When the nonprofit Freedom House recently published its annual report, it noted that 2025 marked the 15th straight year of decline for global internet freedom. The biggest decline, after Georgia and Germany, came within the United States. Among the culprits cited in the report: age verification laws, dozens of which have come into effect over … Read more
We’ve all been there: You can’t (or won’t) get help when something breaks, but the YouTube clip doesn’t cover your specific issue. It’s what repair gurus at iFixit want to solve with FixBot, an AI-enabled app that talks you through whatever repair you’re doing. The chatbot will help you diagnose the problem and then walk … Read more
NVIDIA is now allowed to sell its second-best H200 processors to China, rather than just the sanction-approved H20 model that China had previously declined to buy, President Trump wrote on Truth Social. The United States will collect a 25 percent tariff on those sales, the Commerce Department confirmed yesterday. Trump said that he informed China’s … Read more
Google is no stranger to scrutiny from government bodies such as the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) the UK Competition and Markets Authority (CMA), and the European Commission. Now it can add another probe to its list: The European Commission has opened an antitrust investigation into the company surrounding the content used for its AI … Read more
As we wrap up 2025, we’re looking at the year’s biggest winners: the people, companies, products and trends that made the most impact over the year. Almost at the top of the pile, of course, are the tech billionaires. According to a recent report by Oxfam, the 10 richest US billionaires (who are all tech … Read more
Two years ago, Fairphone launched a pair of modular, fully-repairable headphones called the Fairbuds XL. Now, the Dutch social enterprise is releasing an updated version where the focus isn’t just on the quality of its hardware, but on the merits of its raw materials. The 2025 Fairbuds XL ship with new “premium” 40mm dynamic drivers … Read more
Letterboxd has introduced its first wave of exclusive digital film rentals for the company’s previously announced Letterboxd Video Store. The inaugural collection is themed Unreleased Gems and includes four movies that received awards or acclaim during a film festival. The titles will be available to watch from Letterboxd from December 10 through January 9. Each … Read more
According to a statement from the Public Interest Research Group, the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2026 has removed language that would have granted the US military the right to repair its own equipment rather than requiring it to use official defense contractors for maintenance. This bill is still being considered by Congress, … Read more
Despite making some moves to address the proliferation of AI-generated audio on its platform, Spotify failed to catch a copycat making imitations of music by King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard. The long-running experimental rock band from Australia, has been a vocal critic of Spotify and was one of several artists that took their music … Read more
Katsuhiro Harada is departing Bandai Namco at the end of 2025. He announced the news both with a farewell note shared on X and, in possibly the coolest exit ever, with an hour-long DJ mix. Harada’s 30-year career has most closely been involved with Tekken and he’s a familiar face in the fighting game community. … Read more