“It was concluded that most of the criteria provided for by law support the extradition request of the competent authorities of the United States of America,” a machine-translated version of Montenegro’s Ministry of Justice’s statement said. It doesn’t say when Montenegro plans on releasing Kwon to the US. As noted by Bloomberg, it’s also unclear whether this decision is final, since Montenegro ruled to extradite Kwon to South Korea in August.
Elon Musk, Vivek Ramaswamy, and other members of President-elect Donald Trump’s Silicon Valley coalition are clashing with the MAGA movement’s hardline anti-immigrant faction, and it’s allegedly resulted in Musk stripping far-right critics’ verification badges on X.
The conflict centers on Musk and Ramaswamy’s recent praise for foreign tech workers, beginning soon after Indian immigrant Sriram Krishnan joined the team of Trump’s AI and crypto czar David Sacks. It’s pitted Trump’s tech mogul donor class against his older network of far-right influencers like activist and Trump companion Laura Loomer while escalating into racist rhetoric against Indian Americans in particular. The ugly, extremely online fight between the American far-right influence network parallels the immigration debate currently being hashed out more quietly in Washington.
Anti-immigrant rhetoric was a cornerstone of Trump’s pitch to voters; on top of promoting false, racist rumors about immigrants and promising mass deportations that could destabilize the American economy, he’s expected to revive an H-1B visa crackdown that he imposed during his first term. At the same time, Trump is leaning heavily on...
If you need help shedding pounds from all the junk food you indulged in over Christmas, music is a great activity motivator — which is why wireless earbuds are a useful investment. Luckily, today the Beats Fit Pro — our favorite pair of earbuds for working out — are matching their all-time low price of about $149 ($50 off) at Amazon, Best Buy, and Walmart.
The Beats Fit Pro offer a wide range of features that’ll help you keep motivated while working out. They sport excellent noise cancellation and a transparency mode that sounds natural, so you can tune distractions out and allow outside sound in when needed. They’re also designed for vigorous workouts, with built-in wing tips to keep them firmly in place and IPX4 rating for water resistance.
Even more conveniently, the wireless earbuds offer a host of Apple-centric features typically reserved for AirPods, like support for head tracking spatial audio, Find My, and automatic device switching. They also work well with Android devices, though you won’t be able to take advantage of native Android features like Fast Pairing that are found in newer models like the Studio Buds Plus. All in all, these are a fantastic pair of fitness-friendly earbuds that most people will find helpful, even if they do lack a wireless charging case.
Epicka’s Universal Travel Adapter has returned to its all-time low price of $19.99 ($5 off) at Amazon. The all-in-one adapter features four USB-A ports, a single USB-C port, and one AC socket, allowing you to simultaneously charge smartphones, laptops, tablets, and other gadgets. The adapter also works in over 150 countries, ranging from the UK and Canada to Japan, China, Australia, Argentina, and more.
Target is still selling the green Fujifilm Instax Mini 12 Instant Camera Gift Set for $79.99 ($10 off) and throwing in a $5 gift card. The instant camera is my top pick for most people, as it’s easy for all ages to use and prints relatively true to life photos. The bundle also includes a pack of ten sheets, a photo album, camera case, and stickers, making it an excellent value all around even if you just plan on gifting it to yourself.
NASA sent its Parker Solar Probe just 3.8 million miles from the surface of the Sun — and it survived. The probe transmitted a signal back to Earth on the night of December 26th, “indicating it’s in good health and operating normally,” according to NASA.
The mission marks the closest the Parker Solar Probe — or any human-man object at all — has ever gotten to the Sun. The probe set off on its mission on December 20th, with the closest approach occurring on December 24th as it flew 430,000 miles per hour past the solar surface. Mission operations were out of contact with the probe during this time.
Now that NASA has confirmation of the mission’s success, it expects the Parker Solar Probe to send “detailed telemetry data on its status” on January 1st. The close flyby is supposed to help scientists get a better understanding of solar wind, the Sun’s heat, and how “energetic particles are accelerated to near light speed.”
The Parker Solar Probe was first launched by NASA and Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory in 2018. It’s designed to why study the corona — the atmosphere surrounding the sun — gets so hot. To survive these close encounters, the Parker Solar Probe is equipped with a Sun-facing heat shield that reaches around 2,500 degrees Fahrenheit, while the probe itself remains just 85 degrees Fahrenheit.
I’ve finally had a chance to test out the new hybrid powerhouse from Canon, the R5 Mark II. The camera comes with much-improved autofocus powered by the new Digic X processor, new eye-controlled autofocus, a backside illuminated sensor capable of faster readout and better low-light performance, and stunning video specs like recording in 8K internally with Canon Log 2 color profile.
But as much as those specs sound impressive (and they are), using the R5 Mark II also brought back so many memories I’ve made with previous 5D cameras that have been a huge part of my professional and personal life for well over 15 years, specifically the 5D Mark II.
In this review video, I decided to try something a little bit different. Instead of going through every single one of the specs and pixel-peeping every photo I’ve taken over the past month, I’ve picked the top three photos that have taught me something about the new Canon R5. Let us know what you think about the new format.
OpenAI has laid out plans to become a for-profit company. In a blog post published on Friday, OpenAI’s board said it will replace the company’s existing structure with one that puts control into the hands of its for-profit arm.
Going into 2025, OpenAI plans to become a Public Benefit Corporation (PBC), which is a for-profit company meant to operate for the good of society. This division will “run and control OpenAI’s operations and business,” while OpenAI’s nonprofit will retain a stake in the business but lose its oversight role.
The nonprofit will operate separately with its own leadership team and staff “to pursue charitable initiatives in sectors such as health care, education, and science.” The board said the structure will allow OpenAI to “raise the necessary capital” to build toward artificial general intelligence while also creating “one of the best resourced non-profits in history.” OpenAI’s competitors, including Anthropic and Elon Musk’s xAI, also operate as PBCs.
Rumors about OpenAI’s transition into a for-profit company have been swirling for months as the company looks for ways to appeal to investors and raise money to keep its data-hungry AI models up and running. In September, Bloomberg reported that CEO Sam Altman would receive around a 7 percent equity stake as part of OpenAI’s plans to become a for-profit company, something Altman reportedly denied.
“The hundreds of billions of dollars that major companies are now investing into AI development show what it will really take for OpenAI to continue pursuing the mission,” the board wrote. “We once again need to raise more capital than we’d imagined. Investors want to back us but, at this scale of capital, need conventional equity and less structural bespokeness.”
Under the structure outlined by OpenAI’s board, the nonprofit would get shares in the PBC “at a fair valuation determined by independent financial advisors.” Concerns about keeping OpenAI’s nonprofit board in control boiled over last year, when its members ousted Altman but later reinstated him.
After years of of chasing live-service and open-world blockbusters, games like Astro Bot and Balatro showed that old formats could be a solution to modern industry problems.
In late September, Dominik “Domtendo” Neumayer received a troubling email. He had just featured TheLegend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom in a series of videos on his YouTube channel. Now, those videos were gone.
“Some of your videos have been removed,” YouTube explained matter-of-factly. The email said that Domtendo had now received a pair of copyright strikes. He was now just one copyright strike away from losing his 17-year-old channel and the over 1.5 million subscribers he’d built up.
At least, he would have been, if Domtendo hadn’t spotted something fishy about the takedown notice — something YouTube had missed.
Domtendo had been a little bit confused right from the start;the strikes didn’t make sense. Like countless other creators, Domtendo specializes in “Let’s Play” videos, a well-established genre where streamers play through the entirety of a game on camera.
Nintendo has a complicated relationship with the fans who use its copyrighted works, infamously shutting down all sorts of unauthorized projects by sending cease-and-desists. It has gone after YouTubers, too. But both the Japanese gaming giant and the broader...
Netflix says it had a big audience for its live NFL games on Christmas Day, with Nielsen ratings designating them “the most-streamed NFL games in US history.” The Kansas City Chiefs and the Pittsburgh Steelers notched a 24.1M AMA (average minute audience), while the Houston Texans and Baltimore Ravens hit 24.3M AMA, totaling nearly 65 million total viewers.
Though Netflix buckled under the weight of the more than 60 million households that tuned into the boxing match between Mike Tyson and Jake Paul last month, its systems mostly held up during the two NFL games and star-studded performances from Mariah Carey and Beyoncé.
Netflix has also confirmed it will add a standalone replay of the “Beyoncé Bowl” halftime performance to the service later this week after it registered 27 million live viewers — the game’s peak viewership. Now, the league’s broadcast deal will keep Christmas Day games on Netflix for at least the next two years.
The NBA, which has traditionally aired basketball without competition from the NFL on the holiday, said that despite the competing Netflix broadcasts, its slate of games delivered the “most-watched Christmas Day in five years, averaging 5.25 million viewers per game in the U.S.” All five games up year-over-year, with viewership overall up 84 percent from 2023.
On Wednesday, the NFL offered a preliminary glimpse at viewership, saying the game between the Kansas City Chiefs and Pittsburgh Steelers had already become the second most popular live title on Netflix and that one-third of Netflix’s viewers at the time were watching that game.
Hertz has contacted multiple electric vehicle renters recently with interesting low-cost offers for cars like Teslas, offering them the option to buy their rental EVs instead of returning them. One 2023 Model 3 renter shared on Reddit that they were offered a price of $17,913, which is similar to deals currently showing on the Hertz Car Sales site. However, the rental they were in had about 30,000 miles on it — fewer than other current listings.
Another renter was offered a 2023 Chevy Bolt for $18,442, while a Polestar 2 renter says they saw a $28,500 purchase price. The used cars come with a limited 12-month, 12,000-mile powertrain warranty and a buy-back offer within 7 days.
Asked by The Verge if this was a special offer for EVs or a typical offer for Hertz’s used cars, communications director Jamie Line confirmed the strategy isn’t new, saying, “By connecting our rental customers who opt into our emails to our sales channels, we’re not only building awareness of the fact that we sell cars but also offering a unique opportunity to someone who may be in the market for the same car they have on rent.”
Microsoft is warning users that some manually made Windows 11 installer media could contain a bug where new PC installs may not get future security updates. It affects USB and CD installers made with October and November release patches, which may be relevant to professional users who set up PCs within business or education environments, or enthusiasts who recently built their own PCs.
When using media to install Windows 11, version 24H2, the device might remain in a state where it cannot accept further Windows security updates. This occurs only when the media is created to include the October 2024, or November 2024, security updates as part of the installation (these updates were released between October 8, 2024 and November 12, 2024).
This does not affect PCs that received the October or November patches through Windows Update or the Microsoft Update Catalog website.
Mitigating the problem will require you to rebuild your Windows 11 media installers with the December 2024 patch update included (released on December 10th) and reinstall Windows. (To avoid it altogether, Microsoft suggests that “that media used to install Windows 11, version 24H2, includes the December 2024 monthly security update.”) Microsoft says it’s working on a permanent fix.
Bleeping Computer reported that Windows 11 24H2 also had other bugs in tow, including problems with specific audio devices, issues launching Outlook with an outdated Google Workspace Sync, and others. There was also that weird 24H2 compatibility issue with some Ubisoft games, which are slowly receiving fixes.
ChatGPT stopped working for many users on Thursday afternoon, when the chatbot suddenly couldn’t respond to queries, with some users seeing an “internal server error” message.
It looks like the outage started around 1:30PM ET, which is when reports began to spike on Down Detector. At 2PM ET, OpenAI posted an update to its status page, saying ChatGPT, the API, and its text-to-video generator Sora are “currently experiencing high error rates.” OpenAI said Sora came back online at 6:15PM ET, before seeing a “full recovery” for ChatGPT at around 11PM ET.
OpenAI didn’t specify the “upstream provider” linked to the issue, but its exclusive cloud provider, Microsoft, reported a “power issue” at one of its datacenters that started around the same time as the OpenAI problems and affected North America, and problems with Xbox cloud gaming.
Active - Storage latency, timeouts, or HTTP 500 errors in South Central US
Impact Statement: Starting at 18:44 UTC on 26 Dec 2024, you have been identified as a customer who was impacted by a power incident in South Central US and may experience a degraded experience.
Current Status: There was a power incident in the South Central US AZ03 which affected multiple services. We have applied mitigation and are actively validating recovery to the impacted services. Further updates will be provided in 60 minutes, or sooner as events warrant.
This message was last updated at 21:22 UTC on 26 December 2024
Just after 5PM ET, Microsoft said it had “fully restored” power to the affected datacenter.
ChatGPT has gone down a few times in the past several months. Just days after OpenAI released Sora to ChatGPT subscribers earlier this month, the video generation tool and ChatGPT went down for hours. Meanwhile, a widespread outage affecting AI tools brought down ChatGPT in June.
Update, December 26th: Added an update from OpenAI and Microsoft.
Update, December 27th: Noted ChatGPT is back online.
Loading up HDR photos and videos can be a great way of showcasing the fancy display on your new phone and testing just how bright it can get. But sometimes, especially at night, you might not want your screen to crank into overdrive with blinding highlights just because someone posted a random video to Instagram in HDR. (Devices are increasingly set to capture video with the increased dynamic range by default, so let’s not blame each other.)
With its forthcoming One UI 7 update that’s currently in beta, Samsung is giving Galaxy phone owners a system-wide kill switch for disabling HDR content. As covered by 9to5Google, there’s a new “Super HDR” toggle in the settings menu.
The description — “automatically adjust the display to show the full range of colors and contrast in pictures taken with Galaxy devices” — is a bit misleading, since it turns out that toggling this on will keep your display brightness in check across all apps. But that’s exactly the end result that I’d want.
On the iPhone side, Apple currently has no such setting that’s specific to HDR. It’s possible to avoid HDR content by enabling low power mode on your iPhone, but doing so makes a ton of other system changes that might be overkill.
If you’re looking for a reprieve from HDR on Instagram in particular, you can disable it in the app’s settings in the “media quality” section. (I take credit for this after complaining about the issue a couple years ago.) That only applies to iOS, though. The option doesn’t exist on Android, which makes Samsung’s new toggle all the more useful.
Apple senior VP of services Eddy Cue says Apple will not create a search engine to compete with Google as it “would cost billions of dollars and take many years,” as recorded in a motion to intervene filed with the Department of Justice (DOJ) on Monday. The purpose of the motion is to participate in the penalty phase of the DOJ’s antitrust case against Google, where as much as $20 billion could be at stake for Apple in its ongoing default search engine deal with Google.
The DOJ and Google have disagreed on how to address Google’s monopoly on general-purpose search engines, but both parties have tentatively accepted cutting or renegotiating its Apple partnership. Last week Google proposed a three-year ban on strict long-term exclusivity deals involving any ”proprietary Apple feature or functionality.”
Cue warns that removing the search deal would ultimately hurt Apple and benefit Google:
If this Court prohibits Google from sharing revenue for search distribution, Apple would have two unacceptable choices. It could still let users in the United States choose Google as a search engine for Safari, but Apple could not receive any share of the resulting revenue, so Google would obtain valuable access to Apple's users at no cost. Or Apple could remove Google Search as a choice on Safari. But because customers prefer Google, removing it as an option would harm both Apple and its customers.
As reported by MacRumors, Cue said Apple making its own general search engine would be “economically risky” and suggests AI chatbots are the next big evolution to search. Apple also noted in the filing that it would have to adopt targeted advertising as a core service to make search viable, which would fit badly with its privacy-focused business model.
Cue also says that “only Apple can speak to what kinds of future collaborations can best serve its users” and warns that the DOJ’s proposed remedies would “hamstring” Apple from fulfilling its customers’ needs.
If you’ve just unwrapped a new Xbox Series X or Series S for Christmas, you’ll have enough storage out of the box to download several games. But you’ll quickly feel the squeeze from 100GB-plus installs, especially if you tend to keep a heavy rotation. Expansion cards are your only relief on Xbox consoles if you’re playing titles optimized for Series X/S. Thankfully, you can get a 2TB expansion card cheaper than ever, with Western Digital’s WD_Black C50 going for $189.99 ($70 off) at Amazon. You can also get it in 512GB for $69.99 ($10 off) and 1TB for $109.99 ($48 off). That said, the 2TB model is the better deal in the long run.
Because the Series X and Series S use a proprietary storage format, you can’t use an external SSD, an internal NVMe SSD (as you could on the PS5), or a standard external hard drive to play newer games that are optimized for those consoles. You can use those hard drives to store Series X/S games, but expansion cards like the C50 are the only ones you can actually play them from. That’s because they support the platform’s “velocity architecture,” which has a minimum speed requirement and uses unique hardware and software tricks to enable console features like Quick Resume, not to mention other benefits for developers. Anyway, you don’t need to be a computer science major to understand the bottom line: if you want more storage for your Series X/S games, you’ll need an expansion card.
A few more deals
Now through December 31st, home decor brand Umbra is running a sitewide sale that takes 20 percent off most products in its store, including the Cono portable smart lamp we fell in love with at IFA last year that’s down to $76 ($19 off) at Umbra’s online store, for example. Sadly, the taller $130 “Cup” smart lamp with its convenient organizer for a base isn’t discounted, but the Cono is an intriguing tabletop RGB lamp with an X-shaped stand that lets you shine the light vertically or horizontally. As Nanoleaf helped create it, that’s the app you’ll use for manual remote control over Bluetooth. But because it’s also Matter-ready, you can use voice commands and set lighting schedules when it’s connected to a compatible smart home ecosystem.
Although there’s a newer model with faster polling rates and USB-C charging, the original Logitech G Pro X Superlight is still one of the best gaming mice you can buy. It’s starting around $79.99 (50 percent off) right now at Amazon, Best Buy, and Woot, which is an all-time low price. Through December 29th, Woot is taking an extra $5 off with code LOGITECHFIVE. The Superlight is named for its 63-gram weight, but it drops some fan-favorite features to get there, such as RGB, dedicated DPI buttons, and a weighted scroll wheel. However, you still get five programmable buttons (including two mounted on the left edge) and a 25,600 DPI Hero sensor that offers far more optical resolution than most gamers need. The mouse lasts up to 70 hours per charge, though it uses micro-USB for recharging.
The Beats Pill is matching its all-time low of $99.95 ($50 off) at Amazon, Best Buy, and Target. Apple’s refreshed Bluetooth speaker updates the line with features like two-way USB-C charging and lossless audio. It also has native support for some iOS and Android features, including each operating system’s Find My feature and access to Siri and Google Assistant, but you can’t initiate either via voice. The speaker is built for extended outdoor outings, too, with a battery that lasts up to 24 hours per charge and IP67 protection against water and dust. Read our review.
LG has developed a new lamp that doubles as an indoor garden. The lamp, which LG will show off at CES in January, serves as an adjustable grow light for the tray of up to 20 plants beneath it, while also brightening up your room.
It has two different lighting modes: downward-facing lighting during the day that helps grow your plants, and upward-facing lighting at night to help brighten up your home. The lamp comes equipped with a 1.5-gallon water tank and “automatically dispenses the right amount of water and nutrients for the number and variety of plants being grown,” according to LG.
LG is also showing off a shorter, side table-style grow light at CES, which similarly puts a grow lamp above a bundle of plants. The devices are compatible with LG’s ThinQ app, letting you adjust light settings and manage cultivation schedules while you’re not at home.
This isn’t the first time LG has dabbled in creating indoor gardening technology. The company launched an indoor cultivator called the LG Tiiun in 2019, before following up with much more compact iterations. LG says its new lamp has a larger water capacity than its previous indoor planters, but it doesn’t mention any details about how much it will cost, or when it will actually ship.
Glasses may be more promising as the head-worn computers of the future — and there’s a chance Apple might be looking in that direction.
Apple’s Vision Pro headset is an incredible piece of technology, but even Apple’s design and marketing magic hasn’t been enough to convince many people to don a VR headset for an entire day. Instead, people seem more willing to use discreet wearables like Bluetooth headphones, smartwatches, and products like the Ray-Ban Meta glasses — so Apple’s headset isn’t making the waves the company would have wanted.
Of course, an instant transformation of the computing landscape wasn’t exactly the point of the Vision Pro. Apple was clearly launching its headset for Apple enthusiasts, first adopters, and people who love VR. At a starting price of $3,499, the barrier of entry was just too high to expect the device to be a hit from the jump. Even CEO Tim Cook called it an “early-adopter product.”
Nearly a year from launch, though, Apple hasn’t done enough to demonstrate why the Vision Pro should be a potential showcase of the future of computing. It’s taking a long time to put together its immersive content library, and while those are great demonstrations of what’s possible, the videos have been short and isolating. There aren’t many great games, either.
Yes, Apple keeps adding cool new software features. The wide and ultra widescreen settings for using a Mac display seem exceptionally useful. But those are pretty specific options for pretty specific use cases. There still isn’t an immediate, obvious reason to buy a Vision Pro the way there usually is with the company’s newest iPhones and Macs. If I bought a Vision Pro today, I wouldn’t know what to do with it besides give myself a bigger Mac screen or watch movies, and I don’t think either of those are worth the exorbitant price.
It seems Apple may have already acknowledged that the Vision Pro might not be the future, either. The company has reportedly scaled back production and focused efforts on a cheaper version of the headset (perhaps just called Apple Vision?).
If Apple still wants to make a splash in VR, the company might need to race to get its next product out the door. It can be argued that Meta has the best VR headsets and ecosystem on the market right now — and a very clear lineup for consumers to consider. Its most affordable offering is the $299 Quest 3S, which has the same chip as the $499 Quest 3, meaning you can access the same experiences across both headsets. The price difference between the two largely comes down to displays and storage, and I’d argue that the cheaper Quest 3S is an excellent VR headset for most people.
But like the Vision Pro, Meta hasn’t really found a way to make its headsets much more than a great way to play VR games. The Quest Pro, which Meta pitched in part as a headset for work, was such a flop that the company discontinued it only two years after it launched. Horizon Worlds, the company’s 3D social network, still feels amateur and barren, despite the company’s efforts to make it a better place to hang out.
When I put on a Meta headset, I find that I just want to play games, either serious titles like Batman: Arkham Shadow or lighter fare like Maestro, where you conduct a virtual orchestra. I don’t care about the mixed reality features except to glance at my phone or computer screen to make a note or check notifications. You can make a pretty solid living selling game consoles, as Sony and Nintendo know very well, but it’s a far cry from the full-fledged computing platform Mark Zuckerberg once promised.
I just don’t know if any tech company is going to crack the code on how to make VR headsets anything but solo technology. Yes, you can use VR headsets to interact with other people over the internet. But putting on a VR headset at home means I can’t look my wife in the eye; if I’m going to look at a screen, I’d prefer to look at one that we can share or that I can easily put off to the side. And even if you’re fine with VR being mostly a solo thing, VR headsets don’t fit neatly into everyday life unless you have a good amount of space in your home for them. (And hopefully your controllers haven’t run out of battery power!)
Perhaps that’s why glasses seem like a much more promising option for computers that you wear on your face. Augmented reality glasses have been an aspirational goal for a long time, and you can see why. It’s much easier to make eye contact with somebody while you’re wearing glasses. Meta may have already proved that the glasses form factor works: its relatively simple Ray-Ban Meta glasses, which have a camera, speakers, and look fashionable, are already a huge hit.
If glasses-equipped cameras do truly go mainstream, I have some concerns that I’ve already written about. But I also wrote about the immediate appeal of the tech: whenever I wear the Ray-Ban Meta glasses, I find myself snapping tons of photos because it’s so much fun to capture my point of view without holding up a phone. And because they look like regular glasses, I can walk around and most people will think that they’re glasses, unlike a VR headset, which just looks silly in public.
It seems that Apple might be eyeing computer glasses as well; the company reportedly launched an internal study about the market. I think even glasses with some basic tech would make way more sense for Apple than a VR headset, especially if they let you easily snap photos and listen to podcasts. These devices could be years off, though, meaning that, right now, Apple is stuck selling VR headsets that barely anyone wants.