Month: December 2022

Enlarge / Environmental activists rally for accountability for fossil fuel companies outside of New York Supreme Court on October 22, 2019 in New York City. (credit: Drew Angerer / Getty Images)

ExxonMobil has been the prime target of activists and politicians angered by the oil industry’s efforts to block action on climate change. Now, newly disclosed documents confirm that the oil company’s reputational woes have extended into the industry itself and threatened to derail Exxon’s biggest climate proposal to date.

Last year, Exxon struggled to gain support from its peers when it proposed a cross-industry effort to build a carbon capture and storage hub in Houston, according to documents released by the House Committee on Oversight and Reform, which has been investigating the oil industry. Top executives at Shell, in particular, worried that joining with Exxon would present an “unacceptable risk” to the European oil major’s reputation.

“I am not interested in participating with any advocacy effort led by” Exxon, wrote Krista Johnson, Shell’s head of US government relations, in a July 2021 email to Gretchen Watkins, president of Shell USA. Johnson said their competitor was continuing to draw negative headlines and that “zero companies” were prepared to join an Exxon-led consortium at that time.

Enlarge (credit: Ars Technica)

We're entering the last week of the year and, as you might've guessed, there's still a fair amount of last-minute gifts to grab at some of the best prices you'll find all year. In this week's Dealmaster we have some of our favorite big-ticket items matching their all-time low prices, including the latest iPad, Google Pixel's (6, 6a, and 7), Sony headphones and earphones, and the latest Apple AirPods Pro, to name a few.

iPads are the best tablet devices for most people. At their full retail prices, the regular iPad is usually in an awkward position that makes the iPad Air a slightly better buy. With the current discount, the base iPad moves further away from that odd territory and more squarely into frame as a solid all-around buy for tablet seekers. The iPad Air is also on sale for just $100 more at $499 if having the M1 processor is important to you.

Google's Pixel phone lineup has previously had a similar situation, but the main "issue" here is that the lowest-end Pixel, the Pixel 6a is just too darn good a bargain. That's still the case at its currently discounted $299 price, but we couldn't fault you for buy a $499 ($100 off) Pixel 7 to gain that more buttery 90 Hz refresh rate and, to some, slightly nicer styling.

Enlarge / Other than Amazon's rotating base, the two main product lines look pretty similar.

Google and Amazon are basically the only game in town if you're looking for a plug-and-play smart display, but the companies arrived at similar products from very different directions. A smart display's usefulness mostly has to do with which ecosystem you've committed to, making recommendations no simple affair. If you're on Team Apple, you'll have to keep hoping that Tim Cook announces a Siri smart display someday.

Both products are rather rigid and will expect you to adapt to them rather than the other way around. The Google Screen will only work with the Google Assistant and will push you toward Google products, while the Amazon Screen will only work with Alexa and will push you toward Amazon products. There are a few partners out there that provide various features like music and cameras, but these products are not as infinitely configurable as a smartphone. Smart displays will often demand adherence to an ecosystem.

The Echo Show 10

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  The Amazon Echo Show 10. It has a big display on a rotating base. [credit: Ron Amadeo ]

The specific hardware doesn't matter too much since these smart displays all run the same Amazon or Google software across various screen sizes, maybe with one extra headline feature. I spent most of my testing time with the $249.99 Amazon Echo Show 10, which has a 10-inch screen and super-cool rotation feature. There's also the stationary $64.99 Echo Show 8, the $39.99 Echo Show 5, and if you want to get really wild, there's the $249.99 Echo Show 15, which has the form factor of a wall-mounted picture frame.