Technology news

Many TikTokvideos don’t start from scratch, so neither can its competitors. TikTok is all about remixes where users shoot a new video to recontextualize audio pulled from someone else’s clip, or riff on an existing meme or concept. That only works because TikTok’s had time to build up an immense armory of content to draw inspiration from.
Creators will find themselves unequipped trying to get started on TikTok copycats including FacebookLasso, and Instagram Reels which is testi

TikTok, which recently hit 41 million daily active users outside of China, may soon have some real competition on its hands.
YouTube is currently working on a new feature called Shorts, which aims to rival TikTok, according to The Information.
Shorts will exist inside the YouTube mobile app as a feature, states the report, and not as a stand-alone product. 
Lip sync videos are incredibly popular on TikTok, largely aided by the editing tools the app includes to help facilitate their creation

Photo by Justin Heiman / Getty Images Marriott says a security breach may have exposed the personal information of 5.2 million guests. This marks Marriott’s second data breach in recent years, following a breach in 2018.Personal information such as names, birthdates, and phone numbers may have been taken in the breach, along with language preferences and loyalty account numbers, Marriott says. Although an investigation is still in progress, Marriott said there is “no reason” t

Photo by Alain Pitton/NurPhoto via Getty Images The Zoom videoconferencing app has become a highly popular means of keeping in touch for a world increasingly in isolation during the coronavirus pandemic, both for personal and professional meetings. However, there have been a number of complaints about Zoom’s privacy and security record of late, especially as more and more people flock to the platform and a brighter spotlight is shined on how it works and what data it may collect.We recent

A recent update from Amazonhas made it easier for Apple customers to buy or rent movies from its Prime Videoapp. Before, customers using the Prime Video app from an iOS device or Apple TV would have to first purchase or rent the movie elsewhere — like through the Amazon website or a Prime Video app on another device, such as the Fire TV, Roku or an Android device. Now, Prime Video users can make the purchase directly through the app instead.
The changes weren’t formally announced, bu

Vinyl has been coming back for the last few years, but unlike MP3s, CDs or even cassette tapes (also coming back), records aren’t easy to record on your own. This tiny toy record maker makes it easy, though you probably shouldn’t expect that famous vinyl sound quality.
The Easy Record Maker was created by designer Yuri Suzuki, who has been itching to do something like this for years.
“This idea has been my dream machine since I was teenager,” Suzuki told Dezeen. Digital m

Illustration by William Joel / The Verge YouTube used to be the cool kid on the block, but then TikTok showed up and everything changed. Now, YouTube is looking to compete directly with the short-form, user-generated content app by reportedly launching its own version called “Shorts.”Shorts will allow people to upload brief videos into a feed inside the mobile app, much like TikTok, and take advantage of licensed music that YouTube Music has in its catalog, according to The Informat

Photo: Everybody House Games Hey Robot, the immensely clever board game from designer Frank Lantz’s Everybody House Games, now has a free digital version on the web for anyone to play. Lantz says he and his collaborators, which include his wife Hilary and his son and daughter-in-law, threw together a “quick & dirty online version of Hey Robot for people to play during quarantine.” It’s available here.The game is played much like classic Taboo, except with digital ass

Alex Castro / The Verge Today, Spotify and Warner Music Group announced in a short statement that the two entities have renewed their global licensing agreement. This news comes about two months after Spotify ended its “global food fight” with Warner / Chappell Music (Warner Music Group’s publishing arm), and the two entities inked a multi-territory licensing agreement.“Spotify and Warner Music Group are pleased to announce a renewed global licensing partnership,”

A European coalition of techies and scientists drawn from at least eight countries, and led by Germany’s Fraunhofer Heinrich Hertz Institute for telecoms (HHI), is working on contacts-tracing proximity technology for COVID-19 that’s designed to comply with the region’s strict privacy rules — officially unveiling the effort today.
China-style individual-level location-tracking of people by states via their smartphones even for a public health purpose is hard to imagine in

There’s crowdsourcing a problem, and then there’s crowdsourcing a problem within NASA,where some of the smartest, most creative and resourceful problem-solvers in the world solve real-world challenges daily as part of their job. That’s why it’s uplifting to hear that NASA has issued a call to its entire workforce to come up with potential ways the agency and its resources can contribute to the ongoing effort to fight the current coronavirus pandemic.
NASA is using its cro

Like everyone else, I wanted to play Animal Crossing: New Horizons during social distancing. Unfortunately, this wasn't in the cards for me: The Nintendo Switch and Switch Lite are pretty much sold out, and I cannot afford to pay $800 for one on eBay. (This is maybe not the wisest time to become a gamer from scratch.)
So my isolation game of choice ended up being a little different. It's a word puzzle game on my phone that is not new, features zero adorable characters, and is not particularly co

Spending more than $10 or $20 on a pillow can seem frivolous when other budgeting categories seem much more pressing.
It's like we reserve fancy, fluffy pillows for hotel beds and are fine with sleeping on shitty pillows at home. Flat? Lumpy? Absolutely no neck support or malleability? Questionable stains? That's just how it is — or is it? I think the Original Casper Pillow is luxurious enough to change anyone's mind, even people who wouldn't dare to splurge on bedding in the past. Al

Like many other websites at the moment, the career-oriented networking platform LinkedIn has seen a big boost in traffic as a result of people being asked to work from home and stay indoors overall to slow the spread of the coronavirus, with a bump of 55% more conversational activity between existing connections in recent weeks. Now, to leverage that attention in a way that’s more directly helpful during this health crisis, LinkedInis introducing new measures specifically around job listin

A few weeks ago (or maybe it was days — time means nothing to me anymore), a push notification on my phone alerted me that my friend had tagged me in her Instagram story. 
Given that I hadn't seen her — or anyone besides my roommate — since I started self-isolating almost a month ago, I was curious as to what it could be. Since there were no new photos of us together, say on a night out or at dinner, I assumed it would be a "throwback" to a time before the coronavirus, whe

Image: Apple Apple and Goldman Sachs have allowed Apple Card users to defer their March 2020 credit payments due to the financial impact that the coronavirus is having on many people. According to Bloomberg, Apple has extended the grace period through April, letting its cardholders defer the payment this month.There’s one simple step to take in order to be eligible. Just open the Wallet app on your iPhone, then message a support representative and request to be enrolled in the Customer As

HBO Max is key to the future of AT&T’s entertainment empire, which helps explain why former Hulu chief Jason Kilar was just named WarnerMedia’s next CEO.Although Kilar will oversee all of WarnerMedia — which encompasses Warner Bros., Turner, and HBO — when he takes over on May 1st, there’s an emphasis on HBO Max. In a statement, AT&T COO John Stankey specifically points out that Kilar’s experience with the direct-to-consumer market (his years as Hulu C

Notion, a startup that operates a workplace productivity platform, has raised $50 million from Index Ventures and other investors at a $2 billion valuation, the company told The New York Times.
A Notion spokesperson confirmed the raise and valuation to TechCrunch.
As startups across the board begin looking at layoffs or raising at less than favorable terms, Notion had been in the unusual position of turning away interested investors for years. With this raise, the firm has amassed $67 million in

A recent rebound in domestic equity prices faded further into the distance today, as American stocks fell for a second consecutive day following modest Tuesday declines.
After rising from new 52-week lows, all domestic indices are down after the American president warned of difficult weeks ahead as the country reels from the economic and social impacts of COVID-19. The day’s trading left stocks down heading into Thursday, when a new unemployment claim number is expected.
Some are anticipat

Image: IndyCar / iRacing NBC is joining Fox in televising online sim racing in the absence of real-world races during the novel coronavirus pandemic. The network and IndyCar announced on Wednesday that the second race of the open-wheel racing series’s virtual replacement season, which features star drivers competing on the iRacing platform, will be broadcast on NBC Sports network on Saturday, April 4th, at 2:30PM ET. IndyCar says it’s currently not sure if the race will also be stre

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge Color Factory CEO Jeff Lind knew his Instagram pop-up experience had to close when the NBA canceled the remainder of its season. He was watching the Utah Jazz game when the announcers confirmed the match’s postponement, followed by the league halting all future games.
“That’s when I started making the decision that we’re going to have to close New York immediately,” he says. “You just kind of realize this industry i

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Amazon’s Prime Video iOS and Apple TV apps now let customers make in-app purchases, including renting and buying films and TV shows. The change marks a huge shift in Amazon’s approach to the App Store, which mandates a 30 percent cut on all in-app purchases. Prior to the change, Amazon would not allow you to rent or buy content on the Prime Video app, instead, directing users to a web browser to avoid the App Store fee.Now, when users log in t

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge After years of negotiations and legal battles, Sprint and T-Mobile have finally completed their merger into a single carrier. While the shift from four carriers to just three — AT&T, Verizon, and the newly expanded T-Mobile — will have huge implications in the coming months and years, there are more immediate questions for Sprint customers: what will happen next for them in the short term now that their mobile carrier is technically T-Mobi

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Apple’s native iOS password manager may be getting an overhaul later this year with the presumed release of iOS 14 that will make it more competitive with third-party options like 1Password and LastPass, reports 9to5Mac.Right now, iCloud Keychain can store your passwords and help autofill them on the iPhone, where copying and pasting long strings of letters and numbers or manually doing so has been a headache since the advent of the mobile touchscre

Image: Apple Apple recently released iPadOS 13.4 with a big new feature: full trackpad support for iPads. And now, it’s started updating its major productivity apps, including Pages, Numbers, Keynote, and iMovie, to support mouse and trackpad integration.
The new iWork updates are available now for both iOS and iPadOS, and they include a variety of other features like collaborative editing through iCloud Drive folder sharing (another new feature added in iOS and iPadOS 13.4), new themes i

Photo by Andrew Liptak / The Verge The refreshed version of the Chevy Bolt has become one of the first electric vehicles to be delayed by the novel coronavirus pandemic, according to Automotive News and Electrek. It now won’t arrive until 2021.Originally due out later this year, the new version of the Bolt EV was detailed last month by Chevy parent company General Motors at its big “EV day” press event. It will feature a sportier look, new seats, adaptive cruise control, and a

Tiger King is one of the strongest contenders for most watchable TV show of the year, and it’s a problem. A documentary miniseries comprising seven quick episodes, each under an hour, you could watch the whole thing in a weekend; given the subject, you’ll probably finish even faster.The Netflix series follows a man both larger than life and smothered by it: Joe Exotic, the one-time owner of a successful-seeming private zoo with over 200 tigers and other big cats. He’s a man who

Jack Black has joined TikTok, and his first video shows him doing a goofy dance he calls the “Quarantine Dance.”The 50-year-old celebrity debuted on the popular video-sharing app on Monday. Throughout the clip, Black is shirtless and sporting a pair of cowboy boots plus a cowboy hat while dancing, kicking, and spinning outside. @jackblack Quarantine Dance #reallifeathome #distancedance #happyathome #boredathome ✂️ @taylor ♬ original sound - jackblack
His TikTok deb

Cloudflare’s WARP VPN service began its life last year as a free add-on to the company’s 1.1.1.1 app — which itself is a DNS resolver application that promises faster internet — and was immediately popular. (There were, at one point in time, approximately 2 million people on its waiting list.) Today, the company announced in a blog post that it’s bringing WARP to macOS and Windows in beta.“While we announced the beta of 1.1.1.1 with WARP on April 1, 2019 it to

Photo by Smith Collection/Gado/Getty Images SoulCycle is cutting employee pay by 25 percent in response to studio closures across the United States, United Kingdom, and Canada due to the novel coronavirus pandemic. In an internal memo to full- and part-time staffers this week, SoulCycle said it will also furlough select employees without pay to allow them to seek potential unemployment benefits, with adjustments expected to take place over the next 30 days.
“In an effort to protect our te

Image: WinFuture New leaks for the OnePlus 8 Pro reveal that the phone may come in a good-looking deep blue color that might be exclusive to the Pro model of the OnePlus 8, reports WinFuture.That blue color will apparently be called “ultramarine blue,” according to WinFuture. Here’s another look at the device’s full front and back, thanks to what appear to be leaked marketing renders shared by WinFuture:Image: WinFuture
The OnePlus 8 Pro may also come in “onyx blac

Photo by Eduardo Sanz/Europa Press via Getty Images If you’re a weather geek, you must already know that Dark Sky, one of the most popular weather apps around, has been acquired by Apple — and that, as a result, anyone who uses an Android device is going to lose access to that app. In addition, a variety of other apps (some not even weather-related) will lose access to the Dark Sky API.
If you’re an Android user with Dark Sky and you’re wondering where to go now for your

Image: Twelve South Y’all, I can’t even. Just look at this thing: Image: Twelve South
It looks like your typical purse, right? Except...Image: Twelve South
What we have here is a tiny leather handbag from Twelve South designed for absolutely no other purpose than to carry your AirPods. It’s a limited edition release in honor of (sigh) April Fools’ Day, and there are 671 units left at the time of this writing. It’s called the AirBag, and it’s my absolute favor

While Americans hunker down to wait out the COVID-19 storm and online schooling goes into full swing, U.S. broadband speeds are largely holding up to the challenge, according to new stats from PCMag's sibling company Ookla Speedtest.
Fixed broadband speeds in the U.S. have largely flattened out after a slight dip between March 15 and 22, Ookla's results show, although speeds in Canada are continuing a slow decline. Both countries still have considerably better broadband than Mexico or much of Eu

121 years ago, on April 1, 1899, Dame Jean Macnamara, an Australian doctor and medical scientist whose work contributed to the development of a vaccine for polio, was born.
Now, she's being honored with a new Google Doodle depicting her time spent treating and rehabilitating young polio patients. 
Macnamara graduated from medical school at the University of Melbourne, and eventually started her career at the Royal Children's Hospital in Melbourne. During this time, she began to focus on pol

If you're lucky enough to get to work from home right now, you've probably heard the "tip" that you should still get dressed like you're going into the office. You know, in the name of productivity. But honestly, that's some bullshit. I'm not trying to wear jeans while I'm sitting on my couch for eight hours.
Wear what makes you comfortable. For me, that's been athletic leggings, joggers, soft T-shirts, and hoodies. I'm really leaning into the athleisure look.
You can still be just as productive

Ina Garten has the perfect quarantine cocktail because basically it's a whole mess of booze. 
She posted a video of her cosmo recipe to Instagram on Wednesday and, frankly, it's delightful, even if The Barefoot Contessa... isn't exactly her normal self. 
"During these stressful times, it's important to keep traditions alive," she says. "And my favorite tradition is the cocktail hour. So I'm going to make you my favorite cosmopolitan and you probably have all the ingredients right in yo

YTMND has returned. Nearly a year after being brought down by a server failure, YTMND is back online and somewhat modernized, removing the need for Flash to view its archive of looping GIFs and synchronized music.
“Everyone is stuck inside right now, so I figured it would be a good time to let people play with the site again,” YTMND founder Max Goldberg told The Verge over Discord.
Goldberg has been working to restore the site since it went offline last May. The site’s database

Illustration by Grayson Blackmon The day — her day — was finally here. As Lisa Kabouridis walked down the aisle with her two sons, accompanied by a 19th century waltz played on bagpipes, she was grateful the wedding had miraculously worked out. Despite the social isolation of the COVID-19 pandemic, her fiancé, Graeme Blackett, stood smiling at the altar in a kilt.
Sure, the aisle was the hallway of their house in Edinburgh — not the historic castle they’d envision

If you are looking for a great film to watch, Parasite from director Bong Joon-ho is $9.99 to own in 4K HDR through iTunes. This movie swept the 2020 Academy Awards, picking up big awards in several categories, including Best Picture (it’s the first non-English film to do so), Best Director, Best Original Screenplay, and Best International Feature Film.Even if you don’t use iTunes, buying Parasite through Apple’s storefront will allow you to add it to your Movies Anywhere libra

When fans think about the most monumental episodes of The Office, "Valentine's Day" doesn't usually come to mind.
Not even Jenna Fischer and Angela Kinsey thought of the 16th episode of Season 2 as a favorite until they rewatched it for Office Ladies podcast research. But now that they have, they've realized what an underrated gem it is.
Not only does "Valentine's Day" give us Dwight's famous bobblehead doll and Michael's iconic Sbarro scene, but fans get a Tina Fey reference and a Conan O'Brien