Google is refunding all Stadia purchases — hardware, software, and DLC. Members of the Stadia team will be “carrying this work forward” in other departments at Google.
… Stadia has been facing rumors of its demise practically from the start. Google has a habit of killing projects only a few years after they launch, and Stadia, a cloud gaming service from a company with few ties in the gaming industry, seemed like a prime candidate for an early demise.
https://www.theverge.com/2022/9/29/23378713/google-stadia-shutting-down-game-streaming-january-2023
Category: The Verge
Designers worry Adobe won’t let Figma flourish
The world of creative technology was rocked last week by news that industry giant Adobe had acquired Figma, makers of a hugely popular suite of UI and UX design tools, for a whopping $20 billion. The response from designers was immediate — and for the most part, extremely negative.
https://www.theverge.com/2022/9/21/23363188/adobe-destroy-figma-designers-ux-ui-creative-cloud
Zoom’s Slack competitor is getting a new name and features
On Monday, Zoom announced a small change to the name of the product — it’s now called Zoom Team Chat — alongside a handful of other handy updates coming to the collaboration software.
https://www.theverge.com/2022/9/12/23345352/zoom-team-chat-name-features
Airbnb accidentally sent tons of Android users a ‘test’ notification
Airbnb lit up Android phones around the globe with a notification that reads: “Test dev.” The apparent blunder occurred early Wednesday morning, and judging by how many users are posting about it on Twitter, it seems like a lot of people received the accidental alert (via 9to5Google).
https://www.theverge.com/2022/8/17/23309796/airbnb-android-users-accidental-test-notification
Why BeReal is breaking out
On Monday, BeReal became the No. 1 free app in the iOS App Store, and remains there today. Market research firm Sensor Tower estimates that it has now been installed 20 million times; another firm, Apptopia, estimates its total downloads at 29.5 million, a spokesman told me. About 333,000 people downloaded BeReal on Sunday alone, Apptopia said.
https://www.theverge.com/2022/7/20/23271184/bereal-app-popularity-memes-tiktok-time-to