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In landmark ruling, court declines to break up Google’s advertising business
In landmark ruling, court declines to break up Google’s advertising business - SiliconANGLE
Google spared from ad-business breakup, but judge orders changes to how it operates
Google has dodged an effort to break up its ad business, but a judge said Wednesday that the company will need to adjust its business to benefit competitors.
Judge Rejects DOJ Request to Break Up Google’s Ad Business | What’s News for Sept. 2
Plus, the Trump administration backs OpenAI in a copyright suit and our inside look at an uber rich divorce
US judge rejects bid to break up Google’s ad business
Justice Department had argued Google could not be trusted to run the online advertising exchange.
Judge orders changes to Google’s digital ads business but spares it from a breakup
A federal judge on Wednesday ordered Google to retool the system powering its monopoly in digital advertising, sparing the company from a wrenching breakup soug
Google Avoids Breakup of Ad Tech Business in Antitrust Ruling
Google avoided a breakup of its ad tech business after a federal judge rejected the DOJ’s push to force the company to sell key assets.
Judge orders changes to Google's digital ads business but spares it from a breakup
A federal judge on Wednesday ordered Google to retool the system powering its price-gouging monopoly in digital advertising, sparing the company from a wrenching breakup that had been sought by the U.S. government
Google won't be forced to sell its ad exchange after judge rejects DOJ breakup bid
A federal judge in Virginia declined to order Google to sell AdX, handing the DOJ its second straight loss in efforts to break up the tech giant
Google avoids adtech breakup in federal judge ruling
A judge ruled Google doesn't have to sell off parts of its adtech business, but it will face other remedies.
Dell’s new 14S laptop exists to challenge MacBook Neo and, somehow, might be even cheaper
Apple’s MacBook Neo has made waves in the laptop world because it’s a remarkably well-built and reliable laptop at a...
Google Won’t Be Forced To Sell Ad Tech Business Despite Monopoly, Judge Rules
The same judge previously ruled Google maintained a monopoly on online advertising in April 2025.
MrBeast will try to survive ‘the planet’s most unforgiving landscapes’ using Gemini and Fitbit Air in deal with Google
Google has struck a deal with MrBeast, the most popular YouTuber, to promote Gemini and Google Health, with one of...
US judge rejects bid to break up Google's ad business
A US federal judge on Wednesday refused to force Google to sell a division of its digital advertising business, rejecting the government's push to break up part of the company's ad empire.The decision is the second time in recent years that a federal judge has declined to dismantle a piece of Google's business, after a judge last year refused to force the sale of its Chrome browser in a separate monopoly case over online search.
Google defeats US bid to force ad tech sale
Google defeated the U.S. Department of Justice's effort to force a sale of its online advertising exchange in Virginia, marking a key antitrust ruling.
Google won't be forced to break up its ads business
The latest ruling has enormous implications for the $1 trillion global advertising economy.
Judge rules Google does not have to break up ad tech business
A federal judge ruled Wednesday that Google does not have to break up its advertising technology business after finding last year that the search giant held an illegal monopoly over the industry. U…
Google is sending MrBeast into the wilderness, armed with AI
MrBeast’s videos are about to feature a lot more Gemini.
Federal Judge Declines to Break Up Google’s Ad Technology Business
In a long awaited ruling, the judge said Google must make some changes to its ad tech business to handle antitrust issues, but did not disclose the measures publicly.
Google Pixel adding ‘Battery usage summaries,’ rolling out on Pixel 10 and newer
A new "battery usage summaries" feature is rolling out on Google Pixel devices starting with the Pixel 10 series and newer.
Berkshire CEO Abel sees opportunity for energy business from AI
Berkshire Hathaway Chief Executive Greg Abel said on Wednesday he sees significant opportunities for the conglomerate's energy business from the buildout of AI data centers, after Berkshire made Google parent Alphabet its third-largest common stock holding.
Berkshire CEO Abel sees opportunity for energy business from AI
NEW YORK, Sep 2 (Reuters) - Berkshire Hathaway Chief Executive Greg Abel said on Wednesday he sees significant opportunities for the conglomerate's energy business from the buildout of AI data centers, after Berkshire made Google parent Alphabet its ...
August Monthly Review: ChatGPT In Epic
Death, taxes, another frontier lab healthcare launch inspiring truly insane LinkedIn takes. As much as I want to stay away, I repeatedly am the crewman unplugging his ears whenever we pass these sirens. So it’s not the first and probably not the last time we dial up the typewriter rather than tie ourselves to the mast. The full blow-by-blow timeline: Health API Guy is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Subscribe The End of the Standalone PHR (Jan 8): ChatGPT Health arrives for consumers, at the time powered by b.well. I was bullish on the approach in that the best way for the PHR to finally solve distribution was to meet consumers were they already are (i.e. When Horizontal Meets Healthcare (Jan 9): OpenAI for Healthcare puts out the shingle for enterprises, with SharePoint ingestion standing in for the EHR integration the product actually needed. Another One: Anthropic’s Healthcare Debut (Jan 16): Claude's version, on HealthEx rails instead of b.well, with Agent Skills for FHIR development as the one true vertical-specific investment. ChatGPT for Clinicians: The Trap Sprung (Apr 24): OpenAI filled in the missing GTM middle with a free product for verified clinicians, effectively peeling the enterprise wrapper off ChatGPT for Healthcare and taking the PLG fight directly to OpenEvidence. OpenAI’s Second Attempt at Health (Jul 31): a relaunch of their patient specific app, now branded Health in ChatGPT, where the privacy partition came out, the connectors thinned, and b.well disappeared in favor of first-party FHIR work against a smaller network Beyond a Shingle So what was announced now? Today, we’re introducing a new electronic health record integration that brings authorized patient context from Epic into ChatGPT for Healthcare, along with the Healthcare Public Data plugin for direct, structured access to official healthcare datasets like PubMed, DailyMed, and CMS Coverage. Together, these capabilities bring ChatGPT closer to the systems and sources healthcare teams trust, while supporting the controls and compliance healthcare work requires. The core portfolio is unchanged from prior announcements we delineated and discussed (aside from the relaunch of patient-facing). Since trade publications still seem to be confusing them by using the wrong names: Enterprise sales motion: ChatGPT for Healthcare Protecting their core product / PLG: ChatGPT for Clinicians Consumer/patient-facing product: Health in ChatGPT So really, this is a feature release (specifically for ChatGPT for Healthcare when it comes to EHR integration). What’s cool about it, though, is that we are moving beyond just putting out a shingle. Everything in the January enterprise launch was horizontalizable: Horizontal tech companies thus generally start verticalization with their “putting out a shingle phase”. Telling the world you’re open for business as a horizontal tech company reliably attracts early inbound interest from buyers who are already trying to force-fit horizontal tools into domain-specific workflows and are eager for any signal that the vendor intends to support their use case more directly. Nothing was really vertical specific, which is exactly what you'd expect from the ultimate hypergrowth horizontal company dipping their toes into specific industries. But eventually you have to stop changing the sign on the door and start changing the product. Can you guess where the horizontal product was going to run out of road? This is the core dilemma writ large: verticalization requires differentiation, while scale economics of consumer and horizontal push toward unification. I’ve buried the lede so deep here it will be painful to some readers, but what should be shocking to no one is that my perspective is that EHR integration is the only path that meaningfully resolves this tension for ChatGPT for Healthcare. Integration with Microsoft Sharepoint is fine, but it is categorically insufficient for any product that hopes to influence clinical decision-making. SMART Money Well here we are, eight months later! Real vertical investment has begun, which surprised a few people. One friend in the industry messaged me: “Absolutely no way Epic gave ChatGPT API access.” Looking forensically at the announcements, the integration is notably read-only across appointment notes, laboratory results, medications, and specialist documentation. So while I’m not a betting man, I'd wager the house this is a SMART on FHIR launch: That sounds a lot like USCDI! The recommended path for the workflow they outline would be SMART on FHIR Their Health AI lead’s post is evocative of both standalone and EHR launch SMART, which another termed “ChartGPT” and “EHR Plugin” The implementation burden for SMART on FHIR is the lowest of the available integrative paths This is the team who literally did patient-facing SMART on FHIR with Epic last month Most importantly, if you’re a horizontal company, you generally still haven’t taken the full plunge and thus (overly) value reusability. SMART on FHIR is the logical compromise: healthcare-specific enough to matter, but standardized enough to reuse. Nobody Asked Judy Another friend asked “I thought they had to go to each health system, or did they go direct to Epic and now health systems opt in?” Given the trust paradigms in healthcare, this functionally cannot be Epic hoovering up all the data for OpenAI and shoving ChatGPT in their customers’ faces (or they would revolt). However, I do believe the aforementioned terrible coverage by TechCrunch and other outlets is probably responsible for that question, given the 325 million reference. When using FHIR as a business associate to an Epic customer, there is no EHR gatekeeping to speak of, as that isn’t how fhir.epic.com works: You register an app You pick your APIs You test against the sandbox APIs You list as “Ready for Production” Hospitals pick your app You test and go live with them Bluntly, nobody had to say yes or no in Verona (nor were they given the chance). Vendor Services (their next developer tier up that I doubt OpenAI is using quite yet in this initial release) certainly has contractual paperwork that some resent, but even there, the twin pressures of mounting antitrust and information blocking make outright gatekeeping increasingly fraught. My friend’s sentiment is, to me, representative of a broader industry neurosis, perhaps a sort of scar tissue of prior eras: people assume the gate is still there and never actually try the door. There are certainly other ways Epic (and any EHR) can put its thumb on the scale, but they are not so dumb as to stand in front of a federally mandated API and play bouncer at this exact moment in time. So I think they can and probably should go deeper, as this release is at best parity and at worst behind vertical-specific competition. OpenEvidence did a basic SMART launch with Sutter Health in February, allowing for more convenient evidence search by providers. They then add patient-context (the equivalent SMART on FHIR flow to what we see here) when Cedars-Sinai went enterprise-wide in May. UpToDate has four distinct applications across deeper workflows like patient engagement listed in Epic Showroom and announced a partnership with Epic to power Art at UGM Abridge and other ambient scribes have invested deeply into the deepest bidirectional clinical copilot workflow with integrations well beyond SMART on FHIR. In that light, the “Who is OpenAI primarily targeting here?” is clear. This release brings them into striking distance of OpenEvidence, but not the others quite yet. They are the only one of the three you can reach without building something truly Epic-specific. When will they go further? Competition is a great motivator to overcome the horizontal demons and start building things that can’t be reused: not across industries, not across EHRs, maybe not past the customer you built them for. That’s the price of actually verticalizing. The question is if and when OpenAI will be willing to pay it. Month in Review Here is the monthly review. As a reminder, this is a regular round-up of the month’s posts and other content to surface things you may have missed across regulation, litigation, interoperability, and beyond. AI assistance is used in these bullet summaries so I can focus on articles. Articles Published: None this month Video Content: The Information Exchange: Standards-based Thruple Edition (Aug 14): Back to school for us too, with Brad reporting in from the CMS Health Tech Ecosystem’s one year anniversary in DC. We get into the January CMS-0057 deadline, the fall rulemaking reading list, and why enrollment still keeps most apps off FHIR. The Information Exchange: Epic Dúnadan Edition (Aug 25): A UGM roundup with Ryan Brickner joining for the first time to check our takes against what the building actually thinks. Rangers, Ergo sitting on top of EHI, and a down-market lineup that needs some cuts. Regulatory: Stacked Deck, Bad Hand (Aug 05): ONC’s website refresh took the entire HIT Policy Committee record with it, so I rebuilt the archive and went looking for the regulatory capture story everyone assumes is buried in there. Stacking the deck and winning the hand turn out to be very different things. The Sixth Generation of Patient Access (Aug 19): A quick catalog of the five generations of patient access we’ve layered on since HIPAA, and the two candidates now competing to be the sixth. One is planned. The other is the market routing around the plan entirely. Court cases: Three Cases Walk Into a Docket (Aug 06): Two surprise settlements cleared the board in a single week, and then Judge Maddox dropped ninety-four pages on Vyne v. Henry Schein. The sleeper is a DMCA holding that makes direct-to-database a considerably riskier business model. Epic v. Health Gorilla: Into the MDL (Aug 10): Nine class actions are headed to Miami, and the Panel signaled it wants to bring the case that spawned them along too. That would leave Epic arguing the requests were obviously fraudulent in one courtroom and unknowable in the other. Amazon v. Perplexity: Agents Are Legalized! (Aug 11): The Ninth Circuit vacated the injunction against Comet, holding that the user is the one accessing the servers rather than the company that built the agent. A real win for agentic access, and a much narrower one than the headline suggests. Veeva v. Epic: Come At Me, Bro (Aug 26): Epic’s response brief wants the dismissal affirmed and, unusually, wants the opinion published as precedent. Buried in it is Epic’s own description of what its non-competes actually prohibit, which current and former employees should read closely. EHRs: The Contract Epic Would Never Sign Today (Aug 04): A 1999 SEC exhibit catches Epic licensing nearly its entire product line, Tapestry included, to the company that became TriZetto. The marketing services menu attached to it is the part that will make you blink. Forecast from Verona (Aug 07): The Epic Almanac makes one argument six different ways: the AI is only as good as the networks behind it. Emmie headlines, Art’s context stack is the most ambitious part, and Penny finally gets an autonomous coding date on the calendar. Works With Epic MyChart (Aug 17): Epic’s first new Showroom category since the death of Workshop certifies hardware instead of software, badge on the box and all. Made for iPhone, but for blood pressure cuffs, and rough news for anyone selling the RPM stack sitting in between. UGM Hot Takes 2026 (Aug 20): Everyone else covered the AI announcements, so I went after Savvy deleting the payment gateway, Rangers as Boost with the timer removed, and a down-market lineup with too many entries. Plus the Health Grid tidbits I cannot help myself on. MyChart Central Grows Up (Aug 24): Device data and Emmie turn Epic’s identity hub into a full consumer platform, which is both a logical answer to ChatGPT and a bit of a mistake. It also happens to be the best scraping target Epic has ever shipped. Industry Analysis: The Wrong Yardstick (Aug 12): Vertical software keeps getting judged against Superhuman and Notion, which is the wrong bar entirely. Your user is comparing your product to a whiteboard and forty phone calls before lunch. Primitives vs. Abstractions (Aug 27): Developers want building blocks, systems of record prefer to hand out business logic, and both sides have a real case. There’s no test from the outside that separates the engineering reason from the competitive one, which is why this keeps ending up in court. Cross-industry Comparisons: The Two Kinds of Platform Power (Aug 18): Attention power and record power are different problems that keep getting handed the same regulatory toolkit. Congress’s latest swing at Big Tech shows both what’s possible and where it falls apart. The Dogs of (Platform) War (Aug 21): A CourtListener alert turned up a property management fight with healthcare’s exact shape and none of the Cures Act. Shell prospects, ghost accounts, a notetaker bot that came back to haunt someone, and a lawyer arguing both sides of the same theory in two states. Fractals All the Way Down (Aug 31): Yardi dominates property management right up until you zoom into one segment, where AppFolio owns it outright and Yardi doesn’t appear at all. Where you draw the line around a B2B software market is about to decide an awful lot of cases. Other News: If Judy Had the Courage (Aug 13): A short eulogy for the era when software was allowed to look insane: WinAMP, bold colors, and everything the grey chatbot era has taken from us. External Media: Portland Monthly Health Tech Meetup: Erin O’Brien channeled my own feelings - maybe it’s just because it’s August and beautiful, but the monthly edition of the PDX Health community meetup was a ripper. Make sure to reach out if interested to join for the next one. STAT’s Coverage of Epic This Month: Brittany Trang of STAT did a fantastic job of breaking the FTC investigation that’s been lurking, as well as UGM related coverage, so I had to give her her wish of a meme. Fall Conferences: I’m pumped to be kicking off my fall conference season in NYC at Nabla Accelerate next month, which Chrissy provided the link to apply for. Here’s the rest of my schedule in case you want to meet up: Commonwell (Redwood Shores, CA): Oct 13-14 Open@Epic (Madison, WI): Oct 21-22 eHealthExchange (Austin, TX): Oct 27 Sequoia Project (Austin, TX): Oct 28-29 HLTH (Vegas): Nov 15-18 RSNA (Chicago): Nov 29-Dec 3 Posts I Liked: HTI-6 Should Unbundle API Certification: Josh Mandel makes the case that HTI-6 should split (g)(10) into separate authorization and data certifications, so a PACS or a genomics platform can certify only the role it actually performs. Imaging is the urgent example, but the structure solves a much bigger problem. On implementing ePrior Auth with Epic: Scott Rossignol’s field notes from a live ePrior Auth build on Epic, including the two app registrations nobody warns you about and the CPT mapping problem waiting at the end. CMS-0057 implementations are going to be such a beast. Healthcare point solutions are starting to look a lot like streaming services: Spencer Dorn runs the cable-to-streaming arc against health IT and lands squarely on the bundling half of the cycle. Bundling can be good! It can also be bad! Life is nuanced. Health API Guy is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Subscribe
MrBeast partners with Gemini to turn impossibly big ideas into reality
Google is kicking off a multi-year partnership with Jimmy Donaldson, better known as MrBeast, across Gemini and Google Health.
What Box Office Bomb Crushed Obsession on Streaming?
(Welcome to my weekly streaming ratings report, the single best guide to what’s popular in streaming TV and what isn’t. I’m the Entertainment Strategy Guy, a former streaming executive who now analyzes business strategy in the entertainment industry. If you were forwarded this email, please subscribe to get these insights each week.) Before we get into this week’s issue, let me ask you for some suggestions. At the risk of coining too many names for too many things (hence my dictionary of terms...), I need a name for straight-to-streaming films that are too expensive to justify a straight-to-streaming release, but not big enough to justify a theatrical release. Like some of the films I highlighted in last week’s tally of the biggest film flops of 2026 so far: Hulu’s Mike & Nick & Nick & Alice, Pizza Movie or Never Change! They don’t feel like “made for TV movies” (think Hallmark and Lifetime movies, cheap Netflix romcoms, or Disney Channel Original movies, for example) but they don’t feel big enough for the big screen. They’re not “cinematic” enough, so to speak. As I wrote... “I still need a name for this middle zone of film that’s too expensive to go straight-to-streaming but too small to justify a theatrical release (with all the PR, distribution, marketing and whatnot costs that go along with it), the Goldilocks zone of streaming film death.” Friend of the newsletter Brandon Katz has suggested the “Bermuda Budget Triangle”, “The Platform Gap” and “The Distribution Deadzone”. I love that first one. I’d offer up the much wordier “The Streaming Budget Dead Zone” or “the Goldilocks Zone of streaming film death” but that last one isn’t accurate since, unlike Goldilocks’ porridge, these films are the opposite of “just right”. That’s the problem! Anyway, if you have any suggestions, let me know! On to today’s Streaming Ratings Report. As you can tell by today’s headline, things are going to be spicy! I’m looking at a box office bomb that did really, really well on streaming, somewhat challenging a few different narratives. And another Netflix series declined in its second season. All that, plus Wicked: For Good switching streamers, The Hawk continuing its strong run, _The Bear’_s finale season finally dropping off the charts, the WNBA posting a big viewership number, “shallow libraries”, a sitcom spinoff failing to launch, more big budget IP flopping on Paramount+, all the flops, bombs and misses, and a whole lot more. Let’s dive right in! (Reminder: The streaming ratings report focuses on the U.S. market and compiles data from Nielsen’s weekly top ten viewership ranks, Luminate’s Top Ten Data, JustWatch and Reelgood interest data, Samba TV household viewership, company datecdotes, Netflix hours viewed data, Google Trends, and IMDb to determine the most popular content. While most data points are current, Nielsen’s data covers the weeks of July 20th to July 26th, 2026. You can find a link to my terminology here.) Subscribe Film - The Latest Theatrical Success Story on Streaming In the latest edition of “Flops, Bombs and Misses of the First Half of 2026”, I made a crucial change: I started including theatrical films with the streaming misses. The streamers have collectively—including Netflix, but not to as big of an extent—stopped making a lot of straight-to-streaming films, and the ones they do make aren’t as expensive as in the heyday of the streaming bubble. After the following two films bombed in theaters, you’d guess that they’ll be included in my next collection of flops, bombs and misses six months from now: Masters of the Universe on Prime Video (only $64 million domestic box office) Mortal Kombat II on HBO Max ($79 million domestic) But you’d be wrong! Masters of the Universe, a reboot of the He-Man franchise, a toy from the 1980s, came to streaming on 22-July and did great! This long-gestating project—it’s been at every studio for years, and came close to getting a greenlight at Netflix—then finally came to theaters in June, and showed up on streaming less than two months later. (I don’t love this short theatrical window.) It surprisingly grabbed nearly 20 million hours on its debut: That means, wait for it, Masters of the Universe is currently the eighth biggest film on streaming through two weeks. My rough bar for “hit” is shows or films in the top 15%. Ergo…Masters of the Universe is a legit, streaming hit! (One quick caveat: if it falls out of the top ten next week, it will move to 13th overall, just on the edge of the top 15.) Of course, that’s the data for just 2026. Here’s how it stacks up to Prime Video’s theatrical films: That drop into its second week is typical for Amazon films, but also a worrying sign. I have a feeling interest in this film is front-loaded and we’ll see it drop off after this. As for Mortal Kombat II, in this case, the viewership numbers roughly match the theatrical outing, with only 4.1 million hours in its first week. Here’s how it stacks up to other HBO Max films: The best defense of this number is that, as a relatively violent rated-R film, Mortal Kombat II never had a good chance at breaking out. So now it’s time for a little big of “Entertainment Nuance Guy”: First, yeah, my headline is obviously facetious, since Masters of the Universe besting Obsession says more about horror as a genre than it does that film. Second, I read and listened to quite a few “nobody wanted this IP” takes about Masters of the Universe, and that’s not really true. At least enough people wanted it to power a 20 million+ hour debut! Third, both this film and Mortal Kombat II were considered “average” by viewers, but not great films, with a 6.4 and 6.3 respectively on IMDb. That’s just shy of the level needed to be a word-of-mouth hit. Fourth, in the olden days, strong word of mouth could transform a box office miss into a cable/DVD hit, like Austin Powers or The Shawshank Redemption. We haven’t seen a lot of examples of that on streaming, though. And there are far fewer ways to monetize the post-theatrical life of a film these days. Fifth, Prime Video has shown an ability to push their own titles well, likely because they control the Amazon Fire TV ecosystem. Add it all up, and here’s my nuanced take on Masters of the Universe: it was a box office bomb, but, shockingly, a streaming hit. Unfortunately, while being a theatrical hit saves your film financially, being a streaming hit does not. Both Masters of the Universe and Mortal Kombat II had big budgets and needed to make more money in theaters to justify them. So…Straight-to-Streaming or Theaters? We’ve hit a really fun point in the streaming calendar, since the films that came out in theaters in April, May, and June are now arriving on streaming. So the “Do theatrical releases help streaming performances?” question is gonna get a fresh round of updates nearly every week. No single week will answer the question, but we may get some insights. For example, so far in 2026, it looks like theatrical films are lasting longer on the weekly Nielsen film charts. Here’s a list of films that have made the charts in their fourth or fifth week of release, separated by “for kids” and “general entertainment”: It certainly seems like theatrical films are lasting just a pinch longer on the charts, with Project Hail Mary being the current five-week champion. One Battle After Another did well for HBO Max too, and even The Sheep Detectives made it four weeks. The only exception to this trend? Obsession, which only lasted two weeks on the charts. You might tempted to overreact to this news. Don’t. Obsession is a huge horror hit, but horror just doesn’t do as well on streaming. By the way, here’s the Google Trends for various theatrical and stremaing films: Plus, when it comes to Netflix in four months, Obsession may have another big boost. Quick Notes on Film Note that when I write, “the streamers have pulled back on straight-to-streaming films” that doesn’t mean “abandoned” because Netflix is gonna Netflix. On 24-July, they released 72 Hours, a Kevin Hart comedy. Along with Eddie Murphy, Mark Wahlberg, John Cena and Adam Sandler, Kevin Hart is a streaming film star now. Did this latest one work? Not really. It only garnered two weeks of 13.2 and 12.2 million hours on its debut, well below the 20-million-hour hit threshold. It also was poorly received critically—a 44 on Metacritic—and by customers—a 5.4 on IMDb on 21K IMDb reviews. We’re just getting started with this issue, but the rest is for paid subscribers of the Entertainment Strategy Guy, so if you’d like to find out… The latest Netflix true crime doc to pop on the charts… How The Bear finished its run… Netflix’s latest Western to return to streaming… What Paramount+ animated film flopped… And what sitcom also missed… All the flops, bombs and misses… And a whole lot more… ...please subscribe! We can only keep doing this great work with your support. Coming Soon! I’m behind by a week, so we’ve got two issues coming your way this week, including one in a couple of days or so, then we’ll be all caught up**.** Next issue, inspired by The Super Mario Galaxy Movie coming to Peacock, I’m going to take a look at the workhouse of streaming TV: kids films. Plus The Devil Wears Prada 2 continues theatrical films’ big run on streaming. All that, plus another surprise hit on Hulu, Lioness on CBS, and a whole lot more. Long term, LeBron James is filming his own “Last Dance”-style docu-series, surprising no one. But as I’ve been writing about a lot this summer, this genre is really overrated, so whoever ends up buying it (reportedly ESPN) really shouldn’t pay too much for it.
Samsung’s Android 17-based One UI 9 beta expands to these Galaxy phones this month
Samsung is expanding its Android 17 / One UI 9 beta program to several new Galaxy smartphones this month, signaling...
Apple Maps renames Lake Ontario to Lake America, joining Google
Apple is following Google Maps, after President Donald Trump ordered the federal government to change the name of a Great Lake.
Google's Android update tackles motion sickness, accessibility, and more
The new features coming to Android are aimed at reducing motion sickness, helping blind users navigate their surroundings, and more.
Lenovo’s ‘Pen Pro for Googlebook’ hits Bluetooth SIG with wireless charging and gestures
With Google’s private media event in New York City just around the corner, the hardware surrounding the launch of Googlebook continues to leak out left and right. While we’ve spent plenty of time...
Meta is switching from Google Chat to Slack for AI agents
Meta is moving employees from Google Chat to Slack, saying Salesforce's product is better suited for an ecosystem of AI agents.
Google Find Hub will soon help you locate things without a tracker
Google Gemini will make it easier to remember where you safely stashed your passport.
Sept. 2026 Android Drop: Find Hub ‘Remembered’ list, Motion Assist, & Keep in Google Messages
Google today is rolling out the September 2026 Android Drop with a number of major features. Find Hub and Gemini can now...
Google's answer to Canva is an AI tool where you prompt instead of design
With Google Pics, Google is pushing deeper into the creative software market dominated by Canva and Adobe, but with a distinctly AI-first approach.
Google Pics is a Canva rival, and it's now available for all
Google Pics is the company's Canva rival, and this AI-based image design app is now broadly available if you want to try it out.
Google Pics is like Canva, but with even more AI
By more, we mean it’s all generative AI.
Google Pics is Workspace’s new ‘pro-level’ AI image creator & editor
Following the announcement at I/O 2026 in May, Google Pics is launching in general availability today. This image editor...
Razer Prio is an Android and iPhone game controller that folds down to roughly the size of a credit card
Razer has just launched its new Prio game controller, a USB-C controller for your smartphone that folds down to the...
ESPN Unlimited Now Available on YouTube TV
ESPN Unlimited content is now available directly on YouTube TV, giving the streaming service’s subscribers access to thousands of additional live sporting events. YouTube TV’s addition of ESPN Unlimited comes under the deal struck between Google and Disney reached in November 2025, after a two-week blackout of Disney-owned networks on YouTube TV. Other pay-TV providers …
Google Hikes Prices of TV Streamer, Nest Doorbells and Cameras
The Google TV Streamer gets a massive 50% bump, with the brand saying its price adjustments reflect rising component costs.
The Google TV Streamer Now Costs $150 After A 50 Percent Price Hike
Google's streaming device used to cost $100. Now, it'll set you back $150.
Galaxy Z Fold 8 is so popular that Samsung is stealing parts from next year’s phones just to make more
Samsung has a hit on its hands with the Galaxy Z Fold 8, to the point where the company is...
Authority Acquisition Launches AI-Mediated Discovery System for Business Coaches
Authority Acquisition releases a multi-channel content marketing system to help experts and business coaches build a consistent presence across ...
The Google TV Streamer now costs $50 more
Would you pay $149 for a streaming device from 2024?
Google Nest lineup gets a price hike across nearly every camera & doorbell
Alongside a price hike on the Google TV Streamer, the Nest lineup is also seeing prices go up effective immediately...
Google TV Streamer gets $50 price increase
Google has quietly raised the price of the Google TV Streamer to $149.99.
Pixel 11 owners say their phones are waking up without being touched
Some Pixel 11 users report the Lift to wake phone feature is overly sensitive, waking their devices at even small vibrations.
Google Wallet for Android adds 11th digital state ID, first addition in 10 months
After a 10-month pause, Google Wallet is now rolling out support for Ohio state IDs on Android. This is the first addition...
Trump Personally Bullying Apple to Make It ‘Lake America’
Google Maps has already surrendered on the president’s ridiculous name change, but he isn’t satisfied.
Pixel 11 Pro bug causing static sounds in recordings while using Video Boost
Google continues to improve on video quality with each new Pixel release, but a bug on the Pixel 11 Pro...
If your Google Messages group chats are malfunctioning, you're not alone
Google has acknowledged the issue.
Google Messages just got a gorgeous iMessage-like makeover, but there's one problem
You'll not like the new change if you often pin chats in Google Messages.
Google is getting flak for changing Lake Ontario name to Lake America
Canadian politicians are also scrubbing government websites that embed Google Maps to ensure the lake is labeled Lake Ontario.
Google Maps changes Lake Ontario to ‘Lake America’ for US users after Trump order: 'It's official!'
Google Maps has updated Lake Ontario to “Lake America" for U.S. users following Trump’s executive order and the federal government’s official name change.
Alexandria Car and Business Tax Bills Due Oct. 5
ALEXANDRIA, VA — Alexandria has mailed its 2026 personal property tax bills to registered vehicle owners and businesses, with both due Monday, Oct. 5. The
Google Maps adds 'Lake America' as Ford compares change to 'SNL' skit
"No one's going to call it Lake of America. It's been Lake Ontario for hundreds of years," Ontario Premier Doug Ford said.
Canada claps back at Trump's efforts to rename Lake Ontario as 'Lake America'
Ontario Premier Doug Ford has unveiled a giant billboard reading: "Lake Ontario — Now and Always." But tech giant Google has said it is renaming the lake for U.S. users, as President Trump demanded.
Xero Adds AI, Google Targets Law Firms And Claude Beats ChatGPT: 5 Small Business Tech Stories
Xero adds AI tools, Google expands Gemini for law firms, LinkedIn fights AI slop, Goldman warns of AI risks, and Claude tops user satisfaction.
Tech workers name their dream employers, from OpenAI to Google
Tech workers share their dream employers, from OpenAI and Anthropic to Google and NVIDIA — and the companies they'd rather pass on.
TerminalFix Uses Fake Cloudflare CAPTCHAs to Deploy Reverse-Tunnel Backdoor
Microsoft says TerminalFix uses fake Cloudflare CAPTCHAs to trigger PowerShell and deploy a reverse-tunnel backdoor for internal network access.
Pixel 11's Tensor G6 and Pixel 10's Tensor G5 still fall behind in performance per watt, testing shows
Geekerwan's first efficiency test of the Tensor G6 and G5 shows that both trail the Snapdragon 8 Elite and Apple's A-series chips in CPU and GPU performance per watt, while the Kirin 9030 Pro matches the Tensor chips despite being manufactured on a much older process node.
Engadget review recap: Google's Pixel 11 series and more
A roundup of recent reviews from Engadget.
Google’s hyper-personalized ‘Dreambeans’ feed is now free to test
After previously requiring a subscription, Dreambeans is now available for free Google Accounts in the US to test.
Google further buries search results under AI mode
You might have to do way more scrolling to get to links.
Android 17 QPR2 adds Status bar customization for notification, system icons
Android 17 QPR2 continues to add user-facing changes with new Status bar settings in Beta 4. This update...
Android 17 QPR2 Beta 4 rolling out with many Pixel bug fixes
Following the big release two weeks ago, Google is rolling out Android 17 QPR2 Beta 4 for Pixel devices...
Google didn’t kick Pixel 11 trade-in values off a cliff this year – here’s what you can get
While the US Google Store’s pre-order and launch period deals have ended, Google has started a new round of boosted trade-in values...
People are sticking the Fitbit Air to their bodies, literally, and it works [Gallery]
The Fitbit Air might be one of Google’s most versatile products in a while not just because it’s so simple,...
Oglethorpe business dean: The real challenge isn't tariffs. It's uncertainty.
Oglethorpe Dean Stephen Craft explains why economic uncertainty, not tariff refunds, may drive business decisions going forward.
Pixel 11 Trade-in Values See Big Changes
If you didn't buy a Pixel 11 series phone before today, you missed out on the higher trade-in values that Google was offering through the Google Store. We're now a full week out from launch day...
Android 17 Adds OS-Wide ECH to Hide Website Visits From Network Providers
Android 17 adds OS-wide ECH, local network permissions, default certificate transparency, and carrier-controlled 2G blocking.
I was planning to skip the Pixel 11. These 5 upgrades changed my mind
I compared the new Google Pixel 11 with the Pixel 9, and these upgrades have convinced me that it's finally time to make the jump.
Prediction markets take a swing at hedging for US small businesses
By Suzanne McGee Aug 28 (Reuters) - Mark Murrell, founder of Get Maine Lobster of Portland, Maine, has an irritating business problem that he has been struggling to solve: offering discounts is costly and, well, "it feels so boring." For International ...
Italy business and consumer confidence rise in August
ROME, Aug 28 (Reuters) - Italian business and consumer confidence rose in August, data showed on Friday, in a positive sign for the prospects of the euro zone's third largest economy. • National statistics institute ISTAT's consumer confidence index ...
PaperCut Zero-Day Exploited in Attacks, Affecting All NG and MF Versions
PaperCut says a zero-day affecting all NG and MF versions is actively exploited; emergency patches are available for v25 and v26.
1 in 6 VPNs Track Your Location, According to New Report From Proton
A significant number of VPNs on Apple's App Store and Google Play collect your private data, which is the exact opposite of what a VPN should do.
Google announces ‘Expert Intelligence’ to let you add Play Books in Gemini Notebook
Expert Intelligence is a new “cross Google initiative that helps you engage with your trusted sources through Google AI products,” starting with Play Books and Gemini Notebook.
Google’s AI note-taking app now allows you to interact with books
Coming soon to scholarly articles, newspapers, and more.
Google tells Android app developers to cool it on memory use, or else
Developers will feel the RAM shortage ramifications.
Google’s new Fitbit Air brings Pokémon Sleep to your wrist
Google teamed up with the Pokemon Company to introduce a special-edition Fitbit Air that works with the Pokémon Sleep app.
Google launches Pokémon Sleep special-edition Fitbit Air
Can this replace your Pokéwalker?
AI's memory crunch is coming for Android apps
Google is setting new memory-use limits for Android apps as AI data centers contribute to hardware shortages that could leave lower-cost phones with less memory.
Android 17 boosts network security by hiding domain names, lets carriers disable 2G
Google is out with a blog post today recapping new network security measures in Android 17. These four features...
Google announces new Fitbit Air Special Edition with Pokémon Sleep [Hands-on]
The first follow-up to the Fitbit Air is a new Special Edition that integrates with Pokémon Sleep. Available in the US and Japan...
Google Is Releasing A Special Edition Pokémon Sleep Fitbit Air In September
You can get a special Fitbit Air with a sleeping Pikachu design next month.
Nvidia in talks to acquire Hugging Face in $13 billion deal, Business Insider reports
Aug 26 (Reuters) - Nvidia has been in serious talks to acquire AI platform Hugging Face in a deal that would value the company at more than $13 billion, Business Insider reported on Wednesday, citing a person familiar with the matter. Reut...
Microsoft's latest AI rebrand beats its own history of terrible rebrands, renaming Microsoft 365 Roadmap to "AI at Work"
If you use Microsoft 365 and want to know what’s coming next, what would you search for on Google/Bing? Microsoft 365 Roadmap, right? Wrong. Microsoft now wants you to search for “AI at Work Roadmap,” as it “centralizes AI innovations” across products like Word, Excel, PowerPoint, or Outlook. I use Microsoft 365 products all the […]
Ohio business sues woman over one-star Google review
The lawsuit claims the woman “knowingly, maliciously, and intentionally” published “false” and “defamatory” allegations against the company.
Google announces Gemini 3.5 Transcribe for AI-powered speech-to-text
The AI that powers Gboard's Rambler is coming to more Google products, including Chrome.
Google Gives You 1 Day to Get Their Pixel 11 Launch Deals
For those looking for a straight Pixel 11 discount, I still think this deal we shared with you earlier is the one to jump on. That gets you $150 off with code, plus you get a gift card to spend on...
Google Play mandating reduced memory usage & seamless device migration in 2027
In response to “hardware supply constraints that are altering device memory,” Google aims to reduce the memory usage of Android apps.
Motorola details Android 17 update that you might get eventually
Motorola is bad at updates, but at least they arrive eventually. This week, Motorola is detailing its Android 17 update...
Google’s new AI transcription edits out your ‘ums’ and ‘ahs’
It also removes “ums” and other filler words for you.
Google launches Gemini 3.5 Transcribe, which powers Gboard Rambler & is coming to Chrome
Google today introduced Gemini 3.5 Transcribe as its “most precise speech-to-text model yet” that is already powering...
Galaxy S27 leaks reveal a design that Samsung just won’t kill
Whether you’re a fan of the Galaxy S27 Ultra’s new camera design or not, Samsung is ditching the cohesive design...
Galaxy S26 Ultra is the world’s most popular Android phone, and that’s a first
Android phones are never the top-selling smartphones globally, but the ones that get closest are almost always budget models. In...
Ohio business sues Columbus woman over one-star Google review
COLUMBUS, Ohio (WCMH) – A northeastern Ohio business is suing a Columbus woman over a one-star Google review that she wrote. Starr Manufacturing Inc., a company in Vienna that builds oil and …
Pixel 11 post-launch deals: Amazon now lets you stack trade-in bonus with $100+ gift cards
With the Pixel 11 series hitting store shelves on August 20, launch deals are beginning to wind down. However, some...
Google begins rolling out anti-motion sickness feature on Android 17
It's currently only appearing on Pixels running Android 17.
Nothing’s Android 17 update debuts this week with redesigns, new apps, 3D emoji [Gallery]
Nothing has announced Nothing OS 5.0, its Android 17 update, which will start rolling out in October with some redesigned...
Galaxy S27 Ultra’s major redesign detailed in new renders, price hike rumored
Samsung’s new Galaxy S27 Ultra is getting a massive redesign and, thanks to the latest leak, we’ve got a better...
Beyond the Uniform: Career Venture Prepares Wolverines for Life After Sport
Michigan student-athletes took another step toward preparing for life beyond competition through the Graham Family Athletic Career Center's Career Venture Pr...