The vertical TikTok-style video feed has invaded a lot of the apps we use on a daily basis and now it's officially coming to one more. After announcing a beta test last year, Spotify will begin rolling a new design for the Home section of its mobile app with a "more visual, dynamic" look. The company says the visual feeds are "built for deeper discovery and more meaningful connections between artists and fans."

Music, Podcasts and Audiobooks sections will also give you the ability to "scroll purposefully" through the new feeds where Spotify will offer audio and video clips for you to preview. If you find something you want to hear in its entirety, there are options to save, share, preview multiple songs (playlists or albums), read episode transcriptions and watch video podcasts. These visual feeds will also be in the Search interface, where you can scroll through clips arranged by genre. Additionally, Spotify says it will put the visual content inside of its curated playlists like Discover Weekly, Release Radar, New Music Friday and Rap Caviar. The company sees this as a way to offer previews for songs in those collections before you hit play. Unlike some of the early tests, Spotify hasn't added a fourth button to the app's navigation bar for these newly scrollable feeds.

For the Music tab, users in the US and Canada will see Spotify's AI DJ just below the collection of eight personalized shortcuts. When you begin to scroll, the app will serve up audio and visual snippets of a song (you can watch muted if you prefer). From here, you can preview up to five different songs from an album or playlist by tapping on the cards — much like you would for Instagram Stories. Spotify will also give you some brief context as to why you're seeing these recommendations. 

Spotify

For the Podcasts section, you'll still see those eight shortcuts up top while the rest of the feed will preview selected shows for you. Each recommendation will have an audio sample and real-time transcription or a video clip if the show was recorded in that format. If you want to continue listening, you'll have the option of picking up at the part you previewed or starting from the beginning. Spotify says the Audiobook feed will function much like the Podcast previews. 

Spotify is also renaming its Enhance tool that debuted in 2021. Now called Smart Shuffle, the feature not only adds suggestions to playlists "that perfectly match the vibe," it also mixes up the order. You can activate it by double tapping on the shuffle icon. When you've done so you'll notice a shuffle icon with a star in the top left and any track that is added by suggestion will be highlighted in the list. You can quickly remove all of the app's recommendations by tapping on the Smart Shuffle button once more, reverting the playlist back to your carefully constructed collection. 

Lastly, the company is adding auto play for podcasts to its app. Just like it does for music, Spotify will give you the ability to automatically begin "another relevant episode" based on what you were listening to. Also like it does for music, the company is giving you the ability to turn auto play off, so when your podcast ends you can enjoy the silence. 

Visiting Twitter's Tor onion website will now show you a warning that its certificate has expired, and pushing forward will just send you to an error page. The Tor Project, the non-profit org responsible for maintaining software for the Tor network, has confirmed to The Verge that Twitter's onion site "is no longer available seemingly with no plans to renew." Pavel Zoneff, the group's communications director, said: "The Tor Project has reached out to Twitter to look into bringing the onion version of the social media platform back online. People who rely on onion services for an extra layer of protection and guarantee that they are accessing the content they are looking for now have one fewer way of doing so safely." It's worth noting, however, that you can still access Twitter on a Tor browser. 

Twitter launched its Tor service in 2022, shortly after Russia blocked its people's access to the website. A Tor service allows you to circumvent censorship and gives you the capability to visit an online destination even when it's supposedly restricted in your country. It also protects you from surveillance, thanks to its anonymization features that encrypt your traffic. You can use it anywhere, but it is perhaps especially helpful to people living in countries with more stringent censorship laws, including North Korea and China. 

The company has yet to announce whether it has any plans on reviving its Tor service. Alec Muffett, who helped Twitter's engineers adopt Tor services last year, told The Verge that the people within the company he interacted with "are all gone." He added that he's pretty sure it's going to stop working totally "unless Elon [Musk] takes an interest."

Musk, who purchased Twitter later in 2022, has laid off thousands of workers since he took over, including employees who supported his vision for the website. CNBC reported back in January that only 1,300 personnel were left from the 7,500 people who were working for Twitter before it changed hands. Seeing as Musk seems to be focusing on monetizing Twitter at the moment, and there are barely any employees left at the company, its Tor service may remain unavailable for a long time, if not for good. 

It's been so long since Meta cut Messenger out of the Facebook mobile app that Windows Phone was still somewhat of a thing at the time. Almost nine years later, Meta is ready to bring them back together. "We are testing the ability for people to access their Messenger inbox within the Facebook app and you’ll see us expand this testing soon," Facebook head Tom Alison wrote. "Ultimately, we want it to be easy and convenient for people to connect and share, whether in the Messenger app or directly within Facebook."

When Meta removed Messenger from the Facebook app in 2014, it said that "our goal is to focus development efforts on making Messenger the best mobile messaging experience possible and avoid the confusion of having separate Facebook mobile messaging experiences." It's unclear whether Meta has any plans to bring messaging back to the mobile browser version of Facebook. It started pushing mobile web users toward the Messenger app in 2016. In any case, having one fewer app to juggle on your phone is probably not a bad thing. You might be able to send messages to Instagram users from the Facebook app too.

Meta made the announcement in a bizarrely framed blog post about Facebook's focus areas for 2023. The post seeks to assure people that "Facebook is not dead nor dying," as it now has more than 2 billion users.

In an effort to become more competitive with TikTok, Meta is attempting to shift Facebook away from an app where you keep up with friends and family to more of an entertainment and discovery platform. It's trying to "make Facebook the best place for social discovery and sharing," as Alison put it in the blog post. 

A key reason why Meta is bringing messaging back to the Facebook app is to "make it easier for people to share what they discover on Facebook via messaging, when, where and how it suits their needs, without needing to switch to another app," Alison wrote. TikTok enables users to share videos that they stumble upon with their friends through built-in direct messaging. So, on one hand Meta is reversing course and going back to an older way of doing things, but on the other it is, once again, aping a competitor.

Links are completely busted on Twitter at the minute across the company's website and mobile apps, as well as TweetDeck. Clicking on one brings up an error message that reads "Your current API plan does not include access to this endpoint, please see https://developer.twitter.com/en/docs/twitter-api for more information." As it happens, that link is also broken at the time of writing.

Developing...

One of 2022’s most surprising films will soon be available to stream. On Friday, NBCUniversal took to Twitter to announce that Puss in Boots: The Last Wish will hit Peacock on March 10th. As Gizmodo notes, the Shrek franchise spinoff has had an incredible run since arriving in theaters at the end of last year. To date, the film has grossed nearly $450 million, making it one of the most financially successful movies of 2022. It has also been a hit among critics, leading to a Best Animated Picture nomination at this year’s Oscars.

The Last Wish will join other Shrek films on Peacock, including the 2001 original and 2010's Shrek Forever After, the final entry in the mainline series. You can also use Peacock to watch a handful of other DreamWorks classics, including The Prince of Egypt. Unfortunately, NBCUniversal is making it harder to check out Peacock’s library of content for free. The service recently stopped offering its previously available free tier to new subscribers. Comcast subscribers will also lose free access to the platform later this year.

Meta sees Reels as an important aspect of its apps, and the platform is rolling out some new features for the format on Facebook. For one thing, Facebook is extending the maximum length of Reels to 90 seconds, up from 60. Meta increased the Instagram Reels time limit to 90 seconds last July, but both fall someway short of the maximum length of a TikTok video, which currently stands at 10 minutes.

TikTok and Instagram Reels both have ways to sync clips with a song, and Facebook Reels is getting a similar feature called Grooves. Meta says this uses "visual beat technology" and that it automatically syncs and aligns motion with the beat of a song.

Elsewhere, Facebook will offer an easy way to generate Reels from your memories. You'll also be able to take advantage of trending templates. This allows you to replace clips from an existing template with your own ones.

Meta claims Reels is its fastest-growing format. The number of Reels plays have more than doubled over the last year across Facebook and Instagram. The company says reshares of Reels have more than doubled on both platforms in the last 6 months too. Since August, users have been able to cross-post Reels between the apps.

Nintendo has taken Wii U titles Mario Kart 8 and Splatoon offline indefinitely while it attempts to resolve security issues. "This network service is currently unavailable due to urgent maintenance required to fix a vulnerability related to online play," reads a message posted to Nintendo's website at 11:30PM ET on Thursday. "We do not yet have information on when network services can be restored. We apologize for any inconvenience caused."

As VGC notes, the vulnerability could be related to an exploit that allows an attacker to take control of a victim's system simply by way of being matched with them in an online multiplayer game. Dataminer OatmealDome suggested the issue is “almost certainly” due to ENLBufferPwn.

Mario Kart 7 on the 3DS was previously vulnerable to that exploit. Several Switch games apparently were too, including Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, Animal Crossing: New Horizons, Nintendo Switch Sports and Splatoon 2 and 3. Nintendo has seemingly patched all of those titles to protect them against the exploit.

A video posted by YouTuber PabloMK7 in December shows ENLBufferPwn in action on Mario Kart 7. It's used to inject custom firmware onto the targeted console. PabloMK7 wrote on GitHub that "it would be theoretically possible" to steal an account or credit card information and to record a victim using the 3DS' mic and cameras.

With nearly 8.5 million copies sold, Mario Kart 8 was the biggest-selling game on the Wii U. The original Splatoon sold almost 5 million. Those who are still playing the games on the discontinued system might be disappointed that the online features are currently unavailable, but it seems Nintendo was left with little choice but to take them offline for now.

The issue emerged only a few weeks before Nintendo shuts down the Wii U and 3DS eShops. After March 27th, owners of the systems won't be able to make purchases on the digital storefronts, but they'll still be able to download titles they previously bought. Meanwhile, Nintendo just revealed the latest courses that are coming to Mario Kart 8 Deluxe on Switch next week as part of the Booster Course Pass.

There's only one more season left before Star Trek: Discovery bids farewell. The Paramount+ series is ending after season 5, which according to its official summary, "will find Captain Burnham (Martin-Green) and the crew of the U.S.S. Discovery uncovering a mystery that will send them on an epic adventure across the galaxy to find an ancient power whose very existence has been deliberately hidden for centuries." According to Variety, Paramount+ is also streaming the fifth season in 2024 as opposed to this year as previously expected. 

Star Trek: Discovery marked the first time the franchise has had a Black female lead and has prominently featured LGBTQIA+ characters. It also largely took on a more serialized format, wherein each episode is its own installment in a season's main storyline, unlike other entries in the franchise. That became a point of criticism about the series, however, until the showrunners changed course and embraced storytelling with an overarching plot in season four. 

As The Hollywood Reporter notes, the series currently holds the distinction for being the longest-running drama on Paramount+ so far. Its debut back in 2017 led to record sign-up numbers for the streaming service then known as CBS All Access, and its success paved the way for other Trek shows, including Lower Decks and Prodigy.

Tanya Giles, chief programming officer at Paramount Streaming, said in a statement: "Star Trek: Discovery is a perennial favorite on the service, near and dear to the hearts of legions of ‘Star Trek’ fans as well as all of us here at Paramount+. The series and its incredible cast and creatives ushered in a new era for Star Trek when it debuted over six years ago, embracing the future of streaming with serialized storytelling, bringing to life deep and complex characters that honor Gene Roddenberry’s legacy of representing diversity and inclusion, and pushing the envelope with award-winning world-building. This final season will see our beloved crew take on a new adventure and we can't wait to celebrate the series’ impact on the franchise leading up to its final season early next year."

At the moment, Trek fans can watch Star Trek: Picard, which is streaming on Paramount+. Its third season will also be its last, but there are rumors going around that the service is developing spinoffs centering on characters from the show.

Spoilers for The Mandalorian seasons 1-3 and The Book of Boba Fett below.

Somehow, Grogu has returned. At least, that's what many people will assume when they tune into the first episode of The Mandalorian's third season. When last we left our lone bounty hunter and cub, Grogu was heading off to Jedi training with a creepy de-aged Luke Skywalker. Mando took off his helmet and braced for solitude. We all shed a tear. (How did a show manage to make us care so much for a monosyllabic man in armor and a green puppet? Bless you, executive producers Jon Favreau and Dave Filoni.)

But at the start of this season, Mando (AKA Din Djarin) and Grogu are paired up once again, saving people from gigantic monsters, fighting space pirates and generally being adorable. To a casual viewer, it's like that dramatic season two finale was Jedi mind-tricked away. It turns out if you wanted to get the full story – which also explains why Din is flying a Phantom Menace-era ship, or why Grogu is becoming a more adept force user — you had to watch the final few episodes of The Book of Boba Fett.

Lucasfilm

If I wasn't already a hopeless Star Wars fan, I'd be pretty confused and annoyed. How are normal people supposed to know that The Book of Boba Fett basically served as a stop-gap between Mandalorian seasons? Disney didn't promote the connection between the shows much, so if you weren't reading geeky news sites, or talking to nerdy friends, it was easy to miss.

The first few episodes of Boba Fett made it seem like a far less ambitious series – did we really need to learn the specifics of how he survived the Sarlacc pit? And who cares about his future as Jabba the Hutt replacement? I've talked to several Star Wars fans who tapped out early on, only to catch up once they heard Mando and Grogu popped up. (Honestly, it almost seemed like Favreau and crew got tired of the Boba Fett story – so did we.)

It's not like I'm against the idea of narratives shifting between different shows and films. Everything Marvel's done since Iron Man has practically trained us to consume pop culture this way, with the rise of the Avengers initiative to the ultimate smackdown with Thanos in Endgame. The geeky side of me is overjoyed when I discover connections between films I love. (You should have seen me in the theater at the end of M. Night Shyamalan's Split.) But the idea that viewers have to keep tabs on everything is beginning to feel like homework, and it's particularly frustrating when one piece of media is inexplicably crucial to something that comes later.

It doesn't help that The Mandalorian barely referenced The Book of Boba Fett during its introductory episode. Even a bit of a nudge during the "previously on" opening section would help. Instead, the premiere episode just wants to get us back to normal, with Mando on a video game-like quest and Grogu having fun along the way. It's a shame, since the end of season 2 made it seem like The Mandalorian would actually change things up moving forward.

Speaking to The Hollywood Reporter, creator and executive producer Favreau said he appreciated being able to check in on characters between shows.  “I knew that I didn’t want to dedicate a lot of screen time within The Mandalorian to a period of time where there wasn’t a lot of character progression," he said. "Both [Din and Grogu] were kind of stuck, as far as character progression goes, until they were reunited. So, my feeling was that it would allow me to do both of those things and freed me up now two years later to have a whole new context for these two characters to have a relationship and move forward.”

But what Favreau saw as a problem, I see as an opportunity. In Book of Boba Fett, Din and Grogu's time apart is handled briskly. Neither can fully let each other go. That stalls Grogu's Jedi training, as that's mostly focused on detaching yourself from the world and emotional connections. (Did that really work so well for Anakin Skywalker? Come on, Luke.) Din, meanwhile, acts like an empty nester who's lost his life's purpose. This is all good material for drama, but Favreau cuts through it as quickly as possible on a spinoff show. What a waste.

I may be particularly annoyed by The Mandalorian's disjointed narrative after seeing how Marvel handled its latest big bad, Kang the Conqueror, in Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania. In that film, Kang is introduced as a castaway, someone banished to the Quantum Realm because of his penchant for, well, conquering. But we never got a sense of his true motivation, his powers or what he's actually trying to accomplish.Perhaps that's because the folks behind Quantumania assumed you saw Kang's brief introduction at the end of the Loki streaming series, where he's presented as more of a trickster and vague threat.

Lucasfilm

If you didn't watch Loki and were confused by Quantumania, it's almost like Marvel is saying that's your own fault. To me, that's simply irresponsible storytelling.

Coming off of Andor, Tony Gilroy’s self-contained and trenchant exploration of the Star Wars universe, the simplistic and confusing nature of The Mandalorian feels like a letdown. The show was always a pulpy and almost video game-like romp. But after the end of season two, there was potential for something much greater. Instead, Favreau took the easy way out to deliver more of the same.

A Dead by Daylight movie is on the way. Production studios Atomic Monster and Blumhouse are teaming up with gaming studio Behaviour Interactive to oversee the film adaptation of the multiplayer horror title. In addition, the companies are beginning their search for a director and screenwriter as Hollywood (perhaps naively) hopes HBO’s excellentThe Last of Us ushers in a new era of video game adaptations worth watching.

“We couldn’t be more thrilled to work with Jason Blum and James Wan, two giants of the horror film industry, to further expand the Dead by Daylight universe,” said Stephen Mulrooney, Behaviour Interactive’s executive vice president. “At Behaviour, our motto is to create unique moments, together, forever. Atomic Monster and Blumhouse are the ideal partners to craft Dead by Daylight’s killer entrance onto the big screen.”

The game has been a horror / survival staple since its 2016 launch. The one vs. four multiplayer title splits teams into either survivors or the killer; the survivors aim to activate generators and escape while the killer seeks to hunt them down. It’s added DLC monsters through the years, including Freddy Kreuger, Pinhead, Leatherface, Evil Dead’s Ash Williams and a surveillance-happy tech executive. Strangely, it even has a dating-sim spinoff arriving later this year.

Mulrooney will co-produce with Atomic Monster CEO James Wan (who also directed The Conjuring and Insidious) and Blumhouse CEO Jason Blum. Blumhouse, which made Paranormal Activity and The Black Phone, is set to merge with Atomic Monster; the deal was announced last year and is expected close this summer.