Enormous 12TB Steam leak includes abandoned Half-Life 2: Episode 3 assets
Over 12 terabytes of data, containing builds of every game uploaded to Steam between 2003 and 2013, has been leaked. We don’t know everything in the archives yet because of its massive size. But people have already dug up assets related to the canceled Half-Life 2: Episode 3, content cut from Portal 2, and a […]
The Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope launches to study dark matter and dark energy
NASA’s Nancy Grace Roman Telescope blasts off. | Photo: NASA / John Kraus After funding struggles and a name change, the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope has been successfully launched. It will now make a three-month, one-million-mile journey to its orbit at the second Sun-Earth Lagrange point (L2) beyond the Moon. From this vantage point, […]
Texas Governor Abbott blocks funding for more Flock cameras
As backlash grows over Flock’s AI surveillance cameras, Texas Governor Greg Abbott has frozen state spending on them. The move came just ahead of the publication of a Texas Tribune investigation that revealed the state spent over $30 million on Flock cameras. That money was primarily raised by tacking a $1 fee onto insurance policies, […]
Chess.com launched a poker site and is planning even more classic games
Chess.com has done one thing, and one thing very well, for almost 20 years, but now it’s going beyond its domain name. The biggest name in online chess quietly launched its first companion site in beta back in May: Gambit, a free online poker website where players can learn the game without risking any real […]
China’s robots race ahead
Humanoid robot competes in the optional boxing routine event during the 2nd World Humanoid Robot Games at National Speed Skating Oval on August 26, 2026 in Beijing, China. | Image: Getty Images This is The Stepback, a weekly newsletter breaking down one essential story from the tech world. For more on falling robots and the […]
Sony Music and Warner Chappell are suing Anthropic
Sony Music and Warner Chappell have filed suit against Anthropic in the US District Court for the Northern District of California seeking damages for “tens of thousands” copyrighted works. The companies are asking for up to $150,000 per work, plus up to $25,000 for each instance when identifiable copyright data was stripped. In total, the […]
Distraction-free writing gadget BYOK is adding custom extensions
BYOK is a no-frills, single-purpose gadget that 90 percent of people will find absolutely frivolous. But for those who spend a significant chunk of their lives putting words to virtual paper, there is an obvious allure. Personally, I think it’s at its best when you just stick to the bare minimum, focusing on pure text […]
Welcome to Night Vale cocreator Joseph Fink learned storytelling from Grim Fandango
10 out of 10 beard. | Photo: Ben Mekler Joseph Fink is the cocreator and cowriter of Welcome to Night Vale, arguably the most important fiction podcast ever. He’s also the creator of the noir podcast Unlicensed and Alice Isn’t Dead, which takes some of the conspiratorial cosmic horror of Night Vale and turns it […]
The Galaxy Z Flip 8 is at its best when there’s friction
The Z Flip 8 is designed to be used shut more than ever before. | Photo: Dominic Preston / The Verge What do you want from a flip phone when it’s closed? A simple interface, perhaps notifications and a widget or two, for handling the basics? Or a fully fledged Android experience shrunk down for […]
Musicians-turned-detectives are hunting for AI grifters
As audio-focused generative tools and platforms have gotten more sophisticated, the internet has become increasingly filled with AI-generated music whose melodies and vocals are algorithmically derived from the work of human artists. While some of the people pumping out this kind of content immediately own up to using AI, others have denied using the technology […]