Ten years ago Sony introduced the MDR-1000X headphones. They combined noise canceling, good sound, design, and comfort in a way that we hadn’t quite seen before in a set of wireless headphones. (At the time, the Bose QC35 were the closest competitor, but I wasn’t a huge fan of their sound tuning.) The 1000X set off a line of consistently excellent wireless noise-canceling headphones that became the go-to for comparisons – I still have a pair of WH-1000XM4s that hang on the side of my desk. To celebrate the launch of the original, Sony is releasing the 1000X The Collexion. (The X in “collexion…
Category: Technology
An AI announcer mispronounced and skipped names during a graduation
Glendale Community College president Tiffany Hernandez apologized for the mistakes and eventually offered many students a do-over. | Screenshot: YouTube The use of AI-powered tools to announce students as they walk on stage during graduation and commencement ceremonies has grown in popularity over the past few years, but it’s not always succeeding at the one job it’s there for. Many schools have switched to these systems as a way to ensure names are being pronounced correctly, but during a recent livestream of a Glendale Community College commencement ceremony in Phoenix, Arizona, the AI…
OpenAI co-founder Andrej Karpathy joins Anthropic’s pre-training team
Andrej Karpathy has joined Anthropic to work on pre-training. He previously co-founded and worked at OpenAI and led computer vision and AI at Tesla.
Why does Amazon have no Western rivals?
The internet giant dwarfs other online retailers on both sides of the Atlantic.
Peter G. Neumann, Who Warned of Computer Security Risks, Dies at 93
For decades, he criticized the industry’s lax attitudes toward both computer security and individual digital privacy. And he developed solutions.
Microsoft is retiring Teams’ Together Mode
Microsoft launched Teams’ Together Mode during the pandemic to give the illusion of a bunch of people sitting in a conference room together, even if they were really sitting at home without pants on. But times have changed, and it’s now being retired in favor of a more simplified Teams experience. The feature used AI to cut your head and shoulds out, and place you in a virtual space with others in the meeting. It could definitely feel gimmicky – especially when you’d tap co-workers on the shoulder, or give virtual high fives – but it did limit visual distractions. The changes are being rolled…
TikTok launches an ad-free subscription plan in the UK
Users who sign up for the plan won’t see ads on TikTok, and their data won’t be used for advertising purposes.
Joanna Stern is not a robot, but she lived with them
My guest today is longtime friend of the show Joanna Stern. You all know Joanna: she is the former senior personal technology columnist for The Wall Street Journal, a former Decoder guest host, one of my cofounders here at The Verge, and also just one of my very closest friends.I mention that because Joanna just left that lofty perch at The Journal to start her own media company called New Things. She’s starting with her new book about AI, called I Am Not a Robot, which is out this week on May 12th. You’ll hear us reference the fact that she and I have been talking about her big move…
TikTok is letting UK users pay to remove ads
TikTok is preparing to roll out a paid, ad-free version of its app in the UK. The new subscription announced today will be available to users over 18 “over the coming months,” according to TikTok’s announcement, and will cost £3.99 (about $5.40) per month. In exchange for that, TikTok will remove ads from the user’s feed, and promises to not use their data for undefined “advertising purposes”.This “pay or consent” model is likely in response to the UK’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and other privacy laws that forbid companies from harvesting personal data for advertising…
