Bose is adding a non-“Ultra” earbud option to its lineup today. The new $179 QuietComfort Earbuds offer active noise cancellation, an “everyday earbud design,” wireless charging, and up to 8.5 hours of battery life — presumably with ANC off. Available in black, white, or purple, the QC Earbuds also support multipoint connectivity and are IPX4 water and sweat resistant. The new earbuds add some unique software tricks that aren’t on Bose’s other products, such as Remote Selfie, which lets you turn the QC Earbuds into a remote shutter for your phone’s camera. Can’t say I’ve seen that one before. There’s a “Hey headphones” command for activating your preferred voice assistant, and gamers can take advantage of a low-latency mode.

You’ve spent the last couple of days tweaking the icons on your iOS 18 homescreen and luxuriating in your rest days with watchOS 11. Now, Apple’s hoping you’ll upgrade even further. The company is getting ready to start selling the new iPhone 16 lineup, the new Apple Watch Series 10, and the new AirPods 4 headphones. We’ve been using the devices since they were announced last week, and we’re here to answer the question that matters most: is any of this new stuff worth the money? On this episode of The Vergecast, it’s wall-to-wall Apple reviews. First, we start with the iPhones, which The Verge’s Allison Johnson and Nilay Patel have been reviewing. We talk mostly about the camera, because, well, the camera’s most of what there is to...

The iPhone 16 and iPhone 16 Pro will have a dedicated camera button, but you’ll need to wait months for the promised AI features.

On Wednesday, we launched a new way for us to answer your questions. Our Explain It to Me franchise will include a weekly podcast, weekly newsletter, and regular videos that all focus on what our audience wants to know. The first podcast episode answers a listener’s question about whether his dentist is scamming him while the first edition of the newsletter answers a reader’s question about whether bugs are disappearing — and what we can do about it. Vox’s goal is to explain the world. But we know answers to your questions are hard to find. Misinformation is rampant, and internet searches and AI chatbots often come up empty.  So that’s why we’re here. Our newsroom is ready to answer with deep reporting and expert insight, whether your questions are heavy or silly, systemic or personal.  The newsletter is part of Vox’s Explain It to Me. Each week, we tackle a question from our audience and deliver a digestible explainer from one of our journalists. Have a question you want us to answer? Ask us here. Wondering about why American politics work the way they do? Have a question about retirement? Or just curious about something in your everyday life (like whether your dentist is scamming you)? We want to hear from you. The Explain It to Me podcast is your hotline for all your unanswered questions, and host Jonquilyn Hill is your friendly guide who will find you the answers you’re looking for — and maybe even the ones you don’t expect. New episodes are released every Wednesday. You can always call us at 1-800-618-8545 or fill out this form and tell us what’s on your mind. The Explain It to Me newsletter also tackles a question each week, delivering a digestible explainer that’s fun to read, and gives answers from different journalists around our newsroom. Sign up here to get it straight into your inbox.  Our video team will also tackle your questions in a series that launches later this month. Check out their latest work here. Have a question for us? You can always reach us here or by calling 1-800-618-8545. 

There is something about a slow ascent into something new. Apple does that for artificial intelligence without sacrificing why people like its Pro lineup.

The iPhone 16 is stepping up the game for the first-tier phone this year with physical buttons, Apple Intelligence, and a fusion camera system.

The Hummer EV and its gargantuan 205 kWh pack is among the GM EVs that gain access to the Tesla Supercharger network today. plug to their CCS1 charge ports.

Countries must use a once-in-a-generation UN summit to address current and emerging global challenges and reform outdated international institutions, Secretary-General António Guterres said on Wednesday in New York. 

Apple Intelligence might be overhyped, but it brings some helpful capabilities to the iPhone.

Vox reader Gunnar Colleen writes: “So are all the bugs really disappearing? If so, why does it seem like nobody is doing anything about it? Is there anything I can personally do to help out the little guys at the very base of our ecosystems? I’ve been thinking about this a lot and it seems like something that is really important.” Many of the bugs that humans encounter — the mosquitoes and houseflies, cockroaches and bed bugs — are, in a word, disgusting.   But these loathsome pests represent an almost unimaginably small fraction of the planet’s insect diversity. Scientists have discovered about one million species so far, and they estimate there are likely several million more that they have yet to describe.  This incredible diversity of bug life sustains our planet. Insects pollinate our favorite foods, clean up our messes, and even help reduce the number of insects that we don’t like. Dragonflies, for example, eat mosquitoes, and certain wasps prey on cockroaches.  That’s why recent headlines warning of an “insect apocalypse” — the idea that a huge number of insects are disappearing — are so alarming. A world without insects is not one we want to live in. But are bugs actually disappearing? It’s a good question, considering there’s an ongoing debate over the true extent of insect loss. The newsletter is part of Vox’s Explain It to Me. Each week, we tackle a question from our audience and deliver a digestible explainer from one of our journalists. Have a question you want us to answer? Ask us here. For help answering this question, I spoke with someone who knows insects better than almost anyone: Scott Hoffman Black, executive director of the Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation, a nonprofit that works to protect insects. He’s been with the group for more than two decades. “Unfortunately, the data is conclusive,” Black told me. “Insects on the whole are now declining. And it’s very worrisome.”  Understanding the scale of this decline is a bit more complicated. Many groups of insects, like flies, haven’t been thoroughly studied, so there are still a lot of unknowns. Some critters, meanwhile, are thriving in the world humans have created. Disease-carrying mosquitoes, for example, are expanding into new areas as the climate warms.  But on the whole, studied populations of insects are declining by about 1 percent to 2 percent each year, according to the best available research, Black said. When compounded over two decades, that amounts to as much as a 30 percent decline in insect populations. “I don’t know any insect ecologist that doesn’t agree that insects are now declining,” Black said. “This was a question 10 years ago. It’s not really a question now.” That would be us, humans.  The first problem, Black says, is that we’re gobbling up insect habitat, like prairies and forests, with our farms, buildings, and homes. He points out that there are some 40 million acres of lawn in the US (bluegrass, mostly), which has replaced native habitat.  “Very few animals, insects included,” can live off of bluegrass, Black said. “It’s a giant monoculture.” The extremely common practice of spraying insecticides only makes the landscape less habitable. Globally, we now use more pesticides than at any point in human history, Black said, and they’re clearly linked to insect declines. One recent study, for example, linked insecticides — and particularly neonicotinoids — to the decline of butterflies in the Midwest. Then you add in climate change and its many symptoms — from rising temperatures and deepening droughts to more extreme rainfall and hurricanes — which together can amplify these downward trends.  “That affects us, but it also affects all of the animals,” Black said. Arthropods, a group that includes insects, spiders, and crustaceans, make up roughly half of all animals on Earth, by biomass. There are, for example, an estimated 20 quadrillion ants. And because insects are superabundant and everywhere — in streams and lakes, deserts and mountaintops — they are essential parts to every ecosystem. Scientists estimate that about 90 percent of flowering plants are pollinated by animals, most of which are insects. More than a third of our food crops depend on pollinators, including almonds, chocolate, and coffee.  Insects also make up a huge part of the diet of many animals. Nearly all terrestrial birds in North America feed their young invertebrates. “If you like birds, you should thank an insect,” Black said.  Many fish eat insects, too, including salmon, he said. “They would not make it to the ocean without feeding on insects,” Black said. “This goes all the way up the food chain. Think of grizzly bears. They eat salmon, which rely on insects. And their other main food source is berries, which are insect-pollinated. So bears almost exclusively eat a diet that comes from insects.”  Also worth mentioning: Insects, like dung beetles, clean up animal feces that might otherwise smother the ground and fill the air with a foul stench.  Saving insects isn’t an issue that can be solved by one person alone. City, state, and federal governments play a major role in helping insects, such as by passing legislation to limit habitat loss or certain insecticide chemicals. But there’s still a lot that individuals can do, Black said.  Black pointed me to a publication he co-authored titled, “Eight simple actions that individuals can take to save insects from global declines.” It suggests, among other things, creating insect habitat by growing more native plants. That could entail ripping up part of your lawn, even just 10 percent, or putting a few plants out on your city balcony.  “We have a member in Germany who has a big garden space on his balcony, and he’s getting like a dozen of different bee species,” Black said. “You don’t need to rip out your whole lawn and go native unless you want to. Just start.” Here are some other tips Black shared:  Relative to other major issues that face our planet and our communities — war, American politics, life-threatening natural disasters — insect declines have not, rather unsurprisingly, drawn much attention. They’re harder to see.   But what’s heartening, Black said, is that in his nearly 25 years of work at Xerces he’s seen support for insects swell dramatically. “There are tens of millions of people across the world who now garden for pollinators,” he told me. “There’s a growing movement.” This story was featured in the Explain It to Me newsletter. Sign up here. For more from Explain It to Me, check out the podcast. New episodes drop every Wednesday.

General Motors says it has updated the software in its electric vehicles so its customers can finally use Tesla’s Supercharging network. To gain immediate access, owners of electric Chevy, Cadillac, and GMC vehicles will need to purchase “GM approved” Tesla adapters through each brand’s smartphone app for $225. Future GM vehicles will come with Tesla’s charging port natively installed. The announcement comes more than 15 months after GM first announced it would adopt Tesla’s EV charging plug for its vehicles. The automaker had originally said it expected to complete the software coordination with Tesla by “early spring” 2024, but production bottlenecks and layoffs at Tesla have delayed the process. GM...