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In September, Donald Trump claimed that "the United States is getting a tremendous fee" for brokering the TikTok deal. Now sources tell the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times that fee is expected to be in the range of $10 billion. The money is supposedly being paid by new investors, including Oracle and Silver Lake. Reports are that $2.5 billion was already paid to the Treasury when the deal closed on January 22nd. The rest will be paid out in installments. This is the latest example of the Trump administration inserting itself into private business in unprecedented ways,…

According to Reuters, Meta is looking to offset spending on AI and data centers with a massive round of layoffs. Sources familiar with the matter say the company could lay off as much as 20 percent of its staff, eliminating roughly 15,800 positions. That would be the largest series of layoffs at the company since it terminated 22,000 workers over just a few months between November 2022 and early 2023. Word of the potential downsizing comes after Meta signaled that it was all but giving up on VR and the Metaverse, slashing budgets and closing studios. Instead, the company has…

Happy Saturday, all! This week, we found a number of deals that should help you unwind and relax over the next few days (and beyond). If you’re planning to stream the Oscars on Sunday, there’s still time to take advantage of a great deal on Hulu and Disney Plus, as well as Google’s latest 4K streaming device. Speaking of Google, you can also currently save $60 on the Pixel Watch 4; there are also savings to be had on microSD Express cards, ice cream makers, and a host of other great tech this weekend. So, without further ado, let’s get…

Though it was weird to see the Golden Globes partner with Polymarket for its most recent awards show, the collaboration wasn't shocking given the way that people have begun using prediction markets to gamble on basically anything. Prediction markets are being used to bet on everything from when wars might break out to who will win the Nobel Peace Prize, so why wouldn't people also be interested in placing wagers on more entertaining and less consequential things, like celebrities' chances of winning industry accolades? But this "everything is gambling" culture has given prediction market firms an opportunity to insert themselves…

Neo to the left of me. Pros are to the right. | Photo: Antonio G. Di Benedetto / The Verge Not much has changed in the new MacBook Air for 2026: It now has the M5 chip, Wi-Fi 7, and faster storage starting at 512GB instead of 256GB. It's just as outstanding a computer as last year's model, even if it's a shame it's $100 more expensive. The bigger change has happened to the Air. The MacBook Neo now exists, and it's an awesome little computer for $500 less than the base 13-inch Air. The Neo's existence doesn't invalidate the…

The Live Nation-Ticketmaster trial is back on. Dozens of states are expected to move forward with their claims against the company's alleged concert industry monopoly beginning on Monday, following a brief hearing on Friday. The Justice Department and a handful of states have accepted settlements with the company, but the majority of the 40 state and district attorney general plaintiffs - as of now - are continuing their fight in court. The states that are pressing forward withdrew their motion for a mistrial, filed after the DOJ announced its settlement in court Monday, and showed up with new outside counsel…

Less slop please. | Image: Spotify Spotify Premium users in New Zealand will be the first to experience the service's latest personalization feature. The company is letting users view and make changes to their Taste Profile directly. If your algorithm is serving up too much Bieber, you can politely tell the algorithm to ease up. Beta testers will be able to access the feature by tapping on their profile icon and then selecting Taste Profile from the sidebar menu. The Taste Profile tells you not only what artists you frequently listen to, but also identifies trends in your listening habits.…

Xbox is getting ready to launch its Gaming Copilot AI assistant on "current-generation consoles" this year, according to a report from GamesRadar. Sonali Yadav, Xbox's product manager for gaming AI, revealed the news during a panel at the Game Developers Conference (GDC), adding that the company will also add the assistant to "more services that players are playing." Microsoft has been working on its gaming-focused Copilot assistant for months now, with the company launching it in beta on the Xbox mobile app, Windows 11, and Xbox Ally handhelds. Players can use their voice to call upon the Gaming Copilot if…

Where's the Trump phone? We're going to keep talking about it every week. This week, I wanted to see how Trump Mobile stacks up to its conservative carrier competition. Trump Mobile isn't unique. I mean, it is in some pretty specific senses - it's not every day the president's family launches a phone company while he's in office - but it's far from the first company to offer a mobile carrier targeted at the conservative crowd. In fact, there's a rich history of smaller networks trying to make their money from patriots, Christians, and Republican voters. Like Trump Mobile, they're…

It's only been a year since Digg founder Kevin Rose, Reddit cofounder Alexis Ohanian, and a few others announced the link-sharing site would relaunch, promising a "social discovery built by communities, not by algorithms." Now, two months after opening its Reddit-like platform to the public, Digg is announcing a "hard reset" that's shutting down operations and will "significantly downsize the Digg team." When they announced its relaunch, Rose told The Verge that AI could "remove the janitorial work of moderators and community managers." Now, the new Digg's CEO Justin Mezzell writes in a note pinned to the homepage that, "We…