Technology

Popular streamer Tyler “Ninja” Blevins has announced his next piece of branded gear — a custom $60 hoodie with a “patent-pending” system that’s designed to let customers wear a headset over the hood while still enjoying their music or games uninterrupted. The hoodie works by featuring a “polymesh” ear hole on each side of the hood, allowing for sound from the headset to pass through instead of getting muffled by the (usually) thick material of a sweatshirt hood. I’ve always loved wearing my hood up with my headphones whether I’m traveling & listening to music or gaming. So excited to be releasing my patent pending hoodie that allows you to do either of those without changing your sound quality. TOMORROW NOON PST https://t.co/GbfYE4nQgV pic.twitter.com/xiDEI0sSo4 — Ninja (@Ninja) Novemb...

Amazon announced a joint operation with the National Intellectual Property Rights Coordination Center (IPR Center) on Tuesday, focused on stopping counterfeit goods from entering the US. The partnership will rely on intelligence gathered from Amazon’s Counterfeit Crimes Unit, logistics company DHL, and US Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) to proactively stop the sale of counterfeit products. “Operation Fulfilled Action” relies on Amazon’s dominant positioning as both a distributor and marketplace for products. Because of the amount sold on Amazon’s various storefronts, IPR Center and Amazon have shared information previously, even collaborating on a crackdown on fraud related to COVID-19. This new operation marks a more long-term partnership, however. Prior to Amazon’s involvement, IPR Cente...

Last week, a sheep-counting expedition found a mysterious monolith deep in the Utah desert, and they warned the world to stay away. This is a great opening for a science fiction story, and also the actual events of late November 2020. As local news outlet KSL TV lays out, a Utah Department of Public Safety helicopter crew discovered a 10- to 12-foot steel object that they described as a “monolith.” The crew found the object installed in the canyon’s rock floor on November 18th, and they found “no obvious indication” of its source. On November 23rd, they posted photos of it to Instagram and the DPS site. “There is a significant possibility they may become stranded.” DPS has avoided saying exactly where the monolith is. “It is in a very remote area and if individuals were to attempt to visit...

In 2017, Zunum Aero was flying high. The Kirkland, Washington-based aviation startup came out of stealth mode with bold plans to build a fleet of 12-seat hybrid electric jets for short, regional hops between cities. The company, which had received millions of dollars from the venture arms of Boeing and JetBlue, said it would be ready to fly by 2022. Not long after, those dreams came crashing down to earth. In 2018, Zunum ran out of cash, forcing it to lay off nearly all of its employees and vacate its headquarters. It struggled to raise additional funds that it needed to get its plans back in motion. And now, Zunum is striking back at one of its former investors. The company filed a lawsuit in Washington Superior Court this week accusing aerospace giant Boeing of fraud, technology theft, b...

Ready to re-up your Netflix subscription for another year? What about Spotify or Apple Music? Black Friday and Cyber Monday can be the perfect opportunity to lock in your streaming services for less money than they’d usually cost. Whether you’re after music, live TV streaming, or something more niche, there are a host of offers and limited-time deals to choose between. Once you’re done scoping out the streaming offers, check out our big roundup of the best Black Friday deals you can get right now. Get Hulu for $1.99 per month for the next year Hulu’s hard-to-resist Black Friday promotion is back for another year. It lets you subscribe to the standard (with ads) plan for $1.99 monthly instead of the regular $5.99 rate. Here’s the fine print: this offer is only available for new and returnin...

YouTube has temporarily suspended right-wing outlet One America News Network (OANN) for promoting a false COVID-19 cure. OANN’s channel will stay online, but it will be prevented from uploading new videos for a week, and it’s been removed from YouTube’s advertising partner program. Axios reported the news today, and YouTube spokesperson Ivy Choi confirmed it to The Verge. “After careful review, we removed a video from OANN and issued a strike on the channel for violating our COVID-19 misinformation policy, which prohibits content claiming there’s a guaranteed cure,” Choi says. “Additionally, due to repeated violations of our COVID-19 misinformation policy and other channel monetization policies, we’ve suspended the channel from the YouTube Partner Program and as a result, its monetization ...

Samsung on Tuesday announced the Galaxy A12 and A02S, two new entry-level phones set to launch next year in Europe. Both offer a lower barrier to entry for anyone looking for a modern Android smartphone. The A12 is designed to be a successor to the A11, sporting a 6.8-inch HD+ display with a notch for the 8-megapixel front-facing camera, an octa-core processor, a fingerprint sensor on the side, and a 5,000mAh battery. Photos are covered by a quad-array of cameras on the back, including a 48-megapixel main sensor, a 5-megapixel ultrawide, and a pair of 2-megapixel sensors to help out with macro and depth shots. The A02S is slightly less impressive: it has the same display and battery but with 3GB of RAM and 32GB of storage (though you can expand storage with its microSD slot). The phone is ...

A few weeks ago, I put on some rubber boots, grabbed a shovel, and went gold prospecting. There’s allegedly gold throughout the river systems near my home in western Washington state, and I made it my goal to find some. I went partly to tick another “things The Verge paid me to do” box and partly to demystify one of the most enduring and unique commodities in the world. Gold has been highly valued for pretty much as long as humans have been formally valuing things. It’s been used as jewelry, money, a dental filling, a garnish, a critical component in electronics, and even a medicine. It’s malleable, conductive, harmless to ingest, noncorroding, and captivating to look at. A big part of gold’s value is predicated on its scarcity. But the… Continue reading… You Deserve to Make M...

Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge Whether you’re shopping for a student, an older relative, or anyone in between, a laptop can make a great gift. And the internet’s largest retailers are offering all kinds of laptops at discounted prices this Black Friday, whether you’re looking for a convertible, a Chromebook, a gaming rig, or anything else. Note that for some models, only certain configurations may be on sale. Make sure to double-check the specs of the item you’re buying to make sure they’ll suit your workload (and that you’re actually getting the discount) before you check out. HP deals A number of HP laptops are on sale through Best Buy’s online store. One of them is the HP Envy x360 13 2-in-1, a portable convertible laptop that offers exceptional value for its… Continue reading&...

Microsoft is in the early phases of rolling out its xCloud streaming service on mobile devices, but TVs are the next logical step. In an interview with The Verge, Xbox chief Phil Spencer has revealed we’ll likely see an Xbox app appear on smart TVs over the next year. “I think you’re going to see that in the next 12 months,” said Spencer, when asked about turning the Xbox into a TV app. “I don’t think anything is going to stop us from doing that.” Spencer previously hinted at TV streaming sticks for Microsoft’s xCloud service last month, and this latest hint suggests we might see similar hardware or an Xbox app for TVs during 2021. Microsoft is currently working on bringing xCloud to the web to enable it on iOS devices, and this work… Continue reading… You Deserve to Make Mone...

Google Pixel 5 and Pixel 4A 5G | Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge Google’s line of products has expanded quite a bit over the years, and a bunch of them are discounted for Black Friday. You can find discounts on Nest smart speakers and smart displays, mesh Wi-Fi routers, Pixel phones, Stadia gaming setups, and smart thermostats. Most of the sales are available at a variety of retailers; we’ve linked the most popular ones for each below. If you’re looking for even more Black Friday deals, be sure to check out our continuously updated list of the best deals. Google Pixel phone deals There aren’t a lot of sales on Google’s Pixel phones this year, but if you’ve been eying a Pixel 5 or a 4A 5G, there are a couple of ways to save a few bucks. Pixel 5 activated on Verizon for $499 at B...

Photo by Maja Hitij/Getty Images Elon Musk has passed Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates to become the world’s second richest person, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. The Tesla CEO’s net worth now sits at around $128 billion, after increasing by $100 billion this year. There is a sizable gap between Musk and the number one spot, which is currently held by Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos who has a reported net worth of around $182 billion. In January, Musk ranked 35th on the list, Bloomberg reports. For an idea of how the wealth of these men compares to the average American household, check out this amazing data visualization produced earlier this year in which every pixel represents $1,000. Musk’s rapid ascent up the list has mainly been driven by Tesla’s share price…. Continue read...