Technology

Let’s face it — somewhere inside us all is a greedy five-year-old who wants that wonderful, beautiful, fascinating toy that seems completely out of reach. But what that toy is depends very much on who we are. So, just out of curiosity, we asked the staff of The Verge to tell us something that they would love to get for the holidays — if money (and opportunity) was no object. (And the rule was that idealistic longings like world peace or the end of the pandemic didn’t count — for this once, we were not going for idealism.) So let’s see what hidden longings lie in the hearts of The Verge’s staff… There’s something magical about getting lost in the woods and having to find your way out with just a map and a compass, especially if it’s a relatively safe environment where you’re not too f...

According to reports from some users, an update to Google Photos removed one of the Pixel 6’s big features: the Magic Eraser tool that lets you remove unwanted objects or people from your photos. If your Pixel downloaded the affected version (5.67, according to Android Central), fear not: Google says it’s working on a fix. While the version of Photos with the Magic Eraser erased doesn’t appear to be available in the Play Store anymore, its presence on APK Mirror confirms that it was at one point (though we wouldn’t recommend downloading it). According to one user, the broken version displayed a tip about the object removal feature, despite it no longer being accessible in the app. Google says a fix is coming Google spokesperson Alex Moriconi told The Verge that the company “identified an i...

On Friday, PC gaming giant Valve invited the developer community to learn more about its Steam Deck, a $400 handheld gaming PC with a comparatively powerful AMD chip. It’s akin to the Nintendo Switch of gaming PCs, and there’s a lot we already knew about the delayed handheld from its announcement, our trip to Valve’s headquarters, and an official teardown. But today, we learned even more. Here are the highlights — unless, of course, you’d like to watch Valve’s entire livestream or breakout sessions for yourself. That’s fine too! Aerith lives The AMD chip inside the Steam Deck has a name: it’s the Aerith SOC, a clear reference to the famous Aerith from Final Fantasy VII. It’s an APU with a power envelope of between 4 and 15 watts, and it contains both an 4-core, 8-thread AMD Zen 2 CPU that ...

Mark Zuckerberg’s extensive video about Facebook / Meta’s pivot to the metaverse has become something of a meme, but perhaps the best parody of the presentation was done this week by, of all places, the country of Iceland. In a nearly two-and-a-half-minute video, a man who is identified as Chief Visionary Officer Zack Mossbergsson begins a discussion about “a revolutionary approach on how to connect our world without being super weird. “Some said it’s not possible,” he continues. “Some said it’s out of reach. To them, we say, it’s already here.” He then gestures in the general direction of a beautiful, snow-covered Icelandic landscape that stretches as far as the eye can see. “Seriously, look, it’s right here.” The rest of the video is a hilarious pitch for the “Icelandverse,” which he des...

Meta (formerly Facebook) CTO Andrew Bosworth warned employees that creating safe virtual reality experiences was a vital part of its business plan — but also potentially impossible at a large scale. In an internal memo seen by Financial Times, Bosworth apparently said he wanted Meta virtual worlds to have “almost Disney levels of safety,” although spaces from third-party developers could have looser standards than directly Meta-built content. Harassment or other toxic behavior could pose an “existential threat” to the company’s plans for an embodied future internet if it turned mainstream consumers off VR. At the same time, Bosworth said policing user behavior “at any meaningful scale is practically impossible.” FT reporter Hannah Murphy later tweeted that Bosworth was citing Masnick’s Imp...

Starting this week, newer Echo and Echo Dot speakers can use ultrasound to detect occupancy in your home and turn on and off other connected devices such as lights or your Fire TV. First mentioned at Amazon’s fall hardware event in September, the Echo and Echo Dot fourth-gen speakers can now emit an “inaudible ultrasound wave” to detect if there are people present in a room. You can enable or disable this feature in the Alexa app, where you can also set up occupancy routines to use this new capability to do things like turn on lights when you enter a room and then off again when the room is empty. You could also have Alexa play music or a radio station when motion is detected near an Echo device during a set time and then shut down the tunes once you’ve left. The function is listed under M...

AMC Theaters, which is perhaps the king of the memestocks, promised in August that you’d be able to pay for tickets and concessions with Bitcoin by the end of the year, and now, you can do just that. Bitcoin isn’t the only cryptocurrency you’ll be able to use; AMC is also accepting Ethereum, Bitcoin Cash, and Litecoin for online purchases, according to a tweet from CEO Adam Aron (via CoinTelegraph). He also says you can pay online with Apple Pay, Google Pay, and PayPal. Big newsflash! As promised, many new ways NOW to pay online at AMC. We proudly now accept: drumroll, please… Bitcoin, Ethereum, Bitcoin Cash, Litecoin. Also Apple Pay, Google Pay, PayPal. Incredibly, they already account for 14% of our total online transactions! Dogecoin next. pic.twitter.com/a7pqYBm7HB — Adam Aron (@CEOAda...

Microsoft and the fashion brand Gucci have teamed up on a ridiculously expensive Gucci-themed Xbox Series X that will be released in limited quantities next week. It looks bad, in my opinion; the Gucci Xbox Series X has double G patterns plastered all over it, which I feel ruins the sleek aesthetic of the console’s original design. And it’s completely unaffordable to the average person, costing a cool $10,000, according to Gucci’s website. All this for just $10,000.Image: Gucci With that five-figure sum, you do get a few extras, including two Gucci-themed Xbox controllers, a subscription to Xbox Game Pass Ultimate (though it’s unclear for how long), and an Xbox-branded suitcase in which to carry the console and controllers. And you’re also buying the exclusivity of having one of 100 of the...