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United joins Alaska and Delta on T-Mobile’s list of airlines with in-flight Wi-Fi included in Magenta and Magenta Max plan
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Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge
T-Mobile is broadening its free in-flight Wi-Fi promotion by adding domestic United Airlines flights to the offer. Subscribers to T-Mobile’s Magenta Max and Magenta post-paid plans have already had access to a similar deal on Alaska Airlines and Delta flights, but now United is also in the mix.
It’s part of T-Mobile’s ongoing push to add more incentives to its top-end plans, like free Apple TV Plus, the prospect of future SpaceX Starlink connectivity, and 5GB of high-speed data while traveling abroad. The latter is part of T-Mobile’s “Coverage Beyond” campaign, of which this in-flight Wi-Fi program is a component. T-Mobile wants to capitalize on increased travel now that the pandemic is “over” and more destinations are opening up because the more perks there are, the less likely people are to switch carriers.
One thing to keep in mind — if you’re a T-Mobile Magenta plan subscriber — is your access to free in-flight Wi-Fi is limited to four flights per year. Magenta Max users, in contrast, get unlimited flights. And, of course, while T-Mobile says you can “stream all flight long where available,” airplane Wi-Fi still kinda sucks when it comes to fast speeds that don’t require the occasional buffering or reliance on low-res streams.
If you’re like me and haven’t been on a flight in a while — far too long, sadly — then this is certainly a nice perk to help make a return to sitting very close to many strangers in a big metal tube a little more bearable. In-flight Wi-Fi may not be nearly as fast as we want it to be, but it’s certainly nice to have more options to entertain yourself when you can’t find anything to watch on that crappy little screen less than a foot from your face. Though while I welcome some nice added perks like anyone else, I can’t help but wonder whenever T-Mobile makes an announcement like this if it should have been “flexing its post-merger scale” to keep people’s jobs instead.
Has the Windows 11 2022 Update made your gaming PC stutter?
Nvidia GPU owners have been complaining of stuttering and poor frame rates with the latest Windows 11 update, but thankfully there’s a fix. Nvidia has identified an issue with its GeForce Experience overlay and the Windows 11 2022 Update (22H2). A fix is available in beta from Nvidia’s website.
If you’re using crash detection on the iPhone 14, invest in a really good phone mount.
Motorcycle owner Douglas Sonders has a cautionary tale in Jalopnik today about the iPhone 14’s new crash detection feature. He was riding his LiveWire One motorcycle down the West Side Highway at about 60 mph when he hit a bump, causing his iPhone 14 Pro Max to fly off its handlebar mount. Soon after, his girlfriend and parents received text messages that he had been in a horrible accident, causing several hours of panic. The phone even called the police, all because it fell off the handlebars. All thanks to crash detection.
Riding a motorcycle is very dangerous, and the last thing anyone needs is to think their loved one was in a horrible crash when they weren’t. This is obviously an edge case, but it makes me wonder what other sort of false positives we see as more phones adopt this technology.
Ford is running out of its own Blue Oval badges.
Running out of semiconductors is one thing, but running out of your own iconic nameplates is just downright brutal. The Wall Street Journal reports badge and nameplate shortages are impacting the automaker’s popular F-series pickup lineup, delaying deliveries and causing general chaos.
Some executives are even proposing a 3D printing workaround, but they didn’t feel like the substitutes would clear the bar. All in all, it’s been a dreadful summer of supply chain setbacks for Ford, leading the company to reorganize its org chart to bring some sort of relief.
Spain’s Transports Urbans de Sabadell has La Bussí.
Once again, the US has fallen behind in transportation — call it the Bussí gap. A hole in our infrastructure, if you will.
Welcome to the new Verge
Revolutionizing the media with blog posts
Nilay PatelSep 13
Doing more with less (extravagant holiday parties).
Sundar Pichai addressed employees’ questions about Google’s spending changes at an all-hands this week, according to CNBC.
“Maybe you were planning on hiring six more people but maybe you are going to have to do with four and how are you going to make that happen?” Pichai sent a memo to workers in July about a hiring slowdown.
In the all-hands, Google’s head of finance also asked staff to try not to go “over the top” for holiday parties.
Nvidia’s latest AI model generates endless 3D models.
Need to fill your video game, VR world, or project render with 3D chaff? Nvidia’s latest AI model could help. Trained on 2D images, it can churn out customizable 3D objects ready to import and tweak.
The model seems rudimentary (the renders aren’t amazing quality and seem limited in their variety), but generative AI models like this are only going to improve, speeding up work for all sorts of creative types.
Japan will fully reopen to tourists in October following two and a half years of travel restrictions.
Good news for folks who have been waiting to book their dream Tokyo vacation: Japan will finally relax Covid border control measures for visa-free travel and individual travelers on October 11th.
Tourists will still need to be vaccinated three times or submit a negative COVID-19 test result ahead of their trip, but can take advantage of the weak yen and a ‘national travel discount’ launching on the same date. Sugoi!
Sony starts selling the Xperia 1 IV with continuous zoom lens.
What does it cost to buy a smartphone that does something no smartphone from Apple, Google, Samsung can? $1,599.99 is Sony’s answer: for a camera lens that can shift its focal length anywhere between 85mm and 125mm.
Here’s Allison’s take on Sony’s continuous-zoom lens when she tested a prototype Xperia 1 IV back in May:
Sony put a good point-and-shoot zoom in a smartphone. That’s an impressive feat. In practical use, it’s a bit less impressive. It’s essentially two lenses that serve the same function: portrait photography. The fact that there’s optical zoom connecting them doesn’t make them much more versatile.
Still, it is a Sony, and like.no.other.
If God sees everything, so do these apps.
Some Churches are asking congregants to install so-called “accountability apps” to prevent sinful behavior. A Wired investigation found that they monitor almost everything a user does on their phone, including taking regular screenshots and flagging LGBT search terms.
Shutterstock punts on AI-generated content.
Earlier this week, Getty Images banned the sale of AI-generated content, citing legal concerns about copyright. Now, its biggest rival, Shutterstock, has responded by doing … absolutely nothing. In a blog post, Shutterstock’s CEO Paul Hennessy says there are “open questions on the copyright, licensing, rights, and ownership of synthetic content and AI-generated art,” but doesn’t announce any policy changes. So, you can keep on selling AI art on Shutterstock, I guess.
This custom Super73 makes me want to tongue-kiss an eagle.
Super73’s tribute to mountain-biking pioneer Tom Ritchey has my inner American engorged with flag-waving desire. The “ZX Team” edition features a red, white, and blue colorway with custom components fitted throughout. Modern MTBers might scoff at the idea of doing any serious trail riding on a heavy Super73 e-bike, which is fine: this one-off is not for sale.
You can, however, buy the Super73 ZX it’s based on (read my review here), which proved to be a very capable all-terrain vehicle on asphalt, dirt, gravel, and amber fields of grain.
The sincerest form of flattery.
I had little interest in Apple’s Dynamic Island, but once a developer built their spin on the idea for Android, I had to give it a try.
Surprisingly, I’ve found I actually like it, and while dynamicSpot isn’t as well-integrated as Apple’s version, it makes up for it with customization. Nilay’s iPhone 14 Pro review asked Apple to reverse the long-press to expand vs. tap to enter an app setup. In dynamicSpot, you can do that with a toggle (if you pay $5).
Image: Richard Lawler