Fire engulfs a hospital ward in northern India, killing 10 newborn babies
A fire tore through a neonatal intensive care unit in a hospital in northern India, killing 10 newborn babies and injuring 16 others, authorities said.
Jake Paul beats 58-year-old Mike Tyson in a much-hyped Netflix boxing match
Jake Paul won a unanimous decision over Mike Tyson as the hits didn't match the hype in a fight between a young YouTuber-turned-boxer and the 58-year-old former heavyweight champion.
The Many Contradictions of Trump’s Victory
As Donald Trump prepares to enter the White House for a second term, the reasons people voted him into office are becoming more clear. For Micki Witthoeft, it’s cause for celebration. Her daughter, Ashli Babitt, was shot and killed by a police officer after storming the US Capitol on January 6, 2021. Today, Witthoeft is […]
This county is the most religiously diverse in the U.S.
This stretch of New Hampshire Avenue in Silver Spring, Maryland is so packed with houses of worship, it's been called the Embassy Row of Religions. But locals know it as the Highway to Heaven.
The Rise of the Golden Idol makes a great puzzle game even better
Image: Playstack / Color Gray Games
The Case of the Golden Idol was a rewarding series of point-and-click murder mysteries that became one of my favorite games of 2022. And while I felt there was more story to explore about the titular golden idol, I wasn’t sure if a potential sequel could live up to its clever puzzles and fascinating, slowly unfolding story. Turns out, I had nothing to fear: The Rise of the Golden Idol, the newly launched sequel, easily surpasses the original by improving on just about everything.
At its core, Rise is a very similar game to Case. The new game takes place in the 1970s, around 200 years after the events of the original, and each of Rise’s cases drops you into a specific moment in time, typically during or shortly after a murder. You’re...
Spending money with a crony oligarch to demonstrate loyalty to the unstable vindictive leader.
Reblogged by kornel ("Kornel"):
codepo8@toot.cafe ("Chris Heilmann") wrote:
The WebShare API is so easy to use, it is a crime people don't use it more. Instead, we have tons of dead "share on $thing" buttons on the web.
https://codepen.io/codepo8/pen/rNXbjgJ
https://w3c.github.io/web-share/
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Opinion: Uranus was having a bad hair day. Hey, it was the '80s!
Scientists are reconsidering old information about Uranus. NPR's Scott Simon explains the problem with photos taken of the planet 38 years ago.
slightlyoff@toot.cafe ("Alex Russell") wrote:
@nolan This is a choice, specifically, about class and inclusion. For the benefit of the enfranchised and the comfortable, Bluesky is making their service less accessible to folks who are less wealthy. The pushback I get when pointing out how utterly incompetent their web 2.4MB critical path JS bundle (and fonts served without compression) are is invariably a sort of reflexive defense about how they're "trying so hard" and "just a small team" (rinse, repeat).
And it's both true and telling.
slightlyoff@toot.cafe ("Alex Russell") wrote:
So I've got a bsky acct, and y'all, their web app is everything I warn about. It's React (because they have capitulated to the App Store game via Expo and "need" React Native), but it's also web-as-afterthought-flavoured React. Which is going just about as well as you might expect for folks who don't own the latest devices:
Mastodon's React mistakes pale in comparison and, ofc, @nolan's pinafore.social blows them both out of the water. Failure this bad is a choice.
Women stock up on abortion pills and Plan B, fearing new restrictions under Trump
Telehealth providers say requests for the pills have spiked since the election. Patients and doctors worry what a Trump presidency could mean for medical abortion and emergency contraception.
Trump is creating team of loyalists after conflicts with Cabinet members in 1st term
This time, it's all about loyalty. In his second term Trump is surrounding himself with people who can amplify his message and are simpatico with how he wants to remake the Executive Branch.
These Down-Ballot Election Results Will Slow States’ Transition to Clean Energy
This story was originally published by Grist and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration. Some of the votes Americans cast on Tuesday that may have mattered most for the climate were quite a bit down-ballot from the presidential ticket: A handful of states held elections for the commissions that regulate utilities, and thereby exercise direct control over […]
The NWSL rides a 'rocket ship' of interest in women's sports to a record-setting year
Across the board, 2024 was a record year for women's sports. The WNBA saw record audiences. In college basketball, the women's March Madness tournament outdrew the men's. The NWSL was no exception.
How far can Trump go to get his nominees confirmed?
If the Senate puts up a fight against President-elect Trump's demand for recess appointments, could Trump force Congress to adjourn and ram his nominees through anyway?
Reblogged by slightlyoff@toot.cafe ("Alex Russell"):
ricmac ("Richard MacManus") wrote:
Really informative post by @gavinanderegg about #Bluesky tech: “Bluesky is slightly more decentralized than, say, Facebook — but not by much. Yes, you can host your own data. Yes, you can scrape all of the content on the network. But you can’t do anything with it unless you’re attached to the Bluesky service. I believe this will change with time, but it will be prohibitively expensive and we’re not there yet.” https://anderegg.ca/2024/11/15/maybe-bluesky-has-won
dymaxion@infosec.exchange ("Eleanor Saitta") wrote:
The RNA technology that was used to develop most of the covid vaccines is driving an absolute revolution in medicine right now. A vaccine for malaria, the disease that has killed more people than anything else in history. Personalized vaccines for cancers — the list goes on and we're just getting started. Much of this development is locked up in commercial pharma companies — there are papers, of course but replicating them in practice, let alone continuing development, is very hard without active access to the team involved. It's also very expensive. A lot of that development money comes from the US government. Now, yes it's a problem that that funding is going to private companies that are ransoming patients for their life savings in exchange for life-saving medicine, but this is as much a regulatory problem as it is a structural one. As long as those teams exist, the possibilities of these tools exist also.
Having an American government that wants to actively dismantle vaccine-related research and eliminate its funding is an existential threat to humanity:
Surprise - I did find out from Mastodon who won the Tyson-Paul match this morning 😮 Since I haven’t built up a massive and curated follow list I was pretty pessimistic. However, I want to give Bluesky another chance as well, I hear it’s a less serious place and easier to build up good timeline.
Reblogged by teller ("Siim Teller"):
In a piece for Vogue, Edith Zimmerman writes about trading one addiction for another: A Former Drinker Asks, Am I Addicted to Running? “But I don’t want to stop.” https://kottke.org/24/11/might-as-well-face-it-youre-addicted-to-running
Bullet strikes Southwest Airlines plane at Dallas Love Field Airport
There were no reported injuries on the plane, which was struck on the "right side of the aircraft just under the flight deck while the Crew was preparing for departure," the airline said.
the_consequences@zirk.us ("The Consequences of MAGA") wrote:
November 15, 2024—Disbarred former US Attorney and Four Seasons Total Landscaping press conference organizer Rudy Giuliani surrendered several keepsake watches, other jewelry, and a vintage Mercedes-Benz convertible to attorneys for Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss as part of the damages he owes them for falsely claiming they manipulated vote counts in the 2020 election.
Germany's Scholz discusses Ukraine with Russia's Putin in first such call in 2 years
The new communication between Scholz and Putin — their first since December 2022 — comes at a time of speculation about what the new administration of President-elect Trump will mean for Ukraine.
jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein") wrote:
trying to come up with some coherent analysis of the success of Herr Trump this second time around. sometimes taking a step back & thinking about how I am thinking about a problem is useful, & reading “Nexus: A Brief History of Information Networks from the Stone Age to AI” by Yuval Noah Harari may prove to be useful in this:
“What we usually think of as ideological and political conflicts often turn out to be clashes between opposing types of information networks.”
jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein") wrote:
Today in History: Bill Ham first demonstrates his psychedelic "Light Show", 1965
jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein") wrote:
Today in History: Albert Hofmann synthesizes LSD in Switzerland, 1938
jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein") wrote:
Today in History: Opening of the Suez Canal, 1869
fromjason ("fromjason.xyz ❤️ 💻") wrote:
I wrote a new essay about Web 3.0 and what may come of it.
It's titled "The Computational Web," and I think the Internet will hate it.
It needs a few more rounds of edits, and then I'll publish it. I can't wait.
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Judge blocks Biden administration's rule to expand overtime pay for millions
A federal judge in Texas has blocked a new rule from the Biden administration that would have expanded access to overtime pay to millions more salaried workers across the U.S.
Trump picks Karoline Leavitt to be youngest White House press secretary in history
Leavitt will be the youngest person to ever hold the job and is expected to deliver press briefings based on Trump's statement late Friday that he has "utmost confidence she will excel at the podium."
18 states want the SEC to stop enforcing crypto regulation
In which various government bodies fight over “permissionless” assets | Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge
The US Securities and Exchange Commission wants to “unilaterally wrest regulatory authority away from the States” when it comes to crypto, according to a lawsuit from 18 states. These states want to halt the SEC’s enforcement actions, so they can manage crypto regulation instead. Also named as a plaintiff on the suit is the DeFi Education Fund, a special interest lobbyist.
Controversial SEC chair Gary Gensler is named in the suit, along with other SEC commissioners. Gensler’s treatment of crypto during his time as chair has made him a punching bag for the industry — and for Republicans such as president-elect Donald Trump.
There has been an ongoing turf war over crypto regulation. Until this point, the two major contenders were the...
Half-Life 2 Gets Big 20th Anniversary Update And Is Free To Grab For A Limited Time
Valve’s seminal shooterHalf-Life 2 is now two decades old and to celebrate, the company has released a new documentary alongside a massive update to the game itself.
Valve Reveals Early Gameplay Of Canceled Half-Life 2 Episode 3 And Why It Never Got Finished
In a new two-hour documentary from Valve, current and former members of the company talk openly about the creation of Half-Life 2 as well as finally spilling the beans on what happened to Episode 3, and even showing gameplay of early prototypes of the canceled game.
WhatsApp now lets you save message drafts
Illustration: The Verge
WhatsApp dropped the most “I can’t believe this wasn’t already there” feature this week: message drafts. Now, WhatsApp lets you know if you have unsent messages typed up in chats so you know to get back to them later.
To let you know about a draft, messages you’ve started writing will show a green and bold “Draft” word followed by what you’ve typed up. That way, you can ponder about finishing it when you open the app and not accidentally ignore your friends (though you still purposefully could, I guess.)
Drafts also end up at the top of the chats list, so you don’t have to scroll to search for lost ones. The feature is now available in the app worldwide, Engadget reports.
WhatsApp announced in July that it had hit 100 million monthly...
Everything You Need To Know About The Dune Movies Before Watching Dune: Prophecy
Despite arriving a year after Dune: Part Two, HBO’s new TV adaptation Dune: Prophecy is actually a prequel that takes place almost 10,000 years before the events of the recent films. That doesn’t mean that Denis Villeneuve’s vibes-heavy take on Frank Herbert’s novels isn’t helpful context for what’s going on in Prophec…
Half-Life 2 is getting a huge 20th anniversary update
Image: Valve
Half-Life 2 is getting a major update in celebration of the classic title’s 20th anniversary. In addition to Steam Workshop support directly within the game, Valve has fixed bugs and restored some content, added new graphics settings, updated gamepad controls, and a whole lot more. You’ll also be able to get the game for free on Steam for free through November 18th at 1PM ET. After that, it will cost $9.99.
Valve is also now including the Episode One and Episode Two expansions with the base game. They’ll be accessible from the Half-Life 2 menu, and Valve says that “you will automatically advance to the next expansion after completing each one.” You’ll also be able to access the Steam Workshop within the Extras menu, which means you’ll no...
Scientific American editor resigns after comments about Trump supporters went viral
Laura Helmuth announced her resignation from the long-running magazine after her statements on election night regarding Trump sparked outrage among conservatives.
Coca-Cola's New Christmas Ad Was Made With AI And Looks Terrible
Coca-Cola has been making Christmas ads for a very, very long time. But it’s latest one was created using AI-generation tools and its a terrible, ugly mess.
Malcolm X's daughters sue the CIA, FBI and NYPD over the civil rights leader's assassination
A $100 million lawsuit claims the agencies were aware of and were involved in the1965 assassination plot and failed to stop the killing of the civil rights leader.
The Closest Thing We Have To Destiny: Classic Is Now Cheaper Than Ever
Ten years later, the original Destiny is still around and kicking, and it won’t cost you much to dip your toes back into the old-school Bungie looter shooter. The price for all of Destiny 1's DLC and expansions in one simple package is currently just $20.
19 Years Ago, Shadow The Hedgehog Swore And Used A Gun And It’s Better Than You Remember
It’s the Year of Shadow, a time to celebrate Sonic the Hedgehog’s brooding rival. While Shadow Generations gave the black-and-red hedgehog a starring role in a game this year, it wasn’t the first time that Shadow the Hedgehog got his own game. Today is November 15, and that means it’s been 19 years since Shadow the…
Trump nominates RFK Jr. to remake healthcare.
This week President-elect Donald Trump announced Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as his nominee to run the Department of Health and Human Services.The nomination comes after Trump promised to let Kennedy "go wild on health" during the campaign.Kennedy holds a number of controversial opinions on health, and promotes a number of scientifically debunked claims like vaccines cause autism, fluoride is poisoning the public water system and AIDS isn't caused by the HIV virus.Kennedy has long wanted to remake health and healthcare policy in the United States. Soon, he may get his chance. For sponsor-free episodes of Consider This, sign up for Consider This+ via Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org. Email us at considerthis@npr.org.
Hegseth Fox and the Trump WH
Pete Hegseth has positioned himself as a staunch public defender of President-elect Donald Trump on Fox's airwaves -- and is yet one more example of the Fox-to-Trump pipeline.
ESPN is testing a generative AI avatar called ‘FACTS’
Image: ESPN
ESPN is testing an AI-generated avatar with the Saturday college football show SEC Nation. Dubbed FACTS, it’s going to be “...promoting education and fun around sports analytics” with information drawn from ESPN Analytics, which includes data like the Football Power Index (FPI), player and team statistics, and game schedules. We haven’t seen the avatar in action, but it sounds like a bot-ified version of stats encyclopedia Howie Schwab, who was ESPN’s first statistician and eventually the star of a mid-2000s game show, Stump the Schwab.
ESPN has already brought generative AI to its website with AI-written game recaps. FACTS is still in development, and there’s no word on when it could make its first appearance on the network.
FACTS...
cstanhope@social.coop ("Your friendly 'net denizen") wrote:
It's okay and good for multiple online social platforms to exist that meet diverse needs. It's okay to have small niche platforms (e.g. forums) that won't be a global brand name. The concept of competition in social media platforms only makes sense from a corporate "must consume all the revenue and extract all the profit" angle. Step outside of that, and there's nothing to win. But you might find community.
RFK Jr. isn't the only one. More than a billion people have parasitic worms
Earlier this year, a surprising story emerged about RFK Jr. — the newly named nominee for secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services — and a parasitic brain worm.
Google will let you make AI clip art for your documents
Illustration: The Verge
Google Workspace is rolling out a Gemini-powered AI image generator directly in Google Docs that lets you quickly whip up visuals for your writeups. Essentially, it's a clip art maker that follows in the footsteps of Microsoft’s AI-generated art feature in its Office products.
Google’s image generator in Docs is available to paid Workspace accounts that include the Gemini Business,Enterprise, Education, Education Premium, or Google One AI Premium add-ons.
Those with the new feature can find it under Insert > Image > Help me create an image, which results in a “Create an image” sidebar where you can type in a description of what you’d like to make. It also provides a drop-down to select an art style with options such as “Photography” or...
The Price Israel and Lebanon are Each Paying for Their War on the Border
We bring you views from both sides of the conflict between Israel and Lebanon. Israel says they're closer to accomplishing their mission of pushing Hezbollah militants away from the border so that tens of thousands of Israelis can safely return to the area. Our correspondent visits the tense borderland and finds a dramatically changed landscape. And in Lebanon, intense Israeli airstrikes since September have taken their toll. And recently, strikes have occurred deeper in the country, far away from the fighting, endangering and killing displaced Lebanese civilians. We go to the site of a recent attack. For more coverage of all sides of this conflict, go to npr.org/mideastupdates
Blizzard Working On Open-World Shooter And It Might Be Starcraft-Related
A new job listing from Blizzard seems to indicate that the studio behind Warcraft and Overwatch might be working on an open-world shooter and based on past reports, it might be a Starcraft FPS led by a veteran Far Cry developer.
mckra1g ("Molly Cranberries-Kraig 🦃") wrote:
Gallows humor is gonna get us all through this shitstorm.
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airspeedswift ("Ben Cohen") wrote:
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Reblogged by slightlyoff@toot.cafe ("Alex Russell"):
Teen Vogue continues to lead the revolution and people who devalue media aimed at teenage girls and young women at a time when their bodily autonomy is under attack can fuck off.
https://www.teenvogue.com/story/what-to-do-before-the-trump-administration-takes-office-in-january
Murder trial begins for man accused of killing Georgia student Laken Riley
The 22-year-old nursing student's death fueled an emotional and politically charged debate over immigration and crime after authorities said the suspect was a man who entered the U.S. illegally.
Why the White House hasn't benefited much from investing in infrastructure
The Biden administration is touting the third anniversary of the bipartisan infrastructure law that pumped billions into roads, bridges, airports and more. But there's been little political benefit.
The Full, Insane Story Of The Call of Duty: Black Ops Series
It’s a common refrain that Call of Duty simply needs to cut out the middleman and just turn into a full fledged multiplayer-only game, but there are some absolute sickos out there who just keep egging Activision on to keep giving us 3 or 4 hours of absolute military-industrial nonsense, and god bless ‘em that they…
Disney has reportedly pulled a Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur episode for telling a trans-inclusive story
Disney
Though the remainder of Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur’s final season is set to hit the Disney Channel and Disney Plus some time next year, the studio is reportedly keeping one episode from airing because of its focus on a transgender character.
Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur has often touched on ideas about race, class, and issues like gentrification as it followed the adventures of genius 13-year-old Lunella Lafatette (Diamond White) and her pet dinosaur, Devil (Fred Tatasciore). But according to now-deleted social media posts from animators who worked on “The Gatekeeper” — an episode about Lunella and other members of her school’s volleyball team being terrorized by a transphobic adult — Disney has chosen to keep the episode from...
Next Predator Movie's Main Character Is The Alien Hunter Himself
According to Predator: Badlands director Dan Trachtenberg, the upcoming installment in the sci-fi franchise is going to shake things up and make the alien hunter himself the protagonist.
Yes, You Should Open Every Safe In Call Of Duty: Black Ops 6
It wouldn’t feel like a proper entry in the series if Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 didn’t present a fun single-player campaign alongside the compelling grind to Prestige. Not only is the narrative exciting, but the missions vary quite a lot and give you plenty of options for how to accomplish objectives. There are a lot…
Sometimes The Onion makes a joke that is just for me, and in this case, it is that the logo of Global Tetrahedron LLC is a dodecahedron.
ANDROALPHUS: [...] When he appears in human form, he can be forced to give lessons of geometry. He is an astronomer and, besides, he teaches how to skillfully argue over details.
I say to you, whomst among us has not leaned against the bar and drunkenly given lessons of geometry.
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Trump claims he can bring peace to the world. In India, many believe him
The world's most populous country has consistently favorable views of U.S. President-elect Trump. In a Pew Research Center poll, 42% of Indians, including 51% of men, said they had confidence in him.
Mike Tyson was a heavyweight champ before Jake Paul was born. Tonight, they face off
One is a YouTuber-turned-boxer. The other hasn't been back in the ring in nearly two decades. Tonight they'll fight in Texas.
MissingThePt ("Missing The Point") wrote:
*Trump slapping the side of the Cabinet* “You would not believe how many sex offenders can fit in this baby.”
jon@gruene.social ("Jon Worth") wrote:
“Everyone’s leaving, but we’re buying ads because we fear retribution from the owner”
FFS
What a time to be alive
pzmyers@octodon.social ("pzmyers 🦑") wrote:
SOLD! Probably.
https://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2024/11/15/too-late-i-think/
luca@social.luca.run ("Luca Hammer") wrote:
I collected posts from people using TweetXer to exterminate their Tweets. It makes me happy that my script helps them with letting go.
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Power Up With These 11 Dragon Ball: Sparking Zero Mods
Dragon Ball: Sparking Zero is full of attention to detail and love for the 40-year-old franchise. Of course, that doesn’t mean it has every reference or detail that fans are looking for. Those playing the PC version have already taken the responsibility of fixing that into their own hands. Since the game’s launch,…
jwildeboer@social.wildeboer.net ("Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange:") wrote:
#BlueSky isn't decentralised or federated. The outage yesterday is the obvious proof. It may *look* decentralised and they definitely love to outsource traffic and storage costs by claiming that running your own PDS (Personal Data Server) is somehow something federated, but that's all smoke and mirrors. You have to go deep on [1] to find "networking through Relays instead of server-to-server" as their current implementation choice. THEY run the relays. No one else.
[1] https://bsky.social/about/blog/5-5-2023-federation-architecture
jrconlin@soc.jrconlin.com ("jr conlin —〰—") wrote:
Oh, look. the Mozilla Foundation is asking for community feedback about what folk want them to focus on.
Anyone have opinions?
The M4 MacBook Pro features a quantum dot display
Photo by Antonio G. Di Benedetto / The Verge
The new M4 MacBook Pros that launched last month have an unadvertised change with new quantum dot displays, according to display industry analyst Ross Young and reported by 9to5Mac.
Young posted on X that Apple is adopting quantum dot displays for the first time and that it's using a version of the film that is free of cadmium, which is toxic to humans. “In the past, Apple went with the KSF solution due to better efficiency and lack of cadmium (Cd),” writes Ross. TV manufacturers have been using a version of quantum dot displays with no cadmium traces for years.
The operator of the display motion blur testing website Blur Busters, which features flying UFO animations to help nitpick at display tech, also noted the M4 display’s...
Wind Blowing Out of Uranus Makes It Hard to Probe, NASA Complains: Scientists have found that a "rare intense wind event" during NASA's Voyager 2 flyby of Uranus in 1986 may have seriously messed with our understanding of the planet.
https://jwz.org/b/ykdM
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Super Movement Is A Vague Dragon Ball: Sparking Zero Mechanic You Need To Know About
Dragon Ball: Sparking Zero is a game packed with numerous characters and mechanics alike. Although it does feature training modes to help you master the various systems available, some things just aren’t explained well. Impact Actions are a great example even though it’s a commonly encountered mechanic. Something that…
Bluesky says it won’t train AI on your posts
Image: Cath Virginia / The Verge
Social network Bluesky, in a post on Friday, says that it has “no intention” of taking user content to train generative AI tools. It made the statement shortly ahead of competitor X implementing its new terms of service that spell out how it can analyze user text and other information to train its generative AI tools.
“A number of artists and creators have made their home on Bluesky, and we hear their concerns with other platforms training on their data,” Bluesky says in a post. “We do not use any of your content to train generative AI, and have no intention of doing so.”
A number of artists and creators have made their home on Bluesky, and we hear their concerns with other platforms training on their data. We do not use any of your...
Trump picks Steven Cheung to run White House communications
Cheung, a former spokesperson for the Ultimate Fighting Championship, brought a cage fighter's spirit to speaking on behalf of Trump during the campaign.
Breakthrough Gaming: How To Get Into The Dragon Quest Games
There are few series that have revolutionized video games quite like Dragon Quest. Debuting all the way back in 1986, the first Dragon Quest made its mark by distilling the complex mechanics of early RPGs such as Wizardry and Ultima into a form that even casual gamers could enjoy. Featuring the artwork of the…
Xbox's Big Black Friday Sale Starts Today With 1,000+ Discounted Games
As we get deeper into November, more and more companies are announcing Black Friday deals. Xbox has joined the holiday tradition and revealed a ton of deals on games, consoles, and controllers.
Senator to Valve: what’s with all the Nazis on Steam?
Image: The Verge
US Senator Mark Warner (D-VA) has sent a letter to Valve CEO Gabe Newell asking if the company intends to take measures to curtail extremist content on Steam. The letter references a report by the Anti-Defamation League that identified a large number of user accounts and user-created groups “that glorified antisemitic, Nazi**,** white supremacist, gender- and sexuality-based hate, and other extremist ideologies” on the PC gaming platform.
The letter features a high-level view of the kind of hateful content the ADL found on Steam. That includes “40,000 groups with names that included hateful words, with the most prominent being ‘1488,’ ‘shekel,’ and ‘white power’.” Warner’s letter highlights how the apparent preponderance of hateful content...
Animal rescuers evacuate a lion cub from war-torn Lebanon to South Africa
The group Animals Lebanon says it rescued Sara the lion cub from abuse by a Lebanese social media influencer, kept it safe in Beirut and sent it to a wildlife sanctuary in South Africa.
Gophers needed 1 day after Mount St. Helens erupted to bring explosions of new life
Scientists say the pocket gophers were cranky about being moved into a devastated landscape for a day in 1980. But decades later, their short visit still has visible, and vibrant, effects.
Trump’s Nephew Tells Democrats: Don’t Quit Now
Donald Trump’s nephew Fred Trump III doesn’t expect to be invited to his uncle’s inauguration this time around. He did, after all, write a book exposing some of the president-elect’s unsavory behavior, including the Donald telling Fred he should let his disabled son, William, die. View on Threads But Fred Trump still plans to spend […]
The Plan To Silence Dissent
Donald Trump has made it clear that there are groups he’d like to punish. Much attention has been paid to his planned crusades for his next term against immigrants and trans people. But less discussed has been another group on the list: protesters. Building off the bipartisan crackdown on anti-war student dissent last year, Trump has […]
Director Explains Why Robert Pattinson's Batman Doesn't Appear In HBO's Penguin
HBO’s The Penguin only exists because The Batman was wildly successful and audiences really gravitated to Colin Farrell’s against-type rendition of Oswald Cobblepot, or Oz Cobb as he’s known in this universe. So why isn’t Robert Pattinson’s caped crusader anywhere to be found in the show’s eight-episode tour of…
Here are the best AirPods deals you can get right now
The new AirPods 4 deliver better sound and voice call quality than prior models. | Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge
If you know where to look, you can often score discounts on Apple’s ever-popular AirPods. Although we’ve yet to see major deals on the new AirPods 4 and the updated AirPods Max, both the second- and third-gen AirPods can still often be found at a steep discount. The same goes for the original Max headphones, which are nearly indistinguishable from the previous model aside from the switch to a USB-C connector.
Here, we’ve rounded up the best deals currently available on each model, including the second-gen and third-gen AirPods, both iterations of the AirPods 4, the latest AirPods Pro with USB-C, and the last-gen AirPods Max.
The best AirPods (second-gen) deals
Before they were discontinued alongside the AirPods 4 announcement, the...
jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein") wrote:
sigh… okay, so that did not work right ;^{
time to stop & take a long break
RFK Jr. wants to 'Make America Healthy Again.' He could face a lot of pushback
RFK Jr. wants to tackle chronic disease. Despite controversial views on vaccines, his focus on healthy food and taking on special interests may find broad support — and face political headwinds.
The new Mac Mini is great — now do the iPhone SE
This could be so much better. | Photo by Allison Johnson / The Verge
We could argue all day about the merits of iOS versus Android, but there’s one thing the Android ecosystem offers that you definitely won’t find from Apple right now: a decent midrange phone.
By “decent,” I mean something I can enthusiastically recommend. Not “Eh, if it’s literally your only option, then it’s fine,” which is how I’ve caveated my recommendations of the iPhone SE over the past couple of years. Remember the SE? Apple released the first version in 2016, putting a then-current A9 chip into an older body design for $399 compared to $649 for the iPhone 6S. I still have mine, and it rules.
Two generations later, and the SE is still Apple’s most affordable iPhone, now starting at $429. For that price, you get a well-built phone...
“A Genuine Catastrophe”: Experts React to Trump’s Nomination of Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
Public health experts, physicians, and scientists responded with fury and disgust to the news that Donald Trump will nominate anti-vaccine activist Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to be the secretary of Health and Human Services. If Kennedy—who has also promoted dangerous and ludicrous ideas about fluoride, 5G technology, and the causes of HIV/AIDS, among innumerable other […]
BioWare Clarifies Dragon Age: The Veilguard's Secret Ending As Misinterpretations Spread Online
Dragon Age: The Veilguard’s ending is one of the best segments in the game if not the whole series. But its secret ending, one you unlock by doing specific side quests and finding certain artifacts throughout the world, is a bit more controversial. After fans unlocked the scene in question, some weren’t thrilled at…
Of Misogyny, Musk, and Men
In the days before the election, when too many stories about deadlocked polls and undecided voters and the MAGAfication of young men began to wear on my soul, I turned to TikTok to see what women were thinking. Soon enough I was swimming in a sea of female excitement and angst. I watched videos of […]
Casio’s first smart ring has innovative features like a stopwatch and flashing alarm
Casio’s smart ring is a tiny digital watch. | Image: Casio
Not to be outdone by its longtime rival, Casio has announced its own digital ring watch that brings more functionality than Timex’s wearable that debuted last month. Created to help commemorate the 50th anniversary of Casio getting into the digital watch business, the CRW-001-1JR will be available in Japan starting in December for ￥19,800, or around $128.
Although the tiny watch’s case is just shy of being an inch in size, Casio has managed to squeeze in a retro six-segment LCD screen that can display hours, minutes, and seconds. The ring also includes three functional buttons that can control additional features like displaying the date or the time in a different time zone, and a stopwatch.
Image: Casio
Casio’s new...
Cruise fined $500k for submitting a false report after last year’s pedestrian crash
Image: Cruise
GM’s Cruise will pay a criminal fine of $500,000 to resolve a federal investigation and accept a deferred prosecution agreement after the company admitted to falsifying a report to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) “with the intent to impede, obstruct, or influence the investigation” of a crash where one of its driverless vehicles struck and dragged a pedestrian in 2023.
NHTSA had already fined Cruise $1.5 million in September for submitting incomplete reports that failed to disclose that the robotaxi dragged the pedestrian 20 feet after they were hit by another vehicle and knocked into its path. The dragging wasn’t in a verbal summary Cruise employees gave to NHTSA the next day, video of the accident shown to...
The best robot vacuums
Image: The Verge
Floor-sweeping robots are only getting better, with new mopping skills, better navigation chops, and more automation, meaning less work for you. We picked the best bots you can buy right now.
jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein") wrote:
So you might be wondering: now that I’m over mainstream media, where do I get my news?
Answer: mainly from BBC Sounds, the app from the BBC, which delivers high quality radio reporting from all over the world, for free. It’s not perfect, but... [3/3]
jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein") wrote:
3) The Democratic brand is toxic. FALSE. As Democratic “strategists” (euphemism for “unemployed gasbags”) bloviate on cable news about why their party lost, I’m reminded of a famous quote from the great political humorist Will Rogers: “I am not a member of any organized political party. I am a Democrat.”
The mainstream media have been amplifying the lazy critiques of this circular firing squad… [2/3]
jsonstein@masto.deoan.org ("Jeff Sonstein") wrote:
on “mainstream media” gaslighting the public
(from The Borowitz Report)...classics of the gaslighting genre.
- Donald Trump won in a landslide. FALSE. As of this writing, Trump’s popular vote margin over Harris is only two percent...
2) Kamala Harris lost because she ran a terrible campaign. FALSE. No campaign is flawless, but Harris… had to mount hers in a mere hundred days and… in a year when incumbent parties were swept out of power around the world... [1/3]
Pokémon Is Releasing Some Incredible Merch For Gold And Silver’s 25th Anniversary
Pokémon Gold and Silver turns 25 years old this month. The Game Boy Color RPGs brought fans to the Johto region, introduced 100 new monsters, and are widely considered some of the best games in the franchise’s long history. To commemorate the anniversary, The Pokémon Company is releasing a new line of merchandise…
Study: Equal Pay for Disabled Workers Creates, Not Costs, Jobs
When the Fair Labor Standards Act was signed into law in 1938, first establishing a national minimum wage, it came with an exemption: employers could pay some disabled workers less than minimum wage. The federal exemption still stands, even as many states roll back their versions—and that wage can still be as little as 25 […]
Facebook is changing its primary metric to ‘views’
Image: Nick Barclay / The Verge
Facebook is making “views” its primary metric to measure the performance of content, bringing it in line with Instagram metrics.
Views will be measured not just on video content but also on photos, text posts, and more. When Instagram head Adam Mosseri announced the switch to views this summer, he said that having one consistent metric across the platform would make it easier for creators to understand how their content was performing. For reels, a view is how many times the video was played. For everything else, a view is how many times a piece of content shows up on a user’s screen, and if the same user looks at it multiple times, each instance counts as a view.
Meta has also added a view count to posts on Threads, saying it’s an...
Threads is testing custom feeds for your favorite topics
Image: The Verge
Threads is testing a way to create custom feeds for certain profiles or topics, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced on Friday. The upcoming feature should make it easier to keep tabs on different interests, such as your favorite sports team or even technology-related news.
It sounds similar to the custom feeds feature Bluesky rolled out last year — but Threads’ version seems a lot simpler. To create a custom feed, just search and tap into a topic. From there, select the three-dot icon beside the search term and choose “create new feed.”
GIF: Meta
You can create feeds that track soccer or men’s fashion.
You can also add profiles to your custom feed by selecting the three-dot icon above someone’s profile photo and...
Elon Musk targets Microsoft in amended OpenAI lawsuit
Image: Kristen Radtke / The Verge; Getty Images
Elon Musk has updated his fraud, breach of contract, and racketeering lawsuit against OpenAI to make antitrust claims against Microsoft, accusing the two companies of attempting to “monopolize the generative AI market.” The amended complaint filed on Thursday names Microsoft as a new defendant, as well as LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman and Microsoft VP Dee Templeton, a former OpenAI board member.
Microsoft has invested $14 billion in OpenAI since 2019 and holds exclusive rights to commercially license the AI startup’s technology and a 49 percent stake in its for-profit subsidiary. Musk’s lawyers say that former OpenAI CEO Sam Altman “engaged in rampant self-dealing” to create a “de facto merger” between the two companies to promote...
What's going on with the 'magic' drug for malaria?
The anti-malarial drug Artemisinin is highly effective. It's critical for kids, who are especially vulnerable. A new study comes to an alarming conclusion.