Ethan Hawke shares a delightful scene with Willem Defoe in The Northman. James Gunn talks the melancholy of filming Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3. Hayden Christensen reflects on returning to Darth Vader. Plus, what’s up on the next episode of Halo, and a glimpse at The Walking Dead’s midseason finale. Spoilers now!
BMW has developed the first fully electric 3 series vehicle — but it will only be available in China. In May 2022, the BMW i3 eDrive35L model that's based on the automaker's line of compact cars, will enter the Chinese market. It uses BMW's 5th-gen eDrive powertrain that's also found in the BMW iX3, BMW i4 and BMW iX. The four-door sedan will also be the first 3 Series car with the company's OS8 operating system and its features, including Digital Key, which turns the owner's smartphone into a key for their vehicle.
In its announcement, BMW also shared some key data about the EV, including its 281 horsepower max output and 295 pound-feet of maximum torque. It can apparently go from zero to 62 mph in 6.2 seconds, and it can reach a charge of 80 percent within 35 minutes of being plugged in. Fully charged, it has an estimated range of 327 miles, which is longer than that of the basic BMW i4's.
The automaker says the 3 Series line led the premium-compact segment in China in 2021, so releasing an electrified version in the region makes sense for the company. BMW even even fine-tuned and customized the EV's suspension system for Chinese road conditions and will assemble the vehicle at a plant in Lydia, Shenyang.
The i3 eDrive35L EV is BMW's sixth all—electric model. Similar to rival automakers that are aiming to make a complete shift towards electric vehicles over the coming 10 to 20 years, BMW also ramped up its electrification goals last year. It announced that the last Mini with a combustion engine will be released in 2025 and that it expects its all-electric vehicles to account for 50 percent of its global sales by 2030.
After 355 days aboard the International Space Station, astronaut Mark Vande Hei returns to Earth both a NASA record holder and a changed man. Though his run was not as long as Peggy Whitson’s 665 cumulative days spent in microgravity, Vande Hei’s accomplishment is still one of the longest single stints in human spaceflight — and makes him the subject of intensive research into the effects of zero-gravity on humans.
Though NASA’s Human Research Program has spent 50 years studying the effects of spaceflight on the human body, the full impact of long-duration space travel has yet to be exhaustively researched. As humanity’s expansion into space accelerates in the coming decades, more people will be going into orbit — and going much farther — and the medical needs obviously increase along with this. Andrew Tarantola outlines where the research is headed.
— Mat Smith
What we bought: The perfect family plug-in hybrid, until it wasn't
Android may get its own built-in Bluetooth tracker detection
EV startup VinFast will build a $5 billion plant in North Carolina
The Stanley Parable's rebuilt and expanded 'Ultra Deluxe' edition arrives April 27th
Apple will reportedly no longer fix iPhones flagged as stolen or missing
Roli's redesigned Seaboard Rise keyboard offers more precise playing
Traeger's redesigned Timberline is full of smart grilling tech
Canada has outlined its Emissions Reduction Plan, which will require all new passenger car sales to be zero-emissions models by 2035. The government will gradually put pressure on automakers, requiring "at least" 20 percent zero-emissions sales by 2026, pushing steeply to 60 percent by 2030. Officials didn't say whether this applied to a make's product mix or simply the volume of cars sold.
A Reddit user wrote to Craig Federighi, Apple's Vice President of Software Engineering, to ask how iOS auto-updates work. Federighi responded, revealing that Apple gradually releases "new iOS updates by first making them available for those that explicitly seek them out in Settings, and then 1-4 weeks later (after we've received feedback on the update) ramp up to rolling out devices with auto-update enabled." Generally, this means it takes a few weeks for iOS auto-updates to reach everyone’s iPhone and, in the case of iPadOS, iPad.
Google has begun rolling out a new update for its iOS YouTube TV app. Now both iPhone and iPad users have picture-in-picture functionality. To watch something in PiP mode, swipe up from the bottom of the screen. The video will automatically resize and move across your device’s display. You’ll need to be running iOS 15 or newer — and make sure your app is up to date.
It’s taken its time: Apple’s mobile operating system has supported picture-in-picture functionality on iPad since iOS 13 and iPhone since iOS 14. The feature has also been available on the company’s main YouTube app since last year.
Intel’s finally offered a glimpse of its Arc A-series Limited Edition video card, which is arriving sometime this summer — yes, that means another delay. There are no specs or prices, unfortunately, but the double-height design and twin-fan cooling make clear this aims directly at gamers. Early Arc desktop GPUs are expected to support a raft of modern features, including hardware-accelerated ray tracing and AI-based supersampling. It's still too soon to say if Arc desktop models will offer truly competitive performance. NVIDIA should deliver its first Ampere Next-based GPUs (likely the RTX 40 series) later this year, and AMD will follow suit with the Radeon RX 7000 series.
Yelp today announced it would further expand its health grades information on restaurant listings. While the reviews platform developed its own digital standard for restaurant hygiene (called "Local Inspector Value-entry Specification" or LIVES) alongside the "the technology departments of the cities of San Francisco and New York" in 2013, it's now broadening its partnership with firm Hazel Analytics. Yelp and Hazel teamed up last year, and together the LIVES metric now incorporates "data from health departments across 48 U.S. states" as well as Toronto and Vancouver.
“The expansion of Yelp's health scores program comes at a time when people are returning to indoor dining as COVID-19 restrictions continue to lift, health inspections are restarting from the early pandemic pause, and restaurants are embracing more diner safety measures like contactless payments and virtual menus,” wrote Yelp in a blog post.
There’s a chance you’ve seen health scores on your city’s Yelp restaurant pages already. But in recent years, Yelp became even more proactive in grading restaurants, going so far as to estimate scores in cases where a city might not issue a letter grade or numerical score. Yelp listings for restaurants in Los Angeles and Chicago also include a rundown of health code violations.
Still, some in the restaurant industry have criticized Yelp’s efforts. Cities and states vary widely in their food inspection scoring, with some assigning a letter grade or numerical score, and others opting for a pass/fail system. Restaurants have complained about inaccurate or out-of-date scores on their listings. The Mercury News reported that restaurants in Bay Area counties that use a pass/fail system were taken aback when Yelp’s algorithm generated its own health inspection score for their businesses.
Yelp calculates health inspection scores using three methods: directly using a score provided by a city’s health department, generating a score from raw health data or using an estimated health score generated by Hazel’s algorithm. The third option — which Hazel defaults to in cases where cities don’t publish health inspection scores — leaves a great deal of room for misinterpretation. And as The Mercury News points out, restaurants that, deservedly or not, show low LIVES-generated scores on Yelp might see their business dry up significantly.
It’s not pleasant seeing a once-beloved laptop (or desktop) computer slowly slide into obsolescence as it gets too old and tired to keep up with the demands of modern-day computing, but Google has now provided an option for these ailing machines in the form of Chrome OS Flex.
TweetDeck — a version of Twitter beloved by journalists, social media pros and other power users — might soon become a paid app, The Verge has reported. A new version of the app redirects to the Twitter Blue subscription signup page, according to code discovered by security researcher Jane Manchun Wong. It promises "a powerful, real-time tool for people who live on Twitter" and would be an "ad-free experience," according to screenshots.
The new @TweetDeck might become a paid feature, exclusive to @TwitterBlue subscribers according to the code I’ve come across in the app
— Jane Manchun Wong (@wongmjane) March 16, 2022
The code gates the access of TweetDeck on whether the user has Twitter Blue subscription and redirects them to the sign-up page if they don’t pic.twitter.com/cylyrV3Iwv
TweetDeck is already an essentially ad-free experience, so the inclusion of that language strongly implies that it would become a paid service. The new version would be a "complete rebuild with the parts from the new Twitter app," Manchun noted in a reply. However, she also spotted a link for a "legacy version" which could still be free.
Twitter launched its Twitter Blue subscription service last November for $2.99 per month. Some features like top articles were seen as positives, but users also criticized Twitter for hiding key features like an "undo" button behind a paywall.
Twitter has been testing a new version of TweetDeck since last year, with significant changes like "a full Tweet composer, new advanced search features, new column types, and a new way to group columns into clean workspaces," the company wrote. Some power users haven't exactly embraced it, however, due to user interface and other issues.
The company has also pondered a TweetDeck subscription service, asking users in 2017 if they'd be willing to pay up to $20 per month for a "more advanced TweetDeck experience." And last year, Bloomberg reported that Twitter was considering a subscription fee for the app.
The move would make sense for Twitter internally, as TweetDeck has always been a black sheep product that lets users bypass ads. Adding it to Twitter Blue would finally allow the company to monetize it and offer a true ad-free experience — since Twitter Blue itself still includes ads.
After a fair degree of speculation, Sony has officially announced the next evolution of PlayStation Plus, its subscription service. And, finally, it could offer enough to match Microsoft’s compelling Game Pass. It’s still called PlayStation Plus but will fuse it with PlayStation Now, the company’s middling game streaming service, at least at the highest tiers.
PlayStation Plus Premium ($18 per month) is where the PS Now aspect really comes into play, with access to an extra 340 or so games, including PS3 titles you can stream via the cloud. A bunch of PS1, PS2 and PSP games will be available to stream or download, too, but the streaming feature will be only in markets where PS Now is currently available. That includes the likes of the US, UK, Japan and a large chunk of Europe.
Then there’s PlayStation Plus Extra (for $15 per month), which will fold in the existing PS Plus service, soon to be renamed PlayStation Plus Essential (still $10 per month) but add a library of “up to” 400 PS4 and PS5 games. These will encompass PlayStation’s in-house titles as well as third party games.
At the outset, Sony plans to offer games including Death Stranding, God of War, Marvel’s Spider-Man, Marvel’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales, Mortal Kombat 11 and Returnal. However, it’s unlikely that first-party PlayStation games (usually exclusive at launch) will appear on the service immediately. Sony Interactive Entertainment CEO Jim Ryan told GamesIndustry.biz in an interview: "We feel if we were to do that with the games that we make at PlayStation Studios, that virtuous cycle will be broken." In PlayStation’s favor, at least in the US, the annual price is $60 less than Xbox Game Pass Ultimate members’ annual cost.
The new-look PS Plus will start rolling out in June.
— Mat Smith
The Soundboks Go offers loudspeaker sound in a more portable package
Arden brings BBQ indoors thanks to 'smoke elimination' technology
8BitDo's Pro 2 controller drops to an all-time low in Amazon's gaming sale
Dyson just unveiled its first wearable product: a set of noise-canceling, air-purifying headphones. The Dyson Zone comes with a detachable vizor for the bottom half of the wearer’s face, which looks, to put it mildly, odd. That vizor actually blows filtered air to your nose, mouth and chin, sort of like a portable fan dedicated to the lower portion of your face. Dyson has integrated a smaller version of its air filtration system into the earcups.
Intel has unveiled the Core i9-12900KS Special Edition CPU, claiming it's "the world's fastest desktop processor." Intel boosted the clock speed from 5.2GHz to 5.5GHz (on up to two cores) by bumping the power from 125 to 150 watts. AMD recently said its $449 Ryzen 7 5800X3D was the world's fastest gaming processor, that its 3D V-Cache beats Intel’s older Core i9-12900K. However, Intel’s latest model has a much higher maximum clock speed (5.5GHz compared to 4.5GHz). Now we wait for the benchmark tests to prove the eventual winner.
NVIDIA's GeForce RTX 3090 Ti is finally here, and it's clear the no-compromise design comes with the steep price tag to match. The new flagship GPU is now available, at a heady $1,999. That's $500 more than the 'base' RTX 3090 and closer to the price of line-blurring GPUs like the old $2,499 Titan RTX. And don't be surprised if you pay more thanks to ongoing shortages — we're already seeing more expensive cards at retailers.
There’s not an awful lot of competition at the high-end soundbar market, with most consumers looking towards surround sound speaker setups with multiple speakers, separate subwoofers and the rest. For those of us looking for minimalist aesthetics and better sound, Sennheiser’s Ambeo now has competition from Devialet. The giant soundbar can upmix stereo sound so it’s more enveloping and richer. You also have to be a certain level of rich to afford the thing.
This won’t come as a huge surprise to gamer cynics, but Nintendo has announced it’s delaying the launch of the hugely anticipated Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild sequel. As is usually the case with such delays, Nintendo didn't offer a ton of details. Legend of Zelda series producer Eiji Aonuma said the company decided to "extend our development time a bit" and apologized to those looking forward to playing the new game. Expect to wait til spring 2023. And possibly even a little longer.
In the next wave of emoji, which has brought us burritos, flamingos and so on, don't expect to see more flags. The Unicode Consortium has warned it will "no longer accept proposals" for flag emoji, regardless of category. They're more trouble than they're worth, the organization said, whether it's the inherent politics or the value they bring. Flags are "by far" the least-used emoji, Unicode said, and aren't even used that often in social media bios. The Consortium added that flag additions tend to "emphasize the exclusion of others."
Google may be set to integrate Bluetooth tracker detection into Android. With devices like Tile trackers and Apple AirTags becoming more popular, there have been instances of bad actors planting one on someone else and using it to follow their movements.
Apple released the AirTag last April and since then, it has rolled out several more ways to detect them. It has updated the device to play a sound within 24 hours of being separated from its owner, while an iPhone will notify a user if it detects an unwanted AirTag. In December, Apple released an Android app that can scan for AirTags. Tile this month updated its iOS and Android apps with a similar feature.
However, there are some issues with current detection methods on Android. Users would both need to be aware of the fact that Bluetooth trackers can be misused and have apps that can detect them installed on their device. The Apple and Tile apps also require users to scan for trackers manually, a process that can take around 10 minutes.
According to 9to5Google, the Android team has started work on a tracker detection feature in Play services. The most recent APK code includes references to Tile trackers and "ATag" (probably AirTags) and hints that Android users may be able to ring detected devices.
The feature is said to be in early development and it'll likely be some time before Google releases it publicly (if at all). Having automatic detection built into the OS, or even a manual scanner with a warning to all users about the potential for stalking, would surely help protect users from being tracked. Hopefully, we'll learn more about Google's tracker detection plans at I/O in May.
Hackers stole roughly $625 million in cryptocurrency from the Ronin blockchain and the play-to-earn Axie Infinity video game network that operates on top of it, according to a disclosure from the Ronin Network late Tuesday. The hack is believed to be the biggest theft of cryptocurency in history.
The American Lung Association has released a report detailing the public health benefits of a complete national shift to zero-emission vehicles from 2020 to 2050. Apparently, if all new passenger and heavy-duty vehicles sold by 2035 and 2040, respectively, are zero-emission models, 110,000 deaths could be avoided in the United States over the next 30 years. That figure came from the association's analysis, which also projects that the Biden administration will achieve its target of having 100 percent carbon pollution-free electricity by 2035.
With no air pollution affecting people's health, up to 2.79 million asthma attacks could also be avoided. And perhaps to convince companies to get onboard with the transition, the association also made it a point to mention that up to 13.4 million lost workdays could be avoided with cleaner air.
Harold Wimmer, National President and CEO of the American Lung Association, said in a statement:
"Zero-emission transportation is a win-win for public health. Too many communities across the U.S. deal with high levels of dangerous pollution from nearby highways and trucking corridors, ports, warehouses and other pollution hot spots. Plus, the transportation sector is the nation’s biggest source of carbon pollution that drives climate change and associated public health harms. This is an urgent health issue for millions of people in the U.S."
The widespread transition to zero-emission vehicles would generate up to $1.2 trillion in public health benefits, the report noted, and $1.7 trillion in climate benefits. Communities and counties with the highest percentage of lower-income families and People of Color in the US would benefit greatly from the shift, since they have areas with highly concentrated doses of pollution from diesel hotspots, power plants and other fossil fuel facilities. The top metro locations that would benefit the most include Los Angeles, New York, Chicago, San Jose, Washington, Miami, Houston, Detroit and Dallas Fort-Worth.
To be able to ensure that all new vehicles sold by 2040 are zero-emission and that the grid can supply the country with pollution-free electricity within 15 years, the association has listed a series of recommendations. They include a call for increased funding for non-combustion electricity generation and transportation, extending and expanding incentives for zero-emission vehicle purchases and "converting public fleets to zero-emission vehicles immediately." The association is also urging the Congress to pass legislation that would accelerate the transition and for the EPA to adopt standards that would require lower carbon emissions from vehicles before the shift is complete.
In December of 1986, the Pentagon, the CIA, FBI, the Department of Energy, and just about every other federal agency you can think of came together in Indianapolis for an enormous training exercise code-named Mighty Derringer. The plan was to simulate a nuclear terrorist incident and explore how every agency would…
You might not have cause to panic the next time you miss an important meeting. Otter is updating its collaboration tool with a beta "Automatic Outline" feature that uses the AI-based Assistant to automatically create a meeting summary. You should get the gist of what your colleagues said without having to listen to an entire conversation or read a transcript.
The new version should make it easier to translate meetings into real-world decisions, too. Otter is introducing a "Meeting Gems" panel that can create to-do entries and highlight crucial moments by highlighting segments from the notes. You can also mark action items as complete and copy notes for sharing.
Other improvements aren't quite so dramatic, but could still prove helpful. You can use Otter Assistant to quickly add slides and other presentation images to your notes, and you can join meetings directly from the calendar panel. The home feed now prioritizes "high signal" meetings, and rookies will find more help from the outset.
The AI summaries may tempt you to skip less-than-essential meetings. However, they could easily prove useful as companies settle into the realities of hybrid and remote work. The pandemic has led to a surge in virtual meetings, and it's not always easy to attend every one. Otter's new AI functionality could help you spend more time working — and less time helping coworkers catch up.
Your TikTok habits may vary, but I’ve sometimes pulled myself out of a fugue of lengthy viewing, hopping and browsing on the social app, barely recalling what I just spent 15 minutes doing. For me, and possibly you, a new watch-history feature could offer some insight to exactly what we’re wasting our time on.
According to Hammond Oh, TikTok is testing a watch-history tool to show you a list of videos that previously appeared in your For You feed, making it easier to rediscover clips (and creators) you may have not liked or followed.
There are other ways to seek out your TikTok watch history, but they’re not exactly easy to use. One method involves navigating to the Discover page, tapping search, entering an asterisk and toggling on the “watch videos” option in the search filters tab. As is the case with random feature tests on TikTok, Instagram and others, this might not make its way to all users, but keep an eye on your For You feed — just in case.
— Mat Smith
OnePlus began as a startup making smartphones with high-end specs at relatively reasonable prices. In an age of black slabs, the company was able to forge an identity for itself, backed by devoted fans and a strong online presence. But now, after 10 generations of flagship phones, Sam Rutherford feels like the OnePlus we knew is gone, and it's probably not coming back.
Samsung's latest Smart Monitor is now available to pre-order. The kinda-familiar-looking Smart Monitor M8 has support for streaming services including Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, Disney+ and Apple TV, as well as cloud gaming platforms. You won't necessarily need to connect to external speakers, with two built-in 5W speakers and a tweeter that delivers 2.2-channel audio. The Smart Monitor M8 starts at $700 for the white model. The spring green, sunset pink and daylight blue models will cost you a little extra at $730.
The Amazon Games struggle bus was finally going somewhere, but now studio head Mike Frazzini is stepping down. On LinkedIn, Frazzini cited the desire to spend more time with family. "While there’s never really a perfect time to step away from a great role, now is a good time," he wrote. Amazon’s MMORPG New World was one of 2021's biggest moneymakers on Steam.
Spotify has finally acted on its promise to add a COVID-19 content advisory label. You'll now see a tab for a COVID-19 Guide when you visit podcasts and other content discussing the coronavirus. Tap it and you'll visit a section that points you to authoritative sources (such as the World Health Organization and the UK's National Health Service) as well as trustworthy content from the likes of The Guardian and the BBC.
Gmail is getting a new look on the web, which should be heading your way soon (if it hasn’t arrived already). Its intended, Google says, to better integrate Gmail with the Chat and Meet components that you may or may not make much use of—and it means you’ve now got a few new options when it comes to getting Gmail…
8BitDo's Pro 2 was already great value at its regular price of $50, but now the controller has dropped to an all-time low on Amazon. It's on sale for $42.50, which is 15 percent off the usual price.
Buy 8BitDo Pro 2 controller at Amazon - $42.50As with the excellent SN30 Pro+, the Pro 2 is compatible with Nintendo Switch, Windows, macOS, Android and Raspberry Pi. This time around, the controller has two back buttons. Like all of the other inputs, those buttons on the handles (where your ring finger or pinky might rest naturally) are fully customizable through a Windows, Mac, Android and iOS app. The controller has a profile configuration switcher as well, so you can swap between three input configurations without having to fire up the app.
It's a little disappointing that the controller isn't compatible with iOS devices, PlayStation or Xbox. For those who game on pretty much every other major platform, though, the 8BitDo Pro 2 is well worth checking out, particularly if you pick up a cheap smartphone clip so you can more easily play cloud gaming titles just about anywhere.
Elsewhere as part of Amazon's gaming accessory sale, you can save on Razer's wired Wolverine V2 Chroma controller. It also dropped to an all-time low. At $127.50, the white variant is slightly cheaper than the black model ($130). The controller usually costs $150.
Buy Razer Wolverine V2 Chroma (white) at Amazon - $127.50Buy Razer Wolverine V2 Chroma (black) at Amazon - $130The Wolverine V2 Chroma is compatible with Xbox consoles and PC. It's a worthy alternative to Microsoft's Elite Wireless Series 2 controller.
It has six more buttons than a standard Xbox controller and they're all remappable. Those could be useful for swiftly building structures in Fortnite (once that becomes a thing again) or executing rapid combos. There's also full RGB support via Razer's Xbox controller app, swappable thumbsticks and a hair-trigger mode that could give you an advantage over your rivals.
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The long-awaited current-gen versions of Apex Legends are almost here. Respawn Entertainment will release native PS5 and Xbox Series X/S versions of the battle royale when the Warriors Collection event goes live today.
All three consoles will support 4K output and full 60Hz gameplay as well as HDR. The PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X versions are getting higher-resolution shadow maps and larger level-of-detail distances (so you can see objects from further away).
Some features players might have been expecting at the outset will arrive in future patches. Those include support for 120Hz gameplay, adaptive triggers and haptic feedback on PS5, as well as audio and visual improvements.
The Warriors Collection Event will bring next-gen versions of Apex Legends to PS5 and XSX!
— Apex Legends (@PlayApex) March 29, 2022
PlayStation players: check out the info below to learn how to update your game 👇
Xbox players: no action is needed. Apex will update via Smart Delivery.
🔗: https://t.co/Hye8qEKTVhpic.twitter.com/5HfUSAYkWD
Not having 120 fps capabilities at the jump will be disappointing for many, given the fast pace of Apex Legends matches and the fact the developers have long been discussing that feature as one of their goals for the current-gen versions. Still, after the native PS5 and Xbox Series X/S editions land, it should be somewhat easier for developers to roll out updates across all platforms, so hopefully it won't be long before 120 fps support is added.
Thanks to Microsoft's Smart Delivery tech, the Xbox Series X/S versions of Apex Legends should automatically download if you have the Xbox One edition installed. PS5 players will need to download their console's version manually from the options menu on the Apex Legends game page or from the PSN store if they don't have the PS4 edition on their system.
Beyond the current-gen versions, there's a lot more for Apex Legends players to check out later today. The 9v9 Control mode, which proved popular when it debuted earlier this year, is back until April 12th. The Caustic Treatment area of King's Canyon is getting some changes so it can act as a Control battleground.
There's a new map called Drop-Off for the 3v3 Arena team deathmatch mode. A collection of 24 limited-time cosmetics will be available during the Warriors Collection event, including skins. Collect them all and you'll unlock a new sword Heirloom item for Crypto.
The internet is filled with conspiracy theories ranging from the absurd to the plausible. And plenty of people online have questioned whether Will Smith’s assault of Chris Rock at the Academy Awards on Sunday was staged. But there’s a new twist to this conspiracy theory that we can safely debunk: No, Chris Rock wasn’t…
Amazon improved its Echo Buds in nearly every way when it came out with the second generation last year, and at $120, they're a solid option for those who don't want to spend a ton on ANC earbuds. Now, Amazon's knocked 58 percent off the second-gen Echo Buds, bringing the models with the standard charging case down to only $50. That's $20 cheaper than they were during the holiday shopping season last year.
Buy Echo Buds at Amazon - $50The online retailer learned from the shortcomings of its original Echo Buds and rectified many of them when redesigning the latest models. The buds are 20 percent smaller than the previous models, a bit lighter too, and the entire design is IPX4 rated against water splashes. Sound quality has been massively improved: audio sounds less compressed and you'll be able to hear the differences at low, medium and high volumes. In the Alexa companion app, you can mess around the the EQ if you wish while also customizing the settings for ANC mode, hands-free Alexa and Power Save mode.
Amazon switched from active noise reduction to true active noise cancelling on these buds and it made a world of difference. The buds block out surrounding noises and the Passthrough feature, which allows some environmental noise in, sounds more natural than that of other earbuds. Naturally, you're also getting Alexa voice commands on these buds, and the assistant can do more than it could before, controlling music and podcast playback, finding specific shows on Amazon Music and making recommendations for other content you may want to listen to.
Battery life is pretty decent as well — you'll get about five hours of listening time before the Echo Buds need more juice, and their case can give you two hours of listening time after only 15 minutes of charging. While call performance could be better, the second-gen Echo Buds are still a good option if you rely on Alexa for a lot of things or if you want a pair of ANC earbuds that won't break the bank.
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Plantronics' (now Poly's) long independent streak is coming to an end. Reutersreports HP is acquiring Poly in an all-cash deal worth $3.3 billion including debt. HP said the purchase would bolster its "hybrid work" offerings, such as headsets and videoconferencing hardware. The computing giant didn't say if Poly would still operate as a distinct brand or retain its CEO (we've asked HP for comment), but the deal is expected to close by the end of 2022.
Don't expect this to lead to HP-branded consumer headphones or earbuds. When Plantronics rebranded as Poly, the company was already transitioning from personal audio to work-oriented products like meeting room speakers and videoconferencing cameras. Only a handful of items (such as the Voyager headphone range) are designed with home use at least partly in mind. As it stands, HP already targets everyday users with its gaming-focused HyperX brand.
Whatever HP's intentions, the buyout closes an important chapter in audio history. Plantronics was one of the first companies to produce Bluetooth headsets, and developed an early reputation as a go-to brand for hands-free calling. However, its attempts at competing with consumer heavyweights like Apple, Bose and Sony never really panned out. While Plantronics created well-made headphones and earbuds that sometimes undercut the competition on price, it never reached the level of hype that helped its rivals succeed. The 2018 acquisition of Polycom and the subsequent Poly rebrand was, in a sense, an acknowledgment that Plantronics' strength was in the office rather than at home.
It's also no secret that Poly had entertained buyers. In 2018, Plantronics had been in talks with Logitech about a possible deal. That fell through, but it was already clear the firm was open to a merger. The HP move might represent a happy ending in that light, even if Poly is losing its independence in the process.
Bloomberg reporter Mark Gurman expects Apple will release its next-generation iPad Pro sometime this fall. In his latest Power On newsletter, Gurman says he anticipates the new tablet will feature MagSafe inductive charging and Apple’s long-rumored but as yet unannounced M2 chip, corroborating a previous report from 9to5Mac.
As of the company’s most recent hardware event, the iPad Air and iPad Pro both feature M1 chips. Apple last updated the iPad Pro in 2021 to add 5G and Thunderbolt connectivity, and its first-generation Apple Silicon system-on-a-chip. The iPad Pro has more or less featured the same design since 2018 when the company refreshed the tablet to give its now-iconic edge-to-edge display. Since then, Apple has filtered out that design to most of its other tablets, including the iPad mini and the aforementioned iPad Air.
Details on the M2 remain sparse, but as of last April, it had reportedly gone into production. Most reports suggest the M2 will feature the same eight-core CPU layout as its predecessor while being faster and more efficient thanks to TSMC’s new 4-nanometer fabrication process.
Since late Friday afternoon, Among Us developer Innersloth has been trying to contain a DDoS attack against both its North American and European servers, leaving the popular game unplayable for many. “Service will be offline while the team works on fixing it, but might take a bit, hang tight! Sorry!” Innersloth said on Friday in a tweet spotted by Eurogamer.
servers are still down while we work to fix the DDoS sabotage
— Among Us 🚨 servers down (@AmongUsGame) March 26, 2022
they may come on/off but will update u when we think they're stable, sorry!!! pic.twitter.com/vMmb74ttbJ
As of the writing of this article, Innersloth has managed to restore some servers, but the situation does not appear to be fully resolved with the game’s official Twitter account still stating “Among Us servers down” in its profile. “Can’t believe I’m working on a Saturday right now, I was supposed to go and get a croissant,” Innersloth said in one particularly desperate-sounding update over the weekend.
Thanks to its popularity, Among Us is no stranger to disruptive hacking attacks. In 2020, the game experienced a far-reaching spam attack that affected as many 5 million players after an individual named “Eris Loris” found a way to hack millions of games. The event led to no small amount of grief and frustration among the game's community, with many taking to Reddit to vent their frustration at the hacker.
The month of March has been pretty good for Marvel fans. Last week saw the first trailer for this June’s Ms. Marvel, and in a few days, we’ll finally get to see Oscar Isaac step into the supernatural side of the MCU and become the Moon Knight. Just before the weekend, the news broke that another of Marvel’s heroes is…
Earlier this week, Club 8-bit, one of Ukraine’s largest privately-owned computer museums, was destroyed during the siege of Mariupol. Kotaku spotted news of the event after its owner, Dmitry Cherepanov, took to Facebook to share the fate of Club 8-bit.
It has been reported that the Mariupol Computer Museum in Ukraine, a privately owned collection of over 500 items of retro computing, consoles and technology from the 1950s to the early 2000s, a collection nearly 20 years in the making, has been destroyed by a bomb. pic.twitter.com/7xKi3yYjth
— Lord Arse! 💙🇺🇦💛 (@Lord_Arse) March 23, 2022
“That’s it, the Mariupol computer museum is no longer there,” he said on March 21st. “All that is left from the collection that I have been collecting for 15 years are just fragments of memories on the FB page, website and radio station of the museum.”
Club 8-bit’s collection included more than 500 pieces of computer history, with items dating from as far back as the 1950s. Gizmodo visited the museum in 2018, describing it at the time as “one of the largest and coolest collections” of Soviet-era computers to be found anywhere in the world. It took Cherepanov more than a decade to collect and restore many of the PCs on display at Club 8-bit. What makes the museum’s destruction even more poignant is that it documented a shared history between the Ukrainian and Russian people.
Thankfully, Cherepanov is alive, but like many residents of Mariupol, he has lost his home. If you want to support Cherepanov, he has opened a PayPal account accepting donations to help him and other Ukrainians affected by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Since the start of the war, nearly 10 million people have been displaced by the conflict, making it the fastest-growing refugee crisis since the second world war.
For anime fans, it’s always exciting when a new season brings new anime courtesy of Crunchyroll. The anime streaming service, which became acquired by Funimation this past August, has widely touted itself as the prime place to watch anime for years. But in addition to the exciting new anime debuting with the spring…
Barely a month into its already floundering invasion of Ukraine and Russia is rattling its nuclear saber and threatening to drastically escalate the regional conflict into all out world war. But the Russians are no stranger to nuclear brinksmanship. In the excerpt below from Ben Buchanan and Andrew Imbrie's latest book, we can see how closely humanity came to an atomic holocaust in 1983 and why an increasing reliance on automation — on both sides of the Iron Curtain — only served to heighten the likelihood of an accidental launch. The New Fire looks at the rapidly expanding roles of automated machine learning systems in national defense and how increasingly ubiquitous AI technologies (as examined through the thematic lenses of "data, algorithms, and computing power") are transforming how nations wage war both domestically and abroad.
Excerpted from The New Fire: War, Peacem, and Democracy in the Age of AI by Andrew Imbrie and Ben Buchanan. Published by MIT Press. Copyright © 2021 by Andrew Imbrie and Ben Buchanan. All rights reserved.
As the tensions between the United States and the Soviet Union reached their apex in the fall of 1983, the nuclear war began. At least, that was what the alarms said at the bunker in Moscow where Lieutenant Colonel Stanislav Petrov was on duty.
Inside the bunker, sirens blared and a screen flashed the word “launch.”A missile was inbound. Petrov, unsure if it was an error, did not respond immediately. Then the system reported two more missiles, and then two more after that. The screen now said “missile strike.” The computer reported with its highest level of confidence that a nuclear attack was underway.
The technology had done its part, and everything was now in Petrov’s hands. To report such an attack meant the beginning of nuclear war, as the Soviet Union would surely launch its own missiles in retaliation. To not report such an attack was to impede the Soviet response, surrendering the precious few minutes the country’s leadership had to react before atomic mushroom clouds burst out across the country; “every second of procrastination took away valuable time,” Petrov later said.
“For 15 seconds, we were in a state of shock,” he recounted. He felt like he was sitting on a hot frying pan. After quickly gathering as much information as he could from other stations, he estimated there was a 50-percent chance that an attack was under way. Soviet military protocol dictated that he base his decision off the computer readouts in front of him, the ones that said an attack was undeniable. After careful deliberation, Petrov called the duty officer to break the news: the early warning system was malfunctioning. There was no attack, he said. It was a roll of the atomic dice.
Twenty-three minutes after the alarms—the time it would have taken a missile to hit Moscow—he knew that he was right and the computers were wrong. “It was such a relief,” he said later. After-action reports revealed that the sun’s glare off a passing cloud had confused the satellite warning system. Thanks to Petrov’s decisions to disregard the machine and disobey protocol, humanity lived another day.
Petrov’s actions took extraordinary judgment and courage, and it was only by sheer luck that he was the one making the decisions that night. Most of his colleagues, Petrov believed, would have begun a war. He was the only one among the officers at that duty station who had a civilian, rather than military, education and who was prepared to show more independence. “My colleagues were all professional soldiers; they were taught to give and obey orders,” he said. The human in the loop — this particular human — had made all the difference.
Petrov’s story reveals three themes: the perceived need for speed in nuclear command and control to buy time for decision makers; the allure of automation as a means of achieving that speed; and the dangerous propensity of those automated systems to fail. These three themes have been at the core of managing the fear of a nuclear attack for decades and present new risks today as nuclear and non-nuclear command, control, and communications systems become entangled with one another.
Perhaps nothing shows the perceived need for speed and the allure of automation as much as the fact that, within two years of Petrov’s actions, the Soviets deployed a new system to increase the role of machines in nuclear brinkmanship. It was properly known as Perimeter, but most people just called it the Dead Hand, a sign of the system’s diminished role for humans. As one former Soviet colonel and veteran of the Strategic Rocket Forces put it, “The Perimeter system is very, very nice. Were move unique responsibility from high politicians and the military.” The Soviets wanted the system to partly assuage their fears of nuclear attack by ensuring that, even if a surprise strike succeeded in decapitating the country’s leadership, the Dead Hand would make sure it did not go unpunished.
The idea was simple, if harrowing: in a crisis, the Dead Hand would monitor the environment for signs that a nuclear attack had taken place, such as seismic rumbles and radiation bursts. Programmed with a series of if-then commands, the system would run through the list of indicators, looking for evidence of the apocalypse. If signs pointed to yes, the system would test the communications channels with the Soviet General Staff. If those links were active, the system would remain dormant. If the system received no word from the General Staff, it would circumvent ordinary procedures for ordering an attack. The decision to launch would thenrest in the hands of a lowly bunker officer, someone many ranks below a senior commander like Petrov, who would nonetheless find himself responsible for deciding if it was doomsday.
The United States was also drawn to automated systems. Since the 1950s, its government had maintained a network of computers to fuse incoming data streams from radar sites. This vast network, called the Semi-Automatic Ground Environment, or SAGE, was not as automated as the Dead Hand in launching retaliatory strikes, but its creation was rooted in a similar fear. Defense planners designed SAGE to gather radar information about a potential Soviet air attack and relay that information to the North American Aerospace Defense Command, which would intercept the invading planes. The cost of SAGE was more than double that of the Manhattan Project, or almost $100 billion in 2022 dollars. Each of the twenty SAGE facilities boasted two 250-ton computers, which each measured 7,500 square feet and were among the most advanced machines of the era.
If nuclear war is like a game of chicken — two nations daring each other to turn away, like two drivers barreling toward a head-on collision — automation offers the prospect of a dangerous but effective strategy. As the nuclear theorist Herman Kahn described:
The “skillful” player may get into the car quite drunk, throwing whisky bottles out the window to make it clear to everybody just how drunk he is. He wears very dark glasses so that it is obvious that he cannot see much, if anything. As soon as the car reaches high speed, he takes the steering wheel and throws it out the window. If his opponent is watching, he has won. If his opponent is not watching, he has a problem; likewise, if both players try this strategy.
To automate nuclear reprisal is to play chicken without brakes or a steering wheel. It tells the world that no nuclear attack will go unpunished, but it greatly increases the risk of catastrophic accidents.
Automation helped enable the dangerous but seemingly predictable world of mutually assured destruction. Neither the United States nor the Soviet Union was able to launch a disarming first strike against the other; it would have been impossible for one side to fire its nuclear weapons without alerting the other side and providing at least some time to react. Even if a surprise strike were possible, it would have been impractical to amass a large enough arsenal of nuclear weapons to fully disarm the adversary by firing multiple warheads at each enemy silo, submarine, and bomber capable of launching a counterattack. Hardest of all was knowing where to fire. Submarines in the ocean, mobile ground-launched systems on land, and round-the-clock combat air patrols in the skies made the prospect of successfully executing such a first strike deeply unrealistic. Automated command and control helped ensure these units would receive orders to strike back. Retaliation was inevitable, and that made tenuous stability possible.
Modern technology threatens to upend mutually assured destruction. When an advanced missile called a hypersonic glide vehicle nears space, for example, it separates from its booster rockets and accelerates down toward its target at five times the speed of sound. Unlike a traditional ballistic missile, the vehicle can radically alter its flight profile over longranges, evading missile defenses. In addition, its low-altitude approach renders ground-based sensors ineffective, further compressing the amount of time for decision-making. Some military planners want to use machine learning to further improve the navigation and survivability of these missiles, rendering any future defense against them even more precarious.
Other kinds of AI might upend nuclear stability by making more plausible a first strike that thwarts retaliation. Military planners fear that machine learning and related data collection technologies could find their hidden nuclear forces more easily. For example, better machine learning–driven analysis of overhead imagery could spot mobile missile units; the United States reportedly has developed a highly classified program to use AI to track North Korean launchers. Similarly, autonomous drones under the sea might detect enemy nuclear submarines, enabling them to be neutralized before they can retaliate for an attack. More advanced cyber operations might tamper with nuclear command and control systems or fool early warning mechanisms, causing confusion in the enemy’s networks and further inhibiting a response. Such fears of what AI can do make nuclear strategy harder and riskier.
For some, just like the Cold War strategists who deployed the expert systems in SAGE and the Dead Hand, the answer to these new fears is more automation. The commander of Russia’s Strategic Rocket Forces has said that the original Dead Hand has been improved upon and is still functioning, though he didn’t offer technical details. In the United States, some proposals call for the development of a new Dead Hand–esque system to ensure that any first strike is met with nuclear reprisal,with the goal of deterring such a strike. It is a prospect that has strategic appeal to some warriors but raises grave concern for Cassandras, whowarn of the present frailties of machine learning decision-making, and for evangelists, who do not want AI mixed up in nuclear brinkmanship.
While the evangelists’ concerns are more abstract, the Cassandras have concrete reasons for worry. Their doubts are grounded in storieslike Petrov’s, in which systems were imbued with far too much trust and only a human who chose to disobey orders saved the day. The technical failures described in chapter 4 also feed their doubts. The operational risks of deploying fallible machine learning into complex environments like nuclear strategy are vast, and the successes of machine learning in other contexts do not always apply. Just because neural networks excel at playing Go or generating seemingly authentic videos or even determining how proteins fold does not mean that they are any more suited than Petrov’s Cold War–era computer for reliably detecting nuclear strikes.In the realm of nuclear strategy, misplaced trust of machines might be deadly for civilization; it is an obvious example of how the new fire’s force could quickly burn out of control.
Of particular concern is the challenge of balancing between false negatives and false positives—between failing to alert when an attack is under way and falsely sounding the alarm when it is not. The two kinds of failure are in tension with each other. Some analysts contend that American military planners, operating from a place of relative security,worry more about the latter. In contrast, they argue that Chinese planners are more concerned about the limits of their early warning systems,given that China possesses a nuclear arsenal that lacks the speed, quantity, and precision of American weapons. As a result, Chinese government leaders worry chiefly about being too slow to detect an attack in progress. If these leaders decided to deploy AI to avoid false negatives,they might increase the risk of false positives, with devastating nuclear consequences.
The strategic risks brought on by AI’s new role in nuclear strategy are even more worrying. The multifaceted nature of AI blurs lines between conventional deterrence and nuclear deterrence and warps the established consensus for maintaining stability. For example, the machine learning–enabled battle networks that warriors hope might manage conventional warfare might also manage nuclear command and control. In such a situation, a nation may attack another nation’s information systems with the hope of degrading its conventional capacity and inadvertently weaken its nuclear deterrent, causing unintended instability and fear and creating incentives for the victim to retaliate with nuclear weapons. This entanglement of conventional and nuclear command-and-control systems, as well as the sensor networks that feed them, increases the risks of escalation. AI-enabled systems may like-wise falsely interpret an attack on command-and-control infrastructure as a prelude to a nuclear strike. Indeed, there is already evidence that autonomous systems perceive escalation dynamics differently from human operators.
Another concern, almost philosophical in its nature, is that nuclear war could become even more abstract than it already is, and hence more palatable. The concern is best illustrated by an idea from Roger Fisher, a World War II pilot turned arms control advocate and negotiations expert. During the Cold War, Fisher proposed that nuclear codes be stored in a capsule surgically embedded near the heart of a military officer who would always be near the president. The officer would also carry a large butcher knife. To launch a nuclear war, the president would have to use the knife to personally kill the officer and retrieve the capsule—a comparatively small but symbolic act of violence that would make the tens of millions of deaths to come more visceral and real.
Fisher’s Pentagon friends objected to his proposal, with one saying,“My God, that’s terrible. Having to kill someone would distort the president’s judgment. He might never push the button.” This revulsion, ofcourse, was what Fisher wanted: that, in the moment of greatest urgency and fear, humanity would have one more chance to experience—at an emotional, even irrational, level—what was about to happen, and one more chance to turn back from the brink.
Just as Petrov’s independence prompted him to choose a different course, Fisher’s proposed symbolic killing of an innocent was meant to force one final reconsideration. Automating nuclear command and control would do the opposite, reducing everything to error-prone, stone-coldmachine calculation. If the capsule with nuclear codes were embedded near the officer’s heart, if the neural network decided the moment was right, and if it could do so, it would—without hesitation and without understanding—plunge in the knife.
Following a years-long dispute with the city’s transit regulator, Uber has earned a 30-month license to continue operating in London, Transport for London (TfL) said on Saturday. “Uber has been granted a London private hire vehicle operator’s license for a period of two and a half years,” a TfL spokesperson told CNBC.
We’re delighted to announce @TfL has granted Uber a new 30 month licence in London. TfL rightly holds our industry to the highest regulatory and safety standards and we are pleased to have met their high bar.
— Uber UK (@UberUK) March 26, 2022
Uber’s dispute with TfL dates back to 2017 when the agency said the company wasn’t “fit and proper” to operate in the city and went on to revoke its taxi license. Among other issues, TfL said Uber had failed to properly conduct driver background checks and report serious criminal offenses. Uber appealed that decision. And while a court went on to grant it 15 months to clean up its act, TfL eventually revoked the company’s license again in 2019, noting at the time it had shown a “pattern of failures” in the past. Subsequently, Uber won another court decision in 2020 that gave it a new 18-month license that came with conditions designed to monitor its adherence to local regulations.
On Twitter, Uber said it was “delighted” by TfL’s decision, noting the agency “rightly holds our industry to the highest regulatory and safety standards,” and that it was “pleased to have met their high bar.” But not everyone is happy about the decision.
ADCU statement on @SadiqKhan's decision to license Uber as 'fit and proper' despite the failure of the Silicon Valley/Amsterdam based company to comply with the Supreme Court ruling on worker rights. pic.twitter.com/bKfFyAsL0k
— ADCU (@ADCUnion) March 26, 2022
“This is yet another tragically missed opportunity for [London Mayor] Sadiq Khan to make worker rights a condition of license for Uber to finally bring an end to the abuse of 100,000 gig workers licensed by Transport for London,” the App Drivers and Couriers Union said following the announcement. The group accused the company of failing to comply with a UK Supreme Court ruling from law year that said the company should treat its drivers as workers.
Universal’s Dark Universe died before it could even get off the ground, one of multiple attempts at building a cinematic universe after Marvel’s made it look so cool in the present day. But audiences very much said “yeah, no” to its debut film, the Tom Cruise-led The Mummy, back in 2017. Among the various plans there…
Apple’s third-generation AirPods may only be a few months old, but you can purchase them right now for 16 percent off their suggested retail price. Amazon has discounted the company's latest earbuds to $149.98. That’s only $10 more than their all-time low of $140.
Buy AirPods (3rd gen) at Amazon - $150While you could buy Apple’s second-generation AirPods for less money, we think the new model is a better purchase for most people. We gave Apple’s latest earbuds a score of 88, noting they were “better in nearly every way” from their predecessor. They feature a new design that we found a lot more comfortable. Sound quality is likewise improved with the third-generation AirPods capable of delivering rich bass. Battery life was another highlight, with the included charging case providing up to 30 hours of listening time. Apple’s H1 chip enables a handful of handy features, including hands-free Siri, support for spatial audio with head tracking and seamless pairing with Apple devices.
Of course, they’re not perfect. Their one-size-fits-all design won’t be for everyone, and they don’t come with active noise cancellation, a feature that would make them ideal for commuting. Still, if you own an iPhone, it’s hard to go wrong with the third-generation AirPods.
Follow @EngadgetDeals on Twitter for the latest tech deals and buying advice.
It’s been a long, delay-heavy road for Morbius, which releases next week. Sony’s been trying their best to build Jared Leto’s tragic-ish vampire as another big part of their Spider-Man adjacent cinematic universe that so far has only led to Venom and whatever the heck that Kraven the Hunter movie is going to be. But…
Casey Newton, Platformer
Telegram was almost banned in Brazil because it missed some emails from the local authorities. In his newsletter, Newton explains why this is the latest in a series of troubling decisions from a platform with over 500 million users. "When you’re providing critical communications infrastructure to tens of millions of people, though, you have more responsibility," he writes.
Nicole Wetsman, The Verge
Artificial intelligence is being used for all sorts of things in medicine, one of which is predicting if a patient is at risk for conditions like diabetes or cardiovascular issues. However, it can be difficult for us as members of the public to understand how these algorithms work. The Verge guides us through one called Sepsis Watch, a system that monitors patients for a potentially deadly condition following an infection.
Thomas Brewster, Forbes
Elon Musk's Starlink satellites are helping to provide internet access in Ukraine in the midst of the ongoing Russian invasion, but crews on the ground are venturing into dangerous areas to fix equipment that was already in place that's being damaged by bombings.
For the past three months, a mysterious hacker gang has been giving Silicon Valley a migraine of epic proportions. LAPSUS$, a band of cybercriminals with unorthodox techniques and a flare for the dramatic, has been on a white hot streak—lining tech companies up and knocking em’ down like bowling pins.
While bats have been closely associated with vampires for centuries, there are actually only three species of bats that drink blood. Most of them eat fruits, insects, nectar and small animals, like frogs and fish, instead. Blood is low in calories, while being rich in iron, protein and little else, making it a terrible, terrible food source. Now, a team of scientists has figured out how and why those vampire bat species are the only mammals that can live solely on a diet of blood.
Upon comparing the genome of common vampire bats to 26 other species, the scientists found 13 genes in the blood-sucking mammals that either no longer work or are missing. Three of those losses had been reported in another study published in 2014, with all of them indicating a reduced sense of taste reception in vampire bats. The remaining 10 gene losses are new discoveries, according to the team.
The loss of a gene called REP15 indicates enhanced iron uptake in the animals' gastrointestinal cells, which they also shed and excrete quickly. This prevents iron overload that can have severe detrimental effects. The absence of two other genes allow glucose to remain longer in the bats' bodies and prevent hypoglycemia, since blood contains minimal carbohydrates. Another absent gene might also be the consequence of the "extensive morphological and physiological modifications" in the stomach of common vampire bats. Instead of being a muscular organ, their stomachs are expandable structures used to store large amounts of liquid and serve as a major site of fluid absorption.
The loss of one gene even contributed "to the evolution of vampire bats’ exceptional social behaviors." Since they can't survive too long without feeding, seeing as blood is very low in calories, vampire bats can regurgitate their meals and share with others. They can also keep track of who shared with them in the past and will extend extend help to them in the future if needed. Hannah Kim Frank, a bat researcher at Tulane University, told AP: "It's totally bizarre and amazing that vampire bats can survive on blood — they are really weird, even among bats."
The study revealing the loss of genes that allow them to live off blood doesn't make vampire bats any less weird, or intriguing. You can read the whole study in the Science Advances journal.
