Members of the action group Geef Tegengas put a banner on a crane during a protest. | Image: Getty Images
Protesters have broken into a construction site of a new Microsoft data center in Amsterdam this morning. Members of the Geef Tegengas group helped organize the protest against the construction of three 85-meter data center towers in the outskirts of Amsterdam.
Reuters reports that around 100 people made it into the construction site, with some scaling a crane to place a "fuck AI" banner. Protesters also unfurled a "Microsoft powers genocide" banner on the construction site, and chanted "Microsoft has got to go" and "free Palestine."
Opposition to the new data center in Amsterdam comes more than a year after the city banned new data center …
Microsoft is unveiling a new Xbox PC app that launches "up to 60 percent faster" than before, with an overhauled design to match new updates to Xbox Cloud Gaming on the web and smart TVs. Xbox Insiders will be able to start testing the updated Xbox PC app today, and the updated Xbox Cloud Gaming interface will start rolling out over the next few weeks.
Ever since Microsoft launched its Xbox Ally handheld devices last year, it was clear the Xbox PC app still needed a lot of work to feel more like an Xbox console experience on Windows. Microsoft has greatly simplified the app now, with a design that no longer feels like you're clicking a mous …
While I wasn't expecting Microsoft to announce Windows 12 during its RTX Spark launch event last month, more than a few people were hoping to see something truly new. Between the growing frustration with Windows 11 and the muted response to Copilot Plus PCs, it's starting to feel like Microsoft needs to go bigger with its desktop OS.
Much of this year's Windows development has been focused on underlying performance improvements, after Microsoft acknowledged the bloat and reliability issues with Windows 11 and created a plan to fix them. That work is ongoing, and sources tell me there's now a big focus on quality for the next major release o …
I revealed yesterday that the new Xbox Nano controller supports a Wi-Fi connection directly to Xbox Cloud Gaming, and now Microsoft is making it official today. Two new Xbox previews will let players try out using a phone as a controller on smart TVs, as well as cloud connect on the Xbox Nano to connect directly to cloud servers.
"Instead of a Bluetooth connection to your TV, cloud connect uses your Wi-Fi to connect directly to the cloud server running your game," says the Xbox team. "That can help reduce input latency, so gameplay may feel more responsive."
Players in the US will be able to preview the new cloud connect option for the Xbo …
Emmanuel Roman, chief executive officer of Pacific Investment Management Co. (Pimco), during the Global Financial Leaders' Investment Summit in Hong Kong, China, on Tuesday, Nov. 3, 2026. | Bloomberg via Getty Images
People, including on this staff, keep asking me with varying degrees of excitement or trepidation when the AI bubble will burst. I'll tell you what I tell them: If I knew that, I would make a life-changing bet on the market, levered up as far as I could, and then, after I made my money, go retire on a beach somewhere. Maybe run a cat sanctuary, who knows.
What I can tell you is that I read with interest a story in Bloomberg this morning: "Wall Street CEOs, Big Money Managers Divided Over AI Risks." The story itself is a roundup of stuff said at the 2026 Global Financial Leaders' Investment Summit in Hong Kong. Here's what caught my attentio …
Microsoft is about to launch its new Xbox Nano controller tomorrow, and the tiny device has a little secret. The Nano can connect directly to Xbox Cloud Gaming over Wi-Fi to improve latency. It's a feature Microsoft hasn't officially announced yet, but one I've been anticipating since the Xbox Nano leaked earlier this year.
The Nano will be able to connect directly to Microsoft's cloud servers to reduce latency, much like how Google's Stadia controllers used to work. This new cloud connect feature for the Nano is being privately tested on the new Xbox Cloud Gaming website, and it will require you to pair the controller over Wi-Fi to Microso …
Even though I knew Microsoft's new Xbox Nano controller was tiny, I still gasped when I unboxed it a few days ago. The compact controller is small enough to slip into a pocket unnoticed, and it has been designed specifically for younger people, or for anyone with smaller hands.
I'm not young, but I do have small hands, and I've been surprised at how comfortable the Nano is during gaming sessions. At just over 5 inches long, almost everything on this controller has been shrunk down somehow. The ABXY buttons are ever so slightly smaller than a regular Xbox controller, and the thumbsticks feel like miniature versions. Microsoft hasn't changed …
Bethesda is officially confirming today that the next Elder Scrolls game will be called The Elder Scrolls VI Sentinel. The confirmation came in a less than 10-minute video celebrating 40 years of Bethesda game studios.
It's been more than eight years since Bethesda officially announced the existence of the sixth game in its Elder Scrolls series, and studio chief Todd Howard made the announcement today and called it the "perfect time" to fully name the game.
Bethesda isn't sharing any more details on The Elder Scrolls VI Sentinel today, though. The Xbox Wire press release on the name is literally just a picture of the logo.
Former Xbox COO and Minecraft executive Helen Chiang has responded to reports about her departure from Microsoft, disputing claims that she was fired for violating company policy. In a public statement, the executive pushed back on speculation about her exit and raised concerns about how her situation was handled.
Former Xbox COO Helen Chiang Disputes Policy Violation Claim
Screenshot: YouTube Web Summit
Following her recent departure from Microsoft, Helen Chiang has responded to claims that Xbox fired her in a post on LinkedIn titled “Clarity is Kindness.” The former Xbox chief operating officer directly challenged the claim that a policy violation led to her exit of the company.
“There has been some speculation about my abrupt departure from Microsoft, including claims that I was ‘fired for a policy violation’. That’s not accurate and while I won’t turn this into a play-by-play, silence should not be mistaken for agreement. What has been said about my departure, and what has been left unsaid, has created a picture of me that I hardly recognize. It’s important to me to set the record straight.”
For context, Eurogamer previously reported that a source familiar with the situation alleged Chiang had been dismissed over policy violations. However, the outlet explicitly stated that it had not independently verified that allegation. The claim was subsequently covered by other publications, including Windows Central.
Screenshot: Helen Chiang
In her response, the former Minecraft executive specifically denied leaking confidential information or leaving to work for a competitor. She also denied engaging in discrimination, bullying, harassment, insider trading, embezzlement, or other fraudulent activity.
“I stand by my record: both the results I delivered and the way I have treated people throughout my career. I won’t let speculation define my character or erase that record,” she wrote.
Helen Chiang Says She Intended to Stay at Xbox
Screenshot: Xbox
According to Chiang, she had wanted to continue her career at Xbox. Addressing speculation that she had left for another company, the former executive emphasized her connection to the business.
“You don’t spend two decades somewhere without developing a deep loyalty to the people, teams, and businesses you’ve helped build. XBOX was never just another stop in my career. My end game was always to keep building here.”
Chiang also rejected suggestions that she had left because she was passed over for a larger role. She said she had not actively pursued greater responsibilities and had been promoted into the COO position in July without requesting it.
Screenshot: MOJANG
“I went where the company believed I was needed and where I could have the greatest impact. I did not ask for my most recent role, either and was promoted into it in July,” she explained. Her departure came just months after that promotion. Before becoming Xbox’s first chief operating officer, Chiang had spent more than two decades at Microsoft, with her previous responsibilities including leadership of Mojang and the Minecraft business.
While Chiang did not disclose the specific reason for her exit, she questioned whether standards of fairness and accountability had been applied consistently in her case. “I have serious concerns about how they were applied in my case, and I believe those concerns deserve to be taken seriously,” she wrote.
For now, the circumstances surrounding her departure remain unresolved publicly. Her statement disputes the reported policy violation explanation, but does not provide a full account of what happened. After thanking those who had contacted her with support, Chiang closed with a final message: “This is not how I ever imagined my story here would end. And it is not the whole story.”
Xbox's former chief operating officer, Helen Chiang, suddenly left Microsoft less than two weeks ago after being promoted into the role in July. I wrote in my Notepad newsletter last week that it seemed very weird for Chiang to suddenly depart Microsoft after 21 years with a surprisingly short memo from Xbox CEO Asha Sharma. Now, Chiang says she has "serious concerns" about how she was treated.
In a lengthy LinkedIn post - entitled "Clarity is Kindness," a reference to Sharma's WSJ profile - Chiang doesn't dispute that she was fired, but she doesn't say why she was let go. Eurogamer reported last month that Chiang had been "terminated for p …
The latest Windows 11 Insider build adds some powerful new search features and quick settings while in Xbox mode. The Xbox shortcuts let you control things like Bluetooth, WiFi, and power settings without having to exit gaming mode.
The search improvements are quite comprehensive. You can now filter results for files, actions, or web results. You can also use the search box to perform actions like changing the screen brightness or volume, and even perform actions on a connected phone, including making calls. Results can also offer much more detail, like when a file was last modified and its author, or pull in charts for stock prices and we …
OpenAI, Google, Microsoft, and Anthropic say they will adopt a new standard that publishers can use to opt out of being scraped by AI, as reported earlier by Search Engine Roundtable. With this control, publishers can apply their AI training preferences across multiple AI companies, instead of setting them individually.
The shared "policy token" signal is proposed by Kevin Kelley, a technical lead for standards at Anthropic, as part of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF). It will live within a website's robots.txt file, which has long signaled which web crawlers can and can't scrape a site - whether for search indexing, archiving, or …
Big Tech is pouring billions into AI infrastructure, but mounting debt, negative cash flow, and growing investor skepticism are raising questions about the sustainability of the AI spending boom.
The Wikimedia Foundation is staking out a middle ground in a group of landmark AI copyright cases, pushing courts to legally protect large language models (LLMs) training on copyrighted work - but not chatbots regurgitating that work to users. An overly black-and-white ruling, it says, could either deprive Wikipedians of useful AI-based tools or endanger the open web.
In an amicus brief filed Friday, the nonprofit behind Wikipedia weighed in on a set of lawsuits pitting publishers including The New York Times against OpenAI and Microsoft, taking neither side. "Wikimedia is concerned that the parties' positions in this case push for overbroa …
To anyone listening closely to what Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella has been saying over the past couple of years, this week felt like the clearest sign yet that AI is about to fundamentally change the size of Microsoft's workforce. Microsoft is now offering voluntary buyouts to around 60,000 employees across the US, UK, Canada, and India.
It's the first time the company has presented such an offer to so many employees, expanding greatly upon the retirement offer that was limited to around 9,000 employees earlier this year. It's all part of an ongoing effort to avoid reducing investment in AI infrastructure by lowering Microsoft's operating cos …
Microsoft has never disclosed Azure's quarterly revenue in dollars. But for the first time, we can see just how close it is getting to besting the biggest competitor in the market, AWS.
Microsoft said it made $10 billion in revenue from commercial arrangements with OpenAI, including revenue-sharing payments, in the quarter ending September 30. It underscores the still-enormous financial dependency of the partnership.
Whatever the future of AI might be, the current situation is still very good for Microsoft. The tech giant reported yet another record for quarterly revenue on Wednesday: $92.3 billion, a 19% increase over the year-ago quarter.
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