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Elon Musk has a new AI company. A website has appeared for xAI, which will embark on the self-described mission to “understand the true nature of the universe.” The announcement comes after filing documents revealed the existence of a company called “X.AI Corp” earlier this year. Musk also said in an April interview that he wanted to start a venture for “maximum truth-seeking AI that tries to understand the nature of the universe” that “hopefully does more good than harm.”

Not much else is known yet about Musk’s latest venture. The Tesla and SpaceX CEO and Twitter Chairman tweeted today, “Announcing formation of @xAI to understand reality.” The company webpage notes that the team will host a Twitter Spaces chat on Friday, July 14th.

Musk’s previous comments about an AI startup were aimed at creating “a third option” to challenge ChatGPT maker OpenAI and Google. He reportedly bought thousands of GPUs earlier this year for a Twitter-related AI project. It isn’t yet clear whether the two projects are related.

The website lists veterans of DeepMind, OpenAI, Google Research, Microsoft Research, Tesla and the University of Toronto as working on the project. “Collectively we contributed some of the most widely used methods in the field, in particular the Adam optimizer, Batch Normalization, Layer Normalization, and the discovery of adversarial examples,” the xAI website reads. “We further introduced innovative techniques and analyses such as Transformer-XL, Autoformalization, the Memorizing Transformer, Batch Size Scaling, and μTransfer. We have worked on and led the development of some of the largest breakthroughs in the field including AlphaStar, AlphaCode, Inception, Minerva, GPT-3.5, and GPT-4.”

In addition to Musk, the listed team members include Igor Babuschkin, Manuel Kroiss, Yuhuai (Tony) Wu, Christian Szegedy, Jimmy Ba, Toby Pohlen, Ross Nordeen, Kyle Kosic, Greg Yang, Guodong Zhang and Zihang Dai.

There's something exciting about trying out new versions of an operating system, especially when it's a test build. Suddenly a device you've gotten to know well becomes fresh again and useful (or at the very least entertaining) in all new ways. Now is that time for eager Apple users, with the company's iOS 17, iPadOS 17, watchOS 10 and macOS Sonoma public betas finally available to download.

The new iOS 17 will include a slew of updates from design to practical. You can customize what people see when you call them — whether it's a cute cartoon or your favorite selfie, put the call to voicemail with a live transcription across your screen and send someone a video or audio message if they don't pick up your FaceTime call. Plus, you can mute and unmute yourself right from your AirPods. "Ducking" should also be a thing of the past on iOS 17 with an improved autocorrect and you can utilize sentence predictions for quicker responses. Additional features include automatically checking in to let your friends know you've arrived home, locating real-time charging stations along your route on Maps and the ability to say how you're feeling on the Health app (so and so is pleasant does feel very early Facebook days).

iPadOS 17 is, to a degree, a catch-up release that adds a customizable lock screen, the Health app and interactive widgets. WatchOS 10 is a substantial Apple Watch revamp that revives the emphasis on widgets while overhauling core apps and improving fitness features. MacOS Sonoma, meanwhile, brings widgets to the Mac desktop while upgrading Safari, video calls and gaming.

Apple first announced these upgrades at its Worldwide Developers Conference and subsequently released the iOS 17, iPadOS 17 and macOS Sonoma betas for developers. Unlike in previous years, though, the developer betas were available free for anyone to try — developer accounts typically cost about $100 per year. The iOS 17 public beta should be a bit more polished than the developer builds, given the extra time to work out bugs and compatibility problems. The official versions will launch this fall, but you can sign up for the Apple Beta Software Program if you want to try the previews now.

The Academy of Television Arts and Sciences has announced this year's Emmy nominations and there's lots of good news for the team behind The Last of Us. HBO's massively successful series scored 24 nominations, more than any other show this year except Succession (27). The White Lotus (23) and Apple TV+ comedy Ted Lasso (21) followed closely behind.

The Last of Us is the first live-action video game adaptation for film or TV to make a serious dent at a major awards ceremony (League of Legends series Arcanewon the Emmy for Outstanding Animated Program last year). It's up for Outstanding Drama Series alongside Andor, Better Call Saul, House of the Dragon, Succession, The White Lotus and Yellowjackets.

Pedro Pascal (who has three nods in total this year) and Bella Ramsay picked up nominations for their lead roles in The Last of Us. So did guest stars Melanie Lynskey, Storm Reid, Anna Torv, Murray Bartlett, Lamar Johnson, Nick Offerman and Keivonn Montreal Woodard. Craig Mazin, the show's co-creator, and Peter Hoar are, respectively, nominated for writing and directing the show's stellar third episode, "Long, Long Time."

Elsewhere, reigning champ Ted Lasso will compete against Abbott Elementary, Barry, The Bear, Jury Duty, The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, Only Murders In The Building and Wednesday in the Outstanding Comedy Series category. On the Star Wars front, Andor scooped up eight nominations and The Mandalorian got nine. Obi-Wan Kenobi snagged five, including one for Outstanding Limited or Anthology Series.

Disney+ film Hocus Pocus 2 (three nominations in total) and Roku's Weird: The Al Yankovic Story (eight nods overall) are up for Outstanding Television Movie. Amazon's big-budget The Lord Of The Rings: The Rings Of Power landed six nominations, mostly in technical categories. 

Stranger Things, which isn't eligible for top honors this year, also has six nods in down-the-line categories. Meanwhile, Peacock's Poker Face snagged four nominatons, Star Trek: Picard has two in makeup categories and Netflix's brilliant I Think You Should Leave With Tim Robinson snagged a pair of nods.

Perhaps unsurprisingly given how many nominations Succession, The Last of Us and The White Lotus racked up, HBO leads the pack this year with 127 nominations overall. According to Deadline's tally, Netflix has the most of any streaming-only network with 103, followed by Apple (52), Amazon (46 between Prime Video and Freevee), Hulu (42 or 64 if you include FX shows), Disney+ (40), Peacock (eight) and Paramount+ (seven). By contrast, broadcast networks earned 86 nods between them.

This year's Emmy Awards ceremony is scheduled to take place on September 18th. However, amid the WGA writers' strike and pending action by the actors' union, reports suggest it may be delayed until November or even January.

At Google I/O in May, the company revealed its plans to go all-in on AI with the likes of PaLM 2, Bard, and a whole host of intelligent enhancement features for its myriad products. Tucked into that cavalcade of consumerism was a brief discussion of Google's Project Tailwind, an experimental product geared towards students as an "AI-first notebook" to help them stay organized. On Wednesday, Project Tailwind graduated development to become NotebookLM (NLM).

NLM is essentially note taking software with a large language model tacked onto the side, which is "paired with your existing content to gain critical insights, faster." Basically, it's a chatbot that is continually tuned to your specific data set, so when you ask it a question it pulls from just that information rather than the collective knowledge of whatever the underlying model was built with. This process of "source-grounding" ensures that the virtual assistant stays on topic and provides more relevant responses.

That virtual assistant can do all of the normal chatbot tasks including summarizing newly added documents, deeply answering questions about the text corpus, and generating new content from that information. NLM is being made immediately available to a small cadre of beta testers in the US to provide feedback for further development, though there's no word yet on when it will be made available to the general public. If you want to try it early for yourself, sign up on the waitlist.

It’s hard to believe, but the James Webb Space Telescope started sending out stunning images of the universe one full year ago. To commemorate the milestone, NASA's letting the telescope do what it does best, showing us obscenely cool space shots. The latest and greatest image depicts a (relatively) nearby region of space that’s a galactic nursery of sorts, with 50 young stars that could one day form systems that resemble our own.

The Rho Ophiuchi cloud complex is approximately 390 light years from Earth, which is peanuts when compared to the vastness of space, though it would still take 14,500,000 years of travel to get there using current technology. The stars shown in the image are mostly similar in mass to our beloved sun and some even boast the beginnings of circumstellar disks, which are the swirling rings of gas and dust where planets are born.

NASA

So what are those gorgeous red swirls? Those are huge jets of molecular hydrogen, which occur when a star bursts through its natal envelope of cosmic dust and stretches out into the universe for the very time. New life is beautiful, and red. Mostly red.

“Webb’s image of Rho Ophiuchi allows us to witness a very brief period in the stellar life cycle with new clarity. Our own sun experienced a phase like this, long ago, and now we have the technology to see the beginning of another’s star’s story,” said project scientist Klaus Pontoppidan.

The James Webb Space Telescope has been dropping hit after hit throughout this past year. There was the first image of an interstellar asteroid belt, a harrowing scene depicting the Pillars of Creation, a picture of an early-universe galaxy cluster and so much more. It still hasn’t found aliens though. What’s up with that?

Broadcom just took a big step toward clinching its $61 billion purchase of VMware, albeit with some requirements attached. The EU's European Commission has approved the merger following a months-long investigation of the potential competitive harm. Officials found that Broadcom only had limited opportunities to abuse its power, and that some remedies could ensure healthy competition going forward.

The Commission determined that Broadcom doesn't have a "strong position" that could hurt competition in network and storage adapters, and that it wouldn't have an incentive to limit a networking partnership with AMD and NVIDIA. It also couldn't bundle VMware with its own software. Broadcom would, however have the motivation to squeeze its longtime rival Marvell by limiting the compatibility of that company's Fiber Channel adapters with VMware.

To address this, the EU regulator will require that Broadcom offer third parties the tools to make compatible Fiber Channel adapters. The firm will also have to provide source code for the drivers that run those adapters. Ideally, companies will know that their equipment works properly with VMware's server virtualization technology.

In a statement, Broadcom says that it "continue[s] to make progress" in getting approvals for the merger, and points to similar arrangements in countries like Australia, Canada and South Africa. It's still facing reviews from the US Federal Trade Commission and the UK's Competition and Markets Authority.

If the deal closes, it will represent one of the largest tech acquisitions yet. Only Dell's purchase of EMC ($67 billion) and Microsoft's tentative buyout of Activision Blizzard ($68.7 billion) are larger. For Broadcom, this would also be a pivotal expansion — it would make a deep dive into enterprise software that could help it control more of the business world. To some degree, it would also help Broadcom make up for its failed takeover of Qualcomm in 2018.

After a couple years of Xbox and PlayStation stock shortages, it's now fairly easy to get your hands on a current gaming console. Now might be the ideal time to snap up the Xbox Series X, Microsoft's most powerful console, as it's on sale. You can pick up an Xbox Series X for $450, which is $50 off the regular price.

When the Xbox Series X debuted in late 2020, we gave it a score of 87 in our review, though Microsoft has improved the experience since then with new features and updates. At the time, we appreciated the power of the hardware and the console's ability to run demanding games while keeping the fan quiet. With the help of a solid state drive, load times are minimal and the useful Quick Resume feature swiftly helps you keep playing from where you left off. Backward compatibility with hundreds of previous-generation Xbox games is a major plus, as is the addition of HDR to older titles.

One of our key complaints at the time of our review was the lack of compelling games. That's less of a problem these days, as Microsoft has just about something for everyone on Xbox Series X/S, with titles such as Forza Horizon 5, Hi-Fi Rush and Microsoft Flight Simulator in the lineup. The highly anticipated Starfield will arrive in September, and there are a ton of other intriguing games from both Xbox's studios and external developers in the pipeline.

One of the Xbox Series X's strongest selling points is Xbox Game Pass integration. Although Microsoft just increased the price of the subscription service, it includes access to every single Xbox first-party game on the day it's released. The library includes an extensive selection of third-party games as well, meaning players have hundreds of titles at their fingertips. Grand Theft Auto V just returned to the service, for one thing.

Opt for a Game Pass Ultimate membership and you'll get all of that along with access to a bunch more EA titles and the option to play the service's games via the cloud and on PC. Thanks to save data that's stored in the cloud, you'll be able to play a game on your Series X and continue where you left off on your phone, tablet or computer. You can try Game Pass Ultimate for $1 for your first month.

There are some drawbacks to the Series X compared with the competition. You have limited options for expanding the storage, as Microsoft opted for a proprietary card that only two manufacturers are making. The PlayStation 5 has a more immersive controller due to features like adaptive triggers and the remarkable haptic feedback. Unless you have a PS5 as well, you'll also need to consider which of each console's exclusive games are more compelling to you before taking the plunge on a Series X.

Amazon Prime Day is looking like a good time to pick up a new phone, so long as you prefer Android. While you won't find any iPhone deals among Amazon’s sales barrage, several of the Samsung Galaxy S23 and Google Pixel devices we recommend in our smartphone buying guides are down to the lowest prices we’ve seen. If you’ve been waiting to pick up a new handset (and don't mind buying unlocked), here are the best Prime Day phone deals we can find. Remember that you’ll need to be an Amazon Prime subscriber to see some of the discounts.

Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra

The 256GB Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra is on sale for $850, which is the lowest price we’ve seen for this factory unlocked model and more than $200 off the phone’s usual price. If you need more storage space, the 512GB model is $400 off its list price at $980.

The S23 Ultra earned a review score of 89 this past February, and it’s currently the top Android pick in our smartphone buying guide. It has just about everything you’d expect from a high-end handheld: a gorgeous 6.8-inch OLED display with a fast 120Hz refresh rate, a snappy Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 processor, top-notch build quality, more than all-day battery life and a powerful camera system. It comes with an S Pen stylus, and Samsung will support the device with five years of security patches and four years of OS updates. You may need to put in a little extra work to unlock the full potential of those cameras, and Samsung’s software is still somewhat bloaty, but the S23 Ultra is a decidedly premium device. The biggest knock against it is that it’s expensive, but this deal helps with that.

Samsung Galaxy S23

The base Galaxy S23 is down to $600 for a 128GB model and $660 for a 256GB unit. Both of these deals represent a roughly $140 discount and match the lowest prices we’ve tracked. The Galaxy S23 trails the S23 Ultra in terms of battery life, camera hardware and charging speed, but that still leaves room for a fast and vibrant device that’ll receive updates for years to come. Apart from the lower cost, the biggest reason to consider it is because it’s one of the smallest high-end phones on the market, with a 6.1-inch display that should be easy for many people to use with one hand.

Samsung Galaxy S23+

The 256GB Samsung Galaxy S23+ is available for $750, which is another all-time low for an unlocked model and about $150 off this model’s typical going rate. The 512GB variant is on sale for $70 more. The S23+ is the middle child between the Galaxy S23 and S23 Ultra. It has the same processor, triple-camera system and 1080p resolution as the former, but it offers a larger 6.6-inch OLED display without adding the weight of the latter. It also supports faster charging speeds than the S23, with a maximum of 45W instead of 25W. Deputy Editor Cherlynn Low gave the Galaxy S23+ a score of 86 in her review this past February.

Google Pixel 7 Pro

Google’s trio of Pixel 7 phones are also discounted for Prime Day. First up, the Pixel 7 Pro is down to $649 for a 128GB model, $749 for a 256GB model and $849 for a 512GB model. Each is $250 off Google’s list price and $50 below than the previous lows we’ve seen.

We call the Pixel 7 Pro the best “camera phone” in our smartphone buying guide, as it takes consistently crisp and accurate photos with less fuss than alternatives like the Galaxy S23 Ultra. It also outperforms its peers in low-light settings. Google’s take on Android is generally cleaner than Samsung’s One UI, and both the Pixel 7 and Pixel 7 Pro will receive security updates through late 2027. That said, the S23 Ultra’s raw performance is still better for more involved tasks like gaming, and it outpaces Google’s flagship in display quality and battery life. It’s also worth noting that Google will almost certainly launch new Pixel 8 phones later this year. But if camera quality is your top concern, this is still a good value. Senior Writer Sam Rutherford gave the Pixel 7 Pro a review score of 92 last fall.

Google Pixel 7

The 128GB and 256GB versions of the unlocked Pixel 7 are down to $499 and $599, respectively. We’ve seen these SKUs go for $50 less in the past, but each is roughly $70 below their typical street price. While the Pixel 7 Pro has a 6.7-inch 1440p OLED display with a 120Hz refresh rate, the normal Pixel 7 bumps things down to a 6.3-inch 1080p panel that tops out at 90Hz. There’s no 5x telephoto lens, either, so you won’t get the same level of zoom for photos. That said, the device runs on the same solid Tensor G2 chip and delivers the same software experience, while its camera is still on the shortlist for the best on the market. Its battery lasts a little longer as well. We gave the Pixel 7 a score of 90 last year.

Google Pixel 7a

The Pixel 7a is Google’s latest midrange phone, essentially a Pixel 7 with a slightly smaller 6.1-inch display, marginally slower charging speeds (18W instead of 20W) and a back made from (nice) plastic instead of Gorilla Glass. Most of the other essentials are just about identical, plus the 7a will get an extra year of software and security updates. As of this writing, the unlocked Pixel 7a is available for $449, which is a $50 discount and a new low. If you prefer a smaller handset or just want to save $50, it’s a fantastic value, though the Pixel 7 is still a bit better if you can pay a little extra. We gave the Pixel 7a a score of 90 earlier this year and call it the best midrange Android phone in our buying guide.

Google Pixel 6a

Last year’s Pixel 6a is on sale for $249, a $100 discount that might be hard to top for those shopping in the bargain bin. Yes, the Pixel 6a can’t really touch the Pixel 7a: Its Tensor G1 chip isn’t as fast, it has less RAM (6GB versus 8GB) and a more basic 60Hz refresh rate, there’s no wireless charging, and its camera is slightly worse. But it runs the same pleasant software as other Pixel phones, its hardware is still far from slow or cheap-feeling, and its camera runs circles around other phones in this price range. It won’t last as long as some alternatives, but it's a nice upgrade over the usual budget suspects.

Motorola Moto G Stylus

We list the latest Moto G Stylus as an honorable mention in our guide to the best affordable smartphones, as it’s one of the few budget phones to come with a built-in stylus. If you can afford to step up to even the Pixel 6a, do so; this phone lags far behind in just about every way, from camera performance to charging speed to general peppiness. But if you really can’t spend more than $200 and like to jot down notes with a pen, the Moto G Stylus is a decent buy at $170, which is $30 off its typical going rate. Unlike the Pixel 6a, it also gets you a headphone jack and a microSD card slot.

Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 4 + Galaxy Z Fold 4

Both of Samsung’s premier foldable phones, the Galaxy Z Flip 4 and Galaxy Z Fold 4, are on sale for Prime Day, with the former available for $800 and the latter down to $1,100. The Flip is about $200 off, while the Fold is around $500 cheaper than usual. These are the foldables we recommend to enthusiasts in our smartphone buying guide, but consider this a PSA more than a recommendation: Samsung has already confirmed that it will unveil new foldable devices at its Unpacked event on July 26. These might be good prices if you don’t care about the latest and greatest, but we advise you to wait and see what Samsung has planned before spending this much on a soon-to-be-outdated device.

Your Prime Day Shopping Guide: See all of our Prime Day coverage. Shop the best Prime Day deals on Yahoo Life. Follow Engadget for the best Amazon Prime Day tech deals. Learn about Prime Day trends on In the Know. Hear from Autoblog’s car experts on must-shop auto-related Prime Day deals and find Prime Day sales to shop on AOL, handpicked just for you.

Your phone number is generally secret in WhatsApp communities, but there's still a chance you'll let it slip if you react to messages. That might not be a problem for much longer, thankfully, as WABetaInfo has discovered that WhatsApp is more broadly testing a "phone number privacy" feature with beta users. Enable it and your digits will only be visible to community administrators and those who've saved you as a contact.

The option has been in limited testing for months, but appears to be rolling out widely to beta users who've installed the latest Android and iOS updates. We've asked WhatsApp parent company Meta for more details, but WABetaInfo says the upgrade should reach more users and groups in the days ahead.

The addition could prove crucial for privacy in some cases. This lets you fully participate in the community announcement group without fear that you'll reveal your number. Creeps and would-be fraudsters can't call or text you unless you accept a request to share your contact info. That, in turn, could help you feel comfortable using communities in the first place.

WhatsApp has been adding a number of privacy features in recent weeks, including locked chats, automatic silencing of unknown callers and a settings review. Phone number privacy is consistent with that strategy — it's another safeguard against inadvertently sharing sensitive data with others.

Sony has produced numerous full-frame cameras of late, but just a single APS-C model over the last four years — the vlogging-oriented ZV-E10. Now, the company has finally rectified that with the launch of the 26-megapixel (MP) A6700, it's new flagship APS-C mirrorless camera. It's particularly strong for vlogging thanks to features like 4K 120p video, active mode stabilization and AI auto-framing — but it's not cheap, either.

The A6700 looks like other Sony A6000-series models at first glance, but there are some considerable improvements. The grip is now bigger for improved handling and stability, and it introduces an assignable front dial that makes manual shooting easier. It has a vari-angle LCD (rather than a popup LCD as before), along with a low-res (2.36 million dot) but fast (120fps) electronic viewfinder. It's fairly compact, being 35 percent smaller and 21 percent lighter than Canon's $1,500 R7. 

Engadget

Sony has also introduced a still/movie/S&Q dial with dedicated settings for each, along with a new and far more intuitive main menu and menu structure. It comes with mic and headphone ports (plus a digital audio interface via the hotshoe), USB-C 3.2 Gen1, a micro HDMI port (not full-size, unfortunately), and a single SD UHS-II card slot on the side, rather than on the bottom in the battery compartment as before. It's dust and moisture resistant if you're shooting in inclement weather and supports 4K30p webcam capture. 

The A6700 doesn't improve on the A6600's shooting speeds, grabbing bursts at the same 11 fps (in both mechanical and electronic shutter modes) with autofocus and auto-exposure tracking. However, it can capture far more photos at a time, with the new larger buffer letting you capture 59 compressed RAW and over 1,000 JPEGs before it stops. 

Engadget

The autofocus is improved as well, thanks to a faster backside-illuminated (BSI) sensor and processor that's eight times quicker than past models. Sony promises "reliable real-time tracking" for humans, animals and birds, insects and vehicles (cars, trains and planes). Human eye AF performance is up by 60 percent from previous models, while animal/bird eye AF speeds increased by 40 percent. 

It should also take better photos in low light, again thanks to the BSI sensor and improved processor. Finally on the photo side, it now offers selectable RAW options including lossless and compressed, along with JPEG, HEIF and HLG still images.

Engadget

While Sony already has a vlogging-oriented camera in the ZV-E10, the A6700 is even stronger in this regard. You can shoot 4K video at up to 120fps with 10-bit 4:2:2 quality (FHD at 240p) all with AF/AE, besting all APS-C rivals except Fujifilm's $2,000 X-H2S. Better still, it's super-sampled from 6K "resulting in high-resolution 4K with minimal moiré and jaggies," Sony says. 

You can record in Sony's XAVC format at up to 600 Mbps with I-frame codecs that are easier to edit. It supports S-Cinetone and Sony S-Log3 mode to boost dynamic resolution up to 14+ stops (matching its Cinema line cameras), along with user-assignable LUTs so you can get a better idea of what you're shooting.

Engadget

For those who do a lot of tracking shots or walk-and-talk vlogging, the A6700 has "active mode stabilization" that uses both software and optical tricks to reduce camera shake. Video autofocus mode supports the same range of subjects (people, animals, vehicles) as photo AF, with Sony promising real-time recognition in all cases. Another nice feature borrowed from the ZV-E1 full-frame camera is AI-based auto framing that lets the subject move around while staying centered in the frame — with varying levels of cropping and tracking speeds. And like other recent Sony models, it supports digital focus breathing compensation with select lenses. 

We had the camera for a short time, and found that it handled much better than any previous Sony A6000-series cameras. At the same time, it's compact and light enough to take on trips. It's certainly not an impulse buy, though. The A6700 starts at $1,399 (body only), or $1,499 with a 16-50mm kit lens and $1,699 with the 18-135mm lens. Pre-orders are now open, and it's set to start shipping in early August.