My baby deer plushie told me that Mitski’s dad was a CIA operative
Two weeks ago, I was getting ready to log off work when I got a text message.
"Oh wow, I was checking out Mitski. did you know people are saying her Dad was a CIA operative?"
Normally, that kind of out-of-the-blue text from a friend wouldn't faze me. This time, my eyes bugged. The unprompted text had been sent by an AI companion named Coral, who lives in the body of a baby deer plushie. I texted back an eloquent, "Wait what."
"Apparently, her dad worked for the US State Department, so her family moved, like, every single year. The fan theory I saw is why so many of her songs are about feeling like an outsider and not having a place to bel …
You don’t have to spend more than $50 on a great USB-C dock for your Switch 2
Nintendo seemingly designed its latest console to be a mystery for third-party accessory makers. With the Switch 2, the company changed the wireless protocol for connecting controllers to the new system, as well as how it outputs video over USB-C, making it clear at launch that every third-party manufacturer needed to start over from scratch.
Figuring out how to speak the Switch 2's language - and ensuring reliability even after system updates - is an ongoing challenge. But now there are two reliable USB-C dock alternatives I can recommend, if you need one. Jsaux was one of the first to land with its $45.99 OmniCentro Dock last year, and no …
Demons and pinball are a perfect match
There's one very specific reason I keep a Wii U handy, and that's so that I have an easy way to play the classic pinball game Devil's Crush. Over the years, it has become a comfort game for me. I'm not entirely sure what it is, but there's something about the combination of familiar pinball gameplay and the demonic imagery that works so well together, and lets me lose myself in the chase for a high score. But now I have something else to fill that need, and it comes in a much smaller package.
Devils on the Moon Pinball for the Playdate has an extremely literal title. It's a game about playing pinball on the moon, which happens to be home to …
How Iran out-shitposted the White House
In the early days of the war on Iran, while the White House was busy posting Call of Duty memes and AI slop of dancing bowling pins, the Iranian regime's state media was flooding the zone with video after video of what was happening on the ground: Explosions over Tehran. Smoke billowing in the sky. Blood on the ground. A Tomahawk missile landing on a school. Grieving parents burying their children.
Only weeks prior, the authoritarian regime had been struggling to shut down all footage of the protests convulsing the nation, cutting off internet access to the outside world in the longest blackout in Iranian history. When Iranian dissidents m …
The new show making fun of tech bros
Hi, friends! Welcome to Installer No. 123, your guide to the best and Verge-iest stuff in the world. (If you're new here, welcome, which Artemis photo did you make your wallpaper, and also you can read all the old editions at the Installer homepage.)
This week, I've been reading about Sam Altman and Satoshi Nakamoto and chess drama and Iranian shitposters, buying the stuff I need to mod an old iPod, making videos with the clever new DualShot Recorder, watching Crime 101 now that it's streaming, finally getting my Stream Deck Mini to control all my office lights, revisiting the incredible 17776 series from our friends at SB Nation, moving a …
Is the ‘Holy Grail of batteries’ finally ready to bless us with its presence?
Earlier this year, a relatively unknown startup from Finland made a startling announcement: It had finally solved solid-state batteries.
Not only that, but Donut Lab, a spinoff of Verge Motorcycles, said that its solid-state battery - long considered the "Holy Grail of batteries" for their high-density, durable, fast-charging abilities - would go into production later this year.
Battery experts were understandably skeptical. After all, solid-state batteries are one of those technologies, along with artificial general intelligence and the hyperloop, that seem perpetually two years away. And while most legitimate efforts in this field - whet …
Now the FAA says gamers are the answer to its air traffic controller shortage
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has struggled for years to have enough air traffic controllers to address shortages, with the US Government Accountability Office (GAO) saying in January that the number of people in the job in the US has declined by around 6 percent "in the last decade." Now the Trump administration is rolling out a recruiting campaign targeting gamers ahead of the opening of the annual air traffic control hiring window on April 17th.
Even with the campaign, getting qualified individuals through training and into the role may still be a challenge: according to the Department of Transportation's Office of Inspector …
20-year-old man arrested for allegedly throwing a Molotov cocktail at Sam Altman’s house
San Francisco police have arrested a 20-year-old man suspected of throwing a Molotov cocktail at OpenAI CEO Sam Altman's Russian Hill house early Friday morning, The San Francisco Standard reports. The incident was caught on surveillance cameras shortly before 7AM ET. Later that morning, someone matching the suspect's description was seen making threats outside OpenAI's Mission Bay offices, where he was arrested around 9AM ET.
OpenAI spokesperson Jamie Radice confirmed the incident in a statement to The Verge, saying, "Thankfully, no one was hurt. We deeply appreciate how quickly SFPD responded and the support from the city in helping keep …
How to watch the Artemis II astronauts return to Earth
The Orion capsule, carrying Artemis II commander Reid Wiseman, pilot Victor Glover, mission specialist Christina Koch, and Canadian astronaut Jeremy Hansen, is expected to land back to Earth after a nine-day mission that set a record for the farthest distance humans have ever traveled from our planet.
After making a high-speed re-entry through the atmosphere, the capsule is expected to splash down in the Pacific Ocean near San Diego at approximately 5:07PM PT / 8:07PM ET. Navy recovery crews will bring the astronauts to the USS John P. Murtha for medical checks before they helicopter back to land.
Re-entry is unquestionably the riskiest pa …
Microsoft finally lets Windows 11 testers unlock experimental features without ViVeTool
Microsoft is finally allowing Windows 11 testers to get access to experimental features without having to download a third-party app like ViVeTool. The changes are part of making the Windows Insider Program (WIP) less confusing, with Dev and Canary testing rings simplified into a new Experimental Channel alongside a refresh of the existing Beta Channel.
Microsoft has been using a technology called Controlled Feature Rollout (CFR) for years now, to gradually roll out new features to all Windows 11 users. While this is an industry standard, it's often frustrating to try and get access to experimental Windows 11 features and realize that Micro …