It appears that Petco Animal Supplies, better known as Petco, is turning to smart speakers to differentiate itself from the competition in an increasingly turbulentpet productsmarket. A newinterviewon the Geomarketing blog with a professional from Petco partnerAlpine.AI, a major developer of Google Assistant apps and Amazon Alexa skills, lays out the company’s strategy to position itself as the “best source of information” for pet owners. The development of the new strategy comes from areportfrom Moody’s, as reported by RetailDive, which says that online sales are the fastest growing channel for pet sales and will be for the next five years....

“We wanted to make a game like what we played in our youth,” said Ironbird Creations studio head Alex Godlewska, about its debut projectPhantom Hellcat. Described in Ironbird’s promotional materials as “Devil May CrymeetsNier: Automata, with a twist,”PhantomHellcatis a stylish action game being built in Krakow, Poland. It was shown off-site at this year’s Penny Arcade Expo in Seattle, where I had the chance to interview Godlewska. She describesHellcatas “pure” by design, as it deliberately avoids the inclusion of heavy RPG elements like leveling up or Soulslike mechanics....

HMD Global, the company that sellsNokia-branded phones, is one of the few companies still investing in feature phones, and it has announced three new models — the Nokia 110, the Nokia 2720, and the Nokia 800 Tough. Sounds like madness, doesn’t it? After all, we typically lust after smartphones with multiple camera lenses, big OLED touchscreens, and processors with enough power to run a city. Not alphanumeric keypads and plastic bodies....

The first Samsung Galaxy Unpacked for 2022 came and went onFebruary 9as Samsung launched the highly anticipatedGalaxy S22, Galaxy S22 Plus, and the Galaxy S22 Ultra. We also got three new tablets in theGalaxy Tab S8, Galaxy Tab S8 Plus, and the Galaxy Tab S8 Ultra. Each of these devices comes feature-packed with top-of-the-line specifications — and price points to match. So without further ado, let’s dive into it. Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra The belle of the ball was arguably theSamsung Galaxy S22 Ultra....

Over the past several years, Sony has become a big player in the world ofnoise-canceling headphones, with itsWH-1000XM3over-ears easily ranking as our favorite pair of headphones ever since its launch. Today, the company has announced it will take a shrink ray to that tech, putting their acclaimed noise-canceling chip inside a brand new pair oftrue wireless earbuds, the WF-1000XM3 (we know, confusing name). The new headphones are packed with compelling features, including six hours of battery life with noise-canceling on (eight hours with it off) and a 24-hour charging case, and touch controls....

TheSurface Laptop Go 3is a fast, but affordable new laptop from Microsoft’s latest line of Surface devices. Announced atMicrosoft’s September 2023 Surface event, it offers a speedy modern processor, plenty of SSD storage space, and a range of color options for the chassis. You can get the complete Surface package for $799, but you can configure it with more of less components to make it best suited for your needs....

Japanese role-playing games have their own unique blend of story, gameplay, and, in a lot of cases, style. There’s something in the combination of turn-based battles, usually with unique mechanics, character progression, and item management, that makes JRPGs so engaging, often for hours on end. In this guide, we’ve rounded up the 10 best JRPGs that you should play. For this list, we’re defining JRPGs as a genre. All of our games are from Japanese studios, but we didn’t include, for example,Dark Souls....

Tired of the constant upkeep required to keep your pool in good condition? While there are some aspects that are hard to automate (such as chemical treatments or maintaining pumps and skimmers), you may delegate vacuuming to a reliable robot assistant. Pool robot vacuums have seen big improvements over the past few years, and they make it easier than ever to keep your pool looking brand new. Built to run autonomously after a brief setup, pool robot vacuums will suck up all the dirt and debris lingering in the water....

A point will come within the next five decades where the number of memorial accounts on Facebook will outnumber those belonging to living individuals. That’s the finding of the University of Oxford’sInternet Institute, which studied the demographics of current (living) Facebook users, while projecting future growth of the site to calculate this inflection point. OII believes that some 1.4billionusers will die before 2100. Using this estimate as a guide, accounts belonging to dead users (well, to their estates) will outnumber living ones by around 2070 or so....

Back in 2019, OpenAI refused to release its full research into the development of GPT2 over fears that it was “too dangerous” to release publicly. On Thursday, OpenAI’s biggest financial backer, Microsoft,made a similar pronouncementabout itsnew VALL-E 2 voice synthesizer AI. The VALL-E 2 system is a zero-shot text-to-speech synthesis (TTS) AI, meaning that it can recreate hyper-realistic speech based on just a few seconds of sample audio. Per the research team, VALL-E 2 “surpasses previous systems in speech robustness, naturalness, and speaker similarity....

IfBluetooth speaker dealsandsoundbar dealsaren’t enough for you to get your premium audio fix, it might be time to invest in something more powerful. You may want to go for the Platin Monaco 5.1.2 wireless home theater system, which is on sale from Amazon with a 15% discount that brings its price down to $849 from $999 originally. It’s still pretty expensive, but you won’t regret making this purchase, especially if you hurry so you can make sure to pocket the savings of $150....

Tinder-like dating app for Smash players claims Nintendo sent them a cease & desist A dating app for Super Smash Bros players says it received a cease and desist the day before entering its open beta stage. In June 2024, a new app called ‘SmashTogether’ was announced as the “premium dating site for SuperSmashBros enjoyers.” Screenshots of the app showed that users could list their tag, mains, ranking, ages, notable players they’ve beaten, and location....

Walking Dead fans heartbroken after The Ones Who Live Episode 4 The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live has fans an emotional wreck after Episode 4, with one particularly tough reference hitting a little too hard. The Walking Dead:The Ones Who Liveis in full swing now, with each new episode drawing more and more praise for its high-stakes action and intense character drama.Episode 4, the latest installment, saw Rick and Michonne trapped in an apartment building after their risky helicopter escape....