Meta announced the Muse Spark Open AI model today, claiming that it's the "most capable US open-weight model to date." But the company also says that it's the "the first model in its class" that can "run on your desktop using two Apple M5 Ultra Mac Studios with the latest MLX framework."

Meta and Apple, typically rivals, worked together on the launch and are publicly supporting each other.

"Muse Spark Open - weights releasing today - runs great on new Mac Studios thanks to work with @johnternus and Apple," Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said on X.

"Congrats to the team!" new Apple CEO John Ternus said in a reply. "Amazing to run a model of Muse …

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Sony has announced a trio of new Walkman portable media players that start at an already absurd $1,899.99 for the NW-ZX900 and climb all the way up to $5,899 for the gold-plated NW-WM1ZM3. Sandwiched in between is the $2,999.99 Walkman NW-WM1AM3, which is nearly identical to the WM1ZM3, just minus the gaudy gold shell.

All three devices are aimed squarely at the audiophile market, if the price tag didn't make that clear. All three feature Sony's DSD (Direct Stream Digital) Remastering Engine, which upsamples standard PCM audio to an 11.2MHz DSD stream, which it claims delivers a more analog-like sound. They also all feature gold-plating on …

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Volvo plans to launch hands-free, point-to-point driving by 2030, powered by Nvidia's latest AI technology. The Chinese-owned, Swedish-designed automaker said Thursday it would use Nvidia's autonomous driving stack to power a new partially automated driving system similar to Tesla's Full Self-Driving (Supervised).

Volvo says the new point-to-point system will be Level 2++, meaning it can handle complex urban environments, including traffic lights, stop signs, and unprotected left turns without explicit driver control. In addition to Tesla's FSD, it will also resemble the Nvidia-powered system that Mercedes-Benz recently rolled out for the …

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Google is updating its AI search results to make inline links appear "higher up in responses more frequently," according to a blog post. The company's search results from AI Overviews and AI Mode give you answers in a customized view instead of the traditional list of links, but there are concerns that the format reduces traffic to publishers. Google says it's been making "continued and substantial increases to the presence of inline links in our AI experiences," and this new change will help ensure "ensure key sources are easily clickable right when you need them."

The company is announcing several other changes to highlight links an …

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There's a growing trend in the consumer tech world: gadgets designed to spy on everything and everyone around you, regardless of whether or not anyone else actually consented to it. Now, with the advent of "AI personal assistants" like Meta's Muse, you're being cheerfully asked not just to give up your own data, but also the information of your friends, family, the person you went on a Hinge date with five years ago - and virtually anyone else you've ever come in contact with.

Since Muse was released last month, the agent has already been downloaded millions of times and hit No. 1 on Apple's App Store. With the help of its creepy virtual av …

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E Ink announced the next generation of its Kaleido color e-paper screen technology today, delivering several welcome improvements. The company's existing Kaleido 3 displays can be found in e-readers and tablets from companies like Kobo, PocketBook, and Boox, while Amazon's Kindle Colorsoft uses a customized version to improve performance. The new Kaleido 4 technology addresses some of Kaleido 3's shortcomings with improved color reproduction, better contrast, and faster screen refreshes.

Other E Ink technologies, like its Gallery 3 display found in the Remarkable Paper Pro, use colored pigments that move around to form full-color images, bu …

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Fourteen years ago this month, Microsoft released an Nvidia-powered Windows PC that would become one of the greatest tech flops in modern history. The original Microsoft Surface, which ran a stripped-down version of Windows on an Nvidia Tegra chip, bombed so hard that Microsoft had to write off $900 million in inventory.

The problem was that Nvidia's Arm chip couldn't run existing Windows apps. Buyers had to leave their legacy programs behind.

This Friday, October 16th, Nvidia will once again be at the heart of Arm-powered Windows PCs with the first wave of RTX Spark laptops. But now, the company says, they'll run everything. Adobe. Offic …

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We knew that a number of big tech firms were helping to fund the construction of Trump's ballroom, but we didn't know just how much they were giving to the cause. Now the Washington Post published a list of all the major donors to the White House ballroom project, along with how much each contributed. In total, Silicon Valley and the crypto industry have reportedly delivered over $150 million for the effort.

Some of that money has come from individuals, some from charitable organizations tied to major firms or industry players, and some directly from the companies themselves. In Google's case, the $22 million was part of a controversial se …

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Following the launch of its $50 subscription-free security camera last month, Shelly announced another new accessory for smart home automation today that can keep track of multiple people as they move through rooms or large spaces without recording them. The Shelly Presence Gen4 sensor uses mmWave radar technology instead of a camera to detect the presence, motions, and activities of people and pets. It's available starting today for $84.99 through Shelly's online store and is expected to hit other retailers like Amazon and Best Buy soon.

The Presence Gen4 can be perched on a shelf or a table using its built-in stand or permanently mounted …

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Microsoft has redesigned its Photos app for Windows 11, overhauling the editor and image viewer, and combining photos and videos from your PC, OneDrive, and iCloud into a single space. The new combined gallery experience aims to make it easier to manage and view your photos without jumping between apps or devices, while also improving app launch and scrolling performance in Photos.

To combine your galleries in the Windows 11 Photos app, you'll need to turn on Camera Backup in the OneDrive mobile app on iOS or Android, and follow Apple's guide to set up iCloud for Windows. Once combined in the Windows 11 Photos app, you can browse by date, o …

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Microsoft and Nvidia held a launch party for the first wave of RTX Spark laptops last week in San Francisco, where a new wave of AI PCs took center stage amid a packed crowd and a lively hands-on area. A day after the media event, I was invited to a quieter Nvidia event to hear a lot more about the new RTX Spark computing platform. While Nvidia's new laptops might look like regular Windows machines, the chips inside are Arm-based, instead of the traditional x64 architecture used by AMD and Intel. Combined with a powerful GPU, RTX Spark is designed for the future of AI, and it means a lot of work has gone into getting these laptops ready for …

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An Israeli ad tech firm worked with spyware companies to infect devices, including at Al Jazeera, by simply showing users an online ad, according to a joint investigation by security researchers at Citizen Lab and Confiant. It's the first time researchers have found technical evidence of a zero-click attack - a form of hacking that requires no action by users - delivered through targeted advertising, as reported earlier by NBC News.

The ad firm, called Discover-Tech, presents itself as a typical online advertising agency, but researchers say it actually provides a pipeline for hacking groups to plant malicious ads across the web. It operat …

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Apple's iPhone Duo foldable phone opens for preorder tomorrow, October 16th, at 8am ET / 5am PT, but you don't have to wait until then to get your order mostly sorted. The company's product page for the phone now lets you select the color you want, along with storage capacity, carrier preference, and whether you want to set up a trade to make the $1,999 foldable a little cheaper.

Once you enter all of the details, all you'll need to do tomorrow morning, once preorders open, is to confirm your order. It'll be sitting in your cart ready for checkout. This will save you some time, and you'll jump ahead of people who are still customizing their …

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The funding comes as Ramp's annualized revenue crosses $2B, and its customer count reaches 85,000.

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Ledger has announced its latest crypto-centric hardware effort, the Android-based Atom, a device that resembles a phone but is instead designed to be used alongside one. It arrives at a tricky time for Ledger, which has been forced to cease sales of some of its hardware across southeast Asia following hardware tampering in its supply chain, which has reportedly seen over $86 million worth of crypto stolen from across some users' accounts.

While Ledger's previous hardware wallet signers have been compact devices, running custom software and often with E Ink displays, the Atom is the spitting image of a regular Android smartphone. In fact it …

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Last year, Amazon bought Bee, a relatively unknown startup with a $50 always-listening AI wearable that summarized every conversation you had. Today, the e-commerce giant is announcing two new Bee devices - and a new subscription to go with them. First is the $74.99 Bee Frontier, an updated version of the original Bee device. And coming soon is the $99.99 Bee Eclipse, a credit-card-shaped gadget that snaps magnetically onto the back of a smartphone.

Both devices are framed as gadgets to help you stay present in the moment. They listen to your daily conversations and then provide summaries, transcripts, insights, and to-dos based on what ha …

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There's a new digital pet in town - a cute little marshmallow of a robot that can change its cartoony expressions to match your mood. But if you or your kids talk to "Eiliko" over Wi-Fi, it'll phone home to China. Its AI companion can store literally everything you tell it on Chinese servers, where hackers can easily gain access or even hijack its personality. And the company that made it, Energize Lab, doesn't seem to care.

I bought an Eiliko from Amazon on August 29th. During a 10-minute conversation on August 30th, I asked the little bot: "Do you ever tell anybody else what I'm saying?"

"Your secrets are safe with me," it replied.

With …

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I'm just going to come right out and say it. I love the approach Apple has taken with the HomeView. I think it's the shared, always-available household interface that my family might finally use. Is Apple's first smart display my dream smart home dashboard? No. But is it the right product for Apple Home at this moment? Absolutely.

A lot of initial reactions to the $299 HomeView (which looks like a giant Apple Watch on a flatter metallic HomePod Mini) ask why you would want it when you can do most of what it offers on your iPhone or iPad. And yes, its features replicate many of the things you already do on the devices you use all the time. B …

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We've all gotten a scam text about a nonexistent parking ticket or a fake package delivery, but hopefully you'll start seeing fewer of them. Microsoft says it helped dismantle a marketplace for scammers sending phishing messages like those around the world. Through an investigation with Japan's National Police Agency, it tracked scam activity back to a marketplace called YAM Store and a pair of phishing kits, CoGUI and Iron Man:

Since January 2026, YAM Store, CoGUI and Iron Man have collectively enabled more than one billion malicious messages targeting over 75,000 organizations worldwide, including more than 750 million messages geared to …

Read the full story at The Verge.