It's a day of the week ending in the letter "y," which inevitably means there's news of anothermessysaga in the cryptocurrency world. The Securities and Exchange Commission has charged 11 people who allegedly set up and promoted Forsage, which it said was a crypto Ponzi scheme that pulled in over $300 million from retail investors.

The agency asserts that Forsage enabled millions of people to engage in transactions through smart contracts on the Ethereum, Tron, and Binance blockchains. It alleged that Forsage had essentially been operating as a pyramid scheme for over two years, wherein the main way for investors to make money was by luring other people into the scheme. “Fraudsters cannot circumvent the federal securities laws by focusing their schemes on smart contracts and blockchains," Carolyn Welshhans, acting chief of the SEC’s Crypto Assets and Cyber Unit, said in a statement.

"Forsage is a textbook pyramid and Ponzi scheme," the SEC's complaint reads. "It did not sell or purport to sell any actual, consumable product to bona fide retail customers during the relevant time period and had no apparent source of revenue other than funds received from investors."

Four of those charged are Forsage's founders, who were last known to be living in Russia, the Republic of Georgia and Indonesia. The SEC also charged three promoters based in the US, who the founders allegedly recruited to endorse Forsage on its website and social media. Several members of a group called Crypto Crusaders, a group that promoted the scheme, were charged with violating the registration and anti-fraud provisions of federal securities laws as well. Two defendants have agreed to settle the charges without admitting or denying the allegations.

As CNBC notes, Forsage's founders launched the platform in January 2020. Regulators in the Philippines and Montana tried to shut it down with cease-and-desist actions. The SEC alleged that the defendants continued to promote Forsage while denying claims made against the platform in YouTube videos.

NASA and its partners on the James Webb Space Telescope have shared more spectacular images from the observatory. This time around, they provided a fresh look at the Cartwheel Galaxy, which Hubble and other telescopes previously observed. NASA said JWST has been able to reveal new details about both star formation and the black hole at the center of the galaxy, which is around 500 million light years from Earth.

Using infrared light detection, JWST was able to peer through the dust that obscured the Cartwheel Galaxy from view when other telescopes observed it. The above image is a composite from JWST's Near-Infrared Camera (NIRCam) and Mid-Infrared Instrument (MIRI). The JWST website has higher-resolution versions.

Data from NIRCam, which is the JWST's primary imager, is colored in blue, orange, and yellow, while MIRI's data is in red. NASA says the blue dots that appear in the red swirls of dust are individual stars or pockets of star formation. "NIRCam also reveals the difference between the smooth distribution or shape of the older star populations and dense dust in the core compared to the clumpy shapes associated with the younger star populations outside of it," the agency noted.

MIRI, meanwhile, was able to unearth more details about the galaxy's dust. It detected regions that are rich in hydrocarbons and other chemical compounds, along with silicate dust, which is similar to a lot of the dust present on Earth. Those regions form several spiraling spokes that led to the naming of the Cartwheel Galaxy. Hubble was previously able to image the spokes, but they're much clearer in the JWST observations. NASA also provided a MIRI-only image of the galaxy:

NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI and Webb ERO Production Team

The Cartwheel Galaxy formed following a collision between a large spiral galaxy and a smaller one. It has two rings, a bright inner ring and a colorful outer one. The outer ring has been expanding from the center of the collision for around 440 million years.

The interior ring contains "a tremendous amount of hot dust," NASA said. The brightest areas host gigantic young star clusters. The outer ring, meanwhile, features star formation and supernovas. When it expands and hits surrounding gas, star formation occurs.

NASA, the European Space Agency, Canadian Space Agency and the Space Telescope Science Institute last month revealed the first stunning full-color images from JWST. They included one that showed the "Cosmic Cliffs" of the Carina Nebula and a peek at stars in the early stages of formation. The telescope has also caught sight of Earendel, the most distant star that we know of in the universe. While it's still very early days for the JWST's science operations, it's already helping scientists develop a deeper understanding of the cosmos — as well as providing some incredible images for the rest of us to admire.

Logitech and Tencent have announced that they're working on a handheld cloud gaming device. They're blending the Logitech G brand's hardware knowhow with Tencent's software prowess. According to a landing page (where you can plug in your email address to receive updates), the device is tentatively called the Logitech G Gaming Handheld.

The system should come to market later this year and it will "support multiple cloud gaming services," Logitech said. Tencent and Logitech are working with the Xbox Cloud Gaming and GeForce Now teams at Microsoft and NVIDIA, respectively, so expect the handheld to support both of those platforms at the very least.

Whether the device actually goes on sale as scheduled remains to be seen, given the ongoing supply chain crisis that's making production difficult for just about every electronics company. However, many cloud gaming services are accessiblethrough web apps on phones, so the device likely wouldn't need a ton of processing might. It probably won't need to be as powerful as, say, the Steam Deck. Using lower-power components that aren't super difficult to come by could make it easier for Logitech and Tencent to actually build the handheld. In any case, we should find out more about the device in the coming months. 

Last week, more than 400 TV showrunners, writers and producers called on streaming giants and traditional Hollywood studios to offer improved protections for workers in states where abortions are banned or limited. Now, 594 other industry figures (many, if not all of whom are male) have pledged their support, as Variety reports. They include Jordan Peele, Taika Waititi, Jason Sudekis, Ryan Murphy, Donald Glover and JJ Abrams.

The signatories said they were standing in solidarity with their “female, trans and non-binary showrunner colleagues [...] in demanding a coordinated and timely response from our employers regarding the imminent workplace-safety crisis created by the overturning of Roe v. Wade. Abortion access doesn’t only affect people who can become pregnant. It affects us all."

In late June, the US Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, a ruling that conferred a nationwide right to abortion for almost half a century. Numerous states banned or severely restricted abortion access after the decision.

The initial letter was signed by the likes of Issa Rae, Lilly Wachowski, Lena Waithe, Amy Schumer, Shonda Rhimes, Mindy Kaling and Ava DuVernay. It was sent to Disney, Netflix, Warner Bros. Discovery, Paramount, Apple, NBC Universal, Amazon, Lionsgate and AMC.

The more than 1,000 industry figures who sent the letters are calling for details about studios' abortion travel subsidies, care policies for “ectopic pregnancies and other pregnancy complications” that occur during a production and legal safeguards for those who help a production worker get an abortion. The signatories also demanded that studios “discontinue all political donations to anti-abortion candidates and political action committees immediately.”

Those who signed the letters want the studios to respond by August 10th. The letters did not detail what may happen if the companies don't reply by then. Studios have previously said they would reimburse travel expenses for those who had to leave a state to get an abortion.

Thanks to its generous tax incentives for film and TV productions, Georgia has become a powerhouse in the entertainment industry, which is worth billions of dollars to the local economy. In 2019, several studios, including Netflix, said they'd reconsider setting up projects in the state if a so-called heartbeat law came into effect (the legislation bans abortions after a fetal heartbeat can be detected). A federal appeals court allowed the law to take effect last month.

It's not only Twitter that's trying to force Elon Musk to buy the company for $44 billion. An investor filed a proposed class action lawsuit to try stopping Musk from backing out of the deal. Luigi Crispo's suit accuses Musk of breach of contract and breach of fiduciary duty to Twitter's shareholders, according to Bloomberg. It claims he offered feeble "rationales for reneging on his contract." Two “corporate acquisition entities” connected to the deal are also named as defendants.

Musk last month attempted to wash his hands of his bid to buy Twitter, claiming the company made “false and misleading representations” and that it misrepresented the number of bots and fake accounts on its platform. Crispo concurred with Twitter's claims that Musk is using false claims about bots and spam to wriggle out of the deal without a valid legal standing to do so. Also like Twitter, Crispo is seeking a court order that would require Musk to complete the buyout.

After he tried to back out, Twitter swiftly sued Musk in an attempt to make him "honor his obligations" and buy the company. Last week, Musk made a counter filing, which remains sealed for now. A judge granted Twitter's request for an expedited trial, which is scheduled to start on October 17th and last for five days. Its shareholders will vote on the takeover on September 13th.

Meanwhile, Crispo holds 5,500 shares in Twitter. Those are worth nearly $300,000 at the $54.20 per-share offer Musk made to buy Twitter outright back in April. The shares are currently worth $223,000 at Twitter's current share price, which was $40.55 at the time of writing.

It’s 2022 and Spotify is adding the most basic of functions to its iOS and Android apps: dedicated play and shuffle buttons on playlists and album pages. Until now, tapping the button on most playlists started playback with shuffle mode enabled. To play tracks in order, you’d need to tap an individual song.

The split play and shuffle buttons will only be available to Spotify Premium subscribers. While at first glance it might seem odd to only grant paying members access to the separate icons, it makes sense. Beyond select playlists, free users are only able to use Spotify in shuffle-only mode on mobile (this doesn’t apply to the desktop or tablet app). In the coming weeks, Spotify will roll out the separate play and shuffle buttons, which really should have been baked into the app from the jump.

Last year, Adele pressured the streaming platform to remove the shuffle button from albums. She argued that albums should be listened to in order, in the way artists intended. It seems Spotify agreed, as it started displaying only a regular play button for albums — though it's bringing the shuffle button back to those pages with the latest update.

While many modern TVs already have streaming services baked in, you might still need (or want) a dedicated device for accessing the likes of Netflix and Amazon Prime Video. The Chromecast with Google TV is a solid option and it's currently on sale once again at a record low price of $40. That's $10 less than it typically costs.

We gave the device a score of 86 in our review after being impressed with the voice remote. The dongle has Google Assistant support, of course, and along with telling a smart speaker what you want to watch, you can simply bark instructions at the remote. It's a cinch to navigate the Google TV interface with the remote, which includes dedicated buttons for launching YouTube and Netflix. In addition, the dongle provides access to YouTube TV, Hulu, Disney+, Prime Video, Apple TV+ and HBO Max, among many other streaming services. There's support for 4K HDR content, as well as Dolby Vision and Atmos.

You can also use the device to play games through Google Stadia if you have a compatible controller. Despite recent rumors to the contrary, Google has said Stadia isn't going away. On top of that, you'll have the option to effectively use your TV as a smart display when you're not streaming something. Chromecast with Google TV can show live feeds from some security cameras, display weather forecasts and help you control smart home devices, all with the aid of Google Assistant. The Ambient Mode, meanwhile, can display your Google Photos when you're not actively watching, playing or listening to anything.

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If you missed out on picking up Jabra's Elite 7 Pro noise-canceling earbuds when they got a 30 percent price cut a month ago, you might actually be in luck. They're currently on sale for $130, which is $70 off the regular price. That's the lowest price we've seen for the earbuds to date — it's $10 less than what they were selling for just ahead of Prime Day.

Jabra positioned the Elite 7 Pro, which it announced almost a year ago, as the successor to the Elite 85t. Those earbuds were previously the brand's smallest model, but the Elite 7 Pro is now the holder of that title. Even so, Jabra has squeezed in bone conduction tech that works with microphones and algorithms in an effort to improve voice quality.

When it comes to battery life, Jabra claims the earbuds can run for nine hours with active noise cancellation enabled. That rises to 11 hours if ANC is turned off. The case offers up to three additional full charges.

In January, Jabra released an update that brought Bluetooth multipoint connectivity to Elite 7 Pro. This allows you to connect to two devices at the same time and switch between them seamlessly (such as when you receive a call on your phone while listening to music on your computer).

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TikTok is conducting a broader test of games in its all-conquering app. The company recently added a way for creators in some markets (including the US) to append one of nine mini-games to a video by tapping the Add Link button and choosing the MiniGame option. When viewers come across a video that links to a game, they can start playing it by tapping a link next to the creator's username.

“Currently, we’re exploring bringing HTML5 games to TikTok through integrations with third-party game developers and studios," a TikTok spokesperson told TechCrunch. One of the games is from Aim Lab, the maker of a popular aim training app of the same name. Its TikTok game is called Mr. Aim Lab’s Nightmare. TikTok's other partners on the initiative include developers Voodoo, Nitro Games, FRVR and Lotem.

None of the games have ads or in-app purchases at the minute and the project is in the early stages of testing. TikTok is looking to find out how (or if) creators craft content around them, and how users interact with the games. As The Verge notes, users can record their gameplay and share it in a fresh video.

Reports in recent months suggested TikTok was readying for a major push into gaming. Parent company ByteDance bought game developer Moonton Technology last year. TikTok teamed up with Zynga for an exclusive mobile game called Disco Loco 3D; a charity game called Garden of Good, through which players can trigger donations to Feeding America, became available on the US version of TikTok in June. TikTok previously tested HTML5 games in Vietnam.

Other major tech companies have made a push into mobile gaming, including Apple, Google and, more recently, Netflix. Zynga, of course, became a social gaming giant with the help of Facebook's massive reach, while Facebook moved into cloud gaming in 2020. It's no secret that Meta is trying to ape many of TikTok's features across many of its apps, so it's interesting to see TikTok taking a leaf out of Facebook's playbook on the gaming front.

Tim Hortons has agreed to settle multiple class action lawsuits that accused the company of tracking customers' locations through its app without consent. Under the proposed settlement, which requires a judge's approval, eligible customers in Canada will receive a free hot drink and baked good. In other words, in exchange for your location data, the restaurant chain will give you coffee and a doughnut.

In an email to customers, the company said it will delete any geolocation data it obtained from them between April 1st, 2019 and September 30th, 2020, and tell third-party vendor Radar Labs to do the same. An investigation conducted by Canadian privacy officials determined last month that the Tim Hortons app was tracking and recording users' locations every few minutes, even when they didn't have the app open. The probe determined that the company and Radar Labs didn't have sufficient consent from users for that level of tracking. 

Tim Hortons has not admitted to any wrongdoing and isn't believed to have misused the data. It also avoided disciplinary action.