Author: News Room
Following the huge PlayStation Network (PSN) outage that ended yesterday, Sony is giving an automatic five extra days of service to PlayStation Plus subscribers, according to a post from the official Ask PlayStation support account on X.“Network services have fully recovered from an operational issue,” the company wrote in the post. “We apologize for the inconvenience and thank the community for their patience.” Sony didn’t offer further specifics.The outage lasted about a full day, with the first indications of problems seemingly cropping up around 6PM ET Friday. Sony posted that service had been restored just before 7PM ET Saturday.During the…
What was once ridiculous is now possible. Elon Musk, the richest person in the history of the world, has become President Donald Trump’s attack dog. Musk and his Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) have unprecedented access to the government’s data and computer system. Earlier this week, that came to include systems in the Department of Energy (DOE), which oversees America’s nuclear weapons. The news raised enough concern that Secretary of Energy Chris Wright went on the air to deny Musk and DOGE have access to atomic secrets.It’s alarming to be at a point where someone has to make this kind…
Hi, friends! Welcome to Installer No. 70, your guide to the best and Verge-iest stuff in the world. (If you’re new here, welcome, go Chiefs I guess, and also you can read all the old editions at the Installer homepage.) This week, I’ve been reading about kicking sugar and NBA trades and the rise of Zyn, watching most of Parks and Recreation while I try to fight off a flu, traipsing through the Video Game History Foundation Library, buying a few of these delightful Paper Apps notebooks, rewatching Waiting for Guffman after randomly stumbling upon it on YouTube, and snacking…
When you set up a new Mac, you’re instructed to keep it locked down with a password, a Touch ID, and / or an Apple Watch authorization. But you can’t guarantee that your macOS system will only be seen by you and you alone. Maybe your kids want to borrow your MacBook to play a game or you want to show a friend the photos and videos of your latest trip. How do you prevent them from accidentally opening folders or files that you want to keep private?These scenarios are where hidden files and folders come into play. They won’t…
A common reader request I get goes something like this: what should I buy if I don’t want a smartwatch but want basic fitness tracking? When I suggest alternatives like budget fitness bands or smart rings, I get an unsure hmm and a displeased scrunch of the nose. After a few more back-and-forths, I usually find that many people do want a smartwatch. They just don’t want one from Apple, Samsung, Garmin, or Google. They want something more akin to ye olde Pebble or this retro-chic $56 Casio. For those folks, consider the humble Amazfit Active 2.Amazfit’s shtick is delivering…
For years, Donald Trump’s fight against social media companies has been a one-man boxing match. He calls them out over bias, and they rewrite policies making him the one exception to their rules, taking care never to punch back. But on Tuesday, Twitter slapped back for the first time ever, labeling two tweets as making false and misleading claims about mail-in voting.On Wednesday morning, predictably, Trump hit back. In a series of early morning tweets, the president said he would “strongly regulate, or close [platforms] down” before he allowed them to stifle conservative speech. Trump did not explain the ways…
If you’re on the hunt for the best gaming headsets, you’ve landed in the right spot. After testing countless models over the years, we’ve got a sharp eye for what works best. While wireless options dominate our list (because, let’s face it, ditching the wires during marathon gaming sessions is a game-changer), we’ve also sprinkled in a few wired picks for those who love the versatility of plugging into anything with a 3.5mm jack. Now, you might be tempted to settle for your TV or gaming monitor’s speakers or a budget pair of headphones, but trust us—a great gaming headset…
Looking to buy the best mid-range laptop? It’s a smart move. Why splurge over a grand on a machine if you won’t fully utilise all its premium features? Like mid-range phones, mid-range laptops once meant compromises in performance and speed, but fortunately, technology has come a long way. Today, you can find sleek, fast notebooks for around US$700 / £700 or less, offering more than enough power to handle both work and entertainment. In other words, unless you’re after the ultimate gaming laptop or need a high-end laptop for video rendering, opting for a well-priced laptop with impressive – though…
The Civilization franchise is getting the VR treatment with Sid Meier’s Civilization VII – VR on Meta Quest headsets this spring, 2K and Firaxis Games have announced. The “virtual and mixed reality” game will be available for the Quest 3 and 3S, but no price or specific release date has been announced quite yet.How are 2K and Firaxis making it work? It’s presented through a “board game-like construction” that’s projected into your physical space using the Quest’s passthrough cameras or shown in a virtual museum environment “looking out onto a vista personalized to your leader,” says a Meta blog post…
TikTok is now offering US downloads of the Android version of the app on its own website, the company announced last night. With the change, Android users in the United States now have an easy way to download or update the app for the first time since Google removed it from Google Play last month in response to a US ban on the app.You can download both TikTok and TikTok Lite, a version of the app designed to work with slower internet connections. Once that’s done, you can install or update the app just by opening the file and approving…
A federal judge temporarily blocked Elon Musk’s DOGE from accessing Treasury Department records containing personal information like Social Security numbers early this morning, reports Inner City Press.The order is in response to a lawsuit filed yesterday in New York’s Southern District Court. The suit alleges that the administration exceeded its authority, broke the US Administrative Procedures Act, and violated the US Constitution’s separation of powers doctrine when it granted DOGE access to the Treasury’s federal payments system.District Judge Paul A. Engelmeyer’s order now prohibits the Trump administration ”from granting access to all political appointees, special government employees, and government employees…
Apple is expected to announce a new iPhone SE as early as next week, and it could mark a major shakeup to the company’s affordable iPhone, adding in Face ID and killing off the classic home button. We have a pretty good idea of what’s coming after months of leaks and rumors, so here’s everything we expect to see next week.There won’t be a home button…The biggest change is that Apple is upending the iPhone SE’s design, after leaving it broadly unchanged since the series’ inception in 2016. The 2022 SE is the last iPhone still using a home button,…