ICYMI: the week's 7 biggest tech stories from Texas accusing your TV of
spying on you to iRobot finding a buyer

Date:
Sat, 20 Dec 2025 10:00:00 +0000

Description:
Here's the week's biggest tech news stories from iRobot, Samsung, OnePlus,
and more for December 20, 2025.

FULL STORY ======================================================================

It's almost the end of 2025, but the tech news shows no sign of stopping. We have seven more essential stories you need to catch up on from iRobot, Samsung, OnePlus, and more.

The biggest amongst our seven include Meta trashing its third-party VR headsets, and iRobot going bankrupt, and to catch up on both of those and
five more stories, you simply need to scroll down.

When you're done, you might also want to catch up on some of the big
streaming hits you missed, seven new movies and TV shows to watch this weekend. 7. iRobot went bankrupt, but isnt dead yet (Image credit: TechRadar
/ Carrie-Ann Skinner)

The iRobot Roomba was a pioneer of robot vacuums, with the first model launched in 2002. Sadly, hot competition in the robovac space forced iRobot
to declare bankruptcy this week but that isnt the end of the much-loved brand.

Its been acquired by Picea Robotics, a company that had already been building Roombas for iRobot. For now, iRobot says therell be no immediate changes for Roomba owners to worry about, and the vacuums will continue to work as usual. The future, though, is a bit more uncertain, and iRobots co-founder Colin Angle told us the bankruptcy is a tragedy for consumers." Read more: iRobot has been saved from oblivion by a mysterious Chinese robovac giant heres
what that means 6. ChatGPT finally got an app store (Image credit: OpenAI)

ChatGPT has been steadily gathering some handy plug-ins for the likes of Photoshop and Kayak over the past few months and this week, OpenAI gathered them all in an app store for us to peruse.

The Apps directory, which is available in the app or on the web , already has a number of useful options, including Spotify and AllTrails. Once youve added them, you can call on the apps inside your ChatGPT conversations to create playlists or discover new hiking routes. Weve rounded up our early favorites below. Read more: The ChatGPT app store is now live and these are the 5 apps you should try first 5. Warner Bros. rejected Paramount (Image credit: Getty Images)

The latest episode of the hit entertainment drama we hate to love aired this week: Warner Bros. Discovery announced its head hasnt been turned by the advances of Paramount instead, it remains faithful to its true love,
Netflix.

But much like a rom-com franchise being milked dry, this wont be the last we see of this love triangle dynamic. This was just the WBD execs rejecting the offer and highlighting its issues in a letter to their shareholders WBD
stock owners could still choose to sell out to Paramounts hostile takeover.

Additionally, Paramount could return with a better offer something its CEO, David Ellison, sneakily teased in leaked texts to WBD CEO David Zaslav, in which he highlighted that the bid did not include the words best and final.
If it does, a bidding war will almost certainly materialize. Read more: The Netflix merger drama is only just beginning 4. Your TV was called a mass surveillance system (Image credit: Philips)

What if we told you your TV was watching what you watched and using that information to build a profile and then deliver marketing and other details and offers based on that? That, among other things, is the contention of the Texas Attorney General, who is now suing the largest TV manufacturers, including Samsung, TCL, Hisense, LG, and Sony.

And spoiler alert: we found the Automatic Content Recognition (ACR) setting
in one of our LG TVs (no one knows if it was on by default or not), and we
can show you how to turn it off. Read more : Texas is suing LG, Samsung, Hisense, TCL, and more 3. Micro-RGB is coming to smaller TVs (Image credit: samsung)

Samsung stunned us earlier this year with a 115-inch Micro RGB TV that seriously impressed us after a hands-on. However, at that size and a hefty price tag, it wasn't for most consumers. That's set to change next year, though.

In the lead-up to CES 2026, Samsung has confirmed it will expand its Micro
RGB line to include more sizes, including smaller models such as 55-inch and 65-inch, all of which still feature micro RGB technology for brighter, more immersive colors and a more compelling viewing experience. Samsung isn't sharing pricing yet, but the hope is that bringing Micro RGB TV tech to more sizes will expand the price points beyond a single option. Time will tell. Read more: Samsung announces new micro-RGB TVs 2. The OnePlus 15R landed (Image credit: OnePlus)

The OnePlus 15 might have only debuted in October, but OnePlus is back with the 15R a device that costs less but boasts impressive specs, including a 7,400mAh battery that is larger than the one in the 15 proper.

Other highlights of the OnePlus 15R include its 6.83-inch AMOLED display,
32MP front-facing camera, 50MP primary camera, and 12GB of RAM.

Though it does come with a Snapdragon 8 Gen 5 chipset and an 8MP ultra-wide snapper. So the 15R doesnt quite compete with the OnePlus 15, but at a cost
of just $699.99 / 649 it doesnt need to. OnePlus isn't officially available
in Australia. Read more: OnePlus has announced the OnePlus 15R, a phone with
a 7,400mAh battery 1. Meta paused its third-party VR headsets (Image credit: Future)

In a move which feels as expected as it is disappointing, Meta revealed this week that it has paused its third-party VR headset development program meaning the announced Asus and Lenovo HorizonOS headsets wont see the light
of day. At least not running Metas operating system.

Announced over a year and a half ago, this writing was arguably on the wall when neither device manifested at Meta Connect 2025 .

Meta has pledged to Focus on building the world-class first-party hardware
and software needed to advance the VR market. Though our resident XR expert cant help but wonder if this Meta might have cemented Android XR as the Android of XR instead of Horizon OS. Read more: Meta just u-turned on the
best VR announcement it ever made



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Link to news story: https://www.techradar.com/tech/icymi-the-weeks-7-biggest-tech-stories-from-tex as-accusing-your-tv-of-spying-on-you-to-irobot-finding-a-buyer


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