Technology news

A new undersea internet cable funded in part by Google and connecting Japan with the US is slated to go online starting June 30th. The joint announcement, made today in a press release from NEC Corporation, says construction and testing on the trans-pacific cable, dubbed "Faster," was successfully completed and the system is now ready for service. The whole line runs 9,000 kilometers and stretches from Oregon to Chiba and Mie prefectures in Japan. Though it lands in three distinct loca

A new undersea internet cable funded in part by Google and connecting Japan with the US is slated to go online starting June 30th. The joint announcement, made today in a press release from NEC Corporation, says construction and testing on the trans-pacific cable, dubbed "Faster," was successfully completed and the system is now ready for service. The whole line runs 9,000 kilometers and stretches from Oregon to Chiba and Mie prefectures in Japan. Though it lands in three distinct loca

A human slingshot is a bad idea.
I admit that my career in extreme sports ended with Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3, so it’s possible, likely even, that I have been left behind by this new generation of thrill-seekers. Times have changed, I think, as I watch a human-being catapult into the air, traveling 0-200kph in one second, with no real destination other than "down."
There must be better hobbies. Rock-climbing. Skydiving. Traditional BASE jumping. Anything, really, that doesn’t tr

There are a dozen films fighting for supremacy in Warner Bros. The Legend Of Tarzan, and there’s no clear winner to the war. It’s impossible to guess how narratively and tonally divided Legend is from the trailers, which present it as a standard-issue fantasy/historical epic, or maybe the latest “brand deposit” live-action version of an existing Disney movie. But the filmmakers—four-time Harry Potter director David Yates and writers Adam Cozad and Craig Brewer, with

 So much for losing its mojo.
Despite twists and turns in recent years that have sometimes rivaled those of a telenovela, and even with its most famous member, John Doerr, no longer a general partner, Kleiner Perkins has raised two new funds totaling $1.4 billion, show newly processed SEC filings.
The firm’s digital growth fund — its third — has secured $1 billion in… Read More

Bethesda games and PlayStation consoles go together like peanut butter and toothpaste.
Fallout 4 mod support was supposed to come to PlayStation 4 in June, but the game’s publisher has now confirmed it is delaying that feature. Bethesda’s mod support and Creation Kit tools have already launched in full for PC and Xbox One, the developer needs to work through some of Sony’s software limitations. Fallout 4 was one of the best-selling releases in the PC and console sectors of

Hello and welcome. The year is 2017. You’ve missed a lot over the past few months. Let me catch you up: Apple nixed the headphone jack with the iPhone 7, so throw out those earbuds. You won’t be needing them anymore. Most other phone manufacturers decided not to follow Apple’s lead. Instead, they’re using USB-C. It’s great! Everything’s universal and reversible — except for everything Apple. Life is fabulous. Yeah we have some dongles, but it&r

At the opening of the Ghostbusters: Dimension virtual reality experience in Times Square today, we got a chance to sit down with Ivan Reitman, the producer and director behind the original Ghostbusters film, and a Hollywood legend. Reitman worked with Utah startup The Void as it developed its VR companion to the upcoming reboot, and we got the chance to chat with him about emotional storytelling, technology, tickling digital ghosts, and bringing pornography to high-end virtual reality. Below is

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella is writing a book about his life, Microsoft, and how technology will shape the future. Titled Hit Refresh, the book is scheduled for a fall 2017 release through Harper Business. Nadella intends to give his proceeds to Microsoft Philanthropies.
This is Nadella's first book, and it sounds like he wants it to be a bit different than the typical book from a business leader. Hit Refresh, he says, "is not a 'how to succeed' book, nor is it a memoir." The word that pops up a

After making a pledge in January to improve diversity in its ranks, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences made its first big step today in announcing its 2016 class. A grand total of 683 invitations were sent to actors, filmmakers, executives, and behind-the-scenes talent from around the world this year, including many notable women and people of color from within the industry. The decision comes as a welcome move after the lengthy backlash Hollywood faced earlier this year.
"This

GitHub today announced that it’s releasing activity data for 2.8 million open source code repositories and making it available for people to analyze with the Google BigQuery cloud-based data warehousing tool.
The data set is free to explore. (With BigQuery you get to process up to one terabyte each month free of charge.)
This new 3TB data set includes information on “more than 145 million unique commits, over 2 billion different file paths and the contents of the latest revision for

The Xounts Up, a speaker in the shape of a pyramid, reached its goal on Kickstarter earlier this month. I know because I received PR on it. Two hundred and twelve people backed it, allowing it to successfully raise more than $78,000. Those 212 people will walk into their homes later this year when the Xounts Up ships, and they'll see this:Yes, The Verge was sent a $269 Xounts Up speaker, and we chose to protect you all from it. Whenever someone walks by the Verge-ified Xounts Up, which we h

When I was six years old, I sneezed a noodle out of my nose.
I was at the airport with my family. We were running to catch a flight somewhere, and suddenly I stopped, sneezed, and launched the pasta into the air. I still remember the whitish noodle curled up against the black linoleum floor. We all laughed, and the "noodle sneeze" instantly became family lore.
As I grew older and repeated the story — either to distant relatives or perplexed friends — I started wondering how in the wo

During a National Cancer Summit earlier today, Vice President Joe Biden pledged to take action against research institutions that don't report their clinical trial results.
Biden issued the remarks during his opening address at the Howard University’s summit, citing a 2015 Stat News report that showed that several prominent research centers, including Stanford University and the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, had failed to report their results. That deprives "patients and doctors

 An accelerator that helps tech nonprofits develop their products and raise grant money, Fast Forward, has attracted $1.25 million in philanthropic funding of its own. Backers include big names in venture capital and tech. Omidyar Network, Google.org and BlackRock donated the largest share, along with AT&T, The Nasiri Foundation and Rita Allen Foundation. Fast Forward will use the money… Read More

 An accelerator that helps tech nonprofits develop their products and raise grant money, Fast Forward, has attracted $1.25 million in philanthropic funding of its own. Backers include big names in venture capital and tech. Omidyar Network, Google.org and BlackRock donated the largest share, along with AT&T, The Nasiri Foundation and Rita Allen Foundation. Fast Forward will use the money… Read More

A complicated procedure for transplanting human stem cells into the spinal cord of patients with a fatal neurodegenerative disease may be done safely, new research shows. Although it’s unclear whether the stem cell treatment can actually slow down the progression of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), or Lou Gehrig’s disease, researchers are hopeful that one day the procedure could be used to develop a new life-saving therapy.
This is not the first time that stem cells — cells

If you know you want a PlayStation VR, you better get up early.
Sony announced today that the last chance for PlayStation 4 owners to preorder the PlayStation VR headset will start on June 30 at 7:00 a.m. Pacific on GameStop’s online store. If you want to guarantee one when it launches on October 13, you better be ready. Analysts at research firm SuperData predict that the VR market could generate $40 billion in revenues by 2020.
“Supplies are limited, and this is your final cha

 Cognovi Labs is a new analytics startup that relies on Twitris to take a sample of social media chatter to deduce real-time, large-scale, automated sentiment about specific topics. As a real-world example of the tool’s capability, the Cognovi Labs analyzed Twitter chatter leading up to the Brexit vote and predicted that polls leaning toward the “remain” camp were incorrect… Read More

REVIEW: AMD has a plan for this generation of PC video cards, and it’s all about offering performance at a low price.
The Radeon RX 480 is an excellent video card that everyone building a PC on a budget — especially for the purposes of virtual reality — needs to consider. Out today at $200 for a 4GB version (I’m using the $240 8GB model), the 480 is roughly equivalent in terms of horsepower to the Nvidia GTX 970 or Radeon R9 390. The big difference is that AMD&r

PlayStation Plus is usually all about getting games for free. This month, it’s also about getting one early.
Sony has revealed which free titles subscribers to its PlayStation Plus program will receive in July. These bonuses help drive people to pay extra for the monthly online service, and many PlayStation system owners look forward to the reveal of the new free games. PlayStation Plus has 20.8 million subscribers, according to Sony, and free games help keep them re-up

At Madame Tussauds Wax Museum in Times Square today, we got to try out one of the world’s most expensive and immersive virtual reality experiences. On July 1st, Sony and a Utah startup called The Void will open Ghostbusters: Dimension, which lets you become a ghostbuster in what The Void likes to call a "hyper-real" world.
Dimension is part of a larger exhibit based on the new Ghostbusters movie, which also includes wax versions of the stars and a walk-through haunted house

Google Maps is an incredibly useful smartphone app, and I use it every single day. But there are some things that it's still really stupid about. Sure, the Android and iOS app can tell you about gas, food, and other places to stop along your route from point A to point B. But what if you want to add another destination? What about point C? Until now, only the desktop version of Google Maps has allowed you to get directions for a trip that spans multiple stops. Thankfully that feature is now head

HTC has decided to take its most valuable asset, the Vive VR headset and the budding ecosystem developing around it, and turn it into a separate business. Reports earlier this week indicated that HTC was spinning off the Vive, but the company has now clarified for The Verge that it is only establishing a wholly-owned subsidiary, which it is calling HTC Vive Tech Corporation. HTC’s statement in full:HTC can confirm that it has established a wholly-owned subsidiary, HTC Vive Tech Corporation

 Kanye West and Adidas just announced they are turning their Yeezy collaboration into a full-fledged partnership. The deal, which Adidas is calling “the most significant partnership ever created between a non-athlete and an athletic brand”, will result in the creation of a new business unit inside of Adidas – akin to how Nike handles the Michael Jordan brand. The new unit will… Read More

HBO makes a television program called Game of Thrones, which is increasingly loosely based on a series of books called A Song of Ice and Fire. Both of these things have enormous fanbases, who are prolific writers of theories about the story's 10,000 characters.
[Spoilers for all that stuff.]
Amongst fans of both Game of Thrones and A Song of Ice and Fire it has been widely suspected for some time that Jon Snow is not actually the son of Ned Stark and Some Rando, but actually the love child

D-Link introduced three new Wi-Fi cameras today, all of which come with sound and motion detection, night vision, and local recording. The HD Wi-Fi Camera (DCS-936L) features a 720p camera with 4x digital zoom, and can record continuous, scheduled, or detection triggered video on a microSD card (up to 128GB). It also features a Wi-Fi signal locator to help you choose the best place to place the camera for an optimal connection, remote viewing through the mydlink Lite app, and it's the cheap

NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope captured a "firework" large enough to engulf ourplanet. The birth of a cluster of star in galaxy Kiso 6359 looks like a projectile from a Roman Candle, soaring through the night sky.
NASA’s page includes a helpful from Debra Elmegreen, a lead researcher at Vassar College, that gives the stars some galactic context:"I think Kiso 5639 is a beautiful, up-close example of what must have been common long ago. The current thinking is that galaxies in the early

After four years as one of the show's highest profile correspondents, Jessica Williams is leaving The Daily Show. Entertainment Weekly reports that the comedienne is set to leave this Thursday to focus on a show she's working on with Comedy Central going forward.
"I feel so many emotions," she told EW. "I feel like I’ve learned a lot about myself on the show. I’m 26 now. I’ve learned so much, I always kind of feel like it’s grad school — a sort of continuation

Samsung’s Galaxy J2 will come with a new Smart Glow ring that tells users when they have a notification waiting to be addressed, SamMobile reports. That same ring will also be included in other upcoming devices. The ring surrounds the rear camera and acts in place of the blinking LED light Samsung uses on current Galaxy devices. At first, it’ll give three types of notifications: "priority alerts," "usage alerts," and "selfie assist," which helps users take a selfie with their rear ca

Rihanna's Star Trek Beyond soundtrack contribution "Sledgehammer" is a massive ballad, so it feels appropriate that the song's video is making an IMAX-sized debut tomorrow morning. The Floria Sigismondi-directed clip is the first music video ever shot entirely with IMAX cameras, and it's going to premiere in IMAX theaters tomorrow (June 30th) at 9AM ET. The Fader is reporting that the video's supposed to premiere alongside screenings of The Legend of Tarzan, but that doesn't mesh

The internet has been ablaze the past few weeks about Apple potentially removing the headphone jack from the next iPhone — a move that’s been heavily rumored for months, and has everything from blurry leaked case images to Wall Street Journal articles backing it up. We don’t know if it’s going to happen, but there’s a bunch of fun pieces to read about the pros and cons of removing the jack, and other fun pieces to read about how Apple might do it.
Also, I hate this

If you want to know what can go wrong when police rely on equipment such as Tasers and pepper spray to combat petty crimes, look no further than the case of Bruce Kelley Jr.
Around 3:30PM, on January 31st this year, Bruce Kelley Jr. and his dad, Bruce Kelley Sr., both African-American, were drinking cans of beer near a public gazebo in Wilkinsburg, a small borough on the City of Pittsburgh's eastern border. Two Allegheny County Port Authority Police officers showed up, apparently on a routine pa

 All Def Digital (ADD), a three-year-old, L.A.-based web video platform and media company that was cofounded by hip hop impresario Russell Simmons, has raised $10 million in Series B funding led by Third Wave Digital Partners. Other investors in the round include WPP Ventures, Andreessen Horowitz, and earlier investors Nu Horizons, Greycroft Partners, eVentures and Advancit Capital. The company… Read More

The leaders of the Canada, Mexico, and the United States unveiled a sweeping plan to reduce carbon emissions during this year’s trilateral North American Leaders' Summit, held today in Ottawa, Canada. The leaders issued an ambitious goal to generate half of North America’s energy from renewable sources in the next decade.
In a joint statement, U.S. President Barack Obama, Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau pledged to bring 50% of North Ameri

The first Purge was about other people. In the ingeniously claustrophobic 2013 film, an upper-middle class family is horrified to find their neighbors and fellow country-club members have ganged up on them during the titular annual free-for-all, "purifying" themselves of their pent-up aggression and deviance by prancing on the front lawn with chainsaws. The least political of the three films thus released in the franchise, it preyed on a more basic human frailty: paranoia, amplified by the subur