Author: News Room

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg is all in on AI as the new social media, and he’s previously described a vision of how users could use AI to make interactive experiences and share them with people. The launch of Pocket appears to be one manifestation of that idea, and it follows Meta hiring engineers from a company called Atma Sciences Inc., which made an app called Gizmo, as Business Insider reported in March. Meta got a non-exclusive license to use the company’s technology, and based on screenshots of Pocket on Google Play, the app looks to be pretty similar to Gizmo.“Scroll…

Apple has been slowly (and we mean slowly) adding to the number of auto manufacturers supporting the digital car key feature in Apple Wallet on iPhone, but today we learned a major carmaker could be about to join the fray. MacRumors found evidence of incoming support for Volkswagen vehicles within “new server-side” Apple code. Those are the only details available at present, so we don’t know when the feature will arrive and on what vehicles. The feature not only enables drivers to lock, unlock and start their car but to do so automatically and passively as they approach the vehicle.…

For a few days, it seemed like Universal decided that there would be no advanced screenings of Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey for influencers. But on Monday, influencers sat alongside traditional critics and journalists at special showings of The Odyssey specifically for the associated press junket. Despite what it may have looked like, Universal was not going back on its word. The studio was simply embracing an undeniable reality of the modern entertainment press.Much as it may pain some to admit, influencers and content creators have become a significant part of our media ecosystem — one that offers film studios an…

For decades, to be a gamer was to accumulate a lot of stuff. Consoles, controllers, accessories, weird VR gloves that never worked properly, but mostly the games themselves. Over the years, games have come in every shape and size you can imagine. And now that era appears to be ending. On this episode of The Vergecast, David and Nilay talk about Sony’s plan to end production of PlayStation discs, Microsoft’s ongoing strategy for digitizing games, and in general the end of physical game media. It all makes a certain kind of business sense – and these companies are all desperately…

We’ve got a special Decoder today — I had the chance to talk with Amy Lanzi, the CEO of Digitas North America, in front of a live audience at the Uber Villa at the Cannes Lions advertising festival in the South of France. I know, it’s a hard gig, but I do it for you.Amy has been on Decoder three times now, and she’s one of my favorite people to chat with — she is clear-eyed about what the advertising industry really is and does for brands and what all the money sloshing around the ad-supported internet really accomplishes. You’ll…

All the highlights coming to a small screen near you this year Anya Taylor-Joy in Lucky on Apple TV Cord cutting – swapping a costly satellite or cable subscription and getting all your visual entertainment from cheaper, more convenient streaming services – was once sold to us as a utopian dream. And, for a while, it was just that. But the days of a monthly Netflix subscription costing less than a pint of beer are long gone, and the fragmentation of streaming services over the past decade or so means most of us are now subscribing to at least half…

All the top movies to check out this year. What are you looking forward to the most? Willem Dafoe in Robert Eggers’ Werwulf Summer 2026 is in full swing, and so is blockbuster movie season. After all, there are few better antidotes to a sweltering heatwave than to retreat into a dark, air conditioned cinema for the hottest hours of the day. Hollywood has a full slate of new sequels and fresh adaptations ready to roll on film both at movie theatres and on home streaming services, as well as some entirely original stuff for movie lovers to sink their…

Silo is such a complicated show that even its showrunner gets confused sometimes. While filming the final seasons of the Apple TV sci-fi thriller, Graham Yost remembers two instances where he messed up details: once it was an actor who realized that a conversation they were about to shoot should’ve already taken place, the other involved the Japanese localization team pointing out that a subtitle didn’t match what was going on onscreen. In both instances, the problem was ultimately fixed, but Yost’s reaction was the same: “Oh shit, you’re right.”Keeping everything straight is one of the big challenges of working…

Apple’s smart speaker ambitions have felt strangely quiet over the past few years, but with whispers of a new HomePod Mini 2 and Home Hub incoming, that’s soon set to change. Reports suggest that Apple is preparing its first HomePod Mini refresh in almost six years, alongside an entirely new smart home device widely referred to as the Home Hub. Together, they’re expected to usher in a more capable version of Siri AI powered by Apple Intelligence, while giving Apple a much stronger answer to products such as the Amazon Echo Show and Google Nest Hub. Nothing has been officially…

Twenty-five years ago today, a young, little-known programmer by the name of Bram Cohen fired off a short message to a mailing list for peer-to-peer enthusiasts. “My new app, BitTorrent, is now in working order, check it out here,” Cohen wrote, followed by a link to his personal website.“What’s BitTorrent, Bram?” the founder of the list asked in response.Cohen never bothered to reply. The world would find out soon enough.In the following years, BitTorrent quickly became the world’s most popular file-sharing app, unleashing a massive wave of piracy that upended Hollywood forever. At one point, BitTorrent was said to be…

You may remember the Formula 1 Miami Grand Prix last year where each of the 10 F1 teams were given its own drivable car made out of Lego. Now the concept is back for this weekend’s British Grand Prix but with a new spin – during the driver’s parade on Sunday each of the 22 drivers will have their own drivable Lego car, each made from around 28,000 Lego bricks plus a few actual car bits like go-kart wheels. Now, this won’t be a lap of Silverstone taken at speed – the cars are only capable of 15mph/25kmh – so…

I’ll admit it upfront: I’m a bit of a badge snob. Years of testing everything from Bentleys and Aston Martins to Breitlings will do that to you. So when Jaecoo offered me a day with its new flagship car, the Jaecoo 8 SHS-P, I wasn’t expecting to come away impressed… boy, was I wrong. I spent the day threading it through the lanes around West Wycombe, to fully test it out. Here’s how I got on. The hybrid system is the star of the show Jaecoo calls it the Super Hybrid System, and while that does sound like a gimmicky…