Technology

Reddit is now categorically banning its users, globally, from posting links to Russian state-sponsored media outlets, including RT and Sputnik. It’s possibly the most concrete deplatforming of those channels yet — because while Apple, Google, Meta, Microsoft, Twitter, YouTube, and many others have paused their ads or removed content or restricted discoverability or stopped actively promoting content, and both Facebook and YouTube have blocked content in the EU specifically, none of those is the same thing as a blanket site-wide global ban on all links. In a blog post (via Engadget), Reddit says it’s already been rejecting ads “that target Russia or originate from any Russia-based entity, government or private,” notes that the moderators of some subreddits have already blocked links to Russ...

Coming off a fraught month, Peloton is now extending free at-home trials for its Bike, Bike Plus, and Tread from 30 to 100 days. According to Peloton’s website, this is a limited-time offer for new customers who buy a Peloton machine between March 3rd, 2022, 5PM ET and March 22nd, 2022, 2:59AM ET. Essentially, the program allows customers to buy a new Peloton device, try it for a little over three months, and then return the machine for a full refund if it’s not to their liking. Returns will get free pickups, and Peloton says it’ll also cover shipping fees. While the trial starts once the machines are delivered, Peloton says that buyers will get immediate access to the Peloton app once their orders are confirmed. That said, there’s always fine print with these sorts of things. In this case...

Twitch said Thursday it will ban users who repeatedly spread harmful misinformation on its platform. The streaming site said the new rules won’t apply to users based on “individual statements or discussions” on a channel but to users “whose online presence is dedicated to (1) persistently sharing (2) widely disproven and broadly shared (3) harmful misinformation topics,” the new policy states. Twitch considers such users “harmful misinformation superspreaders.” The company chose those three criteria because, when grouped together, they “create the highest risk of harm including inciting real world harm,” according to a blog post outlining the new policy. Twitch stressed in the blog post that the update “will likely not impact you or the streamers you love” and added that users who spread m...

The US government’s New Car Assessment Program (NCAP), also known as the five-star safety rating, is getting a major update. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) announced Thursday a set of new proposals for the federal program aimed at curbing the surge in pedestrian deaths. For the first time, NHTSA will consider the inclusion of advanced driver-assistance system (ADAS — sorry for all the acronyms!) features, like automatic emergency braking, blind-spot detection, and lane-keep assistance. These ADAS features, which are quickly becoming standard in most vehicles today, could become essential criteria for a five-star safety rating from the government. Traditionally, NHTSA assigns safety ratings to new cars and trucks by putting a couple of crash test dummies inside t...

Beats and Eastside Golf just released their limited-edition collaborative headphones to support the Morehouse College Division 1 golf team. The Beats x Eastside Golf headphone design incorporates a royal blue with gold beside the band that displays the brand’s mantra “Be Authentic”. While they are not available to purchase, everyone from the Morehouse Golf Team was gifted this limited edition headset, along with Eastside Golf apparel and accessories. “Partnering with Eastside Golf is another opportunity for us as a brand to work with amazing Black creatives looking to further shape and broaden our culture in a very defiant way,” stated Astor Chambers from Beats. “Eastside Golf is a great example of paying it forward, ensuring that those coming up behind them have access to a wider view of ...

This week, Rivian updated the price estimates for its R1T electric pickup and R1S electric SUV, informing people that they could cost as much as $20,000 more than the original quotes, depending on the package they’d ordered. Fans who put down $1,000 to get in line for trucks years before they were built were outraged by the change, which Rivian attributed to inflationary pressure and supply chain problems. Today, Rivian CEO RJ Scaringe wrote customers, admitting that “we wrongly decided to make these changes apply to all future deliveries, including pre-existing configured preorders” and says that instead, Rivian will honor the “original configured price” for all preorders placed prior to March 1st. We failed to appreciate how you viewed your configuration as price locked, and we wrongly a...

Sabre, one of the largest airline ticket booking companies in the world, is terminating its distribution agreement with Russian air carrier Aeroflot, the company announced Thursday. The move could further restrict Russian air travel, which has already seen its planes banned from most Western countries’ airspace. State-owned Aeroflot is the flag carrier and the largest airline in the Russian Federation. The airline has about 200 aircraft in its fleet and travels to 146 destinations around the world. Being shut out of online booking software could make it difficult for the airline to operate domestically. Sabre said it is taking “immediate steps” to remove Aeroflot from its global distribution system, which is used by travel agencies, travel websites, and corporations around the world to sho...

For a lot of people, music is an integral part of working out. But not everyone wants to schlep their phone around while hitting the trails or working up a sweat. That’s where smartwatches can come in pretty handy. While nearly every smartwatch lets you control music on your phone, a good number can also play music on-device. Whether it’s an Apple Watch, Samsung Galaxy Watch 4, Garmin, Fitbit or Wear OS watch, you’ve got a lot of options for listening to music. Much of it will depend on which service is supported and what OS your watch runs on. Some will have options for offline playback, either through downloadable playlists or onboard music storage. If your smartwatch has LTE, you may also be able to stream music directly to your wrist. Keep in mind that you’ll likely need a pair of Blue...

When Breath of the Wild was released five years ago today, its rapturous reception didn’t just happen because of how it represented a long-overdue revamp of the Legend of Zelda series’ stale formula. That certainly helped. But what really made it resonate was its revolutionary approach to open-world game design. Unlike typical open-world games that overwhelm you with endless quests and icons on the map, Breath of the Wild told you the endpoint right from the start and trusted the player to make their own way there. You get more powerful in Breath of the Wild by exploring the freely traversable world for yourself and mastering its emergent systems. Once you feel ready, you can take on the final boss — or put it off forever because, hey, simply existing in the world is a joy unto itself. Bre...

Elon Musk has invited the United Auto Workers (UAW) labor union to hold a vote to unionize at Tesla’s Fremont factory in California. Musk tweeted the challenge after President Joe Biden, speaking in his State of the Union Address, mentioned rival automakers Ford and General Motors — both of which have a strong union presence, a key component of Biden’s political base — but not Tesla. Gene Simmons, bassist and singer from iconic rock band Kiss, noted on Twitter that the snub from pro-union Biden may have been “because Tesla is non-union and moved to Texas, a ‘right to work’ state.” Musk apparently agrees, and responded: “I’d like hereby to invite UAW to hold a union vote at their convenience. Tesla will do nothing to stop them.” Musk’s argument is that because the Bay Area has such a compet...

Some of Samsung’s smartphones include software that appears to be artificially limiting, or throttling, the performance of thousands of popular apps, Android Authority reports. Reports about the behavior have been gathering steam on Twitter, as well as Samsung’s Korean community forums. At the core of the issue is Samsung software called Game Optimizing Service (GOS), which is reportedly throttling the performance of 10,000 apps. This list includes popular apps like Instagram, Netflix, TikTok, and even Samsung’s own apps like Secure Folder and Samsung Pay. Crucially, however, it doesn’t appear to include benchmarking apps like 3DMark and GeekBench, which means they might not give an accurate picture of the performance of a phone. So a benchmarking app will run just fine, but when you actua...