🌞 Good morning! I regret to inform you that despite all of the annoyances with Diablo Immortal, I keep finding myself logging on to do a dungeon. Good Diablo times.

Samsung FE finished?

There’s at least some rumors emerging that Samsung might not produce a Galaxy S22 FE, and furthermore, that the Fan Edition releases may end up being canceled as well.

What’s happened:

• According to “multiple sources” anonymously speaking with SamMobile, Samsung could be thinking about killing off the entire Fan Edition line.
• This would mean no Galaxy S22 FE or any other FE models going forward.
• SamMobile also points out “the SM-S900, which would have been the Galaxy S22 FE’s model number, doesn’t exist,” and at this point last year, there were plenty of hints that the S21 FE was in the works, including official renders leaking in April and then in June.
• This year, nothing.
• Hmm.

History:

• If you recall, Samsung’s FE line was kicked off via the Samsung Galaxy S20 FE back in 2020.
• And, it was pretty great: it sold well, it offered most of the important specs of the $999 Galaxy S20 smartphone but at $699, and even won Android Authority’s Editor’s Pick award for 2020 smartphone of the year.
• Unfortunately, the Galaxy S21 FE was a mixed bag. The phone itself was actually fine, but instead of launching around August 2021, it came out in early 2022 at $699.
• That made it close enough to the Galaxy S21 ($799) to be confusing, and then the Galaxy S22 series promptly came out in February, just a few weeks later.
• Again, the phone was fine, it just missed its window for enthusiasts. (Even now, the S21 FE is absolutely a decent buy given you get 4.5 years of updates, and it’s at a much-reduced price compared to RRP.)

What’s next:

• Samsung already killed off the Note series.
• And, it has put more wood behind its premium S-series, value-packed A-series, and Z series of foldables.
• The FE range may come again. As a concept, it’s possible a Galaxy Fold FE of some kind would sell well, offering the new foldable tech but just taking a step back on flagship chip/camera specs to deliver a more affordable option.
• Who knows, I just don’t doubt at some point, Samsung will opt to bring out an FE again — and the rumor of the S22 FE not coming may still be wrong.

Roundup

💳 Samsung launches Samsung Wallet, a one-stop shop to manage your digital identity, essentially incorporating Samsung Pay, Samsung Pass, and Samsung SmartThings in one, though not replacing them (Android Authority).

📺 Samsung once again caught cheating on benchmarks (Android Authority).

📅 Amazon Prime Day 2022 dates and early deals announced (Android Authority).

⚡ Nothing Phone 1 caught on video. It glows. (Android Authority).

👉 Intel’s Arc A380 GPU launches in China for around $150 USD (PCGamer).

📈 Tesla increases prices across lineup, with Model X up as much as $6,000 (TechCrunch).

🏎️ Sony is making a Gran Turismo movie, for some reason, due next August: a gamer becomes a racing driver (Ars Technica).

⛔ Senate considers ban on data brokers selling health and location info (Engadget).

🧊 “It’s hard to do climate research when your glacier is melting” (Wired).

🎹 This PC orchestra, built from 512 floppy disk drives, is wondrous to hear and behold (The Verge).

💍 This is just a nice little story about a ring and Australia’s postal system (Twitter).

⛽ “Manager who accidentally listed gas for 69 cents fired after $16,000 loss” (Jalopnik).

🌴 “ELI5: Why does the US have huge cities in the desert?” (r/explainlikeimfive). (Mostly for the super interesting answers!)

Throwback Thursday

I was digging back into Internet Explorer’s death and remembered some weird Chrome bugs at the same time.

I didn’t see this one happen, but wow, this is an incredibly fun story:

• In Chrome version: 3.0.197.0., a brief Canary release, the X button was …a face.

As mentioned in this hilarious bug report, with screenshot (I found the original on Wayback Machine):

• What steps will reproduce the problem?
  • 1. Look at what the X button is supposed to be
• What is the expected result?
  • an X button
• What happens instead?
  • Some guys head

Zooming in a bit:

• And here’s why it happened: apparently that’s Glen Murphy’s head, and this “feature” was a reminder from one Google team to another that they were waiting on certain design elements.
• And, oops, it shipped to users (though only those alpha testers).

Cheers,

Tristan Rayner, Senior Editor.