Top tech news for Monday, January 23, 2023 - The Verge

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Microsoft is starting the long process of winding down sales of Windows 10 with the announcement that it plans to stop selling the operating system from its own site on January 31st. The software will likely continue to be available from third-party sellers and come pre-installed on laptops and PCs for a while yet, but it’s a significant step towards phasing out the venerable OS.

Meanwhile, Apple announced two new MacBook processors last week (the M2 Pro and M2 Max), which naturally means it’s time to start looking ahead to the inevitable M3 lineup. Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman reports that the next-generation processor could arrive later this year or in early 2024 in a new MacBook Air and / or iMac. Expect performance and power efficiency improvements if Apple’s previous chips are anything to go by.

And finally, Wordle-clone Quordle has been acquired by Merriam-Webster, and is now accessible on the publishing company’s website. It’s an impressive move for the online word game, whose unique selling point is that it asks you to find four words simultaneously. It follows the acquisition of Wordle by The New York Times a year ago.

For now, here’s a silly tweet to start your day:

Stay tuned, as we continue to update this list with the most important news of today: Monday, January 23rd, 2023.

Jan 23, 2023, 8:46 PM UTCUmar Shakir

At launch, The Wall Street Journal reports customers can use it by typing in their email address. Once they’re logged in, it will pull up eligible cards to use for payment as an alternative to payment setups from Apple Pay and PayPal.
Jan 23, 2023, 7:01 PM UTCElizabeth Lopatto

Crypto honcho Vitalik Buterin has just realized privacy is important.

Everything that happens on the Bitcoin and Ethereum blockchains is public. Now, after several years of law enforcement using those public transactions to prosecute, it seems crypto enthusiasts have decided privacy matters.
Jan 23, 2023, 5:58 PM UTCAlex Cranz

The HDMI spec continues to be pretty busted.

The idea of HDMI is you shouldn’t have to worry about bandwidth or VRR or any other part of the alphanumeric soup that makes up the HDMI spec. You should just care about HDMI 2.0 or 2.1 or 1.4 or what have you. But as the video below explains, loopholes exist that make buying the right TV to plug all your HDMI 2.1 gadgets into pretty dang difficult.

If you were hoping most 2023 TVs would have the best version of HDMI 2.1 on every input, you’d be wrong.
Jan 23, 2023, 5:56 PM UTCAndrew J. Hawkins

Elon Musk expects us to believe that his weed joke wasn’t really a weed joke.

The guy who named his cars a specific way so it would spell “S3XY” really just testified — under oath — that his “[a]m considering taking Tesla private at $420 a share” was just a funny coincidence. Amazing stuff.
Jan 23, 2023, 5:53 PM UTCJay Peters

The game hasn’t been updated for more than two years because it was pulled from the App Store. But starting next week, players won’t be able to spend V-Bucks and will have to be older than 18 years of age to play.
Jan 23, 2023, 4:02 PM UTCChris Person

Looks like Gulikit is taking a swing at the PS5’s DualSense controller.

Following the announcement of their (currently sold out) driftless Joy-Con sticks, Gulikit responded to a reply on Twitter saying they’re working on replacement sticks for Sony’s Dual Sense controllers, starting with the modular DualSense Edge. Good! I have a KingKong 2 Pro controller and that thing rocks. There’s no excuse for stick drift any more!
Jan 23, 2023, 3:55 PM UTCMia Sato

Members of a Facebook group for parents didn’t know the FBI pulled the page’s data for a murder investigation.

After the murder of a pregnant woman in Arkansas, the FBI asked Facebook for data related to a private group for local parents, according to a search warrant. The FBI believes the killer found the victim in the group.

But some admins of the group say they had no idea their data was searched by the FBI, and that Meta never notified them.
Jan 23, 2023, 2:14 PM UTCTom Warren

Microsoft says it has invested billions into OpenAI in a multiyear deal that will see the software giant become OpenAI’s exclusive cloud provider.
Jan 23, 2023, 2:00 PM UTCChris Welch

With two processor choices — one for everyday computing, the other for conquering creative work — Apple’s littlest Mac has never been more appealing.
Jan 23, 2023, 10:56 AM UTCTom Warren

Microsoft says it will stop selling downloads for Windows 10 Home and Pro licenses later this month. Windows 10 will continue to be supported until October 2025.