Ahead of Microsoft finishing up its acquisition of Activision Blizzard, it said bringing that publisher’s titles to Xbox Game Pass might take some time. We’ve only seen one so far(Diablo IV), but the company now has added a notable one. In fact, it’s a game that isn’t even here yet. Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 will be available on Game Pass on its release day, later this year.

In Black Ops style, it’s a tactical play. Almost every year in recent memory, the latest Call of Duty release has been the best-selling game. Microsoft is relying on the debut of a new Call of Duty game to draw players to its Game Pass. $10 a month is cheaper than the price of the game, but it’s also a subscription. And the company is banking on Xbox gamers continuing that sub.

If you do pick up Xbox Game Pass, you’ll get to play the game on the day of release, as well as access to the ever-increasing Game Pass game library, including recent addition Senua’s Saga: Hellblade 2.

Check out the teaser trailer here.

— Mat Smith

The biggest stories you might have missed

The best VPN service for 2024

OpenAI’s new safety team is led by board members, including CEO Sam Altman

T-Mobile is acquiring the majority of US Cellular

VR classics Job Simulator and Vacation Simulator come to Apple Vision Pro

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Lego announced its first-ever Zelda playset

With a Great Deku Tree.

Lego

Mario, done. Sonic, done. Finally, Zelda is the latest video game to transition to official Lego kits. The Great Deku Tree set includes 2,500 pieces and is two sets in one. Both include a giant tree. The Ocarina of Time set includes a section inspired by the game’s first dungeon as well as a replica of Link’s house in Kokiri Village. The Breath of the Wild build includes plenty of hidden Koroks. And a Master Sword!

Continue reading.

The TikTok ban law heads to court this September

A group of creators is also challenging the law.

Oh, you thought it was over? You. Thought. It. Was. Over? It hasn’t even started. TikTok will face off with the Justice Department this fall to attempt to stop a law that could lead to a ban of the app in the United States. The US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia set a September date for arguments.

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Apple’s WWDC 2024 keynote kicks off June 10 at 1PM ET

What AI tricks are up its sleeve?

It’s coming. What should we expect at Apple’s keynote this year? WWDC is typically a software-centric event, so we’re expecting new AI tricks as well as updates, like iOS 18, iPadOS 18, tvOS 18, macOS 15 and watchOS 11. There are even rumors Apple might integrate Google’s Gemini AI with Siri and various iPhone apps. We’ll have to wait for June 10 to learn the truth.

Continue reading.

I hope you had a quiet Memorial Day. It was a quiet one tech-wise, and I briefly fought the urge to copy and paste yesterday’s TMA into today’s newsletter hopper.

There were a few teases and glimpses of gaming news, with E3 successor Summer Games Fest kicking off in just over a week. SGF’s game showcase is set for June 7. Leaks suggest we may see a new soccer game to rival EA’s non-FIFA franchise at some point, while there will also be more 2D remakes of classic RPGs and hopefully big reveals at the Xbox Games Showcase on June 9. Expect to hear a lot more about the next Call of Duty title. And what is PlayStation up to? It’ll have a presence, but will it have any new games?

While SGF is a young show, it’s done a good job at platforming indie games, something Devolver Digital may capitalize on, while celebrating its 15-year anniversary. In summary, there should be lots of games to play. And if you’re not a gamer? Don’t worry: Apple’s WWDC kicks off just as SGF ends.

The biggest question though: Where are the best tacos in DTLA and can you tell me? I’ll be in Los Angeles to report on the games show in a few weeks.

— Mat Smith

The biggest stories you might have missed

The Dragon Quest 3 HD-2D remake is coming to Switch, Xbox Series X/S, PS5 and PC

It’s a golden age of puzzle games, even if you suck at puzzle games

Apple’s 16-inch MacBook Pro M3 Max is $250 off

​​You can get these reports delivered daily direct to your inbox. Subscribe right here!

The best ereaders for 2024

Kindles aren’t your only ebook reader option.

Hot off the back of that new color ereader from Kobo, we take another look at the ereader landscape and select our top picks. Yes, there’s a lot of Kindle. No surprise. But there are other valid options too. And if your ereader’s seen better days, maybe it’s time for an upgrade.

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Are breadmakers better than making bread by hand?

The old ways are the best ways.

Engadget

Engadget’s Dan Cooper contends with breadmaking, both manual and with helpful appliances. He tests some of the top breadmakers, while kneading out his own creations. Would a breadmaker work for you? Or is it time to get your hands dirty? (No more rhetorical questions in this newsletter, I swear.)

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Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman reports that AI-generated emojis may be one of the new features Apple shows off at WWDC next month. If the current emoji library weren’t overwhelming enough (let alone my increasingly growing sticker collection both on Messages and WhatsApp), Gurman writes that the company “is developing software that can create custom emojis on the fly, based on what users are texting.” Niche food emojis? Yes, please. :tunamayosandwich:

– Mat Smith

The biggest stories you might have missed

ICQ is shutting down on June 26

Doctor Who: 73 Yards review

The best Memorial Day sale tech deals we could find

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Kobo Clara Colour ereader review

Color pages steal the show.

Engadget

The Clara Colour is a $150 ereader that taps into Kobo’s own book library (and local libraries), but augments the experience with color book covers. Yes, Kobo beat Kindle to the punch in getting a color ereader out the door. While Amazon is busy experimenting with everything else, ereader-wise, it’s safe to assume that a color Kindle will land at some point. For now, though, Kobo’s Clara Colour is the consumer-friendly color ereader to beat.

Of course, I love that Kobo spelled color with a ‘u’, but I’m not sure I can explain why.

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Somehow, Resident Evil 6 sold over a million copies on Switch

A true horror mystery.

Resident Evil 6 has sold surprisingly well on the Nintendo Switch since it was ported to the console in 2019, despite it being almost universally panned by fans. The game was just added to Capcom’s Platinum Titles list, meaning it’s crossed the threshold of one million units sold. Don’t do it to yourself, please. May I suggest the remade RE2 (or 3), or one of the myriad Resident Evil 4 remakes. Or if you feel like having a heart attack, any of the Resident Evil games made for VR.

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Someone made a Flappy Bird tribute for the Playdate

Crank to flap.

Playdate

A Flappy Bird tribute for the Playdate is now available to play, if you’re up for sideloading something onto your cute little crank console. Surprise: using the crank to control the bird makes it even harder.

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Microsoft couldn’t wait until its Build conference today. It just revealed a bunch of new hardware and plans for Windows. Copilot+ PCs were the big announcement, designed to run generative AI processes locally instead of in the cloud. Of course, Microsoft had new Surface devices to showcase these features, but the usual PC suspects also have new laptops that meet the spec requirements — and include Copilot+ in their name for added chaos. The company also claims Copilot+ PCs are 58 percent faster than the M3-powered MacBook Air.

Engadget

We’ll drill into some other announcements down below.

— Mat Smith

The biggest stories you might have missed

Another patient will get Neuralink’s brain implant

Intel-powered Copilot+ PCs will be available this fall

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Volvo and Aurora introduce their first self-driving truck

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Microsoft’s redesigned Surface Laptop has over 22 hours of battery life

It’s a Copilot+ PC too.

Engadget

The new Surface Laptop is a redesigned PC with thinner bezels in 13.8- and 15-inch sizes and Qualcomm’s Arm-based Snapdragon X Elite chip. Microsoft says this is the brightest display it has ever shipped, at 600 nits, and the new Studio Camera is now in the bezel, so no visible notch.

Will the Snapdragon X Elite give better performance? Expect potent battery life. Microsoft claims the 15-inch model will run for up to 22 hours on a single charge while playing videos locally and up to 15 hours while actively browsing the web. We’ve got some hands-on impressions right here, but we’ve got reservations. Devices like the Surface Pro 9, which ran Windows on Arm, still didn’t feel as fast or responsive compared to their more traditional x86-based counterparts.

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Microsoft rebuilt Windows 11 around AI and Arm chips

There’s also a new emulator for running older Windows apps.

Microsoft says it has rebuilt core components of Windows 11 to better support Arm-based hardware and AI. That includes a new kernel, compiler and, most importantly, an emulator named Prism, for running older x86 and x64 apps. Thanks to a powerful new Neural Processing Unit (NPU) in the Snapdragon X Elite chips, Copilot+ PCs can run more than 40 trillion operations per second, a measure of a chip’s AI performance, more than four times the performance of today’s AI PCs.

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With Recall, Microsoft may have fixed Windows’ eternally broken search

The new AI-powered feature is like a photographic memory of everything you’ve done.

This sounds very good. Microsoft also announced Recall, a new feature to make local Windows PC searches as quick and effective as web searches, tapping into AI to add more contextual search parameters. Microsoft product manager Caroline Hernandez gave the example of searching for a blue dress on Pinterest using a Windows PC with Recall. She can search the Recall timeline for ‘blue dress’ (using her voice), which pulls all of her recent searches, saving her from having to sift through browser history. She further refined the query with more specific details like ‘blue pantsuit with sequined lace for Abuelita,’ and Rewind delivered relevant results. Microsoft says it can start with exact information or vague contextual clues to find what you want — and it’s apparently all done locally. It is, however, a Copilot+ exclusive.

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Scarlett Johansson says OpenAI used her likeness without permission

An AI company using something without permission? Whaa?!

AI companies love to tap Scarlett Johansson’s star power, but this time it’s a bigger player in AI. Johansson accused OpenAI of copying her voice for one of the ChatGPT voice assistants, despite her denying the company permission to do so. Johansson’s statement on Monday came hours after OpenAI said it would no longer use the voice. “The voice of Sky is not Scarlett Johansson’s, and it was never intended to resemble hers,” an OpenAI spokesperson said in a statement sent to Engadget. The Her actor said OpenAI only stopped using the voice after she hired legal counsel.

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Normally, Microsoft’s Build is a straightforward (often dry) showcase of the company’s software and hardware developments, with a dash of on-stage coding to excite the developer crowd. But this year, the company is likely to make some huge AI moves, following its 2023 debut of ChatGPT-powered Bing Chat. Then, there’s new Surface hardware.

In fact, Microsoft has a showcase for new Surfaces and AI in Windows 11 on May 20, while Build actual kicks off a day later. And you know what? The Surface event might be the most impactful.

Rumors suggest we’ll see some of the first systems with Qualcomm’s Arm-based Snapdragon X Elite chip alongside new features in the next major Windows 11 update.

A refresh for its consumer PCs is likely to consist of new 13- and 15-inch Surface Laptop 6 models with thinner bezels, larger trackpads, improved port selection and that X Elite chip. We might even see an Arm-based version of the Surface Pro 10 too.

While Intel confirmed Microsoft is already working on ways to make Copilot local, we could see that reach consumers as well. By local, I mean the AI assistant could answer simpler questions, like basic math or queries about files on your system, without an internet connection.

— Mat Smith

The biggest stories you might have missed

Apple will reportedly offer higher trade-in credit for old iPhones for the next two weeks

Indie developers are trying to make horse games that don’t suck

X-Men ’97 didn’t have to go that hard

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Apple may be working on a ‘significantly thinner’ iPhone

iPhone Air?

Engadget

Just like it slimmed down the latest iPad Pro, Apple may try to do the same to the iPhone. To be more precise, the company is working on a “significantly thinner” device that could arrive in 2025, according to The Information. An upgraded front-facing camera could sit alongside Face ID sensors in a smaller pill-shaped cutout, while the rear camera array could move to the center of the phone. The screen size would reportedly be between that of the current base iPhone and the iPhone Pro Max — so between 6.12 and 6.69 inches.

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Slack has been using your chats to train its machine-learning models

You have to email to opt out.

Slack is training its machine learning models on user messages, files and other content, without explicitly asking for permission. This means your private data is being used by default. To opt out, you need your organization’s Slack administrator (IT, HR, etc.) to contact Slack on your behalf.

In response to concerns, Slack recently clarified its data use in a blog post, assuring users that customer data is not used to train generative AI products, which typically rely on external large language models (LLMs). The company uses this data to train machine learning models for features like channel and emoji recommendations and search results. However, it’s misleading, at best, to say customers can opt out when “customers” doesn’t include employees working within an organization. It is also a little misleading, implying all your data is safe from AI training, when the company apparently gets to pick and choose which AI models the statement covers.

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Motorola’s 2024 Razr lineup may include a bigger cover screen for the budget model

The handsets haven’t yet been officially unveiled.

evleaks

Two reliable leaks are showing off the entry-level Moto Razr 50 and high-end Razr 50 Ultra (likely branded as the 2024 Razr and Razr+ in the US), before Motorola even told us about them. The entry-level Razr (2024) will supposedly have a 3.63-inch cover display, quite a step up from the piddly 1.5-inch cover display on the 2023 version I tested. Sadly, no sign of the wood option included in the Edge 50 phone series unveiled last month.

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The following article discusses spoilers for the first season of X-Men ‘97.

I was excited about the return of the ‘90s Saturday morning cartoon version of the X-Men. Still, I wasn’t sure Marvel, under the auspices of Disney, could deliver on the flavor of the original while also making a modern show that older fans, now adults in their 30s and 40s, could enjoy. And X-Men '97 is a total play on our nostalgia, which makes it even odder that it delivers. And is better than the original in pretty much every way.

And of all the Marvel baubles that needed some affection, the X-Men arguably needed it most. The ten-episode run managed to cram in so many plotlines, cameos, comic sagas, villains, plot twists and even deaths that, at times, it was hard to process everything — but I utterly loved how relentless it all was. X-Men ‘97 goes hard, especially if you’re already an obsessive fan.

When Marvel first launched an all-you-can-read comic book app, I went in hard on the X-Men back catalog, especially stories by Chris Claremont and Grant Morrison, two of my favorite writers. X-Men ’97 mines a lot of my favorite characters and stories. Magneto is put on trial, and begins a (brief?) redemption arc, Jean Grey turns out to be a clone, and the cartoon crammed a roughly-year-long comic arc, Inferno, into a single episode. Other arcs either included wholesale, or with some riffs, include Lifedeath, Fatal Attractions, Motendo, Operation: Zero Tolerance and more.

The highlight of this first season (a second is already underway) has to be the crushing episode 5, where the mutant nation of Genosha is devastated by a high-powered sentinel mothership… thing. Just before the attack destroys mutant adults, mutant children and eventually even an X-man, Cable, the time-traveling son of Scott Summers and Jean’s clone. (See: Inferno, mentioned above) reappears to stop the attack. But he fails again and his mother dies.

Magneto is left helpless as mutants are slaughtered and he’s forced to relive the genocide he suffered as a child. Eventually, Gambit sacrifices himself and lights up the entire robot with his mutant ability. This is after Rogue reignites a romance with Magento, changes her mind, and decides to be with Gambit. As I said, each episode is a lot.

I may be alone in this, but I still prefer the older series’ animation style and look. A cartoon can look a little scrappy, in my opinion —or maybe I’m just 39 and also not a Disney executive. The majority of the action scenes are great, too. Cyclops is finally not done dirty and gets to thrive in fights. There are some great combination attacks comparable to the iconic fastball special.

Sometimes, the show can feel a bit too “anime” (And I love anime, don’t at me!), where the ridiculous scale of the fight removed a lot of my interest in it. Cool, Bastian has metal wings in the final episode. Yes, yes, very cool. But didn’t one of his super sentinel underlings wipe the floor with the X-Men mid-series? And did we need the Phoenix to reappear (again!) so that Jean can save her 50-something son from the future? Probably not.

But, it’s the X-Men. It wouldn’t be the X-Men without this kind of nonsense.

I also adored the attention to detail. How Storm changed back to her original comic-book attire, Rogue transitioned to her green and white look, Magneto wore the same black-and-white costume while on trial, just like the original comic book. X-Men '97 doesn’t miss the chance to sprinkle in other Marvel characters, too. Captain America pops up a few times, we spot an out-of-costume Spider-Man, with Mary Jane Watson, watching the fall of Asteroid M. The Silver Samurai, who got his own episode in the original series, stares on as Tokyo loses power due to Magneto’s attack on the whole of Earth.

In other episodes, an aged Polaris, Rachel Grey and more mutants briefly appear in a vision of the future. The series is bursting at the seams with references, easter eggs and surprises. Did you know that Bastian is briefly, obliquely, on-screen during the horrific attack on Genosha, long before he’s revealed as the X-Men’s primary antagonist? Well, he is. It’s a show that’s ripe for debate and discussion in an era of Reddit, Discord and YouTube reactions.

Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige stipulated that both the cast and the music had to return for the project to happen. I’m glad it did and I’m glad the theme song still slaps.

One of the biggest, most iconic gaming series is almost back. Grand Theft Auto 6 is apparently on track for a fall launch next year — a little more specific than the previous release window of “2025.”

There’s no new trailer, and GTA publisher, Take-Two, is not quite ready to offer a specific release date. CEO Strauss Zelnick told Variety: “I think we’re going to leave it there for now.”

The sixth mainline installment will be set in Leonida (Rockstar’s Florida equivalent) and focused mostly on Vice City (Miami). Compared to GTA Vice City, however, it’ll be contemporary. So, I’m banking on OnlyFans pastiches, vapes, self-driving cars and everything else 2020s. Plus explosions and crime.

— Mat Smith

The biggest stories you might have missed

Uber will soon let you reserve a shuttle to get home from a big concert or ballgame

Samsung’s Music Frame gets its first discount on Amazon

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AT&T is making all its phones satellite phones

A new deal will connect your phone with five commercial satellites.

AT&T

AT&T subscribers will soon have cell service even in typical dead zones, like deep inside national parks or far-flung rural locations. The mobile carrier has been working with AST SpaceMobile since 2018, testing two-way audio calls, texts and video calls via satellites in space using ordinary smartphones. Now, the companies have entered a commercial agreement, just in time for a rocket launch of five commercial AST satellites this summer. Those satellites will enable AT&T to roll out its service, but there’s no start date, yet.

Continue reading.

OpenAI strikes deal to put Reddit posts in ChatGPT

The deal is similar to the one Reddit struck with Google just months ago.

OpenAI and Reddit announced, on Thursday, a partnership for OpenAI to surface Reddit discussions in ChatGPT, and for Reddit to bring AI-powered features to its users. The partnership will “enable OpenAI’s tools to better understand and showcase Reddit content, especially on recent topics,” the companies said in a joint statement. As part of the agreement, OpenAI will also become an advertising partner on Reddit. Ugh.

I’ve resurrected my Reddit habit due to an incredible/accursed game called Balatro. So hopefully, soon, I can just ask ChatGPT what certain cards and terms mean.

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US House passes act to force event pricing transparency

But it doesn’t address exorbitant fees or bots.

On Wednesday, the US House of Representatives passed a bill that could provide at least some accountability for Ticketmaster and other live-event vendors. NBC News reports the TICKET Act (not to be confused with the Senate’s separate bill with the same try-hard acronym) would mandate that ticket sellers list upfront the total cost of admission — including all fees — to buyers.

Reforming the ticketing industry became a political point-scoring item in late 2022 after Ticketmaster’s Taylor Swift fiasco. The Live Nation-owned service, which has a stronghold on the industry, melted down as millions of fans battled “a staggering number” of bots. Ticketmaster said presale codes reached 1.5 million fans, but 14 million (including those pesky bots) tried to buy tickets.

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Eight TikTok creators are suing the US government in an effort to block a law requiring TikTok’s parent company, ByteDance, to sell the service or face a US-wide ban. The lawsuit claims the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act is unconstitutional because it violates the First Amendment rights of the creators who depend on the platform.

TikTok has already filed its own lawsuit against the government, but according to The Washington Post, the company is “covering” the legal fees for this separate suit too. ByteDance has money.

But will it work? Maybe? A group of TikTok creators sued Montana over an attempted statewide ban last year. And that ban never happened.

— Mat Smith

The biggest stories you might have missed

Google I/O 2024: Everything revealed, including Gemini AI, Android 15 and more

Assassin’s Creed Shadows brings stealthy mayhem to feudal Japan on November 15

Android 15 will make it harder for phone thieves to steal your data

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Apple brings eye tracking to recent iPhones and iPads

The company is making it easier to use your gaze to navigate iOS and iPadOS.

Coinciding with Global Accessibility Awareness Day, this week, Apple is bringing eye-tracking support to recent models of iPhones and iPads (with an A12 chip), as well as customizable vocal shortcuts, music haptics, vehicle motion cues and more.

With eye tracking enabled, people can look at their screen to move through apps and menus, then linger on an item to select it. That pause to select action is called Dwell Control, which has already been available on Macs. There are also new vocal shortcuts and music haptics for Apple Music.

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The Proteus Xbox controller is an accessible gamepad of modular cubes

A huge array of customizable input options.

Microsoft

Xbox is also expanding its accessibility with the Proteus Controller, a modular gamepad created by peripheral company ByoWave. The controller is a group of palm-sized cubes connected in a variety of configurations, with interchangeable buttons and controller faceplates. This means players can set up the Proteus Controller in myriad ways: in one hand, flat on a desktop or as part of a traditional gamepad with palm grips. The Proteus Controller is available for pre-order now at a discounted price of $255. It’s expected to ship in the fall.

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Bandai is finally rereleasing a beloved Tamagotchi from 2004

Pre-orders are open.

Bandai

Bandai announced this week it’s bringing back the Tamagotchi Connection to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the toy’s release. Yes, you’re old.

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Google boss, Sundar Pichai, wrapped up the company’s I/O developer conference by noting its almost-two-hour presentation had mentioned AI 121 times. It was everywhere.

Google’s newest AI model, Gemini 1.5 Flash, is built for speed and efficiency. The company said it created Flash because developers wanted a lighter, less expensive model than Gemini Pro to build AI-powered apps and services.

Google says it’ll double Gemini’s context window to two million tokens, enough to process two hours of video, 22 hours of audio, more than 60,000 lines of code or 1.4 million-plus words at the same time.

But the bigger news is how the company is sewing AI into all the things you’re already using. With search, it’ll be able to answer your complex questions (a la Copilot in Bing), but for now, you’ll have to sign up to the company’s Search Labs to try that out. AI-generated answers will also appear alongside typical search results, just in case the AI knows better.

Google Photos was already pretty smart at searching for specific images or videos, but with AI, Google is taking things to the next level. If you’re a Google One subscriber in the US, you will be able to ask Google Photos a complex question, like show me the best photo from each national park I’ve visited. You can also ask Google Photos to generate captions for you.

And, if you have an Android, Gemini is integrating directly into the device. Gemini will know the app, image or video you’re running, and you’ll be able to pull it up as an overlay and ask it context-specific questions, like how to change settings or maybe even who’s displayed on screen. 

While these were the bigger beats, there was an awful lot to chew over. Check out all the headlines right here.

— Mat Smith

The biggest stories you might have missed

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Google reveals its visual AI assistant, Project Astra

Full of potential.

Google

One of Google’s bigger projects is its visual multimodal AI assistant, currently called Project Astra. It taps into your smartphone (or smart glasses) camera and can contextually analyze and answer questions on the things it sees. Project Astra can offer silly wordplay suggestions, as well as identify and define the things it sees. A video demo shows Project Astra identifying the tweeter part of a speaker. It’s equal parts impressive and, well, familiar. We tested it out, right here.

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X now treats the term cisgender as a slur

Elon Musk continues to add policy after baffling policy.

The increasingly unhinged world of X (Twitter) now considers the term ‘cisgender’ a slur. Owner Elon Musk posted last June, to the delight of his unhingiest users, that “‘cis’ or ‘cisgender’ are considered slurs on this platform.” On Tuesday, X reportedly began posting an official warning. A quick reminder: It’s not a slur.

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OpenAI co-founder Ilya Sutskever is leaving the company

He’s moving to a new project.

Ilya Sutskever announced on X, formerly Twitter, he’s leaving OpenAI almost a decade after he co-founded the company. He’s confident OpenAI “will build [artificial general intelligence] that is both safe and beneficial” under the leadership of CEO Sam Altman, President Greg Brockman and CTO Mira Murati. While Sutskever and Altman praised each other in their farewell messages, the two were embroiled in the company’s biggest scandal, last year. Sutskever, who was a board member then, was involved in both of their dismissals.

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Apple’s new iPad Pro is one of the most divisive (and thinnest) devices the company has made in years. Sure, it’s an undeniable feat of engineering and thinner than an iPod nano. Apple squeezed a new M4 chip and “tandem” OLED panel into its latest flagship tablet.

The new OLED enables more brightness and improved HDR performance compared to the old iPad Pro—standard screen brightness is up to 1,000 nits, compared to 600 nits for the last model. It’s so powerful and so beautiful. But this cutting-edge tech makes it more expensive than ever, putting it out of reach of most and pitting it against flagship laptops, price-wise.

As Nathan Ingraham explains in his review, the iPad Pro lineup has always been about showing off just how good an Apple tablet can be, but this one truly is without compromise. For the rest of us, there's the new iPad Air.

Later today, Google I/O’s big keynote will reveal the company’s latest AI ambitions. We’ll be reporting live, later today.

— Mat Smith

The biggest stories you might have missed

What to expect at Google I/O 2024: Gemini, Android 15, WearOS and more details

Meta’s next hardware project might be AI-infused headphones with cameras

iOS 17.5 has support for web-based app downloads in the EU

iPad Air (2024) review: This is the iPad to get

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OpenAI’s free GPT-4o model can talk, laugh, sing and see more like a human

And it looks like a big ole black hole.

OpenAI

OpenAI on Monday announced GPT-4o, a brand-new AI model the company says is one step closer to “much more natural human–computer interaction.” The new model accepts any combination of text, audio and images as input and can generate output in all three formats. It also sounds a lot more like digital assistant Samantha from the movie Her. During the presentation, OpenAI showed GPT-4o translating live between English and Italian, helping a researcher solve a linear equation in real time on paper and providing guidance on deep breathing. OpenAI’s demonstrator even used the smartphone’s camera to show how GPT-4o would describe the room they were in. It could infer they were in a studio, filming video or possibly a livestream. OpenAI is making the new model available to everyone, including free ChatGPT users, over the next few weeks.

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Google teases new camera-powered AI feature a day ahead of I/O

The feature looks like an AI-infused version of Google Lens.

Not to be outdone, ahead of Google I/O (kicks off later today — stay tuned for all the news right here), Google teased its own incoming AI camera features. It’s not exactly clear what the feature is, but it bears some similarities to Google Lens, the company’s camera-powered search feature. What’s shown in the teaser video, however, appears to be working in real-time and responding to voice commands.

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Dyson’s first dedicated hard-floor cleaner doesn’t suck

The Wash G1 is your upgrade from the humble mop.

Dyson

It’s a new direction for Dyson: a floor cleaner without mention of suction, cyclone technology or any of its usual vacuum vocabulary. The Wash G1 is the company’s debut hard-floor cleaner, and it swaps suction for high-speed rollers, water and nylon bristles. It’ll go on sale later this year for $700 — we got to test it at Dyson HQ, ahead of launch.

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