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Sun, Jun 21, 2026, 7:36 AM EDT

Tech

AI Summary

  • AI continues its relentless march with key figures like Meredith Whittaker cautioning against treating chatbots as friends, while Nobel laureate John Jumper departs DeepMind for Anthropic, signaling intense competition in the AI research space.
  • The tech industry is seeing strategic moves in AI, with Snap spinning off its AI video team and Elastic acquiring Deductive AI, alongside reports of AI inference startup Baseten raising significant funding, indicating major investment and restructuring around AI technologies.
  • Hardware and infrastructure remain critical, as highlighted by ASML facing scrutiny over potential chip tool sales to China and Google achieving a 50% IPv6 adoption rate, underscoring the ongoing importance of foundational tech advancements.
  • The evolving landscape of consumer tech includes new iOS features, Aura's innovative e-ink photo frame, and discussions around the future of car infotainment systems, with manufacturers reconsidering Android Auto.
  • Emerging technologies and market shifts are evident in areas like fusion startups attracting substantial investment, Waymo recalling robotaxis due to safety concerns, and the broader implications of governmental AI policies, such as potential bans impacting brands.

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The Verge

  • Sony’s Xperia 1 VIII is still a phone for the fans an hour ago by Dominic Preston
    Gadgets, Mobile, Phone Reviews, Phones, Reviews, Sony, Tech

    The 1 VIII doesn’t look much like any Xperia that’s come before. The Xperia 1 VIII marks an attempt at a step change for Sony's flagship phone line. Not only has it had an aesthetic overhaul, but Sony has also revamped the camera system, dropping the continuous optical zoom telephoto that's defined the last four generations of Xperia phone . It's not all different. Sony staples like a 3.5mm headphone jack and microSD card slot remain, and a few specific design touches, like a thick front bezel that fits stereo speakers, have stayed intact. Sony's ambitious pricing hasn't changed either:

  • The Atlantic created a searchable database of the music used to train AI 18 hours ago by Terrence O’Brien
    AI, Entertainment, Music, News

    Atlantic reporter Alex Reisner recently uncovered four datasets of music being used to train AI models and made them fully searchable for the public. Two of the sets are absolutely enormous at 12 million and 9 million tracks. The other two are much smaller, but still represent a significant amount of training data at over 100,000 songs each. According to Reisner, the sets have been downloaded thousands of times and, while it's impossible to know exactly who has used them, Google and Stability have both confirmed they have in research papers. Some of the sources, like the Free Music Archive

  • Musician and YouTuber Hainbach on ‘Breath of the Wild’ and Swiss Army Knives 21 hours ago by Terrence O’Brien
    Creators, Entertainment, Interview, Music, Report, Streaming, Tech, YouTube

    Indulging in the “Dark Souls of synthesis.” | Image: Aleksander Stojanov / Hainbach Stefan Paul Goetsch, better known as Hainbach, is a German experimental composer, artist, and YouTuber who is perhaps most famous for making music with laboratory equipment and scientific instruments. He describes it as being like the " Dark Souls of synthesis ." Despite using "hard mode" production techniques that often rely on telephone line testing equipment and gear salvaged from nuclear testing facilities, Hainbach is also incredibly prolific , releasing six albums in 2025 alone, along with a handful of singles and EPs. His latest, Gentle Hum

  • Moves of the Diamond Hand is an unfinished, irresistibly weird dice-based RPG a day ago by Adi Robertson
    Games Review, Gaming

    From its opening minutes, Moves of the Diamond Hand is upfront about what it offers: You're going to have a lot of strange conversations, and you're going to roll a lot of dice. Get on board with this proposition, and the reward is one of the most creative roleplaying games I've seen in years, even if its many mysteries won't be resolved until 2027. Moves of the Diamond Hand is an Early Access videogame available on PC, macOS, and steamOS (including the Steam Deck, where I played it) from musician and game designer Cosmo D. The game looks and feels

  • Toy Story has the right take on tech a day ago by David Pierce
    Gadgets, Installer, Streaming, Tech

    Hi, friends! Welcome to Installer No. 133, your guide to the best and Verge -iest stuff in the world. (If you're new here, welcome, happy belated Juneteenth, and also you can read all the old editions at the Installer homepage .) This week, I've been reading about Sam Bankman-Fried and PE Guy and admin nights (which we should totally all do together one of these days), listening to Paul McCartney on Song Exploder , trudging through the bugs of the iOS 27 beta in order to use the good new Siri, once again trying and failing to switch to YouTube


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