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The Morning After: MoviePass shuts down

And how to commit consensual phishing.

Richard Lawler
Senior News Editor
·4 min read
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Hey, good morning! You look fabulous.

Apple's big iPhone 11 event revealed the biggest news of the week, but that's not all that happened. Tesla went plaid, we celebrated the Dreamcast and Honda put a price tag on its cute EV. Check out those highlights as well as big news from Friday including the end of MoviePass.

The end of a wild ride.MoviePass is shutting down on September 14th

In a press release, the company said its "efforts to recapitalize MoviePass have not been successful to date." All options are on the table, with MoviePass parent company Helios and Matheson Analytics saying it's considering, among other things, selling itself off entirely.

While the company experienced early success on the back of its $9.95 per month subscription plan and peaked at around 3 million customers, it has been struggling ever since. Not only did MoviePass change its pricing multiple times, in 2018 it was forced to borrow money to avoid bankruptcy. Earlier this year, the company temporarily shut down its app to work on it.

Now with four to five more hours of battery life.Apple reveals the powerful new iPhone 11 Pro and Pro Max

The iPhone 11 Pro and Pro Max are powered by Apple's new A13 Bionic processor, which is reportedly around 20 percent faster than last year's A12 when it comes to CPU and GPU speeds. That's the same CPU as the standard iPhone 11, so the big Pro benefits are a triple camera system and some glorious new Super Retina OLED screens with a 2,000,000:1 contrast ratio and up to 1,200 nits of brightness.

As for the triple cameras, they're housed in a square camera hump for the Wide, Ultra-Wide and telephoto lenses. An upcoming feature called Deep Fusion will use all three at once and then stitch the results together for higher-quality photos. Also, these phones are Apple's first to come with an 18W fast charger packed in.

Better battery life and dual cameras for the masses.iPhone 11: Still cheap and cheerful

The iPhone 11 will follow up last year's XR model by including a new A13 Bionic chipset (that it shares with the more expensive Pro edition). Its new chipset is both more powerful and more efficient, which is enough to extend battery life by another hour over the XR. Apple also upgraded the rear camera with a 12-megapixel ultra-wide lens for dual-lens action and Night Mode.

You can get its aluminum frame in six shades, and an updated front TrueDepth camera can pull off tricks like slow-motion selfies. Still, the best news about this mid-range phone might be the price -- it starts at $699.

Even more black.MIT scientists accidentally create the blackest material ever

MIT engineers have cooked up a material that's 10 times blacker than anything else previously reported. Capturing more than 99.995 percent of any incoming light -- VantaBlack tops out at 99.96 -- the material is made of vertically aligned carbon nanotubes (CNTs) grown on chlorine-etched aluminium foil.

It's like Lego, except each block costs around $10,000.Sony's Crystal cinema display supports 16K, but could cost millions

Sony will sell these screens through specially trained and certified dealers in sizes up to 63 feet wide at 16K resolution, but unless you're a one-percenter, you probably won't be able to afford it. Sony will offer it any way you want, but some sample configurations include 1080p with 18 modules at 8 feet x 4 feet, 4K size at 16 feet wide (72 modules), 8K at 32 feet x 18 feet (288 modules) and 16K and 63 feet x 18 feet (576 modules).

Honda's E isn't like other electric cars.The uphill battle to build Honda's first modern EV

For years, Honda has pursued tech like hydrogen instead of EVs. Now its futuristic Honda E is ready to debut, with a higher price and less range than some rivals. We interviewed company executives at the Frankfurt Motor Show to find out the thinking behind decisions made "to demonstrate Honda's capability in looks, technology and driving ability."

9/9/99The Dreamcast predicted everything about modern consoles

Twenty years after Sega's innovative console debuted, Devindra Hardawar reminisces about all the ways it changed gaming, and the impact those changes had even into the present day. Also, we asked readers for memories of the Dreamcast era, and your responses were just as incredible. Grab your VMUs Sega fans, we're going back to 1999.

But wait, there's more...

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