How to watch today’s Xbox Developer Direct showcase

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Today, Xbox and Bethesda are giving fans the first developer showcase of 2023.

Tune in to either Xbox’s (or Bethesda’s) Twitch or YouTube channels at 12PM PT / 3PM ET for news covering Redfall, Forza Motorsport, and more.

If you’re anxious to get another glimpse at Starfield, which Xbox has stated is due to release in the first half of 2023, you’re going to have to wait. Xbox included in its livestream announcement that it’s planning for Starfield to have its own showcase at a later date.

During the presentation, Redfall will reportedly get several minutes of gameplay in hopes of drumming up hype for its intended release, which is slated for sometime in the first half of 2023. It also looks like we’ll get the first look at the latest F...

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A faulty patch has kept Destiny 2 offline for more than 17 hours

Image: Bungie

Destiny 2 has been forced offline for more than 17 hours, after Bungie issued a faulty patch that caused issues for players. Bungie issued a regular game patch to tweak Destiny 2’s sandbox on Tuesday, but many players quickly realized the game had deleted triumphs, seals, and catalysts. Bungie’s fix will involved rolling back its servers.

Bungie brought Destiny 2 offline to investigate the issue at 2PM ET on Tuesday, two hours after the patch was first released. After hours of testing and investigation, Bungie confirmed it will be “rolling back all player accounts to their state as of 8:20AM PST.”

We are testing a fix. Once testing is complete, we will deploy and verify the fix before bringing Destiny 2 back online.

We will also be...

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Windows 11’s File Explorer is getting a modern UI overhaul

Alex Castro / The Verge

Microsoft is reportedly working on a big update to the File Explorer in Windows 11 that will improve its UI and features. Windows Central reports that the overhaul will include modern designs to match the rest of Windows 11, and features to more deeply integrate Microsoft 365 and OneDrive.

Internal mockups show a redesigned header in the File Explorer, alongside an updated search box and new home button. The home page of File Explorer also includes deeper Microsoft 365 integration, listing large thumbnails of documents that include items related to meetings, downloads, and comments from colleagues.

Image: Windows Central

A mockup of Microsoft’s rumored Windows 11 File Explorer changes.

The UI changes are subtle...

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Major supplier to chip makers expects a recovery sooner rather than later

ASML CEO Peter Wennink. | Image: Getty

A key supplier of chip manufacturing tools believes that demand for semiconductors could pick back up in the second half of this year, CNBC and the Financial Times report. “Most of our customers tell us that they expect a recovery in the second half of this year,” ASML CEO Peter Wennink tells CNBC. The prediction comes after a difficult few months for the tech industry that has been marked by layoffs and a slump in demand for consumer tech following a pandemic boom.

ASML is a lesser known, but critical player in the global semiconductor supply chain. The FT notes it’s the only company in the world that produces the extreme ultraviolet lithography (EUV) machines needed to produce today’s most advanced chips. ASML’s customers include TSMC,...

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Wednesday’s top tech news: an outage at Microsoft

Illustration: The Verge

Plus Rick and Morty cuts ties with its co-creator, and Telsa invests big in Semi production.

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GeForce Now and Amazon Luna offer free trials in the wake of Stadia shutdown

As Stadia players mourn the loss of their cloud gaming platform, alternative services are offering free trials to tempt new users. | Image: The Verge

Free trials are being issued for alternative cloud gaming services like Nvidia’s GeForce Now and Amazon Luna following the shutdown of Google Stadia on January 18th. As reported by 9to5Google, Game publisher Ubisoft has emailed a one-month trial for a GeForce Now Priority membership to Ubisoft account holders today, offering Nvidia’s game streaming service as a way to play Ubisoft games now that Stadia is no longer available.

The Priority tier for GeForce Now typically costs $10 a month and includes streaming up to 1080p / 60fps, raytracing where available, and access to six-hour sessions with no cap (unlike the base tier which is limited to one-hour sessions). GeForce Now is one of the better streaming services available, and the...

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B&W updates PI7 earbuds with better battery life for the same price

The Bowers and Wilkins PI7 S2. | Image: Bowers and Wilkins

Two years after releasing its first pair of true wireless earbuds, Bowers and Wilkins is here with two updated models. The $399 (£349 / €399) PI7 S2 are the higher end of the two, with dual drivers, more microphones, and the ability to use their charging case to transmit audio from a wired source (like an in-flight entertainment system) when Bluetooth isn’t an option. There’s also the step-down $299 (£249 / €299) PI5 S2.

Both earbuds now offer five hours of listening on a single charge. That’s up from four hours for the original PI7 earbuds, and 4.5 hours for the original PI5s, though it falls short of our current top wireless earbud picks, the Sony WF-1000XM4, which offer eight hours of playback, as well as the six-hour AirPods Pro 2....

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Microsoft Teams and Outlook down due to ‘networking issue’

The Verge

Microsoft Teams, Outlook, and other Microsoft 365 services are currently down for thousands of users worldwide due to a networking issue. The software maker says it has “identified a potential networking issue” and is troubleshooting a fix to bring services back online.

Thousands of users reported issues early this morning at around 2:30AM ET, with services like Microsoft Teams and Outlook email not loading for many across Europe and Asia. Microsoft lists the following Microsoft 365 services as affected:

• Microsoft Teams
• Exchange Online
• Outlook
• SharePoint Online
• OneDrive for Business
• Microsoft Graph

We're investigating issues impacting multiple Microsoft 365 services. More info can be found in the admin center under MO502273.

—...

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Rick and Morty will continue, but without Justin Roiland

Justin Roiland at New York Comic Con in 2013. | Photo by Getty

Though Adult Swim initially had little to say about recent news reports that Rick and Mortyco-creator Justin Roiland is facing two felony charges for domestic battery and false imprisonment by menace, violence, fraud, or deceit, the channel now says it has cut ties with him.

In a statement provided to The Hollywood Reporter, Adult Swim / Cartoon Network communications senior vice president Marie Moore announced that the network has “ended its association with Justin Roiland.”

pic.twitter.com/npS7WpywtD

— Rick and Morty (@RickandMorty) January 24, 2023

According to THR sources, plans are currently underway for Roiland’s Rick and Morty roles to be recast, and co-creator Dan Harmon will take over responsibilities as the show’s sole...

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Tesla’s new $3.6 billion Nevada investment includes a ‘high-volume’ Semi factory

The Gigafactory. | Image: Tesla

Tesla is investing more than $3.6 billion into its Reno, Nevada Gigafactory, and with part of the cash, it plans to build its “first high-volume Semi factory,” according to a blog post published Tuesday.

The company officially delivered the first of its long-delayed electric Semi trucks to PepsiCo in December, but it appears Tesla is ready to significantly expand its production of the new vehicle. However, Tesla’s blog post doesn’t specify how many trucks the factory might make on a regular basis or when it’s expected to open, so it might be awhile before that high volume kicks in.

Today, we’re announcing $3.6B of new investment in Giga Nevada.

- 4M sq ft of new manufacturing footprint
- 3k additional team members
- 2 new manufacturing...

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The base M2 14-inch MacBook Pro has an SSD downgrade

A previous-generation 14-inch MacBook Pro with a potentially faster SSD than the the latest models. | Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge

The base level 14-inch M2 MacBook Pro reportedly has a slower SSD than its predecessor, according to tests done by 9to5Mac. In BlackMagic’s Disk Speed Test, the 512GB SSD in Apple’s latest flagship achieved read speed scores of around 2,970 MB/s and write speed scores of around 3,150 MB/s, compared to 4,900 MB/s reads and 3,950 MB/s writes that the M1 Pro with a 512GB SSD was capable of.

That means the 2023 base model has around 39 percent slower reads and 20 percent slower writes than the one released in 2021.

The reason for the difference is likely down to chips. According to 9to5Mac, the 512GB SSD in the previous-gen 14-inch had four NAND storage chips, whereas the one on the M2 Pro seems to have two. Those are obviously...

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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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Now Lyft will charge extra if you make drivers wait

Lyft’s policy arrives a whole seven years after Uber implemented the same one. | Photo by Smith Collection / Gado / Getty Images

Lyft is cracking down on late passengers. The ridesharing company quietly updated its support page with new wait time fees that it’ll charge at a per-minute rate, a policy that’s been around since December 2022, according to Lyft spokesperson Katie Kim (via TechCrunch).

The wait time fees start two minutes after a driver arrives at your location or five minutes for Lux Black and Lux Black XL rides. If a driver reaches your location ahead of time, the wait time fees won’t kick in until two minutes after your scheduled pickup.

Lyft doesn’t specify how much it’ll charge per minute and doesn’t outline any possible fees on its website. It only says that fees “vary by location” and that “additional wait time charges may apply to your trip...

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Meta’s flagship VR app is catching up to the NES by making A the jump button

I, too, am throwing my hands in the air for this change. | Image: Meta

Meta is making a big improvement to controls in its social VR platform Horizon Worlds: jump is being remapped to the A button, according to a blog post about the app’s new v94 update.

You might be surprised to hear that wasn’t the case before, especially given that the A button has been widely used for jumping in video games for decades. But before now, you jumped in Horizon Worlds by pressing the right thumbstick as if it was a button. If you ask me, that wasn’t ideal; not only is jump not where you might expect it to be but the right thumbstick is already used to rotate your character, so pushing down the stick to jump could also lead to accidental turns.

The A button as the default will be in effect for “all players and worlds” with...

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How the Spotify layoffs impact its podcasting business

Nick Barclay / The Verge

Another week, another round of layoffs. This time, it is Spotify. CEO Daniel Ek informed employees yesterday morning that the company would be cutting 6 percent of its workforce and said he took “full accountability for the moves that got us here today.” The most high-profile change is the departure of chief content and advertising officer Dawn Ostroff. And while no additional shows have been cut, advertising and business employees, particularly under Podsights and Chartable, were laid off nearly a year after Spotify acquired both companies.

Plus (and I am fully aware of how incongruous this is, apologies), we have some more announcements for Hot Pod Summit.

After years of podcast acquisitions, Spotify goes lean

Spotify built itself into...

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Elon Musk is theoretically sad that Tesla investors lost money because of his tweets

Illustration by Laura Normand / The Verge

In testimony that was at times fiery and combative, Elon Musk came extremely close to expressing regret that Tesla investors lost money as a result of his tweets.

Musk took the stand for a third day of testimony in a lawsuit brought by a class of Tesla investors who claim that Musk cost them millions of dollars with his tweets about taking the electric car company private in 2018.

The jury will need to decide whether Musk is liable for potentially billions of dollars in damages to Tesla investors. Musk has already agreed to a $40 million settlement with the Securities and Exchange Commission over the tweets that required him to relinquish his position as chair of the company but not admit to any wrongdoing. (Musk has since argued that...

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My favorite new Steam Deck mod is this $30 see-through heatsink backplate

A see-through Steam Deck, with JSAUX’s backplate. | Photo by Sean Hollister / The Verge

Silly me.

I thought I was buying JSAUX’s transparent backplate for the Steam Deck for the bragging rights. Transparent gadgets are fun! But you know what’s cooler than seeing inside your Steam Deck? Having a Deck that runs cooler, too.

I’m happy to report that after spending $30 on my very own JSAUX PC0106 Transparent Back Plate for Steam Deck, my original skepticism didn’t pan out. Not only does it look great, its built-in aluminum heatsink actually does help manage the $400 handheld gaming PC’s heat. And at just eight Phillips-head screws and a little prying to pop off your original backplate, it’s an easy mod to do.

Comparing an original Steam Deck to one with the JSAUX backplate.

Originally, I figured a sheet...

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How to file and pay your 2022 taxes online

Samar Haddad / The Verge

It’s a new year, and while we may have a variety of hopes for the coming year — a cessation or at least a lessening of disease and war might top some lists — one of the things that you can be sure you’ll have to deal with are your annual taxes. (The usual quote about death and taxes goes here.)

While tax day traditionally has been set for April 15th, this year, we have until Tuesday, April 18th. (April 15th is a Saturday, while the following Monday is Emancipation Day, which is an official holiday in Washington, DC.)

One thing to be aware of is that, while there were a number of changes that were in force during the pandemic, the IRS is slowly pulling back on them. They are listed on this page; in short, these changes include: no...

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How to file for a tax extension

Samar Haddad / The Verge

When it comes to filing and paying your federal and state taxes for 2022, there’s good news and bad news. The good news is that you have until Tuesday, April 18th, to file — April 15th is a Saturday, while the following Monday is Emancipation Day, which is an official holiday in Washington, DC.

The bad news is: you still have to file.

If you won’t be able to file your taxes by then — because of a family emergency, a large work project, or simple procrastination — what do you do? Well, one thing you don’t do is panic. You can file for an extension, and it won’t take long.

If you’re an individual (and let’s assume you are), you can file for an extension easily online by filling out Form 4868 using the IRS’s Free File program. (Filing an...

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Microsoft Q2 2023: Windows, devices, and Xbox down as cloud holds strong

Illustration: The Verge

Microsoft has just posted the second quarter of its 2023 fiscal financial results. The software maker made $52.7 billion in revenue and a net income of $16.4 billion during Q2. Revenue is up 2 percent, but net income has dropped by 12 percent. The results come just days after Microsoft announced 10,000 layoffs.

Microsoft previously forecast a tough quarter for Windows OEM revenue and hardware, and the results are clear on the state of the PC industry right now. PC shipments fell by 16 percent in 2022, according to analysis by Canalys, and Gartner reported a nearly 29 percent year-over-year drop in Q4 — the largest quarterly shipment decline since it began tracking the PC market in the mid-1990s. Microsoft’s Windows-related revenue has...

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LastPass owner GoTo shares more bad news about November’s security breach

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge

GoTo, the remote collaboration and IT software company that owns LastPass, has confirmed that, along with LastPass’ password vaults, it had customer data taken by attackers during a November 2022 security breach (via TechCrunch).

The company, which was formerly known as LogMeIn, is updating its blog post about the breach for the first time since November 30th, when GoTo confirmed “unusual activity” within its development environment and cloud storage service.

Many of GoTo’s enterprise products were affected, including Central, Pro, join.me, Hamachi, and RemotelyAnywhere. GoTo CEO Paddy Srinivasan writes that a hacker “exfiltrated encrypted backups from a third-party cloud storage service” and acquired the encryption key for a portion of...

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Google to shut down spam backdoor for political campaigns

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Google plans to end a controversial pilot program that allows political groups to bypass Gmail’s spam filters later this month, as first reported by The Washington Post Tuesday.

Google launched the program last September in response to Republican accusations that the company’s algorithms disproportionately flag conservative fundraising emails as spam. The program allowed candidates, political party committees, and leadership political action committees to sign up with Google to make their messages exempt from the company’s spam detection systems.

“We will keep investing in spam-filtering technologies that protect people from unwanted messages while still allowing senders to reach the inboxes of users who want to see those messages,”...

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Apple issues security update for the almost 10-year-old iPhone 5S

A vintage iPhone is getting an important security update well past its “fresh by” date. | Illustration by Nick Barclay / The Verge

The iPhone 5S got its last OS upgrade in 2018 with the release of iOS 12, but it’s not totally down for the count. As AppleInsider points out, the 2013-vintage device got a security update this week: a bump to iOS 12.5.7, to be precise. Even if you don’t have an iPhone 5S, that’s good news for anyone who’s a fan of getting the most out of their device.

There’s not much to iOS 12.5.7, but it’s an important update if you own one of the phones it supports. It closes a nasty-sounding security loophole in which “processing maliciously crafted web content may lead to arbitrary code execution.” Apple’s support documentation also says it “may have been actively exploited” in devices running iOS versions earlier than 15.1. Sounds like a real bad...

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Samsung’s putting embedded sensors in the next Galaxy Book OLED touchscreen

Image: Samsung

Samsung’s Galaxy Book 3 will feature an OLED panel that uses on-cell technology that embeds sensors directly into the display to create a thinner and lighter touchscreen. The company’s display-making arm announced that it has started to mass-produce the technology for notebooks and says it will come with “some models” of the “next-generation Galaxy Book series” (via ZDNET).

These panels use something called on-cell touch AMOLED (OCTA) technology. Instead of putting touch sensors on a “film” on the panel surface, it incorporates touch sensors directly into the panel, “reducing the thickness and weight” of the display. Companies including both Samsung and Apple already use this kind of technology in smartphones, and bringing it to laptops...

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Crypto collapse: FTX’s fall is one piece of a long, cold, contagious crypto winter

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

FTX is just the latest company facing an uncertain future as cryptocurrency values drop, revealing flaws in risky financial strategies that fueled the recent crypto and NFT boom.

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Elon Musk bought Twitter, and here’s everything that happened next

Laura Normand / The Verge

Elon Musk is now the owner, CEO, and sole director of Twitter. His “Twitter 2.0” era has so far included mass layoffs and rapidly changing policy decisions.

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Twitter for web will now stay on your preferred timeline

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Twitter should now be less annoying about pushing its “For You” algorithmic timeline. The company announced that the web version will now remember which timeline you were using last and default to it when you open it again. The feature should also be coming to iOS and Android soon.

The update brings back functionality that existed before the tab UI was introduced — there used to be a button that let you choose which version of the timeline you wanted to see. If you’re the type of person who occasionally pops over to For You from Following or vice versa, the new version with the ability to remember which tab you left off on should make that easier. This change probably won’t do much to appease users who would rather just set it and forget...

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If you want to use a security key with your Apple account, you’ll need two keys

Seems like this person has everything they need for Apple’s just-launched security key support. | Image: Yubico

Apple just added support for security keys to secure your Apple ID with its latest iOS and macOS updates, but to actually set up your keys with your account, you’ll need to have at least two security keys on hand, according to an Apple support document (via MacRumors).

While that might sound like a bit of an inconvenience, the requirement means that you’ll have a backup in the event that you lose your primary key and won’t be locked out of your account. It’s not an entirely unexpected ask; Google recommends using two security keys with its Advanced Protection Program for Google accounts, though the company only requires that you have one security key to enroll. Apple will let you enroll up to six keys to your account.

You can add...

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Google is being sued by the US government and eight states over online advertising

Illustration: The Verge

Google’s facing a lawsuit from the US Department of Justice and eight states over its alleged monopoly on the digital advertising market. The agency accuses the company of abusing “monopoly power” at the disadvantage of websites and advertisers who use other advertising tools, according to a lawsuit filed on Tuesday (PDF). A press conference is scheduled for 2PM ET to announce the lawsuit.

“Google’s anticompetitive behavior has raised barriers to entry to artificially high levels, forced key competitors to abandon the market for ad tech tools, dissuaded potential competitors from joining the market, and left Google’s few remaining competitors marginalized and unfairly disadvantaged,” the lawsuit reads.

It goes on to allege that Google’s...

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Blizzard’s most recent union election is off

Image: Proletariat

In a surprising and deeply ironic twist, the workers at Activision Blizzard-owned Proletariat have canceled their union election. A statement from the Communication Workers of America confirmed the news saying that Proletariat CEO Seth Sivak is to blame.

“Like many founders, he took the workers’ concerns as a personal attack and held a series of meetings that demoralized and disempowered the group, making a free and fair election impossible,” read the CWA’s statement.

Proletariat would have been Activision Blizzard’s third union after the success of QA-initiated unions at Raven Studios and, most recently, Blizzard Albany. Proletariat’s union bid was of particular interest as it would have been the first “wall-to-wall” unionization...

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