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Today β€” 25 February 2025Tech News

iPhone 16e has five key upgrades to entice iPhone 15 users

25 February 2025 at 10:06

Apple’s new iPhone 16e isn’t quite as budget-friendly as the iPhone SE it replaced, but it’s still a fantastic option for users looking to upgrade without breaking the bank. For iPhone 15 owners specifically, there are five big upgrades that come with the iPhone 16e vs. your current 15.

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New evidence suggests that Mars used to have an ocean and sandy beaches

25 February 2025 at 10:11

Researchers just discovered evidence to suggest that Mars was once home to oceans and sandy beaches on the red planet, according to data published by the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. This is a far cry from the arid, freezing and radiation-filled conditions of modern Mars.

Scientists discovered evidence of buried beaches after they analyzed below-ground imaging data from China’s Zhurong rover. This data from the northern lowlands of Mars is extremely similar to what researchers find when using similar ground-penetrating radar here on Earth, as indicated by The Guardian. They found subsurface material that’s angled and tilted toward a lowland, which likely was an ocean at some point.

#VantageOnFirstpost: A new study reveals that Mars once had an ocean with sandy beaches, with evidence of buried shorelines found deep underground. This study points to past life on the red planet about four billion years ago.

Previous research supports the idea of oceans and… pic.twitter.com/iFIQ61dCVK

β€” Firstpost (@firstpost) February 25, 2025

"Typically the radar picks up on even subtle changes in sediment size, which is probably what’s happening here," said Dr Benjamin Cardenas, a co-author of the research from Penn State University. "It tells you there had to be tides, there had to be waves, there had to be a nearby river supplying sediment, and all these things had to be active for some extended period of time."

Scientists have long debated whether or not Mars had oceans, and this discovery certainly implies the planet was once home to vast bodies of water. Previous discoveries have indicated that it used to have flowing rivers and lakes. There’s also evidence of liquid water deep underneath the Martian surface in the present day.

"A beach is an interface between shallow water, air and land. It’s these sorts of environments where it’s thought life first came to be on Earth, and I think it would be a great place to send a follow-up mission looking for signs of past life," Cardenas said.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/science/space/new-evidence-suggests-that-mars-used-to-have-an-ocean-and-sandy-beaches-181146248.html?src=rss

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Β© Planet Volumes / Unsplash

A render of Mars.

Brex eyes $500M in revenue as it adds the likes of Anthropic and Robinhood as customers

25 February 2025 at 10:08

Fintech Brex expects its annual net revenue to reach $500 million in 2025, according to a person familiar with the company’s operations as cited by Bloomberg and The Information. While the startup did not comment on the specific revenue projection, it did share that Brex has seen β€œ3x overall revenue growth” year-over-year. It also told […]

Β© 2024 TechCrunch. All rights reserved. For personal use only.

Is this 32-year-old a brilliant founder, or a deceptive fraudster?

25 February 2025 at 10:05

Hi there, welcome to TechCrunch’s regular fintech newsletter. We’re going on hiatus for a bit, but you can still find our must-see fintech coverage, including my columns and our daily analysis and breaking news stories, at TechCrunch.com. If you want those stories and much more in your inbox every day, sign up for our daily […]

Β© 2024 TechCrunch. All rights reserved. For personal use only.

Something Unexpected Is Spewing Stars Into the Milky Way

25 February 2025 at 10:05
Fast-moving stars in the Milky Way indicate there could be a supermassive black hole in the neighboring Large Magellanic Cloudβ€”something that has never been detected in a smaller galaxy.

Microsoft makes Copilot Voice and Think Deeper free with unlimited use

25 February 2025 at 09:53

Microsoft made OpenAI’s o1 reasoning model free for all Copilot users last month, and now it’s providing unlimited use of this model and Copilot’s voice capabilities to everyone. Previously, both Think Deeper (powered by o1) and Voice in Copilot had limits for free users, but Microsoft is removing these today to allow Copilot users to have extended conversations with the company’s AI assistant.

β€œWe are working hard to scale unlimited access to advanced features to as many people as possible, as quickly as possible, starting today with Voice and Think Deeper,” says the Copilot team. β€œIt’s worth noting you may experience delays or interruptions during periods of high demand or if we detect security concerns, misuse or other violations of theΒ Copilot Terms.β€œ

The unlimited use of Copilot Voice and Think Deeper comes two years after Microsoft first launched Copilot inside its Bing search engine, and just a month after the software maker revamped its Copilot Pro subscription and bundled Office AI features into Microsoft 365.

Microsoft is continuing to sell its $20 per month Copilot Pro subscription, and says users β€œwill retain preferred access to our latest models during peak usage, early access to experimental AI features (more on that coming soon), and additional use of Copilot in select Microsoft 365 apps like Word, Excel and PowerPoint.”

Chegg sues Google over AI Overviews

25 February 2025 at 09:42

Online education company Chegg filed a lawsuit on February 24th against Google claiming that the company’s AI-generated summaries of search results have hurt its traffic and revenue, Reuters reports. It’s believed to be the first antitrust lawsuit filed by a single company over the AI Overviews feature, Reuters says.

Chegg claims Google uses its power as a monopoly to coerce companies into using their content for AI Overviews, β€œreaping the financial benefits of Chegg’s content without having to spend a dime,” CEO Nathan Schultz says in prepared remarks for investors. Chegg, which offers textbook rentals and homework help, is now considering getting acquired and going private as a result.

β€œOur lawsuit is about more than Chegg – it’s about the digital publishing industry, the future of internet search, and about students losing access to quality, step-by-step learning in favor of low-quality, unverified AI summaries,” Schultz says.

β€œEvery day, Google sends billions of clicks to sites across the web, and AI Overviews send traffic to a greater diversity of sites,” says Google spokesperson Jose Castaneda in a statement to Reuters.

The lawsuit comes as a number of media outlets have expressed concern over how Google’s AI summaries have impacted traffic. Last year, the News/Media Alliance β€” an organization that represents over 2,000 news publishersΒ β€” published a press releaseΒ saying its impact will be β€œcatastrophic.”

Why CTV is evolving into a more efficient and effective advertising ecosystem for brands, publishers and consumers alike

By: Seedtag
25 February 2025 at 09:32

Tina Iannacchino, vp of publisher partnerships, North America, Seedtag

As consumers shift from traditional cable to on-demand streaming services, advertisers can reach and engage targeted audiences more effectively than previously possible. However, the challenges of disparate log-level data and inconsistent data-sharing practices have stymied the potential of CTV. To fully unlock the power of CTV, stakeholders must embrace a more unified approach to data sharing and integration.

CTV advertising provides vast optimization, but only when data is shared effectively

The growth of CTV presents significant opportunities for advertisers, particularly in terms of economies of scale and attention. Advertisers can optimize their reach and efficiency by locating audiences across multiple types of inventory within the CTV ecosystem. However, this is only possible if data is shared effectively across platforms β€” the industry should create a standard to ensure this becomes the case.Β 

Continue reading this article on digiday.com. Sign up for Digiday newsletters to get the latest on media, marketing and the future of TV.

Chegg sues Google, blames AI-generated summaries for traffic loss, falling revenue, and 90% stock crash

25 February 2025 at 09:51

Chegg is taking Google to court, accusing the tech giant of unfair competition over its AI-generated search summaries. The online education company says Google’s AI Overviews have siphoned away traffic and revenue, leaving its business struggling. The lawsuit, filed Monday […]

The post Chegg sues Google, blames AI-generated summaries for traffic loss, falling revenue, and 90% stock crash first appeared on Tech Startups.

Xbox has delayed its Fable reboot until 2026

By: Kris Holt
25 February 2025 at 09:31

Microsoft is delaying one of the major first-party games it had lined up for 2025. The company said during its big annual Xbox showcase last June that its Fable reboot would arrive this year. But that’s no longer the case as Xbox has pushed back the fantasy RPG to 2026.

"We previously announced the date for Fable as 2025. We are actually going to give Fable more time and it's going to ship in 2026 now," Craig Duncan, the new head of Xbox Game Studios, said on the latest edition of the Official Xbox Podcast. "While I know that's not maybe the news people want to hear, what I want to assure people of is that it's definitely worth the wait."

The reboot, which is being developed by Forza Horizon studio Playground Games, was announced all the way back in 2020 and there have been a few teasers since then. While the delay might be disappointing to those who have been waiting for Fable β€” especially since it's been 15 years since the last mainline game in the series β€” Xbox can afford to give it a little more time.

Microsoft's games division has a pretty healthy slate for the coming months. Avowed only just came out, the promising South of MidnightΒ is not too far away and then Doom: The Dark AgesΒ and its ridiculous shield-saw is slated to arrive in May. The Outer Worlds 2 and Ninja Gaiden 4Β are also on the docket for this year, and there are likely others in the pipeline (such as the inevitable annual Call of Duty entry). That's not to mention all the third-party titles coming to Game Pass and Microsoft selling more of its games on PlayStation and Nintendo platforms. So Xbox is probably going to be okay while Playground keeps Fable simmering away.

Duncan claims that the studio is crafting "the most beautifully realized version of Albion you've ever seen" but with its own spin and British humor. The Xbox Game Studios chief visited Playground to play some of Fable and see how things were going. Duncan brought back some new, early footage to show on the video version of the podcast, which you can see below starting at 15:55. Even the pre-alpha versions of these environments look very pretty, so here's hoping Playground makes good use of that extra time to make the most of the game.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/xbox/xbox-has-delayed-its-fable-reboot-until-2026-173118802.html?src=rss

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Β© Playground Games/Xbox Game Studios

Fable

Opera integrates Bluesky, Slack, and Discord into its browser

25 February 2025 at 09:50

Bluesky is getting added to the Opera web browser. On Tuesday, the Norway-based software maker announced the addition of the new social network alongside Slack and Discord, which will all be integrated into the browser’s sidebar alongside other messaging and communication services. Opera users have been able to customize their browsers with shortcuts to messaging […]

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Sweden’s Lovable, an app-building AI platform, rakes in $15M after spectacular growth

25 February 2025 at 09:45

Using generative AI to create software has been possibly the largest use case since it first appeared a couple years ago. But platforms like Cursor and Copilot are mostly confined to a world inhabited by trained engineers.Β  Lovable, a Swedish AI startup, reached the front page of both Product Hunt and Hacker News last year […]

Β© 2024 TechCrunch. All rights reserved. For personal use only.

What to expect from Amazon’s Alexa event on Wednesday

25 February 2025 at 09:41

Amazon is hosting an Alexa-focused press event in NYC on Wednesday. Considering the company hasn’t held a major device presser in nearly two years β€” the last one was September 2023 β€” we’re expecting some splashy announcements. The event will not be live streamed. However, TechCrunch will be reporting on the ground. The festivities, emceed […]

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DocUnlock wants to solve a customs bottleneck

25 February 2025 at 09:40

When goods enter the U.S., they have to be declared to U.S. customs so the importer can be charged the proper taxes. That applies to everything from a consumer ordering clothes from a brand based overseas to every single item on a massive container ship. When it comes to commercial importing, filling out the necessary […]

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