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While billionaires have pushed Kamala Harris to depart from President Joe Biden’s antitrust policy, the Democratic Party seems to be doubling down.
The word “competition” comes up 18 times in the party’s 2024 platform, compared to nine in the 2020 version. Other key policy areas, like tackling junk fees and noncompetes, are mentioned several times in the 2024 platform as well, compared to just one passing reference to noncompetes in the 2020 document. Notably, those are areas where the Federal Trade Commission, led by Lina Khan — a target of ire from more business-minded Democrats like Reid Hoffman — has been instrumental.
The platform is an indication of where Democrats stand on key issues, which will serve as an important signal to Harris about where the party base is. The document passed through committee before Biden decided not to run again and, in its present form, refers repeatedly to Biden’s “second term.” According to The Associated Press, convention platform committee cochair Regina Romero told delegates that, nevertheless, the platform includes input from many parts of the party and has a “forward-looking vision for our party that echoes the voice of all.”
The document refers repeatedly to Biden’s “second term”
Even though it predates Democrats’ swap of their leading candidate, the platform, along with some other early indicators, begins to paint a fuzzy picture of where Harris stands on tech policy. So far, it’s been difficult to pinpoint her specific views on topics like antitrust enforcement and a potential TikTok ban since she’s had little incentive to stray publicly from President Biden’s views.
Now that Harris is the nominee, it’s increasingly reasonable to assume that the Democratic Party’s platform and convention lineup are a reflection of her agenda.
Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo, who is viewed by many progressives as sympathetic to business interests, said in a speech on the first night of the Democratic National Convention that Harris would “forge an economy with fair competition, free from monopolies. Monopolies that crush workers and small businesses and startups.”
The 2024 Democratic platform also has a greater focus on protecting Americans from the potential harms of technology. There’s an entire section of the 2024 platform dedicated to “Protecting Kids Online, Strengthening Americans’ Data Privacy, & Promoting Competition.” Harris has already come out in support of the Kids Online Safety and Privacy Act (KOSPA), which combines the Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA) with the Children and Teens’ Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA 2.0), a bill that passed with 91 votes out of the Senate. The platform makes clear such legislation will be a continued priority, including another area she’s been interested in since her time as prosecutor and senator: combating nonconsensual intimate images.
There’s an entire section of the 2024 platform dedicated to “Protecting Kids Online, Strengthening Americans’ Data Privacy, & Promoting Competition”
“Democrats will pass bipartisan legislation to protect kids’ privacy and to stop Big Tech from collecting personal data on kids and teenagers online, ban targeted advertising to children, and put stricter limits on the personal data these companies collect on all of us,” the platform says. “And, the Administration has strengthened legal protections for survivors and victims of non-consensual intimate imagery, including those generated by AI, building on the federal civil cause of action established under the Violence Against Women Act Reauthorization of 2022.”
The platform again calls for new laws promoting competition and privacy in tech, echoing goals championed by a set of bills that passed the House Judiciary Committee in 2021. “Important policies include promoting interoperability between tech services and platforms, allowing users to control and transfer their data, and preventing large platforms from giving their own products and services an unfair advantage in the marketplace,” the document says. It also calls for stronger data privacy protections and “fundamentally” reforming Section 230, which shields platforms from being held liable for their users’ posts and for content moderation.
There’s also a section on “Seizing the Promise and Managing the Risks of AI,” that discusses combatting biases perpetuated by the technology and banning “voice impersonations.” In 2020, the technology was only mentioned as part of a broader discussion about technology and US competitiveness in the 2020 platform.
Republicans’ 2024 platform has just three references to “competition,” two of which refer to protecting Americans from “unfair Foreign Competition.” Their commitment on AI is to “repeal Joe Biden’s dangerous Executive Order that hinders AI Innovation, and imposes Radical Leftwing ideas on the development of this technology.” They promise in exchange, “AI Development rooted in Free Speech and Human Flourishing.”
“Our platform reflects our values, and after years of tech companies manipulating our economy, endangering people seeking reproductive care, and making the climate crisis worse, it’s clear that Democrats are now committed to holding them accountable,” Sacha Haworth, executive director of the Tech Oversight Project and veteran Democratic campaign strategist, said in a statement. “This is in large part due to President Biden and Vice President Harris’s leadership and willingness to stand up to tech monopolies over the past four years, and we look forward to continuing this work with a future Harris-Walz Administration.”

While billionaires have pushed Kamala Harris to depart from President Joe Biden’s antitrust policy, the Democratic Party seems to be doubling down.

The word “competition” comes up 18 times in the party’s 2024 platform, compared to nine in the 2020 version. Other key policy areas, like tackling junk fees and noncompetes, are mentioned several times in the 2024 platform as well, compared to just one passing reference to noncompetes in the 2020 document. Notably, those are areas where the Federal Trade Commission, led by Lina Khan — a target of ire from more business-minded Democrats like Reid Hoffman — has been instrumental.

The platform is an indication of where Democrats stand on key issues, which will serve as an important signal to Harris about where the party base is. The document passed through committee before Biden decided not to run again and, in its present form, refers repeatedly to Biden’s “second term.” According to The Associated Press, convention platform committee cochair Regina Romero told delegates that, nevertheless, the platform includes input from many parts of the party and has a “forward-looking vision for our party that echoes the voice of all.”

Even though it predates Democrats’ swap of their leading candidate, the platform, along with some other early indicators, begins to paint a fuzzy picture of where Harris stands on tech policy. So far, it’s been difficult to pinpoint her specific views on topics like antitrust enforcement and a potential TikTok ban since she’s had little incentive to stray publicly from President Biden’s views.

Now that Harris is the nominee, it’s increasingly reasonable to assume that the Democratic Party’s platform and convention lineup are a reflection of her agenda.

Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo, who is viewed by many progressives as sympathetic to business interests, said in a speech on the first night of the Democratic National Convention that Harris would “forge an economy with fair competition, free from monopolies. Monopolies that crush workers and small businesses and startups.”

The 2024 Democratic platform also has a greater focus on protecting Americans from the potential harms of technology. There’s an entire section of the 2024 platform dedicated to “Protecting Kids Online, Strengthening Americans’ Data Privacy, & Promoting Competition.” Harris has already come out in support of the Kids Online Safety and Privacy Act (KOSPA), which combines the Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA) with the Children and Teens’ Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA 2.0), a bill that passed with 91 votes out of the Senate. The platform makes clear such legislation will be a continued priority, including another area she’s been interested in since her time as prosecutor and senator: combating nonconsensual intimate images.

“Democrats will pass bipartisan legislation to protect kids’ privacy and to stop Big Tech from collecting personal data on kids and teenagers online, ban targeted advertising to children, and put stricter limits on the personal data these companies collect on all of us,” the platform says. “And, the Administration has strengthened legal protections for survivors and victims of non-consensual intimate imagery, including those generated by AI, building on the federal civil cause of action established under the Violence Against Women Act Reauthorization of 2022.”

The platform again calls for new laws promoting competition and privacy in tech, echoing goals championed by a set of bills that passed the House Judiciary Committee in 2021. “Important policies include promoting interoperability between tech services and platforms, allowing users to control and transfer their data, and preventing large platforms from giving their own products and services an unfair advantage in the marketplace,” the document says. It also calls for stronger data privacy protections and “fundamentally” reforming Section 230, which shields platforms from being held liable for their users’ posts and for content moderation.

There’s also a section on “Seizing the Promise and Managing the Risks of AI,” that discusses combatting biases perpetuated by the technology and banning “voice impersonations.” In 2020, the technology was only mentioned as part of a broader discussion about technology and US competitiveness in the 2020 platform.

Republicans’ 2024 platform has just three references to “competition,” two of which refer to protecting Americans from “unfair Foreign Competition.” Their commitment on AI is to “repeal Joe Biden’s dangerous Executive Order that hinders AI Innovation, and imposes Radical Leftwing ideas on the development of this technology.” They promise in exchange, “AI Development rooted in Free Speech and Human Flourishing.”

“Our platform reflects our values, and after years of tech companies manipulating our economy, endangering people seeking reproductive care, and making the climate crisis worse, it’s clear that Democrats are now committed to holding them accountable,” Sacha Haworth, executive director of the Tech Oversight Project and veteran Democratic campaign strategist, said in a statement. “This is in large part due to President Biden and Vice President Harris’s leadership and willingness to stand up to tech monopolies over the past four years, and we look forward to continuing this work with a future Harris-Walz Administration.”

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Image: Cath Virginia / The Verge, Chris Strider

Big tech companies are backing the C2PA’s authentication standard, but they’re taking too long to put it to use. As the US presidential election approaches, the web has been filled with photos of Donald Trump and Kamala Harris: spectacularly well-timed photos of an attempted assassination; utterly mundane photos of rally crowds; and shockingly out-of-character photos of the candidates burning flags and holding guns. Some of these things didn’t actually happen, of course. But generative AI imaging tools are now so adept and accessible that we can’t really trust our eyes anymore.
Some of the biggest names in digital media have been working to sort out this mess, and their solution so far is: more data — specifically, metadata that attaches to a photo and tells you what’s real, what’s fake, and how that fakery happened. One of the best-known systems for this, C2PA authentication, already has the backing of companies like Microsoft, Adobe, Arm, OpenAI, Intel, Truepic, and Google. The technical standard provides key information about where images originate from, letting viewers identify whether they’ve been manipulated.
“Provenance technologies like Content Credentials — which act like a nutrition label for digital content — offer a promising solution by enabling official event photos and other content to carry verifiable metadata like date and time, or if needed, signal whether or not AI was used,” Andy Parsons, a steering committee member of C2PA and senior director for CAI at Adobe, told The Verge. “This level of transparency can help dispel doubt, particularly during breaking news and election cycles.”

But if all the information needed to authenticate images can already be embedded in the files, where is it? And why aren’t we seeing some kind of “verified” mark when the photos are published online?
The problem is interoperability. There are still huge gaps in how this system is being implemented, and it’s taking years to get all the necessary players on board to make it work. And if we can’t get everyone on board, then the initiative might be doomed to fail.
The Coalition for Content Provenance and Authenticity (C2PA) is one of the largest groups trying to address this chaos, alongside the Content Authenticity Initiative (CAI) that Adobe kicked off in 2019. The technical standard they’ve developed uses cryptographic digital signatures to verify the authenticity of digital media, and it’s already been established. But this progress is still frustratingly inaccessible to the everyday folks who stumble across questionable images online.

“It’s important to realize that we’re still in the early stage of adoption,” said Parsons. “The spec is locked. It’s robust. It’s been looked at by security professionals. The implementations are few and far between, but that’s just the natural course of getting standards adopted.”
The problems start from the origin of the images: the camera. Some camera brands like Sony and Leica already embed cryptographic digital signatures based on C2PA’s open technical standard — which provides information like the camera settings and the date and location where an image was taken — into photographs the moment they’re taken.
This is currently only supported on a handful of cameras, across both new models like the Leica M11-P or via firmware updates for existing models like Sony’s Alpha 1, Alpha 7S III, and Alpha 7 IV. While other brands like Nikon and Canon have also pledged to adopt the C2PA standard, most have yet to meaningfully do so. Smartphones, which are typically the most accessible cameras for most folks, are also lacking. Neither Apple nor Google responded to our inquiries about implementing C2PA support or a similar standard into iPhone or Android devices.
If the cameras themselves don’t record this precious data, important information can still be applied during the editing process. Software like Adobe’s Photoshop and Lightroom, two of the most widely used image editing apps in the photography industry, can automatically embed this data in the form of C2PA-supported Content Credentials, which note how and when an image has been altered. That includes any use of generative AI tools, which could help to identify images that have been falsely doctored.

But again, many applications, including Affinity Photo and GIMP, don’t support a unified, interoperable metadata solution that can help resolve authenticity issues. Some members of these software communities have expressed a desire for them to do so, which might bring more attention to the issue. Phase One, developers of the popular pro photo editor Capture One, told The Verge that it was “committed to supporting photographers” being impacted by AI and is “looking into traceability features like C2PA, amongst others.”
Even when a camera does support authenticity data, it doesn’t always make it to viewers. A C2PA-compliant Sony camera was used to take the now-iconic photo of Trump’s fist pump following the assassination attempt as well as a photo that seemed to capture the bullet that was shot at him flying through the air. That metadata information isn’t widely accessible to the general public, though, because online platforms where these images were being circulated, like X and Reddit, don’t display it when images are uploaded and published. Even media websites that are backing the standard, like The New York Times, don’t visibly flag verification credentials after they’ve used them to authenticate a photograph.
Part of that roadblock, besides getting platforms on board in the first place, is figuring out the best way to present that information to users. Facebook and Instagram are two of the largest platforms that check content for markers like the C2PA standard, but they only flag images that have been manipulated using generative AI tools — no information is presented to validate “real” images.

Image: Meta
Meta has updated its AI labels, but none of its platforms currently flag when images are verifiably authentic.

When those labels are unclear, it can cause a problem, too. Meta’s “Made with AI” labels angered photographers when they were applied so aggressively that they seemed to cover even minor retouching. The labels have since been updated to deemphasize the use of AI. And while Meta didn’t disclose to us if it will expand this system, the company told us it believes a “widespread adoption of Content Credentials” is needed to establish trust.
Truepic, an authenticity infrastructure provider and another member of C2PA, says there’s enough information present in these digital markers to provide more detail than platforms currently offer. “The architecture is there, but we need to research the optimal way to display these visual indicators so that everyone on the internet can actually see them and use them to make better decisions without just saying something is either all generative AI or all authentic,” Truepic chief communications officer Mounir Ibrahim said to The Verge.
X doesn’t currently support the standard, but Elon Musk has previously said the platform “should probably do it”
A cornerstone of this plan involves getting online platforms to adopt the standard. X, which has attracted regulatory scrutiny as a hotbed for spreading misinformation, isn’t a member of the C2PA initiative and seemingly offers no alternative. But X owner Elon Musk does appear willing to get behind it. “That sounds like a good idea, we should probably do it,” Musk said when pitched by Parsons at the 2023 AI Safety Summit. “Some way of authenticating would be good.”
Even if, by some miracle, we were to wake up tomorrow in a tech landscape where every platform, camera, and creative application supported the C2PA standard, denialism is a potent, pervasive, and potentially insurmountable obstacle. Providing people with documented, evidence-based information won’t help if they just discount it. Misinformation can even be utterly baseless, as seen by how readily Trump supporters believed accusations about Harris supposedly faking her rally crowds, despite widespread evidence proving otherwise. Some people will just believe what they want to believe.
But a cryptographic labeling system is likely the best approach we currently have to reliably identify authentic, manipulated, and artificially generated content at scale. Alternative pattern analyzing methods like online AI detection services, for instance, are notoriously unreliable. “Detection is probabilistic at best — we do not believe that you will get a detection mechanism where you can upload any image, video, or digital content and get 99.99 percent accuracy in real-time and at scale,” Ibrahim says. “And while watermarking can be robust and highly effective, in our view it isn’t interoperable.”
No system is perfect, though, and even more robust options like the C2PA standard can only do so much. Image metadata can be easily stripped simply by taking a screenshot, for example — for which there is currently no solution — and its effectiveness is otherwise dictated by how many platforms and products support it.
“None of it is a panacea,” Ibrahim says. “It will mitigate the downside risk, but bad actors will always be there using generative tools to try and deceive people.”

Image: Cath Virginia / The Verge, Chris Strider

Big tech companies are backing the C2PA’s authentication standard, but they’re taking too long to put it to use.

As the US presidential election approaches, the web has been filled with photos of Donald Trump and Kamala Harris: spectacularly well-timed photos of an attempted assassination; utterly mundane photos of rally crowds; and shockingly out-of-character photos of the candidates burning flags and holding guns. Some of these things didn’t actually happen, of course. But generative AI imaging tools are now so adept and accessible that we can’t really trust our eyes anymore.

Some of the biggest names in digital media have been working to sort out this mess, and their solution so far is: more data — specifically, metadata that attaches to a photo and tells you what’s real, what’s fake, and how that fakery happened. One of the best-known systems for this, C2PA authentication, already has the backing of companies like Microsoft, Adobe, Arm, OpenAI, Intel, Truepic, and Google. The technical standard provides key information about where images originate from, letting viewers identify whether they’ve been manipulated.

“Provenance technologies like Content Credentials — which act like a nutrition label for digital content — offer a promising solution by enabling official event photos and other content to carry verifiable metadata like date and time, or if needed, signal whether or not AI was used,” Andy Parsons, a steering committee member of C2PA and senior director for CAI at Adobe, told The Verge. “This level of transparency can help dispel doubt, particularly during breaking news and election cycles.”

But if all the information needed to authenticate images can already be embedded in the files, where is it? And why aren’t we seeing some kind of “verified” mark when the photos are published online?

The problem is interoperability. There are still huge gaps in how this system is being implemented, and it’s taking years to get all the necessary players on board to make it work. And if we can’t get everyone on board, then the initiative might be doomed to fail.

The Coalition for Content Provenance and Authenticity (C2PA) is one of the largest groups trying to address this chaos, alongside the Content Authenticity Initiative (CAI) that Adobe kicked off in 2019. The technical standard they’ve developed uses cryptographic digital signatures to verify the authenticity of digital media, and it’s already been established. But this progress is still frustratingly inaccessible to the everyday folks who stumble across questionable images online.

“It’s important to realize that we’re still in the early stage of adoption,” said Parsons. “The spec is locked. It’s robust. It’s been looked at by security professionals. The implementations are few and far between, but that’s just the natural course of getting standards adopted.”

The problems start from the origin of the images: the camera. Some camera brands like Sony and Leica already embed cryptographic digital signatures based on C2PA’s open technical standard — which provides information like the camera settings and the date and location where an image was taken — into photographs the moment they’re taken.

This is currently only supported on a handful of cameras, across both new models like the Leica M11-P or via firmware updates for existing models like Sony’s Alpha 1, Alpha 7S III, and Alpha 7 IV. While other brands like Nikon and Canon have also pledged to adopt the C2PA standard, most have yet to meaningfully do so. Smartphones, which are typically the most accessible cameras for most folks, are also lacking. Neither Apple nor Google responded to our inquiries about implementing C2PA support or a similar standard into iPhone or Android devices.

If the cameras themselves don’t record this precious data, important information can still be applied during the editing process. Software like Adobe’s Photoshop and Lightroom, two of the most widely used image editing apps in the photography industry, can automatically embed this data in the form of C2PA-supported Content Credentials, which note how and when an image has been altered. That includes any use of generative AI tools, which could help to identify images that have been falsely doctored.

But again, many applications, including Affinity Photo and GIMP, don’t support a unified, interoperable metadata solution that can help resolve authenticity issues. Some members of these software communities have expressed a desire for them to do so, which might bring more attention to the issue. Phase One, developers of the popular pro photo editor Capture One, told The Verge that it was “committed to supporting photographers” being impacted by AI and is “looking into traceability features like C2PA, amongst others.”

Even when a camera does support authenticity data, it doesn’t always make it to viewers. A C2PA-compliant Sony camera was used to take the now-iconic photo of Trump’s fist pump following the assassination attempt as well as a photo that seemed to capture the bullet that was shot at him flying through the air. That metadata information isn’t widely accessible to the general public, though, because online platforms where these images were being circulated, like X and Reddit, don’t display it when images are uploaded and published. Even media websites that are backing the standard, like The New York Times, don’t visibly flag verification credentials after they’ve used them to authenticate a photograph.

Part of that roadblock, besides getting platforms on board in the first place, is figuring out the best way to present that information to users. Facebook and Instagram are two of the largest platforms that check content for markers like the C2PA standard, but they only flag images that have been manipulated using generative AI tools — no information is presented to validate “real” images.

Image: Meta
Meta has updated its AI labels, but none of its platforms currently flag when images are verifiably authentic.

When those labels are unclear, it can cause a problem, too. Meta’s “Made with AI” labels angered photographers when they were applied so aggressively that they seemed to cover even minor retouching. The labels have since been updated to deemphasize the use of AI. And while Meta didn’t disclose to us if it will expand this system, the company told us it believes a “widespread adoption of Content Credentials” is needed to establish trust.

Truepic, an authenticity infrastructure provider and another member of C2PA, says there’s enough information present in these digital markers to provide more detail than platforms currently offer. “The architecture is there, but we need to research the optimal way to display these visual indicators so that everyone on the internet can actually see them and use them to make better decisions without just saying something is either all generative AI or all authentic,” Truepic chief communications officer Mounir Ibrahim said to The Verge.

A cornerstone of this plan involves getting online platforms to adopt the standard. X, which has attracted regulatory scrutiny as a hotbed for spreading misinformation, isn’t a member of the C2PA initiative and seemingly offers no alternative. But X owner Elon Musk does appear willing to get behind it. “That sounds like a good idea, we should probably do it,” Musk said when pitched by Parsons at the 2023 AI Safety Summit. “Some way of authenticating would be good.”

Even if, by some miracle, we were to wake up tomorrow in a tech landscape where every platform, camera, and creative application supported the C2PA standard, denialism is a potent, pervasive, and potentially insurmountable obstacle. Providing people with documented, evidence-based information won’t help if they just discount it. Misinformation can even be utterly baseless, as seen by how readily Trump supporters believed accusations about Harris supposedly faking her rally crowds, despite widespread evidence proving otherwise. Some people will just believe what they want to believe.

But a cryptographic labeling system is likely the best approach we currently have to reliably identify authentic, manipulated, and artificially generated content at scale. Alternative pattern analyzing methods like online AI detection services, for instance, are notoriously unreliable. “Detection is probabilistic at best — we do not believe that you will get a detection mechanism where you can upload any image, video, or digital content and get 99.99 percent accuracy in real-time and at scale,” Ibrahim says. “And while watermarking can be robust and highly effective, in our view it isn’t interoperable.”

No system is perfect, though, and even more robust options like the C2PA standard can only do so much. Image metadata can be easily stripped simply by taking a screenshot, for example — for which there is currently no solution — and its effectiveness is otherwise dictated by how many platforms and products support it.

“None of it is a panacea,” Ibrahim says. “It will mitigate the downside risk, but bad actors will always be there using generative tools to try and deceive people.”

Read More 

Ring has updated its entry-level wireless doorbell with a new field of view showing more vertical space around your door. | Image: Ring

Ring has refreshed its entry-level battery-powered doorbell camera, bringing a new head-to-toe view to better capture footage of packages on your porch. According to the company, the Ring Battery Doorbell ($99.99) also has improved battery life and color night vision, plus a new mounting system to make removing the doorbell for charging easier.

Ring has been slowly upgrading its video doorbell line from its original 16:9 aspect ratio to 1:1, with a 150-degree by 150-degree field of view that shows a full top-to-bottom view of what’s in front of your door. This square view is common among most of Ring’s competitors, as it’s more useful for seeing packages left on the floor.
Ring first introduced the square aspect ratio to its line with the Ring Pro 2, a wired doorbell, in 2021. Earlier this year, it launched the Battery Doorbell Plus ($179.99) and the Battery Doorbell Pro ($229.99) with the same view. Now, the company’s budget battery-powered buzzer is being updated. The new Ring Battery Doorbell will replace the Ring Video Doorbell 2, leaving only the entry-level wired doorbell ($49.99) with the 16:9 view in the company’s main lineup.

Image: Ring
The Ring Battery Doorbell is a refresh of the company’s entry-level battery doorbell. It has a new square field of view and longer battery life.

The entry-level Battery Doorbell features 1080p HD video, compared to 1536p HD video on the more expensive Plus and Pro models. It has a standard PIR motion sensor for motion-activated recording, also found in the Plus model; the Pro model has an upgraded radar sensor for more accurate motion detection.
Unlike the Pro and Plus, the Battery Doorbell has no removable battery. This means you have to take it off your door to charge it unless you can wire it to doorbell wiring, which will trickle charge the battery. Ring says it has redesigned the mounting system on this model to make it easier to remove using a push-pin tool.

The new doorbell’s battery life has been extended from its predecessor, the Ring Video Doorbell 2. Ring says the Battery Doorbell “delivers up to 23 percent longer battery life than the previous model (based on commonly used settings).”
As with all Ring doorbells, the Ring Battery Doorbell can send motion alerts, allow for a live view of the camera’s footage, two-way talk, and customizable motion zones — all for free. With a Ring Protect subscription (starting at $4.99 a month / $49.99 a year), you can see recorded videos with 180 days’ worth of cloud storage, plus get person and package alerts.
The Ring Battery Doorbell is available now to preorder on Ring.com and Amazon.com for $99.99 and will start shipping on September 4th.

Ring has updated its entry-level wireless doorbell with a new field of view showing more vertical space around your door. | Image: Ring

Ring has refreshed its entry-level battery-powered doorbell camera, bringing a new head-to-toe view to better capture footage of packages on your porch. According to the company, the Ring Battery Doorbell ($99.99) also has improved battery life and color night vision, plus a new mounting system to make removing the doorbell for charging easier.

Ring has been slowly upgrading its video doorbell line from its original 16:9 aspect ratio to 1:1, with a 150-degree by 150-degree field of view that shows a full top-to-bottom view of what’s in front of your door. This square view is common among most of Ring’s competitors, as it’s more useful for seeing packages left on the floor.

Ring first introduced the square aspect ratio to its line with the Ring Pro 2, a wired doorbell, in 2021. Earlier this year, it launched the Battery Doorbell Plus ($179.99) and the Battery Doorbell Pro ($229.99) with the same view. Now, the company’s budget battery-powered buzzer is being updated. The new Ring Battery Doorbell will replace the Ring Video Doorbell 2, leaving only the entry-level wired doorbell ($49.99) with the 16:9 view in the company’s main lineup.

Image: Ring
The Ring Battery Doorbell is a refresh of the company’s entry-level battery doorbell. It has a new square field of view and longer battery life.

The entry-level Battery Doorbell features 1080p HD video, compared to 1536p HD video on the more expensive Plus and Pro models. It has a standard PIR motion sensor for motion-activated recording, also found in the Plus model; the Pro model has an upgraded radar sensor for more accurate motion detection.

Unlike the Pro and Plus, the Battery Doorbell has no removable battery. This means you have to take it off your door to charge it unless you can wire it to doorbell wiring, which will trickle charge the battery. Ring says it has redesigned the mounting system on this model to make it easier to remove using a push-pin tool.

The new doorbell’s battery life has been extended from its predecessor, the Ring Video Doorbell 2. Ring says the Battery Doorbell “delivers up to 23 percent longer battery life than the previous model (based on commonly used settings).”

As with all Ring doorbells, the Ring Battery Doorbell can send motion alerts, allow for a live view of the camera’s footage, two-way talk, and customizable motion zones — all for free. With a Ring Protect subscription (starting at $4.99 a month / $49.99 a year), you can see recorded videos with 180 days’ worth of cloud storage, plus get person and package alerts.

The Ring Battery Doorbell is available now to preorder on Ring.com and Amazon.com for $99.99 and will start shipping on September 4th.

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Photo: Volkswagen

Volkswagen has taken one of the final steps toward delivering the ID Buzz in the US by announcing pricing, battery range, and initial options available at launch later this year. The ID Buzz will start at $59,995 for a Pro S model that comes standard with RWD and, crucially, seven seats, as it’s the bigger, long-wheelbase version previously confirmed for the American market.
The 2025 ID Buzz now has a finalized EPA-estimated range of 234 miles for RWD models and 231 miles on the 4Motion AWD ones — well under some expected guesses of 300 or so miles on a single charge for a vehicle that has a sizable 91kWh battery.

The next model up is the Pro S Plus, which starts at $63,495 for RWD with bench seating standard and $67,995 for AWD, which only comes in the six-seat configuration with captain chairs. Plus, it gets you premium features, including a heads-up display, “Area View” surround cameras for easy parking, a 700-watt Harman Kardon sound system with 14 speakers, and easy open and close on the dual power sliding rear doors.

There’s also a launch-only first-edition model that starts at $65,495 with RWD (five seats) and $69,995 with AWD (six seats), both with a standard special dune interior package and several two-tone exterior color options that have candy white on top and the rest in cabana blue, orange, green, and more. The first edition is based on the Pro S trim but includes special 20-inch wheels, roof rail crossbars, special badging, easy doors, the better audio system, and an electrochromic panoramic glass roof (also available on the Plus).

Photo: Volkswagen

Volkswagen has taken one of the final steps toward delivering the ID Buzz in the US by announcing pricing, battery range, and initial options available at launch later this year. The ID Buzz will start at $59,995 for a Pro S model that comes standard with RWD and, crucially, seven seats, as it’s the bigger, long-wheelbase version previously confirmed for the American market.

The 2025 ID Buzz now has a finalized EPA-estimated range of 234 miles for RWD models and 231 miles on the 4Motion AWD ones — well under some expected guesses of 300 or so miles on a single charge for a vehicle that has a sizable 91kWh battery.

The next model up is the Pro S Plus, which starts at $63,495 for RWD with bench seating standard and $67,995 for AWD, which only comes in the six-seat configuration with captain chairs. Plus, it gets you premium features, including a heads-up display, “Area View” surround cameras for easy parking, a 700-watt Harman Kardon sound system with 14 speakers, and easy open and close on the dual power sliding rear doors.

There’s also a launch-only first-edition model that starts at $65,495 with RWD (five seats) and $69,995 with AWD (six seats), both with a standard special dune interior package and several two-tone exterior color options that have candy white on top and the rest in cabana blue, orange, green, and more. The first edition is based on the Pro S trim but includes special 20-inch wheels, roof rail crossbars, special badging, easy doors, the better audio system, and an electrochromic panoramic glass roof (also available on the Plus).

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Lucid Motors CEO Peter Rawlinson demonstrating the Gravity SUV’s front trunk seating. | Image: Tim Stevens

Different brands do different things under the hoods of their EVs. Some fill that space with inverters and high-voltage cabling. Others carve out a cubby of extra storage, the frunk that many EV aficionados demand but few actually use.
With the Gravity SUV, Lucid is taking the frunk option a step further, creating a space that can be used as a seat. I confess, I thought it was a gimmick, but sitting in that frunk is surprisingly comfortable. It’s a bit cozy for two adults, as I found when Lucid CEO Peter Rawlinson joined me, but we fit just fine.
The Gravity is no longer a concept
Rawlinson was representing Lucid at the Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance, where the Gravity was situated on the so-called “Concept Lawn,” just a few feet from the main event. That’s a bit of a misnomer, though, as the Gravity is no longer a concept. After years of anticipation, it’s finally becoming a reality.
“I had the honor, the privilege of driving the very first pre-production car off the production line in Casa Grande just a couple of weeks ago,” Rawlinson told me. That SUV, and others that follow, are going through verification now.

Image: Lucid
Lucid Gravity.

The electric Gravity SUV is the follow-up to the Air sedan, Lucid’s first (and so far, only) vehicle. Launched in 2021, the Air set a standard for range that has improved in the years since, now scoring 516 miles on a single charge in the $110,900 Grand Touring trim. Meanwhile, the $69,900 Air Pure has an efficiency rating of five miles per kWh and will get an estimated 420 miles of range from an 84kWh battery pack, making it one of the most efficient production EVs in the world.
With the Gravity launching into an increasingly skeptical market, Rawlinson sees this level of market-leading efficiency and continued performance as something of an antidote.
However, the market is carrying some extra turbulence thanks to the political posturing surrounding EVs. Rawlinson declined to weigh in on the political state of affairs. “I’m completely independent in terms of political viewpoint, really agnostic,” he said, before adding, “Unlike someone else, who’s clearly distracted with politics.”
Elon Musk jabs aside, Rawlinson said that reducing climate change is a strong motivator for his company and that any softness the EV market is experiencing now is short term.
“I’m completely independent in terms of political viewpoint, really agnostic.”
“I think we’re seeing a temporary blip. I think any talk of retrenchment into hybrids is a blind alley. I think hybrids offer the worst of all,” he said. Rawlinson also pointed at dealerships full of “underwhelming EVs,” a refrain echoed by the company’s senior vice president of design and brand, Derek Jenkins.
“A lot of EVs have been rushed to market with rather mediocre experiences, and I think that’s also affecting the overall perception of the category,” Jenkins said. “Long term, obviously, EV is the future. No question in my mind.”
But while the competition is getting stronger, on the premium EV side, the specter of excessive depreciation is slowing some buyers down. That the three-year-old Air still offers industry-leading range, Rawlinson says, will help Lucid’s cars buck that trend.
Still, the Air is a sedan in an SUV market, a problem the Gravity is designed to fix. Offering 440 miles of range and seating for seven (or eight, if you include the frunk seat) at a price somewhere under $80,000, the full-size SUV certainly offers compelling numbers. But Rawlinson’s primary targets are less about digits and more about performance.
“A lot of EVs have been rushed to market with rather mediocre experiences”
“The benchmark is Porsche Cayenne, Lamborghini Urus,” Rawlinson said. “It’s got more legroom than an Escalade. It’s got seven feet of flat loading area. So it’s got the practicality which is unprecedented here.”
The Air sedan also offers a combination of big speed and legroom, but it’s had some big problems, too. The sedan has seen 12 recalls and over 70 software updates since its release. Check owner groups and forums, and you’ll find endless complaints of glitches ranging from the mundane (touchscreens that won’t respond) to the more significant (doors that won’t unlock).
“There’s been a big learning curve with Air,” Jenkins said, lessons that will be applied to the Gravity, hopefully ensuring it comes out of the gate with a significant leg up over its predecessor.
There were lessons learned in manufacturing the Air, too. “We simplified even obvious things like… making closures and the openings of the vehicle easier to align and assemble,” he said.
This desire to simplify and streamline forced the Gravity design team to focus on design purity. “I’m proud of the Air interior, but I feel like here [with the Gravity] we managed to get even more minimalist and yet keep it warm and elegant, which is always my goal,” Jenkins said.
This desire to simplify and streamline forced the Gravity design team to focus on design purity
With the Gravity SUV, Rawlinson said he hopes to access a market six times bigger than the Air. Lucid says it’s on target to produce 9,000 of the sedans this year, having set new sales records in both Q1 and Q2. Still, deliveries are short of the company’s previous estimates of 10,000 per year.
Six times that from sales of the Gravity will substantially boost the company’s bottom line, but to go truly mainstream, Lucid will need to continue further down-market. There’s a plan for that, which Jenkins calls “the mid-size program.”
Lucid has a series of more affordable models in the works, with prices starting under $50,000 and planned availability in 2026. One is positioned squarely after the Tesla Model 3. Another predictably targets the world’s bestselling car, the Model Y, but Jenkins says there are more interesting things to come: “Then you’re going to see us move into a little bit more ruggedized category, which I think will be a welcome thing for Lucid. It’ll still be a Lucid, it’s not like anything else, but allowing us to broaden our swath a little bit.”
Before any of that, the company needs to get the Gravity out the door. Rawlinson said that the first Gravity buyers should receive their cars before the end of the year, with the company’s factory ramping up to full production speed through the beginning of 2025.
“The crash cars are being dispatched for crash validation. We built the cars for EPA range authentication,” he said. “This is on track.”

Lucid Motors CEO Peter Rawlinson demonstrating the Gravity SUV’s front trunk seating. | Image: Tim Stevens

Different brands do different things under the hoods of their EVs. Some fill that space with inverters and high-voltage cabling. Others carve out a cubby of extra storage, the frunk that many EV aficionados demand but few actually use.

With the Gravity SUV, Lucid is taking the frunk option a step further, creating a space that can be used as a seat. I confess, I thought it was a gimmick, but sitting in that frunk is surprisingly comfortable. It’s a bit cozy for two adults, as I found when Lucid CEO Peter Rawlinson joined me, but we fit just fine.

Rawlinson was representing Lucid at the Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance, where the Gravity was situated on the so-called “Concept Lawn,” just a few feet from the main event. That’s a bit of a misnomer, though, as the Gravity is no longer a concept. After years of anticipation, it’s finally becoming a reality.

“I had the honor, the privilege of driving the very first pre-production car off the production line in Casa Grande just a couple of weeks ago,” Rawlinson told me. That SUV, and others that follow, are going through verification now.

Image: Lucid
Lucid Gravity.

The electric Gravity SUV is the follow-up to the Air sedan, Lucid’s first (and so far, only) vehicle. Launched in 2021, the Air set a standard for range that has improved in the years since, now scoring 516 miles on a single charge in the $110,900 Grand Touring trim. Meanwhile, the $69,900 Air Pure has an efficiency rating of five miles per kWh and will get an estimated 420 miles of range from an 84kWh battery pack, making it one of the most efficient production EVs in the world.

With the Gravity launching into an increasingly skeptical market, Rawlinson sees this level of market-leading efficiency and continued performance as something of an antidote.

However, the market is carrying some extra turbulence thanks to the political posturing surrounding EVs. Rawlinson declined to weigh in on the political state of affairs. “I’m completely independent in terms of political viewpoint, really agnostic,” he said, before adding, “Unlike someone else, who’s clearly distracted with politics.”

Elon Musk jabs aside, Rawlinson said that reducing climate change is a strong motivator for his company and that any softness the EV market is experiencing now is short term.

“I think we’re seeing a temporary blip. I think any talk of retrenchment into hybrids is a blind alley. I think hybrids offer the worst of all,” he said. Rawlinson also pointed at dealerships full of “underwhelming EVs,” a refrain echoed by the company’s senior vice president of design and brand, Derek Jenkins.

“A lot of EVs have been rushed to market with rather mediocre experiences, and I think that’s also affecting the overall perception of the category,” Jenkins said. “Long term, obviously, EV is the future. No question in my mind.”

But while the competition is getting stronger, on the premium EV side, the specter of excessive depreciation is slowing some buyers down. That the three-year-old Air still offers industry-leading range, Rawlinson says, will help Lucid’s cars buck that trend.

Still, the Air is a sedan in an SUV market, a problem the Gravity is designed to fix. Offering 440 miles of range and seating for seven (or eight, if you include the frunk seat) at a price somewhere under $80,000, the full-size SUV certainly offers compelling numbers. But Rawlinson’s primary targets are less about digits and more about performance.

“The benchmark is Porsche Cayenne, Lamborghini Urus,” Rawlinson said. “It’s got more legroom than an Escalade. It’s got seven feet of flat loading area. So it’s got the practicality which is unprecedented here.”

The Air sedan also offers a combination of big speed and legroom, but it’s had some big problems, too. The sedan has seen 12 recalls and over 70 software updates since its release. Check owner groups and forums, and you’ll find endless complaints of glitches ranging from the mundane (touchscreens that won’t respond) to the more significant (doors that won’t unlock).

“There’s been a big learning curve with Air,” Jenkins said, lessons that will be applied to the Gravity, hopefully ensuring it comes out of the gate with a significant leg up over its predecessor.

There were lessons learned in manufacturing the Air, too. “We simplified even obvious things like… making closures and the openings of the vehicle easier to align and assemble,” he said.

This desire to simplify and streamline forced the Gravity design team to focus on design purity. “I’m proud of the Air interior, but I feel like here [with the Gravity] we managed to get even more minimalist and yet keep it warm and elegant, which is always my goal,” Jenkins said.

With the Gravity SUV, Rawlinson said he hopes to access a market six times bigger than the Air. Lucid says it’s on target to produce 9,000 of the sedans this year, having set new sales records in both Q1 and Q2. Still, deliveries are short of the company’s previous estimates of 10,000 per year.

Six times that from sales of the Gravity will substantially boost the company’s bottom line, but to go truly mainstream, Lucid will need to continue further down-market. There’s a plan for that, which Jenkins calls “the mid-size program.”

Lucid has a series of more affordable models in the works, with prices starting under $50,000 and planned availability in 2026. One is positioned squarely after the Tesla Model 3. Another predictably targets the world’s bestselling car, the Model Y, but Jenkins says there are more interesting things to come: “Then you’re going to see us move into a little bit more ruggedized category, which I think will be a welcome thing for Lucid. It’ll still be a Lucid, it’s not like anything else, but allowing us to broaden our swath a little bit.”

Before any of that, the company needs to get the Gravity out the door. Rawlinson said that the first Gravity buyers should receive their cars before the end of the year, with the company’s factory ramping up to full production speed through the beginning of 2025.

“The crash cars are being dispatched for crash validation. We built the cars for EPA range authentication,” he said. “This is on track.”

Read More 

Image: Samsung

Samsung has announced a new Odyssey gaming monitor lineup at gamescom that uses eye-tracking technology to convert 2D visuals into glasses-free 3D. The Odyssey 3D is set for a global release “within this year” according to Samsung, and will allow users to “seamlessly switch between 2D and 3D modes” based on preference — which may tempt folks who are curious about 3D gaming, but apprehensive to commit.
The Odyssey 3D is Samsung’s first 3D gaming monitor, having first teased a concept display at CES earlier this year. It’ll be available in 27- or 37-inch sizes and features a 4K QLED panel with a 165Hz refresh rate, alongside a 1-millisecond response time and support for AMD FreeSync. Both monitors also include a single DisplayPort 1.4 and two HDMI 2.1 ports for connectivity, and a tilting, height-adjustable stand to ensure you can best position it to experience 3D content.

The glasses-free 3D is achieved by combining a lenticular lens — specialized hardware that can direct different images to each eye — with a built-in eye tracking camera, and view mapping to continuously adjust for depth perception. Acer uses a similar system in its own SpatialLabs laptops and monitors. The resulting Stereoscopic 3D can only be viewed by one person at a time, but that’s hardly an issue for gamers, and my own experiences with the technology have left a good impression: it’s really fun to see things jumping out at you without having to wear special glasses.
One thing that’s missing is the price. We’ve reached out to Samsung to see if pricing information is available, but if Acer’s products (and the historical pricing on Samsung’s Odyssey lineup) are any indication, the Odyssey 3D offerings won’t come cheap.

Image: Samsung

Samsung has announced a new Odyssey gaming monitor lineup at gamescom that uses eye-tracking technology to convert 2D visuals into glasses-free 3D. The Odyssey 3D is set for a global release “within this year” according to Samsung, and will allow users to “seamlessly switch between 2D and 3D modes” based on preference — which may tempt folks who are curious about 3D gaming, but apprehensive to commit.

The Odyssey 3D is Samsung’s first 3D gaming monitor, having first teased a concept display at CES earlier this year. It’ll be available in 27- or 37-inch sizes and features a 4K QLED panel with a 165Hz refresh rate, alongside a 1-millisecond response time and support for AMD FreeSync. Both monitors also include a single DisplayPort 1.4 and two HDMI 2.1 ports for connectivity, and a tilting, height-adjustable stand to ensure you can best position it to experience 3D content.

The glasses-free 3D is achieved by combining a lenticular lens — specialized hardware that can direct different images to each eye — with a built-in eye tracking camera, and view mapping to continuously adjust for depth perception. Acer uses a similar system in its own SpatialLabs laptops and monitors. The resulting Stereoscopic 3D can only be viewed by one person at a time, but that’s hardly an issue for gamers, and my own experiences with the technology have left a good impression: it’s really fun to see things jumping out at you without having to wear special glasses.

One thing that’s missing is the price. We’ve reached out to Samsung to see if pricing information is available, but if Acer’s products (and the historical pricing on Samsung’s Odyssey lineup) are any indication, the Odyssey 3D offerings won’t come cheap.

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Image: Cath Virginia / The Verge; Getty Images

A federal judge has blocked the Federal Trade Commission’s ban on noncompete agreements that make it difficult for workers to join their employers’ rivals or launch competing businesses. The ruling prevents the FTC’s ban on noncompete agreements from taking effect on September 4th, though the agency could still appeal the decision.
On Tuesday, US District Judge Ada Brown in Dallas, Texas ruled that the antitrust agency exceeded its statutory authority to ban practices related to unfair methods of competition, saying the noncompete agreements ban is “unreasonably overbroad without a reasonable explanation,” and would “cause irreparable harm.” Brown’s decision now stops the FTC from blocking noncompetes nationwide after initially delaying the ban with a preliminary injunction in July.
According to the FTC, around 30 million people — one in five Americans — have signed noncompete agreements. A federal judge in Pennsylvania had previously declined to block the ban in a separate case last month.
“We are seriously considering a potential appeal”
“We are disappointed by Judge Brown’s decision and will keep fighting to stop noncompetes that restrict the economic liberty of hardworking Americans, hamper economic growth, limit innovation, and depress wages,” FTC spokesperson Victoria Graham said in a statement to The Verge. ”We are seriously considering a potential appeal.”
If the FTC does push ahead with an appeal, it would go to the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals to be heard. Appeals on district court decisions are often a lengthy process, with the FTC’s appeal against Microsoft’s Activision Blizzard acquisition still pending a result. In the meantime, the FTC will have to challenge noncompetes via case-by-case enforcement actions.
The ruling upholds a lawsuit that Tax firm Ryan LLC filed in April — later backed by the US Chamber of Commerce and Business Roundtable — to challenge the noncompete agreements ban, arguing that it would make it difficult for companies to retain talent. When the FTC voted 3-2 in support of the ban, the agency said it would allow for more than 8,500 new businesses to be made each year.

Image: Cath Virginia / The Verge; Getty Images

A federal judge has blocked the Federal Trade Commission’s ban on noncompete agreements that make it difficult for workers to join their employers’ rivals or launch competing businesses. The ruling prevents the FTC’s ban on noncompete agreements from taking effect on September 4th, though the agency could still appeal the decision.

On Tuesday, US District Judge Ada Brown in Dallas, Texas ruled that the antitrust agency exceeded its statutory authority to ban practices related to unfair methods of competition, saying the noncompete agreements ban is “unreasonably overbroad without a reasonable explanation,” and would “cause irreparable harm.” Brown’s decision now stops the FTC from blocking noncompetes nationwide after initially delaying the ban with a preliminary injunction in July.

According to the FTC, around 30 million people — one in five Americans — have signed noncompete agreements. A federal judge in Pennsylvania had previously declined to block the ban in a separate case last month.

“We are disappointed by Judge Brown’s decision and will keep fighting to stop noncompetes that restrict the economic liberty of hardworking Americans, hamper economic growth, limit innovation, and depress wages,” FTC spokesperson Victoria Graham said in a statement to The Verge. ”We are seriously considering a potential appeal.”

If the FTC does push ahead with an appeal, it would go to the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals to be heard. Appeals on district court decisions are often a lengthy process, with the FTC’s appeal against Microsoft’s Activision Blizzard acquisition still pending a result. In the meantime, the FTC will have to challenge noncompetes via case-by-case enforcement actions.

The ruling upholds a lawsuit that Tax firm Ryan LLC filed in April — later backed by the US Chamber of Commerce and Business Roundtable — to challenge the noncompete agreements ban, arguing that it would make it difficult for companies to retain talent. When the FTC voted 3-2 in support of the ban, the agency said it would allow for more than 8,500 new businesses to be made each year.

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The touchscreen on the JBL Tour Pro 3’s charging case is now 30 percent larger. | Image: JBL

JBL has announced an upgraded version of its first wireless earbuds with a touchscreen charging case. The new JBL Tour Pro 3’s case features a larger screen and now works as a transmitter, broadcasting audio to the earbuds from a wired source such as a plane’s in-flight entertainment system. However, that larger screen also comes with a steeper price tag. They’ll sell for $299, which is nearly $50 more than the JBL Tour Pro 2.
The 1.57-inch touchscreen on the JBL Tour Pro 3’s charging case is 30 percent larger than the screen on the Tour Pro 2’s, giving it enough room to fit additional info like the name of the song currently playing. That will potentially make it even more useful as an alternative to reaching for your smartphone if you want to skip tracks, set alarms, or even check text messages or incoming call notifications.
The argument can be made that the case’s screen is unnecessary for those who already wear a smartwatch that offers similar functionality. But the Tour Pro 3’s charging case also provides easier access to earbud settings, including noise-canceling modes and EQ profiles, which are otherwise only accessible through the JBL smartphone app or by customizing the earbud’s gesture controls.
The less obvious but more interesting upgrade on the Tour Pro 3 is the charging case’s audio transmission capabilities. It can be plugged into any analog or USB audio source and isn’t only limited to older devices with a headphone jack. And with newly added support for Auracast, that audio can be broadcast to multiple Bluetooth devices nearby that also support Auracast — such as Samsung’s earbuds.

Image: JBL
The Tour Pro 2 will be available in two color options: black and latte.

The Tour Pro 3 earbuds now feature larger 11-millimeter drivers — up from 10 millimeters on the Tour Pro 2. Despite the driver upgrades and larger touchscreen, JBL is still claiming up to 10 hours of music playback for the earbuds with ANC turned off, or up to 40 hours in total when paired with the charging case. If the buds do happen to die at a bad time, a 10-minute charge will provide three hours of listening.
Spatial sound is included with built-in head tracking, and while JBL claims it works with “stereo sound from any source or device,” what the company is essentially doing is keeping the left and right audio signals locked in 3D space so, as you turn your head, they always sound like they’re coming from the same place. For comparison, Apple’s Spatial Audio is designed to simulate a more expansive surround sound experience through a pair of headphones, with audio sounding like it’s coming from all around you.
The JBL Tour Pro 3 are expected to be available starting on September 22nd, 2024, in black or latte color options.

The touchscreen on the JBL Tour Pro 3’s charging case is now 30 percent larger. | Image: JBL

JBL has announced an upgraded version of its first wireless earbuds with a touchscreen charging case. The new JBL Tour Pro 3’s case features a larger screen and now works as a transmitter, broadcasting audio to the earbuds from a wired source such as a plane’s in-flight entertainment system. However, that larger screen also comes with a steeper price tag. They’ll sell for $299, which is nearly $50 more than the JBL Tour Pro 2.

The 1.57-inch touchscreen on the JBL Tour Pro 3’s charging case is 30 percent larger than the screen on the Tour Pro 2’s, giving it enough room to fit additional info like the name of the song currently playing. That will potentially make it even more useful as an alternative to reaching for your smartphone if you want to skip tracks, set alarms, or even check text messages or incoming call notifications.

The argument can be made that the case’s screen is unnecessary for those who already wear a smartwatch that offers similar functionality. But the Tour Pro 3’s charging case also provides easier access to earbud settings, including noise-canceling modes and EQ profiles, which are otherwise only accessible through the JBL smartphone app or by customizing the earbud’s gesture controls.

The less obvious but more interesting upgrade on the Tour Pro 3 is the charging case’s audio transmission capabilities. It can be plugged into any analog or USB audio source and isn’t only limited to older devices with a headphone jack. And with newly added support for Auracast, that audio can be broadcast to multiple Bluetooth devices nearby that also support Auracast — such as Samsung’s earbuds.

Image: JBL
The Tour Pro 2 will be available in two color options: black and latte.

The Tour Pro 3 earbuds now feature larger 11-millimeter drivers — up from 10 millimeters on the Tour Pro 2. Despite the driver upgrades and larger touchscreen, JBL is still claiming up to 10 hours of music playback for the earbuds with ANC turned off, or up to 40 hours in total when paired with the charging case. If the buds do happen to die at a bad time, a 10-minute charge will provide three hours of listening.

Spatial sound is included with built-in head tracking, and while JBL claims it works with “stereo sound from any source or device,” what the company is essentially doing is keeping the left and right audio signals locked in 3D space so, as you turn your head, they always sound like they’re coming from the same place. For comparison, Apple’s Spatial Audio is designed to simulate a more expansive surround sound experience through a pair of headphones, with audio sounding like it’s coming from all around you.

The JBL Tour Pro 3 are expected to be available starting on September 22nd, 2024, in black or latte color options.

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Illustration: The Verge

Google is upgrading its Gemini writing tools in Gmail to help you polish drafts that you’ve already written. Now, among other Gemini-powered “Help me write” options like Formalize and Elaborate, you can tap “Polish” to refine your emails, Google says in a blog post. The company has also added shortcuts that appear in the body of your emails on Android and iOS, making it more obvious that there are AI writing tools to use.
The tools are available to people who pay for Google One AI Premium accounts or who have paid for Google’s Gemini add-on for Workspace. If that’s you, when you open an empty draft, you’ll see a “Help me write” shortcut appear that you can tap to have Gemini draft text for you. Once you have 12 or more words in a draft — AI-written or not — you should see a new “Refine my draft” shortcut, shown in gray letters below the words.

GIF: Google
Swiping on the “Refine my draft” shortcut brings up options like “Polish” and “Elaborate.”

Swipe your thumb across the text, and you’ll be given the choice to Polish, Formalize, Elaborate, or Shorten, or to have Gemini just write a whole new draft for you. (And if the “Refine my draft” shortcut doesn’t appear, tapping the pencil icon does the same thing.)

Illustration: The Verge

Google is upgrading its Gemini writing tools in Gmail to help you polish drafts that you’ve already written. Now, among other Gemini-powered “Help me write” options like Formalize and Elaborate, you can tap “Polish” to refine your emails, Google says in a blog post. The company has also added shortcuts that appear in the body of your emails on Android and iOS, making it more obvious that there are AI writing tools to use.

The tools are available to people who pay for Google One AI Premium accounts or who have paid for Google’s Gemini add-on for Workspace. If that’s you, when you open an empty draft, you’ll see a “Help me write” shortcut appear that you can tap to have Gemini draft text for you. Once you have 12 or more words in a draft — AI-written or not — you should see a new “Refine my draft” shortcut, shown in gray letters below the words.

GIF: Google
Swiping on the “Refine my draft” shortcut brings up options like “Polish” and “Elaborate.”

Swipe your thumb across the text, and you’ll be given the choice to Polish, Formalize, Elaborate, or Shorten, or to have Gemini just write a whole new draft for you. (And if the “Refine my draft” shortcut doesn’t appear, tapping the pencil icon does the same thing.)

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Illustration by Cath Virginia / The Verge

Google will have to face a class action lawsuit that accuses it of collecting users’ data through Chrome without their consent. In a decision on Tuesday, a federal appeals court reversed a December 2022 ruling that dismissed the case, saying the lower court should’ve reviewed Google’s disclosures and determined “whether a reasonable user reading them would think that he or she was consenting to the data collection.”
The class action lawsuit, first filed in 2020, alleged that Google collected data from Chrome users — regardless of whether they enabled Chrome sync. This feature saves bookmarks, passwords, open tabs, and other data to your Google account, giving you easy access to this information when signed into Chrome on multiple devices.
The plaintiffs claimed Chrome “intentionally and unlawfully” sent Google browsing history, IP addresses, persistent cookie identifiers, and unique browser identifiers without their explicit permission. At the time, Google argued users consented to this by accepting the company’s privacy policy. Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers agreed, stating in her order granting dismissal that “Google adequately disclosed, and plaintiffs consented to, the collection of the at-issue data.”

However, Judge Milan D. Smith Jr. writes in today’s decision that Judge Gonzalez Rogers didn’t take into account whether users actually understood this agreement. “Google had a general privacy disclosure yet promoted Chrome by suggesting that certain information would not be sent to Google unless a user turned on sync,” Smith writes. The case will be returned to the lower courts for reconsideration.
“We disagree with this ruling and are confident the facts of the case are on our side. Chrome Sync helps people use Chrome seamlessly across their different devices and has clear privacy controls,” Google spokesperson José Castañeda says in a statement to The Verge. And while Google will soon no longer require users to enable Chrome sync to access saved information, Castañeda says, “This announcement is not related to the litigation.”

Illustration by Cath Virginia / The Verge

Google will have to face a class action lawsuit that accuses it of collecting users’ data through Chrome without their consent. In a decision on Tuesday, a federal appeals court reversed a December 2022 ruling that dismissed the case, saying the lower court should’ve reviewed Google’s disclosures and determined “whether a reasonable user reading them would think that he or she was consenting to the data collection.”

The class action lawsuit, first filed in 2020, alleged that Google collected data from Chrome users — regardless of whether they enabled Chrome sync. This feature saves bookmarks, passwords, open tabs, and other data to your Google account, giving you easy access to this information when signed into Chrome on multiple devices.

The plaintiffs claimed Chrome “intentionally and unlawfully” sent Google browsing history, IP addresses, persistent cookie identifiers, and unique browser identifiers without their explicit permission. At the time, Google argued users consented to this by accepting the company’s privacy policy. Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers agreed, stating in her order granting dismissal that “Google adequately disclosed, and plaintiffs consented to, the collection of the at-issue data.”

However, Judge Milan D. Smith Jr. writes in today’s decision that Judge Gonzalez Rogers didn’t take into account whether users actually understood this agreement. “Google had a general privacy disclosure yet promoted Chrome by suggesting that certain information would not be sent to Google unless a user turned on sync,” Smith writes. The case will be returned to the lower courts for reconsideration.

“We disagree with this ruling and are confident the facts of the case are on our side. Chrome Sync helps people use Chrome seamlessly across their different devices and has clear privacy controls,” Google spokesperson José Castañeda says in a statement to The Verge. And while Google will soon no longer require users to enable Chrome sync to access saved information, Castañeda says, “This announcement is not related to the litigation.”

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