The Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 5 may finally get the crease right

The crease is still pretty noticeable on the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 4. | Photo by Allison Johnson / The Verge

The upcoming Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 5 could come with a much less visible crease thanks to a potential design change. According to a report on the Korean site Naver, Samsung could adopt a “droplet”-style hinge that allows the display to form a teardrop shape when closed, making for a much gentler curve that leaves less of a crease (via SamMobile).

While Samsung has certainly made improvements to the crease over the years, it’s still pretty noticeable on its fourth-gen foldables. Both the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 4 and Galaxy Z Flip 4 use a “U”-shaped hinge design that puts the display at a sharper angle when closed. This creates a more prominent crease and also puts more stress on the display.

Other folding smartphones have already...

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Tweetbot is (mostly) working again

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Tweetbot is mostly up and running after an outage locked users out of major third-party Twitter clients. While users can now sign in to Tweetbot and browse through tweets, some say they still can’t post anything to Twitter through the service without getting an error message stating they’ve reached a “data limit.”

The client isn’t back online because of anything that Twitter did, though. Tweetbot co-creator Paul Haddad tells The Verge that they still haven’t heard anything from Twitter, so they’ve “decided to start using new API keys and see if it fixes the problem.” This could allow Tweetbot to temporarily avoid any disruptions to the service, even if it puts it in a semi-working state.

This is a proof that #Twitter has deliberately...

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Who should be the next CEO of Twitter?

Illustration by Kristen Radtke / The Verge; Getty Images

The following is a free preview from last week’s Command Line, my new weekly newsletter about the tech industry’s inside conversation:

Elon Musk has said he will find a new CEO for Twitter after users voted for him to leave. But who would, in his own words, be “foolish enough to take the job”?

It’s a question I’ve been posing in conversations over the past week. Based on my checks with people who would know, Musk doesn’t appear to be running a formal search yet. And given his propensity to ~~lie~~ go back on his word, he might not try to find someone. The matter is complicated by his saying that, even after finding a CEO, he will still run the “software & servers teams.” That’s basically the whole company.

For what it’s worth, I do think...

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England’s banning plastic plates and cutlery later this year

England already has restrictions on plastic straws, drink stirrers, and cotton swabs. | Photo By Paul Chinn/The San Francisco Chronicle via Getty Images

England’s taking its single-use plastics ban even further by restricting the sale of plastic cutlery, plates, bowls, trays, balloon sticks, as well as certain kinds of polystyrene cups and food containers (via Engadget). According to an announcement on the English government’s website, the new ban will go into effect in October of this year.

Once the ban comes into force, people will no longer be able to buy or obtain these single-use plastics from businesses, including retailers, restaurants, food vendors, and other locations.

The ban won’t affect the plastic plates, trays, or bowls that come with pre-packaged food items, though, as they’re already included in the country’s Extended Producer Responsibility Scheme. This initiative...

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These are real earrings — and also real earbuds

Nova’s H1 Audio Earrings come with an equally stylish charging case. | Image: Nova

These may look like your typical pair of earrings outfitted with — rather large — pearls, but they’re more than just jewelry: they actually double as ultra-discrete earbuds (via Gizmodo). The clip-on or stud H1 Audio Earrings from Nova Audio feature two speakers behind both pearls (which are real, by the way) that use directional sound to transmit audio up and into your ears.

Nova says the technology adds “a layer of sound” to your environment, allowing you to hear what’s going on around you while still enjoying your audio, similar to Sony’s open-style LinkBuds or Aftershokz’s bone-conduction headphones. That means they don’t have any noise-cancellation properties, which could come in handy for athletes who want to remain aware of their...

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Tesla’s big price cuts mean ‘a major shift in the EV market’

Can Tesla remain the leader in the modern electric vehicle market it effectively created?

That question has been on the mind of EV buyers, investors, analysts, industry watchers, and Elon Musk stans for months now. That’s especially been the case as questions over demand in China and the US — not to mention the Twitter drama — seemed to cast a shadow on the electric automaker’s success story.

On Thursday night, Tesla revealed its answer to this problem, at least for now: steep price cuts on its lineup of cars, which in some cases amount to as much as 30 percent off when the latest EV tax credits are applied as well.

Can Tesla remain the leader in the modern electric vehicle market it effectively created?

Moreover, some of the price...

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Republican lawmakers push for crypto regulation with new panel

House Financial Services chair Patrick McHenry (R-NC) announced the new subcommittee on Thursday. | Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images

Republican lawmakers announced a new panel on Thursday that will oversee the cryptocurrency industry, as reported earlier by Politicoand CNBC. Led by Representative French Hill (R-AR), the Subcommittee on Digital Assets, Financial Technology and Inclusion aims to provide “clear rules of the road” for federal regulators.

Some other duties include promoting financial technology to underserved communities, as well as strengthening “diversity and inclusion” in the crypto industry, which has been subject to increased scrutiny following the stunning implosion of FTX. Representative Patrick McHenry (R-NC), the chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, tells Politico that he created the panel to address a “big hole” in how the...

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You can get up to 20 percent off PlayStation, Xbox, and Nintendo gift cards this weekend

Saving on a gift card is an easy way to get a slight discount on games that aren’t actually on sale. | Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge

Happy Saturday! It’s time to take a load off, and what better way is there than some sweet savings? If you’re in the market for some digital games or DLC for your console of choice, Eneba is running some handy promos that shave a little off the cost. Right now, for example, you can get a digital gift card for either the PlayStation, Xbox, or Nintendo Switch digital storefront for up to 20 percent off. Here are the details:

• A $100 PlayStation gift card is now $83.99 (about $16 off) from Eneba with promo code PSNWknd.
• A $100 Xbox gift card is down to $79.99 (about $20 off) from Eneba with offer code XBXWknd.
• Lastly, a $99 Nintendo eShop gift card is on sale for $84.99 (about $14 off) at Eneba with promo code NINWknd.

All of these codes...

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LG’s StanbyME is a so-so TV on a stellar stand

The 27-inch smart TV part is merely adequate, especially for $999, but the elegant stand could make it worth it for some people.

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Spotify is having an outage

The service is... spoty. | Nick Barclay / The Verge

It’s Friday night in the US, and the music is not playing on Spotify for many people. Users report streams suddenly stopped, and for people who’ve logged out, some say they can’t log in again.

The outage has garnered over 30,000 reports on DownDetector.com, starting just before 8PM ET and rising sharply since then. A status page for the company’s web API indicates a “minor” partial outage affecting only the player itself, which is consistent with what we’re seeing — but that’s also the most important part of Spotify.

Something’s not quite right, and we’re looking into it. Thanks for your reports!

— Spotify Status (@SpotifyStatus) January 14, 2023

The Spotify Status Twitter account has acknowledged the issues, tweeting, “we’re...

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Toyota took classic AE86s and filled them with batteries and hydrogen

Neither of these AE86s take gas. | Image: Toyota

The “E” in the name of Toyota’s legendary AE86 was there to designate it as a Corolla, but wouldn’t it be awesome if it stood for “electric” instead? Apparently someone at the company thought so; Toyota is showing off a concept version of what the 80s icon would look like if it were powered by batteries (or hydrogen). The two cars are being exhibited at the Tokyo Auto Salon show, which runs from January 13th to the 15th.

The AE86 BEV Concept uses “electrification technologies cultivated by Lexus,” according to Toyota’s website, with parts from a hybrid Tundra and Prius. Mated to the truck motor is something you don’t usually see in electric cars — a manual transmission. I can’t say I’m exactly sure what driving stick with a motor that...

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The best tech you can gift mom year-round

The Oura Ring is a great gift for the mom who hates strapping things to her wrist. | Image: The Verge

What do you gift your mom? That’s a challenging question to answer, especially given mothers — the generous, unselfish beings they can be — are not likely to spill the beans when asked.

Luckily, we’ve done the hard work for you. With the help of The Verge staff, we’ve curated a list of some of the best tech gifts you can treat your mom — or any mother figure, really — to year-round. Whether it’s for her birthday, Mother’s Day, or Christmas, here you’ll find something that caters to all kinds of budgets and interests, ranging from smartwatches and Kindles to massage guns, robot vacuums, and more. You can rest assured that these are items we can personally vouch for as well, having tested and reviewed them ourselves.

Peruse this list...

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EVgo’s New Year’s resolution: make its EV fast-charging network more reliable

A crew works to replace older EVgo fast charging stations through its new ReNew program. | Image: EVgo

When electric vehicle owners take longer trips, they often rely on nationwide fast charging providers like EVgo, Electrify America, and ChargePoint to reach their destinations. So it can be more than a minor inconvenience for EV drivers if they arrive at a station with problems like damaged cables, disconnected modems, or annoying error codes.

This year, EVgo is looking to leave behind broken and unreliable EV chargers with its ReNew program that bolsters site maintenance efforts across its more than 850 fast charging stations with 1,700 or so charging stalls. It’ll also upgrade older stations with new hardware that enables up to 350kW charging for capable vehicles like the GMC Hummer EV.

The backbone of the ReNew program is,...

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Maybe don’t stick flying bladed cameras in a movie star’s face

A promo still for Netflix’s Agent From Above. | Image: Netflix

The upcoming Netflix show Agent From Above tried to film its star up close with a drone — and Taiwanese actor Kai Ko got stitches, and possibly worse, when things went wrong (via DroneDJ).

We don’t have many confirmed details on what happened during the December 27th shoot other than that they were filming an action scene close-up when the drone hit him in the face, slashing his cheek.

“Standard safety guidelines”

Ko’s manager told Taiwanese media that the star suffered “serious disfigurement” and needed up to 30 stitches after the drone exploded. Production companies mm2 and Good Films say “there was no explosion or blades shattering as reported in some articles,” claim it was operating “within standard safety guidelines,” and say that...

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Microsoft fixed an issue that made Windows Start menu and taskbar shortcuts disappear

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

On Friday afternoon, Microsoft wrote it’s fully deployed a fix for an issue in Windows that caused application shortcuts in the Start menu or taskbar to disappear. Multiple IT admins have detailed the problem on Twitter and Reddit this morning, and it appears to be related to a recent update to the Microsoft Defender threat detections.

The problem is affecting businesses and organizations using Microsoft 365 and Defender for protection against malware, viruses, and other threats. In a note to customers, Microsoft said it received reports that a certain attack surface reduction (ASR) rule is causing the problems. Earlier in the day, IT admins tried to work around the issue by setting the “Block Win32 API calls from Office macro” rule to...

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YouTube’s testing free ad-supported TV channels

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

YouTube is testing free ad-supported TV channels that show content from certain media companies, according to a report from The Wall Street Journal. The concept is similar to services like Pluto TV, Roku’s Live TV channels, or the experiences built into TVs from companies like Samsung, LG, and Vizio — there will be a “hub” that lets you pick what you want to watch.

The concept has been part of a profitable business model for some of the other companies in the space, as earnings reports from Vizio and Roku show that they make more profit from advertising and commissions on subscriptions than they do from selling hardware. The most recent reports showed Vizio (PDF) pulls in an average of $27 annually per user, while Roku (PDF) manages to...

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RIP Google Stadia: the latest news on the discontinued cloud gaming service

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge

Stadia will shut down on January 18th, 2023. Here, you’ll find the latest developments on the service as its winds down as well as pieces from our writers on its impact (or lack of it) on the gaming and tech industry.

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Strava knows its messy price hike is confusing

Strava, an official price chart would be nice. | Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge

No one likes price hikes, but Strava’s messy rollout has left many customers wondering what’s happening to their subscription. Here’s what’s actually happening: the company is raising prices for the first time in more than a decade, and the new price everyone pays depends on the region they live in, whether they are a monthly or annual subscriber, and whether they purchased their subscription prior to November 23rd, 2022. (Customers who subscribed after that date aren’t affected.) But Strava didn’t make this easy to understand.

As spotted by sports blogger DC Rainmakerand r/Strava Redditors, things got confusing when customers started comparing notes on Strava’s price bump. Customers on r/Strava say emails were sent to some, while...

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Google’s Stadia Controller is getting Bluetooth support

Image: Google

Google is launching its final Stadia game today and is promising to release a tool next week to enable Bluetooth connections on its Stadia Controller. The last Stadia game to launch on the service is Worm Game, a test game that was technically available on Stadia before Stadia launched publicly in November 2019. Developers at Google have decided to release the game just before the streaming service disappears next week.

“Worm Game is a humble title we used to test many of Stadia’s features, starting well before our 2019 public launch, right through 2022,” says Google in its listing for the newly published title. “It won’t win Game of the Year, but the Stadia team spent a LOT of time playing it, and we thought we’d share it with you....

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The best phone to buy right now

Photo Illustration by William Joel / The Verge

Bad news: flagship phones cost a small fortune these days. Good news: we can help you pick the right one and get the most for your money.

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The best smartphone you can buy for under $500

The Verge

You can get a great smartphone at this price, whether you want an iPhone, a 120Hz screen, or water resistance

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Dungeons & Dragons finally addresses its new Open Gaming License

The company claims that a version of the license that leaked last week was a draft and that controversial restrictions in it will not be present in the final release. | Image: Wizards of the Coast

Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) publisher Wizards of the Coast (WotC) has issued a statement addressing outrage from the tabletop gaming community in regard to the company’s upcoming Open Gaming License update. A leaked draft of the new license that applied greater restrictions was badly received by fans of the franchise, resulting in a call from some community members to boycott the Hasbro-owned gaming company.

The Open Gaming License (OGL) is a public copyright license that outlines how fans and third-party publishers are permitted to make and monetize their own D&D content. The current version of the license allows third-party publishers relative freedom to create and / or sell content containing elements from the D&D tabletop roleplaying...

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A Swiss company says it has pulled CO2 out of the atmosphere and stored it underground

Collector containers at the “Orca” direct air capture and storage facility, operated by Climeworks AG, in Hellisheidi, Iceland. | Image: Arnaldur Halldorsson/Bloomberg via Getty Images

Microsoft, Stripe, and Shopify are officially the first companies in the world to pay to filter their carbon dioxide emissions out of the air, store those emissions underground, and have that service verified by a third party. Climate tech company Climeworks announced yesterday that it had completed the service, and its third-party verification of the carbon removal marks a first for the emerging industry.

In 2021, Climeworks opened up the world’s largest direct air capture (DAC) plant, called Orca, which essentially filters carbon dioxide out of the ambient air. That captured carbon is then supposed to be trapped in basalt rock formations permanently, keeping the greenhouse gas from lingering in our atmosphere and heating up the planet....

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The best noise-canceling headphone deals

You can currently buy the AirPods Max for $479.99 instead of $549. | Photo by Becca Farsace / 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, for instance, 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...

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Twitter’s For You timeline appears on desktop browsers now, too

The new tabs are here. | Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Twitter’s new For You tab, which rolled out to iPhones and iPads on Tuesday, is now appearing on desktop web browsers.

The For You tab is the TikTok-inspired name for Twitter’s algorithmically curated “Home” tab, and on iOS, it’s now the default tab you see when you close and reopen the app. You can still access the reverse-chronological list of the latest posts from the people you follow on the “Following” tab (previously “Latest”), though Twitter has removed the star icon to switch between the timelines.

For some, this change is now even more annoying since major third-party Twitter apps just stopped working, blocking people’s escape from features or changes they don’t like. As of Friday afternoon, developers of those apps are still...

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Judge rejects Elon Musk’s request to move his upcoming securities fraud trial to Texas

Illustration by Kristen Radtke / The Verge; Image: Getty Images

A judge rejected Elon Musk’s request to move his upcoming securities fraud trial out of San Francisco, Bloomberg reports. Musk had argued that the jury pool from the city would be biased against him.

Musk is facing a civil trial next week stemming from a lawsuit filed by Tesla shareholders who accuse the billionaire of making false statements in his tweets from 2018 about taking the electric vehicle company private. The shareholders argue that Musk’s tweets, in which he claimed he had “funding secured” to take the company private, caused wild swings in Tesla’s share price, costing them billions of dollars.

The deal to take Tesla private never materialized, and Musk ultimately lost his chairmanship of the company and was forced to pay a...

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The best streaming service deals available right now

If you’re eligible, you can stream Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery on Netflix at a discount. | Image: Netflix

Now that winter’s cold weather is upon us, a lot of us are spending more time indoors and bingeing movies and shows like Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery, Wednesday, and House of the Dragon. And while it’s true that most streaming services don’t cost very much, we all know that those monthly subscription fees have a way of adding up in the long run. Before you know it, you’re spending as much on streaming as you would on cable.

However, if you’re trying to cut down on your expenses (and who isn’t these days?), you don’t necessarily need to unsubscribe from everything. In fact, we’ve found a few ways for you to save on your monthly subscriptions. It turns out a variety of platforms are offering deals right now, some of which are even...

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Another viral iPod app was pulled from Apple’s App Store

Photo Illustration by Grayson Blackmon / The Verge; Getty Images

Retro Pod played right into TikTok’s love affair with the iPod. From demos of defunct Minis to outfits showcasing Shuffles as hair clips, an app turning your iPhone into an iPod was naturally going to be a hit. When Retro Pod started making the round in late December, TikTokers praised the app’s ability to replicate the iPod’s “tactile, bumpy, vibratey feels” that have been lost in the era of music streaming. Videos featuring the app racked up nearly 5 million views, but by the second week of January, viewers started commenting they couldn’t find the app at all. Retro Pod had disappeared from the App Store.

It is not confirmed why Retro Pod was removed from the App Store — neither the developer of the app nor Apple returned The Verge’s...

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YouTube creators are ducking outraged by its swearing policy

Don’t put this article in your video’s thumbnail. | Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

At exactly 18 seconds into his video “YouTube is Run by Fools,” ProZD makes his feelings on the platform’s recent restrictions on foul language crystal clear: “That’s the dumbest fucking shit I’ve ever heard.”

The tirade’s timing was deliberate, meant to test the company’s updated “approach to profanity” that it announced in November: YouTube will now limit ads or completely demonetize a creator’s video if they swear within the first 15 seconds.That may not seem like a huge deal on its own, but it also seems to apply to every video YouTubers have ever created — and they’ve done a whole lot of swearing.

ProZD is far from the only creator speaking out about the changes, as YouTube is seemingly on a demonetization spree that’s affecting...

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Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra and Plus images leak ahead of the February 1st launch event

A leaked rendering of the Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra shared by Nieuwe Mobiel_._ | Image: Nieuwe Mobiel

Leaked renders posted by Dutch publication Nieuwe Mobiel reveal the cameras, design, and colors of the Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra and Plus. The news comes shortly after similar leaks shared by WinFuture gave us a glimpse into the base Galaxy S23.

Like Samsung’s Galaxy S23, the Ultra and Plus seem to share a metal frame and glass cover design that closely resembles the iPhone and pretty much every other slab smartphone from the last few years. Unlike the Galaxy S22 series, all will be available in four of the same colors: black, white, green, and light pink.

The images of Samsung’s S Pen-equipped Galaxy S23 Ultra reveal few differences from the rest of the lineup.

Like the other S23s in these rendered images, the Ultra’s back appears...

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