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Amazon’s short story collections are one of the best reasons to own a Kindle

2026-07-29T15:06:24-04:00

Over the last few years, I've gradually shifted away from ebooks. It's been part of a general return to physical media, an attempt to create a deeper sense of ownership over the art I love and collect. A Kindle is obviously more convenient than a paperback: It's tiny, holds a huge library, and you can purchase new books instantly. But, much like with retro game cartridges, I find there's a deeper connection formed with a book dug out of a stack in a used book shop versus simply choosing the next thing in a series from a menu on an e-reader. But I haven't completely given up on my Kindle, and there's one big reason - actually, there are lots …

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What’s the catch with the Apple Upgrade program?

2026-07-29T14:55:04-04:00

Apple's new Upgrade program is here, allowing you to lease select models of iPhones, iPads, Macs, and Watches with a relatively low monthly payment. The company promises you won't pay more than the full price of the device over the course of the one- to three-year lease, and in some cases, you'll pay hundreds of dollars less.

The basics of the program make it sound like an amazing deal… so surely there must be a catch, right?

The answer basically depends on how you use the Upgrade Program. At least with current pricing, a diligent user really should be able to make a monthly payment, swap in their phone a year or more later, and move along …

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Meta is royally screwing up its smart glasses rollout

2026-07-28T10:46:42-04:00

We’re leaning in with the playing card metaphor.

Across New York City, London, and Washington, DC, ads for Meta's smart glasses have been plastered over with satirical posters from activist groups. One guerrilla ad calls these "the biggest advancement in pervert technology since the trenchcoat." Another transposes the words "mass surveillance predator glasses" over influencer Kylie Jenner's face, calling her out for partnering with the company as a glasses ambassador.

The message of these ads is clear. These glasses may violate your privacy - and would you trust Meta?

Meta seems spooked. For so long, the company's privacy efforts for smart glasses have essentially relied on a single LE …

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Meta just created a moderation nightmare for its smart glasses

2026-07-24T15:23:44-04:00

Meta's smart glasses have been a PR headache for the company. Public backlash has been swift, and fierce; people are concerned about the erosion of privacy and expansion of surveillance. Some especially bad actors are using the glasses to film themselves "pranking" random strangers. Women have become unsuspecting social media content for men filming themselves hitting on them without their knowledge. When your product is being referred to as "pervert glasses," you have a problem on your hands.

On Thursday, Business Insider reported that Meta was taking the fairly extraordinary step of banning some content filmed with Meta glasses from the c …

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Meta made its own AI detection system. It should have just used Google’s

2026-07-22T05:29:02-04:00

Content Seal sounds a lot like a less accessible and reliable version of SynthID. | Image: Meta / The Verge

IIn March, Meta's Oversight Board called on the company to "meet its public commitments and employ its own tools" to help quell the spread of deceptive generative AI content across platforms. Meta responded in July by introducing Content Seal - an invisible watermarking technology that flags images generated by the company's new AI model. But it was basically a footnote buried in the company's announcement for its Muse image and video generation tools.

As someone who spends a lot of time scrutinizing AI labeling systems, Content Seal doesn't fill me with confidence. There are already more established solutions, like C2PA Content Credentials …

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Neill Blomkamp’s new zombie AI ‘film’ is just slop warmed over

2026-07-21T18:06:43-04:00

On Monday, District 9 and Gran Turismo director Neill Blomkamp unveiled his latest project: a 13-minute sci-fi short titled Nightborne that's loosely based on Peter Watts' 2014 novel Echopraxia. The short comes from Blomkamp's new AI startup / production company, Barley Studios, and features characters whose voices and faces are modeled after human actors. But every single one of Nightborne's shots was made with ByteDance's Seedance 2.0 text-to-video generator.

In an X post about the short, Blomkamp described it as a "test start" meant to demonstrate what generative AI is capable of, and he said that he wants "to tackle a full feature in th …

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Instagram will let users endlessly swap the audio on old posts

2026-07-20T23:28:28-04:00

There's a symbiotic - and sometimes frustrating - relationship between social media sites and the creators that depend on them. Platforms need influencers' and creators' content to keep consumers on their apps; the creators, in turn, need to be able to reach those audiences to justify creating their content in the first place. Creators want a seamless way to make and disseminate their content while being able to make money; audiences want a bottomless feed of entertaining things to look at. And platforms need to keep both parties relatively happy.

Over the last few months, Instagram has added a slew of features that are helpful for creator …

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The Odyssey turned me into an IMAX believer

2026-07-20T17:47:37-04:00

After seeing Christopher Nolan's The Odyssey for the first time early last week, I came away impressed, but somewhat conflicted about two of the film's more fantastical set pieces. While those scenes were beautifully crafted and tremendously acted, there was something a little bit off about the way they hit my eye. I spent days wondering what, exactly, wasn't quite working for me during that first theatrical viewing, and I thought that might have just been splitting hairs. But it wasn't until I saw the movie again over the weekend - this time in IMAX - that the issue became crystal clear.

Though I'd heard all of the buzz about The Odyssey b …

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Google is better than Apple at playing the AI regulations game

2026-07-16T15:41:51-04:00

Google CEO Sundar Pichai | Bloomberg via Getty Images

Today, the European Union ordered Google to give its AI rivals greater access to Android, the open-source operating system that powers billions of devices worldwide. The demand is hardly surprising. It may look like a defeat on paper for Google, which has spent years resisting exactly this kind of access, but it is a regulatory win. It's also a sign that Google may have outmaneuvered Apple by playing Brussels' regulatory game far more shrewdly.

In one of two decisions handed down on Thursday, the European Commission - the EU's executive arm and the principal enforcer of the bloc's competition rules - said Google must give rival AI assistan …

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OnePlus never had a chance in the US

2026-07-16T11:29:40-04:00

Twelve years after the launch of the OnePlus One, OnePlus announced today that it has exited the United States. It's bittersweet, as the brand has been on a comeback tour of sorts with its excellent OnePlus 15 and widely praised (though still too expensive) OnePlus Open.

The writing has been on the wall for a while now. T-Mobile stopped stocking OnePlus' flagship phones after 2022, instead deciding to only carry its low-end Nord devices, and Verizon's run with OnePlus only lasted two years, from 2020 through 2021. Even though it continued releasing flagships, OnePlus' US footprint has been fading. In January, Android Headlines even claimed …

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