There’s been no shortage of headlines in the last year detailing how X (formerly Twitter), under current owner Elon Musk and CEO Linda Yaccarino, has had a fraught relationship with the advertising industry — sometimes resulting in legal swings taken at some of its players.
Market research firm Forrester on Tuesday issued guidance to its clients on how advertisers ought to handle the pressures exerted by X, in a blog post authored by analysts Jay Pattisall and Kelsey Chickering. Titled “X-tortion: How Advertisers Are Losing Control Of Media Choice,” the analysts recommend three steps advertisers should take to maintain as much control in any such situation:
Lean into non-binding advertising commitments with X
Explore principal media solutions for X upfront deals
Require X to meet media performance thresholds
Pattisall said the post is meant to help with efforts advertisers have already put to work. “My understanding is that many advertisers and agencies have been quietly working in this direction,” he told Digiday. “So anything that we’re recommending is not to contradict that, but rather to support that.”
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The Sonos Era 100 is more affordable than ever for Sonos customers.
Since its app fiasco last year, Sonos has been busy slowly rebuilding its reputation with customers. This latest sale, which is exclusive to existing customers, seems to be a part of that strategy — and we’re not complaining, because the deals are solid. Through March 2nd, Sonos is taking 25 percent off one select Sonos product up to $2,500, though you’ll have to sign in (or create an account) to see the discounted prices. To qualify, you must have registered a Sonos product by February 19th, 2025.
The Sonos sale includes a wide range of audio gear, many of which are down to new all-time low prices. For example, the Sonos Ace is cheaper than ever at $336.75 ($112.25 off). Along with delivering good sound and noise cancellation, the Ace supports TV Audio Swap so you can pair it with Sonos soundbars for private listening. That includes the latest Sonos Beamand Sonos Ray, both of which are also on sale for some of their best prices at $374.25 ($124.75 off) and $209.25 ($69.75 off), respectively. The Beam is the larger, more capable of the two, with support for Dolby Atmos as well an eARC HDMI port. That said, the entry-level Sonos Ray also produces balanced, dynamic sound for its size, even if it’s not on the same level.
Alternatively, if you’re looking for a powerful yet portable speaker, the Sonos Move 2 is down to $336.75 ($112.25 off). The six-pound speaker features stereo sound that can fill up any outdoor patio or room, and also comes with a built-in handle for greater portability. If you prioritize portability over power, though, the smaller and waterproof Sonos Roam 2 is also on sale for $134.25 ($44.75 off).
Last but not least, the Sonos sale also includes its newest smart speakers. You can, for example, buy the Sonos Era 100 and Sonos Era 300 for an all-time low of $186.75 ($62 off) and $336.75 ($112.25 off), respectively. Both speakers offer support for Wi-Fi, Bluetooth audio, and line-in playback via an optional 3.5mm to USB-C adapter. The Sonos Era 300, however, is designed to deliver an excellent spatial audio experience with Dolby Atmos support.
As part of its February Xbox update, Microsoft is making it easier to invite your friends to an Xbox Cloud Gaming session by letting you generate shareable links. You can send the link through an Xbox message or by copying it to your clipboard for pasting into any messaging app you want. Players can accept the invite on a supported PC or mobile web browser and jump in right away or receive a code to enter on any TVs or streaming devices with Xbox gaming features.
Willing participants must have an Xbox account, with some games requiring an active Game Pass Ultimate subscription. It also requires each player to have an “entitlement” to the game, presumably by owning it outright or having access through Game Pass or a free-play period. You can invite as many friends as the game allows and revoke access to the link at any time. Some games will also allow you to remove unwanted players from your session.
This new feature arrives as part of the continued expansion of Xbox Cloud Gaming, which recently added the ability to stream your own games on your Xbox console or on mobile, PC, and TVs. (Previously, you could only stream select Game Pass titles.) That feature launched with 50 supported titles, but Microsoft recently expanded it with about half a dozen, including notable additions like Blasphemous II, Kingdom Come: Deliverance II, and Subnautica.
Samsung's new 9100 PRO Series solid-state drives (SSDs) include the company's first consumer-grade 8TB NVMe SSD. The latest models use the speedy PCIe 5.0 standard, which — unless you train AI models for a living — is almost certainly overkill for your PC needs.
The Samsung 9100 PRO series offers up to double the storage of its predecessor, the 990 PRO line. It launches in 1TB, 2TB and 4TB models, with the 8TB ones not arriving until later this year. Each tier ships in models with and without a heatsink (whether you need that will depend on whether your motherboard includes one for NVMe drives).
Samsung
The company says the 9100 PRO SSDs have sequential read speeds of up to 14,800 MB/s and sequential write speeds of up to 13,400 MB/s. Their random read speeds are as fast as 2,200K IOPS (input-output per second), with random write speeds up to 2,600K IOPS. The company says the 9100 PRO SSDs are up to 49 percent more power-efficient than the 990 PRO line and have a profile as slim as 0.35 inches (around 8.9mm).
But as Engadget's Igor Bonifacic wrote in our SSD buying guide, very few real-world use cases demand those speeds. (Think people training large-scale AI models and the like.) As it stands, PCIe 4.0 drives already benchmark far beyond what most gamers and other consumer uses require. They also cost about half as much.
The first 9100 PRO SSDs arrive in March: 1TB ($200), 2TB ($300) and 4TB ($550). Variants with a heatsink tack an extra $20 onto those prices. As for the 8TB tier, which Samsung hasn't announced pricing for, it doesn't arrive until the second half of the year.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/computing/accessories/samsungs-9100-pro-ssd-line-includes-its-first-8tb-nvme-model-for-consumers-205727818.html?src=rss
Warner Bros Discovery made sweeping cuts to its games division today, closing three studios and ending development on its planned Wonder Woman project. Monolith Productions, Player First Games and WB Games San Diego will be shuttered due to a “disappointing 2024” for WB's gaming business, according to an internal memo from JB Perrette, the company's CEO and president of global streaming and games. Bloomberg broke the news of the restructuring.
Monolith Productions made two well-regarded Lord of the Rings games, Middle-Earth: Shadow of Mordor and Shadow of War. The studio was going to apply its popular Nemesis system from those titles to a Wonder Woman game, which was announced back in 2021.
WB acquired Player First Games last year. The team was responsible for MultiVersus, a platform fighting game that reached 20 million players in its early days before dwindling to a planned shutdown of the online services when its fifth season ends this May.
WB Games San Diego was working on AAA free-to-play gaming. In December, Warner Bros Games also announced that it would lay off employees at WB Games Montreal as well as pulling back on the studio's game Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League.
According to the internal email from Perrette, WB's gaming efforts will be focused on four of its properties: Harry Potter (including Hogwarts Legacy), Mortal Kombat, the DC universe and Game of Thrones. "We need to make some substantial changes to our portfolio/team structure if we are to commit the necessary resources to get back to a ‘fewer but bigger franchises’ strategy," Perette said.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/warner-bros-discovery-slashes-gaming-business-closing-three-studios-204344213.html?src=rss
OpenAI announced on Tuesday that it’s rolling out deep research, its web browsing agent that creates thorough research reports, to all paying ChatGPT users. ChatGPT Plus, Team, Enterprise, and Edu subscribers will get 10 deep research queries per month. OpenAI’s Deep research was previously only available to ChatGPT Pro users, the company’s $200-a-month tier; they […]
A new Mac app called Framous launched on Tuesday, giving you the ability to add device frames around screenshots to make them look more professional. The helpful new tool can aid app developers, graphic designers, and even journalists who need to add an iPhone or Mac frame—also known as a mockup or template—to photos. This […]
In a development that's startled analysts and serves as a reminder that shorter tenures apply to CEOs and CMOs alike, consumer products giant Unilever announced that its chief executive will step down after a tenure of 1 year and 10 months. Hein Schumacher will leave the CEO's office on May 31st, to be replaced by...
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt took a moment out of Tuesday's briefing to unveil a seismic change in press access for journalists covering President Donald Trump's administration. Going forward, Leavitt said that White House press team would oversee the press pool instead of the White House Correspondents' Association. "Legacy outlets who have participated in...
After the game taught me an unfortunate lesson on the gacha economy, I’ve kinda taken it easy with Infinity Nikki, and have found myself enjoying it way more at a slower pace.
Updates come about once a month, and when I first started playing, I’d blaze through all the new and shiny quests within days only to spin my wheels at the tail end of the month desperate for something new to do. With that in mind, I slowly worked my way through all the Lunar New Year content, completing everything I wanted mere hours before the event was due to wrap up. It feels like I’ve finally gotten into a steady rhythm with the game. I know how to play and how to spend and I’m happy again enjoying the game for what it is.
With the flashy fireworks in the distance, I took a look ahead to the next event, Eerie Season, due to start February 26th. It’s an oddly themed update. Typically games save their spooky events for October not March. But the community has been clamoring for more darker themed clothing since the overwhelming majority of the game’s items are pink and pastel so this seems like a response to that. The update will also flesh out the Queen’s Palace Ruins, an area of the game that’s visually interesting with its dilapidated and haunted castle vibe but devoid of any story or quest content. I am interested in poking at the darker bits of Infinity Nikki’s story and the overall lore of the world and Eerie Season seems poised to give me just what I’m looking for.
One of the things that’s helped me stick to my guns about not spending any extra money is the fact that premium outfits have never really moved me at all. Everything’s cute, of course, but nothing’s made me sit up and go “I must have this!” However, that apathy disappeared the moment I took a look at the premium outfits for Eerie Season.
I saw that cowboy outfit and audibly cursed. I’m from the midwest, we don’t have cowboys here. I don’t even like cowboys like that but … I must have this. So I’ve decided to apply all the tricks and tips I’ve learned about gacha game to acquiring this one outfit without spending any extra money. I think I’ll be able to do it, too.
After that rather frustrating lesson on exactly how gacha games can fleece even the most clear-eyed players, I haven’t spent any more money and have ignored the game’s clothing slot machine. As a result, I’ve amassed a small but tidy sum of premium currency, although not enough to get the cowboy outfit outright. After some light mathing, I’ve determined that I’ll need another 4,000 or so of the premium currency (or roughly $15). Thankfully, with what the battle pass and the new event quests will provide, I’m reasonably confident that I’ll have more than enough to get the entire outfit without any extra spending.
Weirdly enough, I’m excited about it. Not just because I’ll have an outfit that I truly want but also because there’s a thrill to making, executing, and succeeding with a plan. We’ll see how that goes when the new event starts February 26th.
As the name suggests, it also boasts a ginormous display, which Razer describes as “the world’s first 18-inch dual mode display.” This means that users can instantly switch between UHD+ at 240Hz for appreciating the finer details of AAA games and FHD+ at 440Hz for absolute speed.
The keyboard has been fully redesigned, with a new scissor switch that allows for 35 percent more travel distance versus the previous generation, along with a 63g actuation force. There’s a 10-key numeric keypad and dual-LED backlighting per key. Otherwise, the design remains mostly unchanged since the first Razer Blade 18 hit store shelves back in 2023.
Razer
Razer also promises “desktop levels of connectivity.” To that end, there are a pair of Thunderbolt ports, including a Thunderbolt 5 port. It supports Wi-Fi 7, HDMI 2.1, Bluetooth 5.4 and Gigabit LAN. Each Blade 18 includes a six-speaker virtual surround sound system that supports THX Spatial Audio and a 5MP camera with a privacy shutter.
The good news? Pre-orders are open right now. The bad news? This is a Razer Blade 18, so it’s a real wallet-buster. Pricing starts at $3,200, but can shoot all the way up to $4,900 depending on RAM and storage configurations. Early adopters do get a free skin and a laptop stand.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/computing/laptops/razer-announced-a-refreshed-blade-18-laptop-with-a-dual-mode-display-200943604.html?src=rss
Apple shareholders rejected an anti-DEI proposal at its investor meeting Tuesday. The proposal was brought by a conservative group called the National Center for Public Policy Research (NPPR). It asked Apple to end its DEI activities. Boards typically ask shareholders to reject shareholder proposals, and this was one of four such shareholder proposals. This proposal […]
After three weeks of trending downwards, the CBS Evening News moved the ratings needle upwards during the week of Feb. 17. The reimagined newscast recorded gains in total viewers and the Adults 25-54 demo for the first time since its revamp. To make things even sweeter, it was the only evening news broadcast to record...
