Technology

Apple must pay $300 million in royalties following a retrial in a patent dispute, a Texas jury determined Friday. As reported by Reuters, the jury found that Apple should pay patent company Optis Wireless Technology and its related companies because the technology Apple used in its iPhones, iPads, and Watches allegedly infringed Optis’ patents. Last year, a jury awarded Optis $506 million in the dispute, but a judge vacated that award in April, and ordered a new trial focused on damages only. US District Judge Rodney Gilstrap said the first jury had not been allowed to consider whether the amount was awarded on the “fair, reasonable, and non-discriminatory,” or FRAND, terms required in standard-essential patent cases. The five patents involved in the case once belonged to LG, Panasonic, an...

Once upon a time, the Thinkpad X1 Yoga was Lenovo’s flagship business convertible, joining the clamshell X1 Carbon at the top of the company’s business hierarchy. These days, it has more company. We now have the paper-thin, titanium-coated X1 Titanium Yoga, the featherweight X1 Nano, and the powerhouse X1 Extreme kicking around, all of which are excellent, pricey, and could reasonably be considered flagships in their own right. There’s a lot of innovation happening across the ThinkPad line, but the X1 Yoga retains a lot of the hallmark features that have graced old-school ThinkPads over the years. (With a starting tag of $1,493.40 — $2,315.28 as tested — that includes the premium price.) There are some subtle but important upgrades, of course, including a 16:10 (finally) touch display, a n...

Twitter has reinstated the accounts of several politicians in India’s opposition party, which were suspended after party leader Rahul Gandhi tweeted a photo of himself with the parents of a girl who was allegedly raped and murdered in New Delhi, Reuters reported. Gandhi had tweeted his support of the girl’s family, saying that they deserved justice and others had shared his tweet. However, Indian law prohibits the disclosure of the identities of children and sexual assault victims. According to a notice posted on the Lumen database, India’s National Commission for Protection of Child Rights requested Twitter take action. A Twitter spokesperson said in an email to The Verge that Gandhi submitted a copy of an authorization letter from the people in the image to the company’s India Grievance ...

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) recently reported that July was officially the hottest month on record in 142 years of record keeping. As wildfires continue to rage on in the U.S, particularly in California and Oregon, Nest Hub is coming out with a new feature that will display the Air Quality Index (AQI) on its weather widget. Google draws air quality data from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) website which displays real-time AQI data across the U.S. The Nest Hub display will show color-coded rankings from 0 to 500 and green to maroon. Google Assistant will also begin responding to air quality questions and can give alerts when air quality levels rise to unhealthy levels. For reference, air quality levels from 51 to 100 (yellow) will begin to pose risk ...

Reddit is the latest social platform to incorporate a short-form video feed on its iOS app. In its latest update, the Reddit app has incorporated a button to the right of the search bar which streams videos in a fashion similar to TikTok and Instagram Reels. Subreddits tags are shown at the top, and users have the power to upvote, downvote, comment, share and gift a range of medals and animated awards. The user interface itself isn’t exactly new as Reddit has been experimenting with this format for a while, but the new button and algorithm allow users to easily discover new subreddits and videos without having to scroll through the discussion forum. Reddit acquired TikTok’s competitor, Dubsmash, back in December and has confirmed plans to incorporate its technology to develop new features ...

July was officially the hottest month in 142 years of record keeping, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). JUST IN: It’s official. #July was Earth’s hottest month on record. https://t.co/xKGLizOml4 via @NOAANCEIclimate #StateOfClimate #July2021 (Tweet 1 of 5) pic.twitter.com/Qqbu6CLqVt — NOAA (@NOAA) August 13, 2021 New data released by the US federal agency on Friday noted that while July is usually the warmest month of the year, this July saw unprecedented heat around the world. The previous record was set in July 2016, with 2019 and 2020 reaching the same high temperature. According to NOAA, the combined land and ocean-surface temperature reached 1.67 degrees Fahrenheit (0.93 of a degree Celsius) above the 20th century average of 60.4 degrees Fahrenhe...

Ford has filed a motion asking the US District Court in San Francisco to dismiss a lawsuit from rival GM over Ford’s BlueCruise self-driving feature. Last month, GM filed a trademark infringement lawsuit claiming that the name BlueCruise was too close to Super Cruise, the name of GM’s hands-free driving tech, which it introduced in 2017, as well as its autonomous vehicle subsidiary Cruise. Ford said in its motion that the term “cruise” has been been in “ubiquitous use” over the past 50 years to refer to driver-assist features. “Consumers understand “cruise” to refer to a feature in their vehicle that performs part of the driving task or assists them in driving, and they do not associate that term with any one company or brand,” Ford argued in its complaint. In its lawsuit filed July 23rd, ...

Twitter on Friday announced that it was temporarily pausing its newly-relaunched verification program. “We’ve temporarily hit pause on rolling out access to apply for Verification so we can make improvements to the application and review process,” Twitter said. “For those who have been waiting, we know this may be disappointing. We want to get things right, and appreciate your patience.” Some users responded to the tweet, expressing frustration at the program, which just reopened its application process in May after a three-year hiatus. Don’t worry, we’re working through reviewing all of the applications we’ve received as quickly as we can. — Twitter Verified (@verified) August 13, 2021 Twitter assured users that it was “working through reviewing all of the applications we’ve received as q...

For journalists and others in creative and technical fields, having a side hustle or doing freelance work is extremely common. In addition to a day job an editor, for example, one may write paid-per-piece articles for other publications who aren’t competitors of her primary employer, and typically (ideally) with her employer’s explicit or tacit approval. Some people do so for the needed additional income, some like the work. And according to a story in The Wall Street Journal, a new website provides tips for tech workers who want to earn two full-time paychecks while working remotely, giving half-assed effort to one (or both) and without letting either employer know about the other. The WSJ describes the scenario: Alone in their home offices, they toggle between two laptops. They play “Tet...

Why privacy experts are concerned Contributors: Verge Staff When Apple announced changes it plans to make to iOS devices in an effort to help curb child abuse by finding child sexual abuse material (CSAM), parts of its plan generated backlash. First, it’s rolling out an update to its Search app and Siri voice assistant on iOS 15, watchOS 8, iPadOS 15, and macOS Monterey. When a user searches for topics related to child sexual abuse, Apple will redirect the user to resources for reporting CSAM, or getting help for an attraction to such content. But it’s Apple’s two other CSAM plans that have garnered criticism. One update will add a parental control option to Messages, sending an alert to parents if a child age 12 or younger views or sends sexually explicit pictures, and obscuring the image...

For years, my primary gaming display has been the Asus VS228H-P, a 21.5-inch screen with a 1920 x 1080 resolution I’ve had since late 2015. Even though it’s old, I’ve had very few complaints with it. But when I picked up both a PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X last year, I wondered if I wasn’t using them to their full abilities by not having a monitor that could take advantage of the 120fps and 4K resolution of which the consoles were capable. For the past month and a half, I’ve been able to test Acer’s Nitro XV282K KV, the company’s new $900 gaming monitor, with two HDMI 2.1 ports, that supports 4K resolution and 120Hz refresh rates. During that time, I’ve been using it as my primary gaming screen to see if the high cost is worth investing in for higher-fidelity gaming. Verge Score 8 out o...