Technology

There’s a new group of affluent conservatives planning to revamp the American right by investing more than $30 million into new legal, policy, and media ventures, including “influencer programs,” according to a recent report from The New York Times. The coalition, known as The Rockbridge Network, features prominent conservative billionaires like Peter Thiel and Rebekah Mercer. The network aims to “disrupt but advance the Republican agenda” with its new policy and media programs. According to a network brochure obtained by the Times, “The Rockbridge Network will replace the current Republican ecosystem” of activist and media organizations with “better action-oriented, more effective people and institutions.” The brochure doesn’t reveal the details of these new media ventures The brochure do...

Corsair is announcing an updated version of its K70 mechanical keyboard today that comes with more responsive OPX optical mechanical switches. It costs $149.99, $10 more than the standard K70 released last year with more traditional Cherry mechanical switches. Aside from the switch change, the new K70 is broadly identical to last year’s model, with a detachable USB-C cable, RGB lighting, and a tenkeyless layout. The reason you might want a gaming keyboard with optical switches comes down to debounce delay, which typically affects keyboards with traditional mechanical switches. When you press a mechanical switch, there can be a brief period when its metal contacts clatter together before eventually settling, and this means the keyboard can take a moment to register a keypress. Optical switc...

You like the way that dress looks but you’d rather have it in green. You want those shoes but prefer flats to heels. What if you could have drapes with the same pattern as your favorite notebook? I don’t know how to Google for these things, but Google Search product manager Belinda Zeng showed me real-world examples of each earlier this week, and the answer was always the same: take a picture, then type a single word into Google Lens. Today, Google is launching a US-only beta of the Google Lens Multisearch feature it teased last September at its Search On event, and while I’ve only seen a rough demo so far, you shouldn’t have to wait long to try it for yourself: it’s rolling out in the Google app on iOS and Android. Take a screenshot or picture of a dress, then tap, type “green,” and searc...

Two of the biggest names in entertainment are coming together to create a virtual space aimed at kids, through a new partnership between Fortnite developer Epic Games and Lego. “We are excited to come together to build a space in the metaverse that’s fun, entertaining, and made for kids and families,” Epic CEO Tim Sweeney said in a statement. Details are scarce — and the concept of a metaverse remains a murky one — but the companies say that whatever it is they end up building will be designed as a family-friendly virtual space from the beginning. “The Lego Group and Epic Games will combine their extensive experience to ensure that this next iteration of the internet is designed from the outset with the wellbeing of kids in mind,” the companies explained in a press release. The pairing mak...

Chrono Cross got off to a, let’s say, difficult start. It was billed as a follow-up to Chrono Trigger, one of the most beloved role-playing games ever created, but while the two take place in the same world, there are some big differences. Chrono Trigger was created by a superteam of developers including Final Fantasy mastermind Hironobu Sakaguchi, long-time Dragon Quest steward Yuji Horii, and Dragon Ball creator Akira Toriyama. It’s frequently cited as one of the greatest games ever made. That all-star team didn’t continue on with the series, and though Chrono Cross was largely well-received at launch, its legacy never reached the same heights as its predecessor. It’s always been that weird follow-up with parallel worlds, a confusing story, and far too many characters. Which brings us to...

A voting app run by supporters of prominent Putin critic Alexei Navalny is once again available for download on Apple’s Russian App Store, The Washington Post reports, citing independent researchers and Navalny’s chief of stall Leonid Volkov. Both Apple and Google removed the app last year after the Kremlin threatened to criminally prosecute company employees in the country. The “Smart Voting” app contains over a thousand endorsements of Russian political candidates, WaPo notes, with the idea being to help citizens consolidate votes against the ruling United Russia party, which has Vladimir Putin as its de facto leader. Pressure to remove the app came ahead of Russia’s legislative election in September. WaPo reports that Google restored the app shortly after the election. Apple halted prod...

Google is preparing to limit the availability of outdated apps on the Play Store, the company has announced. From November 1st, all existing apps in the store should aim to target an API level within two years of the latest major Android OS release. If they don’t, Google says it’ll place limits on which users are able to discover or install them. The changes are meant to ensure that software available from the Play Store makes use of Android’s latest privacy and security features. Device owners “expect to realize the full potential of all the privacy and security protections Android has to offer,” Google product management director Krish Vitaldevara writes in a blog post. “Expanding our target level API requirements will protect users from installing older apps that may not have these prot...