Tech
Waymo cuts off L.A. taxi service after cars are set on fire
Waymo suspended its self-driving taxi service in downtown Los Angeles after people set fire to some of the company's vehicles on Sunday.
Peaceful protests began in L.A. on Friday, in response to workplace raids conducted by Immigration and Customs Enforcement, targeting undocumented residents.
By late Sunday, some of the protests turned violent as President Donald Trump authorized the deployment of National Guard troops and threatened to send military troops to the area. California Governor Gavin Newsom and Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass both criticized Trump's moves as "purposefully inflammatory" and a "chaotic escalation."
The Los Angeles Police Department said Sunday evening that "agitators" had "splintered" into downtown L.A.
It's unclear whether the individuals who torched the Waymo cars were affiliated with organized protests or were agitators who capitalized on the situation. Before the cars burned, they were graffitied with anti-ICE messaging.
Waymo is owned by Alphabet, the parent company of Google, though there is no evidence yet to suggest the vandals knew that. A Waymo spokesperson told Mashable that the company is in touch with law enforcement.
The LAPD asked people to avoid the area following the fires.
"Burning lithium-ion batteries release toxic gases, including hydrogen fluoride, posing risks to responders and those nearby," the department said on X.
Waymo removed the burned vehicles from the street, according to the New York Times.
Over the weekend, Trump attacked California politicians multiple times on his social media platform, Truth Social. On Sunday afternoon, he also called for bringing in military troops to respond to protests. Trump also deployed National Guard troops to the protests.
Governor Newsom said on X that the federal government was trying to create a "spectacle" by "taking over" the state's National Guard troops.
Authorities used tear gas and non-lethal impact rounds to disperse protesters, according to the Washington Post.
In advance of the ICE raids, LAPD's chief of police Jim McDonnell reassured Los Angeles residents in an Instagram post that the department wasn't involved in the federal operations. He also acknowledged that "these actions cause anxiety for many Angelenos."
Authorities arrested dozens of people who participated in protests, according to NBC Los Angeles. Charges included attempted murder, looting, and arson.
"This violence that I've seen is disgusting," McDonnell told NBC Los Angeles. "It's escalated now."
The vandalism of Waymo cars in Los Angeles wasn't the first time they became a target of mob violence.
In February 2024, a 14-year-old boy allegedly began vandalizing a Waymo in San Francisco. About a dozen bystanders joined him in smashing the car. A firework thrown inside the vehicle ignited it, according to authorities.
On Sunday evening, Mayor Bass urged protesters to remain peaceful.
"Angelenos — don’t engage in violence and chaos," she said in an X post. "Don’t give the administration what they want."
SAVE $50: As of Aug. 6, buy the Samsung Galaxy Watch8 for $349.99 at Best Buy and get a free $50 e-gift card.
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A good smartwatch can be your constant companion when it comes to handling your day. It can track your fitness, handle notifications and texts, and even help you make calls, all while giving you a full spectrum of body-centric metrics. If you're already using an Android phone or want a reliable brand for your purchase, you should consider heading to Best Buy to grab a Samsung smartwatch and get a little extra.
As of Aug. 6, buy the Samsung Galaxy Watch8 for $349.99 at Best Buy and get a free $50 e-gift card.
The 2025 Galaxy Watch8 has a slew of features, including Google Gemini integration, something Samsung managed to get before Google could implement in its Pixel Watch lineup. It also has a wide variety of health and fitness options, including preset workout data, sleep tracking, heart rate monitoring, and much more to help you make sure you can face the day at your best.
Beyond those things, the Galaxy Watch8 also lets you handle comms straight from your wrist so you can make calls, text, use some of your favorite apps, and organize your life. Your personal AI assistant is voice-activated as well, so it can help you get things done even when your hands are busy.
You'd think Android and YouTube would work together flawlessly, but early this week, that wasn't the case.
As reported and confirmed by 9to5Google, YouTube users on Android devices couldn't change the playback speed on videos. Changing the speed to anything other than 1x would simply not work, as the setting change wouldn't save, acting as if you hadn't done it at all. Obviously, that's not a great user experience, considering that Android and YouTube are both Google's responsibility. It seems a bit strange for Android users specifically to lose access to a core YouTube feature, but that's what happened.
Thankfully, it seems that as of Wednesday morning, the issue has been fixed, per a YouTube community note. The note states that any users still experiencing the issue should simply close and reopen the app. Hopefully, by doing that, you can fix the problem and get back to frame-by-frame analysis of movie trailers at 0.25x speed.
For once, it paid off to use a Google app on iOS instead.
On top of directing horror hits Get Out, Us, and Nope, Jordan Peele has produced several exciting genre projects, from Dev Patel's Monkey Man to Nia DaCosta's Candyman, which he also co-wrote. Next up on his production slate is the football horror film Him, directed by Justin Tipping.
Co-written by Skip Bronkie, Zack Akers, and Tipping, Him introduces promising young football star Cameron Cade (Tyriq Withers). Not only does Withers have acting experience from projects like I Know What You Did Last Summer and Atlanta, he was also part of Florida State University's 2017 football team as a wide receiver. Hopefully his experience playing was nothing like Cameron's in Him, though, because the trailer makes it out to be a full-on nightmare.
After suffering a traumatic brain injury at the hands of an unhinged fan, Cameron thinks his football dream is dead. But when his hero, legendary quarterback Isaiah White (Marlon Wayans), offers to train him at his personal compound, he's excited to accept.
However, Isaiah's training methods are far more violent than Cameron realized. (And football is already pretty violent!) We're talking smashing footballs into players' faces until they bleed as punishment.
But that's just the start of the horrors that await in Him, which demands that Cameron sacrifice everything to be the GOAT he so badly wants to be. Check out the unsettling trailer above.
Him also stars Julia Fox, Tim Heidecker, Jim Jefferies, and MMA fighter Maurice Greene, as well as hip-hop artists Guapdad 4000 and Tierra Whack.
Him hits theaters Sept. 19.
Buy the Samsung Galaxy Watch8 at Best Buy and get a free $50 e-gift card
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