We saw a number of gadgets go on sale this week as July comes to a close. Both Amazon's Echo smart speaker and the Echo Show 5 have been discounted, with the Echo now down to the same price as it was on Prime Day earlier this month. The Apple TV 4K is nearly $50 off and down to $130, and you can save $300 on the 16-inch MacBook Pro as well. DJI's Action 2 combo pack remains on sale for $279, and if you're on the market for a new smartphone, Amazon will give you a free $50 gift card when you buy the new Google Pixel 6a. Here are the best tech deals from this week that you can still get today.

Amazon Echo

Amazon's full-sized Echo speaker is down to $60, which is a return to its Prime Day price. We gave it a score of 89 for its solid audio quality, handy Alexa capabilities and its built-in Zigbee smart home hub.

Echo Show 5

The Echo Show 5 smart display is on sale for $40 right now, or only $5 more than it was on Prime Day last week. We gave the device a score of 87 for is compact, minimalist design, good audio quality and tap-to-snooze feature.

Apple TV 4K

The Apple TV 4K is back in stock at Amazon and on sale for $130. While not quite as cheap as it was on Prime Day last week ($109), this remains one of the best prices we've seen no our favorite high-end set-top box. We gave the device a score of 90 for its fast performance, Dolby Vision and Atmos support, HomeKit integration and much-improved Siri remote.

16-inch MacBook Pro

The 16-inch MacBook Pro is down to $2,199, or $300 off its usual price. We gave it a score of 92 for its powerful performance, lovely Liquid Retina XDR displays and new bevy of ports.

Blink Outdoor + Blink Mini

Amazon includes a free Blink Mini camera when you buy a Blink Outdoor kit, so you'll save $35 in total on the bundle. Blink cameras are a relatively affordable way to outfit your home with security cameras — all of them record 1080p video and support two-way audio and motion alerts. The Outdoor cameras are wireless and weather-resistant, while the Blink Mini is a smaller, wired camera that's designed to fit into tight spaces inside your home.

Echo Show 15 + Echo Show 5

A bundle that includes the Echo Show 15 smart display and the Echo Show 5 is on sale for $250, which essentially means you're getting the Show 5 for free. The Show 15 is the most unique of Amazon's smart displays as it's a large TV-like device that you can mount on the wall and that will show you things like calendar events, reminders, shopping lists and more. It also lets you video chat and watch shows and movies from services like Netflix, Prime Video and others. The Echo Show 5 is one of our favorite smaller smart displays thanks to its compact design, decent audio quality and useful tap-to-snooze feature.

DJI Action 2 Power Combo

DJI

DJI's Action 2 Power Combo bundle is still 33 percent off and down to $279. The pack includes the Action 2 camera, a magnetic protective case and a battery module. DJI introduced the Action 2 last year as a total redesign of its Osmo Action cams, and it has a super compact design along with a 12-megapixel sensor that can capture 4K video at up to 120fps.

Google Pixel 6a + Amazon gift card

Sam Rutherford/Engadget

Google's newest smartphone, the Pixel 6a, comes with a free $50 Amazon gift card when you order the handset through the online retailer. From now through August 7, you'll get the gift card at no extra cost — just click the "Add both to cart" option under the "Special offers and product promotions" section that's underneath the phone's description. We gave the Pixel 6a a score of 89 for its attractive design, great cameras and long battery life.

Instant Pot Vortex Plus air fryer

Instant Pot

The 6-quart Instant Pot Vortex Plus air fryer is still 38 percent off and down to only $99. This is a slightly older version of one of our favorite air fryers, and we like that it has six different cook modes including air fry, broil and dehydrate, and that it has a clear window on its drawer that lets you check out your food while it's cooking.

Logitech Litra Glow

Mark Anthony Reyes/Engadget

Logitech's Litra Glow soft light for streaming is on sale for $50 right now, or $10 off its normal price. Unveiled earlier this year, the Litra Glow is produces light that's designed to be easy on the eyes so you can keep it on for multi-hour streams. It comes with five different brightness and color temperature presets, but you can also create your own using Logitech's G Hub software.

Solo Stove

Solo Stove

Solo Stove's summer sale knocks up to $350 off fire pits, so you can grab one for as low as $200. The discounts translate to $100 off the Ranger, $180 off the Bonfire and $350 off the Yukon. We like these fire pits because their double-walled designs minimize smoke while keeping the fire hot, and they're sleek and relatively portable, too.

Samsung 980 Pro SSD

The Samsung 980 Pro SSD in 1TB that comes with a heatsink is on sale for $150, or 35 percent off its usual price. We like this PS5-compatible drive for its standard design, sequential read speeds up to 7,000MB/s and handy optimization software.

Crucial MX500 SSD

Crucial's MX500 in 1TB is on sale for $85 when you clip the on-page coupon that knocks $5 off its $90 sale price. It’s a good option if you need a standard 2.5-inch drive that works with both laptops and desktops. It also has AES-256 bit hardware encryption and integrated power loss immunity to protect your data.

PNY XLR8 CS3040 SSD

Another one of our favorite PS5 SSDs, the PNY XLR8 CS3040, has dropped to $105. It's an already affordable drive made even better by this sale, and we like its 5,600 MB/s read speeds and its five-year warranty.

OnePlus 9

The OnePlus 9 smartphone is 32 percent off and down to $500, which is the lowest price we've seen for it. We gave the handset a score of 88 when it came out last year for its fantastic display, excellent performance and improved main camera.

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Twitter now has an exact start date for its trial against Elon Musk over his attempt to withdraw from his $44 billion purchase offer. The Vergenotes Delaware Court of Chancery Judge Kathaleen McCormick has scheduled the lawsuit's trial for October 17th. The courtroom showdown will last the promised five days, wrapping up on October 21st.

The timing represents a slight compromise. Twitter had pressed for a four-day trial starting in September. The social media firm's shareholder vote on the takeover is slated for September 13th. Musk's attorneys wanted to push the trial to February 2023, arguing that they needed more time to collect and interpret data on Twitter's volume of fake accounts and bots.

The move ultimately favors Twitter. It only has to wait a few months for a ruling. If Musk's team isn't finished combing through data by October, the company may also strengthen its argument that the Tesla chief rushed his offer and doesn't have enough information to level accusations of deceit. That, in turn, may let Twitter either force completion of the deal or demand compensation for a broken agreement.

It’s been a longer wait than we’d hoped, but the first major software update for the Analogue Pocket is finally here. It’s still a beta version so not everything is fully fleshed out, but you’ll at least be able to get a taste of the company’s vision for its fledgling OS. The beta does include a taste of the “reference” Library, much-improved game saves and, most excitingly, a glimpse at how third-party developers can use the Pocket to emulate consoles beyond the ones it already does.

Analogue OS 1.1

“Memories,” as Analogue calls save-states, still aren’t complete, but you can at least save a respectable 128 different game states which is a vast improvement on the minimal offering at launch (one slot for just one game total). You can create saves for any game, be that physical cartridge, or any “.pocket” GB Studio files you have (like Deadeus). The method for making a save is the same as before (Up+Analogue button) and you can recall a list of saves during play with Down+Analogue button. If you prefer to start from the last save point immediately, you can activate that in options also (rather than choosing from a list).

What you can’t do is keep updating the last save as you go along (think “save slots” in most emulators). Every new save will be a separate file and you’ll manage them individually. They show up in a long list which details the platform for the game you were playing (Game Boy, Game Gear etc.) the game’s title and date/time of the save.

Right now you can pull up Memories from the main menu (before loading a game), but choosing a save that corresponds to the cartridge in the slot doesn’t take you directly there (it’s grayed out), you have to load the game first. Analogue says that saves/Memories will soon have a screenshot attached and will be sortable in a variety of ways to make the experience much smoother in the full release this September.

James Trew / Engadget

What wasn’t in the OS at launch at all was the “Library” feature. All we knew was that it had the lofty goal of being a complete reference of all gaming history. From within that you’d see artwork for titles along with what company made the game, for what platform, what year and even what region or version you had inserted in the cartridge slot. In today’s beta, the Library is more of a splash screen before the game loads. Analogue says you’ll even be able to add your own image to a game in the Library, but again, expect that in the final release.

All the cartridges I tested had the correct details with a screenshot, but the information is limited (no mention of what year or version of the game I have etc.). Of course we’re excited to see how this scales up once it’s fully integrated, but for now it’s a pleasant stop along the way to playing a game. It’s worth noting that, as is, it only applies to cartridges and not titles launched from the GB Studio section (such as the aforementioned Deadeus which is a full game that Analogue made available for the Pocket at launch).

On a more practical note, Analogue has added support for more third-party controllers for when playing through the TV via the dock. To be fair, even though the officially supported list at launch was short (three 8Bitdo models plus the PS4 and Switch controllers), many more did still work. As of this release the number of 8Bitdo controllers supported jumps to 15 and PS5 owners can now use their DualSense, too, if they wish.

OpenFPGA

One of the more interesting features of the Pocket at launch was the presence of a spare FPGA chip. Analogue’s hardware doesn’t use software emulation, instead it uses a Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA) to emulate consoles at the hardware level with cores — instructions for the FPGA that configure it to mimic a specific system. Analogue pledged that others would be able to develop cores for the Pocket, and today we see the first example of that.

James Trew / Engadget

A core for the PDP-1 has been created for the Pocket allowing you to play one of the very first videogames — Spacewar! — from 1962. As you can imagine, the game is very simple and doesn’t really tax the Pocket, but it’s a fitting first example for a console that wants to celebrate the history of gaming. And this should really just be the start of something more exciting as other developers – which can be anyone – get onboard.

What’s more of a surprise is that the entirety of the Pocket’s hardware appears to be open to developers. Initially, it was thought that the Pocket’s main FPGA would be kept for Analogue and the less powerful second FPGA was there to be tinkered with. But the company's founder, Christopher Taber, confirmed to Engadget that "developers will be capable of implementing totally decentralized cores as far as they can push Pocket's hardware ... roughly up to the 32-bit generation.”

Best of all, we might not even have to wait very long to see what comes along. “Many third-party developers have had their hands on openFPGA for some time now and you can expect a plethora of new amazing things being publicly released by them shortly on/after July 29th”, Taber told Engadget, before concluding: “We are not f***ing around with this.”

Politicians are making another attempt to restore net neutrality rules. Democrat Senators Ed Markey and Ron Wyden have introduced a Net Neutrality and Broadband Justice Act that would classify broadband internet as a telecom service under Title II of the Communications Act. The move would let the FCC restore net neutrality protections repealed by the Ajit Pai-era Commission in December 2017, including safeguards against blocking, throttling and paid prioritization for data traffic.

The bill would also help the FCC institute policies that improve accessibility, safety and "close the digital divide," according to Markey's statement. Another 28 senators, including independent Bernie Sanders and prominent Democrats like Cory Booker and Elizabeth Warren, are co-sponsors. California Representative Doris Matsui is sponsoring an equivalent bill in the house. The measure has the endorsement of civil rights and activist groups like the American Civil Liberties Union and Electronic Frontier Foundation.

Democrats have tried to revive net neutrality before with efforts like 2019's Save the Internet Act. As Markey explained to The Register, though, they're trying a different strategy. The new bill is purposefully short at just two pages long — that brevity gives the FCC the regulatory power to adapt to the "changing nature of the internet," the senator said. Previous attempts tried to enshrine specific rules in law.

The Act's survival is far from certain, though. It needs to advance beyond a Senate committee, and Congress will go into recess during August. A Senate vote might not succeed unless Democrats can pass the 60-vote threshold needed to avoid a filibuster, and the House bill isn't guaranteed to pass if it comes up for a vote after the November midterm elections.

The FCC isn't guaranteed to resurrect net neutrality even if the bill becomes law, for that matter. The Commission is currently deadlocked with two Democrats and two Republicans. Nominee Gigi Sohn still hasn't been confirmed. An FCC vote on neutrality-related policy changes could easily fail, even though the agency would have the authority (and effectively the obligation) to reinstitute consumer protections.

Snap has set up a new grant program to pay indie musicians behind popular songs on Snapchat. It created the Snapchat Sounds Creator Fund to "recognize emerging, independent artists for the critical role they play in driving video creations, inspiring internet trends and defining cultural moments," according to a blog post.

Starting in August, the fund will give artists who distribute music on Snapchat Sounds via DistroKid up to $100,000 in total each month. For now, the program is limited to 20 songs each month. The artists behind each of the songs Snapchat selects will receive $5,000. "We want to support the independent and emerging artists that are driving creation on Snapchat," said Snap's global head of music partnerships Ted Suh said. 

Artists need to be at least 18 years old to be eligible (or 16 if they have written consent from a parent or guardian). Snap says artists can't apply for a grant and it will decide recipients at its own discretion.

Snapchat started letting users attach music to snaps through the Sounds feature in October 2020. Creators have made more than 2.7 billion videos with music from Sounds and have accrued more than 183 billion views in total. The Snapchat Sounds Creator Fund seems like a reasonable way to reward musicians whose work has become a viral hit on the platform or helped creators to express themselves.

Nike wants to make fitness apps accessible to more people with disabilities. The athletics gear maker has introduced adaptive workouts to the Nike Training Club app (available for Android and iOS) that you can perform whether or not you have a disability. The seven classes in this set target a wide range of movement and equipment, ranging from upper-body strength training with dumbbells to yoga.

A Nike athlete with limb loss, Amy Bream, leads all the classes. You'll also find guidance from an adaptive training-focused physical therapist. Training Club already offers an exercise program for expecting and recent mothers.

The company isn't alone in making these apps more accessible. Apple added Fitness+ workouts for pregnant people and seniors last year and has Apple Watch wheelchair workout tracking, for instance. Still, Nike's move is an important step that could bring exercise apps to a wider audience.  

YouTube has introduced a new tool that makes it easier for creators to turn regular videos into Shorts, it announced in a community update. If you have any of your own videos loaded up, you'll see a new tool under "Create" called "Edit into a Short" right inside the main app. It lets you select up to 60 seconds of the video and bring it directly into the Shorts editor, where you can add text filters, or additional video, then upload it as a Short. 

After you upload the Short, it links to the full video it was taken from via "Created from" link at the bottom of the video. That lets creators use Shorts as promo tools for the main video, helping drive views and engagement. However, the tool only works on your own content, unlike Cut, which lets you remix content from any video. 

YouTube

I tried the tool out by creating a 10-second Short out of a longer video I created back in 2010 and it was as easy to use as advertised, letting me grab the best part of the video, embed text and add a filter. 

The immense success of TikTok has forced all social media networks to respond in some way. However, Instagram recently backpedaled on its TikTok like full-screen feed and recommended posts features following a significant backlash from users. YouTube is arguably less threatened by TikTok as it offers longer-form content that draws a different audience. The new tool shows that it can have its (Short?)cake and eat it too, though, by letting creators offer Shorts as a form of publicity for their primary content. 

Samsung vowed to make foldable phones mainstream last year, and so far, more and more people have been embracing the form factor. In fact, the tech giant previously said that more people switched brands for the Galaxy Flip 3 than for its flagship devices. The company is set to unveil its next foldable phones in just a few days, but those who want to know what to expect can get a look at the upcoming phones through what seems to be marketing photos leaked by Evan Blass. He posted images of the Galaxy Z Flip 4 and Z Fold 4 in different colors and posed in different angles on 91Mobiles.

Based on the renders, the Z Flip 4 will be available in purple, blue, black and gold. Meanwhile, the Z Fold 4 will be available in black, dark gray and what seems to be beige. On the surface, they look pretty much identical to the current generation of foldables, and there's no glaringly obvious difference in design. We'll likely find out the subtle differences between them after Samsung officially launches the devices. 

As The Verge notes, the images don't exactly show whether the Fold 4 has its predecessor's under-display selfie camera and whether it will finally have a slot for the S Pen. Since the Fold 3 supports input from Samsung's S Pen, there were speculations that the next version will have a slot for the stylus. However, the most recent reports say that it may not have one after all. 

We won't know for sure until Samsung launches the devices. The good news is that we won't have long to wait: Its next Unpacked event is scheduled to take place on August 10th. For now, you can check out the Fold 4's and Flip 4's leaked renders below:

Samsung/Evan Blass/91Mobiles

Samsung/Evan Blass/91Mobiles

This week, Cherlynn and Devindra dive into the world of AI art with Senior Editor Dan Cooper and Creative Futurist John LePore. We know Dall-E and Midjourney can create some truly compelling images from a bit of text, but do they owe a debt to all of the images that they were trained on? Also, we explore the sorry state of Meta and Cherlynn gushes about the new Pixel Buds Pro. Stay tuned to the end of the show for our chat with Joshua Stiksma, Design Director of Moss 2, who discusses the current state of VR game development.

Listen above, or subscribe on your podcast app of choice. If you've got suggestions or topics you'd like covered on the show, be sure to email us or drop a note in the comments! And be sure to check out our other podcasts, the Morning After and Engadget News!

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Topics

• Is AI-generated art borrowed or stolen? – 1:30

• Meta’s many problems and a reversal on Instagram plans – 27:35

• Pixel Buds Pro review – 42:16

• Bloomberg report reveals a few details about Grand Theft Auto 6 – 51:37

• Playstation VR 2 will have live-streaming support and cinematic mode – 53:25

• RIP Car Thing by Spotify – 54:35

• Filipino politician wants to make ghosting illegal – 58:08

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• Working on – 1:08:05

• Pop culture picks – 1:12:34

• Interview with Polyarc design director Joshua Stiksma on Moss: Book II – 1:17:56

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Credits
Hosts: Devindra Hardawar and Cherlynn Low
Guests: Dan Cooper and John LePore
Producer: Ben Ellman
Music: Dale North and Terrence O'Brien
Livestream producers: Julio Barrientos
Graphic artists: Luke Brooks and Brian Oh

On March 23rd, hackers broke into Axie Infinity's Ronin network to steal Ethereum and USDC stablecoins that were then worth over $600 million. In response to the massive theft, Axie developer Sky Mavis disabled token withdrawal — but apparently not before its CEO moved $3 million worth of Axie's main token, AXS, into Binance. According to Bloomberg, company CEO and co-founder Trung Nguyen made the large transfer mere hours before Sky Mavis disclosed on March 29th that the "play to earn" game was hacked. 

It was YouTube user Asobs who first identified the transaction and who shared his documentation with Bloomberg. The news organization then worked with associate professors of mathematics at Winthrop University to confirm his findings. Asobs analyzed the transaction details and connected it to a wallet controlled by Nguyen based on previous transactions, such as the initial distribution of tokens for the game during its early years. 

When asked, company spokesperson Kalie Moore has confirmed the transaction to Bloomberg. Moore said Nguyen made the transfer to shore up the company's finances and ensure it could provide liquidity to its users. Nguyen apparently had to do so on the down-low so that people tracking official Axie wallets wouldn't be able to front-run the news and cash out before the rest of the players even find out what's going on.

Moore said:

"At the time, we (Sky Mavis) understood that our position and options would be better the more AXS we had on Binance. This would give us the flexibility to pursue different options for securing the loans/capital require. The Founding Team chose to transfer it from this wallet to ensure that short-sellers, who track official Axie wallets, would not be able to front-run the news."

Nguyen posted a Twitter thread after Bloomberg's report went up and said that his team had been in contact with Binance after the hack was discovered to "ensure user funds would be restored as soon as possible." The executive added: "This discussion included the fact that Sky Mavis would provide liquidity while we worked on a full backing of the bridge." He also called speculations of insider trading as "baseless and false."

In Axie Infinity, people can earn cryptocurrency by playing the game and completing tasks, such as winning Arena battles and breeding Axie monsters, which are non-fungible tokens. The attack on its Ronin network is now known as one of the biggest in crypto history. According to previous reporting by The Block, bad actors gained entry into its system by sending a spyware-filled PDF to one employee who thought he was getting a job offer with higher pay from another firm. Turns out the company didn't exist, and the offer, according to the US government, came from North Korean hacker group Lazarus.

Sky Mavis has secured $150 million in funding to help reimburse users since then, and Nguyen said all players' funds are now backed 1:1. The value of Ethereum dropped considerably since March, however, so players will not get the money they could've gotten if they had cashed out months ago. As for the game itself, it opened back up in late June with a new system to flag "large, suspicious withdrawals" and a new land-staking feature that enables players to earn passive income.