Image: Meta During Meta’s Connect conference on Tuesday, Mark Zuckerberg made a huge announcement: the avatars in the company’s Horizon VR app will be getting legs soon. To demonstrate this groundbreaking technical achievement, Zuckerberg’s digital avatar lifted each leg in the air, then did a jump, while Aigerim Shorman’s avatar kicked into the air.
It may have all been for show. According to UploadVR editor Ian Hamilton, an unnamed Meta spokesperson said that the “the segment featured animations created from motion capture,” meant to “enable this preview of what’s to come.” To me that reads like what we saw wasn’t actually a demo of what Horizon’s legs will look like, but rather an artist’s interpretation of what Horizon’s legs may end up looking…
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Nicholas Barclay / The Verge Amazon’s Prime Early Access Sale, its second Prime Day event of 2022, is drawing to a close. That means it’s the last chance to take advantage of many of these deals. Our entire team is continuing to scour Amazon’s catalog high and low to find the best tech deals for you, including the great ones, and even some of the “hey, that ain’t bad” variety.
While it’s possible some of these deals may linger a little longer than the official end date, most of them are set to expire in less than a few hours, and may not return until Black Friday and Cyber Monday come around next month. So, get a head start on your holiday shopping, pick up that big-ticket item you’ve been patiently waiting for, or jump on a fun impulse purchase (we won’t tell…
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Nicholas Barclay / The Verge Amazon is back with another Prime Day for 2022, and we’re here to highlight the deals that are worth your money. The Prime Early Access Sale is happening now through tomorrow, October 12th, and it’s an event that should serve as a good primer for the kinds of deals we might see during Black Friday and Cyber Monday. In other words, you might be able to get some — or all — of your holiday shopping done, whether it’s all at Amazon or from one of the many other retailers that are serving up a rush of deals to compete.
What you’ll find below are the best deals from Amazon’s Prime Early Access Sale. And just to reiterate, most of the Amazon deals below are exclusive to Prime members, though you may beeligible for a free 30-day trial.
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Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge On Monday afternoon, as pointed out by Parker Molloy, CNN ended its big Web3 project by announcing, “we have decided that it’s time to say goodbye to the Vault by CNN.”
You may have already forgotten about it, but Vault by CNN launched in the summer of 2021 as a marketplace for its own NFTs (non-fungible tokens) that would “offer collectors the opportunity to own a piece of history.” Sort of like NBA Top Shot except for media nerds instead of basketball nerds, it minted CNN reports of key events or artistic interpretations inspired by them, creating digital collectibles that owners could show off somehow or trade with others, like baseball cards. This idea apparently seemed more reasonable while cryptocurrency prices were sky-high, and…
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Image: Google Google’s shutting down Driving Mode, its standalone Assistant-powered dashboard that offers quick access to audio controls, contacts, navigation, and other shortcuts while you’re on the road, according to a report from 9to5Google. The feature, which Google first announced at I / O in 2019, wasn’t officially launched until last year, but now Google’s sunsetting it on November 21st.
The standalone version of Driving Mode isn’t to be confused with the Driving Mode feature built into Google Maps, which automatically boots up once you start navigation. As Esper’s Mishaal Rahman points out, Google added Assistant Driving Mode to Maps before it even released the standalone Driving Mode.
The only difference between the two is that you can access…
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Image: Ivan Reis / DC Comics DC’s adding a new Ultra tier to its Universe Infinite comic book subscription service that lets you digitally read comics just one month after they hit store shelves (via Gizmodo). The new tier launches on Monday at an introductory price of $99 / year, but this price only lasts until November 28th and DC doesn't specify how much it will cost after that.
Currently, users have to wait six months after a new comic hits DC Universe Infinite. While the new tier could make the service more attractive to diehard comic book fans, it’s considerably more expensive than the $74.99 / year or $7.99 / month standard subscription option.
In addition to a shorter launch window, DC’s throwing in 5,000 exclusive titles from Vertigo, DC Black Label, and…
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The downtime will begin at about 9PM ET. | Image: Blizzard Blizzard will be taking the Overwatch 2 servers offline once again to fix more of the issues that have cropped up during the game’s rocky launch. The company plans to shut the game down at about 9PM ET (6PM PT), and expects the downtime to last for an hour. This downtime will be the third in two days, as Blizzard had to take the game offline twice on Thursday.
Blizzard detailed the fixes in the works and some updates on a few of the bigger issues in a post on its forums. In Friday evening’s downtime, Blizzard plans to fix Watchpoint Packs not appearing as available for players who preordered them, and to address the LC-208 error that is preventing some players from logging in.
In Friday’s post, Blizzard confirmed that the change to its…
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Is this the OLED future? | Image: Acer The race to market a truly portable, affordable, and long-lasting OLED laptop is on. Asus is currently the major player. Not only has it made several attempts this year, but it’s come the closest so far with its AMD-powered Zenbook S 13.
But Acer, today, is throwing its hat in the ring. The new Swift Edge is a 16-inch, 3840 x 2400 OLED device that weighs just 2.58 pounds — which would make it the lightest 16-inch laptop in the current market (though LG’s Gram 16 is very close).
And here’s the really good news: it’s got AMD Ryzen inside. Specifically, the model being sold in North America includes the Ryzen 7 6800U, the same eight-core processor that powers the Zenbook S 13.
Image: Acer That’s a screen, all right. … Continue reading…

Excellent battery life and a large display make the 14 Plus upgrade-worthy
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The company may have to attend a hearing in December if it doesn’t settle with workers. | Nick Barclay / The Verge The National Labor Relations Board has filed a complaint against Apple, alleging that the company “discriminated against employees” at its World Trade Center store, according to Kayla Blado, a spokesperson for the regulator. The NLRB’s investigation was spurred by charges filed in May by the Communications Workers of America, the union working with organizers at Apple retail stores in New York, Atlanta, and Oklahoma. The later store is preparing to hold a vote later this month on whether to become the second US location to unionize.
According to Blado, the NLRB’s complaint alleges that Apple wouldn’t let workers put union fliers on a breakroom table, even though it allowed other solicitations and notices there. She also told The Verge…
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