Apple announces new iPad Pro with M2 chip and Wi-Fi 6E

Image: Apple

Apple has just announced the new sixth-generation iPad Pro. The company’s latest flagship tablet is powered by the M2 chip that first debuted in the MacBook Air and 13-inch MacBook Pro earlier this year. It’ll be available in the same two screen sizes as before: you can choose between 12.9-inch and 11-inch sizes. Preorders open today and it’ll be in stores on October 26th starting at $799 for the 11-inch and $1,099 for the 12.9-inch model.

As with the 2021 refresh, the 12.9-inch iPad Pro features Mini LED display technology for improved black levels, better contrast, and more impactful HDR performance, while the smaller model sticks with a more basic screen. Both support Apple’s ProMotion feature for refresh rates up to 120Hz.

The new...

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Why Signal won’t compromise on encryption, with president Meredith Whittaker

Photo illustration by William Joel / The Verge, photo by Florian Hetz / Getty Images

Signal messages are more private than iMessage and WhatsApp. Here’s how.

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Apple restored Russian social network VKontakte to the App Store

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Apple has reinstated the apps made by the Russian technology group VK on the App Store, as reported earlier by The Guardian. The company removed the VK-owned social network VKontakte, email app Mail.ru, and others last month in response to sanctions the UK put on the financial institutions that own the Russian firm. According to the Russian outlet Interfax, the apps returned to the App Store late last week. It’s not clear why Apple has chosen to restore the VK-owned apps right now; as The Guardian notes, there hasn’t been an ownership change at VK.

At the time, Apple confirmed it blocked the apps globally because they’re “distributed by developers majority-owned or majority-controlled by one or more parties sanctioned by the UK...

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How to add names to your Google Photos

Illustration by Samar Haddad / The Verge

Memory is a tricky thing. Some of us are great at attaching names to faces, while others (and here I raise my hand) have always had a problem with remembering names, especially when you meet someone out of context. For example, imagine the embarrassment when someone you know from work suddenly shows up at a friend’s party, and you spend the next hour trying to remember their name.

As a result, I’m always looking for a way to be able to put a name with a face. One tool I sometimes use is Google Photos. For years now, the app has used steadily improving AI to put names to the faces in your photos so that you can, say, look at a photo and be reminded of the name of your best friend’s cousin, whom you met at a party five years ago. On the...

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The new entry-level Kindle is the one to buy

Amazon’s new Kindle shares many of the features that make the Kindle Paperwhite terrific, including a sharp screen and USB-C support, but for $40 less

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Nest Doorbell wired review: Hello again

An almost worthy successor to the excellent Nest Hello, the new Nest Doorbell wired is faster, smarter, and sleeker and has better video quality. But spotty behavior on 2.4GHz networks lets it down.

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Inside the messy fight between Meta and The Wire

Illustration by Nick Barclay / The Verge

The journalists behind a controversial series of stories tell us they haven’t been hoaxed. We’re not so sure

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Get 20 percent off the Sonos Beam and Arc at eBay

Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge

On Microsoft’s eBay page, you can score big price cuts on Sonos products. This sale was picked up by Slickdeals, which pointed out that the offer code COUNTDOWN22 can be applied at checkout to save 20 percent on either the Sonos Arc soundbar in white, the Sonos Beam (white, first-generation), or the second-gen Sonos Beam in white. Deals on Sonos gear were nonexistent during Amazon’s Prime Early Access Sale. And if you can’t wait until Black Friday nears, this could be a great opportunity to score the savings that you may be looking for.

The $899.99 Arc will go down to $719.20 after using the offer code. If you’d rather use it on the second-gen Beam soundbar, that’ll go from $429.99 (already a $20 discount) to $343.99. Given that it has...

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Sony’s new DualSense Edge controller arrives on January 26th for $199.99

Image: Sony

Sony is launching its new DualSense Edge Wireless Controller in January priced at $199.99. The “high performance” controller is fully customizable, much like Microsoft’s Xbox Elite controllers, and includes removable analog thumbsticks, rear buttons, changeable stick caps, and multiple control profiles.

The DualSense Edge allows owners to change out stick caps for three types: standard, high dome, and low dome. There are also two swappable back buttons (half-dome or lever) that can be mapped to any other buttons, much like paddles found on other controllers. You can even replace the stick modules, which will be sold separately.

Image: Sony

Everything that’s in the carrying case for Sony’s DualSense Edge.

Sony...

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Xbox Elite 2 controllers now customizable in the Xbox Design Lab starting at $149.99

A fully customized Xbox Elite 2 controller. | Image: Microsoft

Microsoft is bringing its Xbox Elite 2 controllers to the company’s Xbox Design Lab today. You can now order a custom color variant of the Xbox Elite 2 starting at $149.99, with options to buy and personalize separate Elite Accessory Packs or purchase all of the Elite components with the controller for $209.99.

There are a variety of colors to pick from, and most of the external parts of the controller can be customized. That includes the body, back case, D-pad, bumpers, triggers, thumbsticks, and buttons. “You can even choose between a cross-shaped or faceted D-pad and for the first time ever in Xbox Design Lab, color-customize the thumbstick base and ring,” explains Microsoft in a blog post. You can also customize the colors on the...

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Red and Fujifilm cameras will be able to back up straight to Adobe’s cloud

Image: Adobe / Frame.io

Camera giants Red and Fujifilm are partnering with Adobe and Frame.io to connect cameras directly to Adobe’s Creative Cloud. Announced today at Adobe Max 2022, specific models of Red and Fujifilm cameras will be able to natively upload images or footage directly into the Adobe Creative Cloud without requiring users to first transfer files onto a computer.

Red video cameras have previously supported camera-to-cloud functionality via the use of an external video encoder, but this new collaboration will allow both the Red V-Raptor and V-Raptor XL to directly upload up to 8K RAW files into Adobe cloud from the camera, without the need for additional hardware.

You’ll be able to shoot up to 8K RAW and then upload the footage as fast as your...

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Foxconn’s CEO hopes to one day make Tesla’s cars

Foxconn founder Terry Gou introduces the prototype Model B. | Photo by SAM YEH/AFP via Getty Images

Foxconn’s chairman and CEO Liu Young-way hopes to one day be in a position to produce electric cars for Tesla as the iPhone assembler expands into transportation. Liu made the comments at the unveiling of two new Foxconn electric car prototypes — the Model B crossover and Model V pickup truck — which the contract manufacturer hopes will serve as reference designs for companies who want to outsource manufacturing of their own EVs.

“Foxconn is not in the business of selling its own EV brand,” Liu said at its annual tech day, in comments reported by the Financial Times. “I hope one day we can do Tesla cars for Tesla,” he added.

The company has ambitious targets for its fledgling EV business. “Based on our past records for the PC and...

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Meta says it will sell off Giphy following order from UK competition watchdog

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Facebook and Instagram parent company Meta says it will accept a ruling by the UK competition watchdog to divest itself of social media GIF library Giphy.

A spokesperson for Meta, Matthew Pollard, told The Verge: “We are disappointed by the CMA’s decision but accept today’s ruling as the final word on the matter. We will work closely with the CMA on divesting Giphy.” When asked if the divestment would apply to all of Giphy’s international operations, Pollard said: “Yes, this applies globally.”

Meta was originally ordered to sell Giphy last year but appealed the ruling. Today, the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) announced that Meta had failed on five of the six objections raised in its appeal. The CMA said that the...

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DuckDuckGo’s privacy-focused Mac browser is now available for public beta testing

DuckDuckGo’s new Duck Player offers a more private way for users to watch their favorite YouTube content. | Image: DuckDuckGo

DuckDuckGo is rolling out its web browsing app for Mac users as an open beta test. Designed for privacy, the app was announced back in April as a closed beta, but is now available for all Mac users to try before its official public launch.

The desktop browser includes the same built-in protections we’ve seen already featured in DuckDuckGo’s mobile apps, combining DuckDuckGo’s search engine, defenses against third-party tracking, cookie pop-up protection, and its popular one-click data clearing ‘Fire Button.’

Image: DuckDuckGo

DuckDuckGo’s web browser integrates some of its most popular search engine features, such as the ‘fire’ button that clears your browsing data.

Some additional features have been added to...

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Photoshop is making it easier to quickly edit and collaborate on projects

New features are available for Photoshop for iPad, as well as the desktop Photoshop application and Photoshop for web beta. | Image: Adobe / Danner Orozco

Photoshop is getting some new collaboration tools and AI capabilities to help remove some of the more tedious parts of image editing. Announced at Adobe Max 2022, these new features include improvements to automated object selections, content-aware fills, file-sharing collaboration, and content crediting to ensure proper attribution of work. The new features are shipping in updated versions of Photoshop for desktop, iPad, and web (beta) rolling out today.

First up, improvements to the Adobe Sensei AI mean that higher-quality object selections can be made in the desktop Photoshop app. The Object Selection tool was originally introduced back in 2020, allowing users to quickly select an object with a single click, negating the need to...

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Rolls-Royce announces the 2024 Spectre electric ‘super coupe’ with 260 miles of range

The 2024 Rolls-Royce Spectre is the automaker’s first foray into electrification. | Image: Rolls-Royce

Rolls-Royce revealed its first all-electric vehicle, the 2024 Spectre, an ultra-luxury coupe with an estimated 260 miles of range and a price tag that is sure to make even the wealthiest choke on their tea. For those who can afford it, the Spectre is expected to make its first customer deliveries starting in late 2023.

The Spectre marks the first step toward a fully electrified Rolls-Royce lineup, which the company has said it will achieve by 2030. That stands in contrast to the company’s parent company, BMW, which has yet to declare when it expects to transition to 100 percent EV sales. (Mini, another BMW-owned brand, has also said it would be all-electric by the end of the decade.)

The Spectre marks the first step toward a fully...

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Google’s updated Family Link app can tell parents when their kids leave school

Highlights gives you a quick overview of what your kid is up to, and Location can now alert you when your kid leaves or arrives at certain locations. | Image: Google

Google is redesigning its parental control Family Link app with an easier interface and new features, like the ability to get alerted when their kids leave known locations (like school) and when they get home. Family Link lets parents manage Android devices for their kids by setting screen time limits and more, all from a control app on the parent's phone.

The app is receiving a significant facelift from the version that was initially released in 2017. It now gives parents a simplified interface with three tabs: Highlights, Controls, and Location. The app is updated on Android and iOS, and Google is also releasing a new web-based version of Family Link that lets parents keep tabs on a computer, and kids can review their settings on the...

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Google TV now lets parents create watchlists for their kids

Image: Google

Google TV added kids profiles to the platform in 2021, giving young viewers their own portal designed to showcase only age-appropriate content. Today, the company is building upon kids profiles with new features, including parent-managed watchlists, recommendations on the homescreen, and supervised usage of the normal YouTube app. All of these software capabilities begin rolling out today and will continue to reach Google TV customers over the next several weeks.

Managed watchlists are exactly what they sound like: parents can add movies and TV shows to a universal watchlist that will appear on the child’s Google TV homescreen. This will make it easy for them to progress from one video to the next. Adding content to a kids profile is...

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Stability AI, proponent of hands-off AI image generation, gets a $1 billion valuation

Sample images generated by Stable Diffusion. | Image: The Verge via Lexica

Stability AI, the company behind popular text-to-image AI program Stable Diffusion, has raised new funding that values the company at around $1 billion (according to a report from Bloomberg citing a “person familiar with the matter”). It’s a significant validation of the company’s approach to AI development, which, in contrast to incumbents like OpenAI and Google, focuses on open-source models that anyone can use without oversight.

In a press statement, Stability AI said it raised $101 million in a round led by Coatue, Lightspeed Venture Partners, and O’Shaughnessy Ventures, and that it will use the money to “accelerate the development of open AI models for image, language, audio, video, 3D, and more, for consumer and enterprise use...

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FedEx is shutting down its robot delivery program

FedEx’s Roxo robot was able to navigate autonomously, but was overseen by human operators at all times. | Image: FedEx

FedEx is stopping development of its last-mile delivery robot, Roxo. The news was first reported by Robotics 24/7, with FedEx confirming to the publication that the company would be shifting focus away from the bot to more “nearer-term opportunities.”

Roxo was announced in 2019 as a collaboration with DEKA, makers of the iBot wheelchair, which used multiple sets of wheels to “walk” up and down stairs, and raise its user from a sitting level to eye-height. Roxo also used multiple sets of wheels to climb steps and curbs. The robot had a top speed of 10mph, a cargo capacity of 100lbs (45kg), and was able to autonomously navigate around cars and pedestrians using cameras and LIDAR sensors. Human operators were used to oversee its movements...

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Nothing hikes price of Ear 1 earbuds by 50 percent

The Ear 1 earbuds released last year for $99. | Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge

Nothing is hiking the price of its debut Ear 1 earbuds from $99 to $149, the company’s CEO Carl Pei has announced. Citing “an increase in costs,” Pei said that the new price will come into effect on October 26th. No price changes were announced for Nothing’s more recently-announced Phone 1 smartphone.

In a followup tweet, Pei justified the price increase by noting the amount of development effort that’s gone into the earbuds since their original release last year. “When we started developing it, we only had 3 engineers,” the CEO said. “A year later, we have 185. During this time, the Ear 1 has received 15 firmware and tuning updates, and is a completely different product to when we launched it.”

When we started developing it, we only...

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Fortnite’s Halloween update will turn you into a werewolf

Image: Epic Games

Spooky season has arrived in Fortnite. The game’s most recent patch has ushered in Fortnitemares, the annual Halloween event, and it includes the ability to turn into a werewolf.

As part of the update, there’s now a DJ hanging out at the Reality Tree, and players can perform a ritual to get access to an item called “howler claws” that results in the werewolf transformation. (If you don’t play Fortnite, I promise that sentence actually makes sense.) With the claws equipped, you’ll have a sense ability to find other players, a new melee attack, and a double jump. It sounds similar to the wraith-like abilities from 2020.

Elsewhere, the update also brings a new Zero Build version of the classic horde rush mode, the return of...

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Motorola’s teasing a rollable concept phone

The device appears to extend and retract with the push of a button. | Image: Motorola

At parent company Lenovo’s Tech World 2022 event, Motorola is showing off a rollable mobile phone in a quick video demo. With the press of a button, the screen extends and retracts, with a moving wallpaper to match.

The demo video only gives us a glimpse of the front of the device, and the screen appears to wrap around the phone, rolling up from the bottom edge. At least as far as prototypes go, this concept appears to be on the “operational” side of the spectrum — there are at least battery and cellular indicator icons on screen. The rolling display is a flexible OLED panel, measuring 6.5 inches when extended and retracting down to “just over” 4 inches.

Image: Motorola

The device wallpaper expands and contracts...

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YouTube ends the test that made 4K a premium feature

Looks like 4K’s back on the menu, boys. | Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

YouTube has ended the experiment that locked the ability to watch videos in 4K behind its $11.99 a month premium membership, according to one of its official Twitter accounts (via 9to5Google). Earlier this month, the company made waves when it confirmed with a series of now-deleted tweets that some of its users were part of a test meant to explore “the feature preferences Premium & non-Premium viewers,” and asking users to provide feedback on the idea.

The idea of having to pay to access higher resolution videos was a divisive one, with some users calling it a sign of the platform’s downfall, and others saying it was understandable given the cost of streaming 4K content. YouTube’s announcement that it had “fully turned off” the...

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Cadillac outrolls Rolls-Royce with the $300,000 Celestiq electric sedan

The 2024 Celestiq is not your typical Cadillac.

The low-volume ultra-luxury Celestiq is the second EV in Cadillac’s lineup and features a host of 3D-printed parts for extensive customization

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FuboTV shuts down its sports betting service that synced with on-screen action

The FuboTV Sportsbook app. | Image: FuboTV

On Monday, the live TV streaming platform FuboTV dropped a shocking announcement with its decision to immediately close its gambling business, Fubo Gaming, and the Fubo Sportsbook product. It came at the same time FuboTV reported preliminary earnings results of over 1.2 million subscribers and income for the quarter that exceeded its prior guidance.

In a world where advertising-supported media has struggled to scale steadily, and even the biggest subscription video giants are looking shaky, streamers across the industry have looked at gambling as a reliable source of revenue in the years to come. FuboTV had promoted Multiview tech to show multiple games at once in a single stream, plus overlays on live sports broadcasts and games that...

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Leaked documents show just how fast employees are leaving Amazon

Two thirds of new hires in 2021 didn’t last 90 days. | Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Last year, only a third of Amazon’s new hires stayed with the company for more than 90 days before quitting, being fired, or getting laid off, according to leaked documents obtained by Engadget. The report is the latest indication that Amazon is having serious issues retaining employees, and it reveals the company’s estimate that its attrition rate costs it almost $8 billion a year across its global consumer field operations team.

The report, which is based off internal research papers, slide decks, and spreadsheets from Amazon, claims that workers are twice as likely to leave by choice, rather than because they were laid off or fired. It also says that the issue is widespread throughout the company, not just with warehouse workers; from...

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Here are the best iPad deals right now

Select iPad models go on sale quite regularly. | Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge

While some of the best iPad deals typically occur around Black Friday and Cyber Monday, you can still find plenty of great discounts at all times of the year if you know where to look. Whether you’re after the high-end iPad Pro or the most affordable entry-level iPad, there’s likely a sale going on somewhere you may be interested in.

Of course, it’s difficult to know exactly where you can find the most notable deals unless you’re scouring the major retailers on a daily basis. But that’s often what our deal hunters at The Verge are doing each and every day, so let us help you out. Below, we’ve listed the best deals you can get on each iPad model that is currently available, including the latest ones equipped with Apple’s powerful M1...

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Everything you need to know about Meta’s moderation controversy in India

Illustration by Nick Barclay / The Verge

Meta — Facebook and Instagram’s parent company — is currently at the center of controversy in India, where a local publication claims the company removed an Instagram post on behalf of an Indian politician. Meta has since pushed back on these claims and accuses the outlet of using “fabricated” evidence, which may actually be the case based on Meta’s rebuttals and the findings from users online.

It’s an unusually difficult story to keep track of, drawing on the nuances of Indian politics, email forensics, and Meta’s contentious relationship with the press. So we’ve boiled down the last week of chaos into a simple recap of what’s happened and why it matters.

What’s going on here?

On October 6th, independent Indian news publication The Wire...

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Google Fit is missing

The Fossil Gen 6 smartwatches are eligible for the upgrade to Wear OS 3 starting today. | Photo by Dieter Bohn / The Verge

Last week, Fossil announced the Gen 6 Wellness Edition, its first Wear OS 3 smartwatch. But starting today, the company is also beginning to roll out the Wear OS 3 update for patient owners of existing Gen 6 smartwatches. The update has a few significant omissions, but one of the more surprising ones is Google Fit — an app that was once preloaded onto nearly every Wear OS 2 smartwatch. The app is also missing from the newly launched Pixel Watch.

First reported by 9to5Google, the lack of Google Fit was confirmed in an update that Fossil posted in r/WearOS. The gist is the Google Fit app hasn’t been updated to support Wear Health Services, a new system layer in Wear OS 3 that collects health data for apps in a more battery-efficient way....

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