Technology news

Photo: Allbirds Allbirds co-CEO Joey Zwillinger has waded further into the ongoing debate over Amazon’s propensity for cloning popular products, penning a short Medium post slamming the company’s copycat behavior and offering to help the e-commerce giant make its version more environmentally friendly.Amazon made headlines earlier this year when its private label brand, 206 Collective, began selling a shoe that copies the most distinctive features of Allbirds’ namesake runners.

According to the Consumer Federation of America, of the top ten consumer complaints in 2018, the third most frequent was concerned with retail sales: “False advertising and other deceptive practices, defective merchandise, problems with rebates, coupons, gift cards and gift certificates, failure to deliver.”We all like to think that the retailers we buy from, either online or in person, are trustworthy, reasonably honest, and willing to honor their guarantees (as long as you pay atte

Image: Hasbro If you’re looking for a familiar game to play this Thanksgiving that could also eat up the weekend and destroy your entire family, Hasbro’s got you covered with a brand-new version of Monopoly called “Monopoly Longest Game Ever” edition, which is available exclusively on Amazon right now for $19.99 (via BleedingCool).
If you thought Monopoly was a long game before, this version will probably be pure torture. The only way to win is to own every purchasable s

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge A group of musicians and activists is calling for artists to pull their music from Amazon’s music streaming service until it ends its ties with the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency (ICE), as spotted by Stereogum. The group, No Music For ICE, was formed under the nonprofit advocacy group Fight for the Future last month, initially asking artists to sign a pledge to boycott performing at Amazon-sponsored events.
Now, in a new letter, No Mu

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Facebook has a new market research app launching today called Viewpoints, just a few months after the company introduced an Android data collection app called Study designed to monitor what and for how long users are accessing other software on the Google-owned operating system.Both apps have a controversial history. In January, Facebook shut down a market research app ostensibly offered as a virtual private network (VPN) provider. It was marketed to teen

Netflix has signed a lease to keep New York City’s iconic Paris Theater open, and will use the space to play some of its most prestigious films, the company announced today. The Netflix have plans to get into major theatrical distribution, but will instead use this to showcase their own films. The move comes at a time when AMC Theaters and Regal have also refused to stream Netflix originals because of discrepancies over exclusive theatrical windows.
The theater shuttered in August, and Net

Apple’s annual holiday advertisements are designed to make people tear up, and this year’s is no different. The only noticeable change between this new commercial and those from years prior is the addition of Pixar’s incredibly popular Up theme song, part of the Oscar-winning soundtrack created by longtime Pixar collaborator and composer Michael Giacchino.It’s appropriate since Apple’s new advertising spot incorporates an Up-like moment at the end of the commercial.

Mint Mobile, a wireless carrier known for its cheap cellphone plans, announced today that it has a new owner: Ryan Reynolds. That’s right. The voice of Deadpool is now part-owner of a cell service provider.Based on the press release, it doesn’t seem as though Reynolds is going to make drastic changes to the company, which as an MNVO (or mobile network virtual operator), currently offers its service over T-Mobile’s network. All we really know from the announcement is that Reynol

On Monday, Facebook and Twitter announced that the data of “hundreds of users” may have been improperly accessed after their accounts were used for logging into Google Play Store apps on Android devices. The issue was first reported by CNBC. So far, there is no indication that iOS users were affected.
The companies were notified of the vulnerability by third-party security researchers, Twitter said in a blog post disclosing the issue. The researchers discovered that a development kit

On Monday, Facebook and Twitter announced that the data of “hundreds of users” may have been improperly accessed after their accounts were used for logging into Google Play Store apps on Android devices. The issue was first reported by CNBC. So far, there is no indication that iOS users were affected.
The companies were notified of the vulnerability by third-party security researchers, Twitter said in a blog post disclosing the issue. The researchers discovered that a development kit

Protesters gather outside Hong Kong Polytechnic University on November 25 | Photo by Chris McGrath/Getty Images Pro-democracy candidates won a landslide victory in Hong Kong yesterday, but many Chinese Americans have been unable to express their approval online. WeChat, a popular social media messaging app, has been censoring political messages and disabling people’s accounts if they voice their support for the movement — even if they’re in the United States.
Bin Xie, an infor

Photo by Philippe Lopez/AFP via Getty Images One of Amazon’s largest urban fulfillment centers opened last fall in the New York City borough of Staten Island, but the more than 3,000 workers it employs may be more at risk for injury than at other manufacturing facilities. According to a report from Gizmodo this morning, the NYC warehouse, called JFK8 and opened in September 2018, has a staggeringly high injury rate. And we don’t know why, or whether the injury rate is abnormal compa

Last year, Amazon launched the Echo Wall Clock, a physical clock that can also display timers from your Echo device via a ring of LEDs around the clock’s face. Now, a new model of the device, the Echo Wall Clock ME, has shown up in Federal Communications Commission filings, and it appears that the new model will be Mickey Mouse-themed.
Beyond the addition of Mickey’s smiling face, twisted time-telling arms, and a cartoony background, it seems like the Echo Wall Clock ME (Mickey Editi

Tumblr is rolling out a new community hub feature to keep people engaged with what they’re following. The new product feature comes not too long after Tumblr announced it was launching group chats to help people connect with others.The way community hubs function on Tumblr might be recognizable to anyone who used Google Groups in the past. People can follow tags, see the most recent and popular Tumblr posts within a specific tag, and see group chats associated with that tag. Tying in Tumbl

Tumblr is rolling out a new community hub feature called tag pages to keep people engaged with what they’re following. The new product feature comes not too long after Tumblr announced it was launching group chats to help people connect with others.The way tag pages function on Tumblr might be recognizable to anyone who used Google Groups in the past. People can follow tags, see the most recent and popular Tumblr posts within a specific tag, and see group chats associated with that tag. Ty

Image: Huawei Huawei’s latest smart speaker, the Sound X, is being made in partnership with Devialet, a high-end audio company known for its premium Phantom speakers. Engadget reports that the Sound X is available to preorder now for 1,999 yuan (around $285), but there’s no word of a release outside of China.
The 360-degree speaker includes a 60-watt double subwoofer and comes equipped with a full array of Huawei services, including the company’s Xiaoyi voice assistant, Huawei

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge On Monday, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton announced that his office would drop its lawsuit opposing the multibillion-dollar merger between telecommunications giants T-Mobile and Sprint.
Texas dropped its lawsuit as part of a settlement with the proposed New T-Mobile. In the settlement, New T-Mobile committed to providing “5G wireless broadband coverage to areas where most Texans live” and across most rural parts of the state over the next t

Pictured: AMD Ryzen Threadripper, 2nd-gen | Image: AMD Next year will see the release of AMD’s first Threadripper CPU with 64 computing cores and 128 threads, double that of the 32 cores and 64 threads found in the second-generation flagship 2990WX. AMD has yet to provide an exact release date or pricing information for the Ryzen Threadripper 3990X, but don’t expect it to come cheap; the most expensive of AMD’s first two third-generation Threadripper chips costs $1,999.
Althou

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Instagram has shared new details on how its app uses machine learning to surface content for users, stressing that, when making recommendations, it focuses on finding accounts it thinks people will enjoy, rather than individual posts.
The blog post is technical in nature and contains no big surprises, but it offers an interesting behind-the-scenes perspective at a time when algorithmic recommendation systems are under scrutiny for pushing users toward dan

Spend any time in New York or London, and you’ll inevitably come across dozens of people whizzing along each city’s streets on electric scooters. Yet, despite their popularity, e-scooters are technically illegal in both places, and the politicians with the power to change things are in no rush to do so.In London, e-scooters are illegal because of Britain’s national laws, some of which date back to the Victorian era. Meanwhile, in New York City, the legislation exists to legaliz

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge Black Friday is technically Friday, November 29th, but the many great deals available right now indicates that the shopping holiday has already begun. Retailers like Amazon, Best Buy, Walmart, and Google Store are live with big discounts on phones, gaming consoles and accessories, headphones, and many more.
We have several roundups based on retailer, and category of products, but this post is meant to distill it all down to the best deals you can get

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Facebook is developing a new feature for Messenger which would allow you to share content to a limited circle of close friends. The feature, currently under development under the name “Favorites,” was first discovered by app researcher Jane Manchun Wong, before its existence was confirmed to TechCrunch by Facebook directly. It’s a similar approach to Instagram’s “Close Friends” feature, which the Facebook owned network

Photo by Oliver Berg/picture alliance via Getty Images Tim Berners-Lee, the inventor of the world wide web, has officially launched the Contract for the Web, a set of principles designed to “fix” the internet and prevent us from sliding into a “digital dystopia,” The Guardian reports. The contract lists nine core principles for governments, companies, and individuals to adhere to, including responsibilities to provide affordable, reliable internet access and to respect c

Photo by FREDERIC J. BROWN/AFP via Getty Images The unveiling of Tesla’s Cybertruck last week was full of surprises, but none more shocking than the moment when lead designer Franz von Holzhausen smashed two of the vehicle’s “armor glass” windows onstage with a metal ball. It certainly wasn’t the result CEO Elon Musk was expecting, who could be heard muttered “oh my fucking god” under his breath before being forced to complete his presentation in front

Photo by Tom Warren / The Verge London’s transport regulator, Transport for London (TfL), has refused to grant Uber a new license in the city. TfL had been extending Uber’s license to operate in London in recent months, after the ride sharing company lost its license in 2017. TfL originally revoked Uber’s license citing Uber’s approach to serious criminal offences, medical certificates, disclosure and barring checks, and the company’s use of its Greyball software t

Peak Design Everyday Zip backpack | Image: Peak Design Peak Design has announced an overhaul of its entire camera-focused bag lineup, called the Everyday Line V2. The new bags are similar to the immensely popular prior models, but with improvements made to both design and materials, based on feedback from customers of the earlier versions. In addition, Peak Design is expanding its lineup with a new backpack and tote bag, which join the existing Everyday Backpack and Everyday Tote. All of the ne