In a pair of Truth Social posts on Sunday, Donald Trump announced a set of picks for his administration’s tech policy team that will report to David Sacks, Trump’s “AI and crypto czar.” The picks include Michael Kratsios, who will lead the Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) if confirmed by the Senate.

Kratsios, who served in Trump’s first term as the White House chief technology officer, also briefly held an acting undersecretary role at the Department of Defense near the end of the term. He later became a managing director at Scale AI and has been helping lead Trump’s tech policy transition team.

The President-elect also picked his former deputy CTO, Dr. Lynne Parker, as Executive Director of the Presidential Council of Advisors for Science and Technology. Directing the Presidential Council of Advisers for Digital Assets (AKA the “Crypto Council”) will be former college football player and unsuccessful Republican congressional candidate Bo Hines. Advising Trump on AI policy as part of the OSTP will be Sriram Krishnan, who has extensive Silicon Valley experience, with roles at Andreessen Horowitz, X, Meta, and Snap.

Sacks is close with Elon Musk, who Trump has charged with gutting the US government as part of the not-yet-established Department of Government Efficiency — and who recently helped send Congress into chaos by posting relentlessly to stop a US spending bill.

Robert Eggers’ Nosferatu gets at the heart of what makes vampires an eternally fascinating fixture in our sexual imaginations.

Even if you haven’t seen F.W. Murnau’s original Nosferatu or read Bram Stoker’s Dracula, those stories have undoubtedly shaped your ideas about vampires. They weren’t the first tales about undead ghouls rising from the grave to suck the blood out of the living. But by presenting their monsters in such wildly innovative ways, they became a blueprint from which countless subsequent tales took inspiration. Writer / director Robert Eggers knows that his Nosferatu remake would be hard-pressed to scare audiences who cut their teeth watching a multitude of Draculas and demon hunters menacing one another on the big and small screens.

But rather than trying to work around that obstacle with experimental riffs on vampire lore, the new film accepts it as fact while inviting you to imagine what it might have felt like to experience this kind of disturbing story for the first time when they were new. You can feel Eggers working to conjure an atmosphere of psychosexual dread, and you can see him using modern filmmaking techniques to create haunting visuals evocative of early 20th century cinema. Though it cleaves very close to the original while incorporating elements from other vampire classics, this Nosferatu puts far more focus on the interiority of its central heroine as she grapples with her deep-seated longing to be taken by an avatar of death.

“Vampire” is not a word that many people are familiar with in Nosferatu’s depiction of 19th century Wisborg, Germany, but after years of being tormented by psychic visions of a shadowy presence, Ellen Hutter (Lily-Rose Depp) is no stranger to living in fear of the supernatural. Despite her constant feeling of being misunderstood, Ellen’s days are filled with joy thanks to her realtor husband Thomas (Nicholas Hoult) and best friend Anna Harding (Emma Corrin). But Ellen’s nights of sleepwalking through her deathly quiet mansion are harrowing because of the way a mysterious voice from within beckons her to give in to her darkest, most unsettling desires.

Even when Ellen is awake, she can sense that somehow, somewhere, something is watching and waiting for an opportunity to make her its own. No matter how much Ellen insists that danger is afoot, though, all her loved ones can see is a woman on the brink of a mental breakdown. It’s much easier for Thomas and Anna’s husband, Friedrich (Aaron Taylor-Johnson), to dismiss her fears as symptoms of a wandering uterus rather than consider whether there might be more to her premonitions. It’s even hard for Anna — a mother to two young girls — not to assume that Ellen’s troubles are rooted in the fact that she and Thomas have no children of their own. But Ellen and the sinister voice in her head both know that, while sex is definitely on her mind, having kids is not.

Nosferatu’s depiction of Ellen is one of the clearer examples of Eggers combining aspects of the 1922 film and Stoker’s novel to create a new take on the character that feels both true to the source materials and deeper than the sum of its parts. The movie presents Ellen as the kind of woman who, even without her visions, would still feel smothered by the misogynistic social norms of her era. Ellen’s powers are an innate part of who she is, as is the way they often send her into fits of moaning that, to onlookers, read as explicitly orgasmic.

Ellen struggles to remember or articulate much of what she experiences during her nocturnal premonitions. But Nosferatu spells it out plainly as it first shows you how Transylvanian Count Orlok (Bill Skarsgård) is the one calling out to her through their seemingly inexplicable telepathic connection. The mechanics of Ellen and Orlok’s bond is another detail that Eggers has retooled just enough to make it work as a point of intrigue. It’s obvious that this is a film about a vampire who wants to sink his teeth into an unsuspecting woman’s flesh. But Nosferatu cleverly leaves you wondering how, exactly, Orlok first came to know about his latest target.

Establishing that link early on adds a delicious layer of dread to Nosferatu’s story as Thomas’ presence is requested in Transylvania, where he’s meant to assist an “eccentric” nobleman purchase a new home. We can see that Orlok is orchestrating some kind of elaborate plan to insert himself into Ellen’s life, but what’s fun is the way none of the film’s characters have any frame of reference cluing them in to the fact that they’re dancing through the motions of a classic Dracula period piece like Tod Browning’s 1931 adaptation.

Contemporary horror movies about people who don’t know standard horror movie beats are frustrating because they pull you out of the fantasy. Eggers previously worked around that by focusing his films on characters planted firmly in times when their fears of the surrounding world and their own feelings could give rise to creatures they had never seen before. This Nosferatu is doing something similar, but because its story stays so true to the original, it also feels like Eggers is encouraging you to appreciate it as a thoughtful remake rather than a film trying to reinvent vampires.

This becomes clearer as Nosferatu shows you more of Orlok’s ability to project his shadow across Europe to menace Ellen with promises of untold pleasure. On a technical level, it’s clear that Eggers is creating scenes that Murnau could have only dreamed of, but you also get the sense that this is exactly the kind of alarming energy that made Max Schreck’s Orlok so frightening when he first appeared onscreen. To that end, this Nosferatu works hard to make you feel Orlok’s presence more than it actually tries to show you what he looks like as his plans begin taking shape. He’s lurking in Ellen’s mind but also in Thomas’ fears that he might not be able to satisfy his wife’s needs.

Skarsgård’s Orlok is skincrawling once the film gets around to fixing the camera squarely on his face, but much of the count’s essence is channeled through the way Depp and Hoult inhabit Ellen and Thomas. Ellen vacillates between terror, shame, and arousal to make you feel exactly what kinds of designs Orlok has. And Thomas’ guileless confusion when he encounters clearly supernatural things speaks volumes to Orlok’s ability to misdirect his unsuspecting victims.

While Nosferatu isn’t trying to shock you with its plot or gory deaths, it does want to impress you with its arresting visuals. We’ve seen Eggers work in black and white before, but the way Nosferatu frequently shifts into a near-monochromatic palette of blacks and blues is a brilliantly artful trick evocative of blood draining out of a face in fear. Those moments help make Nosferatu feel like a uniquely inspired presentation of vampires as beings of darkness. But beyond their aesthetic beauty, they also highlight the extent to which Eggers has crafted Nosferatu as a tribute to films from Murnau and Browning.

It’s rare to see a remake that so effectively celebrates its predecessors while also realizing its own distinct vision, but that’s what is going to make Nosferatu an instant horror classic when it hits theaters on December 25th.

Nosferatu also stars Willem Dafoe, Ralph Ineson, and Simon McBurney.

Despite loud proclamations, AI on smartphones is still mostly a sideshow.

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Not even authority, just the signifiers of authority

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A hybrid supercar that can run on electricity alone, while still delivering that twin-turbo 3.0-liter V6 experience

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Honda and Nissan have announced plans to merge as the Japanese automakers struggle with competition from rival brands in the electric vehicle market. The two companies confirmed on Monday that they had signed a memorandum of understanding that would create the third largest car maker by sales, behind Toyota and Volkswagen.

Nissan alliance member Mitsubishi Motors is also in talks with Honda and Nissan to join the integration, with a decision expected by the end of January. Based on the market capital of all three companies, a finalized merger could result in an entity worth more than 50 billion dollars. Honda will initially lead the management of the merged company according to Honda president, Toshihiro Mibe, with the aim to complete a formal merger agreement by June and finalize the deal by August 2026.

“Creation of new mobility value by bringing together the resources including knowledge, talents, and technologies that Honda and Nissan have been developing over the long years is essential to overcome challenging environmental shifts that the auto industry is facing,” Mibe said in a statement.

The proposed merger was initially teased last week, and aims to establish a joint holding company to tackle growing global competition from brands like Tesla and China’s BYD in the EV market. The deal would also help to rescue the struggling Nissan, which saw its net earnings in mid-2024 fall by more than 90 percent year over year, and announced plans in November to lay off thousands of workers.

“If realized, I believe that by uniting the strengths of both companies, we can deliver unparalleled value to customers worldwide who appreciate our respective brands,” said Nissan CEO Makoto Uchida. “Together, we can create a unique way for them to enjoy cars that neither company could achieve alone.”

Ex-Nissan boss Carlos Ghosn told Bloomberg on Friday that the merger is a “desperate move” by Nissan, and that it’s “not a pragmatic deal because frankly, the synergies between the two companies are difficult to find.” The company has been in turmoil since Ghosn was arrested by Japanese authorities in 2018 over charges of financial misconduct.

X has substantially raised the price of its top-tier user subscription in multiple regions to help bolster the platform’s creator payouts. The increase for Premium Plus came into effect on December 21st according to X, raising prices in the US from $16 per month to $22, or from $168 to $229 for annual subscriptions.

Many European countries like France, Germany, and Spain are impacted by a similar increase, taking monthly prices from €16 to €21. Monthly subscribers in Canada (currently paying $20), Australia ($26) and the UK (£16) will also see pricing increased to $26, $35, and £17 respectively. The higher pricing is immediately applicable to new subscribers, with existing users grandfathered into their current rates until January 20th. X’s basic subscription tier remains unaffected.

The pricing changes for US subscribers are the highest increase introduced since Elon Musk purchased the social media platform in 2022. X gave several reasons to justify the price hike, citing that Premium Plus is now completely ad-free — which it described as a “significant enhancement” to the current user experience.

X also references changes made to the X revenue sharing program in October, saying that subscriptions “now more directly fuels” creator payouts to “reward content quality and engagement rather than ad views alone.” Premium Plus subscribers will additionally receive priority user support, access to additional features like X’s Radar trend monitoring tool, and higher limits on the platform’s Grok AI models.

Days after furloughing dozens of its employees without pay, EV startup Canoo told the remainder of its staff they will be on a “mandatory unpaid break” through at least the end of the year, TechCrunch reported Friday. A company email seen by the outlet said employees would be locked out of Canoo’s systems by the end of Friday, with their benefits continuing through the end of this month.

The report follows Canoo’s announcement last week that it was idling its Oklahoma factories and furloughing employees while it worked “to finalize securing the capital necessary to move forward with its operations.” As TechCrunch notes, the company reported that it had only about $700,000 left in the bank last month.

Also on Friday, the company announced a 1-for-20 reverse stock split, effective December 24th. Canoo says the consolidation aims to keep its stock listed on the Nasdaq exchange and attract “a broader group of institutional and retail investors.”

Canoo was founded in 2017 to sell electric vans and trucks to adventure-seeking customers but has mostly only ever made vehicles for the US government. As The Verge’s Andrew Hawkins wrote last year, analysts have warned of its risk of insolvency as it’s teetered on the edge of running out of cash since 2022. Canoo has lost a steady stream of executives since then, including all of its founders and, more recently, its CFO and general counsel.

This year’s Prime Video streaming content was led by adaptations and spinoffs like Fallout and The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power.

Read the full story at The Verge.

Apple is working on a new smart doorbell camera that uses Face ID to unlock your door, according to Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman in today’s Power On newsletter. The camera could be released by the end of 2025 “at the soonest,” Gurman writes.

The lock would work just like your iPhone, automatically unlocking your door when you or another resident looks at it. Like biometric login info on other Apple devices, the camera would be equipped with the company’s Secure Enclave chip that stores and processes Face ID information separately from the rest of the system’s hardware.

Gurman writes that this device will “likely” work with existing third-party HomeKit smart locks and that the company may also partner with a smart lock company “to offer a complete system on day one.” He expects the camera will make use of Apple’s in-house “Proxima” combination Wi-Fi / Bluetooth chip that’s rumored for new HomePod Mini and Apple TV devices next year.

This doorbell camera joins a broader collection of rumors surrounding a renewed Apple push into the smart home that’s centered around Apple Intelligence. Those include another new smart home camera, a possible Apple-branded TV, and new smart home displays — one a simple iPad-like device that magnetically attaches to wall mounts or speaker bases, while another display sits on the end of a robotic arm attached to a larger base.

The grid is a comfortable place to live.

The app grid, I mean: the rows and rows of app icons on your iPhone’s homescreen. It’s familiar. Safe. It’s how I’ve lived with my various phones over the past decade. But at some point, it started to feel oppressive.

All those icons staring at me in the face, vying for my attention. The clutter! The distracting little notification badges! The grid was a reasonable way to organize apps when I had like, ten of them. There are sixty on the iPhone I’m using now, and I set it up from scratch a few months ago.

Naturally, living off-grid or in a non-traditional homescreen arrangement has been possible for much longer on Android. Google’s OS lets you keep your screen clear and just find your apps in the app drawer, which is always a swipe away. You can even replace the launcher entirely. But iOS — where every new app you download winds up on your homescreen by default — hasn’t exactly made it easy to abandon the grid.

That started to change when iOS 14 added widgets, an app library, and the ability to hide apps from your homescreen — though I haven’t developed the muscle memory to use it much. Now, iOS 18 adds even more flexibility. You...

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Our staff writes about the best books they read over the course of the year.

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Hi, friends! Welcome to Installer No. 65, your guide to the best and Verge-iest stuff in the world. (If you’re new here, welcome, get ready to take up all your phone’s storage space, and also you can read all the old editions at the Installer homepage.)

This is the last Installer of the year! I’m taking a couple of weeks off for the holidays, and I hope you’re getting some relaxation in too. Thank you so much to everyone who has subscribed to this newsletter, emailed me your recommendations, told me I’m a lunatic about to-do lists, and generally been part of the Installerverse this year. Making this newsletter is so much fun, and I’m so thrilled to get to do it with you. Bigger and better next year!

This week, I’ve been reading about Spotify’s ghost artists and Formula 1 and Mufasa and the deeply silly New York Jets, watching Hot Frosty (you can judge me, it’s fine) and re-watching 30 Rock, beating Balatro for the very first time, and trying to convince my toddler that it’s actually not fun and cool and great to wake up at 4am every day.

I also have for you a nifty new smart home controller, a new app for the future of social networks, the next Sonic movie, and much more. Plus,...

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In the latest version of the Files by Google app, summoning Gemini while looking at a PDF gives you the option to ask about the file, writes Android Police. You’ll need to be a Gemini Advanced subscriber to use the feature though, according to Mishaal Rahman, who reported on Friday that it had started rolling out.

If you have the feature, when you summon Gemini while looking at a PDF in the Files app, you’ll see an “Ask about this PDF” button appear. Tapping that lets you ask questions about the file, the same way you might ask ChatGPT about a PDF. Google first announced this screen-aware feature during its I/O developer conference in May.

Rahman posted a screenshot of what it looks like in action:

Other context-aware Gemini features include the ability to ask about web pages and YouTube videos. For apps or file types without Gemini’s context-aware support, the assistant instead offers to answer questions about your screen, using a screenshot it takes when you tap “Ask about this screen.”

The US Commerce Department has awarded Samsung and Texas Instruments with a combined over $6 billion in “direct funding under the CHIPS Incentives Program’s Funding Opportunity for Commercial Fabrication,” according to a pair of announcements published on Friday.

Samsung will get the larger of the two awards at $4.745 billion. The Commerce Department says the company will use this as part of its planned $37 billion investment in Texas chip facilities that include two new “leading-edge logic fabs and an R&D fab” in Taylor, Texas, and the expansion of its plant in Austin.

The company was originally slated to receive $6.4 billion. In a statement reported by Bloomberg, the company said that its “mid-to-long-term investment plan has been partially revised to optimize overall investment efficiency,” which suggests the company has dialed back its plans, according to the outlet.

Texas Instruments will receive $1.61 billion to bolster the $18 billion it plans to spend on projects like constructing two wafer fabs in Texas and a third in Utah. The Commerce Department announced smaller awards this week too, including $407 million in funding for Amkor Technology, a US-based company that...

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Asus has announced the Asus NUC 14 Pro AI, the first Copilot Plus-capable AI mini PC that crams an Intel Core Ultra 9 processor into a form factor resembling a black M4 Mac Mini. First introduced at IFA in September, Asus is providing a little more detail about the mini PC’s specs than it did before, but still isn’t saying it will become available or how much it will cost.

The NUC 14 Pro AI will come in five CPU configurations, from the Core Ultra 5 226V processor with 16GB of integrated RAM to a Core Ultra 9 288V processor with 32GB of RAM. The company says it has up to 67 TOPS of GPU performance and 48 NPU TOPS, and that its M.2 2280 PCIe Gen 4 x 4 slot supports 256GB to 2TB NVMe SSDs.

All of that is packed into a PC that measures 130mm deep and wide and just 34mm tall; comparatively, the Mac Mini is 127mm deep and wide and 50mm tall. Here are some pictures from Asus’ website:

The Asus NUC 14 Pro AI features a fingerprint sensor on top and a Copilot button on the front for speaking voice commands to Microsoft’s AI assistant. Also on the front are two USB-A ports, a Thunderbolt 4 port, a headphone jack, and a power button. Around the back, you’ll find a 2.5Gbps ethernet jack, another Thunderbolt 4 port, two more USB-A ports, and an HDMI port. For connectivity, it features Wi-Fi 7 and Bluetooth 5.4.

Asus still hasn’t said when the NUC 14 Pro AI will be available, nor how much it will cost.

Stellar hardware from a controversial figure.

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Earlier this year, TCL released a trailer for Next Stop Paris — an AI-animated short film that seems like a Lifetime movie on steroids. The trailer had all the hallmarks of AI: characters that don’t move their mouths when they talk, lifeless expressions, and weird animation that makes it look like scenes are constantly vibrating.

I thought this might be the extent of TCL’s experimentation with AI films, given the healthy dose of criticism it received online. But boy, was I wrong. TCL debuted five new AI-generated short films that are also destined for its TCLtv Plus free streaming platform, and after the Next Stop Paris debacle, I just had to see what else it cooked up.

Though the new films do look a little better than Next Stop Paris, they serve as yet another reminder that AI-generated videos aren’t quite there yet, something we’ve seen with many of the video generation tools cropping up, like OpenAI’s Sora. But in TCL’s case, it’s not just the AI that makes these films bad.

Here are all five of them, ranked from tolerable (5) to “I wish I could unsee this” (1).

5. Sun Day

This futuristic short film basically has the same concept as Ray Bradbury’s short story “All Summer in...

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One of the best Black Friday deals has returned — and this time, it’s done so with an added perk. Right now, LG’s B4 Series OLED TV is matching its all-time low at Best Buy, where you can pick it up in the 48-inch configuration for $599.99 ($200 off) with a $50 digital gift card. The larger 55-inch panel, meanwhile, is on sale at Best Buy with a $100 digital gift card for $999.99 ($400 off), its best price yet.

Although LG is likely to introduce its 2025 lineup at CES in a few short weeks, the B4 is likely going to remain a bargain, especially at this price. You don’t get the same brightness levels or performance speeds as LG’s flagship C4 or G4 — the B4 lacks the AI-focused a11 processor found in the latter — but it provides all the core benefits you’d expect from an OLED panel. It offers deep blacks and wide viewing angles, along with four full-bandwidth HDMI 2.1 ports that are capable of 4K 120Hz gaming, making it a great pick for use with modern consoles like the PS5 or Xbox Series X.

Personally, as the current owner of a 48-inch OLED, I find the smaller size more than big enough for my entertainment needs. It’s not as much of an eyesore in my living room as my previous 65-inch panel, yet I have little trouble watching movies and playing Final Fantasy VII Rebirth from my couch. The real question is whether you need all the bells and whistles on LG’s high-end TVs or if an entry-level OLED will suffice.

More weekend deals and discounts

• Twelve South’s quirky Butterfly charger is on sale at Amazon for a cool $103.99 ($26 off), which is the first discount we’ve seen. The travel-friendly 2-in-1 charger consists of two aluminum-clad discs connected via a vegan leather strap, one of which can fast-charge an Apple Watch and another that can supply 15 watts of power to any MagSafe-compatible phone. Moreover, it comes with a 30W power supply, complete with swappable international prongs.
• If you’re not concerned regarding the shipping timeline, Apple’s latest entry-level iPad is matching its all-time low of $249.99 ($100 off) in select colors at Amazon thanks to an on-page coupon (it’s also on sale at Walmart and Best Buy for $279). The 64GB base model isn't as capable as the newer Air or Pro models, but it offers USB-C charging, plenty of power, and enough battery life to burn through The Penguin, the second season of Silo, or whatever else is on your holiday watch list this year. Read our review.
• If you’re a bike commuter, investing in a proper tail light this time of the year is a must. Thankfully, the Garmin Varia RTL515 is down to $149.99 ($50 off) at Amazon and Target, matching its best price to date. The bright, IPX7-rated light can be seen from up to a mile away and offers up to 16 hours of battery life in select modes; however, the main attraction is its ability to alert you of rear-approaching vehicles via the Garmin app or a Garmin Edge computer, which is done using a combination of visual, vibration, and tone alerts.

Between The Penguin, Dune: Prophecy, and I Saw the TV Glow, Max has you covered when it comes to last-minute streaming options to get you through the holidays.

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