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Twitter is testing new labels for conversation threads

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A few months ago, Twitter tested an “original tweeter” label. The goal was to clarify who started a thread and to cut down on spam. Last month, software engineer Jane Manchun Wong discovered a prototype of a “subscribe to conversation” button that would allow users to follow a thread without liking or replying to it. These new labels seem to be an evolution of both of those features.

While this could be a useful way to prevent spam and add some clarity to jumbled threads, users expressed concerns that the labels will be distracting and unnecessary. Whether subscribers are ready or not, Twitter is determined to shake things up. In its experimental app, Twttr, the company is also toying with nested and color-coded replies. We’ll have to wait to see which changes stick.



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Netflix ‘Cowboy Bebop’ series casts John Cho and Mustafa Shakir

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While there are still roles on the show to be filled, including for a hacker known as Radical Ed, Netflix’s take on the classic anime is starting to take shape. The company first announced plans for a live-action Cowboy Bebop late last year with Shinichiro Watanabe, director of the anime series, on board as a consultant. The show, which will be co-produced by Tomorrow Studios, will get an initial 10 episode run. According to Variety, Thor: The Dark World and Thor: Ragnarok screenwriter Christopher Yost will pen the first episode.

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Tesla adds ‘2048’ and Atari’s ‘Super Breakout’ to its dashboards

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Tesla is adding more free games to the dashboard display on Model S, Model X and Model 3 cars. Super Breakout and 2048 are joining other Atari classics Missile Command, Asteroids, Lunar Lander and Centipede, which Tesla added in August. To date, hundreds of thousands of people have played those games, according to the automaker.

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The tiny Palm phone is no longer just a sidekick

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And yes, Palm is using this as an opportunity to improve some of the phone’s other sticking points. Software updates should extend the battery life as well as improve the camera’s color accuracy and low-light shooting. It can even take HDR photos, which isn’t something you’d expect from a device this compact. The stand-alone Palm phone will include these features out of the box, while everyone else will receive them later in April.

Those improvements might just make it a more compelling product, although you’ll still want to think carefully about getting one. As we noted in our review, the size isn’t for everyone. The tiny keyboard and gesture searches won’t completely make up for the lack of screen area, and the jury’s out on whether the battery life improvements will be enough. Palm’s creation is still aimed at a narrow group of people — it’s just a larger group than it was before.

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Save $80 on Samsung’s 2TB T5 portable SSD

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Plantronics BackBeat FIT 500 On-Ear Bluetooth Headphones

Plantronics

Street price: $78; deal price: $53

Down to $53 in the black and just a dollar more in the teal finish, these sweat & moisture-resistant Bluetooth headphones are close to the best price we’ve seen for them. If you’ve been waiting for a good deal to pick up some on-ear headphones that you can take to the gym, these are a nice option at this price as they’ve largely been $70 or higher even when on sale until recent days.

The Plantronics BackBeat FIT 500 are our on-ear pick for weightlifters in our guide to the best wireless workout headphones. Wirecutter Senior Staff Writer Lauren Dragan wrote, “Weightlifting at the gym means a lot of repping-in, spot requests, and plate borrowing, which also means you need to talk to the people around you. Earbuds can be a pain to put in and take out, so many weightlifters prefer the convenience of a traditional wireless headphone design. The Plantronics BackBeat Fit 500 fits comfortably but stays put and it’s sweat resistant and easy to keep clean. Simple-to-use controls allow you to change tracks, adjust volume, take calls, and access your phone’s digital assistant without pulling out your device. These headphones also have a fun, bass-forward sound and 18 hours of battery life.”

Aukey 12W Travel Charger

Aukey

Street price: $10; deal price: $6 with code X9VO4ZMI

Use code X9VO4ZMI to drop the white color of this charger back down to $6, matching the lowest price we’ve seen. We see similar deals with coupon codes with some regularity, but this is still a solid price on one of the cheapest options we speak highly of in our guide. While not the most powerful option we tested, the Aukey 12W offers two USB-A ports in an extra-compact pocketable form.

The Aukey Ultra Compact Dual Port 2.4A Output & Foldable Plug is a compact option we like in our guide to the best multiport USB charger. Wirecutter Senior Staff Writer Nick Guy wrote, “For an impressive amount of power in a tiny package, we like Aukey’s Ultra Compact Dual Port 2.4A Output & Foldable Plug. You get as much juice as you’d get with Apple’s iPad charger and an extra charging port, in a much smaller package—a scant 1.4 by 1.2 by 1.2 inches with its prongs folded in—for half the price. The Aukey is the smallest full-speed iPad/tablet charger we’ve found, and it’s a great travel companion for charging a tablet and phone overnight, for fast-charging two smartphones, or for just charging your phone and a Bluetooth headset or speakers. (It provides a total of 2.4 amps of current, which means it can fast-charge an iPad by itself; if you connect two tablets, or a tablet and a smartphone, those 2.4 amps will be split between them.)”

Philips Hue White & Color Ambiance A19 60W 2-Bulb Starter Kit + Echo Dot

Philips hue

Street price: $105; deal price: $90

This deal is a great chance to pick up a bundle that includes two of our picks. The lighting kit is a two-bulb variant of the top pick. We’ve seen deals on the lighting kit at $80 and the speaker at $25, so $105 total—much of the time these two options are significantly more expensive individually, so the bundle savings are nice to get as well.

The Philips Hue White & Color Ambiance A19 60W Starter Kit is a two-bulb variant of the top pick in our guide to the best smart LED light bulbs. Wirecutter Senior Editor Grant Clauser wrote, “We researched more than 20 smart LED bulbs and spent eight weeks testing 10 contenders to decide that Philips Hue is the best way to convert existing lamps and lights into smart lights without swapping out existing switches, and the Philips Hue White and Color Ambiance A19 kit is the best way to start. Hue’s top-of-class customizability, reliable mesh network, and large ecosystem—which includes support for all major smart-home platforms and many accessories—stand out among its increasingly cheaper, less-established competition.”

The Amazon Echo Dot is the affordable Echo pick in our guide to Amazon’s line of Echo smart speakers. Clauser wrote, “For a lot less than the full-size Echo, and with the ability to connect wirelessly to your choice of speaker or sound system, the Echo Dot (3rd Gen) is a smart option. The new Dot is slightly larger than the old one, has a fabric cover like the main Echo, and overall looks less like a tuna can than the original. It includes volume and microphone buttons on top like the current Echo (and the original Dot).”

2TB Samsung T5 Portable SSD

Samsung

Street price: $410; deal price: $328

We’ve seen a few sales for the 2TB T5 in the last week, with one on Sunday and this one cropping up a few days later to match that price. This year in general has brought multiple drops for various capacities of this drive and even a bundle with a Samsung Chromebook in recent weeks, but this is the best price we’ve seen by a few bucks for the 2TB version. If National Backup Day didn’t serve to remind you that you’ve got data you can ill afford to lose, this drive deal might be just the kickstart you need.

The 2TB Samsung T5 is a larger storage capacity version of our top portable SSD pick and more storage pick, which should potentially make it even faster than those options as higher-capacity solid-state drives often provide slightly improved performance. Of the lower-storage 500 GB T5, Wirecutter Staff Writer Justin Krajeski wrote, “The T5 has one USB 3.1 Gen 2 Type-C port and includes cables to connect to new and old devices as well as AES 256-bit hardware encryption to protect your sensitive data. It has the most pleasant software to navigate, with a clean layout that looks less bloated than other portable SSD software, which makes it a breeze to set up encryption or check for updates. Plus the T5 has an indicator light that lets you know when it’s connected and comes with a three-year warranty.”

Because great deals don’t just happen on Thursday, sign up for our daily deals email and we’ll send you the best deals we find every weekday. Also, deals change all the time, and some of these may have expired. To see an updated list of current deals, please go here.

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Snap expands its short-form original series lineup with 10 new shows

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Among the new shows are Two Sides, which Snap is calling “New Form” genre because it lets viewers watch the narrative from both characters’ point of view at the same time. Basically, what Snap is doing is splitting your screen into two; one character is on the top and the other on the bottom. While Black, on the other hand, is a docuseries that explores racially charged social issues in the US. And there’s also a comedy show for people who love sneakers called, well, Sneaker Heads, which follows three college freshmen “as they navigate the crazy, shady, mercurial world” of the culture in Los Angeles. Both While Black and Sneaker Heads will arrive in the summer.

Snap

Snap’s other new shows include Commanders, Can’t Talk Now, Compton Dreams, Denton’s Death Date, Stranded with Sam and Colby, Dead of Night and an untitled BuzzFeed daily show.

According to Snap executives who spoke to Engadget during a media briefing, original shows like Endless Summer have had as many as 28 million unique viewers on Snapchat, which gives the company confidence in the format as a whole. And it may be onto something, considering that another one of its Originals, Bringing Up Bhabie, has also been quite a hit with its young audiences. The next step, Snap execs said, is to make changes to the app that will make it easier to chat with your friends and quickly get back to watching a show — something that doesn’t work particularly smoothly right now.

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Universal Pictures will master new and existing titles in HDR10+

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Now that Samsung has established HDR10+ as a viable and accessible alternative to Dolby Vision HDR, it's looking to bring more HDR content to viewers. To do so, Samsung is partnering with Universal Pictures Home Entertainment (UPHE) to master a selec…

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Apple cuts HomePod price to $299

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Third-party retailers have often offered discounts on HomePod, but it’s the first official price drop from the mothership. Apple typically doesn’t cut prices on products part-way through their life cycle. The HomePod arrived only 14 months ago.

The move could entice more people to buy a HomePod, though it’s competing with many other recognizable brands at both its bracket and lower price points. Speakers from Amazon and Google (save for the $399 Google Home Max) are all less expensive, while Sonos has a number of products that are cheaper than HomePod. Soon after Apple started shipping HomePod, reports suggested sales were sluggish.

While HomePod might sound great, it doesn’t help that it’s a little more limited than other speakers. You can, for instance, connect seven Echo Dots to a smart home network for the same price as a single HomePod, while Alexa and Google Assistant are perhaps more open than Siri.

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‘Anthem’ is proof that crunch can’t save AAA games

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Under the wrong conditions, however, talented developers will build terrible games. And sometimes, despite every mental, emotional and strategic roadblock thrown their way, they’ll create fantastic games, and then get laid off a few weeks later anyway. That’s the business, baby.

A crunch-lite process plays out all the time in Silicon Valley, with scrum sprints that give developers aggressive month-long or short-term plans to complete a product. Developers at all levels, in all tech industries, are familiar with the idea of strict deadlines and working overtime to see a project through the finish line. Crunch becomes a problem when executives build months of mandatory 80-hour work weeks into their production cycles, relying on a frantic, brutal and extended push from developers, even when things are on schedule.

Crunch becomes a problem when executives build months of mandatory 80-hour work weeks into their production cycles.

Of course, mandatory crunch isn’t the only way to make games. Plenty of AAA developers have ditched the complex entirely and formed independent studios, and many of these smaller teams approach development from a human-first perspective. They work hard and create spectacular experiences, but they also don’t clock more than 40 hours a week, or they prioritize time off for vacations, rest and burnout prevention. Not every indie studio is a bastion of humane working conditions and creativity, but anti-crunch action has definitely found a home in these smaller spaces.

As indie and AA studios demonstrate that game development doesn’t need to be soul-crushing to be successful, larger companies are coming under fire for their approach to crunch. Take Rockstar for example: In the run-up to the launch of Red Dead Redemption 2, founder Dan Houser bragged that his team was working 100-hour weeks to finish the game, and a firestorm of criticism immediately sparked. Rockstar developers spoke up to say they were expected to work themselves to exhaustion, logging 60-hour weeks, including nights and weekends, for years. RDR2 came out in the middle of a full-blown crunch controversy, echoing similar scrutiny that Rockstar faced in 2010 during the development of Red Dead Redemption.

Anthem

EA has been in the business for 36 years. It employs nearly 10,000 people and reported more than $5 billion in revenue last year. Some of its internal hierarchies and processes have been ingrained in the company for decades, and so far, they’ve served the company well. One of those baked-in policies, crunch, has helped EA studios churn out genre-defining franchises such as Battlefield, FIFA, Madden, Mass Effect and Dragon Age.

Crunch has also been a documented problem at EA for just as long. In 2004, a game developer published the “EA Spouse” letter, accusing the company of enforcing cruel crunch practices, with months of mandated overtime and weeks up to 85 hours long.

“The stress is taking its toll.”

“The stress is taking its toll,” the letter reads. “After a certain number of hours spent working the eyes start to lose focus; after a certain number of weeks with only one day off fatigue starts to accrue and accumulate exponentially. There is a reason why there are two days in a weekend — bad things happen to one’s physical, emotional, and mental health if these days are cut short. The team is rapidly beginning to introduce as many flaws as they are removing.”

That was 15 years ago. Crunch has been an accepted facet of game development for so long because, for the most part, it’s worked. This system has given the world Grand Theft Auto, Mass Effect, Call of Duty, The Last of Us, Halo, Red Dead Redemption and hundreds of other industry-shifting universes. Red Dead Redemption 2, while mired in controversy, made a record-setting $725 million its launch weekend, collected a slew of awards and has clocked 23 million units shipped worldwide. And it’s no surprise; it’s a great game.

This is exactly what BioWare argued in its rebuttal to Kotaku‘s report — crunch is simply part of the process if you want high-quality games. However, just because it’s worked in some cases doesn’t mean it’s the only way. It also doesn’t mean the system will continue to work forever, as Anthem can attest.

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The Internet Archive will host 490,000 music tracks ‘lost’ by MySpace

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The collection contains 490,000 tracks, allegedly gathered by an anonymous academic group that grabbed around 1.3 terabytes of music from the site to study between 2008 and 2010. While this represents a pretty small percentage of the total tracks lost — estimated to be around 53 million — many users are nonetheless delighted by this haul. Jason Scott from The Internet Archives tweeted that one creator managed to locate a track they’d assumed for was lost for good, while Twitter user @pinkpushpop found a bunch of early clips from the likes of Katy Perry, Nicki Minaj and Donald Glover.

You can investigate the collection using Hobbit, the search and playing mechanism for the Dragon Hoard, although The Internet Archive notes that the index will take a little while to initialize when you first load it. It also says that the collection “can best be described as unwieldy”, so who knows what gems of bygone internet nostalgia you’ll find there.



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