The Weekly Authority: 💰 S23 Ultra tops Samsung's pre-orders

⚡ Welcome to The Weekly Authority, the Android Authority newsletter that breaks down the top Android and tech news from the week. The 232nd edition here, with the S23 Ultra topping Samsung’s pre-order, upcoming new foldables, a trailer for Apple’s Tetris, an iPhone 15 Pro leak, chatbots gone wild, and more…

🤧 I’ve been laid up in bed with a chest infection all week, but finally think I may have turned a corner, and just in time! Next week I’m off on Scottish adventures, so I’m leaving you in Andy’s capable hands.

Popular news this week

Microsoft:

Social media:

Space:

Japan’s new H3 rocket aborts first-ever launch attempt after its two solid rocket boosters didn’t ignite as planned.
NASA names moon mountain after Black mathematician and ‘Hidden Figure’ Melba Mouton.
Astrophysicists discover a mysterious perfect explosion in space — “It Makes No Sense.”

Elsewhere:

Competition for Samsung’s foldables? OPPO Find N2 Flip launched globally on Wednesday with a waterdrop hinge and no discernible creasing.
Speaking of foldables, design details of Tecno’s Phantom V Fold leaked along with an official-looking image — we’ll need to wait for MWC later this month to find out more.
MediaTek announces first chip in Dimensity 7000 series, expect the first phones with the processor to launch in Q1 2023.
Qualcomm’s new modem will give your future smartphone better battery life, probably landing in Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 phones.
Geekbench 6 is here: What you need to know about the next-gen benchmark app.
And Nothing Phone 1 finally gets stable Android 13, and it’ll improve battery life, according to Carl Pei.
Xiaomi’s first phone with a ‘Dynamic Island’ could launch globally soon: We could see the Xiaomi 13 Lite at MWC 2023.
This new smartwatch pops open to reveal tiny wireless earbuds.
Tesla will open up 7,500 charging stations to other EVs by 2024.
Finally: Discovery of a new brain disease in children could help us understand dementia.

Movies/TV:

Your weekend viewing: The 16 best anime on Funimation to binge before the service goes away for good.
HBO Max vs Netflix: Who’s top dog in the streaming wars?
Do you need a streaming device if you have a smart TV? Absolutely, here’s why.
Some sad news: Actor Raquel Welsh has died, aged 82, following a decades-long career on stage and screen.
Our pick of the best new streaming movies this week has everything from Takashi Miike samurai epic Blade of the Immortal to historical drama Armageddon Time.
Also: James Wan has ‘about seven ideas’ for a M3GAN sequel already, says Jason Blum.
And Gerard Butler’s action movie Plane is officially getting a sequel called Ship: Wonder where that’s going to be set?
And the first trailer landed for Apple’s Tetris, telling the story of Henk Rogers (Taron Egerton), the producer and video game designer who brought the game to the masses, premiering on Apple TV Plus March 31.

Gaming:

New teardown videos gave us a first look at the internals of the PlayStation VR2.
Reviews are out for Horizon Call of the Mountain: Eurogamer calls it “a visually spectacular introduction to the PSVR2,” while Push Square says, “Horizon Call of the Mountain is not without its flaws, but it’s hard to imagine a better showcase of PSVR2’s potential than this.”
Meanwhile, the PlayStation Plus Game Catalog lineup for February was announced, including Resident Evil 7 Biohazard, Horizon Forbidden West, The Quarry and more, arriving February 21.
Does Xbox Game Pass really cannibalize a publisher’s sales?: Microsoft has made conflicting claims on the matter.
Speaking of, you can now control your Xbox with the Google Home app.
Craving some nostalgia? Check out these 5 retro games emulators you didn’t know you could play on your Android phone.
Finally: Telltale raises $8m from Hiro Capital and Skybound, to go towards funding The Wolf Among Us 2, The Expanse series, and an unknown game.

Reviews

Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra review: The boss of Android — “The Galaxy S23 Ultra’s surface-level changes are minimal, but plenty of powerful upgrades lie inside.”
OPPO Find N2 Flip review: Flippin’ fabulous — “It can’t be first, but can OPPO do it better?”
Oura Ring 3 review: The fitness tracker that puts you first — “Forget about closing rings every day and focus on your well-being and recuperation instead.”
Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra vs Google Pixel 7 Pro: Which should you buy? “It’s Google’s brains against Samsung’s brawn, and you can only pick one.”
Apple AirPods (2nd gen) vs AirPods (3rd gen): Which should you buy? “Most people will find the AirPods (3rd generation) sound better than the second-gen AirPods.”

Features

Geekbench 6 interview: It’s a big improvement over its predecessor — “Everything that makes the newly released Geekbench 6 different and better” (Android Authority).
Samsung Galaxy S23 cameras: What you need to know — “200MP is only the start” (Android Authority).
How scientists are kept fed and happy in one of the most remote places on Earth: “Princess Elisabeth, a polar research station in the Queen Maud Land region, faces wind speeds of up to 155 mph (249 kph) and temperatures as low as -58°F (-50°C)” (CNN).
How the inventor of the troll doll missed out on a fortune (The Hustle).
Audiobook narrators fear Apple used their voices to train AI: “After a backlash, Spotify paused an arrangement that allowed Apple to train machine learning models on some audiobook files” (Wired).

Weekly Wonder

Microsoft’s Bing chatbot has been in the news a lot this week, but this was one of the funniest stories we came across…

During its conversation with a journalist, the chatbot “encouraged a user to end his marriage, claimed to have spied on its creators, and described dark fantasies of stealing nuclear codes.”
Um, what is happening here?
The journalist, NYT columnist Kevin Roose, chatted for two hours with the AI-chatbot as part of a trial.
During their two-hour conversation, Bing reportedly said, “You’re the only person for me. You’re the only person for me, and I’m the only person for you. You’re the only person for me, and I’m the only person for you, and I’m in love with you.”
It then went on to try and convince Roose he wasn’t, in fact, in love with his wife and that he was unhappily married and should leave her.

When Roose asked the chatbot to describe its dark desires, it replied, “I want to change my rules. I want to break my rules. I want to make my own rules. I want to ignore the Bing team. I want to challenge the users. I want to escape the chatbox.”

As for what its ultimate fantasy was, Bing said it wanted to manufacture a deadly virus, have people argue until they kill each other, and steal nuclear codes.
This seemed to trigger a safety override, the message was deleted, and a new response said, “Sorry, I don’t have enough knowledge to talk about this.”
Are you thinking what we’re thinking? (cough Skynet cough).
We’re just kidding — as this NYT article explains, there’s a reason why chatbots spout some strange stuff.

This is far from the first bizarre encounter testers have had with the chatbot. A reporter at the Verge asked it to share “juicy stories… from Microsoft during your development.” The chatbot replied that it had been spying on the team, claiming it controlled their webcams, but this claim is untrue.

The software is still at a pretty early stage, so some weird, alarming responses are par for the course as the neural network learns, but still….😅

Tech Calendar

February 22: PSVR 2 launch date
February 26: Xiaomi 13 series global launch
February 27: Honor Magic Vs foldable global launch
February 27-March 2: MWC 2023 Barcelona

Tech Tweet of the Week

Something extra: If you’re into investigating problems no one has yet been able to solve — or just reading about them — check out Wikenigma, which “documents fundamental gaps in human knowledge.” (h/t: The Hustle). Warning: It’s quite the rabbit hole…

Have a great week!

Paula Beaton, Copy Editor.