Vergecast: Microsoft to acquire Activision, Google building a headset, and the 5G battle with airlines

Image: Blizzard

Every Friday, The Verge publishes our flagship podcast, The Vergecast, where we discuss the week in tech news with the reporters and editors covering the biggest stories.

The biggest news in tech this week was Microsoft acquiring game publisher Activision Blizzard for $68.7 billion. On today’s Vergecast, Verge editor-in-chief Nilay Patel talks with games reporter Ash Parrish and senior reporter Alex Heath about the acquisition, the issues behind the culture at Activision Blizzard, and what this means for the gaming space in the future.

The crew also discusses Alex’s scoop this week that Google is building an AR headset, internally codenamed Project Iris, that it hopes to ship in 2024.

Later in the show, Verge policy editor Russell Brandom joins to discuss the ongoing battle between the FAA, AT&T, Verizon, and airlines over activating 5G towers around airports, as well as the tech antitrust bills developing in Congress this week.

You can listen to the show here or in your preferred podcast player for the full discussion.

Further reading:

The US’s free COVID test website has more visitors than all other .gov sites combined
Microsoft to acquire Activision Blizzard for $68.7 billion
Read Activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick’s email to employees about the Microsoft acquisition
Read Microsoft Gaming CEO’s email to staff about the Activision Blizzard acquisition
Microsoft’s Xbox Game Pass service grows to 25 million subscribers
Microsoft’s Activision acquisition would instantly make it a force in mobile gaming
A guide to Microsoft’s Xbox game studios empire
Is Microsoft building a gaming monopoly?
Sony expects Microsoft to ‘continue to ensure’ Activision games stay multiplatform
Google is building an AR headset
AT&T and Verizon are limiting C-band 5G expansion around airports even more
AT&T begins 5G C-band rollout in limited number of metro areas
Verizon’s faster C-band 5G is live and off to a promising start
Apple and Google split with startups over antitrust bill
Tim Cook and Sundar Pichai are personally lobbying senators against antitrust legislation: report
Lawmakers approve Big Tech antitrust overhaul, but with strings attached
US competition enforcers launch overhaul of merger approval process
Democrats unveil bill to ban online ‘surveillance advertising’