Google’s AI chatbot for your Gmail inbox is rolling out on Android
Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge
Google recently started letting you use its Gemini AI chatbot to ask questions about your Gmail inbox on the web, and now, that feature is coming to mobile. The company says its Gmail Q&A feature is starting to roll out on Android and that the feature will be “coming soon” to iOS.
Using Gmail Q&A, “you can ask Gemini questions about your inbox or to do things like find specific details in your emails, show you unread messages, view messages from a specific sender, or summarize emails about a topic in your inbox,” according to Google’s blog post. Google previewed Gmail Q&A earlier this year at its I/O conference.
Gmail Q&A could be a potentially useful way to sift through your email or find something that might be buried in the depths of your inbox. But note that the feature isn’t available to all users: you’ll need to subscribe to Google One AI Premium or be on a Google Workspace plan with the Gemini Business, Enterprise, Education, or Education Premium add-ons.
LG’s new smart home hub has a built-in voice assistant
The ThinQ On is LGs new smart home hub. A smart speaker, it uses generative AI for conversational commands and control of connected devices. | Image: LG
LG has announced the ThinQ ON, the company’s first dedicated smart home hub. The device, which was teased at CES earlier this year, will debut at the IFA 2024 tech show in Berlin, Germany, next week.
The ThinQ ON is an AI-powered hub that can connect and control LG appliances and other smart home devices via Thread, Matter, and Wi-Fi. It works on LG’s ThinQ smart home platform and uses LG’s Affectionate Intelligence to learn from your usage patterns, monitor your appliances, and allow for voice control of connected devices.
A small, circular white hub, the LG ThinQ ON is also a smart speaker with LG’s AI voice assistant onboard. The company says the assistant can understand natural language, interpret context, and learn user preferences. LG’s AI chipset powers the hub, and according to LG, it has been designed with future scalability in mind.
Image: LG
The ThinQ ON is LG’s new smart home hub.
Like most smart home hubs, the ON will allow you to control and monitor the settings of connected devices and create routines to enable smart home automations through LG’s ThinQ app.
The ThinQ ON is Matter-certified, and LG says it will support various network connectivity options, “including Wi-Fi and Thread.” It’s also compatible with a wide range of LG devices and “a growing number of appliances and IoT devices from other manufacturers.”
LG’s approach to the smart home to date has largely been limited to controlling its own devices and appliances. This new hub is the first major move toward becoming a more robust smart home platform, similar to Samsung and its SmartThings smart home platform.
Earlier this year, LG also announced that some of its TVs will work as Matter-enabled Google Home Hubs, allowing you to set up and control any Matter-compatible smart home devices, along with LG, Google, and Google Home devices, through the ThinQ app.
We don’t yet know how much the ThinQ ON will cost or when it will be available. We’ve contacted LG for more details and will be at IFA next week to see the new device in person.
California State Assembly passes sweeping AI safety bill
Illustration by Cath Virginia / The Verge | Photos from Getty Images
The California State Assembly has passed the Safe and Secure Innovation for Frontier Artificial Intelligence Models Act (SB 1047), Reuters reports. The bill is one of the first significant regulations of artificial intelligence in the US.
The bill, which has been a flashpoint for debate in Silicon Valley and beyond, would obligate AI companies operating in California to implement a number of precautions before they train a sophisticated foundation model. Those include making it possible to quickly and fully shut the model down, ensuring the model is protected against “unsafe post-training modifications,” and maintaining a testing procedure to evaluate whether a model or its derivatives is especially at risk of “causing or enabling a critical harm.”
Senator Scott Wiener, the bill’s main author, said SB 1047 is a highly reasonable bill that asks large AI labs to do what they’ve already committed to doing: test their large models for catastrophic safety risk. “We’ve worked hard all year, with open source advocates, Anthropic, and others, to refine and improve the bill. SB 1047 is well calibrated to what we know about forseeable AI risks, and it deserves to be enacted.”
SB 1047 — our AI safety bill — just passed off the Assembly floor. I’m proud of the diverse coalition behind this bill — a coalition that deeply believes in both innovation & safety.
AI has so much promise to make the world a better place. It’s exciting.
Critics of SB 1047 — including OpenAI and Anthropic, politicians Zoe Lofgren and Nancy Pelosi, and California’s Chamber of Commerce — have argued that it’s overly focused on catastrophic harms and could unduly harm small, open-source AI developers. The bill was amended in response, replacing potential criminal penalties with civil ones, narrowing enforcement powers granted to California’s attorney general, and adjusting requirements to join a “Board of Frontier Models” created by the bill.
After the State Senate votes on the amended bill — a vote that’s expected to pass — the AI safety bill will head to Governor Gavin Newsom, who will have until the end of September to decide its fate, according to The New York Times.
Anthropic declined to comment beyond pointing to a letter sent by Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei to Governor Newsom last week. OpenAI didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
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The best noise-canceling headphones to buy right now
Sony’s WH-1000XM5 headphones have an all-new design. | Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge
Get some peace and quiet with any of our top picks for noise-canceling headphones. Sony’s still the best overall, but there are reasons to go elsewhere, too.
Whether you’re wearing them for the morning commute, while traveling, or if you’re simply trying to find some peace and quiet while working at home, noise-canceling headphones are a more essential piece of kit nowadays than ever before. And you’ve got a slew of great options to pick from; it’s hard to make a bad choice.
There are longtime heavyweights like Bose and Sony to pick from. Apple has quickly carved into the market with the luxurious AirPods Max. And if you’ve got an ear that demands the best audio quality, headphones from Bowers & Wilkins and Sennheiser might appeal to you more than the mainstream contenders.
Not everyone loves the feel of earbuds, and there are scenarios where over-ear and on-ear headphones are just simpler or make more sense than wireless buds — particularly if lengthy battery life matters to you.
No matter how you’re using them, the criteria for picking the best noise-canceling headphones haven’t changed.
The “best” headphones for you will differ based on which of those factors you prioritize and care about most, but our overall pick for the best noise-canceling headphones remains Sony’s WH-1000XM5. They offer a combination of sound quality, comfort, and great noise cancellation that’s hard to beat.
Sony’s WH-1000XM5s have a completely different design from their predecessors. The changes result in greater comfort when you’re wearing them on your head for extended periods of time — like on a flight or if you’re at the office.
Noise cancellation has been further improved from the already-stellar performance of the M4, putting Sony at the front of the pack compared to all major competitors. Sound quality is more detailed and balanced than the older 1000XM4; the low end is still punchy but tighter and less boomy than before. The M5 offer the best voice call performance in the 1000X series to date, and they can connect to two devices simultaneously, so you can stay clued in to what’s happening on your phone when you’re working away on your laptop or tablet.
Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge
Sony’s WH-1000XM5 are the best overall choice for noise-canceling headphones.
Sony’s headphones also include unique features like “speak to chat,” which automatically pauses your music and pipes in ambient audio whenever you start talking. Or you can hold one hand over the right ear cup to activate quick attention mode, which is convenient when grabbing a coffee or listening to airport announcements. And like other high-end headphones, the 1000XM5 can detect when they’ve been removed from your ears for auto-pause.
The main downside of the WH-1000XM5 is that at $399.99, they’re more expensive than prior models. That’s a big reason to consider the 1000XM4, which were our previous top pick for noise-canceling headphones. They remain part of Sony’s lineup and can often be found on sale.
Bose’s QuietComfort Ultra Headphones are basically a blend of the company’s prior Noise Canceling Headphones 700 and QuietComfort 45 that borrow the best traits from both — while throwing in a new “immersive audio” listening mode. Like past Bose cans, they’re very light and comfortable on your head, even when worn for long stretches of time. Best of all, unlike the Noise Canceling Headphones 700, these can be folded to make them easier to travel with.
Their 24-hour battery life is more than adequate, and Bose has added support for the aptX Adaptive Bluetooth codec for improved audio fidelity on Android devices.
Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge
The immersive audio feature works well on some songs, but less so on others. It’s worth experimenting with, but even if you leave it off entirely, you’re left with best-in-class noise cancelation, pleasing sound, and a helpful “aware” transparency mode.
There was definitely some sticker shock when Apple introduced a $549 set of noise-canceling headphones in 2020. The AirPods Max cost significantly more money than any of our other recommendations. But Apple’s build quality is on another level: these trade the plastic you’ll find in many noise-canceling headphones for steel and aluminum, and the ear cups are a breathable mesh fabric. They’re hefty headphones, there’s no denying that. But aside from Apple refusing to include a headphone cable in the box, there’s nothing about the AirPods Max that feels cheap. And I appreciate the simplicity of using the digital crown for controls instead of relying on hit-or-miss gestures like taps and swipes.
The most important part is that the AirPods Max deliver audio quality that’s up there with the best high-end Bluetooth headphones. They have an immersive, wide soundstage and fantastic dynamics, and you’ll find yourself hopping around your music library just to hear what they bring out in your favorite songs.
Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge
The AirPods Max have a stylish design and very premium build quality.
Apple’s noise cancellation is on par with Sony and Bose, and no one does transparency mode better; at times, it can make you think you’re not wearing headphones at all. Extra features like Spatial Audio (surround sound for movies and TV shows) and automatic switching between Apple gadgets help make it a bit easier to swallow their daunting price.
But the AirPods Max do have faults. The carrying case is abysmal, battery life is only average for the category, and just like regular AirPods, they’re designed with Apple’s ecosystem in mind. It gets much harder to justify dropping $550 on them if you live outside the iPhone and Mac universe.
Rumors suggest that Apple could introduce a new pair of the AirPods Max with a USB-C connector — but few other changes — during the company’s iPhone 16 event on September 9th. So if you’re eager to rid your life of Lightning, it might be worth holding out until after the event. Then again, sometimes it’s hard to resist a standout deal.
If sound quality is priority number one, then Bowers & Wilkins has you covered with the PX7 S2e headphones. They exhibit superb, detailed sound quality that some people prefer to the AirPods Max. The Bowers & Wilkins cans are true to the company’s legacy and style, with a fine-crafted design that exudes quality. And the newer “e” variant has a revamped digital signal processing that can bring out the best audio quality from streaming music.
I prefer their physical buttons over the tap/swipe ear cup gestures of Sony’s 1000XM5. With 30 hours of battery life, they’re more than competitive with mainstream, less expensive picks. And the sound profile is delightfully warm and will bring out the most from your favorite music. The main downside of the PX7 S2e is that there’s no traditional 3.5mm or 2.5mm output for a headphone cable. You can still listen wired over USB-C, however.
The noise-canceling headphones with the best battery life
Battery life:60 hours /Multipoint:Yes /Audio codecs:aptX Adaptive, aptX, AAC, SBC / Connectors: USB-C (audio and charging), 2.5mm headphone jack (audio)
Sixty hours. They can last for up to 60 hours on a single charge. That’s really all you need to know about the Sennheiser Momentum 4 headphones if you’re looking for an endurance champ. But they also sound terrific and prove extremely comfortable over long listening periods. This combination doesn’t come cheap, but you can find some good occasional deals on them.
Sennheiser’s Momentum 4 Wireless headphones edge out Bowers & Wilkins on comfort thanks to their lighter design, and the noise cancellation is slightly better. Next to the Sonys and Bose’s QC Ultra Headphones, it doesn’t get much cozier. These are headphones you can wear for multiple hours without any fatigue or pressure on your ears.
They lack the vintage style of prior Sennheiser cans (like the Momentum 3, left), but the Momentum 4 are far more comfortable.
Sennheiser’s sound signature is a bit more expressive and puts more emphasis on bass than B&W, but that upper treble range still comes through crystal clear. My only real nitpick with the Sennheisers is that they tend to occasionally power on inside the case for no obvious reason and automatically connect to my phone.
Both the B&W and Sennheiser headphones support multipoint connectivity and a range of Bluetooth codecs, including SBC, AAC, aptX, and aptX Adaptive.
Marshall’s wireless headphones have proven surprisingly popular, and the company’s most expensive pair is also its best yet. The Monitor II ANC headphones are priced at $320, which puts them on the same playing field as Bose, Sony, and other tech companies that have been making premium noise-canceling cans for many years.
Marshall falls short of those brands in sound quality and ANC, but the Monitor II still provide warm, textured sound and perform decently at cutting down on ambient noise. But they definitely stand out from the pack in looks, with a design that speaks to the company’s heritage. The headphones fold up for easy carrying, and Marshall’s signature gold joystick makes the Monitor II simple to control.
They can also last up to 30 hours with NC enabled or up to a staggering 45 hours if you’re already someplace quiet and can do without the feature. That impressive longevity beats our primary picks. A lack of AAC codec support at this price stings, but I’ve enjoyed the Monitor II every time I’ve put them on. They’re more than just an amp brand stamped onto an average pair of headphones.
Update, August 27th:Updated to reflect current pricing and Apple’s upcoming “Glowtime” event in September.
The maker of the Palma has a new cheaper e-reader
Image: Boox
Boox, the company behind the pocket-friendly Palma e-reader, has revealed its cheapest device yet. At just $149.99, the Boox 6 Go features a six-inch 300ppi E ink display and a wider-than-the-Palma form factor for reading while on the go.
The device uses an upgraded Carta 1300 E ink display that’s supposed to offer deeper blacks and brighter whites. Like many of Boox’s other e-readers, the Boox 6 Go is pretty light, weighing in at just 146 grams (or 5 ounces) and measuring a quarter of an inch thick.
Image: Boox
Along with Android 12 and the Google Play Store on board, it runs the latest version of Boox’s firmware, which introduces a minimalistic interface, a dark mode option, and a new handwriting tool. The Boox 6 Go ships with a 2.0Ghz octa-core processor and 32GB of storage. But it only has 2GB of RAM, which could slow down performance — especially if you want to download and use Android apps.
Either way, the Boox Go 6 could be a good fit if you’re looking for an e-reader that’s a bit larger than the Palma, but cheaper and more portable than its other options, like the Go Color 7 or the Go 10.3.
Samsung’s new AI smart TVs are getting seven years of OS updates
Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge
Samsung says it will provide seven years’ worth of Tizen operating system updates for its newer AI-powered TVs in a bid to fend off competition from Chinese rivals. The announcement was made last week at Samsung Electronics’ Suwon Campus according to Business Korea, and will first apply to TV models released in March 2024, alongside some products released in 2023.
The policy extension is a notable jump from the updates Samsung currently provides, which typically address bugs without upgrading the Tizen OS itself. The move comes as Samsung, currently the world’s biggest seller of smart TV, finds its market leadership being challenged by Chinese companies like Hisense and TCL. Research from analytics firm Omdia found that Samsung had a nearly 29 percent share of the global TV market during the first half of the year — down more than 2 percent from the year prior — while TCL and Hisense closed in with 12.1 percent and 10 percent, respectively.
“With the seven-year free upgrade of Tizen applied to AI TVs, we will widen the gap in market share with Chinese companies,” said Yong Seok-Yoon, the president of Samsung Electronic’s Visual Display Business Division. The exact models guaranteed to benefit from the expanded updates haven’t yet been specified by Samsung.
Samsung made a similar announcement back in January regarding its Galaxy S24 smartphone series, pledging to provide seven years of OS upgrades and security updates. Around that time LG, Samsung’s domestic rival, also revealed it would be offering five years of webOS upgrades for its own smart TV lineup, though specific models it would apply to were at least included in that announcement.
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Garmin’s terrific Forerunner 265 running watch is down to its lowest price to date
Garmin’s midrange running watch is $100 off in both the standard configuration and the smaller 42mm sizing. | Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge
As part of its “Glowtime” event on September 9th, Apple is expected to reveal the Apple Watch Series 10 and possibly a new Apple Watch Ultra. However, while both watches are expected to feature new chips and better displays, neither of them will likely rival the Garmin Forerunner 265 when it comes to dedicated running features or battery life. Luckily, Garmin’s excellent running watch is currently on sale at Amazon, Best Buy, and REI for $349.99 ($100 off) — an all-time low.
Of all the running watches Garmin currently sells, the platform-agnostic Forerunner 265 probably strikes the best balance between price and performance. Both the 265 and smaller 265S offer multiband GPS for more precise tracking, onboard music storage, and a vibrant, always-on OLED display, which allows you to eke out an entire week of battery life on a single charge (or longer with the AOD disabled).
More importantly, both models provide every running metric you can think of, including stride length, cadence, and other form-related data. They also let you take advantage of Garmin’s more novel — albeit, welcome — features, including PacePro, Training Readiness, and Race Predictor. The latter is my favorite, as it provides you with an estimated time for a 5K, 10K, half marathon, or marathon using your long-term training data. That makes the Forerunner 265 just as suitable for beginners as it is for those training for their next marathon.
Apple’s AirPods Max are on sale at Amazon for $399 ($150 off), matching their lowest price to date. It’s always possible that Apple will announce an updated model with USB-C support during its upcoming iPhone 16 event, but if you can’t wait, the current pair still offer great sound, exceptional build quality, and enough ecosystem tricks that we consider them the best noise-canceling headphones you can get if you’re an iPhone owner. Read our review.
Last week, we saw Amazon’s latest Kindle Kids return to $94.99 ($25 off) at Amazon. If you don’t want a protective case or any of the kid-friendly perks, however, you can now grab the standard Kindle with ads at Amazon, Best Buy, and Target starting at $84.99 ($15 off). That’s one of the best prices we’ve seen this year on the entry-level ebook reader, which offers an excellent 6.8-inch display with 300ppi resolution, USB-C charging, and enough battery life to keep you going for weeks at a time. Read our review
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Telegram says CEO has ‘nothing to hide’ after being arrested in France
Telegram CEO Pavel Durov. | Getty Images
Telegram says its CEO and founder Pavel Durov has “nothing to hide” after he was arrested by French authorities outside of Paris.
“It is absurd to claim that a platform or its owner are responsible for abuse of that platform,” the company says in an unnamed statement posted to its official channel in the Telegram app on Sunday. French officials have confirmed to multiple outlets that Durov was arrested as part of a police investigation into criminal activity taking place on the social network.
While not encrypted by default, Telegram’s largely hands-off approach to moderation means that the app is seen by many as a private, censorship-free alternative to other social networks. “Almost a billion users globally use Telegram as means of communication and as a source of vital information,” reads the company’s statement. “We’re awaiting a prompt resolution of this situation.”
Telegram has also been a critical source of information for the ongoing war between Ukraine and Russia, the latter of which appears to be quite interested in what happens to Durov. The Russian Embassy in Paris says that the French government has so far not granted it access to Durov, who was born in Russia and holds citizenship in both France and the United Arab Emirates, where Telegram is headquartered.
In a rare interview with Tucker Carlson in April, Durov said Telegram’s goal is to be a “neutral” platform and resist requests from governments to moderate. He said he mostly avoids traveling to “big, geopolitical” countries where there’s “too much attention” on the company. “I travel to places where I have confidence that those places are consistent with what we do and our values.”
Formula 1’s new gyro camera adds a Dutch angle to the Dutch Grand Prix
Formula 1 racer Lando Norris in Bahrain in 2022. | Photo: Hasan Bratic / Picture Alliance via Getty Images
Formula 1 broadcast footage from the Dutch Grand Prix qualifiers at Circuit Zandvoort this weekend that was captured by a gyro camera system mounted above the helmet of the weekend’s race winner, Lando Norris.
The camera, which F1 has been testing since 2022, was conceived with an eye particularly toward accentuating exaggerated angles of banked turns at Zandvoort, but despite using it there last year, F1 wasn’t able to broadcast it, according to AutoSport.
It’s almost a steady cam that follows what the curvature of the track is actually like, this is exactly how this track would flow with the camber. It’s incredible #JapaneseGP#F1
Dino Leone, Formula 1’s head of onboard camera operations, explained in a recent video that the camera allows for on-the-fly adjustments to increase or decrease the gyroscopic effect. Formula 1 used the camera in some 2023 races, such as in Brazil and Japan, and plans to use it more often this year.
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European iPhones are more fun now
We got game emulators in the app store, as a treat. | Photo by Allison Johnson / The Verge
Whining about stuff is a treasured American pastime, so allow me to indulge: the iPhone is more fun in Europe now, and it’s not fair.
They’re getting all kinds of stuff because they have cool regulators, not like, regular regulators. Third-party app stores, the ability for browsers to run their own engines, Fortnite, and now the ability to replace lots of default apps? I want it, too! Imagine if Chrome on iOS wasn’t just a rinky dink little Safari emulator! Imagine downloading a new dialer app with a soundboard of fart sounds and setting it as your default! Unfortunately, Apple doesn’t seem interested in sharing these possibilities with everyone.
But outside of emulators and its begrudging adoption of RCS, Apple only seems interested in doing the bare minimum to keep regulators off its back. It’s starting to look like the company sells two different iPhones: one for people in Europe, and one that everyone else can buy. That’s weird, especially since keeping things simple and consistent is sort of Apple’s thing. But the company is so committed to keeping the two separate that it won’t even let you update apps from third-party app stores if you leave the EU for more than a month.
Here’s the thing: wouldn’t it just be good business to offer everyone the same choices no matter where they live? It’s not as if Apple was making two different iPhones to try to appeal to different cultural preferences. It’s making one iPhone that’s more flexible and customizable, and one that isn’t.
Maybe, bit by bit, Apple will cave in and offer parity the way it did with emulators. But think the company should make an uncharacteristic move: drop the charade and let everyone, everywhere have the same iPhone. It would be bold! Courageous, even! But most importantly, it would be a lot more fun.
French authorities arrest Telegram’s CEO
Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge
Telegram CEO Pavel Durov is reportedly in custody after being arrested near Paris Saturday evening as he was departing his private jet. The billionaire was apprehended on a warrant related to a preliminary investigation, writes Reuters.
French authorities believe that the platform’s lack of moderation has “allowed criminal activity to go on undeterred on the messaging app.” Durov will go before a judge tonight and could be indicted as early as Sunday, according to TF1 (which we read using Google Translate), one of two French outlets cited by Reuters.
Telegram has become a critical resource as people turn to it to find crucial information in places where heavy information censorship is common, such as Russia. But Durov’s preference for hands-off moderation has also helped make it a haven for misinformation, with the site only controlling its content when it’s forced to do so by other governments and organizations.
Canoo is down to one co-founder as its CTO reportedly leaves
Image: Canoo
EV startup Canoo has lost co-founder and chief technology officer Sohel Merchant and is moving its operations out of Los Angeles, according to two reports from TechCrunch this week, citing unnamed sources.
Merchant took over the CTO position in 2021, when the company’s CTO left, along with two other co-founders. One of those who remained, chief designer Richard Kim, departed last year. With Merchant now reportedly gone, chief engineer Christoph Kuttner is the last founder standing at Canoo, according to TechCrunch yesterday.
Canoo wrote in a quarterly SEC filing on August 14th that it was “permanently” dropping its headcount as part of a reorganization plan for its Torrance, California facility, and offering to move “approximately 137” of 194 employees from there to either Oklahoma or Texas. Then, earlier this week, it told employees during a company meeting that it was shutting down its LA office, TechCrunchwrote on Thursday.
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Valve officially announces Deadlock, a game ‘in early development’
Valve has finally, officially announced Deadlock, in the most minimal way imaginable. The game now has a Steam page that lists Valve as its developer and publisher, and a simple notice:
Deadlock is in early development with lots of temporary art and experimental gameplay. Access is currently limited to friend invite via our playtesters.
Valve provides no other details, just an animated teaser image. (You can see a still screenshot of it above.) The system requirements only mention that the game requires a 64-bit processor and operating system.
While the game has ostensibly been a secret until now, details about it have been trickling out for months. Information started to emerge from closed playtests in May. By August, tens of thousands of people were playing the game, as more players invited their friends to check it out. The Verge received an invite and published a hands-on preview last week.
Today, many streamers are playing the game live, including Shroud, after admin Yoshi said in the game’s Discord that Valve was lifting its rules against public conversation.
Screenshot by Tom Warren / The Verge
While Deadlock seems like another promising addition to Valve’s lineup of big multiplayer games, it’s unclear if it will have sustained popularity like Counter-Strike or Dota 2 or will eventually fizzle out like Artifact.
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ElevenLabs’ AI Reader app can now narrate text in 32 languages
Image: The Verge
AI audio startup ElevenLabs has now made its text-to-speech Reader app available across the world, adding support for 32 different languages — including Spanish, Portuguese, French, Arabic, Mandarin, and Hindi.
The app, which is available on both iOS and Android, was first released in June in the US, UK, and Canada. It allows users to listen to PDFs, articles, newsletters, ePub files or “any other text content” according to the developer, but that support seemingly doesn’t extend to files from Kindle or Apple Books.
There’s a good selection of AI-generated voices available for the text-to-speech tool, including deceased celebrities like Judy Garland, James Dean, and Burt Reynolds. The few I’ve listened to are impressive enough to avoid sounding overly robotic. ElevenLabs said their respective heirs were “excited to see their’ legacies live on” at release, so these voices are presumably licensed.
The reader app is free to download and use, and won’t consume credits from the broader ElevenLabs web-based subscription plan. The company is, however, planning to “eventually launch some premium version of the app,” but is promising to have a “generous free plan” available when that happens.
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YouTube has a new tool to help restore hacked channels: an AI chatbot
Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge
YouTube has announced a new AI assistant feature to help users recover accounts that have been targeted by hackers. Described as a “troubleshooting tool” on Google’s support page, the chatbot can be accessed via the YouTube Help Center, and should ask hacked creators a series of questions to guide them through the process of securing their impacted Google logins and reversing any changes that have been made to their YouTube channels.
The support assistant is currently only available in English, and access to “certain troubleshooting features” is limited to a select group of “certain creators,” but Google says it plans to eventually make the feature available to all YouTube creators.
We’ve managed to access the tool and the results seem… fine. It’s a fairly standard support chatbot with no generative AI weirdness detected so far, and some guardrails appear to be in place. It doesn’t really solve one of the major complaints that creators have voiced, however: that YouTube is nigh impossible to contact when issues arise. Speaking to a YouTube rep directly is typically limited to only the largest creators in the platform's partner program, leaving smaller accounts left to resolve their own situations via help pages or seemingly automated responses from YouTube support.
OpenAI exec says California’s AI safety bill might slow progress
Image: The Verge
In a new letter, OpenAI chief strategy officer Jason Kwon insists that AI regulations should be left to the federal government. As reported previously by Bloomberg, Kwon says that a new AI safety bill under consideration in California could slow progress and cause companies to leave the state.
A federally-driven set of AI policies, rather than a patchwork of state laws, will foster innovation and position the U.S. to lead the development of global standards. As a result, we join other AI labs, developers, experts and members of California’s Congressional delegation in respectfully opposing SB 1047 and welcome the opportunity to outline some of our key concerns.
The letter is addressed to California State Senator Scott Wiener, who originally introducedSB 1047, also known as the Safe and Secure Innovation for Frontier Artificial Intelligence Models Act.
According to proponents like Wiener, it establishes standards ahead of the development of more powerful AI models, requires precautions like pre-deployment safety testing and other safeguards, adds whistleblower protections for employees of AI labs, gives California’s Attorney General power to take legal action if AI models cause harm, and calls for establishing a “public cloud computer cluster” called CalCompute.
In a response to the letter published Wednesday evening, Wiener points out that the proposed requirements apply to any company doing business in California, whether they are headquartered in the state or not, so the argument “makes no sense.” He also writes that OpenAI “...doesn’t criticize a single provision of the bill” and closes by saying, “SB 1047 is a highly reasonable bill that asks large AI labs to do what they’ve already committed to doing, namely, test their large models for catastrophic safety risk.”
The bad movie reviews quoted in Lionsgate’s Megalopolis trailer were mostly made up
A screenshot from the Megalopolis trailer. | Image: Lionsgate
Hours after it was released, Lionsgate pulled a trailer for Megalopolis that was clearly “gunning for the haters” with a selection of negative quotes about director Francis Ford Coppola’s previous works. That’s because reports like this one from Vulture’s Bilge Ebiri showed that critic quotes in the trailer lambasting films like The Godfather and Apocalypse Now were fabricated.
“Lionsgate is immediately recalling our trailer for Megalopolis,” a Lionsgate spokesperson said in a statement to Variety. “We offer our sincere apologies to the critics involved and to Francis Ford Coppola and American Zoetrope for this inexcusable error in our vetting process. We screwed up. We are sorry.”
That all led some people to immediately wonder whether the quotes may have been generated by a tool like OpenAI’s ChatGPT. Chatbots, and ChatGPT specifically, will create quotes in responses to queries complete with citations and even fake URLs for content that never existed. A famous example is a case earlier this year where a lawyer cited judicial decisions that did not exist. The lawyer admitted using ChatGPT for his research and said he was “unaware of the possibility that its content could be false.”
We’ve asked Lionsgate if it used a generative AI tool as part of the creation of the trailer but haven’t heard back.
Variety also reports that one of its staffers was falsely quoted in the trailer over their review of Bram Stoker’s Dracula and that a Roger Ebert quote attributed to his Dracula review was actually from a review of the 1989 Batman.
Samsung’s new Odyssey monitor lets you play games in glasses-free 3D
Image: Samsung
Samsung has announced a new Odyssey gaming monitor lineup at gamescom that uses eye-tracking technology to convert 2D visuals into glasses-free 3D. The Odyssey 3D is set for a global release “within this year” according to Samsung, and will allow users to “seamlessly switch between 2D and 3D modes” based on preference — which may tempt folks who are curious about 3D gaming, but apprehensive to commit.
The Odyssey 3D is Samsung’s first 3D gaming monitor, having first teased a concept display at CES earlier this year. It’ll be available in 27- or 37-inch sizes and features a 4K QLED panel with a 165Hz refresh rate, alongside a 1-millisecond response time and support for AMD FreeSync. Both monitors also include a single DisplayPort 1.4 and two HDMI 2.1 ports for connectivity, and a tilting, height-adjustable stand to ensure you can best position it to experience 3D content.
The glasses-free 3D is achieved by combining a lenticular lens — specialized hardware that can direct different images to each eye — with a built-in eye tracking camera, and view mapping to continuously adjust for depth perception. Acer uses a similar system in its own SpatialLabs laptops and monitors. The resulting Stereoscopic 3D can only be viewed by one person at a time, but that’s hardly an issue for gamers, and my own experiences with the technology have left a good impression: it’s really fun to see things jumping out at you without having to wear special glasses.
One thing that’s missing is the price. We’ve reached out to Samsung to see if pricing information is available, but if Acer’s products (and the historical pricing on Samsung’s Odyssey lineup) are any indication, the Odyssey 3D offerings won’t come cheap.
The FTC’s noncompete agreements ban has been struck down
Image: Cath Virginia / The Verge; Getty Images
A federal judge has blocked the Federal Trade Commission’s ban on noncompete agreements that make it difficult for workers to join their employers’ rivals or launch competing businesses. The ruling prevents the FTC’s ban on noncompete agreements from taking effect on September 4th, though the agency could still appeal the decision.
On Tuesday, US District Judge Ada Brown in Dallas, Texas ruled that the antitrust agency exceeded its statutory authority to ban practices related to unfair methods of competition, saying the noncompete agreements ban is “unreasonably overbroad without a reasonable explanation,” and would “cause irreparable harm.” Brown’s decision now stops the FTC from blocking noncompetes nationwide after initially delaying the ban with a preliminary injunction in July.
“We are disappointed by Judge Brown’s decision and will keep fighting to stop noncompetes that restrict the economic liberty of hardworking Americans, hamper economic growth, limit innovation, and depress wages,” FTC spokesperson Victoria Graham said in a statement to The Verge. ”We are seriously considering a potential appeal.”
If the FTC does push ahead with an appeal, it would go to the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals to be heard. Appeals on district court decisions are often a lengthy process, with the FTC’s appeal against Microsoft’s Activision Blizzard acquisition still pending a result. In the meantime, the FTC will have to challenge noncompetes via case-by-case enforcement actions.
The ruling upholds a lawsuit that Tax firm Ryan LLC filed in April — later backed by the US Chamber of Commerce and Business Roundtable — to challenge the noncompete agreements ban, arguing that it would make it difficult for companies to retain talent. When the FTC voted 3-2 in support of the ban, the agency said it would allow for more than 8,500 new businesses to be made each year.
JBL made its charging case touchscreen more useful with a size boost
The touchscreen on the JBL Tour Pro 3’s charging case is now 30 percent larger. | Image: JBL
JBL has announced an upgraded version of its first wireless earbuds with a touchscreen charging case. The new JBL Tour Pro 3’s case features a larger screen and now works as a transmitter, broadcasting audio to the earbuds from a wired source such as a plane’s in-flight entertainment system. However, that larger screen also comes with a steeper price tag. They’ll sell for $299, which is nearly $50 more than the JBL Tour Pro 2.
The 1.57-inch touchscreen on the JBL Tour Pro 3’s charging case is 30 percent larger than the screen on the Tour Pro 2’s, giving it enough room to fit additional info like the name of the song currently playing. That will potentially make it even more useful as an alternative to reaching for your smartphone if you want to skip tracks, set alarms, or even check text messages or incoming call notifications.
The argument can be made that the case’s screen is unnecessary for those who already wear a smartwatch that offers similar functionality. But the Tour Pro 3’s charging case also provides easier access to earbud settings, including noise-canceling modes and EQ profiles, which are otherwise only accessible through the JBL smartphone app or by customizing the earbud’s gesture controls.
The less obvious but more interesting upgrade on the Tour Pro 3 is the charging case’s audio transmission capabilities. It can be plugged into any analog or USB audio source and isn’t only limited to older devices with a headphone jack. And with newly added support for Auracast, that audio can be broadcast to multiple Bluetooth devices nearby that also support Auracast — such as Samsung’s earbuds.
Image: JBL
The Tour Pro 2 will be available in two color options: black and latte.
The Tour Pro 3 earbuds now feature larger 11-millimeter drivers — up from 10 millimeters on the Tour Pro 2. Despite the driver upgrades and larger touchscreen, JBL is still claiming up to 10 hours of music playback for the earbuds with ANC turned off, or up to 40 hours in total when paired with the charging case. If the buds do happen to die at a bad time, a 10-minute charge will provide three hours of listening.
Spatial sound is included with built-in head tracking, and while JBL claims it works with “stereo sound from any source or device,” what the company is essentially doing is keeping the left and right audio signals locked in 3D space so, as you turn your head, they always sound like they’re coming from the same place. For comparison, Apple’s Spatial Audio is designed to simulate a more expansive surround sound experience through a pair of headphones, with audio sounding like it’s coming from all around you.
The JBL Tour Pro 3 are expected to be available starting on September 22nd, 2024, in black or latte color options.
Nvidia is linking Xbox accounts to GeForce Now so you can automatically sign in to games
Image: Nvidia
Nvidia will soon let you link an Xbox account to its GeForce Now streaming service to enable automatic sign-in for supported games. Starting on August 22nd, the new account linking feature will mean you only need to sign-in and link an Xbox profile once so that it’s stored for all future GeForce Now sessions.
“This new feature joins Xbox game library sync on GeForce Now, which allows members to sync their supported Xbox Game Pass and Microsoft Store games to their cloud streaming library,” explains Nvidia.
Nvidia first started rolling out access to PC Game Pass and Microsoft Store titles on GeForce Now last year, before adding account syncing to bring games from Microsoft’s store to the GeForce Now library. Those features provided access, but without automatic sign-in, you had to manually authenticate each time you used the GeForce Now service. Now, it’s simply set it and forget it.
Nvidia’s improvements for Xbox games on GeForce Now come just weeks after Microsoft integrated GeForce Now into its Xbox game pages on the web. The integration allows you to pick between either Xbox Cloud Gaming or Nvidia’s GeForce Now service when you view a game listing on the web.
All of this close collaboration has been possible thanks to a 10-year deal between Nvidia and Microsoft to allow Nvidia to license Xbox PC games for GeForce Now, including Activision Blizzard titles.
How to watch Gamescom Opening Night Live 2024
Photo by Sascha Thelen/picture alliance via Getty Images
Geoff Keighley’s big Opening Night Live (ONL) show for Gamescom is back for another year. and we’re set to see some new looks at many upcoming games and hopefully a few surprises.
Disney gives up on trying to use Disney Plus excuse to settle a wrongful death lawsuit
Illustration by Nick Barclay / The Verge
Disney has now agreed that a wrongful death lawsuit should be decided in court following backlash for initially arguing the case belonged in arbitration because the grieving widower had once signed up for a Disney Plus trial.
“With such unique circumstances as the ones in this case, we believe this situation warrants a sensitive approach to expedite a resolution for the family who have experienced such a painful loss,” chairman of Disney experiences Josh D’Amaro said in a statement to The Verge. “As such, we’ve decided to waive our right to arbitration and have the matter proceed in court.”
The lawsuit was filed in February by Jeffrey Piccolo, the husband of a 42-year-old woman who died last year due to an allergic reaction that occurred after eating at a restaurant in the Disney Springs shopping complex in Orlando. The case gained widespread media attention after Piccolo’s legal team challenged Disney’s motion to dismiss the case, arguing that a forced arbitration agreement Piccolo signed was effectively invisible.
As noted by Reuters, Disney initially made no mention of arbitration when it first addressed the case in April, instead arguing it wasn’t liable because it merely serves as the landlord for the Raglan Road Irish Pub and Restaurant and had no control over the restaurant’s operations. Disney then later argued in a filing in May that Piccolo had allegedly entered an agreement to arbitrate all disputes with the company by signing up for a Disney Plus trial in 2019, and using the Walt Disney Parks’ website to buy Epcot Center tickets.
Valve bans Razer and Wooting’s new keyboard features in Counter-Strike 2
Image: Valve
Valve is banning Counter-Strike 2 players from using keyboard features to automate perfect counter-strafes. Razer was the first keyboard maker to add a Simultaneous Opposing Cardinal Directions (SOCD) feature to its range of Huntsman V3 Pro keyboards last month, followed shortly by Wooting. Using Snap Tap as Razer calls it or Wooting’s Snappy Tappy will now get you kicked from Counter-Strike 2 games.
“Recently, some hardware features have blurred the line between manual input and automation, so we’ve decided to draw a clear line on what is or isn’t acceptable in Counter-Strike,” says Valve. “We are no longer going to allow automation (via scripting or hardware) that circumvent these core skills and, moving forward, (and initially—exclusively on Valve Official Servers) players suspected of automating multiple player actions from a single game input may be kicked from their match.”
Image: Tom Warren / The Verge
You’ll get kicked from a Counter-Strike 2 game if you use Razer or Wooting’s new SOCD keyboard features.
I’ve tested using SOCD in Counter-Strike 2 this morning and can confirm you get removed from a game on Valve’s official servers, but there’s no account ban. Valve is banning the use of these keyboard features, but it doesn’t appear to be ready to ban accounts for using them right now.
Razer and Wooting’s SOCD features both let players automate switching strafe directions without having to learn the skill. Normally, to switch strafe directions in a first-person shooter, you have to fully release one key before pressing the other. If both are pressed, they cancel each other, and you stand there for a moment until you release one of the keys. SOCD means you don’t need to release a key and you can rapidly tap the A or D key to counter-strafe with little to no effort.
Some professional Counter-Strike 2 players had called for SOCD to be banned, much like how null binds that prevent you from pressing two opposing directions have been banned in tournaments for years.
Wooting reluctantly added a beta version of SOCD to its range of keyboards after Razer introduced the feature on its own hardware. “We are glad Valve has taken a stance against Snap Tap,” says Wooting in a post on X today. “Don’t use Snappy Tappy (SOCD) or Rappy Snappy in CS2 any more as it will result in a kick.”
Lamborghini’s first EV is nearly ready — but are we?
Image: Lamborghini
The Italian automaker is not quite ready to release its first full EV. Thankfully, it has a ridiculous new hybrid to tide you over.
“The sun is really dangerous!” Rouven Mohr said as we ducked into some shade behind Lamborghini’s booth at The Quail, a Monterey Car Week event filled with some of the world’s most deep-pocketed buyers. Just a few feet away, surrounded by a crowd of hundreds, was the company’s just-unveiled Temerario super sports car, emerald paint gleaming in the California sun. Mohr, Lamborghini’s CTO since 2022, has an infectious grin breaking through the extra layer of sunscreen he’s just applied.
“It’s your baby, and then to see it for the first time on the stage, it’s always special,” he said.
The car’s development began four and a half years ago, kicking into high gear 36 months ago ahead of its debut this past weekend. The Temerario replaces the decade-old Huracán, Lamborghini’s outgoing V10 super sports car. Over the years, it has been upgraded numerous times, gaining power, handling, and technology along the way, but the new Temerario makes it look remedial.
Though the Temerario steps down to a 4.0-liter V8, it adds a pair of turbochargers. That configuration sounds a bit like the Audi-sourced engine inside the company’s Urus SUV, but Mohr is adamant that this is unrelated. “It is totally new,” he said. “There is nothing, not any part to do with the V8 of the Urus.”
Lamborghini developed this new engine to do two things: rev to 10,000rpm and sound amazing.
The result is a car with a distinct spine-tingling scream when driven hard. But the feel of the engine is also unique. “When you drive the car at the beginning, you tend to shift up much too early because you have a lot of torque. But if you rev it up, to be honest, you feel it’s a kind of explosion because the torque is still there that in a naturally aspirated one you don’t have,” Mohr said.
Adding turbochargers might add torque, but they don’t necessarily increase the fun factor. The engine relies on turbos that Mohr called “huge.” Big turbos make big power but often result in a lag between putting your foot on the accelerator and the forward surge of the car.
That’s where the hybrid system comes in. The Temerario has three axial flux electric motors. A pair live on the front axle, one driving each front wheel. The third is directly connected to the crankshaft of the new V8.
The total system output is 907 horsepower and 538 pound-feet of torque, up from 631 horsepower and 417 pound-feet in the outgoing Huracán. The combined output of the hybrid system alone is 295 horsepower, or about the same as a single-motor Polestar 2. The Temerario accelerates from zero to 62mph in 2.7 seconds, with a top speed of over 210mph.
On paper, it’s an architecture similar to Lamborghini’s other hybrid, the 1,001 horsepower Revuelto. In fact, Mohr said the dual-motor front axle setup is exactly the same as the Revuelto’s, as is the 3.8kWh battery.
But the differing characteristics of the two cars mean less software sharing between them than you might think. “The basic strategy is the same, but the application is a completely different one because the weight distribution is different, the track, the wheelbase,” he said.
Still, the Temerario shares many of the Revuelto’s high-performance tricks, like using the hybrid system for traction control.
Imagine accelerating too hard out of a corner. In your overexuberance, the rear wheels start to spin. Rather than the traction control reducing power to maintain grip, as on a normal car, the Temerario will increase regen on that rear electric motor. The motor then converts that extra power from the V8 into charge for the battery while simultaneously keeping you from spinning into a ditch.
The Temerario looks brilliant sitting in the sun at Lamborghini’s booth, but something is missing this year: the all-electric Lanzador concept that debuted last year. It was a bit of an odd thing, a tall coupe with SUV-like proportions and an unconventional design that was a throwback to the company’s earlier four-seat coupes like the Espada of the ’60s or the Jarama of the ’70s.
Though it’s just a concept, it was said to be a preview of an eventual production EV, and Mohr said its development is still actively underway. “On this, we are still full-throttle working,” he said.
The target for the release of the Lanzador is sometime toward the end of the decade, but Mohr said that timeframe isn’t just a question of engineering. “It depends a little bit also on the market,” he said.
In other words, Lamborghini is waiting for the EV market to stabilize. Mohr said that high depreciation rates on premium EVs have product planners scared. Residual values are key for cars costing hundreds of thousands of dollars. Unlike your average SUV, these extremely rare cars often gain value as soon as they roll off the dealership lot. Many owners literally bank on that.
A Lamborghini EV that quickly loses value would be unacceptable. “In some regions of the world, the people are a little bit scared about the residual values and all the things that are important for us,” Mohr said.
The Rolls-Royce Spectre will be a bit of a litmus test for this new era of ultra-premium EVs, he noted, but it’s too early to know how that one will fare in the market in the long term.
Wealthy buyers still have a long way to go before the Lanzador has its true moment in the sun. Until then, they’ll have to be sated with the Temerario, which should be available sometime next year. Lamborghini hasn’t set a price yet on the car, but given the outgoing Huracán starts at around $250,000, you can be sure the Temerario will extend well into the $300,000 territory.
And what about that name? Like many Lamborghinis, it’s borrowed from a bull — a bull from 1975, in fact. “We picked his name because he was very brave,” Lamborghini CEO Stephan Winkelmann said at the car’s unveiling.
It’s not a name that easily rolls off the tongue, even for Mohr. “I am also not Italian speaking, so also for me, it’s not so easy,” he said with a laugh. “I was training at the beginning in front of the mirror. Temerario. Temerario...”
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