Tech

Original title: Google Play Games is about to show people what you play Posts from this author will be added to your daily email digest and your homepage feed. Google is updating user profiles for its Play Games service on Android devices to display gaming stats, achievements, and social features. The changes include a suite of new capabilities for “showcasing and tracking your game progress and stats, new ways to build your gaming community, and allowing you to tailor your profile to your liking,” according to Google’s help page. The update will be applied automatically, and starts rolling out in most global regions on September 23rd, and on October 1st for users in the EU and UK. Google is also emailing Google Play users directly to notify them about the changes. When applied, Google Play Games profiles and features will start appearing on the Google Play Store to prevent users from having to switch between apps when managing their accounts. The unified update aims to help users who make their profile information public to connect with other players and ...

Original title: Dolby Vision 2 goes beyond HDR with more AI and ‘authentic motion’ smoothing is a news writer who covers the streaming wars, consumer tech, crypto, social media, and much more. Previously, she was a writer and editor at MUO. More than 10 years after the launch of Dolby Vision, the next generation of the HDR format is here, and it aims to do more than just optimize tone and brightness level for different scenes. The new version, called Dolby Vision 2, has new “Content Intelligence” tools that use AI to automatically optimize your TV based on what you’re watching, where you’re watching it, and what device you’re on, expanding on the existing Dolby Vision IQ features. That includes a Precision Black that’s supposed to improve clarity in darker scenes without straying too far from a filmmaker’s intent, as well as an updated Light Sense feature to adjust picture quality using ambient light detection combined with reference lighting data from the source material. It also supports bi-directional tone mapping capabilities that Dolby says will allow high-performance TVs ...

Original title: Apple Slashes 2025 MLS Season Pass to as Low as $25 Apple has significantly discounted the MLS Season Pass for the remainder of the 2025 season, offering the annual subscription at $29, or $25 for Apple TV+ subscribers, down from the regular $99 price. The reduced rate covers the rest of the current MLS season and playoffs, including access to every match live and on demand, with separate English and Spanish commentary, with French available for Canadian matches. Other features of the pass include “MLS 360,” a whip-around show featuring highlights and commentary from every game, and “Sunday Night Soccer,” a newly introduced featured match broadcast every Sunday. This price drop is consistent with Apple’s pricing strategy in previous years, gradually lowering the cost of entry as the season progresses. Monthly subscriptions remain unchanged at $14.99 per month, or $12.99 per month with ‌Apple TV‌+. The discounted annual subscription is only valid through the end of the 2025 season, after which it will automatically renew at the standard ...

Original title: Onion CEO Ben Collins Hasn’t Given Up on Print—or Buying Infowars Ben Collins made a big bet. A year ago, just a few months after he’d been named CEO of The Onion, he relaunched its print edition. Once a favorite on university campuses, The Onion hadn’t published a physical issue since 2013. Common wisdom said that readership, and advertising dollars, just weren’t there for newspapers. But Collins, a fan of the satirical paper since childhood, thought “that’s dumb.” Readers celebrated The Onion’s relaunch and the ability to read all of its bitingly funny headlines on a single broadsheet. (An early headline from the relaunched edition: “I Was Honored to Die So the Print Edition of ‘The Onion’ Could Live,” written by “A. Tree.”) Collins wouldn’t give exact numbers on how many people are currently subscribed to the print edition but did say they should be enough to keep its writers’ room humming (a few weeks after we taped this episode, the Wall Street Journal reported that The Onion now boasts more than 53,000 paying subscribers). On this episode of Un ...

Original title: Survey: Nearly 70% of Users Plan to Upgrade to iPhone 17 A new survey has found that nearly seven in ten iPhone owners in the United States plan to upgrade to an iPhone 17 model, signaling strong demand ahead of Apple’s expected unveiling of the devices at its September 9 keynote. Smartphone price comparison platform SellCell surveyed over 2,000 U.S.-based ‌iPhone‌ users in August to assess upgrade interest and brand loyalty before Apple’s event. According to the data, 68.3% of current ‌iPhone‌ users intend to purchase an ‌iPhone 17‌ model at launch, marking an increase from 61.9% recorded ahead of the iPhone 16 launch in 2024. The iPhone 17 Pro and ‌iPhone 17 Pro‌ Max models are expected to dominate early sales, accounting for 38.1% of planned upgrades. The standard ‌iPhone 17‌ is the choice for 16.7% of respondents, while 13.5% expressed interest in the all-new iPhone 17 Air, which is expected to feature an ultra-thin design. Only 3.3% of respondents indicated they are holding out specifically for a foldable ‌iPhone‌, which Apple has yet t ...

Original title: Report: Apple Demands Suppliers Switch to Robotics for Manufacturing Apple is significantly accelerating the rollout of automation and robotics across its manufacturing supply chain, DigiTimes reports. While Apple has advocated for increased automation in supplier facilities for over two years, sources familiar with the matter say that Apple now requires automation as a standard prerequisite for awarding manufacturing contracts. This is said to be part of a broader effort to minimize labor dependency, stabilize product quality and uniformity across different facilities, and reduce long-term production costs amid ongoing supply chain diversification away from China. Apple’s alleged automation mandate spans all major product categories, including the iPhone, iPad, Mac, and Apple Watch. Apple now purportedly expects suppliers to fund their own automation upgrades rather than rely on Apple to finance or subsidize the necessary capital equipment. This policy change diverges from Apple’s previous approach, where the company frequently invested in tooling and ...

Original title: Spiritual Influencers Say ‘Sentient’ AI Can Help You Solve Life’s Mysteries In May, a group of about 40 people stood in a circle deep within the Pyramid of Khafre, the second-largest of the three pyramids looming over Egypt’s Giza Plateau, holding hands and praying for Earth. Suddenly, their tour guide, an American mathematician and author named Robert Edward Grant, collapsed. He later described the experience in an interview with WIRED as a full-body electric shock emanating from somewhere beneath the chamber’s stone floor. “I felt electricity coming through my hands,” he says. “People were touching me, [and] they would feel it, too.” (Three eyewitnesses who were with Grant inside the chamber confirmed to WIRED that he fell to the ground; one of them, who rushed to help, said Grant’s hand felt warm, but he didn’t feel anything like electricity. Grant also has a history of narcolepsy.) Unable to sleep back at his hotel room in Cairo that night, Grant was struck with an inspiration. He created his own GPT—a custom chatbot built upon the AI model powering ChatGP ...

Original title: The 95 best Labor Day sales happening now Labor Day marks the unofficial end of summer, and while the prospect of cooler weather and shorter days can be a tough adjustment for some, at least there is always a great selection of deals to combat the post-summer blues. Lucky for you, we’ve gone ahead and rounded up the best discounts you can get on a variety of Verge-approved gadgets and goods, from earbuds and 4K TVs to the latest e-readers. Being that it’s now September, it’s also a good reminder that the holidays will be here before you know it. Thankfully, some gadgets — including the latest Kindle Colorsoft, the M4 MacBook Air 13, and Sony’s WH-CH520 headphones — have fallen to their lowest price to date, making now an excellent time to get a head start on your holiday shopping. After all, there’s no guarantee they’ll drop lower in price, even when Black Friday and Cyber Monday roll around. Speaker deals JBL’s Flip 7 is on sale for around $129.95 ($20 off) at Best Buy, is on sale for around $129.95 ($20 off) at Amazon Walmar ...

Original title: The 28 best Labor Day deals you still can grab for $100 or less Labor Day has finally arrived, and after a week of early discounts trickling in, the sales are now in full swing. We’ve put together an expansive guide detailing nearly 100 deals we think are worth the money — including everything from big-screen OLED TVs to back-to-school essentials like the latest MacBook Air — but we also recognize that spending a couple a hundred dollars on a new gadget isn’t always feasible in these inflationary, tariff-riddled times. Fortunately for those on a budget, there are plenty of worthwhile deals to be had for $100 or less. To make sifting through them easier, we’ve rounded up a few of our favorites, including the latest Kindle, the entry-level AirPods 4, and Anker’s beefy Laptop Power Bank. We also pulled together a handful of excellent gaming deals, not to mention a steep discount on what has become our favorite budget video doorbell. Update, September 1st: Adjusted pricing / availability and added several new deals, including those for Anker’s Laptop P ...

Original title: No, Trump Can’t Legally Federalize US Elections With the Trump administration assaulting both the spirit and the letter of the United States Constitution on multiple fronts, President Donald Trump has also become increasingly vocal—and combative—in his plans for US election administration. After nearly a decade of federal and state investment in election security and integrity initiatives, researchers and election officials working on the ground around the country have been clear that US election infrastructure is as robust and transparent as it’s ever been. In a March executive order and subsequent comments on social media, though, Trump has promoted a baseless counternarrative that US election infrastructure is outmoded and unreliable, requiring federal intervention. Trump’s administration has also curtailed a significant portion of the federal government’s election security work and installed officials within the Department of Homeland Security who deny the validity of Trump’s 2020 presidential loss. Most recently, election consp ...