Amazon CEO Andy Jassy takes a dim view of antitrust enforcement

Andy Jassy is being persecuted by those meanies at the FTC, says Andy Jassy. | Illustration by Laura Normand / The Verge

Andy Jassy, CEO of the biggest e-commerce store in the world, is very upset with the regulators who won’t let him buy more companies.

In January, Amazon decided it wasn’t going to buy Roomba maker iRobot for $1.4 billion, after discovering that the EU probably wouldn’t approve the deal and that the FTC had some concerns. Regulators blocked the acquisition because, Jassy told CNBC, “They worry that we’re going to feature our vacuum cleaner, the Roomba, vs. others, which of course is not our model.”

Weird that the FTC, which has filed a massive lawsuit against Amazon for alleged anticompetitive behavior, would ever even think that! Amazon would never promote its own vacuum cleaner on its site in a way that harmed competition — like, that a...

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TikTok may add AI avatars that can make ads

Illustration by Nick Barclay / The Verge

TikTok plans to add an AI creator feature to its platform, which may compete with the sponsored ads human influencers make on the site.

The Information reports TikTok is developing virtual influencers to promote and sell items on the platform. The AI avatars can read scripts from prompts generated by advertisers or sellers on its TikTok Shop. The feature is not live yet and could still be changed.

According to The Information’ssources, TikTok staff have been testing AI avatars but found that they were not ready for release and attracted fewer e-commerce sales than human influencers. However, TikTok believes AI creators would complement their crop of creators.

TikTok did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

It’s unclear how...

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Apple is reportedly planning a big AI-focused M4 Mac upgrade

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge

Apple is getting ready to refresh its entire lineup of Macs with M4 processors that have an emphasis on AI, according to a report from Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman. The new M4-equipped Macs will reportedly start arriving later this year, with the rest coming in early 2025.

Even though Apple just launched its first MacBook Pro with an M3 chip in November 2023, the company is “nearing production” on its M4 chip, sources tell Bloomberg. Apple will reportedly emphasize the M4’s AI-processing capabilities once released, which likely comes in response to the slew of rival “AI PCs” hitting the market and a slowdown in Mac sales.

The M4 chip will come in at least three different tiers, including the entry-level M4 chip codenamed Donan, the mid-tier...

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Microsoft is trying to convince Windows 10 users to upgrade with full-screen prompts

Image: The Verge

Microsoft is trying to entice Windows 10 users to upgrade to Windows 11 with fullscreen prompts 18 months before the end of support cutoff. Reddit user Woopinah9 spotted a notification “while in the middle of working,” where Microsoft thanks Windows 10 “customers” for their loyalty with a full-screen message and then explains the end of support date. You might be expecting a free upgrade as part of this interruption, but unfortunately for this Reddit user, their PC can’t upgrade to Windows 11, so it’s more “hey check out this cool thing we have! oh but you cant have it,” as one Redditor puts it.

While Some Windows 10 users will see this prompt and be able to upgrade to Windows 11, this Reddit user, in particular, has one of the many...

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Fallout 4 is getting a next-gen update just in time for the show

Image: Bethesda

Bethesda has smartly guessed that with the arrival of the new Fallout series from Amazon, folks are going get curious about all the Fallout games. In addition to making Fallout 3 and Fallout 76 available on Amazon Luna and updating Fallout Shelter to include a bunch of characters from the show, Bethesda has announced that Fallout 4 will get a next-gen update.

Return to the Commonwealth April 25th! Learn more about the #Fallout 4 next-gen update coming to console and PC, and additional free content for players in the Wasteland: https://t.co/JfSvJVpDut pic.twitter.com/xJ4FSbRUd6

— Bethesda Game Studios (@BethesdaStudios) April 11, 2024

Fallout 4 will get performance and quality mode settings on the PS5 and Xbox Series X / S, while PC...

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PSA: Don’t let your kids use Yoto’s recalled Mini speaker

Image: Yoto

If your kid uses this Yoto Mini speaker, take it away immediately. Yoto has recalled the popular speaker due to a charging cable issue that causes the lithium-ion battery to overheat and catch fire, posing a burn and fire risk.

The recall affects the Yoto Mini speakers sold nationwide from November 2021 through April 2024. It includes 251,165 devices in the US and 19,721 in Canada with the PRPLXX00860 SKU. You can find the SKU number, along with the speaker’s serial number and model name, on the base of the device. There haven’t been any reported injuries.

Image: US Consumer Product Safety Commission

The recall affects Yoto Mini speakers with the SKU PRPLXX00860.

You won’t have to get rid of the entire device....

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Taylor Swift’s music is back on TikTok

Photo by Neilson Barnard / Getty Images for The Recording Academy

Taylor Swift’s catalog of music has returned to TikTok, just a few months after it was purged alongside other popular artists represented by Universal Music Group (UMG).

In January, UMG and TikTok’s licensing deal expired, and the companies took turns blaming each other for why fans would no longer be able to use UMG artists’ music on the app. UMG argued that TikTok wasn’t willing to pay what it wanted and that allowing AI-generated content on the app was “sponsoring artist replacement” by the technology. Meanwhile, TikTok said UMG was being greedy and that it was able to come to agreements with every other label and publisher.

It’s not immediately clear how Swift’s music has made its way back to TikTok — as Variety noted, Swift may...

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Fallout Pip-Boy review: a wearable fit for the wasteland

Image: Amazon

It’s hard to say what, precisely, makes a design timeless. Some classic gadgets are simply beautiful, while others remain functional years after they come out. The list of truly timeless products in tech is small, but there’s one name that looms large: RobCo Industries’ Pip-Boy. Sure, it’s relatively simple, and some of its features only work if you’re stuck underground. But when a design hasn’t changed for 200 years, you know it’s doing something right.

For those who have been living under an irradiated rock, a Pip-Boy is a wrist-worn computer that — despite originally being meant for the pre-war world and, later, life inside of a Vault-Tec vault — has become an indispensable tool for survival out in the wasteland. It’s large and...

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Sony’s new headphones and speakers are all about skull-rattling bass

Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge

Sony is changing up the strategy around its mainstream wireless headphones and speakers. Today, the company is announcing several new products and introducing a new brand, ULT Power Sound, to go with them. Any kind of actual “name” is an improvement from years past, when Sony would typically just refer to devices by their model number. And as the branding implies, all of these new products — three speakers and one pair of headphones — focus on lively, bass-forward sound.

All of them also have an ULT button that can cycle between different sound modes depending on how much bass emphasis you want. ULT1 gets you “deeper, lower frequency bass,” while ULT2 delivers “powerful, punchy bass.” And yes, apparently there’s a difference between...

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Apple will open the iPhone to repair with used parts

Photo by Dan Seifert / The Verge

Apple is finally making it easier for users to repair their iPhones with used parts. In an update on Thursday, the company announced that this fall, owners of “select” iPhone models will be able to repair their devices with used, genuine parts while retaining full functionality.

When repairing a phone, Apple requires iPhone users to go through a process called parts pairing, which makes them match the serial number of their device to that of a new part sold by Apple. If a user replaced a part with an aftermarket or used component, the iPhone would display pesky notifications saying that Apple isn’t able to verify the newly installed piece. In the case of Face ID and Touch ID sensors, the part might not work at all.

This change should do...

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Apple’s latest sci-fi series is the trippy Dark Matter

Image: Apple

Apple is continuing its run of streaming sci-fi with the upcoming Dark Matter, a thriller about a man who... kidnaps himself. The first trailer looks appropriately trippy and follows a physicist played by Joel Edgerton who is “abducted into an alternate version of his life.” The show involves him trying to get home while navigating this new multiversal reality, which is powered by a big black box that he invented.

The nine-episode-long show is based on the novel of the same name by Blake Crouch and also stars Jennifer Connelly, Alice Braga, Jimmi Simpson, Dayo Okeniyi, and Oakes Fegley. It starts streaming on May 8th with a two-episode premiere, and subsequent episodes debut on Wednesdays after that.

Dark Matter joins a growing list of...

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You can snag Mario Kart 8 Deluxe and all 48 DLC tracks for $20 off right now

Waluigi is still a scumbag, but his racecourse is pretty great. | Image: Nintendo

Despite essentially being a rehash of the bestselling Wii U game of all time, I’d argue _Mario Kart 8 Deluxe_is the quintessential multiplayer game for the Nintendo Switch (sorry, Smash Bros. stans). The 2017 title only got better with the additional 48 tracks Nintendo introduced as DLC, which, thanks to a discount at Amazon and Walmart, you can currently grab alongside the base game for $64.98 ($20 off).

The so-called Mario Kart 8 Deluxe — Booster Course Pass includes a digital copy of the original Switch game and all six waves of added DLC content, which Nintendo also offers as a standalone purchase for $24.99 or as part of a Nintendo Switch Online + Expansion Pack subscription for $49.99 a year. The booster pack contains eight...

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Weather Channel’s parent company has a new AI tool to make hyperlocal weather videos

Illustration by Cath Virginia / The Verge | Photos by Getty Images

Generative AI could be coming to your local TV station as The Weather Company, aka the people that run The Weather Channel, is bringing AI tools to make weather videos.

The Weather Company announced ReelSphere on Thursday, a video creation tool for broadcasters and other customers that automatically adds captions, graphics, and hyperlocal weather information overlays to video weather reports. ReelSphere even lets users add an AI voice that can sound like a local meteorologist. Think of the quick weather forecast updates you usually see while watching local news. ReelSphere can make all those graphics showing the temperature or radar information for a specific area, especially now as people demand they get up-to-date weather more often...

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Official: here’s the DJI Avata 2, possibly one of the best sequels in years

The DJI Avata 2 drone. | Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge

The DJI Avata is my favorite drone for people who want to fly, not just film. The starter kit comes with a wand and goggles that let you skim and soar to your heart’s delight with a first-person view from the sky. But you might not want to buy an original Avata anymore — because the just-announced DJI Avata 2 seems even better for hundreds of dollars less.

After weeks of leaks, DJI is revealing the Avata 2 in full, and we’ve been playing with one for several days now. It looks better, it flies better, it lasts longer, and most importantly, the kit you want with goggles and controller starts at just $999 — down from the $1,388 you’d pay for the OG or the $1,278 after DJI swapped out the original kit’s goggles for a slightly cheaper and...

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Yale’s inexpensive new retrofit lock will work with Matter-over-Thread

The Yale Approach with Wi-Fi is a retrofit smart door lock that works with a wireless keypad. | Image: Yale

This week, Yale launched its first retrofit smart door lock, the $129.99 Yale Approach with Wi-Fi. The lock attaches only to the back of your door, so you don’t have to replace your entire deadbolt to get access to smart features like auto-unlock and locking your door from your phone. The Yale Approach will also work with a new wireless Yale Keypad ($69.99), with a fingerprint-enabled version coming later this year. Also later this year, Yale says the new lock will have the option of a firmware upgrade to add Matter-over-Thread connectivity.

Retrofit locks are great for renters who can’t swap out their locks or for people with nice door hardware who want to keep the look of their door while still asking a voice assistant to lock the...

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In Chechnya, the rhythm does indeed stop

The tempo restrictions effectively ban most popular Western music in the region of Chechnya, if it wasn’t already restricted. | Image: Kirill Kudryavtsev / AFP via Getty Images

People partial to a shindig in the Russian republic of Chechnya are about to find their music options will be rather limited. The region is introducing a ban on tunes that don’t conform to the Chechen “sense of rhythm.” In a statement translated by The Guardian, Chechnya’s Culture Ministry announced last week, “From now on all musical, vocal and choreographic works should correspond to a tempo of 80 to 116 beats per minute,” effectively criminalizing anything the region considers to be too fast or too slow.

The ban requires local artists to rewrite their music to comply with the restrictions by June 1st, or else they won’t be allowed to perform publicly. “Borrowing musical culture from other peoples is inadmissible,” said Chechen Culture...

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DuckDuckGo launches $9.99 per month privacy bundle with VPN

DuckDuckGo

DuckDuckGo is announcing a new bundled subscription service, Privacy Pro, that offers an additional layer of privacy beyond its existing offerings. Users who pay $9.99 per month will get access to a VPN that uses the open-source WireGuard protocol, on-device personal information removal, and 24/7 identity theft restoration. While users of DuckDuckGo’s private browser and/or search engine are no fans of online tracking, PrivacyPro seems geared towards the most cautious of its user-base — who are also willing to pay extra for an encrypted internet connection.

DuckDuckGo’s full array of offerings have long been free to use, including its browser, search engine, various plug-ins, even its email protection service. PrivacyPro is the...

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Humane AI Pin review: not even close

For $699 and $24 a month, this wearable computer promises to free you from your smartphone. There’s only one problem: it just doesn’t work.

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Instagram will blur nudes in messages sent to minors

The new protections for blurring nude images will start rolling out globally in the coming weeks. | Image: Meta

Instagram is preparing to roll out a new safety feature that blurs nude images in messages, as part of efforts to protect minors on the platform from abuse and sexually exploitative scams.

Announced by Meta on Thursday, the new feature — which both blurs images detected to contain nudity and discourages users from sending them — will be enabled by default for teenage Instagram users, as identified by the birthday information on their account. A notification will also encourage adult users to turn it on.

These efforts follow longstanding criticism that platforms like Facebook and Instagram have caused harm to their youngest users, from harming children’s mental health and body image, to knowingly platforming abusive parents and creating...

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Testing VanMoof’s refreshed e-bikes, which are again available to buy

The new 2024 VanMoof S5 in Amsterdam where the majority of this UK-owned company still works. | Photo by Thomas Ricker / The Verge

Big question: can you trust the new company to build a better S5 and A5 electric bike?

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VanMoof S5 e-bike review: too much, too late

A long list of features, but how many do you really need?

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Two former execs of the company behind the Truth Social merger are caught up in a messy hacking lawsuit

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge

Two former executives of the firm that recently purchased Truth Social are embroiled in a lawsuit related to the acquisition of Trump’s social media company, Wired reports. The former CEO of the Digital World Acquisition Corp. (DWAC) — the special purpose acquisition company that was created to purchase the Trump Media & Technology Group — is suing his successor for allegedly hacking his private accounts as part of a “coup d’etat.”

The details are fairly messy. Patrick Orlando, the CEO of DWAC until March 2023, claims he was ousted by Eric Swider, a Trump Media board member who was appointed CEO immediately after Orlando was fired. (Swider served as CEO until March of this year.) Orlando filed the suit against Swider through the...

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Apple’s antitrust case is getting a new judge

Illustration by Cath Virginia / The Verge | Photo by Getty Images

The Department of Justice’s massive antitrust case against Apple will unfold before a new judge. A court filing on Wednesday reveals that Judge Michael E. Farbiarz has determined his “recusal is necessary” under the code of conduct for US Judges.

The filing says Farbiarz’s “disqualification is mandatory and cannot be remitted by the parties.” Judge Julien Xavier Neals, whom President Joe Biden nominated to the US District in 2021, will preside over the case instead.

It’s not clear why Judge Farbiarz was disqualified from the case, but there are a couple of possibilities. The specific rule mentioned by the filing — Canon 3(C)(1)(d) — says a judge must disqualify themselves from a proceeding when the “judge’s impartiality might reasonably...

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Meta says it’s fixing ‘HD’ photo sharing in Facebook Messenger

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Facebook rolled out the ability for Messenger users to share 4K photos back in 2017. Now, Meta has announced that users can share HD photos in the app. Confused? We were, too, so we asked about it. The short answer is that, here, HD means 4K, and now 4K photos are... more 4K?

Facebook Messenger comms team representative Liz Sweeney clarified in an email to The Verge that 4K (specifically, 4,096 x 4,096 pixels per inch) shared photos were more compressed before, and how they looked was “dependent on the network conditions of both the sender and receiver.” Now, Sweeney says they won’t be as heavily compressed, and users will have a new “HD” button that enables 4K sharing. And if you don’t tap the button, photos will share in 2K instead.

...

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Apple Store employees in New Jersey are trying to unionize

Illustration: The Verge

Another Apple Store is trying to unionize. This time, it’s a group of 104 employees in Short Hills, New Jersey, who filed a petition to unionize with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) on Tuesday, as reported earlier by Bloomberg.

If the unionization efforts are successful, the Apple Store employees would join the Communications Workers of America — the union that represents other Apple Store employees, along with employees of AT&T, Verizon, Frontier, and more.

Four other Apple Stores have moved to unionize within the past couple of years, but only the retail locations in Oklahoma City and Townson, Maryland, have successfully formed a union. These efforts haven’t come without some pushback from Apple, however.

Last year, the NLRB...

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AMC Theatres’ top brass has misgivings about the Dune popcorn bucket

What? It’s just a sandworm. | Image: Saturday Night Live

Dune: Part Two is a sprawling sci-fi epic that The Verge’s Charles Pulliam-Moore called “categorically breathtaking” in his March review. And for AMC moviegoers, the film came with an equally epic exclusive popcorn bucket — one that, apparently, the top brass at AMC Theatres wishes it had never made.

That’s because it kind of looks like a butthole. And the internet noticed. Elizabeth Frank, AMC’s chief content officer, told Variety in an interview published on Monday that collectible popcorn buckets are “a material part” of the company’s food and beverage business. But she said the company “would have never imagined the ‘Dune’ thing” and wouldn’t have made the bucket topper if it had known “it would be celebrated or mocked.”

What, this...

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Today is the last day to take advantage of Samsung’s buy one, get one free TV promo

You can get a lower-end TU690T for free when you preorder Samsung’s glare-free QD-OLED S95D. | Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge

Who doesn’t want a free TV? If you were eyeing Samsung’s new anti-glare OLED or one of the many models it announced back at CES, Samsung and Amazon are both still offering a free 65-inch TV when you preorder select 2024 models. You’ll have to act quickly, though, as the ongoing buy one, get one promo ends tomorrow, April 11th.

Granted, the free TV is an entry-level TU690T from 2022, which is a pretty basic 4K TV with a 60Hz panel and only two HDMI ports. But if you were already thinking of picking up the 2024 version of Samsung’s OLED S95D, its artsy Frame TV, the Neo QLED 8K, or Neo QLED 4K, the TU69OT can still serve as a decent secondary TV for a spare bedroom or garage. It lacks modern features like local dimming and variable...

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The best entertainment of 2024

Image: Prime Video

Finding something to watch or play can sometimes feel like work — there’s just so much out there vying for your free time. That’s true whether you’re heading to a theater, browsing the many streaming platforms, or looking for a new video game. It’s easy to get overwhelmed with choice.

So, as we’ve done in years past, we’re collecting all of our favorite releases from 2024 in one place. The goal is to make your decision-making a little easier. That could mean highlighting anything from an anticipated movie that actually lives up to the hype to a surprise indie game that takes the world by storm.

And we’ll be updating this page all year long as we continue to check out the latest in film, television, and gaming — so stay tuned.

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Ubisoft won’t say whether the Prince of Persia’s incredible actor has been replaced

It’s looking like thetroubled Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time Remake has lost one of its most important assets: Yuri Lowenthal, the voice actor who played the prince, famously narrated the entirety of the original 2003 game, and is currently renowned for playing Peter Parker’s Spider-Man in the excellent Insomniac games.

Yesterday, Tom Henderson, currently one of the most trusted voices in gaming leaks, reported that you should “forget everything you know” about the Prince of Persia remake — and revealed that Lowenthal would no longer be in the role.

Ubisoft would not tell me whether he’s still attached to the project; Lowenthal’s agent said he can’t comment because he’s under an NDA. Those non-denials are not confirmation, but...

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Google’s AI photo editing tools are expanding to a lot more phones

The Pixel 8’s Magic Editor is exclusive no more. | Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge

Google is making its AI photo editing features available to a lot more people. Starting May 15th, just about all Google Photos users will be able to access features previously limited to Pixel owners and Google One subscribers — a nifty upgrade if you were tired of Photos urging you to “upgrade” to get access to more editing tools (it’s me).

Magic Editor is Google’s generative AI photo editing tool, and it debuted as one of the headline AI features on the Pixel 8 and 8 Pro. Those kinds of features typically remain exclusive to new Pixels for six months after launch, and right on time, Google’s bringing it to previous Pixel phones.

But it’s not stopping there; any Google Photos user with an Android or iOS device that meets the minimum...

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