New parental controls and insights are coming soon

Dear parent,

We’ve been working on a series of important changes that we’ll be making to your child’s account, ____________, next month.

About Roblox accounts with parent privileges

Next month, we’re changing the way parents manage their child’s experience on Roblox by introducing Roblox accounts with parent privileges. After linking your account to your child’s, parents can view and update parental controls for their child all from their own device. Parents also get access to insights about their child’s Roblox usage, such as their daily screen time and on-platform friends.

Given these changes, starting next month, parents will no longer be able to set a parent PIN, use Account Restrictions, or receive account-related notifications to their parental email. Instead, you will need to use an account with parent privileges. Existing verified parental emails on child accounts will continue to be used for account recovery. Any settings previously set using a parent PIN will not change, but you will need an account with parent privileges to make updates going forward.

As always, if users are interested in an added layer of security on their account, you can set up 2-factor authentication.

Updated content maturity settings

As we shared with the community in July, to help provide parents and users more clarity into the types of content available on Roblox, we’ll soon begin labeling experiences based on the type of content users can expect in an experience, rather than by age. Experience Guidelines will be renamed Content Labels, and you’ll be able to set limits on the type of content accessible to your child through the content maturity setting in parental controls.

New default settings for users under the age of 13

As part of Roblox’s commitment to safety, we are also updating certain default settings for our youngest users. Starting next month, users under the age of 13 will need parent permission to access certain chat features. Users under the age of 9 will also need parent permission to access experiences with content maturity “Moderate,” which may contain things like moderate violence or moderate crude humor.

Your child’s settings will be updated when they reach certain ages, if you and your child haven’t previously made changes to them. You and your child will be notified of these updates in advance.

We will share more information on these setting updates when the changes go into effect next month.

Next steps

To continue receiving notifications about your child’s account related to spending or other important activity, you’ll need to set up a Roblox account with parent privileges and link to your child’s account. When these changes take effect, your child will receive a notification inviting them to add a linked parent account, and we’ll send you an email with instructions.

Since day one, Roblox has been committed to building safety features and tools into the design of our products. We will always continue to explore different ways to update our parental controls to make them even more useful for parents.

Roblox

I felt like I opened a can of worms when I asked Samsung about its stance on AI photo editing at Galaxy Unpacked back in January. “There is no such thing as a real picture,” Patrick Chomet, Samsung’s Head of Customer Experience, told me at the time – a nihilism-tinged soundbite that, in fairness, came as part of a nuanced and perfectly valid philosophical commentary on the nature of photography (in the same interview, Chomet rightly talked up the importance of validating authenticity).

Marques Brownlee recently included Chomet’s quote in an X post highlighting the differing opinions of Samsung, Apple, and Google on this very subject. Still, ultimately, all of the major phone manufacturers are offering similar editing features (Magic Eraser, Clean Up, AI Eraser, and so on).

GenAI is plain vanilla, if you ask the folks at Google India. As the tech behemoth rolled out its ambitious ‘Google for India’ repertoire for their biggest and fastest growing market, there was one familar focus area where further announcements predictably came – Google’s onboarding of Indian languages as a digital tool. And, of course, artificial intelligence (AI) and lots of it.

Well in verse with the parent company’s efforts to take the pole position in AI advancements and grab the thunder back from that petulant upstart called OpenAI is evidently a dream up there on Mountain View (where Google’s global HQ is), and the trickle down effect was well evident in many of the announcements in India on Thursday – Google’s Gemini AI can now go ‘Live’, with real time conversation by adapting to the user. The ‘Gemini Live’ feature is available in 8 Indian languages, besides English.

Google’s next-generation AI project called Astra is at the core of it, and while it is awaited, the slow rollout of its features, the company hopes, will be transformational. For now, there is already AI Overviews expected in Telugu, Tamil, Bengali and Marathi in the coming days, while ‘ask with video’ feature in Search also debuted, starting with English.

With image-based search on Maps, Gemini summarising Google reviews to save time, real-time weather and traffic updates on Maps, Google’s attempt is to make AI work for daily chores, beside the focus on Indian languages to take its tech evangelism to the hinterland. 

Another path-breaking endeavour has been in the field of healthcare. Not only is the company tying up with the government’s Ayushman Bharat project to roll out the issuance of the ABHA health ID through Google wallets soon, its iCALL feature whereby a user can call and speak to a health professional live has been expanded to more vernacular languages. And perhaps incredibly, its AI tools are now evolved enough to detect eye issues, TB and even cancer. For instance, TB could apparently be detected through just an audio sample analysis of a person’s sound!

Google also announced a spate of partnerships, right from Adani and CleanMax (for clean energy projects) to Muthoot (for online loan-against-gold) to Glance (skilling). 

Black Friday and Cyber Monday are some of the best periods to snag yourself a new smartwatch, especially if you’ve been waiting a while before upgrading. While the actual sales day might be a little while off, there are already a lot of great early Black Friday deals that you can take advantage of, including on some of the best smartwatches on the market. To that end, we’ve collected some of our favorite early deals for you below, although it’s also worth keeping an eye on our larger smartwatch deals roundup as well.

Garmin Forerunner 55 — $170 $220 15% off

While most smartwatches focus on the smartwatch part, the Garmin Forerunner 55 is made for runners who want to keep track of their overall fitness and their runs. It comes with GPS tracking in the three major systems, has a whole suite of sensors such as heart rate and Vo2 Max, and comes with a very solid $30 discount off the $200 price tag.

Samsung Galaxy Watch6 Classic — $270 $400 33% off

The Samsung Galaxy Watch6 Classic is easily one of the best Android phones on the market. In fact, when our senior mobile writer Andy Boxall got his hands on it, he felt that “the Galaxy Watch 6 Classic has superb styling, all-day comfort, comprehensive health tracking, and more. It’s the smartwatch to buy for your Android phone.” Even better, this deal lets you snag it for a substantial 33% discount.

Apple Watch Series 9 — $329 $429 23% off

For those who are in the Apple ecosystem, the Apple Watch Series 9 is probably one of the best and most affordable options, even more so with this impressive $100 discount. The conclusion our senior mobile writer came to when reviewing it was “The Apple Watch Series 9’s 24/7 comfort, extensive features, fast performance, and seamless integration with the iPhone make it a must-buy.”

Garmin Venu 3S GPS — $400 $450 11% off

If you’re just as interested in tracking your fitness as having a smartwatch, the Garmin Venu 3S GPS does a great job of balancing both, and since it comes from Garmin, you know that fitness tracking is top notch. Between the GPS coverage, Sleep Coach and Body Battery, you’ll have all the stats you need to refine your fitness journey, plus the $50 discount isn’t too bad either!

Apple Watch Ultra 2 GPS + Cellular — $680 $799 15% off

If you’re in the Apple ecosystem and truly want the best experience money can buy, then you’ll want this Apple Watch Ultra 2 GPS deal that knocks $119 off the price tag. Our senior mobile reviewer feels that it has “an outstanding design, great software, and some very welcome upgrades, the Apple Watch Ultra 2 is tough to beat.”

How to Choose a Smartwatch Deal on Black Friday

There are a lot of options out there for smartwatches, but for the most part, there are generally three big players on the market: Apple, Samsung, and Garmin. Apple Watches are made specifically for the Apple ecosystem, and if you’re in it, then you’ll want to go with one of those, with your main options being the Watch Series 9 for a good budget-friendly option, the Ultra Watch 2 for the best, and the Series 10 for something in the middle. We actually have a great breakdown of the Apple Watch Series 9 vs. Ultra 2, so be sure to check that out before taking the plunge.

On the other hand, Samsung is the go-to smartwatch maker for Android, and it generally has two options every generation: a standard model and a pro or classic model with a bezel that you can turn to control the watch. Samsung does have a high-end option in the form of the Galaxy Watch Ultra, but it borrows, almost to a comical extent, from the Apple Watch Ultra.

Finally, Garmin is the brand you go for if you want something more about fitness tracking than a smartwatch. It has a wide range of products, but the Forerunner lineup is great for runners, while the Venu is a great option for those who want a good balance between smartwatch and fitness tracker.

How We Chose These Smartwatch Black Friday Deals

Circle to Search is one of the most potentially useful AI-powered tools Google has developed for mobile devices. Currently, the feature is available on select smartphone models from some manufacturers. However, the expansion of Circle to Search continues, now reaching the Motorola Razr 2024 lineup.

This year, Motorola introduced the Razr Plus 2024 and Razr 2024, a pair of clamshell-designed and competitively priced foldable smartphones, with the aim of reaching the mass market. Perhaps these devices are among the reasons why sales of Galaxy foldable smartphones were below Samsung’s expectations this year. In any case, Motorola’s latest foldable phones are now equipped with Circle to Search, enhancing their functionality.

Motorola’s 2024 Razr foldable phones now support Circle to Search

Interestingly, it seems that Motorola is enabling Circle to Search via a security update for the Razr 2024 series. According to Android Central, the update’s changelog doesn’t mention anything beyond the usual bug fixes and performance optimizations. However, after installing the update, Circle to Search is available on both devices. The firmware is 1.05GB in size on the Razr Plus but just under 1GB on the Razr 2024.

Circle to Search is a quick way to trigger searches related to anything you see on your screen. After invoking it, you just need to circle or draw on an item on the screen. Then, you’ll immediately receive results related to the item. For instance, if you spot a pair of shoes that pique your interest, you can utilize Circle to Search to get the shoe’s model, price, and availability, among other details.

Circle to Search is actually a way to significantly speed up Google Lens searches. For instance, without this feature, a user on a phone would have to take a screenshot, share it with Lens, and then crop the image around the shoes. However, you can access all of Lens’s features from Circle to Search.

The feature is expanding at a slow pace

Initially, the option was only available on select Pixel and Galaxy phones. Later, brands like Xiaomi and Honor announced its availability on some models. Now Motorola is jumping on the bandwagon by rolling out Circle to Search practically by surprise. Although the brand had already announced that it would bring it to its devices, it has not even mentioned it in the changelog of the update that includes it.

Roblox has adopted several new policies designed to give parents control over how their children use the sprawling online game platform. reported that the company has created a new type of parental account so that a guardian can oversee their kids’ online activities and friends. Roblox is also now requiring parent permission for users under age 13 to access certain features. Users age 9 and younger will also need permission in order to access game modes with moderate violence or crude humor. The publication said these changes are slated to go into effect next month.

Concerns about safety for young players have been a recurring issue for Roblox. The platform faced a claiming exploitation of a minor in 2022. was reluctant to host the game on its hardware over questions of whether Roblox exposed children to inappropriate sexual content, and the same justification led to a earlier this year. Hindenburg Research recently released an about predatory behavior as well as misleading financial activity at Roblox (although that source has a shaky reputation of its own). An investigation by Bloomberg Businessweek found that at least two dozen people have been arrested by US law enforcement since 2018 for abusing or abducting child victims they met on Roblox.