Workers at two of Amazon’s warehouses in New York City are set to go on strike after the company failed to come to the bargaining table by a December 15 deadline. Unionized workers at the JFK8 facility on Staten Island and DBK4 depot in Queens voted “overwhelmingly” to authorize strikes in protest against “Amazon’s illegal refusal to recognize their union and negotiate a contract addressing the company’s low wages and dangerous working conditions,” according to the International Brotherhood of Teamsters (IBT). Engadget has contacted the Teamsters and Amazon Labor Union (ALU) for more details about the strikes.
“Our members are ready to do whatever it takes to get a contract,” Connor Spence, president of ALU-IBT Local 1, said in a statement. “While Amazon continues to disrespect us by refusing to listen to our concerns, our movement is only growing stronger.”
As for DBK4 — which the Teamsters say is Amazon’s biggest delivery station in NYC — workers there voted almost unanimously for strike authorization. Meanwhile, workers at the DIL7 delivery depot in Skokie, Illinois, also voted “overwhelmingly” to approve a strike. The Teamsters represent hundreds of workers at that station as well. “Amazon is one of the biggest companies on Earth, but we are struggling to pay our bills,” Riley Holzworth, a DIL7 worker, said in a statement.
Amazon has lodged legal challenges against the union election win at JFK8, but it has been unsuccessful in its efforts to overturn results thus far. The company has appealed a ruling by the National Labor Relations Board that certified the union. As ABC News reports, workers claim that Amazon is using the challenges as a tactic to illegally delay union contract talks.
“For more than a year now, the Teamsters have continued to intentionally mislead the public — claiming that they represent ‘thousands of Amazon employees and drivers’. They don’t, and this is another attempt to push a false narrative,” Amazon spokesperson Eileen Hards told ABC News. “The truth is that the Teamsters have actively threatened, intimidated, and attempted to coerce Amazon employees and third-party drivers to join them, which is illegal and is the subject of multiple pending unfair labor practice charges.”
News of the impending strike comes just after a Senate committee released a report regarding an investigation into safety at Amazon facilities. The Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions claimed the company ignored internal research indicating that there was a high level of injury rates at its warehouses.
Are you ready for the holiday travels and the long hours on your phone that accompany them? Whether you’re using your device for directions or entertainment, it’s a pain when you’re phone just dies. Try to avoid this by picking up one of our choices for best power banks and portable chargers, like Anker’s 200W Prime Power Bank — our favorite premium power bank.
Anker’s Prime Power Bank with a 100W charging base is currently available for $110, down from $185. This 41 percent off deal brings the power bank and charging base back down to a record-low price. To start from the bottom, its charging base has a USB port and two USB-C ports. You can use them while the base is plugged in and juicing up the power bank. As for the power bank, it can charge a MacBook Air once and an iPhone 14 or Galaxy S23 3.4 times. The power bank’s sleek screen shows how much battery the Anker device still holds.
Anker
If you’re only really interested in the power bank then you can get it for a lot cheaper. The Anker Prime Power Bank is available on its own for just $78 — a 40 percent discount. This deal is also a record-low price for the device and offers all the same perks just sans-base.
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At its re:Invent 2024 conference in Las Vegas, Amazon on Sunday announced a somewhat unusual new service for Amazon Web Services (AWS) customers: Data Transfer Terminal, a set of physical locations where customers can plug in their storage devices to upload data to the AWS cloud.
So how’s it work, exactly? From the AWS management console, customers can reserve a time slot, optionally assign process and data transfer specialists from their organization, and visit a Data Transfer Terminal location to upload their data.
“On your reserved date and time, [you’ll] visit the location and confirm access with the building reception,” Channy Yun, a principal developer advocate at AWS, explained in a blog post. “[You’ll then be] escorted by building staff to the floor and your reserved room of the Data Transfer Terminal location […] Don’t be surprised if there are no AWS signs in the building or room. This is for security reasons to keep your work location as secret as possible.”
The initial Data Transfer Terminal locations have been opened in New York City and Los Angeles, and more will be added in the future. Each location is equipped with a patch panel, fiber optic cable, and a PC for monitoring data transfer jobs.
A pilot AWS Data Transfer Terminal location. Image Credits:AWS
Now, why would someone want to lug all their hard drives to a building and sit around and wait for the upload to finish? Well, Amazon claims that Data Transfer Terminal delivers fast upload speeds (up to 400Gbps) via a secure, “high throughput” connection.
You’ll have to pay for the privilege, though. Amazon charges “per port hour” for usage of ports in Data Transfer Terminal locations during a reservation — even when no data is being transferred.
“At a minimum, you’ll be charged per port hour for the number of hours reserved,” reads an Amazon support page. “You’ll be charged for port hours for each port you use and/or request as part of your reservation.”
Per-port charges are $300 for “U.S. to U.S.” data transfers (i.e., uploads to a U.S.-based AWS data center) and $500 for “U.S. to EU” transfers (uploads to an EU region). Amazon doesn’t list the prices for transfers to the rest of the globe.
Amazon has some excellent Black Friday deals on our picks for best smart speakers. There’s a range of Amazon products on sale, including the Echo Pop, which is available for $18, down from $40. The 55 percent discount brings the Amazon Echo Pop to a record-low price.
Amazon launched the Echo Pop in May 2023 as a new entry-level option for Alexa-powered devices. It features a 1.95-inch front-facing speaker which could work well in a small room like a study or a dorm room. It uses Amazon’s AZ2 Neural Edge processor to allow for on-device tasks and lets you do all the standard commands with Alexa. Plus, you can get it in four colors: Charcoal, Glacier White, Lavender Bloom and Midnight Teal.
Amazon
The Pop isn’t the only Echo device on sale ahead of Black Friday. Right now, you can get the fifth-generation Echo Dot for $23, down from $50 — a 44 percent discount. The Echo Spot is also on sale, dropping to $45 from $80 and the fourth-generation Echo is $55, down from $100.
Amazon is closing down Freevee, its free ad-supported video on demand service. This platform was home to original programming as well as more than from the Prime Video roster. Freevee will be phased out over the coming weeks, and its content will become available as part of Prime Video. The ad-supported tier of Prime Video is included as part of Amazon’s Prime membership for $15 a month.
“To deliver a simpler viewing experience for customers, we have decided to phase out Freevee branding,” an Amazon spokesperson told . “There will be no change to the content available for Prime members, and a vast offering of free streaming content will still be accessible for non-Prime members, including select originals from Amazon MGM Studios, a variety of licensed movies and series, and a broad library of FAST channels – all available on Prime Video.”
The free viewing platform went through several rebrands since its original launch as IMDb Freedive in January 2019. It its final phase as Freevee in April 2022.
TV sales are as predictable as the changing seasons, with prices steadily dropping on multiple brands and models this time of year. As Black Friday has become more of a monthlong free-for-all than a weekend event, you’ll find many of the best TV deals available now, making it the perfect time to complete your big purchase. Below are some of my very favorites and top performers at a wide variety of price points for your perusal. And don’t forget to check out our Black Friday buying tips and curated gift guides as you check off your shopping list.
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TV Deals
Samsung S90D
Photograph: Ryan Waniata
LG’s C4 (9/10, WIRED Recommends) is perennially named one of the best TVs you can buy, for good reason, and it’s now at the lowest price we’ve seen all year. You’ll get the stunning contrast and perfect black levels of a top OLED display, rich and naturalistic colors, sparkling clear picture processing, and solid brightness with support for Dolby Vision HDR. LG’s smart interface is quirky but lightning-fast, and the Magic Remote works like a Nintendo Wii remote for versatile control. Extras like four fully-loaded HDMI 2.1 inputs to serve up the top gaming features make the C4 feel like a flagship TV at second-tier pricing.
Not to be outdone, Samsung’s second-tier OLED (9/10, WIRED Recommends) is another of my favorite TVs of the year. The 65-inch model’s QD-OLED panel (the 42-, 48-, and 83-inch models use a more traditional WOLED panel) provides fabulously rich colors and a slight brightness boost over its C4 counterpart, alongside the perfect black levels and excellent picture quality from any angle that makes OLED TVs top performers. Like the C4, you’ll get HDMI 2.1 support across all four inputs and Samsung’s Game Hub lets you stream games from an impressive list of services, including Xbox. Like all Samsung TVs, the S90D doesn’t support Dolby Vision, the most common dynamic HDR format, opting for HDR10+ instead. Otherwise, it’s hard to find a flaw.
If you’re after something more budget-friendly, Hisense’s U7N QLED TV (8/10, WIRED Recommends) is our pick as the best TV for most people right now, thanks to its mix of killer brightness, vivid quantum dot colors, and excellent contrast. We saw some uniformity issues in testing (aka the dirty screen effect) but it’s not noticeable in most situations, and the TV’s mini LED backlighting system is a step above regular LED TVs, with loads of dimming zones for minimal “blooming” or light wash around bright images. An intuitive Google TV interface and high-end gaming features complete the package for a TV that punches well above its price.
Hisense U8N
Photograph: Ryan Waniata
Looking to bust the brightness barrier? Hisense’s 65-inch U8N TV (8/10, WIRED Recommends) is among the brightest we’ve ever tested, outshining the vast majority of LED rivals with its searing highlights and voluminous quantum dot colors. You might think all that power would make it a poor performer in the dark, but the U8N’s advanced mini LED backlighting allows for inky black levels with very little light bloom. You’ll also get top-end gaming features and a Google TV interface. The TV’s off-axis image quality and motion handling are just OK, but otherwise you’re getting a lot of the goodies found in premium TVs for far less money. Add in a good sale, and it’s hard to say no.
If affordability and convenience top your TV checklist, this balanced baseline model from Roku is an enticing choice. Roku’s simplified interface runs the show, making it easy for even the less technically inclined among us to navigate between inputs, broadcast TV, and your choice of hundreds of streaming services. The TV’s picture quality isn’t top tier, and its 60-Hz refresh rate may not appeal to avid gamers, but you do get good brightness, vibrant colors, local dimming for solid black levels without blotchy light patches, and smart support for Apple Homekit, Alexa, and Google Assistant.
Maybe you’ve been waiting to go gonzo with a mega screen this holiday season. If so, TCL’s QM7 is a tempting bargain, offering good performance at a great price in an absolutely massive screen size. I’ve only tested the 65-inch version, but the large-and-in-charge model should offer a similar overall experience, with excellent brightness and more dimming zones to provide good contrast and black levels. It’s loaded with features, including gaming extras and all major flavors of HDR, and its overall picture processing and screen uniformity are surprisingly solid for its class. My only hesitation with this TV is a settings issue I experienced where the HDR changes with SDR settings. TCL was able to fix this for me with a firmware update, and the brand says one is coming for all its TVs in December. That hindrance aside, this is a whole lot of screen real estate for a price that costs less than some premium 65-inch models. If you’re still unsure, last year’s excellent Hisense U8K (8/10, WIRED Recommends) comes in 100 inches right now for $3,000.
Another brightness champion, the Bravia 9 (9/10, WIRED Recommends) matches its next-gen LED potency with brilliant balance to create one of the most stirring performances of any TV I’ve tested. You’ll almost feel the heat of the sun or lasers cascading across the screen, while Sony’s proprietary backlighting and processing systems provide incredible contrast and clarity. You’ll get Sony’s Google TV smart interface for simple navigation, and high-end gaming features, including in-house PlayStation exclusives. The TV’s off-angle viewing is good, not great, and I wish Sony would offer HDMI 2.1 gaming support across more than just two of its four inputs, but if you’re after the best LED TV on the market at its lowest price yet, you’re welcome.
If I’d known the Bravia 7 (7/10, WIRED Recommends) would drop this low, I honestly would have given it a higher score. It seemed a bit too high at its $2,300 MSRP, but now that it’s $1,000 lower, and $400 off its original sale price, it feels like Sony’s giving these things away. My main gripe about the Bravia 7 was its notably poor performance from the side. If you’re mainly watching from straight-on, though, this is a killer performer for the money. The TV’s mini LED backlight is brilliantly bright, with dazzling colors, excellent contrast, and stunning clarity across content. Like most TVs in its class, it tacks on top gaming features (though only across two of its four HDMI inputs), and its Google TV interface adds intuitive control. At this price, this is among the best options for anyone after a bright-yet-refined TV experience.
If you’re wondering what happened to Amazon’s new and improved version of its Alexa voice assistant, you’re not alone. reports that the new Alexa is still stuck in its developmental phase and Amazon has cut off access to its beta phase including its new “Let’s Chat” phase. As a result, a planned late 2024 launch has been pushed back to next year.
The problem seems to be with its large language models (LLMs). The new Alexa is designed to from users but it’s also more likely to fail doing some of the most basic things the old version could do quite easily like create a timer or operate smart lights, according to a follow up report from .
Amazon originally planned to unveil its new version of Alexa AI in October but now the timeline has been extended into next year. (As you might have noticed, October has come and gone.) The original timeline planned to premiere the next evolutionary step in Alexa’s advancement on October 17 but Amazon decided to pivot and used the date to show off its new line of Kindle ereaders. Then in August, news surfaced that the new Alexa would be powered by and come with a monthly subscription fee.
As ChatGPT began to rise in popularity in the summer of 2023, Amazon CEO Andy Jassy wanted to see if Alexa could compete if it had an AI upgrade. Jassy reportedly started peppering Alexa with sports questions “like an ESPN reporter at a playoff press conference” and its answers were “nowhere near perfect.” It even made up a recent game score for Jassy.
Despite this, Alexa passed the good enough stage and Jassy and his fellow executives felt their engineers could build a beta version by the early part of 2024. Unfortunately, Amazon wasn’t able to meet its deadline.
Even with the new deadline, the new Alexa still has a long way to go to fix its problems. Some employees told Bloomberg that the problem outside of Alexa’s innerworkings is with Amazon’s overstuffed management and a lack of “a compelling vision for an AI-powered Alexa.” .
It’s a slower October than usual in the tech industry, thanks mostly to Google and Microsoft having held their typical fall hardware announcements earlier this year. Still, we’ve seen a fair number of companies reveal new devices in the last two weeks, while Amazon’s October Prime Day raged on. Whether you were busy shopping or watching Elon Musk talk up robotaxis and cybervans, the Engadget team continued to review recently (and not-so-recently) launched products. As usual, this bi-weekly roundup is here to help you catch up, though because I missed last week’s edition (as I was out on time off), the cadence is just a bit off.
From Meta’s Quest 3S VR headset and the DJI Air 3S drone, to Sony’s midrange suite of audio gear, these weeks have coincidentally been about the less premium, more affordable “un-flagships,” if you will. And it turns out you don’t have to throw chunks of your retirement savings at companies to get solid devices that are well worth the money.
Sony LinkBuds Fit and LinkBuds Open and Bose QuietComfort Earbuds reviews
by Billy Steele
Sony
Sony flexes its mobile audio muscle on the LinkBuds Fit, combining great sound with tons of features.
The main thing I learned from Billy’s recent reviews of Sony and Bose headphones is that flagship, premium-level noise cancelation is making its way down to the midrange products. And I, for one, am happy about it. Looks like most of the things you’ll miss if you opt to save some money are features like spatial audio, head-tracking and stuff that’s supposed to be make for a more immersive, intuitive listening experience. Personally, I’m okay missing out on those things for now — I really just want decent sound, good voice quality and competent reduction of background noise.
Definitely check out Billy’s review of Sony’s LinkBuds trio of devices even if you’re not in the market for headphones, because he put his ears through literal pain to test the strangely designed earbuds for us. In fact, a rejected headline for the review was “Why am I in pain?” We salute you, Billy.
by Devindra Hardawar
Meta
The Meta Quest 3S delivers immersive virtual reality for just $300. It’s fast, comfortable to wear and it has a wealth of games and VR experiences to choose from.
The Quest is arguably the industry’s leading VR headset for consumers, especially considering it costs a fraction of alternative options while offering a relatively high-quality immersive experience. Unlike the Apple Vision Pro, which costs $3,500, the new Quest 3S is much more palatable at $300. And, as Devindra observes in his review, it’s comfortable, fast and allows wearers to access Meta’s large library of VR apps and content. To quote Devindra, “It’s not Meta’s first $300 VR headset, but it’s still a tremendous accomplishment.”
DJI Neo and DJI Air 3S reviews
by Steve Dent
DJI
DJI’s Air 3S is the company’s first consumer drone with LiDAR designed to make it safer to fly at night.
Continuing in the trend of excellent products that cost less than usual, the DJI Neo is an excellent drone for just $200. Calling it the best $200 drone ever made may sound hyperbolic, but we truly can’t think of any other drone that cost the same that came close to delivering similar performance as the Neo. And though one of its main drawbacks, according to our reviewer Steve, is that it sounds like a banshee, I honestly think that would be a pro for me just for the pure comedy of it all. I never thought I’d be in the market for a banshee-sounding drone but here I am thinking $200 would be a fair price to pay for the aerial videos I could get, and I could easily lay upbeat, operatic singing over the footage anyway.
On the other end of the spectrum, Steve’s also tested the higher-end DJI Air 3S drone and Canon’s EOS R5 II, both of which will cost you a lot more money. The good news is that Canon’s EOS R5 II is now so much improved that it better takes on Sony’s rival offerings, while bringing intriguing features like eye-control autofocus. Sure, it’s still too early to be reliable. But if you have the money for these premium products, you’ll get to experience bleeding-edge tech, maybe part of the appeal is that they may not always work well.
by Dan Cooper
reMarkable / Engadget
reMarkable adds a color screen to its e-paper tablet, creating a best-in-class distraction-free writing experience.
I know Dan was a bit worried about giving a device as niche as the reMarkable Paper Pro such a high score, but after some discussion, we both agreed it fit. As it stands, the reMarkable Paper Pro is arguably the best e-paper writing tablet with a color screen, even after this week’s announcement of Amazon’s first color Kindle. Per Dan’s review, the Paper Pro not only levels up with the addition of color, but also got much faster and reliable in the process.
I particularly enjoy how much care has been taken to more seamlessly blend handwriting and typed text for a more natural note-taking and annotating experience. And though it falls outside this edition’s general theme of being a less-expensive product with premium specs, I’m still incredibly tempted to find ways to cough up the $600 or so needed to bag myself a Paper Pro with the accessories Dan recommends.
Phoenix Springs and Neva reviews
by Jessica Conditt
I’m not the most engaged gamer, but I love learning about games from Jess. She recently reviewed sci-fi mystery Phoenix Springs and dreamy platformer Neva, with pieces written so beautifully that I can’t help but itch to check out each title so I can feel the way she clearly does about them. Phoenix Springs even follows a technology reporter and covers my favorite genres (science fiction and mystery), while Neva’s art looks simply gorgeous. I don’t yet know if I’ll ever find the time to play new games, but these two have certainly been added to my list.
Upcoming reviews: On the horizon
The Engadget team geeks out about a multitude of things, and as we get started on our holiday gift guide writing, we’re thinking about products we like for ourselves and our loved ones. Many of us love e-readers and writing tablets. I certainly have my eye on one of the new Kindles that were announced this week, particularly the new Kindle Scribe and possibly the Colorsoft. Those won’t be available until later this year, so for now I’ll keep hungrily eyeing the reMarkable Paper Pro. I’ll also be wondering what Amazon hardware chief Panos Panay has up his sleeves, other than cans of Diet Coke — something I learned he (like many people) enjoys when I got the chance to speak with him in an interview this week.
Many of us are millennials and have gigantic soft spots for retro gaming. Our executive editor Aaron Souppouris talked to the folks at Analogue, and you can read his beautifully constructed piece to learn more about the upcoming Analogue 3D.
This week, Apple sort of surprised us by announcing the new iPad mini, which has been tweaked to offer more storage and power with an A17 Pro processor. It’ll also support Apple Intelligence, of course, and though it seems like a minor update, some of my coworkers and I still love the idea of a small tablet. If only it had a better screen.
All of those recently announced things are on our review roster, alongside things like the Google TV Streamer and Samsung Galaxy S24 FE that launched in the last few weeks. As we approach November and all the holiday shopping that brings, hopefully the hardware launches properly slow down. We’re still anticipating an Apple event for Macs, and can still remember being surprised by the announcement of Humane’s AI Pin late last year. But for now, we’re chugging along while occasionally bathing in nostalgia and longing for a simpler time.
AWS CEO Matt Garman has harsh words for remote workers: return to the office or quit. The Amazon executive recently told employees who don’t like the new five-day in-person work policy that, “there are other companies around,” presumably companies they can work for remotely, Reuters reported on Thursday.
Amazon’s top boss, Andy Jassy, told employees last month that there will be a full return-to-office starting in 2025, an increase from three days for roughly the last year.
Garman is the latest tech CEO to put his foot down on remote work, but he’s not the first. Earlier this year, Dell reportedly told employees they won’t be considered for promotions if they don’t come into the office. That said, remote work likely isn’t going anywhere for most people. Studies suggest most remote workers would quit if they had to return to the office.
Amazon did not immediately respond to TechCrunch’s request for comment.
Next to Black Friday, Prime Day is a great time to buy hardware from Amazon and Apple. On the latter brand, we’re seeing some of the best prices to date for the latest models of iPads, AirPods and AirTags, to name a few. And if you’re in the market for a new laptop, it’s also a great time to buy a MacBook, with prices starting at a record low $849 for the latest MacBook Air. It’s currently Engadget’s top pick on our best laptop list.
Here’s why: They get you in the door for that sub-$1,000 price, which is an enticing $250 less than you’d spend at the Apple Store. But Apple is notoriously stingy on memory and storage for its devices: The baseline model only has 8GB of RAM and a 256GB drive. That’s fine if you’re only using your laptop for the basics – say, social media, streaming video and light document creation. But even with cloud storage, that SSD will fill up very quickly with photos, audio and video if you’re doing anything creative. (Yes, you can get external USB drives, but they’re slower and ruin the lines of Apple’s sleek laptop.) And while Apple does a great job of managing software resources on the Mac, that 8GB of memory feels like a low ceiling.
So here’s what I did when Amazon ran a version of this same deal a few months ago: I paid to double both specs. For $1,249 (after clipping that same $50 on-screen coupon), you get 16GB of RAM and 512GB of storage. Yes, a terabyte or more would be even better, but you pick your battles. And this configuration still saves you a cool $250 off the Apple Store price for the same configuration, while being a lot more future-proofed. For instance, if you’re laptop shopping for a high school or college student, this stepped-up model will survive a 4-year academic stint with more comfort than that $849 version.
If that’s still too steep, you can split the difference with the 512GB MacBook Air M2. It doesn’t have the extra RAM, but the otherwise identical slightly older model still gets you a very capable, modern Apple laptop with decent storage for just $999. But don’t wait: these laptop deals end today, and we don’t know if we’ll be seeing them again before Black Friday.
Your Prime Day Shopping Guide: See all of our Prime Day coverage. Shop the best Prime Day deals on Yahoo Life. Follow Engadget for Prime Day tech deals. Hear from Autoblog’s experts on the best Amazon Prime Day deals for your car, garage, and home, and find Prime Day sales to shop on AOL, handpicked just for you.
