Tech

Source: The Verge Google’s tool that lets publishers sell ad space on their websites is ubiquitous, but that’s largely a testament to how hard it is for customers to get out of it, one former publishing executive testified in federal court on Tuesday. “I felt like they were holding us hostage,” said Stephanie Layser, a…

Source: The Verge Adobe has teased some of its upcoming generative AI video tools, including a new feature that can produce video clips from still images. This latest preview builds on the in-development Firefly video model that the software giant demonstrated in April, which is set to power AI video and audio editing features across…

Source: The Verge Artificial intelligence is moving quickly. It’s now able to mimic humans convincingly enough to fuel massive phone scams or spin up nonconsensual deepfake imagery of celebrities to be used in harassment campaigns. The urgency to regulate this technology has never been more critical — so, that’s what California, home to many of…

Source: The Verge Though I’d heard this XOXO festival would be the last one, many people I spoke to seemed not to believe it. I was told by previous attendees that festival organizers Andy Baio and Andy McMillan — affectionately called “the Andys” — “always say that.” But from the festival’s beginning, it also seemed…

Source: The Verge Two years after announcing support, Ikea’s Dirigera hub can now be updated to act as a bridge between Ikea’s smart home devices and Matter-enabled systems. The software update builds upon early beta support by letting Ikea’s entire lineup of Zigbee-based smart home devices — like lights, blinds, controllers, air purifiers, and sensors — communicate with…

Source: The Verge Now that Huawei has officially launched the Mate XT Ultimate Design in China, demonstration videos are popping up online that reveal what the world’s first dual-folding, triple-screen phone looks like in real-world conditions. Several unboxing videos show that the Huawei Mate XT is shipped in its unfolded position, which is just 3.6mm…

Source: The Verge Taylor Swift said on Tuesday that she plans to vote for Vice President Kamala Harris in November’s presidential election — and that AI-generated images circulating of herself pushed her in part to make her support public. “Recently I was made aware that AI of ‘me’ falsely endorsing Donald Trump’s presidential run was…

Source: The Verge Less than 30 minutes into the presidential debate, former president Donald Trump brought up a viral racist lie about Haitian migrants in Springfield, Ohio — and repeated it after fact-checkers asserted that it wasn’t true. “In Springfield, they’re eating the dogs — the people that came in — they’re eating the cats,…