A private equity firm owned by President Donald Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, is no longer backing Paramount’s hostile acquisition bid for Warner Bros. Discovery, the firm confirmed Tuesday.Days after Warner agreed to be bought by Netflix in early December, Paramount launched a rival bid that seeks to bypass Warner’s management and appeal directly to its shareholders with more money. Paramount is offering $30 per Warner share to Netflix’s $27.75.Warner, one of the “big five” Hollywood studios, owns Warner Bros. Pictures, HBO, the DC Comics universe and the Harry Potter franchise. Experts say its acquisition could supercharge the winning company and reshape the streaming wars, either by catapulting Netflix further ahead of top competitors or by cementing a new power player in Paramount.Paramount, which is significantly smaller than Netflix, said its decision to circumvent Warner’s top managers came after they “never engaged meaningfully” with several earlier offers by the company.Paramount made the details of its new offer public and gave Warner shareholders an option to tender their shares selling them directly at a set price in support of its bid. The company is offering to buy Warner’s entire portfolio, including cable networks like CNN that Netflix excluded from its bid.In its appeal to shareholders, Paramount argued its offer may be more likely to pass regulatory scrutiny from the Trump administration.The president has said the Warner and Netflix deal “could be a problem” due to the size of the combined market share.Kushner’s decision to pull his firm’s financial backing takes away a possible Paramount advantage to win over Trump. The amount Kushner’s Affinity Partners was contributing to the offer was not disclosed in Paramount’s latest SEC filings.“With two strong competitors vying to secure the future of this unique American asset, Affinity has decided no longer to pursue the opportunity,” the firm said in a statement. “The dynamics of the investment have changed significantly since we initially became involved in October. We continue to believe there is a strong strategic rationale for Paramount’s offer.”Paramount’s bid is still backed by wealth funds run by three governments in the Persian Gulf, widely reported as Saudi Arabia, Abu Dhabi and Qatar.Paramount, which owns which owns CBS, MTV and the streaming service Paramount+, is newly headed by David Ellison, the son of a major Trump donor. But Trump has recently criticized the Ellisons for his treatment by CBS News’ “60 Minutes.”“If they are friends, I’d hate to see my enemies!” Trump said Tuesday on Truth Social.Warner is reviewing Paramount’s offer and is expected to tell shareholders soon whether it’s a better deal than selling to Netflix.
Hannah Schoenbaum, Associated Press
Want to know how much you spent on Uber Eats this past year? If the answer is no, bad luck.
Just days after Saturday Night Live dropped a satirical skit about an “Uber Eats wrapped,” Uber brought the feature to life with a year-end recap.
Around this time each year, platforms from Spotify to YouTube start rolling out personalized recaps, breaking down how users spent their time over the past 12 months. The next logical step? A full accounting of every Uber trip taken and every guilt-ridden Uber Eats order placed this year.
On Monday, the company launched its new year-in-review feature called YOUBER, which compiles users activity across both Uber and Uber Eats. The recap shows where you went, how often you splurged on Uber Comfort, and just how frequently you returned to the same takeout spot. If you rank in the top 1% of a restaurants customers, YOUBER will let you know, whether or not that realization fills you with pride or shame.
In the SNL sketch, one character learns hes eaten more chicken nuggets than 99% of users worldwide. Another is assigned an Uber Eats agea riff on Spotifys listening ageonly to be told his is Dead. Better than mine, his wife replies. 52 and fat.
The parody recap also shows users the compromising and unflattering ways they appeared to the delivery driver while grabbing their food from their doorway. Finally, the app shows personalized messages from customers most frequented restaurants, and calculates the total spent on deliveriesin this case, $24,000.
Ubers real version is slightly less brutal. The YOUBER featurecurrently available only in the U.S.can be accessed via a banner in the app and presents users with a card of their stats.
That includes total rides, top order, most-used ride type, Uber rating, and one of 14 assigned Uber Personality Profiles, such as Do-Gooder for Uber Electric loyalists, Rise & Shiner for early-morning riders, or Delivery Darling for users who live for deliveries of all kinds. Of course, all shareable on social media if youre brave enough.
Alongside individual recaps, Uber also shared global highlights from its 2025 data. The longest ride of the year stretched nearly 700 miles from Austin, Texas, to Pensacola, Florida, taking around 11 hours. Meanwhile, Uber Eats largest order of the year was a Chinese food delivery containing more than 180 items.
The proposed $85 billion merger of Union Pacific and Norfolk Southern railroads has lost the support of two unions that represent more than half their workers over concerns it will jeopardize safety and jobs, raise shipping rates and consumer prices, and cause significant disruptions.
The Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen and the Brotherhood of Maintenance of Way Employes Division are among the most prominent critics of the deal to create the nation’s first transcontinental railroad. When they officially announce their decision Wednesday, they will join the American Chemistry Council, an assortment of agricultural groups, and competing railroad BNSF in raising concerns the merger would hurt competition.
The deal has the support of the nation’s largest rail union, which represents conductors and hundreds of individual shippers, and President Donald Trump has said the deal sounds good to him. The U.S. Surface Transportation Board will weigh the opinions of all stakeholders to determine whether the merger is in the public interest once the railroads file their formal application, which is expected later this week.
Union Pacific CEO Jim Vena has argued that creating a railroad that stretches from coast to coast would be good for the economy because without the need for a hand-off between railroads in the middle of the country rail shipments would move faster, meaning it could better compete against trucking.
But after months of meetings with Vena and other executives, the presidents of the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen and the Brotherhood of Maintenance of Way Employes Division unionsboth affiliated with the Teamsterssaid they have serious doubts about the potential benefits, and warned the promises Vena made to preserve jobs aren’t detailed enough to be reliable. The unions say there’s nothing to keep the companies from transferring jobs hundreds of miles away or to prevent the sale of some UP lines to short-line railroads that pay less.
Union Pacific said in a statement that every employee with a union job at the time of the merger will continue to have one. Weve formalized this jobs-for-life agreement with five unions.
Vena has acknowledged that the number of employees at the combined railroad could still shrink through attrition, if workers leave on their own.
Rail unions worry about safety and shippers
This proposed monopoly will end up costing businesses more and those costs will be passed on to consumers, Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen National President Mark Wallace said. “We believe this transcontinental railroad will make shipping by rail less attractive as the merged carrier passes off rail lines that serve small towns, factories and farms to short line railroads while running miles-long slow-moving trains on the main line. For rail customers it will be a choice between Hell or the highway.’
The unions say they are worried that safety could deteriorate after a merger, because Union Pacific hasn’t made the same improvements Norfolk Southern has in the two and a half years since the disastrous derailment in East Palestine, Ohio.
Vena and Norfolk Southern CEO Mark George have said they are optimistic the merger will be approved because they believe it will be good for the country, their customers and rail workers. Shareholders of both railroads overwhelmingly support it.
Deal faces stringent review
The Surface Transportation Board will review the deal under a tough new standard it adopted in 2001 after a series of disastrous rail mergers in the 1990s that led to shipment delays of weeks or even months. These untested rules require any merger of the six largest railroads to be in the public interest and show that it will enhance competition. When the Surface Transportation Board approved the first major rail merger in more than two decades two years ago, it used a less stringent standard allowing Canadian Pacific’s $31 billion acquisition of Kansas City Southern.
Transportation expert and DePaul University Professor Joe Schwieterman said many people have questioned the Union Pacific merger because of its scope and the likelihood that it could trigger another merger, resulting in only two American railroads. Everyone will examine the merger application closely, Schwieterman said.
Currently, Norfolk Southern and CSX serve the eastern U.S. while Union Pacific and BNSF serve the west, and the two major Canadian rails compete where they can with their tracks crossing Canada and extending into the United States and Mexico.
A merged Union Pacific would likely control more than 40% of the nations freight.
This merger is like nothing weve seen before. Its creating a railroad of such enormous scope that its somewhat of a paradigm shift, Schwieterman said.
Competitors question the benefits
BNSF’s Chief of Staff Zak Andersen said his railroad, which is owned by Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway, is convinced this merger would be bad for competition and lead to higher rates and fewer options for shippers.
No customer is asking for this. This is strictly a Wall Street play for shareholders, Andersen said.
Earlier this fall, Buffett and CPKC’s CEO both said they weren’t interested in any kind of rail merger right now. Instead, they believe the railroads should continue to find ways to cooperate to deliver shipments more quickly, which can be done without all the complications of a merger. Still, CSX decided to replace its CEO this fall with an executive who has a background leading companies through major mergers.
Josh Funk, AP transportation writer
Fernando Moreno has been on dialysis for about two years, enduring an “unbearable” wait for a new kidney to save his life. His limited world of social contacts has meant that his hopes have hinged on inching up the national waiting list for a transplant.That was until earlier this year, when the Philadelphia hospital where he receives treatment connected him with a promising pilot project that has paired him with “angel advocates” Good Samaritan strangers scattered around the country who leverage their own social media contacts to share his story.So far, the Great Social Experiment, as it was named by its founder, Los Angeles filmmaker David Krissman, hasn’t found the Vineland, New Jersey, truck driver a living kidney donor. But there are encouraging early signs the angel advocate approach is working, and there’s no question it has given Moreno new optimism.“This process is great,” said Moreno, 50, whose own father died of kidney failure at 65. “I’m just hoping there will be somebody out there that’s willing to take a chance.”Moreno is part of a pilot program with 15 patients that began in May at three Pennsylvania hospitals. It’s testing whether motivated, volunteer strangers can help improve the chances of finding a life-saving match for a new kidney particularly for people with limited social networks.“We know how this has always been done, and we’re trying to put that on steroids and really get them the help that they need,” Krissman said. “Most patients are too sick to do this on their own many don’t have the skills to do it on their own.”
Seeking a blueprint for the future
The Gift of Life Donor Program, which serves as the organ procurement network for eastern Pennsylvania, southern New Jersey and Delaware, is supporting the pilot program with a grant of more than $100,000 from its foundation.So far, two of the five patients in the program through Temple University Hospital have found kidney donors, and one is preparing for surgery, according to Ryan Ihlenfeldt, the hospital’s director of clinical transplant services. One of the five patients at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center in Harrisburg has also undergone a transplant.The approach Krissman has developed is something new, said Richard Hasz Jr., Gift of Life’s chief executive, and may help identify the types of messages that attract and motivate potential live kidney donors.“This is the first of its kind that I’m aware of,” Hasz said. “That’s why, I think, the foundation was so interested in doing it studying it and hopefully publishing it so we can create that blueprint, if you will, for the future.”Gift of Life agreed to fund a broader test and helped Krissman identify five patients each at Temple, UPMC-Harrisburg and Jefferson University Hospital in Philadelphia.Hasz said the pilot program’s approach combines social media outreach with Krissman’s storytelling talents and aggressive efforts to mobilize the patients’ own connections.“We know that patients who are waiting don’t always have the energy or the resources to do this themselves,” Hasz said.There have been other ways for patients to set up “microsites” where they can tell their stories and seek a donor match. But the pilot program currently underway in Pennsylvania aims to connect patients with a wide universe of potential donors and produce videos and other ways to spread their message.
Potential to ‘snowball’
Krissman’s bout with an illness about two decades ago inspired him to tackle the sticky challenge of increasing live kidney donations. He was debilitated for more than a year before medication helped him recover, explaining, “It gave me my life back. And I never forgot what it’s like to be chronically sick.”After producing a podcast on kidney transplantation, Krissman recruited four patients through Facebook who were waiting for kidneys. He was able to help two of them. A second effort, a pilot program with three patients in North Carolina that ended last year, helped match all three with living donors.Becca Brown, director of transplant services at UPMC-Harrisburg, thinks it might be a game changer.“There’s potential for this to really snowball,” Brown said. “I’m anxious to see what happens and if we can roll it out to other patients.”Some 90,000 people in the United States are on a list for a kidney transplant, and most of the roughly 28,000 kidneys that were transplanted last year came from deceased donors. Living kidney donations are hard to come by about 6,400 were transplanted last year. Thousands die each year waiting for an organ transplant in the United States.Living kidney donations can be a better match, reducing the risk of organ rejection. They allow for surgery to be planned for a time that is optimal for the donor, the recipient and the transplant team. And, the foundation says, living donor kidneys, on average, last longer than kidneys from deceased donors.The National Kidney Foundation says living donors must be at least 18 years old, although some transplant centers set the minimum age at 21. Potential donors get screened for health problems and can be ruled out if they have uncontrolled high blood pressure, diabetes or cancer, or if they are smokers.Many living donors make “directed donations” to specify who will get their kidney. Nondirected donations are made anonymously to a patient.
A way to make a difference
Francis Beaumier, a 38-year-old information technology worker from Green Bay, Wisconsin, came into contact with the angel advocate program after being a double living donor a kidney and part of his liver.He sees the program as “a great little way for everyone to make a small difference.”Another angel advocate, Holly Armstrong, was also a living donor. She hopes her efforts will plant a seed.“Some people might just keep scrolling,” said Armstrong, who lives in Lake Wiley, South Carolina. “But there might be someone like me, where they stop scrolling and say, ‘This boy needs a kidney.'”A study released last year found that people who volunteer to donate a kidney are at a lower risk of death from the operation than doctors had previously thought. Tracking 30 years of living kidney donations, researchers found fewer than 1 in every 10,000 donors died within three months of the surgery. Newer and safer surgical techniques were credited for dropping the risk from 3 deaths per 10,000 living donors.Temple serves a large cohort of poorer patients who can have difficulty understanding health issues and who suffer from uncontrolled hypertension and diabetes, Ihlenfeldt, who works there, said.“What David’s trying to do is coalesce a network of support around these patients who are sharing the story for them,” Ihlenfeldt said.
Rallying for Ahmad
At a kickoff event in a Harrisburg meeting room for kidney patient Ahmad Collins, a couple dozen friends and family listened with rapt attention as Krissman went over the game plan, answering questions and describing the transplant processCollins, a 50-year-old city government worker and former Penn State linebacker, has needed 10 hours a night of dialysis since a medical procedure left him with damaged kidneys late last year.His mind was on the strangers who might decide to pitch in.“They can be a superhero, so to speak,” Collins said. “They can have the opportunity to save somebody’s life, and not too many times in life do you have that opportunity.”
Mark Scolforo, Associated Press
The Great British Railways has a great British brand.
The U.K.’s new public railway is leaning on well-known, classic symbolism for its visual identity unveiled this month. Train liveries for the new brand will show a design of a stylized Union Jack flag, while the new logo brings back an old double arrow concept designed in 1965 by Gerald Barney for the old state-run British Rail. The brand’s font is the simple, modern sans-serif Rail Alphabet 2, an updated version of the British Rail font designed in the 1960s by Margaret Calvert and Jock Kinneir.
The new brand was designed in house by the U.K.’s Department for Transport and it will begin rolling out on trains, stations, signage, websites, and a ticketing app by spring 2026. The branding is an outward manifestation of a wider goal to deliver better public transportation. Already, they’ve frozen rail fare for the first time in 30 years.
[Image: GBR]
“This isn’t just a paint job,” U.K. Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander said in a statement. Instead, “it represents a new railway, casting off the frustrations of the past and focused entirely on delivering a proper public service for passengers.”
A new take on an old brand
Modern, minimalist, and geometric, Barney’s original 1965 double arrow logo for British Rail used the lines and angles of the U.K. flag to cleverly communicate two-way transportation. The mark also has staying power.
[Image: GBR]
Even after British Rail began to be privatized in the 1990s, the double arrow mark remained in use as an official rail symbol in the U.K. at stations and on tickets. And just as with classic mid-century civic design in the U.S., there’s similarly an audience for print standards manuals of the old British Rail brand.
The U.K. is in the process of renationalizing its railway companies following challenges like a drop in riders following the pandemic and high ticket prices. Both Conservative and Labour governments have pushed to make more of the country’s railways public, and for now, nine train operators, representing a third of all passenger train traffic in Great Britain, are nationalized. The remaining seven are expected to be nationalized by October 2027.
[Image: GBR]
Bringing the double arrow logo back, refining an old, classic font, and using a flag-inspired livery design is a smart move that keeps the public’s ownership of the brand front and center with well known and widely understood symbolism. If Great British Railways can deliver on a better experience for riders, the brand could become an example of civic design and public ownership done right.
Ryan Coogler’s bluesy vampire thriller “Sinners,” the big screen musical “Wicked: For Good” and the Netflix phenomenon “KPop Demon Hunters” are all a step closer to an Oscar nomination. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences released shortlists for 12 categories Tuesday, including for best song, score, international and documentary film, cinematography and this year’s new prize, casting.“Sinners” and “Wicked: For Good” received the most shortlist mentions with eight each, including makeup and hair, sound, visual effects, score, casting and cinematography. Both have two original songs advancing as well. For “Wicked” it’s Stephen Schwartz’s “The Girl in the Bubble” and “No Place Like Home.” For “Sinners,” it’s Ludwig Göransson, Miles Caton and Alice Smith’s “Last Time (I Seen the Sun),” and Göransson and Raphael Saadiq’s “I Lied to You.”The “KPop Demon Hunters” hit “Golden,” by EJAE and Mark Sonnenblick, was another shortlisted song alongside other notable artists like: Nick Cave and Bryce Dessner for “Train Dreams”; John Mayer, Ed Sheeran and Blake Slatkin for the “F1” song “Drive”; Sara Bareilles, Brandi Carlile and Andrea Gibson for “Salt Then Sour Then Sweet” from “Come See Me In the Good Light”; and Miley Cyrus, Simon Franglen, Mark Ronson and Andrew Wyatt for “Dream as One” from “Avatar: Fire and Ash.” Diane Warren also might be on her way to a 17th nomination with “Dear Me” from “Diane Warren: Relentless.”One of the highest profile shortlist categories is the best international feature, where 15 films were named including “Sentimental Value” (Norway), “Sirât” (Spain), “No Other Choice” (South Korea), “The Secret Agent” (Brazil), “It Was Just an Accident” (France), “The Voice of Hind Rajab” (Tunisia), “Sound of Falling” (Germany) and “The President’s Cake” (Iraq).Notable documentaries among the 15 include “My Undesirable Friends: Part I Last Air in Moscow,” “The Perfect Neighbor,” “The Alabama Solution,” “Come See Me in the Good Light,” “Cover-Up” and Mstyslav Chernov’s “2000 Meters to Andriivka,” a co-production between The Associated Press and PBS Frontline.The Oscars’ new award for casting shortlisted 10 films that will vie for the five nomination slots: “Frankenstein,” “Hamnet,” “Marty Supreme,” “One Battle After Another,” “The Secret Agent,” “Sentimental Value,” “Sinners,” “Sirt,” “Weapons,” and “Wicked: For Good.” Notably “Jay Kelly and “Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery” did not make the list.Composers who made the shortlist for best score include Göransson (“Sinners”), Jonny Greenwood (“One Battle After Another”), Max Richter (“Hamnet”), Alexandre Desplat (“Frankenstein”) and Kangding Ray (“Sirt”).For the most part, shortlists are determined by members in their respective categories, though the specifics vary from branch to branch: Some have committees, some have minimum viewing requirements.As most of the shortlists are in below-the-line categories celebrating crafts like sound and visual effects, there are also films that aren’t necessarily the most obvious of Oscar contenders like “The Alto Knights,” shortlisted in hair and makeup, as well as the widely panned “Tron: Ares” and “The Electric State,” both shortlisted for visual effects. “Tron: Ares” also made the lists for score and song with Nine Inch Nails’ “As Alive As You Need Me To Be”.The lists will narrow to five when final nominations are announced on Jan. 22. The 98th Oscars, hosted by Conan O’Brien, will air live on ABC on March 15 at 7 p.m. ET.
Lindsey Bahr, AP Film Writer
Shares of publicly traded companies operating in the cannabis space continue to perform strongly as the Trump administration considers reclassifying marijuana.
Reports first emerged last week that the Trump administration might change marijuana from a Schedule I drug to a Schedule III drug, which would lessen restrictions on it.
On Monday, President Trump told reporters that he was considering the reclassification.
We are considering that because a lot of people want to see itthe reclassification, because it leads to tremendous amounts of research that cant be done unless you reclassify, Trump stated, according to CNN. So, we are looking at that very strongly.
Prior to Trumps announcement, a White House official told Fast Company that the administration had yet to make a final decision about reclassification. We have reached out to the White House about its current plans and will update this post if we hear back.
Cannabis brands see their shares rise
The potential of a reclassification has been enough to bolster shares of cannabis companies since the opening bell on Friday. Below are just some of the impressive jumps to watch.
Tilray Brands Inc. (Nasdaq:TLRY)
Closing on Tuesday: 27.54%
Five-day growth: 71.97%
Premarket growth on Wednesday: 3.66%
Cresco Labs Inc (OTCQX: CRLBF)
Closing on Tuesday: 34.93%
Five-day growth: 123.11%
After-hours growth: -0.23%
Canopy Growth Corp. (Nasdaq:CGC)
Closing on Tuesday: 10.24%
Five-day growth: 61.49%
Premarket growth on Wednesday: 6.01%
Curaleaf Holdings Inc. (OTCQX:CURLF)
Closing on Tuesday: 23.18%
Five-day growth: 67.89%
After-hours growth: 0.38%
Trulieve Cannabis Corp. (CNSX: TRUL)
Closing on Tuesday: 12.58%
Five-day growth: 76.40%
After-hours and premarket: N/A
Each of these stocks are still significantly down from highs in early 2021, during the early Biden era, when marijuana reform excitement seemingly peaked.
Whats the difference between Schedule I and Schedule III?
The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) defines Schedule I drugs as those with no currently accepted medical use and a high potential for abuse. Marijuana currently sits on this list alongside heroin, ecstasy, LSD, peyote, and more.
The DEA states that Schedule III drugs are those with a moderate to low potential for physical and psychological dependence. Right now, that list includes anabolic steroids, ketamine, Tylenol with codeine, and testosterone.
If the change occurs, marijuana would be considered less dangerous than Schedule II drugs, which have a high potential for abuse, such as Adderall, cocaine, fentanyl, and Ritalin.
Reclassifying marijuana would have no impact on its federal legality.
A federal judge said Tuesday he’s leaning toward denying a preservationist group’s request to temporarily halt President Donald Trump’s White House ballroom project, saying the organization failed to show that “irreparable harm” would be caused if the project moves forward.U.S. District Judge Richard Leon said he could issue a final decision on the restraining order by Wednesday. But Leon said he plans to hold another hearing in January on the National Trust for Historic Preservation’s request to pause the ballroom project until it goes through multiple independent reviews and wins approval from Congress.In the meantime, Leon warned the administration to not make decisions on underground work, such as the routing of plumbing and gas lines, that would dictate the scope of future ballroom construction above ground. If that were to happen, Leon said, “the court will address it, I assure you of that.”Trump, speaking Tuesday night at a Hannukah event, thanked the judge for the “courage in making the proper decision.” He also described the ballroom as costing $400 million, though its previously listed price tag was $300 million.Carol Quillen, president and CEO of the National Trust, said it remained “fully committed to upholding the interests of the American people and advocating for compliance with the law, including review by the National Capital Planning Commission and an opportunity for the public to provide comment and shape the project.”Trump went ahead with the ballroom construction before seeking input from a pair of federal review panels, the National Capital Planning Commission and the Commission of Fine Arts. Trump has stocked the planning commission with allies, including the chairman, Will Scharf, who recently said he expected to receive the ballroom plans sometime this month.Leon made a couple of references during the hearing to the administration having just two weeks to submit the plans. Adam Gustafson, the principal deputy assistant attorney general, said the administration had “initiated outreach” to the panel to do just that, but no date had been set.Trump recently dismissed all members of the fine arts panel. He has yet to name replacements.Gustafson argued at the hearing that the Trust has no standing in the case to sue and that underground construction must continue for national security reasons that were not outlined in open court. He also said Trump is exempt from federal laws the Trust said he has failed to follow.Gustafson said the Trust cannot show “irreparable harm” because the ballroom plans have not been finalized and construction above ground was not scheduled to begin until April at the earliest.Tad Heuer, the attorney representing the Trust a private, nonprofit organization said that with every day that construction is allowed to proceed absent the independent reviews, the government gets to say “wait and find out” what the ballroom will look like.“It’s not about the need for a ballroom. It’s about the need to follow the law,” Heuer said of the case.The White House announced the ballroom project over the summer and by late October, Trump had demolished the East Wing of the White House to build in its place a ballroom that he said will be big enough to fit 999 people at an estimated cost of $300 million in private funding.
Darlene Superville, Associated Press
More than any other Apple product, the Vision Pro is stillto quote Bob Dylan by way of Steve Jobsbusy being born. Announced at the Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) on June 5, 2023 and shipped the following February, the $3,500 spatial computing headset has evolved some since its first release. This year brought a meaty operating system upgrade and a slightly revised version of the device sporting Apples powerful new M5 chip.
But much of the progress the Vision Pro has made hasnt stemmed from the routine tick-tock of software and hardware updates. Apple has also been throwing itself into the equally vital work of getting third-party developers and creators to build experiences that will help the rest of us understand what, exactly, its headset is good for. That was the goal of a Vision Pro developer event the company held at its Cupertino campus in late October.
Unlike the sprawling, online-first WWDC confab, this gatheringpart of an ongoing series called Meet with Applewas intimate and focused. Yes, a worldwide audience tuned in via livestream, and Apple later posted videos from the event on YouTube. But in-person attendees got to mix, mingle, and witness onstage presentations in the Apple Developer Centers Big Sur theater, a 200-seat venue named after the 2020 MacOS release. And every minute of the two-day meeting was devoted to sharing best practices about the art and science of creating immersive media for the Vision Pro.
This years Vision Pro has Apples latest M5 chip and a more comfortable Dual Knit Band. [Photo: Courtesy of Apple]
The fact that there are best practices to share reflects Apples own growing confidence as a creator of experiences for its own device. We’ve seen a lot of great momentum over the last several months with third-party creators, says senior director of Apple Vision Pro product marketing Steve Sinclair. And a lot of that is steeped in learnings that we’ve had over the last 12 to 18 months of making this type of content.
Such advances are essential to the Vision Pros future. In August, Bloombergs Mark Gurman argued that the headset was stuck in a catch-22 situation. Without a sizable base of Vision Pro customers, Apple wasnt incentivized to release vast quantities of content in Apple Immersive Video, its format for 3D 8K video with spatial video. But the lack of such content made the Vision Pro a less tempting purchase, even for people with a spare $3,500 to spend on it.
Gurman did say that third-party creators might help increase the amount of available content. He also noted the release of two products from Blackmagic Design: its $33,000 Ursa Cine Immersive camera and a new version of the DaVinci Resolve video editor capable of handling Apple Immersive Video. They will help independent creators tackle immersive production, a process that has historically involved, as Blackmagic business development manager Dave Hoffman puts it, rigs that were bespoke and really kind of science projects.
Blackmagic Designs Apple Immersion Video-ready Ursa Cine Immersive camera [Photo: Courtesy of Blackmagic Design]
At Apples event, I spoke with filmmakers and developers who are already producing Apple Immersive Video and other forms of Vision Pro content. (The terminology can get tricky: Not everything on the headset thats immersive and/or video is Apple Immersive Video, a specific technical specification.) Given the venue, its not shocking that they spoke highly of the assistance the company has given them. Yet they also talked about the adventure of diving into a medium thats still finding its way.
Figuring out immersive storytelling has kind of felt like sailing off into the unknown and drawing the map as you go, says cinematographer Ben Allan, the author, along with his wife, writer-director Clara Chong, of a book about Apple Immersive Video filmmaking. For now, there arent that many content consumers along for the trip. But if it some eventual version of Apple Vision becomes a mainstream hit, the pioneers currently adopting the medium will share in the credit.
In music video, in documentaries, and scripted content, there are things that are working extremely well and that [can] be used as a template for the future, says Victor Agulhon, the CEO of Targo, whose Vision Pro interactive documentary app D-Day: The Camera Soldier, produced in collaboration with Time magazine, was an Emmy and Apple App Store Awards finalist this year. How much time it’s going to take to get to a hundred million users, we don’t know. But I do believe that the kind of experience you can get on these headsets today is definitely worth having by hundreds of millions of users.
Really, truly immersive
In the grand scheme of things, the Vision Pros new features scratch timeless itches. Certainly, the dsire to conjure up you-are-there experiences was foundational to movie-making as a medium. As VisionOS design evangelist Serenity Caldwell noted onstage at Apples event, audiences were thrilled by the realism of the Lumire brothers 50-second 1896 film showing a train arriving in a French station. (One contemporaneous reaction: It speeds right at youwatch out!)
By putting 23 million pixels of 3D video directly in front of your eyes, the Vision Pro can create effects the Lumires wouldnt have dared to dream about. Ultimately, though, the headsets twin Organic Light-Emitting Diode (OLED) displays, eye-tracking sensors, front-facing cameras, and other technologies go only so far to shape the platform. Its still up to creators and developers to determine how to draw users into stories in ways that are inviting rather than off-putting or disorienting.
That involves a bevy of decisions, some of which Caldwell walked through during her talk. Should you keep the real world surrounding the user fully visible, dim it a bit, or block it out entirely? Is it better to unleash visual spectacle as quickly as possible, or to kick off an experience with more subtle effects? How do you use gestures to ensure that users feel like theyre in control?
Anyone creating Mac apps builds on more than 40 years of lessons about how to put users at ease; the iPhone, iPad, and even the Apple Watch are also mature platforms at this point. The Vision Pro is different. Immersion is a powerful tool for media experiences, but we have a responsibility as storytellers to consider the audience experience whenever we use it, urged Caldwell. Remember, this is still a new platform. Your app might be the first thing someone sees on VisionOS and the first thing they try, so it’s important to make sure that that experience is a great one.
Even if thats a sobering responsibility, it can also be an exciting opportunity. Filmmakers Allan and Chong saw it that way. We saw this technology at the early stages, and just went, Wow, this is going to be a thing, and we want to get in on it as soon as we can, recalls Allan. Each has around 30 years of movie-making experience and an appreciation for new tech. In the previous decade, theyd even made a family film projected on a wraparound 5:1 screen at Sydneys Taronga Zoo, a project Chong calls a really big head start in understanding the Vision Pros potential.
Allan and Chong have recently completed two Apple Immersive Video films: a five-minute documentary on the most Instagrammed cake in the world and a romantic drama. Both are far afield of the eye-popping extravaganza typical in early Vision Pro experiences. Indeed, their drama consists entirely of two characters talking to each other, something that can be a challenge to make compelling even in a non-interactive 2D movie. We thought, Well, if we can pull that off, you can do anything cinematically with this format, says Chong.
Director and photographer Anton Tammi had an eminently practical reason for getting into Vision Pro storytelling: Singer-songwriter The Weeknd asked him to. The two have worked together on music videos for years. I guess my style was something that the artist himself really felt that would make sense in the immersive format, muses Tammi.
Their video, for The Weeknds Open Hearts single, was released in November 2024. Because it was one of the very early-stage projects, I guess almost like an R&D project with Apple Immersive, I felt like I really was taken good care of by the Immersive team, says Tammi. I learned a lot. I almost went through this school of immersive filmmaking.
[The Weeknd, up close and personal in his ‘Open Hearts’ video. Photo: Courtesy of Apple]
The videos vibe isnt a radical departure from The Weeknd and Tammis previous collaborations. Its just that Apple Immersive Video both opens it up and brings it closer. Over three and a half minutes, it drops you into several worlds, featuring everything from majestic galloping horses to gritty Los Angeles cityscapes to a surrealistic conclusion I wont spoil here. You also get face-to-face with The Weeknd, who at times seems to be just millimeters away. (Right after removing the headset, I watched the same video on my iPad, where he looked trapped behind glass by compsarison.)
Despite totally feeling like a Weeknd video, “Open Hearts” required Tammi to rethink his filmmaking techniques and priorities. Because of the crazy attention span shortening that’s happening around us, music videos and social media stories and whatever have extremely fast-paced cutting, he explains. With Apple Immersive Video, You cant do that, and I dont think the viewers need that. He estimates that a previous Weeknd video he directed, “Blinding Lights,” includes 300 to 400 cuts. “Open Hearts” has around 30.
History via headset
Even unleashed on the Vision Pro, “Open Hearts” remains a music video in the classic sense. Targos D-Day: The Camera Soldier is tougher to nail down. Part app, part documentary, it painstakingly weaves together new and archival footage with still images, CGI video, and 3D artifacts such as WWII dog tags and medals. It’s a 20-minute experience, and there was a nine-month production, says CEO Agulhon.
Its easy to imagine the real-life story that inspired itinvolving a Connecticut woman learning about her fathers work as a combat cameraman during the Allies landing at Omaha Beachbeing told in a conventional documentary. But the Vision Pro both demands and rewrds attention in a way that differs from other media. If you look at the data of what people do when they watch TV, for instance, everyone’s actually on their phones and doing something else, says Agulhon. Not so once youve slipped on Apples headset.
Consequently, the 20-minute running length isnt a fluke. Targo has eight years of experience making interactive documentaries for platforms such as Meta Quest, ranging from 10 to 40 minutes. According to Agulhon, at 20 minutes, the time flies by for [viewers], but its still a very intense experience.
Targos D-Day: The Camera Soldier documentary app [Photo: Courtesy of Targo]
Targo built parts of D-Day using a game engine, but its not gamelike: Nothing the viewer does affects the flow of the narrative or its outcome. Instead, the app has some of the feel of an uncommonly rich museum exhibit, where touching some of the itemsif only virtuallyis not only allowed but a defining feature.
One concept we leaned into was that we could transform moments of time into places that people can explore, says Agulhon. That’s an effect that only immersive can bring to you.
Another immersive media studio, Rogue Labs, leaned into an entirely different use for the Vision Pro: Helping people learn to fly helicopters. (Not coincidentally, its founder also owns a helicopter flight school.) Released in November, its app, Flight Sight, melds Apple Immersive Video, CGI helicopters and scenes, and flat videos and maps. To recreate real-world instruction, Rogue staffers shot POV video by strapping a Blackmagic Ursa Cine Immersive camera into the seat where a student pilot would sit. Since helicopters arein Rogue creative and technical director John Racines wordsgiant vibration machines, the filmmakers had to both stabilize the camera and perform additional stabilization in post-production.
Flight Sight isnt a flight simulator or an FAA-accredited way to log training hours, but that isnt the point. It’s more of a supplemental tool that will help you become familiar with the helicopter, hopefully more quickly, and hopefully help you save some money from time that you would spend in the helicopter watching your instructor do some of these maneuvers over and over again, says Rogue Labs president Cory Hill.
The company also hopes to grow the community of helicopter pilots by sparking the imagination of Apple Vision owners. Everybody we show it to, whether they’re full-on pilots or someone who’s never been in a helicopter before, they watch it, and they instantly say, This makes me want to learn how to fly a helicopter, which is what we want to do, says Racine. That said, Rogue is also filming additional content in scenic locales, such as Catalina Island and Channel Islands National Park, whose splendor might draw in those of us who are happy to keep our ‘copter piloting strictly virtual.
A helicopter takes off in Flight Sight. [Photo: Courtesy of Rogue Labs]
Even the coolest single immersive video or app wont silence all doubts about the Vision Pro being a sufficiently enticing consumer product to lead to bigger things for Apple. But a flurry of recent announcements involving high-profile names might help. In September, the company unveiled a new slate of Apple Immersive Video shows with partners such as the BBC, CNN, CANAL+, and Red Bull, ranging from classical music concerts to a documentary about emperor penguins. A month later, it revealed that select Los Angeles Lakers 2025-2026 season games will stream live, courtesy of Spectrum SportsNet.
Ultimately, as with every new Apple platform before it, the odds are decent that the Vision Pro will end up being defined not by items the company had an active hand in willing into existence, but rather ones nobody saw coming. There are a lot of stories that people want to tell, and they’re seeing that the immersive capabilities of Vision Pro and the toolsets that we offer, and some of our partners offer, really give them a chance to tell those stories in new ways, says Apples Sinclair.
And some of those new ways are yet to come, Take longer-form immersive narratives, which Blackmagic Designs Hoffman contends nobody has yet mastered.
From my perspective, the tools are there now, and I know there’s a couple of people that are trying to figure out what the challenges are, he says. How do we work out situations where you used to do cross shots and closeups and mid-range shots and all that kind of stuff? That dialogue is going on right now, and someone’s going to hit it. Some filmmaker is going to be like, Yeah, this is how we do it. A few more of those epiphanies, and the Vision Pro might eliminate any residual sense that its uncharted territory for storytellers.
Ice cream lovers rejoice: Ben & Jerrys has something new and exciting to introduce to the world.
The Vermont-based ice cream company announced that it will add ice cream bars to its lineup. The new ice cream bars will be available in these five flavors:
Caramel Blondie
Chocolate Fudge Brownie
Cookie Dough
PB Pretzel
Strawberry Cheesecake
A December 10 company news release noted that each ice cream bar features decadent ice cream, plenty of chunks and swirls, dipped in a chocolatey coating with cookie pieces.
[Photo: Ben & Jerry’s]
The new product line will be available at retail stores as soon as January 2026. Each box will feature four ice cream bars. The company will also offer single Cookie Dough ice cream bars, which will be sold at convenience stores beginning next spring.
How can I try the new flavors?
Ice cream lovers dont have to wait until the new year to try the new ice cream bar flavors.
To celebrate the news, Ben & Jerrys will be doing a free ice cream “bar drop” at 150 Ben & Jerrys Scoop Shops nationwide.
The bar drops are happening today: Wednesday, December 17, 2025, in shops from Los Angeles to New York. More than 20,000 ice cream bars will be given away for free, according to the company.
To find out whether your closest Ben & Jerrys Scoop Shop will be participating in the event, check out the brand’s interactive store locator map, and do the following:
Enter your city
Make sure “Free Bar Drop Shop” is selected
A list of participating shops will populate
Ben & Jerry’s urges customers to “Get ’em before they’re gone!”
