Column | The Verge

AI music is flooding streaming services — but who wants it?

2026-05-03T12:17:30-04:00

This is The Stepback, a weekly newsletter breaking down one essential story from the tech world. For more on how AI is changing music and the music industry, follow Terrence O'Brien. The Stepback arrives in our subscribers' inboxes at 8AM ET. Opt in for The Stepback here.

How it started

The use of generative AI in pop music started almost as a gimmick. There was a sense of experimentalism to 2018's I AM AI by Taryn Southern and 2019's Proto by Holly Herndon, albums that were created with significant assistance from AI. Others got in on the action too, exploring the outer limits of tools like Google's Magenta and even training their own mod …

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My $5K smart bed needs to shut the hell up

2026-05-01T16:39:34-04:00

This is Optimizer, a weekly newsletter sent every Friday from Verge senior reviewer Victoria Song that dissects and discusses the latest gizmos and potions that swear they're going to change your life. Opt in for Optimizer here.

I take my beauty rest seriously. So seriously that, after months of testing, I bought my ludicrously expensive Eight Sleep Pod 4 Ultra review unit. It had a lot of things going for it. It kept my spouse's side of the bed cool and mine toasty. That, in turn, convinced my aloof cats to curl on my side at night. It improved my marriage by dramatically reducing my spouse's sonorous snoring. What more could I possibly wa …

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After working on the Vision Pro, this AR veteran is going back to phones

2026-04-30T12:58:39-04:00

This is Lowpass by Janko Roettgers, a newsletter on the ever-evolving intersection of tech and entertainment, syndicated just for The Verge subscribers once a week.

When Mark Drummond was working on the Vision Pro at Apple, he had a bit of an epiphany that didn't really fit Cupertino's preferred narrative.

Drummond was managing the Character Intelligence Team, which among other things built the Encounter Dinosaurs demo. Preinstalled on the Vision Pro, the demo puts viewers eye to eye with interactive prehistoric creatures.

"We built that with Jon Favreau," Drummond says, referring to Apple's long-standing partnership with the Mandalorian …

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Grindr — yes, Grindr — won the WHCD party circuit

2026-04-30T11:44:41-04:00

General atmosphere during Grindr White House Correspondents' Dinner Weekend Party 2026 at LXIV DC on April 24, 2026 in Washington, DC. | Tasos Katopodis/Getty Images for Grindr Inc.

Hello and welcome to Regulator, a newsletter for Verge subscribers about technology, politics, and technology learning how to politick. If you're not a subscriber but would like to support our work, please subscribe here. I promise that your money will not go toward paying for a drone-proof ballroom for The Verge staff, no matter how much fun we'd have throwing parties there.

Speaking of parties: The Verge normally wouldn't do a party report from the White House Correspondents' Dinner week, also known as "Nerd Prom," because it's a bit too much Washington insider circle-jerking for normal people to stomach. (This year was weirder than most, …

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Tomora’s Come Closer is an ecstatic love letter to ’90s dance music

2026-04-27T10:40:40-04:00

Before Coachella, Tomora wasn't on my radar at all. It's actually only by chance that I stumbled upon them - I opened the wrong stream because my TV was lagging like a MFer. I paused for a few moments, entranced by the two ethereal Nordic women banging on giant drums to a techno beat. I made a mental note to check them out the following weekend, because Drain was the priority (especially since the Sonora stage wasn't streaming on weekend two). It was only later that I would find out that Tomora is a collaboration between Norwegian singer-songwriter Aurora and Tom Rowlands, one-half of The Chemical Brothers.

Suffice it to say, they were incr …

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The plan to quietly kill Coyote v. Acme blew up in David Zaslav’s face

2026-04-27T14:35:32-04:00

This is The Stepback, a weekly newsletter breaking down one essential story from the tech world. For more on Hollywood trends and streaming culture, follow Charles Pulliam-Moore. The Stepback arrives in our subscribers' inboxes on Sundays at 8AM ET. Opt in for The Stepback here.

How it started

Under David Zaslav's leadership, WBD got very into the practice of shelving its own nearly completed projects in order to cash in on subsequent tax write-offs. To help deal with its looming debt and operating costs, the studio killed Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fallah's live-action Batgirl feature and the Scoob! Holiday Haunt movie from Michael Kurinsky …

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I don’t think Gwyneth Paltrow knows what a peptide is

2026-04-24T10:26:03-04:00

She’s definitely heard of a peptide. I don’t know if she understands what they are. | Photo: Getty Images

These days, it seems I cannot escape peptides. Online, I've been assaulted by videos of shirtless Chads injecting dubiously sourced bottles of the so-called "Wolverine stack." On the New York City subway, I'm haunted by Serena Williams' Ro ads for easy GLP-1 access. Silicon Valley seems to be a parade of peptide parties. In Washington, RFK Jr. has said he's pro-peptide and wants to expand access. In July, the FDA wi …

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25 years later, is it time for a new iPod?

2026-04-23T09:09:02-04:00

This is Lowpass by Janko Roettgers, a newsletter on the ever-evolving intersection of tech and entertainment, syndicated just for The Verge subscribers once a week.

This year marks the 25th anniversary of the original iPod. With its monochrome display, mechanical scroll wheel, and 5 GB hard drive, Apple's pioneering music player now looks like the relic of a bygone era.

And yet, in a surprising twist, there's growing interest in a redo.

After being essentially flat for five years, Google searches for "MP3 Player" tripled since last fall. A Reddit group for fans of digital audio players is now attracting 90,000 visitors per week on average …

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Alexis Ohanian shocks Washington with pro-immigration remarks

2026-04-22T16:47:31-04:00

Los Angeles Golf Club owner Alexis Ohanian looks on during the match against the Jupiter Links Golf Club at SoFi Center on March 24, 2026 in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida. | Image: TGL Golf via Getty Images

Hello and welcome to Regulator, a newsletter for Verge readers about tech politics, political tech, and how they're muddying the waters of Washington, DC. My birthday is this week, and if you're not a Verge subscriber but would like to wish me a happy birthday, you should subscribe here, because that would be the best gift of all. (Tips sent to tina.nguyen+tips@theverge.com would be a very good gift, too.)

Last night, I watched Alexis Ohanian, venture capitalist and cofounder of Reddit, stun a room of Washington insiders by criticizing the Trump administration's immigration policies. This happened in front of at least one senior administrat …

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The Stars My Destination is classic proto-cyberpunk

2026-04-20T10:56:42-04:00

Gully Foyle is my name… | Image: Brick Tower Press

This might feel like a somewhat obvious recommendation to some, but it flew under my radar until now. Alfred Bester's The Stars My Destination (originally published as Tiger! Tiger! in the UK) is a 1956 sci-fi novel that some have cited as a precursor to cyberpunk. It's a work I admit I have some conflicted feelings about, but one I think is well worth reading if you consider yourself a fan of sci-fi. It's also well worth seeking out a physical copy, something I wish I had known before I started reading it in the objectively inferior ebook form that can't capture the ergodic elements of the climax.

It's hard to explain the plot of The Stars …

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