Science and Tech

GM Will Give The Majority Of Its US Team Cash If They Quit In The Next Two Weeks

Published

2 weeks ago

March 10, 2023

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Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

A letter from CEO Mary Barra sent to GM workers on Thursday offered buyouts to many of its 58,000 employees, saying the company plans to trim $2 billion in fixed costs over the next two years. GM announced its plan to cut costs in January, on the same earnings call where it announced a record income of $14.5 billion for 2022. GM plans to spend billions over the next few years transitioning to building electric cars and making other changes.

It’s not alone in making that shift either — Ford announced a split between its gas and electric automotive segments and followed that by laying off thousands of employees in the fall. Ford has said it will spend up to $20 billion reorganizing for EVs on top of the $30 billion it already planned to…

Science and Tech

Three Months Later, Epic Is Still Silent About Free “Unreal Tournament 3 X”

Published

7 days ago

March 15, 2023

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Gritty sci-fi warriors running with space guns. — Image: Epic Games

Remember when I told you how Epic Games accidentally revealed a new version of 2007’s Unreal Tournament 3 that would be completely free on Steam, EGS and GOG with “no microtransactions and no strings attached?” That was three months ago. Unreal Tournament 3 X still hasn’t been announced, and the company still declines to confirm or deny whether it’s happening at all.

“Thank you for checking in. We have no new information to share on this,” Epic Games comms director Dana Cowley tells The Verge.

As of this writing, an extensive description of the unreleased Unreal Tournament 3 X still appears on Steam. I check almost daily, and I don’t think the page has changed at all in the past three months. The game’s apparently been in the works…

Science and Tech

Google-Backed Anthropic Launches Claude, An AI Chatbot That’s Easier To Talk To

Published

7 days ago

March 15, 2023

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An image showing a repeating pattern of brain illustrations — Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Anthropic, the artificial intelligence company founded by ex-OpenAI employees, has launched its AI chatbot, Claude. While the tool does much of what OpenAI’s ChatGPT can, Anthropic says its early clients report the tool’s “less likely to produce harmful outputs” and is “easier to converse with.”

Like OpenAI, Anthropic also has big tech backing: Google invested $300 million into Anthropic in February. The company’s chatbot — similar to ChatGPT — can provide summaries, answer questions, provide assistance with writing, and generate code. You can also tweak the chatbot’s tone, personality, and behavior, which sounds a bit more comprehensive than the “creative, balanced, and precise” settings Bing’s chatbot offers.

After working for the…

Science and Tech

Will You Be The Bearer Of Magic: The Gathering’s One Ring?

Published

7 days ago

March 15, 2023

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Image from the Magic: The Gathering Card the One Ring featuring a close up of a gold ring with Elvish script engraved in it. — Image: Wizards of the Coast

I’m usually immune to the charms of Magic: The Gathering’s special crossover sets (although the Bob Ross lands collection almost got me). But this Lord of the Rings-themed collection has pretty much obliterated all of my willpower because these cards are. so. frigging. cool!

I love seeing Frodo and Sam and Aragorn and Arwen rendered in cards that pay homage to their personalities and their big hero moments in the story. I think it’s really clever that Sam’s card, Samwise the Stouthearted, can be flashed in at any time and will return a dead creature to the battlefield, just like when he showed up to rescue Frodo from Shelob’s clutches.

Image: Wizards of the Coast

The card for Tom Bombadil — who is either whimsical…