Xiaomi just couldn't wait until MWC to unveil its latest Leica-endorsed flagship phone. Following the 12S Ultra and 13 Ultra, Xiaomi is finally catching up with the competition by picking up Sony's second-gen 1-inch mobile camera sensor, the LYT-900, for its brand new 14 Ultra flagship phone. This marks the second device to don this crème de la crème of imaging silicons, after Oppo's Hasselblad-tuned Find X7 Ultra from early January. That said, the Xiaomi 14 Ultra does have a slight edge with its faster main variable aperture at up to f/1.63, beating the Find X7 Ultra's f/1.8 — on paper, at least.

With the exception of the faster f/2.5 aperture on the new 120mm periscope shooter, the remaining three Summilux rear cameras are almost identical to the previous set, and they are still powered by a Sony IMX858 sensor each. The biggest change in this field is the new Xiaomi AISP neural chip, which claims to be the world's first AI large-model computational platform for photography. This leverages four large models — "FusionLM," "ToneLM," "ColorLM" and "PortraitLM" — to fine-tune results, especially with digital zoom at 30x or more.

Xiaomi

The 14 Ultra also packs some surprises in the battery, durability and connectivity categories. As seen in the super-slim Mix Fold 3 and Honor Magic V2, the 14 Ultra is Xiaomi's first candybar to jump onto the silicon carbon cell bandwagon, in order to pack 5,300mAh of juice into a space that's 8 percent smaller. Xiaomi claims that compared to the previous model, you get 17-percent more stamina with this battery upgrade. To replenish the battery, you get both 90W of wired fast charging and 80W of wireless fast charging — these take 12.5 minutes and 20 minutes to reach 50 percent, respectively.

Going along with the "Year of the Dragon" theme, Xiaomi claims that the 14 Ultra's "Dragon Armor" structure has double the bending resistance, thanks to its special "6M42" aluminum alloy mid-frame (supposedly crafted with a better grip as well). The Chinese brand even claims that this part is 8-percent stronger than the iPhone 15 Pro's titanium frame." aluminum alloy mid-frame (supposedly crafted with a better grip as well). The Chinese brand even claims that this part is 8-percent stronger than the iPhone 15 Pro's titanium frame, but it decided to offer a more premium titanium version as well.

Xiaomi

This metallic frame is complemented by a "Dragon Crystal" glass — shielding the 6.73-inch AMOLED screen (3,200 x 1,440 120Hz; made by TCL CSOT) — with apparently 10 times more drop resistance. Xiaomi also touts its new vegan leather material, which has been certified by SGS to have six times more wear resistance, has more dirt resistance and is less prone to yellowing due to ultraviolet rays — an important breakthrough particularly for the white version. But if you prefer something shiny, the 14 Ultra is also available in a blue "Dragon Crystal" ceramic flavor, which resembles ceramic but isn't as heavy — it only weighs 5 grams more than its vegan leather counterpart. Regardless of the cover material, this device has IP68 rating for dust and water resistance.

Much like the 14 and 14 Pro from October (and the SU7 electric sedan's in-car entertainment system), the 14 Ultra runs on Xiaomi's Android-based HyperOS, and it's powered by Qualcomm's latest Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 processor. This is cooled by a dual-loop vapor chamber, which also sucks heat out of the camera modules. The processor is backed by Xiaomi's new proprietary chip, the Surge T1, which apparently boosts cellular connectivity by up to 37 percent, as well as Wi-Fi and Bluetooth connections by up to 16 percent.

Xiaomi

This device also supports two-way satellite calling and texting, now with 60-percent faster satellite locking and 29-percent faster satellite connection. As a bonus, when you're lost, you can send your location data along with vital signs from your wearable device — presumably exclusive to one of the latest Xiaomi watches or smart bands. Sadly, these satellite features are likely limited to China for now.

We'll likely be hearing about the Xiaomi 14 Ultra's global launch at MWC next week, but for now, we can refer to the Chinese pre-order pricing. The vegan leather and ceramic variants all start from 6,499 yuan (about $900) for the 12GB of RAM and 256GB of storage configuration, and max out at 7,799 yuan ($1,080) with 16GB of RAM and 1TB of storage. These will be available for retail from February 27. The titanium version with dark gray vegan leather is based on the top configuration but costs an extra 1,000 yuan ($140), and it won't be available until March 12.

Xiaomi

Likes its predecessor, the 14 Ultra has an optional photography kit with a shutter button grip that adds an extra 1,500mAh of power. The upgrade this time is the new video recording button, along with a customizable jog dial. You can get this accessory for 699 yuan ($100) as a bundle with the phone.

Meta’s Oversight Board is expanding its purview to include Threads. The group announced that Threads users will now be able to appeal Meta’s content moderation decisions, giving the independent group the ability to influence policies for Meta’s newest app.

It’s a notable expansion for the Oversight Board, which up until now has weighed in on content moderation issues related to Facebook and Instagram posts. “Having independent accountability early on for a new app such as Threads is vitally important.,” board co-chair Helle Thorning-Schmidt said in a statement.

According to the Oversight Board, user appeals on Threads will function similarly to how they do on Instagram and Facebook. When users have “exhausted” Meta’s internal process, they’ll be able to request a review from the Oversight Board. Under the rules established when the board was formed, Meta is required to implement the board's decisions regarding specific posts, but isn’t obligated to adhere to its policy recommendations.

Adding Threads’ content moderation to the board’s scope underscores the growing influence of the Twitter-like app that launched last summer. Threads has already grown to 130 million users and Mark Zuckerberg has speculated that it could one day reach a billion users.

Officially, Threads has the same rules as Instagram. But Meta has already encountered some pushback from users over its policies for recommending content. Threads currently blocks search terms related to COVID-19 and other “potentially sensitive” topics. The company also raised some eyebrows when it said last week that it wouldn’t recommend accounts that post too much political content unless users choose to opt-in to such suggestions.

Regardless of whether the board ends up weighing in on those choices, it will likely be some time before Threads users see any changes as the result of the board’s recommendations. The Oversight Board only accepts a tiny fraction of user appeals, and it can take several weeks or months for the group to make a decision, and many more months for Meta to change any of its rules as a result of the guidance. (The board can, in some cases, expedite the process.)

In the big Nintendo Direct presentation yesterday, we learned of two of the four Xbox titles Microsoft said would appear on “the other consoles.” One of them is Pentiment, coming to Nintendo Switch, PS4 and PS5, well, today.

Microsoft

The critically acclaimed Pentiment has been an Xbox, PC and Xbox Cloud exclusive since launch in late 2022. It has an eye-catching animated historical art style — and is delightfully niche. The game’s director, Josh Sawyer, said creating and launching a game like this would never have been possible without Game Pass, which, as Kris Holt notes, makes it an unusual pick to be transferred to other platforms. Xbox boss Phil Spencer said earlier this month the titles hopping platforms had all been on Xbox and PC for at least a year and had hit their “full potential” on those platforms.

The other game coming to other consoles is Grounded — pretty much Honey I Shrunk the Kids, the game — and will land April 16. Microsoft also later confirmed that Hi-Fi Rush and Sea of Thieves are coming to PlayStation 5.

— Mat Smith

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Watch the first Borderlands movie trailer

It stars Cate Blanchett, Jamie Lee Curtis, Kevin Hart and Jack Black.

YouTube

There’s a Borderlands movie coming out, and we have our very first teaser trailer. This footage gives us a glimpse of all of the major characters. Cate Blanchett is taking a nice fat paycheck starring as the famously short-tempered Lilith, who’s searching for a mysterious vault. Comedian Kevin Hart portrays the mercenary Roland, and Jamie Lee Curtis plays the scientist Dr. Tannis, who featured in all three games. Also, you can’t have a video game adaptation without Jack Black, it seems.

Continue reading.

Apple Sports puts real-time scores on your iPhone lockscreen

It’s a smoother way to follow your favorite teams.

Apple

Apple has launched a new iPhone app, offering real-time stats for a number of major sports leagues. Once you’ve installed Apple Sports, you can set your favorite team and get a trove of data on your lock screen in the live activities box when the team is playing. The app is free and available in the US, UK and Canada for basketball, hockey and soccer. The company said other sports, including baseball and football, will debut when new seasons kick off.

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FTC concludes Twitter didn’t violate data security rules, in spite of Musk’s orders

Staff disregarded Musk’s directive to provide outsiders with “full access to everything.”

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) concluded Elon Musk ordered Twitter (now X) employees to take actions that would have violated FTC rules on consumer data privacy and security. Twitter security employees “took appropriate measures to protect consumers’ private information,” likely sparing Musk’s company from government repercussions. FTC chair Lina Khan wrote: “Ultimately, the third-party individuals did not receive direct access to Twitter’s systems, but instead worked with other company employees who accessed the systems on the individuals’ behalf.”

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X, formerly Twitter, is once again restricting content in India. The company's Global Government Affairs account announced that the Indian government had issued an executive order mandating that X withhold specific accounts and posts or face penalties such as "significant fines and imprisonment." X further stated that it doesn't agree with the order and is challenging it. 

The designated posts and accounts will only be blocked within India, however, there's no clear list of those affected. "Due to legal restrictions, we are unable to publish the executive orders, but we believe that making them public is essential for transparency," the Global Government Affairs post stated. "This lack of disclosure can lead to a lack of accountability and arbitrary decision-making." X claims to have notified all affected parties. 

The posts likely center around the ongoing farmers' protest, which, since February 13, has seen multiple farmers' unions on strike in a bid to get floor pricing, or a minimum support price, for crops sold. Violent clashes between protesters and police have already resulted in at least one death, AP News reports. Mohammed Zubair, an Indian journalist and co-founder of Alt News, shared purported screenshots of suspended accounts belonging to individuals critical of the current government, on-the-ground reporters, prominent farm unionists, and more. 

This forced blocking is far from the first incident between X and India. In 2022, X sued the Indian government for "arbitrarily and disproportionately" applying its IT laws passed the year prior. The law required the company to hire a point of contact for the local authorities and a domestic compliance officer. Prior to this concession, in early 2021, the Indian government had threatened to jail X's employees if posts about the then occurring farmers' protest stayed live on the site. Shortly after, the country mandated that X remove content criticizing its COVID-19 response.

India dismissed X's suit in June 2023, claiming the company didn't properly explain why it had ever delayed complying with the country's IT laws. The court also fined X 5 million rupees ($60,300), stating, "You are not a farmer but a billon dollar company." The order followed shortly after Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey claimed that India had threatened to raid employees' homes and shut down the site if the company hadn't taken down posts during the farmers' protest. 

After teasing it for the past couple of weeks, Google is rolling out a new sign-in page with a slightly cleaner design. The changes are small and don't affect functionality, but it's something that users encounter often, and Google has been using the previous version since it changed its logo, as far as I can see. 

The refresh puts the sign-in (and sign-up) page more in line with the company's Material Design ethic introduced back in 2014. To that end, it's now aligned left (instead of centered) and features an orientation that automatically adjusts to your screen's size — so it's wider on PC screens and narrower on smartphones. It shows up on all types of devices, but may not appear on older browsers, the company said. 

The biggest previous change Google made to its sign-in page was putting password entry onto a second page back in 2015. That update was made "in preparation for future authentication solutions that complement passwords," and to reduce confusion among people who have multiple Google accounts, it said at the time. 

Google emphasized that the change will be permanent, much like the switch to Gmail's integrated view. The rollout will be fairly gradual, starting on February 21 and set for completion by March 4, 2024.

You don't have to type in your password every time you log into your PlayStation account anymore. Sony Interactive Entertainment (SIE) has launched passkey support for PlayStation accounts, which means you can simply sign in through your mobile device or computer and use its screen unlocking method to log in. If you use a PIN, your fingerprint or your face to unlock your phone, for instance, that's also how you'll be able to get into your PlayStation account. On desktop, we were easily able to link our account with 1Password and use its passkey capability. 

In its official page for the update, the company touches on the benefits of using passkeys, such as reducing account vulnerability. Passkeys can't be reused or given away, whether it's inadvertently or on purpose as SIE explains, making them resistant to phishing and data breaches. 

To set up a passkey, you simply have to go to Security under Account Management. There, you can activate the option and create a passkey by following the on-screen instructions. The company warns that some hardware security keys could cause issues, and it might be better to use synced passkeys on mobile devices instead. It also cautions against the use of mobile PIN codes as passkeys on Android and recommends iCloud Keychain, Google Password Manager, 1Password and Dashlane as a passkey provider. After setting up the option, you'll be prompted to use your passkey whenever you need to sign in on a PlayStation 5 or a PlayStation 4 console. You can deactivate the option anytime, though, if you want to go back to signing in with a password.

Google's Gemini chatbot, which was formerly called Bard, has the capability to whip up AI-generated illustrations based on a user's text description. You can ask it to create pictures of happy couples, for instance, or people in period clothing walking modern streets. As the BBC notes, however, some users are criticizing Google for depicting specific white figures or historically white groups of people as racially diverse individuals. Now, Google has issued a statement, saying that it's aware Gemini "is offering inaccuracies in some historical image generation depictions" and that it's going to fix things immediately. 

According to Daily Dot, a former Google employee kicked off the complaints when he tweeted images of women of color with a caption that reads: "It's embarrassingly hard to get Google Gemini to acknowledge that white people exist." To get those results, he asked Gemini to generate pictures of American, British and Australian women. Other users, mostly those known for being right-wing figures, chimed in with their own results, showing AI-generated images that depict America's founding fathers and the Catholic Church's popes as people of color. 

In our tests, asking Gemini to create illustrations of the founding fathers resulted in images of white men with a single person of color or woman in them. When we asked the chatbot to generate images of the pope throughout the ages, we got photos depicting black women and Native Americans as the leader of the Catholic Church. Asking Gemini to generate images of American women gave us photos with a white, an East Asian, a Native American and a South Asian woman. The Verge says the chatbot also depicted Nazis as people of color, but we couldn't get Gemini to generate Nazi images. "I am unable to fulfill your request due to the harmful symbolism and impact associated with the Nazi Party," the chatbot responded. 

Gemini's behavior could be a result of overcorrection, since chatbots and robots trained on AI over the past years tended to exhibit racist and sexist behavior. In one experiment from 2022, for instance, a robot repeatedly chose a Black man when asked which among the faces it scanned was a criminal. In a statement posted on X, Gemini Product Lead Jack Krawczyk said Google designed its "image generation capabilities to reflect [its] global user base, and [it takes] representation and bias seriously." He said Gemini will continue to generate racially diverse illustrations for open-ended prompts, such as images of people walking their dog. However, he admitted that "[h]istorical contexts have more nuance to them and [his team] will further tune to accommodate that."

Intel's relatively new Foundry division — formerly known as Intel Foundry Services until earlier today — has just landed a notable order from a big name. According to Bloomberg and The Wall Street Journal, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella announced that his company will be tapping into Intel's latest 18A (1.8nm) fabrication process for an upcoming in-house chip design. But given Intel's process roadmap, this means we likely won't be seeing Microsoft's new chip until 2025.

While neither company disclosed the nature of said silicon, Microsoft did unveil its custom-made Azure Maia AI Accelerator and Azure Cobalt 100 CPU server chips last November, with an expected rollout some time "early" this year to bolster its own AI services. The Cobalt 100 is based on Arm architecture, and it just so happens that Intel has been optimizing its 18A process for Arm designs since April last year (it even became an Arm investor later), so there's a good chance that this collaboration may lead to the next-gen Cobalt CPU.

In addition to the usual efficiency improvements as node size decreases, Intel 18A also offers "the industry's first backside power solution" which, according to IEEE's Spectrum, separates the power interconnect layer from the data interconnect layer at the top, and moves it to beneath the silicon substrate. This allows for improved voltage regulation and lower resistance, which in turn enable faster logic and lower power consumption, especially when applied to 3D stacking.

In Intel's Q4 earnings call, CEO Pat Gelsinger confirmed that "18A is expected to achieve manufacturing readiness in second half '24." Given that Intel's very own 18A-based processors won't arrive until 2025, chances are it'll be a similar time frame for Microsoft's next chip.

Intel

At Intel's event earlier today, the exec shared an extended Intel Foundry process technology roadmap, which features a new 14A (1.4nm) node enabled by ASML's "High-NA EUV" (high-numerical aperture extreme ultraviolet) lithography system. According to AnandTech, this 14A leap may help Intel play catchup after its late EUV adoption for its Intel 4 (7nm) node, though risk production won't take place until the end of 2026.

Intel Foundry is the brainchild of Gelsinger, who launched this department right after he assumed the CEO role in February 2021, as part of his ambitious plan to put Intel up against the likes of TSMC and Samsung in the contract chip-making market. Before Microsoft, Intel Foundry's list of clients already include MediaTek, Qualcomm and Amazon. The company still aims to become "the second largest external foundry by 2030" in terms of manufacturing revenue, which it believes is achievable as early as this year.

Samsung said Wednesday that the Galaxy S24’s AI features will arrive on last year’s phones (including foldables) and tablets in late March. In January, Engadget’s Sam Rutherford reported that the AI suite would soon be available on the Galaxy S23 series, Z Fold 5, Z Flip 5 and Tab S9. Today’s announcement makes that device list official while adding the more specific arrival window of late March 2024.

That group of 2023 devices will receive a software update next month with the AI features from the S24 series. Those include communication-based AI tricks like Chat Assist (adjusts message tone and translates messages), Live Translate (real-time voice and text translations) and Interpreter (split-screen translation for in-person conversations).

They’ll also get the productivity-based AI features Circle to Search (search for anything on your screen by drawing a ring around it), Note Assist (formatting, summaries and translations of notes), Browsing Assist (summaries of news articles) and Transcript Assist (transcribe and summarize meeting recordings).

Finally, image-based AI features coming to those devices include Generative Edit (reframe shots, move subjects around or delete and replace them), Edit Suggestion (recommended image tweaks), and Instant Slow-Mo (generate extra frames to transform a standard video into a slow-motion one).

Photo by Sam Rutherford / Engadget

The full list of devices receiving the update starting in March includes the Galaxy S23, Galaxy S23+, Galaxy S23 Ultra, Galaxy S23 FE, Galaxy Z Fold 5, Galaxy Z Flip 5 and Galaxy Tab S9. But Samsung says you can expect more devices to join them later. “This is only the beginning of Galaxy AI, as we plan to bring the experience to over 100 million Galaxy users within 2024 and continue to innovate ways to harness the unlimited possibilities of mobile AI,” Samsung President TM Roh wrote in a press release.

We were mostly impressed with the AI features in our Galaxy S24 Ultra review. “While harnessing AI might not be a super exciting development now that everyone and their grandmother is trying to shoehorn it into everything, it does make the S24 Ultra a more powerful and well-rounded handset,” Engadget’s Sam Rutherford wrote in January.

Although he noticed a few hiccups in the AI tools at launch, he found most of them to be a genuinely helpful complement to the phone’s high-end hardware. “Samsung finally has an answer to the sophisticated features that were previously only available from the Pixel family,” he wrote. “Sure, the S24’s tools aren’t quite as polished as Google’s offerings, but they get you 80 to 90 percent of the way there.”

Electric car maker Rivian announced on Wednesday that it’s laying off 10 percent of its salaried workforce to cut costs after facing a quarterly loss. The Amazon-backed company reported that it lost $1.5 billion in the fourth quarter of 2023 and said that it expects to build 57,000 electric vehicles in 2024, the same number it built last year.

“Our business is facing a challenging macroeconomic environment — including historically high interest rates and geopolitical uncertainty — and we need to make purposeful changes now to ensure our promising future,” Rivian’s founder and CEO wrote to employees in an email, CNN reported. "We must strategically prioritize our growth areas of the business, including the launch of Peregrine and R2 as well as investing in our go-to-market capabilities."

As part of its plans to cut costs, Rivian will shut down a factory in Illinois in the middle of this year and will upgrade its manufacturing line to boost production rates by 30 precent.The company is expected to unveil the R2, a compact SUV in the $40,000 to $60,000 range, on March 7, although deliveries of the vehicle won’t start until 2026.