Visible, the budget wireless brand owned by Verizon, is offering a new premium plan that looks like a heck of a deal compared to its parent company’s offerings.

The new Visible Plus Pro plan (I didn’t say the name was good) costs $45 per month. For that price you get unlimited 5G Ultrawideband (UW) data, which is an awfully good deal when you consider that Verizon’s own entry-level unlimited plan, Unlimited Welcome, starts at $65 per month and doesn’t include 5G UW.

This new Plus Pro plan also comes without throttling. Many lower-cost carrier plans and MVNOs tend to offer a certain allotment of “premium” data. Once you exceed your allowance, you might see slowdowns at times when the network is busy. But Visible’s fine print states that both its Plus and Plus Pro plan are “not subject to any data prioritization limitations.” So that rules.

It gets better: the Plus Pro plan includes unlimited hotspot usage at up to 15 Mbps. Verizon’s basic plan doesn’t include any hotspot data, just the option to add it for an extra $10 per month. There’s also 4K video streaming and service for one cellular smartwatch included. You can probably guess what I’m going to say next, but just to reiterate, Verizon’s basic unlimited plan doesn’t include any of that.

This would all be less of a good deal if Verizon puts Visible traffic on a lower network tier than its own postpaid customers. Network operators commonly put different kinds of customers on certain service tiers called Quality of Service Class Indicators, or QCIs. This helps with overall traffic prioritization when there’s congestion, usually putting first responders on the fastest tier.

Verizon didn’t immediately respond to my question about Visible Plus Pro’s QCI, but Android Authority’s comprehensive comparison between Visible and Verizon suggests that Visible’s premium plan is actually assigned a higher-priority QCI than Verizon’s Unlimited Welcome — at least, that’s been the case in the past. We’ll update this article if Verizon responds to our request.

It’s all too rare to read about an ISP’s new plan and think “Huh, that sounds like a good deal, actually.” But that’s the case here, even after going through the fine print.

Last week, National Security Advisor Michael Waltz inadvertently invited a journalist to a Signal chat discussing a planned military strike. Today, a new Washington Post report says that he has also discussed “sensitive military positions and powerful weapons systems relating to an ongoing conflict,” using his personal Gmail account.

Waltz, along with other members of the National Security Council, used Gmail “for highly technical conversations with colleagues at other government agencies,” according to emails the Post saw, with headers showing that others on the emails used their government-issued accounts. Waltz also had “less sensitive, but potentially exploitable information sent to his Gmail,” like his schedule and “other work documents,” some unnamed government officials told the outlet. The Post quotes National Security Council spokesman Brian Hughes saying, “Waltz didn’t and wouldn’t send classified information on an open account,” and that Hughes says he’s “seen no evidence of Waltz using his personal email as described.”

The Post’s report puts the adviser’s communications practices back in the spotlight after Waltz invited The Atlantic editor-in-chief, Jeffrey Goldberg, to a Signal chat about a military strike in Yemen that took place later that day. Attorney General Pam Bondi indicated that the incident probably won’t be criminally investigated in response to questions at a press conference Sunday night, while suggesting that people should be discussing “what was in Hillary Clinton’s home,” seemingly referring to the personal email server scandal that cropped up late in her last Presidential campaign.

Since then, a Wired report detailed how his public Venmo account had revealed “the names of hundreds” of his associates, including journalists and military officers. And like most of us, personal online account info for Waltz and other Trump administration officials has been found in online database leaks, including “several passwords for Waltz’s email address,” writes Spiegel International.

Meta is reportedly preparing a higher-end version of its Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses with a built-in screen to launch as early as by the end of the year, Bloomberg reports.

The new glasses, codenamed Hypernova, can run apps and display photos, all controlled using hand gestures and capacitive touch on the sides of the frame. Bloomberg reports that the screen will only be visible on the right lens at the lower-right quadrant, and is best viewed when looking downward. When the device is turned on, a home screen appears and displays icons horizontally, similar to a Meta Quest.

Hypernova will also feature an improved camera compared to the current model, and will continue building upon the idea of having an AI chatbot on your face, according to Bloomberg. 

Bloomberg says that Hypernova will cost over $1,000 and could sell for as high as $1,300 to $1,400. For comparison, the current Meta Ray-Ban smart glasses start at $299.

Meta is reserving advanced augmented reality technology for its still-in-development Orion glasses. In contrast, the Hypernova will target the “mid-tier” smart glasses shown off in droves at CES, such as the Rokid Glasses that display green text.

However, the Hypernova will command a higher price tag than other options, likely since it will come with the Orion’s “neural” wristband controller, codenamed Ceres. 

Meta is also working on a next version of Hypernova, with the codename Hypernova 2, that will have two screens, Bloomberg reports. The company is apparently planning to launch Hypernova 2 in 2027.

Some Google Pixel users have found that their At a Glance widget has been showing outdated weather forecasts, as reported by Android Police. But the company says in a statement to The Verge that it’s addressing the issue.

According to one user on Reddit who has been dealing with the problem, “the current temperature is fairly accurate, but the expected high/low forecast hasn’t been correct in the past week.” The expected temperatures in the weather app itself were also accurate, they said.

Another user on Google’s support forums said that their Pixel 8A’s lock screen was showing “the weather for the correct location, but in the morning it shows yesterday’s forecast as the temperature ‘today’ and in the evening it shows today’s forecast as the weather ‘tomorrow.’”

In a statement this afternoon, Google spokesperson Matthew Flegal says that “we’re currently rolling out a fix for an issue causing outdated weather forecasts on the At a Glance widget for some Pixel users.”

Roblox is launching a new type of ad that, if watched, will give players things like in-game currency and power-ups, according to an announcement from the company.

The full-screen video ads, called “Rewarded Video ads,” can be up to 30 seconds long. The ads will be available to buy programmatically “via Google’s advertising solutions and direct buying (Direct IO) in the coming weeks,” Roblox says. 

Owners of Roblox experiences must be at least 18 to show ads, and only public experiences are eligible, according to a page on its creator hub. Roblox says it only shows ads to players that are 13 and older.

The new ads are part of an expansion of Google’s “Immersive Ads” format. Google writes in a separate announcement today that they can show up as “a billboard ad you see driving through a virtual city or an ad on the big screen during a virtual football game.” The company claims these ads “blend naturally into the game environment.” 

Roblox says it will start selling other ad formats through Google’s platform in the coming months, including billboards and entire rows on the Roblox home page.

T-Mobile has officially closed its joint venture deal with the fiber provider Lumos,  after taking down its webpage dedicated to diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) in the process, as reported by Fierce Network. The now-blank page outlined T-Mobile’s “culture of fairness, respect, and inclusion” and was online until at least March 26th, the Internet Archive shows.

Its removal seems like a direct response to the threats from Federal Communications Chair Brendan Carr, who said companies should “get busy ending any sort of their invidious forms of DEI discrimination” during an interview with Bloomberg last month. He suggested that major deals, such as T-Mobile’s plan to acquire most of US Cellular, won’t happen if DEI is still in play. 

T-Mobile executive vice president Mark Nelson has already indicated that the company plans on complying with Carr’s orders. In a March 27th letter to the FCC, he stated T-Mobile is “conducting a comprehensive review of its DEI policies, programs, and activities,” adding that the joint venture with Lumos “will not promote invidious forms of discrimination.” As pointed out by Fierce Network, the FCC signed off on the deal on March 28th. The Verge reached out to T-Mobile with a request for comment but didn’t immediately hear back.

Since becoming FCC chair, Carr has probed the DEI practices at Comcast, Verizon, and Disney. The Energy and Commerce Committee Democrats have responded by opening an investigation of their own, which will examine the time and resources the FCC has spent on “bogus investigations.”

Drastic “reductions in force” are upending agencies within the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

Thousands of people who work at the CDC were notified by email today that they were subject to the Trump administration’s efforts to cull federal workforce jobs, Wired reports. Top officials were among those either put on administrative leave, laid off, or reassigned to remote roles, the Washington Post reports.

HHS announced last week that it would slash its workforce by 20,000 people. Now, the nation is starting to see how that purge is rolling out, affecting programs meant to prevent and treat HIV infection and sexually transmitted disease, respiratory diseases, and foodborne illnesses, to name a few.

“We’re going to have patients die,” Jade Pagkas-Bather, an infectious disease doctor at the University of Chicago, tells Wired. “Unnecessary, preventable death.”

HHS, on the other hand, says the changes will save $1.8 billion a year. “Over time, bureaucracies like HHS become wasteful and inefficient even when most of their staff are dedicated and competent civil servants,” HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. said in a press release when HHS announced its restructuring last week. Kennedy is a staunch anti-vax crusader who has spread disinformation falsely linking vaccines to autism. 

The FDA’s Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research (CBER) regulates vaccines, and director Peter Marks resigned on Friday, writing that “it has become clear that truth and transparency are not desired by the Secretary, but rather he wishes subservient confirmation of his misinformation and lies.” 

“The FDA as we’ve known it is finished, with most of the leaders with institutional knowledge and a deep understanding of product development and safety no longer employed,” Robert Califf, FDA commissioner under Joe Biden and Barack Obama, wrote on LinkedIn today. 

In an email to The Verge, HHS press secretary Vianca Rodriguez Feliciano maintains that “ongoing critical public health efforts will remain a top priority and will not be impacted by this administrative realignment.”

What was once a humble research lab has transformed into one of the biggest consumer technology companies of all time.

OpenAI, founded in 2015 to develop artificial general intelligence (AGI) — AI systems with human-level intelligence — has transformed dramatically since launching ChatGPT, which was once considered to be “the fastest-growing consumer application in history.” Most cofounders have left either to create a competitor or work for one. The company has secured billions in funding and partnerships with Apple and Microsoft, even announcing a $500 billion datacenter project called Stargate. Meanwhile, it faces copyright lawsuits from authors and news organizations, legal action from cofounder Elon Musk over the company’s alleged departure from its original mission, and criticism for burning through cash despite projected billions in revenue. After Altman’s brief ouster, OpenAI is now expected to restructure from a nonprofit-led organization to a full for-profit company to stabilize operations and reassure investors.

As San Francisco’s hottest AI company continues to barrel towards ever growing valuations, its claims become more nebulous. Altman expects we may see “the first AI agents ‘join the workforce’ and materially change the output of companies” in 2025, and says his team is “now confident we know how to build AGI as we have traditionally understood it.” A decade since it was founded, OpenAI has become synonymous with the future of AI, with the tech industry and beyond closely monitoring its next moves.

All of the news and updates about OpenAI continue below.

• OpenAI just raised another $40 billion round led by SoftBank
• ChatGPT’s Ghibli filter is political now, but it always was
• OpenAI says ‘our GPUs are melting’ as it limits ChatGPT image generation requests
• ChatGPT is turning everything into Studio Ghibli art — and it got weird fast
• ChatGPT’s new image generator is delayed for free users
• OpenAI rolls out image generation powered by GPT-4o to ChatGPT
• OpenAI reshuffles leadership as Sam Altman pivots to technical focus
• ChatGPT accused of saying an innocent man murdered his children
• What does OpenAI really want from Trump?
• The questions ChatGPT shouldn’t answer
• OpenAI announces GPT-4.5, warns it’s not a frontier AI model
• ChatGPT is a terrible, fascinating, and thrilling to-do list app
• Mira Murati is launching her OpenAI rival: Thinking Machines Lab
• OpenAI is rethinking how AI models handle controversial topics
• OpenAI lays out plans for GPT-5
• What $200 of ChatGPT is really worth
• Inside OpenAI’s $14 million Super Bowl debut
• I tested ChatGPT’s deep research with the most misunderstood law on the internet
• ChatGPT drops its sign-in requirement for search
• Here’s OpenAI’s new logo
• SoftBank’s Masayoshi Son says AGI will arrive ‘much earlier’ than he thought
• ChatGPT’s agent can now do deep research for you
• OpenAI launches new o3-mini reasoning model with a free ChatGPT version
• Sam Altman’s Stargate is science fiction
• DeepSeek, Stargate, and the new AI arms race
• OpenAI and SoftBank are starting a $500 billion AI data center company
• Las Vegas police release ChatGPT logs from the suspect in the Cybertruck explosion
• OpenAI’s Sam Altman says ‘we know how to build AGI’
• You can now call 1-800-CHATGPT
• ChatGPT’s AI search engine is rolling out to everyone
• Sora’s AI video revolution is still a ways off
• Inside the launch — and future — of ChatGPT
• iOS 18.2 is rolling out now, adding ChatGPT integration and more Apple Intelligence tools
• OpenAI has finally released Sora
• Microsoft’s AI boss and Sam Altman disagree on what it takes to get to AGI
• Sam Altman lowers the bar for AGI
• OpenAI’s 12 days of ‘shipmas’ include Sora and new reasoning model
• ChatGPT’s search results for news are ‘unpredictable’ and frequently inaccurate
• Siri’s big ChatGPT upgrade is here — for better and worse
• OpenAI plans to release its next big AI model by December
• OpenAI was a research lab — now it’s just another tech company
• OpenAI’s for-profit switch could include equity for Sam Altman
• OpenAI says Iran tried to influence US elections with ChatGPT
• Elon Musk is suing OpenAI and Sam Altman again
• OpenAI is making ChatGPT cheaper for schools and nonprofits
• Former OpenAI board member explains why they fired Sam Altman
• OpenAI has a new safety team — it’s run by Sam Altman
• ChatGPT has a Scarlett Johansson problem
• ChatGPT will be able to talk to you like Scarlett Johansson in Her
• OpenAI releases GPT-4o, a faster model that’s free for all ChatGPT users
• Sam Altman rejoins OpenAI’s board after investigation into sudden firing
• OpenAI introduces Sora, its text-to-video AI model
• OpenAI says there’s only a small chance ChatGPT will help create bioweapons
• OpenAI CEO Sam Altman is still chasing billions to build AI chips
• ChatGPT is winning the future — but what future is that?
• Sam Altman on being fired and rehired by OpenAI
• Microsoft joins OpenAI’s board with Sam Altman officially back as CEO
• Sam Altman to return as CEO of OpenAI
• What happened to Sam Altman?
• Sam Altman fired as CEO of OpenAI
• Jony Ive is reportedly developing an AI gadget with OpenAI’s Sam Altman
• Sam Altman sells superintelligent sunshine as protestors call for AGI pause
• As conservatives criticize ‘woke AI,’ here are ChatGPT’s rules for answering culture war queries
• OpenAI announces ChatGPT Plus at $20 a month
• ChatGPT proves AI is finally mainstream — and things are only going to get weirder
• OpenAI’s new chatbot can explain code and write sitcom scripts but is still easily tricked

The Xbox Series X and Series S are excellent machines directly out of the box, but there’s always room for improvement. Add-on accessories like the Elite Series 2 Controller and the Xbox Wireless Headset can help you get the most out of your new gaming console, while others, like Seagate and Western Digital’s expansion cards, can help ensure you have ample storage space to stow all of your favorite games.

Below, we’ve listed some of the best accessories available for the Series X and Series S, many of which often go on sale at most major retailers.

Controllers

Xbox Wireless Controller

The last-gen Xbox wireless controller from the Xbox One generation is compatible with the Series X / S consoles. However, the older controller lacks a few features only found in the newer, better version. For instance, the revised controller (which comes with every new Series X and Series S) has a dedicated button for saving and sharing clips and screenshots, a USB-C port for wired use or charging Microsoft’s play-and-charge rechargeable battery, and an improved D-pad.

In addition …

Read the full story at The Verge.

Though John Wick definitely seemed dead by the end of his last high stakes adventure, that no longer appears to be the case.

During its presentation at this year’s CinemaCon, Lionsgate announced that it has greenlit production on yet another John Wick feature that will see Keanu Reeves return to reprise his role as the Baba Yaga. Though Lionsgate has not yet shared any plot details or other casting announcements, longtime John Wick director / producer Chad Stahelski, and producers Basil Iwanyk and Erica Lee are attached to the project.

Speaking at CinemaCon about the film, Lionsgate Motion Picture Group head Adam Fogelson assured attendees that Reeves, Stahelski, Iwanyk, and Lee wouldn’t signed on “unless they had something truly phenomenal and fresh to say with these characters and this world,” according to IGN.

In addition to a new live-action movie centering John Wick in the present, the larger John Wick brand will continue to grow with an animated prequel starring Reeves that tells the story of how he once completed the “impossible task” (the franchise’s terminology for killing all of one’s rivals in a single night.) The animated project will be directed by Shannon Tindle (Ultraman: Rising) and written by Vanessa Taylot (Game of Thrones, The Shape of Water.)

Lionsgate has also tapped Donnie Yen to both star in and direct a live-action spinoff built around the blind assassin character Caine, who first appeared in John Wick: Chapter 4.

Given the way John Wick has been featured in the trailers for Ballerina, it’s not entirely surprising to learn that reports of the character’s death were a bit exaggerated. But with Reeves returning to headline another John Wick mainline film, its even more clear now that Lionsgate intends to keep Wick’s story going as long as it possibly can.

Starting with this year’s football season, the NFL will use Sony’s Hawk-Eye cameras to measure the line to gain — a process the chain crew has done manually for decades. The 8K cameras will use virtual measurement technology to quickly and accurately determine whether the ball traveled 10 yards for a first down.

The Hawk-Eye system is made up of six 8K cameras that use optical tracking to determine the ball’s position. When officials receive a measurement, the system will create a digital recreation of the measurement that the NFL will show inside the stadium and on TV.

The NFL says Sony’s technology will offer a more “efficient” alternative to using sticks and a 10-yard chain to track the ball’s position. Measuring the ball with Sony’s Hawk-Eye system takes around 30 seconds, which the NFL says is 40 seconds less than the chain crew takes. But this doesn’t spell the end of the chain crew, as the NFL says they’ll still “remain on the field in a secondary capacity.”

The NFL began testing Sony’s Hawk-Eye last year. It will be deployed in all 30 US NFL stadiums and international venues. Aside from football, Hawk-Eye technology has become an integral part of other sports, like soccer, cricket, rugby, and even tennis, which my colleague Kevin Nguyen wrote about last year.

Sony already works with the NFL to power Synchronized Multi-Angle Replay Technology (SMART), a system that combines up to four live video feeds at once to help officials determine the outcome of a play.

Hyundai has revealed a gaming-inspired “Insteroid” concept EV in Seoul that takes its tiny all-electric Inster and gives it an over-the-top street racing makeover. The automaker’s cutesy compact SUV was handed off to Hyundai’s European design team with the goal of merging “gaming influences with extensive customization,” according to a press release.

The Insteroid gives the Inster a wide body kit, massive spoiler, track wheels, and a stripped interior featuring bucket seats and a futuristic instrument cluster. In the release, Hyundai’s chief designer Eduardo Ramírez says that Insteroid “represents a modern take on the idea of a dream car.”

Hyundai is also featuring the Insteroid in an in-house-developed video game that will be available for anyone to play in a web browser.

Hyundai hopes the Insteroid concept will “spark further interest in the Inster production model already on sale in key markets,” which continues to exclude the US. The regular Inster is launching as the Casper Electric in Korea this summer, followed by Europe and Asia, with pricing starting under $26,000.

AI startup Runway says its latest AI video model can generate consistent scenes and people across multiple shots, according to an announcement. AI-generated videos can struggle with maintaining consistent storytelling, but Runway claims on X that the new model, Gen-4, should allow users more “continuity and control” while telling stories. 

Currently rolling out to paid and enterprise users, the new Gen-4 video synthesis model allows users to generate characters and objects across shots using a single reference image. Users must then describe the composition they want, and the model will then generate consistent outputs from multiple angles.

As an example, the startup released a video of a woman maintaining her appearance in different shots and contexts across a variety of lighting conditions.

The release comes less than a year after Runway announced its Gen-3 Alpha video generator. That model extended the length of videos users could produce, but also sparked controversy as reportedly had been trained on thousands of scraped YouTube videos and pirated films.

More than 1,900 scientists and engineers have signed a letter saying they “see real danger in this moment” as the Trump administration slashes federal support for scientific research.

“Wise investments by the US government have built up the nation’s research enterprise, making it the envy of the world,” says the open letter published on Monday. “Astoundingly, the Trump administration is destabilizing this enterprise by gutting funding for research, firing thousands of scientists, removing public access to scientific data, and pressuring researchers to alter or abandon their work on ideological grounds.”

The letter was penned by members of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, which was created by Congress under President Abraham Lincoln to advise policymakers. Each person signed to express their individual support rather than as representatives of the universities and research institutions with which they are affiliated.

They accuse the Trump administration of censorship through executive orders and funding threats meant to stop any initiatives the president and his close allies dislike, including efforts to address climate change and develop vaccines.

The White House didn’t immediately respond to The Verge’s request for comment.

In less than 100 days in office, President Donald Trump and billionaire-backer Elon Musk have laid waste to the scientific arms of federal agencies including the Environmental Protection Agency, Health and Human Services, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The Trump administration is investigating more than 50 universities as part of its efforts to eliminate programs meant to support students from underrepresented and historically marginalized groups.

“The quest for truth — the mission of science — requires that scientists freely explore new questions and report their findings honestly, independent of special interests,” the letter says. “The administration is engaging in censorship, destroying this independence.”

By threatening to withhold $400 million in funding, the administration has already managed to strong arm Columbia University into changing school policies and academic programs. Other institutions have had to halt research, layoff staff, and stop graduate student enrollment, the letter notes.

The US is at risk of losing an entire generation of scientists as a result, the signatories warn. More than 1,200 scientists are already thinking about leaving the US because of the Trump administration’s drastic actions, making up 75 percent of respondents in a separate poll by the journal Nature.

“A climate of fear has descended on the research community,” National Academies members write in the letter. “We are sending this SOS to sound a clear warning: the nation’s scientific enterprise is being decimated.” 

Members of ZeniMax Workers United, a union of over 300 quality assurance workers in Texas and Maryland, have voted to authorize a strike.

The vote, which passed with over 94 percent in favor of authorization, does not mean workers have gone on strike like SAG-AFTRA members have in the ongoing video game voice actors strike. But should contract negotiations break down, the ZeniMax union now has the permission to call a strike.

This authorization comes as contract negotiations between union members and parent company Microsoft continue into a second year.

The strike authorization is the latest escalation between the union and management. Last year, ZeniMax Workers United participated in a one-day strike claiming that Microsoft did not adequately address employee concerns over its return to office policies and its outsourcing practices. Those concerns have come up again in negotiations alongside better pay and benefits.

“Our in-house contractors have been working on minimal wages with no benefits, including no paid sick time,” said associate QA tester Aubrey Litchfield in the press release announcing the strike authorization. “Workers are choosing not to start families because of the uncertainty of finances. We’ve released multiple titles while working fully remote. When will enough be enough?”

“Our quality assurance team is an integral part of our business and is key to our ability to deliver games our players will love,” Microsoft spokesperson Delaney Simmons says in a statement to The Verge. We respect the team’s right to express their viewpoints and are deeply committed to reaching a fair and equitable resolution that acknowledges the teams’ contributions. There has been substantial progress over the course of the negotiations, reaching tentative agreements on a majority of the topics at the table. We have presented a package proposal that we believe is fair — if accepted it would result in immediate compensation increases, even more robust benefits and is in alignment to the company’s hybrid model of 3 days in office. We look forward to continuing this progress during negotiations.”

ZeniMax Workers United is one of several unions under the Microsoft umbrella. It formed in 2023 and was once the largest union within the company with 300 members before Activision Quality Assurance United organized roughly 600 quality assurance workers last year.

At GDC 2025, the Communications Workers of America (CWA) announced the launch of the United Videogame Workers, a nationwide direct-join union open to any worker in the video game industry.

Yesterday, we wrote that a new Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) process would help private jet owners keep their registration details private upon request, and speculated that it would make things difficult for celebrity jet trackers. Jack Sweeney, known for his accounts tracking the flights of celebrities like Elon Musk and Taylor Swift, says he doesn’t think it will.

In an email, Sweeney told The Verge that learning “who owns what planes already requires research,” and that he and other jet trackers often “use the media and associated sources” rather than the FAA’s database of registrations. 

The FAA said on Friday that it’s considering defaulting to withholding personally identifiable information from registration records. Even if jet trackers relied more on the FAA’s database, Sweeney suspected that the rule doesn’t apply to those who register their jets with trusts or other entities, something he says private jet owners do regularly. However, FAA spokesperson Kevin Morris told The Verge in an email that when it says it will withhold “personally identifiable information,” it’s referring “to both individuals and entities (trusts, LLCs, etc.) operating private aircraft.”

The FAA created its new process to comply with new requirements in the Biden-era FAA Reauthorization Act of 2024. The law was written in response to privacy concerns raised about jet trackers like Sweeney’s ElonJet account that Twitter banned in 2022 and Meta later banned on Threads and Instagram. 

We’ve also reached out to the National Business Aviation Association for comment on Sweeney’s commentary.

A year and a half ago, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) worked with state attorneys general to shut down Prehired, a shady tech sales bootcamp program that a court said deceptively saddled students with millions of dollars in loans. Now, as the federal watchdog is being dismantled by Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), a consumer advocacy group says the company is relaunching its old pitch under a new name: FastTrack.

Prehired was an online program that offered training for entry-level software sales roles, promising that students would only have to pay the course’s cost once they landed a job that paid more than $60,000 within 12 months of finishing. In a 2023 complaint, the CFPB and 11 states claimed that these were deceptively marketed loans with buried terms that left students on the hook even if they didn’t get a job. After students had signed up, Prehired allegedly claimed they’d benefit from converting these loans into settlement agreements with the company, which actually made it harder for them to fight debt collectors.

In November 2023, a court approved an order shutting down Prehired and permanently banning it from offering sim …

Read the full story at The Verge.

You probably shouldn’t expect major changes to Google’s next Pixel foldable. Renders shared with Android Headlines by reliable leaker Onleaks show a Pixel 10 Pro Fold that looks very similar to its predecessor, potentially indicating that it could largely be just a spec bump.

As shown in the renders, the Pixel 10 Pro Fold appears to feature the same stacked rear camera setup as the Pixel 9 Pro Fold, along with a hole-punch camera on the external display and one on the top-right corner of the inner screen. The upcoming phone also seems to have a similarly-sized bezel and nearly the same dimensions as the Pixel 9 Pro Fold when unfolded: 6.1 x 5.9 x 0.21 inches.

It does look like Google may have shrunk the gap between the screen and the device’s hinge on the left side of the display, which would be a plus.

The Pixel 10 Pro Fold will also likely come equipped with an upgraded Tensor G5 processor. Sources tell Android Headlines that the device could have a lower price compared to the Pixel 9 Pro Fold, which starts at $1,799. 

Google might not be making any big changes to the standard Pixel 10, either, as another set of renders OnLeaks shared with Android Headlines hint at …

Read the full story at The Verge.

If you want to create a cinematic experience at home, then chances are that your TV’s built-in speakers just won’t cut it. Instead, it may be worth investing in a top-notch soundbar like the Sonos Arc, especially now that the Arc has dropped to an all-time low price of $599 ($300 off) at Amazon, Best Buy, Walmart, and directly from Sonos. 

The all-in-one home theater soundbar delivers powerful audio, with eight woofers, three tweeters, and a pair of upward-firing Dolby Atmos speakers that fill the room with sound. The Arc also features eARC support, allowing it to work especially well with large 4K TVs that support Atmos over HDMI ARC. Plus, the soundbar can also work as a standalone smart speaker, with support for Google Assistant, Amazon Alexa, and Apple’s AirPlay 2.

It’s worth bearing in mind that Sonos last year released the Sonos Arc Ultra, the Arc’s more powerful successor. The Ultra delivers even more immersive sound than the Arc and, unlike its predecessor, supports both Bluetooth audio and Trueplay EQ tuning. That said, the Ultra costs a whopping $999, so if you don’t prioritize those features, it may be worth saving the money and splurging on the Arc instead.

Read our Sonos Arc review.

A few more ways to save

• Now through April 3rd at 12PM ET, Nomad is offering a 15 percent discount on many of its accessories when you apply the code FOOLS15. The sale includes a wide range of products, including MagSafe-compatible chargers, cases for smartwatches, wireless earbuds, and more. You can, for example, purchase this 35-watt Slim Power Adapter from Nomad for just $24.65 ($4.35 off) or the Nomad Stand One MagSafe charger for $92, down from $109.
• You can buy the second-generation Arlo Video Doorbell bundled with the Chime 2, which lets you hear doorbell alerts, for an all-time low of $79.99 ($50 off) at Amazon. Arlo’s video doorbell is amongst those we featured in our guide to best video doorbells. Along with 2K resolution, it offers a wide, 180-degree field of view, an integrated siren, and support for both Google Home and Amazon Alexa.
• The JBL Authentics 200 Smart Home Speaker is on sale for $249.95 at Amazon, Walmart, and Best Buy, which is $50 shy of its best price to date. The smart speaker stands out from the competition because it’s one of those that lets you give Google Assistant and Amazon voice commands at the same time. It also offers a unique retro-inspired appearance and includes multiple connectivity options, including Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, and aux. Read our hands-on impressions.

Smartphones are great. They’re also… a lot. The idea of a more balanced device, one that gives you all of the most important and useful features of a smartphone but keeps you out of the infinite-doomscrolling loops, has been an enticing one for a long time. Nailing that balance, though, turns out to be almost impossible.

On this episode of The Vergecast, we try and get it right. The Verge’s Allison Johnson joins the show to talk about the new Light Phone III, and then we run through a list of a few dozen things your phone can do and we wonder if your perfect, sane, functional phone should be able to do them. Some things are easy, some are surprisingly difficult. We’re still not sure what to do with Snapchat.

After that, The Verge’s Andy Hawkins catches us up on all things Tesla Takedown. After this weekend’s coordinated set of protests, we talk through what the protestors want, why they’re pointing their anger at Tesla in particular, and how we’ll know if it’s working. Andy also walks us through the tariff chaos coming for the auto industry, and tells us a little about the surprisingly cool new Nissan Leaf.

Finally, we answer a question from the Vergecast H …

Read the full story at The Verge.