If you missed the chance to get the NVIDIA Shield TV for $20 off its usual price in August, here's your chance to do so before Black Friday even arrives. The $150 streaming box is now on sale for $130 at Best Buy, which is only $1 more than its all-time low price for Black Friday last year and is the best price we've seen for the device in 2021. It's a great chance to grab the streaming box if you're looking for something a bit more powerful than a Chromecast either for yourself or as a gift this holiday season.

The Shield TV is powered by an NVIDIA Tegra X1+ processor, giving it the capability to run the Android TV software smoothly and efficiently. It supports Dolby Vision HDR and Dolby Atmos surround sound, and it's capable of 4K streaming from services where it's available, including Netflix, Prime Video, Disney+, YouTube, Google Play Movies & TV. You can also stream straight from your phone with its built-in Chromecast 4K.

The Shield TV isn't literally a box and comes in a tubular body, which NVIDIA says can help avoid wireless interference. On it, you'll find a Gigabit Ethernet port and a microSD card slot for storage expansion. You can control the device with your voice using Google Assistant, and you can issue commands hands-free with Alexa through an Amazon Echo speaker, as well. As a plus, it has Bluetooth that you can use to transfer media and to connect accessories like wireless headsets. The NVIDIA Shield TV has been around for a couple of years at this point, but it's still a powerful addition to your entertainment center.

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Ford has ambitions to become the biggest US-based EV manufacturer someday, and that means greatly ramping up its production. Company CEO Jim Farley has announced that the automaker is planning to produce 600,000 electric vehicles per year by the end of 2023, which will double the number of EVs it originally intended to manufacture. According to Automotive News, production will be spread across the Mustang Mach-E, F-150 Lightning and E-Transit.

Ford's current EV lineup is wildly popular, Farley said, and the demand is "so much higher" than the company expected. The Mustang Mach-E is selling on three continents, while the Ford F-150 Lightning has been popular from the time it was announced. Ford received 100,000 reservations within three weeks after it was unveiled, and that number's now up to 160,000 — all placed with a $100 refundable deposit. Due to the high demand for the F-150, Ford previously decided to invest $250 million to boost its production, creating 450 new jobs to help it make 80,000 trucks a year. It's unclear how much that target would change now that the company is doubling its manufacturing goal. 

Before it achieves its ultimate goal of being the biggest EV producer in the US, Ford is first aiming to become the second largest behind Tesla. As CNBC notes, whether Ford can achieve that with 600,000-a-year production target remains to be seen. Long-time Ford rival GM is expecting to sell 1 million electric vehicles by 2025 and is also ramping up production by converting current plants and opening new ones in the US over the coming years.

Starbucks has teamed up with Amazon to open a cashierless store in NYC. The new location — at 59th Street between Park & Lexington Avenues — will combine the Starbucks app's order ahead feature with Amazon's Just Walk Out technology. In fact, the store sounds a like a cross between the cafe and the Amazon Go store, which served as the launching pad for the e-commerce giant's cashierless tech experience. 

It has a lounge area customers can enter by using the "In-Store Code" in the Amazon Shopping app, by scanning their credit cards or by scanning their palm registered with Amazon One on the terminals onsite. Once they're in, they'll find a small Amazon Go market containing a curated selection of customer favorites from both companies. Anything they take from the shelf will be added to their virtual carts, and they will be charged after they leave like in any other location that uses Amazon's Just Walk Out tech.

Over the past year-and-a-half, Amazon has expanded the availability of its cashierless technology. It teamed up with airport stores to implement the check-out free experience and opened the first full-size Fresh grocery store with the technology in June. Amazon also added the technology to a few Whole Foods locations and, more recently, licensed it for use to UK supermarket chain Sainsbury's. This partnership with Starbucks is yet another step towards making Just Walk Out more ubiquitous than before.

Starbucks and Amazon are planning to open three joint stores in the coming year, including this one. The second location is planned for The New York Times Building located at 40th Street & 8th Avenue. For now, New Yorkers can head to the first location at 59th Street to check out the concept. 

Starbucks

Boost Mobile has revealed its first Carrier Crusher plans, which also happen to be its first under AT&T's network. The main Carrier Crusher product is a $100 annual plan designed for customers who use less than 10GB of data a month. It costs $100 a year and will give customers access to unlimited talk and text, as well as 1GB of high speed data. The Dish-owned prepaid mobile carrier cited a couple of studies in its announcement, including one that found that 45 percent of Americans are paying for unlimited data, even though one in three use less than 5GB.

Stephen Stokols, CEO of Boost Mobile, said:

"The US market is set up for the carriers to provide a high price point to all Americans today. It's great for the 15 percent of users who consume over 10 GB of data per month, but for the rest of us, we are subsidizing the bill for those users. You wouldn't pay $70 for an all you can eat buffet if you only wanted a salad, so why are we forced to choose all you can eat in wireless?"

In addition to the $100 annual plan, Boost has also launched a Carrier Crusher product with unlimited talk and text plus 15GB of data. It costs $20 a month, but customers will be billed annually. For those who prefer paying monthly, it now offers a $25 and a $15 plan with unlimited talk and text, as well as 5GB and 2G of data, respectively. 

Dish struck a deal with AT&T back in July, paying the carrier at least $5 billion over 10 years to provide voice, data and messaging services to its Boost Mobile, Ting and Republic Wireless customers. Boost used to be Sprint's prepaid brand until the company had to spin it off as part of its merger with T-Mobile. Prior to its deal with AT&T, Boost was entirely reliant on T-Mobile's network. However, the companies' relationship soured when T-Mobile announced that it was shutting down the Sprint legacy network Boost is using on January 1st, 2022. Dish argued that the deadline doesn't give it enough time to migrate its customers, and T-Mobile ultimately agreed to move it to March 31st next year.

Cher Scarlett, one of the lead organizers of the #AppleToo movement, is leaving the company on Friday. Scarlett was the face of the movement and connected with workers with grievances to air via Apple's Slack channels and on social media. The former Apple security engineer was also one of the workers who filed a complaint against the tech giant with the National Labor Relations Board, accusing the company of suppressing workers' organizing efforts and interfering with surveys involving gender pay equity.

According to Bloomberg, Scarlett reached a settlement with the iPhonemaker regarding the NLRB complaint and has already requested a withdrawal. She didn't divulge the details of the settlement, but her lawyer Alek Felstiner, told Bloomberg News: "The matter was settled privately and the request for withdrawal is pending before the board. We hope the crucial organizing work at Apple will continue."

It's unclear what will happen to the #AppleToo movement with Scarlett's departure. Its website, which publishes workplace stories from Apple employees and workers, hasn't had an update over the past 10 days. That said, Scarlett isn't the only face of the movement. Most of the posts on the website are by Janneke Parrish, the other #AppleToo lead organizer who was fired by the company back in October. Apple fired its former program manager for allegedly sharing private information, something that Parrish denies. When details of a company meeting were leaked to the press, Apple investigated Parrish and confiscated her work devices. She deleted some apps and work information before doing so, which Apple interpreted as being noncompliant with its investigation. 

Aside from Scarlett, former Apple senior engineering program manager Ashley Gjøvik also filed a complaint with the NLRB. She said she spent months talking to Apple about unsafe working conditions and sexism in the workplace and was put on indefinite paid administrative leave after raising her concerns. Apple fired Gjøvik in September.

Apple has rolled out iOS 15.1.1, and you may want to install it if your iPhone 12 or iPhone 13 has been dropping calls. The update comes with bug fixes specifically for Apple's more recent phone models, including one meant to improve their call drop performance. This release comes almost a month after the tech giant launched iOS 15.1, which enabled its long-awaited SharePlay feature. SharePlay lets you watch movies and shows or listen to music with friends on a FaceTime call. You can also send whatever you're watching on the iPhone to an Apple TV. 

While iOS 15.1.1 is a fairly minor update — unless you've been having major issues with dropped calls on your phone — iOS 15.2 is expected to bring some more significant features. As MacRumors has reported, the upcoming software will add playlist search to the Apple Music app and the capability to bulk rename tags in the Reminders app. It will also show when a game is from Apple Arcade if you search for it and will tweak the Macro mode toggle. 

iOS 15.2 is still in beta testing, but you can now get iOS 15.1.1 by going to Software Update under General in the Settings app. 

You can now access your Apple Music account on LG smart TVs even if you don't have an Apple TV. The music streaming service is now available for all the brand's TVs running webOS version 4.0 and higher, over a year after it made its debut on TV platforms with Samsung. Since webOS 4.0 only rolled out in 2018, the Apple Music app will most likely be accessible on newer models.

If your TV can run Apple Music, you'll find yourself faced with an interface and navigation similar to what you'll see if you were using an Apple TV. They're also visually similar to the Apple Music experience on iPads, iPhones, Android devices and PC. The service's app for LG can access all its songs, playlists, 4K music videos and livestreamed Apple Music Radio. It supports tracks with time-synced lyrics, as well, so you can sing along while reading the lines on a big screen. 

The app's release on LG smart TVs stays true to Apple's strategy of focusing more attention on its services and making them available on non-Apple hardware. That way, the tech giant can reach more potential customers who aren't married to Apple devices and can work towards making its services more veritable rivals to competitors like Spotify and Netflix. 

Amazon has escalated its fight with Visa: Starting on January 19th, 2022, the e-commerce giant will stop accepting Visa credit cards issued in the UK. It notified Amazon UK customers in an email about the change, blaming the high fees Visa charges for credit card transactions. Buyers can at least continue using their Visa credit cards throughout the holidays, but after that, they'd have to switch to a Visa debit card or another credit card like a Mastercard or an AMEX.

An Amazon spokesperson said in a statement:

"The cost of accepting card payments continues to be an obstacle for businesses striving to provide the best prices for customers. These costs should be going down over time with technological advancements, but instead they continue to stay high or even rise. As a result of Visa’s continued high cost of payments, we regret that Amazon.co.uk will no longer accept UK-issued Visa credit cards as of 19 January, 2022. Customers can continue to use all debit cards (including Visa debit cards) and other non-Visa credit cards to shop on Amazon.co.uk. With the rapidly changing payments landscape around the world, we will continue innovating on behalf of customers to add and promote faster, cheaper, and more inclusive payment options to our stores across the globe."

Meanwhile, a Visa spokesperson said the company is disappointed that "Amazon is threatening to restrict consumer choice in the future." They added: "When consumer choice is limited, nobody wins." They also said that Visa is working towards a resolution with the e-commerce giant so that cardholders can keep on using their UK-issued Visa credit cards on the website "without Amazon-imposed restrictions come January 2022." It's worth noting that Amazon has a much better relationship with other credit card brands in the country. The e-commerce giant currently has a partnership with Mastercard for consumer credit cards and with AMEX for business cards in the UK.

The companies may be engaging in a public war in an effort to get better terms from each other. Amazon has been putting pressure on the credit card brand over the past few months and started imposing a 0.5 percent surcharge on Visa credit card purchases on its Singapore website on September 15th. A month-and-a-half after that, Amazon also started imposing a surcharge on Visa transactions in Australia. In both instances, the company offered customers a gift card (AU$20 and SG$30) to add an alternative payment method that isn't a Visa credit card.

The fourth season of Star Trek: Discovery was supposed to be available on Netflix a day after it premieres on Paramount+ in the US on November 18th, but that will no longer happen. In fact, fans outside the US and Canada will have to wait months to be able to see the new episodes — legally, that is — if they ever get the chance at all. According to Deadline, ViacomCBS has ended its deal with Netflix that had been in place since the series launched in 2017. 

The publication says the money Netflix paid for the show's overseas rights paid for most of Discovery's hefty budget. Now that ViacomCBS has paid off the deal, it also pulled the entire show from Netflix. Apparently, it plans make the series available again to international fans in 2022 when Paramount+ goes global. The UK, Germany, Ireland, Austria and Switzerland will be among the first regions to get access to the streaming service next year. By the end of 2022, the service will be out in 45 countries, but as Gizmodo points out, that's still a tiny fraction of the 190 regions where Netflix is available.

Kelly Day, ViacomCBS Networks International streaming boss, told Deadline:

"As we rapidly expand our global streaming footprint, we are bringing more of our top titles home to ViacomCBS for Paramount+ markets around the world. We have a strong global and local content pipeline that positions us for success across our regions, and repatriating beloved series like Star Trek: Discovery for Paramount+ is another step forward as we bring fans more must-watch series worldwide."

In a tweet, the show's official account said that the fourth season will still premiere on Paramount+ on November 18th in the US. Meanwhile, it will arrive on CTV Sci-Fi Channel in Canada on the same day and will be available for streaming in the country on Crave the day after.

Porsche has unveiled two new options for those looking to get one of its Taycan EVs: A Taycan with the legendary GTS moniker and a third body model called the GTS Sport Turismo. Kevin Giek, VP of the Taycan model line, said the GTS "is positioned above the Taycan 4S and below the Taycan Turbo derivatives, so it represents a real sweet spot in the range." As TechCrunch notes, with the addition of these two, there are now 10 Taycan variants in all.

The luxury automaker calls the GTS version the "sporty all-rounder" of the line. It has a range of 504 km or 313 miles, making it the first Taycan to break the 500 km mark. The model's adaptive air suspension was specifically adapted to the GTS, and it has Black or dark details on the exterior — including the front apron, the bases of the exterior mirrors and the side window trims — as is traditional for a GTS car. 

Meanwhile, the Taycan Sport Turismo is a mix between the Cross Turismo and the sports saloon, though it doesn't have off-road elements. It has the sporty silhouette and the rearward-sloping roofline of the Taycan Cross Turismo, and its rear headroom is 45mm (around 1.7 inches) greater than the Taycan sports saloon. Both the GTS and the Sport Turismo can go from 0 to 100 kmh (62 mph) within 3.7 seconds and have a maximum speed of 250 kmh (155mph). 

The Taycan GTS and Sport Turismo will have prices that start at EUR131,834 (US$149,000) and EUR132,786 (US$150,000), respectively. They will both be heading to dealers in the spring of 2022, and more engine options for the Sport Turismo will follow. Porsche will also be showcasing the new EVs at the LA Auto Show, which will take place from November 19th through the 28th, so we'll hear more about the new vehicles in the coming days.