, Meta spokesperson Kash Ayodele said the company had fixed a “few technical issues” with the Advantage Plus ad platform. “Our ads system is working as expected for the vast majority of advertisers. We recently fixed a few technical issues and are researching a small amount of additional reports from advertisers to ensure the best possible results for businesses using our apps.”

But marketers are still complaining about underperformance on the platform. “Things have recovered for many, but not all. It’s been a very turbulent end to Q1 and beginning of Q2,” wrote media buyer David Herrmann in a direct message to The Verge.

The dramatic increase in cost per click (CPC) and CPM is not just a Meta problem — online ads as a whole are getting costlier due to what marketers say are increased inefficiencies, which automation has only made worse. This significantly decreases profits for individual advertisers. And fixing this problem may be more complicated than fixing a “glitch” or series of glitches on Advantage Plus, especially since the millions that Meta as well as Google have poured into automated advertising hasn’t led to more successful ad campaigns.

“The performance of accounts and campaigns hasn’t intrinsically increased [over the last three years],” noted Hawke Media’s Areen Mayelan.

When ad campaigns are automated, such as with Meta’s Advantage Plus, “things get brushed under the rug,” said Mayelan. Everything from loose keywords to loose audiences to low-quality ads all effectively become inefficiencies that increase the cost of ads for brands. “Inefficiency results in an increase in CPCs and CPMs, because you’re creating artificial ‘competition’ where there otherwise might not be.”

Meanwhile, Meta only stands to benefit from the boost in ad revenue. According to Meta’s first quarter earnings call on Wednesday, its ad business is doing just fine. Ad revenue amounted to $35.64 billion for the quarter, an impressive jump of 27 percent from this time in 2023.

The Delta emulator will soon turn your iPad into a giant Nintendo DS

The Delta emulator will soon turn your iPad into a giant Nintendo DS

Delta is about to get better on the iPad. | Image: Riley Testut

The Delta emulator made a huge splash when it hit the Apple App Store earlier this month, quickly rocketing to the top spot in Apple’s free apps, where it remains today. Now, developer Riley Testut says an iPad-specific version is “near completion,” and will be released with Delta version 1.6. Testut says the app is already available for his Patreon supporters through “the regular AltStore,” which I take to mean the non-EU-specific one, rather than the Apple-approved AltStore PAL.

Of course, the iOS version already works on the iPad (and the Vision Pro, where I’ve been playing Metroid Prime Hunters). But a native version would let it take advantage of the full iPad screen real estate for better skins, including one that turns your tablet into more of a gigantic (or not so much, if you’re on an iPad Mini) Nintendo DS Lite. It also apparently will support iPad Split View:

After releasing the iPadOS native version of Delta, Testut says he will turn to bringing “device-to-device multiplayer” to the app. Multiplayer already works in Delta, but on a single device — which is nice for playing on a TV using AirPlay (although that introduces a lot of lag for me). Being able to play with other people on their own devices, especially if the app supports doing that over the internet, would be a very welcome change!

@verge

The best part about Delta Emulator: it’s for your TV, too. #deltaemulator #emulator #gameboy #gametok #retrogames

♬ original sound - The Verge

In a reply farther down the chain, Testut also says that Sega Genesis emulation is coming soon as well, as it’s currently in beta. It sounds like that also won’t happen until after the iPad version of the app is out, though.

I’m excited for the iPad version of the app to hit. Until then, I’ll be over here panic-drawing rainbows in Kirby Canvas Curse, which already works great with the Apple Pencil.