Snap’s newly announced AR Specs might seem similar to other smartglasses, but Snap CEO Evan Spiegel says that’s the wrong way to think about the product. Specs, he says, is “a new type of computer, a see-through computer.”

Shortly after unveiling Specs at AWE, Spiegel sat down with Engadget to tell us more about the device we got a glimpse of onstage. The CEO repeatedly referred to Specs as a “computer” and that really is core to understanding how Snap is positioning the product (and justifying the price). Specs, Spiegel said, “is able to overlay computing on the world around you and bring computing into the world, which is so important if you want to make computing feel more human.”

But Snap will have to do more than just persuade people to buy a computer for their face. When Specs go on sale later this year, the company will face a very different environment than when it first started experimenting with camera-enabled glasses in 2016. For one, it has a lot more competition now. But today, there’s also increasing suspicion of smartglasses, given that there have been some very public cases of people misusing the tech.

There’s the Meta of it all, too. The company was recently caught with an unreleased facial recognition feature on its Ray-Ban glasses (that it removed soon after outside researchers discovered it). 

Spiegel, not surprisingly, isn’t a fan of facial recognition.

“There are certain use cases, like facial recognition, that we don’t allow in Lenses, and one of the benefits of having our own developer ecosystem and our own developer tools is that we’re able to moderate the Lenses that are submitted and available on Snap to make sure that they comply with our guidelines,” he told Engadget.

He also said he hopes people will view Specs differently than what’s currently out there. “I think AI glasses are typically being used to record content, that’s sort of the purpose of the glasses as they’re marketed,” he said. “That’s not the purpose of Specs. In fact, I think that might be an almost tangential use case.” 

Spiegel said he thinks people will feel more comfortable around Specs once they understand wearers are more likely to be “using a computer, not surreptitiously recording videos.”

Specs will also launch at a time when more governments and regulators are scrutinizing social media companies’ track records on child safety. Earlier this week, UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer said the UK would ban children under 16 from social media, including Snap. Spiegel said that while he anticipates Specs “will mostly be used by adults,” the company has built some parental control features for people who want to share the glasses with their teens. “You can basically swipe a little toggle [in the Specs app] and limit the world of Lenses that they can use when they’re using Specs,” he explained. “So they can have all the fun and play, and still provide comfort to parents that they’re overseeing what their teens are doing.”

At $2,195, Specs will be more expensive than any other smartglasses currently on the market. It’s also more expensive than even most headsets, save for the Apple Vision Pro, which Spiegel drew a clear comparison to during his keynote. I asked if Snap’s goal is for the price of Specs to come down eventually and he said it is a long term goal for the company.

“That’s something we’re really focused on over time, because we want Specs to be as accessible as possible,” he said. “As far as computers go, it’s an incredibly powerful new computer, and we try to price in a way that makes it something that early adopters and developers and folks who are really passionate about this technology can afford.”

Besides price, the biggest question ahead of the Specs reveal was just how much Snap would be able to change their design. Spiegel was wearing the new Specs throughout our conversation, and after seeing them up close I’m able to confirm they are indeed much more refined than the developer version from 2024. The arms are still quite thick, though, and stuck out a bit past Spiegel’s head. But from the front, they are noticeably narrower and rounder than the boxy, more angular frames we’ve seen in the past from Snap.

While he was speaking, I was able to easily see his eyes through the lenses, though I could detect some rainbow-like reflections from the embedded waveguides when he turned his head. I also saw the lenses when the dimming feature was enabled and they looked fully blacked out, like dark sunglasses.

Unfortunately, Snap isn’t offering demos of the glasses just yet, so my impressions are limited to what I was able to observe during my quick chat with Spiegel. But I’m looking forward to seeing how Snap’s “computer” will look and fit on different faces.

Facepalm: Claims that Trump Mobile could deliver a “Made in America” smartphone within months sounded dubious when the T1 was initially unveiled a year ago. The ensuing mockups suspiciously resembled existing foreign designs, and a recent teardown confirms the device is nearly identical to one from Taiwan-based HTC.

iFixit’s teardown of the Trump Mobile T1 confirms that the phone is essentially an HTC U24 Pro with a few minor cosmetic changes. The findings settle suspicions that had been circulating since earlier this year and undercut Trump Mobile’s original claim that the device would be American-manufactured.

The T1’s listed specs: a 6.78-inch 120Hz AMOLED display, a Snapdragon processor, a 50MP main camera, a 50MP telephoto, and an 8MP ultrawide – closely mirror what HTC publishes for the U24 Pro. When NBC brought a unit to iFixit, the repair team disassembled it using the same techniques that had worked on the U24.

HTC U24 Pro (left) and Trump Mobile T1 (right). Source: iFixit

Scans revealed nearly identical internal layouts and component placement, and iFixit successfully booted the T1 using a motherboard taken from the HTC device. The LPDDR5 RAM was sourced from Micron rather than SK Hynix, a difference iFixit attributes to supply chain variability rather than any meaningful design divergence.

Other changes are cosmetic or minor: a gold chassis (with the American flag rendered with 11 stripes instead of 13), re-drilled speaker holes, a different camera shell, a repositioned flash, and a larger battery. That battery grows from 4,600mAh to 5,000mAh, though charging speed drops from 60W to 30W.

When Trump Mobile unveiled the T1 alongside its carrier service exactly one year ago, the company claimed the phone would be “designed and built in the United States,” but walked that back quickly. Subsequent language described the device as “designed with American principles in mind,” and the website now simply calls it “Proudly American.”

The earliest mockups depicted a vague design that sparked doubts about whether a real product existed, while later images mirrored a repainted Samsung Galaxy Ultra. When the actual phone leaked in February, observers immediately recognized HTC’s design.

Trump Mobile executives have said the company aims to rely as little as possible on Chinese parts and labor, but Taiwan’s National Communications Commission database lists Guangdong Yuanchang Electronics Co., Ltd., a China-based manufacturer, as the producer of the HTC U24 Pro, and some U24 Pro retail boxes carry a “Made in China” label. Furthermore, when Google acquired a significant portion of HTC’s hardware engineering team in 2017 for $1.1 billion, it left the company with a considerably reduced capacity to design its own handsets. iFixit suspects HTC contracted a Guangdong company to both manufacture and design the U24 in the first place.

President Trump, like Obama before him, has pressured companies including Apple and Samsung to explain why smartphone manufacturing cannot be revived domestically. Supply chain analyst Kevin O’Marah has estimated that a fully domestic smartphone production timeline would span roughly a decade, requiring a phone designed from scratch around automated US production lines and manufacturing equipment that doesn’t currently exist in the country – making it unsurprising that Trump Mobile couldn’t accomplish the feat in a single year.

That said, final assembly of the T1 occurs in Miami, which could represent a first step toward a more domestically produced device. The persistent obstacle is the cost of US labor, and if domestic companies can gradually master the supply chain, fully automated US factories might eventually make it viable, though not for years. Pre-orders for the T1 are open at a promotional price of $499, slightly undercutting the U24 Pro’s $579 MSRP. A successor, the T1 Ultra, is planned.

Looking for the most recent regular Connections answers? Click here for today’s Connections hints, as well as our daily answers and hints for The New York Times Mini Crossword, Wordle and Strands puzzles.

Today’s Connections: Sports Edition is a tough one. If you’re struggling with the puzzle but still want to solve it, read on for hints and the answers.

Connections: Sports Edition is published by The Athletic, the subscription-based sports journalism site owned by The Times. It doesn’t appear in the NYT Games app, but it does in The Athletic’s own app. Or you can play it for free online.

Read more: NYT Connections: Sports Edition Puzzle Comes Out of Beta

Hints for today’s Connections: Sports Edition groups

Here are four hints for the groupings in today’s Connections: Sports Edition puzzle, ranked from the easiest yellow group to the tough (and sometimes bizarre) purple group.

Yellow group hint: Almost time to draft!

Green group hint: U.S. Bank is another one.

Blue group hint: Sharp items on sports shoes.

Purple group hint: Big Red Machine.

Answers for today’s Connections: Sports Edition groups

Yellow group: Fantasy football moves.

Green group: NFL stadiums.

Blue group: Soccer cleat makers.

Purple group: Cincinnati Reds to win MVP.

Read more: Wordle Cheat Sheet: Here Are the Most Popular Letters Used in English Words

What are today’s Connections: Sports Edition answers?

The yellow words in today’s Connections

The theme is fantasy football moves. The four answers are add, drop, sit and start.

The green words in today’s Connections

The theme is NFL stadiums. The four answers are Arrowhead, Highmark, MetLife and SoFi.

The blue words in today’s Connections

The theme is soccer cleat makers. The four answers are Adidas, Diadora, Lotto and Puma.

The purple words in today’s Connections

The theme is Cincinnati Reds to win MVP. The four answers are Bench, Larkin, Morgan and Votto.

If you’ve ever taken a close look at a vacuum tube, you’ll have seen the seals around the pins that keep everything air-tight while providing the the device’s electrical contacts. As [maurycyz] finds out, it’s not an easy process to get right.

The problem is one of both chemistry and thermal expansion, as while a good seal can be made between glass and red copper oxide, it remains very difficult indeed to stop the glass cracking on cooldown due to differing thermal expansion properties. We’re led through a variety of experiments including surface treatments and flattening the metal to a sheet, with varying pros and cons. The most successful seal on the page comes from very thin tungsten wire, though hardly the most practical conductor for a vacuum tube.

It’s a fascinating investigation for the casual reader, taking them into the properties of metal-glass bonds and the difficulties involved in making them. We have even more respect for the people who make their own tubes after reading it.

ai + ml

Goodbye, useful Spotlight; hello force-fed Apple intelligence bloatware that feels distressingly like Google AI Overviews

HANDS ON That new AI-juiced Siri that Apple rolled out last week at WWDC was supposed to set a new paradigm for on-device AI.

But don’t believe the hype coming out of Tim Cook’s final big event. After a week-long test drive, it seems like Apple just crammed Google AI Overviews on top of the most useful parts of its various operating systems and made the whole ecosystem more cumbersome to use. But hey, it has more AIs! 

I’ve been running the iOS and macOS 27 developer betas since they were made available on June 8, and I was blessed by the waitlist gods with access to the new version of Siri a few days after that. There are definitely some useful new features: Siri now carries on actual conversations, which makes it far more useful than the ask, get a response, we’re-done-here flow of the old Siri that left no room for clarifying questions or follow ups. Siri is now able to find things on my device more easily too – at least on my M1 MacBook. My iPhone 15 Pro has been telling me it’s still re-indexing my device after the update for more than a week, but I was still able to use it to conduct web searches and find some things on my phone – it’s possible this message itself was an error.

The dedicated Siri app is also nice in its own way, as it shows a record of every conversation I’ve had with the new Apple Intelligence front end for later review, but that comes with a caveat, too. Even the most brief questions  – the overnight weather  forecast, for example – is now stored in perpetuity, cluttering up the list of chats we’ve had until I manually delete it. The only apparent alternative is setting an expiration window for past chats and losing records of the more useful conversations we’ve had.

Who turned out my Spotlight?

Those are small inconveniences, however, compared to my biggest gripe with Siri AI: It’s completely ruined Spotlight. 

I’ve come to rely on Apple’s embedded search/launcher feature almost exclusively for digging up apps that I don’t keep a shortcut for, and on my iPhone, it’s the main method I use to kick off a web search because it’s so simple. Swipe down from the center of the screen, type what I want to search for, and tap on the item that points to my query as a Google search in Safari. Swipe, type, and a tap and I’m perusing a search result page. 

Not anymore. 

The new Siri-first interface that presumes that if you’re searching for anything but an app or file, you must want Siri to feed you a few links of Apple Intelligence’s choosing. 

Getting to a web search from a Spotlight query now requires multiple taps: Type your query, tap “Show Results” (careful: hitting enter will trigger Siri to craft a response, eliminating the possibility of seeing any actual Spotlight content), tap on “Show More” next to the list of Siri-surfaced web results, scroll down until you see Search Google (or whatever engine you have set as your default), then tap that. 

Maybe I’m being a grumpy old journalist who likes things the way they used to be, the transformation of Spotlight into a Siri interface seems like intentional degradation of a basic feature in order to front-load an AI that in my experience so far is largely an inconvenience.

Overall, the experience reminds me of Google’s much-maligned and often wrong AI Overviews, which push actual search results down the page in favor of force-fed info from Google Gemini.

There’s a logical reason for the similarity. At the end of 2025, Apple replaced its former AI chief John Giannandrea, formerly Google’s SVP of search and AI, in a bid to right the Siri ship. Taking his place was another Google alum with even closer ties to The Chocolate Factory’s AI strategy, Amar Subramanya, who spent 16 years there, including a turn as the head of Gemini engineering. Subramanya, now Apple’s VP of AI, now reports directly to Apple’s SVP of software engineering, Craig Federighi, who himself has assumed responsibility for Apple’s machine learning initiatives, including the construction of Apple foundation models. 

As we learned at WWDC last week, Apple has leaned heavily on a partnership with Google to build its foundation models, and it appears Subramanya has brought some of that Google AI ethos with him as well.

So, what’s the alternative to the new AI bloat in iOS 27? Siri can still be turned off entirely in the Settings app, so there’s that, but I’ve decided to take another tack and use one of Apple’s other AI features to get what I want. 

As the iMaker mentioned at WWDC, you can now create shortcuts (tiny scripts that automate basic tasks) by making a natural language request to Siri. In my case, I asked it to build a shortcut I could drop on my home screen to do a Google search with whatever text I input. It works perfectly, and is available to duplicate on your own iDevice should you see fit. 

Again, this is a developer beta, so it’s entirely possible that Apple will wise up and stop burying basic Spotlight search functionality before its 27 series of OSes release to the public this fall. We asked Apple if the change was intentional, but didn’t hear back. ®

beyerdynamic has expanded its professional in-ear monitor lineup with the new DT 30 IE, a more affordable stage-focused IEM designed for musicians who need proper monitoring without jumping straight into the custom-molded or higher-end pro IEM category.

Priced at $159.99, the DT 30 IE sits below beyerdynamic’s DT 70 IE Series ($579.99) and is aimed at singers, drummers, guitarists, church musicians, rehearsal spaces, and working performers who are ready to move beyond floor wedges or consumer earbuds. Cheap earbuds on a loud stage are not a monitoring solution. They are a cry for help with a 3.5mm plug.

A More Affordable Entry Into beyerdynamic’s Pro IEM Lineup

Rather than offering instrument-specific tuning like DT 70 IE Series offers, beyerdynamic is positioning DT 30 IE as the versatile all-rounder in the lineup. That makes sense at this price. Most musicians shopping at $159 are not buying four pairs of IEMs and picking one based on whether they are playing bass, keys, or trying to survive playing with a rather enthusiastic drummer. The DT 30 IE is designed to be an affordable in-ear monitoring system for performers who need a more reliable, isolated, and balanced option for live work.

Related Review: Beyerdynamic DT 7x IE Series IEMs Review: Four Tunings For Stage Life

11mm Dynamic Driver and Balanced Stage Monitoring

Inside the DT 30 IE is an 11mm dynamic driver with a stated frequency response of 5Hz to 20kHz. beyerdynamic says the tuning is balanced and neutral, with a focus on monitoring rather than casual listening.

That distinction matters. A lot of consumer earbuds are tuned to impress quickly, with boosted bass and hyped treble that sound exciting during a commute or a quick demo. That can be fun for playlists, but it is not what a musician needs when pitch, timing, vocal placement, click tracks, backing tracks, and the rest of the band all have to be heard clearly without fighting the mix.

Up to 39dB Passive Isolation

One of the most important specs here is up to 39dB of passive noise isolation. For live performers, that may matter more than any exotic driver claim.

Stage volume can get ugly fast. Loud drummers, guitar amps, bad venue monitoring, crowd noise, and unpredictable room acoustics can wreck a performance before the first chorus. Passive isolation helps musicians hear their own mix more clearly at lower volumes, which is better for focus and potentially better for long-term hearing health.

The DT 30 IE includes three pairs of silicone ear tips and three pairs of foam ear tips in small, medium, and large sizes. That is not just accessory padding. With in-ear monitors, the seal matters. A poor fit can reduce bass response, weaken isolation, and make the sound less consistent from one listen to the next.

Lightweight Shells Built for Long Sets

The DT 30 IE weighs 2.7 grams per side, which is extremely light for a stage IEM. beyerdynamic says the shell shape was developed using hundreds of ear scans, with the goal of creating a secure, ergonomic fit that stays in place during long rehearsals and full sets.

That lines up with what we found in our coverage of the DT 70-73 IE Series. beyerdynamic’s recent pro IEM designs are compact, lightweight, and clearly intended for real-world use rather than desk-bound audiophile pampering. Fit still matters, and memory wire can be a little fussy depending on your ears, but the company has been taking stage comfort seriously.

The DT 30 IE also uses an over-ear cable design with integrated memory wire to help keep the monitors locked in place during movement.

Rugged Enough for Stage Abuse

Beyerdynamic has also given the DT 30 IE some practical durability features. The monitors carry an IP54 rating for protection against dust and water splashes, which is useful for sweat, rehearsal rooms, outdoor gigs, and the general filth of live music life.

The included 1.4-meter Kevlar-reinforced detachable cable uses MMCX connectors and terminates in a 3.5mm 3-pole plug. The cable is designed to minimize handling noise, while the detachable design means it can be replaced if it fails. Gold-plated connectors, spare foam cerumen filters, and separately available replacement parts also point to a product intended to survive beyond one tour, one semester, or one chaotic weekend of bar gigs.

The package includes the cable, silicone tips, foam tips, spare filters, quick start guide, and carrying case.

How the DT 30 IE Fits Below the DT 70 IE Series

The DT 70 IE Series remains the more advanced and specialized option in beyerdynamic’s in-ear monitor range. In our review of the DT 70-73 IE models, the key story was how beyerdynamic used the same basic platform across four versions but tuned each one for a specific use case.

The DT 30 IE strips that idea down to something more accessible. One model. One price. One all-purpose tuning.

That may actually be the smarter move for a lot of musicians. Not everyone needs a dedicated IEM for drum monitoring, vocal work, classical instruments, or neutral reference listening. A lot of performers just need something that isolates well, fits securely, sounds balanced, and does not cost more than the gig pays.

At $159.99, the DT 30 IE is clearly aimed at that audience.

The Bottom Line

The DT 30 IE is for musicians who are ready to stop using consumer earbuds or fighting bad floor wedges and move into proper in-ear monitoring. It should make the most sense for vocalists, drummers, guitarists, keyboard players, worship musicians, rehearsal bands, small venue performers, and anyone who needs isolation and reliable monitoring without spending custom-IEM money.

It is probably not the IEM for listeners chasing luxury materials, exotic multi-driver configurations, or boutique tuning drama. This is a stage tool first.

That is not a bad thing. In fact, it might be the entire point. The DT 30 IE looks like beyerdynamic’s attempt to bring its pro IEM thinking to a price that working musicians can actually justify. For $159.99, that could make it one of the more practical new in-ear monitor options for performers who need to hear themselves clearly before the room, the drummer, or the house mix ruins the evening.

Price & Availability

The beyerdynamic DT 30 IE retail for $159.99 through beyerdynamic and authorized retailers. However, we currently see them on sale for $119 at Audio46.

Related Reading:

The screen-time debate is no longer confined to parenting advice. As states introduce legislation limiting devices in schools, and pediatric researchers rethink how digital environments affect development, educators are confronting a difficult question: when does technology support learning, and when does it undermine it?

In the first part of this series, I examined the American Academy of Pediatrics’ updated guidance on children’s digital ecosystems and how screens can shape early development at home. The same principles now apply in another place where children spend much of their day: school.

Screens are already a routine part of early childhood classrooms. In a 2025 RAND survey of pre-K teachers, roughly two-thirds reported using games on electronic devices in their classrooms. At the same time, a growing body of research is raising new questions about how different types of digital media affect children’s developing brains.

One frequently cited Canadian longitudinal study followed nearly 2,500 children between 24 and 36 months old and found that higher levels of screen time were associated with missed developmental milestones on screening tests at ages 36 to 60 months. That means that we’re seeing the developmental effects of increased toddler screen time as early as one year later.

Other studies suggest that certain types of media may be particularly overstimulating for young children. Fast-paced content designed to capture attention usually features rapid scene changes, constant motion, bright colors and loud sound effects. I love shows like Netflix’s “Word Party” for the language acquisition skills it teaches, but its features can overwhelm developing brains and temporarily disrupt executive functions such as attention, emotional regulation and self-control (ask me how I know).

These design features are meant to hold viewers’ attention, but the result can sometimes be what many parents recognize instantly: the moment when their sweet child suddenly turns into what I jokingly call a “screen monster.” I have three of them. I can’t imagine a classroom full of screen monsters.

As new technology becomes even more embedded in our lives, screens have become more pervasive in both homes and classrooms. And because technology changes so frequently, it’s helpful for educators to understand how instructional technology choices can either support or disrupt healthy digital environments for students.

I know this tension well, both as a parent and as a behavioral science and public health researcher. In the first part of this column series, I wrote about how screens have both helped and challenged my own family as we navigated parenting during the pandemic. Like most parents and teachers, we are still figuring it out. I’ve written previously about how short-form video addiction has made its way to Gen Z and Gen Alpha. And I recently reported the results of a research project we did at EdSurge that showed that prohibiting devices doesn’t really meet its intended goal.

Devices, screens, algorithms and technology in general have mutated from a household question to an education policy issue.

The Emerging Landscape of Technology Regulation

From a public health perspective, digital media is becoming part of the broader developmental environment shaping childhood development.

In education, conversations about technology traditionally have focused on the digital divide and ensuring equitable access to devices and internet connectivity. That conversation is shifting.

Researchers are now examining how digital environments affect sleep, attention, emotion regulation and social development. Population-level research suggests that heavy or poorly designed media exposure can contribute to sleep disruption, emotional dysregulation and difficulty disengaging from devices. Remember, screen monsters are lurking with their snotty noses and sippy cups.

Now, these concerns are beginning to influence policy.

Across several states, lawmakers are proposing restrictions on student device usage during the school day, including bans on smartphones and new scrutiny of edtech that uses personalized algorithms to maximize engagement. Since many edtech companies have enhanced or marketed their AI-powered features, the competition to capture and hold students’ attention has likely stiffened.

This is a significant shift. Historically, digital technology, social media and the Internet has been one of the least regulated environments with, arguably, among the greatest effects on both children’s and adults’ lives. Technological change often moves faster than public policy and data, leaving lawmakers and educators to respond after new tools become widespread.

Now the regulatory landscape appears to be catching up and entering the environments children already inhabit.

So What Should Educators Do?

What started as a deeply personal parenting dilemma has become a much larger question for schools. As pediatric researchers update guidance on children’s digital environments, and states debate limits on student screen exposure, educators are being asked to reconsider how technology shapes the cognitive environments where children learn.

The debate often falls into extremes. Some people argue that screens are ruining learning. Others claim that technology is the future of education.

The research suggests that the truth lies somewhere in the middle.

This is one of those test questions where “all of the above” fits best. How screens affect children depends heavily on context, content and duration of use. A passive, fast-paced digital experience is very different from an interactive lesson where students discuss ideas, solve problems or collaborate with peers.

It can be tempting to respond to uncertainty by rejecting technology altogether. And I don’t fault that perspective, because I believe that response comes from a desire to protect kids from unpredictable harm. But the reality is that there is no one-size-fits-all approach for every child, classroom, school or community.

Public health offers a useful framework for thinking about this challenge: harm reduction.

When an exposure is widespread and difficult to eliminate, reducing risk is often more effective than banning it outright. Seatbelts and car seats made riding in cars and buses safer, instead of banning vehicles to reduce vehicular accidents. That’s a classic harm-reduction strategy.

Similarly, screens are unlikely to disappear from classrooms. The more productive question is how educators can create guardrails that reduce potential harms while preserving the benefits of digital tools. I think students would keep using devices, anyway. What’s school without TikTok dances nowadays?

That means choosing technology that supports interaction rather than passive consumption, and balancing digital activities with discussion and hands-on learning. The personalized algorithms in edtech are becoming more common, but the science suggests that it’s best to avoid tools designed primarily to maximize screen engagement.

As states debate new regulations on student screen exposure, educators and school leaders will increasingly be asked to make decisions about how technology shapes the environments where children learn.

The research offers a useful starting point: children’s brains learn best through interaction, conversation, manageable stimulation, productive struggle, and moments of curiosity that make ideas stick.

Technology can support those experiences. But it cannot and will not replace the relationships between students and the adults who teach and care for them.

The real question for schools is not whether screens belong in classrooms, but whether they help students think, or simply keep them clicking and scrolling.