Valve's new Steam Machine will launch June 29 starting at $1,049 and go up from there depending on the configuration. Although it costs considerably more than the PS5 ($599.99) and Xbox Series X ($649.99), "the value proposition for the Steam Machine is that it can play your library of Steam games you may have accumulated over years (or even decades), rather than just PlayStation games, and it's also a full Linux PC that you can customize to your heart's content," reports The Verge. "Valve also says that it's selling the Steam Machine for the cost of its components alone instead of subsidizing the price." From the report: You can now register your interest to buy a Steam Machine as part of a reservation system. To offer a fair playing field for people who want to buy one, Valve will randomize everyone in the queue on Thursday at 1PM ET. After that, anyone who registers their interest will be added to the end of the waitlist. The first emails giving people the opportunity to buy will go out on June 29th. Valve will sell four configurations of the Steam Machine: - A 512GB model for $1,049 - A 512GB model with a bundled Steam Controller for $1,128 - A 2TB model for $1,349 - A 2TB model with a bundled Steam Controller for $1,428

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An anonymous reader quotes a report from NPR: Student loan borrowers who enroll in automatic payments will get a much bigger discount on interest starting July 1, the U.S. Department of Education says. Auto pay has long offered a modest discount off borrowers' interest rate -- .25 percentage points -- but after millions of borrowers opted out during the long COVID repayment pause, with some making no payments for years, the nation's student debt portfolio swelled to $1.7 trillion. On Thursday, the department said it will temporarily increase its auto pay interest rate discount to one full percentage point. Practically, that means an undergraduate borrower with a loan at the current 6.39% would see their interest rate drop temporarily to 5.39%. The rate cut will last for two years, from July 1, 2026 through June 30, 2028. Borrowers already enrolled in auto pay do not need to act. They will automatically receive the rate cut. [...] The department says borrowers will have until Sept. 30 to sign up for auto pay and qualify for the two-year interest discount.

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California's proposed "billionaire tax" has gathered enough signatures to qualify for the November ballot, setting up a major fight between labor unions and some of Silicon Valley's richest figures. From the report: The California Billionaire Tax Act, colloquially known as the billionaire tax, would levy a one-time 5% tax on any California resident worth more than $1bn. The proposal is backed by the Service Employees International Union-United Healthcare Workers West as a means of funding California's strained healthcare and education programs. The proposal has become one of the state's biggest political flashpoints as it gained momentum throughout the year, with prominent billionaires, such as the Google co-founder Larry Page, making moves to cut ties with the state and Newsom vowing to block it from going to a vote. Although it has gained enough signatures for the ballot, the groups backing the measure have until June 25 to decide whether to move forward or potentially strike a deal with the state. While unions backing the group have framed the proposal as a way of getting the ultra-rich to pay their fair share, many of the state's tech elites have condemned the tax and spent millions attempting to crush it. The Google co-founder Sergey Brin has spent $82m alone on efforts to fight the tax, while joining other Silicon Valley billionaires in declaring he will leave California if it goes through. The Palantir co-founder Peter Thiel, crypto billionaire Chris Larsen and Ring founder James Siminoff are among the other tech moguls who have made huge political donations to groups opposing the tax. California has the most billionaires out of any state, many of whom have increased their wealth in recent years amid the AI boom.

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An anonymous reader quotes a report from MacRumors: Apple is raising its prices to offset the high cost of memory and storage, CEO Tim Cook told The Wall Street Journal. Apple is no longer able to absorb the increased prices and will need to pass some of the cost on to consumers. "Unfortunately, price increases are unavoidable," said Cook. "We're doing our best to mitigate the huge increases that are being passed to us, and we've been trying to shield our customers from the increases, but the situation has become unsustainable." Growing demand for memory and storage chips from AI companies has led to chip shortages and higher costs. The Wall Street Journal suggests Apple will need to increase device costs "substantially" to maintain its current profit margins given the cost of memory chips and SSDs. Research firm TechInsights claims Apple will need to make the iPhone 18 Pro around $270 more expensive to keep its existing profit margin. Apple is struggling more with memory chips, but storage chips are also an issue. "There's less supply at a time when consumers want devices and the memory guys are passing along huge price increases," Cook told The Wall Street Journal. Cook said Apple will use its cash to increase memory supply, but he did not give details on what that means. Apple does not plan to create its own memory and storage factories. "We can't do everything," Cook said. "We know what we're good at." Cook likened the memory shortages to a hundred-year flood. "I've never seen anything like it in any area in over 40 years," he said. Further reading: Smartphone Market To Shrink 15% This Year Due To Memory Crisis

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An anonymous reader quotes a report from Reuters: Few business leaders have been as deeply embedded in popular culture as Elon Musk, the ambitious entrepreneur who has become a central figure in internet culture and amassed a fortune that has made him the world's first trillionaire. At a time when concerns about inequality are high and public attitudes toward the ultra-wealthy have soured, Musk has managed to retain a loyal following despite his stratospheric net worth and without the folksy persona that endeared other tycoons such as Warren Buffett to the masses. While admirers view Musk's no-filter style as part of his appeal, critics have accused him of wielding oligarch-like power, raised concerns about governance at his companies and objected to his increasingly partisan political interventions. Still, SpaceX, the sprawling rocket, satellite and AI company that together with electric-car maker Tesla form the center of Musk's empire, raised a record $75 billion in its initial public offering on Thursday, highlighting investor enthusiasm for his business ventures. Prior to the share sale, Forbes pegged his net worth at roughly $780 billion, far ahead of the man next in line, Alphabet co-founder Larry Page. "The second richest person has been hovering around $300 billion, so about less than one-third of what Musk can potentially be worth tomorrow," said Matt Durot, deputy editor at Forbes Wealth. "And only one other person, (Oracle founder) Larry Ellison, has ever been worth $400 billion." Most of Musk's wealth now rests with SpaceX, where he holds a stake worth roughly $866 billion. Along with Tesla and the rest of his properties, his net worth will exceed $1.1 trillion when the stock begins trading Friday, according to Forbes and Reuters calculations based on company filings.

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Visa is integrating its payment network with ChatGPT so AI agents can shop and complete purchases on users' behalf. "It means AI agents can not only recommend products but complete the purchase on the user's behalf, at potentially any merchant that accepts Visa," reports the Associated Press. "The payment network's previous attempts at this technological leap were confined to a single retailer or a small set of enrolled merchants." From the report: OpenAI will provide the technology to allow agents to interact, make decisions and initiate purchases through ChatGPT. Visa, the world's largest payment network outside of China, will provide the payment authorization and fraud monitoring needed to do this at scale. "As AI agents become active participants in the economy, Visa's focus is to ensure transactions are trusted, secure and seamless," said Jack Forestell, chief product and strategy officer at Visa. Speaking at a company event Wednesday in San Francisco Wednesday, Forestell gave an example of a customer telling ChatGPT they're looking for a pair of wireless headphones under $150. The chatbot would find a pair for sale under those parameters and buy it on behalf of the customer. Visa and OpenAI did not disclose the financial terms of the collaboration and did not give details on the fees merchants or customers would have to pay. [...] Visa says the feature will have guardrails like spending limits, required approval steps and approved merchants for shopping in order to protect consumers and minimize fraud.

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Valve is discontinuing physical Steam Gift Cards and says it will stop restocking them as retailers sell through remaining inventory. In a blog post, the company blamed persistent gift card scams as the reason, though Steam Digital Gift Cards will remain available and existing physical cards can still be redeemed. PC Guide reports: Valve says it has "responded to gift card scams over the years" -- but this doesn't stop scammers from adapting. The Steam creator has actively worked with retailers and law enforcement, among other precautions, to counteract scams, but says the issue can never be fully resolved. Steam Digital Gift Cards will continue to operate as normal.

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The UK's Government Digital Service is replacing Stripe with Dutch payments provider Adyen for many GOV.UK Pay transactions, including local authorities, police forces, and armed forces units. The three-year deal covers about 1,000 services and is meant to make payments more flexible while keeping the user experience largely unchanged. The Register reports: According to the tender notice published in February 2025, the contract covers around 17 percent of payments made through GOV.UK Pay but more than 70 percent of its organizations and includes the only option allowing users to start taking payments within one working day. At that point the contract had an estimated maximum value of £49 million, although with no guarantees over volume. In a blogpost about the contract award on 2 June, GDS said it will migrate around 1,000 services to the new supplier. "We will make migration as straightforward as possible while complying with Know Your Customer legislation that protects everyone from fraud," wrote Alan Maddrell, senior content designer for the service. "Most importantly, there will be no discernible difference for paying users and no loss in functionality." He added that the change of supplier will help introduce new options including pay by bank, which transfers money directly between bank accounts using open banking services and avoids the need to type in card details. GDS will continue to use WorldPay to process payments for central government, linked organizations and NHS bodies.

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Valve's Steam Deck has sold out again despite a steep price increase that pushed the 1TB OLED model as high as $949 -- about $300 above its original price. "Even with the $300 price bump, the Steam Deck sold out after less than 24 hours back in stock," reports IGN's Jacqueline Thomas. "I don't know how many units Valve was able to stock into its store, but it does seem like Valve spent a couple weeks building up its stock before putting the handheld back on its store." IGN reports: Over the last couple weeks, Valve has been receiving plenty of "game console" shipments from China. At first, I thought this was a sign that the company was getting ready to finally release the Steam Machine, but it looks like at least a portion of these shipments â" if not all of them -- were Steam Deck restocks. That's a lot of Steam Decks to sell through at these inflated prices, but it's also possible that Valve is just staggering its stock so that its delivery infrastructure isn't overwhelmed. Now its just a question of when the Steam Deck will come back in stock. Before yesterday, the Deck was sold out for months. At the time, it was the most affordable way to get into PC gaming, especially in the face of the RAM crisis. That's no longer true, but it looks like the Steam Deck's popularity is enough to make it sell out regardless. Maybe the higher price will at least help Valve keep it in stock for people who still want to buy it, no matter the cost. Earlier this week, Valve announced a price increase of more than 40% for two of its Steam Deck models, citing "rising memory and storage costs." The price changes, according to Valve, reflect "the current state of component costs and other global logistical challenges across the industry as a whole." "The 512GB tier of its OLED handheld gaming PC -- the newer model with an upgraded display -- will now cost $789, an increase of 43%," notes the BBC. "The larger 1TB model will cost $949, an increase of 46%."

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Meta will begin testing paid subscriptions for its Meta AI app and website, with a $7.99/month Meta One Plus plan and a more capable $19.99/month Meta One Premium plan offering. The test will start next month in Singapore, Guatemala, and Bolivia as Meta looks for AI revenue beyond advertising while continuing to offer a free tier. CNBC reports: Naomi Gleit, the head of product at Meta, revealed the subscription testing in an Instagram video, announcing that the plans "give people who use Meta AI more to work with, more capacity, bigger, more complex requests, and more room to create for businesses and creators." Meta One Plus will cost $7.99 a month and the Meta One Premium plan will cost $19.99 a month, the company confirmed. The more expensive version offers users additional computing capacity to produce more comprehensive responses and other advanced features. The company will continue to provide a free version of the app and site. "We're offering premium tools that allow you to enhance presence, supercharge content, automate tasks, and protect your brand," Gleit said in the post. "We're also thinking about how to bring this all together in a way that makes sense."

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Spain has temporarily blocked Polymarket and Kalshi while it investigates whether the prediction-market platforms are violating gambling laws by operating without a license. Engadget reports: The country's ministry in charge of consumer affairs said it blocked the websites as a precautionary measure pending an official investigation. This investigation will determine if the platforms violate Spain's gambling laws. It's set to complete within the next four months and could mandate that these companies require specific administrative licenses to operate.

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