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AI Summary

  • Bucket Robotics is focusing on business growth and fundraising after its CES debut, aiming for strategic commercial partnerships.
  • Moxie Marlinspike has launched Confer, a privacy-focused AI alternative to ChatGPT that ensures user conversations aren’t used for training or advertising.
  • Elon Musk seeks compensation of up to $134 billion from OpenAI for what he claims are "wrongful gains" related to his initial investment in the AI company, amid ongoing controversies surrounding AI ethics and usage.
  • California's Attorney General has issued a cease-and-desist order to Musk's xAI for producing non-consensual deepfake images, highlighting the growing concern over AI-generated harmful content.
  • In response to a changing landscape for electric vehicles, Canada has significantly reduced tariffs on Chinese EVs, opening new opportunities in cross-border trade with the U.S. maintaining stricter import laws.

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Engadget

  • Apple's latest 25W MagSafe charger is on sale for $30 an hour ago by Steve Dent
    Technology & Electronics, Handheld & Connected Devices, site|engadget, provider_name|Engadget, region|US, language|en-US, author_name|Steve Dent

    If you want a wireless charger for your iPhone and prefer to stick with Apple, Amazon has a sale that may pique your interest. The retailer is selling the one meter Apple Magsafe charger for $30, saving you $10 off the regular price, while also selling the two meter model for $40 ($10 off). If you have an iPhone 16, iPhone 17 or iPhone Air, this cable can charge your device at 25W as long as it's connected to a 30W power adapter on the other end. While you'll need a more recent iPhone to get the fastest MagSafe charging speeds,

  • Disney+ and Hulu deal: Get one month of the bundle for only $10 an hour ago by Valentina Palladino,Georgie Peru
    Media, Arts & Entertainment, site|engadget, provider_name|Engadget, region|US, language|en-US, author_name|Valentina Palladino

    The peak time for deals on streaming services — the holiday shopping season — has come and gone, but Disney is back with a fresh offer for the new year. New and eligible returning subscribers can get one month of the ad-supported Disney+ Hulu bundle for just $10. That's $3 off the usual monthly rate for the bundle, and more than 58 percent off if you consider the prices for each service individually (Disney+ at $12 per month and, separately, Hulu also at $12 per month). We'd be remiss if we didn't mention that this isn't quite as good as the

  • The plan for a gaming-themed Atari hotel in Las Vegas has reportedly been scrapped 20 hours ago by Cheyenne MacDonald
    Travel & Tourism, site|engadget, provider_name|Engadget, region|US, language|en-US, author_name|Cheyenne MacDonald

    Six years after the announcement of plans to build Atari Hotels in eight cities across the US, including Las Vegas, only one now seems to be moving forward, in Phoenix, Arizona. The Las Vegas deal ultimately "didn't come to fruition," spokesperson Sara Collins told Las Vegas Sun this week, and Atari Hotels is putting its focus into the Phoenix site "for the time being." Phoenix was always meant to be the first site, followed by other hotels in Austin, Chicago, Denver, Las Vegas, San Francisco, San Jose and Seattle. But Las Vegas is now apparently off the table, and there haven't

  • Amazon's live-action God of War adaptation adds Teresa Palmer 21 hours ago by Jackson Chen
    Media, site|engadget, provider_name|Engadget, region|US, language|en-US, author_name|Jackson Chen

    Amazon is reportedly adding Teresa Palmer (The Fall Guy, Warm Bodies, Hacksaw Ridge) to its pantheon of Norse gods for its God of War TV show adaptation. As first reported by Deadline, Palmer will play Sif, Thor's wife and eventual leader of the Aesir, in the live-action adaptation. It may not carry as much weight as the casting of the video game's protagonist that was revealed earlier this week to be Ryan Hurst, but it could hint at the direction the TV show may take. > View this post on Instagram While Sif plays a minor role in the God of War

  • TikTok's latest spinoff app feels a lot like Quibi, but with shorter and cornier content a day ago by Jackson Chen
    Software, Media, Technology & Electronics, Arts & Entertainment, Television, site|engadget, provider_name|Engadget, region|US, language|en-US, author_name|Jackson Chen

    In another attempt to reduce our attention spans to mush, TikTok has released the PineDrama app, which offers serialized drama series that are roughly a minute per episode. As first spotted by Business Insider, the app is designed exactly like TikTok, but instead of trendy dance videos, you can scroll through and watch "micro dramas." For those new to the category, micro dramas are bite-sized TV shows shot in vertical video and available in minute-long episodes. Don't expect any nominations for Best Original Screenplay with series like The Officer Fell For Me or Married to my past life's nemesis, since they


The Verge

  • Microsoft’s first Windows 11 update of 2026 stopped some computers from shuting down 35 minutes ago by Terrence O’Brien
    Microsoft, News, Tech

    Microsoft released its first security update of 2026 for Windows 11 on January 13th. Just four days later, it was forced to release an emergency out-of-band update to fix some pretty serious bugs, the first one introduced. The security patch was stopping some systems from shutting down or hibernating properly, and also preventing some users from logging in via remote desktop. This is just the latest buggy update that has forced Microsoft to issue an out-of-band update, something that used to be pretty rare, but seems to be becoming increasingly common. According to the changelog: > Microsoft has identified issues upon installing

  • Here are the 10 deals worth grabbing from Best Buy’s winter sales event 3 hours ago by Sheena Vasani
    Deals, Gadgets, Tech, Verge Shopping

    Sony’s terrific Bravia 8 II is $900 off for a limited time. Good deals are often hard to come by at the beginning of the year — which is precisely what makes Best Buy’s Winter Sale worth checking out. The ongoing sales event features discounts on everything from big-ticket OLED TVs to smaller electronics, including fitness trackers that can help you achieve your New Year’s resolutions. There are also solid deals to be had on laptops, Bose headphones, and other Verge-approved pieces of tech, many of which are matching their best prices to date. The sale ends on January 19th, meaning you

  • Kaoss Pad V is the first major upgrade to Korg’s touch-based effects in 13 years 4 hours ago by Terrence O’Brien
    Entertainment, Gadgets, Music, News, Tech

    The Kaoss Pad has seen many different iterations, but the mainline effect unit and sampler hasn't received an update since the launch of the KP3+ in 2013. Korg has finally given it the attention it deserves with the release of the Kaoss Pad V. Rather than a dramatic reimagining of what a Kaoss Pad is, the V takes the core idea - an effect unit with an X / Y pad for controlling parameters in a natural, performance-focused way. The big innovation on the Kaoss Pad V is that it can recognize two fingers simultaneously to control two distinct sets of

  • Why Coinbase derailed the crypto industry’s political future 4 hours ago by Tina Nguyen
    Crypto, Policy, Politics, Tech

    Brian Armstrong, chief executive officer of Coinbase Global Inc., speaks to members of the media on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC, US, on Thursday, Jan. 15, 2026. | Aaron Schwartz/Bloomberg via Getty Images. January was going to be a landmark month for the crypto industry. The Senate would start negotiating the finer details of the CLARITY Act, a major law that would finally enshrine the fundamental structure of how the crypto market could legally operate in the United States: what digital assets counted as a security versus a commodity, what regulatory responsibilities companies had to abide by, what legal protections consumers

  • Under Musk, the Grok disaster was inevitable 4 hours ago by Hayden Field
    AI, Column, Elon Musk, Tech, The Stepback, xAI

    This is The Stepback, a weekly newsletter breaking down one essential story from the tech world. For more on dystopian developments in AI, follow Hayden Field. The Stepback arrives in our subscribers' inboxes at 8AM ET. Opt in for The Stepback here. HOW IT STARTED You could say it all started with Elon Musk's AI FOMO - and his crusade against "wokeness." When his AI company, xAI, announced Grok in November 2023, it was described as a chatbot with "a rebellious streak" and the ability to "answer spicy questions that are rejected by most other AI systems." The chatbot debuted after a


Wired


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