Hardware

XChat, the standalone app for messaging on X, is available on iOS now

XChat, the standalone app for accessing X's messaging feature, is available to download now for iOS . X first suggested it would be stripping direct messaging from X in 2025 , but at least for now, XChat is available in the original X app, the web and this new app. Based on its launch video , the new XChat app offers many of the elements of modern messaging X had already introduced to its chats feature , like the ability to delete and edit messages, block screenshots and send disappearing messages. The new XChat app also supports video and audio calls, and X claims that all messages sent with XChat are end-to-end encrypted. XChat will also be expected to be the home of any groups that formed around X's Communities feature. The social platform recently announced that it was retiring Communities at the end of May, and suggested that XChat's support for larger group chats could be a worthwhile alternative. XChat's group chats can currently have 350 participants, but X plans to expand that number in the future. The everything app, which requires 3 apps to use the core product. pic.twitter.com/1aJF4n2par camol (@camolNFT) April 23, 2026 Elon Musk's original pitch after he rebranded Twitter as X, was to turn the platform into an everything app, where things like an algorithmic feed, messaging, job boards and even payments could exist side-by-side. A standalone messaging app seems like the exact opposite of that, but it might also reflect where X finds itself in 2026. The company is now a subsidiary of xAI , and xAI itself is part of SpaceX . Musk's push into AI appears to be the going concern, and cloning something like WeChat might just be less important. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/apps/xchat-the-standalone-app-for-messaging-on-x-is-available-on-ios-now-214826886.html?src=rss

Maine governor vetoes bill temporarily banning large data centers in the state

The governor of Maine, Janet Mills, has vetoed a bill that halts the construction of large data centers in the state until the fall of 2027. While the bill passed both houses of the Maine's legislature on April 14, and Mills has suggested she'd support a temporary moratorium, the governor wanted a bill that would exempt an existing data center project in Jay, Maine . The bill specifically blocked the construction of data centers that consume 20 megawatts of power or more and directs state agencies and other entities to not issue permits unless proposed projects fall under those energy needs. Passing the bill would also require the creation of a Maine Data Center Coordination Council that would provide strategic input, facilitate coordinated state planning considerations and evaluate policy tools to address data center opportunities and related benefits and risks to the State. While Mills killed this attempt at data center regulation, she said she would sign an executive order calling for the creation of a council like the one proposed in the bill. She also signed LD 713, a bill that prohibits data centers from participating in Maines business development tax incentive programs. Maine is far from the only state pursuing data center bans or temporary blocks. There are at least 12 other states exploring similar legislation, like New York, where lawmakers recently introduced a bill that would block the construction of new data centers for at least three years. At the federal level, Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) endorsed a bill that would not only create a moratorium on new data center construction, but also any upgrades to existing facilities. Any desire to slow down AI development or the infrastructure that makes it possible runs counter to the demands of tech companies, and the perspective of the Trump administration, who's actively encouraging faster AI buildout in the US. President Donald Trump's recent AI framework even called for the process of building and powering data centers to be streamlined in March. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ai/maine-governor-vetoes-bill-temporarily-banning-large-data-centers-in-the-state-210407936.html?src=rss

A Battlefield movie adaptation is on the way, possibly starring Michael B. Jordan

Have you ever noticed how Walgreens and CVS locations often end up across the street from each other? Well, Call of Duty and Battlefield have a similar thing going on. A mere eight days after the upcoming Call of Duty movie got an official premiere date , lo and behold: There's news from The Hollywood Reporter that a Battlefield movie is on the way . The project has some heavy-artillery star power attached. Oscar winner Michael B. Jordan ( Sinners ) is slated to produce and possibly star in the film. Meanwhile, Christopher McQuarrie of Mission Impossible fame is set to write, direct and produce. Naturally, EA will also produce, as the company tries to cash in on the recent wave of Hollywood video game adaptations that don't suck . The movie's creators are reportedly meeting with studios and streamers as we speak, with an expected bidding war to commence. They're said to have met with Apple and Sony on Thursday. The project's team is reportedly prioritizing a deal that includes a theatrical release. It's understandable why business types would see the time as right for a Battlefield film adaptation. (And not just because Call of Duty is already doing it.) The latest game in the long-running series, Battlefield 6 , was the top-selling game of 2025 outselling Call of Duty for the first time. After selling over 7 million copies in its first three days , it went on to surpass an estimated 20 million sales before the end of the year. Whichever studio pays big bucks for this project will try to ride that wave. The Call of Duty movie, meanwhile, is scheduled for release on June 30, 2028. The Paramount project has tapped Taylor Sheridan ( Yellowstone ) to co-write the screenplay and produce, with Peter Berg ( Friday Night Lights ) set to direct. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/entertainment/a-battlefield-movie-adaptation-is-on-the-way-possibly-starring-michael-b-jordan-201906079.html?src=rss

The DOJ is backing xAI in its lawsuit against Colorado

The Department of Justice has announced that it's intervening on the behalf of xAI in the company's recent lawsuit against the state of Colorado. xAI first filed the suit in early April in response to a recent Colorado law that requires developers of high-risk AI systems (for example, ones used in healthcare, employment or housing) to both disclose and mitigate the risk of algorithmic discrimination in their systems. The law is set to go into effect in June, and the DOJ is now asking a Colorado District Court to declare it unconstitutional. In xAI's original argument, Colorado Bill SB24-205 violated the company's First Amendment rights by forcing its developers to change how they create AI products and compelling them to align their products with Colorado's views on diversity and discrimination. The DOJ acknowledges those concerns in its complaint , but specifically focuses its argument on the idea that the law violates the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. According to the DOJ, because the law relies on demographics and statistical disparities as evidence of discrimination, it will essentially require developers to distort an AI system's outputs and discriminate based on race, sex, religion and other protected characteristics, a violation of the Fourteenth Amendment. The department also positions Colorado's law as a risk to the United States' position as the global AI leader, a title the current administration is committed to protecting. As both an AI cheerleader and enabler, the Trump administration has been particularly sensitive to the notion of diversity, equity and inclusion being incorporated into AI. President Donald Trump signed several executive orders following the announcement of his AI Action Plan in 2025 that specifically called for government agencies to use AI tools that avoid ideological dogmas such as DEI. He also called for the creation of a task force that could challenge state AI regulation in favor of a federal regulatory framework for AI. The irony is that the DOJ's argument, and the administration's stance in general, are equally idealogical, just in a way that's ahistorical, and ignores the downstream effects of discrimination in the US. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ai/the-doj-is-backing-xai-in-its-lawsuit-against-colorado-200500890.html?src=rss

What you need to know as Elon Musk's lawsuit against Sam Altman begins

In a few short days, jury selection will begin in the long-awaited Musk v. Altman case. At the end of that process, an Oakland federal court will task nine regular people with deciding if OpenAI defrauded Elon Musk when it announced, and recently completed, its reorganization to become a more traditional for-profit business . More than just being the venue where two billionaires will air their grievances against one another in public, the trial has the potential to reshape the AI industry. How did we get here? Musk first sued OpenAI in 2024 , but the seed of the dispute was planted when Sam Altman emailed the billionaire on the evening of May 25, 2015. Been thinking a lot about whether its possible to stop humanity from developing AI. I think the answer is most definitely not, Altman wrote at the time. If its going to happen anyway, it seems like it would be good for someone other than Google to do it first. Any thoughts on whether it would be good for [Y Combinator] to start a Manhattan Project for AI? Probably worth a conversation, Musk responded a couple of hours later. That same year, OpenAI announced itself to the world , with Altman and Musk as co-chairs of the new joint venture. OpenAI is a nonprofit artificial intelligence research company. Our goal is to advance digital intelligence in the way that is mostly likely to benefit humanity as a whole, unconstrained by a need to generate financial return. Since our research is free from financial obligations, we can better focus on a positive human impact. If were to believe OpenAIs telling of the events that followed , by 2017, almost everyone at the company, including Musk, agreed that a for-profit entity had to be part of the next phase for OpenAI, due to the enormous amount of investment needed to pursue its original mission. At some point before Musk left OpenAIs board of directors in February 2018, OpenAI claims he demanded full control of the company, with the intent to eventually merge it with Tesla. Following Musks departure, OpenAI created its for-profit arm in 2019, which at the time was organized under a capped-profit structure designed to limit investor returns to 100x, with any excess windfalls flowing to the companys nonprofit. The idea being that if OpenAI achieved artificial general intelligence, its nonprofit would be the greatest beneficiary. However, after the success of ChatGPT in 2022, that structure became problematic for OpenAI as the company sought to raise ever more capital, and as part of its $6.6 billion funding round in October 2024, it reportedly agreed to a less-than-two-year deadline to free its for-profit from control of the nonprofit. At the heart of this trial is that OpenAI began as a non-profit organization, and then decided that it needed to be a for-profit organization in order to raise the enormous sums of money it needed to develop the technology it wanted to create, explains Professor Michael Dorff , executive director of the Lowell Milken Institute for Business Law and Policy at UCLA. That is a very troublesome transition under the law. Earlier this year, following protracted negotiations with Microsoft (the for-profits largest investor) and the state attorneys general of California and Delaware, OpenAI announced the successful reorganization of its corporate structure. As things stand, the for-profit is now a public benefit corporation, making it more appealing to investors looking for an uncomplicated return structure. Meanwhile, the nonprofit now known as the OpenAI Foundation holds equity in the for-profit arm, a stake valued at $130 billion at the time the agreement was announced. At the end of last year, Musk filed an injunction to prevent the reorganization from going through but failed. As an early donor to OpenAI, Musk will not see a single cent of money come his way when the company holds an initial public offering, on account of the fact donations are made with no expectation of any return. Musk has therefore argued OpenAIs founding group, including CEO Sam Altman and President Greg Brockman, defrauded him as a donor. Determining the exact amount Musk contributed to OpenAI was an early question during pre-trial discovery. You see, Musk has greatly exaggerated his monetary contributions. As recently as March 2023 , the billionaire regularly claimed he had donated about $100 million to OpenAI. He later cut that estimate by half, telling CNBC in May 2023 : Im not sure the exact number but its some number on the order of $50 million. In recent court filings, that number was again revisited to $38 million , and its the number that currently stands. Whats at stake for OpenAI? In his original complaint, Musks legal team tried to throw the kitchen sink at OpenAI, says Professor Dorff. In subsequent filings, Musks lawyers narrowed down their clients desired set of outcomes to a handful of remedies. Should the jury rule in his favor, Musk has requested the court force Altman and Brockman to step down, and for OpenAI to restructure as a bona fide public charity that operates as the nonprofit it was intended to be, consistent with its founding charter and mission. He's also made the highly unusual request that any monetary damages which would be awarded to him in the verdict be redirected to OpenAI's own nonprofit arm. According to Professor Dorff, its highly unlikely Musk will be able to undo OpenAIs reorganization. For one, District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers has already signaled her reluctance to do just that and its her, not the jury, who will get to decide if thats an appropriate remedy. Effectively, Musk is asking the judge to unscramble the eggs of a complicated corporate restructuring. There was a moment where that might have been possible, when the attorneys general of Delaware and California intervened and came to the current compromise, explains Dorff. Whether you agree or disagree with what the AGs decided to do, I think it's unlikely the court will feel it's appropriate to undo that compromise because of all the high government officials involved who, in theory, had all of the right incentives. When Musk filed his request for a preliminary injunction to stop OpenAIs conversion to a for-profit company, the judge said the request was extraordinary and rarely granted . The fact Musk is deeply involved with OpenAI's competitor xAI may also weigh heavily on the judge's mind, Droff adds. Far more uncertain is how Musks other demands could play out, since the jury will decide if OpenAI is guilty of defrauding him. According to Dorff, most high-stakes business cases end with the two sides settling because of the risk of involving a jury in the outcome. I just dont see that happening here given the tenor of the dispute, he says. It seems unlikely either side will settle. If the case does end in a jury decision, it will then be up to those nine people, with guidance from the judge, to decide on monetary damages. That will be very difficult to figure out because there is a maximalist version of this, and a minimalist version of this. Theyre very different numbers and the result could be anywhere in between two, says Dorff. Musks legal team is seeking a disgorgement of between $65.5 billion and $109.43 billion from OpenAI (and between $13.3 billion and $25.06 billion from Microsoft, which is a co-defendant in the case).In a worse case scenario, Professor Dorff suggests Altman might lose the confidence of OpenAIs board, costing him his position as CEO. He might even be forced to write some checks to settle the disgorgements. Dorff suspects OpenAI would love the minimalist version where Musk is rewarded his $38 million donation back (and it ends up with the companys non-profit). Should some other disgruntled donors emerge to sue OpenAI for fraud, the Musk v. Altman case would make it easier to litigate those cases, given the map has been drawn as to which legal claims are likely to succeed, says Dorff. However, those would amount to traffic tickets for OpenAI. Whatever happens next, it should be an eventful trial. With public testimonies from Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, former OpenAI board member and Musk confidant Shivon Zilis and even Altman himself a likelihood, we'll at the very least be treated to a wealth of formerly private communications and some new piece of vocabulary between some of the richest people in the tech space. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ai/what-you-need-to-know-as-elon-musks-lawsuit-against-sam-altman-begins-191500726.html?src=rss

Google plans to invest even more money into Anthropic

Google plans to invest up to $40 billion into Anthropic in what could be viewed as a circular deal with the AI startup (and frequent competitor), Bloomberg reports . The search giant has invested in Anthropic at multiple points in the past, but this new investment comes after an announcement that the AI startup had signed a joint agreement with Google and Broadcom for multiple gigawatts of next-generation TPU capacity. According to Anthropic, Google is committing $10 billion now at the company's current valuation, with an additional $30 billion on offer if Anthropic meets specific performance milestones. Through Anthropic's existing commitment to use Google's TPUs (tensor processing units) and servers, Anthropic says Google will also provide 5 gigawatts of computing capacity in 2027. If the structure of the deal and business relationship between Google and Anthropic sounds familiar, it might be because the AI startup recently announced something similar with Amazon. Earlier in April, Amazon announced that it would invest $5 billion in Anthropic, with an additional $20 billion in payments available if certain milestones were met. Anthropic also agreed to use Amazon's Trainium chips for its AI models. The deals are another example of Anthropic's ability to burn through money the company only just raised $30 billion in its most recent round of funding. They could also serve as an example of the AI industry's love of circular deals. Anthropic agreeing to use Google and Amazon's silicon and servers, receiving investment from both companies and then presumably spending some of that investment on more silicon and servers, is a pattern seen in the relationship between OpenAI , Nvidia, Microsoft and plenty of other players in the AI race. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ai/google-plans-to-invest-even-more-money-into-anthropic-185000776.html?src=rss

The MacBook Neo is a glimpse into John Ternus's Apple

John Ternus was unavoidable when Apple debuted the Macbook Neo. He kicked off an intimate media event for the Neo, introducing it as a transformative machine for Apple thanks to its low $599 cost ($499 for education customers) and premium build quality. He was interviewed on Good Morning America , the sort of prominent media feature CEO Tim Cook typically handles. And when I asked Apple workers about the Neo at its launch event, they almost always brought up Ternus vision of the laptop. For all intents and purposes, Tetanus was Apples frontman for the MacBook Neo. Ternus is slated for his coronation as Apple's CEO on September 1, and the Neo is not only a feather in his cap, but a likely indication of the company's approach to products going forward. Its a sign that Apple is getting more comfortable taking risks. Apple lives and dies on its own premium image. It completely gave up on making cheap iPhones like the SE and 5C, and the $599 iPhone 16e and 17e are more expensive than typical mid-range Android phones (though the $249 Apple Watch SE is admittedly one of the cheaper smartwatches around.). It was risky to shove a mobile processor into a full-fledged computer, which could have made it too weak. And it was a gamble to stick with a meager 8GB of RAM, practically sacrilegious within the Apple pantheon. It's not breaking new ground for product categories, but the Neo, in being a budget laptop at all, is surprisingly un-Apple. A citrus MacBook Neo on a table outside. Devindra Hardawar for Engadget And yet, thanks to Ternus's hardware leadership and Apple's command of its software, the MacBook Neo has been a resounding success. It has the best build quality, screen, keyboard, speakers and trackpad that I've ever seen in a $600 laptop. As I wrote in my review , every Windows PC maker, including Microsoft, should be ashamed. While we dont know the full build cost for the Neo, Apples margins for selling it will undoubtedly be far slimmer than the MacBook Air or Pro. But the Neo is more than a profit maker. Its a device that can serve as a gateway to the Apple ecosystem for kids and students. Even better, it could easily tempt over Windows users. We can't give Ternus all the credit for the Neo, of course, there's an entire team of product managers and engineers below him doing the actual design work. But it's hard to deny the flex of building a $600 laptop that doesn't feel like total garbage. The MacBook Neo surprised me, a jaded technology reporter, on practically every level. And its existence makes me wonder how a Ternus-led Apple could continue to iterate without compromising quality or Apple's signature attention to detail. Ternus is the rare Apple engineer who has played a role in almost all of its existing products in his 25 year tenure, hes taken charge of building the Mac, iPad, iPhone and Apple Watch. That gives him a unique perspective of where the company could go next, as well as how Apple could stretch its own capabilities. And based on what Ive seen of the MacBook Neo, itll be interesting to see how Apple reshapes itself for the future. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/computing/laptops/the-macbook-neo-is-a-glimpse-into-john-ternuss-apple-170000842.html?src=rss

Engadget Podcast: Tim Cooks Apple era and what lies ahead for John Ternus

The Apple rumors were true, once again. This week, the company announced that Tim Cook will be stepping down from his CEO role on September 1. Replacing him will be John Ternus, who currently serves as Apple's SVP of hardware engineering. In this episode, Devindra and Engadget's Nathan Ingraham discuss Cook's legacy as Apple's CEO, and pontificate about how Ternus may change things. We're going from Apple being led by a logistics guru, to Apple being driven by a product and engineering wizard. Surely, that will have some impact on future products. Subscribe! iTunes Spotify Pocket Casts Stitcher Google Podcasts Topic Tim Cook to step down as Apple CEO after 15 years, John Ternus will take his place on September 1 1:22 Palantir woke up last Saturday morning and posted a comic book villain manifesto on X 26:01 DHS wants to make facial recognition smart glasses for ICE 31:53 A lot of people panic bought PCs to avoid RAMageddon 36:25 Meta faces a new lawsuit over running ads for outright scams Employees at Meta will have they keystrokes and mouse moves recorded for AI training 40:10 Xbox Game Pass Ultimate price goes down, but it wont include Call of Duty 44:55 Around Engadget: a great (expensive) Dyson vac with a silly name 49:15 Working on 51:58 Pop culture picks 52:55 Credits Hosts : Devindra Hardawar and Nathan Ingraham Producer: Ben Ellman Music: Dale North and Terrence OBrien This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/computing/engadget-podcast-tim-cooks-apple-era-and-what-lies-ahead-for-john-ternus-121853488.html?src=rss

DeepSeek promises its new AI model has 'world-class' reasoning

DeepSeek has released its latest AI models, the V4 Pro and Flash versions, a bit over a year after it went viral and became the top rated free app on Apple's App Store in the US. Welcome to the era of cost-effective 1 million context length, DeepSeek said in its announcement . Context length is what you call the maximum number of tokens that an AI model can remember, so the bigger it is, the more coherent and consistent an AI is when it comes to extended conversations. OpenAIs recently announced GPT5.5 has a context window ranging from 400,000 to 1 million, for instance. The new model is still open-source, allowing users to download its code and modify it if they want. DeepSeek says V4 Pro has enhanced agentic capabilities and claims that it rivals top closed-source models when it comes to reasoning. It also says that it trails only Gemini-3.1-Pro in rich world knowledge. Meanwhile, V4 Flash isnt quite as powerful as the V4 Pro, but it has faster response times. Still, its reasoning abilities closely approach V4 Pro, DeepSeek says, and it performs on par with with the Pro version on simple Agent tasks. Shortly after DeepSeek topped the App Store charts, it was banned for use by US federal agencies and on government-owned devices. Authorities believed it was a national security risk and posed a threat to US AI stocks. South Korea also paused downloads of its app over privacy concerns. DeepSeek-V4 Preview is officially live & open-sourced! Welcome to the era of cost-effective 1M context length. DeepSeek-V4-Pro: 1.6T total / 49B active params. Performance rivaling the world's top closed-source models. DeepSeek-V4-Flash: 284B total / 13B active params. pic.twitter.com/n1AgwMIymu DeepSeek (@deepseek_ai) April 24, 2026 This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ai/deepseek-promises-its-new-ai-model-has-world-class-reasoning-115733512.html?src=rss

The Morning After: Polymarket and a hairdryer

Although its one of the more inoffensive topics on Polymarket, this news typifies the Wild West of prediction markets and betting sites. A hairdryer was allegedly used to rig Polymarket bets on temperatures at Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris, according to a report by The Telegraph . French authorities noted that the official temperature readings at the airport spiked twice in the past month. On both occasions, gamblers betting on those temperature fluctuations on Polymarket appear to have walked away with thousands upon thousands of dollars. There is no indication that Polymarket forced anyone to return winnings, but the temperature sensor has been moved to a new location. The site is also still running bets on the daily temperature in and around Paris. In a more serious development, a US soldier was arrested for allegedly making over $400,000 on Polymarket using information he had about the plans to capture the former Venezuelan president, Nicols Maduro . Gannon Ken Van Dyke was arrested and charged with using classified military information to place bets on the prediction marketplace Polymarket. Van Dyke created a Polymarket account around December 26, 2025, and made 13 bets related to Maduro from December 27 to January 2. The soldier has also been charged with one count of wire fraud, carrying a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison, and one count of unlawful monetary transaction, carrying a maximum sentence of 10 years. Its a lot heavier than hairdryer shenanigans. Mat Smith The other big stories (and deals) this morning Heres to the stable ones: In praise of Tim Cook Meta is downsizing by about 10 percent Hey Meta workers, are you getting paid for those keystrokes? Apple TVs upcoming For All Mankind spinoff Star City oozes Cold War-era paranoia DJI Lito 1 and Lito X1 drone review High-quality aerial video at its most affordable. Engadget DJI is taking another stab at the budget drone market with the new Lito series. The Lito 1 and Lito X1 are both under $400 and weigh less than 249 grams theyre ideal for beginners. Both replace DJIs Mini series, but they offer things those models lacked, like LiDAR and 360-degree obstacle avoidance. After testing both models, I believe they offer unbeatable value and performance at these prices, by a long shot. However, due to DJIs standing in the US , you might not see either. Continue reading. Xbox cuts Game Pass prices But new Call of Duty games will no longer hit the service at launch. Activision As suggested by recent comments by the new boss of Xbox, Microsofts gaming arm is cutting the prices of both Game Pass Ultimate and PC Game Pass, effective immediately, but theres one big caveat. New Call of Duty games will no longer be available on Game Pass Ultimate or PC Game Pass on day one. Theyll eventually hit those tiers about a year later, during the following holiday season. Continue reading. Accessory maker Anker made its own AI chip Of course it did. Anker, of battery-pack and cable fame, has announced its own AI chip that it will integrate into its future headphones and other devices. The company is planning to debut the chip, called Thus, on a new model of headphones to be unveiled at its Anker Day event in May. Ankers Thus chip integrates computing power directly into NOR flash memory cells, which offer faster read speeds than NAND. Anker says headphones are a particularly challenging environment to demonstrate what a new chip can do because hardly any other device places higher demands on an AI chip. Anker announced one particular feature to showcase its silicon. Clear Calls will cancel noise with a large neural network running entirely on the device, supported by eight MEMS microphones and two bone conduction sensors. Continue reading. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/general/the-morning-after-engadget-newsletter-112802570.html?src=rss

Porsche's new Cayenne Turbo Coup Electric can do 0-60 mph in 2.5 seconds

Porsche has announced an electric version of its popular Cayenne Coup and it could be the company's most powerful vehicle ever either ICE or electric. Mechanically, the Cayenne Coup Electric is nearly identical to the Cayenne Electric but the body is substantially sleeker for improved range and performance. While the front end of the Coup looks much the same as the Cayenne Electric, the back is giving off BMW X-series vibes in a big way. Porsche says that bulbous rear makes the new model more aerodynamic and thus efficient, with a drag coefficient of just 0.23. It also sits nearly an inch lower than the standard SUV for a more race-ready look. It can haul four adults and comes with a 3.2 cubic foot frunk. Porsche There are three versions: the Cayenne Coup Electric, Cayenne S Coup Electric and Cayenne Turbo Coup Electric. All use the same 800-volt architecture that allows charging speeds up to 400 kW, for a 10-80 percent recharge in 16 minutes under ideal conditions. With a 113 kWh battery, range is estimated at 415 miles in the WLTP cycle, which equates to about 350 miles under EPA conditions. The main difference between the models is power. The base Cayenne Electric model produces a mere 408 hp (442 hp with overboost), while the Cayenne S takes that up to 544 hp (666 hp with overboost). However, the Cayenne Turbo Electric cranks things up to deranged with 857 hp (1,156 hp overboosted), letting you bring three guests and their cargo from 0-60 mph in just 2.5 seconds and hit a top speed of 162 mph. Porsche The interior is bound to have a bit less room than the regular Cayenne Electric due to the sloping roofline, but Porsche made things comfortable and high-tech. It comes with an optional electrochromic panoramic roof with adjustable tint and power operated doors, along with a choice of trims including leather upholstery. Physical controls are married with digital interfaces and a screen that stretches from the left edge of the middle console to the passenger side vent. As with other recent lux vehicles, it offers customizable graphics, an AR heads-up display and personalized app integration. Debuting at this year's Beijing Auto Show, the Cayenne Coup Electric starts at $113,800 (minus the $2,350 delivery fee), while the base Cayenne S Coupe Electric is $131,200 and the Cayenne Turbo Coupe Electric costs $168,000. For a luxury sport electric SUV with 350 miles of range and 1,156 hp, that's actually... not bad? After all, you can easily pay six figures for a kitted-out Ford F-150 these days. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/transportation/evs/porsches-new-cayenne-turbo-coupe-electric-can-do-0-60-mph-in-25-seconds-091925467.html?src=rss

US soldier arrested for allegedly making over $400,000 on Polymarket with classified Maduro information

United States soldier Gannon Ken Van Dyke has been arrested and charged for placing bets on prediction marketplace Polymarket using classified information he had access to related to the capture of former Venezuelan president Nicols Maduro . The US Army Special Forces master sergeant, who was directly involved with the planning and execution of the operation, allegedly made $409,881 in profits. According to the Department of Justice, Van Dyke created a Polymarket account around December 26, 2025 and made 13 bets related to Maduro from December 27 to January 2. He took the Yes position on several Polymarket wagers, including US Forces in Venezuela by January 31, 2026, Maduro out by January 31, 2026, Will the US invade Venezuela by January 31 and Trump invokes War Powers against Venezuela by January 31. The US military captured Maduro and his wife on January 3. Van Dyke allegedly bet a total of $33,034 and made over ten times that amount from his winnings. He withdrew his money from Polymarket on the day Maduro was captured and then sent it to a foreign crypto vault before depositing it to a new online brokerage account. Shortly after Maduros capture, reports came out about how an anonymous gambler made almost half a million dollars before it was announced, raising concerns that someone had profited off insider military knowledge. The Justice Department says Van Dyke tried to cover his tracks. After reports about the potential insider bets were published, he allegedly asked Polymarket to delete his account, falsely claiming that he lost access to the email he used. He also changed the email address linked to his crypto account to another one not associated with his name. Van Dyke has been charged with three counts of violation against the Commodity Exchange Act, with each one carrying a max sentence of 10 years in prison. He has also been charged with one count of wire fraud with a max penalty of 20 years in prison, as well as one count of unlawful monetary transaction with a max sentence of 10 years. Prediction marketplaces have been struggling with insider trading problems, and this is far from the first incident. Recently, Kalshi took action against three political candidates, accusing them of insider trading related to their campaigns. Matt Klein of Minnesota and Ezekiel Enriquez of Texas face a fine of less than $1,000 and suspensions of up to five years. Meanwhile Mark Moran of Virginia faces disciplinary action, a five year suspension and a fine of more than $6,000. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/apps/us-soldier-arrested-for-allegedly-making-over-400000-on-polymarket-with-classified-maduro-information-014531367.html?src=rss

Claude can now connect to lifestyle apps like Spotify, Instacart and AllTrails

Anthropic is expanding its directory of connected services for its Claude AI chatbot. The platform can now link up with your accounts on AllTrails, Audible, Booking.com, Instacart, Intuit Credit Karma, Intuit TurboTax, Resy, Spotify, StubHub, Taskrabbit, Thumbtack, TripAdvisor, Uber, Uber Eats and Viator.Additional services will be added in the future. More and more AI companies are trying to up their third-party integrations in a pitch to make their services as useful as possible. The benefit of having multiple apps connected means that a chatbot can theoretically execute more complicated tasks on your behalf. This expansion takes that capability from the professional and educational settings, where Anthropics connectors have been focused for the past year, to a personal one. So, for instance, Claude can now help plan a hike on AllTrails and then pull up a Spotify playlist that will last for the duration of your trek. Anthropic noted that it is also reframing how apps are showing up so that an appropriate service is suggested for the task you want to perform. The apps should appear dynamically within the Claude conversation rather than needing a user to swipe between programs. As with most AI actions, Claude is supposed to check with its user before actually taking any actions like securing a reservation or making a purchase. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ai/claude-can-now-connect-to-lifestyle-apps-like-spotify-instacart-and-alltrails-225510552.html?src=rss

Microsoft is reportedly offering voluntary buyouts to up to 7 percent of its employees

Microsoft is planning to get rid of more US employees via its first voluntary buyout program, CNBC reports . The buyout program will reportedly be offered to US employees at he senior director level and below whose years of employment and age add up to 70 or higher, and could cover up to 7 percent of the company's US workforce. With around 125,000 employees in the US as of June 2025 , that could mean up to 8,750 will be offered a paid exit when Microsoft begins its program in May. That's a smaller figure than the 15,000 or so employees the company laid off in May and July of 2025, but still significant, particularly if the majority of employees do take the buyout. Our hope is that this program gives those eligible the choice to take that next step on their own terms, with generous company support, Microsoft's executive vice president and chief people officer Amy Coleman shared in a memo viewed by CNBC . Engadget has contacted Microsoft to confirm the existence of the voluntary buyout program and other details CNBC reported. We'll update this article if we hear back. Microsoft used its 2025 layoffs to streamline layers of management and its video game business, but these new cuts may have a lot more to do with AI. Not necessarily because the company's adoption of AI tools has made employees redundant, but rather because Microsoft continues to aggressively spend on AI infrastructure. The company said it spent $37.5 billion in capital expenditures during Q2 2026, much of which went toward data center buildout. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/microsoft-is-reportedly-offering-voluntary-buyouts-to-up-to-7-percent-of-its-employees-200050484.html?src=rss

Titanium Court mashes together genres and cultural references to tell a strange, funny tale

I would love to tell you everything about my favorite game of the year so far. But that would be doing a great disservice to Titanium Court . I'm not even sure I could explain it all, anyway. Titanium Court is a run-based game with elements of permanent progression, so it's technically a roguelite. However, you cannot really break Titanium Court like you can with Balatro . There are multiple ways to win a run, but you have to play by the rules. Gradually learning what those are and how the game suddenly changes them is a big part of what makes this so effective. I can at least break down the core gameplay loop for you. There are two stages to each battle in every run aka a war. The first is a match-three segment (think Candy Crush Saga ), in which you gather resources by lining up wheat fields, rivers, hills and forests. At the same time, you're setting up the terrain and positioning your own tile (the titular court) for the second stage. For instance, water will stop foot soldiers entirely, so you can position yourself behind a barricade of rivers to block them. But you'll need to be careful, since a chain reaction of matches can wipe out your carefully constructed defense. At the same time, you'll be moving around enemy strongholds. You can line up three or more matching enemy bases to eliminate them, but you don't gain any resources from those. Plus, you can only make a limited number of moves in this phase. So that makes for an interesting risk-reward conundrum. A timeline shows you which enemies will attack and when so you can plan accordingly. The second phase is where the tower defense element really takes hold. You'll use what you've collected to recruit soldiers to attack enemies or defend your base, add workers that will gather more resources and maybe deliver magic attacks. You can trade at shops and markets as long as you haven't wiped them from the grid, since they're bonded to terrain tiles. When you're ready to fight, you hit a play button and the battle takes place automatically. Nothings as simple as it might seem at first, because this is a game that will mess with you. I was scolded for trying to buy my way to victory by trading too much, with the game calling that approach boring and closing the shop's doors for the round. Perfectly fair. I chuckled the first time that happened. When I thought I was being clever by using the introspective power of self-reflection (you'll see) to win a boss fight, I was swiftly shut down. Between wars, you'll explore the titular court as its newly anointed queen, trying to figure out what on Earth is going on and, ultimately, how to get home. Here, Titanium Court morphs into a blend of old-school adventure game and bizarre visual novel. This is where much of the magic lies, and where you gradually learn about the story and even how to play the game. AP Thomson/Fellow Traveller Developer AP Thomson's writing is smart and funny. I lost count of the number of jokes I've laughed out loud at. His narrative takes you in startlingly unexpected directions. It feels like a grand performance and Thomson is the master of ceremonies. Its a confidently authored experience that offers further evidence as to why absolutely no one needs a generative AI game platform that seeks to kill the scripted RPG. Titanium Court won the prestigious Seumas McNally Grand Prize at the Independent Games Festival Awards earlier this year and it's not hard to see why. Thomson and his collaborators have cooked up something really special here. It's a game with dragons and ballet, baseball and bike races, shower thoughts and wormholes. There are road signs in a world in which faeries believe cars are a figment of your imagination. It references Catan, the Civilization series, Jenga and A Midsummer Night's Dream . It skewers capitalism and social inequality. I'll let you discover the details of the job system, which completely upends how you play the game, yourself. I haven't been this engrossed by a game since Ball x Pit . It surprises and delights at almost every turn. Titanium Court is certainly not going to be for everyone (there's so much reading!) and Im going to stop here before I tell you too much about it. You can get a taste by checking out a Steam demo thats available for PC and Mac. The full game arrived today . It usually costs $15, but it's 20 percent off until May 7. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/titanium-court-mashes-together-genres-and-cultural-references-to-tell-a-strange-funny-tale-184750797.html?src=rss

Apple, Amazon join push for looser greenhouse emissions reporting

The Greenhouse Gas Protocol , a widely used international environmental standard for measuring and reporting emissions, is considering changes to how certain types of the emissions are reported. Advocates for the new guidance argue that the current rules make it too easy for businesses to overstate their commitments to environmentally friendly operations, such as being powered by renewable energy or making progress toward net-zero emissions. Today, some major tech companies joined a call pushing back against the new guidance, asking for the new reporting rules to be optional rather than required. The joint statement argued that the proposed policies would reduce investments in sustainability programs and increase electricity prices. Apple and Amazon are among the more than 60 companies that signed the letter, Bloomberg reported. The protocol's three tiers of emissions present a clearer picture about companies' environmental efforts and how impactful they are in reducing emissions. Scope 1 includes emissions from sources directly owned or controlled by a business, while Scope 2 covers how corporations measure emissions from purchased or acquired electricity, steam, heat and cooling. Scope 3 is the catch-all for any other emissions produced within a business' value chain. New proposed changes to the scope 2 guidance would place tighter requirements on how companies use renewable energy certificates to offset their electricity emissions. Rather than purchase clean energy certificates at any point during the year, companies would have to source clean energy that is both geographically close and simultaneously available to their grid-derived power. Any changes adopted by the Greenhouse Gas Protocol could take effect as early as next year. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/apple-amazon-join-push-for-looser-greenhouse-emissions-reporting-182314690.html?src=rss

Apple TV's upcoming For All Mankind spinoff Star City oozes Cold War-era paranoia

Apple TV just dropped a real-deal trailer for Star City , after releasing a short teaser earlier this year . It's a spinoff of For All Mankind , but this new show examines the alt-history space race from the Soviet perspective. In other words, this is a trailer steeped in Cold War-era paranoia. Secret photos are snapped, phones are tapped and characters are disappeared, all set against the backdrop of space exploration. The vibe looks decidedly different from For All Mankind , despite the parent show occasionally dabbling in Russia-based espionage. The vibe isn't the only shift here. Star City isn't doing time jumps, which is a hallmark of For All Mankind . The original show started in 1969 and season five is set in 2012 . The spinoff lives in the 1970s and is its own genre. This is according to showrunners Matt Wolpert and Ben Nedivi . For the uninitiated, For All Mankind begins with Russia beating us to the Moon in the 1960s. This creates a butterfly effect that changes history in ways both big and small. Star City looks like it'll focus on how Russia managed to land astronauts on the Moon before America and what happened to the space program in the immediate aftermath. It stars Rhys Ifans, Anna Maxwell Martin, Agnes OCasey and Alice Englert. Star City premieres on May 29 with two episodes. That's the same day season five of For All Mankind concludes. The original show was recently renewed for a sixth and final season . Apple TV really has become the best streamer for sci-fi. This summer sees not just the premiere of Star City , but the second season of the multiverse-based thriller Dark Matter and season three of the dystopian adventure Silo . The platform is also home to shows like Pluribus , Severance and Foundation , among many others. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/entertainment/tv-movies/apple-tvs-upcoming-for-all-mankind-spinoff-star-city-oozes-cold-war-era-paranoia-180429809.html?src=rss

Rivian begins production on the R2 electric SUV

Rivian has begun production of its R2 SUV. However, you can't get one just yet: The first customer deliveries (of the most expensive version) aren't expected until later this spring. On Wednesday, CEO RJ Scaringe drove the first electric SUV off the production line at the company's Normal, IL, factory. A storage and logistics building at that factory was damaged by a tornado last weekend, with Wednesday's rollout event seemingly designed to reassure nervous customers and investors. We are really excited to be producing R2 for our customers, Scaringe is quoted as saying in a news release . However, Rivian CFO Claire McDonough told Reuters that customers won't be able to configure their vehicle orders until June. Electrek reports that these first units rolling out now are going to Rivian employees. Rivian If you were drawn to the R2's $45,000 starting price , well, Rivian won't have any of those for a while. First off the line (this spring) is the Launch Package, starting at $57,990. A Premium trim, expected late 2026, will cost $53,990. Then, in the first half of 2027, a Standard (RWD long range) variant arrives at $48,490. And as for that headline-grabbing $45,000 base-model R2, I hope you like waiting. It won't be here until late 2027. The Rivian R2 was revealed in 2024. Smaller and lighter than the flagship R1, the company is positioning the EV as its answer to Teslas best-selling Model Y . All versions of the new two-row SUV are rated for at least 300 miles per charge. Each trim has a native NACS charge port. The vehicle can charge from 10 percent to 80 percent in under 30 minutes when using a DC fast charger. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/transportation/evs/rivian-begins-production-on-the-r2-electric-suv-171729320.html?src=rss

Five Annapurna Interactive games get Switch 2 releases

If youre a Switch 2 owner itching for something new to play and you happen to be partial to an Annapurna Interactive game, then boy is it your lucky day. The prolific indie publisher has announced that five of its titles are coming to Switch 2 , three in the form of next-gen upgrades and two for the first time on Nintendo platforms. The magnificent Sayonara Wild Hearts and Lorelei and the Laser Eyes are available starting today, complete with 120Hz and 4K upgrades for Nintendos latest console. First-time buyers can grab Sayonara Wild Hearts for $13, while 2024s Lorelei and the Laser Eyes costs $25. The upgrades are free if you already own either game on Switch, and Sayonara Wild Hearts also adds the previously unavailable Remix Arcade mode for the first time. This speeds up gameplay and removes loading as you chase high scores. Next month, May 28, cyberpunk cat adventure Stray is also getting the Switch 2 treatment, sporting improved 4K visuals, a frame rate boost and, fittingly given its feline focus, mouse controls. The Switch 2 port will be available to purchase digitally from the eShop for $30, but its not clear if this will also be a free upgrade for those who bought Stray on Switch. Katamari creator Keita Takahashis charmingly weird puzzle-adventure To a T skipped Nintendo consoles when it launched last year, so its nice to see that one coming to Switch 2 on June 11 (digital-only, $20). A few weeks later on June 23, cozy narrative game Wanderstop arrives on both Switch and Switch 2. Itll cost $25 on the eShop, with no word on a physical version. Annapurna Interactive released a lot of its games on Switch, and that trend happily looks set to continue throughout the Switch 2 generation. The musical turn-based RPG People of Note came to Nintendos latest console at launch earlier this month, with stylish adventure game Mixtape also arriving on Switch 2 on May 7. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/nintendo/five-annapurna-interactive-games-get-switch-2-releases-164950446.html?src=rss

Someone allegedly used a hairdryer to rig Polymarket weather bets

A hairdryer was allegedly used to rig Polymarket bets on the weather at Charles de Gaulle airport in Paris, according to a report by The Telegraph . French authorities note that the official temperature readings at the airport spiked twice in the past month, reaching levels much higher than expected. On both occasions, gamblers on Polymarket appear to have walked away with thousands upon thousands of dollars by betting on those temperature fluctuations. The gambling site relies on readings from temperature sensors, and the one at Charles de Gaulle airport is on a public road. This makes it easy to access. The operating theory is that someone snuck in and used a battery-powered hairdryer to bring the recorded temperature up well beyond the actual heat outside. Meanwhile, the Polymarket page indicated less than a one percent chance of the airport exceeding a particular temperature. Successful bets on these fluctuations netted an unknown user around $34,000. holy fuck, a hair dryer at a Paris airport broke Polymarket weather markets & made someone $34,000 richer - polymarket was settling Paris temperature bets on a single Mto France sensor sitting near the Charles de Gaulle runway perimeter - basically unguarded - the guy bought pic.twitter.com/ona2hP3oZc @aaronjmars (@aaronjmars) April 22, 2026 In view of physical findings on one of our instruments and the analysis of sensor data, Mto-France was indeed led to file a complaint for alteration of the operation of an automated data processing system with the Air Transport Gendarmerie Brigade of Roissy, a spokesperson for France's official weather agency said. There is no indication that Polymarket forced anyone to return their winnings, but the temperature sensor has been moved to a new location. The site is still running bets on the daily temperature in and around Paris. It sucks that someone potentially tricked a temperature sensor with a hairdryer to scam actual gamblers out of potential winnings. However, this sort of thing should be expected when betting money on real-world scenarios like this. If something can be rigged, and there's money to be made, it'll get rigged. Humans are gonna human. This does, however, shine a light on the types of bets that should be allowed on sites like Polymarket and Kalshi. Polymarket, for instance, hosts numerous bets on the outcome of wars , whether or not countries will receive nuclear weapons and potential prison sentences , among many other sensitive topics. What happens when someone uses something much more dangerous than a hairdryer to change the outcome of something for financial gain? This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/someone-allegedly-used-a-hairdryer-to-rig-polymarket-weather-bets-155312411.html?src=rss

Turkey wants to ban social media for kids under 15

The Turkish parliament has voted through a bill that would ban all children under the age of 15 from using social media. As part of the legislation, social media platforms would be required to enforce age-verification measures on their apps, provide parental control tools, and react more quickly to harmful content being posted. As reported by The Associated Press , lawmakers have passed the bill in the wake of two deadly school shootings in Turkey, after which police arrested 162 people accused of sharing footage of the tragedies online. Turkeys President Recep Tayyip Erdogan now has 15 days to accept the bill in order for it to become law, after reportedly saying social media platforms had become cesspools in a televised address to the nation. As well as the major social media platforms, AP reports that online gaming companies would also have to implement their own restrictions on minors, with potential punishments including bandwidth reductions and financial penalties. This isnt the first time Turkey has locked horns with social media and online gaming platforms. Instagram has been blocked in the country before, back in 2024, relating to a dispute over the posting of Hamas-related content. Access was restored around a week later, but in the same time period Turkey also banned Roblox over reports of inappropriate sexual content accused of being explorative to children. At the time, a Turkish official also named the promotion of homosexuality as one reason for the ban. Turkey has also temporarily banned Twitter (now called X) on several occasions, most recently after 2023s devastating earthquakes, though it was not clear at the time why the government may have moved to block the social media platform. The countrys lawmakers moving to ban under-15s from accessing social media is part of an emerging trend in Europe and across the globe. The likes of Greece and Austria have recently introduced similar legislation of their own, following Australia becoming the first country in the world to ban children under 16 from social media last year. The UK has since considered bringing in tighter restrictions too. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/social-media/turkey-wants-to-ban-social-media-for-kids-under-15-143053462.html?src=rss

Meta will show parents the topics of their teens' AI conversations

With countries banning social media for kids left and right , Meta is trying different things to convince parents that its platforms are safe for teens. In its latest effort , the company will start showing parents the topics their teens have discussed with Meta AI over the previous seven days. Parents will be able to see the topics their teen has been asking Meta AI about in [Facebook, Messenger or Instagram] over the past week, Meta explained in a blog post. Topics can range from School, Entertainment, and Lifestyle to Travel, Writing, and Health and Wellbeing, among others. For parents overseeing Meta's teen accounts, the feature will appear in a new Insights tab within supervision, both in-app and on web. Parents can tap on a topic to see the different categories within each: for instance, sub-categories within Lifestyle include fashion, food and holidays, while fitness, physical health and mental health are part of the Health and Wellbeing topic. Meta Meta also worked with the Cyberbullying Research Center to develop what it calls conversation starters, or open-ended conversations about their experience with AI. It provides detail about what the questions are designed to address, and can be found on the Family Center website or through a link in the new Insights tab. Finally, Meta revealed more detail about its AI Wellbeing Expert Council, who will provide ongoing input on our AI experience for teens. It will be made up of three existing advisory groups as well as new members with special expertise in responsible and ethical AI, who are affiliated with the National Council of Suicide Prevention and multiple universities. It's worth noting that Meta has a separate oversight board that deals with subjects ranging from AI to moderation. Offboarding moderation chores to busy parents appears to be par for the course for Meta these days. The company has recently cut back on the use of third-party vendors that help with content moderation, shifting responsibility instead to advanced AI systems, according to recent reports . The dangers of AI for teens have been one of multiple reasons countries like Spain have banned social media platforms for kids. One of the most recent and tragic cases was in Canada , where a teen was provided specific details by OpenAI's ChatGPT about how to carry out a school shooting. Another such case is under investigation in Florida, and AI's have been implicated in multiple teen suicides as well. In the US, the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline is 1-800-273-8255 or you can simply dial 988. Crisis Text Line can be reached by texting HOME to 741741 (US), 686868 (Canada), or 85258 (UK). Wikipedia maintains a list of crisis lines for people outside of those countries. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ai/meta-will-show-parents-the-topics-of-their-teens-ai-conversations-123119624.html?src=rss

Musk pledges to fix 2019-2023 Teslas that can't fully self drive

Tesla still doesnt have a solid pathway for how to give Hardware 3 cars Full Self-Driving (FSD) capabilities, based on what Elon Musk said during the companys latest earnings call . The automaker has known for quite a while that its vehicles equipped with Hardware 3 arent capable of unsupervised FSD, even though the company built the system specifically to give its cars the ability . Tesla used Hardware 3 on cars manufactured from 2019 until early 2023 before Hardware 4 shipped. During an earlier earnings call back in January 2025, Musk admitted that the company was going to have to upgrade peoples Hardware 3 computer for those that have bought Full Self-Driving. At Teslas latest earnings call, Musk said that Hardware 3 simply does not have the capability to achieve unsupervised FSD. Tesla thought it would be able to at one point, but Hardware 3 apparently has 1/8th the memory bandwidth of Hardware 4. Musk explained that memory bandwidth is one of the key elements needed for unsupervised FSD. Tesla will be offering to upgrade and replace the computers and cameras on older vehicles, but it doesnt have a concrete plan in place yet. I do think over time its going to make sense for us to convert all Hardware 3 cars to Hardware 4, he said. To do so at service centers would be extremely slow, Musk has admitted. Around 4 million cars or so have Hardware 3, though not everyone has paid for FSD. Still, to be able to replace its vehicles hardware efficiently, Musk said Tesla is going to have to set up microfactories or small factories in major metropolitan areas. He didnt give any indication that Tesla has already started building those microfactories, though, or even that construction is already scheduled to begin. He did say that in the meantime, the company is going to be releasing FSD version 14 for Hardware 3 around the end of June. Musk also said during the same earnings call that Teslas Fremont factory will start manufacturing the companys humanoid Optimus robots in late July or August. The Tesla CEO is known for announcing highly optimistic and aggressive timelines. Tesla made the decision to kill off its Model X and S cars earlier this year, so that it can convert its Fremont facility into an Optimus factory. The last Model S and X vehicles will be rolling off the production line in May, which gives the company just a few months to dismantle the facilitys current equipment and put new ones in place. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/transportation/evs/musk-pledges-to-fix-2019-2023-teslas-that-cant-fully-self-drive-095002120.html?src=rss

Kalshi suspended three political candidates from its platform for insider trading

Prediction market Kalshi has taken action against three political candidates, alleging that each was engaged with insider trading of information about their campaigns. The company implemented new rules last month aimed at preventing politicians and athletes from placing bets on events they can control, and it said those guardrails helped to flag this trio of cases. The three candidates are Mark Moran of Virginia, Matt Klein of Minnesota and Ezekiel Enriquez of Texas. Kalshi reached settlements with Klein and Enriquez , both of whom cooperated in the platform's investigations. Each will face a fine of less than $1,000 and suspensions of up to five years. Moran's case has resulted in a disciplinary action , with a five year suspension and a fine of more than $6,000. He posted on X about the situation and claimed this was essentially a stunt to see if he'd be caught and to highlight how this company is destroying young men. Kalshi and other prediction markets have been the subject of several lawsuits by state attorneys general that are attempting to regulate the sector as gambling. Nevada , Arizona and New York have cases underway, but the state-level attempts are not looking promising. An appeals court ruled against New Jersey's effort to govern this industry, and the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission has launched a lawsuit of its own in an effort to ensure it will be the only party to regulate prediction markets. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/kalshi-suspended-three-political-candidates-from-its-platform-for-insider-trading-222433937.html?src=rss

Ecco the Dolphin: Complete will combine remasters and a sequel into one package

Last year, Ecco the Dolphin creator Ed Annunizata teased plans to remaster the first two games in the series and create an entirely new sequel. Ecco the Dolphin: Complete , announced by Annunziata's studio A&R Atelier , appears to be the result of that work. The game doesn't have a release date yet, but A&R Atelier says it combines the planned remasters and third title into the complete, definitive Ecco the Dolphin experience, created by the people who made the originals. Complete includes all versions of Ecco the Dolphin and Ecco: The Tides of Time , according to the developer, alongside a brand-new contemporary Ecco game. Besides graphical improvements, A&E Atelier says the game will introduce built-in speedrunning support, achievements and leaderboards, and things like the ability to create custom courses from existing levels. And while A&R Atelier's announcement doesn't include footage of the new game or the platforms it'll release on, the official Ecco the Dolphin website has a countdown clock that could point to when more information will be released. Annunziata sued Sega to try and win the rights to the Ecco the Dolphin IP in 2013, the same year he failed to get The Big Blue , a spiritual sequel to Ecco the Dolphin , fully funded on Kickstarter. Sega and Annunziata ultimately settled their lawsuit in 2016 , which may have laid the groundwork for Ecco the Dolphin: Complete to happen. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/ecco-the-dolphin-complete-will-combine-remasters-and-a-sequel-into-one-package-222020243.html?src=rss

NASA targets a September launch for its next big space telescope

NASA's next eye into the cosmos is due to leave our planet later this year. The agency says it's targeting an early September launch for the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope. Roman (for short) has a field of view 100 times larger than Hubble's. The September date is the earliest possible launch for Roman. NASA says it will go up (aboard a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket ) no later than May 2027. The Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope, named after NASA's first chief astronomer and mother of Hubble , was introduced in 2016. (Back then, it was known as the Wide Field Infrared Survey Telescope, or WFIRST .) The telescope's mirror is roughly the same size as Hubble's, but it can capture sections of the sky at least 100 times larger than its predecessor. NASA Roman will work in tandem with NASA observatories such as the James Webb Space Telescope and Chandra X-ray Observatory , which are designed to zoom in on rare transient objects once they've been identified, but seldom if ever discover them, Julie McEnery, Roman's senior project scientist, said in 2023. Roman's much larger field of view will reveal many such objects that were previously unknown. And since we've never had an observatory like this scanning the cosmos before, we could even find entirely new classes of objects and events. After leaving our atmosphere, Roman will set course for a vantage point nearly 1 million miles from Earth. There, it will rely on a pair of instruments to study space. The first is a 300.8-megapixel camera that captures light from visible to near-infrared. There's also a high-contrast coronagraph that will allow it to capture exoplanets that would otherwise be blocked by starlight. Romans mission: to settle essential questions in the areas of dark energy, exoplanets and astrophysics. Despite decades of study, astronomers know surprisingly little about dark energy , which makes up about 68 percent of the universes contents. And while scientific discoveries are cool and all, youll be pleased to know that Roman is also sure to beam back more dazzling pictures of our cosmos . This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/science/space/nasa-targets-a-september-launch-for-its-next-big-space-telescope-204140176.html?src=rss

France's national agency for managing IDs and passports suffered a data breach last week

The French government confirmed that France Titres, also known as Agence nationale des titres scuriss (ANTS), experienced a security breach last week. France Titres disclosed that it detected a data breach on April 15. The next day, a hacker claimed responsibility for the breach and claimed to have up to 19 million records that they are attempting to sell. According to Bleeping Computer , the data does not appear to have been widely leaked yet. France Titres is responsible for the country's identification and registration materials, including drivers licenses, national ID cards, passports and immigration documents. The compromised data includes full names, email addresses, dates of birth, account identifiers, login IDs, phone numbers and mailing addresses. The department said that while the breach did not permit access to its portals, the exposed information could be used for phishing attacks or other illicit actions. The announcement advised caution regarding any suspicious communications claiming to be from the agency. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/cybersecurity/frances-national-agency-for-managing-ids-and-passports-suffered-a-data-breach-last-week-201432189.html?src=rss

Apple rolls out iOS 26.4.2 to fix a flaw that allowed the FBI to access push notifications

Apple's latest iOS update fixes a flaw in its notification database that made it possible for law enforcement to view deleted push notifications on a person's iPhone or iPad. The security flaw was one way law enforcement agencies like the FBI could circumvent Apple's strict stance towards user privacy, the Electronic Frontier Foundation writes , particularly since the company has required a court order to share notification data since 2023. According to Apple's update notes, iOS 26.4.2 introduces improved data redaction to address an issue where otifications marked for deletion could be unexpectedly retained on the device. The update is available now on iPhone 11 and later, iPad Pro 12.9-inch 3rd generation and later, iPad Pro 11-inch 1st generation and later, iPad Air 3rd generation and later, iPad 8th generation and later and iPad mini 5th generation and later, Apple says. The FBI's use of this particular iOS notification flaw was first reported on by 404 Media , who learned the agency used a tool to access Signal notification data stored locally on an iPhone even after it was deleted. Signal CEO Meredith Whitaker later acknowledged the issue on Bluesky , writing that otifications for deleted [messages] shouldn't remain in any OS notification database, and we've asked Apple to address this. At the time, Whitaker directed Signal users to adjust their settings so that push notifications from the app didnt include the name of the messenger or message content. The privacy of your notifications is vulnerable in at least two places, according to the EFF. In the cloud, where they get routed through a company's servers and likely partially logged in metadata, and on the local storage of the phone where they're received. Apple's update should ideally make deleted notifications appropriately inaccessible, but limiting what's actually visible in notifications in the first place is also worth considering. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/cybersecurity/apple-rolls-out-ios-2642-to-fix-a-flaw-that-allowed-the-fbi-to-access-push-notifications-201153603.html?src=rss

LG's first RGB TV starts at $5,000 and is available to pre-order today

LG has announced the pricing and availability of its Micro RGB evo , the company's first take on a TV display trend that kicked off in earnest at CES 2026. The LG Micro RGB evo is available to pre-order today starting at $5,000, and follows the recent release of the ultra-thin LG Wallpaper . The Micro RGB evo represents the top of the line of a new class of display at LG that directly builds on the company's work with Mini LED technology. The new TV features LG's Micro RGB panel and its Alpha A11 AI processor, which runs the TV's webOS software, and perhaps more importantly, powers the Micro RGB Engine that controls the TVs individual LEDs. LG says the Micro RGB evo offers full gamut coverage across DCI-P3, BT.2020 and Adobe RGB, along with enhanced contrast and refined detail from the TV's over a thousand dimming zones. While Micro RGB should offer better color representation than OLED, LG's OLED TVs still have their share of benefits, especially in things like contrast and dimming. Micro RGB panels are similar to the company's Mini LED ones, but rather than using all blue or white LEDs, the Micro RGB evo has individually controlled red, green and blue LEDs. The new style of display is also being explored by companies like TCL and Samsung , and at least for now, it's not as affordable as some QD-OLED or OLED TVs can be. The LG Micro RGB evo is available to pre-order today from LG's website in 75, 86 and 100-inch screen sizes. The TV starts at $5,000 for the smallest 75-inch model and goes up from there. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/home/home-theater/lgs-first-rgb-tv-starts-at-5000-and-is-available-to-pre-order-today-185159193.html?src=rss

Vampire Survivors developer Poncle is opening more studios and has over 15 games in the works

Vampire Survivors developer Poncle has big plans for the future, according to an interview The Game Business conducted with the company's chief strategy officer Matteo Sapio. It's opening two new studios in Japan and Italy and has over 15 games in active development. That's a lot of action for a company primarily known for one franchise. Sapio says the company is developing three basic types of games. There are spinoffs to Vampire Survivors , like this week's deckbuilder Vampire Crawlers . Poncle is also making original IPs and says there are two games set in new universes coming down the pike. Finally, it's working on some roguelites with similar mechanics to Vampire Survivors , but using other IPs. We already know about one of these, a roguelite set in the Warhammer 40K universe called Warhammer Survivors . It's set to land on Steam sometime this year. To assist with these plans, Poncle has developed an engine that can turn pre-existing IPs into games that play like Vampire Survivors . If you're wondering if there are enough fans for multiple top-down roguelites with simple controls and bullet hell mechanics, let me point you to Halls of Torment , Deep Rock Galactic: Survivor and Soulstone Survivors , among many others. This has become a popular genre in recent years, likely due to the continued success of Vampire Survivors . To that end, the original game has surpassed 27 million players . Poncle has, however, paused all of its third-party publishing plans after releasing a couple of games last year. It was a learning experience, Sapio said. But we found that we werent able to give the right support. The company could revisit third-party publishing in the future. This is great news for Poncle and fans of the Vampire Survivors franchise, but there's always risk when a company tries to grow like this. Remember Embracer Group? It went on a massive buying spree beginning in 2019, before having to sell off and close a number of studios . However, this isn't a AAA game development studio. Poncle makes indie titles and the new studios will be lean operations, with little teams of people. Sapio said this organizational structure will help keep the company agile and flexible. I personally have high hopes for this endeavor. This is because the just-released spinoff Vampire Crawlers is so very good, which proves to me that Poncle isn't a one-trick pony. It plays like a mix of Slay the Spire with a first-person dungeon crawler like Etrian Odyssey, all while successfully capturing the vibe of Vampire Survivors . If Poncle can keep up this level of quality, gamers could be in for a long-term treat. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/vampire-survivors-developer-poncle-is-opening-more-studios-and-has-over-15-games-in-the-works-174022348.html?src=rss

Control: Ultimate Edition is out for the iPhone and iPad

Control is one of my favorite adventure games of the last decade or so, a mind-bending trip through an ever-changing building where you get to use telekinesis to battle some pretty freaky enemies. It was a graphically-demanding game when it was released in 2019, but a lot can change in less than six years: Control: Ultimate Edition is now available on the iPhone and iPad for a mere $5, following its announcement last October . Its a universal purchase, which means if you buy it itll work on the iPad, iPhone and Mac as well. Developer Remedy promises that its the full Control experience, with the DLC episodes included. Remedy rebuilt the UI and controls to make it work on touchscreen devices; the company says that it has tweaked aiming and the various puzzles to make them work better for the iPad and iPhone. But naturally, the game also works with controllers. If youre serious about having the best experience with the game, finding a way to play with physical controls is probably a good idea. The game will run on iPhones with at least an A17 Pro chip. That includes the iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max, as well all of the iPhone 16 and iPhone 17 series. Plenty of iPad models can run the game, as well any iPad with an M-series chip or the A17 Pro will work. That means the current basic iPad, with its A16 processor, is left out of the fun. But any iPad Air or Pro from the last four years or so should be good to go. I tried a test version of Control when I reviewed the new iPad Air recently and, unsurprisingly, the tablets M4 chip was more than powerful enough to make for a smooth experience. My main gripe is that when sprinting, you have to hold down the L3 button the entire time youre running rather than just click it once, which is how it works on other platforms. Otherwise it looks and plays smoothly, though I cant vouch for how itll perform on hardware older than the M4 from 2024. Control marks the latest AAA title to hit the iPad and iPhone. Apple has aggressively courted developers for its platforms in recent years, and while most games dont hit the Mac or iOS when they launch, more and more are showing up eventually. There are multiple recent Resident Evil titles for the iPad, and other games like Death Stranding and Assassins Creed Mirage have been ported recently as well. There are others on the Mac as well, including demanding titles like Cyberpunk 2077 and Lies of P . Apples platforms arent going to be an avid gamers first stop still, but having high-profile games to supplement the many indie titles available helps round out the options for Apple users. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/control-ultimate-edition-is-out-for-the-iphone-and-ipad-150532940.html?src=rss

Heres to the stable ones: In praise of Tim Cook

Tim Cooks tenure as Apple CEO ends September 1 when he takes the role of executive chair. He will be replaced by John Ternus , a 25-year Apple veteran and head of its hardware engineering division. I get the sense Cooks professional obituaries will focus on his steady hand, execution success and lack of intra-company drama. All of those are virtues but I suspect the media, ever in love with a narrative of its own concoction, will use them as cudgels. Consider this an attempt to balance the record ahead of Cooks damning with the faintest of praise. Cook is quiet and private, making it easy to paint him as a bland managerialist who coasted on the success of the iPhone. In Ternus, Apple once again has a product guy at its helm, a term loaded with enough subtext to sink a battleship. You can feel the implication that its only product guys who have the vision, taste and knowledge to innovate. By extension, Cook was never a real nerd, but an empty finance guy that never understood what makes Apple tick. If theres one thing Silicon Valley loves more than money, its a mercurial genius upon whom they can rest their dreams. Figures with a capital-V vision who invent new product categories with a flick of a wrist, captains of industry who inspire awe and devotion. And making enough money that even a Rockefeller would start thinking gosh, thats a bit much. The Jobsian myth-making obscures his talents and minimizes the number of misses he had along the way. Jobs first tenure at Apple ended in failure and NeXT, for all its innovation, didnt survive as a standalone hardware maker. Many of his ideas were too big and ambitious to succeed and his refusal to compromise made them sink. His time in the wilderness made him a better manager, and a far better storyteller. But to suggest Jobs was gifted with Midas touch is wrong, since for all his vision and taste, he needed strong execution. Kimberly White via Getty Images It doesnt help that Jobs is the ur-example of Silicon Valleys tech genius founder which means so many there have never stopped looking for his successor. The title of the next Steve Jobs has been diluted to the point of meaninglessness at this point given the list of nominees. Those include Elizabeth Holmes , Elon Musk, Adam Neumann , Trevor Milton , Sam Altman and Travis Kalanick . Given that sort of company, Im sure Cook is delighted when people say hes no Steve Jobs. I suspect, in part, Cook was seen as a mere employee (derogatory) rather than a startup founder who built something himself. That obscures his success, first at IBM and Intelligent Electronics where he took up a COO role at 34. Even in an industry that treasures youth, I doubt these companies would elevate someone as young as Cook unless he was damn good. And when he got to Apple in 1998, his role was to make the wheels of the company turn. We may laud Jobs and Ive for dreaming up the products but, to quote Jobs himself, real artists ship. By that metric, Cook was the real artist. When Cook took over as Apple CEO, it was just weeks before Jobs passed away, in what must have been a very hard time. Holding the company together after such a shock while grieving for your own loss must have been an enormous challenge. And while Cook had Jobs army of lieutenants around him, it was upon Cook to actually lead that team. That he then took Apple to the outrageous success it is today is proof of his ability to actually make things happen. Think about how it was Cook that used Apples initial success to make good deals with manufacturers that wound up boxing out so many of its rivals. Im sure Cook lacks the taste and vision of a Jobs or an Ive, and instead relies upon the skill of his team. Im not sure why that would be painted as a bad thing given the roster of people Apple pays to have such taste. If Cook is lacking in taste, hes not lacking in humility, and clearly knows well enough to not meddle in things. Friends, thats not the sign of a bad leader, its the sign of a good one, who makes his team feel trusted, respected, and listened to. Think about how rapidly Cook democratized the Apple keynotes, making stars of many of its senior executives, rather than trying to put on a Steve Jobs tribute act. His tenure as CEO wasnt flawless: Hiring John Browett to replace Ron Johnson at Retail was an early error but one that Cook was smart enough to correct just six months later. The power struggles with Scott Forstall could be a miss given Ives instincts around user interface design . On the product front, we had the embarrassment of AirPower, the stop-start work on the Mac Pro and the muted rollout of the Vision Pro . The lack of proactive management of the App Store and the opacity of its workings counts as a big strike, too. Im sure well get some chatter about the Apple Car project from people who thought that was ever a good idea. As for the Trump Stuff(), I have some sympathy for Cook, who probably didnt expect to play diplomat when he took the job. His ties to the current administration have tainted his reputation, even if his engagement seems finely calibrated. As CEO of Apple, hes responsible for around 170,000 people and has legal obligations as the head of a public company. As much as he may wish to flick the bird at the Commander in Chief, he has to tread a fine line. And it will be for him to wrestle with his own conscience to decide if he did the right thing down the line. One of the pitfalls of a sustained period of success is that people lose sight of how things were in the bad old days. You can anticipate the editorials saying Cook failed on AI because he wisely avoided not launching head-first into a boondoggle. Failed on launching a new product category in the post-Jobs world, even though the Apple Watch and AirPods are, on their own, a bigger business than some major corporations. Failed by building a subscription and services business despite every single hardware company in the world doing the same thing. I'd say Cook's judgment was far better than anyone has given him credit for, and he's made plenty of earth-shattering changes of his own. Think about Apple Silicon and how it has upended the order of things in the chip world, almost inadvertently taking a wrecking ball to Intel's dominance. A technology transition that was so seamless, so undramatic, and yet with so many dividends, that the idea of Apple using other people's chips in its hardware feels like ancient history. To all of those people, Id say look look! with your own stupid eyes at the MacBook Neo. Look at a company that found a way to produce hardware like that , with performance like that , for that sort of price! The MacBook Neo is so good and so cheap that its made the rest of the consumer electronics industry look like incompetents. It may not be a shiny new gadget you can show off to the envy of your early adopter friends, but its going to make a meaningful difference for countless people. We can all agree that no kid is going to hang a poster of Tim Cook on their bedroom wall in the same way they might with Jobs, or even Musk. I dont think thats a bad thing, because Cooks legacy isnt in headlines or fawning biopics, its in a legacy of actually getting things done. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/heres-to-the-stable-ones-in-praise-of-tim-cook-144850435.html?src=rss

Xfinity Mobile now includes device protection and anytime phone upgrades

Cell phone plans can get exceedingly complicated, so Comcasts pitch for Xfinity Mobiles simplicity is rather appealing particularly at a time when everything is more expensive than ever. Today, the company is announcing two simple plans priced at $30 and $45 a month that have some serious perks for their prices. The $30 Mobile Select plan covers the main basics, including 50GB of premium full-speed data; Global Travel Pass to cover yourself when traveling in 215 different countries; and Xfinitys Wi-Fi PowerBoost. That latter feature takes advantage of Xfinitys wide network of Wi-Fi hotspots around the country. Your phone will automatically connect to those when youre out and about, and youll get priority speeds of up to 1 gigabit on those networks as well as at home. The $45 Mobile Plus plan adds some pretty significant perks. For starters, youll get unlimited premium data and 4K video streaming (the Select plan limits you to 720p). But more significantly, the Plus plan promises device upgrades at literally any time. At this point, most carriers offer ways to upgrade before the typical three-year device payment plan is up, but as someone who did that late last year, I can confirm that the constantly changing promotions around phone upgrades make it hard to know exactly what youll be eligible for. Comcast, however, says that Mobile Plus subscribers can literally upgrade their phone at any time. I asked how it would work if I was crazy enough to switch to a Galaxy S26 six months after getting an iPhone 17 Pro, and they said it would be no issue, regardless of how much I had beat up my iPhone. Im trying to figure out if theres a catch, but the companys representatives were very adamant about anytime upgrades being as uncomplicated as they said. Similarly, the Plus plan also includes lifetime device protection, another thing that most carriers charge separately for. This extends to any connected device on your plan like smartwatches or iPads in addition to your phone. If you need a replacement, just bring it in. Xfinity Mobile is still limited to people who subscribe to an Xfinity internet plan. But given Xfinity promises five-year price guarantees and even lets customers try a year of the Mobile Select plan for free (or the Plus plan for $15/month) so theres very little risk involved here. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/mobile/xfinity-mobile-now-includes-device-protection-and-anytime-phone-upgrades-133511715.html?src=rss

Hey Meta workers, are you getting paid for those keystrokes?

No longer content to subsume recognizable intellectual properties , the majority of the i ndexed internet and books ( basically all of them ), AI will apparently now begin devouring its own workforce. A report in Reuters alleged that the keystrokes, mouse movements and clicks of Meta's workforce are to be captured for the purposes of training AI something the company's communications department was happy to confirmed as accurate! In a cheery missive, a company spokesperson told Engadget that If we're building agents to help people complete everyday tasks using computers, our models need real examples of how people actually use them [...] were launching an internal tool that will capture these kinds of inputs on certain applications to help us train our models. All this leads one to ask the obvious question: hey, what the fuck? The nature of at-will employment in the United States is such that your boss basically never needs to explain why your job duties change, but it's rarely so sweeping, so brazen or so unavoidably tied to the reminder that you are being surveilled at a frighteningly granular level. Gross! Installing keyloggers on someone else's computer in a non-work setting can often constitute a criminal offense (hello CFAA !) and it's frankly weird we allow this sort of thing to happen in the workplace at all. But in this case, there's at least some possibility this data may eventually be used to replace the exact people currently strongarmed into making those clicks and clacking those keys or as a thin excuse to lay a lot of them off . It's not as though the data underpinning large language models is worthless. Ill-gotten information has been the subject of exorbitant settlements and many pending court cases with considerable sums riding on their eventual judgements. If Meta thought it could obtain this sort of data from its estimated 3.5 billion combined users instead of its comparably paltry body of employees without it immediately reading as the single most invasive chapter in a laughably long history of move fast, break things, and never admit to the mess, wouldn't it just... do that? Technology has progressed so far, yet people continue to really hate feeling taken advantage of. And that sort of thing is still bad for business . In a fragile economy floated by rampant self-dealing and the shifting moods of a few very rich weirdos, even the mere mention of AI's relentless forward march to annihilate its own creators can make a shoe company's stock pop, however briefly . Maybe that's why Meta was delighted to confirm the broad details of the Reuters story, yet declined multiple requests to comment on if workers can opt out of this surveillance, or if they are being compensated in any way for their data. I, for one, would still love to know! Do you work at Meta and want to talk confidentially? I'm @amarae.60 on Signal. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/general/hey-meta-workers-are-you-getting-paid-for-those-keystrokes-131934881.html?src=rss

BMW's new i7 xDrive EVs will offer longer range and faster charging

BMW just announced its 7-series lineup for 2027 promising the most extensive model update ever undertaken by the Bavarian automaker. The series includes a pair of i7 EVs, a plug-in hybrid, two ICE models and a V8-powered M model all running on BMW's Neue Klasse technology and flaunting all-new design language. BMW describes its updated luxury segment design language as monolithic, touting the minimalist crystal headlights and (divisive) light-up kidney Iconic Glow grille . The body form includes a new character line that lends an almost boat-tail-like aesthetic to the three-quarter view, according to the company. BMW also hyped its new Individual Dual-Finish paint that pairs a matte finish in the lower area of the vehicle with a manually-applied metallic finish in the upper section for a discrete but supremely elegant look. The 7-series offers some shiny new interior tech as well, with an extensive upgrade for its 31.3-inch 8K BMW Theater Screen that gives back seat passengers 8K streaming, gaming and Zoom calls. If you get BMW's Digital Premium package (which includes 5G data), you'll also gain access to a TiVo powered video app, select games and the BMW Drive Recorder that gathers exterior footage in case of an accident. Naturally, it includes Apple CarPlay and Android Auto integration as standard. The new lineup also offers special welcome and goodbye animations for when you approach and walk away from the vehicles, in Relaxed, Balanced and Excited modes. Part of that animation is the Ceremonial Light Carpet that projects a dynamic graphic light pattern onto the ground near the door. With two new i7 electric sedans the i7 50 xDrive and i7 60 xDrive BMW has far from given up on EVs. Both promise reduced sound levels thanks to their sound-isolated electric motors, along with instantaneous power delivery, passenger comfort and a luxurious ambience. BMW's new 7 series (the gas powered version) at Grand Central. The electric version were not allowed inside the terminal,. Sam Rutherford Both come with all-new cylindrical battery packs with 20 percent higher energy density and capacities up to 112.5 kWh. Combined with increased drive system efficiency, they'll power the BMW i7 60 xDrive up to an EPA-estimated 350 miles on a charge. You'll also be able to charge them quicker thanks to the higher 250 kW charging rate. The company claims they'll go from 10 to 80 percent in just 28 minutes with a compatible charger. The i7 50 xDrive's dual motors offer up to 449 hp and 487 lb-ft of torque, allowing acceleration from 0 to 60 mph in 5.3 seconds with a 130 mph top speed. The i7 60 xDrive, meanwhile, packs 536 hp and 549 lb-ft of torque for a 0 to 60 mph time of just 4.6 seconds and a top speed (electronically limited) of 149 mph. They'll also feature a new adaptive recuperation system that takes traffic lights into account and can automatically brake. Drivers can choose from high, medium or low brake energy recuperation, with the high setting offering a one-pedal feeling. BMW also introduced AI-powered charging optimized route planning to include charging stops if a destination is outside the vehicle's range. It can even precondition the battery to an ideal temperature to increase the charging rate as soon as the vehicle is plugged in. The i7 50 xDrive and i7 60 xDrive are debuting today at Auto China 2026 in Beijing and at a special New York City event at Grand Central Terminal. Production begins in July 2026 and they'll be priced starting at $106,200 and $124,700 (plus $1,550 destination and handling) respectively. BMW is also introducing the 750e xDrive PHEV arriving in 2027, which pairs a 308 hp six cylinder inline engine with a 194 hp electric motor for a combined peak 483 hp and 516 lb-ft of torque. No electric-only range was specified, but the top speed on all-electric power will be limited to 87 mph. That model will start production in Q4 2026, with no price yet announced. Finally, BMW's 740 and 740 xDrive ICE vehicles will offer up to 394 hp and 398 lb-ft of torque, offering sub-five second 0 to 60 mph sprint times and 155 mph top speeds. They'll arrive later this year at $99,800 and $102,800 respectively. All of the new 7-series models and drivetrain variants, including EVs, will be built on a single production line at BMW's Group Plant in Dingolfing. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/transportation/evs/bmws-new-i7-xdrive-evs-will-offer-longer-range-and-faster-charging-131059423.html?src=rss

Yoshi and the Mysterious Book preview: A choose-your-own-adventure even adults can love

Yoshi's solo titles have always been a product of contrasts: lovingly crafted art styles belying somewhat thin gameplay meant to appeal to a younger audience. But after getting the chance to preview Yoshi and the Mysterious Book , it feels like Nintendo has created a cozy side-scroller that retains the accessibility of earlier titles while adding extra depth and replayability for gamers of all ages. As you'd expect from Nintendo's lovable green dino, Yoshi's moveset consists of familiar techniques like his signature ground pound, egg toss, extendable tongue and jumping flutter kicks, the latter of which now last longer than ever before. Seriously, if you get enough height, you can float across entire levels. However, one new mechanic is that Yoshi now also possesses a tail flick that allows him to toss certain enemies onto his back. Not only is this a nice twist after years of often being treated as a beast of burden by Mario and co., it also allows Yoshi to use whoever he's carrying to interact with other elements in the stage. By flicking a Crayzee Dayzee (one of the new flower characters) into his saddle, Yoshi can make plants bloom to earn stars and uncover secrets, for example. Instead of selecting a stage based on its location, in Yoshi and the Mysterious Book you choose new levels by picking which character you'd like to meet next. Nintendo Instead of simply remixing the gorgeous textile-inspired visuals we saw in Yoshi's Woolly World and Yoshi's Crafted World , Nintendo opted for a treatment that looks like a children's bedtime story. The game looks hand-drawn, while also featuring a cell-shaded effect that adds extra depth and impact to characters and backgrounds. Animations have a sort of hitch (which I initially mistook for a bug) that gives them a stop-motion effect, as if you're seeing the pages of a flipbook whiz by instead of frames being refreshed on a digital display. But the biggest change in Yoshi and the Mysterious Book is that it's not a traditional side-scrolling format. In many ways, this title plays like a mix between an adventure game and a platformer. Instead of just running to the right as fast as possible, the game encourages you to explore, experiment, backtrack and see what kind of new hijinks Yoshi can discover. Don't do what I did and mindlessly run around and eat up every enemy you see, because there's a good chance they are more valuable alive instead of being turned into an egg. It's almost like Nintendo applied a similar approach to subverting expectations in Super Mario Bros. Wonder , but builds on that style of gameplay even more here. Now Yoshi is in control of who gets to ride on his back. Nintendo To really drive home the children's storybook conceit, Yoshi and the Mysterious Book gives you greater control over how you unlock and explore new levels. Instead of linearly moving from one stage to the next, you actually select stages by moving a magnifying glass over a new character, allowing you to learn who they are experientially. Collect enough stars from quests and you can decide where you'll go and who you'll meet next, while spending tokens found throughout each level allows you to reveal hints about how to find and complete specific objectives. Then, once you finish a stage, Mr E. (who is both the titular book and acts as the game's narrator), allows you to name each new character whatever you like. Instead of fighting, sometimes Yoshi just needs to help out Shy Guys by flicking them on his back and bringing them back home. Nintendo The one thing that may rub old-school sidescroller fans the wrong way though is that Yoshi doesn't take damage for all intents and purposes, he's invincible. This is great for kids because they don't need to worry about running out of lives or looking for coins to heal. But after playing through a couple of chapters, I found that the game can still be quite challenging the learning process is just a bit more forgiving. One objective required me to bounce off the heads of a series of Croakaokes (the chubby amphibians that make sounds when you jump on them) to the tune of Mary had a little lamb while trying to reach a high-up platform. If you play a note out of order or miss a jump, it's not game over, but you will need to start over from the bottom. And even without damage, enemies like Bunchabees will still chase you around and disrupt your adventuring if you try to ignore them. Croakaokes love to sing when Yoshi jumps on their head. Nintendo Yoshi's latest adventure might not be a super traditional side-scrolling platformer, but it offers a fresh take on the genre while also providing a new level of exploration and adventure for gamers of all ages. But I suppose the real test will be if it gets my own kid's seal of approval. Yoshi and the Mysterious Book is available for pre-order now for the Switch 2 before official sales begin on May 21 ($70 for a physical copy or $60 for a digital download). This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/nintendo/yoshi-and-the-mysterious-book-preview-a-choose-your-own-adventure-even-adults-can-love-130000507.html?src=rss

Anker's 'Thus' chip brings AI to its headphones and other products

Anker has announced its own chip that can give its small, wearable products AI capabilities that run locally on device. The company is planning to debut the chip called Thus on a new model of headphones, slated to be unveiled at its Anker Day event on May 21. Anker calls Thus the first Compute-in-Memory (CIM) AI audio chip with neural networks. The company explains that Thus is inspired by the workings of the human brain in that the storage and processing of information takes place in one location instead of keeping them separate, similar to how it works on modern chips for computers. Thus integrates computing power directly into NOR flash memory cells, which provide faster read speeds than NAND memory. A NOR-based CIM system requires only a tiny space inside devices, which makes it an ideal option for small products like headphones. Anker says headphones are a particularly challenging environment to demonstrate what a new chip can do, because hardly any other device places higher demands on an AI chip. They have a tiny space allotted for components and operate with just a few milliwatts of power, even though they have to consistently provide noise cancellation. If the model delivers, it could be a huge advertisement for Thus, which Anker plans to put in other mobile accessories and IoT devices, as well. While the company has yet to reveal all its upcoming headphones AI-powered capabilities, it did announce one particular feature. Clear Calls, as its called, will cancel noise with a large neural network running entirely on the device, supported by eight MEMS microphones and two bone conduction sensors. Anker says it will enable significantly clearer conversations even in environments that are challenging for conventional noise cancellation. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ai/ankers-thus-chip-brings-ai-to-its-headphones-and-other-products-122142552.html?src=rss

X finally adds custom timelines

Nikita Bier, Xs head of product, has announced the launch of custom timelines, which lets you curate what you see on your feed based on your topics of interest. He called the update one of the biggest changes to X and a huge undertaking that took the team many months to develop. The feature lets you pin specific topics to your home tab, so you can switch from one to the other to see the latest discussions about your interests and hobbies. Bier said that Xs custom timelines is powered by Grok's understanding of every post with the algorithm's personalization. You have 75 topics to choose from, including food, art, photography, business, finance, movies and TV. As youd expect, the personalization aspect of the feature works better if its a topic you already engage with regularly. Xs new feature is similar to Blueskys and Threads custom feeds, which also allow you to pin topic-based timelines to the home screens of the apps, and which their users have been enjoying since 2023 and 2024, respectively. At the moment, Xs custom timelines is still in its early access phase and is only available to Premium subscribers on iOS. It will be rolling out to Premium users on Android very soon, as well. Bier has also announced that X has released a tool to snooze topics on the For You tab. With the tool, youll be able to hide certain topics, such as politics or sports, for 24 hours from your feed. Its now available for Premium users on iOS and the web. Ladies and gentlemen, today we're launching one of our biggest changes to Introducing Custom Timelines This feature allows you to pin a specific topic to your home tab. With support for over 75 topics, you can dive deep into your favorite niche on X. It's powered by Grok's pic.twitter.com/9jkIEXvubj Nikita Bier (@nikitabier) April 21, 2026 This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/social-media/x-finally-adds-custom-timelines-103130966.html?src=rss

SpaceX and Cursor strike partnership that might end in a $60 billion acquisition

SpaceX and AI company Cursor have struck a new partnership that could see the owner of X buy the AI company for $60 billion later this year. SpaceXAI and @cursor_ai are now working closely together to create the worlds best coding and knowledge work AI, SpaceX wrote in a post on X. SpaceXAI and @cursor_ai are now working closely together to create the worlds best coding and knowledge work AI. The combination of Cursors leading product and distribution to expert software engineers with SpaceXs million H100 equivalent Colossus training supercomputer will SpaceX (@SpaceX) April 21, 2026 According to SpaceX, the deal allows for it to either invest $10 billion into the company known for its AI coding tool, or acquire it entirely later this year for $60 billion. If an acquisition were to happen, it's not clear at what point Cursor could officially join the fold of Elon Musk's rapidly expanding and increasingly enmeshed web of companies. SpaceX bought xAI, the billionaire's AI company that also controls X , earlier this year . SpaceX is currently getting ready to go public this summer in what will likely be the biggest initial public offering (IPO) in history. Cursor, which has reportedly been in talks to raise its own $2 billion round of funding, is known for its AI coding tool of the same name that's become the vibe coding platform of choice for many developers. It allows people to use either its own models or those from other leading AI companies, including OpenAI, Google, Anthropic and xAI. In a statement , Cursor said its partnership with SpaceX will accelerate our model training efforts while addressing infrastructure-related issues that have slowed it down in the past. We've wanted to push our training efforts much further, but we've been bottlenecked by compute, the company said. With this partnership, our team will leverage xAI's Colossus infrastructure to dramatically scale up the intelligence of our models for coding and beyond. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ai/spacex-and-cursor-strike-partnership-that-might-end-in-a-60-billion-acquisition-232131487.html?src=rss

Mozilla says it patched 271 Firefox vulnerabilities thanks to Anthropic's Claude Mythos

Anthropic's buzzy announcement about using AI to improve cybersecurity earlier this month was met with plenty of skepticism. However, Mozilla shared some details that support use of the company's special Claude Mythos Preview model as a way to protect critical services. Using Mythos helped Mozilla's team find and patch 271 vulnerabilities in the latest release of the Firefox browser. So far weve found no category or complexity of vulnerability that humans can find that this model cant, the foundation said. The blog post from Mozilla feels like a positive sign for Anthropic's Project Glasswing. Obviously the AI company would want to put itself in the best possible light while presenting its own initiative, but there's something encouraging about hearing the benefits from a third party. Mozilla also noted that in its time with Claude Mythos, the AI wasn't able to turn up any bugs that a human wouldn't have been able to find, given enough time and resources, which indicates that AI isn't presently able to do more to crack cybersecurity protections than a person can. An organizaion successfully using AI for good is certainly a refreshing change of pace in tech news. And for those Firefox users who aren't personally interested in applying any generative AI in their browsing, Mozilla has given the option to turn it all off for the past several months. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ai/mozilla-says-it-patched-271-firefox-vulnerabilities-thanks-to-anthropics-claude-mythos-224330023.html?src=rss

Cash App now supports accounts for kids 6-12

Cash App, the banking and payments app run by Block, has added support for parent-managed kids accounts . The new accounts include key benefits from the service's normal account, with an eye towards teaching financial literacy to younger users ages 6 to 12. Cash App first allowed teenage users on its platform in 2021. As part of the expanded Cash App Families experience, eligible legal guardians and parents can create managed accounts that offer a dedicated place on the platform to send allowances, set aside savings, and track spending for their child, kickstarting their path to financial independence, Cash App says. Adults managing these accounts will be able to set up recurring transfers, see how their child is spending and do things like lock their child's account to prevent transactions. Kids will get a custom debit card and the ability to receive payments from up to five trusted accounts, though notably they won't be able to access Cash App itself. Today, we're launching Cash App accounts for kids age 6-12. Parents manage the accounts. Kids get to learn about safety, start saving for goals, and design and use their own debit card. Next generation banking never looked so good. Proud of the team for this one. pic.twitter.com/jIAcbvsfB9 Kristen Anderson (@FintechKristen) April 21, 2026 Cash App says managed accounts are designed for kids 6 through 12. Once those kids turn 13, Cash App says parents will be able to choose to convert their account to a sponsored account to unlock more features, like the ability to send and receive payments, invest in stocks or trade crypto. Those sponsored accounts are technically still monitored and controlled by a parent or legal guardian, but they do give 13-year-olds more control over how they use their money. A parent-managed account for kids is not a new idea in the fintech space, though Cash App is trying to reach a younger audience than some of its competitors. Venmo rolled out access to its payment platform to teens between the ages of 13 to 17 in 2023. Separately, both Apple and Google also offer their own kids accounts in Google Wallet and Apple Cash Family . This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/apps/cash-app-now-supports-accounts-for-kids-6-12-210651025.html?src=rss

YouTube is muting push notifications from channels you don't watch

YouTube notifications can get messy fast, particularly if youre subscribed to a lot of different channels. To address that, today the company will begin muting push notifications from creators that you havent engaged with in the last month. The change to YouTube notifications began as a small trial the company tested out earlier this year. The idea behind it is that if a viewer continually receives notifications about content they don't engage with, this may eventually cause the user to disable YouTube notifications altogether. Now obviously, this is bad for YouTube. Turning off notifications means people will use the platform less, thereby resulting in lower revenue. However, it's also bad for content creators, especially the ones you do like, who will have one fewer avenue to keep you updated about new and upcoming videos. So starting today, for channels that you have subscribed to and have notifications set to all, YouTube will no longer send out push notifications to mobile devices from creators that you haven't interacted with for one month. That said, these notifications will continue to be available inside the YouTube app in your inbox (the little bell icon in the top right). Notably, for those who are clicking on notifications and watching related videos, nothing will change. Additionally, based on info from the test earlier this year, YouTube said channels that upload infrequently will not have their notifications affected. This is a good thing, especially for creators who post long-form content that takes extra time to make, as people probably don't want notifications to go away in case they happen to miss a once-a-month upload. The one thing that's unclear is if you start watching a channel again that you have not interacted with in a while, is if YouTube will automatically restart related push notifications. However, as a way to prevent too many alerts from clogging up your phone, YouTube's new protocol seems like a good way to cut down on the clutter. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/entertainment/youtube/youtube-is-muting-push-notifications-from-channels-you-dont-watch-205119228.html?src=rss

AI company deletes the 3 million OKCupid photos it used for facial recognition training

When online platforms violate their own privacy policies to sell your photos, have no fear: They just might have to pay an undisclosed settlement fee 12 years later. (Who says justice is dead?) According to Reuters , AI company Clarifai says it has deleted 3 million profile photos taken from dating site OkCupid in 2014. It follows a settlement reached last month between the FTC and Match Group , OkCupid's owner. The Delaware-based Clarifai reportedly certified the data deletion to the FTC on April 7. The company also confirmed to US Representative Lori Trahan (D-MA) that it deleted any models that trained on the data. Clarifai told the representative's office that it hadn't shared the data with third parties. The FTC opened the investigation in 2019, after The New York Times reported that Clarifai had built a training database using OkCupid dating profile photos. The behavior was a direct violation of OkCupids privacy policy. Court documents reviewed by Reuters reveal that Clarifai asked OkCupid executives for the data in 2014. Apparently, they obliged. Clarifai uses this creepy facial profiling example to sell its services. Clarifai We're collecting data now and just realized that OkCupid must have a HUGE amount of awesome data for this, Clarifai founder Matthew Zeiler wrote in an email to OkCupid co-founder Maxwell Krohn. The AI startup used the dating site's images to build a facial recognition service that can identify a person's age, gender and race. (Another brilliant and totally ethical idea from Clarifai, tapping into unsecured city surveillance cameras without authorization, was reportedly shuttered.) Zeiller suggested to The New York Times in 2019 that people needed to, well, get over it. There has to be some level of trust with tech companies like Clarifai to put powerful technology to good use, and get comfortable with that, the AI founder declared. Some of OkCupid's founders were reportedly investors in Clarifai. As part of the settlement, the FTC permanently prohibited OkCupid from misrepresenting its data collection and privacy controls. TechCrunch notes how strange it is to use that as a penalty, given that FTC rules already bar that behavior. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ai/ai-company-deletes-the-3-million-okcupid-photos-it-used-for-facial-recognition-training-195223996.html?src=rss

Meta has misled users about scam ads on Facebook and Instagram, lawsuit says

Meta is facing a new lawsuit over its advertising practices. The nonprofit group Consumer Federation of America (CFA) has filed a proposed class-action suit against Meta for failing to protect users from scam ads on Facebook and Instagram. The lawsuit, which was first reported by Wired , alleges that Meta has run afoul of consumer protection laws in Washington D.C. for misleading Facebook and Instagram users about scams on its apps and that the company has chased profits rather than protecting its users. The filing includes numerous examples of alleged scam ads that CFA says it found in Meta's ad library. These include ads promoting a free government iPhone, as well as those claiming to offer $1,400 checks to people born in certain years. Many of the ads use AI videos, according to CFA. Some of examples of alleged scam ads CFA includes in its lawsuit. CFA Meta's advertising practices have been in the spotlight since last year when Reuters reported on internal documents that indicated the company was making billions of dollars from ads promoting scams and banned goods. The report also highlighted how Meta's own processes have at times made it harder for its own employees to fight malicious advertisers. Meta claims it is doing all it can to crack down on scam advertising on its platforms, CFA's lawsuit states. But in reality, Meta has knowingly taken steps and adopted policies that pad its bottom line at the expense of its users safety and well-being. In fact, rather than prohibiting advertisers who the company itself has determined pose a higher risk to its users (as other tech companies like Google have), Meta just charges these advertisers more. The perverse result is that the riskier the advertiser, the more money Meta makes. CFA's allegations misrepresent the reality of our work and we will fight them, a Meta spokesperson said in a statement. We aggressively combat scams across our platforms to protect people and businesses last year alone, we removed over 159 million scam ads, 92% of which we took down before anyone reported them, and took down 10.9 million accounts on Facebook and Instagram associated with criminal scam centers. We fight scams because they are bad for business people don't want them, advertisers don't want them, and we don't want them either. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/social-media/meta-has-misled-users-about-scam-ads-on-facebook-and-instagram-lawsuit-says-193220235.html?src=rss

New York Attorney General sues two prediction markets on illegal gambling allegations

New York is the latest state to take a stand against prediction markets. Attorney General Letitia James has sued Coinbase Financial Markets and Gemini Titan on charges that both are illegally running unlicensed gambling operations. The suit also claims that these prediction markets violate state laws that prevent betting on games involving New York college sports teams. Gambling by another name is still gambling, and it is not exempt from regulation under our state laws and Constitution, James said. Gemini and Coinbases so-called prediction markets are just illegal gambling operations, exposing young people to addictive platforms that lack the necessary guardrails. Multiple states have taken similar actions over the proliferation of prediction markets, but they may face a new roadblock at the federal level. Earlier this month, the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission sued three of the states that have charged prediction markets with running unlicensed gambling. The CFTC claimed that it should be the sole regulator for prediction markets and called the efforts by Arizona, Connecticut and Illinois an overreach of authority. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/new-york-attorney-general-sues-two-prediction-markets-on-illegal-gambling-allegations-192012225.html?src=rss

Florida AG opens criminal investigation into OpenAI and ChatGPT

Florida Attorney General James Ulthmeier has announced that the state's Office of Statewide Prosecution has opened a criminal investigation into OpenAI and ChatGPT. The investigation was opened because the suspect in a mass shooting at Florida State University in 2025 reportedly used ChatGPT in the lead up to the shooting. Per Uthmeier, Florida law states that anyone who aids, abets, or counsels someone in the commission of a crime, and that crime is committed or attempted, may be considered a principal to the crime. That means that the responses provided by ChatGPT to the shooter could be interpreted as the AI assistant aiding and abetting his actions. Or at least that's what Florida seems interested in arguing. OpenAI provided the following statement when asked to comment on the Florida investigation: Last year's mass shooting at Florida State University was a tragedy, but ChatGPT is not responsible for this terrible crime. After learning of the incident, we identified a ChatGPT account believed to be associated with the suspect and proactively shared this information with law enforcement. We continue to cooperate with authorities. In this case, ChatGPT provided factual responses to questions with information that could be found broadly across public sources on the internet, and it did not encourage or promote illegal or harmful activity. ChatGPT is a general-purpose tool used by hundreds of millions of people every day for legitimate purposes. We work continuously to strengthen our safeguards to detect harmful intent, limit misuse, and respond appropriately when safety risks arise. As part of the investigation, Florida has subpoenaed OpenAI for information on all policies and internal training materials related to how the company handles things like users threatening to harm others, threatening to harm themselves and how OpenAI responds to law enforcement. The state is also asking OpenAI to share its organizational chart and any publicly released statements on the shooting. Florida is leading the way in cracking down on AI's use in criminal behavior, and if ChatGPT were a person, it would be facing charges for murder, Attorney General James Uthmeier said. This criminal investigation will determine whether OpenAI bears criminal responsibility for ChatGPT's actions in the shooting at Florida State University last year. Floridas investigation isnt the first time OpenAI has been connected to a mass shooting. Canadian regulators called for OpenAI to change how it approaches threats of harm following a Wall Street Journal report that claimed the company flagged the account of a Canadian shooting suspect in 2025 but failed to bring their threats to law enforcement. The company agreed to new policies around how it works with Canadian law enforcement in March. Separately, OpenAI is still in the midst of a wrongful death lawsuit from 2025 for the role it may have played in the suicide of a teenage user. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ai/florida-ag-opens-criminal-investigation-into-openai-and-chatgpt-190200227.html?src=rss

Netflix's Devil May Cry animated adaptation returns for a second season on May 12

Netflix's hit animated adaptation of the video game series Devil May Cry is returning for a second season on May 12. The streamer has released a full trailer alongside this announcement, after dropping a short teaser several months back . The new footage promises plenty of action and franchise fans will note that protagonist Dante now looks extremely similar to his counterpart from the games. This tracks with what series creator Adi Shankar said last year , when he promised that season two would show the character embrace more of the iconic badassery fans of the game expect. The show, and the games, follow a half-demon demon hunter as he fights to prevent the gates of Hell from opening. The first season was a gigantic hit for the platform, racking up more than 5 million views in its first four days of release. Showrunner Shankar was heavily involved with the animated Castlevania adaptation , also for Netflix. Studio Mir is once again handling the animation, which is always great to see. This is the studio behind The Legend of Korra , X-Men '97 , Kipo and the Age of Wonderbeasts and My Adventures with Superman , among others. The first season of Devil May Cry looked gorgeous, so season two should follow suit. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/entertainment/tv-movies/netflixs-devil-may-cry-animated-adaptation-returns-for-a-second-season-on-may-12-184003226.html?src=rss

Framework is building an eGPU kit for its Laptop 16

Frameworks Laptop 13 Pro may be the star of todays launch, but it is by no means the only product the company is unveiling. Were also seeing some quality-of-life upgrades for the Laptop 16, a new wireless keyboard and a carrying case. Plus, its addressing something a vast number of its own users have demanded for a while: A 10GB Ethernet expansion card. Laptop 16 Framework The top deck of the Laptop 16 is sufficiently customizable that you can cram in any number of modules alongside the keyboard and trackpad. If you want an area blank, then you can just put in the requisite spacer, but that creates an unintended problem for some users. CEO Nirav Patel admitted the areas where the modules sit side-by-side can trap some peoples arm hairs, leading to some unplanned depilations when they move away from the deck. To solve this, the company is releasing a new all-in-one trackpad and all-in-one keyboard cover. The trackpad has also been updated to the same haptic model found in the 13 Pro. Plus, its now available with a lower-end Ryzen 5 340 mainboard as a more affordable entry level model. OCuLink Dev kit At the back of the Laptop 16 is an expansion module slot that either holds a blank unit or the discrete graphics hardware. Last year, the company launched a module with an RTX 5070 inside and, now, its started thinking about using it for eGPUs as well. The OCuLink Dev Kit (pictured, above) is a prototype board using OCuLink 8i which can connect directly to your mainboard over its native PCIe lanes. If you already own a blank module, you wont need to buy a replacement either. Framework has ensured you can simply drop the OCuLink board into the slots of your existing one. As well as the board, the kit includes an OCuLink Dock thatll let you slot in any off-the-shelf PCIe card including GPUs, 100Gb Ethernet and video capture and run it as if you had your very own desktop. Sadly, its not yet ready for prime time and so far all the company has said is well see more about the hardware later this year. Wireless Touchpad Keyboard Framework Theres one living room keyboard that everyone owns, that Logitech keyboard they havent updated in 15 years, said Patel. Ive got two of them, polled the team, and a bunch of them all have the same keyboard, he added. But Patels frustration drove him and his team to build their own, better model, which has been an idea since development work started on the Framework Desktop . It was only when the team learned that the Desktop was being used as a living room PC, however, that they actually brought it to market. It is, in fact, using the same excellent keyboard hardware as found on the Framework Laptop 12, repackaged for its all-in-one form. Laptop Sleeve Framework Frameworks built a laptop sleeve containing extra pockets for your spare expansion cards and screwdriver. Patel said that the real focus was on ensuring the materials used had as small a carbon footprint as possible. 10Gb Ethernet Expansion Card Framework / WisdPi Rounding out the announcements is a 10Gb Ethernet expansion card for users who want a faster wired internet experience than the current 2.5Gb model. But this isnt a Framework product per-se, but was designed and developed by hardware makers Wisdpi. Patel said the community is so passionate that theyre constantly looking at new chip and hardware announcements. They then head to the companys forums to ask Hey, like, can we get a Framework version of this? he explained. The advent of a slender 10Gb Ethernet chip was enough to inspire one third-party developer to build an Expansion Card module to harness it. Basically, we got in contact with them, said Patel and offered some guidance to help build the module. And once it was finished, Framework is now acting as a reseller to enable the whole community to easily buy it. Patel admitted that a 10Gb Ethernet Card would inevitably cater to a fairly niche customer, but love to see a third party come in and fill that gap. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/computing/laptops/framework-is-building-an-egpu-kit-for-its-laptop-16-181516238.html?src=rss

Framework launches the Laptop 13 Pro with Intel's new Panther Lake chips

Frameworks lineup of modular, repairable laptops has seen the company grow from a niche to the mainstream. Now, the company is launching a pro version of its 13-inch laptop, but its still held close to all of its principles. Because while this all-new version has plenty of bells and whistles, almost all of its components are still instantly compatible with the rest of the range. You can take a part from this new 13 Pro, and install it into the first-generation 13 launched back in 2021 without much fuss. Framework Laptop 13 Pro is touted as a ground up redesign of the existing 13, taking into account feedback from its dedicated and passionate users. That includes a far bigger battery, new chassis, new memory, haptic trackpad and a custom touch display. It also comes in black and, even in the press images, its immediately clear its a better color for the companys austere industrial design. CEO Nirav Patel smiled knowingly when I said its immediately evocative of a ThinkPad, and I mean that in the most complimentary way. Framework The biggest change has been to boost the battery to 74Wh to address gripes about longevity. Its the second time Framework has boosted the cell size, which started at 55Wh and presently runs to 61Wh. To make the battery fit, the bottom of the chassis has been redesigned, filling out the chamfers present on the existing 13. Framework says the Pros lifespan will hit 20 hours of uptime while streaming Netflix in 4K, and says itll post the videos to YouTube to prove it. Given the redesigned lower chassis, the new battery is the one part you cant simply drop into an older machine. Youll need the new bottom cover to fit, explained Patel, but because weve also increased the thickness of the battery, you have to switch over to the new input cover that has the haptic trackpad. Patel added while you may need to pair up some parts from upgrades, theres no component that you cant retrofit. The new chassis means the speakers are now side-firing, and are now Dolby Atmos-certified. The bigger battery is working in tandem with Intels new Core Ultra Series 3 chips which promise to be incredibly efficient. Both Intel and Framework are sure the Panther Lake silicon is going to sip at that beefy battery, but with enough grunt to play AAA games. Users will get the pick of a Core Ultra 5, X7 or X9, with the promise all of them will be able to eat a game like Cyberpunk 2077 for breakfast, lunch and dinner. At the same time, the Pro will also launch with an AMD Ryzen AI 300 series mainboard option, which are the same mainboards found on the 2025 Laptop 13. Framework The last major shift has been in the RAM, going from regular SO-DIMMs to LPCAMM2. The newer hardware design enables the use of LPDDR5X RAM with its better power efficiency and faster memory bandwidth. And its not soldered to the board, so you can add in more at some unspecified future date. Which is important if, I dunno, for some reason the global RAM market suddenly crunches and you need to mortgage a kidney for a single stick. Naturally, I wanted to know how this would impact the laptops thermals, Frameworks weak spot. Patel said the mainboards cooling has been tweaked (once again), this time with some extra help from Intel. He added the Pro he was using to run our call hadnt spun up its fans in half an hour which, for a Framework, is a big deal. As always, Ill reserve judgment until Ive seen the thing in person. The Pro is also a way for Patel to fix some of the compromises the company had to make at its genesis. As a startup six years ago, we just didnt have access, said Patel, when we go to a display vendor [now] and say we want a custom panel they say okay, lets talk specs rather than who are you? The 13 Pro ships with a 13.5-inch, 3:2, 2,880 x 1,920 touch display with a variable refresh rate between 30 and 120Hz. Its backlight pushes all the way to 700nits, it has a 1800:1 contrast ratio and per-unit color calibration. I was surprised the 13 Pro has touch given its still a 13-inch productivity notebook without a wraparound hinge. All the way back in 2021, when we first launched, we were getting asked for touch support, said Patel. But the company was naturally resistant, assuming touch was an unnecessary addition for a machine of this class. It was only when building the Laptop 12 did the team find it to be quite useful. It was a slam dunk. We know people want it, we used it on the 12, we like it and it doesnt actually cost that much. Lets just add it in, said Patel. Framework Framework knows touchpads are a weak spot for Windows laptops when compared to those made by Apple. Consequently, the Pro 13 has a haptic touchpad with four piezo elements that, its hoped, will stand shoulder-to-shoulder with a MacBook Pro. The new input cover keeps the came keyboard and fingerprint sensor, wisely not touching a feature that isnt broken and doesnt need fixing. What is cool, however, is the more punky gray and black aesthetic on the keyboard that splits the difference between a ThinkPad and a cyberdeck. A big part of this goes back to the idea to build the ultimate developer laptop, said Patel. Existing Framework owners may be concerned about how this will affect their machines longevity. The company might not like me saying, but to me, the Pro name is only meaningful if youre buying a new machine off the shelf with the new features in one package. Theres nothing stopping you from upgrading your existing machine to match the pro in one go, or as your needs evolve. Thats fundamentally the companys greatest strength, since it has committed to bringing every single one of its existing users along. But doesnt make for the splashiest headlines when it comes to debut a new product. Framework Laptop 13 Pro is available to pre-order today, with the first shipments due to start in June. The base-model pre-built Windows system will start at $1,699, while the DIY model will set you back $1,199. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/computing/laptops/framework-launches-the-laptop-13-pro-with-intels-new-panther-lake-chips-181503934.html?src=rss

Monterey Park, California has banned any data centers within its city limits

Monterey Park's city council has moved to ban construction of any data centers within its borders. The California city's leaders placed a permanent ban on these buildings, labelling them a public nuisance. A proposed plan to construct a 250,000 square foot data center was stopped after residents and advocates pushed back against the project. Tech journalist Brian Merchant reported on the public comment phase of the city council meeting where residents spoke decisively about data centers. I can tell you that this issue has brought left, right and center together. Its a quality of life issue, one commenter said. Dont let the rich steal our future. Monterey Park may be the first US city to lay down the law blocking data center projects, but others are primed to follow suit. New York's state leadership is working on legislation that would prevent data center construction for three years . Maine has a similar bill that has already made it to the governor's desk. At the federal level, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) and Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT) have proposed a ban on building new data centers until there are more guardrails in place for AI development and environmental security. Existing facilities have also faced some pushback. For instance, the NAACP is suing xAI for alleged violations of the Clean Air Act at its data center in South Memphis. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ai/monterey-park-california-has-banned-any-data-centers-within-its-city-limits-180426656.html?src=rss

NASA's Curiosity Rover found promising organic chemicals on Mars

The search for signs of life on Mars continues to yield promising data. Afirst-of-its-kind wet chemistry experiment, published Tuesday in Nature , confirmed the presence of essential ingredients of life preserved in ancient Martian sandstones. The molecules were found inside 3.5-billion-year-old sandstone. NASA's Curiosity rover collected the clay-filled rocks from an area called Glen Torridon, inside Mars' enormous Gale Crater. The rover's Sample Analysis at Mars (SAM) mobile instrument suite analyzed the data. The experiment was unique as the first off-Earth study to use the chemical tetramethylammonium hydroxide (TMAH). The reagent allows Curiosity to break down larger organic molecules on the Martian surface, reducing them to something the rover's instruments can read. It revealed the presence of over 20 different organic molecules. Among the data was confirmation of naphthalene and benzothiophene, some of the largest and most complex organic compounds discovered on the Red Planet. The experiment also yielded the first detection of a possible N-heterocycles, which DNA and RNA are built upon. NASA That detection is pretty profound because these structures can be chemical precursors to more complex nitrogen-bearing molecules, the papers lead author, Amy Williams, wrote in NASAs announcement . Nitrogen heterocycles have never been found before on the Martian surface or confirmed in Martian meteorites. As with previous discoveries of organic material on Mars , this one is not yet the smoking gun we've been waiting for. But it adds to a growing body of evidence that, at a minimum, the foundations of life as we know it were present on an ancient version of the planet. The study also confirms that organic material can survive on Mars for billions of years, which will encourage future experiments. The paper's authors say the data will help NASA to optimize its second (and final) TMAH experiment on Curiosity. It also opens the door to future TMAH tests on the Rosalind Franklin Mars rover and the Dragonfly mission to Saturn's moon, Titan . Both missions are scheduled for 2028 at the earliest. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/science/space/nasas-curiosity-rover-found-promising-organic-chemicals-on-mars-174514375.html?src=rss

Silo's season 3 trailer takes us back to how it all began

The relatively long wait for the third season of Silo is nearly over. Apple TV just announced the dystopian sci-fi hit returns on July 3 , with episodes airing each Friday until September 4. We have long championed this show , calling it another gem for the platform. The streamer has dropped a short teaser for the upcoming season and it confirms rumors of an increased focus on the efore times via a storyline that was introduced in the finale of season two. The trailer depicts scenes from both time periods, as protagonist Juliette, played by Rebecca Ferguson, speaks in voiceover. Before we can know why were here. Before we can know everything is as it is. Before we know how it all will end, we need to understand how it all began, she says, alluding to the creation of the various bunkers littered throughout the post-apocalyptic wasteland. For the uninitiated, Silo is an adaptation of Hugh Howey's Wool series of books. It's primarily set in the titular silo, a society of around 10,000 people living deep underground. The show is sort of like Fallout , but without the radioactive monsters and nihilistic sense of humor. Silo stars Ferguson, along with Tim Robbins, Common and Steve Zahn. Cast members joining the show for season three include Colin Hanks, Jessica Henwick and Ashley Zukerman. The show has already been renewed for a fourth and final season . This is a busy summer for sci-fi on Apple TV. The second season of Dark Matter premieres on August 28, which is uncharted territory as the first season was based on a book that doesn't have a sequel. Star City , a spinoff of For All Mankind , premieres on May 29 . This is the same day that For All Mankind concludes its fifth and penultimate season. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/entertainment/tv-movies/silos-season-3-trailer-takes-us-back-to-how-it-all-began-171033410.html?src=rss

Oppo announces the Find X9 Ultra with a 50MP 10x optical zoom telephoto camera

Elbowing for attention alongside Vivo and Xiaomi, Oppo has finally launched its long-teased ultra version of its flagship smartphone. The Find X9 Ultra is another camera-first smartphone from Oppo, with an even more impressive spec sheet and a new array of accessories. Were not even halfway through 2026 and weve been spoiled with choices, whether its the Galaxy S26 Ultra, the Xiaomi 17 Ultra (with or without Leica livery) or Vivos X300 Ultra. The Find X9 Pro was already a powerful, capable camera phone. So, whats changed with the Ultra? Weve had the base device for over a week, but were waiting on the upgraded telephoto converter kit to land before we tackle a more in-depth review. There are several design changes, starting with the two color options. Canyon Orange looks similar to Oppos recent flagship phones, with a subtle etched finish meant to replicate the Grand Canyon. Meanwhile, Hasselblad fans might prefer the other option: a woodland-themed Tundra Umber, inspired by the camera makers X2D. Oppo says this colorway channels Scandinavian minimalism and the raw elegance of glaciers. Together at last. Image by Mat Smith for Engadget Perhaps due to all the camera hardware, its a big, thick phone with the camera unit protruding noticeably from the back. The camera array on the Ultra now has a subtle hexagonal design, apparently a nod to camera history and that Hasselblad partnership. That area has a circular, metal frame, like many of Oppos rivals. The edges of the camera unit are knurled, which helps you to grip the device when taking photos. Unlike Xiaomis recent Ultra phone , the ring doesnt act as a zoom control, but Oppo and Hasselblads Earth Explorer Kit for the Find X9 Ultra adds a very understated camera grip with a zoom lever. Putting last years Find X9 Pro next to the X9 Ultra, the Ultra model looks more modern, more advanced and more powerful. And it is. The Ultra has Qualcomms Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 chip, a notable step up from the MediaTek Dimensity 9500 chip found on last years Find 9 Pro. Theres also a 7,050mAh silicon-carbon battery that supports 100W SUPERVOOC charging. Oppo says it has included the industrys first encapsulated thermal unit to keep temperatures under control when pushing the device hard, such as recording high-resolution video for extended periods. The display screams expensive Android flagship, too. The 6.82-inch 144Hz display can reach up to 3,600 nits of peak HDR brightness and drop to 1 nit in low-lit situations. Image by Mat Smith for Engadget Its all about the cameras, however. The Find X9 Ultras main camera is a 200-megapixel sensor. At 1/1.12 inches, Oppo says its the largest 200MP sensor in a phone yet. It has a low f/1.5 aperture, too. This was my main camera when I first started taking the X9 Ultra out to shoot sample photos. After all, bigger sensors mean more detail, and more ability to crop for tighter zoomed shots. With a mixture of streetlights, neon signs and more, I was impressed by the color accuracy. Oppo has embedded a new True Color Camera into the Find X9 Ultras camera module, which works across stills and video. Still, if youre demanding punchy, high-contrast images, theres an array of Hasselblad filters and effects for playing with, too. Image by Mat Smith for Engadget Theres also a 3x Telephoto camera, with another (different!) 200MP sensor and f/2.2 aperture. This is the camera that the new teleconverter lens attaches to. Theres something appealing about having an instant 3x zoom camera, even though it gets a little lost among the cropped focal-length equivalents in the camera app. In fact, Oppo claims that the Find X9 Ultra offers the equivalent of eight focal lengths. Sadly, I noticed some differences in color temperature and light sensitivity as the Find X9 Ultra hopped between all those camera sensors while I tested different zoom levels. Images by Mat Smith for Engadget The next camera is another telephoto, with an impressive 10x zoom with a 50 megapixel sensor. Weve seen 10x zoom on phones before, like the Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra, but never at such high resolution. Oppo added support for its Portrait mode here, even at full zoom. You can also crop in for a 20x zoom, but the results didnt blow me away in early testing. At 10x zoom, though, I was impressed. Thats a lot of zoom before even thinking about attaching a teleconverter. Oppo isnt going quite as hard on video as its rival (and distant corporate relative) Vivo, but the Find X9 Ultra can capture 4K 60 fps video with Dolby Vision. Its also the first Oppo smartphone capable of recording 8K video at 30 fps. For those looking to dig into video detail, Oppo has launched a new log profile, O-Log2. The company says this will help reveal greater shadow detail and reduce image smearing its something else Im itching to try once the teleconverter lands. Images by Mat Smith for Engadget Like Vivo's X300 Ultra, Oppos newest phone is certified for the Academy Color Encoding System (ACES), so videographers can integrate its footage into professional workflows. You can also load third-party LUTs (look-up tables) directly onto the device to monitor custom color grades in real time and see how they look in the on-device preview. As is often the case with Chinese phone makers, theres a lavish accessory kit to build on the smartphones shooting talents. Oppos Hasselblad Explorer case adds a two-stage focus button and the aforementioned zoom controls. The case has the same muted black and clay colors as the Tundra Umber edition of the Find X9 Ultra. Then theres the new Hasselblad 300mm Explorer Teleconverter. The magnification ratio of the teleconverter has been increased from 3.28x on Find X9 Pro to around 4.3x on the Find X9 Ultra. The lens mounts directly onto the 200-megapixel 3x telephoto lens, upgrading it to a heady 13x optical zoom. Image by Mat Smith for Engadget This is also the biggest smartphone telephoto lens yet, dwarfing both the Find X9 Pros add-on and Vivos not-petite 400mm teleconverter. The companies chose different combinations of camera sensors and lenses, making spec sheet comparisons a little trickier, but Oppos latest accessory is certainly the largest thus far. I cant wait to see how the Find X9 Ultras photos fare against images from the Vivo X300 Ultra, though. In the Find X9 Ultras favor, it has an iPhone 17 Pro-like touch-sensitive button for quickly launching the camera, something I missed on Vivos new flagship. Unfortunately, there is no cross-compatibility among previous Oppo teleconverters and phones. The company says this is to ensure optimal image quality, but itll disappoint faithful Oppo fans hoping to carry over the expensive camera accessories from previous years. The company has learned some lessons from the Find X9 Pro, with a new telephoto adapter that can be left mounted on the phone without obscuring the other camera lenses. On first impression, the Find X9 Ultra is shaping up to be another powerful camera phone, with another hard-to-actually-buy caveat. The Find X9 Ultra will arrive in parts of Asia and Europe. In the UK, its set to launch on May 8th, priced at 1,449 (roughly $1,959). While theres no US release planned, well update this story when we hear more details on the global launch. Once the telephoto add-on arrives, Im excited to put it through its paces. Ive got its rival from Vivo too, so its time for the battle of the teleconverters. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/mobile/smartphones/oppo-find-x9-ultra--50mp-10x-optical-zoom-telephoto-release-date-price-170052539.html?src=rss

Xbox cuts Game Pass prices but new Call of Duty games will no longer hit the service on day one

Xbox is cutting the prices of both Game Pass Ultimate and PC Game Pass, effective immediately, but theres one big caveat. First, the good news: Game Pass Ultimate now costs $23 per month, down from $30. PC Game Pass will now run you $14 a month instead of $16.50. The Xbox team noted in a blog post that prices may vary by region. Thats a smart, much-needed decision. In a memo that leaked last week, new Microsoft Gaming CEO Asha Sharma expressed concern over the high price of Game Pass, stating that it has become too expensive for players, so we need a better value equation. Long term, we will evolve Game Pass into a more flexible system which will take time to test and learn around. Sharma reiterated that publicly in a post on X . Game Pass Ultimate has become too expensive for too many players. Starting today, were dropping the price from $29.99 to $22.99/month. Future Call of Duty titles will no longer join Game Pass Ultimate on day one. They will join this tier the following holiday after launch (about Asha (@asha_shar) April 21, 2026 In October, Microsoft increased Game Pass Ultimate to $30 per month, which was a 50 percent price hike. It was the second time in 15 months that the company had jacked up the monthly fee, making it an unjustifiable expense for many . The price of a PC Game Pass subscription also rose by $4.50 per month, and now Microsoft is bringing that back down a bit too. Our players cover a wide breadth of geographies, preferences, and tastes, so while thereisnta single modelthatsbest for everyone, this change responds to a lot of feedbackwevegotten so far, the Xbox team wrote. Wellcontinue to listen and learn. There is one giant tradeoff here: new Call of Duty games will no longer be available on Game Pass Ultimate or PC Game Pass on day one. Theyll eventually hit those tiers about a year later, during the following holiday season. That means Call of Duty titles will be the only first-party Xbox games that dont hit Game Pass on their release date. This, of course, is an attempt to generate more revenue from one of the biggest gaming franchises in the world. Call of Duty is a major reason why Microsoft shelled out $68.7 billion to buy Activision Blizzard a few years back. While Call of Duty fans on PlayStation still had to pay full price for the last few annual releases to play them as soon as possible, Xbox and PC players have been able to hop in to them via Game Pass . (Theres still no sign of Call of Duty on Switch or Switch 2 as yet!) There had been rumors that Microsoft would carve out Call of Duty from the current versions of Game Pass and give those tiers a price cut. Chatter suggests that the company may introduce yet another, higher-level Game Pass tier (or an add-on) that will include day-one Call of Duty games, but theres no official word of that as yet. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/xbox/xbox-cuts-game-pass-prices-but-new-call-of-duty-games-will-no-longer-hit-the-service-on-day-one-163636536.html?src=rss

Google now lets you have full conversations with Gemini for Home

Google announced today that it is upgrading the Gemini for Home service with a continued conversations feature. Continued conversation allows a user to have a natural discussion with the Gemini platform without prefacing every follow-up request with the Hey Google prompt. The microphone will remain active on a smart device for a few seconds after the Gemini AI assistant provides its reply. During that window, the lights on the hardware will pulse or glow, indicating that you can keep chatting normally with the chatbot without needing a wake word. Gemini should retain the context as the conversation progresses, which should allow it to provide the desired information faster without the need for a user to repeat key details. The feature is rolling out today for all Gemini for Home voice assistant languages and in all supported regions. Continued conversations have to be manually enabled in the Google Home app through the settings menu under Gemini for Home voice assistant. Google said that Gemini should be able to distinguish between follow-up questions addressed to the chatbot and other conversations happening in a room, but it should be interesting to track how successful that is given the past history of voice assistants unintentionally eavesdropping. Continued conversation was an option under the Google Assistant platform, but it had more limited availability. Google has been preparing Gemini for Home as a replacement for Google Assistant platform since the fall. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/home/smart-home/google-now-lets-you-have-full-conversations-with-gemini-for-home-160000511.html?src=rss

Samsung brings SmartThings integration to IKEA's Matter devices

Samsung is expanding the SmartThings connectivity platform to include many IKEA products . The company promises seamless integration with the furniture giant's Matter-over-Thread devices , which include stuff like smart lights , air quality sensors, remote controls and smart plugs. This is great news for IKEA fans who want to bark orders at a smart assistant to turn the lights off and on, as Samsung says users will be able to effortlessly incorporate these gadgets into daily life. The SmartThings platform allows for advanced home automation routines . Samsung Samsung says it uilt enhanced integrations for IKEA's devices and that the two companies conducted multiple rounds of validation to enhance connectivity stability and implemented a dedicated user experience within the SmartThings app for full compatibility. This should translate into a plug-and-play experience with minimal frustration. The caveat here is that Matter is already supposed to offer a plug-and-play experience, without the need for this kind of intensive platform-specific work to get things going. IKEA customers have had serious problems connecting the company's Matter devices to networks . Matter is supposed to offer a comprehensive smart home integration solution to manufacturers, but that doesn't look to be working out . Samsung has steadily been improving the SmartThings platform. It recently integrated Siri voice commands . This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/home/smart-home/samsung-brings-smartthings-integration-to-ikeas-matter-devices-151819629.html?src=rss

Splatoon Raiders lands on Nintendo Switch 2 on July 23

Nintendo has padded out the Switch 2 release slate for this summer by revealing that Splatoon Raiders is coming to the console on July 23. This is the first spinoff in the series and while it's a single-player-focused Splatoon game, there is a multiplayer element. Nintendo announced Splatoon Raiders (the title of which is a soft pun on Tomb Raider) last June. You play as a mechanic and after customizing your character's appearance, you'll go hunting for treasure across the Spirhalite Islands. You'll be working with Deep Cut a fictional band that appeared in Splatoon 3 and upgrading your weapons as you take on enemy sea creatures. The colorful, inky action and wacky weapons in the latest trailer remind me a bit of Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart . You can mount Deep Cut member Big Man (a manta ray) as you venture into battle and it seems as though you'll be able to cut through swarms of bad guys by firing a shark at them. Alongside Splatoon Raiders , Nintendo will release an Amiibo pack featuring the three members of Deep Cut. The company also confirmed there's a multiplayer mode in Splatoon Raiders . You'll be able to team up with as many as three friends locally or online to take on raids together. Dont abandon the squad just yet #SplatoonRaiders also lets you invite up to three friends to join you on raids via local wireless or online multiplayer! pic.twitter.com/lpmGMHtHv0 Nintendo UK (@NintendoUK) April 21, 2026 This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/nintendo/splatoon-raiders-lands-on-nintendo-switch-2-on-july-23-140447901.html?src=rss

Chipolo and Secrid team up for a new trackable wallet

Chipolo has built a name for itself as the independent tracking company which happily integrates its products with both Apple and Googles item-finding networks . Today, its announcing a partnership with wallet maker Secrid that, if you havent guessed already, sees the pair launch a compatible miniwallet. The Chipolo x Secrid Miniwallet Trackable is tailor-made to suit Chipolos Card tracker and accentuate all of its positives. For instance, the tracker sits on the back of the wallet, with the Find button accessible from the outside to make it easier to find your phone. If you misplace your device, you can simply press the button and follow the noise back to whichever couch cushions it slid between. Even better, the wallet is designed to amplify the Cards speaker, ensuring youll never not hear it when it goes off. The pair claim that the unit will boost the sound by up to 3dB, for the far more likely these days event you misplace your wallet. The pair are also buffing the hardwares sustainability credentials, made in the EU from responsibly sourced materials. And the tracker itself is made from 50 percent recycled plastic and has a wirelessly rechargeable battery thatll regain all of its mojo after just two hours sat on a Qi pad. If any, or all of that, appeals, then you can order it from today for $140, 120 or 120, depending on your local currency. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/general/chipolo-and-secrid-team-up-for-a-new-trackable-wallet-130035324.html?src=rss

Amazon allegedly pressured companies to raise product prices with other retailers

Rob Bonta, the Attorney General of California, has released an unredacted copy of a legal document that the state filed in relation to its lawsuit against Amazon, containing details of the companys alleged price fixing scheme. In it, the state of California accuses the e-commerce company of reaching out to brands and asking them to fix the retail prices of their products on competitors websites. Due to Amazons overwhelming bargaining leverage and out of fear of punishment, the brands agree to raise their products prices on other retailers like Walmart and Target or to remove them altogether, the filing reads. California filed an antitrust lawsuit accusing Amazon of price fixing back in 2022. It said the company prevented sellers from offering lower prices on other sites and that vendors risked losing buy buttons and prominent listings if they defied Amazon. In February this year, Bonta filed for a preliminary injunction, asking the court to put a stop to Amazons illegal conduct while the states lawsuit is ongoing and waiting to go to trial next year. In the unredacted filing, California said that Amazon instructs vendors and brands to increase their prices on other retailers and threatens them with significant penalties for failure to comply. State officials gave several examples in the filing, including one incident wherein Amazon allegedly emailed security systems provider Arlo . The company talked to Arlo about external price matching, along with a screenshot of one of its cameras on Walmart, noting that its price of $549.93 did not go back up. Arlo reportedly responded that it would get it addressed, and Amazon told the company to get [it] corrected by EOD. Afterward, Arlo sent Amazon a screenshot, showing the same Walmart page now listing the cameras price at $649.99. Amazon ended the conversation by thanking Arlo for its quick action. Other samples include Amazon asking Levis to resolve the lower prices of its khaki pants on Walmart and Hanes to increase the prices of its clothing items on Walmart and Target. Amazon shrugged off the filings release and called Californias case against the company weak. The Attorney Generals motion is a transparent attempt to distract from the weakness of its case, coming more than three years after filing its complaint and based on supposedly new evidence it has had for years, an Amazon spokesperson told Engadget. Amazon is consistently identified as Americas lowest-priced online retailer, and were proud of the low prices customers find when shopping in our store. Amazon looks forward to responding in court at the appropriate time. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/amazon-allegedly-pressured-companies-to-raise-product-prices-with-other-retailers-115302642.html?src=rss

The Morning After: The next CEO of Apple will be hardware exec John Ternus

Apples current SVP of hardware engineering John Ternus will take over as the new CEO when Tim Cook steps down this September . Cook said in a statement: It has been the greatest privilege of my life to be the CEO of Apple and to have been trusted to lead such an extraordinary company. Following the death of co-founder Steve Jobs, Cook led the charge for Apples post-iPhone and iPad era, launching the AirPods, Apple Watch and Vision Pro. He also turned the company into a service provider with the launch of Apple TV, Apple Music and several other subscription services. Cook will transition to a new role as executive chairman of Apples Board of Directors. Ternus joined Apple in 2001 and became VP of hardware engineering in 2013, later transitioning to a senior executive role in 2021. You might have spotted Ternus being prominently featured at the MacBook Neo launch a few months ago. Expect to see a lot more of him. Mat Smith The other big stories this morning DaVinci Resolve 21 hands-on: A viable Lightroom alternative for casual users The Mandalorian and Grogu director used Apple Vision Pro to preview the film in IMAX Palantir posted a manifesto that reads like the ramblings of a comic book villain Meta is testing a WhatsApp Plus subscription Artemis II commander shares a view of Earth vanishing behind the Moon Who else has seen an Earthset? Apollo 17. NASA Weve seen a few beautiful moments from the Artemis II crews history-making trip around the Moon. Now, Reid Wiseman, the missions commander, has something to share. While mission specialist Christina Koch was using a Nikon camera to snap stunning still images of the Earthset, Wiseman used an iPhone 17 Pro Max to film the moment. I could barely see the Moon through the docking hatch window, but the iPhone was the perfect size to catch the view. This was the first time that human eyes had witnessed an Earthset in 54 years, since the Apollo 17 mission. Continue reading. Beijing's robot half-marathon is back for its second year And far less embarrassing results. This year's edition of the robot half-marathon hosted more than 100 competitors, with first place going to Honor and its red-clad robot named Lightning. Last year's event featured many bipedal robots receiving assistance from human operators who ran alongside them, along with some comical mishaps. According to the BBC , around 40 percent of the robots competed autonomously this year, while the rest were remote-controlled. Continue reading. Dyson PencilVac Fluffycones review Almost the perfect floor cleaner for tiny apartments. Engadget The PencilVac is light, mobile and easy to use, making it great for smaller living spaces and quick clean-ups. However, it struggles with thicker carpet and rugs. It could be perfect for a future-forward witch costume next Halloween, though. Continue reading. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/general/the-morning-after-engadget-newsletter-111546149.html?src=rss

Yelp's AI chatbot can now make your dinner reservation

Every business seems to think that its customers want more AI. Yelp is the latest to add more artificial intelligence tools. The review site has upgraded its Yelp Assistant, an agentic AI chatbot, to work across all of Yelp's categories. Yelp Assistant was initially launched in 2024 with a limited scope and then expanded in 2025. With the latest update to its chatbot, Yelp Assistant can handle natural language queries for finding a specific local business. It can also be used to take some additional actions, such as making a restaurant reservation or ordering takeout. Yelp's spring product updates introduced new third-party integrations with Vagaro, ZocDoc and Calendly. Yelp Assistant can also use these integrated services for booking appointments in related fields.The chatbot now has a dedicated Assistant tab in the iOS and Android apps, and it can also be accessed directly from business pages for certain fields, such as restaurants and retail shops. Support for all business types and a desktop version are planned for later in 2026. Other AI features coming to Yelp include a personalized home page on mobile and extra photo discovery tools. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/apps/yelps-ai-chatbot-can-now-make-your-dinner-reservation-110000661.html?src=rss

Homeland Security reportedly wants to develop smart glasses for ICE

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is reportedly developing smart glasses that could be used to collect intelligence on immigrants and US citizens, journalist Ken Klippenstein reported. The devices would help ICE agents identify illegal aliens from a distance by capturing video and comparing it to biometric data like facial recognition and walking gait, according to budget documents seen by Klippenstein. The DHS wants to deploy the ICE Glasses by September 2027. The project will deliver innovative hardware, such as operational prototypes of smart glasses, to equip agents with real-time access to information and biometric identification capabilities in the field, the document states. The glasses could allow agents to compare observed subjects against existing biometric databases and identify them in real time during interactions. Such devices could help make surveillance of US residents ubiquitous, according to the report. It might be portrayed as seeking to identify illegal aliens on the streets, but the reality is that a push in this direction affects all Americans, particularly protestors, a DHS lawyer speaking on the condition of anonymity told Klippenstein. The deployment of such devices is worrying to civil liberty groups, particularly in light of recent law enforcement activities under the Trump administration. The FBI was reportedly directed by the Department of Justice to compile a list of groups or entities who demonstrate anti-Americanism, according to a previous Klippenstein investigation . It's not the first time smart glasses have come up in reports about the DHS. An investigation by The Independent last month found that ICE and Border Patrol agents in six states were using Meta's AI smart glasses of their own accord, in possible violation of DHS rules. Congress has reportedly been notified of the DHS's Ice Glasses project but has yet to comment publicly. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/wearables/homeland-security-reportedly-wants-to-develop-smart-glasses-for-ice-093449347.html?src=rss

Instagram says a bug turned your photos black and white

If Instagram has been turning your color photo posts into black and white recently, dont worry, theres no problem with your camera or your account. The Meta-owned app has confirmed to Engadget that the issue is caused by a bug thats affecting HDR photos in particular. Earlier today, a technical issue caused some HDR photos to appear incorrectly as black-and-white for a subset of accounts, Instagram has told us. However, we see complaints dated April 18 and 19, so the issue has been going on a bit longer for some people. Regardless of when the bug started causing problems, the Instagram team said it has since corrected the issue. If your posts are still showing up in black and white, Instagram said the fix will automatically turn your affected photo posts back to their original state over the next few hours. We apologize for any inconvenience, they added. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/apps/instagram-says-a-bug-turned-your-photos-black-and-white-061802389.html?src=rss