Now there’s an AI gas station with robot fry cooks

Screenshot: Wes Davis / The Verge

There’s a little-known hack in rural America: you can get the best fried food at the gas station (or in the case of a place I went to on my last road trip, shockingly good tikka masala). Now, one convenience store chain wants to change that with a robotic fry cook that it’s bringing to a place once inhabited by a person who may or may not smell like a recent smoke break and cooks up a mean fried chicken liver.

The convenience store chain Re-Up announced that it's installing “The Wingman,” a robot from Nala Robotics that drops fry baskets into hot oil and rolls chicken wings around in sauce before dumping those things into buckets for your consumption (at least, based on the video below). The company says that the machine will use...

Continue reading…

Here are the best Apple Watch deals right now

The Apple Watch Series 9 isn’t a massive step up from the prior model, but it does offer a few new features. | Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge

In September, Apple launched its latest batch of smartwatches, introducing the Apple Watch Ultra 2 ($799) alongside the new Apple Watch Series 9 ($399). Each wearable has its own pros and cons, as does the second-gen Apple Watch SE ($249), but the introduction of the new wearables also means there are now more Apple Watch models on the market than ever before — and a lot more deals to be had.

But with all of those options, which one should you pick? Generally speaking, you want to buy the newest watch you can afford so that it continues to receive software updates from Apple. The latest update, watchOS 10, launched in September on the Apple Watch Series 4 and newer, though no one can say with certainty whether the Series 4 will get the...

Continue reading…

President Biden is now posting into the fediverse

The president’s account can now be found on platforms like Mastodon. | Screenshot: Wes Davis / The Verge

The official US president Threads account, currently helmed by President Joe Biden, has begun using Meta’s ActivityPub integration, making Biden the first sitting US president to post on the decentralized networking protocol. If you want to follow the President’s posts, but don’t want to leave Mastodon, you can follow @potus@threads.net.

The account turning on fediverse posting comes only a couple of weeks after Threads rolled out its beta ActivityPub integration for users in the US, Canada, and Japan.

Here’s the account as viewed from the official Mastodon client:

Screenshot: Wes Davis / The Verge

The Presidential Threads account, as viewed on Mastodon.

Biden may not be able to see replies and follows as they...

Continue reading…

Apple quietly added Qi2 charging to the iPhone 12

Photo by Antonio G. Di Benedetto / The Verge

Apple never mentioned it, but the iPhone 12 received Qi2 wireless charging support when it got updated to iOS 17.4 last month. That means you can make full use of the Qi2-certified chargers that have entered the market, which have adopted the magnetic attachment and 15W speeds of Apple’s MagSafe tech.

Macworld originally reported the update late last week. It published findings from its own tests alongside confirmation from Belkin that its Qi2 chargers supported 15W charging on updated iPhone 12 devices. Anker has since confirmed to The Verge similar compatibility for its products_,_ while Apple has yet to respond to a request for comment_._

The iPhone 12 was Apple’s first phone with MagSafe and has supported 15W magnetic MagSafe charging...

Continue reading…

US and UK will work together to test AI models for safety threats

Cath Virginia / The Verge | Photos from Getty Images

The United States and United Kingdom agreed to work together to monitor advanced AI models for safety risks. The two countries will collaborate on research and do at least one joint safety test.

Both countries say safety is a top concern when it comes to using AI models. US President Joe Biden’s executive order on AI required companies developing AI systems to report safety test results. Meanwhile, UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak announced the creation of the UK AI Safety Institute, saying that companies like Google, Meta, and OpenAI must allow the vetting of their tools.

The agreement between both countries’ AI Safety Institutes takes effect immediately

US Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo said the government is “committed to developing...

Continue reading…

NYC’s AI gun detectors hardly work

Cath Virginia / The Verge | Photos from Getty Images

When New York City Mayor Eric Adams announced the city would be testing out AI gun detectors on at subway stations last week, he touted the technology as “clearly impressive.” But critics, including the Legal Aid Society, were immediately skeptical of the pilot — and as it turns out, they were right to be.

When the city installed Evolv scanners at a hospital in the Bronx in 2022, the machines frequently reported false positives, according to a public records request obtained by Hell Gate. In the seven months that the Evolv scanners were active, 50,000 of the 194,000 scans resulted in a positive alarm — 85 percent of which were false positives. Most of the actual positives were triggered by police officers; just 295 were triggered by...

Continue reading…

Final Fantasy VII Rebirth’s biggest twist is concealed in a tiny detail

Image: Square Enix

I’m in awe of how smart the developers of Final Fantasy VII Rebirth are. After seeing a post comparing Cloud during the Nibelheim flashback and his arrival at the city much later in the game, my mind is reeling from the subtle brilliance in how Square used the tiniest of animation details to convey one of the biggest, most shocking plot twists in Final Fantasy narrative history.

Spoilers for Final Fantasy VII Rebirth to follow.

In a clip shared on X by pwtizza, Cloud, with one of his big-ass swords strapped to his back, is seen sitting at the top of Nibelheim’s famous water tower. In the right half of the clip, Cloud removes his sword before sitting at the top of the water tower. In the left half of the clip, he doesn’t; Cloud simply...

Continue reading…

Amazon gives up on no-checkout shopping in its grocery stores

An Amazon Dash Cart in Whole Foods. | Photo by Tayfun Coskun / Anadolu via Getty Images

Amazon has decided to give up on its Just Walk Out program that lets customers leave its brick-and-mortar grocery stores without a formal checkout process. Instead, it’s switching fully to “Dash Carts,” where customers scan products as they toss them in their cart.

That’s according to The Information, which reports that the company is pulling Just Walk Out from all larger stores where the system is in place and “sprucing up the stores across the board” as it prepares to expand Amazon Fresh locations later this year. Amazon will keep using it in smaller corner stores, though.

Amazon hasn’t managed to get a handle on in-person retail despite buying the upscale, popular Whole Foods chain back in 2017. Over the years, the online shopping...

Continue reading…

Google’s final warning: Dropcam, Dropcam Pro, and Nest Secure support ends on April 8th

Illustration: The Verge

Google just sent out its final reminder that Dropcam and Dropcam Pro cameras and Nest Secure home security systems will stop working next Monday, April 8th. Google first made the announcement a year ago, a month before it rolled out its redesigned Home app.

The Dropcam and Dropcam Pro, which came out in 2012 and 2013, respectively, will stop being able to connect to the Nest app and stop recording video.Video history will remain available after April 8th, but the length of time depends on your individual Nest Aware subscription version and tier, which range from five to 60 days.

Current users should also check their emails for an offer toward an indoor wired Nest Cam, which expires on May 7th, 2024. But perhaps most importantly, users...

Continue reading…

It’s time for a hard reset on notifications

Phones need to go to notification jail. | Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge

Feel that? Your phone buzzing in the pocket of your yoga pants? Better check it. Maybe it’s a request to approve a substitution in your grocery order. Maybe it’s a fraudulent charge on your credit card. Maybe it’s your mom or your spouse or your sister. Maybe it’s a notification from your kid’s daycare. It might be any of those things! But it’s probably not. It’s probably something like:

Hi! You’re running out of time to do your Spanish lesson! Still thinking about ordering dinner? Enjoy $8 off your purchase. Terms apply. You hit your sleep goal seven times in the last two weeks. Nice one, Allison. Shop these fresh beauty picks. Take a second to reflect on how you’re feeling. Beck performing on Wed, Jul 3. Tap to learn more!

N...

Continue reading…

Hello to you as well, Starbucks

Screenshot: Chris Welch / The Verge

I’ve become almost numb to the deluge of notifications that hit my phone every day. But when an app sends a simple, very human “Hi!” message, apparently that’s enough to stop me in my tracks. And Starbucks just sent exactly that push notification to god knows how many devices a few minutes ago. For what purpose? Who knows?

Just hi. No other context. A random hello on what’s (here in New York) a dreary, rainy Tuesday. So I tapped. Doing so just brought me into the Starbucks app without any special destination or obvious promotion attached to the prompt.

Starbucks has sent out accidental notifications before. So it’s fair to question:

1. Was this some dumb stunt? Or was it yet another test notification that went to the wrong audience?
2. Did...

Continue reading…

Apple’s second-gen AirPods are available at a rare discount

Apple’s second-gen AirPods still deliver a lot of value for Apple fans given how well they integrate with other iOS devices. | Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge

We don’t often recommend five-year-old earbuds, but Apple’s second-generation AirPodsare one of those rare gadgets that have stood the test of time. They’re still a good option if you just need a simple pair of earbuds that integrate well with other Apple devices, and right now, they’re just $89 ($40 off) at Amazon and Walmart. That’s $20 shy of the all-time low price set during Black Friday and the best price we’ve seen them sell for so far this year.

Apple’s last-gen entry-level earbuds still deliver excellent sound and voice call quality, even if they lack the IPX4 water resistance and MagSafe charging compatibilities of the third-gen AirPods. They nail the basics with long battery life and reliable performance, while letting Apple...

Continue reading…

Tesla’s year-over-year sales dropped for the first time since 2020

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge

Tesla delivered 386,810 vehicles this quarter, falling short of its fourth quarter 2023 deliveries by nearly 100,000 and marking a year-over-year sales drop from Q1 2023’s 422,875 vehicles. As Bloomberg notes, the company hasn’t delivered fewer vehicles than the same prior-year period since 2020 and hasn’t delivered under 400,000 vehicles in a quarter since Q3 2022.

Tesla blamed the decline partially on “the early phase of the production ramp of the updated Model 3 at our Fremont factory,” as well as shipping delays resulting from Houthi rebel attacks in the Red Sea and the arson at its Berlin factory. The company had earlier predicted slowed 2024 growth as it prepared to begin new vehicle production in 2025.

Tesla’s explanation may not...

Continue reading…

Here are the best iPad deals right now

Entry-level iPad models go on sale quite frequently, but some discounts on more powerful models are getting harder to find. | Photo by Dan Seifert / The Verge

While the best iPad deals usually land during major sale events like Black Friday, Cyber Monday, and Amazon’s various Prime Days, many of the best iPad deals from the holiday season have persisted into 2024. The discounts come and go like changing winds, but you can still take advantage of sales on many models today, particularly on the more affordable iPads. What’s more, prices are likely to drop even further when Apple ushers in a new slate of iPad Pro and iPad Air models, which will reportedly now happen in May.

Forthcoming models aside, it’s difficult to know where exactly you can find the most notable iPad deals unless you’re scouring the major retailers on a daily basis. But that’s often what our deal hunters at The Verge are...

Continue reading…

Google Podcasts is gone — and so is my faith in Google

Google Podcasts was a simple but good podcasts app — and now it’s gone. | Image: Google

Google Podcasts is dead. It has been dying for months, since Google announced last fall that it was killing its dedicated podcast app in order to focus all its podcasting efforts on YouTube Music. This is a bad idea and a big downgrade, and I’d be more mad if only I were more surprised.

The Podcasts app is just the latest product to go through a process I’ve come to call The Google Cycle. It always goes the same way: the company launches a new service with grandiose language about how this fits its mission of organizing and making accessible the world’s information, quickly updates it with a couple of neat features, immediately seems to forget it exists, eventually launches a competitor out of some other part of the company, obviously...

Continue reading…

Now Apple Vision Pro Personas can float freely across different apps

You’re not limited to hovering in FaceTime. | Video: Apple

Starting today, Vision Pro personas will be able to do more than hover like a ghost in FaceTime calls. Now, you can use them in SharePlay-enabled apps to collaborate, play games, or watch media with other people.

Apple is calling this a “spatial Persona.” The idea is to make it feel like you’re in the same physical space as another user. It was part of what Apple showed in developer previews last year but hasn’t been available in the actual Persona beta until now. It’s a bit hard to imagine, but you can see what it looks like in the video below.

Each user will purportedly be able to control what they see and reposition where an object is without impacting what another user sees. Spatial audio will also supposedly help you sense where...

Continue reading…

Jon Stewart on AI, Lina Khan, and the other things Apple didn’t want him to say

Jon Stewart interviews Lina Khan. | Screenshot: Wes Davis / The Verge

In the months since the cancellation of The Problem With Jon Stewart on Apple TV Plus, the former host of the show, Jon Stewart, has revealed details here and there about the acrimonious relationship with Apple. While interviewing FTC Chair Lina Khan yesterday on The Daily Show about tech companies and antitrust behavior, he revealed more, telling Khan, “I wanted to have you on a podcast,” but Apple “literally said, ‘Please don’t talk to her.’”

The whole episode is worth a watch when you get a chance. The episode’s first segment included Stewart lampooning the hyperbolic promises tech companies frequently make about AI, interspersed with clips of tech execs discussing AI’s potential for replacing human labor or explaining AI-enabled...

Continue reading…

Alaska ‘hires’ robot dog to scare animals away from airport runway

As per this still from an Anchorage Daily News video, Aurora is already hard at work spooking the local animals. | Image: Anchorage Daily News

The Alaskan government has a new four-legged friend keeping migratory birds and other animals away from the runways at Fairbanks International Airport: a dog-like Boston Dynamics robot dubbed “Aurora.” The Alaska Department of Transportation and Public Facilities posted its “new hire” on Instagram last month, saying that the robot will be trialed to “enhance and augment airport safety” by trying to prevent hazardous encounters between planes and wildlife.

While addressing the Alaska House and Senate transportation committees on March 19th, robot handler Ryan Marlow said the agency opted to trial Aurora after plans to spray repellents like grape juice from flying drones were judged too risky. According to Marlow, Aurora will be put to...

Continue reading…

A better keyboard than QWERTY

Image: Alex Parkin / The Verge

There are fewer things more ubiquitous in technology than QWERTY keyboards. If you type anywhere, you almost certainly type the QWERTY way. But why? It turns out that by almost any objective measure, the keyboards we use are decidedly unoptimized. Commonly used keys are too hard to reach; your fingers have to move side to side too much; it requires way too much movement overall. There are a million theories about why QWERTY was invented — the most common one holds that its creator wanted to make sure old typewriter mechanisms didn’t crash into each other as you whacked the keys — but almost everyone agrees, it’s not the best way. And yet, after decades of using it, hardly anybody wants to switch.

On this episode of The Vergecast, we have...

Continue reading…

Yahoo is buying Artifact, the AI news app from the Instagram co-founders

The Artifact app will be gone soon — but the Yahoo News app might start to be more like it. | Image: Artifact

Instagram’s co-founders built a powerful and useful tool for recommending news to readers — but could never quite get it to scale. Yahoo has hundreds of millions of readers — but could use a dose of tech-forward cool to separate it from all the internet’s other news aggregators. And so, the two sides are joining forces: Yahoo is acquiring Artifact, the companies announced on Tuesday.

The two sides declined to share the cost of the acquisition, but both made clear Yahoo is acquiring Artifact’s tech rather than its team. Mike Krieger and Kevin Systrom, Artifact’s co-founders, will be “special advisors” for Yahoo but won’t be joining the company. Artifact’s remaining five employees have either gotten other jobs or are planning to take some...

Continue reading…

Best printer 2024, best printer for home use, office use, printing labels, printer for school, homework printer you are a printer we are all printers

Photo: Brother

It’s been over a year since I last told you to just buy a Brother laser printer, and that article has fallen down the list of Google search results because I haven’t spent my time loading it up with fake updates every so often to gain the attention of the Google search robot.

It’s weird because the correct answer to the query “what is the best printer” has not changed, but an entire ecosystem of content farms seems motivated to constantly update articles about printers in response to the incentive structure created by that robot’s obvious preferences. Pointing out that incentive structure and the culture that’s developed around it seems to make a lot of people mad, which is also interesting!

Anyway, here’s the best printer for 2024: a...

Continue reading…

Microsoft is working on an Xbox AI chatbot

A mockup of what Microsoft’s Xbox chatbot looks like. | Cath Virginia / The Verge

Microsoft is currently testing a new AI-powered Xbox chatbot that can be used to automate support tasks. Sources familiar with Microsoft’s plans tell The Verge that the software giant has been testing an “embodied AI character” that animates when responding to Xbox support queries. I understand this Xbox AI chatbot is part of a larger effort inside Microsoft to apply AI to its Xbox platform and services.

The Xbox AI chatbot is connected to Microsoft’s support documents for the Xbox network and ecosystem, and can respond to questions and even process game refunds from Microsoft’s support website. “This agent can help you with your Xbox support questions,” reads a description of the Xbox chatbot internally at Microsoft.

Microsoft expanded...

Continue reading…

Will the Apple antitrust case affect your phone’s security?

Image: Cath Virginia / The Verge

Of all the allegations that the Department of Justice has laid at Apple’s door, the most contentious is perhaps its salvo over security and privacy. Apple has warned that if the DOJ gets its way, Apple products — especially the iPhone — will be less secure for users. Meanwhile, the DOJ claims that Apple’s much-touted privacy features are pretextual.

The complaint in the DOJ’s antitrust lawsuit against Apple says that the company “wraps itself in a cloak of privacy, security, and consumer preferences to justify its anti-competitive behavior.” In the press conference announcing the lawsuit, Assistant Attorney General Jonathan Kanter said Apple’s choices have actually made its system “less private and less secure.”

“Apple selectively...

Continue reading…

Twitch’s Hype Train record smashed again by Pirate Software

The record was broken during a 15-hour stream on April 1st. | Illustration by Nick Barclay / The Verge

Game developer Jason Thor Hall, better known by the moniker Pirate Software, has set a new Twitch Hype Train world record, with his channel reaching level 106 on April 1st. Once the Hype Train was initiated, it took Hall roughly three hours to beat his previous level 55 world record from December, with viewers contributing 54,380 gifted subs (alongside regular subscriptions) and 8,225,386 Bits — likely earning Hall a healthy six-figure sum in the process.

Hype Trains, a feature that Twitched launched in 2020, are a limited-time event triggered when a channel receives an uptick in Bits or subscriptions, pushing past a streamer-designated threshold. While we won’t know the official figure paid by Hall’s community, it’s sure to be...

Continue reading…

How Meta’s global head of safety approaches online age verification

Illustration: Nick Barclay / The Verge

“The ability to know somebody’s age and try to protect privacy at the same time can be challenging,” says Meta’s Global Head of Safety Antigone Davis. Meta has been advocating for app store operators like Apple and Google to be in charge of verifying users’ ages and soliciting parental consent for app downloads. Now, it’s using its own virtual reality Quest store as a model for how it thinks that should work.

Meta is prompting Quest 2 and 3 users to reenter their birthdays so that it can place accounts in the appropriate age experience as it tries to centralize age verification through its Quest store. Teens aged 13 to 17 will have more privacy settings turned on by default and can be monitored through parental supervision tools....

Continue reading…

Samsung says Bixby’s still not dead

Are you there, Bixby? | Photo by Allison Johnson / The Verge

Bixby’s not dead yet, apparently. A Samsung executive tells CNBC that the company is “working so hard” to equip its voice assistant with AI features, suggesting that the company sees the likes of Gemini as competition — not a replacement.

That’s good to know, because some of us were starting to wonder. Earlier this year as Samsung announced a boatload of new generative AI features for its flagship phones, its voice assistant was scarcely mentioned. Samsung and Google also made a big deal about the Galaxy S24 phones using Gemini Nano — Google’s on-device AI model. It wouldn’t have been a stretch to see Samsung replace Bixby with Google’s Gemini-powered assistant, but apparently, that’s not the plan.

Samsung’s Won-joon Choi, executive...

Continue reading…

The best deals on MacBooks right now

Some of the latest M3 MacBooks are on sale, and you can find great discounts on older models, too. | Photo: Dan Seifert / The Verge

Apple sells MacBooks equipped with its own M-series chips in a wide range of sizes and price points. The offerings start with the 13-inch M1 MacBook Air from 2020 at $999 (which is being replaced by the M2 Air — at the same price point — now that Apple has officially discontinued it to make room for the M3 MacBook Air) and go all the way up to the latest 16-inch MacBook Pro with M3 starting at $2,499. But finding a deal on a current Mac with an M1, M2, or even the new M3 chip — as well as the higher-end M3 Pro and M3 Max — is actually not that difficult.

While Macs may not experience perpetual discounts, it’s not uncommon to see various current models discounted by as much as $400. Alternatively, purchasing refurbished options...

Continue reading…

How to mix politics with your Threads

Illustration: The Verge

You can’t really blame Meta’s executives for wanting to limit the amount of political yelling on Instagram and Threads. That stuff can get pretty toxic. As a result, both of Meta’s social networks now limit what Meta terms “political content” from people you are not following.

However, if you are a Threads or Instagram user and you want to be exposed to posts “likely to mention governments, elections, or social topics that affect a group of people and/or society at large” (which is how Meta describes it), you can still do it by opting in to political content. The only thing that may be a little confusing is that you have to opt in within the Instagram app — even if you are mainly using Threads.

Here’s how:

• On your mobile device, go to...

Continue reading…

The FTC is trying to help victims of impersonation scams get their money back

Illustration by Laura Normand / The Verge

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has a new way to combat the impersonation scams that it says cost people $1.1 billion last year alone. Effective today, the agency’s rule (PDF) “prohibits the impersonation of government, businesses, and their officials or agents in interstate commerce.” The rule also lets the FTC directly file federal court complaints to force scammers to return money stolen by business or government impersonation.

Impersonation scams are wide-ranging — creators are on the lookout for fake podcast invites that turn into letting scammers take over their Facebook pages via a hidden “datasets” URL, while Verge reporters have been impersonated by criminals trying to steal cryptocurrency via fake Calendly meeting links.

L...

Continue reading…

Tekken fans pester developer to add a Waffle House stage

Photo: Waffle House (Flickr)

Get ready for the next battle… at the Waffle House. For a while now, Tekken fans on social media have been pestering Katsuhiro Harada, longtime Tekken producer, to add a Waffle House battle stage. All the posts seemingly got to Harada, who finally asked, “Why?” The resulting thread on X was a neat bit of American / Japanese cultural exchange in which fans explained the deep lore of the Waffle House franchise and why it’d make for a fitting addition to the King of the Iron Fist Tournament.

Waffle House is a breakfast diner known for being always full and always open; it’s the place you go at 2AM when you’re drunk and hungry. And because it remains open rain or shine or worse, feeding families and the inebriated alike, it’s developed a bit...

Continue reading…