The MSI Claw EX is the most important handheld since Steam Deck — I still wouldn’t buy one
As The Verge's resident handheld reviewer, I have nearly every portable gaming PC on a shelf in my house. The MSI Claw 8 EX AI Plus is now the first one I reach for. Thanks to a next-gen Intel chip and improved MSI design, the Claw EX is the most powerful handheld that truly feels portable. It's the handheld with the longest battery life, and the first Windows handheld I can trust to sleep and wake reliably.
Like the Steam Deck, when I press the power button, my game is always right where I left off. Unlike the Steam Deck, it can hibernate for days without losing a significant amount of charge.
Performance and battery? Windows and sleep? …
Hoto’s new cordless soldering iron heats up in three seconds
Hoto is introducing its first soldering iron through its modular Snapbloq collection that lets you assemble your own custom toolbox by stacking magnetic cases and tools together. The new I-A06 Cordless Soldering Iron can heat to just over 200 degrees Celsius in about three seconds and offers an adjustable temperature range from 100 to up to 450 degrees with customizable presets you can quickly jump to.
The full kit version of the soldering iron is available starting today for $99.99 and includes a C245 knife tip plus additional tips that can be used for other tasks such as wood burning. If you just want the tool you can buy it on its own fo …
Apple trained its own AI model for China with help from Alibaba
Apple has reportedly trained a custom AI model for the China market alongside domestic tech giant Alibaba, a rare cross-border partnership that cuts across growing tensions between Beijing and Washington.
The China-focused large language model was developed in partnership with Alibaba and trained with the company's support, Reuters reports, citing three unnamed people familiar with the matter.
Developing a custom model of its own marks a departure from Apple's previous strategy in the country and would give the company more control over its products in the competitive Chinese smartphone market. Historically, Apple has used domestic Chines …
Help build a monument to that ‘sad little bitch’ Elon Musk
Cards Against Humanity is gearing up to build "something that will annoy Elon Musk," and it's crowdfunding the project with its usual flavor of vulgarity. The company behind the card game announced plans to build "a grand monument" to Musk on the parcel of land it owns near Starbase, Texas, with the aim to "make him wonder, for a brief moment, 'Wait, am I a sad little bitch with no friends?'"
Cards Against Humanity is known for these kinds of stunts, having purchased the land in question back in 2017 specifically to disrupt President Donald Trump's plans to build a US/Mexico border wall. The card game company later sued SpaceX in 2024 for a …
Trump declares 100 percent tariffs on many drones and all aircraft parts
The United States has already banned future foreign drones from entering the United States unless their companies kiss the ring - as well as routers, robots, and Roombas. Now, President Donald Trump is targeting existing drone imports and parts, too. He's going to try to make them cost a lot more.
In a presidential action, he's declared a whopping 100 percent tariff on imports of drones with thermal cameras, drones weighing over 25kg (57 pounds), and any kind of part for any kind of unmanned aircraft weighing over 25kg - you can read the full list here. For all other drones, including tiny sub-250-gram "Mini" consumer drones, he's declared …
Apple and Epic argue over how much Apple should get from purchases made outside the App Store
In a new filing in its long-running legal dispute with Epic Games, Apple has proposed a structure that would allow it to collect fees on digital purchases made via external links that don't use the company's in-app purchase system. Epic has already responded, saying that Apple's request is "far outside of the bounds" of the court's guidance.
Right now, Apple cannot take a commission on external purchases after California district court judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers ruled in April 2025 that found the company "willfully" didn't comply with her 2021 Epic Games v. Apple injunction. However, a Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals panel said that Apple …
‘That is not acceptable’: Judge orders Google to make rival app store installs easier
One month after Epic Games and Google seemingly stopped fighting over the future of Android app distribution, they were back in a San Francisco courtroom today - where Judge James Donato just ordered Google to make it easier to install rival app stores on Android.
It's been nearly three years since a jury unanimously decided that Google had an illegal monopoly over Android apps, and almost two years since Judge Donato decided the best way of undoing that monopoly would be to crack open Android app distribution. Donato ordered Google to carry rival Android app stores inside its own Google Play Store, and to provide rivals with complete acce …
The fight over Flock and other ALPRs
There are over 120,000 of Flock’s automatic license plate reader (ALPR) cameras installed all over the US. Flock’s cameras, and others like them, use AI to identify and track vehicles based on their license plate number, make, model, color, and other info, networked together to track vehicles and people’s movements throughout the day and across the country.
Dozens of communities have canceled contracts for the cameras or turned them off, including Los Angeles, as officials have pushed for more limits on the data they collect, who has access to it, and how it can be used in the future. Earlier this year, Amazon-owned Ring canceled a partnership with Flock after online backlash.
- Flock CEO: ‘We got this one wrong’
- Flock cameras? Target practice.
- Another grim portent for our AI policing future.
- The LAPD has suspended its use of Flock’s license plate readers, for now.
- No, Flock isn’t threatening people for debating surveillance
- The all-too-predictable Flock stalking problem.
- Let’s talk about Ring, lost dogs, and the surveillance state
- Ring’s Flock breakup doesn’t fix its real problem
- Flock is “pausing further exploration of a potential partnership with Ring.”
- Ring cancels its partnership with Flock Safety after surveillance backlash
- Dozens of Flock AI camera feeds were just out there
- AI annotators overseas may be reviewing Flock license plate camera footage from the US.
- Amazon’s Ring now works with video surveillance company Flock
- Unprotected license plate surveillance cameras let anyone with a web browser tune in
Microsoft’s Clippy-like Mico character is no longer the face of Copilot
Microsoft Copilot will no longer show its emotive yellow blob, Mico, when you use the chatbot's voice mode. In a support page, Microsoft says it's going to move Mico to its Learn Live platform, where the avatar will have "more to react to," as reported earlier by GeekWire.
Mico launched in Copilot's voice mode last October, with Microsoft AI CEO Mustafa Suleyman pitching the avatar as a way to give the chatbot an "identity." The blob would react to what you say in real-time, complete with facial expressions and animations.
Mico joins the long list of virtual helpers that Microsoft has retired over the years, like Clippy, Cortana, and Rover …
Netflix is closing two game studios
Netflix plans to shut down two of its gaming studios, as reported by Game File and Variety, as it makes a bigger shift toward party games and titles streamed to TVs.
One of the studios being shut down is Night School Studio, creators of the Oxenfree series. Netflix bought Night School in 2021, and it just released a horror experience called Unhinged for TVs and launched a mobile game in 2025 tied to Black Mirror. The other studio that's set to close is Helsinki-based Moonloot Games, which was created in 2022.
Netflix's big push into TV-based games kicked off late last year and was a pivot from a mobile-focused approach that featured presti …