At a "crypto summit" on Tuesday held by Eric Adams - the controversial mayor of New York City who recently escaped several federal corruption charges - crypto CEOs and investors made an open plea: please get rid of state crypto regulations so we can write our own and turn the Big Apple into a "crypto sanctuary city."

This was, in fact, Adams's goal for the summit. "I smell money, crypto, crypto, blockchain, and all the good things," he told reporters at a press conference right before the private event began.

As of now, crypto companies can only do business in New York state if they acquire a BitLicense from state financial regulators, which is notoriously difficult to obtain. According to Bitcoin Magazine, attendees, which included Galaxy CEO Mike Novogratz and Nick Spanos, the founder of the New York City Bitcoin Center, frequently attacked the program, both in front of reporters and behind closed doors during the private event, arguing that it was preventing billions of dollars from entering the city.

"We're giving sanctuary to immigrants," said Spanos. "We can give sanctuary to crypto companies."

Though Adams can't directly change state law as mayor, he's previously calle …

Read the full story at The Verge.

Google’s AI search results are about to get even more ads. On May 21st, the company announced that it’s going to start testing ads in AI Mode, the new AI-powered search feature that just rolled out to everyone in the US.

AI Mode is the new tab in Google Search that opens an AI chatbot-like interface, where you can get a rundown of what you’re searching for, along with links to relevant websites. But these answers could soon have product recommendations and other ads.

As an example, Google says if a user asks AI Mode for tips on how to build a website, the feature will surface a step-by-step guide on how to get started. It might even show a “helpful ad” for a website builder, which will have a “sponsored” label on it. Google says it’s testing search and shopping ads in AI Mode for users on desktop and mobile.

The search giant is also expanding its ads in AI Overviews — the AI-generated summaries that appear at the top of some search results — from mobile to desktop devices. Now, if you’re searching for advice on how to bring small dogs on flights, you might see a “sponsored” list of small dog carriers and links to buy them beneath the AI Overview.

Ads in AI Overviews on desktop are rolling out to everyone in the US starting today. Google also plans to bring ads to English-language AI Overviews in “select countries” later this year.

A 19-year-old college student will plead guilty to carrying out a massive hack against PowerSchool, a popular student information system used by schools around the country. On Tuesday, the Department of Justice said Matthew Lane of Massachusetts agreed to plead guilty to four counts, including cyber extortion, unauthorized access to protected computers, and aggravated identity theft.

Though the DOJ doesn’t identify PowerSchool by name, the details outlined by the DOJ line up with the attack, such as the hacker’s threat to leak the names, email addresses, phone numbers, Social Security numbers, dates of birth, and medical information of tens of millions of students and teachers if the company didn’t pay a $2.85 million ransom. A source close to the situation also tells NBC News that the company in question is PowerSchool.

In January, PowerSchool said it became aware of a data breach involving the “unauthorized exfiltration of certain personal information” from its customer support portal, PowerSource. The company later revealed that it paid the ransom in an attempt to keep the attacker from making its information public.

However, PowerSchool customers later received additional threats to expose stolen data. “As is always the case with these situations, there was a risk that the bad actors would not delete the data they stole, despite assurances and evidence that were provided to us,” PowerSchool said.

The DOJ accuses Lane of breaking into PowerSchool using stolen login credentials and transferring the information of students and teachers to a computer server in Ukraine.

The agency also charged Lane with breaching and extorting another unnamed US-based telecom company.

“As alleged, this defendant stole private information about millions of children and teachers, imposed substantial financial costs on his victims, and instilled fear in parents that their kids’ information had been leaked into the hands of criminals — all to put a notch in his hacking belt,” US Attorney Leah Foley said in the press release.

Sony is shutting down the “current version” of the PlayStation Stars loyalty and rewards program that it launched in 2022, according to a blog post. 

The program let users obtain “digital collectibles,” which Sony described at the time as “digital representations of things that PlayStation fans enjoy, including figurines of beloved and iconic characters from games and other forms of entertainment, as well as cherished devices that tap into Sony’s history of innovation.”

While that might make them sound like they could have been NFTs, they weren’t; PlayStation’s Grace Chen, VP of network advertising, loyalty, and licensed merchandise, told The Washington Post that the program was “not leveraging any blockchain technologies and definitely not NFTs.”

In Wednesday’s blog post about the shutdown, Chen says that “since launching the program, we’ve learned a lot from evaluating the types of activities our players respond best to, and as a company, we are always evolving with player and industry trends. Through this evaluation, we have decided to refocus our efforts and will be winding down the current version of PlayStation Stars.”

As of today, “PlayStation Stars will no longer accept new members for this version of the program,” according to Chen. If you’re in the program now, users can “still earn Digital Collectibles, Points and level up their status” until July 23rd at 10:59AM ET, and after that date, there will be no new PlayStation Stars campaigns.

“This version” of PlayStation Stars will fully end on November 2nd, 2026.

Microsoft’s Ninja Theory studio is bringing Senua’s Saga: Hellblade II to the PS5 “this summer.” Set in a dark ninth-century Iceland, Hellblade II originally debuted on Xbox Series S / X and PC last year, and it’s now making its way to Sony’s console just over a year later.

Hellblade II is the latest Xbox game to make its way to PS5 this year, with Microsoft bringing Forza Horizon 5 to Sony’s rival console soon, alongside Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition and the Age of Mythology: Retold release on PS5 in March. Indiana Jones and the Great Circle also arrived on PS5 this spring, with Doom: The Dark Ages following on May 15th. The original Gears of War is also coming to PS5 in August as a remastered version, and Microsoft also released its Oblivion remaster on PS5 recently.

The original Hellblade was a timed console exclusive for the PS4 in 2017, before it arrived on Xbox One the following year. Hellblade II is part of Microsoft’s wave of Project Latitude titles, which see the software giant evolving the Xbox platform to bring more games to rival platforms.

I revealed last year that Hellblade II was under consideration for a PS5 release, alongside other titles like Gears of War, Halo: Combat Evolved, and Microsoft Flight Simulator. Microsoft is also working on some Xbox ports for Nintendo’s Switch 2, which I expect we’ll hear about soon.

If you got a kick out of Baby Driver, there’s a very good chance you’re going to be into Darren Aronofsky’s upcoming black comedy / thriller, Caught Stealing.

Adapted from Charlie Huston’s 2005 novel of the same name, Caught Stealing tells the wild take of Hank Thompson (Austin Butler), a former high school baseball prodigy whose dreams of going pro came to an end following a career-ending injury. Though life hasn’t worked out the way Hank expected, things seem to be going pretty well for him in the movie’s new trailer. Hank’s girlfriend Yvonne (Zoë Kravitz) loves him, he’s got a solid job working as a bartender, and his eccentric neighbor Russ (Matt Smith) tends to keep to himself.

But when Hank agrees to watch Russ’ cat, he doesn’t realize that he’s putting himself at risk of dealing with some of his neighbor’s shady business partners. And it isn’t long before Hank finds himself having to run from and fight off members of multiple crime syndicates. Compared to the novel, Aronofsky’s Caught Stealing looks like it’s going to be a bit more of a high-octane thrill ride, tonally speaking. With Huston writing the film’s script as well, the new adaptation probably won’t veer all that far away from its source material. But we won’t know until Caught Stealing hits theaters on August 29th.

Nintendo’s latest entry in its “ask the developer” interview series has some fun new details about the Switch 2 launch title Mario Kart World. Among the many things discussed is an explanation for why the game isn’t called Mario Kart 9, despite being a sequel to the best-selling Mario Kart 8 — and it has to do with the game’s approach to open-world design.

“If the idea had just been to add more courses, then I think we would’ve called it Mario Kart 9,“ explained producer Kosuke Yabuki. “But, that wasn’t our approach this time. We wanted to take the series to the next level. So, we decided to drop the numbering this time and go with a completely new title, Mario Kart World. So, we’d already added “MARIO KART WORLD” to the concept art from the early stages of development.“

The development team also discussed the game’s origins on the original Switch. Many of the key aspects of World — including its interconnected map and increasing the number of players per race from 12 to 24 — were in place early on, but they apparently proved to be a challenge on the previous hardware.

“When we were developing for the Nintendo Switch system, it was difficult for us to incorporate everything we wanted, so we were always conscious of what we were giving up in return,” programming director Kenta Sato  said. “We discussed things like toning down the visuals, lowering the resolution, and we even considered dropping the frame rate to 30 fps in some cases. It was a tough situation.” Yabuki added that when the idea of moving the game to the Switch 2 came up, “It was truly a ray of hope.”

There’s a lot more to dig into in the four-part Q&A, including the fact that there will be 200 tracks to listen to and how important food is to the game from a worldbuilding perspective. So you should definitely check out the full thing. My favorite detail, though, is how a character named Cow made it onto the roster of racers. As art director Masaaki Ishikawa explains it “Cow is actually a pivotal character in the Mario Kart series.“

After looking at this concept art, I can’t help but agree:

Metaphor ReFantazio — a game that combines innovative turn-based combat with a story timely for our current political moment — is coming to Xbox Game Pass later this month. In fact, the Game Pass line up for the rest of May is actually pretty sweet.

Metaphor, Atlus’ best RPG since Persona 5, arrives on Game Pass next week on May 29th. Another fave, Tales of Kenzera: ZAU, an afro-futuristic metroidvania that deals with grief and loss and a heaping helping of African folklore, is also heading to Game Pass tomorrow on May 22nd. I’m also really excited to see that To a T, the quirky and cute new game from Katamari Damacy creator Keita Takahashi, is launching day and date on Game Pass on May 28th.

Venturing outside the realm of RPGs, Tom Clancy’s The Division 2 arrives on Game Pass on May 27th and if you just gotta have something new to play today, there’s Monster Train 2, a deckbuilding roguelike from Devolver Digital, out right now. Check out the full list of late May Game Pass additions here and there’s also a list of games coming to the Cloud Gaming Beta too so maybe something will catch your interest.

If you ask me, there’s always space in my games catalog for a fun third-person shooter that I can play with my buds online. Warhammer 40K: Space Marine 2 delivers some of the best blood-gushing, bug-crushing action, filling a Gears of War void that I didn’t know needed filling. You can jump into the fray while saving some money, as Space Marine 2 has hit its lowest price yet at Amazon, GameStop, and Best Buy. Normally $69.99, it costs $39.99 for the PlayStation 5 or Xbox Series X.

Other deals worth checking out

• If you find yourself in a position of needing more storage for your original Nintendo Switch, Steam Deck, Asus ROG Ally, or some other device, there’s a great deal happening on Samsung’s 512GB microSD card at Amazon. You can get it for $29.99, a price we’ve seen before, but one that’s still good enough that it’s worth sharing again.
• My colleague Sheena recently highlighted some of the great discounts happening on LG’s C4 OLEDs in time for Memorial Day. The lowest price, of course, is on the the smallest 42-inch version, which currently costs $796.99 (roughly half off). The price drops apply to larger sizes, too, like the 65-inch version that’s down to $1,299.99 at Best Buy, which I consider to be a stellar deal.

Google is working with Samsung to bring a desktop mode to Android. During Google I/O’s developer keynote, engineering manager Florina Muntenescu said the company is “building on the foundation” of Samsung’s DeX platform “to bring enhanced windowing capabilities in Android 16,” as spotted earlier by 9to5Google.

Samsung first launched DeX in 2017, a feature that automatically adjusts your phone’s interface and apps when connected to a larger display, allowing you to use your phone like a desktop device.

A demo during the presentation revealed a Samsung DeX-like layout, with apps like Gmail, Chrome, YouTube, and Google Photos centered in the taskbar at the bottom of the screen. It also showed how Android 16’s adaptive apps can move and stretch across the screen. The time sits at the top-left corner of the screen, with the Wi-Fi signal and battery on the right.

In March, Android Authority’s Mishaal Rahman reported on Google’s plans to create a desktop mode of its own, and later enabled an early version of the feature on a Pixel device.
Google shared more details in a blog post about the update, saying Android 16’s emphasis on adaptiveness will also help apps work on more kinds of devices, like foldables, tablets, Chromebooks, mixed reality wearables, and even cars.

One of the more surprising moments in volume four of Love, Death, and Robots is an appearance from YouTube star MrBeast. He shows up in the episode "The Screaming of the Tyrannosaur," playing a sort of twisted game master presiding over a death race on one of the moons of Jupiter. Also, there are dinosaurs. According to LDR creator Tim Miller, who also directed the episode, the collaboration started out simply because MrBeast was a fan of the show. It then solidified once Miller realized he had the ideal role.

"I have this evil game master here, and I thought he would be perfect for that," Miller says. "I watched his Amazon show and I thought 'what a dick' often. With some of the contestants, he seemed to take a particular joy in their uncomfortableness. Not because he's an evil guy - he's not, he's a super nice guy. I think he just enjoys the whole machination of people and how they can either work together or against each other. And it seemed to fit this particular role very well."

Miller says that because MrBeast was such a fan, he didn't actually charge anything for his performance. "The cool thing is he likes the show so much - we couldn't afford MrBeast prices or anything …

Read the full story at The Verge.

Google’s new Material 3 Expressive design language includes a welcome surprise for Pixel owners: the mandatory At a Glance home screen widget has shrunk, leaving space for an extra row of apps.

The new look is included in the latest version of the Android 16 beta. Upon installation, Pixel owners are greeted with a pop-up message on the home screen:

Enjoy more space for apps

Good news! Your home screen has a new layout, which means there’s space for more apps & widgets

The new design both shrinks the At a Glance widget and removes some of the dead space between the other rows, compressing the entire screen. It leaves room for a full extra row of apps below the redesigned widget.

The bad news is that Google still won’t let you turn off the widget, which is a mandatory part of the Pixel home screen, just like the Google search bar at the bottom. Making it smaller will at least go some way to appeasing Pixel owners who’ve long hoped for the same home screen flexibility as other Android phones.

Material 3 Expressive is a colorful, bouncy new aesthetic for Android that Google unveiled last week. It was made available in the new Android 16 beta yesterday, and should roll out widely later this year, after the OS update launches in full next month.

TikTok users will now be able to save tracks they discover straight to their SoundCloud app. On Wednesday, the two companies announced they’re partnering to expand an existing TikTok feature that was previously available to users of music streaming platforms like Apple Music and Spotify.

The “add to music app” button appears when a TikTok user clicks on an audio track added to a video. Saved songs are automatically added to a TikTok playlist on users’ default music streaming service. The integration streamlines a process many TikTok users do organically: find new music on the video app. The “add to music app” feature is an easy way for listeners to take their discoveries off the app (and for artists, especially indie musicians, to grow their fanbase beyond just passive TikTok listeners).

Over the past five or so years, TikTok has proved to be a powerful driver of pop music — not just for emerging artists but also for household names. Artists plan and unveil TikTok-specific marketing to hype up their new music and older songs get a second wind as a new audience on social media discovers their work. Even Taylor Swift recognizes she needs her music on the platform: last year, as TikTok’s licensing deal with Universal Music Group expired and spiraled into a nasty back and forth, UMG artists’ music was pulled from the video platform. Swift’s music reappeared before a deal was publicly announced (and just in time to promote her upcoming album). There was even a Billboard TikTok chart ranking the app’s hits, though it was short-lived; the chart was discontinued earlier this year.

TikTok says that since rolling out the “add to music app” feature last year, songs have been saved more than a billion times. The SoundCloud integration begins rolling out today to all users.

Following the debut of the Oura Ring 4 last October, which featured improved accuracy for blood oxygen tracking and heart rate readings, the company has announced it’s introducing additional algorithm improvements that will deliver more comprehensive and accurate movement tracking.

First announced last month, the updates are now “rolling out to members globally” and include a new step-counting algorithm called Real Steps that makes the Oura Ring function more like a pedometer. Instead of estimating your step count using generic movement data, an advanced machine-learning model will now more accurately determine when ring movement is the result of a step, although the company warns that users may see a decrease in step count of up to 20 percent as a result of the changes.

Oura’s active calorie burn estimates will also now factor in the intensity of your movements during exercise using heart rate measurements. As with the potential changes in step count, the company says that during more intense workouts users may see that they’ve “burned more calories than previously shown,” or have burned fewer calories during low-impact exercises like yoga or walking, when heart rates don’t tend to dramatically increase.

The wearable’s all-day activity tracking is being expanded to work all night as well, including between the hours of 12AM and 4AM, so that late-night activities such as dancing at the club until the early morning are tracked and taken into account. And if you forget to add a workout, you can add or edit activities from the past seven days in the Oura app — not just the current day — with Readiness and Activity Scores being automatically adjusted to reflect those changes.

New fitness metrics are being added to the Oura Ring’s Automatic Activity Detection, including running splits that leverage GPS data from a connected smartphone to show walks and runs in more detail. And heart rate data will now be included when importing activity data into the Oura app that was collected by third-party health and fitness apps, including Apple Health, Strava, and Android Health Connect.

In addition to these upgrades, Oura has announced new partner integrations with CorePower Yoga, The Sculpt Society, Technogym, and Open, whose respective apps will “tailor training and recovery recommendations” based on a user’s Oura Readiness Score and other biometric data captured by the smart ring, including sleep, stress, calories, and heart rate variability.

Strava is making it easier to plan workouts and keep activity leaderboard rankings fair. The updates rolling out over the coming weeks focus on helping users optimize their workout routes to compete against other users and their own personal bests, building on some of the existing AI features that Strava announced last year.

Anyone paying for a Strava subscription (starting at $11.99 monthly) can now access a new AI-powered routes experience under the Maps tab that should provide more intuitive suggestions based on popular routes enjoyed by other Strava users. Users can generate community-backed routes from custom starting points or their current location, pulling data from Strava’s heatmaps feature.

Other route-related updates will be rolled out to the Strava mobile app in the coming months, including changes to the tappable points of interest (POI) feature that currently enables subscribers to instantly generate routes to cafés, restrooms, viewpoints, and other locations. Starting in June, POI’s will also display elevation, distance, and estimated arrival time information, and allow users to upload photos of the location. Point-to-point routing will also launch in July, which uses heatmaps and machine learning to deliver “the most efficient, activity-specific route from A to B,” according to Strava.

Strava is also doubling the number of live segments, which allow users to view real-time performance data and achievements in sections of their route, and introducing additional data screens for subscribers.

Finally, Strava says it’s “continuing to advance” the AI-powered Leaderboard Integrity feature it launched to weed out cheaters on cycling and running paths. The company says that 4.45 million activity logs have been removed so far that carried the wrong sport type, or were recorded in vehicles — which is an easy way to fabricate scores now that e-bikes can make anyone the king of a mountain.

Google's AI models have a secret ingredient that's giving the company a leg up on competitors like OpenAI and Anthropic. That ingredient is your data, and it's only just scratched the surface in terms of how it can use your information to "personalize" Gemini's responses.

Google first started letting users opt in to its "Gemini with personalization" feature earlier this year, which lets the AI model tap into your search history "to provide responses that are uniquely insightful and directly address your needs." But now, Google is taking things a step further by unlocking access to even more of your information - all in the name of providing you with more personalized, AI-generated responses.

During Google I/O on Tuesday, Google introduced something called "personal context," which will allow Gemini models to pull relevant information from across Google's apps, as long as it has your permission. One way Google is doing this is through Gmail's personalized smart replies - the AI-generated messages that you can use to quickly reply to emails.

To make these AI responses sound "authentically like you," Gemini will pore over your previous emails and even your Google Drive files to cr …

Read the full story at The Verge.

In The Andromeda Strain, Michael Crichton wrote about killer alien space crystals that are (spoiler alert) ultimately stymied by Earth's breadth of pH values. In reality, crystals grown in space could be key to a new generation of cancer-fighting treatments that save lives, not threaten them.

Colorado-based startup Sierra Space is nearly ready to launch its reusable space plane, Dream Chaser. It's set to carry into orbit a 3-D printed module designed by engineers at pharma giant Merck. If the test goes well, and if Dream Chaser's gentle reentry process keeps that sensitive cargo safe, this could be the start of something big - despite those crystals being microscopic.

A brief history of space crystals

Space crystals sound like something an astrology guru would hang over their bed to help them sleep, but there's real science here. According to the ISS National Lab, crystals grown in space are simply better: "Scientists hypothesize that these observed benefits result from a slower, more uniform movement of molecules into a crystalline lattice in microgravity."

Research into monoclonal antibodies points towards crystallization as being key for developing more stable, subcutaneous …

Read the full story at The Verge.

AMD has announced its latest Zen 5-based Ryzen Threadripper 9000 Series of CPUs at Computex today. The 9000 Series and 9000 WX-Series are built for the demanding workstation market, and the top Threadripper Pro 9995WX will ship with 96 cores and 192 threads.

This flagship Threadripper chip is designed for professionals who are working on visual effects, simulations, and AI model development. The Threadripper Pro 9995WX also has up to 384MB of L3 cache and 128 lanes of PCIe Gen 5, making it ideal to pair with multiple GPUs.

AMD claims that the Threadripper Pro 9995WX is 2.2x faster than Intel’s 60-core Xeon W9-3595X processor in Cinebench 2024 multi-threaded rendering.

If you don’t need a 96-core CPU, AMD’s Threadripper 9000 Series are also targeted at enthusiasts and creators who want workstation-like performance. The Ryzen Threadripper 9980X has 64 cores and 128 threads, a base frequency of 3.2GHz, and 320MB of L3 cache.

All of these new Threadripper chips, pro or not, will run at a thermal design power (TDP) of 350 watts and will work (after a BIOS update) on existing motherboards that support the sTR5 socket.

Both Threadripper 9000 Series and the Pro WX-Series processors will be available from retailers in July, but AMD isn’t announcing pricing just yet. Given the its high-end 7980X Threadripper CPU retailed at $4,999 in 2023, it’s fair to say these next-gen equivalents will be around that price.

Google I/O was, as predicted, an AI show. But now that the keynote is over, we can see that the company's vision is to use AI to eventually do a lot of Googling for you.

A lot of that vision rests on AI Mode in Google Search, which Google is starting to roll out to everyone in the US. AI Mode offers a more chatbot-like interface right inside Search, and behind the scenes, Google is doing a lot of work to pull in information instead of making you scroll through a list of blue links.

Onstage, Google presented an example of someone asking for things to do in Nashville over a weekend with friends who like food, music, and "exploring off the beaten path." AI Mode hopped into action, creating Google-curated lists of "restaurants good for foodies," recommending places with a "chill bar atmosphere with live music," highlighting "places off-the-beaten path," and suggesting websites featuring good things to do in Nashville. It even created a custom map recommending places to go. (If you're doing some shopping, AI Mode can show you a personalized batch of listings, too.)

This is essentially Google doing your planning work for you. The service generated a whole bunch of related search quer …

Read the full story at The Verge.

Microsoft is working on a new “Cross Device Resume” feature for Windows 11 that works similarly to Apple’s Handoff feature in macOS. The feature was spotted in a Microsoft Build 2025 session, before Windows Central noticed Microsoft editing out the demo that showed a mobile Spotify session resuming on a PC.

“When you open the app on your mobile device or tablet, Windows can show a subtle badge right on your app’s taskbar icon,” explains Aakash Varshney, a senior product manager for cross devices and experiences at Microsoft, in a “Create Seamless Cross-Device Experiences with Windows for your app” Build session for developers. “It’s a visual nudge that when clicked launches your app directly into the task, delivering a smooth intuitive handoff from PC to phone.”

Varshney’s now-deleted demo shows a Spotify app icon with a badge on it in the taskbar, and a message when you hover over the badge that says “resume, recently opened on your mobile device.” It’s designed to let you resume the Spotify app on PC right from where you left off on mobile. “Spotify launches and I’m instantly back in the same song, now playing on my PC,” says Varshney. “No need to search or start over, it’s a smooth one-click transition that keeps the music and user experience uninterrupted.”

Microsoft first started testing an app handoff feature in Windows 10, back in 2016. Codenamed Project Rome, the cross-device experience for apps was designed for developers to write apps that can “run on multiple devices and travel with the user as they switch between devices.” We’ve not seen much adoption of Project Rome in reality though, so hopefully this new Cross Device Resume is more widely adopted.