The Steam alpha is finally arriving on select Chromebooks

Google recommends testing out (slightly older) AAA games on the Chromebook, like_Portal 2,The Witcher 3, and_Civ V. | Image: Google

Google says that an alpha version of Steam is finally available for Chrome OS users with specific machines to test, as long as they’re willing to put a beta OS on their computer. This announcement comes after the company prematurely said Valve’s PC game store was available last week before changing its tune to say it would be “coming soon.” While Google’s John Maletis, a Chrome OS VP, calls it “early days” for the software, it’s exciting that we’re finally going to get a peek at what the Steam experience will be like on Chromebooks.

Google says that the alpha will only be available on “a small set of recent Chromebooks,” as it’s focused on “devices where more games can run well.” (It’s also limited to certain configurations of those...

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The CDC is still trying to fix its data problem

Two years into the COVID-19 pandemic, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is still trying to improve the way it collects and analyzes public health data, Politico reported.

A March 16th email reviewed by Politico from Dan Jernigan, the CDC’s deputy director for Public Health Science and Surveillance, mentioned the Data Modernization Initiative — a plan that would include integrating state and federal data systems and giving states funding to hire staffers to work with data.

The COVID-19 pandemic highlighted the stark limitations of the US public health data systems: information is siloed at individual hospitals and local health departments and often takes a winding path before it gets to the federal level. Labs couldn’t send...

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Nvidia reveals H100 GPU for AI and teases ‘world’s fastest AI supercomputer’

The H100 die. | Image: Nvidia

Nvidia has announced a slew of AI-focused enterprise products at its annual GTC conference. They include details of its new silicon architecture, Hopper; the first datacenter GPU built using that architecture, the H100; a new Grace CPU “superchip”; and vague plans to build what the company claims will be the world’s fastest AI supercomputer, named Eos.

Nvidia has benefited hugely from the AI boom of the last decade, with its GPUs proving a perfect match for popular, data-intensive deep learning methods. As the AI sector’s demand for data compute grows, says Nvidia, it wants to provide more firepower.

In particular, the company stressed the popularity of a type of machine learning system known as a Transformer. This method has been...

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Spider-Man: No Way Home’s VFX wizards couldn’t see the Doc Ock memes coming

Digital Domain/Marvel Studios

VFX supervisor Scott Edelstein opens up about Spider-Man: No Way Home

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Peloton finally adds a pause button to its treadmills

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge

One downside to Peloton’s treadmills is that they’ve lacked a pause button. Thankfully, the company announced yesterday that the latest software update brings the feature to both the Tread and Tread Plus.

Tread and Tread Plus users can now tap the center of the screen to bring up the pause button. You can then hold the button to confirm. Previously, you’d have to hit the back button to exit the class or hit the manual stop button. Once you hit pause, the Tread will gradually slow down until it comes to a complete stop. At that point, you have the option of locking the Tread, or the machine will automatically lock itself after 45 seconds for safety. Your aggregate metrics, class, and progress can be paused for up to 60 minutes.

It might...

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The best fitness trackers to buy right now

Photo illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

From simple fitness bands to rugged sports watches

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Apple’s Studio Display has 64GB of storage in addition to its iPhone 11-caliber processor

Photo by Becca Farsace / The Verge

Apple’s new Studio Display is a fascinating piece of technology, largely due to the A13 Bionic chipset that powers it — making it as powerful as an entire iPhone 11. But it turns out the internal hardware of the Studio Display is even odder: not only does the Studio Display have an A13 chipset, but it also comes with a whopping 64GB of internal memory, as spotted by Twitter user Khaos Tian.

lol Studio Display has 64GB onboard storage?! pic.twitter.com/XfHGCYUYMG

— Khaos Tian (@KhaosT) March 21, 2022

The Studio Display having some storage is logical, given the extra software that Apple is running on it to enable extra camera and audio features for things like portrait mode and spatial audio effects. But it’s certainly surprising to...

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Instagram now lets all users tag products in their posts

US-based users on Instagram can now tag products in their posts. | Image: Instagram

Instagram is opening its product tagging feature to all users in the US, which means you no longer need a business or creator account to tag products in your posts. Starting today, the feature will start rolling out to everyone “over the next few months.” Instagram has transformed into an app where just about everything can be shoppable, and now you can purchase the same look that your friend is wearing in their posts.

The platform first rolled out product tagging in 2016 as part of its initial push into e-commerce, later supporting product tags in video posts and stories (and, eventually, Reels). As Instagram’s shopping experience continued to evolve, the platform added a native checkout feature that lets you buy products directly from...

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Teens are struggling to quit smoking and vaping

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

More adolescents failed to quit smoking in 2020 than in any of the previous 13 years, according to new data published in the Journal of the American Medical Association. 2020 was the first year the research team had data on attempts to quit e-cigarettes, and it showed that around 4 percent of adolescents unsuccessfully attempted to quit e-cigarettes.

E-cigarettes have been pushed to adult smokers as an alternative to traditional, combustible cigarettes — some evidence shows they might be less dangerous, and there’s mixed evidence that they could push adults to quit smoking altogether. But the picture might be different for teens, who started vaping in droves in 2018 and are far less likely to be cigarette smokers first. The new analysis...

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What happened at Stitcher

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge

I told you I was gonna sob over that new MUNA song. I didn’t lie.

Now, more non-lies! Aka news!

But first, here’s Jake with something to flag for you all:

What happened at Stitcher

Hi everyone, I’m excited to share with you one more story from Ashley Carman — a piece she spent months reporting out and wrapped up right before she left.

The story is a deep dive into SiriusXM’s acquisition of Stitcher — how it went, where it went awry, and how it speaks to the broader podcasting landscape’s move toward consolidation and scale.

Former employees at Stitcher say SiriusXM lacked a podcast strategy when they were brought onboard, felt like the company didn’t empower them to act on their expertise, and clashed over basic things like...

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How SiriusXM bought and bungled a beloved podcast network

SiriusXM leapt into podcasts with a $325 million deal — insiders say it’s off to a messy start

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Samsung’s Galaxy Buds Pro are cheaper than ever at Walmart

Photo by Becca Farsace / The Verge

If you want some of the best true wireless earbuds that Samsung has crafted yet, the Galaxy Buds Pro are selling for their lowest price yet at Walmart. You can pick them up in black, silver, or violet for $119.99, which is about $20 less than the previous low price. These offer the most amount of functionality on Samsung devices, including automatic device switching and 3D audio. But they’re still great on other Android phones and tablets.

Normally $199.99, this price drop is significant because it makes them affordable enough to consider over the newer Galaxy Buds 2, which are typically on sale for about $105. Compared head to head, the Galaxy Buds Pro boast superior water and sweat resistance, better sound quality, and a more effective...

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Nintendo’s original mobile gacha game Dragalia Lost is shutting down

Dragalia Lost, one of Nintendo’s increasingly dwindling stable of mobile games for iOS and Android, is shutting down. The company announced today that the game’s main campaign will be ending in July and that it’ll cease adding new characters or content updates (outside of the main campaign) at the end of March when its final set of characters is introduced.

Nintendo hasn’t said when exactly Dragalia Lost will be fully shutting down. The company only says that “after the main campaign has concluded, service for the game itself will come to a close at a later date. Further details on the end-of-service schedule will be provided in a future notification.” The announcement does note that players will still be able to summon new characters...

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Maserati jumps into luxury EV market with all-electric Grecale compact SUV

Italian luxury automaker Maserati unveiled the Grecale, a brand-new compact SUV that will come in a range of powertrains, including an all-electric version in 2023. It will be the tip of the spear in Maserati’s plan to become an EV-only brand by 2030.

Last week, Maserati announced plans to launch a range of EVs bearing the brand name Folgore, which is Italian for “lightning.” One of the first vehicles to feature that nameplate will be the Grecale, a crossover SUV slotting underneath the mid-size Levante.

Maserati is keeping most of the EV-relevant specs under wraps, including range, battery size, and charging time. The electric Grecale will come with a 400-volt architecture, which is similar to the one used by most EVs on the road...

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The $549.99 Insta360 One RS adds a better action camera to its modular setup

The One RS is still a modular system, with some minor upgrades. | Becca Farsace / The Verge

Insta360 has announced the One RS, a successor to the modular One R action / 360 cam it released last year. The RS is mostly a minor upgrade, with the brain module (or “core,” as Insta360 calls it) and mounting system getting a few tweaks that should make the experience of shooting with the 360 lens slightly better.

The One RS upgrades are mostly minor, but welcome, quality of life improvements. The core has an extra microphone, faster Wi-Fi for transferring your photos and videos, a quick menu to change shooting modes, and an “Instant Zoom” that lets you punch in up to 2.7 times while recording.

Insta360 also says the camera’s built-in “FlowState” stabilization is improved. The mounting bracket used to attach the RS to other...

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Roku OS 11 will let you set your own photos as a screensaver

Image: Roku

Roku device owners will soon have a whole host of new personalization features, including all-new ​​Photo Streams, with the Roku OS 11.

Firstly, when Roku OS 11 rolls out to users in the weeks ahead, they’ll be able to change their screensaver to display their own photography or images with Photo Streams. Not only will Photo Streams allow users to display photos from their desktop or mobile device on Roku, but users will also be able to share Streams with other Roku device owners as well. Once a Stream is shared, other Roku owners will be able to add to it, allowing everyone to collaborate on a shared album.

Roku OS 11 will also introduce a new “what to watch on Roku” menu, a personally curated hub added to the home screen menu that will...

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Robinhood’s new debit card will automatically invest in stocks and crypto as you spend

Robinhood’s new Cash Card. | Image: Robinhood

Robinhood has announced a new debit card, branded as the Robinhood Cash Card. The card will be linked to a spending account separate to users’ brokerage accounts, and work for in-person and online payments as well as ATM withdrawals. The new card will replace Robinhood’s current Cash Management debit card, originally announced in 2019.

The card’s big new feature is the option for users to automatically invest in assets like stocks and crypto when spending money. Robinhood will round up transactions made using the card to the nearest dollar, and use that extra money to buy assets chosen by the user. So, you might spend $10.55 on a burrito bowl with your Cash Card, and Robinhood will round the payment up to $11 and use the extra $0.45 to...

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How Robinhood’s Aparna Chennapragada is building the future of investing

Aparna Chennapragada | Photo Illustration by Grayson Blackmon / The Verge

Robinhood is launching a new cash card today

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How Microsoft built its smart Surface camera

Microsoft always wanted to upgrade the Surface Hub 2 camera

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WhatApp starts rolling out emoji reactions in Android beta

The feature offers a choice of six emoji. | Image: WABetaInfo

WhatsApp, the Meta-owned encrypted messaging service that boasts over two billion users worldwide, is adding emoji reactions in beta on Android. WABetaInfo, a reliable source of upcoming WhatsApp features, reports that emoji reactions have started appearing in beta version 2.22.8.3 of the service’s Android app, giving users a quick and easy way to respond to incoming messages.

With a long-press of a received message, the feature lets users react with one of six emoji: thumbs up, heart, crying, laugher, shocked face, or folded hands (usually taken to mean “thank you”). WhatsApp appears to be rolling out the feature on Android in phases, and we were unable to get it to appear ourselves.

Image: WABetaInfo

The emoji...

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Tesla officially opens Berlin Gigafactory

Tesla cars in front of its new factory in Germany. | Photo by Patrick Pleul/picture alliance via Getty Images

Tesla’s fourth Gigafactory, and its first in Europe, is officially being opened today by the company’s CEO Elon Musk, _Reuters_reports. The milestone was reached around two and a half years after Tesla initially announced its plans to build a factory on the site, which is located just outside the German capital of Berlin, and is officially called Giga Berlin-Brandenburg.

As part of the opening ceremony, Tesla is handing over the first production cars made at the factory to customers: 30 Model Y compact SUVs. _Reuters_reports that these are the performance configuration of the vehicle, which have a range of 320 miles and sell for €63,990.

Excited to hand over the first production cars made by Giga Berlin-Brandenburg tomorrow!

— Elon Musk...

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Okta hack puts thousands of businesses on high alert

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Okta, an authentication company used by thousands of organizations around the world, says it’s investigating news of a potential breach, Reuters reports. The disclosure comes as hacking group Lapsus$ has posted screenshots to its Telegram channel claiming to be of Okta’s internal systems, including one that appears to show Okta’s Slack channels, and another with a Cloudflare interface.

Writing in its Telegram channel, Lapsus$ claims to have had access to Okta’s systems for two months, but said its focus was “only on Okta customers.” The Wall Street Journal notes that in a recent filing Okta said it had over 15,000 customers around the world, including businesses, government agencies, and universities. It lists the likes of Peloton,...

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Nintendo finally adds folders to the Switch, kind of

Nintendo has added a new folder-style feature to the Switch’s UI, more than five years after the console was first released. It’s included as part of system firmware version 14.0, which is available to download now.

This being Nintendo, the system doesn’t work exactly like you might expect. It’s called “groups” and doesn’t allow you to place anything on the home screen — instead, you have to scroll all the way to the right to get to the vertical list of all your software and press L. That lets you access or create groups of various games. Nintendo has posted a guide to using the feature here.

It won’t do all that much to help you organize your home screen or full list of games, then. I already have a big enough Switch library that it...

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The best deals on 4K TVs

LG’s fantastic C1 OLED is on sale in the 55-inch configuration for around $1,197, its lowest price to date. | Image: LG

With CES 2022 having wrapped not too long ago, the future looks bright if you’re looking to nab a great TV deal. Many manufacturers — including LG and Samsung — announced new versions of some of their most popular models during the event, ranging from The Frame to LG’s new C2 lineup. And now that manufacturers like Samsung and LG have announced official pricing details, we’re probably going to start seeing prices fall on the last-gen models as their newer counterparts start to become available.

However, if you’re looking to pick up a solid deal before the new models arrive, fret not, as there are already some great discounts available. There are currently a number of discounted 4K TVs to choose from, spanning a wide variety of prices,...

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The best noise-canceling headphone deals

Bose’s terrific QuietComfort 45 headphones are currently on sale for $279, their best price to date. | Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge

With more people working from home than they used to, owning a good pair of noise-canceling headphones has become more appealing than ever. However, they can be expensive and difficult to shop for due to the range of available models, many of which cater to different lifestyles and priorities. Some are better suited for long-haul flights, while others are ideal for multitasking and marathon listening sessions.

That’s why we’ve curated this list of the best deals on noise-canceling headphones. Here, you’ll find sales on all kinds of on-ear and over-ear headphones, all of which are designed to eliminate outside noise but come with their own strengths and weaknesses. And if you want to do even more research before making a buying decision,...

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Google settles with engineers who said they were fired for trying to organize

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Google has settled with six engineers over claims the company squashed employees’ efforts to organize, as first reported by Motherboard. The specifics of the settlement remain under a non-disclosure agreement, but four of the workers who were allegedly fired out of retaliation for their labor activism in 2019 will not be reinstated, while one still remains employed by the tech giant.

Four employees, Rebecca Rivers, Laurence Berland, Paul Duke, and Sophie Waldman, filed labor charges against Google in 2019 after the company said they were fired because they violated its data security policies. Prior to their termination, they rallied against some of Google’s ethically questionable choices, including its work with the Customs and Border...

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The Mac Studio’s removable SSD is reportedly blocked by Apple on a software level

Photo by Becca Farsace / The Verge

Apple’s new Mac Studio was revealed to have an interesting secret over the weekend: it has removable SSD storage. But a subsequent video from YouTuber Luke Miani reveals that the Mac Studio still can’t be upgraded: not because of hardware limitations, but because Apple appears to be blocking replacement SSDs on a software level, via AppleTrack.

Unlike all of Apple’s other M1-powered computers, the Mac Studio’s storage isn’t soldered onto the mainboard, as Max Tech’s teardown over the weekend discovered. Getting to the SSD is a tricky business, involving removing the rubber ring on the bottom of the device, unscrewing the panel, and pulling out the unshielded power supply. But as it turns out, those expandable SSD hardware slots are for...

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Apple service centers can reportedly replace the Studio Display’s ‘built-in’ stands

Apple says this stand is “not interchangeable,” but reports say it plans on offering a replacement service. | Photo by Becca Farsace / The Verge

Workers at Apple Stores or Authorized Service Providers will be able to change which stand is attached to the Studio Display, according to a report from MacRumors, which cites internal Apple documents. This is despite a warning on Apple’s “Buy Apple Studio Display” page, which says that you have to choose a stand at the time of purchase, as they’re “built-in” and “not interchangeable.”

Apple provides three different stand options for the Studio Display. You can get either the standard stand with tilt adjustments or the VESA adapter for attaching the monitor to third-party arms without paying anything extra. If you want a height-adjustable stand from Apple, it’s a $400 upgrade. Apple says you have to decide at the time you’re buying the...

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Canceling your Stadia Pro subscription is easy, and you won’t lose your paid games

Google Stadia streams games on mobile and desktop Chrome browsers. | Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge

Google Stadia never quite set the video game world ablaze with a paradigm shift towards cloud game streaming, but it has quietly soldiered on as a convenient service for those who value playing the latest games on less-than-capable hardware. Its future remains a little bit unclear, with Google reportedly putting less priority on it internally. Though the service’s future may still carve out its niche among gamers seeking free demos and trials that are easy to test out, what if you already subscribed but feel it’s time to step off this beta-like ride?

The good news is that canceling a $9.99-per-month Google Stadia Pro subscription is fairly easy.

However, you may already be thinking to yourself: “What’s going to happen to my games?” Here...

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DC sues Grubhub, claiming its app is full of hidden fees and jacked-up prices

District of Columbia Attorney General Karl Racine is suing Grubhub for deceptive business practices, saying its food delivery app covertly inflates prices for diners who order through it. The suit demands an end to a laundry list of allegedly illegal practices as well as financial restitution and civil penalties.

The newly filed lawsuit argues that Grubhub’s promises of “free” online orders — and “unlimited free delivery” for Grubhub Plus — are misleading. While customers can make pickup orders for free, the company charges delivery and service fees for standard orders and service fees for Grubhub Plus orders, displaying the service fee until recently as part of a single line with sales taxes. “Grubhub misled District residents and took...

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