Amazon’s new plan for games: James Bond and AI Snoop Dogg
Amazon’s new plan for games: James Bond and AI Snoop Dogg

Amazon’s gaming strategy has never really been clear. It’s been very active in the space: acquiring Twitch, launching its Luna cloud gaming service nearly six years ago, investing heavily in MMOs during the peak of live-service wave, and having access to a huge slate of franchises through Prime Video and the MGM Studios library. Late […]

Let us filter AI slop, you cowards
Let us filter AI slop, you cowards

It’s almost impossible to avoid seeing AI-generated content online, but it doesn’t have to be this way. YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, and more have ramped up content authentication efforts over the last year, with many now automatically applying labels to distinguish AI-generated images, videos, and music from those made by real, human creators. That’s all very […]

PlayStation is getting back to what it’s good at
PlayStation is getting back to what it’s good at

PlayStation used its most recent State of Play showcase to make it clear where its focus is. After a series of costly live-service stumbles, it’s getting back to focusing on premium, narrative-driven, single-player games. That statement was made clear with how it started and ended the hourlong show. The showcase began with an extended look […]

Microsoft and OpenAI broke up — now they’re ready to fight
Microsoft and OpenAI broke up — now they’re ready to fight

At Microsoft’s annual Build conference on Tuesday, the company announced a slew of new or expanded AI initiatives, including a super app, in-house reasoning models, a cybersecurity tool, and OpenClaw-esque AI agents. All this news added up to a clear message: Microsoft is positioned to be one of the biggest players in AI, and it’s […]

SwitchBot’s acquisition of Nanoleaf is about more than lighting
SwitchBot’s acquisition of Nanoleaf is about more than lighting

Smart lighting company Nanoleaf has been acquired by OneRobotics, the parent company of SwitchBot. In an exclusive interview with The Verge, Nanoleaf CEO Gimmy Chu says the company will remain independent and that he and his cofounder and COO, Christian Yan, will continue to run it. “Nothing is changing operationally,” says Chu, adding that there […]

AI has a water problem — Google thinks it has a fix
AI has a water problem — Google thinks it has a fix

In the face of widespread backlash to the AI data center buildout throughout the US, Google is touting its efforts to minimize the environmental impact by actually increasing water for local communities. The company laid out five commitments around water use in a new blog post published Wednesday, including a goal to replenish more water […]

Trump goes after green cards
Trump goes after green cards

On the Friday before Memorial Day, on the eve of a long weekend, the Trump administration announced that it was further gutting legal immigration. The Department of Homeland Security didn’t use this language. “This policy allows our immigration system to function as the law intended instead of incentivizing loopholes,” the agency said on X. “The […]

Lego’s Smart Play Pokémon can train and battle, but don’t do the one thing I wish they could
Lego’s Smart Play Pokémon can train and battle, but don’t do the one thing I wish they could

When Lego announced its tech-packed Smart Bricks at CES, we were impressed by the potential – enough to give it our Best in Show award. But when the first Star Wars sets actually launched in March, we were less enamored. All that promise of clever interaction and creative play ultimately boiled down to a few […]

This could be Windows’ M1 moment — but expect it to cost a ton
This could be Windows’ M1 moment — but expect it to cost a ton

Nvidia’s announcement that it’s getting into the consumer laptop chip space with RTX Spark is huge. Apple has proved for years that Arm-based chips can perform incredibly well while also delivering great battery life – at least on the Mac. In the Windows world, performance hasn’t fully matched up under Qualcomm chips, mostly in the […]

Gemini’s new AI agent is about as good as Google’s demo
Gemini’s new AI agent is about as good as Google’s demo

Google’s new “24/7” AI agent, Gemini Spark, can be shockingly good at doing things on your behalf. But I’m not sure it’s worth the financial cost and potential privacy tradeoffs. The company gave me access to Spark last week. Google advertises Spark as an AI agent that can take on tasks and work on them […]