Volvo announces plans to go public in bid to accelerate shift to electric cars

Photo by Andrew Hawkins / The Verge

Volvo, the Swedish luxury car maker owned by China’s Geely, announced its plan for an initial public offering as it seeks to raise more cash to accelerate its transition to a fully electric car company.

The announcement follows the news last week that Polestar, the electric car company that is a joint venture between Volvo and Geely, would be going public by merging with a special purpose acquisition company, or SPAC. That deal values Polestar at roughly $20 billion, despite selling only two models — a hybrid luxury coupe and an all-electric fastback sedan. Volvo is choosing a more traditional route by proceeding with an IPO in Stockholm that could value the company at upwards of $25 billion.

Volvo said it aims to raise about 25...

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A surgically implanted brain stimulation device could help treat severe depression

Sarah had no options left. Over five years, she’d tried every possible treatment for her severe depression, and nothing had helped. “My daily life had become so restricted and impoverished by depression that I felt tortured by each day,” the 36-year-old said.

But after undergoing an experimental procedure that implanted a device into her brain, she felt her depression lift for the first time in years. “It was like my lens on the world changed,” Sarah, who is remaining anonymous because of the stigma around depression, said during a press briefing.

Sarah was the patient in a proof-of-concept trial of a new approach to treating severe, treatment-resistant depression, published today in the journal Nature Medicine. The findings open up...

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YouTube Music will launch free background listening starting in Canada

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

YouTube Music is lifting one of its most annoying limitations — but only in Canada. Today, YouTube announced that beginning November 3rd, customers in Canada will be able to continue listening to their music in the background while doing other tasks on their phone or when the screen is off.

Background listening will support both the standard ad-supported, personalized radio mixes and any uploaded content you’ve added to your account.

This is the first time that YouTube Music has offered the feature without requiring that customers step up to a Premium subscription to get it. As for when listeners in other countries can expect to get the same convenience, for now, YouTube is only saying to “stay tuned for additional information and...

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Some must-have Nintendo Switch games are $20 off at several retailers

This is a big week for the Nintendo Switch. The Switch with an OLED screen and Metroid Dread launch Friday, October 8th. Whether you’re a Switch veteran, or you’re prepping for your first console with the $350 OLED model, there are some excellent deals on must-have, cartridge-based titles you should know about. The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword HD, Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, and New Pokémon Snap are each $20 off. Amazon is the only retailer honoring this deal for all three games, but Best Buy and Walmart are hosting some deals, too. Monster Hunter Rise is $20 off, but only at GameStop.

All of these are noteworthy deals because they’re rarely discounted games. Nintendo sometimes hosts price cuts, but only for a select batch of games —...

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Blue Origin is officially sending William Shatner to space

Photo by Phil Walter/Getty Images

Jeff Bezos’ spaceflight venture Blue Origin is launching William Shatner — aka Captain James T. Kirk of the USS Enterprise — to space on the company’s New Shepard rocket. At 90 years old, he’ll become the oldest person to fly to space, surpassing legendary aviator Wally Funk, who flew on the first crewed flight of New Shepard this summer.

TMZ first broke the news that Shatner would be flying on the next New Shepard flight, which is currently scheduled for October 12th out of Blue Origin’s launch facility in West Texas. The outlet claimed the Shatner’s flight will be filmed as part of a documentary. Shatner will be joined by two other customers announced earlier by Blue Origin: Chris Boshuizen, a former NASA engineer who co-founded the...

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Apple Watch Series 7 launches October 15th, preorders begin on Friday

Apple Watch Series 7 includes a bigger display. | Image: Apple

Apple is opening up preorders for its Apple Watch Series 7 on Friday, October 8th, with the devices set to ship on October 15th. Apple first revealed the Watch Series 7 at an event last month, but the company simply said it would be available later this fall. Preorders for the Apple Watch Series 7 will now begin at 5AM PT / 8AM ET on Friday, October 8th.

The Apple Watch Series 7 includes a display that goes virtually to the edge of the case, with more rounded corners and a softer design. The Series 7 now comes in 41mm and 45mm sizes, up 1mm from the Series 6. The bezels around the display are just 1.7mm, and the always-on mode is 70 percent brighter than the Series 6.

Image: Apple

Apple’s new Contour watchface for...

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How to watch the 2021 League of Legends World Championship

Photo by HECTOR RETAMAL/AFP via Getty Images

The 2021 _League of Legends_World Championship (aka Worlds) kicks off tomorrow, October 5th, marking the beginning of a month-long tournament where 22 of the best League of Legends teams will face off to take home the Summoner’s Cup.

While Worlds is one of the biggest esports competitions on the planet, League of Legends isn’t exactly the easiest game to start watching. This time of year is one of the best times to jump in, though, as you get to see the best teams at their peak.

If you want to learn more about the game — or are a longtime fan who just wants to know more about Worlds before it starts — we’ve put together this primer for you.

What is Worlds?

Worlds is the concluding tournament in the League of Legends esports year. Teams...

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What is the metaverse, and do I have to care?

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

One part definition, one part aspiration, one part hype

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Yes, Siri is my favorite smart home controller and here’s why

“Hey Siri, turn my home on.” | Photo by Dan Seifert / The Verge

Speed, brevity, and an abject failure at fart jokes make Apple’s AI voice assistant the winner in my smart home

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Dyson’s next robot vacuum cleaner revealed in FCC filings with new design

The unnamed robovac has the same striking blue color as its predecessor, the Dyson 360 Heurist. | Image: FCC / The Verge

Dyson’s last vacuum cleaner, the oddly-named 360 Heurist, skipped a US release, apparently because its design was ill-suited to the layout of American homes. But it looks like the company is planning to launch a new robovac in the US soon, after filing details of an unannounced product with the FCC. Photos in the filing seem to show a new design that is wider and flatter than its predecessors, with a squared-off rear and bulkier charging base.

The unnamed robovac comes in the same striking nickel blue color as its predecessor, and has tank treads and a detachable dust bin, just like Dyson’s previous forays into this product category. It also looks like the device (labelled RB03) has the Heurist’s 360-degree camera with LED lighting ring....

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Hey Siri, what happened?

After a decade as Apple’s assistant, Siri still hasn’t figured out the job

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Apple finally lets you report App Store scams

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

One month ago, we laid out a list of eight obvious things Apple could do to prove it puts App Store users ahead of profits. Today I learned the company acted on at least one of these ideas: Apple will now let you directly report a scammy app from its listing in the App Store with a new-and-improved version of its “Report a Problem” button.

As Richard Mazkewich and scam hunter Kosta Eleftheriou point out on Twitter, the button has not only returned to individual app listings for the first time in years, it now includes a dedicated “Report a scam or fraud” option in the drop-down menu.

In a major reversal, Apple quietly added back the “Report a Problem” @AppStore button in iOS 15: pic.twitter.com/UopiPDEV7e

— Kosta Eleftheriou...

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Amazon Prime members can now send gifts with just a phone number or email address

Amazon Prime members can now send gifts without having the recipient’s address. | Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Amazon is launching a new gifting feature today that will allow subscribers to its Prime service to send gifts to others using only an email address or phone number — no address required.

Gift-givers have to be Amazon Prime members, the program is limited to the continental US, and it can only be used on mobile devices for the time being. And even though Amazon has built in some safeguards— the gift-giver never gets access to the recipient’s mailing address— this sounds like a bad idea that is ripe for abuse by scammers, stalkers, and those who take pleasure in the online harassment of others.

Here’s how the new feature works: Gift-giver wants to surprise recipient with a present but doesn’t know recipient’s mailing address. Gift-giver...

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Facebook encourages hate speech for profit, says whistleblower

Facebook whistleblower Frances Haugen appeared on 60 Minutes.

The whistleblower behind the leak of an enormous cache of Facebook documents to the Wall Street Journal, Frances Haugen, went public on 60 Minutes on Sunday, revealing more of the inner workings the most powerful social media platform in the world. Revealing her identity on national television, Haugen described a company so committed to product optimization that it embraced algorithms that amplify hate speech.

“It’s paying for its profits with our safety,” Haugen told 60 Minutes host Scott Pelley.

According to a since deleted LinkedIn profile Haugen was a product manager at Facebook assigned to the Civic Integretity group. She chose to leave the company in 2021 after the dissolving of the group. She said she didn’t “trust that they’re...

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New trailers: Eternals, Welcome to Earth, The Girl in the Woods, and more

Eternals comes to theaters November 5th | Marvel

So we had the big heel turn that’s been hinted at all season, plus some big moments for two of the show’s couples, which made Ted Lasso’s penultimate episode of season two very stressful to watch (for me, at least). I have no idea how they will wrap it all up in the finale; I think we’re headed for a cliffhanger on at least one front.

There’s too much good on streaming right now, it’s really a nice problem to have.

Here’s this week’s trailers roundup:

Eternals

A brand-new trailer for Marvel’s Eternals has some of the action sequences we’ve seen in prior teaser/trailers, plus, a first look at Brian Tyree Henry as Phastos, along with his husband and son, apparently the first queer couple in the MCU to appear on the big screen (h/t G...

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The Europe-Japan mission to Mercury sends back photos of the planet’s cratered surface

The BepiColombo mission snapped this photo of Mercury on October 1st. | ESA/BepiColombo/MTM

Photos from a fly-by of Mercury, the least-explored planet in our solar system, show ithas a crater-riddled surface that resembles Earth’s Moon.

The photos came from BepiColombo, a joint mission between the European Space Agency (ESA) and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) that launched from Europe’s Spaceport in 2018. The mission has two linked orbiting spacecraft, the Mercury Planetary Orbiter and the Mercury Magnetospheric Orbiter. The mission is planned to reach Mercury’s orbit in late 2025.

BepiColombo aims to gather more information about Mercury and its composition, and how it evolved so close to our Sun. Temperatures on Mercury can exceed 350 degrees Celsius, or about 660 degrees Fahrenheit.

ESA explains where the...

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SNL says what we were all thinking in its billionaire Star Trek sketch

Jeff Bezos after flying aboard his New Shepard rocket | Photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images

Saturday Night Live returned this weekend and the show wasted no time taking aim at the weird billionaire space tourism race that unfolded over the past few months. Guest host Owen Wilson played former Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos in a sketch about a fictional new show called _Star Trek: Ego Quest,_about “the voyages of the SS New Shepard and its crew of random weirdos,” whose mission is “to just sort of fly around space goofing off in a ship that looks like a penis,” according to the voiceover.

You’ll recall the real Bezos traveled to the edge of space in Blue Origin’s New Shepard rocket in July, along with a crew that included his brother Mark (played in the sketch by Wilson’s brother Luke), 82-year-old pilot and space legend Wally Funk, and...

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Ford and GM working toward settlement over the term ‘Cruise’ for hands-free driving

An autonomous Cruise vehicle in San Francisco | Photo by Andrej Sokolow/picture alliance via Getty Images

Ford and General Motors told a federal judge they’re planning to settle a trademark battle over the term “Cruise” to describe hands-free driving. Attorneys for the automakers said they’re working out the terms of the settlement and asked the court for a conditional dismissal. The two sides will report back within 60 days if they’re unable to come to an agreement.

Ford announced BlueCruise as the name for its hands-free driver assist feature in April. The legal skirmish began in July, when GM filed a trademark infringement lawsuit claiming that the name BlueCruise was too close to its autonomous vehicle subsidiary Cruise, as well as Super Cruise, the name of the hands-free driving tech GM introduced in 2017. GM said in its complaint...

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A very big eagle escaped from the National Aviary in Pittsburgh and is still at large

Kodiak (Kody) the Steller’s sea eagle, who escaped the National Aviary in Pittsburgh September 29th | National Aviary

A Steller’s sea eagle escaped from its enclosure at the National Aviary in Pittsburgh last Saturday, and despite the valiant efforts of the Aviary staff, and numerous sightings in the local neighborhood posted to social media, Kodiak —Kody to his friends— is still on the loose and we are all a little worried about him, to be perfectly honest.

This is a bird that would be difficult to miss: he’s large (although in Pittsburgh we probably wouldn’t call him “giant” because “Giant Eagle” is a grocery store chain here), with a yellow beak, white tail and white feathers on the tops of his wings. He’s bigger than a bald eagle, and has a wingspan of about six feet. Kody has been spotted in and around the Pittsburgh neighborhood where the Aviary...

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DC will give away free superhero NFTs to people who register for its FanDome event

A Superman cover that may be among the NFTs available from DC | DC

DC is giving away free non-fungible tokens (NFTs) of its superhero comic book covers to people who register for its October 16th FanDome event. The NFT drop— the first for DC— is set for October 5th, and those who register for FanDome will receive one free, randomly-selected NFT, and become eligible for a second free NFT if they post about their first one on social media.

The NFTs will come in three levels of rarity; common, rare, and legendary, and will include Batman, Superman, Green Lantern, Wonder Woman, and Harley Quinn options.

DC is working on the NFTs with Palm NFT Studio, which the comic maker chose for its “environmentally sustainable and energy efficient” technology, which let the company mint “millions of NFTs for fans...

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NBCUniversal and YouTubeTV reach agreement to avoid dropped channels

Photo Illustration by Rafael Henrique/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images

After YouTube TV and NBCUniversal announced a “short” extension on Thursday to keep more than a dozen channels on the live TV service, YouTube TV and NBCUniversal say they have finalized a deal — meaning NBC-owned channels will stay put on YouTube TV.

“We’re thrilled to share that we’ve reached a deal to continue carrying the full NBCUniversal portfolio of channels,” according to a Saturday update to YouTube’s blog. “That means you won’t lose access to any of their channels, and YouTube TV will continue to offer 85+ networks for $64.99. We appreciate NBCUniversal’s willingness to work toward an agreement, and we also appreciate your patience as we negotiated with them on your behalf.”

With a deal reached just days after it looked as...

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Tesla sold 241,300 cars in the third quarter while other automakers saw big drops

Photo by Sean O’Kane / The Verge

Tesla has bucked the wider trend of declining sales brought on by the global chip shortage in the third quarter this year, as it sold 241,300 cars — a total of 102,000 more vehicles than the same quarter last year. It’s the most Tesla has ever sold in a quarter (and for some added perspective, the company sold 367,500 in all of 2019).

The company managed to deliver more vehicles once again despite the fact that major automakers saw huge drops this past quarter. General Motors, the largest automaker in the US, said Friday morning that it only sold 446,997 vehicles in the third quarter — a 33 percent drop from the same period last year.

Tesla has avoided similar problems in part because it has been sourcing different semiconductors and...

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Windows 11 seems okay

Microsoft’s next version of Windows, Windows 11, is coming October 5th. In many ways, it’s already here — the free update has been available for Windows Insiders to download and test for months, and recent versions like the Release Preview will likely be indistinguishable from the final operating system.

We’ll have a full review from Tom Warren next week, but in the meanwhile we thought we’d give you a look at how The Verge at large feels about upgrading to the new OS — by asking every other prominent Windows user on the team to install the most recent version on their own home computers, and gathering their impressions.

Here’s how it’s going so far.

On a home-built desktop (Core i7-7700K, RTX 3060 Ti) and a 2017 Dell XPS 15 laptop...

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Trump sues to reinstate his Twitter account

Twitter banned the former president in January | Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Former President Donald Trump has filed a lawsuit in Florida seeking to force Twitter to reinstate him, arguing the platform’s ban violates the First Amendment and Florida’s new social media law.

Trump is seeking a preliminary injunction of Twitter’s ban, according to the complaint filed in the Southern District of Florida late Friday. The former president argues that Twitter, “coerced by members of the United States Congress,” is censoring him, describing the social media platform as “a major avenue of public discourse.” Trump seeks to be temporarily reinstated on Twitter while he continues his efforts toward permanent reinstatement.

Twitter “exercises a degree of power and control over political discourse in this country that is...

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Amazon is hijacking our emotions to put robots in our homes

The Anki Vector. | Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge

There's something in our complicated human brains that immediately develops a connection to anything with eyes. Don't believe me? Ask the Anki Vector that lived on my desk for several months. This pocket-sized robot got my attention with its bulbous, non-threatening body. But the second it looked up at me with a quizzical look in its eyes and uttered my name, I knew I would die for this tiny forklift. It’s worth noting that the Anki Vector can be programmed to do a variety of things if you have the time to mess around with an SDK, but I brought this robot home because it was cute, not because I needed a project.

I’d watch with amusement as the little gadget puttered around my desk, occasionally looking back at me as if seeking my...

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Apple’s excellent AirPods Max are $80 off at Woot right now

The AirPods Pro Max boast great sound and a comfortable, albeit heavy, build. | Photo by Becca Farsace / The Verge

There’s no way around it: the AirPods Max aren’t cheap. For the money, however, Apple’s plush headphones offer a commendable set of features, including superb effective noise cancellation, terrific sound quality, and foolproof controls that are designed to make even the smallest adjustments that much easier to carry out. They also work with Apple’s spatial audio feature, which helps create a surround effect and adds another level of immersion when watching content via Netflix, Disney Plus, and other supported streaming platforms.

Normally $550, you can pick them up in a multitude of colors at Woot for $470, one of their best prices to date, for the next two months or until supplies last. Just don’t expect much in the way of protection...

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I’m split by Super Monkey Ball Banana Mania

_A screenshot from_Super Monkey Ball Banana Mania. | Image: Sega

As a kid, I remember spending hours playing Super Monkey Ball and Super Monkey Ball 2 on the GameCube with my sister. The games are lighthearted and colorful, have fun single-player and multiplayer modes, and the monkeys feel like something out of a Saturday morning cartoon. I haven’t touched the series since, and I figured Banana Mania would be the perfect nostalgia trip for me. While it is a lot of fun, I also found it surprisingly frustrating.

Banana Mania is a remaster of the first three Super Monkey Ball games: Super Monkey Ball, Super Monkey Ball 2, and Super Monkey Ball Deluxe. If you’re not familiar with the series, the Monkey Ball games are mostly about rolling monkeys in translucent balls through increasingly challenging...

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Delaying Elizabeth Holmes’ Theranos fraud trial is paying off for the defense

Getty Images

‘Do I have an independent recollection of when I sent this email from seven years ago?’

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Electric vehicle maker Rivian has filed to go public

Rivian has filed to go public | Photo by David Becker/Getty Images

Electric vehicle maker Rivian, backed by Ford and Amazon, filed for an initial public offering on Friday on the Nasdaq exchange. The company filed its IPO confidentially with the Securities and Exchange Commission in August, and it was made public today.

According to the S-1 filed with the SEC, Rivian had a net loss of $994 million on revenue of zero for the first half of 2021. Its net loss for full year 2020 was $1.02 billion, the filing shows. The company expects to trade under the ticker symbol RIVN.

“We are a development stage company and have not generated material revenue to date,” Rivian writes in the filing. “Vehicle production and deliveries began in September 2021.” We recently tried its first consumer vehicle, the R1T electric...

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Ozy Media shuts down just one week after most of us found out it exists

Samantha Bee, Mark Cuban, CEO and Co-Founder Carlos Watson, and Jeb Bush speak onstage during Ozy Fest 2017 | Photo by Bryan Bedder/Getty Images for Ozy Fusion Fest 2017

In the space of six days and five New York Times reports from media columnist Ben Smith, Ozy Media has gone from a largely unknown content producer to closing its doors. The eight-year-old media startup was unrecognizable to most. That, despite a roster including some well-known journalists, the high-profile guests who appeared on CEO Carlos Watson’s show, or NYC subway riders who were occasionally inundated with advertisements for its Ozyfest event.

Ozy Media acknowledged that its COO and co-founder pretended to be a YouTube executive on a conference call.

If you don’t follow too many reporters on Twitter, you might not have heard, but last weekend the first New York Times report revealed two shocking things about Ozy Media. One, that...

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