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The U.S. added a record amount of solar power generating capacity in 2024. That helped push the share of power that comes from renewables up to 24%.

All of that is according to a report out Thursday from Bloomberg’s energy research arm and the Business Council for Sustainable Energy.

The burst of growth in solar power was helped along by tax credits supported by the Biden administration. Now the industry is figuring out how it might navigate a future without those credits.

The solar industry is no stranger to challenges: tariffs on imported panels, labor shortages, long waits to connect new projects to the grid. 

“Many here call it the solar coaster, kind of up and down and up and down,” said Abigail Ross Hopper, president of the Solar Energy Industries Association.

In 2024, the ride was mostly up. Tax credits were available and regulations stayed fairly steady, she said. And when that’s the case, “People are willing to either invest their personal capital and put something on their home or literally hundreds of millions of dollars and build something,” said Hopper. 

Whatever happens to the tax credits, solar has something going for it in the energy market, said Dennis Wamsted at the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis.

“We’ve gotten to a point where it’s just incredibly cheap to build, and it provides electricity that has no variable fuel cost,” said Wamsted. 

Electricity demand is growing again in the U.S. for the first time in about 15 years as more data centers, manufacturing plants and electric vehicles suck up more power. So, Wamsted said, solar’s speed of deployment works to its advantage.

“You can build a solar plant in 12 to 18 months. If you want to build that as a gas plant, it’s going to take you four to five years,” said Wamsted. 

And unlike a natural gas plant or even a wind turbine, solar arrays can be set up pretty much anywhere, said Tara Narayanan at BloombergNEF.

“You can also have solar projects that are a lot smaller, and can, you know, be on a field, can be in slightly less sunny parts of the country,” said Narayanan. 

So if Congress rolls back tax credits that have benefited the solar industry, other factors, Narayanan said, may work in its favor. 

But, the industry is still on that solar coaster, said Abigail Ross Hopper at the Solar Energy Industries Association. 

“It feels a little bit like, you know, when you’re kind of going fast around a corner, and you’re banking up on the side, right? It feels a bit like that,” said Hopper. 

And, she said, they’re waiting to see if they’ll go up or down.

In late January, critical government data sets used by health researchers and economists disappeared from government websites in response to executive orders and memoranda from President Trump’s administration. Though some of those tools came back online, the purge sparked a data downloading frenzy among researchers and academics worried about the future of federal statistics. 

David Van Riper, director of spatial analysis at IPUMS, an organization at the University of Minnesota focused on making government data easier for the public to use, spoke with “Marketplace” host Kai Ryssdal about the importance of government statistics. The following is an edited transcript of their conversation. 

Kai Ryssdal: This will sound like a silly question, but I don’t really think it is. Why does what you do matter?

David Van Riper: So, I think of Federal Statistical data sets like an X-ray. They provide information about the population throughout the U.S., diving all the way down to individual neighborhoods. You know, thinking of it as an X-ray, we can really hone in on various parts of the body and figure out what’s going on in our communities.

Ryssdal: Okay, so given that the state of play here with access to federal data is in flux — it does seem like some of the data has come back — some of it, maybe not. My question is, was there a moment in the last three and a half, four weeks when you woke up and said, “Oh, shoot, this is bad?”

Van Riper:  Yeah. So I went to bed on Thursday, January 30, kind of thinking that the next day was going to be a kind of a regular work day and I woke up on the 31st and got to my office and started looking at Slack and social media, and started to realize that, “Oh, a lot of the Centers of Disease Control data are not available anymore.” And started to realize that, “Oh, this could become a problem for people who rely on these data to carry out their day-to-day jobs.”

Ryssdal: Say more about those problems.

Van Riper: Yeah, so you know, a lot of people have built workflows. They kind of build these data sets into their day-to-day operations. They’re continually going to federal statistical websites to look up documentation, to download data files, and all of a sudden those were no longer accessible. And if you didn’t have those data sets downloaded to your local computing system, you started to get real nervous about how you were going to access those data, potentially long time into the future. 

Ryssdal: You and your colleagues, in point of fact, actually spent some frenzied moments there in sort of late January, early February, downloading basically everything you could.

Van Riper: We did. We wanted to make sure that we had all of the data and documentation, especially that we needed for our particular data products. We were also, you know, getting inquiries from groups around the country asking us if we had grabbed, you know, data set X or data set Y, and we were in communication with other organizations and people who were also kind of grabbing and downloading as much data as they could.

Ryssdal: We don’t know what’s going to happen with federal data. The management of it right now is chaotic at best. And I guess that leads to this question, what happens if, in six weeks, somebody flips a switch and this data just vaporizes and never comes back?

Van Riper: I think the research community has done a lot of work in the last, you know, three weeks to download as much data as they could as it’s come back online. Right now it’s mostly we’re going through a process of documenting who has what data. Going forward, though, if federal statistical products are delayed or are no longer provided, if they’re canceled, it’s going to be like we’ve taken that X-ray machine away from a doctor. We’re not going to know what’s going on in communities and being able to measure whether or not specific policies are having the expected impact, you know, those, those statistical data sets are really fundamental for that measurement.

Ryssdal: So it’s, you know, it’s interesting. I went to your website, and I went to the mission statement, and the first sentence in the mission statement is, “democratizes access to the world’s social and economic data for current and future generations.” That seems unobjectionable. And I guess I wonder, as a guy now who’s been doing this for decades, right? What do you make of this current moment?

Van Riper: Um, I think it’s definitely concerning, right? I think we’ve never seen such a widespread removal of public access to data that you know should be made available to the public. You know, it’s all paid for by our tax dollars, and without that public data, you really have to rely on other channels of communication, which might be biased or which might be, you know, telling you a story they want you to hear. But we as a population aren’t allowed to see the data to make our own assessments of what’s going on.

OpenAI said ChatGPT now has more than 400 million weekly active users, up 30% in the last couple of months. The growth comes as chatbot competition has been heating up with the release of highly capable but purportedly much cheaper to build models from Chinese company DeepSeek. The success of those free, open-source models has raised questions about how artificial intelligence companies can sustainably monetize their products and whether they can recoup the billions of dollars invested.

Four hundred million weekly active users is nothing to sneeze at, said Eric Seufert, an independent tech analyst at Mobile Dev Memo. 

“But the problem is, consumers are just going to migrate to whichever model or whichever app they feel best serves them,” said Seufert.

About a month ago, DeepSeek topped Apple’s download charts. This week, it’s the latest version of xAI’s Grok. Then there’s Perplexity, Anthropic’s Claude and Google’s Gemini. 

Large language models have become a commodity, said Gary Marcus, a professor emeritus of cognitive science at New York University and author of “Taming Silicon Valley.”

“Everybody’s using the same formula to make essentially the same kind of thing, which makes it hard for any of them to say, you know, their product is distinct from anybody else’s,” said Marcus.

Which means companies are likely to compete on price, said Ted Mortonson, tech strategist at Baird.

“You’re going to see a race to zero in the near term,” he said.

Most companies already offer a free tier, and they’ll be under pressure to keep lowering prices for advanced features, said Mortonson.

Last month, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said on X that the company was losing money, even on its pro subscriptions, which cost $200 a month. 

Computing costs should come down as semiconductor efficiency improves, said Doug O’Laughlin at SemiAnalysis.

“As hardware improves, yeah, we see cost downs of like one-tenth, one one-hundredth,” said O’Laughlin.

But consumer chatbot memberships aren’t likely to drive profits for AI companies, said analyst Andy Thurai at Constellation Research. What will is tailoring AI systems for industries that will pay a premium for productivity gains, like health care, law and finance.

“It’s about the business use case and the business problems you solve,” said Thurai.

And, AI companies might also look to make money the way most apps do, with advertising.

Walmart held its quarterly earnings call Thursday morning at 7, to be exact, in Bentonville, Arkansas. And if you were listening in, you would have heard CEO Doug McMillon bragging about the highlights of the retail giant’s business.

Its advertising sales grew 29% last quarter on an annual basis. Its third-party marketplace grew 34%. Its membership income grew by double digits too. Notice, though, that none of those things is actually retail sales.

Walmart is the quintessential big box. Right?

“Not anymore,” said Michael Baker, who heads consumer research at investment firm D.A. Davidson. “They’ve done a pretty good job the last couple of years investing in these alternative businesses.”

Baker said those “alternative” businesses include taking a cut of revenue from third parties who sell through Walmart’s website. Walmart also sells ads on said website. It offers shipping services too.

One reason Walmart can do all that, said Cuihong Li, a business professor at the University of Connecticut, is that it’s really big.

“They have the scale. They have the infrastructure. And they have the expertise,” said Li.

Walmart has thousands of trucks, warehouses and stores — plus a fancy web platform — all initially built for its sprawling retail business.

“When you build up all of these resources that may have excess capacity, if you can sell that on the marketplace, it makes sense,” said Jason Miller, a professor of supply chains at Michigan State.

He said this isn’t an original idea. For instance, Amazon has allowed third-party sellers on its platform for decades. Walmart is following suit.

“Some of these resellers may be selling niche goods that Walmart itself would never want to stock in inventory and sell itself,” said Miller. “And what it does is it gives the consumer a broader product portfolio.”

Baker of D.A. Davidson said there’s a reason Walmart is leaning into its advertising, logistics and marketplace services.

“All fall into this heading of alternative businesses, and all have higher margins. They’re pretty profitable,” he said.

Baker said Walmart can use that profit to keep prices low at its retail stores. That could come in handy, he said, “at times when the core business might be a little bit more, you know, impacted by some external factors.”

Because at the end of the day, retail is still Walmart’s core business. It sells more stuff to Americans than anyone else.

Elon Musk has a problem with Community Notes, the crowdsourced fact-checking feature that started as Birdwatch, and launched at scale after he purchased Twitter.

"Unfortunately @CommunityNotes is increasingly being gamed by governments & legacy media," Musk posted. "Working to fix this..." Based on the rant his tweet descends in to afterwards, his issue appears to be with how X's Community Notes contributors have been treating misinformation about President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and the war in Ukraine. Musk quotes a post from an X account that claims polls showing Zelenskyy has a 57 percent approval rating in Ukraine are "not credible." Information like that being challenged on X doesn't jive with President Trump's description of Zelenskyy as a "dictator" or Musk's desire to use the platform as an unofficial arm of the current administration.

Unfortunately, @CommunityNotes is increasingly being gamed by governments & legacy media.

Working to fix this …

It should be utterly obvious that a Zelensky-controlled poll about his OWN approval is not credible!!

If Zelensky was actually loved by the people of Ukraine, he… https://t.co/gy0NjtPwiq

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 20, 2025

What "fixing" Community Notes will look like remains to be seen, but Musk uncritically quoting a post that cites no sources beyond an image with small text that says "Accuracy Confidence: Normal" is hopefully evidence enough that Community Notes are the bare minimum needed. Ragging on the feature of course fits the larger pattern of Musk's tenure at X, which has been characterized by him manipulating the platform's algorithm and eliminating features that helped determine credibility, like verification. If he thinks you can't even trust crowdsourced fact-checks, there's really no source of truth left on the platform.

The concept of Community Notes is no longer unique to X — Meta recently opened up the waitlist to use the feature on its platforms — but how long Community Notes exists its current form is apparently now an open question.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/social-media/elon-musk-wants-to-fix-community-notes-on-x-212310412.html?src=rss

iPhone 15 Pro owners will soon have one less reason to consider upgrading to an iPhone 16 series handset. Visual Intelligence, Apple's equivalent to Google Lens, is coming to the 2023 Pro-series flagships, according to Daring Fireball.

Owners of the iPhone 16 and 16 Pro can trigger Visual Intelligence with a long press of their dedicated camera button. But like the recently announced iPhone 16e (which also supports the feature), the iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max don't have a physical camera button. So, all three phones will have to assign it to the Action button or use a Control Center shortcut, which will arrive in an upcoming software update.

Apple hasn't said which iOS version will bring the Apple Intelligence visual search feature to the iPhone 15 Pro series. However, Daring Fireball's John Gruber suspects it will be in iOS 18.4, which could arrive "any day now" for beta testers.

Cherlynn Low for Engadget

Part of the Apple Intelligence suite of AI features, Visual Intelligence lets you point your camera at something and use AI to analyze it in real time. It does a few things on its own, but it gets more useful with info from its persistent onscreen shortcuts to ChatGPT or Google Image Search.

So, say you find a set of towels in your closet with a unique pattern. You really like those dang towels and want to buy more, but you can't remember where you got them. Activate Visual Intelligence, choose the Google search shortcut and see if your beloved rags are among the web results that pop up. Alternatively, you could use ChatGPT to ask it about the product and where to order it.

Visual Intelligence can also do a few things without the help of Google or OpenAI. You can interact with text: translate, read aloud and summarize. Or learn about a business you point your phone toward: view its hours, menu and services or buy something from it.

So, iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max owners should get a taste of that before long. And perhaps even sooner for those willing to brave the (sometimes rough) waters of beta software.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/mobile/smartphones/an-ios-update-will-give-iphone-15-pro-owners-visual-intelligence-205030298.html?src=rss

ChatGPT has surpassed 400 million weekly active users. "We feel very fortunate to serve 5 percent of the world every week," OpenAI COO Brad Lightcap said on X about the new audience stat. This figure is twice the weekly active user count reported by the company in August 2024, which was double the figure it posted in November 2023.

The latest milestone for the AI assistant comes after a huge uproar over new rival platform DeepSeek earlier in the year, which raised questions about whether the current crop of leading AI tools was about to be dethroned. OpenAI is on the verge of a move to simplify its ChatGPT offerings so that users won't have to select which reasoning model will respond to an input, and it will make its GPT-4.5 and GPT-5 models available soon in the chat and API clients. With GPT-5 being made available to OpenAI's free users, ChatGPT seems primed to continue expanding its audience base in the coming months.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ai/chatgpt-reaches-400m-weekly-active-users-203635884.html?src=rss

The $599 iPhone 16e is many things, but don't you dare call it a budget phone. I hesitate to even call it "cheap." As a successor to the $429 iPhone SE, it's hard not to see the 16e as a disappointment. Sure, it's $200 less than the vanilla iPhone 16 (which I argued was a great deal at launch), and the 16e also packs in the latest A18 chip with support for Apple Intelligence. But it's no longer a small phone, and it pushes Apple's cheaper iPhone option well beyond $500. That's something we'll likely never see again. (And it's potentially terrible news for future iPhone pricing, as well.)

Given the sheer amount of new hardware in the iPhone 16e — including a larger 6.1-inch OLED screen, Apple's first in-house "C1" modem and that aforementioned A18 chip — it's easy to make excuses for the price. The 16e is certainly far closer in specs to the iPhone 16 than the third-gen SE was to the iPhone 13. But I'd argue that Apple didn't exactly need an OLED screen for this model, and there are likely other ways to cut down costs. (It's even stranger Apple kept out MagSafe and fast wireless charging, which would have been cheaper to implement, and arguably more useful, than a large OLED display.)

Apple

And while it's nice to have the A18 chip (albeit with one less GPU core) and full Apple Intelligence support, I agree with my colleague Igor Bonifacic that users aren't exactly clamoring for those AI features. If we had to blame one culprit for the iPhone 16e's pricing, though, it's likely Apple Intelligence. After all, Apple is still fighting to prove it isn't too far behind Microsoft, Google and OpenAI. In any other year, Apple might have been able to justify throwing an older chip in the 16e, but that's not possible when it's in the middle of an AI hype war.

Mostly, I'm just sad that Apple is once again raising the price of admission to its walled garden without much justification. There's something special — noble, even — about sub-$500 smartphones. They're a reminder of a saner era of smartphones, when prices were being driven down by phones like the Moto G. These days you're left with Android phones like the Pixel 8a (and potentially the upcoming Pixel 9a), as well as the $400 Samsung Galaxy A35 and $499 Galaxy A55.

Apple

Now that the dream of a sub-$500 iPhone is well and truly dead, it feels like Apple is just setting the stage for future price jumps. A $600 or $650 iPhone 17e will certainly look like a deal compared to a $850 or $900 iPhone 17. And just wait for the inevitable $2,000 iPhone foldable, which could potentially be specced beyond $3,000. 

Of course, you could be a smart Apple shopper and opt for used or refurbished iPhones. I recently picked up a refurbished iPhone 14 Plus as an early Mothers' Day gift for $420, and Amazon currently has listings for iPhone 14 Pros right under $500. Those devices won't support Apple Intelligence, but I'd argue sticking to the used market is simply a more useful form of intelligence. 

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/mobile/smartphones/a-599-iphone-16e-is-a-cruel-joke-200507275.html?src=rss

Among Us VR has proven itself to be a major hit since first being released back in 2022. Now, developers Innersloth and Schell Games have announced they are rejiggering the virtual reality title for traditional PC players. Among Us 3D is playable without a headset and will be available via Steam in the near future.

This title keeps the core gameplay loop from the original, but shifts to a first-person perspective. It's basically a new way to keep sabotaging your friends and family. Among Us 3D is for four to ten players and includes native proximity voice chat, with no need for a third-party platform. All of the minigames are returning, though there’s also some new ones coming down the pike. Innersloth is holding off on those details for now.

It features crossplay with Among Us VR, but not with the original game. That's a bummer, but understandable. There will be, however, an expanded costume selection to offer "an endless number of cosmetic customization combinations." There's a new in-game currency called Stardust that will, presumably, be used to purchase some of those outfits.

There's no release date yet, other than "soon." However, a demo will be available to US players as part of Steam Next Fest from February 24 to March 3. Preorders for the full game are already live on Steam.

This is just the latest cool thing that developer Innersloth has announced. The company recently revealed a publishing arm called Outersloth. There's also an Among Us cartoon coming sometime in the near future.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/pc/among-us-vr-is-being-transformed-into-a-traditional-3d-game-for-pc-194545497.html?src=rss

The Action button is available on nearly every iPhone Apple sells, offering a quick way to access a feature, app or shortcut on your phone, just by pushing a button. It can be a flashlight, activate a smart home routine or let you access any number of custom shortcuts without having to unlock your phone and pick through apps.

Apple added the Action Button on the iPhone 15 Pro as a replacement for the iPhone's original Ring / Silent switch, and it was an acknowledgement of sorts that lots of people keep their phones on silent anyway. Having a reassignable button was pitched as a "Pro" feature at the time, but much like the Dynamic Island, it came to all of Apple's other phones in short order, even the entry-level iPhone 16e.

How to use the Action Button Apple

You can use the Action Button for yourself on an iPhone 15 Pro, iPhone 16, iPhone 16 Plus, iPhone 16 Pro, iPhone 16 Pro Max and iPhone 16e just by pressing or holding down the small button above the volume up and down buttons on the left side of your phone. By default, the Action Button will mute or unmute your text and ringtones. This fills the same role as the old Ring / Silent switch. Heading into the Settings app will let you reassign it to another task and you can silence your phone via the Control Center.

How to reassign the Action Button to Flashlight Ian Carlos Campbell for Engadget

Out of the box, Apple lets you assign the Action button to several different controls: Silent Mode (Ring / Silent), Focus (either a specific Focus or a menu that lets you pick each time), Camera (a specific mode like Photo or Video), Flashlight, Voice Memo, Recognize Music, Translate, Magnifier, Controls (a specific control from Control Center like Airplane Mode), Shortcut, Accessibility (toggling a specific accessibility feature) or do nothing at all.

If you wanted to switch from the default, Silent Mode, to the Flashlight, you need to first unlock your phone. Then: 

1. Open the Settings app. 

2. Tap on "Action Button." 

3. From there, swipe through the different options until you land on Flashlight.  

4. To test that it worked, try pressing on the Action Button.

You can use this same process to reassign the Action Button to any of the built-in actions Apple provides.

How to make the Action Button open an app Ian Carlos Campbell for Engadget

If you'd like to get a little more adventurous, you can also have the Action Button open a specific app on your phone. Let's say, for example, your go-to game on the iPhone is Balatro. You can have the Action Button automatically pull up Balatro whenever you press it.

To set it up, you'll need your iPhone unlocked.

1. Open the Settings app.

2. Tap on "Action Button."

3. Swipe through the options until you reach "Shortcut."

4. Tap on "Choose a Shortcut..."

5. Then tap on "Open App..."

6. Then scroll until you find your chosen app and tap on it.

This process works for any app on your phone, including features of specific apps, like if you wanted to jump directly into ChatGPT's Voice Mode or a new note in the Notes app.

How to make the Action button activate a shortcut Ian Carlos Campbell for Engadget

The Shortcut action works for more complicated Apple Shortcuts, too. Technically, any shortcut designed to be triggered by you choosing to activate it (as opposed to a time or location-based shortcut) works. There's a lot of interesting shortcuts out there, and plenty of custom ones you can make on your own, but to use a simple example, here's how you'd set the Action Button to start a Pomodoro timer.

1. Open the Settings app.

2. Tap on "Action Button."

3. Swipe through the options until you get to "Shortcut."

4. Tap on "Choose a Shortcut..."

5. Tap on whatever shortcut you want activate.

6. Press and hold the Action Button to make sure it works.

In the case of the Pomodoro timer, you'll be prompted to choose how long you want the timer to last, and then you can tap "Done" to start it.

Between lock screen widgets and app shortcuts, home screen widgets, and the Action Button, there's now multiple ways to check information inside of an app, adjust a specific setting or use specific functionality from the apps on your iPhone. It's confusing, but a good rule of thumb is that the Action Button works best for actions that you only need to enable once or binary, on / off features. Plenty of others things work, but at a certain point you'll want to be spending time in an app instead of futzing with the buttons on your phone.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/mobile/smartphones/how-to-make-the-most-of-the-iphones-action-button-193038089.html?src=rss

The Amazon Appstore will no longer be available on Android as of August 20, 2025. After that date, apps from the digital storefront "are not guaranteed to operate" on Android hardware; however, they can continue to be used on devices like the Fire TV and Fire Tablets. The Coins program, Amazon's virtual currency for some Appstore app and in-app purchases, will also end on that same date. Coins will no longer be available for purchase beginning today.

The Appstore was Amazon's effort to get in on the app distribution game for Android. Third-party app stores have been a hot topic for the business world in recent years, with the owners of walled gardens insisting that everything is fair while the companies trying to get a share of the action for themselves insist that it's not. There have been mixed moves to address the question in the US government, while regions such as the EU have taken more decisive steps to increase competition.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/amazon-is-shutting-down-its-third-party-android-app-store-192047953.html?src=rss

After announcing its plan to end third-party fact-checking in January 2025, Meta's crowdsourced replacement is finally starting to take shape. You can now join a waitlist to be a Community Notes contributor on Facebook, Instagram and Threads when the feature rolls out in the coming months.

Contributors are expect to provide context via a note when a post on one of Meta's platforms "might be inaccurate or confusing," according to the company's sign-up page. Community Notes will be able to be added to "most public content across Facebook, Instagram and Threads" and must be 500 characters or fewer. Any note is also subject to Meta's Community Standards and the judgment of other contributors. Meta expects contributors to rate notes so that the correct context gets displayed under posts.

To sign-up, you need to be based in the US, be over the age of 18, have a Meta account that's more than six months old and in good standing and have either a verified phone number or two-factor authentication. Meta says contributors will start to be taken off the waitlist once the Community Notes beta launches. The company hasn't given a hard date for the launch, but does mention that Community Notes will be phased in "over the next few months."

Meta started testing Community Notes on Threads a little over a month ago. The feature, in name and basic functionality, is inspired by X's Community Notes, which originally launched in 2022 when the company was still known as Twitter. Community Notes and other crowdsourced pseudo-fact checks have been tested on Google platforms like YouTube and Search as well, and they all have the same general weakness. A crowdsourced answer doesn't come with the same guarantee of accuracy as one provided by someone whose sole job it is to be an impartial fact-checker. 

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/social-media/you-can-now-sign-up-to-be-a-contributor-to-metas-community-notes-feature-190814234.html?src=rss

A day after it was reported that Denis Villeneuve's third Dune movie starts shooting this summer, developer Funcom announced that its open-world MMO Dune: Awakening arrives on May 20 for PC. You can even get a jump on your journey through Arrakis with a character creator that's available today.

Dune: Awakening draws inspiration from Frank Herbert's novels and the 2020s films. (Sorry, no speedo-clad Sting in this one.) However, it takes some detours from the established canon. In the game's version of Dune's world, the Fremen have vanished, Paul Atreides was never born and Lady Jessica obeyed the Bene Gesserit's instructions to give birth to a girl. (In other words, she's a total square.)

So, in addition to being a bit of a "What If?" version of the Duniverse, it gives the developers freedom to use familiar environments and characters without having to tread too closely to the lore of the books and films. Handy!

Funcom

Funcom says you start as a prisoner sent to Arrakis to investigate the Fremen's disappearance. "Following in the footsteps of the mysterious desert tribe, you will learn the true meaning of desert power as you rise from a nameless survivor to becoming an agent of the Atreides or the Harkonnen," the game blurb reads.

The character creator you can tinker with today lets you tweak your hero's looks and choose their home planet, caste and mentor (Swordmaster, Bene Gesserit, Mentat or Trooper). True to Dune form, your protagonist will have to put their hand in the box and take the dreaded Gom Jabbar test. (Fortunately, your hand will be on a keyboard or controller, not inside a sci-fi torture test.) You can use your custom character when the full game launches.

The tool also includes a benchmark mode, so you'll know whether you need to invest in new PC hardware to play the survival game when it arrives.

Dune: Awakening launches on May 20 on Steam. It costs $50, and pre-orders will open soon. The game is also coming to PS5 and Xbox Series X/S, but there's no release date for the console versions yet. You can check out the latest trailer below.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/pc/dune-awakening-will-spice-things-up-on-may-20-184552623.html?src=rss

It’s been ten long years since Avatar: The Legend of Korra aired its final episode and over 15 years since Avatar: The Last Airbender bowed out. Now, finally, Nickelodeon has greenlit a sequel series and it sounds pretty awesome. Deadline reports that Avatar: Seven Havens will be a 2D animated 26-episode followup that chronicles the rise of the next Avatar after Korra.

Franchise creators Michael DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko are developing the series, so we know it's in good hands. The plot sounds pretty dark. It seems the world has fallen into chaos following a cataclysmic event of some kind. The titular "seven havens" refer to a handful of small civilizations that have managed to weather the storm.

Also, the next Avatar will be a female Earthbender. In this world, however, the Avatar is reviled and seen as a harbinger of doom instead of a hero. That’s an interesting twist.

"This new incarnation of the Avatarverse is full of fantasy, mystery and a whole new cast of amazing characters. Get ready to take another epic and emotional adventure," DiMartino and Konietzko said in a statement.

The premiere date and casting information will be released later in the year. We do know that the 26 episodes will be split into two books, or seasons, which is similar to how the original shows handled things. It remains to be seen if the series will cap out at 26 episodes or if that’s just the first two chapters. Personally, I wonder if any aged Korra characters will show up. 

The announcement of Avatar: Seven Havens is just the latest news from the franchise. DiMartino and Konietzko are also working on a trilogy of animated movies, with the first one centering on an adult Aang and friends. That one hits theaters on January 30, 2026. Of course, the Netflix live-action adaptation of the original series still has two more seasons to go.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/entertainment/tv-movies/theres-a-new-avatar-the-last-airbender-cartoon-coming-to-nickelodeon-182956881.html?src=rss

Time (and perhaps a large check or two) heals all wounds. Amazon and the longtime producers and custodians of the James Bond movies have finally agreed on a way forward for the series. Amazon MGM Studios will form a joint venture with Michael G. Wilson and Barbara Broccoli that will hold the intellectual property rights and ensure they remain co-owners of the franchise. However, Wilson and Broccoli will be stepping back to focus on other projects, with Amazon gaining full creative control.

The company bought MGM in 2022 for $8.45 billion to get its hands on a renowned film studio with a vast library of film and TV episodes. Co-ownership of the Bond series was a big part of that. However, production of Bond movies had been on hold amid reports of a power struggle between Amazon and Broccoli, who is said to have felt that an ecommerce giant was not the right fit for her family's franchise (she inherited the series from her father, Albert “Cubby” Broccoli, who died in 1996).

Until now, Broccoli and her half-brother Wilson had retained creative control. She and her family have been very protective of the series and its legacy. Broccoli reportedly rebuffed most of Amazon's attempts to develop spinoffs, save for the reality competition series 007: Road to a Million. But that's about to change with Amazon seemingly eager to propel the series forward before Ian Fleming's Bond novels fully enter the public domain in a decade — allowing anyone to publish their own adaptations of them.

"My life has been dedicated to maintaining and building upon the extraordinary legacy that was handed to Michael and me by our father, producer Cubby Broccoli," Broccoli said in a statement. "I have had the honor of working closely with four of the tremendously talented actors who have played 007 and thousands of wonderful artists within the industry. With the conclusion of No Time to Die and Michael retiring from the films, I feel it is time to focus on my other projects.”

On one hand, the series will be exiting the limbo it's been in since Daniel Craig stepped away from the role after 2021's No Time To Die. We might finally learn who the next James Bond is in the near future. On the other, there's no telling how Amazon might dilute the prestige quality of the franchise with spinoffs and more projects like the game show Brian Cox didn't realize he was signing up to host.

The movies have a tradition of product placement from luxury brands, and we could see Amazon replacing the likes of LG monitors with, say, Echo Show displays. And if ever there was an opportunity for Amazon to create and market its own smartwatch...

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/entertainment/amazon-will-take-full-creative-control-of-the-james-bond-franchise-174255959.html?src=rss

The Pokémon Company is hosting a morning livestream on February 27 at 9AM ET to share the "latest news and updates" from Pikachu and pals. You can stream it via the official YouTube channel. This is the yearly Pokémon Presents event that typically provides info on what’s coming to empty our wallets throughout the year (and beyond.)

So what can we expect this year? Both The Pokémon Company and Nintendo remain tight-lipped, but we can make some educated guesses. Pokemon Legends: Z-A, the follow-up to the open-world Pokémon Legends: Arceus, was announced in early 2024. It’s high time we got some more details on the upcoming game.

The title was originally advertised as a Switch exclusive, but now that the Switch 2 is on our radar, maybe it’ll be a dual-release or something. We could get that information, along with an announcement regarding the game’s trio of starter Pokémon.

There’s a new Pokémon TGC set arriving in May. It’s called Destined Rivals, so we can expect a detailed look at this update. We might even get a tease for another set down the line. Pokémon cards, both digital and physical, are still very much a big deal. To that end, we could get details regarding new features for TGC Pocket.

Pokémon GO's next season starts on March 4, which is just a few days after the stream. We’ll most definitely get a trailer for that, along with some updates on any new features. Beyond that, it’s a guessing game. Hope springs eternal that we’ll finally get those remakes of Pokémon Black and White. In any event, February 27 is right around the corner.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/nintendo/theres-a-pokemon-presents-livestream-scheduled-for-february-27-171813096.html?src=rss

The Google Pixel 8a mid-tier smartphone is back on sale for $399 via Amazon. This is close to a record-low price and represents a discount of 20 percent. Even better? The sale applies to multiple colorways, including mint green, light blue and white. This deal is for the 128GB model.

This device topped our list of the best mid-range smartphones, and with good reason. It’s a well-designed phone that gets the job done. It features a powerful Tensor G3 chip, offers support for Google Gemini AI tools and includes an excellent camera system. The 120Hz OLED display is gorgeous and the battery life is on point.

We called the Pixel 8a “one of the best values of any phone on sale today” in our official review, and that was at the original $499 asking price. It’s especially well-valued with today’s sale. We even enjoyed gaming with this device, which isn’t always the case with mid-range phones. The 8a also comes with IP67 dust and water resistance and 7.5-watt Qi wireless charging.

There aren’t any major downsides to this phone, though we do have a couple of nitpicks. The wireless charging, while convenient, is pretty slow. The display bezels are also on the thicker side, so you lose some precious screen real estate. Other than that, this is a near-perfect mid-range phone. It’s also a full $200 cheaper than Apple’s just-announced “budget” smartphone, the iPhone 16e.

Follow @EngadgetDeals on Twitter and subscribe to the Engadget Deals newsletter for the latest tech deals and buying advice.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/deals/googles-pixel-8a-drops-to-399-at-amazon-163059224.html?src=rss

While there's a new iPhone that's surely soaking up the attention of many Apple fans, it's often worth keeping an eye on the company's other products as you might find a decent deal. If you've been on the lookout for a discount on the latest Mac mini, you're in luck. The M4 Mac mini is back on sale as it has dropped to $549.

The deal is for the base model with 16GB of unified memory and 256GB of SSD storage. It's not the lowest price we've seen for this Mac mini — it was $100 off during the Black Friday period. But with a $50 discount, this is the best price we've seen so far this year.

If you'd like more built-in storage, you might want to opt for a configuration with a 512GB SSD. That'll currently run you $719, which is $80 off the regular price. However, it's worth bearing in mind that you can connect an external SSD to your Mac mini if Apple's internal storage upgrade prices are too pricey for you to justify.

We gave the Mac mini (albeit one equipped with a more powerful M4 Pro chipset) a score of 90 in our review. That said, the base M4 model should be zippy enough for most people's needs. For instance, those who like to play games on Mac should find that the GPU is fast enough to support 60 fps gameplay at a resolution of 1080p on many titles.

Follow @EngadgetDeals on Twitter and subscribe to the Engadget Deals newsletter for the latest tech deals and buying advice.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/deals/apples-m4-mac-mini-is-back-on-sale-for-549-161512511.html?src=rss

On the Friday after Christmas, OpenAI published a blog post titled "Why OpenAI's structure must evolve to advance our mission." In it, the company detailed a plan to reorganize its for-profit arm into a public benefit corporation (PBC). In the weeks since that announcement, I've spoken to some of the country's leading corporate law experts to gain a better understanding of OpenAI's plan, and, more importantly, what it might mean for its mission to build safe artificial general intelligence (AGI).

What is a public benefit corporation?

"Public benefit corporations are a relatively recent addition to the universe of business entity types," says Jens Dammann, professor of corporate law at the University of Texas School of Law. Depending on who you ask, you may get a different history of PBCs, but in the dominant narrative, they came out of a certification program created by a nonprofit called B Lab. Companies that complete a self-assessment and pay an annual fee to B Lab can carry the B Lab logo on their products and websites and call themselves B-Corps. Critically, B Corp status isn't a designation with the weight of law, or even an industry-wide group, behind it — it's a stamp of approval from this specific nonprofit.

As a result, B Lab eventually felt the certification program "was not enough," says Professor Michael Dorff, executive director of the Lowell Milken Institute for Business Law and Policy at UCLA. "They wanted something more permanent and more rooted in the law." So the organization began working with legal experts to create a model statute for what would become the benefit corporation. B Lab lobbied state legislatures to pass laws recognizing benefit corporations as legal entities, and in 2010, Maryland became the first state to do so. In 2013, Delaware enacted its own version of the law. To make things somewhat confusing, the state went with a different name: the public benefit corporation.

Delaware is arguably the most important state for corporate law in the US, thanks to the Delaware Chancery Court and its body of business-friendly case law. As of 2022, 68.2 percent of all Fortune 500 companies, including many tech giants, are incorporated in the state despite largely operating elsewhere. Delaware is also the state where OpenAI plans to reincorporate its for-profit as a PBC.

The basic idea behind public benefit corporations is that they're business entities that impose a constraint on their board to balance profit maximization, a public benefit that's stated in the charter of the company, and the concerns of people impacted by its conduct.

"It's a bit of a paradigm shift," says Professor Dammann, but don't confuse a PBC with a nonprofit. "The key characteristic of a nonprofit is what we call a non-distribution constraint, meaning if a nonprofit makes a profit, they can't distribute it to their shareholders," Professor Dammann says. "If you form a public benefit corporation, there's no such non-distribution constraint. At its heart, a PBC is still a for-profit corporation."

Why is OpenAI pursuing a PBC structure?

First and foremost, a PBC structure — whether it's private or selling share on the open market — would get OpenAI out from under that non-distribution constraint. But there are likely some other considerations at play.

OpenAI hasn't publicly said this, but it appears some of its employees believe a PBC structure could protect the company from a hostile takeover if it were to go public. In a recent Financial Times report, a source within the company said a PBC structure would give OpenAI a "safe harbor" if a rival firm were to try to buy the company. It "gives you even more flexibility to say 'thanks for calling and have a nice day'," the person said.

The specific threat OpenAI likely wants safe harbor from is what's known as the Revlon doctrine, which is named after a 1986 Delaware Supreme Court case involving the cosmetics company Revlon Inc. and now defunct supermarket chain Pantry Pride, then led by CEO Ronald Perelman. "The Revlon doctrine holds that if you're a publicly traded corporation [incorporated in Delaware] and somebody stages a takeover attempt, then under certain conditions, you have to sell to the highest bidder," says Professor Dammann.

The underlying rationale behind Revlon is that a for-profit company’s sole function is to generate profits, so the board is forced to make whatever choice will return the most money to shareholders.

"We don't know for sure, but we're fairly confident that the Revlon doctrine doesn't apply to public benefit corporations," says Professor Dammann. Theoretically, PBC boards may have the flexibility to reject a takeover bid if they believe a buyer won't adhere to the social values the company was founded on. However, because "none of this has been litigated," according to Professor Dorff, it remains a purely hypothetical defense.

Moreover, it's unclear if reorganizing as a PBC would offer OpenAI more protection against a hostile takeover attempt than what it already has as a nonprofit. "I don't think this has been tested with this particular kind of structure, but my sense is that the nonprofit would not be obligated to sell even in a Revlon moment," says Professor Dorff.

"We need to raise more capital" OpenAI

Publicly, OpenAI has said it needs to secure more investment, and that its current structure is holding it back. "We once again need to raise more capital than we'd imagined," OpenAI wrote in December, two months after securing $6 billion in new venture funding. "Investors want to back us but, at this scale of capital, need conventional equity and less structural bespokeness."

Unpacking what the company likely means by "structural bespokeness" requires a short history lesson. In 2019, when OpenAI originally created its for-profit arm, it organized the company using a unique "capped-profit" structure. The company said it would limit investor returns to 100x, with excess returns going to the nonprofit. "We expect this multiple to be lower for future rounds as we make further progress," OpenAI added.

It's fair to be critical of the company's claims. "You'd have to ask the investors, but I have to say that 100x is an exceptional rate or return, so the idea that you cannot get investment because of a 100x cap seems rich to me," says Professor Dorff. In fact, there are suggestions OpenAI was already making itself more attractive to investors before announcing its reorganization plan in December. In 2023, The Economist reported that the company changed its cap to increase (and not decrease as OpenAI had originally said it would) by 20 percent per year starting in 2025. At this time, OpenAI does not expect to be profitable until 2029, and racked up about $5 billion in losses last year.

"We want to increase our ability to raise capital while still serving our mission, and no pre-existing structure we know of strikes the right balance," OpenAI said in 2019. At that point, Delaware's PBC legislation had been law for nearly six years. However, the company is now arguing that a PBC structure would "enable us to raise the necessary capital with conventional terms like others in this space."

In OpenAI's defense, calling its current structure convoluted would be an understatement. As you can see from the company's own org chart, there are two other entities under the OpenAI umbrella, including a holding company that's an intermediary between the nonprofit and for-profit. Engadget was able to find at least 11 different Delaware companies registered to OpenAI. George R.R. Martin, Jodi Picoult and other members of the Author's Guild probably described it best in their copyright lawsuit against the company, calling OpenAI "a tangled thicket of interlocking entities that generally keep from the public what the precise relationships among them are and what function each entity serves within the larger corporate structure."

OpenAI did not respond to multiple requests for comment from Engadget.

"A stronger nonprofit supported by the for-profit’s success" Reuters

OpenAI's nonprofit arm does essentially two things: controls the for-profit side's business, and exists as a "vehicle" to develop "safe and broadly beneficial AGI" (artificial general intelligence).

According to the company, its current structure does not allow its nonprofit arm to "easily do more than control the for-profit." If it were freed of that responsibility — by say, handing it off to investors — OpenAI suggests its nonprofit could focus its resources on charitable initiatives, all while becoming "one of the best-resourced nonprofits in history."

To remedy the situation, OpenAI's board says the nonprofit should give up absolute control over the for-profit and take whatever degree of control comes with the amount of stock it's granted through the reorganization process. "The nonprofit's significant interest in the existing for-profit would take the form of shares in the PBC at a fair valuation determined by independent financial advisors," OpenAI says of this part of its plan.

Professor Dorff argues who controls OpenAI is critical to the company maintaining its mission. The move to reorganize the for-profit as a PBC is not controversial. "Companies do it all the time; there’s a straightforward and clear process to do that," he tells me. "What is controversial is what they're trying to do to change the nature of the nonprofit's ownership interest in the for-profit."

At the risk of oversimplifying things, OpenAI's board of directors wants to divest the company's nonprofit of two of its most important assets: control of the for-profit and its rights to the profits from AGI. "You can't just do that," says Professor Dorff. "The assets of the nonprofit must remain dedicated to the purpose of the nonprofit." There are rules that allow nonprofits to modify their purpose if their original one is made defunct, but those won't apply to OpenAI since we're not living in a world with safe (or any) AGI.

Think of it this way, what is the value of artificial general intelligence? It's not a traditional asset like real estate or the EVs sold by Tesla. AGI, as defined by OpenAI, doesn't yet and may never exist. "One could imagine it's worth all the labor of the economy because it could eventually replace human labor," says Professor Dorff. Whatever the eventual value of the technology, Professor Dorff says he's unsure "any number would enable the nonprofit to do what it's supposed to do without control."

No matter how OpenAI spins it, any version of this plan would result in a massive loss of control for the current nonprofit entity and its board.

One more thing

Something the experts I spoke to agreed on was that the laws governing PBCs aren't very effective at ensuring companies stick to their social purpose. "The legal constraints aren't very strict," Professor Dammann says, adding, "the problem with a very broad public benefit is that it's not so constraining anymore. If you're dedicated to a very broad version of the public good, then you can always defend every decision, right?"

"The dual goal of profit and public purpose doesn't really tell you how a company is going to manage those objectives," says Jill Fisch, professor of Business Law at the University of Pennsylvania Law School. "To the extent that public purpose sacrifices profits, and it doesn't have to, but to the extent that it does, how much of a sacrifice is contemplated?"

"What matters a lot in PBC governance is what the private arrangements are," Professor Dorff adds. "That is, what do the documents say?" A company's certificate of incorporation, shareholder agreements and bylaws can provide "very robust" (or very few) mechanisms to ensure it sticks to its social purpose. As Professor Dorff points out, OpenAI's blog post said "nothing about those."

Contrast that with when OpenAI announced its "capped profit" plan. It gave us a glimpse of some of its paperwork, sharing a clause it said was at the start of all of its employee and investor agreements. That snippet made it clear OpenAI was under no obligation to generate a profit. Right now, there's a lot we don't know about its restructuring plan. If the company is still serious about its mission of "ensuring artificial general intelligence benefits all of humanity" it owes the public more transparency.

What happens next? Reuters

Elon Musk's recent $97.4 billion bid to buy the nonprofit's assets complicates OpenAI's plan. In this situation, the nonprofit isn't obligated to sell its assets to Musk under Revlon or anything else — the company simply is not for sale. However, as part of OpenAI's reorganization plan, the for-profit will need to compensate the nonprofit for its independence. Musk's bid likely an attempt to inflate the price of this transaction to one higher than what Sam Altman and the rest of OpenAI's board of directors had in mind. To say Musk and Altman have had a contentious relationship since the former left OpenAI would be an understatement on a grand scale, and having an enemy who not only has the most money of any human on the planet, but also broad and largely unchecked control of the United States' executive branch data, may frustrate plans.

OpenAI also faces a ticking clock. According to documents seen by The New York Times, the company has, under the terms of its latest investment round, less than two years to free its for-profit from control of the nonprofit. If it fails to do so, the $6.6 billion it raised in new funding will become debt.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ai/why-openai-is-trying-to-untangle-its-bespoke-corporate-structure-160028589.html?src=rss

Inside a warehouse in Rancho Dominguez in south Los Angeles County, four Isuzu trucks are in various stages of repair. These trucks were originally headed for the scrap yard or abroad, where they’d continue to be driven and pollute for years to come.  

“Instead, now they get at least 10 more years of operation as a zero-emissions vehicle here in California,” said Jakson Alvarez, the co-founder of Evolectric, a company that retrofits medium-duty diesel trucks to all-electric.  

California — along with states such as New Jersey, Massachusetts and New Mexico — is working to electrify the trucking industry to cut pollution. That effort so far has focused on swapping out old diesel-powered trucks for shiny, new electric ones.

But thanks to businesses like Evolectric, there is another option: giving old trucks a new, electric life.  

Alvarez said that converting these trucks costs between $80,000 to $110,000 — about half as much as buying a new electric truck. “This solution is especially ideal for those smaller fleets.”

Small businesses often spend tens of thousands of dollars over the life of the vehicle to maintain their diesel trucks and keep them running, he added. Converting to electric can help those businesses save money on fuel and on maintenance in the long run.  

“Calculations we’ve done could be 70% lower than a diesel truck,” said Alvarez.

Evolectric’s clients now include a few small recycling businesses and a construction contractor, as well as major industry players such as Anheuser-Busch and Coca-Cola. 

But a challenge has been training the needed workforce — including Marlon Guillén, who’s tightening bolts for a new inverter he’s installing in one of the Isuzus.

The 24-year-old recently graduated from LA Trade Tech College, where he studied diesel engine tech. Now, he works for Evolectric.  

“So far where we’re at, the trade schools, they don’t really teach electric stuff,” he said. “They do teach basic low-voltage diagnostics and stuff, but when it comes to higher voltage stuff, they don’t really teach it.”

Marlon Guillén is a technician at Evolectric. (Erin Stone/LAist)

Converting these trucks isn’t quite as simple as swapping out a diesel engine for a lithium-ion battery; technicians add a lot of high-voltage wires. The motor goes in the middle instead of the front of the chassis.

The company, now running for five years, spent its first several years engineering the optimal design. It’s one of the first companies successfully converting medium-duty trucks.  

“It’s just that satisfaction and feeling that you get once you complete it, once you finally have that final build and it’s running, it’s a good moment,” Guillén said.

And for Guillén, it’s also the start to a good career.