Hello! This is The Vergecast, the flagship podcast of The Verge... and your life. Every Friday, Nilay Patel and Dieter Bohn make sense of the week's tech news with help from our wide-ranging staff. Join us every week for a fun, deeply nerdy, often off-the-rails conversation about what's happening now (and next) in technology and gadgets.
The AI is in the computer
It's gadget season. More specifically, it's apparently "new computer for your new AI" season. David and Nilay talk through a slew of announcements — Amazon's Alexa Tablets, Microsoft's Surface Laptop Ultra, the new Googlebooks, and Apple's upcoming smart home launch — to figure out if anyone has the right idea about the future of computing, and where the AI is supposed to live. After that, it's time for Brendan Carr is a Dummy, our thoughts on the Paramount / Warner / Skydance merger, and much more.
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Read more about the topics discussed in today's 1 hour, 41 minute podcast:
- Amazon’s Alexa Tablets are powerful, impressive, and designed to take on iPad
- Hands-on with Amazon’s Alexa Tablet 12 Pro and its wild new matte display
- Amazon is phasing out Fire Tablets because they weren’t ‘giving customers what they were asking for’
- Amazon’s new Kids Tablets let parents manage access to the Google Play store
- Apple announces surprise ‘Welcome home’ launch event
- Apple and LG team up on new smart home gear, starting with a lock, doorbell, and thermostat
- New leaks provide our first look at Apple and LG’s smart home devices
- Everything announced at Microsoft’s Surface Laptop Ultra event
- The Surface Laptop Ultra finally has a release date — and a starting price of $2,599
- Microsoft’s Surface Laptop Ultra has built-in magnetic USB-C charging
- How Microsoft built its MacBook Pro competitor
- Surface RTX Spark Dev Box is available for preorder for $5,999
- The first Nvidia RTX Spark laptops cost up to $7,000
- Microsoft is giving Copilot more control over Windows and your files
- Our first five impressions of Googlebooks — exciting but underbaked
- Android’s physical navigation buttons are back on Googlebooks, but not the way you think
- Google admits not every Android app runs great on Intel Googlebooks
- Politico: ‘Head on a guillotine’: ABC says Trump’s threats are already swaying coverage
- ChatGPT’s ‘Intelligent UI’ update fills its responses with pictures, charts, and buttons
- Paramount and Warner Bros. Discovery complete $110 billion media megamerger
- HBO Max and Paramount Plus will merge into a single streamer under Skydance
- CNN’s boss will remain as Paramount and WBD merge into Skydance
- Skydance is merging Paramount and Warner Bros. Discovery’s games teams.
- Sam Altman says ‘some bad things’ will happen, but AI is totally worth it
0:00 Cold Open 00:37 David’s back! 01:10 Parenting Chaos Update 02:49 Gadget News Rundown 03:47 New Amazon Alexa Tablets 05:15 Panos Strategy Shift 06:31 Play Store Bet 11:17 Default Android Tablet 13:18 Ads and Pricing Fears 15:30 Amazon Great Products 21:20 Matte Display Debate 25:01 Apple Smart Home Tease 26:12 Siri AI Reality Check 29:08 Smart Home Too Complex 33:37 Candy Crush Question 34:56 iPad Multiuser Problem 39:04 Microsoft AI Surface Push 40:35 Local AI Computing Shift 47:22 Magnetic USB C Charging 48:37 Google Book Laptop Confusion 54:20 AI Agents Need A Surface 58:50 Skepticism About Agents 01:07:46 Brendan Carr is a Dummy 01:09:23 ABC License Chilling Effect 01:11:24 Brendan Carr Ownership Cap 01:12:30 Cable Companies Sue Back 01:14:44 SXSW Corruption Game 01:15:50 Skydance Mega Merger 01:18:04 Debt Layoffs Streamer Cuts 01:22:58 Go90 Scale Returns 01:24:02 Netflix Loses Its Edge 01:30:44 ChatGPT Interactive UI 01:37:47 Sam Altman Tradeoffs 01:44:49 Wrap Up And Plugs
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