German Bionic, the robotic exoskeleton startup behind the Cray X, will be showing off two new posture-protecting products at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Nevada this week. The Apogee is the company's latest and lightest powered exosuit built for commercial and industrial use while the Smart SafetyVest will "bring ergonomic monitoring and protection to every worker," per a Monday release.

German Bionic

The Apogee builds from the lessons learned in developing the Cray X, resulting in German Bionic's lightest exosuit to date. Despite the litheness, it can offset up to 66 pounds of load to the user's lower back per lifting motion and offers active walking assistance to reduce fatigue. The SafetyVest, on the other hand, doesn't actively help the user pick up heavy stuff but it does monitor their movements and body positioning as they work and offers "data-based, personalized ergonomic insights, as well as assessments and recommended actions."

Both the Apogee and SafetyVest rely on the German Bionic IO architecture to collect, monitor, analyze and report the user's ergonomic data back to them. This is done typically either through the onboard display or via audible alerts when the user is actively making unsafe movements.   

German Bionic

“With our new wearables, we are empowering hard-working people with the tools they need to do their jobs more safely and sustainably," Norma Steller, CPO of German Bionic, said in the release. "Both our new ergonomic wearables – Apogee and Smart SafetyVest – as well as our award-winning Cray X exoskeleton enable us to provide the right support for just about any company or work environment where manual work is performed. And with the German Bionic IO data platform, we also deliver a powerful analytics tool for workplace ergonomics and processes."

Details are still sparse ahead of the show but German Bionic will be exhibiting its wares at CES, booth #7141 in the West Hall if you're attending in person. If not, no worries, Engadget will have full coverage of the show floor with hands-on reviews, videos and news throughout the week — stay tuned!

Welcome, reader, to 2023! While some of us are still musing on New Year’s resolutions (we have the tech to help you right here), will 2023 be the year you finally break up with Twitter? There’s never been a better time. All this Elon Musk-induced chaos has breathed new life into the numerous Twitter alternatives. Of all of them, Mastodon has probably benefited the most. The open-source service gained notoriety back in 2017 when some Twitter users were upset with changes the company had made to the functionality of @-replies. (Back then, that was a big deal.) Mastodon isn’t the only app to get a boost from the turmoil at Twitter, though. Other apps like CounterSocial, which has a Tweetdeck-like interface, and Tribel have also seen increased user numbers. There are some new upstarts, too. Post News, a new service from former Waze CEO Noam Bardin, has also tried to capitalize on Twitter’s current state.

Meanwhile, Twitter hasn’t been paying its office rent in San Francisco. According to Bloomberg, Twitter was told on December 16th that it would default on its lease for the 30th floor of the Hartford Building. So far, it’s failed to pay $136,250 in rent.

– Mat Smith

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The biggest stories you might have missed

• The tech that can help you stick to your New Year’s resolutions

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• Big Tech critic Tim Wu is leaving the White House

• The worst of tech in 2022

NASA’s Artemis 1 Orion spacecraft returns to Kennedy Space Center

The agency can now take apart the capsule.

POOL New / reuters

After completing its 1.4 million mile trip to the Moon and back at the start of last month, NASA’s Artemis 1 Orion spacecraft has returned to the Kennedy Space Center. The homecoming occurred on December 30th. Artemis 1’s record-breaking journey began on November 16th, launching atop NASA’s next-generation Space Launch System heavy-lift rocket. NASA will now conduct an “extensive analysis” of the component and determine precisely how it fared during atmospheric reentry. The agency will also remove Moonikin Campos, the test dummy NASA sent aboard Orion to collect data on how travel to the Moon might affect humans.

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TikTok says it’s getting better at detecting ‘borderline’ content

The app previously added age restrictions to some "mature" content.

TikTok is launching a new version of its “borderline suggestive model,” which the company uses to automatically identify “sexually explicit, suggestive, or borderline content.” According to a TikTok spokesperson, the new model can better detect so-called “borderline content,” videos that don’t explicitly break the app’s rules but may not be suitable for younger users. Elsewhere, the app is also allowing creators to restrict their videos to adult viewers.

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Grubhub ordered to pay $3.5 million to settle lawsuit

The Attorney General’s office accused the company of using deceptive techniques.

Washington DC Attorney General Karl Racine has announced that his office has reached an agreement with Grubhub "for charging customers hidden fees and using deceptive marketing techniques." The company was sued earlier this year, accused of charging hidden fees and misrepresenting Grubhub+ subscription's offer of "unlimited free delivery" since customers still have to pay a service fee. The DC Attorney General's office also accused the company of listing 1,000 restaurants in the area without their permission by using numbers that route to Grubhub workers or creating websites without the eateries' consent. Under the settlement terms, Grubhub will pay affected customers in the DC area a total of $2.7 million.

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Samsung hires former Mercedes-Benz designer to lead its mobile design team

A different look to Galaxy phones?

Engadget

Samsung’s mobile division has a new design chief. The company announced Hubert H. Lee would head up its mobile design team, the unit responsible for designing some of Samsung’s most important products, including its flagship Galaxy S series of phones. Lee joins the electronics giant after a stint as the chief design officer of Mercedes-Benz China.

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After completing its 1.4 million mile trip to the Moon and back at the start of last month, NASA’s Artemis 1 Orion spacecraft has returned to the Kennedy Space Center. The homecoming occurred on December 30th. Artemis 1 splashed down in the Pacific Ocean on December 11th. After the USS Portland recovered the unmanned crew vehicle and brought it to Naval Base San Diego on December 13th, the capsule embarked on an overland trek to Florida the next day. Artemis 1’s record-breaking journey began on November 16th with a memorable nighttime launch atop NASA’s next-generation Space Launch System heavy-lift rocket.

Now that Orion is back at Kennedy Space Center, NASA will remove the spacecraft’s heat shield so that it can conduct an “extensive analysis” of the component and determine exactly how it fared during atmospheric reentry. The agency will also remove Moonikin Campos, the test dummy NASA sent aboard Orion to collect data on how travel to the Moon might affect humans. “Artemis I was a major step forward as part of NASA’s lunar exploration efforts and sets the stage for the next mission of the Space Launch System rocket and Orion to fly crew around the Moon on Artemis II,” NASA said.

While Artemis II won’t launch until 2024 at the earliest, there’s still a lot to look forward to between now and next year. NASA promised to announce the mission’s four-person crew sometime in “early 2023.” Artemis II will set the stage for the first human lunar landing since the end of the Apollo program in 1972, and eventually a permanent NASA presence on the Moon.

A federal judge has set a date for the first pre-trial hearing between Microsoft and the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). The two go to court on January 3rd to spar over the fate of Microsoft’s $69 billion bid to buy Call of Duty publisher Activision Blizzard. Microsoft and Activision announced the merger at the start of 2022. At the time, the tech giant said it expected the deal to close no later than June 2023. Last month, the FTC sued Microsoft to block the acquisition from moving forward.

“Microsoft has already shown that it can and will withhold content from its gaming rivals,” FTC Director Holly Vedova said at the time. “Today we seek to stop Microsoft from gaining control over a leading independent game studio and using it to harm competition in multiple dynamic and fast-growing gaming markets.”

The FTC is expected to face an uphill battle trying to convince a judge of the merits of its case. For one, Microsoft isn’t pushing for a “horizontal” merger that would see it take one of its direct competitors out of the picture. Additionally, the company has signaled it’s ready to make concessions to rubberstamp the deal. Should the merger move forward, Microsoft has pledged to release future Call of Duty games on competing platforms for at least 10 years. It also said it would bring the franchise to Nintendo consoles.

“The commission cannot meet its burden of showing that the transaction would leave consumers worse off, because the transaction will allow consumers to play Activision’s games on new platforms and access them in new and more affordable ways," Microsoft wrote in a legal filing last month. The deal also faces regulatory scrutiny from the United Kingdom’s Competition and Markets Authority, which recently said it would conduct an “in-depth” investigation of the proposed merger.

California Property Trust, the owner of the building that houses Twitter headquarters, is suing Elon Musk’s social media company for failing to pay $136,250 in rent. According to Bloomberg (via The Verge), the firm notified Twitter on December 16th that it would default on its lease for the 30th floor of the Hartford Building, located at 650 California Street in San Francisco, if it didn’t pay its outstanding rent within five days. In a complaint filed this week with the San Francisco County Superior Court, California Property Trust said Twitter failed to comply with the order.

According to a December 13th New York Times report had "for weeks" stopped paying rent on all of its global offices to save on costs. The company also faces a lawsuit for failing to pay $197,725 for charter flights Musk took during his first week at Twitter. Over that same time period, Musk has reportedly brought over “more than half a dozen” lawyers from SpaceX to bolster Twitter's legal team.

Samsung’s mobile division has a new design chief. On Friday, the company announced the appointment of Hubert H. Lee to head up its Mobile eXperience (MX) Design Team, the unit responsible for designing some of Samsung’s most visible products, including its flagship Galaxy S series phones. Lee joins the electronics giant after a stint as the chief design officer of Mercedes-Benz China, a position that saw him lead the automaker’s design teams in China and the US. “His unique and visionary perspective will help shape the look and feel of Galaxy, building on the distinct design ethos that users know and love,” Samsung said.

It will probably be at least a year before we see Lee start to leave his mark on Samsung’s products. Prelease leaks of the company’s next Galaxy S series phones suggest they’ll look a lot like their Galaxy S22 predecessors. What’s more, with the way smartphone development timelines work, Samsung has likely already settled on a design for its 2024 flagship. Even then, don’t expect dramatic changes; from a design standpoint, phone companies have played it safe for more than a decade. Still, Lee could push for small but meaningful tweaks to Samsung's design formula — much like Evans Hankey did at Apple after Jony Ive's departure. 

The time has come to say goodbye to Dark Sky. Nearly two years after Apple purchased the much-loved weather app, and more than a year after announcing its impending shutdown, Dark Sky is about to stop functioning. Since September, an in-app notification has warned iOS users the software would no longer work come January 1st, 2023. In September, Apple also removed Dark Sky from the App Store (following an earlier delisting from the Play Store).

If you’re looking for an alternative, it’s worth revisiting Apple’s own Weather app before turning to the App Store. Since iOS 14, the company has gradually integrated Dark Sky’s technology into its native offering. For instance, the Weather app now includes next-hour precipitation alerts, which is a feature that was directly inspired by Dark Sky. That said, if you’re set on trying a third-party alternative, a few that are worth checking out include AccuWeather and Carrot Weather.

After advising President Biden on technology and competition policy for nearly two years, net neutrality advocate Tim Wu is leaving the White House. The Biden administration announced the departure this week, noting Wu’s final day at the National Economic Council would fall on January 4th. Wu became a special advisor to the president in March 2021. He held a similar position during the Obama administration.

Wu told The New York Times he’s leaving the federal government to spend more time with his family. His post at the White House had required Wu to commute between New York and Washington DC, leaving his young children without their father for stretches of time. “There’s a time where the burden on family is too much,” he said. “I’ve been feeling the balance has shifted.” Wu told The Times he plans to return to Columbia University, where he was a law professor before his latest government stint.

Wu is leaving the White House at a critical moment during the Biden administration's efforts to rein in Big Tech. Last year, he co-authored the executive order that instructed the Federal Communications Commission to restore net neutrality and promised greater scrutiny of mergers. In July of this year, the Federal Trade Commission sued Meta to block the purchase of VR developer Within. Earlier this month, the agency also moved to prevent Microsoft’s merger with Activision Blizzard. Both cases are currently before the courts and are expected to be tough battles for the FTC. 

Facebook parent company Meta has acquired Luxexcel, a Dutch startup specializing in smart eyewear. News of the purchase was first reported by De Tijd and later confirmed by TechCrunch. “We’re excited that the Luxexcel team has joined Meta, deepening the existing partnership between the two companies,” a Meta spokesperson told the outlet. The company did not disclose the financial terms of the deal.

Founded in 2009, Luxexcel began life as a prescription lens manufacturer. More recently, the company has made a name for itself in the augmented reality space. At the start of 2021, for instance, it partnered with WaveOptics, the display manufacturer Snap paid $500 million later that same year to buy. As TechCrunch points out, there are also rumors Luxexcel previously worked with Meta on the company’s Project Aria AR glasses.

The acquisition comes as Meta faces regulatory scrutiny from the Federal Trade Commission over its purchase of Supernatural developer Within. The agency sued Meta in July to block the deal. The social media giant also faces criticism over just how much it's spending to further its metaverse ambitions. In October, a month before the company laid off 11,000 employees, Meta told investors Reality Labs, its virtual and augmented reality unit, lost more than $9 billion in 2022. It went on to predict the division’s operating losses were likely to “grow significantly year-over-year” in 2023.

Grubhub has been ordered to pay $3.5 million to settle the lawsuit filed against the company by the District of Columbia over "deceptive trade practices." Washington DC Attorney General Karl Racine has announced that his office has reached an agreement with the food delivery service "for charging customers hidden fees and using deceptive marketing techniques." If you'll recall, his office sued the company earlier this year, accusing it of charging hidden fees and misrepresenting Grubhub+ subscription's offer of "unlimited free delivery," since customers still have to pay a service fee.

The DC Attorney General's office also accused the company of listing 1,000 restaurants in the area without their permission by using numbers that route to Grubhub workers or creating websites without the eateries' consent. A previous TechCrunch report said the company had already ended those practices. Racine also said at the time that Grubhub ran a promotion called "Supper for Support" at the beginning of the pandemic and then "stuck restaurants with the bill" that cut into their profit margins.

Grubhub called the lawsuit frivolous at the time of its filing and said that the company was "disappointed [the AG's office has] moved forward with [it] because [the service's] practices have always complied with DC law, and in any event, many of the practices at issue have been discontinued."

Under the terms of the settlement, Grubhub will pay affected customers in the DC area a total of $2.7 million. Their cut will be credited to their accounts, and it will be sent to them as a check if it remains unused within 90 days. In addition, the company has to pay $800,000 in civil penalties to the District of Columbia and has to clearly mark additional fees people have to pay with their order going forward.