The PS Vita’s time is now, again

The 2013 PS Vita still looks and feels surprisingly modern.

Every couple of weeks, I exhume my gadget graveyard from underneath my bed. I look at my iPods, old phones, and some other stuff. Most of it doesn’t stir me anymore, but the PS Vita is another story. It’s the device that I pull out most frequently, charging it up to, well, just to feel like it’s a part of the modern world.

I keep mine in a svelte Waterfield Designs soft case that cleans off fingerprints when it goes in so that it’s smudge-free when I pull it out, revealing design details that I apparently have an unshakable affinity to seeing over and over: gorgeous translucent shoulder buttons; the big (but not too big) display; and the sturdy yet elegant build quality. Almost everything going on with the look and feel of the Vita is...

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Apple is too strict with copy and paste in iOS 16

Where’s my “always allow” option, Apple? | Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge

In my time using iOS 16 so far, I’ve generally been very pleased with the new features and improvements. The customizable lock screen is fun. Removing the background of images just by holding down on a picture’s subject still hasn’t gotten old. But only a few days after the new software rolled out, I’ve already found my biggest frustration: iOS now asks if it’s okay to paste an item from one app to another. Constantly. Over and over and over again.

There’s got to be a better solution than this.

I understand the why behind the new prompt. Your iPhone’s clipboard often contains sensitive data — passwords, personal photos, two-factor passcodes, and so on. Apps likely skim this information more often than any of us realize. And this is...

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Lil Nas X, please don’t let League of Legends fans sing the n-word

Image: Riot Games

Lil Nas X has been the “president of League of Legends” for barely more than 24 hours, and he is already cutting up. No longer content as the Lord of Hell, Lil Nas X has relinquished his fiery crown, exchanging it for a desk in the CEO suite of Riot Games. His first executive order? Making a nude skin of Udyr. His second executive order, well... it’s going to make half the population of League players very unhappy.

as the new president of league of legends, bottoms are no longer allowed to play.

— PRESIDENT NASARATI (@LilNasX) September 15, 2022

There’s also another LoL-flavored tweet from President X that I cannot link here because it will likely trip every not-safe-for-work filter built into this browser and laptop by my employers....

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EVGA stops making video cards and blames Nvidia’s bad behavior

A titan in graphics cards is stepping away. | Photo by Sean Hollister / The Verge

EVGA, a titan in the PC component space, is getting out of the graphics card game. The company posted in its community forum, saying that it won’t be making next-generation Nvidia graphics cards but will continue to sell and support “the existing current generation products.” According to Gamers Nexus, the company doesn’t currently have plans to make AMD or Intel graphics cards.

EVGA is reportedly making the decision to no longer work with Nvidia because it feels the company was a bad partner, according to both Gamers Nexus and JayzTwoCents. The company claims that Nvidia wouldn’t tell EVGA how much it would have to pay to obtain GPU cores before publicly announcing the price of cards like the RTX 3080, which made it difficult for EVGA...

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Best gaming laptop in 2022: seven laptops to get your game on

The best gaming laptop is the Asus ROG Zephyrus G15. | Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales/ The Verge

The best gaming laptop at every size and price

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What’s the best student laptop? We asked students

The Dell XPS 13 is one of the best laptops for high school and college students. | Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge

Shopping for a laptop can be stressful — doubly stressful if you or your children will be learning online for the first time. Kids of different ages have a range of different laptop use cases and different needs. And as the choices for best laptop and best Chromebook evolve, so do students’ needs. So I spoke to some experts on the subject: students themselves.

My recommendations here are meant to accommodate a variety of preferences and price ranges. But they’re a jumping-off point rather than an exhaustive list: every student is different. Before making a decision, you’ll want to make sure you read reviews and try out devices yourself if you can. I’ll do my best to keep this article up to date with items that are in stock.

Best laptop...

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How to edit or unsend an iMessage in iOS 16

Samar Haddad / The Verge

We’ve all done it: sent a text message and then instantly regretted it. Whether it was a text to your parent with a spelling error that they’d never let you live down, a message with a wrong word in it (“I don’t want to come to the party!” instead of “I want to come to the party!”), or a sudden realization that you just sent your message to the wrong person — it can be embarrassing at the least and disastrous at the worst.

While messaging apps like Signal, WhatsApp, and Viber all have some version of “delete for everyone,” until now, there was nothing you could do about it on iMessage except to follow it up with an “I didn’t mean that!” message.

In iOS 16, Apple has introduced a feature to its iMessage chat app that allows you to unsend...

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The best laptop you can buy in 2022

Image: William Joel/The Verge

The best laptops for you, from ultraportables to high-powered editing machines

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Alarms over healthcare cyberattacks are getting louder

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge

Cybersecurity alarm bells have been ringing loudly in the healthcare industry this month. The FBI warned healthcare facilities that medical devices (like patient monitors or infusion pumps) often run on outdated software that could be vulnerable to hacks. OakBend Medical Center in Texas was hit with a major ransomware attack from a gang that says it stole 1 million patient records. A report showed that patients at hospitals dealing with cyberattacks are more likely to die.

The series of warnings come with a growing awareness of just how dangerous cybersecurity holes in healthcare can be. Healthcare organizations are more and more dependent on internet-connected devices to do things like track patient records and deliver medications. And...

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Tim Cook says ‘buy your mom an iPhone’ if you want to end green bubbles

Getty Images for Vox Media

Apple CEO Tim Cook dismissed the idea of adopting RCS messaging to put an end to the green bubbles that surround messages when iPhone users text someone on an Android device.

“I don’t hear our users asking that we put a lot of energy in on that at this point,” Cook said when asked how Apple founder Steve Jobs would feel about using the RCS standard in iMessage during Vox Media’s Code 2022 event on Wednesday night. Instead, Cook said, “I would love to convert you to an iPhone.”

Video of the panel is now available on YouTube, and you can watch it by clicking here or where it is embedded above, and cued up to the question at the 1 hour, 15-second mark.

But the person who asked the question, Vox Media’s LiQuan Hunt, came back with a valid...

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Uber’s hack shows the stubborn power of social engineering

Like many other hacks, Uber’s major security breach started with a text message. Citing details provided by the alleged hacker, The New York Times reported that a fake text message tricked an Uber employee into revealing their password details, triggering a sequence of events that led to a large-scale compromise of the ridesharing company’s IT systems.

Even for a company with Uber’s resources, these kinds of social engineering threats are impossible to completely defend against. It doesn’t matter how good a firm’s password policies are, whether sensitive information is properly stored or encrypted, and even whether multi-factor authentication is used — there’s always a chance that a human employee will be fooled into letting the...

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PSVR games aren’t compatible with PSVR2 because they aren’t

If you want to play your original PSVR games, you’re going to have to keep your old headset around. | Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge

We finally have an answer about whether the PlayStation VR2 will be able to play games from the original PlayStation VR: no. As Twitter user Nibel spotted, the Official PlayStation Podcast asked Hideaki Nishino, a vice president of platform experience at Sony, whether the games from its last-gen virtual reality headset would run on its new one. His response? “PSVR games are not compatible with PSVR2, because PSVR2 is designed to deliver a truly next-gen VR experience.”

He continued: “PSVR2 has much more advanced features like all-new controllers with haptics feedback and adaptive triggers.” He also referenced the headset’s inside-out and eye tracking as well as 3D audio. “This means developing games for PSVR2 requires a whole different...

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The best Xbox controller to buy right now

Photo Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Basic, premium, affordable, and customizable — lots to pick from

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I think flouting the Joker’s copyright is funny, and I’m tired of pretending it isn’t

TIFF via Polygon

There’s a new Joker movie coming out, but you might not get a chance to see it because copyright is broken.

I’m not talking about Joker: Folie à Deux, the officially sanctioned sequel to the Todd Phillips film Joker. I’m talking about The People’s Joker, a crowdfunded Toronto International Film Festival selection that was pulled at the last minute, thanks to unspecified “rights issues.” The People’s Joker is (as far as I can tell) an extremely loose retelling of the Batman villain’s origin story, reinterpreting the Joker as a trans woman trying to break into the mob-like world of Gotham’s stand-up comedy scene. Its trailer describes it as “an illegal comic book movie,” but its creators more seriously defend it as an unauthorized but...

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It sure seems like Google is struggling to invent the future

The Verge

Earlier this week, Google made some serious cuts to its startup incubator Area 120, cutting half of its projects, according to TechCrunch. The purpose of Area 120 was to give Google employees somewhere to experiment or chase their passion projects, with the hope that they could stumble upon the next Big Idea like Adsense, Gmail, or Google News.

But as the economy has turned, it seems Google may be losing its stomach for big bets and experimentation, instead trying to focus its efforts on what makes money today (or services that it really just has to run despite the fact that they lose money, like Google Cloud). Instead of challenging employees to spend 20 percent of their time building wacky apps, CEO Sundar Pichai says the company needs...

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Uber says ‘no evidence’ user accounts were compromised in hack

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Uber says there is “no evidence” that any of its users’ private information was compromised in a breach of its internal computer systems. All of the company’s products, including its ride-hail and Uber Eats food delivery services, are currently “operational,” Uber said in a new statement Friday afternoon.

The hack, which was discovered early Friday morning, forced the company to take several of its internal systems offline. Uber is continuing to investigate how a hacker, who claims to be 18 years old, was able to gain administrator access to the company’s internal tools, including Amazon Web Services and Google Cloud Platform.

Those internal software tools were taken offline yesterday afternoon as “a precaution” and started to come back...

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What the Biden administration might do to keep crypto mining from derailing climate goals

Workers install a new row of Bitcoin mining machines at the Whinstone US Bitcoin mining facility in Rockdale, Texas, on October 9th, 2021. | Photo by MARK FELIX / AFP via Getty Images

Crypto mining has exploded in the US over the past few years, and we’re just now starting to understand how that boom affects our infrastructure, environment, and daily life. As the US became the biggest hub for Bitcoin mining, for instance, crypto mines have revived ailing fossil fuel plants and driven up electricity bills.

We finally got a clearer picture of the fallout from US crypto mining last week when the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) published a report on the industry’s impact on energy and climate change. The analysis estimates that the crypto industry operations in the US pump out about as much greenhouse gas pollution annually as all the diesel fuel used on the nation’s railroads, 25 to 50 million...

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Hollow Knight: Silksong is coming to PlayStation, too

You’ll play as Hornet, who was featured in Hollow Knight_._ | Image: Team Cherry

Hollow Knight: Silksong, the long-awaited sequel to the indie action-platformer Hollow Knight, will be coming to PS5 and PS4, according to a Friday tweet from the official PlayStation Twitter account.

We already knew the game was coming to Nintendo Switch, Xbox, and PC, so it’s good to hear that it will be available on PlayStation, too. But for those of us who have been desperate news about a concrete release date (like me), we still don’t know that; PlayStation only confirmed that the game would be coming to its consoles, not when.

Sharpen your needles – confirming Hollow Knight: Silksong is coming to PS5 and PS4 pic.twitter.com/poIclQDfvr

— PlayStation (@PlayStation) September 16, 2022

Silksong, which features the character Hornet...

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iOS update fixes annoying iPhone 14 activation bug

New iPhone activations have been encountering issues on open Wi-Fi networks | Photo by David Pierce / The Verge

If you’ve been having trouble setting up your new iPhone 14 or iPhone 14 Pro, you aren’t alone. According to MacRumors, the company has sent a memo saying it is a known issue in iOS 16 when attempting to activate devices on open Wi-Fi networks.

Thankfully, Apple has already provided a solution in the form of its iOS 16.0.1 update. The latest update, which is only available for the iPhone 14 lineup, should resolve any activation or migration issues facing owners of the new iPhone, but users may need to update and restore their phones using a Mac or PC to fully address the issue.

The iOS 16 update became available on September 12th for the iPhone 8 and newer, changing just about every app or screen of the mobile operating system. Some of...

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Parler pivots to ‘uncancelable’ cloud services

Image: The Verge

On Friday, Parler announced that it was entering the internet infrastructure industry in order to provide new “uncancelable” cloud services for online businesses.

In a Friday press release, Parler announced that it was restructuring; the new venture, called Parlement Technologies, will provide new internet infrastructure services for businesses it says are at risk of being forced off the internet. With $16 million in new Series B funding, the company purchased Dynascale, a California-based cloud services company that touts more than $30 million in annual revenue and 50,000 square feet of data center space.

“We are entering a new era as Parlement Technologies, one that goes far beyond the boundaries of a free speech social media...

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Amazon’s 75-inch Fire TV Omni hits a new low price at $400 off

Amazon’s 75-inch Fire TV Omni is cheaper than ever. | Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge

Want a big-screen TV to watch Monday Night Football without paying, well, typical big-screen TV prices? Right now, Amazon’s 75-inch Fire TV Omni is on sale at Best Buy for $699.99 instead of $1,099.99, which marks a new all-time low for the 4K set. Amazon’s also discounting the TV but selling it for $8 more at $708.34.

Amazon’s Fire TV Omni series isn’t known for impressive picture quality — the black levels are so-so and the color accuracy isn’t great — but they do offer some nice perks, including an HDMI 2.1 eARC port. It also has built-in mics for hands-free Alexa voice commands even when the screen’s off. Unlike the smaller configurations, the 75-inch model also includes support for Dolby Vision HDR. That’s in addition to a low input...

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Intel Processor will replace Pentium and Celeron in 2023 laptops

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Intel is replacing its Pentium and Celeron brands with just Intel Processor. The new branding will replace both existing brands in 2023 notebooks and supposedly make things easier when consumers are looking to purchase budget laptops.

Intel will now focus on its Core, Evo, and vPro brands for its flagship products and use Intel Processor in what it calls “essential” products. “Intel is committed to driving innovation to benefit users, and our entry-level processor families have been crucial for raising the PC standard across all price points,” explains Josh Newman, VP and interim general manager of mobile client platforms at Intel. “The new Intel Processor branding will simplify our offerings so users can focus on choosing the right...

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Vergecast: reviews of the iPhone 14 Pro, Apple Watch Series 8, and more

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge

Every Wednesday and Friday, The Verge publishes our flagship podcast, The Vergecast, where our editors make sense of the week’s most important technology news. On Fridays, Verge editor-in-chief Nilay Patel, editor-at-large David Pierce, and managing editor Alex Cranz discuss the week in tech news with the reporters and editors covering the biggest stories.

Today’s episode focuses on The Verge’s reviews of the iPhone 14, iPhone 14 Pro, Apple Watch Series 8, and iOS 16. The crew discusses whether the updates to the hardware are worth upgrading to or if updating to the new software is good enough. Of course, there is a lot of talk about the Dynamic Island, Apple’s solution to the front camera notch.

If you’re still wondering whether...

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How to add Apple Home widgets to your lock screen in iOS 16

Apple Home app widgets can now be on your lock screen in iOS16. | Samar Haddad / The Verge

With the launch of iOS 16 this week, Apple also released an all-new Home app for its HomeKit smart home platform. And now, you can put a shortcut to that Home app directly on your lock screen, thanks to the new lock screen widgets feature.

These Home widgets also provide glanceable info about the status of your home, including how many lights are on, the temperature or humidity inside, and whether your alarm system is armed or your door is locked.

You can add up to four Home widgets to your lock screen; they will show up in the lower shelf below the clock. There are two widget sizes: double and single, and they aren’t interactive — you can’t lock your door or turn your lights off directly from them. Instead, tapping on a Home widget...

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How to personalize your iOS 16 lock screen with widgets and wallpaper

Illustration by Samar Haddad / The Verge

Your lock screen can do a lot more in iOS 16: this platform update provides a level of lock screen customization that iOS has never offered before, including widgets and wallpaper options. Even better, you’re not stuck with just one lock screen — you can create several to reflect the time of day, the weather, or your mood.

It’s an amount of personalization that’s uncharacteristic of an Apple device. But beyond the entertainment value of turning your wallpaper into a grid of poop emoji, iOS 16 makes it possible to get useful information at a glance that once required you to unlock your phone — and that deserves a thumbs-up emoji for sure.

Here’s how to completely design your new lock screen.

• Tap and hold any blank space on your lock...

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You can play Half-Life 2 in VR thanks to this free mod

Image: Valve

A third-party mod that lets you play through Valve’s Half-Life 2 in room-scale virtual reality will be available in public beta starting at around noon ET. The developers, Source VR Mod Team, are offering it for free; you just need to own the base game that currently costs $9.99 (spotted thanks to TechRadar).

The Steam listing for the mod is here, and it claims to be broadly compatible with wired VR headsets that include tracked motion controllers, like Valve’s Index and the HTC Vive, Oculus Rift, and Windows Mixed Reality models. Presumably, it’ll work just fine if you, like me, connect your Meta Quest 2 via a USB cable, or wirelessly, to your PC. I’m going to give it a try this weekend.

The developers seem to have figured out clever...

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YouTube is turning on the money hose for Shorts — and taking on TikTok for real

YouTube Shorts is taking on TikTok with one big move: money. | Image: YouTube

In its ongoing battle with TikTok for vertical video supremacy, YouTube is about to play its most valuable card. It’s getting ready to turn on aggressive monetization for Shorts, its shortform vertical video format, and promising to help millions of creators make money on the platform.

Starting early next year, Shorts will be part of the YouTube Partner Program, meaning those who qualify can start getting a share of the ad money generated in Shorts. YouTube is also making it easier for creators who don’t qualify for the program to make money through tips, subscriptions, and merch sales. (The New York Times first reported the news.)The goal is to offer more and better monetization options than TikTok and potentially win over (and win...

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We could all use a ‘This is Fine’ Focus mode

A Focus mode for when things are not fine.

These days, it often feels like the world is on fire. Sometimes, quite literally. In those moments, my phone morphs into an instrument of endless doomscrolling. So when Apple tweaked its Focus modes in the iOS 16 beta earlier this summer, I knew what needed to be done. I had to create a “This is Fine” mode.

The grounding principle behind a This is Fine mode is the fact that sometimes, you are not fine. Even so, life doesn’t stop just because terrible things keep happening. Deadlines need to be met, bills need to be paid, dogs need walking, kids need picking up from school, and you still need to eat. But even if I understand that it’s sometimes best to ignore my Twitter feed, mustering the willpower to do so leaves my brain a pile of...

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Amazon actually pulled off its first big-deal football game

Amazon’s pregame coverage featured a bunch of veteran players and broadcasters. | Photo by Jamie Squire/Getty Images

It didn’t crash! That’s the most important thing you can say about the first Thursday Night Football game aired on Amazon Prime Video. Amazon didn’t crumble like HBO Max did during the House of The Dragon premiere. It didn’t crash like CBS All Access during the 2021 Super Bowl. It even streamed better than DirecTV did five days ago. There were some reports of blocky resolution and buffering, but in general, Amazon hung in there, and it aired a football game.

Watching the Kansas City Chiefs and Los Angeles Chargers play, I got the distinct sense that “airing a football game” was Amazon’s one and only goal for the evening. There was nothing particularly innovative or new in the broadcast, from the choice of cast to the style of...

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How to buy the iPhone 14

This year, there are four new iPhone models to choose from. | Image: Apple

Apple’s iPhone 14 lineup is now in the wild, consisting of the base iPhone 14, and the faster, more capable iPhone 14 Pro and 14 Pro Max. The slightly bigger iPhone 14 Plus will release in October. Each of those links will take you to either a full review or a hands-on preview. Is Apple’s A16 Bionic chip worth upgrading to? Do you want to pay more to get the Dynamic Island notch experience? Check out our reviews to see what our staff though.

If you already know that you want to buy one, here are the straight details: these phones just released today, Friday, September 16th, with one exception. That’s the iPhone 14 Plus, which comes out on October 7th. If you’re thinking about buying the iPhone 14 (or, heck, all four varieties — follow...

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