Twitter will let businesses keep their gold checkmarks — for $1,000 per month

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Twitter wants to cash in on businesses on the platform by charging them $1,000 per month to keep their gold checkmarks, according to a report from The Information. As noted by The Information, brands who don’t pay the $1,000 per month fee will lose their gold badges, although it’s unclear when that will happen.

Internal messages viewed by the outlet also reveal that Twitter’s looking to tack on an extra $50 per month charge to add badges to each account affiliated with the business. This aligns with a screenshot posted by social media consultant Matt Navarra, which shows what appears to be an email between Twitter product manager Evan Jones and an unnamed business.

“As an early access subscriber, you’ll get a gold checkmark for your...

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11 great movies from the 2023 Sundance Film Festival

Priya Kansara in Polite Society. | Image: Sundance Institute

It was a busy festival filled with gruesome horror, inventive sci-fi, and plenty more films that will be coming to theaters and streaming services in the coming months.

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Nix’s Hydration Biosensor is for athletes who sweat the details

Hydration doesn’t have to be this high-tech or complicated, but nerdy endurance athletes might find the data worth the price.

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Contractors who work on YouTube Music are striking

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Over 40 contractors for YouTube Music are going on strike — a first at Google, according to the Alphabet Workers Union (or AWU). The action is in response to an order to return to in-person work next week, something that many of the workers say they can’t do. They’re demanding a return-to-work policy that’s “fair, flexible, and does not threaten the safety and livelihoods of workers,” according to an AWU press release.

The workers are part of the YouTube Music Content Operations team via Cognizant, a subcontractor for Alphabet, Google and YouTube’s parent company. Their jobs are to “ensure music content is available and approved” for the platform, according to a prior press release from the AWU.

The objections to the return to office...

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Nvidia says there’s a fix for Discord slowing down your GPU

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Nvidia says there’s a fix for a recently discovered issue where Discord being open in the background limited the performance of some graphics cards. According to a tweet from the company, the patch will download automatically when you log into Windows, so you won’t have to go through the trouble of manually downloading a graphics driver or other software update.

The issue, which affected systems with cards like the RTX 3080 and RTX 3060 Ti, was seemingly caused by a recent Discord update. It kept GPUs from reaching their maximum memory clocks, missing by around 200Mhz. That came with a slight performance penalty when playing games, which isn’t exactly ideal given that Discord is made to help you talk to friends while gaming.

GeForce...

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The best deals on 4K TVs

We’ve got deals on all sorts of TVs, ranging from affordable (yet feature-packed) models to high-end OLED and Mini LEDs that can really wow you. | Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge

The future looks bright for those who are looking to nab a great TV in 2023 at a substantial discount. Although a fresh slate of new models was announced at CES 2023, it might be a while until many of them arrive — and even longer before they receive a discount. However, you don’t have to wait until later this year to land a great deal on a mid- or high-end TV from Sony, LG, TCL, or Samsung, as many models of the flagship models from last year are currently selling for hundreds of dollars less than their original list price.

Right now, there are a number of discounted 4K TVs to choose from, spanning a wide variety of prices, size configurations, and feature sets. Whether you want a secondary TV for the bedroom or a high-end OLED that’s...

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Electrify America is increasing prices at its DC fast charging stations

Photo by Umar Shakir / The Verge

Remember how rising gas prices weren’t a concern to electric car owners? Electrify America is giving users of its DC fast charging network a reminder about one of the biggest frustrations of owning internal combustion engine cars again — by increasing electricity rates at its stations (via Ars Technica).

Starting on March 6th, Electrify America will be charging US customers a standard rate of $0.48 per kilowatt hour. The company, a subsidiary of Volkswagen Auto Group, was charging $0.43 per kWh, but now, it is emailing customers to share the price increase details.

Tara Geiger of Electrify America’s corporate communications emailed the company’s statement on the price changes to The Verge:

Electrify America has been able to maintain...

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EA and Meta weren’t the only companies to ax games this week

Apex Legends Mobile is one of the games shutting down. | Image: EA

Over the course of this week, the developers of several major live service titles announced that their games would be shutting down. That means that players who actively enjoyed those games — and possibly spent money on them — might have to move on to something else.

The shutdowns are a reminder of the challenges facing these ambitious online titles. If they don’t quickly become massive hits, they might be closed down before they really have time to find their footing. Any new entrants have to fight an uphill battle to compete against juggernauts like Destiny 2, Call of Duty: Warzone, and Fortnite.

That means, for many of these newer games, they’re stuck in a chicken-and-egg situation: they need players to become a hit, but players may...

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A remastered version of Myst is coming to iOS

Indie studio Cyan is bringing its latest Myst remaster to iOS. | Image: Cyan

The classic puzzle game Myst is celebrating its 30th birthday this year with a new way to play: on your iOS device. Myst Mobile is based on the remastered version of the original that’s been released for Oculus headsets and PCs over the past few years.

The new iOS port will support iPhones and iPads with A12 bionic chipsets and newer, so you can experience the mind-numbing frustration of turning dials and locating switches wherever you take your phone. Compatible iPhones include the XS, XS Max, XR, and newer; the eighth-gen iPad, third-gen iPad Air, and fifth-gen iPad Mini and newer will all be compatible, too.

Mobile ports of Myst have existed for quite a while. The Masterpiece edition with point-and-click graphics of the original has...

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The best deals on TVs for Super Bowl LVII

A deal on a TCL 6-Series TV offers a whole lot of bang for the buck. | Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge

It’s almost time for the Super Bowl, the only game that functions more akin to an annual holiday in the US than a mere sporting event. This means there are bound to be not only good prices on chips and dip at your local grocery store but also great deals on some of our favorite TVs.

Even if you don’t care one iota about the NFL or American football as a whole, or you only enjoy tuning in for the spectacle of the halftime show and all the cheesy commercials, there’s no reason not to save money on a new TV set when given the opportunity. So we’ve been on the lookout for 4K models with the best discounts that are worthy of your money — and not the junky, ultra-cheap ones many big-box retailers overhype at this time of year.

TCL 6-Series

Y...

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Pakistan is reportedly blocking Wikipedia

It’s currently unclear what the government wants removed from the site. | Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Wikipedia has been blocked in Pakistan over “sacrilegious” content on the site, according to a report from Bloomberg. The ban comes after the government ordered the site to remove offending content within 48 hours, and the country’s telecom authority “degraded” its services.

It’s not currently clear what Wikipedia is being asked to remove, though Bloomberg reports that it’s still in talks with Pakistani officials. Wikimedia, the foundation in charge of Wikipedia, didn’t immediately respond to The Verge’s request for comment on the matter. According to research from the OpenNet Initiative, the country blocks sites that have content it considers to be “blasphemous, anti-Islamic, or threatening to internal security.”

Given the intentional...

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A jury will now decide whether Elon Musk committed fraud when he tweeted ‘funding secured’

Kristen Radtke / The Verge; Getty Images

The question of whether Tesla CEO Elon Musk committed fraud when he tweeted in August 2018 that he was thinking of taking the company private, adding “funding secured,” is now up to a jury.

With Musk in attendance, the jury in the billionaire’s securities fraud trial heard closing arguments from an attorney representing a class of Tesla investors who claim they suffered big losses as a result of Musk’s tweet. They also heard from Musk’s lawyers, who claimed all he was guilty of was “poor word choice.” Their decision will determine whether Musk and Tesla are liable for possibly billions of dollars in damages or he gets to walk away unscathed.

“Just because it’s a bad tweet doesn’t make it fraud,” Alex Spiro, Musk’s attorney, said in his...

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The best noise-canceling headphones to buy right now

Sony’s WH-1000XM5 headphones have an all-new design. | Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge

Get some peace and quiet with the any of our top picks for noise-canceling headphones. Sony’s still the best overall pick, but there are reasons to go elsewhere, too.

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The EU has reportedly issued a formal warning to Microsoft over the Activision Blizzard deal

It’s more regulatory pressure on the deal. | Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Microsoft is seemingly facing more regulatory opposition to its proposed acquisition of Activision Blizzard. According to Politico, the European Union has issued a formal antitrust warning against Microsoft regarding the $68.7 billion deal.

Politico didn’t share exact details about the contents of the warning, but the publication says that in a “statement of objections,” EU officials “laid out the reasons why the deal could threaten fair competition on the video game market.”

In a statement to The Verge, Microsoft spokesperson David Cuddy said, “We are committed to solutions and finding a path forward for this deal. We are listening carefully to the [European Commission’s] concerns and are confident we can address them.” The EU didn’t...

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TikTok adds a strikes policy for bans

Illustration by Nick Barclay / The Verge

TikTok has announced an update to its moderation system, which will implement account strikes, similar to YouTube’s community guidelines strikes. The company says it’s doing this because its previous system could be confusing to creators and exploited by bad actors.

If TikTok removes content, such as a video or comment, for violating a community guideline, the account behind it will get a strike, which expires after 90 days. There are multiple types of strikes — you can get them for specific product features like Comments or Live or for sections of TikTok’s policies (so strikes for doing a dangerous challenge won’t necessarily be counted with strikes for leaving a spammy comment).

Getting enough strikes in any category will result in a...

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PSA: Twitter’s API changes may make it difficult to log in to your favorite games

Image: Mihoyo

Elon’s messing up the game — literally. Two extremely popular online games, Arknights and Genshin Impact, have warned that players who use Twitter to log in may be affected by Twitter’s pending API changes.

“We are in the process of confirming the impact of the Twitter API adjustments on game account login and the corresponding resolutions,” read the tweet on Genshin Impact’s official Twitter account. “To prevent possible account login problems, we recommend going to the HoYoverse Account page to link your email address for account logins.”

Arknights’ tweet suggested similarly. “We STRONGLY recommend players binding their game accounts with the Yostar account if have not done so in case of any contingency.”

It’s not known if the changes...

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The best wireless earbuds to buy right now

The current earbuds lineup is the strongest to date.

The best from Apple, Bose, Samsung, Sony, Beats, Google, and more

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Is this Microsoft’s ChatGPT-powered Bing?

A screenshot purportedly showing the “new Bing,” inviting users to query an AI chatbot. | Image: Owen Yin

Microsoft is reported to be capitalizing on the success of ChatGPT by integrating the AI chatbot into its search engine Bing. But what might that look like? We may now have some idea, thanks to Bing users who said a new, AI-assisted version of the search engine mysteriously appeared (and disappeared) earlier today.

Student and designer Owen Yin reported seeing the “new Bing” on Twitter this morning. He told The Verge via Twitter DM that he has Bing set as his homepage on Microsoft’s Edge browser and the new UI just loaded up. “Didn’t do anything to find it,” said Yin. “After a couple of minutes it stopped working ... Jaw dropped when I realized what I was looking at!”

(The Verge has been unable to verify the authenticity of these...

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Amazon reportedly facing FTC antitrust investigation

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

The Federal Trade Commission is reportedly exploring an antitrust suit against Amazon, although its future remains uncertain. The Wall Street Journal reported the news today, saying that the case could cover an “array” of Amazon business practices. But the agency reportedly hasn’t committed to the suit or heard dissenting arguments from key Amazon executives.

FTC head Lina Khan has leveled heavy criticism at Amazon over allegedly monopolistic business practices, including before joining the agency; she’s the author of an influential 2017 Yale Law Review article titled “Amazon’s Antitrust Paradox.” (Amazon unsuccessfully attempted to disqualify her from regulating the company based on her statements.) And over the past years, she and...

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Elon Musk will share Twitter ad revenue — but only with creators who pay for Twitter Blue

Image: Laura Normand / The Verge

Elon Musk says that Twitter will start sharing revenue from reply-thread ads with creators who are subscribed to Twitter Blue Verified. (According to Musk, “legacy” verified marks will be going away in “a few months.”) He says the program will start today, though there are currently very few details about how it will work.

Currently, subscribing to Blue will cost you $8 per month if acquired directly via its site or $11 per month from Apple’s App Store or Google Play, but the cheapest version is an annual subscription directly from Twitter for $84. It’s unclear how many viral tweets it would take to pay that off, but it could be difficult given Twitter’s rocky relationship with advertisers right now.

To be eligible, the account must...

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The Last of Us Part I on PC delayed by a few weeks

Sorry, Joel, you’re going to have to wait a bit longer to play the game on PC. | Image: Sony

The Last of Us Part I for PC has been delayed to March 28th, developer Naughty Dog announced on Friday. The remake of the first The Last of Us game was originally set to launch on March 3rd, so the delay isn’t too long, but it still might be disappointing to fans who may have circled the original date on their calendars.

“We want to make sure that The Last of Us Part I PC debut is in the best shape possible,” Naughty Dog wrote in a tweet. “These additional few weeks will allow us to ensure this version of The Last of Us lives up to your, and our, standards.”

The Last of Us Part I PC will now be released on March 28. An update from our team: pic.twitter.com/lvApDT71Xj

— Naughty Dog (@Naughty_Dog) February 3, 2023

The remake, which...

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The Treasury Department just fixed the EV tax credit’s Tesla Model Y problem

Image: Getty Images

The US Treasury Department says it is modifying the electric vehicle tax credit to potentially allow more vehicles to qualify — for now.

In a press release, the department said that to determine whether a vehicle is a sedan, SUV, pickup truck, or van, it would use the Environmental Protection Agency’s Fuel Economy Labeling standard rather than the EPA’s corporate average fuel economy, or CAFE, standard.

In plain language, this could clear up some of the confusion around which vehicles qualify for the $7,500 tax credit, which was written into law last year as part of the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA).

In plain language, this could clear up some of the confusion around which vehicles qualify for the $7,500 tax credit

“This change will...

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How to stereo pair two Apple HomePods

Samar Haddad / The Verge

If you’ve read through our review of the latest HomePod, you’ll know that one of Apple’s smart speakers alone sounds pretty good. But combining two of them in a stereo pair really takes the listening experience to a different level. It’s not a cheap proposition, but you’ll end up with even more immersive room-filling sound — and if you use two HomePods as speakers for an Apple TV, they’ll outperform many sound bars that are in a similar $600 price range.

It’s important to note that you need two of the exact same model (first-gen HomePod, HomePod Mini, or second-gen HomePod) for a stereo pair; you can’t mix the old and new HomePods together, for example.

Outside of that limitation, Apple makes it simple to pair two HomePods. There are a...

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Developer pleads guilty to hacking his own company after pretending to investigate himself

Nickolas Sharp worked on one of the teams investigating his illegal activities while holding Ubiquiti data ransom for 50 Bitcoin. | Illustration: Beatrice Sala

A former employee of network technology provider Ubiquiti pleaded guilty to multiple felony charges on Thursday after posing as an anonymous hacker in an attempt to extort almost $2 million worth of cryptocurrency while employed at the company.

Nickolas Sharp, 37, worked as a senior developer for Ubiquiti between 2018 and 2021 and took advantage of his authorized access to Ubiquiti’s network to steal gigabytes worth of files from the company during an orchestrated security breach in December 2020. The press release announcing his plea does not mention the company’s name, calling it only Company-1, but he has been identified publicly as a former employee and in a lawsuit filed by Ubiquiti.

Prosecutors said that Sharp used the Surfshark...

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Activision Blizzard to pay $35 million SEC penalty

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

A Securities and Exchange Commission probe into Activision Blizzard has concluded with the company paying a $35 million penalty.

At the heart of the probe were charges that Activision Blizzard did not have adequate procedures in place that allowed it to document employee workplace misconduct complaints. As a result of this inadequacy, Activision Blizzard could not, therefore, determine if the misconduct problems were severe enough to warrant shareholder disclosure. Additionally, the SEC found that wording in the company’s separation agreements was in violation of an SEC whistleblower protection rule, requiring former employees to notify the company if they received a request for information from the Commission or other investigative...

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Here are the best AirPods deals you can get right now

Apple’s AirPods Pro are often on sale. | Photo by Becca Farsace / The Verge

If you know where to look, there are often some great discounts available on Apple’s ever-popular AirPods. Since Apple launched the third-gen AirPods at the end of 2021, we’ve seen the starting price of the second-gen, entry-level model slowly dip to around $100. And now that you can buy the second-gen AirPods Pro, we’re seeing even better discounts on the last-gen Pro and other models.

For your convenience, we’ve curated the best deals currently available on each model, including the entry-level AirPods, the AirPods Pro, the third-gen AirPods, and the AirPods Max.

The best entry-level AirPods (second-gen) deals

In 2021, Apple lowered the list price of the second-gen AirPods — now the entry-level model — from $159 to $129. It now only...

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The fantastic fitness-focused Beats Fit Pro are at a new low price of $149.95

The Beats Fit Pro come in gray and pink (pictured) as well as white and black. | Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge

While there are all kinds of TV and speaker deals running now in the buildup to the Super Bowl, we’ve got some impeccable everyday tech deals for everyday users.

The Beats Fit Pro wireless earbuds have dropped to a new low price of $149.95 ($50 off) at Walmart, Best Buy, Amazon, and Target — which is even better than the $40 discount we saw during Black Friday. These are one of our overall favorites when it comes to Bluetooth buds and arguably the best earbuds you can use for running. They sound great, have top-tier noise cancellation, and work fine with both Apple and Android phones (though they pair faster with iPhones). The biggest drawback is that their chunky case does not support wireless charging, though at least it’s got USB-C...

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Sports Illustrated’s publisher is using AI to generate fitness advice

More media publishers are turning to AI to crank out content. | Image: Joe Raedle/Getty Images

Another major publisher is using AI to generate stories in the name of efficiency.

Arena Group Holdings, a media firm whose brands include Sports Illustrated, TheStreet, Parade, and Men’s Journal, says it’s partnering with AI language startups Jasper and Nota to broaden and increase the speed of “its AI-assisted efforts.” These include training AI language models on the company’s archives to generate stories that are then edited by humans.

In Men’s Journal, for example, evergreen articles like “Proven Tips to Help You Run Your Fastest Mile Yet” and “What All Men Should Know About Low Testosterone” have been written using tools made by ChatGPT creator OpenAI. The stories’ bylines are attributed to “Men’s Fitness Editors,” while a...

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Mami Wata is a breathtaking modern myth about faith and technological progress

Evelyne Ily Juhen as Prisca in Mami Wata_._ | Image: Fiery Film Company

Out of all the films that debuted at this year’s Sundance Film Festival, none were quite as visually striking as Nigerian writer / director C.J. Obasi’s Mami Wata, a monochromatic modern-day myth about a small village during a time of upheaval. One doesn’t need to be familiar with Mami Wata’s eponymous embodiment of the divine feminine to appreciate its story about multiple generations of women doing everything in their power to keep their people safe. But as you let Mami Wata wash over you, the film paints a picture of people fighting to understand their beliefs in forces larger than themselves. And in each of those people, you can see shades of Mami Wata.

Set in a small village called Iyi, Mami Wata tells the tale of three women whose...

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Emm aims to upgrade periods with a smart menstrual cup

The Emm product lineup includes a case, a cup with biosensors, a portable UV sanitizer, and a tampon-like applicator. | Image: Emm

In wearable tech, menstrual health often feels like an afterthought. Case in point: Fitbit, the first major wearable maker to add period tracking to its platform, did so in 2018 — over a decade after launching its first device. So is it any surprise that, in the era of smartphones and smartwatches, people are still using menstrual products that have remained largely unchanged over the last 90 years? Not really, but that might soon change. Emm, a smart menstrual cup, is currently going through beta testing. If all goes well, the product could launch as early as this year.

What exactly isa smart menstrual cup? In Emm’s case, it’s a suite of products that center around a wearable device that kind of looks like a shuttlecock-shaped ketchup...

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