Here’s 44 seconds of the Moto Razr Ultra because an entire ad has leaked

Three images from the Motorola Razr Ultra leaked video. | Images: Motorola via Evan Blass (@evleaks)

The Moto Razr Ultra foldable still isn’t official — but thanks to reliable gadget leaker Evan Blass, who’s been on top of this phone for months, we now have what appears to be an official 44-second commercial for the phone.

This is what you came for:

Leaked Motorola video via Evan Blass (@evleaks)

It’s well past my bedtime, so I won’t revisit all the other leaks — mostly, suffice it to say that Blass (whose Twitter account remains private) has been instrumental in revealing almost every aspect of this phone.

He gave us a bevy of leaked images, bite-size marketing videos, codenames for two alleged foldables (Juno and Venus), and a prospective launch date of June 1st, 2023 — meaning the phone will likely appear just before Google’s...

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Alan Wake 2 won’t be available on disc

Image: Remedy Entertainment

Alan Wake 2 just got an official release date — October 17th — but you won’t be able to buy a physical copy of the game, developer Remedy Entertainment revealed in an FAQ on Wednesday. Remedy has three arguments as to why: it says that many players have shifted to only buying games digitally, not releasing the game on disc keeps the price down, and the studio didn’t want to require a separate download even if it released a disc product.

Here’s the company’s full explanation, from the FAQ:

Why is Alan Wake 2 a digital-only release?

There are many reasons for this. For one, a large number of have shifted to digital only. You can buy a Sony PlayStation 5 without a disc drive and Microsoft’s Xbox Series S is a digital only console. It is...

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An Android app started secretly recording users almost a year after it was listed on Google Play

Innocent-seeming apps can be trojan horses for your information. | Image: Amar Toor / The Verge

An Android recording app called iRecorder Screen Recorder began as an innocent screen recording app but turned evil nearly a year after it was first released, as detailed by Ars Technica. The app first came out in September 2021, but after an update the following August, it began recording a minute of audio every 15 minutes and forwarding those recordings, through an encrypted link, to the developer’s server. The whole thing is documented in a blog post from Essential Security against Evolving Threats (ESET) researcher Lukas Stefanko.

In the post, Stefanko said the app was updated in August 2022 to include malicious code “based on the open-source AhMyth Android RAT (remote access trojan).” The app had 50,000 downloads by the time it was...

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It’s Metal Gear Solid Delta, not Metal Gear Solid Triangle

It’s confusing, so I had to ask. | Image: Konami

Sony and Konami just revealed a Metal Gear Solid 3 remake, but it has a curious logo that reads Metal Gear Solid Δ: Snake Eater. While preparing our article about the announcement, I assumed that triangle symbol translated to _Metal Gear Solid Delta, but w_hen I read Kotaku’s very good piece about the news, my stomach dropped: Kotaku called the new game Metal Gear Solid Triangle: Snake Eater, and I wondered if we had made an error.

To clear this up this very important issue, I had to ask Konami’s public relations team how we should pronounce the game’s name. The answer? Delta.

“Delta (“Δ”) was chosen because the meaning that the symbol has fits the concept of the remake project,” Tommy Williams, Konami’s head of communications for the...

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Elon Musk fails to launch Ron DeSantis in disastrous Twitter Space

Photo by Paul Hennessy/NurPhoto via Getty Images

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis announced his 2024 presidential campaign to screeching audio feedback and technical difficulties in a Twitter Space with Elon Musk on Wednesday.

DeSantis eventually did launch his campaign, but the event was mired with problems from the very beginning — and DeSantis didn’t manage to use the initial Space hosted by Musk. When moderator David Sacks, a venture capitalist and former PayPal product lead, first unmuted himself to start the talk, the Space was filled with loud, echoing feedback sounds before quickly going silent. The accounts of DeSantis and Sacks popped in and out of the initial room, muting and unmuting themselves before leaving entirely.

As of publication, it’s not entirely clear what went...

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The 6 biggest announcements from Sony’s PlayStation Showcase 2023

Image: Sony Interactive Entertainment

Sony kicked off a summer of gaming events with a bang. The company’s PlayStation Showcase was more than an hour of rapid-fire announcements, surprises, and trailers — including a new piece of hardware. You can catch up on everything that happened right here in our storystream. But if you’re just looking for the biggest news of the day, this is the place.

The rumored handheld is real

Sony is making a handheld again, with the 8-inch Project Q. It’s designed for playing your PS5 games remotely and looks like a Nintendo Switch smashed with a DualSense controller. There was other hardware, too: wireless PlayStation earbuds are also in the works.

A good long look at Spider-Man 2

The show ended with a nice long gameplay trailer for Spider-Man...

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Beat Saber will be available Wednesday for PlayStation VR2

Image: Beat Games

At its PlayStation Showcase event, Sony revealed that Beat Saber, the hit music VR game, would be launching on Wednesday for the PlayStation VR2. We already knew that Beat Saber was in the works for Sony’s new VR headset, but the sudden launch is a surprise. If you already own Beat Saber for the original PSVR, you’ll get a free upgrade to the PSVR 2 version, according to the description in Sony’s YouTube trailer for the game. Alongside the release, Sony also revealed that you’ll be able to buy a Queen-themed music pack for the game.

Beat Saber wasn’t the only piece of VR news from the event. Sony showed off footage of the in-development VR mode for the recently released (and very good) Resident Evil 4 remake. It looks appropriately...

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Revenant Hill is the latest game from Night in the Woods developer

Image: The Glory Society

Revenant Hill is the latest game from the developers behind Night in the Woods. At first glance at the game’s announcement trailer, you’d be forgiven for thinking Revenant Hill was the sequel to Night in the Woods. The cat featured bears a suspicious resemblance to one Mae Borowski, NITW’s protagonist. But according to the PlayStation blog announcing the game, Revenant Hill takes plays in the early 1900s, long before Borowski and her band of friends arrived in Possum Springs.

In Revenant Hill, you play as Twigs, a cat that’s fallen on hard times and forced to do odd jobs to pay the rent on the wet log he calls home.

“Grow crops to sell at the secret market or use for your own purposes,” wrote technical director Coby West on...

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Sony’s first PlayStation earbuds promise lossless audio for PS5 and PC gaming

PlayStation earbuds | Image: Sony

PlayStation is launching its own pair of wireless earbuds. During the PlayStation Showcase on Wednesday, Sony showed off its first pair of Bluetooth-enabled buds that you can use with the PlayStation 5, PC, or with its new Project Q handheld device.

Sony says the earbuds will feature “new wireless technology developed by SIE” later this year to make them capable of delivering lossless audio with low latency. The company didn’t reveal too much about the wireless buds but says that additional details will come “in the months ahead.” While Sony already has a number of well-regarded wireless earbuds, like the Sony WF-1000XM4, Bluetooth support alone isn’t good enough to use them directly with your PS5 for gaming.

Image:...

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The best smartwatches for Android users

Photo illustration by William Joel / The Verge

WearOS is much better than it used to be, so there’s never been a better time to consider a smartwatch.

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WWDC 2023: what to expect at Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference

Image: Apple

Apple’s upcoming Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) is expected to be one of its biggest yet. After years of rumors and leaks, Apple could finally take the wraps off of its mixed reality headset, entering the company into a new product category and giving the world a first look at its attempt to prove that virtual reality is worth investing in.

There’s also certain to be a lot more: operating system updates, new apps and features, and possibly some new hardware, too. Here, we’ve pulled together details on how and when you can watch the main WWDC keynote as well as some of the announcements that we expect from Apple.

When is the WWDC 2023 keynote?

Apple has confirmed that this year’s main WWDC keynote is slated for Monday, June 5th,...

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Spider-Man 2’s new trailer shows off symbiote powers and Miles Morales

Image: Sony

Sony shared new details about Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 at its PlayStation Showcase on Wednesday. The game’s central villain will be Kraven the Hunter — this guy — and the lengthy new gameplay footage showed off Peter Parker utilizing new powers with a symbiote suit. Suffice to say, it seems much darker than the first game. We also got a look at Miles Morales, who will be playable in the new game. The sequel doesn’t have a specific release date, but it’s launching sometime this fall.

Here’s a look at Kraven specifically:

Spider-Man 2 was first announced in September 2021, revealing that Peter Parker and Miles Morales would be back and that Venom would be appearing in the game. The title will be exclusive to the PS5, though given Sony’s many...

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Sony’s new Q handheld is official: 8-inch screen, streams PS5 games

Sony’s Project Q revealed. | Screenshot by Sean Hollister / The Verge

Sony has officially confirmed it’s working on a PlayStation handheld to make it easier to play your PS5 games. It was announced at Wednesday’s PlayStation Showcase and is called Project Q.

Take a sneak peek at new accessories revealed at today’s Showcase — the Project Q device for playing games installed on your PS5 and streamed over WiFi, plus our first official wireless earbuds offering lossless audio on PS5 and PC.

More details to come in the months ahead. pic.twitter.com/0nzemSWSCV

— PlayStation (@PlayStation) May 24, 2023

“We will launch a dedicated device that enables you to stream any game from your PS5 console using Remote Play over Wi-Fi,” PlayStation boss Jim Ryan said during the PlayStation Showcase. “Internally known as...

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Bungie announces Marathon, a new sci-fi PvP extraction shooter

Image: Bungie

Bungie is reviving its Marathon IP to create a Player versus Player extraction game. It’s the long-awaited next title from Bungie that we’ve been waiting years for the Destiny and Halo creator to announce, and the Sony-owned studio did it right in the middle of today’s PlayStation Showcase.

Bungie has only dropped a teaser and website so far, but Marathon is currently in development for PS5, Xbox Series S / X, and PC with full cross-play and cross-save. Here’s how Bungie describes Marathon:

become a runner in bungie’s new sci-fi pvp extraction shooter. compete for survival, riches, and renown in a world of evolving, persistent zones, where any run can lead to greatness.

It looks like Marathon will be set in a sci-fi universe in 2850,...

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Assassin’s Creed Mirage due out this fall

Image: Ubisoft

Assassin’s Creed Mirage will hit storefronts on October 12th later this year. Though the date was announced officially during today’s PlayStation Showcase, it was apparently leaked ahead of time. Japanese retailers started listing the game with a launch date of October 12th. According to a tweet from Gematsu, Japanese retailers do not use placeholder dates in game listings, only featuring a date if it’s official.

Assassin’s Creed Mirage will feature Basim Ibn Ishaq, a side character from Assassin’s Creed Vahalla, and take place in ninth-century Baghdad. The game was first announced during a Ubisoft Forward presentation last year as a part of a group of several forthcoming Assassin’s Creed games, including one for mobile.

According to...

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Verizon warns customer service employees of impending layoffs

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Just days after overhauling its wireless data plans, Verizon on Wednesday held a meeting with a wide audience of customer service employees to notify them of upcoming “restructuring” and “streamlining” measures that are all but certain to result in significant layoffs. More details will be shared tomorrow, May 25th, according to a prerecorded message that employees received. Over 6,000 employees were present on today’s call — The Verge spoke with several of them — but the consolidation measures could end up impacting numbers far beyond that.

The warning comes just a month after Verizon posted Q1 ’23 earnings, which fell short of Wall Street estimates as its subscriber base continued to shrink. The company lost 127,000 postpaid...

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The Metal Gear Solid 3 remake is officially happening

Image: Sony

After months of rumors, it’s finally official: Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater is getting a remake. It’s got a new name: Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater. The project was confirmed during Wednesday’s PlayStation Showcase. It’s set to release on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X / S and Windows PC via Steam, but the brief teaser didn’t reveal much more than that.

In addition to this new game, a rerelease of the original three MGS games — Metal Gear Solid, Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty, and Snake Eater — was revealed on Wednesday as part of a collection called Metal Gear Solid Master Collection: Volume 1. It’s set to release this autumn on PS5.

Metal Gear Solid 3, or MGS3, is widely considered to be one of the best stealth action games...

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Sony announces heist game Fairgames

Image: Sony Interactive Entertainment

Sony opened up its big showcase event with a brand-new title called Fairgames. It’s the first release from Haven Studios, which was acquired by Sony in 2022 and is led by industry vet Jade Raymond. It’s a competitive multiplayer title with a focus on heists.

“Fairgames will give you an opportunity to break the rules as a modern-day Robin Hood, a thrill seeker, or just someone who wants to collect cool loot,” creative director Mathieu Leduc wrote on the PlayStation blog. “Trespass inside forbidden locations around the world, fill your pockets like a kid in a candy store and unravel the nefarious plans of untouchable billionaires.”

Sony is likely hoping the game will join its growing library of big-name properties. Right now, that includes...

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Right-to-repair rules are now the law in Minnesota

Image: The Verge

Minnesota Governor Tim Walz has signed a groundbreaking right-to-repair law after it passed the state legislature in April. The rules, part of an omnibus appropriations bill, require electronics manufacturers to let independent repair shops and consumers buy the parts and tools necessary to repair their own equipment. But the rules don’t apply to some notable categories, including farm equipment, game consoles, medical devices, and motor vehicles.

The new Minnesota rules take effect July 1st, 2024, and they cover products sold on or after July 1st, 2021. If manufacturers sell a product in the state, they must offer residents the equipment to repair it on “fair and reasonable” terms within 60 days, and they must offer documentation for...

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Warner Bros. Discovery apologizes for crediting writers and directors as ‘creators’ on Max

A view of the stage during the Warner Bros. Discovery Upfront 2023 at the Theater at Madison Square Garden. | Photo by Kevin Mazur / Getty Images

Warner Bros. Discovery’s baffling (but unsurprising) decision to lump writers, directors, and producers together as nondescript “creators” in Max’s new credits section has been met with almost nothing but contempt for reasons that should be very clear four weeks into an industry-wide writers strike. Now, the entertainment giant is apologizing for the move, blaming it on technical issues and apparently working to make things right.

In joint public statements from Writers Guild of America West president Meredith Stiehm and Directors Guild of America president Lesli Linka Glatter, both organizations lambasted Warner Bros. Discovery Wednesday afternoon for Max’s “devaluation of the individual contributions of artists.”

“For almost 90 years,...

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You can finally view all your saved Wi-Fi passwords in the latest Windows 11 preview

Illustration: Alex Castro / The Verge

Microsoft is working on an easier way to view your saved Wi-Fi passwords in Windows, the company reveals in its latest blog post. The new feature comes in a new Insider Preview Build that’s been released to the Dev Channel.

With the new build (23466) of Windows 11, you can now see saved SSID keys in plain text by going to Settings > Network and internet > Wi-Fi and then going to Manage known networks. Then, you can select a saved SSID and click View Wi-Fi security key. And that’s it.

Image: Microsoft

The new “View Wi-Fi security key” section when viewing any known network in Windows 11 settings.

Currently, the Wi-Fi password of the current network your Windows 11 PC is connected to is buried in the wireless...

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Windows 11 is getting a force quit option to close apps without the Task Manager

The new force quit option on the Windows 11 taskbar. | Image: Microsoft

Microsoft is planning to add a force quit option to the Windows 11 taskbar. Similar to macOS, it will allow Windows users to finally force crashed apps and buggy ones directly from the taskbar without having to open Task Manager.

We first saw this appear in some early test versions of Windows 11, and Microsoft has confirmed at its Build developers conference this week that it’s adding the feature soon. It’s part of a series of new Windows 11 features, including native support for RAR, Tar, 7-zip, and gz archives, a new Windows Copilot AI assistant, and a dedicated Dev Home for developers.

Image: Microsoft

Native RAR and 7-zip support in Windows 11.

Microsoft has also released a new Windows 11 test build today...

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Sam Altman sells superintelligent sunshine as protestors call for AGI pause

Author Azeem Azhar talks to Sam Altman onstage at UCL. | Image: The Verge

The queue to see OpenAI CEO Sam Altman speak at University College London on Wednesday stretched hundreds deep into the street. Those waiting gossiped in the sunshine about the company and their experience using ChatGPT, while a handful of protesters delivered a stark warning in front of the entrance doors: OpenAI and companies like it need to stop developing advanced AI systems before they have the chance to harm humanity.

“Look, maybe he’s selling a grift. I sure as hell hope he is,” one of the protestors, Gideon Futerman, a student at Oxford University studying solar geoengineering and existential risk, said of Altman. “But in that case, he’s hyping up systems with enough known harms. We probably should be putting a stop to them...

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Apple might add a smart display-like iPhone lock screen in iOS 17

Illustration by Nick Barclay / The Verge

Apple is working on a new feature in iOS 17 that turns the iPhone’s screen into a smart home-style display, according to a report from Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman. As noted by Gurman, the interface will show things like the weather, calendar appointments, and notifications when the phone is locked and tilted horizontally.

It will show these widgets on a dark background with bright text, Gurman notes, and expands on the lock screen widgets that Apple revealed with iOS 16. This could come in handy when you have your iPhone set atop your desk or on your nightstand and want to keep up with any notifications or upcoming appointments.

Image: Google

Examples of Google’s “At a Glance” widget for locked Pixel phones.

Google...

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A Google DeepMind AI language model is now making descriptions for YouTube Shorts

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Google just combined DeepMind and Google Brain into one big AI team, and on Wednesday, the new Google DeepMind shared details on how one of its visual language models (VLM) is being used to generate descriptions for YouTube Shorts, which can help with discoverability.

“Shorts are created in just a few minutes and often don’t include descriptions and helpful titles, which makes them harder to find through search,” DeepMind wrote in the post. Flamingo can make those descriptions by analyzing the initial frames of a video to explain what’s going on. (DeepMind gives the example of “a dog balancing a stack of crackers on its head.”) The text descriptions will be stored as metadata to “better categorize videos and match search results to...

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The Wheel of Time’s second season starts spinning this September

Ayoola Smart as Aviendha and Marcus Rutherford as Perrin Aybara. | Image: Jan Thijs / Prime Video

After nearly two years of waiting, Amazon Prime Video’s adaptation of The Wheel of Timeis returning for its second season this fall, and the streamer has plans to make the show’s first season even easier to watch this summer.

Amazon announced today that ahead of The Wheel of Time’s second season premiere on September 1st, the show’s entire first season will be coming to Amazon Freevee, where it will be free to stream for a month beginning July 14th.

The great hunt begins September 1. #TheWheelOfTime pic.twitter.com/b3eMLfM6cl

— The Wheel Of Time (@TheWheelOfTime) May 24, 2023

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A fake climate change theory is going viral on TikTok after Joe Rogan talked about it

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

A made-up global warming theory discussed in the Joe Rogan Experience podcast is spreading on TikTok despite the platform’s new policy against climate disinformation, a new report shared exclusively with The Verge finds.

Seven TikTok videos promoting the so-called “Adam and Eve” theory — which spuriously claims Earth’s magnetic fields will shift and cause catastrophic effects across the planet — garnered more than 20 million views between January and April, according to the report by the nonprofit organization Media Matters for America. The videos include clips from a January 18th episode of The Joe Rogan Experience, amplifying statements Rogan and his guests made that contradict mainstream science.

The videos’ popularity shows how...

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A day on the Vivobook 15

The Vivobook 15 is a 15-inch budget alternative to the Acer Aspire 5 but with some of the same problems.

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Mobvoi TicWatch Pro 5 review: timing is everything

This long-delayed smartwatch is good, but it would’ve been great if it came out when it was supposed to.

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The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom — all the latest on Nintendo’s huge sequel

Link in The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom_._ | Image: Nintendo

Going deep on the biggest game of the year with analysis, interviews, and the wildest builds.

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