Technology news

The NodPod solves a real problem. When we fall asleep in random places, like on airplanes and in the car, our heads nod, and we temporarily wake up. One: this is annoying. Two: this hurts necks. It’s a big-time sleep bummer. The NodPod is essentially a head cradle. It prevents your head from bobbing and thereby lets you sleep more soundly. I’m a big fan of anything that lets me sleep better. I am a potential fan of the NodPod.
Here’s the thing with it, though. It looks incredib

It's almost been a year since we first learned about Roborace, the autonomous racing series that will run alongside Formula E next season. Since then, though, the series has been pretty tight-lipped, offering up some tantalizing renders of the cars but little in the way of information about when or how the series will run. Today we know a tiny bit more, because the series posted a video of an actual car using actual wheels and no actual human driving — very briefly — around

Hyundai and Amazon have partnered up to let customers order test drives of the Hyundai Elantra, right from Amazon’s website. The pilot program — called "Prime Now. Drive Now." — is under the umbrella of Amazon’s same-day delivery service and it’s basically just a way to schedule test drives in advance.
Given how much of a nightmare car dealerships can be, it’s actually an excellent idea. Unfortunately, the program only runs for two weekends (August 20th–

NASA has reestablished contact with its STEREO-B spacecraft, nearly two years after losing communication with the vehicle. The space agency has been trying to get in contact with the spacecraft since October 1st, 2014, when the last signal from STEREO-B was received on Earth. Finally on Sunday, NASA was able to pick up a signal from the vehicle using the Deep Space Network, or DSN — an international network of large radio antennas used for communicating with spacecraft. Continue readi

ZeniMax isn’t backing off the lawsuit it originally filed in 2014 against Oculus VR and Facebook. Instead, the publisher is making some new allegations.
ZeniMax, which owns Fallout publisher Bethesda, names Oculus chief executive Brendan Iribe and chief technology officer John Carmack as defendants in the amended complaint (as first reported by Game Informer). Carmack was previously a chief executive at id Software, which is a wholly owned subsidiary of ZeniMax and the developer of Doom. Z

The National Park System is turning 100, and The Verge is celebrating with Wilderness Week: a look at the natural world, its freaky critters, and its future.Whitebark pines are majestic trees with a whitish, often wind-curled trunk that grow up high in the Rocky and Sierra Mountains, in the Western US. They’re icons of Yellowstone National Park, where they provide high-calorie seeds for many animals, including grizzly bears that eat the seeds before hibernating. Some whitebark pines manage

In the four years since Channel Orange was released, Frank Ocean’s greatest weapon has been ambiguity. Save for a guest spot on Kanye West’s The Life of Pablo and a few Tumblr essays, the R&B singer has remained silent and reclusive, while fans wondered how he was spending his time. There were rumors of an album called Boys Don’t Cry, which was supposed to be released more than a year ago, but never came. Then, at the start of this month, The New York Times confirmed that t

Money can't buy happiness, or Ian McKellen's dignity!In a recent interview with The Daily Mail, the British knight who has more acting awards than I have square feet in my apartment has revealed that he was once invited to officiate Sean Parker's wedding in exchange for $1.5 million. McKellen says he would "perhaps" have "considered" the invite if the Napster co-founder and early Facebook investor hadn't required that he come dressed as Gandalf, the fictional wizard hero from J.R.R. Tolkein's&nb

This week, the MTA completed the launch of its Metro North eTix app, which lets commuters in Connecticut, Long Island, and upstate New York purchase train tickets directly on their phones. The initial release of the app came earlier this summer with a grandiose celebration from New York’s Governor Andrew Cuomo, who proclaimed the death of the ticket line at train stations all over New York.The MTA was able to launch this app fairly painlessly, mostly because tickets on the Metro North comm

Deus Ex: Mankind Divided is the latest epic in the long-running series about the moral dilemmas humanity faces with synthetic augmentations for humankind. You act as superhuman “aug,” or augmented human, Adam Jensen, with bionic limbs and other powers. You can play Jensen’s character in full stealth, without killing anyone. Or you can go into combat out in the open.
Both options are valid strategies in Mankind Divided, and you’ll find yourself trading off between them as

Most game industry observers expect Sony to reveal a more powerful PlayStation 4 next month in New York City, but now it looks like the company may have more than one piece of new hardware to reveal during its September 7 event.
The rumored PlayStation 4 Slim looks like it is real after the tech experts from the YouTube channel Digital Foundry found one. While you might still think this is some 3D-printed user modification, this device is starting to look more realistic. This updated box is, of

VB LIVE: Banks are starting to catch on — but not quickly enough. Quick-thinking companies leveraging innovations in transactional data analysis are driving millennials to new kinds of financial services. Join our panel of fintech experts to find out what the future of finance innovation looks like — and how to catch the wave.
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“There’s a fantastic quote from a Times article a couple of years ago that said, ‘Millennials are more will

Several states have been exploring ways to squeeze more money out of the rapidly growing ride-hailing industry, but Massachusetts appears to have just beaten them to the punch. According to Reuters, Republican Governor Charlie Baker signed into law a 20-cent tax per trip on Uber and Lyft rides, with some of the revenue collected going to the traditional taxi industry.Riders and drivers will not see the extra fee, as the law explicitly bars companies from passing on the tax to them. Rather, ride-

MediaBrix, a mobile advertising startup that says it creates “emotionally targeted brand connections,” announced today that it scored a $6.5 million investment led by Edison Partners.
“With this funding, we will continue to ramp our programmatic offerings, invest in R&D and expand our data sciences team focused on consumer receptivity,” said MediaBrix CEO and cofounder Ari Brandt.
Also, with a new president and global chief revenue officer on board — Richard Kos

I’m not a sports person, but I know some things about athletes. I know they wear gym shoes; I know they usually coordinate their pants and shirt to match their shoes; and I know they enjoy sweating. Tech companies seem to think true athletes want to have Bluetooth earbuds that come with a neck strap. Today Samsung announced its new Bluetooth Level Active headphones, which it designed for "exercise and outdoor activities." They have earhooks so they don’t fall out of ears, they come w

Color Switch has joined a rarified club in mobile gaming, as the colorful puzzler has been downloaded more than 100 million times since its launch seven months ago on January 22. The growth of the free-to-play game shows it’s still possible for small independent developers to create megahits in the maturing $36 billion mobile game industry.
Above: Zeb Jaffer, cofounder of Fortafy Games.Image Credit: Zeb Jaffer
Zeb Jaffer, cofounder of publisher Fortafy Games, said in an email that For

Picturelife, a four-year-old photo-storage and management service acquired by digital media hub Streamnation last year, is shutting down. An email sent to subscribers today said the service faced "a challenging economic environment" and was no longer viable. Members will have the option of transferring their photos to SmugMug, a paid photo-storage service aimed at professional and semi-pro photographers, and continue to view and download them for no cost. Continue reading…

Microsoft today announced the availability of a new extension for its cross-platform Visual Studio Code text editor that makes it possible for developers to debug code for websites when they’re running on iOS devices.
Until this point, if developers wanted to do this type of debugging, they’d have to do it using a tool in Safari — which in turn meant that they’d need a Mac handy. Now all you have to do is get Visual Studio Code running and install the new Debugger for iOS

Bessemer Venture Partners led a $29 million investment for data privacy startup Virtru, the Washington, D.C.-based security software developer announced today. The series A capital will help Virtru build new products and scale worldwide.
“With the new funding and the support of best security and privacy investors and operators in the industry, we will take our mission to more businesses, software developers and individuals around the world,” said Virtru cofounder and CEO John Ac

When AMC’s Walking Dead spinoff Fear the Walking Dead debuted last year, it tried to distinguish itself with a very simple premise. Where the original hit series follows Andrew Lincoln’s Rick Grimes as he roams a landscape ravaged by the zombie apocalypse, Fear would explore the tick-tock of a world falling apart, as the zombie outbreak begins and society starts to collapse. Showing the first signs of a pandemic rocking daily suburban life? Check. Portraying the public reaction as mi

Frank Ocean finally dropped his much-anticipated album Blonde this weekend, along with a limited companion zine called Boys Don't Cry that came with some physical copies of the album. The zine features artwork from collaborators, personal essays and interviews, and a poem about McDonald's by none other than Kanye West.
Accompanying the poem are artsy shots of Kanye picking up McDonald's drive-thru in a very expensive-looking car, which, like, same. As a fellow McDonald's lover, I

The price of PlayStation Plus is rising by a Hamilton. Beginning on September 22nd, the yearly fee will increase by $10 — from $49.99 to $59.99.
The new price won’t impact current subscribers until its time for renewal. So, if you’ve been considering PlayStation Plus, it would be cheaper to join this month for the next year at the lower rate. If you’re a subscriber already and would rather not continue with the new price, Sony’s blog recommends you turn off auto-ren

Twitter is now rolling out the much-anticipated night mode feature to its iOS app. First introduced on Android back in July, night mode re-skins the mobile app in darker hues to make it easer to scan the feed and read tweets in environments with less light. To toggle night mode on and off, head to Twitter’s settings panel after you receive and download the update. Then tap "Display and sound," where it now sits under text size and other accessibility options.
This has been the in works for

Google today started rolling out Android 7.0 Nougat to existing Nexus devices via an over-the-air software update. This is a gradual rollout: The Nexus 6, Nexus 5X, Nexus 6P, Nexus 9, Nexus Player, Pixel C, and General Mobile 4G (Android One) will all be updated, but “it may take several weeks” before everyone gets the latest and greatest, a Google spokesperson told VentureBeat. Just like the Nexus 4 did not get Android Marshmallow, don’t expect the Nexus 5 to get Nougat. If yo

Source code repository software startup GitLab today is introducing Issue Boards, an open-source task-management tool that will be integrated into the existing web service for all users, free of charge.
The tool provides a visual interface where team members can track the status of their projects. Rather than require users to list out all the tasks that have been completed and have yet to be done, the tool can take in existing issues from teams’ repositories and drop them in automatically

Google has announced that the latest version of Android 7.0 Nougat, is rolling out to newer Nexus devices starting today. It’s a good upgrade, but only available if you have a recent Nexus device like the Nexus 6, 6P, 5X, Pixel C, or Nexus 9 tablet — and it will take some time for everybody's devices to receive the over-the-air update. I've been using the various public betas that have been running since March of this year and most of the bugs have been worked out.
Nougat isn’

Weeks after Twitter’s Android app received support for night mode, its iOS counterpart is also getting it. The company announced that the feature is rolling out to all users starting today.
When night mode is enabled, Twitter’s app interface changes from its traditional white background to a dark blue, lessening the strain on your eyes should you be inclined to tweet in the dark. While the iPhone does have a universal night mode feature, Twitter has added its own so that it can contr

Without its national parks, "America The Beautiful" might be a song about polluted skies, dirty strip malls, and gated playgrounds. The park system has lovingly been called "America’s best idea" for a good reason; even in a time when it feels like our neighbors are yelling at each other more than ever, we can all agree that parks already make America great.
This week marks the National Park Service’s 100th birthday, and for The Verge it’s an opportunity to explore spacious skie

A tiny ball of gold carrying medicine could help doctors fight Alzheimer’s disease. Scientists have created a nanoparticle that is just the right size to target the overactive brain receptors that cause neurological disease, while leaving the rest of the receptors we need alone. This super-precise method could reduce the side effects of a common Alzheimer’s drug so doctors can prescribe it to help people during earlier stages of the condition.Neurological problems can be caused by to

Eurogamer has gotten its hands on a working version of the rumored PS4 Slim, seemingly confirming the leaked images of the console that came out yesterday. A report from The Wall Street Journal also corroborates the existence of a smaller PlayStation 4, stating Sony will unveil a less expensive version of its gaming console alongside a higher-end model at its event on September 7th.The video shows the PS4 Slim booting up and displaying the home screen. Although the small poss

Sony is about to start charging more for one of its best gaming services.
PlayStation Plus will jump in price from $50 to $60 annually, according to an announcement on Sony’s PlayStation Blog. Three months of PS Plus will now cost $22; it previously was $18. If you pay monthly for PS Plus, nothing will change for you in the United States because Sony plans to continue charging $10 12 times a year for that tier — although Canadian will now have to pay $12 monthly. All of these new pri

Car dealerships are beginning to use virtuality reality to sell their vehicles, but once upon a time, sealing the deal required carmakers to pass out printed matter. The folded car dealer brochure was a carefully planned work of artful design intended to show the promise and prestige of the newest makes and models.
Automobile Design Graphics is a new book, edited by Jim Heimann, that covers the evolution of automotive advertising from 1900 to 1973. Over the course of this era, Americans began to

Heads-up displays or HUDs are one of the best features in newer vehicles, as they allow drivers to keep their eyes focused on the road instead of on their in-dash navigation or their smartphone running Google Maps. Now, Hudly is looking to bring that technology to drivers whose vehicles don't currently support the feature with its aftermarket HUD.
Hudly is a three-part system featuring a projector, transparent display, and a plug-in for the OBD-II Data Link Connector, which is standard on every

I always enjoy a good personal story. It’s a nice way to get to know people, and retelling such stories is my favorite part of journalism. So I enjoyed moderating the first IBM Science Slam talks at the recent celebration of the 30th anniversary of the IBM Almaden Research Center.
Almaden, one of 12 IBM Research facilities, is the birthplace of technologies like the relational database, nanotechnology (the ability to position individual atoms), the first data mining algorithms, and th

You’ll get to try one of the year’s most anticipated role-playing games early if you’re willing to pay for it ahead of its official release date.
Developer Larian Studios announced today that its upcoming PC RPG Divinity: Original Sin II will hit Steam Early Access on September 15. This will enable gamers to try an early version of the title before its official release. The early access version will cost $45 and include the opening part of the campaign and t

In a lab in Germany, researchers are making shrunken, see-through rodents. Don’t worry, it’s not as macabre as it sounds. Rather, this new method is a step forward for science because it’s the first time we can image whole animals at once and see how their organs work together. In fact, the researchers hope it’ll actually cut down on the number of rats we need for animal testing.In a study published today in Nature Matters, researchers led by Ali Ertürk at Ludwig Max

Nintendo isn’t the only one making a smaller NES.Today the company behind the gorgeous, aluminum Analogue Nt — a modern console designed play classic games — announced new version that keeps the same beautiful style, but shrinks it down into something more compact. The new version of the Analogue Nt is 20 percent smaller than the original, and has a number of useful new features, including an HDMI input built right in (the previous version required an adaptor) and an included w

For the 30 short stages of Hidden My Game By Mom, a mother hides a little boy’s Nintendo DS, and you must help find it. This is, at least at first, a traditional hidden object game, a genre indebted to Where’s Waldo and decades of Scholastic magazines. By tapping the 2D artwork, you move books and furniture or collect stools and brooms from the living room, gradually adjusting accumulating the right tools to find the hidden treasure. Except it’s not quite so simple, and after a

 Talk about being at the right place and at the right time. Following revelations of government spying, data breaches, malicious hacking, identity theft and other online threats, the email and file encryption application Virtru has now grown to over 4,000 customers and has closed on $29 million in Series A funding, the company announced this morning.
The round was led by Bessemer Venture… Read More

Microsoft today announced the acquisition of Genee, an artificial-intelligence-powered scheduling service. The company is planning to integrate the intelligence technology into Office 365 and shut down the Genee service on September 1, 2016. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.
Genee was founded in 2014 to simplify the scheduling and rescheduling of meetings. Booking a meeting with the service is a three-step process: Email the attendees you want to include, carbon copy “[email protected],&r