Technology

An iceberg that was once the largest on the planet, dubbed A68a, recently released 152 billion tons of fresh water close to the sub-Antarctic island of South Georgia, potentially impacting the region’s ecosystem, a study published earlier this month found. A68a captured the world’s attention in 2017 when it broke off the Larsen-C ice shelf, located near the tip of the Antarctic Peninsula. The largest iceberg in the world at the time of its formation, it initially floated around the Weddell Sea close to Antarctica before making its way its way across the Drake Passage between southern South America and the northern reaches of Antarctica. As it approached the southern Atlantic island of South Georgia in December 2020, researchers became concerned that it would disrupt wildlife in the remote ...

Ahead of the Steam Deck’s launch, Valve has detailed a new feature for Steam’s cloud saves that should carry over your progress from your Steam Deck back to your PC (or another Steam Deck) even when you put your Steam Deck into suspend mode without fully exiting a game. Valve has talked about this intriguing idea before, but now it has a name — Dynamic Cloud Sync. Here’s how it should work: when you put your Steam Deck into sleep mode, Dynamic Cloud Sync will automatically upload “all modified save game data” to the cloud, Valve explained in a blog post published Monday. That way, you can pick up your save when you sit down at your PC or another device with Steam. The Steam Deck will also automatically download save updates when you wake up the device. Others have struggled with seamless c...

Spring is coming (soon, we promise), and smart lighting company Philips Hue has some new products that can help you spruce up your outdoor space, so you can enjoy spending more time outside when the ice finally melts. Signify, which owns Philips Hue, has announced three new additions to its outdoor smart lighting line, all arriving in the US on March 1st, 2022. Plus, two new lighting effects are scheduled to arrive on the Hue app later this year to add features to its indoor smart bulbs. The Philips Hue Inara wall light ($99.99, available on March 1st) is a vintage-style outdoor wall light featuring a filament bulb. Also known as an Edison bulb, a filament bulb has its “electric” filament visible through the bulb, resembling that first incandescent bulb designed by Thomas Edison. This trad...

At the beginning of this month, my colleague Monica Chin published an article with the headline “It’s 2022, and the Surface Duo still doesn’t have Android 11,” pointing out that Microsoft hadn’t brought Android 11 to the dual-screen phone despite having said in September that it was working on delivering the by the end of 2021. That’s finally changing, as Microsoft has begun to roll out Android 11 for unlocked Surface Duos in North America and Europe, as reported by 9to5Google. Not every Surface Duo will be getting the update right away; if you have a Surface Duo that’s tied to AT&T, it sounds like you’re going to have to wait just a bit longer. “For locked or unlocked AT&T Surface Duos, we are testing this release and it is pending final validation,” according to Microsoft’s page ...

Google is working on a lower-end Chromecast with Google TV that would slot in below its current model in price — and also video resolution. According to Protocol’s Janko Roettgers, the upcoming, cheaper Chromecast will run the same Google TV software as the existing hardware and will still include a remote control. But it will be limited to a maximum of 1080p video quality. Playing to that limitation, Protocol believes Google might market the device as “Chromecast HD with Google TV,” similar to the branding of Apple’s Apple TV HD. The product would be marketed towards consumers with 1080p TVs who don’t necessarily care about having the very best picture quality. Other specs mentioned in the report include a maximum of 2GB RAM and 60fps frame rate and confirmation that the hardware would be...

Twitter has banned @wordlinator, a bot that replied to people’s Wordle posts with rude messages that include spoilers for the next day’s game. The account’s spoilers appeared to be accurate (the key is easily accessible in the game’s code, so it’s not necessarily a surprise), which could end up ruining the game for anyone who sees them. For anyone who’s managed to avoid it, Wordle is a game where you get six chances to guess a five-letter word — if you’re interested, you can learn how to play it here. The answer is the same for everyone playing, and it only changes once a day. The game also has an interesting sharing mechanic, where you can copy and paste a series of emoji to let people know how easy or hard it was for you to guess the word of the day. If you’ve seen a ton of yellow, gray,...

My TikTok For You page is generally a wonderland of soothing cooking videos, lesbian carpentry, dieticians frothing at the mouth at fitness scams, and whatever it is @yoleendadong is up to. But every so often, my FYP will land me in FinanceTok and CryptoTok. And buddy, I do not think everyone there is OK. I’ve never turned down a chance to leap down the TikTok rabbit hole, and perusing the #marketcrash2022 and #cryptocrash2022 tags is truly tragic. There’s this baby going through a rollercoaster of emotions watching stocks go up and down. There’s also this grown adult man doing the same thing, set to the Emotional Damage vs. Pompeii by William Li sound. Actually, it seems like a lot of grown men are crying about their cryptocurrency and investment portfolios tanking. Those are just the tip...

Panasonic is due to start mass producing next-generation lithium-ion batteries for Tesla with five times the energy capacity of existing models as early as 2023, according to a report from Nikkei Asia. Although the batteries are being manufactured primarily for Tesla, a Panasonic executive didn’t rule out supplying them to other companies in a November interview. The new batteries promise to boost the range of electric cars, and make them more affordable to produce and sell. In a statement given to Reuters, Panasonic declined to confirm Nikkei’s report. “We are studying various options for mass production, including a test production line we are establishing this business year,” the company said. “We don’t, however, have anything to announce at this time.” Nikkei reports that the larger, h...

Did you think the season of giving was over? Not at The Verge! Not only are we continuing to give you a heads-up regarding discounts and sales on the latest gadgets, but we have another mystery bag stuffed full of freebies to give away to one lucky reader. This time, we’ve filled an Alienware M17 Elite Backpack (which typically retails for $99.99) with a whole bunch of goodies. In total, the combined value of the bag and its contents is about $623. We’d be remiss to keep all of these gadgets to ourselves, so we’re offering them to one of you. Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge Just where did we get all this stuff? Well, The Verge is always trying out and reviewing the latest tech, and sometimes we end up with some leftover items that need a good home. And what better way to find t...

The attorneys general of three states and the District of Columbia are suing Google for the allegedly deceptive collection of location data on Android. The complaints, which build on a 2020 lawsuit filed by the Arizona Attorney General, allege that Google’s “complex web” of settings obfuscated whether users were sharing their location at a given moment. Furthermore, they allege Google pushed Android users with “repeated nudging, misleading pressure tactics, and evasive and deceptive descriptions” to share more information either “inadvertently or out of frustration.” “Google falsely led consumers to believe that changing their account and device settings would allow customers to protect their privacy and control what personal data the company could access,” said DC Attorney General Karl Ra...

After years of being trapped in different circles of development hell, co-director Guillermo del Toro’s long-awaited take on Pinocchio is finally happening, and the stop-motion feature’s first teaser trailer is here to introduce the world to the story’s minuscule moral center. Set during Benito Mussolini’s fascist reign over Italy in the 1930s, del Toro’s Pinocchio once again tells the tale of a wooden puppet who suddenly comes to life, much to his woodcarver “father’s” surprise. Unlike some of the other Pinocchio tellings you may be familiar with, though, this film’s Pinocchio (Gregory Mann) quickly gets into the sorts of cruel mischief that put him at odds with Geppetto (David Bradley), who loves his son but can’t help but see that he isn’t exactly what one would call a “nice” child. Tho...

Toshihiro Nagoshi, former chief creative officer at Sega, where he led development of the Yakuza series as general director of Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio, has announced his next move. He’s started up his own studio, simply titled Nagoshi Studio, which is being wholly funded by Chinese internet and gaming company NetEase. Nagoshi announced his departure from Sega last October, but today’s news also follows a report from Bloomberg back in August that named NetEase as his prospective future partner. Masayoshi Yokoyama, who The Verge interviewed last year about his work on the most recent Yakuza game Like a Dragon, is the new head of Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio and is currently working on the next game in the series. Nagoshi Studio will be headquartered in Tokyo and has hired several former long-time Sega ...