Lifehacker

Dark Waters (2019)

Dark Waters, from director Todd Haynes, kicks off with farmers discovering that their livestock are dying by the hundreds from exposure to waste in the water produced by a local DuPont chemical plant—which is just the beginning, as cancer rates among humans are also unexpectedly high. Mark Ruffalo stars as lawyer Robert Bilott, who takes on the farmers' case. It's based on the New York Times Magazine article "The Lawyer Who Became DuPont's Worst Nightmare" by Nathaniel Rich, and Haynes and company do a masterful job of dramatizing the high-stakes legal battle, as well as the problem of buy-in—parties to the legal action become pariahs in their community because many would rather take their chances with cancer than risk losing a big employer. This all happened within the last decade, so many of the issues related to so-called "forever chemicals" (those that never leave the bloodstream once exposed) are very much ongoing, and will only become more prominent in the current era of deregulation. You can rent Dark Waters from Prime Video.

Dark Waters (2019)

The Insider (1999)

Michael Mann's account of tobacco industry shenanigans did only middling business at the box office, but nonetheless earned seven Oscar nominations—including one for Best Picture. It comes at the story from a smart, sideways angle: The focus is on the 60 Minutes piece that broke wide open the story of big tobacco's malfeasance over the risks of smoking—a story that made clear that these companies knew the true dangers of smoking, and lied about it to keep their customers addicted. In the movie's largely accurate telling, CBS producer Lowell Bergman (Al Pacino) coaxes former tobacco-company chemist Dr. Jeffrey Wigand (Russell Crowe) to reveal what he knows, only to face pushback from fearful executives and threats from the tobacco industry. The narrative makes clear the high cost of telling even the most straightforward of truths. You can stream The Insider on The Criterion Channel or rent it from Prime Video.

The Insider (1999)

The Constant Gardener (2005)

Even the Rain (2011)

In 1999, a group of investors lead by the American company Bechtel invested in a dam near Cochabamba, Bolivia. The thus contained water was then sold back to the locals at vastly higher rates. The resulting protests saw tens of thousands of people take to the streets. In director Icíar Bollaín's wildly ambitious film-within-a-film, a crew, led by director Sebastián (Gael García Bernal), comes to Cochabamba to make a movie based on Christopher Columbus' first voyage. His thoughtless executive producer Costa (Luis Tosar)stirs up trouble with his lack of consideration for the locals as the water protests simmer in the background. Weaving in themes that consider the long history of colonization, the film isn't shy about drawing clear lines between past and present. You can stream Even the Rain on Netflix.

Even the Rain (2011)

at Netflix

Into the Weeds (2022)

The jury is still out, I suppose, on the risks of glycophosphate (a prime ingredient in Monsanto's herbicide Roundup) in typical doses, but there's nevertheless much to cheer in Dewayne "Lee" Johnson's case against the chemical company. A school groundskeeper in California, Johnson was exposed to hundreds of gallons of the stuff over the years. He was diagnosed with a terminal case of non-Hodgkin lymphoma at the age of 42, and as this documentary reveals, Johnson won his case against the chemical giant—an extremely rare victory that, if even in only a small way, put these companies on notice. You can stream Into the Woods on Hoopla or rent it from Prime Video.

Into the Weeds (2022)

The Constant Gardener (2005)

Ralph Fiennes stars as Justin Quayle, a British diplomat in Kenya, trying to solve the murder of his wife Tessa (Rachel Weisz, who won an Oscar for the role), an Amnesty International activist. It seems that Tessa had been investigating the deaths related to drug trials around something called Dypraxa. The movie alternates between the harrowing investigation and the story of the development of the relationship between the two. An adaptation of the John le Carré, both book and film were inspired by a Pfizer drug trial in Nigeria in 1996 that left 11 children dead. You can rent The Constant Gardener from Prime Video.

The Informant! (2009)

Nearly a decade after Erin Brockovich, Steven Soderbergh took on another real-life whistleblower, this time puncturing the self-importance and self-seriousness of white-collar criminals with a dose of dark comedy. (As we ought to have learned by now, capitalism rewards the goofy and dumb at least as often as it does those with half a brain.) Matt Damon plays corporate executive Mark Whitacre, who confesses to a couple of FBI agents (Scott Bakula and Joel McHale) about his involvement in a scheme to fix the price of commercial livestock-related chemical lysine. Whitacre gets increasingly loopy during his time wearing a wire for the Feds, a period during which his various other infractions come out. Oh, and during which he also embezzles a ton of money from the company he's purportedly trying to expose. You can stream The informant! on Prime Video.

The Informant! (2009)

Radium Girls (2018)

A fictionalized account of the real-life radium girls (oddly, it's not based on Kate Moore's nonfiction bestseller of the same name), this film follows Josephine and Betty Cavallo, sisters employed painting watch dials at an "American Radium" factory in New Jersey. In real life, radium workers were often called "ghost girls" for the ways in which the radium they worked with made their clothes and hair glow. Workers were assured the radioactive element was entirely safe, and even encouraged to lick their brushes to make the points finer for painting clocks and watches. In real life, much as in the movie, it was the United States Radium Corp. that fought to keep the truth about the dangers of radium from coming out, blaming illnesses and deaths on syphilis long after it was clear what was happening. The back half of Radium Girls dives into the famous court case that resulted, one that wasn't entirely a triumph at the time but that did pave the way for the creation of OSHA and other safety reforms that protected workers for decades—until very recently. You can rent Radium Girls on Prime Video.

Radium Girls (2018)

Michael Clayton (2007)

A legal drama with a bit of extra swagger, Michael Clayton is from writer/director Tony Gilroy, the filmmaker who wrote and/or directed most of the Bourne movies. It manages to be just as thrilling, if in an entirely different way. George Clooney stars as the eponymous fixer, working at a major law firm finding legal loop holes that will benefit clients—until he starts to develop a conscience after discovering that his firm is working to clear a path for an agricultural chemical concern to escape the consequences of knowingly selling a cancer-causing weedkiller. The drama and action are on point, as following Clayton as he is hunted by chemical industry goons. It earned seven Academy Award nominations, including for one for Best Picture. You can stream Michael Clayton on Prime Video.

Michael Clayton (2007)

Harlan County, USA (1976)

Filmed as its history unfolded, Barbara Kopple's essential documentary chronicles what became known as the “Brookside Strike” against the owners of the Brookside Mine and Prep Plant in Harlan County, Kentucky. Kopple’s original intent was to create a film about efforts to unseat the wildly corrupt leader of the United Mine Workers of America union at the time, W.A. Boyle, who seemed to many to be in the pockets of the mine owners (he was later convicted of conspiracy in the murders of a reformist opponent’s entire family). That explosive story turned out to be a side-note to the brutal, bloody, violent opposition faced by the striking mineworkers and their families. These workers were no pushovers when it came to their rights and mine safety; nor were their wives and mothers. It's a throwback to an era when what we might call the "white working class" (though it was not exclusively white) would still fight fiercely against government and corporate greed. You can stream Harlan County USA on Max and The Criterion Channel.

Harlan County USA (1976)

North Country (2005)

Though occasionally a bit formulaic, there's no faulting North Country for its ability to rouse, at least in moments, nor for its acting: both Charlize Theron and Frances McDormand earned Oscar nominations for their roles. While fictionalized, the film is based on the nonfiction book Class Action, by Clara Bingham and Laura Leedy Gansler, which examines Jenson v. Eveleth Taconite Co., the first-ever class-action sexual harassment lawsuit in the U.S., which took place in 1989. Theron plays Josey Aimes, who moves back to her hometown in northern Minnesota and takes a well-paying job in the local iron mine at the behest of an old acquaintance (McDormand). No rabble-rouser, Aimes nonetheless immediately sees how women at the mine are treated: Their skills are dismissed, and they're viewed as low-cost replacements for more deserving men. What's more, sexual harassment and even sexual assault are daily occurrences. With the (initially reluctant) backing of the local union, Aimes takes the mine to court on behalf of all the women workers, facing down a massive company more than willing to make an issue of her own sex life. You can stream North Country on Hoopla or rent it from Prime Video.

North Country (2005)

Philadelphia (1993)

Andrew Beckett isn't a traditional "little guy," instead a successful senior associate at a major corporate law firm in Philly. He's also gay and closeted, and starts displaying lesions (Kaposi's sarcoma, specifically) related to the AIDS diagnosis that he's been concealing. When he's fired with little reason given, he hires Joe Miller (Denzel Washington), one of the few lawyers who will take his wrongful termination suit. There were few mainstream films about about the darkest days of the first HIV/AIDS crisis (and we're living through another, as effective treatments and miracle preventatives have become increasingly scarce and unaffordable), and none had more cultural impact than this all-star legal drama. It's based loosely on the real-life case of attorney Geoffrey Bowers and his own lawyer, Clarence Cain, who took on the law firm Baker McKenzie under similar circumstances, though the Hollywood version has a somewhat happier end—Bowers' own case wasn't settled until eight years after his death. You can rent Philadelphia from Prime Video.

Philadelphia (1993)

The Rainmaker (1997)

Matt Damon stars in this John Grisham adaptation, directed by Francis Ford Coppola, as Rudy S. Baylor, a poor kid who just barely made it through law school only to find himself in a profession that mostly makes him uncomfortable—not helped by the fact that his first boss is a smarmy con man played by Mickey Rourke. Convinced by scrappy paralegal Deck Shifflet (Danny DeVito) to join him in a little storefront operation, the two take on three cases around which the movie revolves, but the emotional core is in the one about a kid with cancer whose treatment his insurance company refuses to fund. It quickly becomes clear that Donny's life can't be saved, but there's hope that the insurance company can be forced to treat him like a person and not a line item anyway. It's still timely, except for the "hope" part. You can stream The Rainmaker on Pluto TV or rent it from Prime Video.

The Rainmaker (1997)

Salt of the Earth (1954)

Once of the first films that we'd recognize as independent in the modern sense (the writer, director, and producer were all blacklisted), Salt of the Earth was suppressed and dismissed as propaganda for its wild, still controversial propositions that racism is bad, women should maybe have some rights, and working conditions ought not be awful. Commie nonsense, to be sure, but presented not without dramatic flair. Based on a real 1951 strike, the movie is set in "Zinc Town, New Mexico" among mostly Mexican-American miners who are agitating for better working conditions—at least as good as those of their white counterparts. The strikers are arrested and the strike is put down by use of the real, and then recent, Taft-Hartley Act, the nation's most significant anti-union legislation (it's still in force, by the way). A loophole allows the miners' wives to march in their places, and the movement is lead by Esperanza Quintero (Rosaura Revueltas), the spouse of a jailed striker. You can stream Salt of the Earth on MGM+, Tubi, Pluto TV, and Prime Video.

Salt of the Earth (1954)

The China Syndrome (1979)

The China Syndrome (1979)

The Meryl Streep-starring Silkwood, the acclaimed film based on the real-life case of a nuclear whistleblower, isn't streaming or digitally rentable anywhere (conspiracy!), but The China Syndrome isn't a terrible substitute. Jane Fonda plays a reporter who begins to smell something fishy at the Ventana nuclear power plant, the owners of which are handing out radiographs that don't make much sense. It turns out there's a leak that they can't be bothered to fix, and rather than shelling out that money, they're putting out faked test results suggesting that all is fine, and surely the tragic accidents that befall anyone who considers speaking up are mere coincidences. Nuclear industry executives were initially livid at the suggestion that anything could ever go wrong at one of their plants, but got much quieter 12 days later, when the Three Mile Island nuclear accident occurred in Pennsylvania. Jane Fonda and Jack Lemmon both earned Oscar nominations for their performances. You can rent The China Syndrome from Prime Video.

Sound: Stereo, Connection Type: Wireless, Connectivity: Bluetooth, Maximum Wireless Range: 33 feet.

Five Reasons You Might Qualify for Lower Car Insurance Premiums

Emily Long — Thu, 06 Mar 2025 13:30:39 +0000

Like homeowners insurance, auto insurance is getting significantly more expensive: Data show that policy costs rose 11% last year, likely due to factors like climate change, rising accident rates, and higher repair costs. Under certain circumstances, you may be able to offset or at least keep your car insurance premium stable, if not reduce it.

If you go through any of the following life changes, it may be time to call your insurance company about lowering your policy premium.

You've moved

A move is a major life transition—and one that could impact your auto insurance policy for the better in a few ways. First, insurers factor where you park your car into your rate, so living in a lower density or safer neighborhood can potentially save you some money. Moving also gives you the chance to bundle your renters or homeowners insurance policy with your auto policy if you haven't already, which typically reduces the cost of both. Finally, moving can change your driving habits, which we'll get into next.

You're driving less

Let's say your move has put your closer to work, or you've changed jobs or begun working remotely more frequently, or another shift in your routine has cut the number of miles you drive on a regular basis. Insurance companies consider annual mileage when calculating premiums, so a significant drop could save you some money.

Your family size has changed

If you've had a teenager on your policy who now has their own vehicle or own policy and no longer lives at home, removing them from yours can save you a significant amount of money on your premiums (potentially cutting the cost by half). On the flip side, combining your policy with a new spouse's could reduce the cost per person.

You've taken a defensive driving course

One of the many discounts available on auto insurance is for taking a defensive driving course—in fact, some states require insurers to offer this discount. Typically, these discounts are good for several years before you need to retake the class. Discounts range from 5% to 20% off your premium.

Your coverage is about to renew (or expire)

Re-upping your policy won't save you money specifically, but it is a good time to call your current insurer about options for reducing your premium as well as to shop around for cheaper options.

Other ways to lower your car insurance premium

Even if you don't have a life change that could qualify you for a lower insurance premium, there are other ways to reduce the cost of your policy:

Increase your deductible: Raising your deductible (the amount you'll pay out of pocket before your policy kicks in) can lower your premium. Most policies have a $500 deductible, but bumping that up to $1,000 can potentially save you 25% on your policy cost, according to Consumer Reports. However, you'll want to consider whether you have an emergency fund to cover the added potential cost.
Decrease certain types of coverage: Collision and comprehensive coverage may be optional in your state, and dropping one or both can reduce your policy premium. Collision may be an unnecessary expense if your car's value is especially low (and if your premium is more than 10% of that value).
Ask about discounts: Many insurers offer policy discounts for things like setting up autopay or paperless statements, paying your premium upfront, maintaining a clean driving record, and bundling with other policies.
Drive a cheaper car: This may not be a change you can make immediately, but when you're in the market for a vehicle, consider a make and model that's cheaper to insure.
Look for usage-based policies: Usage-based insurance calibrates your policy to your real-life driving habits, so low-risk drivers pay less. However, this typically requires you to have a tracking app that sends data to your insurance company, which raises privacy concerns, and risky driving can actually increase your policy cost.

This Simple Text Document Could Replace Your Calendar App

Justin Pot — Thu, 06 Mar 2025 13:00:00 +0000

Gina Trapani, founder of the website you're reading right now, popularized a plaintext format for to-do lists way back in 2006 (please excuse any weird formatting on that nearly 20-year-old article). Called Todo.txt, it is used by many people to this day, in part thanks to an ecosystem of applications built around the format.

I recently stumbled on Calendar.txt, by author and teacher Tero Karvinen. It's a text document based on a similar philosophy—a stripped down, just-the-basics take on your overloaded calendar app. It's a concept worth considering. We're at least a decade into the "using a separate app for everything" era, and sure, a lot of those apps are pretty great. I've spent years recommending software-based tools for everything from managing tasks to making drinks, and I don't plan to stop anytime soon.

But not everyone needs a bespoke app for everything they do. Productivity is personal, and everyone has different needs. I've known several highly technically competent people who still use paper day planners to track their appointments and tasks—a simple notebook is flexible in a way that no app can match.

One line of text per day

I view plaintext tools like Calendar.txt in a similar light. This specific tool is about as simple as it gets: It uses one line of text for every day. You can download a pre-made file with lines for dates that stretches through the year 2033, or you can just make your own.

Every line starts with the date, followed by the week number, followed by a three-letter week name. The idea is that you write your appointments after that, by simply writing the time, followed by the name of the event. Events are simply added, in order, to the line.

So, for example, a line for today, with one appointment/task (me cleaning the house this afternoon) would look like this:

2025-03-06 w10 Thu 14 cleaning the house

There are many shortcomings to this approach. There's no built-in tool for reminding you of events, for one thing, and there's no way to invite others to your appointment. But this simple approach might work for you.

And, as todo.txt demonstrated two decades ago, there are benefits to using plaintext files. Plaintext is versatile, can be opened on any device, and your files won't disappear because some software company decides it wanted to change its priorities. If you're familiar with the command line, you can use existing tools in all kinds of interesting ways. For example, the calendar.txt documentation shows how you can use grep, a tool for searching text documents, to pull up today's appointments:

grep 2025-03-06 calendar.txt

You could use the same command to search for events by the day.

Credit: Justin Pot

Again, this approach won't seem useful to everyone—especially if you never open the command prompt—but not every tool needs to be for every user. Only you can decide which tools work best for you.

More AI Is Coming to Your Google Search Results

Jake Peterson — Wed, 05 Mar 2025 22:00:41 +0000

When Google rolled out AI Overviews for Search last year, it didn't go over so well. The company's AI made some pretty massive mistakes with its results, many of which went viral. In response, Google pulled back the feature, reworked it, and slowly reintroduced it to the masses. You've probably noticed.

This month, Google is continuing its work of adding AI to Search—whether you want it or not. First, it's rolling out a new version of AI Overviews that's powered by Gemini 2.0, the company's latest AI model. Google says this update will help with "harder questions," like coding, math, and multimodal (prompts using different types of media) requests. In addition, teens can now see AI Overviews, as can users without a Google Account. Yippee.

Introducing AI Mode

But the larger AI announcement from Google is something the company is currently testing: AI Mode. See, Google says that they've heard from "power users" that they are looking for AI responses from more of their Google searches. In response, AI Mode lets you ask the AI multi-part questions, that offers more advanced reasoning, thinking, and multimodal functions.

On paper, it sounds like a more complex AI Overview, but it's a bit more nuanced than that. AI Mode is its own tab in Search, that turns the UI into more of what you'd expect from ChatGPT or Gemini. Google says this experience is supposed to combine what would've taken multiple searches into one: You ask the AI something complicated, it reasons through it (showing its thinking along the way) and delivers a full answer with multiple results, claims, and summaries—citing its sources for each of its generations.

Credit: Google

Google says AI Mode uses a “query fan-out” technique to generate its results. Essentially, it searches for multiple related things at the same time, combining those results together into the response you see at the end. AI Mode pulls from many different data points for its results, including web results, Google's Knowledge Graph, and shopping data.

Google uses the following query to demonstrate this approach: “What's the difference in sleep tracking features between a smart ring, smartwatch and tracking mat?" AI Mode supposedly takes that multi-part question, develops a multistep "plan" to conduct a number of searches to find the information, and changes that plan according to the results it returns.

This is still obviously a work in progress (as AI search is across the board) so Google says AI Mode won't get it right all the time. In fact, you may simply see a result of just web links, if the program thinks the AI result isn't good enough.

I'm not sure how useful AI Mode actually is, especially when compared to either searching with Gemini, or a traditional Google Search (especially one without the AI). I'll need to wait until Google lets me try the feature out for myself before making any judgement calls. My guess, though, based on my current experience with AI, is that I'll prefer the usual Search method.

How to try Google's AI Mode

If you have any interest in trying Google's new AI Mode, there are a couple ways to get in. First, if you are a Google One AI Premium subscriber, you'll be among the first to be invited to try out AI Mode in Labs.

If you aren't a subscriber, however, you'll need to jump on the waitlist. Sign into your Google Account, then head to Google Labs. Under "Introducing the AI Mode Experiment," choose "Join waitlist." Google will then bring you to a page advertising the feature, where you can confirm you are on the waitlist.

These Shokz Bone Conduction Headphones Are $60 Off Right Now

Daniel Oropeza — Wed, 05 Mar 2025 21:30:43 +0000

We may earn a commission from links on this page. Deal pricing and availability subject to change after time of publication.

Bone conduction headphones are ideal for activities where it is vital to your safety to hear your surroundings. That's because they use a technology that sends audio vibrations through to the inner ear while leaving your ear canals open. Shokz is one of, if not the best, brand making bone conduction headphones right now; at the high end of Shokz's offerings is the OpenRun Pro 2, which I got to review and put to the test. But the OpenRun Pro are also quality headphones and are currently discounted on Best Buy for $99.99 (originally $179.95), the lowest price they've been, according to price-tracking tools.

SHOKZ OpenRun Pro

If you've never used bone conduction headphones, they're worth a try, and the Shokz OpenPro are a great introduction. The technology has come a long way since their early days. The major downside of the way they work has been that the bass doesn't sound as good as their in-ear counterparts. The OpenRun Pro is designed to compensate for some of that—you won't get the same thumpy bass you'd get from regular headphones, but it'll be the best you can get from any other bone conduction headphones.

As the name implies, these are meant to be used on runs outdoors. They have an IP55 rating for dust- and water-resistance, are lightweight and comfortable, and, because of their design, can be worn with bicycle helmets and sunglasses.

You can use these as everyday headphones around the house as well since they can take calls; just be mindful that they don't block any sound. If you plan to use these in a location with a loud music or has a lot of ambient noise, you'll hear everything, so you might prefer taking regular headphones—but that will defeat the purpose of the "open ear" headphones.

My Favorite Amazon Deal of the Day: The Ikarao Shell S1 Portable Karaoke Speaker

Daniel Oropeza — Wed, 05 Mar 2025 21:00:35 +0000

We may earn a commission from links on this page. Deal pricing and availability subject to change after time of publication.

Testing the Ikarao Shell S1 karaoke speaker during my review has been one of the highlights of my job as tech reviewer. Now that it's $100 off, reaching the price of $249.99 (originally $349.99) after the on-page coupon, it's at its lowest price ever, according to price-tracking tools. While you might've never heard of the brand before, I can attest that this speaker is quality, and now, it's a bargain for its price.

Ikarao Shell S1 Smart Karaoke Speaker

Battery Life: 9 hours, Connectivity: USB, AUX In/Out, HDMI, Wifi, OTG, and Bluetooth V5.4.

$349.99 at Amazon

It bewilders me why no company before thought of doing what Ikarao has done with the Shell S1: Combine a touchscreen tablet, two Bluetooth microphones, and powerful sound to a small portable speaker. None of those things are new technologies, yet it took until Ikarao thought of it to make it happen.

The Shell S1 is their newest and most affordable karaoke speaker. And it's loud enough to host a house party with its 104dB stereo speaker (it fills my whole 1,300 square foot home with sound loud enough to have a party). The two wireless microphones have a 20-hour rechargeable battery life while the speaker itself lasts about nine hours if you're using the screen. The screen is a 10.1-inch touchscreen tablet that lets you control the music. It comes with an integrated Spotify app but unfortunately no YouTube app (it does have a direct link to it using a web browser).

You can hook up the speaker to a TV to have more people sing along with you, but you'll need to hook up an HDMI cable. There is a casting option but it's done through a third-party app that you need to download. It's not as easy as AirPlay or connecting an HDMI cable.

If you're looking for a reliable and compact karaoke machine that you can hook up to your TV and play for hours, the Shell S1 at $250 is the best you can get right now.

Digg Is Coming Back (Sort Of)

Justin Pot — Wed, 05 Mar 2025 20:30:00 +0000

Digg, the dominant link aggregator of the mid-2000s, is attempting yet another comeback. Kevin Rose, one of Digg's original founders, has acquired the brand name for an undisclosed sum and is teaming up with Reddit founder Alexis Ohanian to build a new-ish social network. The plan was announced this morning in articles on Techcrunch and in the New York Times.

There aren't many concrete details in these articles about what the site will look like, though they do note it will use AI as a key moderation tool. "Online communities thrive when there’s a balance between technology and human judgment,” Ohanian told Techcrunch, adding that, "AI should handle the grunt work in the background while humans focus on what they do best: building real connections." Rose surveyed current Reddit moderators in an attempt to learn what improved moderation tools could look like.

That's about it in terms of specifics—both pieces focus less on the tech and more on the founders themselves. But we do know the new Digg won't look like an "old school forum" according to Rose. He said that, in a few years, it "will be an interface that is unlike any other that you've seen." Whatever that means.

Digg was founded in 2004—more than two decades ago, an eternity in internet terms—by Rose and other collaborators. Reddit arrived on the scene around a year later, in 2005, founded by current CEO Steve Huffman, the late hacktivist Aaron Swartz, and Ohanian. The two websites fought to be the dominate link aggregator for a half-decade, a competition Reddit eventually won. One way of looking at this history is that Reddit ultimately won over users, though you could also argue that Digg destroyed itself: An extremely buggy and widely unpopular 2010 redesign, launched under Rose's leadership, prioritized the posts of certain contributors and ultimately led to a mass exodus of users. The site never recovered and was soon more or less sold off piecemeal in 2012.

Invitations to the new version of the site will be sent in the next few weeks—you can sign up here to try it if you're curious. With any luck it won't just be yet another place to yell about screenshots taken from other social networks; the internet sure could use something that's actually new. Only time will tell, though.

Three Roth IRA Rules to Know During Tax Season

Meredith Dietz — Wed, 05 Mar 2025 20:00:25 +0000

Tax season is the perfect time to review your Roth IRA contribution strategy. While Roth IRAs offer incredible tax advantages, they come with specific rules that can trip up even savvy investors. After all, the humble Roth IRA is one of your most powerful retirement savings tools—when used correctly.

You have until the April tax return deadline to set up and fund an IRA for the prior tax year. This means you have until April 15, 2025 to open and contribute to a Roth for 2024. We're also in the window where you can fund your 2025 IRA at the same time. Additional contributions for 2025 can be made until April 15, 2026, and so on. Keep in mind, filing for an extension to submit your return does not extend the deadline for IRA contributions.

Here key contribution guidelines to know about Roth IRAs right now, so you can maximize your retirement savings and avoid potential penalties.

Rule 1: Earned income

The most fundamental rule for Roth IRA contributions is simple: You can only contribute money you've actually earned. This means your contributions must come from:

Wages from a job
Salary
Tips
Commissions
Self-employment income
Bonuses
Alimony

Important nuances to remember:

Investment income, Social Security benefits, and pension payments do not count as earned income
If you're a stay-at-home spouse, you can still contribute based on your working spouse's earned income
For students or part-time workers, your contribution is limited to your actual earned income for the year

Rule 2: Annual contribution limits

The IRS sets specific limits on how much you can contribute to a Roth IRA each year. For 2024, these limits are:

Under 50 years old: $7,000 maximum annual contribution
50 and older: $8,000 (includes a $1,000 catch-up contribution)

These limits are aggregate across all your IRAs. So if you have multiple Roth or traditional IRA accounts, the total contributions cannot exceed the annual limit.

Attempting to contribute more than the annual limit will result in a 6% penalty tax on the excess amount unless promptly removed. If you exceed the Roth IRA contribution limits, you have until the tax filing deadline, plus extensions, to withdraw the excess contributions and any income they earned.

Rule 3: You can't contribute more than you earn

This rule is a direct extension of the earned income requirement. Your Roth IRA contribution cannot exceed your total earned income for the year. For example:

If you earned $5,000 in part-time work, your maximum Roth IRA contribution is $5,000
If you only earned $3,000, you can only contribute up to $3,000
If you earned $0, you cannot make any Roth IRA contributions

Pro tips for Roth IRA contributions

As a rule of thumb, keep detailed records of your earned income. I know I rely on automated contributions to stay within limits, as well as make sure I'm maxing out my fund.

Remember that contribution limits can change annually, so stay informed. Tax season is an excellent time to review your Roth IRA strategy. For me, this means making contributions as early in the calendar year as I can. I highly recommend getting ahead by maxing out 2025 as soon as you can, and then contributing larger lump sum right at the start of 2026. At the end of the day, compound interest is the name of the game, and early investing means more time for compounding to work.

Four Ways to Make a House Work for You (When You Can’t Move)

Jeff Somers — Wed, 05 Mar 2025 19:30:32 +0000

There used to be a clear progression in home ownership: You bought a “starter” home when you were young, built equity, then cashed in when prices rose and leveled up to something bigger, newer, or with the features you really want. And if you bought a house that didn’t live up to expectations, or if your situation changed without warning (hello, unexpected third child!), you would list the place and move to a better option.

But increasingly, that seems like an artifact of a bygone age. It’s easy these days to feel “stuck” in your current home—because of that amazing mortgage rate you locked in years ago, the eye-watering cost of a house these days, or some other issue. If that’s you, don’t despair: Maybe you can’t sell and move right now, and an expensive whole-house renovation or addition might not be in the cards, but there’s a lot you can do with your current home to make it work for your family and lifestyle without needing to launch a Kickstarter.

Work with it

If you’re stuck in your current house, your first step is to assess what you have and look for ways to make it work for you. This doesn’t have to involve an expensive major renovation or addition project—there are probably a lot of resources already in your current home that you’re not using to their full potential, such as:

Closets are potentially versatile spaces that can become home offices, pantries, or even small spare bedrooms.
Home offices don’t have to be their own room—aside from that tiny closet, you can fit an office under a lofted bed, in the corner of your bedroom, or under a flight of stairs.
Hallways are often overlooked as usable space, but if yours are wide enough, you can cram seating or library space and even a sleeping area into your hallways.
Second (or third) bathrooms might not be in the cards if your house (and budget) are small, but if you just need a practical solution, you can actually create a usable bathroom just about anywhere in your home without any plumbing whatsoever.
Storage is one of the biggest reasons people feel like they’ve outgrown their homes, but you might be surprised at how much extra storage you can carve out of your house if you put your mind to it.
Laundry facilities in the house are one of the greatest gifts of the modern age. If your current home lacks a washer, a portable washing machine might make things more tolerable for you until you can find a place with laundry hookups.

By using every inch of your home’s potential you can find ways to make it meet your needs—at least for a while.

Start over

Sometimes all you need to make a house work for you is a reset. A cluttered, crowded house can have a negative impact on your mental health in general, which will obviously affect your feelings toward your home. Rooms filled with boxes can’t be used for their intended purpose, and the constant sense of disruption and unfinished business can make a home feel less than comfortable. Decluttering and organizing your home can make it feel almost new.

And this doesn’t have to be a monumental project requiring time off from work and an extra therapy session—start with one room. Clear it out completely, clean and freshen it up (a coat of paint can make a room feel brand-new), then re-imagine it. Even if it remains a storage room, making it neat and tidy will make it usable, which will make you more positive toward it and thus toward the house. Repeat for each room at your own pace, and you’ll slowly gain back that sense of pride, control, and ownership you had when you first bought the place.

Look outward

Maybe you’ve explored the spare square footage and decluttered like a champ, and there are just things your current home can’t give you. Space is finite, after all, and there may be no super creative solutions to give you that space or functionality you need.

If you’re stuck in your home for the time being, you might find contentment by looking elsewhere for what’s missing in your house. No space for a workout? A gym membership’s got you covered. No spot for even a tiny office? A co-working space nearby might work. If your closets are bursting, hauling seasonal stuff to a local storage unit can give you your house back. While the ideal might be to have all these things conveniently in your house, stashing them away temporarily will at least meet your needs until you can make some real estate moves.

Personalize

It’s funny: You go through all the trouble and expense of buying a house, and then you work very hard to keep the place “neutral” for potential resale. You never use the bathtub, but you keep it because it’s “good for resale value.” You choose paint colors and design elements that are broadly in line with what “most people” want in a house.

This can result in a house that never feels like yours—it’s like living in someone else’s house. If you’re going to be in this house for the time being, one way to feel better about it and make it work for you is to go in the opposite direction: Lean into personalizing the space. Choose colors and furniture pieces that make you happy, display your collections and art pieces, DIY whatever you want or need to in order to use the space the way you want to. If part of what’s driving your desire to move is a sense of not being comfortable in your current home, working to make it as comfortable as possible—resale value be damned—might solve the problem.

Apple's Newest MacBook Air Is the One to Buy

Jake Peterson — Wed, 05 Mar 2025 19:00:00 +0000

So, you want to buy a MacBook? You have no shortage of options. If you go directly through Apple, you can pick between the Air or the Pro, in two different sizes, across a seemingly endless number of configurations. If you're shopping from a third party retailer, the issue only compounds. There are a lot of MacBooks out there.

Which machine you should purchase is entirely up to you and your unique needs. However, unless you have demanding or specialized work to do, there is one model that makes more sense than most. Before today, I recommended the M2 MacBook Air to most people. Its combination of price, portability, and power made it not just the best MacBook for most people, but the best laptop overall. (Sorry, PCs.) There were and are cheaper options out there, but that M2 MacBook Air was simply, in my opinion, the best overall value on the market.

I no longer think this, because Apple just dropped a new MacBook Air, and it's my new pick for the best MacBook for most customers. Here's why.

The price is right

Let's kick things off with what makes the MacBook Air great: the price. The MacBook Air has been Apple's entry-level machine for a long time, presenting a very clear trade—you spend $999, you get a solid Mac. You could pay more to acquire additional features and a power boost, but you didn't have to. A cool grand was all you needed.

Apple changed that deal a bit starting with the launch of the M2 MacBook Air. Rather than offer it as the $999 entry-level model, it kept the previous generation M1 in that spot, and priced the newer model a few hundred dollars higher. Now, the "old" MacBook Air was your entry into the Mac line, and if you wanted the latest MacBook Air, you needed to spend more.

Lucky for consumers, the M1 MacBook Air was great. It's still pretty great, in fact. Despite Apple continuing to release new Macs with new chips, I argued the M1 MacBook Air was the best MacBook for most people up until early 2024. It was only when Apple replaced the M1 with the now "old" M2 MacBook Air, pricing it at $999, that I proclaimed that to be the best option.

The M4 MacBook Air only continues that tradition, but with a bit of a twist. The M4 is brand new, and yet it's also the entry-level machine in Apple's lineup. That $999 doesn't get you the model from last year, or the year before that: This is the freshest MacBook Air you can buy. It doesn't feel like any kind of compromise, and that makes it easy to recommend to just about anyone looking for a great MacBook for a reasonable price.

The M4 chip

If the argument was just about money, it wouldn't hold water. Now that Apple has dropped both the M2 and M3 MacBook Airs from its lineup, those machines are likely going to be on sale from other retailers. If the M2 MacBook Air was the best Mac for most people yesterday for $999, shouldn't it definitely be the best Mac for most people if they can pick it up for? That's part of my argument against buying the latest iPad Air after all—it's a great tablet, but so are the older Airs that are now likely going to be less expensive than ever.

Yes, a discounted M2 MacBook Air is a fantastic value, and I wouldn't stop anyone from buying it. But I feel that $999 is an even better value for the M4 MacBook Air. For that price, you get Apple's latest chip—the M4—which represents the highest performing chip in Apple's laptop lineup. The M4 in the MacBook Air has 10 CPU cores, compared to eight in the M2, and its NPU (the chip responsible for running AI tasks) has a 120GB/s memory bandwidth, versus 100GB/s on the M2. The M2 is still a very capable chip, and you won't notice as big of a difference between the two as you would between the M1 and M4 (Apple says the M4 Air is up to twice as fast as an M1 Air) but there will be gains, as evidenced by independent benchmarking of other M4 chips. We won't know exactly how well the M4 Air performs until reviewers put it through its paces, but it will undoubtedly run better than a chip that came out in 2022.

Beyond performance, Apple will almost assuredly support the M4 chip longer than the M2. I have no doubts that M2 still has many years of support ahead of it, but when the time does come for Apple to eventually stop issuing updates for these machines, the M4 will likely receive them for at least an extra year or two—if not longer.

Apple is also continuing the trend of starting each MacBook off with at least 16GB of RAM. Previously, Apple's base MacBooks included 8GB of RAM, which, while enough for simple tasks, wasn't always enough for more intensive applications—and didn't bode well for their longevity. You needed to spend an extra $200 to upgrade to 16GB, which completely erased the value aspect of the MacBook Air. Last year, Apple made the decision to bump all Macs up to 16GB of RAM to start, without raising the price. Maybe $999 for a laptop with 8GB of RAM is a tough pill to swallow, but for one with 16GB? It's an excellent value.

The perks you expect from a MacBook Air

Apple hasn't broken the mold with the M4 MacBook Air, and that's a good thing. This design is functionally identical to both the M2 and M3 MacBook Airs—which is to say, it's excellent.

The base M4 MacBook Air still comes with a 13.6-inch "Liquid Retina" display, with a resolution of 2560x1664, a P3 wide color gamut, and a maximum brightness of 500 nits. It weighs the same 2.7 pounds, comes with the same great speakers and microphones, and ships with an excellent backlit keyboard with Touch ID. (The days of the butterfly keyboard are long gone.) Like the M3 MacBook Air, this M4 comes with Wi-Fi 6E support (one generation newer than the M2's Wi-Fi 6 support).

You also get MagSafe charging, which is among the best MacBook features. Why Apple ever rid itself of magnetic chargers, I'll never understand, but at least it has corrected itself in recent years.

Various smaller advantages

What the company did change from previous MacBooks are minor, but notable. First up, the camera. The M4 sports a 12MP camera, which should improve the quality of video calls. However, the bigger perk with this higher megapixel count is the addition of Center Stage. This feature, introduced on iPad and found on the M4 MacBook Pro, follows your face as you move around the frame during calls. That lets you walk and talk in front of your MacBook Air, while still remaining in focus.

The M4 MacBook Air still comes with two USB-C ports, but they're different than the two found on previous MacBook Airs. These ports are Thunderbolt 4, not USB-4, which means there are higher minimum speed requirements here. That enables the M4 MacBook Air to extend to up to two 6K external monitors.

The colors have shifted a bit this go around, too. Gone is the iconic Space Gray option that many know and love, which isn't necessarily a "small advantage." However, the new Sky Blue color looks great. Ever since Apple revamped the iMac line with fun new colors back in 2021, I've wanted them to adopt the same with their laptops. This is the closest we've come yet, and I hope they keep it up with future models.

Older MacBooks are still an excellent value (with a caveat)

Apple will let you preorder an M4 MacBook Air today, and the machine will go on sale on Wednesday, March 12. But if you have any interest in an older Mac, I'd recommend waiting to buy it if you can: Once this new MacBook is out, the discounts on older machines should follow.

M3 MacBook Air, 16GB RAM (2024)

M2 MacBook Air, 16GB Ram (2022)

Apple won't be selling new M2 and M3 MacBook Airs, but outlets like Amazon and Best Buy certainly will. If you're looking to pick up a new MacBook Air for under $999, that's the way to do it. I imagine these companies will take $100 or $200 off these models at least, if not more. If Apple is selling new M4s for $999, these stores can't justify keeping older models at the same price. Apple will likely sell used M2 and M3 models in its refurbished store, too, so keep an eye out there.

Like I said above, the M2 and M3 chips are still excellent, and Apple will likely support them for years. No matter which of these three machines you buy, they'll feel functionality the same, since the design hasn't changed, so you'll snag a modern MacBook experience for a great price.

Check your RAM

My one caveat is to watch out for the RAM: You will likely find deals on MacBooks with 8GB of RAM, which I can't recommend in 2025. These Macs will generally work well, and may run the tasks you need to run, but you will hit limitations with that amount of memory sooner rather than later. Your Mac won't work as well as machine with 16GB of RAM, and, in all likelihood, Apple will drop support for it sooner than the models with more memory. These machines aren't worthless by any means (Apple currently fully supports all M-series Macs with 8GB of RAM) but if you're looking to buy a new MacBook this year, it's important to prioritize that 16GB of RAM.

There's an Archive of the Pre-Trump CDC Website

Beth Skwarecki — Wed, 05 Mar 2025 18:30:55 +0000

Some accurate medical information was removed from the CDC’s website last month, and we gave you some tips on where to look for archived versions and for sources of similar information. Now, there’s a nearly complete mirror of the CDC website being hosted in Europe, so you can look up information on HIV, health for trans people, and other topics that really shouldn’t be controversial, but for some reason are.

Some of the removed information has been reinstated by court order, but it comes with a disclaimer at the top of the page that somehow manages to be insulting, incorrect, sensationalist, and inflammatory. Just what you need when you want to know, say, who is most vulnerable to HIV.

Credit: CDC

As 404 Media reports, the archive’s creators say it is being hosted in Europe, and the pages were downloaded with the help of the DataHoarder community on Reddit. Unlike many of the other goverment data archiving projects, this one aims to build a fully functional version of the CDC website, including the links between pages, and interactive elements.

They haven’t entirely accomplished that goal; a note at the top of the page says that they are working on getting videos added to the archive. Notably, the search function sends you back to www.cdc.gov instead of keeping you on the restoredcdc.org site, so if you want to find a specific page, you’re best off finding an old link, and then typing in “https://restoredcdc.gov/” just before the URL. For example, https://www.cdc.gov/hiv/data-research/facts-stats/transgender-people.html becomes https://restoredcdc.org/www.cdc.gov/hiv/data-research/facts-stats/transgender-people.html .

But for most information, the website is still present and functional. Trans health information is still there, without the insulting disclaimer. The page on health equity guiding principles for inclusive communication is up at the archive, even though it’s still missing from cdc.gov.

There is still one major gap, though: current information on outbreaks and other developing situations. The CDC is not updating information at restoredcdc.org. It's a static archive of what was available in January. So if you want to check the numbers on the current measles outbreak, or see what's going on with bird flu, the regular CDC website is still the place where that stuff is getting updated. For now, anyway.

The Easiest Way to Free Up Disk Space on Your Mac

Pranay Parab — Wed, 05 Mar 2025 18:00:00 +0000

If your Mac's close to running out of space, don't ignore the problem. These machines can run into issues when their storage is 100% full: Updates may struggle to install; the machine may slow down; apps might not work well; and you may notice that some stop backing up their data to the cloud, too. To avoid all of these issues, free up space. It's not as daunting as it seems.

Use built-in tools to free up space on your Mac

Credit: Pranay Parab

Apple gives you plenty of easy tools to start clearing unwanted files from your computer. To get started, you should identify where the problem lies. Click the Apple logo in the top-left corner of your Mac's screen and go to System Settings > General > Storage. Wait until all the loading signs disappear, and you'll see why your Mac is running out of space. The Recommendations section offers an easy way to start the cleanup process. Here, you can quickly offload unused apps, delete local copies of files stored in iCloud, automatically delete old files from Trash with a click, among other useful functions.

Once you've followed these steps, you should have some breathing room, but you can take it even further by clicking the i buttons next to each item in the list below the Recommendations section. For instance, you can click the i button next to Applications to see a full list of installed apps sorted by size, and quickly delete apps you don't use. Once you're through with this, you should've reclaimed a lot of space.

Use DaisyDisk to clean up your Mac

Credit: Pranay Parab

Apple's built-in method is usually quite good at getting you started, but if you want to get every last unwanted bit of data out of your Mac, consider using the excellent DaisyDisk ($10). This app has been around for well over a decade and has earned itself a reputation for making it easy to free up space. Once you open the app, you can run a scan to see which apps are taking up storage space. Once that's done, you can easily browse through various folders and drop things in the collector area, which is like a shopping cart for things you want to delete. DaisyDisk lists all of your folders by size, and finds files that the built-in tool misses. In my case, I discovered 80GB of data in WhatsApp—files shared in a large group that I'd muted long ago and forgotten all about.

Once all files are collected, you can click the Delete button to erase them quickly.

Try Hyperspace to clear out the stragglers

Credit: Pranay Parab

Hyperspace should be the last stop in your Mac cleanup process. It clears up storage space without deleting any files. Here's how it works.

Apple Filesystem (APFS) has a neat space-saving feature that lets multiple files share a single copy of data. For instance, if you duplicate a 1GB file on macOS, you'll notice that a copy is created instantly. Try to copy the same file to an external drive and no matter how fast the drive is, it'll take a while to copy it over. This happens because APFS just creates a new file with fresh metadata and doesn't actually create a second copy of the data underneath. This saves you a lot of space.

Hyperspace uses this APFS feature to locate identical files and converts them into clones of each other. This means that you will continue to see the same number of files in the same original locations, but the app will use the APFS feature to free up space.

The explanation is slightly complex, but this app does seem to work. Hyperspace is a free download, and you can also scan your folders without paying. If these scans show the app can save you a significant amount of space, you can then pay to clear those files. The app costs $10 per month, $20 per year, or a one-time purchase of $50.

When to See the Lunar Eclipse (and More Space Events) in March

Emily Long — Wed, 05 Mar 2025 17:00:00 +0000

March isn't the most exciting time of the year for casual skywatching, though there are two notable events: a total lunar eclipse in the middle of the month and the partial solar eclipse at the end. There are other reasons to head outside and look up too. Here's what you're looking for.

March 13–14: Total lunar eclipse (Blood Moon)

Late on the night of March 13, the entire moon will fall into the darkest part of Earth's shadow, creating a total lunar eclipse throughout the Western Hemisphere. Because of the alignment of the Sun, Earth, and moon—and the filtering of the Sun's light through Earth's atmosphere in between—the moon will appear red or orange, which is why it is also known as a Blood Moon.

The partial eclipse starts just after 1 a.m. ET on March 14 when the moon begins to enter Earth's shadow, with totality expected between 2:26 a.m. and 3:31 a.m. ET.

NASA notes that Jupiter and Mars will also be visible in the western sky that night, and constellations may appear brighter as the moon dims throughout the event. For ideal viewing, head somewhere with dark skies.

March 29: Partial solar eclipse

Eclipses come in pairs, and this pair is rounded out with a partial solar eclipse on March 29 that can be seen from northeastern North America, northwestern Africa, and much of Europe. Most viewers in the U.S. will miss this one, as only a small portion of the sun will be obscured in New England, and maximum coverage will occur over the northernmost parts of Canada and Greenland.

That said, early risers on the East Coast will be able to see the moon take a bite out of the Sun around sunrise, as the partial eclipse will already be underway. The event is expected to begin around 3:50 a.m. ET and end at 7:43 a.m. ET.

Planet visibility

Planet visibility is pretty good in March following February's impressive planet parade. Venus will be low in the western sky right after sunset for the first two weeks, while Mercury can be seen just below that for about a half hour. Mars will be in the east after sunset until around 3 a.m., and Jupiter can be viewed nightly in the west before 1 a.m.

Zodiacal light

Finally, while there aren't any meteors to speak of until the Lyrids arrive in April, early spring is a great time to view zodiacal light. What looks like lingering twilight is actually believed to be sunlight reflecting off dust in the solar system. The phenomenon, which looks like hazy light emanating up from the horizon, is easiest to see around the equinox (March 20) but will be visible all spring whenever the moon is dark.

How to Take Photos on Android Without All the Post-Processing Junk

Eric Ravenscraft — Wed, 05 Mar 2025 16:30:00 +0000

Your phone’s camera does so much filtering, processing, and AI adjustments, it can make you question reality itself. In a world where Google can put you into photos you take, what's even real? If you'd rather avoid letting your phone decide what your photos look like, here's how to take control back from your camera app.

Since Android is an open platform, the default apps on your phone may be different from someone else's. The various settings and apps I reference may be different on some phones, and some apps might not be compatible with all devices, but there are usually options that will work for you.

Switch to RAW photos (where available)

Much like higher-end cameras, many smartphones can now take RAW photos. These are specially encoded versions of photos that store all of the data your camera's sensor captures, uncompressed, in an easy-to-edit format. Some phones, like the Google Pixel phones, will take a RAW photo and a processed JPEG at the same time, allowing you to get the best of both worlds.

On Google Pixel devices, you can swap to this mode by tapping the Settings icon on the bottom left of the camera app, selecting the Pro tab, and toggle on RAW/JPEG. The setting may be different on some phones, so poke around in your camera's app to see what you can find.

Once you have a RAW photo, you can use apps like Adobe's Lightroom to edit photos how you prefer. You can adjust exposure levels, tweak highlights and shadows, or alter color tint to get a more realistic—or a more stylized—look.

Use ZeroCam for one-button simplicity

If your phone doesn't support RAW photos—or if you prefer a simpler camera experience—ZeroCam is a handy alternative. This app has exactly one feature: It takes photos without any filtering or post processing. There are no sliders or adjustments, just a shutter button to take a photo. If your phone has multiple lenses, you can tap to swap between them, but there's not much else to the app.

The one major downside of this app is that it’s only free on a trial basis (one week if you go for the annual plan, three days if you choose monthly), after which you’ll need to pay for a subscription. The good news is the service is dirt cheap at $1/month or $7.49 for a year, so it's not a huge expense, especially if the simplicity helps you focus more on the moment than what you’re using to capture it.

Get more control with Camera FV-5

I'll let you in on a little secret: Even when you shoot RAW photos, your phone's manufacturer is still making some decisions about what your photos are going to look like. That's because your camera has to automatically make decisions about things like ISO level, shutter speed, focus, or even which lens to use. If you want to get maximum control, you'll want an app like the Camera FV-5 Lite.

This app gives you controls to adjust ISO, shutter speed, white balance, and other settings to get the exact shot you want. It also has some nice advanced features like burst photo mode, and automatic exposure bracketing. Some features—including capturing photos in RAW format—are only available in the paid version, which costs a one-time fee of $5.

Pro controls for video with Blackmagic Camera

Blackmagic is best known for its suite of excellent cinema cameras and free Davinci Resolve editing suite. The software that runs on Blackmagic’s cameras is some of the best and most intuitive in the business, and now you can get it on your phone with the Blackmagic Camera app. Well, some phones. It works on most of the recent flagship phones from Samsung, Google, OnePlus, and a few other manufacturers; you can check the full list of supported devices here.

The Blackmagic Camera app technically only supports recording video, so if you primarily want photos, you might want to go with one of the other options on this list. However, this app is peerless for videographers. In addition to pro camera controls, it includes handy features like an RGB histogram and image stabilization to get the perfect shot.

Everything New in Google’s March 2025 Pixel Drop

Emily Long — Wed, 05 Mar 2025 16:00:00 +0000

The first Pixel Drop of 2025 is here—quarterly upgrades coming to Google's phones, tablets, and watches include improvements to Gemini Live and other AI-powered functionality (like scam detection for calls and texts), health and safety features, and camera and connectivity updates.

Here's everything in the March drop, rolling out now.

Gemini upgrades

As with the December Pixel Drop, much of what's new for Pixel this month is powered by Google Gemini. Gemini Live is getting smarter with the ability to automatically switch between 45 languages in conversation without having to change your language settings. Multimodal capabilities for adding images, files, and YouTube videos to conversations are expanding to Pixel 6 (and newer) as well as Pixel Fold devices, and live video and screen sharing are coming to Gemini Advanced.

If you have a Pixel 9 phone with Gemini Nano, you'll soon get real-time Scam Detection that alerts you to malicious calls. The on-device, AI-powered feature identifies conversation patterns typical of scammers and gives you an on-screen prompt to end the call. Scam Detection is also available in Google Messages for anyone with a Pixel 6 or newer located in the U.S., Canada, or the UK. If the AI suspects a scam text message, you'll see a warning to report and block the number.

Also in the AI category: Pixel Screenshots is getting a new suggestions feature and integration with work profiles, while Pixel Studio will be able to generate images of people based on a description of the person or scene.

While many Pixel features remain limited to users in the U.S., Pixel Screenshots, Pixel Studio, Pixel AI weather reports, and Pollen tracker in the Weather app are being rolled out for those in Germany and Japan. Recorder App AI summaries will also be available in Japanese (on Pixel 9 only) as well as in English.

New health features for Pixel Watch

Pixel Watch 3 wearers in the U.S. will soon have access to Loss of Pulse Detection. This feature detects if the wearer's heart stops beating, and then calls emergency services with an automated message if you remain unresponsive (your device must have a cell connection). The feature was recently cleared by the FDA and is expected to roll out toward the end of the month. Pixel Watch 3 is also getting on-device menstrual tracking and more accurate step counting for atypical walking patterns, such as pushing a cart or hiking with poles.

Finally, Auto-bedtime Mode, which turns off your watch face and disables notifications when you fall asleep (and back on when you wake up), is expanding to Pixel Watch 2.

Improved connectivity

Google is releasing several safety-oriented connectivity features, including a Find My Device beta that shares your live location with family and friends. Satellite SOS—which lets you contact emergency services even if you don't have a cell or wifi connection—is expanding to Pixel 9 users in Hawaii, Alaska, Europe, and Canada, and satellite texting is now available for U.S.-based Verizon and T-Mobile customers.

Camera and video upgrades

A new feature called Connected Cameras lets you link your Pixel 9 to another Pixel phone (6 or newer) or GoPro camera (HERO10 Black or newer) to stream video from multiple angles directly to Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, and Snapchat. Dual Screen Preview on Pixel Fold is adding support for video recording as well as Add Me for those on Pixel 9 Pro Fold.

Additional accessibility and quality-of-life upgrades

Pixel's speech-to-text Recorder app is getting another update: The app will now automatically transcribe audio recordings, such as lectures, transferred from an older device or Pixel Watch to your current phone. And Gboard has a new Voice Toolbar so you can easily access voice-to-type without opening the full keyboard.

A new Modes menu is coming to the Quick Settings panel, allowing you to switch between modes for driving, bedtime, do not disturb, and other customizations simply by swiping down.

Finally, new actions for audio coming to Pixel Watch include fast forward, rewind, and the ability to adjust playback speed and control the playback queue.

How to get new Pixel Drop features on your device

To check if these updates are available on your Pixel phone or tablet, go to Settings > System > Software updates.

What to Start Seeding and Planting in March

Amanda Blum — Wed, 05 Mar 2025 15:30:00 +0000

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After a long winter of planning, strategizing, and buying seeds, you can finally start to plant this month. Most of that planting will happen inside, beginning the seedlings that will eventually move into your spring and summer garden. All the seeding tools like trays and heat mats come out of storage for a cleaning. As excited as you may be, it's important to exercise some restraint: You don't want to start all your seedlings at once. This is a game of timing. March only sees us starting a few spring seedings, as well as some seeds that take a long time. Everything else will get started next month.

Once you start seeding for yourself, you can also lean into succession planting, which means that instead of planting everything at once—and then being done at the end of the summer—you plant throughout the spring and summer, and your harvests are staggered. For instance, it would be nice to have radishes ready to eat for a number of weeks, not a flush of them all at once. You can do this with lettuce and beans and flowers and all kinds of "short" crops (so called because they can be grown in less than 90 days).

Onions, potatoes, and asparagus

While it might not feel like these items are related, they are in the simplest way: You won’t be putting seeds in the ground. Onions you'll purchase from a nursery in a bundle of 25 or so five-inch starts, ready to go into the ground. (These are keeping onions, not scallions.) They go into the ground in long troughs you dig in the dirt.

Potatoes will look like, well, potatoes, but you can cut each potato into many pieces, so long as each piece has at least one eye. Cut them the night before planting, and then allow them to heal over by leaving them out on a tray in the open air. These pieces get planted in your potato bed about a foot apart, then covered with compost and mulch.

Asparagus come as crowns from your nursery, which look like sad desiccated roots when you buy them. But rest assured, these roots, once planted, produce actual asparagus. You plant them in a trench, not unlike roses, and they will make a perennial bed, coming back spring after spring. Asparagus needs three years of growth before you can harvest any spears, so while you could grow this plant from seed, buying these two- or three-year-old crowns gives you a jump start.

Every kind of pea

If you do one thing this month, it should be getting peas into the soil. The best news is that peas are incredibly hard to screw up. You stick the seeds (which are large and easy to work with) in the soil. There are two kinds of peas to consider. Sweet peas, which are inedible and toxic but gorgeous and sweet-smelling, and their edible brethren can all be directly seeded outside right now. Plant both, but keep them separate, so you can tell them apart. For edible peas, make sure to plant shelling peas, snap peas, and sugar peas. You can, if you want, give them a head start by growing starts inside, and they’ll generally be ready to plant out in two weeks. Plant a second bunch of peas two weeks after the first so you have a spring succession. Peas need a structure to climb, so plant them on an arch or trellis. Best of all, both edible and sweet peas give your garden early color.

Fast-rotation crops

There are certain crops I have going constantly all season, like lettuces, radishes, scallions, and carrots. I make sure that as soon as the ground is workable, I am putting out a short row of radishes and scallions. I seed a few lettuces each week at this point, and all of this can take place outside. Carrots aren’t fast, but you can get a number of successions in during the summer, and they’ll germinate easier while you have a lot of rain. Get a row of them in every few weeks, starting now.

Strawberries

Heed my cry: You never, ever need to buy strawberry plants. They multiply like tribbles, and you likely have enough from last year to relocate to anyplace you need them this year. You need to thin them yearly anyway so that each has at least six to eight inches around it. Even if you somehow do not have the supply, someone in your neighborhood does. Remember you want both June-bearing, which produces the sweetest berries but only for a short time, and ever-bearing, which produces bigger berries for the whole summer.

Short spring crops

Inside, I’m seeding cabbage, cauliflower, broccoli, kale, spinach, kohlrabi, and chard to go outside as soon as they’re ready, since they’re all cold-hardy. Spinach, in particular, loves the cold. Outside, I'm seeding beets and more kohlrabi into the ground. (The kohlrabi I'm seeding inside will go out in a few weeks, and have a later harvest date. This is a great example of succession planting.)

Long summer crops

Two crops that don’t get enough attention this time of year—but must be planted now in order to have enough time to mature by winter—are parsnips and Brussels sprouts. Both of these crops take the entire spring and summer to grow enough to be ready by fall. Plant parsnip seeds directly in the soil outside now, and pick up Brussels sprout starts at the nursery.

Summer crops

Some summer specialties require a longer nurturing stage, like tomatoes, peppers, and eggplants. But you absolutely cannot put them outside without protection like Agribon or a greenhouse until temperatures are 50 degrees at night, and that can be a long time from now. Your planting date will be determined by your growing zone and last frost date—all things you can easily google. You’ll have to house, feed, and water these babies until then. Every moment they’re in your care, they are susceptible to pests, virus, fungus, and interference from family pets. You may see professionals getting their seeds in now—I’ll start mine in late March—but I have a greenhouse to move them to. Many people wait until April, and you shouldn’t feel anxious about doing so.

Peppers first, then tomatoes, and finally eggplants. They’ll go into 50-cell trays to start, two seeds per cell. Within the first few weeks, I'll have ruthlessly cut the weaker seedling from each cell so the stronger seedling can thrive (do not try to separate them to save them both; learn to let go) and will be up-potting them into four-inch pots by the time they’re six weeks old. I don’t seed other summer crops like pumpkins, corn, or beans until late April or May.

Flowers

What I do try to get an early start on now is flowers. I want as many as possible, and as big and healthy as possible before I put them in the ground. I start with the earliest flowers now—snapdragons, poppies, Bells of Ireland, larkspur, dianthus, bachelor buttons, Love-in-a-Mist, and celosia. These are the most stubborn to grow and are spring-hardy, so the early start is warranted. You’ll be able to move them out relatively early in the season to make room for zinnias and sunflowers, which will be seeded later in the season. I plant these in trays of 72 or 128 cells.

No matter how eager you are to plant all winter, when March hits, it often feels like you're behind. I assure you, you have time. It's still early, and if you don't have time to seed, you'll still be able to purchase starts at the nursery.

Here’s How Samsung’s Galaxy A Series Compares to the iPhone 16e

Khamosh Pathak — Wed, 05 Mar 2025 15:00:00 +0000

Less than a month after Apple released its own "budget" iPhone, the iPhone 16e, Samsung is out with a new midrange Galaxy A series update for 2025. And unlike Apple's $599 phone, the Galaxy A26, an admittedly more budget-friendly device, starts at just $300. The Galaxy A56 on the other hand, a more direct iPhone 16e competitor, will be $500 when it launches later this year, yet nets you double the storage as the 16e.

If you're thinking about picking up any of these phones, you might be curious about how they all compare on paper. While we'll need to wait for reviewers to get their hands on these devices before we truly know how they stack up, it's helpful to see the specs and price points side-by-side.

iPhone 16e

Credit: Apple

What was once the iPhone SE is now called the iPhone 16e, and at a $599 starting price for the 128GB model, it's expensive for a midrange phone. But if you can stretch your budget, you do get a lot for that money.

Yes, it has a notch and not a Dynamic Island, but you get a 6.1-inch screen, Apple's latest and greatest A18 chip (that's only missing one GPU core when compared to the iPhone 16 model), 8GB of RAM, Apple Intelligence, a 48MP single camera setup, and a long battery life.

That said, since you're paying less than you would for the standard iPhone 16 or any of its upgrades, you do miss out on some bonuses. The screen is still only 60Hz; there's no always-on display; and you lose an ultra-wide lens, in addition to camera features like Cinematic mode and the new Photographic Styles. Apple even took out MagSafe.

At its core, though, it's a solid iPhone. Apple is known for supporting its devices for years, and the fact that this has 8GB of RAM and the A18 chip means that the iPhone 16e will continue to stay fast and fresh for a good while.

Samsung Galaxy A26, A36, and A56

Credit: Samsung

There are three new phones to talk about here. The A26, starting at $300, the A36, starting at $400, and the A56, starting at $500. For the sake of this comparison, I will mostly focus on the A56, as it's the closest in scope to the 16e, but there are reasons to consider the other options, especially the $400 A36.

All three phones run One UI 7.0, which includes new software features like the Now Bar and a redesigned interface that looks quite a bit like iOS. And while the complete Galaxy AI suite is reserved for Samsung's flagship phones, the A series devices do get Google's Circle-to-Search, Filters, Best Face, Auto Trim, and Samsung's AI Object Eraser tools. Samsung is calling this suite of features "Awesome Intelligence," which I'm sure won't be confusing to anyone. Samsung is also promising six generations of OS upgrades, and six years of security updates, which is up there with Google's seven-year updates promise for Pixel devices.

As specs, go, all three phones get a 5,000 mAh battery, but the 45-watt fast wired charging is only available for the A36 and the A56. It's a similar story with the display too: the A36 and A56 both feature a 6.7-inch AMOLED display with a 120Hz refresh rate, a 1080 x 2340 resolution, and Corning Gorilla Victus+ Glass protection (not present on the iPhone 16e). The A26, though gets a smaller 6.5-inch screen, featuring the same 120Hz refresh rate, and the FHD+ display. The screen goes up to 1,200 nits when you're outside, and can push to 1,900 nits using the Vision Booster feature. The iPhone 16e, meanwhile, is locked to 800 nits.

All three devices feature different processors and RAM configurations, with the best chip saved for the A56. The A26 features Samsung's Exynos 1380 chipset, 6GB RAM, and 128GB storage, while the A36 uses Qualcomm's Snapdragon Gen 3 processor, 6GB RAM, and 128GB storage. The A56 comes with the Exynos 1580 chip, 8 or 12GB RAM (depending on the configuration), and 128 or 256GB storage.

When it comes to raw performance, however, the iPhone 16e easily beats out the A56. Based on early (leaked) testing data compiled by ZoneofTech, the Exynos 1580 in the Galaxy A56 scores 1353 in single-core and 3832 in multi-core performance. The A18 chip, on the other hand, scores 3317 in single-core, and a whopping 8165 in multi-core performance. That's more than double the raw performance on the 16e.

Credit: ZoneofTech

The body shape differs slightly between the three devices. The A26 has a plastic frame and body, compared to the more "premium" metals found on the other two devices. All three phones feature thin bezels around, but a prominent chin, so the bottom bezel is slightly thicker than the other three sides.

There's a triple camera setup on every A series phone, compared to Apple's single 48 MP unit. All three Samsung units get the same 50 MP wide-angle lens. The A56 gets a 12 MP ultra-wide, and a 5 MP macro lens, while the A36 gets a 8 MP ultra-wide, and a 5 MP macro lens. The cheaper A26 gets 8MP ultra-wide and a 2 MP macro lens. All A series phones can take advantage of AI photography features like Best Take, which merges faces from different photos to create a better single image. There's also Samsung's Object Eraser tool which is better than Apple's Cleanup utility. The A56 and A36 can also record content in HDR from the main sensor.

The 5,000 mAh battery in the A series devices is rated for 29 hours of video playback, while the iPhone 16e manages 26 hours on a single charge. Those might not reflect real-life battery tests, however, so we'll need to watch for reviewers before we know how these batteries really compare.

In fact, that's true for a lot of features across these devices. We'll simply need to see how the A series' cameras and chips stack up against the iPhone 16e in real-world use before we can make any definitive calls here. But, for now, it's helpful to compare the specs and data we do have.

The Galaxy A36 5G will be available March 26th in Black and Lavender, and an exclusive Lime color at Best Buy. While the A26 goes on sale March 27th and is only available in a Black color. But the A56 will be out in the US later this year, no details on the color options yet.

What People Are Getting Wrong This Week: Measles Myths

Stephen Johnson — Wed, 05 Mar 2025 14:30:00 +0000

A recent outbreak of measles in West Texas has resulted in 159 cases of the disease in the state so far; 22 victims required hospitalization, and one has died. In response to the deadly outbreak, some Texas parents seem to be considering hosting "measles parties" instead of vaccinating their kids. Misinformation about measles can have deadly consequences, so here's a look at some ways people are getting measles wrong.

Myth: Measles vaccines are potentially dangerous

While a small percentage of people suffer side effects from the measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) vaccine, they are almost always mild. The most common is a fever that hits between 5% and 10% of those vaccinated. About 2% to 5% develop a mild rash, and about 1 in 4,000 develop something more serious. The "side effects" of contracting the disease itself, on the other hand, are much worse: Nearly 100% of people who contract the disease develop symptoms that include fever, red eyes, a sore throat, and a blotchy rash. About one in 300 people who get measles will die.

Myth: The measles vaccine gives people measles

The belief that measles outbreaks are caused by the measles vaccine is growing in certain circles, helped along by advocates like Children's Health Defense, the anti-vaccine advocacy group founded by Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.

The measles vaccine works by introducing a weakened form of the measles virus into the body to trigger an immune response. So the theory goes, people who have been injected with the measles vaccine are infecting others with the disease. But while the measles virus can potentially be detected in people for up to four weeks after a shot, it is extremely unlikely for the virus to be be transmitted to anyone in that weakened form—which is significant, given measles itself is among the most contagious diseases. As for the Texas outbreak specifically, to make sure, all cases have been tested, and they've all been declared to be the result of "wild" measles. No one got it from vaccine "shedding," because that doesn't really happen with the measles vaccine.

Myth: The measles vaccine is linked to autism

The vaccine for measles has been around since 1963. It has prevented countless cases of the diseases and has long been proven safe and effective. But people are still hesitant to take it and/or give it to their children. The belief that the measles vaccine, or any vaccine, can cause autism is one of the reasons. A recent survey conducted by the University of Pennsylvania's Annenberg Public Policy Center, found that 24% of Americans believe there is a link between vaccines and autism, and 3% aren't sure.

The supposed link between autism and vaccination is based on two flawed studies that have been thoroughly and overwhelmingly debunked. To put it simply, if you listen to the science, there's no there there. Vaccines for measles are safe and effective, and they prevent the disease and thus save lives. If enough people get vaccinated, we can eliminate measles from our country (in fact, the World Health Organization did declare it eradicated in the U.S. back in 2000, though as lower vaccination rates have recently resulted in more frequent outbreaks, that designation is at risk). It's really as simple as that.

Myth: Measles can be cured or prevented with vitamin A

The idea that vitamin A can be used to treat measles has a grain of truth of it, but it's a small grain. Studies conducted in developing nations indicate vitamin A can help prevent complications in severe measles cases, and that children with low amounts of vitamin A tend to develop more severe cases of measles. But in the United States, where few children have such nutritional deficiencies, it's unclear whether there's any benefit to giving vitamin A for measles. Some doctors' position is "why not?" but vitamin A is not part of the measles treatment protocol in the U.S., let alone a recognized cure or preventative measure. It's definitely not a substitute for vaccination.

To prevent measles cases in the current outbreak, public health officials are encouraging people to get vaccinated. One cool thing about the measles vaccine: As the Texas health department points out, a dose can still be given within 72 hours after you are exposed to the virus to lessen the severity of the disease if you do get sick.

Myth: Measles can be prevented by "natural means"

The only "natural" way you can prevent the spread of measles is by staying away from other people if you are infected with it. Measles doesn't care if you eat healthy food and work out. It's extremely contagious—according to the CDC, "if one person has it, up to 9 out of 10 people who are nearby will become infected if they are not protected." Being a generally healthy may result in a better outcome if you are infected, but not getting infected in the first place (by being vaccinated) is an infinitely healthier choice.

Myth: Measles parties can help kids gain "natural immunity"

While surviving measles will protect you from reinfection, this "natural" immunity offers no more protection from the disease than vaccination, and, again, it's much riskier: About three out of every 1,000 people who get measles die (a tally that sadly included a child in Texas amid the current outbreak) and more suffer life-changing complications. As Dr. Ron Cook, chief health officer for the Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center in Lubbock, put it in a press conference, "We can’t predict who is going to do poorly with measles, being hospitalized, potentially get pneumonia or encephalitis, or potentially pass away.

"It’s a foolish thing to go have measles parties," he added, I imagine with a pained sigh.

Myth: The current measles outbreak is normal

Deadly measles outbreaks are unusual in the U.S. Until this year, we hadn't had a child die from measles since 2015. Heck, measles has been considered eliminated from both North and South America since 2000. Since 2000, our measles outbreaks have been small and sporadic, started by travelers who brought a case in from overseas. Quick action from the CDC and from local health authorities has usually managed to get things back under control. But low rates of measles vaccination make it easier for these small outbreaks to spread to larger areas, and we may be looking at a new and growing problem.

Along with Texas, this year measles cases have been reported in Kentucky, California, New Mexico, Georgia, Alaska, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania, but there are less than 200 cases total, so it's unclear if the current wave is the beginning of a larger problem. But it isn't good. The fear is that the current climate of vaccine hesitancy and reduced vaccination rates will lower the percentage of immunized people enough that measles will reestablish a foothold in the U.S. According to the CDC a vaccination rate of 95% is needed for "herd immunity" but we're slipping below that magic number. Fourteen states have fallen under 90 percent.

Myth: You can't get measles if you've been vaccinated

The vaccine for measles is extremely effective (and safe) but it's not 100% effective. It's "only" 97% effective. No one knows why a small number of people get measles even though they've had shots. On the bright side, vaccinated people who suffer from "breakout" measles tend to have milder cases.

Myth: There's nothing we can do about rising rates of measles

The sudden spike in measles cases is alarming, but it's nothing compared to a measles outbreak that occurred in the early 1990s. That one was much worse, but it also provides historical evidence of how to combat a measles outbreak.

Even though the vaccine was nearly 30 years old at that point, there were 27,000 cases of measles in the U.S. in 1990. Low-income communities in New York City were hit hardest, although outbreaks were also reported in Philadelphia, Chicago, Los Angeles, and Houston. The root cause was the same as with the current rash of the disease: Not enough people were being vaccinated. In 1990, the CDC estimated that about half of all inner-city toddlers in New York City had not been vaccinated by their second birthday, mostly because the vaccine was difficult to get or difficult to afford.

The response from city, state, and federal government included wide-ranging public outreach programs, mobile immunization centers, the creation of the federal, congressionally approved Vaccines for Children Program, pro vaccine messages flashed in Times Square, and even Michelangelo from the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles emerging from a sewer to encourage kids to get vaccinated. In short, we really threw everything we had at pro-vaccine, anti-measles messaging. And it worked: Vaccination rates climbed above 90% in New York. Whether a similar effort would work in today's climate of distrust and misinformation is an open question, but at least there's evidence vaccination has worked to contain an outbreak once before.

You Can Add These New Gemini Widgets to Your iPhone Lock Screen

David Nield — Wed, 05 Mar 2025 14:00:00 +0000

You can now use Siri with added ChatGPT on your iPhone, but Google is keen for you to use its Gemini AI bot instead: A few months ago, an official Gemini iPhone app was launched, and now we have some lock screen widgets to go with it.

While you can't swap out the iPhone's default digital assistant entirely, as you can on Android, these six new lock screen widgets do give you easier access to Gemini on iOS, and are handy shortcuts if you prefer Google's AI. The widgets are available to you whether or not you're paying $20 a month for Gemini Advanced.

To make use of these widgets, you first need Google Gemini for iOS installed. Launch the app after it's been downloaded, and you'll be asked to sign into your Google account. Next, switch to the lock screen, long press on a blank part of it, then choose Customize.

Gemini now shows up in the lock screen widgets list. Credit: Lifehacker

Tap inside any of the widget spaces—just below the clock, or in the lower corners—to find all of your widgets options, including the Gemini ones. Choose Gemini from the list, swipe left or right to scroll between the widgets on offer, then tap on the one you want to use or drag it into place on screen.

First up there's Type prompt, which does exactly what its name suggests: It brings up the Gemini app and lets you start a new conversation with a text prompt. For a voice chat instead, you can add Talk Live, which launches the Gemini Live experience—designed to mimic talking to a person as much as possible.

Open mic leads you to the more basic voice interaction mode in Gemini, while Use camera sends you straight to the camera interface: You can snap a picture of something and ask Gemini questions about it (like what species of flower you're looking at, or how to fix something that's broken).

You've got six widgets to pick from, including Talk Live. Credit: Lifehacker

Share image lets you pick an image from your iPhone for Gemini to work with—to ask a question about it, for example, or to create new AI art—and finally there's Share file, which lets you give Gemini a file to analyze. One way to use this would be to have the AI assistant summarize a PDF.

All these widgets worked as advertised during my testing, and do indeed allow quick and easy access into the Gemini interface. You're only saving a couple of taps each time, but those taps can add up if you're using Gemini a lot—even if it's not quite as simple to get to Gemini as it is to Siri.

The widgets should be available now in version 1.2025.0762303 of Google Gemini in the App Store. The release notes also mention improvements to the user interface, bug fixes, the option to share text, images, and links directly to Gemini from any other app, and access to Deep Research for Gemini Advanced users.

This Refurbished iRobot Roomba Is $250 Right Now

Pradershika Sharma — Wed, 05 Mar 2025 13:30:46 +0000

We may earn a commission from links on this page. Deal pricing and availability subject to change after time of publication.

If you don’t mind going the renewed route for automated home cleaning, you can now grab a refurbished iRobot Roomba j7+ for $249.99—a fraction of the cost compared to the $799 price tag on a new unit at Amazon or Best Buy. This deal gets you a Refurbished Premium model, meaning it’s been tested, inspected, and reconditioned to meet Amazon's "Renewed" standards, so you can expect it to work as intended. PCMag gave this vacuum an Editor’s Choice award for its ability to detect and avoid common household obstacles like power cords using its PrecisionVision Navigation system and machine learning technology. Plus, iRobot backs this model with its P.O.O.P. (Pet Owner Official Promise) guarantee, which means they’ll replace it for free if it fails to dodge solid pet waste in its first year. Also, it learns from your feedback to improve over time.

iRobot Roomba j7+ (7550) Self Emptying Robot Vacuum (Renewed Premium)

$249.99 at Amazon

Beyond the smart navigation, this Roomba takes convenience up a notch with self-emptying capabilities. Once it’s done cleaning (or when its bin is full), it returns to its base and dumps the dirt into an allergen-sealed bag—holding up to 60 days' worth of debris, depending on how often you vacuum, making upkeep a lot simpler. Just a note, though, that it does get a bit loud during that process, but only for about 15 seconds. It’s also smart enough to resume cleaning after recharging, so if its 86-minute battery life isn’t enough for one run, it’ll pick up where it left off. If you are considering alternatives, the Eufy RoboVac G30 is a solid choice at $199.99. (Here is our full list of the best robot vacuums.)

The Roomba j7+ moves efficiently across hard floors, carpets, and rugs, adjusting suction as needed, notes this PCMag review. Additionally, it works seamlessly with Alexa and Google Assistant, meaning you can start or stop a cleaning session by speaking your commands. The mapping feature of the J7+ takes a few runs to learn the layout, but once set up, you can enable targeted room cleaning, scheduled cleanings, customized clean zones for high-traffic areas, set up no-go zones, and more in the companion app. The app also tracks its cleaning runs, showing you exactly where it’s been, how much dirt it found, and whether it automatically emptied its bin when it docked.

This Tool Turns Any Wikipedia Topic Into an Interactive Timeline

Justin Pot — Wed, 05 Mar 2025 13:00:00 +0000

It can be useful, while studying any topic, to get an overview of when major events happened relative to each other. History textbooks commonly use a timeline for this—a chronological chart that shows when various events happened. WikiTimeline is a free website that uses a large language model to turn any Wikipedia article into a visual timeline you can use to see major events in a sequence.

Wikipedia's open nature means there's all kinds of third party tools that use the articles in interesting ways. There's WikiTok, a sort of TikTok for Wikipedia, which allows you to scroll through articles to learn topics at random. WikiTimeline is another tool like that, putting the free and open information into a new context. To get started, just head to the home page and search for anything—you will see suggested articles.

Select the article you want to turn into a timeline. WikiTimeline will scan the article, note everything in the article that happened on a particular date, then compile it all into a timeline. You can start exploring right away. You can click any item to read a few more details, typically the year and a one-sentence summary of the event. You can zoom in and out, depending on how crowded the timeline is, and you can use the arrows on the side to jump between events. You can also add multiple articles to one timeline, allowing you to compare the relative history of two people or organizations.

Credit: Justin Pot

You can then copy the URL to your timeline and share it. An embed code is offered if you want to put the timeline on a website. There's even the option to customize the color scheme, if you want.

Credit: Justin Pot

As for the timelines themselves, they're pretty good. I'd say they're useful as a quick study aid than anything as authoritative as the timelines in a history textbook. And all of the usual nuances that apply to large language models are relevant here—it might get facts wrong or miss certain things. The product's about page recommends actually reading the Wikipedia article: "Our tool is meant to be a visual aid and should not be used as the sole source of information."

In other words, it's probably best to think of this tool as a visual supplement. It's a potentially useful one, though.

Some iPhone 16s Use a Special Glue That Makes Them Easier to Repair

Jake Peterson — Tue, 04 Mar 2025 23:00:00 +0000

All batteries age, and the lithium ion battery in your iPhone is no exception. Overtime, the battery degrades, meaning it can no longer hold as much of a charge as it could when it was new. After a few years of using the phone, you may notice your phone needs more frequent juice-ups throughout the day.

When the inevitable happens to you, you don't need to buy a new iPhone. Instead, you can simply replace the battery at a relatively inexpensive cost. Depending on your iPhone, you may not only notice an increase in time away from the charger, but also a boost in performance, since iOS slows down the processing power of your iPhone when its battery is too degraded.

Though replacing your battery is possible, it could certainly be easier. Apple secures the battery to the inside of most iPhones with strong adhesive. To remove it, you need to pull on a few tabs that are easy to break, making the removal process more precarious than it should be. The battery itself is also fragile, and you'll need to remove and reattach some very delicate cables. Despite all of this, it's possible to replace your battery yourself, but it's simpler to opt to take it to a repair shop. (Apple would prefer you use one of its own.)

All that said, the process is notably easier with three of the iPhone 16 devices—including the newly released iPhone 16e.

Some iPhone 16s use a different adhesive

The iPhone 16, 16 Plus, and 16e all ship with a new type of battery adhesive that makes repairs much easier. At first glance, it doesn't seem like much has changed: When you pry open the back case of your iPhone, you'll still find a tab on its battery. However, that tab isn't meant to be pulled yet. Instead, you need to apply an electric current through the adhesive holding the battery to the device for 60 seconds. The current is enough to shake the battery loose, at which point, you use the tab to gently pull the battery away from the iPhone. You don't need to worry about damaging the battery, since the battery will be so loose, gravity could remove it.

As iFixit explains, the tech works by oxidizing the adhesive with the electric current. That breaks the bonds that actually makes the glue adhesive, so it no longer sticks to the surface it was connected to. It's quite technical, and I am no expert, but it's really cool tech—and something that makes replacing the battery in your iPhone 16, 16 Plus, or 16e safer and easier.

Apple probably didn't make these changes out of its concern for customers. Instead, it's likely in response to an EU law that requires smartphones to have "replaceable batteries" by 2027. Europe has had quite an influence over Apple's decisions in recent years, requiring the company to open up many of its closed platforms, including allowing independent app stores and browsers on iOS.

That said, if you own an iPhone 16 Pro or 16 Pro Max, you won't find your batteries any easier to repair. These devices still come with Apple's traditional battery adhesive, so their batteries are just as difficult to replace as ever. It's not clear why Apple opted to skip this new adhesive on the Pro phones, but it is possible that it's simply trialing the fresh tech on some of their devices, not all—especially while there's still time before that EU law takes effect. Perhaps the entire iPhone 17 line, Pro iPhones and all, will sport easy-to-remove batteries. For now, it seems it's just the less expensive models that benefit.

The iPhone 16e has some added repairability

In addition to this new adhesive, Apple added some additional repairability perks to the 16e. The biggest is that Apple now has a guide for repairing the USB-C charging port on this particular iPhone, the first time the company has issued a manual for such a repair.

However, as iFixit reports, this repair is not easy. It involves removing a number of iPhone components in the way of the port, including the back glass, front camera, top speaker, battery, among others; lift up the logic board, then access the USB-C port to repair it. This was apparently the procedure before, but now Apple has a step-by-step guide confirming the difficulty of the repair.

Finally, you don't need to be as careful when opening the back cover on the 16e: One of the metal clips that holds the back cover in place now guards an important flex cable. With other iPhones, you can easily slice this cable while sliding pick tools into the back case when opening it, but the clip here ensures you won't damage the cable in the process.

Amazon Prime Members Can Get Two Free E-Books in March

Daniel Oropeza — Tue, 04 Mar 2025 22:30:00 +0000

We may earn a commission from links on this page. Deal pricing and availability subject to change after time of publication.

You can get thousands of free e-books over the course of 2025 if you know where—and when—to look. All year long, Amazon is offering free Kindle e-books to readers, with new opportunities popping up every month. In March, Prime members can get two free Kindle e-books from Amazon's First Reads program.

What is Amazon's First Reads?

Amazon First Reads is a program aimed at Prime members that offers early access to new e-books across many genres, as curated by First Reads editors (one of your many Prime Member benefits). Prime members can choose to download one free e-book every month from a rotating list—though some months that number is bumped up to two—and non-members get them for a discounted price. These e-books can be read on any compatible Kindle device or via the free Kindle app.

Amazon Kindle (16 GB)

Display size: 6⁠″ glare-free, Resolution: 300 ppi, Storage: 16 GB, Battery life: Up to 6 weeks.

$109.99 at Amazon

How to get your free Amazon Kindle e-books in March

Go to the First Reads landing page to see the full list of e-books available this month. Once you find a book that seems interesting, click the "Shop Now" button from the First Reads landing page. Make sure you’re not being redirected to the Kindle or Amazon mobile application, because you won't see the free book option there; instead, use your internet browser on your phone or computer.

Make sure you’re not clicking the ”Pre-order for...” button, as that will direct you to pay; instead, click the “Read for Free” or the "Buy Now with 1-Click" button under the "First Reads" banner on the book's Amazon page (don't worry, you won't be charged). This will send the e-book directly to the Kindle linked to your Amazon account.

You can see what it should look like from the screenshot below.

Credit: Daniel Oropeza

You’ll know you did it right when you see a “Thanks, [your name]!” order summary indicating the e-book is being auto-delivered to the Kindle Cloud Reader.

Free Amazon Kindle e-books available in March 2025

This month, you can choose one from eight new Kindle e-books plus a free short story, The Sublet. Amazon notes the genre for each of the books above the title, offering a quick way to narrow down your options. (If you hover over the "See Editor Notes" under the "Shop Now" button, you'll be able to read a short description from the First Reads editor who picked the book.)

Here are your options for March 2025. You can choose one of these e-books, plus the short story The Sublet:

Short Story by Greer Hendricks.

The Sublet: A Short Story

$1.99 at Amazon

Suspense by Wendy Corsi Staub.

The Fourth Girl: A Novel (Haven Cliff Book 1)

Historical Fiction by Anita Abriel.

American Housewife: A Novel

Horror by Dawn Kurtagich.

The Thorns

Women's Fiction by Allison Ashley.

If Tomorrow Never Comes

Psychological Thriller by Douglas Corleone.

Falls to Pieces

Speculative Fiction by Lauren Stienstra.

The Beauty of the End: A Novel

$5.99 at Amazon

Thriller by Elizabeth Rose Quinn.

Follow Me: A Thriller

Romance by Dani Atkins.

Always You and Me

Nebula Mars 3 Air GTV Projector

I Tried Microsoft Copilot’s Mac App, and You Probably Shouldn't

Justin Pot — Tue, 04 Mar 2025 20:00:00 +0000

There's a lot of talk online these days about hiding Copilot in Windows and tools that can remove it entirely. There's a reason for that: Some people are annoyed with AI and would prefer not to deal with it.

Despite this trend, Microsoft recently launched Copilot for Mac, for some reason. While Windows users are looking to remove Microsoft's AI tool from their machines, Mac users are invited to actively install it on theirs. So, in the interest of fairness, I am going to take the exact opposite approach to hiding Copilot in Windows: setting up Copilot on your Mac. The thing is, unless you really love Copilot, you probably shouldn't use this app.

Copilot for Mac is about what you'd expect

Copilot for Mac is basically the web version of Copilot in a dedicated Mac window. You can sign into your Microsoft account and start talking with the virtual assistant right away. There are a few Mac-specific features here: The first is a system-wide keyboard shortcut, Option-Space, for quickly sending a message to Copilot in a little pop-up overlay. (You can change the keyboard shortcut if you want.) This is not unlike how ChatGPT's launcher works on its desktop app.

Credit: Justin Pot

There's also a menu bar icon you can click to bring up this same pop-up. The application respects your Mac's Appearance setting, meaning if you switch to Dark Mode so will Copilot.

And that's honestly most of the Mac integration features offered. Unlike ChatGPT's Mac app, there's no screenshot button, which is a bit of a disappointment—that feature lets you ask ChatGPT about things currently on your screen. With Copilot, you'll have to take the screenshot and upload it yourself. If you don't care about this keyboard shortcut you could just as easily use the web version of Copilot and not notice the difference.

You can use Copilot to do pretty much all of the usual stuff you associate with other large language model chatbots, like ChatGPT or Claude—everything from coding, to research, to cheating on homework. The free version of Copilot, notably, has access to current information from the web, meaning you can ask it about current events and sports. But there aren't a lot of Mac-specific reasons to install the app.

For the sake of comparison, here is the Mac version (spouting widely-reported misinformation about the NHL trade deadline):

Credit: Justin Pot

And here's the Windows version (which seems to have decent taste in Game Boy Advance games):

Credit: Justin Pot

Yeah, they're the same. If you like Copilot on Windows, you'll like it on Mac. If you haven't tried Copilot, and are curious, maybe try the web version first. It's essentially the same, and won't take up any space on your hard drive.

This Anker Projector Is $120 Off Right Now

Daniel Oropeza — Tue, 04 Mar 2025 19:30:00 +0000

We may earn a commission from links on this page. Deal pricing and availability subject to change after time of publication.

It's a good time to shop for portable projectors, with the Nebula Capsule 3 GTV projector down to its lowest price and now the more powerful Anker Nebula Mars 3 Air going for $419.99 (originally $599.99), also its lowest price, according to price-tracking tools. Both of these projectors are portable, but the Nebula Mars 3 Air is more suitable for outdoor use.

Brightness: 400 lumens, Native Resolution: 1080p, Max Resolution: 3840 by 2160.

The Nebula Mars 3 Air came out last August to an "average" review from PCMag due to its auto-focus feature (keystone) being finicky and the image being darker when watching 1080p SDR input content. However, it's still a great portable projector for the right person.

This projector has 1080p resolution and supports 4K HDR input, and like the Nebula Capsule 3, it has a built-in Google TV with the Netflix app, which not a lot of other portable projectors offer. Google TV is also my favorite smart TV OS for projectors since you can cast your smartphone using the Chromecast feature.

Since you'll likely be using it outdoors, brightness is important because you can only control the light outdoors to a certain degree. The 400 ANSI lumens doubles the brightness of what the Nebula Capsule 3 offers. The screen size ranges from 30 inches up to 150 inches. If you plug it in with the AC power, you get a boost in brightness, which is always appreciated. Otherwise, you can expect a battery life of 2.5 hours in Eco mode and 1 hour at full power. This projector also doubles as a Bluetooth speaker and lasts 8 hours when just playing music.

If you're looking for a portable projector that you can easily carry around the home or want to use it outdoors, consider the Nebula Mars 3 Air. At its current price, it's a good bang for your buck and better than the Nebula Capsule 3 if you plan to use it outdoors.

The Out-of-Touch Adults' Guide to Kid Culture: The Creator of 'Brain Rot'

Stephen Johnson — Tue, 04 Mar 2025 19:00:46 +0000

This week, I'm taking a look at a brain-rot creator Cookie King, whose constant output of brain-rot videos is shaping the internal lives of millions of kids under 15. I'm also taking a look at what people think ChatGPT would be like if it were a person, introducing the clueless to Beabadoobee, and dunking on "millennial burger joints."

I think of brain-rot internet memes as springing fully formed from the collective unconscious of the internet like Athena sprang from the head of Zeus, but the culture vultures at KnowYourMeme tracked down the actual person who is probably most responsible for brain-rot.

Demir Basceri, known as Cookie King to his millions of followers, has probably done more to create and define the brain-rot aesthetic than anyone else. Cookie pioneered ironically applying garish transitions, effects, and filters from video editing software Capcut on all-but-meaningless footage. He started off making "fan edits" of The Walking Dead like this one—

—then matured into making videos like this:

Then he started making videos that combine unrelated memes in ways that defy meaning. Check out this video:

Here's Cookie King's explanation of it: "On Instagram, there was a new meme. It was about Chopped Chin and Property in Egypt, and people were doing battles between them. I was like, 'Wait, what if I just combined them together with the Johnnie Walker thing and the Friggin' Packet Yo?' I just thought, 'I'm gonna combine them all."

Cookie King says he's been posting videos since he was seven, first on YouTube and then everywhere else, and the key to his brain-rot supremacy is his work ethic: Dude says he spent his senior year of high school spamming "20, 30, 40, 50 videos a day." Eventually, some of them caught on, like the currently popular memes Eye of Rah and making "99% accurate" copies of existing videos. He seems to not think at all about what he puts out—brain-rot is a pure expression of his internal life, and it resonates with his audience of millions of "raised in the digital world" followers.

So what's going on with all this shit?

In the 1920s, partly in response to the mechanized mass slaughter of World War I, avant-garde artists created Dadaism, a movement that aimed to replace meaning in Art with chaos and nonsense. The Dadaist movement didn't really catch on—it was elitist, self-conscious, and bogged down by a central contradiction: The Dadaist said they didn't care about meaning in art, but they sure liked publishing manifestos explaining what their work meant. Maybe brain-rot is actual Dadaism—chaos blotting out reason entirely. Unlike Dada art, there really is no discernible ideas or thoughts behind brain-rot: It's actually nonsense. Brain-rotters are just spamming 50 videos a day without trying to comment on the horrifying alienation of modernity or whatever, even if that's the message I'm taking from it. I don't think this is a good thing, but it's the thing that's happening.

"How I imagine ChatGPT:" Young women personifying AI

Speaking of the unspeakable horror of the modern world, young people, especially young women, have been asking and answering a fascinating question this week: If large language model artificial intelligence program ChatGPT was a person, what would they look like? The initial post came from TikToker @mymetaldiary. According to them, ChatGPT is a brown-haired, handsome young white dude wearing glasses, as you can see in this video:

While many commenters replied with a variation of "nailed it," others reported their own head-canon visions of ChatGPT-as-a-person. These responses run the gamut from "an old lady like mother nature," to "a mafia boss," or "a golden retriever."

I don't picture anything physical when I think of ChatGPT, but the AI's unfailing politeness and literally endless patience suggest a human personality. I think of ChatGPT as someone I regret having started a conversation with at a party. They seem like someone I don't know who is trying to get me to like them, and I can't figure out why. ChatGPT is a combination of boring and desperate, like someone searching for the most non-offensive thing to say at all time. It's someone I don't trust, even though I have no reason not to trust them.

Famous people you've never heard of: Who is Beabadoobee?

If you've been hearing people talking about (or reading people posting about) "Beabadoobee" lately, here's a look at the person behind the unique name: Beabadoobee is a 24-year-old singer/songwriter who was born in the Philippines. Her parents named her "Beatrice Kristi Ilejay Laus." At three, her family moved to London. When she was 17, she taught herself to play guitar, started writing songs, and began calling herself Beabadoobee. It was a joke at first, but it stuck. Her music might have been called "twee" a generation ago; it's wistful and soft and influenced by artists like Elliott Smith and Mazzy Star. It sounds like this:

She released her first single in 2017, and has been growing in popularity since, helped along by many, many uses of her songs on TikTok videos. As of 2025, there are three full-length Beabadoobee albums and six EPs, all released on indie labels. In a nutshell: Beabadoobee is a cult-popular singer favored by young women who make their own clothing.

What does SYBAU stand for?

The acronym SYBAU isn't exactly new—it was first defined on urban dictionary in 2008—but it's growing in popularity in the comment section of TikTok and Instagram lately. It means "shut your bitch ass up." (Rude.)

What does "snatched" mean?

According to young-people slang, "snatched" means very attractive and/or flawlessly styled. Example: "That new dress has you looking snatched."

(For more definitions of slang words, check out "'Mewing,' 'Sigma,' and Other Gen Z and Gen Alpha Slang You Might Need Help Decoding.")

Viral video of the week: dunking on millennial burger joints

Tim Marcin over at our sister site Mashable noticed a hilarious new trend on TikTok: Generations Z and A are mocking millennial burger joints, pointing out the cliches and tropes of a kind of restaurant you've probably eaten at dozens of times, especially if you've spent any time in a "medium-sized city just outside of a major metropolitan area," but never thought about.

This week's viral video from Tiktoker @user2521208780374 lays it out:

Here are some of the hallmarks of a millennial burger joint:

Founded by "two friends with a dream"
Burgers cost $19
Metal barstools
Reclaimed wood table
Truffle fries
Menu written on a chalkboard
Garlic aioli
Brioche bun
Special sauce described with mild swear like "kick ass" or "bitchin'"
Local "craft" beers, always IPAs.

Some millennial burger joints really strive to be different by serving food on something other than plates, usually slabs of wood, a phenomenon covered in detail on Reddit's "We Want Plates" board.

How Much Running Races Costs, Depending on the Type of Runner You Are

Meredith Dietz — Tue, 04 Mar 2025 18:30:00 +0000

We may earn a commission from links on this page.

I'm Lifehacker's resident marathon runner and senior finance writer. And now, I'm merging my two worlds. Running is often touted as one of the most accessible sports—just lace up and go, right? But as many runners discover, what starts as a "free" activity can quickly transform into a significant investment. Last week I broke down what it looks like to invest in proper running gear. And now, I'm turning my eye to the world of races.

You might think you'll never get into races. I was like you, once: a casual runner who scoffed at the idea of paying money to run. Then you get coerced into running a 5k for charity or something. Then you feel the high of crossing the finish line. You realize how intoxicating it to push yourself to longer distances, to have strangers cheering your name, to simply set your sights on a goal and work toward it. Now, six marathons later (and so many smaller distances along the way), I understand how people budget races into both their finances and fitness.

Of course, once you enter the world of racing, costs can add up quickly and vary dramatically depending on your approach to the sport. So let's take a look at the financial commitment involved in running organized races.

The casual runner

For those who participate in a handful of local races each year, running remains relatively affordable. As a minimalist runner who does sign up for a marathon a year (and some shorter races leading up to the main event), I fall in this category.

Typical annual expenses:

3-5 local 5K/10K races: $25-50 each ($75-250 total)
One half-marathon: $75-120
Basic running shoes: $80-120 (replaced annually)
No-frills running clothes (see more here): $100-200
Optional race photos: $20-40 per event

Total annual cost: $330-730

Casual runners can keep costs down by focusing on community races organized by local running clubs, which often have lower entry fees than commercial events. Early bird registration can also save 15-30% off standard entry fees. Many casual runners also use free training plans available online rather than paying for coaching.

The dedicated road racer

Runners who focus on performance and participate in multiple races throughout the year face a more substantial financial commitment. Keep in mind, a lot of these are upfront costs for investing in gear that will last years. For instance, you probably won't be buying a new smartwatch annually.

Typical annual expenses:

Races of varying distances: $100-1,000
One or two major marathons: $150-350 each
Premium running shoes: $130-180 (two to three pairs annually)
Technical running apparel: $300-500
GPS watch: $200-500 (amortized over two to three years)
Race photos/videos: $100-200
Training plan or app subscription: $100-300

Total annual cost: $580-1,630

These runners often join running clubs ($40-150 annually) for the social aspects and training benefits. They might also invest in regular sports massages ($70-120 per session) or recovery tools like foam rollers, massage guns, and compression gear ($150-300).

Brooks Women's Ghost 16 GTX

$165.17 at Amazon

The destination racer

Those who combine their love of running with travel face the highest costs.

Typical annual expenses:

Two to three local races: $100-200
Two to three major destination races: $150-350 each
Travel costs (flights, accommodations, food): $1,000-3,000+ per destination race
Premium running gear (technical clothing, shoes, watches): $300-500
Race insurance: $50-100 per major race

Total annual cost: $1,600-4,100+

The World Marathon Majors (Boston, New York, Chicago, London, Berlin, and Tokyo) are particularly expensive, with entry fees up to $350—not to mention extremely competitive qualification standards or lottery systems to sign up in the first place. International races may also require additional expenses like travel insurance and vaccinations.

The trail/ultra runner

Now I'm speaking outside of personal experience, but I am manifesting a future in ultra distances for myself. Fun fact: "Ultra marathon" refers to any distance longer than a marathon. A 30-miler and an 100-miler would both be called ultras. Neat!

Naturally, ultra runners and trail enthusiasts face unique cost considerations for specialized gear requirements and remote race locations.

Typical annual expenses:

Three to five trail races: $50-100 each
One to two ultra marathons: $150-500 each
Trail-specific shoes: $130-180 (2-3 pairs annually)
Specialized gear (hydration vest, headlamp, trekking poles): $300-600
Weather-appropriate apparel: $400-800
Navigation tools: $100-300
Required safety equipment: $200-500

Total annual cost: $1,630-3,980

Ultra events often have higher entry fees due to their length and the support required from the organizers. Many require specific safety equipment like emergency blankets, whistles, and first aid supplies. Remote race locations can also increase travel costs significantly.

CamelBak Hydrobak Hydration Pack

Look out for hidden costs

Regardless of runner type, several hidden costs can impact your budget:

Race day parking: $10-30 per event
Post-race celebration meals: $20-50 per event
Physiotherapy or sports medicine appointments: $80-150 per session
Cross-training (gym membership, yoga classes): $300-1,000 annually
Nutritional supplements and race-day fuel: $100-500 annually
Race cancellation or postponement fees

Cost-saving strategies

Like I mentioned above, I'm a marathon runner who refuses to spend more than $1,000 a year on my hobby. Here's how I save on costs I can't avoid altogether:

Volunteer at races: Many events offer free future entries to volunteers.
Register early: Take advantage of early bird pricing.
Seek out package deals: Some race series offer discounted entries when you sign up for multiple events.
Shop end-of-season sales: Stock up on gear when prices drop.
Consider virtual races: These typically have lower entry fees and no travel costs.

While racing costs can add up, I still find the most valuable aspects of running—the endorphin rush, sense of achievement, and community connection—are more than worth it. When you consider the costs associated with your preferred style of running, you can make informed decisions about which races and experiences are worth the investment for you.

These ‘Budget’ Bowers & Wilkins Earbuds Are 32% Off Right Now

Daniel Oropeza — Tue, 04 Mar 2025 18:00:13 +0000

We may earn a commission from links on this page. Deal pricing and availability subject to change after time of publication.

Bowers & Wilkins is known to make high-end audio products like headphones and speakers. You might see their speakers on luxury cars or expensive monitors. The Pi6 earbuds are their "budget" earbuds, but are still expensive, normally going for $249. However, you can get them right now for $168.08, the lowest price they've ever been according to price-tracking tools.

Bowers & Wilkins Pi6 Wireless Earbuds

AptX Adaptive, 12mm Drivers, Bespoke Active Noise Cancelling, 3 Built-in Mics, 15-Min Quick Charging

$249.00 at Amazon

The Pi6 are a step down from the more premium Pi8 wireless earbuds, both of which came out in 2024. Despite this being the product where cuts were made to make it a "budget" option, the audio quality stayed premium. I've had these earbuds for almost a year and consider them one of the best sounding earbuds I own. You'll get support for SBC, AAC, aptX Adaptive, and aptX Classic codecs, which explains the great audio. The soundstage is detailed, and it has Bowers & Wilkins' usual crisp sound signature. The fit is comfortable and light. Despite not having hooks, I felt like I could take them on a run without issues.

However, the Pi6 aren't perfect. They lack Spatial Audio, a find-my-headphones feature, and the app can be buggy. Although I may sound picky, these are basic features other earbuds at this price point have. But at the discounted price of $168, I'm willing to look past those issues. The drivers are 12mm and provide a decent ANC. You can expect about eight hours of battery life and another 24 hours with the case. You'll get Bluetooth 5.4 and an IP54 rating for water resistance (you shouldn't submerge them underwater). The earbuds also have three microphones so people can hear you clearly.

If you're looking for good quality audio with hi-res playback and good ANC and battery life, the Pi6 earbuds offer great value for your money at their current price.

Don't Buy the New iPad Air

Jake Peterson — Tue, 04 Mar 2025 17:30:00 +0000

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When Tim Cook posted "There's something in the AIR" on X this week, it seemed to imply the company was soon dropping the hotly anticipated M4 MacBook Air. After all, it's the only major Mac (aside from the Mac Studio) that Apple hasn't upgraded with the M4 chip, so it only makes sense the company would refresh the line. As it turns out, however, Apple had a different plan for consumers. If you want a new MacBook Air, you'll still need to settle for the M3 chip. If you want a new iPad Air, however, you're in luck.

On Tuesday, Apple announced two brand new iPads: an iPad Air, which now sports the M3 chip, and a base iPad, that now runs the A16 chip. As with any new devices, both of these new iPads come with perks previous models didn't, and, as such, it might seem like the logical choice for anyone looking for a new Apple tablet to pick up. If you had your eye on a new iPad Air, the M3 would be the best one, right? The thing is, I don't think so.

Not much new with the M3 iPad Air

Objectively, yes: This new iPad Air is the best one Apple has ever made. It has Apple's M3 chip, which Apple says is nearly two times faster than the M1 iPad Air (notice how they skip the M2 iPad Air here). That M3 chip enables hardware-accelerated ray tracing, a first for the iPad Air, so lighting effects in games and graphically intensive apps should look better.

The thing is, the M3 chip is the only thing that's new on this iPad Air. Everything else is exactly the same as it is with the M2 iPad Air: You have your choice between an 11-inch and 13-inch device, in the same four color options; the displays are identical whether you go M2 or M3; the front and rear cameras are exactly the same; both use USB-C and Touch ID in the top button (no Face ID on these iPads); both devices are compatible with Apple Intelligence (if you even care about that); both have the same battery life; and both support the same Apple Pencils. If someone placed both iPads side by side, you'd never know which was which.

In fact, if you used these iPads side by side for a week, you probably wouldn't be able to tell which was which. While the M3 chip is faster than the M2 chip, it likely won't feel that way in real-world use, considering the chips here have the same number of CPU and GPU cores. The M3 chip in the MacBook Air, on the other hand, has two extra GPU cores compared to the M2 MacBook Air. As such, the difference in performance between these two iPads is going to be less—which is to say, imperceptible to the vast majority of people who use an iPad.

So, yes, the M3 iPad Air is the best you can buy. But that's because it slightly improves on the already-great tablet Apple made in the last go-around, which really only slightly improved on the tablet that came before it. The only other new iPad Air announcement Apple made on Tuesday was a refreshed Magic Keyboard, but even it is compatible with older iPad Air models.

You should buy an old iPad

I love my iPad. I use it every day to catch up on the news, message friends, and browse the web. There was zero reason I needed an M1 chip to power those tasks back in 2021 when I bought the tablet, and, to be honest, virtually zero reason I need that M1 chip in 2025. Everything I do on an iPad, my iPad Air from 2014 could probably handle (albeit very slowly).

It's a problem plaguing the iPad line in general. Apple builds these tablets with incredible hardware, a fantastic combination of high quality screen and powerful processors—and yet, it all powers the same, souped-up version of iOS. iPadOS, for the most part, simply cannot push the M-series chips anywhere close to their limits. Sure, there are professional apps and demanding games available on the App Store to give your iPad something to work with. But really, iPadOS is nothing for even my M1 iPad Pro to handle—even when I have multiple windows open at once with Stage Manager.

The point is, you probably don't need the M3 chip in the latest iPad Air. Hell, you probably don't need the M2 chip. But if you're looking for a new iPad Air in March of 2025, I'd highly recommend looking for the latter.

Now that Apple has moved on to a new iPad Air model (at the same $599 price point, no less) the M2 version is likely to see some decent discounts across various stores. The new iPad Air isn't due out until March 12, so you might need to give it some time, but expect stores like Amazon and Best Buy to cut the price of the older model while selling the newer one at full price. Even today, you can get the 256GB M2 iPad Air for $649 on Amazon, which doubles the storage of the base model Air for an extra $50.

Consider an iPad

Let me rephrase: Consider the entry-level iPad, which Apple confusingly calls "iPad."

Alongside the M3 iPad Air, Apple also dropped the 11th-generation iPad. Like the Air, this new iPad doesn't change all that much from the 10th-generation iPad. There are really two big changes, and one small one: The screen is 0.1 inches larger on the new iPad (pretty small); the base model doubles the storage from a tricky 64GB to a useable 128GB (without changing the price tag); and the new one runs the A16 chip found in the iPhone 14 Pro and iPhone 15, which should offer a decent performance bump over the A14 in the 10th-gen iPad.

The rest is about the same: a decent, bright display; a nine-to-10 hour battery life; USB-C charging; identical front and rear cameras; the same Apple Pencil support. The new iPad does leave a couple things behind: It ditches the nano-SIM slot in favor of relying entirely on eSIM, while also losing support for True Tone on the retina flash feature. But it does support Smart HDR 4 over the 10th-gen iPad's Smart HDR 3.

But that's getting into the nitty-gritty: The 11th-generation iPad represents the best iPad for most people, as long as you can live without some of the perks the iPad Air (or even iPad Pro) offers. You won't get the best quality display in Apple's lineup, or the fastest processor. But that A16 chip is going to be more than enough to run iPadOS for years to come.

The same purchase principle that I discussed with the iPad Air applies here as well: Stores are likely going to discount the 10th-gen iPad once Apple starts selling the 11th-gen. I'd encourage anyone who wants an iPad for basic iPad tasks to try that route, but I also think the 11th-gen iPad is a pretty good value as-is. Even in the face of tariffs, Apple didn't raise the price on the iPad, while at the same time doubling the storage to 128GB. That means you get an all-around great Apple tablet for $349, $250 less than an iPad Air. You could use those savings to buy a Magic Keyboard and Apple Pencil, or just pocket the rest and enjoy the iPad itself.

At the end of the day, none of Apple's iPads are a bad buy—but while each tier offers additional perks and features you may or may not enjoy, the overall "iPad experience" is the same. The question is, how many perks and features can you cut, while still enjoying the overall experience as much as you would with the more expensive model? For the vast majority of people, I'd say that answer is the 11th-gen iPad. But, if possible, head to your local Apple Store or tech outlet to try them out for yourself.

Everything We Think We Know About iOS 19

Pranay Parab — Tue, 04 Mar 2025 17:00:00 +0000

With iOS 19 expected to be unveiled in June 2025 at Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC), rumors about its features have been coming in fast. Although none of these rumors can be confirmed at the moment, they still give us a good idea about what Apple might be considering behind the scenes. Since AI is the flavor of the month, Apple Intelligence improvements are expected for iOS 19, but the camera app might also be getting some attention. Here's everything that's been leaked so far.

The merging of Siri and Apple Intelligence

According to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman, Apple plans to merge Siri with Apple Intelligence sometime during the iOS 19 patch cycle. Yes, the assistant is currently listed as being part of Apple Intelligence, but behind the scenes, it's supposedly got a new LLM in the works that would unify its currently split architecture and allow it to more frequently handle complex requests. As of now, its AI features are much more limited, and most of Siri doesn't use AI at all.

Gurman says he expects the merger to be completed by spring of 2026 with the launch of iOS 19.4. His report states that, originally, Apple's plan was to launch a more conversational Siri in the same update, but that's been delayed and is not expected to be unveiled at WWDC 2025.

Gurman also indicates that because Apple has not yet completed last year's Apple Intelligence feature rollout, any as yet unannounced features shouldn't be expected for a while.

A Camera app redesign

About a month ago, YouTuber FrontPageTech revealed a leaked redesign of the iPhone's Camera app. He claimed to have seen a video of the rumored redesign and recreated it for a video. The render primarily focuses on the control system. Instead of swiping left or right to switch between camera modes, this leak indicates that we may see just two options when we open the app—photos and videos. Swiping switches between them, while tapping reveals more options such as panorama or spatial videos. You can also see a slightly larger viewfinder in the render, but all of this should be taken with a pinch of salt. Even if the sources are credible and the information accurate (other leakers have doubted FrontPageTech before), a lot can change between now and release. Features get shifted around all the time during development, and you can expect some of that with iOS 19 as well.

No major UI changes

The FrontPageTech leak also suggests that Apple won't be making other major UI changes in iOS 19. With iOS 18's development not yet complete despite WWDC 2025 being right around the corner, I do have to agree that looks unlikely that big UI changes would follow so soon.

Your iPhone will (probably) run iOS 19

With no major UI redesign expected, there's no reason for Apple to axe more phones from the iOS 19 update lineup. Citing a source within Apple, French website iPhoneSoft.fr reports that any phone that runs iOS 18 should be compatible with iOS 19 as well. However, the iPad 7 will supposedly not be so lucky, as the website says it will not be included in the iPadOS 19 update.

This Massive Data Breach Compromised 3.3 Million People's Information

Emily Long — Tue, 04 Mar 2025 16:30:00 +0000

A handful of major data breaches that occurred in 2024 have already come to light in the last few months (including the PowerSchool and Community Health Center incidents), the latest of which affected a major employment screening and background check service and compromised information from more than 3.3 million people.

DISA Global Solutions provides background checks for more than 55,000 employers across the country, and its systems were compromised for more than two months last year.

What happened with DISA?

According to the company's filing with the Maine attorney general's office, hackers accessed DISA's system between Feb. 9, 2024 and April 22, 2024 (when the breach was discovered) and stole the data of 3,332,750 individuals

In its letter notifying consumers of the breach, DISA did not provide specifics as to what was stolen, noting simply that the hackers "procured some information." However, an additional filing located by TechCrunch indicated that the breach included Social Security numbers, medical records, financial account information, credit and debit card numbers, and other government-issued documents.

In conducting background checks, DISA collects a wide range of consumer data, including credit, education, and employment histories; driving records; drug tests; references from employers and landlords; and criminal and civil legal filings.

What you can do if your data was stolen

The best you can do after a data breach is to pay attention to your personal accounts, follow basic security best practices—such as being especially vigilant with suspicious communication that might be a phishing attempt—and lock down as much as possible to prevent any further damage being done with your information.

If you haven't already, you should take steps like freezing your credit and placing a fraud alert to prevent anyone from taking on debt in your name, as well as considering identity protection services that can notify you of anything suspicious. You can also set up protections for your SSN so no one can take on employment or file taxes fraudulently.

As of Feb. 21, DISA is notifying consumers affected by the breach and offering a 12-month membership to Experian's IdentityWorks identity monitoring service. To enroll, go to the IdentityWorks website and enter the activation code in your notice. You must sign up by June 30, 2025.

Here Are All the New Features in iOS 18.4

Khamosh Pathak — Tue, 04 Mar 2025 15:00:00 +0000

The new iOS 18.4 beta is still missing an AI-overhauled Siri with on-screen awareness and the app integrations Apple promised all the way back in June at WWDC. If you're waiting on that, try your luck with iOS 18.5. Nevertheless, 18.4 isn't an empty update. The patch is set to introduce Priority Notifications, and Apple Intelligence will now support more languages—which is great news for Apple users across the globe. In addition, iOS 18.4 will make Apple Intelligence accessible in the European Union for the first time. Here's everything new with the next iOS update.

Priority notifications

One of the new highlight features in iOS 18.4 is Priority Notifications. When enabled, your iPhone will use on-device intelligence to figure out which notifications are truly important, and will highlight them in a new Priority Notifications box above the rest of your pings.

However, in this beta, it's not enabled by default. Go to Settings > Notifications > Prioritize Notifications and then enable the feature to start using it.

Credit: Khamosh Pathak

Starting with iOS 18.4 Beta 2, you can also now remove apps from Priority Notifications—it used to be an all or nothing affair. If you don't want messages from an app like Uber Eats to show up in the Priority Notifications section, you can now easily disable them with a toggle from the same menu.

Credit: Khamosh Pathak

Sketch style in Image Playground

Credit: Khamosh Pathak

When you're creating an image in Image Playground, you'll see a new style option called Sketch. This style makes it look like your AI-generated image was drawn on paper. If that sounds familiar, that's because it was also shown off back at WWDC, but Apple only just added it to iOS with this update.

Visual Intelligence comes to the iPhone 15 Pro series

Credit: Khamosh Pathak

Apple brought the Visual Intelligence feature, which allows you to use real-time video to get help from Apple's AI, to the iPhone 16e despite its lack of a Camera Control button, and now with the iOS 18.4 update, iPhone 15 Pro users will get it, too.

Now, users can map the feature to the Action button, which even works as an alternate way for phones with a Camera Control to launch it.

Apple Intelligence comes to the Control Center

Credit: Khamosh Pathak

If you want to use your hardware buttons for something else, but would still like access to Visual Intelligence, you can also add a new Visual Intelligence control to the Control Center. In fact, the Siri section of Control Center has been renamed to Apple Intelligence & Siri, and it also has Controls for Talk to Siri and Type to Siri.

All new emojis

Sometimes, it's the new emojis that get users to upgrade their iOS, rather than new features. In iOS 18.4 Apple is bringing out seven new distinct emojis. There's a new face emoji called Face with Bags Under Eyes (my personal new favorite), and there's also a fingerprint emoji. You also have a shovel, a harp, a leafless tree (aww), a splatter emoji, and the flag of Sark. Here's what they look like.

Credit: Khamosh Pathak

New Ambient Music feature in Control Center

Credit: Khamosh Pathak

Apple already has a background sounds feature that generates nature sounds for ambient playback. However, in iOS 18.4, you'll find a new Ambient Music section in Control Center. There are four options: Sleep, Chill, Productivity, and Wellbeing. Tap one, and it'll play a corresponding playlist from Apple Music.

Credit: Khamosh Pathak

Apple has mapped a playlist to each button by default, but you're not locked to any of them. If you go into Control Center's editing view and then tap on a control, you can choose a different playlist (Apple gives you four different options for each control), or you can choose any playlist from your own collection.

New Shortcuts actions

Credit: Khamosh Pathak

iOS 18.4 introduces numerous new actions to the Shortcuts app, most of which have to do with changing settings for Apple apps like Safari, Maps, Calendar, Reminder, TV, Books, Notes, Voice Memos, and Weather. This is great for people who really like tinkering with Apple's default apps, but it also might be laying the groundwork for Apple's upcoming Siri Intents feature, which will let Siri take control of apps and perform actions on your behalf.

As an example of what you can do for now, though, Safari Shortcuts will now let you toggle pop-up blocking, close tabs, change search engine, and more.

Apple Intelligence comes to the EU

In addition to becoming available for EU users, Apple Intelligence now supports French, German, Italian, Portuguese (Brazil), Spanish, Japanese, Korean, and Chinese (simplified). Plus, there's now support for localized English for both India and Singapore.

Recipes come to the News+ app

The News app has a new Apple News Food+ section for paying subscribers. Here, you can access tens of thousands of aesthetically pleasing recipes. There are also stories, restaurant reviews, and more.

The new Mail app comes to iPad and Mac

With iPadOS 18.4 beta and macOS 15.4 beta, the redesigned Mail app is coming to the iPad and the Mac. Once you update, you'll get access to email categories and other AI features on your tablet and computer.

A much better Genmoji button

Credit: Khamosh Pathak

When I wrote about Genmoji, I was tempted to call it a hidden feature, because that's what it felt like. Genmoji was just a multicolor smiley face tucked in the corner of the Emoji keyboard.

Apple seems to have learned its lesson: With 18.4, the new icon says "Genmoji" right next to a smiley face rainbow icon.

New Podcasts widgets

Credit: Khamosh Pathak

The Podcasts app now has two new widgets: one for Library, and one for Shows. The Library widget can show you all saved episodes, downloaded episodes, or latest episodes. The Shows widget is for highlighting all episodes from a single show. You can choose a show, and then access all the latest episodes of the show from the Home Screen.

More choices for default apps

Apple's selection of default apps options is growing. You can now set a different Translate app by default, and if you're in the EU, there's now support for choosing a default navigation app, too. (If you're not in the EU, try using Map Redirect as a workaround.)

CarPlay changes

For some users, it looks like CarPlay is adding a third row of app icons on the Home screen. It seems like whether you see this depends on which vehicle you have.

A new Apple Vision Pro app

Credit: MacRumors

The iPhone now has a new companion app for the Apple Vision Pro. This app can be used to explore Vision Pro apps and content, and to download them to the headset when it's not in use.

Other small changes

Major app updates like iOS 18.4 typically include a number of smaller changes in addition to more notable ones. Here's what else iOS 18.4 updates on your iPhone:

When you're setting up a new device with iOS 18.4, you'll be prompted to select an age range for it. You can choose between Child (12 or younger), Teen (13 to 17), and Adult (18 or older). Apple says that it will use this data only to help set up parental controls.
When you edit your Albums, you'll see a new List View option, hopefully making it easier to rearrange them.
There's a new button in the Recently Deleted section of the Photos app to quickly Delete All photos.
While it's not added yet, based on the code in iOS 18.4, it looks like Apple is planning to add support for NACS (North American Charging System) for the Apple Maps EV route planning feature.

All the Gardening Tasks to Tackle in March

Amanda Blum — Tue, 04 Mar 2025 14:30:06 +0000

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Two weeks ago, there was a blanket of snow across most of the country. That melted into what feels like an early spring, with occasionally clear days and warm(ish) weather. The irises and tulips have begun to emerge in some areas, the surest sign that planting season is around the corner. This is the time to get organized and get ready, because by the time we talk again in April, we will be in it.

Start garden and lawn cleanup in March

Now is the time to get out there and start your spring clean up. You don’t want to get rid of the leaves—there are still insects slumbering, and they will be until spring temperatures hit. But you can gently rake them into beds and clear your lawn. Grab your pruners and get rid of the dead wood you see around you on shrubs. If you didn’t hit your berry canes before now, this is your last chance to clear away the dead wood. Your blueberries are ready to get a good structural pruning, too. Give your large shrubs and small trees a final pruning; we’re at the tail end of when it’s acceptable to do so. For trees, remove branches aimed inward, or those that cross another branch. You want to create airflow. The same is true for your shrubs: If you’ve allowed your hydrangeas and lilacs to become woody, now is a good time to lighten them up by removing interior branches and those that aim inward, cross other branches, or are too close to the house.

Clean up your water features like ponds and bubblers. They might have algae or too much nitrogen from leaves. Consider mosquito dunks to prevent a problem later this summer.

Empty your bird boxes; birds don’t like a used space. Do a deep clean of all your bird feeders, so you’re not spreading disease amongst the local bird population, particularly this year given the status of the bird flu.

While I am an ecolawn convert, it’s time to revive the green space, whether it’s clover or grass. Uncover it, and consider aerating it with an aerator, which you can rent or borrow. Then fertilize the lawn, and as soon as it’s warm enough, overseed it. For grass seed, you need 50 degree ground temps; for clovers, you need 40 degrees.

Divide tubers and plan your bulbs

Now that your irises and other tubers should be sending up small shoots, you can see precisely where they are and, if necessary, break them up. Tubers (ginger root is a tuber, and it looks exactly like iris tubers and others) are very hard to kill. You can dig them up and break them apart, or take a spade to them (shove it through the tuber to divide it). I have been known to take a serrated bread knife into the garden, shove it into the dirt and saw tubers apart but a good serrated hori hori will do the job, too. Even a small piece can be replanted. You should really never need to buy more irises; you have the ability to propagate as many as you need.

With the exception of a few flowers like ranunculus, it’s too late to plant most fall-planting/spring-flowering bulbs, like tulips. But consider that when you plant tulips in fall, you have no idea what your garden looks like in spring. During this time of year, I take pictures every week of most of my yard, and try to pay attention to where I need more bulbs, which kinds of bulbs, what colors, etc. I take a lot of notes that I can reference in fall when I order bulbs and plant.

You can plant ranunculus, which is a fall bulb, but is very forgiving on early spring planting. "Ranuncs," as they’re referred to by gardeners, are like small peonies and come in fantastic colors. Their tiny spider-like corms (like bulbs) are easy to plant; they don’t need a lot of depth, and since you’re planting them now, you can put them exactly where you need them to bloom. Soak them in room temperature water over night before planting, and then place them with the roots facing down.

Prep the garden beds

There are lots of ways we can get garden beds ready for spring if they’re not in use with your winter garden. First, clean up the beds. Chop all your dead crops down, but leave the roots in place to compost if you can. Cleaning up the top of beds, whether that’s leaves or branches, will mean less food for slugs and snails, since this is when you’re most likely to catch them before they repopulate. Go ham on slug traps right now. They don’t need to be complicated—shallow dishes of beer work really well.

Get rid of the weeds, too, now, before they multiply. It will only get worse from here on out. Make sure you’re pulling them out entirely, no matter how small they are. You don’t have to till up your entire bed; in fact, many people believe doing so only brings weed seeds to the surface. You can use a broadfork to break up the soil just enough to allow your plants to grow healthy roots, without destroying the structures that have been established in the soil already, like healthy mycorrhizae. Speaking of which, you can add mycorrhizae to your beds to help create better soil health and structure, and now would be a good time to do so.

If you’ve never tested your soil, do it now. Talk to your local nursery, extension office, or farm store about testing. You collect a little dirt, send it off, and they’ll let you know what your soil needs. Realistically, the most effective thing you can do in your garden is have really healthy soil with as few weeds as possible.

Once the beds are clean and ready, consider two additional tasks. First: mulch. Mulch is great for stopping weeds, but it also protects plant roots to keep them moist and insulted from the weather. You can also consider getting low tunnels up at this point so you can get an early start on the season.

Plant (or prune) roses

If you have established roses, it’s pruning time. If you don’t, we’ve just started rose-planting season, and bareroot roses from all the big rose houses like David Austin are hitting nurseries now. Pay attention to the nursery instructions for planting bareroot roses: These frilly friends need fertilizer, good planting hole prep, and to be planted correctly in order to thrive.

Fertilize these shrubs

Camellias are about to bloom (mine has already started), and other large shrubs like azaleas and rhododendrons aren’t far behind. They benefit from ericaceous fertilizer, and now’s the time to dress them with it. You can pick up this acidic fertilizer at the local nursery.

Plant spring crops as soon as the ground is workable

It's hard to believe the time is here, but if the nursery has spring crops, you can start adding them to your garden. Broccoli, cauliflower, kale, spinach, lettuce and radicchio is good to go in once the hard frost risk has passed. Pea seeds can go in, and sweet peas can get planted.

I've seen multiple friends sketching out their summer garden the last week. It may still be chilly outside, but the season is soon upon us. Get outside and start digging; it'll be here in no time.

These New Emojis Are Coming to Your iPhone With iOS 18.4

Emily Long — Tue, 04 Mar 2025 14:00:00 +0000

iOS users will find a handful of new emojis with an update to the 18.4 beta, including a "Face with Bags Under Eyes," which represents us all right now.

The new characters were recommended for release in September 2024 with Unicode Emoji 16.0, though it typically takes designers for Apple (as well as Google, Samsung, and others) to interpret and create their versions of the new emojis and push them to users. The last round of characters rolled out with the iOS 17.4 update in March 2024 and included "Head Shaking Horizontally" and "Head Shaking Vertically," as well as a phoenix, lime, brown mushroom, and broken chain.

What new emojis are coming to iPhone?

These are the new emojis launching with iOS 18.4:

Bags under eyes
Fingerprint
Leafless tree
Root vegetable
Harp
Shovel
Splatter

On top of the standard emojis, some users can create any emoji they want using Apple Intelligence's Genmoji feature, which launched in beta with iOS 18.2 for iPhone 15 Pro, iPhone 15 Pro Max, and iPhone 16 series. To make an AI-generated emoji, switch to the emoji keyboard from any text field, tap the emoji, and enter the prompt for what you want to create.

The next round of new emojis will come with Unicode 17, which is expected sometime in the fall and will make its way to Apple OS around this time in 2026. The proposed characters include hairy creature, distorted face, fight cloud, apple core, orca, trombone, landslide, and treasure chest as well as skin tone variations for several existing emoji.

These Exercise-Friendly JBL Earbuds Are $40 Right Now

Pradershika Sharma — Tue, 04 Mar 2025 13:30:55 +0000

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If you've been looking for a solid pair of workout earbuds that won’t slip out mid-burpee, the JBL Endurance Peak 3 is down to $39.95 on Woot (originally $99.99) this month (or until they sell out). That’s a steal for earbuds that scored an Editor’s Choice from PCMag for their workout-friendly design and secure fit. This deal includes a one-year JBL manufacturer warranty, and if you’re an Amazon Prime member, you get free standard shipping (otherwise, it'll cost you $6).

JBL Endurance Peak 3 True Wireless Sports Headphones

These wireless earbuds come with ear hooks that wrap snugly around your ears, ensuring they stay put even during the most intense sessions. And unlike some other hook-style earbuds, these reportedly don’t clash with glasses frames (an underrated feature for anyone who wears specs). That said, the ear hooks double as a power switch, turning off when the tips magnetically touch the body of the earpiece—that's useful in theory, but it can be frustrating if you’re just taking them out for a quick break. Also, the touch controls take some getting used to since the panels have a larger surface area than most earbuds.

Sound-wise, JBL packs a punch with 10mm dynamic drivers that cover the full frequency range from 20Hz to 20KHz (with fully customizable EQ settings in the companion app), delivering a sound profile with strong bass that stays clear of distortion, even at top volume. If you’re an Android user, you’ll appreciate Google Fast Pair for easy setup, though the earbuds stick to basic AAC and SBC codecs—no AptX support here, notes this PCMag review. They do, however, boast an impressive IP68 rating, meaning they’re fully dust-proof and can survive full submersion in water for over 30 minutes. Rain, sweat, or a quick rinse under the tap? No problem. Battery life is another win, with JBL estimating 10 hours per charge, plus an additional 40 hours from the charging case (your mileage may vary depending on usage). So unless you’re planning to run an ultramarathon, you should be covered.

Note: Woot does not ship these earbuds to Alaska, Hawaii, or PO box addresses.

How to Finally Stick With a Fitness Habit

Beth Skwarecki — Tue, 04 Mar 2025 13:00:00 +0000

Have you committed to a new habit—exercising, let’s say—but keep falling off the wagon? Do you give up when the going gets tough? Does this whole “pursuing goals” idea seem really daunting? You may have low self-efficacy. But don’t worry: Self-efficacy is something that you can build with practice. Here's how.

What is self-efficacy?

Self-efficacy, as psychologists understand it, is related to the idea of confidence, but it’s not just being cocky for no reason. It’s a feeling something like determination and related to discipline and motivation.

When you have high self-efficacy, you believe that you can do the thing. Whatever that thing may be. Maybe you’re just getting started on a long journey, but you know you’ll make it to the end. You see the obstacles in your path as speed bumps, not barriers. If you run into a problem, you’ll find a way to solve it. You just know you will.

These beliefs aren’t something you’re born with or something you get from luck or miracles. You build them over time, with practice and experience.

At the heart of self-efficacy is the idea that you can control what you do, and that you can control at least some of the things around you in your life. If there’s a snowstorm on the day you were going to go to the gym, for example, you don’t just give up on exercise for the week. You might rearrange your schedule so you can go another day, or you might do a home workout, or you might just remind yourself that your routine will survive a missed day and that your long-term plan is still on track.

Here are some of the ways that psychologists say we can build self-efficacy:

Congratulate yourself for small wins

Past successes are fuel for future success. This applies to tiny things like habits: If you managed to make it to the gym once, it’s a lot easier to show up on day two.

It also applies to bigger projects. If you did a beginner running program and “graduated” by running a 5K race, that’s huge. You learned that you can follow a program. You learned that you can run farther than you ever thought you could. You learned what it feels like to go out for a run when you’re tired, but finish anyway. You learned what that finish-line glow of accomplishment really feels like. And you can harness all of that, all over again, when you start working on a new goal.

Another thing I like to do, especially when I haven’t seen success in something lately, is to look for things I can be proud of in the process. I didn’t lift the 140-pound log at my last strongman meet, but I hit 127 pounds in training, which is a hell of a lot more than I could do when I started.

Watch people doing the thing you want to do

The second-best thing to reflecting on your own past experiences is to vicariously experience others’ success. You’ll want to choose your role models carefully; pay attention to who really inspires you.

For some people, looking up to a world-class athlete can inspire them in the gym. For others, it can be helpful to look at somebody who is closer to you in skill level or experience. When your buddy hits a new deadlift PR, you’ll cheer for them, right? Even though you weren’t the person walking up to the bar, you’ve still experienced a taste the whole rollercoaster of emotions from being nervous at the attempt to celebrating the success.

Seek out people who encourage you

Believing in yourself doesn’t have to be a solo project. Just as you can cheer on a gym buddy, your buddy can cheer you on as well. Also, make an effort to seek out instructors, coaches, and mentors who make you feel unstoppable. If somebody you trust thinks that you can do something, you’ll start to believe it too.

Visualize success (and failure)

When you’re trying to stay on a path, it helps to know where that path leads. What will it look like to make it to your goal? How will you feel when you cross that finish line, when you lift that goal weight, when you’ve been eating vegetables with your meals for a whole year?

While you’re at it—if you’re ready for this—also imagine scenarios where you’re trying to do the thing and you momentarily can’t. How will you feel if you get injured, if a vacation knocks you off track, or if your gym buddy stops being able to come with you on deadlift day? Your plan is big enough to survive these obstacles, but it will help to think them through ahead of time and plan out how you will handle them. Then, when the time comes, you won’t hesitate to execute your plan.

The Google Pixel 9 Is $200 Off Right Now

Daniel Oropeza — Mon, 03 Mar 2025 22:00:54 +0000

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The Pixel 9 is the latest series of the Google Pixel phone lineup. They were released late last summer with the 9 Pro and Pro XL getting released as well. But if you're OK with an already good camera and prefer to save some money, the 128 GB unlocked Pixel 9 is just $599 (originally $799) after a $200 discount, the lowest price it has been since its release, according to price-tracking tools. You can get it in obsidian, peony, or porcelain.

Brand: Google, OS: Android 14, RAM: 12 GB, Storage: 128 GB, Screen Size: 6.3 Inches.

Google Pixel 9 (Obsidian)

Brand: Google, OS: Android 14, RAM: 12 GB, Storage: 128 GB, Screen Size: 6.3 Inches.

Google Pixel 9 (Peony)

Brand: Google, OS: Android 14, RAM: 12 GB, Storage: 128 GB, Screen Size: 6.3 Inches.

Google Pixel 9 (Porcelain)

As most Pixel fans are probably aware, the budget Pixel 9a is expected to release sometime this month, which probably explains the new discount of the Pixel 9. If the pattern continues, you'll likely see the Pixel 9a come out for $500 during the pre-order sale. Also, if the trend of a-series phones continues, the Pixel 9 might still be a better value than the 9a.

The Pixel 9 comes with 12GB of RAM, starts with 128GB of memory storage, a maximum 120 HZ refresh rate, and the Android 14 operating system. Lifehacker's associate tech editor Michelle Ehrhardt deemed the more premium Pixel 9 Pro's hardware as the best Google has made so far, but its AI features still had hiccups. However, AI features will keep improving over time; the most important thing to get right is the hardware.

The battery life can last almost 12 hours, according to PCMag's "excellent" review. The main camera has a 50MP shooter, a 48MP ultra-wide camera with a 123-degree field of view, same as the Pro models, but it has a single-zone laser detect autofocus (LDAF) sensor (the pro has multi-zone LDAF).

If you have the Pixel 8, you might not notice a huge upgrade in this version. However, if you're upgrading from an older version or doing a switch from a non-Pixel phone, the 9 has a lot to offer. One of my favorite things about Pixel phones is the ongoing support for many years. My Pixel 6A still gets all of the updates and tons of AI features that make the phone feel fresh many years later, with the latest ones dropping last month. With the Pixel 9, you'll be getting a quality phone with software updates for a while (as long as seven years).

Siri's Apple Intelligence Upgrades Are Still a Couple of Months Away (at Least)

Jake Peterson — Mon, 03 Mar 2025 21:00:00 +0000

When Apple first revealed Apple Intelligence, its slate of generative AI features, a huge part of that announcement was a super-charged Siri. No longer would Apple's digital assistant be lagging behind competitors like Google: With the power of AI, the new Siri might actually be useful.

When Apple Intelligence drops in full, Siri will reportedly be much more contextually aware, and be able to scan what's on your phone to understand and answer questions you ask. If your friend sends you their new address, you can ask Siri "add this address to their contact card." You don't need to specify which address or which contact, because the assistant will, according to Apple, be able to understand that by what's currently on-screen. Another huge feature is the ability to ask Siri to take action for you: You can ask Siri to send an email you have in your drafts, edit an image on your behalf, or add a photo to a specific note.

If your iPhone is compatible with Apple Intelligence, you might have assumed it supports this new Siri. iOS 18 has been out for a bit, after all, and Apple has been pushing Apple Intelligence (and the new Siri) hard, including with a campaign featuring Bella Ramsey. Some Apple Store employees even started a chant about AI during the iPhone 16 launch.

A waiting game

The thing is, the new Siri isn't here yet. Apple did upgrade Siri a bit with iOS 18.1, and its the first wave of new AI features: That includes Siri's new design, which glows around the edges of the display; the ability to type to Siri by double-tapping on the bottom of the screen; Siri's ability to understand requests even when you misspeak; and a new feature that turns Siri into impromptu tech support (e.g., "How do I turn off Do Not Disturb?").

But iOS 18.1 came and went without any further updates to Siri. iOS 18.2 added more Apple Intelligence features, including ChatGPT integration, but no major Siri changes. iOS 18.3 was a smaller update (Apple even disabled notification summaries for certain alert types), but, again, skipped any upgrades for Siri. At one point, iOS 18.4 appeared to be the likeliest Siri update, but, alas, no dice. (It does bring a number of new features, though.)

It's not clear when Siri's full form will arrive

Anyone hotly anticipating Siri's AI promise will need to keep waiting. Bloomberg's Mark Gurman reported back in September that Apple was planning on rolling out most of Siri's big features by iOS 18.4. However, shortly before Apple dropped the first 18.4 beta, Gurman said issues and bugs are plaguing the engineering team, who are having trouble getting Siri's AI features working consistently. As a result, Siri could be delayed even further. It turned out his reporting was correct.

Now, the attention turns to iOS 18.5. Gurman's report said Apple hopes to ship these new AI Siri features with the next update, which would likely roll out sometime in May. (The 18.5 beta would ship earlier.) In order to make it work, Apple has had to separate Siri into two parts—or brains, as Gurman puts it: One brain handles the traditional Siri tasks we've come to know over the years (setting reminders, making calls, choosing a song, etc.), while the other handles the new AI features. Ideally, these two brains would be morphed into one, to offer the most complete Siri experience possible. That simply isn't ready yet—even for 18.5. Whenever these Siri features do arrive, they'll be a bit underpowered compared to what Apple wants them to be.

Gurman says this theoretical super Siri (codenamed LLM Siri) won't arrive until at least iOS 19 (and likely iOS 19.4), which Apple could introduce at this year's WWDC. Like iOS 18.4, iOS 19.4 won't arrive until the following year, 2026. Apple also reportedly wanted to make Siri more conversational, perhaps akin to ChatGPT's Voice Mode, but, like other Apple AI features, it's also delayed, and probably won't be shown off at WWDC. In fact, it might not arrive until iOS 20, as late as 2027. Who knows where competitors like ChatGPT will be by then.

Not all iPhones will get new Siri features

While Apple supports iPhone as old as the XS with iOS 18, not many iPhones will actually get these new Siri features. That's because Apple Intelligence is limited to iPhone 15 Pro, iPhone 15 Pro Max, and the iPhone 16 series—including the new iPhone 16e. If you have an iPhone 15 or older, you won't see these new upgrades, even when you update to iOS 18.5, or whichever update contains the AI-overhauled Siri.

The Best Movies and TV Shows to Watch on Max This Month

Stephen Johnson — Mon, 03 Mar 2025 20:00:00 +0000

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I've looked into everything coming to Max this month, and the below TV shows and movies are the best of the bunch, or at least the most interesting. My top pick: HBO's fearless, acerbic comedy The Righteous Gemstones is coming back for its fourth and final season. There's also The Parenting, an HBO original horror movie with an intriguing premise and an all-star cast, and a trio of movies produced by A24: Queer, Heretic, and Sing Sing.

The Righteous Gemstones, season 4

The fourth and final season of HBO original comedy The Righteous Gemstones features the titular family of scummy televangelists fighting America's "war on Christianity" while continuing to grift suckers hilariously. The show's talented cast—including Danny McBride, Adam DeVine, Edi Patterson, and John Goodman—will be returning, and a couple of new faces will be onhand to keep things fresh. Will & Grace star Megan Mullally plays Lori, an old family friend of the Gemstones, and Sean William Scott from American Pie plays her son.

Starts streaming March 9.

The Parenting

Max original horror/comedy The Parenting features a stacked cast that includes Brian Cox, Lisa Kudrow, Dean Norris, Edie Falco, Parker Posey, Nik Dodani, and Brandon Flynn. Dodani and Flynn play a young couple who plan a weekend getaway so their parents can meet and they can announce their engagement. Tensions between the future in-laws flare, but that's the least of the family's problems. The malevolent poltergeist that haunts the isolated country house is much more serious issue, especially when it starts possessing people.

Starts streaming March 13.

Queer (2024)

Daniel Craig turns in an unforgettable performance in this A24-produced film based on the novel from iconoclastic writer William S. Burroughs. Set in Mexico City in 1950s, Queer tells the story of an America expat William Lee (Craig) who spends his days drinking and chasing younger men, but falling in love with an American GI, played by Drew Starkey, complicates his life immensely. Queer was directed by Luca Guadagnino (Call Me By Your Name), and he makes fantastic movies.

Starts streaming March 28.

Heretic (2024)

In this critically acclaimed horror movie, a pair of idealistic Mormon missionaries knock on the wrong man's door. Hugh Grant is extremely charming when Sisters Barnes (Sophie Thatcher) and Paxton (Chloe East) stop by; he even invites them in for a slice of pie and a conversation about spirituality. But things soon turn ugly. The smart, sharp script and masterful performance from Grant may transcend the genre, but the brutality and suspense won't let you forget you're watching a horror movie, "elevated" or not.

Starts streaming March 7.

Sing Sing (2024)

Sing Sing earned nearly universal acclaim for its depiction of Sing Sing prison's Rehabilitation Through the Arts (RTA) program, in which hardened prisoners stage dramatic productions behind bars. Colman Domingo won an Oscar for his portrayal of John Whitfield, a real person who was imprisoned for a crime he didn't commit. Much of the rest of Sing Sing's cast are former convicts playing versions of themselves, which gives Sing Sing a raw, almost documentary feel. This unique, powerful film should be at the top of your must-watch list.

Starts streaming March 21.

Paul American

If you haven't had enough of YouTube superstars Jake and Logan Paul, this eight part reality show will take you deep inside the over-the-top lives and careers of these uniquely American entertainment and sports superstars. Along with the famous brothers, Paul American will introduce the nation to the extended Paul family so that new stars may emerge. God bless America!

Starts streaming March 27.

Celtics City

This sports reality series takes viewers inside the locker rooms and boardrooms of the Boston Celtics, the winningest team in NBA history. From its founding back in 1946, through the 1980s Larry Bird years, to the triumphant 2024 season, Celtics City examines the complex forces that shapes the squad into an enduring sports legacy.

Starts streaming March 3.

When No One Sees Us

Based on the novel by Sergio Sarria, When No One Sees Us is Max's first original Spanish language series. It stars Maribel Verdú (The Flash) as local Spanish police officer Lucía Gutierrez. When a series of disturbing murders take place around Holy Week in Morón de la Frontera (Seville), Gutierrez must work with lieutenant Magaly Castillo from the American military base nearby. More than a thriller and police procedural, When No One Sees Us explores the clash of culture between “deep Spain” and one of the largest U.S. military bases in the world.

Starts streaming March 7.

Last month's picks

The White Lotus, Season 3

Mike White's Emmy-winning series The White Lotus is the best. Its mix of biting commentary on wealth and privilege, well-drawn (but nearly always reprehensible) characters, and pitch-black humor add up to a nothing-else-like-it TV series. Season 3 sees a new group of pampered Americans arriving at a White Lotus luxury resort in Thailand. I can't say for sure, but I'm guessing they'll have unexpected and troubling times instead of a restful vacation. Season 3 also see the return of Natasha Rothwell, who played the spa owner from season one—one of the few sympathetic characters in the show's run. Other notable cast members include Walton Goggins (The Ghoul in Prime's Fallout series), Carrie Coon, Scott Glenn, Leslie Bibb, Michelle Monaghan, and Parker Posey.

Starts streaming February 16.

Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, season 12

There's a new season of Last Week Tonight premiering this month, and I'm pretty sure sardonic host John Oliver will have a lot to talk about in 2025 America. Oliver promises to ask the hard questions, like "Have two presidents ever kissed?" and "Did Tucker Carlson's mom really leave him $2 in her will?" (She actually left him $1.) Don't miss it if you like pointed political humor, because who knows how long pointed political humor will remain legal.

Starts streaming February 16.

Common Side Effects

This Adult-Swim-produced cartoon looks intriguing. Common Side Effects' executive producer, Mike Judge, created both King of the Hill and Beavis and Butthead, but Common Side Effects is not really a comedy. It's a moody, stylish looking drama about a pair of high school friends who discover both a drug that cures literally everything and a vast conspiracy from the pharmaceutical industry and the government to cover up its existence.

Starts streaming February 3.

Have I Got News for You, Season 2

If John Oliver doesn't provide enough comedic news coverage, why not give Have I Got News for You a try? Hosted by Roy Wood Jr. with Amber Ruffin and Michael Ian Black, this show takes the grinding misery out of "following the news" and makes it fun. Each episode features a different pair of celebrity guests who compete against each other in games and quizzes that test their knowledge of current events. It's a little like a TV version of NPR's Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me.

Starts streaming February 15.

We Live in Time (2024)

If you're in the mood for a tragic drama about doomed romance in the vein of The Notebook, this is the movie for you. Anchored by solid performances from Florence Pugh and Andrew Garfield, We Live in Time takes risks with structure, jumping around in time to tell the story of Pugh's character's cancer diagnoses and her decision to skip treatment to live her last days as fully as possible instead. We Live in Time was produced by A24, a company that rarely misses.

Starts streaming February 7

The Takedown: American Aryans

This HBO original docu-series details law enforcement's battle with the Aryan Brotherhood of Texas, a neo-Nazi street and prison gang responsible for dozens of murders and hundreds of other crimes, including the brutal killing of Breanna Taylor. Through interviews with cops, Taylor's family, and members of the Aryan Brotherhood of Texas, The Takedown: American Aryans examines the investigation, arrests, and trials that crippled the notorious criminal enterprise.

Starts streaming February 6.

We are the Best! (2014)

There are no recognizable actors in We are the Best! It was made for very little money in Sweden. Although it got good reviews, hardly anyone saw it—it barely broke a million dollars at the box office. It's hard to explain why anyone would care about three twelve-year-olds in Stockholm starting a terrible punk rock band in 1982, but I promise you will care if you watch it. It captures something elusive and true about youth and hope in a way that few films ever have. Seriously, watch this movie.

Starts streaming February 1.

How I Left the Opus Dei

I was brought up Catholic, but it was "try to go to church on Sunday because it makes your mom happy" style Catholicism, a world of the difference from the hardcore Catholics in Opus Dei: They mean it. Among other things, they sleep on boards instead of beds and are into "mortification of the flesh," and not in a fun/kinky way. Anyway, How I Left Opus Dei is a docu-series that tells the story of 13 women who got sick of being abused and left the group. I'm definitely checking it out.

Starts streaming February 7

Puppy Bowl XXI

If you want a little break from the Kansas City Chiefs versus the Philadelphia Eagles, you can switch over to HBO's coverage of The Puppy Bowl on Super Bowl Sunday, and watch cute little puppies on Teams Ruff and Fluff play with dog toys and wrassle around with each other, totally unaware that they're on TV and people are saying, "awwwwww." Don't miss the cat-centric halftime show, either.

Starts streaming February 9.

You’ll Soon Be Able to Send Video and Screenshares to Google’s Gemini AI

Michelle Ehrhardt — Mon, 03 Mar 2025 19:30:00 +0000

As part of Mobile World Congress, happening this week in Barcelona, Google has teased that its Gemini AI is finally ready to see the world. Literally.

Originally teased as Project Astra in May of last year, Google’s Gemini Live with Video and Gemini Live with Screenshare features each have a new trailer, showing how the search giant plans to catch up with ChatGPT’s Advanced Voice Mode. Soon, Google One AI Premium subscribers will be able to share their phone screens and real-time video with Gemini, which the chatbot will then be able to use to answer questions.

ChatGPT’s Advanced Voice Mode got these features late last year, but it also requires you to shell out at least $20/month for a ChatGPT Plus subscription. While a Google One AI Premium plan is priced identically, it also throws in 2TB of storage for your Drive and Gmail accounts, so depending on your needs, it could be the better pick for you.

In the trailers, Google shows users accessing Gemini Live via the Gemini phone app to open a real-time conversation with the AI, then tapping either a video or screen sharing button at the bottom of the screen to get started. In the Gemini Live with Video demo, we see someone showing the chatbot some vases they’ve just fired as well as some glaze swatches and asking for advice on which one to choose. In the Screenshare demo, the chatbot instead looks at a store listing for a pair of jeans and gives advice on which type of clothes to pair with them.

I’d love to meet the type of person who would go through all of the effort of spinning and firing a vase without knowing what color to glaze it, but the point is clear. Gemini will soon be able to use real-time video and screen captures as input when answering prompts.

Unfortunately, Google hasn’t yet said much more than that. When Project Astra was originally teased, it boasted such impressive (and creepy) abilities as “being able to tell where you live just by looking out the window.” These trailers seem significantly scaled back in comparison, but they're also clearly just short demos. I’m curious to see how the feature actually functions once users get their hands on it, which Google says will happen “later this month.”

My Favorite Amazon Deal of the Day: The M4 iPad Pro

Daniel Oropeza — Mon, 03 Mar 2025 19:00:00 +0000

We may earn a commission from links on this page. Deal pricing and availability subject to change after time of publication.

Apple has been top dog in the premium tablet space for years, and the iPad Pro with an M4 chip released last year solidified their dominance. If you've been waiting for a discount on the best-performing tablet you can get, take your pick from the available options: You can get the 11-inch wifi version for $849 (originally $999) or the cellular version for $1,049 (originally $1,999) after getting an extra $50 off at checkout. The 13-inch wifi version is $1,099 (originally $1,299) and the cellular version is $1,299 (originally $1,499). These deals bring all versions down to the lowest prices these iPad models have been since their release, according to price-tracking tools.

Apple iPad Pro 11-Inch (M4, Wifi)

Apple iPad Pro 11-Inch (M4, Wifi + Cellular)

$1,199.00 Save $100.00

Apple iPad Pro 13-Inch (M4, Wifi)

$1,199.00 Save $100.00

Apple iPad Pro 13-Inch (M4, Wifi + Cellular)

$1,299.00 at Amazon

$1,499.00 Save $200.00

$1,299.00 at Amazon

$1,499.00 Save $200.00

The M4 is about 1.5 times faster than the M2, the chip used in the previous generation of iPads. That's a big difference for anyone looking to use their iPad for more than just navigating the web and streaming media apps. The 11-inch screen is an OLED display with a maximum brightness of 1,600 nits and a contrast ratio of 2,000,000:1, making it ideal for creators who need to see accurate colors for pictures or videos. The processing power can easily handle heavy-duty apps like Final Cut Pro, Logic Pro, or Photoshop. A 120Hz refresh rate also means games will look smooth.

As far as battery life, you can expect about 10 hours depending on your use, and a charge that takes about two hours to get to full. Keep in mind Apple switched to USB-C charging, and this iPad does not support wireless charging. If you don't get the cellular version, you'll be limited to wifi signal. You can get the Apple Pencil Pro and the Magic Keyboard if you want to complete the set, but of course, they're not necessary.

If you're not going to be doing heavy work, the iPad Air will do just fine. But if you're looking for the best tablet to perform professional tasks, the iPad Pro M4 is at a great price right now.

Opera's AI 'Browser Operator' Will Complete Tasks for You

David Nield — Mon, 03 Mar 2025 18:30:00 +0000

We're now starting to see some rudimentary AI agents appear: tools that can not only write code and solve math problems, but also perform actions on your behalf. And Opera has announced the first AI agent for its browser, the aptly named Browser Operator.

The idea is that Browser Operator can take care of some tedious online tasks for you, saving you time and clicks. It could arrange your next grocery order, for example, or check out hotel prices in a place you're thinking of visiting.

"For more than 30 years, the browser gave you access to the web, but it has never been able to get stuff done for you," says Opera's Krystian Kolondra. "Now it can."

Right now the feature is in what's being labeled as a "preview" release. Opera states that none of your personal or sensitive data is sent back to the web while the AI agent is working, and says users remain in full control of the process while it's happening—you wouldn't want an order full of the wrong groceries, after all.

As is the norm with the latest wave of modern AI tools, you talk to Browser Operator using natural language: "I want to get plane tickets from New York to San Francisco at the cheapest time in August," for example. The bot then figures out what the necessary online actions are, and carries them out.

If any kind of user action is required, like entering payment information or login details, Browser Operator pauses so you can take over. You can also pause the tool manually whenever you like, just in case it's booking you a hotel in the wrong city or ordering clothes that aren't your style.

The feature is coming soon

The Browser Operator feature doesn't seem to be live at the time of writing, but when it's available, you'll be able to launch it from the browser's Command Line interface or via the sidebar (where Aria, Opera's integrated AI, can also be found). Opera says the feature will roll out "in the near future" as part of an AI-related feature drop.

The idea seems like an appealing one, in principle: Online tasks like shopping around for the best prices on gadgets or booking hotel rooms for a vacation can be tedious and take up a lot of time. If an AI bot was able to do all of the grunt work with human supervision, that would be genuinely useful.

That said, it all has to work. These tasks might be time-consuming and dull, but they're jobs that also need to be done right. If Browser Operator can't follow instructions properly or keeps on making mistakes, then Opera users are going to go back to relying on their own clicking and scrolling.

As I'm not able to access the feature yet, I'm relying on Opera's demo video for ideas about what it can do. The interface looks to be straightforward and intuitive, sitting to the side of the browser or just above the webpages the AI agent is working on.

The example of booking tickets for a soccer match seems the most useful: You can tell the AI when you want to go, where you want to sit, how much you want to pay, and which ticket types to look for. Assuming Browser Operator understands what you mean and can navigate the necessary websites well enough, that's a lot of time saved.

This new AI agent inside Opera also explains what it's doing as it goes, so you can see what it's trying to do and how successfully it's managing to carry out your instructions. It looks as though you're going to be able to jump in and interfere if Browser Operator is about to do something it shouldn't.

Opera isn't the only company working on agentic AI. Last month ChatGPT introduced its own Operator tool, which can carry out tasks on the web: Like Opera Browser Operator, it's in preview' at the moment, and it's also only available to users paying for the $200-a-month Pro plan.

Five Easy Ways to Make Your Old Car Look New(er)

Jeff Somers — Mon, 03 Mar 2025 18:00:00 +0000

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On average, the number of years people hold onto their cars has been creeping up for about a decade—it's up to about 14 years these days. Aside from improved reliability, given that new cars average $49,740, and used cars cost more than $26,000, it's not hard to figure out why. If your car still runs well and reliably gets you where you need to go, that’s all that really matters.

That said, you probably don't want your car to look it's age. Time takes a toll on every vehicle, from sun damage to chips and scratches in the paint, and eventually even a car that’s been maintained to perfection will start to show its years. If you want to make your car look as good as it still runs without investing in a full detailing, there are a few tricks you can try it in an afternoon, without spending a lot of money.

Try a clay bar polish

Step one is, of course, to give your car a thorough washing. But once the car is clean and dry, you can use a clay bar treatment to remove the stuff you can’t get off with a simple wash. Clay bars remove all the tiny bits of grit, sticky bits of tar, and other contaminants that make paint look dull. (For some extra oomph, follow up with another wash and then polish your car using a high-quality polish (either by hand or using a power tool).

Remove scratches with a power tool

A scratched-up finish adds years to any car, but scratches can also allow moisture to infiltrate under the topcoat, encouraging rust and other visual damage. Repairing those visible scratches is the logical next step.

For relatively shallow scratches, you can use a scratch removing product like this one. Just apply some of the product to the provided pad, slip the pad into your power drill, and run the pad over the scratch a few times. Once you wipe away the excess, the scratch should be gone (if you don’t have a drill or don’t want to use one, there are other products rely on muscle power alone).

Deeper scratches require a lot more effort—including sanding, filling, and repainting—and may be better left to a detail shop, unless you don't care about imperfect results.

Restore plastic trim with a heat gun

Your car's plastic exterior trim can start to show wear after years of exposure to the sun and harsh weather. Unless you restore the plastic, of course.

There are two ways to accomplish this:

Use a heat gun. You can use a heat gun to heat the plastic, and watch as it darkens and shines up like magic. This works because the heat brings the remaining oils in the plastic to the surface. There are two downsides to this approach, however: It’s easy to overdo it and actually melt the plastic, and it will only work a few times before your plastic has been bled dry and can never be restored again.
Buy a product intended for the purpose. If you're wary of taking a heat gun to your ride, there are store bought options for car trim restoration. Something like Wipe New is easy to use—you just wipe it on—and can last a few weeks to a few months. They can be applied repeatedly to keep your trim looking newer.

Use a power scrubber on your rims

Cleaning and polishing your tires and rims will also help your car to look new(er). A spray-on cleaner applied with a power scrubber can bring your rims back to life with a little elbow grease. A tire coating like this one can also put some shine back into your tires.

Polish your headlights with toothpaste

Finally, one spot older cars always suffer is the headlights, which can become cloudy and faded over time. You could rip them out and replace them, of course, but cleaning them up is a lot cheaper and works surprisingly well.

You can DIY this in a variety of ways by scrubbing your headlights with toothpaste, a mixture of vinegar and baking soda, even sandpaper. Or you could make your life a little easier by using a bespoke product to brings those headlights back to life without any extra steps or mess.

Doing these things on a regular basis will not only keep your car looking good, it will protect it from further damage and help its exterior last as long as you need it to—which hopefully won’t be another 14 years.

What to Do If You Skipped an Exercise Day (Besides Feel Guilty)

Beth Skwarecki — Mon, 03 Mar 2025 17:30:00 +0000

Sometimes you need a day off. Sometimes you don’t need a day off, but you take one anyway. If you have any anxieties about what exercise means to you, you may spiral into worry or guilt: Am I a slacker? Am I losing all my gains? And if rest days are so important, why do I feel guilty every time I take one?

You probably know the answers to these questions, which all boil down to: A day off doesn’t define who you are. But feelings of rest day guilt are pretty common, and I’ve felt them myself. So here's a pep talk to help you understand these contradictory feelings, and some options for what to do when you feel this way. Tell yourself these things:

Know that one day doesn’t matter

Being strong or fit or getting in shape is a years-long goal, if not a lifelong one. Five years from now, will you look back on this one particular day with regret? You probably won’t even remember it happened.

Tomorrow is a new day, so don’t fall into the trap of thinking you’ve ruined your whole week or your whole training program. Either skip the day or make it up tomorrow, whichever will make the path easier for you going forward.

Rest is useful

A well-designed program will usually have at least one rest day each week; some programs might even have three or four. All are perfectly valid ways to work out. So if you took three rest days this week rather than two, it’s not like all your hard work went to waste.

Your body will put that rest to good use, anyway. Some people will say a certain number of rest days per week are necessary; I don’t know that that’s actually true as long as your fatigue is well managed. But regardless of whether you need a day off, your body can still use one for extra recovery. You’ll feel fresher the day you come back.

You may feel better if you do something

A rest day doesn't have to be 100% sedentary. Resting too much can backfire. Let's say you need to take a day off from running—cool, great, you're taking care of yourself. But then you may be missing out on the mental health benefits of exercise, and now you're sitting around being grumpy. Go for a walk to get those benefits, or do another low-key activity you enjoy, like yoga or stretching.

You feel guilty because you care

It's worth taking a minute to unpack those guilty feelings. Often, we feel guilty about taking a day off because we have a plan in our mind (say, we envision ourselves working out every day) and we see that we're falling short. Having a plan, and being able to compare our actions to our plan, are both good things! We may just need to recalibrate a bit.

So when you feel guilty, think about your plan. Maybe your plan can allow some extra rest days, which means you're not off-target at all. Or maybe your plan is unrealistic, and you've been putting inappropriate expectations on yourself. Check whether your benchmarks (or SMART goals) actually match up appropriately with your big-picture dream goals.

Focus on consistency

A big part of the reason one day doesn’t matter is that, in the long run, what does matter is consistency. If you’ve been hitting all your workouts for weeks on end, and this week you have to miss one, you are still the kind of person who usually hits all their workouts.

Maybe you’re afraid that this one day off is going to send you down a slippery slope, and you’ll end up taking more days off. Well, that’s within your power! Decide how and when you’ll get back on that horse. Plan out your schedule for tomorrow, or for next week, and make sure you’ll be able to make those next sessions.

Problem-solve for next time

Why did you take this rest day, anyway? If you were feeling worn down, maybe you need a more balanced exercise program that doesn’t leave you feeling that way. Or if you dread a certain workout, maybe that’s a sign that you need to change something—either the workout, or your mindset. If you always skip workouts with box jumps, for example, there are ways to get over that fear.

Just a time management issue? Try some of these tips for getting in regular exercise even when your schedule is already packed.

Consider your overall plan

Or maybe you’re feeling guilty because you’ve missed a lot of days. That’s a sign that you may be on a path that’s unsustainable. Are you so stressed out from work that you don’t feel motivated to work out? Maybe you need more than a day’s break from working out to see if that relieves some of the extra pressure. Or maybe you need to lift before work instead of after, to see if that gives you enough of a mood boost to get you through a stressful day. Or maybe you just have to solve the larger problem in your life. (Talk to your boss about your workload? Start looking for a new job?)

Bottom line, if you feel guilty about missing one day because to you it’s a symbol of other things going on in your life, zoom out and see what you can do about fixing those other things.

Use TikTok's 'Rage Cleaning' Trend to Get Your Place Spotless

Lindsey Ellefson — Mon, 03 Mar 2025 17:00:00 +0000

Creating and sticking to a cleaning schedule is difficult, but only because life is difficult. Finding time to clean can feel impossible sometimes, especially when you've had a stressful day at work, with your family, or just in general. But what if you could harness that negative energy and turn it into cleaning power? That's the idea behind TikTok's "angry cleaning" trend—also known as "rage cleaning"—and if you're as grumpy as I am, you mind find it helps you get your home a lot cleaner.

What is TikTok's rage cleaning trend about?

I see the terms "angry cleaning" and "rage cleaning" all over TikTok, but quickly realized they describe something I already do: When I'm annoyed or upset, I start to clean—usually something that requires a little oomph, like scrubbing or vacuuming. It turns out I'm not alone.

There are a few benefits at work here. Pouring your negative energy into cleaning can distract you from whatever is annoying you, providing a menial task you can accomplish without a lot of active thinking. It lets you physically work out your negativity, especially if you're really putting some muscle into whatever you're doing (cleaning the oven is a good option here). It also gives you a positive end result that can lift your spirits and make you feel motivated: After cleaning for a while, your head will feel clearer and you'll have a cleaner home to show for it.

How to incorporate angry cleaning into your routine

I'll stop short of recommending that you wait to clean until you're upset; you should still try to follow a cleaning schedule and stay consistent with your efforts to tidy up. Additionally, I don't recommend intentionally pissing yourself off so you can work up the motivation to scrub all those dirty pans.

When the opportunity to rage clean arises naturally, however, it pays to find the right outlet. Choose an arduous task like cleaning the bathroom grout so you can really put your back into it and physically work out your anger. It needn't be something truly strenuous. For instance, I like folding laundry when I'm mad because I get to slap the folded garments down on the pile with a bang. Whatever works!

This isn't really the time for something that takes brainpower, like decluttering. Angry cleaning is most effective when you can focus on feelings over thoughts, so stick to mopping the floor extra hard. I'm generally a proponent of cleaning your home in small bursts, so tap into that thinking to bust through one annoying, laborious cleaning task while you're good and pissed.

I'm not saying rage cleaning will fix whatever is bothering you, but it can help you let off some steam and will allow you to think a little more clearly afterward—and in a neater space to boot. Challenge yourself to work quietly on one task, see it through with no distractions, and reevaluate how you feel afterward. Think about what's bothering you, or just focus on cleaning, but don't take any steps to address what's wrong until you've finished your project and given yourself a little time alone and a bonus jolt of accomplishment. Your problems, and your to-do list, might both feel a bit more manageable afterward.

What to keep in mind when rage cleaning

I'll add a few more notes here, as someone who's now watched what feels like a million of these TikTok videos and who also does enjoy cleaning up when negative emotions are afoot. First, don't just channel your rage into cleaning to make it more effective, but make sure you're also using that time to yourself to calm down the anger. That looks different for everyone, sure, but on TikTok, you'll see examples of people lighting candles or putting on some music they enjoy. Ideally, by the end of an angry cleaning session, you'll feel better—which will help you address the cause of your annoyance more effectively, too.

Second, if you're feeling mad all the time, it's really not good, whether you're able to turn that into productive rage cleaning or not. Obviously, it's more important to deal with the root cause of your problems than constantly use them to clean. Just wanted to put that out there. In the meantime, though, make sure you're taking note of when you're feeling the inspiration to angry clean. If, say, you hang up every phone call with your mom in a bad mood or consistently get frustrated after a weekly meeting at work, reorient your cleaning schedule to make sure you're harnessing that energy. If one of the parents at your kid's 6 p.m., Tuesday dance class enrages you, 8 p.m. on Tuesday sounds like a great time to give the kitchen its weekly cleaning, right? Let it work for you, not against you, and your home and emotions will thank you.

Declutter Your Home With TikTok’s Viral ‘Core 4’ Method

Lindsey Ellefson — Mon, 03 Mar 2025 16:30:00 +0000

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There’s a difference between cleaning and decluttering. If you have too much stuff (clutter), you’ll have a much harder time sweeping, dusting, sanitizing, and actually cleaning, plus your house will never look clean. But decluttering is harder than cleaning, by far. It’s overwhelming, even, which is why clutter can get out of hand, making cleaning a nearly impossible task. That’s also why we’re always on the hunt for new ways to declutter: Surely, someone out there has cracked the code, right? As it turns out, organizer Kayleen Kelly may have. Her method, Core 4, is wildly popular on TikTok and could be the one that works for you. (Check out all these other pro decluttering methods, too, for more inspiration.)

What is Core 4?

Kelly’s Core 4 cleaning method is a big hit on CleanTok, with one analysis I was sent by Upmove showing videos on the technique have amassed over 23 million views. Here’s the video that launched it all:

When decluttering, Kelly suggests moving through each room in four stages: Clear out, categorize, cut out, and contain.

How to use Core 4 to declutter

If you want to try Core 4 on your own, Kelly advises starting with small areas to avoid getting overwhelmed. Instead of trying to do each stage through your entire home at once, do all four stages in one room, then repeat that process in each room. If a single room has a ton of stuff in it, you can divvy that up even more, focusing first on a closet or the counter space, for example.

Clear out

Start the first phase, which is clear out, by just removing everything and putting it in a pile. Throw out trash if you see it, but focus on getting your cupboards, table space, and other storage areas completely clear, so they can be filled in a more organized way later.

Categorize

Next, categorize. You’ll need sorting bins for this (more on that later), so designate a bin for each different category of stuff you’re moving through, like your clothes, a family member’s clothes, makeup, knick-knacks, pet products, etc. Start sorting your pile by putting every item into its associated bin.

Cut out

The third phase is "cut out." This one is difficult because you’ll be tasked with going through each bin and determining what can be thrown away or donated. This is a good time to practice putting your clutter in “purgatory”—moving things you’re unsure about getting rid of to a special bin that you’ll hide away somewhere, like an attic, for a month to determine if you can live without it. Otherwise, be decisive and do your best to shrink the amount of stuff in each bin. Here's a list of questions I recommend asking yourself as you declutter so you can focus on making objective, reasonable choices.

Contain

Finally, contain. Reassess your bin situation. If you threw out a bunch of old kitchen tools, you might be able to put the remaining ones in a smaller container, for instance. The bins are key here—you’ll be using them for storage and organizing going forward, not just for sorting and decluttering when you’re working through the steps.

What to keep in mind while utilizing Core 4

Core 4 relies on principles you'll also find echoed throughout the wider landscape of organizing and decluttering techniques. Specifically, it works well because it falls back on the principles that make up the Organizational Triangle, namely, that similar items should be stored together and everything you own must have a designated space. The containers are crucial because they keep everything categorized and stored together, but also because they give you a sense of volume. If all of your skincare products are stored in a bin, for instance, you'll notice if you run out of space to add more, which can signal to you that you need to declutter and pare down your collection. If they're scattered all over your bathroom and vanity, you'll have a much tougher time noticing you have too much.

While the containers are important and valuable, they also pose a bit of a problem: With everything boxed up and hidden away, the containers themselves can become cluttered. You'll still need to repeat the Core 4 technique periodically over time, focusing on that "clear out" step and dumping the bins, so you don't end up with a bunch of smaller, invisible messes inside your cabinets and closets. Another approach you can use is the "out in the open" method, which is pretty similar, but involves dumping every item in every closet or cupboard in a room right into the center of the space, then going through it. The scale at which you tackle the "clear out" stage as you continue to employ Core 4 is really up to you, but I recommend moving in smaller chunks to avoid getting overwhelmed.

What bins you'll need

It might seem counterintuitive to buy more stuff to declutter, but to use this method, you really do need the bins. They make sorting easy, plus give you a place to store the things you decide to keep, helping you stay organized so you don’t have to keep repeating the Core 4 all the time. Here are a few bin options to consider:

Classic storage bins

If you’re focusing on pure functionality, nothing is better for this job than clear, plastic containers with lids. They nest and stack, so whether they’re empty or full, storing them is easy and intuitive. Try the IRIS bins from Amazon, which come in a six-pack of 53-quart bins ($69.99) for larger items or categories and a 20-pack of 5.9-quart bins ($28.99) for smaller needs.

IRIS USA 6-quart clear storage boxes, 20 pack

$28.99 at Amazon

Decorative storage bins

If you live in a small space where the bins are more likely to be visible or you just prioritize aesthetics, you'll want more decorative bins. Your best bet is to buy sets of matching boxes, like this small and large box set on Wayfair for $58.99, which comes in a bunch of colors and designs. Collapsible fabric boxes, like this set of three from Amazon ($29.95) are good options, too, since they can be folded up when not in use and fit well onto shelving units.

How (and Why) to Grow a Crevice Garden

Amanda Blum — Mon, 03 Mar 2025 16:00:00 +0000

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A crevice garden is an exceptional way to deal with one of the hardest terrains to grow a garden. But more than that, crevice gardens can create architectural interest and structure, while growing a drought-tolerant garden that can be full of native plants. You can even create a crevice garden in a place that didn’t previously have rocky terrain, if you like the look of them.

With climate change bringing hotter summers, a garden that is drought tolerant while also improving the soil and providing food for pollinators is a win all around. Since these gardens are so low maintenance, they’re perfect for people who want a dramatic, natural garden without a lot of upkeep.

Crevices provide the perfect growing conditions

If you have a patio, driveway or bricked walkway, you know that plants love to grow in the nooks and crannies, whether you want them to or not. There’s good reason these plants grow in the tiny spaces—the surrounding matter, whether that’s rock, brick, or pavement, provide almost perfect germination conditions. They keep the seeds dark, warm, and moist in the soil, shaded from the sun. The roots are protected, and hard surfaces almost always trap heat, offering the plant what it needs to survive.

With a crevice garden, you embrace this idea, and either create or adapt rocky spaces. If you have a rock wall, adding plants between the rocks creates a symbiotic relationship: The roots help the wall maintain stability, holding soil and rocks in place, even in storms; the rocks provide drainage, insulation, and minerals that leach into the soil, providing nutrients for the plants. The rocks also act as protection.

How to start planting in your rock wall

If you have an existing rock wall or outcropping of rocks, you just need to check the conditions to get started on your crevice garden. You'll need enough soil between the rocks to anchor your plants. Use a cup or scoop to pour garden soil into the crevices, only enough so the seedings you place there will touch soil. Once you ensure that your rock wall has enough soil between the rocks, tuck small plants into the crevices. When you pull these plants out of the plastic containers they come in, be sure to free up and spread out the roots, so they’ll begin rooting into the soil once planted. While they’re establishing themselves, ensure the wall gets watered only enough to keep the plants alive. Don’t baby these plants—overwatering will stop the roots from seeking water deep within the soil. Water the plants once after planting, and then watch for signs of plant stress such as wilting before watering again. Remember, water flows down, so if you’re watering a rock wall, don’t overdo it: Water well at the top of the wall and then allow gravity to move the water down to lower plants.

There are different variations on crevice gardens

A new generation of landscapers is using the notion of a rock wall to landscape entire flat yards. Washington State University recently demonstrated this, laying stone slabs parallel to one another, creating gorgeous diagonal lines between which to plant. Plantings are made in small groupings, two or three together.

You don’t need to design your entire yard around the crevice concept: A small outcropping of large rocks creates vertical interest in a large yard. Consider a long, low rock wall to define a change of elevation in your yard, or to shield a sitting area from the wind.

Once you have rocks or slabs in place, the instructions are the same as for a rock wall. Make sure there's some dirt or soil for the plants to grab onto in the crevices between rocks, or add enough soil to do so. Plant small, drought tolerant plants in the crevices and encourage root growth by watering minimally.

Resources to start your own crevice garden

If you’re interested in starting a crevice garden, consider the book “The Crevice Garden: How to make the perfect home for plants from rocky places,” which is full of suggestions for plants and layouts of crevice gardens.

The best way to start is to visit a local nursery that specializes in natives; explain your project and find out what plants are recommended for your zone. This is the perfect time of year, as nurseries are beginning to stock for the spring and summer. This early in the season, you also have time to grow your own seedlings from seed. Seeing what is available will help you envision the colors, shapes and textures your garden can embody. From sedums that will tolerate a Northeast winter to caper berry plants that would thrive in a high desert, your crevice garden has to be suited to the local weather.

If you’re interested in building a crevice garden from scratch, consider working with a landscape designer. If you want to go it on your own, seek out a local rock yard. These businesses have different rocks, soils, and sands are separated out, and you can walk or drive around and look at each. You’ll purchase the material by the ton, not pound, and can usually opt to pick it up yourself or have it delivered. Someone will walk with you through the yard and show you options.

You can be as organic or rigid in your design as you'd like, by just placing a few rocks close together or by laying out an entire yard's worth of stone in distinctive planes. The formula remains the same: Identify the spaces between the rocks (the crevices), ensure there's enough soil to plant into, and then place drought-tolerant plants in those spaces.

Four Savings Strategies to Try Instead of a 'No-Buy Month'

Meredith Dietz — Mon, 03 Mar 2025 15:00:00 +0000

If you're trying to get your finances back on track—and who isn't?—you're sure to see "no-buy months" and "low-buy years" all across social media. No-buy challenges ask participants to eliminate all non-essential purchases for a set period. While the concept seems straightforward, these challenges often fail because they don't address the psychological aspects of spending or provide realistic frameworks for long-term financial habits.

I've written before that sticking to a budget can feel a lot like sticking to a diet. A strict approach is not only too difficult to maintain, but it can backfire. The all-or-nothing mentality is frustrating and demoralizing, and you might wind up abandoning your financial goals. And like trying to cut out all carbs on a random Tuesday, it's sure to lead to some sort of binge. The solution? Some sort of moderation.

Let's take a look at several alternative saving strategies that offer more sustainable paths to financial wellness without requiring complete, all-or-nothing spending freezes.

Use "cash stuffing" to curb your spending

This method involves dividing physical cash into different envelopes or containers for specific spending categories. Common categories for cash stuffing include groceries, entertainment, restaurants, gas, rent, etc. The key here is you can only spend money in a certain category from its designated envelope. Once the envelope is empty, that’s that for the month.

Cash stuffing works because it forces you to be more intentional (deciding how much money gets allocated into your envelopes) and more disciplined (you can’t put more money into the envelope once it runs out). I also love how it eliminates the abstract nature of transactions. It's always helpful to see immediate visual feedback on your remaining budget.

Use category-specific spending challenges

Instead of cutting all discretionary spending, focus on reducing expenditures in one problematic area, such as dining out or clothing purchases.

How to implement:

Identify your highest unnecessary spending category.
Set a specific, reasonable reduction goal (like cutting restaurant visits in half).
Track your progress without eliminating the category entirely.

Get mindful with "slow shopping"

This approach emphasizes thoughtful consumption rather than impulsive buying or complete abstinence.

Key principles:

Implement a mandatory waiting period (24-72 hours) before making non-essential purchases.
Research alternatives, compare prices, and consider second-hand options.
Ask yourself meaningful questions about each potential purchase's value and necessity.

Create your own values-based budget

Rather than focusing on restriction, the values-based budget aligns spending with your personal values and priorities.

Some steps to follow:

Identify what truly matters most to you (family experiences, health, education, etc.).
Allocate more resources to high-value categories.
Naturally reduce spending in areas that don't align with your core values.

The bottom line

The most effective saving strategy is one you can maintain consistently. Experiment with different approaches to discover which creates sustainable financial habits without triggering feelings of deprivation or eventual spending rebounds.

Remember that financial wellness isn't about never spending money—it's about spending intentionally on what truly matters while building security for the future.

The Best Movies and TV Shows to Watch on Hulu This Month

Stephen Johnson — Mon, 03 Mar 2025 14:00:00 +0000

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The movies and television shows below are the best of what's coming to Hulu this month—according to me. Because I'm an expert at watching things. The best of the month is Deli Boys, a fishes-out-of-water comedy about pampered Pakistani brothers who inherit a criminal empire. Also of note: Good American Family, a series based on a very strange true story.

Deli Boys, season 1

Created by Abdullah Saeed, Deli Boys is an outrageous comedy series about a pair of sheltered, pampered Pakistani American brothers whose lives are upended when their father dies, and they learn that baba's real money didn't come from the delis he owned, but from the illegal drugs he dealt. Now the sons must take over the family business, but these goofs are the furthest thing on earth from drug dealers.

Starts streaming March 6.

Good American Family

Mark Duplass and Ellen Pompeo star as a Midwestern couple who adopt a child they believe has a rare form of dwarfism, but they start to suspect she's not actually a child, and wonder what nefarious designs she has on their family. Based on the same true stories that inspired The Orphan, Good American Family aims to go deeper than a potboiler by telling its creepy, bizarre story from multiple points of view to explore the subtleties of bias, culture, and trauma that are really behind this odd story.

Starts streaming March 19.

O'Dessa

I don't know whether O'Dessa will be good or not, but this Hulu original is the kind of movie that takes such a huge swing, it's bound to be entertaining, even if it falls apart. It's a sci-fi rock opera in which Sadie Sink plays a farm girl who ventures out into a post-apocalyptic wasteland to save the world through song, so it's bound to be either a classic or a cult-classic. Either way, I am so on board.

Starts streaming March 13.

Last Take: Rust and the Story of Halyna

When a movie quality camera is pointed at a shooting, you'd think it would be obvious who's to blame, but the story of Alec Baldwin killing cinematographer Halyna Hutchins on the set of the movie Rust is way more complex than that. Through interviews with people who were there, police interrogation videos, and behind-the-scenes footage from the movie set, Last Take goes beyond the sensational headlines to tell the real story of the day everything went so horrifically wrong.

Starts streaming March 11.

Control Freak

This Hulu original horror movie stars Kelly Marie Tran as a successful motivational speaker whose life is close to perfect, until her head starts itching. The maddening itch gets worse, but not lice. It's a parasitic infection, a malevolent creature that begins to take control of her mind and body. If you're into body horror, you should definitely check out this squirmy, suspenseful flick.

Starts streaming March 13.

Am I Being Unreasonable? season 2

If you're looking for something unusual to watch, check out Am I Being Unreasonable? Produced by BBC, the first season of this dark comedy/thriller series earned rave reviews for its anarchic, try-everything cinematic style, its sharp writing, and its talented cast headed by Daisy May Cooper. She plays Nic, a woman stuck in an unhappy marriage whose life unravels in hilarious ways when she tells someone her darkest secret.

Starts streaming March 12.

Bill Burr: Drop Dead Years

Bill Burr's new special showcases the honesty, anger, and wit that brought him to the top of the stand-up comedy heap. Age hasn't softened Bill at all: in this deeply personal hour of stand-up, Burr focuses on subjects like aging, death, and male sadness with his unique, don't-give-a-fuck style.

Starts streaming March 14.

Last month's picks

A Thousand Blows

Created by Steven Knight, the genius behind Peaky Blinders, this British boxing drama is made for fans of hardcore Victoriana. A Thousand Blows takes viewers to the mean streets of London in the 1880s where we follow Hezekiah (Malachi Kirby) and Alec (Francis Lovehall), two friends from Jamaica who immigrate to the UK only to find themselves fighting for their lives in the crime-ridden East End. The pair run afoul of criminal kingpin and pugilist Sugar Goodson (Stephen Graham) and find a friend in Mary Carr (Erin Doherty), head of an all-woman shoplifting gang known as the Forty Elephants.

Starts streaming February 21.

The Kardashians, season 6

Love 'em or hate 'em, the Kardashians are an American institution, and they're back for another season of rich people hijinks, including the potential of Khloé reuniting with her ex, Lamar Odom, a look at Kim and Khloé's summer getaway to India, and North West's Lion King tribute performance. I can't freakin' wait. (OK, I can wait.)

Starts streaming February 6.

SLY LIVES! (aka The Burden of Black Genius)

If you don't like Sly and the Family Stone, we probably shouldn't hang out. Directed by Questlove, whose first documentary series, Summer of Soul, is a classic, SLY LIVES! investigates the life and legacy of Sly Stone through amazing archival performance footage of Sly in his prime and in-depth interviews with the people who were there. Deeper than the "wasn't Sly cool?" movie this could have been, SLY LIVES! doesn't shy away from the bigger issues surrounding his fame or gloss over the downfall of a legend.

Starts streaming February 13.

My Best Friend's an Animal

As anyone with a loyal pet can tell you, love doesn't care what species you are. My Best Friend's an Animal is a for-the-whole-family documentary series by National Geographic that examines the bond between people and unusual, exotic pets. Expect a ton of awwwwws.

Starts streaming February 5.

Muslim Matchmaker

Hulu's original series Muslim Matchmaker is from Indian Matchmaking creator Smriti Mundhra’s Meralta Films, a company with a proven track record of creating cross-cultural, reality dating shows. The series follows the adventures of Hoda Abrahim and Yasmin Elhady, matchmakers who help Muslim Americans find romance. The focus is on traditional Muslim relationships, so this is not a show about hook-up culture; it's a show about finding the person you want to settle down with, but that doesn't mean there's a shortage of awkward first dates.

Starts streaming February 11.

Wicked Game: Devil in the Desert

I can't find a ton of information about this Hulu original documentary series, but I'm intrigued by Wicked Game's official show description: "Hunting the mastermind of a violent abduction, authorities unravel a twisted tale of obsession during the early days of legalized pot." That's a good enough premise for me to give it a spin, for sure.

Starts streaming February 4.

Shoresey, season 4

I have a confession to make: I'd never heard of Shoresey before today, and I can't believe I haven't been watching this show. Why wasn't I informed? This Canadian sports comedy series is excellent and totally deserves the 100% fresh rating it has on rotten tomatoes. Shoresy follows the adventures of a Shoresy, a foul-mouthed, fan-favorite hockey player on the Sudbury Bulldogs in Sudbury, Ontario, known as the dirtiest player in the game. Hockey comedy has been funny since the original Slap Shot!

Starts streaming February 26.

Devil in the Family: The Fall of Ruby Franke

If you're a true-crime fan and you're unfamiliar with the bizarre story of Ruby Franke, you're in for twisted treat. Franke was once a prominent mommy vlogger, but something went terribly wrong and she ended up in jail, accused of abusing her children in horrible ways. Devil in the Family promises new insight into this dark story through interviews with the Frankes' eldest children, Shari and Chad, and Ruby's husband, Kevin.

Starts streaming February 27.

The Best Movies and TV Shows to Watch on Prime This Month

Stephen Johnson — Mon, 03 Mar 2025 13:30:00 +0000

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I've scoured the February releases on Amazon's Prime platform to find the best new and new-to-streaming movies and shows. My pick for best of the month is Holland, a thriller starring Nicole Kidman that reminds me of The Stepford Wives. There are also the final season of Bosch: Legacy, and don't sleep on Anora; it's excellent.

Holland

Nicole Kidman stars in an off-kilter thriller from director Mimi Cage. Kidman plays Nancy Vandergroot, a teacher in the idyllic town of Holland, Michigan, where everyone is way into their Dutch heritage and they smile at each other with straight, white teeth. But (as you'd probably guess) something sinister lurks beneath the surface of this town, and Nancy is about to take a big bite into a rotten apple. If you're into strange suspense, check out Holland.

Starts streaming March 27.

The Wheel of Time, season 3

If fantasy is your sort of thing, check out Prime's sprawling sorcery and orcs (sorry, "trollocs") series The Wheel of Time. The show is returning for a third season, and the White Tower is really in peril now. Right off the bat, Liandrin is revealed as a Black Ajah in front of the Hall of the Sitters. Later, Rand, Moiraine, Lan, Egwene, and Aviendha embark on an epic journey to the Aiel Waste. If you haven't seen the first two seasons or read Robert Jordan's 14(!) Wheel of Time novels, there's no better time than now to dig in.

Starts streaming March 13.

Bosch: Legacy, season 3

The third and final season of hard-boiled police procedural Bosch: Legacy sees retired LAPD homicide detective turned private eye Hieronymus "Harry" Bosch (Titus Welliver) confronted by his daughter Maddie (Madison Lintz). Last season, Maddie learned that Bosch may have killed the man who previously kidnapped her. This season, the investigation into the kidnappers' death could bring ruin to Harry, Maddie, and Honey "Money" Chandler (Mimi Rogers), who's running for Los Angeles district attorney.

Starts streaming March 27.

Anora (2024)

Director Sean Baker's radical empathy shines in Anora, a romantic comedy about a sex worker who hooks up with the son of a Russian billionaire, to the great displeasure of his family. In other words, this is not Pretty Woman. Mike Madison turns in a brilliant, nuanced performance in the main role of a film that revels in life's gray areas. Anora refuses to simplify the complexities of love, money, and power in 2025, while refusing to ignore the humanity of its characters. There's a reason this movie killed at Canne and critics love it.

Starts streaming March 18.

Picture This

Picture This is a romantic comedy starring Bridgerton's Simone Ashley as Pia, a talented photographer who receives a surprising prediction: both true love and success will follow from the next five dates she goes on. With her sister's wedding looming, Pia's family busily lines up potential suitors giving Picture This's character actors (including Ted Lasso's Phil Dunster) a chance to shine. But when Pia's ex Charlie (Hero Fiennes Tiffin) returns, things get complicated.

Starts streaming March 6.

Last month's picks

Clean Slate

This Amazon original series was dreamed up by the late, great Norman Lear, a man who was known for spinning comedy gold from hot-button social issues with grace. Clean Slate stars actress and trans activist Laverne Cox as Desiree, who returns to her hometown after decades of living in the city. She's been gone for so long, her father, played by George Wallace, doesn't recognize her, mainly because she used to be his son.

Starts streaming February 6.

Reacher, season 3

Universally praised action series Reacher returns for a third season. Based on Lee Child’s seventh Reacher novel, Persuader, season 3 sees former military operative Jack Reacher going undercover for the DEA in New England and facing off against a character played by Olivier Ritchers, the seven-foot bodybuilder called “the Dutch Giant" in muscle-show circles, and Zachary Beck, played by Anthony Michael Hall, the six-foot tall American actor called "The Geek" in 16 Candles.

Starts streaming February 20.

House of David

No matter what you think of this "God" person, the Bible contains a lot of great stories, including that of David, who, like Madonna, needs no last name. This faith-based series begins with the fall of King Saul and the anointing of his successor, David, a teenage outcast who seems to have no business being king of anything. But David embarks on a personal journey of discovery and eventually (spoiler alert) becomes the greatest king of Israel. God, as they say, works in mysterious ways.

Starts streaming February 27.

Invincible, season 3

Both critics and fans love superhero cartoon-for-adults Invincible; the rotten tomato scores for season 1 are 98% and 93% respectively, and one critic called it "the Game of Thrones of the Superhero genre." If you're unfamiliar, Invincible is based on Robert Kirkman’s comic and tells the story of 17-year-old Mark Grayson. Mark is just like any teenager, except his dad is Omni-Man, and he's developing super powers. Season 3 sees Mark meeting up with tons of villains, including Powerplex, voiced by Aaron Paul, The Elephant, voiced by John DiMaggio, and the merciless leader of The Order, Mr. Liu, voiced by Tzi Ma.

Starts streaming February 6.

My Fault: London

My Fault: London is a British romantic drama based on the novel Culpa mía by Mercedes Ron. It tells the story of Noah, played by Asha Banks, whose mother marries a rich British man and drags her daughter from Florida to London (oh no!). Despite the tony Notting Hill address, things in the UK don't go great for Noah, especially when she meets Nick, played by Matthew Broome, her mother’s new husband’s privileged and snobby son. But, surprisingly, love blooms between the the extremely attractive couple, who then must navigate a chaotic life of partying in Ibiza and driving around in cars worth a million dollars each.

Starts streaming February 13.

The Best Movies and TV Shows to Watch on Netflix in March 2025

Stephen Johnson — Mon, 03 Mar 2025 13:00:00 +0000

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I've pored over Netflix's release schedule to bring you the best movies and TV shows premiering on the service this month. My must-watch of the month: The Electric State, a comedy sci-fi movie starring Millie Bobby Brown, Chris Pratt, and adorable (but maybe deadly) robots. I'm also psyched for Chaos: The Manson Murders, a new film from documentary GOAT Errol Morris (The Thin Blue Line, Mr. Death), and I'll be checking in on Everybody’s Live, a talk show hosted by John Mulaney that's streamed live.

The Electric State

Based on the acclaimed graphic novel by Simon Stålenhag, The Electric State is a sci-fi comedy set in a retro-future version of America in the years after a war between humans and robots nearly wiped out humanity. Most people, understandably, don't trust robots, but main character Michelle, played by Millie Bobby Brown, is traveling with a pair of mysterious 'bots, searching for her lost brother. Also on hand: a drifter named Keats, played by Chris Pratt. The Electric State's big stars and intriguing premise make it a must-watch.

Starts streaming March 14.

Chaos: The Manson Murders

Legendary film-maker Errol Morris turns his always-revealing lens on the Manson Family murders in this provocative new documentary. Not satisfied with "official" explanations of Charles Manson's motives and strange personal charisma, Morris ties the crimes to a larger narrative involving the CIA, LSD, Jack Ruby, The Beach Boys, and who knows what else. Chaos: The Manson Murders features interviews with experts, living witnesses, and archival footage of the Manson clan, combined by a master of the craft.

Starts streaming March 7.

Everybody’s Live with John Mulaney

Netflix is entering the talk show world with Everybody’s Live with John Mulaney, a weekly live show hosted by Mulaney, who also serves as co-showrunner, and executive producer. If his first Netflix live show, John Mulaney’s Everybody’s in LA, is the model, expect eclectic celebrity guests, phone calls with the viewing audience, and the spontaneous magic that only working live brings. At a recent press event, Mulaney promised, "We will never be relevant. We will never be your source for news. We will always be reckless. Netflix will always provide us with data that we will ignore.” Sounds promising.

Starts streaming March 12.

Million Dollar Secret

British comedian Peter Serafinowicz hosts this Netflix reality show in which 12 cutthroat competitors travel to an opulent mansion to try to get rich. One contestant finds a million dollars in their room. They get to keep it, but only if no one else discovers their secret. The combination of exotic locations, intricate schemes, a hilarious host, and a contest with a million dollars on the line sounds like reality-show gold to me.

Starts streaming March 26.

With Love, Meghan

Meghan Markle, the Duchess of Sussex, has her own reality show. According to Netflix, in With Love, Meghan, Markle "challenges us to pursue joy over flawlessness—to revel in the small, meaningful touches that may make a loved one’s day." Right away, Your Grace. The show features a mix of practical how-tos and conversation with guests like chef Roy Choi and Mindy Kaling that take place in Markle's kitchen, garden, and even her beehive. I love beehive talks!

Starts streaming March 5.

The Leopard

Based on the best-selling novel by Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa, The Leopard is set in late 19th century Sicily and tells the story of the redshirt army's attempt to conquer the Italian island. It's the last days of the European aristocracy, and Don Fabrizio Corbera, the Prince of Salina, realizes that his family's lives of privilege and frivolity are at their end, so he must forge new alliances and make difficult choices so they can survive in the modern world.

Starts streaming March 5.

Delicious

This Netflix original from Germany tells the story of a wealthy family unraveling during their summer vacation in Provence. After they hit a woman with their car, the family agrees to take her on as their maid. It seems like kindness, but it's anything but: Each member of the family secretly wants something different from this beautiful young woman, leading to consequences that spin out of control and shatter the facade of their perfect lives.

Starts streaming March 7.

Plankton: the Movie

Who doesn't love Plankton from Spongebob? This animated Netflix original finally gives the little copepod with big dreams a starring role. As you'd probably expect, Plankton is trying to destroy the world, but his plans are complicated when domestic problems inspire his sentient computer wife Karen to destroy the world without him. Don't despair, Squidward fans: favorite Spongebob characters like Patrick and Sandy will appear in Plankton: The Movie, and so will the voice actors who bring them to life.

Starts streaming March 7.

American Manhunt: Osama bin Laden

Remember Osama Bin Laden? This suspenseful documentary tells the story of how he was tracked, caught, killed, and had his corpse dumped in the sea. Featuring rare archival footage and interviews with the CIA agents who were there, American Manhunt: Osama bin Laden gives viewers an inside look at one of the most complex and extensive manhunts in history.

Starts streaming March 10.

Adolescence

The dramatic question at the center of four-part Netflix series Adolescence is "What would you do if your teenage son was accused of murder?" Stephen Graham plays Eddie Miller, whose 13-year-old son Jamie, played by Owen Cooper, is arrested for the murder of a teenage classmate. To illustrate the provocative premise, each episode of Adolescence is presented as a single, continuous shot, so both film nerds and drama fans should put this on their watch list.

Starts streaming March 13.

The Twister: Caught in the Storm

Tornadoes are the most visually interesting natural disaster, and this documentary takes full advantage of their awesome cinematic power. The Twister: Caught in the Storm tells the story of the massive tornado that tore apart the town of Joplin, Missouri in 2011 through interviews with survivors and tons of harrowing footage shot by people who were right freakin' there when disaster struck.

Starts streaming March 18.

The Residence

If you like a good whodunit, check out The Residence. Uzo Aduba plays Cordelia Cupp, a brilliant but eccentric detective tasked with solving a murder that takes place during a state dinner at the White House residence. Everyone is a suspect: the staff, the guests, maybe the president himself. With a killer on the loose in the halls of power, Cupp must navigate a complex web of politics and personalities if she's going to crack the case.

Starts streaming March 20.

Gold & Greed: The Hunt for Fenn's Treasure

Forrest Fenn was a strange old rich guy who buried a chest full of gold somewhere in the Rockies, published a poem full of cryptic clues to its location, then invited everyone on Earth to try to find it. This Netflix original documentary examines the decade-long treasure hunt that followed. As you'd probably guess, it got way out of hand: Searching for Fenn's treasure ended up costing people their families, their jobs, and even their lives.

Starts streaming March 27.

Survival of the Thickest, season 2

Comedian Michelle Buteau is the co-creator and star of Survival of the Thickest, an ensemble comedy that earns high praise from critics. Season 2 of Thickest finds main character Mavis Beaumont, a large and in charge fashion stylist, in Italy, rebuilding her life, chasing her dreams, looking for love, and scoring designer swag. Series regulars Tone Bell, Tasha Smith, and Marouane Zotti will return, and we'll meet new characters played by Anderson .Paak, Deon Cole, Sandra Bernhard, and more.

Starts streaming March 27.

The Life List

If you're in the mood for a rom com, check out The Life List. Sofia Carson stars as Alex Rose, a young woman on a quest to check off all the items on a bucket list she made when she was 13. By following through on entries like "go all out in a mosh pit" and "do stand-up comedy," Rose opens her world, but one of the entries is "find true love," and you know that's gonna drive this heartfelt, emotional romantic comedy.

Starts streaming March 28.

Last month's picks

Zero Day

This is the first time Robert De Niro has starred in a TV series, so Netflix is going big with Zero Day, a political drama/thriller series detailing the aftermath of a deadly cyberattack. De Niro plays respected former President George Mullen, who's heading up the investigation of an information attack that killed thousands of Americans. Mullen must navigate a world of shady tech moguls, government power brokers, and his own past if he's going to prevent a second, even deadlier cyber-disaster.

Starts streaming February 20.

Kinda Pregnant

In this Netflix original romantic comedy, comedian Amy Schumer plays Lainy, a woman who is so jealous of her pregnant friend, she straps on a fake stomach and tells everyone she has a baby on board too. Her mountain of lies grows with her fake belly, but things get really complicated when Lainy meets the man of her dreams. If you're into Schumer's brand of comedy or just like a little frothy rom-com action, check out Kinda Pregnant.

Starts streaming February 5.

La Dolce Villa

Just in time for Valentine's Day comes La Dolce Villa, a Netflix original rom-com set in a romantic Italian village. Scott Foley plays Eric, a businessman who's lost his mojo, who travels to Italy to stop his daughter from wasting her money restoring a crumbling villa she bought for a Euro. Along the way, he rediscovers his lust for life, laughter, beauty, and love. I bet the old Villa actually isn't such a dump after all. La Dolce Villa also stars Maia Reficco, Giuseppe Futia, and Violante Placido.

Starts streaming February 13.

Home Improvement, Seasons 1-8

If you're in the mood for comforting nostalgia, you could do much worse than Tim Allen's iconic late 90s/early aughts series; it's the ultimate, mildly amusing, totally mindless family sit-com. Allen plays Tim Taylor, host of home improvement show-within-a-show Tool Time and patriarch of a suburban Detroit family that has all kinds of sit-com style dilemmas. The Taylors' mix-ups and lighthearted hassles fill up eight seasons of episodes, so feel free to binge them all at once while pretending it's 2004.

Starts streaming February 1.

Space Jam (1996)

Speaking of comforting nostalgia, 1996's cartoons-meet-basketball comedy Space Jam is coming to Netflix. The movie pairs ancient sports superstars like Michael Jordan, Larry Bird, and Charles Barkley with ancient cartoon superstars like Bugs Bunny, Yosemite Sam, and Daffy Duck, and then has them play basketball on another planet. Somehow, this weird concept works and results in a movie that's great fun and superior in every way to the recent reboot.

Starts streaming February 1.

Celebrity Bear Hunt

In this reality show version of The Most Dangerous Game, professional survival guy Bear Grylls hunts a group of 12 celebrities in the jungles of Costa Rica. Sadly, the cast is made up of British celebrities like Shirley Ballas, Mel B., and Boris Becker, and losing contestants aren't gunned down like rabid wildebeests when Grylls catches 'em; but still, Celebrity Bear Hunt puts privileged people in uncomfortable situations (always good TV), and the scenery is beautiful.

Starts streaming February 5.

Grimsburg

In this Fox cartoon for adults, Jon Hamm voices hardboiled detective Marvin Flute. Flute has cracked some of the most complicated and dark cases in history, and now he's returning to his home town to tackle his most puzzling mystery: his own family. Judging from the trailer, Grimsburg looks pretty funny with sharp writing and a talented voice cast, so I'm going to give this one a shot.

Starts streaming February 5.

Sweet Magnolias, season 4

Sweet Magnolias is the kind of feel-good, heartfelt, emotional series that never makes it past my algorithm, but enough people dig it that it's coming back for a fourth season. In season 4, The Magnolias' world is shaken and their bonds are tested by a town tragedy and a destructive storm. I don't know for sure, but I have a feeling that love and hope will ultimately save the day—it seems like that kind of program.

Starts streaming February 6.

The Åre Murders (Season 1)

I'm not sure why icy Northern European nations make such great neo-noire murder series, but I'm glad they do. Swedish Netflix original The Åre Murders tells the story of one of Stockholm's finest, officer Hanna Ahlander, whose vacation at a ski resort in Åre is interrupted by a missing person case. A young woman has disappeared, and the understaffed local cops need Ahlander's skills to solve the mystery, but can they trust her enough to work together?

Starts streaming February 6.

Surviving Black Hawk Down

This Netflix original documentary series tells the story of the Battle of Mogadishu made famous in Black Hawk Down. Speaking of, both that film and Surviving Black Hawk Down. were produced by Ridley Scott, who gathered survivors of the incident on both sides to tell the story of the harrowing day when two American helicopters were shot down in Somalia. If you like true-life war stories, don't miss it.

Starts streaming February 10.

The Witcher: Sirens of the Deep

It's probably going to be more than a year until a new Witcher game comes out, but in the meantime, check out The Witcher: Sirens of the Deep, a feature-length anime movie that continues the adventures of the famous monster hunter Geralt. Based on one of the original Witcher stories, Sirens of the Deep finds Geralt at a seaside village, investigating a series of attacks. At the risk of spoiling the story, there are monsters bedeviling the town—merpeople, mankind's ancient, soggy enemy.

Starts streaming February 11.

Cobra Kai, season 6 – part 3

This is it: the end of the Cobra Kai saga that began back in 1984 with The Karate Kid. (But since Cobra Kai never dies, it might not actually be the end.) The new version of the Karate Kid story takes place in a weird alternative universe version of the San Fernando Valley where everyone's life revolves around youth karate, and literally everyone remembers the All Valley championship of 1984. Cobra Kai's mix of campy, "remember the 80s?" nostalgia, fighting, and over-amped teen drama shouldn't be as entertaining as it is.

Starts streaming February 13.

Resident Alien, season 3

I don't feel like Resident Alien gets enough love. The quirky, inventive comedy sci-fi series is entering its third season, and the first two were awesome. The titular alien, played by Alan Tudyk, is no longer on a quest to destroy all mankind. With the gray aliens on the way to end humanity, Harry (or more accurately, the alien wearing Harry's skin) now wants to save the earth and thwart the invasion, all while trying to navigate the weird culture of people without blowing his cover.

Starts streaming February 13.

It's been five years since Love is Blind launched, and to mark the anniversary, Netflix is releasing a new season of the romance-based reality show. Season 8 is set in Minneapolis and finds another crop of singles agreeing to meet and date romantic partners—and potentially get engaged—without ever seeing each other. As a life choice, waiting until the wedding to lay eyes on your fiancee seems unwise, but as a television diversion, it's top notch.

Starts streaming February 14.

Running Point

Kate Hudson stars in this basketball-based comedy series created by the always inventive Mindy Kaling. Hudson plays Isla Gordon whose family owns storied Los Angeles basketball team, the LA Waves. When her brother is forced to step down as president, Isla takes over, setting up a classic culture-clash of a woman entering a massively male-dominated space. Will she win over skeptical players, fans, investors, and her own brothers? I'd bet on "yes," now that sports betting is allowed in the U.S.

Starts streaming February 27.

Lenovo Is Showing off a Bunch of Quirky Laptop Prototypes

Michelle Ehrhardt — Sun, 02 Mar 2025 23:00:00 +0000

Journalists love a good tech prototype. These exciting experiments break up the monotony of covering the same incremental refreshes day-in and day-out.They also come with a downside: As attention grabbing as they are, there’s no guarantee that they’ll ever actually come to market.

That’s why covering them can be a bit tricky, as it can be difficult to decide how much attention to give a product consumers might never actually see. Luckily, Lenovo actually made good on one of its earlier promises at CES this year, showing off a rollable laptop that’s set to launch sometime in 2025. Now, the company has three additional concepts it's showing off for Mobile World Congress, all of them arguably as cool.

A foldable spin on that CES’ rollable screen

Credit: Michelle Ehrhardt

First, there’s the ThinkBook Flip AI PC, which you can think of as a more affordable take on that rolling laptop from CES. Rather than having some of the screen hidden inside the laptop and unfurling like a scroll, this laptop’s screen folds over the top-half of the device, stretching across both the sides of the lid. Using your hands, you can unfold it to get an especially tall vertical display, or, alternately, mirror the front of your screen to the backside for presentations. Or, you could use the laptop in a sort of tablet mode while it’s closed. It’s similar to existing devices like the Yoga Book 9i, sure, but unlike on those, the screen is continuous and the keyboard is built into the device.

Credit: Michelle Ehrhardt

There are upsides and downsides to this approach. Because there’s no need to house a rolling mechanism, the Flip AI PC is actually able to get a little taller than a rollable laptop, but at the same time, it’s also a bit more top heavy, so you can’t use the fully extended screen at a steep angle without extra support.

Snap-on laptop monitors

Credit: Michelle Ehrhardt

Also in the realm of extended laptop displays are the Magic Bay Dual Display and 2nd Display laptop accessories. Technically, this isn’t the first time Lenovo’s shown off concepts for Magic Bay, existing technology that allows certain accessories to snap onto pogo pins on the back of some ThinkBook laptops. Those have even included secondary displays before, but this year’s ideas definitely are a bit more involved.

Starting smaller, the Magic Bay 2nd Display is an 8-inch vertical screen that complements a laptop with a (non-touch) tablet-like companion. It’s similar to the 10-inch horizontal panel that sits above your laptop screen that Lenovo showed off at last year’s CES, and coincidentally recalls my husband’s own desktop setup. As handy as it seems—it’s even on a hinge for a customizable angle— it’s nonetheless overshadowed by Lenovo’s other Magic Bay display concept.

Credit: Michelle Ehrhardt

The Magic Bay Dual Display turns your laptop into a three-monitor workstation, with additional 13.3-inch screens on either side of your device, complete with a 120Hz refresh rate across both. At 2.6 pounds, it's rather heavy, so it comes with a built-in kickstand. This isn’t the first time I’ve seen an idea like this, but when I saw this in person, I was impressed by how much more intuitive the connection process seems compared to current third-party alternatives.

A solar-powered laptop

Credit: Michelle Ehrhardt

Outside of the realm of screens, there’s also an experimental solar-powered laptop that can charge off sunlight, called the Yoga Solar PC. It works through a solar cell built into the back of the laptop’s lid, which Lenovo says has “an over 24% solar energy conversion rate” and can charge up enough to play one hour of video within about 20 minutes of direct sunlight. I didn’t get to see it in action, seeing as I was in a dark room while Lenovo was showing it off, but I can say the solar technology doesn’t seem like it’s impacting the form factor too much. It was plenty thin looking to my naked eye, and the company says it’s 0.6-inches thin and 2.69 pounds. If that’s still too big for you, Lenovo did also show off the Solar Power Kit for Yoga concept, which is a standard battery bank that connects to a detachable USB-C solar panel (I didn’t see this one in person).

Credit: Lenovo

Evolutions on earlier concepts

Credit: Lenovo

While I got to see (most of) the above concepts in person, the company also has a few iterative changes on earlier ideas, and showed that it’s prototyping out its own version of competing devices. These include a glasses-less 3D ThinkBook, similar to devices that Asus and Acer already have on the market, as well as an AI-powered robotic companion named Tiko that would attach to laptops via Magic Bay.

For more functionality, there’s also a Tiko Pro in the works, a small horizontal Magic Bay display that combines the advantages of the 2nd Display with AI-powered widgets. Again, we’ve seen versions of these either from competitors or at previous Lenovo concept announcements, but they’re still worth keeping an eye on.

A bit more exciting is the Hybrid Dimensional 24-Inch Curved Monitor, which can supposedly display 3D visuals while simultaneously showing 2D assets without any loss in resolution, although this needs to be seen with your own eye to really be judged, and I have yet to get hands-on time with it.

Bringing AI to non-AI PCs

Credit: Lenovo

Finally, there are tools to bring AI to non-AI PCs. Lenovo says it’s experimenting with two dedicated neural processing units, or NPUs, that can connect to existing PCs either through a USB stick or a monitor. Working like an external graphics card, the Lenovo AI Stick contains a 32TOPS NPU that can plug into a computer without an NPU over Thunderbolt to allow it to run LLMs and AI graphics tools locally. It can work off just the laptop’s own power, but Lenovo says you can also plug it into a wall at the same time for increased performance.

Meanwhile, the AI Display with NPU Inside does much the same thing, but rather than including the NPU in a hub-like structure, builds it right into your monitor. This comes with the added benefit of allowing the screen to physically rotate, elevate and tilt to follow your movements, but like most monitors, it’s much bulkier and does need to be plugged into a wall at all times. Lenovo also says it’s working on an “AI Ring” that would provide gesture-based control while in spatial computing apps, although the company didn’t go into much detail beyond that.

And that’s it on Lenovo’s MWC concepts. It’s a pretty wide array. Again, none of these are guaranteed to come to market, but that does mean they get to be a bit wackier than the typical product announcement. Personally, I’d love to get my hands on the Magic Bay Dual Display, and I could see the AI Stick being useful to developers. In the meantime, the company also announced a number of chip upgrades for its existing ThinkPad, ThinkBook, IdeaPad, and Yoga laptops that will start hitting the market with the new Yoga 7 2-in-1 and IdeaPad Slim 3x this month.

My Favorite Apps to Make Studying Less Painful

Lindsey Ellefson — Fri, 28 Feb 2025 22:30:00 +0000

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While it's true that hand-writing helps you retain more of what you're studying, it's also true that the convenience of a phone or computer just can't be beaten. Taking your study materials with you wherever you are and having digital access to them can be a major benefit, whether you're preparing for a test in school or memorizing points before a big work presentation. Here are my favorite study apps to help do exactly that.

For flashcards: Anki

Credit: Anki

Anki, which can be downloaded and accessed across all kinds of devices from MacBooks to Android phones, is my top pick for for a flashcard app—it actually hews close to the Leitner system, the best way to use real-life flashcards.

Unlike other apps, this one doesn't always show you every card in your deck. Rather, it shows you the ones you get wrong more often, so you go over those more and deal with the material you're more familiar with less. You can put audio, video, and picture files on your cards, too, so you can use them for a wide variety of tasks, like learning a language or memorizing people's names. You answer a few questions about yourself—like whether you're a student, parent, or trivia enthusiast and what times of day you prefer to study, as well as how long you plan to study each day—and the app creates a plan for you.

To use features like customized cards and the Leitner system, as well as flip unlimited cards per day, you'll pay $4.99 per month or $29.99 per year after a free three-day trial. You can add your own cards, of course, but there are plenty of pre-made decks to choose from.

For mind maps: Xmind

Credit: Xmind

Oh, you like studying with mind maps more than flashcards? No problem. Download Xmind, which is free on the iOS App Store, but will cost you $99 per year after your two-week trial. You can make a blank mind map to organize your notes—it also comes with a ton of templates for mind maps that focus on problem-solving, business plan creation, project management, or whatever else. They're color-coded, easy to create and edit, and can be accessed by multiple accounts, so you can work on them in tandem with others on your team. (Perfect for group projects!)

To minimize distractions: Flora

Credit: Flora

Flora, available on iOS and Android or via Chrome extension, isn't actually a study app so much as a focus app—but when you're studying, that matters a lot. It's similar to some other apps on the market in that you grow "trees" in a virtual forest, but they only grow as long as you don't interrupt them by using your phone.

What I like about this one, though, is that it's free to download and use. You have the option to donate if you want to plant real-life trees based on your own forest and the option to bet actual money on the fact that you won't kill your tree, which will only happen if you abandon your focus during the preset time you scheduled the app for focusing. For instance, I grew a tree successfully by telling the app I wanted to work for 10 minutes straight, then take a five-minute break. You can pick the kinds of trees you grow, how long you spend working, how long your breaks are, and whether your app keeps data on your focus times and/or resets after a week or a month. It's easy to use and very relaxing.

To stay organized: MyStudyLife

Credit: MyStudyLife

I like MyStudyLife as a planner because it's specially designed for school, while apps like iCal and Google Calendar aren't (although you can import your iCal data on here, too).

Available on iOS and Android, this tool is free but extremely customizable: You can enter in assignments, tests, and course details right down to the room the class is in and the name of the professor who teaches it. The app will remind you whenever you have something coming up and keeps it all organized in a very simple calendar. It's got a bare-bones interface that is super easy to use and navigate and, for $4.99 per month or $29.99 per year (after a free one-week trial), you can access additional features like grade tracking, widgets, and dark mode. It works absolutely fine on the free version, though, which is why it's the best planner on the market right now.

For note-taking: Evernote

Credit: Evernote

Evernote basically always wins in a battle of note-taking apps, but that's because it really is excellent. You get a planner, docs that you can access from anywhere, and a load of note-taking tools so you can jot down everything important, which the app will then help you organize.

With excellence, however, comes a price: The "Best of Evernote" package is $4.99 per week or $169.99 per year while the "Essentials" package is $3.99 per week or $129.99 per year. The free version, though, still lets you create 50 notes, upload up to 250 MB of media and attachments per month, search images and documents, and use features like Tasks, Calendar, and Web Clipper, which lets you save online content to your account.

A feature I love is the ability to take a photo of text and have the app transcribe it so it's editable. It's easy to use and fits into way more elements of daily life than just studying and note-taking, so it's ideal to have around. Go to class, take notes, and head to the grocery store with a to-buy list, then make it home in time for your scheduled phone call at 7 p.m., all without leaving the app. (You can leave, though; Evernote will send you push notifications about what's coming up.)

The Five Best Video Call Apps to Replace Skype

Jake Peterson — Fri, 28 Feb 2025 22:00:00 +0000

Microsoft is officially shutting down Skype (RIP). Even if you haven't used the app in years, it's possible Skype was your introduction into modern video chats. The app made it easy to call friends and family via video no matter where in the world you all were. As long as you had a stable internet connection, you could Skype.

Once Microsoft pulls the plug on Skype for good, legacy users will need a new platform to turn to. Microsoft will encourage you to switch to Teams, and you can. But there are better alternatives out there.

The goal (and challenge) of choosing a video calling platform is to convince other people to join you. The last thing you want is to pick an app that no one uses, then force everyone in your circle to adopt that choice. The less friction, the better. That's why platforms that work with people's existing accounts and platforms are best here: There are some great options out there, from Viber to Signal, that offer good video calling features, but you'll have a lot more luck calling your friends if you meet them where they are. I've focused this list with that in mind.

Google Meet

Credit: Lifehacker

If your goal is to find the easiest video call solution for the average person in your contacts list, my go-to would be Google Meet. In 2025, chances are high the person you're trying to reach has a Google Account—even if it isn't their platform of choice.

Because many of us have Google Accounts already, it doesn't really matter what devices or platforms you're working from. Whether one of you has a Mac, another a PC, or you're on competing ends of the iOS versus Android debate, Google Meet works on just about any device. It free, of course, but you do get some perks if you pay—including higher quality video.

My main issue with Google Meet, though, is it's not all that intuitive. The service seems designed more for business and professional use than casual conversation, so it isn't necessarily as ideal as Skype was in its heyday. (Just the fact that Google calls the default option "meetings" on the web app makes me feel like I'm working, instead of calling a friend or family member.) Plus, there's a 60 minute limit on calls at a time for free users: That's fine for shorter calls, but if you tend to sit on video chats for hours, you'll be picking up the phone a number of times.

If your friend has their Google Account properly set up, though, calling them is as easy as it was on Skype—or about as easy as opening the traditional phone app. However, if their Google Account isn't setup for calls, you need to share the call link with them instead, which is fine, but adds some friction to what should be a simple experience. Again, though, you're not going to find a perfect video call solution if the other person isn't already using that platform.

If you're on your computer, you can use the Google Meet web app for most purposes. If you prefer video chatting on mobile, there are apps for both iOS and Android—though Meet may already be installed on your Android device.

Google Meet supports video calls with up to 100 participants, as many as Skype did.

Credit: Lifehacker

Like Google, WhatsApp is insanely popular around the world. If you're not using WhatsApp, someone you know is, which makes it a close second on this list (if not tied for first).

WhatsApp's standardization gives it the same advantage as Google Meet: There is a very good chance the person you want to video call has an account. I don't use WhatsApp, but I have a WhatsApp account. Better yet, the app doesn't have a time limit for calls, so you can talk as long as you want.

Like Google Meet, WhatsApp is available just about everywhere you access the internet. You can use it on an iPhone or Android device, or access it via the web app. WhatsApp even has a desktop app, unlike Google Meet, which potentially makes it the better Skype replacement. I personally used Skype on my Mac back in the day, and the experience of calling someone on WhatsApp using the app is a bit more reminiscent of that experience than Google Meet's web app is.

WhatsApp doesn't support as many participants as Skype did: The app will let you hold calls with up to 32 other people, which, while far less than 100, is still a lot of people for video calls.

Facebook Messenger

Credit: Lifehacker

If not one Meta app, why not another? Messenger has been the go-to option for Facebook users for years, simply because it's built right into Meta's flagship social network. But in recent years, the company's efforts to spin the app into a dedicated messaging service have been successful. I don't use many Facebook account these days, but I do check my Messenger app more often than not.

Again, you have the built-in user base here. Facebook might be the largest network of the three mentioned so far. You might have to add your friend before giving them a ring, but seeing as the social media platform contains more than 35% of the world's population, you shouldn't be shocked if the person you want to call is a member.

I quite like Messenger's video calling experience, especially on desktop. The Mac app definitely offers a video chat interface that veteran Skype users will enjoy. However, it's a little frustrating you can't start a video call without already having a chat thread going first. If the person or group you want to call already has a conversation going, great: just hit the video call icon to start a chat. However, if not, you'll need to send a message to your friend or friends first, then call them. I suppose it's nice to give them a heads up, but, again, friction!

Facebook Messenger used to support video calls of up to 50 people through a feature called "Rooms," but Meta has since discontinued that option. There are no time limits on Messenger calls.

FaceTime

Credit: frank333/Shutterstock

If you have an Apple account and the person you're trying to chat with also has an Apple account, just FaceTime them. The service is easy to use, end-to-end encrypted, and comes with a number of features you might expect from a more business-facing platform than FaceTime—like screen sharing and remote screen controlling. There's hardly anything easier than hitting the FaceTime button on an iMessage thread, or tapping your friend's name in the FaceTime app: seconds later, you'll be chatting.

Things get trickier though when you consider the friends who don't have iPhones—especially those who live outside your country. It's suddenly not so easy when you try to call a friend who doesn't have their international number tied to their Apple Account.

Still, that doesn't mean you should count out FaceTime entirely. Apple lets you create a FaceTime link that anyone can use to join a call—even those on Android or PC. It's adds an extra hurdle than if you were calling another Apple user, but it still works, which makes this method perhaps the easiest for those of us with iPhones or Macs: Forget about the other apps, just make a FaceTime link, send it to your friends, and wait for them to join your call.

FaceTime supports the same number of callers as WhatsApp, 32, with no time limits. Perhaps its biggest drawback is the lack of a native text chat feature: Google Meet supports a native chat, like Skype, while WhatsApp and Messenger are built out of chat apps, so you can send messages there as well. FaceTime, however, is its own entity: If you're all on Apple devices, you can continue the conversation on iMessage, but it isn't quite the same.

Teams

So work focused. Credit: Lifehacker

Microsoft, unsurprisingly, wants you to switch from Skype to Teams. In some ways, that makes sense: The company owns both platforms, so moving from Skype to Teams should be the simple answer. However, Teams is so obviously built with work conferencing in mind (hence the name), that if you're looking for a standard app for casual video calling, this one could be a bit overkill. (It's not like I'd recommend to switch to Slack for casual video calls, either.)

If your callers are all Windows users with corresponding Microsoft Accounts, Teams might work. The app does support up to 100 people, and you can chat for 60 minutes at a time. (One-on-one chats are available for 30 hours at a time.) You can also access Teams on a number of different devices—not just Windows machines. If your device has a camera, you can probably use Teams for video calls. The addition of a built-in chat function is helpful, as well.

Still, personally, I'd suggest trying one of the other options over Teams.

Zoom (not recommended)

Many of us in the working world (as well as those of us who jumped on video chats during the pandemic) are quite acquainted with Zoom. The app is perhaps one of the first you think of when you consider video calls, though it's not necessarily one you pick up for casual use.

Zoom does offer large video calls—up to 100 participants—for free, but that comes with some limits. While many free video calling platforms end after 60 minutes, Zoom's free calls end at 40 minutes. Unless you're already paying for the service, it really isn't a convenient option for those times you want to catch up with friends or family on video.

This 65-inch QLED Samsung TV Is at Its Lowest Price Right Now

Daniel Oropeza — Fri, 28 Feb 2025 21:30:00 +0000

We may earn a commission from links on this page. Deal pricing and availability subject to change after time of publication.

QLED TVs are a step above budget LEDs and a step below premium OLEDs. One example is the 65-inch QLED Samsung TV Q60CB, which sits at a surprising price of $492.68 (originally $947.99) after a nearly 50% discount. This is the lowest price this TV has been since its release according to price tracking tools.ok!

SAMSUNG 65" Class Q60CB QLED 4K Smart TV

Screen size: 65 in, Platform: Tizen Resolution: 4K, Display: QLED, Refresh rate: 60 Hz, Aspect: 16:9

For those who are willing to pay a bit more than a budget LED but don't want to spend a ton, the 65-inch Q60CB is a perfect middle ground. Like all QLED TVs, you'll notice a difference in colors compared to budget TVs, with deeper blacks and a wider range of colors. However, this TV won't have local dimming technology you'll find in Hisense U7N or the TCL QM7, but that's why you're saving money.

Some other things this TV will lack compared to newer or higher end QLEDs are HDMI 2.1 bandwidth (if you're not a gamer this won't make a difference) and variable refresh rate (VRR) support—again, mainly for gamers but also for streaming content with inconsistent frame rates. Gamers will be happy to know that this TV has a low input lag of 9 ms.

Because this is a smart TV, you'll have the Tizen smart platform to download apps. If you're going to watch SDR content, the peak brightness on the Q60CB will be strong, making it able to handle viewing in bright rooms, plus the screen has good reflection handling. HDR content won't look as bright because of the lack of local dimming, but in dark rooms you'll still be able to enjoy the QLED picture quality.

You Can Now Limit How Much RAM Microsoft Edge Eats Up While Gaming

Khamosh Pathak — Fri, 28 Feb 2025 21:00:00 +0000

Microsoft Edge continues to position itself as the sensible, performance-centric alternative to Chrome, free of the bloat that Google's continual feature creep can sometimes result in. Now, it seems, the company is also coming after other browsers like Opera GX, as it's just copied one of that browser's most useful features.

As reported by Windows Latest, Edge has recently added a new Resource Controls feature, which lets you severely limit how much RAM the browser can use. This can be useful while gaming (or performing other demanding tasks), and you can even set it to only limit RAM while you're in-game. You can give the browser access to as little as 1 GB of memory, too, so you can get especially stingy here, but note that doing so will limit you to about five active tabs while browsing modern websites. Pages might also take longer to load, especially if they have elements like video on them.

Still, that might be worth it if you're really starved for RAM while running Edge in the background. Let's say you have 16GB of RAM and you're in the middle of a game. You could then limit Edge to about 4GB of max RAM usage, which should be enough to allow you to quickly check emails or a walkthrough without hurting your gaming performance.

While Resource Controls has been in beta before, Microsoft is seemingly now rolling it out to the stable build of Edge for Windows, so everyone should have access to it now (or soon). To find it, first first update your browser to the latest version (under Settings > About Microsoft Edge), then click the three-dot menu in the top-right corner and navigate to System and Performance using the sidebar that pops up.

Here, scroll down to Manage Your Performance and toggle on Resource Controls.

Credit: Khamosh Pathak

You'll see a RAM slider that ranges from 1GB to however much memory your PC has installed. Choose the amount you want— Edge will warn you if your choice will slow down your browser, but it won't stop you.

Finally, choose if you want to limit RAM only when you're PC gaming, or always. For convenience, I prefer the former—I don't really need it limited when I'm outside of a game.

How to Prepare for Your First 5K Race

Beth Skwarecki — Fri, 28 Feb 2025 20:30:00 +0000

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Running is hard. Sticking to a training plan is hard. But knowing that you have a race coming up is a great motivator to get you out on the road when you’d rather be watching TV. If you’ve never run a race before, putting one on your calendar might seem scary: Will I feel out of place? What should I wear? How long is a 5K anyway? (It’s 3.1 miles.)

I remember being nervous for my own first 5K. Actually, I considered signing up for probably half a dozen before I worked up the nerve to actually do it. I actually signed up for a 10K first, which was probably just a way to put it off even further; I survived the 10K, just barely, and was still nervous for my 5K a few months later. But in the years after that, I came to love the 5K. It's a race you can do on a Saturday morning and still have the rest of the day ahead of you. Most of them only cost about 25 bucks to enter, and they run the gamut from low-key small races to big ones with practically a whole festival occurring at the start line.

Let’s warm up those cold feet and demystify what will actually happen at your first race, and what you can do to prepare.

There’s a real simple answer for this. If you’re starting to wonder whether you’re ready to take on a race, you already are. So go ahead and sign up, already. (I’ll wait.)

A 5K, or five-kilometer, race is the perfect distance for beginners. It’s about three miles, which means the average person could walk that distance in about an hour. Most 5K races encourage walkers as well as runners to join, so you don’t have to worry about standing out for being “slow.” You could literally walk the whole thing and blend right in.

Races are more fun and more welcoming than newbies often realize. Even if you aren’t normally the competitive type, the energy and atmosphere of race day can make for a great experience. A race is a great test of your physical and mental strength. Any old training run can be a good one or a bad one, but your first race day will be one to remember, no matter what happens. You’ll have a little extra motivation to push the pace, and you may be pleasantly surprised at what you can do.

What’s a good 5K time to aim for?

Since this is your first race, your goal should be just to have a good time. Finish the race, take note of your time, and use that as a baseline to improve on next time. There is no such thing as a “bad” time for your first 5K.

But if you’d like to have a personal time goal, look back at your training runs. Have any of them been 3.1 miles or longer? If so, use your pace from those runs to calculate the 3.1 mile equivalent. (For example, if you ran 3 miles in 32 minutes, that works out to a 10:40 pace, which is 33:08 for a 5K.) You can do that math with a pace calculator like this one. Aim to beat your best training time on race day.

That said, you’ll want to check whether your race’s course is similar to the terrain you’ve been training on. If you’ve been running on mostly flat roads, and the race website promises a “fast and flat” course, great. But if the race course is described as “challenging,” or if it’s on trails, you can expect some hills that will slow you down. Adjust your expectations accordingly.

Can I walk during a 5K race?

Absolutely! Not only are some people walking the whole thing, the point of a race is just to cover the distance as fast as you can. The faster runners will run the whole time, but plenty of middle-of-the-pack folks will mix in some walking. My first 5K, I couldn’t keep up a steady pace and ended up walking a lot more than I wanted. I still finished, though, and although I don’t recall my time I remember being pleasantly surprised by it.

Definitely do not think of walking as shameful. We all do what we need to do to cover the distance. Think of walking as a tool that can reduce fatigue while still moving you closer to the finish line. Use it as much as you need.

Will I get a medal?

This depends on the race. Usually, at small races like a local 5K, medals are only for the top finishers—so, no, most 5K runners will not get a medal. If you're hoping to get a medal just for finishing the race—called a finishers' medal—those are usually reserved for longer races like marathons and half-marathons, where finishing is considered to be an accomplishment in itself. That said, there are 5K races that promise all participants a cool medal, so keep an eye out for those if that’s your kind of thing.

In most 5K races, awards are given to the overall winners and the age group winners. Decisions about awarding medals are up to the race organizers, but a typical selection goes like this: Overall winners are usually the first three men and first three women to cross the finish line (there may be a cash or other prize in addition to a medal), and then age group medals are given to the top three men and women in each age group. The age groups will vary: Some races will have 30 to 39 as a single age group, while others will break it into 30 to 34 and 35 to 39. Check out the previous year’s results to see how competitive your age group tends to be. Who knows: If you’re a fast beginner, you might medal at your first race!

How do I train for a 5K?

For your first 5K, any amount of running you do will get you ready. If you’re looking for a general guideline, here’s a basic structure that will work (it’s pretty much the same as what I recommend for beginning runners regardless of goals):

Three runs per week
20 to 30 minutes per run (can be a mix of running and walking)
…for about two months before the race

Here’s an example of a training plan along those lines, meant for absolute beginners. Couch-to-5K is another beginner program, which starts with a mix of running and walking and gradually phases out the walking.

If you’re more experienced, you may like this intermediate 5K program, which includes five days of running per week. The runs are still fairly short, but they include some speedwork (fast intervals) and a weekend long run that ranges from five to seven miles.

What happens on race day?

First, you’ll want to sign up for the race ahead of time. At some local races, you may be able to walk up to a table on race morning and hand over cash for your entry fee. I prefer to sign up online to make sure I’ll have my spot. (If they offer a free t-shirt, they may not guarantee shirts to late entries.)

The day before the race, there may be an option for “packet pickup.” It’s called a packet because you’re often given an envelope or swag bag that includes coupons, flyers about other races, and maybe some free samples of products or other items. But the most important part of the packet is your race bib, which is a piece of tear-proof paper with a number on it. There is usually a timing chip glued to the back. Make sure you have this pinned to your shirt when you’re running the race.

On race morning, aim to get to the start line at least half an hour before the race; earlier is better. A typical race morning routine goes like this:

Wake up, have coffee and/or whatever breakfast you can stomach. Maybe bring a snack for the road.
Drive/travel to the race start (aim to arrive 30 to 60 minutes before the official start time).
Pick up your bib if you haven’t already. Pin it to your shirt. Put any other items from the packet in your car or use the bag drop service if they offer one.
Warm up. Take a walk or go for an easy, short jog. Stretch if you normally stretch before runs.
Listen carefully for an announcement that you should start lining up for the start.
Run the race!
After you finish, rest as needed, grab a snack (snacks are almost always provided), and retrieve your bag if you left it at the bag drop.
Stick around for the award ceremony, if desired.
Go home and have a nice meal. And maybe a nap.

What should I eat before a 5K?

First, remember the number one rule: nothing new on race day. This is not the time for a new pre-workout, or for drinking coffee if you normally don’t, or for trying the breakfast your friend swears by.

Eat whatever you can stomach. Good options will be mainly carbs, and the closer you are to the race start time, the smaller the meal should be. Classic runners’ breakfasts include:

Toast or a bagel, maybe with a thin smear of peanut butter
A banana
A Clif bar or other energy bar that is mostly carbs (not a low-carb protein bar)
A muffin, croissant, or cookie
Yogurt, with or without fruit

What should I wear to a 5K race?

Your regular running clothes will be fine, but there are a few extra considerations. First, where will you put your bib? You're usually asked to pin the bib with your race numbers to the front of your shirt. If you'll be layering up, decide which layer gets the bib. You can also pin your bib to your pants or shorts, as long as the race rules allow. If you want to be fancy, you can buy a race belt that holds your bib on without safety pins.

Second, about those layers. If it's a chilly day, you may be waiting around a bit before the start, and then you'll warm up when you're running. So you may want to have a long-sleeved layer that you can hand to a friend (if you have a friend staying behind as a spectator) or that you can tie around your waist as needed. Whatever you do, make sure your bib is visible.

How do I calm pre-race jitters?

If you’re nervous, just remind yourself that it’s normal to be nervous. Nervous and excited are two sides of the same coin. Think of those jitters as your body amping itself up to be able to give the race everything you’ve got.

That warmup walk or jog will help you to feel more comfortable. Once the race has started, you’ll feel a lot more comfortable, mentally (even if you’re more uncomfortable, physically).

The best way to deal with pre-race nerves is to plan ahead: Know where you’ll go and what you’ll do. Practice your pre-race breakfast and warmup on a training day.

And just remember why you’re there. Your real goal is to have fun, to learn what it’s like to run a race, and to find out what kind of 5K time your body is capable of on this particular day. There’s no way to really fail at this. Keep a positive attitude, and if you decide you like racing but you weren’t happy with your time, you can always run another race later.

How fast should I run my 5K?

You may be tempted to run as fast as you can from the start, but take it easy. You don't want to go out too fast and then tire yourself out. Start at a slightly slower pace than you think you should. After the first mile, you can speed up if you're still feeling good. I like to think of the first half of the race as a chance to conserve energy that I can spend in the second half. The closer you get to the finish line, the more you can speed up.

What’s a good heart rate for race day?

This one is for the folks who train by heart rate. You probably have some numbers that you’re used to seeing on your training runs. The most important thing to know here is that your heart rate doesn’t matter on race day. And it probably won’t match the numbers you’re used to seeing.

First, your heart rate increases when you’re nervous. The start-line adrenaline will likely have you in zone 3 or 4 when you’re running zone 2 pace. Do not waste time trying to get your heart rate down into a normal zone.

Second, a race is supposed to be hard! You’re going to be running faster, for longer, than you ever were in your training. Your heart rate may shoot sky-high. It would not be unusual to see your heart rate in zone 4 for the first two miles and zone 5 in the third. That’s OK! You can do this! If your legs are still moving, you’re doing okay.

Try to feel for a “redline” where if you went any faster, you wouldn’t be able to sustain it, but at the current level you feel like you can at least finish this mile, or this half-mile, or this minute. Just keep doing one more, and soon you’ll be finishing with a smile on your face. Or a grimace, but it will turn into a smile once the accomplishment sinks in. I promise.

What's New on Prime Video in March 2025

Emily Long — Fri, 28 Feb 2025 20:00:00 +0000

Prime Video has new installments of two familiar series coming in March.

First up is season three of The Wheel of Time (March 13), an adaptation of Robert Jordan's fantasy books of the same name. Rosamund Pike stars as sorceress Moiraine Damodred, a member of the powerful Aes Sedai. The season opens with a magical battle between members of the order—viewers will get a three-episode premiere with five weekly episodes to follow.

Also in its third season is Bosch: Legacy (March 27)—also an adaptation, this time of Michael Connolly's crime novels. A sequel to Prime Video hit Bosch, the series was originally canceled after its second season but was revived for a third and final installment. Titus Welliver reprises his role as former LAPD detective Harry Bosch working to solve his final case.

Prime Video is also releasing Holland (March 27), a mystery thriller starring Nicole Kidman as a teacher and homemaker in an idyllic Michigan town, where mysteries and secrets begin to unravel her life. The film also stars Matthew Macfadyen (of Succession) as Kidman's husband and Gael García Bernal as her close friend.

Here are all the originals coming to Prime Video in March.

What’s coming to Prime Video in March 2025

Available March 6

For the Win: NWSL
Picture This

Available March 13

The Wheel of Time S3

Available March 20

Tyler Perry's Duplicity

Available March 27

Bosch: Legacy S3
Holland

Start Using This Ultimate Tax Spreadsheet Now so You’re Ready for Next Year

Meredith Dietz — Fri, 28 Feb 2025 19:30:00 +0000

Time is ticking to file your taxes before April 15, 2025. If you've already do so, congrats! Now you can kick back and await that refund, right? Sure—but your relief will be short-lived. Once tax season rolls around next year, you'll again find yourself frantically searching for receipts, statements, and other documentation needed to file an accurate return.

Instead of accepting the annual scramble, you can get ahead of the game by using a spreadsheet to track all your tax-related information throughout the year. And there's no better time to start than right now—when your tax knowledge is fresh as can be—to make your spreadsheet and start logging things away for next April.

Make your own spreadsheet—or download this template

I've created a basic template to get you started here. And I mean basic—this is for people who essentially just want to convert their Form 1040s into a spreadsheet, so all your yearly info is one accessible, editable location. I've included different tabs depending on what you want to track and just how thoroughly you want to track it.

For instance, the first tab is a simple table that turns different lines on your Form 1040 into rows of data—making the information easily accessible from year to year. Another tab allows you to clearly list out your income and deductions throughout the year. I've even included a tab dedicated to home office expenses, if that applies to you.

There might be some redundancies or glaring omissions based on your personal situation, so I urge you to take what I've given you and run wild with it. It's different strokes for different folks, and different spreadsheets for different...freaks. (It's a slant rhyme.)

Basics to include on your tax spreadsheet

You can expand on the template above, or start from scratch—whatever allows you to get the most out this system. Give it a clear name like "2025 Tax Records" so you can easily reference it later. Remember, the goal is to have a single file where you can input and update information and keep everything centralized.

To get started with a barebones tax tracking spreadsheet, create separate sections or tabs for different categories of tax information. At minimum, you'll want sections for:

Income. This will track income from jobs, self-employment, investments, retirement distributions, etc.
Deductions. List out anything you plan to itemize or claim as a deduction, such as mortgage interest, charitable giving, medical expenses, etc.
Tax credits. Track estimated expenses that may qualify for a tax credit, like education costs, childcare, etc.
Prior year tax documents. Keep a record of last year's tax return details and any carryover items.

How to use your tax spreadsheet

Within each section, create rows and columns to track the details you need for tax time. For example, under Income you may want columns for:

Date earned
Income source/employer
Amount earned
Tax withholdings

For deductions, you may have columns like:

Date paid
Expense category (medical, mortgage interest, charity, etc.)
Amount

Make updating your information a habit

As you earn income throughout the year, be diligent about entering the details into your income section right away, while it's all still fresh. Do the same with potential deductions as you incur those expenses. You can update your spreadsheet weekly, monthly, or whenever is convenient, as long as you stick to a routine.

Keep digital copies of all your documents

Any time you receive tax documentation—like W2s, 1099s, donation receipts or mortgage interest statements— save digital copies and attach or link them within your spreadsheet file. This creates a handy archive of all your tax records in one spot.

Using a spreadsheet to meticulously track your tax information throughout the year will save you the inevitable time and stress of having to reconstruct it all at the last minute. While staying organized requires diligence, that small effort goes a long way when tax season arrives. Your future self will appreciate having these detailed records ready to go. From the most thorough travel plans, to excruciatingly detailed journals, to elaborate to-do lists: If you have a goal, that goal needs a spreadsheet.

The Sonos Arc Soundbar Is $250 Off

Daniel Oropeza — Fri, 28 Feb 2025 19:00:46 +0000

We may earn a commission from links on this page. Deal pricing and availability subject to change after time of publication.

The Sonos brand is well known in the smart speaker and surround sound space. And very much like Apple, people will pay a premium price for their minimalistic, premium quality, and discounts are often hard to come by. But today, the Sonos Arc, which was Sono's flagship soundbar prior to the launch of the Sonos Arc Ultra, is $649, $250 off its usual $899 price. It's also a new low price for this model, according to price-tracking tools.

Maximum Output Power: 110 Watts, Connectivity Technology: Wi-Fi, Audio Output Mode: Surround Mount.

Maximum Output Power: 110 Watts, Connectivity Technology: Wi-Fi, Audio Output Mode: Surround Mount.

Sonos speakers are not for everyone, if only because you'll have to justify paying around two grand for a complete surround sound system when you can get a setup like the Samsung Q990C for about half the price. But audiophiles swear they can hear the difference, so the cost might be worth it to you.

If you pick up this soundbar, you'll want to consider the Sonos 300 rear speakers and the Gen 4 subwoofer to go with it—they're the latest Sonos has to offer, though you can choose Eras 100 or an older or smaller subwoofer to lower the price tag.

As for the Arc, it offers Dolby Atmos, providing immersive three-dimensional sound with height channels that simulate audio coming from above you (you can read the details in PCMag's "excellent" review). It offers enough of a low-end kick that you don't really need a subwoofer if you have a small space. If you already own other Sonos speakers, you can seamlessly connect them through the Sonos app to create a surround sound setup or a multi-room system.

Seven Home Upgrades That Require Zero Tools

Jeff Somers — Fri, 28 Feb 2025 18:30:00 +0000

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A lot of folks want to upgrade their homes with a remodel, renovation, or smaller project. But cost is always a factor (and a barrier)—the average renovation cost for a house is over $50,000. Those costs drive a lot of folks to watch way too many home improvement shows and attempt do-it-yourself transformations, but those kinds of DIY projects require money, too—not to mention some basic skills and at least a few tools.

If you’re not someone who’s comfortable swinging a hammer or plugging in a power drill—or someone who doesn’t even own a hammer or a power drill—the idea of upgrading your house might seem impossible unless you’ve got that spare 50 grand. But there are numerous ways you can upgrade your house without the need for any tools whatsoever.

Towel racks

If your bathroom or kitchen needs a place to hang towels and you don’t trust yourself to drill holes, hammer in screw anchors, and drive some screws home, you don’t have to: You can pick up some Command towel racks for both hand towels and bath towels. As you can see in this video, they pop on your walls using the same Command strips you find for hooks and other products (these are water-resistant for obvious reasons). While using a level might make this installation a little easier, you can actually download a bubble level app for your phone that will work in a pinch, or just eyeball it—the good news is that your towel rack will be relatively easy to remove and reset if you mess it up.

Lighting

There are a lot of options for upgrading the lighting situation in your house that don’t require any wiring, cutting, or wall opening. Lights like these rechargeable LED lights have magnets built in so you can slap them onto metal surfaces for instant, no-tool installation, as well as an adhesive backing so you can attach them under wood cabinets or onto walls. They’re motion-activated, so they can act as nightlights, closet lights, or kitchen work lights. And these stick-on lights are programmable and come with a remote control to make your kitchen feel truly futuristic.

You can also find ceiling lights like this one that adhere to the ceiling without any tools, giving you the ability to add an overhead light to any room without hiring an electrician or drilling into your ceiling.

Floating shelves

Need some shelving for light storage? The High & Mighty shelf requires no tools and can hold up to 20 pounds of stuff (there’s also a 25-pound version). It even supplies its own level as part of the installation packaging, so all you have to do is stick the guide to the wall, push the brackets in using just your muscles, and hang the shelf. It’s a super easy way to add some attractive storage to your walls without drilling 1,000 holes.

Grout pens

Is the grout in your shower or kitchen backsplash looking a little dirty? You don’t need a grout saw, float, or even a stiff brush to clean it up or replace it. If the grout’s still in good physical shape, you can brighten it up in no time with a grout pen like this. You can find grout markers in a variety of colors, so you can clean up or transform just about any grout line in your house sans tools. Check the directions before you buy, though—some grout markers only work on unsealed grout, so if your grout has been sealed they may not work properly.

Peel-and-stick everything

Peel-and-stick stuff has come a long way, and are a powerful way to reinvent any space without the need for tools or extensive renovations. Technically they’re not entirely tool-free, as you will probably need a pair of scissors to size these materials to your space, but since most people possess and know how to use a pair of scissors, I'm allowing it.

Wallpaper is the easiest way to cover up an unattractive wall or just change the look and feel of it. Products like this one are also easily removed, so they’re ideal for rentals or for folks who change their minds a lot—and they can be applied and smoothed using just your hands.
Floor stickers and tiles can upgrade your floors pretty easily. They can be installed on top of just about any flooring (including existing tile), so you don’t need to do any demolition—just cut as needed, peel, and stick. And these tiles come in a wide variety of styles, from faux wood to porcelain to natural stone.
Another option to consider is tile stickers/decals, which are designed to be pasted on top of existing tile to give it a fresh new look. They can be cut to size, and then simply paste over your existing floor or backsplash (you can see it done here).

Window treatments

If you want to add some window treatments without drilling and screwing, it’s pretty easy with shades that use a tension system—you simply insert the rod inside the window opening and let the pressure hold it in place. You can add roller shades, Roman shades, and even heavy curtains to your windows in a snap without any tools required.

Faux headboard

If you feel like your bedroom could use a little upgraded classiness, you might think that adding a headboard must require some woodworking and wall attachment—but it doesn’t have to. You can create an illusory headboard on the wall behind your bed by sticking stuff to it. If you have spare wood paneling lying around, grab some Command strips and hang them on the wall. You can also use vinyl peel-and-stick tiles, or literally anything that can be arranged artfully on the wall to create the outline of a headboard without getting any drywall dust on your bed.

Oura’s Readiness Score Finally Takes Menstrual Cycles Into Account

Beth Skwarecki — Fri, 28 Feb 2025 17:30:00 +0000

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Oura, the smart ring, is finally taking menstrual cycle data into account when assigning readiness scores—a feature whose absence has baffled users for years. The ring’s app was notorious for assigning lower-than-expected scores during the luteal phase of users’ cycles, but that is changing thanks to an update to the Readiness score algorithm that Oura announced this week.

If you don’t have a menstrual cycle, or if you have one but don’t track it, you probably won’t notice anything different about your Readiness scores. But this update is a big deal for anyone who uses Cycle Insights, the feature of the Oura app that uses temperature data to keep track of ovulation, menstruation, fertile window, and follicular and luteal phases.

Why many users had incorrect readiness scores

To explain why this was an issue, I’m going to zoom out and give a quick biology lesson. The monthly cycle that’s sometimes called a menstrual cycle isn’t just about menstruation, i.e., the bleeding that lasts a week or less. Instead, the cycle is a phenomenon that lasts all month, with distinct phases in the first and second halves of the month.

To be clear, this cycle doesn’t happen in everyone. It’s specifically a phenomenon that occurs in people who have a regular period and are not taking hormonal birth control. If you fall into this category, you can use the Cycle Insights feature of the Oura app to track when you are in the first half of your cycle (the follicular phase) versus the second half (the luteal phase).

(An important aside: Every time I write about menstruation or hormonal cycles, I get someone writing in to tell me that “women” and “people who menstruate” are synonyms. Let’s just take a minute to discuss the fact that they are not. Not only can we acknowledge the existence of trans folks, non-binary people, and a strange species of human known as “girls,” it’s worth remembering that a significant percentage of women do not have a cycle! This includes women who are past menopause, and women who use hormonal birth control.)

When your cycle starts on day one of your period, you’re in what’s called the follicular phase, as an ovarian follicle (which will produce an egg cell) develops over the course of about two weeks. Midway through the month—day 14 in a textbook cycle—that follicle releases the egg, ending the follicular phase. The releasing of the egg is called ovulation.

At this point, the body’s temperature ticks up by about half a degree. It will stay at this slightly elevated temperature for the rest of the cycle, and the Oura ring can detect the change in temperature. The empty follicle stays behind in the ovary, secreting hormones, and becomes the corpus luteum, Latin for “yellow thing.” (Scientists are so creative.) In its honor, the second half of the cycle is called the luteal phase.

Temperature isn’t the only difference between the follicular and luteal phases; all kinds of hormonal and biological phenomena are happening throughout the month, some of which have catchy names like “period flu,” but that’s a discussion for another time.

What’s changing in the Oura algorithm

As Oura points out in their announcement about the change, the luteal phase tends to have a few detectable differences from the follicular phase (from the ring’s point of view):

Skin temperature increases
Respiratory rate increases
Resting heart rate increases
Heart rate variability (HRV) decreases

All of these are things that, if they weren’t associated with the menstrual cycle, would indicate that a person is under stress or maybe getting sick. And so the algorithm (at least sometimes) processes this data as dings to your Readiness. Forums that discuss the Oura ring are full of threads with titles like “PSA to Oura: luteal phase is not a sickness” and “Anyone else get terrible readiness during luteal phase?” (according to the comments: yes).

With that in mind, Oura is finally taking your cycle phase into account when calculating Readiness scores. They predict that 35% of users who track a menstrual cycle will no longer get “disproportionately negative” readiness scores in the luteal phase. They expect that scores will be four to five points higher for those people, and that there will be 81% fewer days with too-low scores.

How to get the updated readiness scores

To benefit from the new algorithm, you’ll need to be using the Cycle Insights feature. This requires you to input the dates that your periods start, and it detects temperature changes to determine when you are in the luteal phase.

To turn on Cycle Insights, tap the menu icon in the app, then Settings, and then Women’s Health. There is a switch to turn on Cycle Insights, and below that you can enter some background information: whether you use hormonal contraception, how long your typical cycle lasts.

So, yes, this means that the app will need to keep track of when you have your period and when you’re ovulating. If that makes you uncomfortable in the current political climate, I don’t blame you—but you’ll have to decide whether it’s worth it to get that slightly more accurate data. Oura has a blog post on their approach to reproductive data privacy, noting that they are subject to GDPR regulations (since they are based in Finland) and that they plan to fight any requests for data from legal authorities. The support page for Cycle Insights includes instructions for deleting your cycle data from the app, which you can do at any time.

Skype Is Dead

Michelle Ehrhardt — Fri, 28 Feb 2025 17:00:00 +0000

It’s official: Skype is dead. The long-lived (by internet standards) voice-over-internet app has been put out to pasture by parent company Microsoft. Though Skype was once considered the way to call someone online, it's now going the way of Google Hangouts and dozens of other trendsetting apps before it. Come May 5, it’ll officially be replaced by Microsoft Teams.

It’s truly the end of an era. Launched in 2003, Skype quickly became synonymous with video calls online, with “skype-ing” entering the lexicon as its own verb. It has supported countless long distance relationships, podcasts recording sessions, and remote D&D games, but after being supplanted by apps like Zoom during the pandemic, it seems Microsoft has decided it’s finally time to go.

Users will be prompted to transition to Microsoft Teams

Microsoft is doing its best to make the transition seamless, and “over the coming days,” will roll out the ability for Skype users to sign into a Microsoft Teams account and immediately import their Skype chats, contacts, photos, and call history. Users who wish to move on from Skype will also be able to export their data to download locally, and Microsoft tells The Verge that it’s also made a tool that will allow users to view their Skype chat history after the shutdown.

The company also says that Skype and Teams will be interoperable from now until the shutdown, so if you migrate to Teams and then message one of your old Skype contacts, they’ll still see your message on Skype.

No more Skype calls

However, one big part of Skype will go away once Teams officially supplants it—phone calls. While Microsoft says it will honor existing Skype credits and subscriptions, it’s not going to support paid Skype features beyond that—and existing subscribers won’t be able to renew once their plans run out. To help customers as they use up their paid benefits, the Skype dial pad will be available within the Skype web portal and within Teams after the shutdown.

The choice to sunset Skype follows a move in December that saw Microsoft phasing out new Skype Credit sales as well as the Skype Number feature, which allowed users to use Skype to answer calls and send texts from a standard phone number. In retrospect, it seems the writing has been on the wall for a while.

“We hope we’ll migrate most Skype users,” Microsoft’s Jeff Tepper told The Verge, “...but we want to make sure the users know they’re in control.”

To that end, while Teams is definitely a viable choice for personal use despite its more business-oriented name, you might find yourself preferring one of its competitors. Here are some of best free video calling apps to consider migrating to once the Skype shutdown arrives.

My Favorite Amazon Deal of the Day: Apple AirTag Four-Pack

Daniel Oropeza — Fri, 28 Feb 2025 16:00:00 +0000

We may earn a commission from links on this page. Deal pricing and availability subject to change after time of publication.

These days, you don't need to be a spy to have tracking devices. If you're an Apple user, AirTags use Find My to track anything that you can put these devices on. Right now, Amazon has the four-pack for $64.49 (originally $99)—a new record-low price according to price-tracking tools—likely because the AirTag 2 release date is approaching. If four is too many, you can also get a single AirTag on sale for $22.99 (originally $29).

Apple AirTag Tracker (4-Pack)

AirTags are mostly marketed for purses, keys, and travel bags (airlines are adopting their use now), but there are examples of people using them much more creatively (someone on this Reddit post used it on their dog collar and trained it to come back whenever they pressed the "play sound" feature). The AirTag works with Apple's network of iOS devices to create a Bluetooth tracker. Essentially, every person with an iPhone (or iPad) is part of this iOS network, and as long as one of these people gets within Bluetooth range of your AirTag, it will show up as the last location on your Find My app.

As you can see on PCMag's "excellent" review of the AirTag, the Find My app has a screen that points you in the direction of your AirTag like a compass, including the distance it is from you. There is also an option to play a sound—which is perfect for locating, say, a remote that's buried under the couch.

Once the AirTag is more than 30 feet from your phone, the network of iOS users will kick in. When the AirTag is closer than 30 feet, it uses your own Bluetooth. There are security measures in place set by Apple, including end-to-end encryption, so that nobody (not even Apple), knows where your AirTag is except for you. The batteries last about a year and are replaceable. There is also no monthly charge for these, unlike competitors like Tile or Chipolo for Android users.

The ‘Out in the Open’ Method Can Help Even the Most Organized People to Declutter

Lindsey Ellefson — Fri, 28 Feb 2025 15:30:19 +0000

What are you doing this weekend? Don't know? Now you do: You're going to organize and declutter your home with the "out in the open" method. This technique is helpful whether you have a cluttered space, live in a relatively tidy home, or even are hyper-organized. Here's what you need to do.

What is the "out in the open" method?

This decluttering and organizing technique, like a lot of others, comes from tidy-home gurus The Minimalists. Essentially, you pull everything out of the space you're trying to organize, whether it's your closet, a cupboard, or a junk drawer. Truly, pull it all out and pile it up. The Minimalists say this approach is the opposite of one of their other methods, the "packing party," which involves putting everything from a certain room or location into categorized boxes, as if you were moving, then live out of those boxes for three weeks, pulling out only what you actually need. Three weeks after your packing party, you get rid of what you didn't use and put the rest away. With "out in the open," you don't have the luxury of living normally for three weeks, though; all your stuff is in a big pile, and cleaning and organizing it becomes an immediate necessity if you'd like to move freely around your space again.

So, that's what you do. Once everything is pulled out of its usual spot, you get a real sense of the volume of what you have. You have to organize it, because it's in your way. This creates some urgency while helping you get a handle on all that clutter that has been stored away. From there, you just have to follow your preferred decluttering technique, sorting, as usual, into piles of keep, throw, donate, and sell, before putting away what you're keeping and getting rid of the rest as you see fit.

Why the "out in the open" rule works so well

This is actually one of the best techniques out there because it works well for everyone, even—hell, especially—people who are already pretty organized. I often recommend following the rules of the Organizational Triangle to keep your home in order, particularly the rules that say to store similar items together and that everything needs a designated space. All of my favorite organizing techniques require you to use containers, smell shelves, boxes, and other specific storage tools to keep everything in order while it's stashed away in cupboards or closets. That's why I'm always going on about the best storage boxes and divided shelving units. The goal here is to keep everything organized and out of sight—but that can become its own kind of problem. Even if you adhere to all the storage and organizing rules strictly, once everything is out of sight and mind and your home looks presentable, you can still be accumulating way too much unnecessary stuff in those closets, cupboards, and boxes. You may not even think it's an issue since, hey, at least it's all organized.

By periodically pulling it all out and creating the very kind of mess you usually try to avoid, you have to confront all that stuff. I do this with my closets and dressers pretty regularly, every two or three months, so I can pare down clothes I no longer wear, need, or fit. It's also a great idea for junk drawers, spice and medicine cabinets (or anything full of products that might expire), garages or sheds, shoe storage, and even your living room shelving. As annoying as it is to temporarily have a giant mess on your hands, it will be worth it to only hold onto what is still serving you and let go of the things that were taking up too much organizational space.

Google's First Pixel Watch Is $110 Right Now

Pradershika Sharma — Fri, 28 Feb 2025 15:00:00 +0000

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The Google Pixel Watch, in either champagne gold with a hazel band or polished silver with a charcoal band, is down to $109.99, $170 off its usual price of $279.99.

Launched in 2022 as Google's first smartwatch (the stainless steel build is 80% recycled, so Google gets some sustainability points here), the Pixel Watch blends Wear OS with Fitbit’s health-tracking expertise, and does everything you’d expect from a premium smartwatch—texts, calls, contactless payments, smart home controls, fitness tracking, among others. Plus, it works with any Android 8.0+ device, not just Pixels, so you’re not locked into Google’s ecosystem. Here's everything you need to know about the Google Pixel Watch.

The Pixel Watch comes with a 5ATM water resistance rating, allowing for shallow water submersion. However, Google doesn’t provide an official IP rating for dust resistance, which might be something to consider if you plan on taking it into rough environments. Additionally, its AMOLED display is covered by a domed layer of Corning Gorilla Glass for better durability, but there's no raised bezel for extra protection against accidental bumps. That said, the display is smooth and highly responsive, with no noticeable lag, and its visibility is strong both indoors and outdoors. Internally, it runs on an Exynos 9110 chip paired with a Cortex M33 co-processor and 2GB of RAM. Google claims this setup helps improve heart rate tracking without draining the battery too quickly, and in practice, it does last a full day—about 25 hours with the always-on display enabled, notes this PCMag review.

On the fitness side, the Pixel Watch leans heavily into Fitbit’s ecosystem, tracking heart rate, sleep, and daily activity while supporting 40 workout modes—CrossFit, HIIT, Pilates, yoga, etc. It also includes an ECG app for detecting atrial fibrillation and Fitbit’s Active Zone Minutes to help you hit recommended activity goals. If you’re into data, the included six-month Fitbit Premium trial unlocks extra insights, guided workouts, and mindfulness sessions. After that, it’s $9.99 a month, so you’ll need to decide if it’s worth the subscription. The latest iteration of Google's wearable, the Pixel Watch 3, will introduce pulse loss detection by March. If that is something you care about, it might be worth waiting for the upgrade.

This Free App Helps You Make Cocktails With Ingredients You Already Have

Justin Pot — Fri, 28 Feb 2025 14:30:00 +0000

Some people have fully stocked bars—the rest of us make do with a rotating cast of liquors and ingredients.

If that's you, Drinkable is a totally free app that tells you which cocktails you can make with the ingredients you have on hand. Even better: it works offline, perfect if you're stranded in a cabin with a well-stocked bar but no wireless signal (it happens, believe me).

This application, available for iOS and Android with no ads or in-app-payments, includes a catalogue of over 150 drinks. This means you could use it to quickly look up the recipe for all of the common cocktails. To get started, install the app from Google Play or the App Store. You can start searching for recipes right away. Honestly, the application is perfectly useful just as a pocket recipe book for all the classic cocktails.

To me, though, the real fun happens when you head to the Ingredients tab and start entering which things you have on hand. While browsing recipes, you'll see checkmarks next to the ingredients you have on hand. Or, if you prefer, you can filter the recipes to only see drinks you can make with your current ingredients. Tap any of them and you'll see the recipe.

Credit: Justin Pot

Scroll down past the list of drinks you can make with current ingredients and you'll see a list of drinks that you're one ingredient away from making. Basically, this app is built around showing you what drinks you can make with what you have on hand while also pointing out things you could make with just a few more things. I like this because it can help inform your next shopping trip without totally overwhelming you.

Even if you don't want to bother with inventory management, this app is a handy reference—and it's completely free (with no in app purchases). Whether you're making a quick drink for yourself or a batch of bottled cocktails for a party, you'll have the knowledge you need.

Four TikTok Tax ‘Hacks’ You Should Ignore

Meredith Dietz — Fri, 28 Feb 2025 14:00:00 +0000

When it comes to managing your finances and taxes, consider advice from TikTok with a hefty grain of salt. Certain tax "loopholes" may go viral, but that doesn't mean they're good for your specific tax situation. TikTok's bite-sized videos have a habit of distilling nuanced tax strategies into just a few sentences—a recipe for misinformation. This advice is lightly misleading at best, and totally inaccurate at worst. Blindly following this advice could cost you in penalties, back taxes owed, and a tremendous hassle.

Let's take a look at the questionable TikTok tax advice I've seen and how you can make sure it doesn't lead you and your money astray.

Hiring your kids

Some videos suggest that business owners should hire and pay their children as employees. The claim is that this allows the child to contribute to a Roth IRA using their "earned income."

While it's true that only earned income can be contributed to a Roth IRA, hiring your kids has very specific requirements. The work they do must be legitimate and age-appropriate, and the pay must be reasonable for the job performed. Simply putting your children on payroll as a tax workaround could be considered fraud.

Hiring your dog

I've seen videos like this one garner hundreds of thousands of likes for the claim that you can write off your pet as a guard dog who protects your business. It's true that guard dog expenses are deductible if the dog is trained and of a breed fit for the job. Unfortunately, trying to deduct your corgi for occasionally barking at the door isn't going to get your very far with the IRS.

Writing off your Range Rover

Another viral claim about a legal "tax loophole" advises people to write off the cost of a luxury vehicle like a Range Rover or Mercedes-Benz G-Wagon on their taxes.

The truth is, according to the IRS Section 179 tax code, businesses may be able to write off a G-Wagon if it’s used for business purposes at least half of the time. Section 179 does allow businesses to deduct the full cost of certain assets like vehicles in the year they are placed into service, rather than depreciating the expense over several years. But there are very strict requirements. Additionally, there are limits on the deductible amount for luxury vehicles that exceed $19,800 for cars and $20,500 for trucks and vans in 2023.

Forming an LLC to deduct personal expenses

Luckily, this faulty advice seems to falling out of fashion, but sometimes old videos like this one make the rounds. Creators claim you can form a limited liability company (LLC) to deduct personal expenses like your mortgage, car payments, and even grocery bills as business expenses to reduce your taxes.

While LLCs can provide some tax benefits, simply forming one doesn't magically allow you to write off all your personal costs. There are strict rules about what qualifies as a legitimate business expense. Deducting personal expenses improperly could land you in hot water with the IRS.

The bottom line

When it comes to complex topics like these (and really all things tax-related), don't rely on brief videos from non-professionals. Improper tax strategies could inadvertently cost you much more in penalties, interest, and fees down the road.

Unless a TikTok video is from a credentialed tax expert giving a general overview of tax concepts, take it with a hefty scoop of skepticism. It's best to consult a qualified tax professional who can look at your specific situation and give you legitimate, tailored advice. What makes for a good viral video rarely translates to good tax planning.

The Best TV Series to Stream This Week

Stephen Johnson — Fri, 28 Feb 2025 13:30:00 +0000

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If you're looking for a new show to watch this week, I've got your back. I've scoured the schedules of Netflix, Prime, Max, Hulu, and other streaming platforms to bring you the best and most notable shows streaming this week.

Running Point

Kate Hudson stars in this basketball-based comedy series created by the always inventive Mindy Kaling. Hudson plays Isla Gordon, whose family owns storied Los Angeles basketball team the LA Waves. When her brother is forced to step down as president, Isla takes over, setting up a classic culture-clash of a woman entering a massively male-dominated space. Will she win over skeptical players, fans, investors, and her own brothers? I'd bet on "yes," now that sports betting is allowed in the U.S.

Where to stream: Netflix

House of David

No matter what you think of this "God" person, the Bible contains a lot of great stories, including that of David, who, like Madonna, needs no last name. House of David is a faith-based series that starts with the fall of King Saul and the anointing of his successor, David, a teenage outcast who seems to have no business being king of anything. But David embarks on a personal journey of discovery and eventually (spoiler alert) becomes the greatest king of Israel. God, as they say, works in mysterious ways.

Where to stream: Prime

Grosse Pointe Garden Society

Black comedies about rich people committing crimes are generally awesome, and Grosse Pointe Garden Society's creators have a track record in the space: Bill Krebs and Jenna Bans created Good Girls. The suburban "garden society" of the title is made up of a real estate agent, a socialite, a high school teacher, and a single dad, and they share a secret: a body buried under the hydrangeas. They have a pact to never tell a soul, but I have a feeling someone's gonna break that promise.

Where to stream: Peacock

Shoresey, season 4

I have a confession to make: I'd never heard of Shoresey before today, and I can't believe I haven't been watching this show. Why wasn't I informed? This Canadian sports comedy series is excellent and totally deserves the 100% fresh rating it has on rotten tomatoes. Shoresy follows the adventures of Shoresy, a foul-mouthed, fan-favorite hockey player on the Sudbury Bulldogs in Sudbury, Ontario, known as the dirtiest player in the game. Hockey comedy hasn't been this funny since the original Slap Shot!

Where to stream: Hulu

Last week's picks

Zero Day

Where to stream: Netflix

The White Lotus, Season 3

Mike White's Emmy-winning series The White Lotus is the best. Its mix of biting commentary on wealth and privilege, well-drawn (but nearly always reprehensible) characters, and pitch-black humor add up to a nothing-else-like-it TV series. Season 3 sees a new group of pampered Americans arriving at a White Lotus luxury resort in Thailand. I can't say for sure, but I'm guessing they'll have unexpected and troubling times instead of a restful vacation. Season 3 also see the return of Natasha Rothwell, who played the spa manager from season one—one of the few sympathetic characters in the show's run. Other notable cast members include Walton Goggins (The Ghoul in Prime's Fallout series), Carrie Coon, Scott Glenn, Leslie Bibb, Michelle Monaghan, and Parker Posey.

Where to stream: Max

1923, Season 2

Harrison Ford and Helen Mirren return for the second, and reportedly final, season of critically lauded drama 1923, a show that aims to tell a story as big as its stars. In this prequel to Yellowstone, Ford and Mirren play Jacob and Cara, matriarch and patriarch of the Dutton family, proud ranchers from Montana whose lives are shaped by drought, pandemics, and war, and who must face off against and a cadre of evil moguls who have their eyes on the ranch. Big drama!

Where to stream: Paramount+

Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, season 12

There's a new season of Last Week Tonight premiering this month, and I'm pretty sure sardonic host John Oliver will to have a lot to talk about in 2025 America. Oliver promises to ask the hard questions, like "Have two presidents ever kissed?" and "Did Tucker Carlson's mom really leave him $2 in her will?" (She actually left him $1.) Don't miss it if you like pointed political humor, because who knows how long pointed political humor will remain legal.

Where to stream: Max

A Thousand Blows

Where to stream: Hulu

Reacher, season 3

Where to stream: Prime

The Best New Movies to Stream This Week

Stephen Johnson — Fri, 28 Feb 2025 13:00:00 +0000

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Looking to settle in with a good movie? Me too. That's why I've pored over release schedules to bring you the best original and new-to-streaming movies you can watch on Netflix, Prime, Max, Hulu, and other streaming platforms this week.

Sonic the Hedgehog 3 (2024)

Based on everything we know about movies based on video games, Sonic the Hedgehog 3 shouldn't even be watchable—a third movie based on the 1990s Sega mascot?—but somehow, Sonic 3 is good, even if you don't feel nostalgic for the games. It's surprisingly complex for a kids' movie about a blue hedgehog that runs fast, but it doesn't stray from manic energy and over-the-top vibe of the source material. Jim Carrey deserves special praise: He plays a dual-villain role as both Eggman and Robotnik, and manages to more than hold his own with his frenetic, CGI co-stars.

Where to stream: Paramount+

Matthew Perry: A Hollywood Tragedy

It may be distasteful to root around in the dirty laundry of dead celebrities, but it's so entertaining. Matthew Perry: a Hollywood Tragedy is of high-enough quality that you won't feel that bad as you learn about the ring of shady Los Angeles drug dealers and Dr. Feelgoods who (allegedly) provided Friends star Matthew Perry the horse tranquilizer that led to his death. We also get a window into Perry's childhood, his mental health struggles, and his meteoric ascension to the top of the Hollywood dungheap.

Where to stream: Peacock

Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves

Dungeons and Dragons, the game, owes a lot to Tolkien, but Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves shines most when it's least like The Lord of the Rings. Unlike other direct and indirect D&D adaptations, Honor Among Thieves respects the source material while not taking itself too seriously. It captures the lighthearted anarchy and laughs of a good game of D&D with your pals, and makes you feel like this ragtag band of adventurers' quest for a powerful relic is in imminent danger of going off the rails hilariously if someone rolls a one.

Where to stream: Netflix

The Wrong Track

I've been watching a lot of foreign language original Netflix content lately, and man, is it good, so I have high hopes The Wrong Track, a comedy from Norway about the long-distance Birkebeinerrennet ski race. Main character Emilie's life has fallen apart, so she decides to rebuild by joining her brother in a long distance skiing adventure. It's not the most original premise, but the possibilities are endless, and I can't wait to see what people in Norway think is funny.

Where to stream: Netflix

Last week's picks

Grand Theft Hamlet (2024)

Back in the bad old days of the full-lockdown pandemic, British stage actors and gamers Sam Crane and Mark Oosterveen had the audacious, ridiculous idea of staging a production of Hamlet within the video game Grand Theft Auto V Online. Composed entirely of footage captured in-game, Grand Theft Hamlet features all the backstage drama of a "let's put on a show" documentary, but it's punctuated by the chaos and violence of online gaming—other players break up rehearsals with gunplay, the NPC police arrive ready to kill the cast and crew, etc. Grand Theft Hamlet is funny, but it's also shot through with glimpses of the lives behind the avatars, and it defiantly asserts that Art still matters, no matter how absurd the world becomes, online and off.

Where to stream: Mubi

Nosferatu (2024)

Robert Eggers's remake of Nosferatu doesn't rethink the source material. Instead, Eggers raises the original film's dark, corrupted imagery from the dead to terrify another generation. The new Nosferatu hits the same basic plot beats as F. W. Murnau's 1922 expressionist masterpiece: Thomas Hutter, an unsuspecting young lawyer, travels to the Carpathian Mountains for some routine business with a new client, but quickly learns that Count Orlock is actually Nosferatu, an elementally evil vampire who is has dark plans for Hutter and Humanity. If you like your vampires un-sexy and truly monstrous, don't miss Nosferatu.

Where to stream: Peacock

Ladies & Gentlemen... 50 Years of SNL Music

Peacock is a must-subscribe for fans of Saturday Night Live. Viewers can stream all 50 seasons of the show, the 50th anniversary special, a multi-part behind-the-scenes docu-series, the SNL concert at Radio City Music Hall, and more. But, because music ages better than comedy, my must-watch piece of SNL 50th anniversary content is Ladies & Gentlemen... 50 Years of SNL Music. Directed by Questlove, this documentary chronicles the ludicrously deep lineup of emerging geniuses, one-hit-wonders, and musical legends who have performed on the show, including David Bowie, Prince, Radiohead, Adele, Run DMC, Beyonce, The Replacements, Nirvana, and basically everyone else who is awesome.

Where to stream: Peacock

Memes and Nightmares

LeBron James and Maverick Carter executive-produced Memes and Nightmares, a quirky comedy documentary that takes viewers inside the world of NBA Twitter (or NBA X now, I guess). When a beloved meme (J.R. Smith Squinting) disappears from the internet, Josiah Johnson, former college baller and current king of NBA Twitter, embarks on a quixotic quest to uncover what happened. Featuring interviews with terminally online fans, NBA players, techies, and many other possible suspects, Memes and Nightmares is as much about the bonds we form and the communities we build in a digital world as it is about a missing meme.

Where to stream: Hulu

Things Will Be Different

In this inventive puzzle-box thriller, first-time director Michael Felker deftly blends sci-fi, action, and horror into a movie with more twists than 1950s dance party. Adam David Thompson and Riley Dandy play Joseph and Sidney, a brother and sister who use time travel to escape after a bank robbery. But the pair learns that the punishment for breaking state and federal laws is child's play compared to the punishment for breaking the laws of Space and Time.

Where to stream: Hulu

OpenAI Is Leaning on Paid Users to Test ChatGPT-4.5

Michelle Ehrhardt — Thu, 27 Feb 2025 22:30:00 +0000

In a livestream today, OpenAI finally announced the launch of its GPT-4.5 model, but with a twist: For now, using it requires a $200 per month ChatGPT Pro subscription.

That’s because the new large language model, or LLM, is still technically in a “research preview” state. This is all apparently shorthand for “please pay us for the privilege of being a beta tester.”

Jokes aside, the company is promising GPT-4.5 provides more “natural conversation,” and performs better when it comes to programming, pattern recognition, writing, and “solving practical problems.”

Note that GPT-4.5 isn’t intended as a reasoning model, meaning it won’t have the self-correcting or deep research capabilities of OpenAI o1, o3-mini, or the upcoming full version of o3. In a leaked document, the company said it’s not considering GPT-4.5 a “frontier” model, but it is OpenAI’s largest LLM yet, which should make it ideal for everyday queries, as the large database of training material should make for quicker answers.

Credit: OpenAI

In internal tests, OpenAI says the new model hallucinated about 24.7% less frequently than GPT-4.0, and was about 34.3% more accurate. Around 57% of internal human testers reportedly preferred GPT-4.5 to 4.0.

Credit: OpenAI

In other words, GPT-4.5 isn’t exactly at the cutting edge of AI, but it should be an improvement on other non-reasoning models, providing a nice middle ground between cheaper, more traditional LLMs and their frequently paywalled successors. The only major omissions seem to be multimodal features like AI Voice Mode and video input, although OpenAI says its working on updating its user experience, which seems to hint some version of these capabilities might come to the model in the future.

That makes sense, given that, once again, this is technically an early release, with OpenAI saying it’s “still exploring” GPT-4.5’s limits and how people can use it. To that end, the LLM is set to expand to all paid ChatGPT plans over the next two weeks, before presumably reaching free users as a replacement for GPT-4.0 once it leaves its preview state.

These Surprisingly Good Earbuds Are Just $20 Right Now

Daniel Oropeza — Thu, 27 Feb 2025 22:00:00 +0000

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I used to buy cheap earbuds from random brands all the time, simply because I needed some earbuds that wouldn't give me a heart attack if (or when) I lost them or got them wet. If that sounds like your earbud-buying strategy, there's a great deal on a pair of budget earbuds that actually have pretty decent specs: the Anker Soundcore P20i. Right now, they're on sale for $19.99 (originally $39.99), the lowest price they have been according to price-checking tools.

Soundcore by Anker P20i

Color: White, Ear Placement: In Ear, Battery life: 30 hours, Water resistant: Yes.

Anker has been making surprisingly good, budget-friendly earbuds, headphones, and speakers for a while. The Anker P20i/P25i (same earbuds, different names) came out in late 2023 and are a nice pair of budget earbuds offering a lot of features that you usually see in higher end earbuds. You get Bluetooth 5.3, 10-hour battery life per charge and another 30 hours from the case, a bass boost feature, and a companion app that offers more features.

The app lets you choose from 22 preset EQ options so you can find the sound signature that best works for you. There is no custom EQ, but the fact that you have a companion app from a reliable brand for under $20 is impressive by itself. You can also set up a voice assistant from your phone through the app by making it one of the touch control commands.

The earbuds are great for people who need a cheap pair of earbuds to take to the gym since they are rated IPX5 for water resistance, and although they don't have ANC, the in-ear design naturally eliminates a lot of background noise. These earbuds work with iOS and Android phones and have a "Find My Device" feature with its app.

If I was still in my cheap earbuds era, I'd be grabbing these right away.

Is the PSVR 2 Worth Its New, Lower Price?

Michelle Ehrhardt — Thu, 27 Feb 2025 21:30:00 +0000

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Sony's PlayStation VR 2 headset is getting a permanent price price drop this March, down to $400 from $550. That'll include the headset, the controllers, and a pair of wired earbuds—but is that a deal worth getting excited over?

Well, for Sony, maybe. The price cut comes a year after Bloomberg reported that Sony had stopped making new PSVR 2 units and shifted efforts towards getting rid of excess stock. That points to lower-than-expected sales for the peripheral, and it's easy to see why.

Sony's VR loyalists were surprised to hear when the headset came out, for instance, that it would not work with the existing library of games built for PSVR 1. That's because the PSVR 2 uses improved tracking technology and controllers compared to Sony's first crack at virtual reality, but still, the difference meant gamers had to rebuy their entire libraries, or just ditch games that hadn't been ported to the new headset altogether. This means PSVR 2 gamers have a slightly smaller selection of games than on other systems, with little assurance that their games will continue to work as hardware gets upgraded. Even Sony mascot Astro Bot has yet to come to the new system, with Astro Bot Rescue Mission still being stuck on the PSVR 1.

That doesn't mean the headset is totally unworthy of the upgrade, though. It has a higher resolution than the PSVR 1, with a higher field-of-view, more precise controllers, and the addition of eye tracking. Having tried it myself, I was pretty happy with the experience, but I didn't see much to use it on with the PS5.

Luckily, in the time sense its release, Sony has made the PSVR 2 available for PC, with the release of a $60 adapter. That just about fixes the library issue, assuming you have a VR-compatible PC, but it also opens the headset up to increased competition. Namely, while the PSVR 2 is well-priced compared to luxury PCVR headsets like the Valve Index (which can reach upwards of $930), it still has to compete with the likes of the Meta Quest 3 and 3S, which also work with PC.

Compared to those other devices, whether this price drop is a good deal comes down to your priorities. It's still more expensive than the Quest 3S ($300), but it has higher-resolution displays and a built-in halo strap, something that I find more comfortable than the default Quest strap. On the other hand, it doesn't have a processor for standalone gaming and loses out on Meta exclusives like Batman: Arkham Shadow.

The PSVR 2 is cheaper than the regular Quest 3 ($500), but you do get those same downsides plus slightly lower-resolution screens. However, the PSVR 2's screens are OLED, and again, it's pretty comfortable right out of the box (I've swapped the default Quest 3 strap for an aftermarket halo strap, which cost me $50).

Personally, I'd prefer to see another $50 chopped off before I start recommending it, but it could work in the niche case where you don't care about standalone play and just want a comfortable PCVR headset that can occasionally also come to the living room to play the odd Sony exclusive, like Horizon Call of the Mountain. Bloomberg has also reported that Apple might soon adopt the PSVR 2's controllers for use with the Apple Vision Pro, so getting a set now could get you ahead of the game if you plan to upgrade later on.

Note that the exact start date for the price drop might vary based on region, according to Sony's blog, so be sure to check your local retailer before purchasing.

This Note-Taking App Can Replace Four of the Most Popular Productivity Tools

Justin Pot — Thu, 27 Feb 2025 21:00:00 +0000

Obsidian is the Winamp of productivity tools. If you're as ancient as I am, you might remember that the best part of that once-ubiquitous music player extension was the massive number of plugins and themes you could install to make it better, all of them built by enthusiasts.

Obsidian is a good note-taking application on its own, stuffed with all kinds of features: You can organize notes in folders, link to notes from other notes, and even use advanced options like Mermaid diagrams. But like Winamp, Obsidian truly shines once you dig into its extensive plugin ecosystem. There are over 2,000 Obsidian plugins available as of this writing, and you can use them to basically turn Obsidian into whatever you can dream up.

Many of these plugins are small in scope, granted, but not all of them. Some of the extensions are extensive enough to replace entire applications you might otherwise be using. Here's how I used Obsidian plugins to replace four different productivity tools.

Your kanban app

My real kanban board is full of secrets so enjoy this fake one. Credit: Justin Pot

I used to be a big fan of Trello, once a humble personal kanban planner. Fifteen years of bloat and upselling mean that application is unrecognizable today, which I'm fine with, because Obsidian works better for me than Trello ever did. I owe it all to the Obsidian Kanban plugin.

Install it, and you can create as many Kanban boards in Obsidian as you like. Every card can include as much text as you want, formatted the same way you would anything else in Obsidian. That includes links—every card can link to the pages you're using to manage your projects.

I'm a freelance journalist who writes for a handful of publications, including the one you're reading now. I typically write around 20 articles a month, meaning I always have multiple projects on the go. I use an Obsidian Kanban board to keep track of everything. I have columns for "Plan to write this month," "Plan to write this week," "Outlined," "Submitted need edits," "Edited not invoiced," "Invoiced not paid," and, finally, "Paid." This system allows me to see everything I'm working one in one place, and track my progress on all of them. I honestly don't know if I could manage my workflow without it. And, because I also do all of my writing directly in Obsidian, I can jump straight to a project from my dashboard.

This is just one example—I'm sure you can think of other uses. But perhaps my favorite part of this system is that every kanban board in Obsidian is, in reality, just a markdown document that combines a few lists, meaning I can export them and keep an archive, even if I stop using Obsidian.

Your journaling app

Credit: Khamosh Pathak

Lifehacker has written a lot about journalling apps over the years, and I personally have extensively tested every example you can think of, multiple times. All of them have pros and cons, and I'm not going to pretend that Obsidian is the best tool for everyone. What I will say is that I use Obsidian for my personal journal, and I can't imagine using anything else.

My colleague Kamosh has already written about using Obsidian as a journalling app, so I'll refer you to him for more on how to get started. But I'll add that I recommend installing the journal review plugin so that you can regularly look back at previous entries. You can also look into Obsidian's templates feature if you want to use the same outline for your journal every day. I used it to create something similar to a bullet-journal, with questions about my day.

Your read-it-later app

Credit: Justin Pot

A few months ago, Obsidian launched Obsidian Clipper, which saves webpages to your personal "vault." This is an extension for every major browser that allows you to save entire articles from the web. This is useful for research, but it also means you can use Obsidian as a replacement for read-it-later applications like Pocket or Instapaper. Just set up a dedicated vault for articles you want to read later, point the plugin toward that vault, and open your read-it-later vault every time you want to catch up on your backlog. You can even do things like highlight or add your own notes while you read, all without having to pay for a subscription.

Your to-do app

Credit: Obsidian Tasks

The problem with many to-do apps—and the reason Lifehacker will seemingly never stop writing about them—is that everyone has different productivity needs and no single app can serve them all. If you have never found a to-do system that's perfect for you, that's understandable.

But if that's you, and you're a fan of Obsidian generally, look into the tasks plugin. This tool goes through every single note in your vault and collects all of the markdown task lists you've created. It's a perfect add-on if you already use Obsidian to outline your projects. The extension also allows you to add due dates, including recurring tasks, and set your priorities.

This GoPro Bundle With a Ton of Useful Accessories Is $100 Off

Daniel Oropeza — Thu, 27 Feb 2025 20:30:00 +0000

We may earn a commission from links on this page. Deal pricing and availability subject to change after time of publication.

GoPro is the indisputable king of small outdoor action cameras. Its latest flagship camera, the GoPro Hero13 Black came out this past September, but the older GoPro Hero12 (released in 2023) has a good bundle deal you should consider. The Black Creator Edition bundle offers the Volta pack, a media and light mod, extra battery, and carrying case all for just $55 more than the camera alone. You can get the bundle for $399 (originally $499), its lowest price yet, according to price-tracking tools.

GoPro HERO12 Black Creator Edition

Color: Black, Brand: GoPro, Item Weight: 454 Grams, Maximum Weight Recommendation: 5E+2 Grams.

GoPro releases a new camera just about every year, so the changes aren't always ground-breaking. There's not much you can do with just a GoPro, since they heavily rely on their accessories, so the bundles are usually where the best offers are. That's what makes the GoPro HERO12 Black Creator Edition a great deal in 2025. Here is what you get: HERO12 Black, Carrying Case, Enduro Battery, Curved Adhesive Mount, Mounting Buckle + Thumb Screw, USB-C Cable, Volta, USB-C Pass-Through Door, Lanyard, Media Mod, Vertical Mounting Buckle, Light Mod, Light Diffuser, and 2-Finger Adapter.

The Volta handle is arguably the most valuable item. The handle is a portable battery, has built-in buttons for easier control, lets you use the GoPro wirelessly with a remote, and doubles as a tripod. The media mod and light mod also offer useful tools, giving you a microphone with audio ports and an LED light so you can see better in the dark.

The GoPro Hero 12 Black received an "outstanding" review from PCMag upon its 2023 release, and the bundle is almost the same price as the GoPro Hero 13 Black, so it makes it a great deal for anyone looking to get a good GoPro with all the important accessories at a discounted price.

Try the Viral ‘GFD Bin’ Decluttering Method the Next Time Guests Are on Their Way Over

Lindsey Ellefson — Thu, 27 Feb 2025 20:00:11 +0000

I like watching Reels and TikToks about cleaning because in addition to getting some good tips, I find them relatable. Why, yes, Algorithm, I do often find myself in a position where friends are coming over but my home isn't exactly spotless. How did you know? One Instagram user has a suggestion for how to turn that exact situation into a cleaning win: Called the "GFD bin," it's gained some traction on the app as a quick decluttering method worth trying.

What is a "GFD bin?"

A "GFD bin" is a "guests for dinner" bin, according to its creator, Holly Blakey. The organizing and interior decorating guru shared this video last December explaining the idea:

View this post on Instagram

Essentially, before guests come over, you grab a big basket (or even a bag) and take it around the house, tossing anything out of place inside. Then, stash it somewhere, like a closet, committing to putting its contents away the next day. By doing this, you accomplish a few things at once: Obviously, you get your home ready for guests quickly, but you also set yourself up for cleaning success by segmenting the work into two parts.

It might seem like a cop-out to just run around and hide all the dirty parts of your home, but it draws on two techniques I really stand by. The first is the idea of segmentation, like you employ when you follow the "magic basket" approach. The magic basket, for its part, involves going around your home every night and depositing out-of-place items into said basket, then putting everything away the next day. The goal here is to space out your labor so it never gets overwhelming. You wake up the next day feeling good about the work you did do the night before, put everything away, then get motivated by that effort, creating a looping cycle instead of one longer, dread-worthy task.

The second approach the GFD bin calls on is the idea of rewarding yourself to create further cleaning motivation. You need breaks when you do anything productive or you'll get burned out eventually, but when you're doing a task that is especially unpleasant or tedious, like cleaning, you should also make sure those breaks are fun and enjoyable. In the same way I've recommended eating a favorite candy or watching a favorite show while cleaning, incorporating the arrival of friends as an enjoyable activity mid-cleaning can be motivating, too.

Rather than getting down on yourself for letting a mess pile up and being in a rush before someone gets to your place, think of this as a built-in motivational scheme. There's no shame in hiding away the mess as long as you follow through on the commitment to putting it away the next day.

20 of Gene Hackman's Greatest Performances (and Where to Watch Them)

Ross Johnson — Thu, 27 Feb 2025 19:30:00 +0000

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They don't make movie stars like they used to, but they only made a movie star like Gene Hackman once.

Born in 1930, Hackman served as a marine and studied journalism in college before dropping out to work as an actor, earning acclaim on Broadway and in television roles but not breaking out in films until his late 30s, when he earned a Best Supporting Actor Oscar nomination for playing Warren Beatty's brother in the crime classic Bonnie and Clyde.

It proved to be the start of an eclectic big-screen career that would see him earn four more Oscar nominations (and two wins, for 1971's The French Connection and 1992's Unforgiven). With hangdog looks and an ability to project gravitas and heroism and weakness and villainy in equal measure, he gave one indelible performance after another, always bettering the films he appeared in.

To honor his recent death—and celebrate his truly remarkable career—here are 20 of his most iconic performances.

Bonnie and Clyde (1967)

Bonnie and Clyde is best remembered today as a harbinger of the auteur era that would transform Hollywood in the 1970s. Filled with dark humor and visceral violence, and borrowing techniques from the French New Wave, Arthur Penn's film overcame tepid early reviews to become a counter-cultural sensation and a major awards contender. Though Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway are iconic as the title criminals, then-newcomer Gene Hackman made his mark (and earned a Best Supporting Actor Oscar nomination) playing Clyde Barrow's ill-fated brother Buck. You can rent Bonnie and Clyde from Prime Video.

Bonnie and Clyde (1967)

Downhill Racer (1969)

The first of a string of memorable movies in which Gene Hackman plays a coach, Downhill Racer is a quintessentially '70s affair—a moody, heady sports drama led by one of Hollywood's biggest stars (Robert Redford) that critic Roger Ebert called "the best movie ever made about sports—without really being about sports at all." Redford commands the spotlight as a cocky, self-centered skiing champ, but it's Hackman who grounds the film as the teamwork-minded coach hoping to lead his athletes to Olympic gold. You can stream Downhill Racer free with ads on Pluto TV or rent it from Prime Video.

Downhill Racer (1969)

The French Connection (1971)

The French Connection (1971)

Watching The French Connection today, we recognize a certain formula: big-budget, well-choreographed shoot-outs, chases, and car crashes given gravitas by a complex and troubled lead, usually a cop. But it only became a formula because so many other films tried to copy what director William Friedkin accomplished here with Hackman in the lead. All of the action beats land because of his performance as antihero Popeye Doyle, one that landed him his single Best Actor Oscar. You can rent The French Connection from Prime Video.

The Poseidon Adventure (1972)

The Poseidon Adventure (1972)

Poseidon rests firmly in the very ‘70s disaster-movie style: an all-star cast faces doom and soapy drama, this time on a cruise ship turned upside down. These casts were always blends of older, more familiar faces and relatively younger stars, of which top-billed Hackman was representative. These movies aren’t really about the acting, but this one wasn’t received as a dumb action movie: it received multiple Academy Award nominations and earned Hackman a Best Actor BAFTA, a single award given for two performances in two very different movies. The first was his performance as earnest reverend Frank Scott in this one, and as Popeye Doyle in The French Connection. Even way back in 1972 it was clear that Hackman had range. You can stream The Poseidon Adventure on Starz or rent it from Prime Video.

Scarecrow (1973)

A little-known entry in the filmographies of both Hackman and costar Al Pacino, this character drama is worth seeking out. Hackman plays a drifter and ex-con who hooks up with a simple-minded sailor (Pacino). The pair set off across the country with plans to open a business together, but get into trouble along the way and wind up doing a stint in prison—and experience that will have a profound effect on both their lives. Though it won the top award at the Cannes Film Festival, it is little discussed today, and that's too bad—it's not often you get to enjoy the likes of Hackman and Pacino playing opposite one another. You can rent Scarecrow from Prime Video.

Scarecrow (1973)

The Conversation (1974)

Francis Ford Coppola’s film didn’t do much in the way of business on its initial release, but the critics and the years have been extremely kind to the film, no small accomplishment given that much of its plot hinges on 1970s-era technology. The movie’s themes about the dangers of the surveillance state and ambivalence about our need to know everything about everyone are as relevant now as ever. Hackman plays yet another iconic character in Harry Caul, brilliant at his job but also, himself, a deeply secretive and haunted man. His performance here is simply one of the finest in an era full of brilliant performances. You can stream The Conversation on The Criterion Channel or rent it from Prime Video.

The Conversation (1974)

at The Criterion Channel

Night Moves (1975)

An absolutely essential neo-noir, Hackman stars here as retired football player Harry Moseby, now a private investigator but with a personal life that’s crumbling around him. Like the greatest noir films before it, the nest of plot threads grows increasingly convoluted and dense, building toward an unexpected ending, but Harry is the glue that holds it all together. Even as a depressed and sullen character who you wouldn’t want to spend five minutes with in real life, he’s riveting. You can rent Night Moves from Prime Video.

Night Moves (1975)

A Bridge Too Far (1977)

Though it received mixed reviews at the time, war film A Bridge Too Far was a box office hit, and stands today as the kind of epic adult drama Hollywood rarely makes anymore. With a screenplay by William Goldman, it depicts a doomed military operation in the Nazi-occupied Netherlands in 1944. Hackman is part of a stacked cast that includes James Caan, Michael Caine, Sean Connery, Elliott Gould, Anthony Hopkins, Laurence Olivier, Ryan O'Neal, and Robert Redford. You can stream A Bridge Too Far on MGM+ or rent it from Prime Video.

A Bridge Too Far (1977)

Superman (1978)

For at least a generation, Hackman was the definitive Lex Luthor in the definitive superhero movie. Director Richard Donner promised a level verisimilitude in his Super-saga, which Christopher Reeve and Margot Kidder deliver. Hackman, though, is the third point on that triangle, alternately delivering comic relief and a sense of real menace—even with a full head of hair. Today’s movie supervillains are all about conquering the universe, which feels like a distraction from this movie’s more real and present threat: a ruthless real-estate mogul willing to watch millions die for a few extra bucks. You can stream Superman on Max or rent it from Prime Video.

Superman (1978)

Hoosiers (1986)

A sleeper hit at the box office that has come to be recognized as one of the most inspiring sports movies ever made, this 1986 drama gave Hackman one of his best-loved roles. He plays Norman Dale, a teacher at a poor high school in rural Indiana who leads a team of misfits to glory on the court. Though Hackman was overlooked, Dennis Hopper earned a Best Supporting Actor Oscar nod for his turn as the town drunk who finds new purpose serving as Dale's assistant coach. You can rent Hoosiers from Prime Video. Starting Feb. 28 you can also stream it free on Prime Video With Ads.

Hoosiers (1986)

Mississippi Burning (1988)

No Way Out (1987)

Simultaneously smart and trashy, No Way Out pays tribute to noir movies past while steering more firmly into erotic thriller territory—not that big a leap. Hackman here plays Secretary of Defense David Brice, the type of role that’s just window dressing in many other movies. Here, though, Hackman is having a grand time playing Brice as a thoroughly nasty bit of business—duplicitous, murderous, and sharing a mistress (Sean Young) with lead Kevin Costner. It’s not Hackman’s finest performance, but it’s definitely one of his juiciest. You can stream No Way Out with ads on Pluto TV or rent it from Prime Video.

No Way Out

at Pluto TV

Mississippi Burning (1988)

Though its politics don't seem quite as progressive 37 years on, there's no arguing the fact that Gene Hackman commands the screen in this racially charged crime thriller, set amid the 1960s civil rights movement and inspired by true events. Hackman and Willem Dafoe play FBI agents investigating the murders of three civil rights workers in a southern town that is cozy with the KKK. Hackman was nominated for Best Actor for his turn as a former good-ol'-boy sheriff turned federal agent, who knows all too well how racism and prejudice operate in the town, and is willing to bend the rules to bring the killers to justice. You can stream Mississippi Burning free with ads on Pluto TV, catch it on Prime Video, or rent it from Apple TV.

at Apple TV

Unforgiven (1992)

Unforgiven was seen as a valedictory for Clint Eastwood, but the movie’s sole acting Oscar went to Hackman. He plays Sheriff Little Bill Daggett, whose rejection of vigilantism puts him at odds with Eastwood’s William Munny, in town to avenge the disfiguring of a sex worker. Munny may be the movie’s center, but Little Bill provides all the conflict, and it offers a later-career return to the types of complicated, morally grey characters of his earlier days. You can stream or rent Unforgiven from Prime Video.

Unforgiven (1992)

The Quick and the Dead (1995)

The Quick and the Dead (1995)

Everyone says Unforgiven is a revisionist western, but it looks wildly traditional next to Sam Raimi’s deliberately over-the-top take on the genre. Hackman plays John Herod, the ruthless and endlessly greedy ruler of the Old West town of Redemption. Herod arranges a round-robin style contest of champions in town, in which gunfighters are to fight for cash, win, yield, or die. This isn’t a subtle or insightful performance, but a delightfully hammy one. Even when playing a very recognizable Gene Hackman type, the actor could still be awfully fun to watch. You can stream The Quick and the Dead on Hulu or rent it from Prime Video.

at Hulu

Crimson Tide (1995)

Though sometimes dismissed as a spin on The Hunt for Red October, this submarine thriller is impressively smart, pitting Hackman’s experienced sub commander against Denzel Washington as his first officer, both men in conflict over interpretation of an order to launch missiles, the outcome of which could have devastating consequences. You don’t necessarily come to a Tony Scott action thriller for the acting, but the movie is a real showcase for its leads, and a fascinating juxtaposition of two brilliant actors from different generations. You can rent Crimson Tide from Prime Video.

Crimson Tide (1995)

Get Shorty (1995)

Gene Hackman's range encompassed all types of characters, but he rarely seemed to be having more fun than when playing a sleazeball—something he does with gusto in this satire of mid-'90s Hollywood excess, directed by Barry Sonnenfeld and based on the novel by Elmore Leonard. He plays a B-movie director in debt with the mob who gets in way over his head when he get involved with a movie-obsessed loan shark (John Travolta) in an attempt to get out a tight spot. Unsurprisingly, things don't go smoothly. You can stream Get Shorty free with ads on the Roku Channel or rent it from Prime Video.

Get Shorty (1995)

at The Roku Channel

The Birdcage (1996)

An indisputable crowd-pleaser, The Birdcage sees Hackman as a thoroughly conservative senator (in stark contrast to the actor’s real-life politics) who heads to South Beach to meet the EXTREMELY GAY family of his daughter’s fiancée. It’s a fun villain-esque role for Hackman, one that memorably sees him in full drag for the final act. You can rent The Birdcage from Prime Video.

The Birdcage (1996)

Enemy of the State (1998)

Enemy of the State (1998)

This surveillance-state thriller isn’t nearly as smart as its 1970s influences, but it’s entirely entertaining in the way it approaches many of the same themes with a more action-heavy style. Opposite Will Smith, Hackman here plays Brill Lyle, a paranoid surveillance expert who has so much in common with The Conversation’s Harry Caul that you might consider Enemy of the State a blockbuster take on the earlier film. You can rent Enemy of the State from Prime Video.

Heist (2001)

The same year Steven Soderbergh's Ocean's Eleven pulled off a box office cash grab on the backs of (almost) a dozen of Hollywood hottest stars, David Mamet built his own crime caper around a band of aging thieves. Hackman plays the leader of a gang of professional smash-and-grabbers whose face is captured by security cameras during a job, forcing him to go on the run and attracting the ire of his partners in the "business." Hackman handles Mamet's mouthfuls of dialogue with practiced ease, elevating what Roger Ebert described as "the kind of caper movie that was made before special effects replaced wit, construction, and intelligence." You can rent Heist from Prime Video.

Heist (2001)

The Royal Tenenbaums (2001)

The Royal Tenenbaums (2001)

Though he'd appear in a few more movies before retiring in 2004, Wes Anderson's The Royal Tenenbaums was Hackman's last standout performance, and one of his very best. He's hateable and irresistible in equal measure as the deeply flawed patriarch of a deeply neurotic, Salinger-inspired New York family who assembles his estranged wife (Anjelica Huston) and deeply resentful children (played by Luke Wilson, Ben Stiller, and Gwyneth Paltrow) to tell them he only has weeks to live. You can rent The Royal Tenenbaums from Prime Video.

Nebula Capsule 3 GTV Projector

This Can-Sized Projector Is $120 Off

Daniel Oropeza — Thu, 27 Feb 2025 19:00:00 +0000

We may earn a commission from links on this page. Deal pricing and availability subject to change after time of publication.

Projectors are a great option for some evening entertainment inside and outdoors (once the weather warms up a bit), but they can be a little bulky. If you're looking for a smaller projector you can take with you to a party or a friend's house, consider the Nebula Capsule 3 GTV projector, currently $379.99 (originally $499.99), the lowest price it has been according to price-tracking tools.

Resolution: 1080p, Streaming: Google TV, Brightness: 200 lumens, Engine: DLP.

The Nebula Capsule 3 came out this past September to an "excellent" review from PCMag. It has an 8-watt speaker, which is decent for a portable projector, but it won't fill a room with sound. Luckily, it does have an eARC port for a home theater setup.

What sets this projector apart is its small size of 4.7 inches by 2.7 inches (height by diameter), which is about the size of a tall beer can. The image correction is fast, responsive, and works well—an important feature since you're likely going to be moving the projector often. The auto focus will adjust to the distance and angle of whatever surface you're casting it on.

The brightness is 200 lumens, which is not a lot. You'll be limited to darker rooms to get a good image. The resolution is just 1080p with a maximum screen size of 120-inches, which is decent. This is enough for casual watching in a bedroom, but you won't get the same picture quality, colors, or blacks that home projectors offer. With Google TV, you'll be able to use Chromecast to mirror your phone on the screen, download apps, and watch free live TV.

The battery life is up to two and a half hours, long enough to watch most movies. At its current price, it's even with the weaker Nebula Capsule Air, making it a great deal.

This Dyson Vacuum Is $120 Off Right Now

Lindsey Ellefson — Thu, 27 Feb 2025 18:30:00 +0000

We may earn a commission from links on this page. Deal pricing and availability subject to change after time of publication.

While I was poking around online shopping this week, I noticed a great deal: Amazon has the Dyson V8 Plus Cordless Vacuum marked down to $349.99, a 26% discount off its normal price of $469.99. A little over a quarter off doesn't usually move me, as far as sales go, but on something as expensive as a Dyson that's a solid deal. The spring and summer get dusty and allergen-y, so a strong vacuum is always a smart upgrade to make before the sneezy season hits.

Dyson V8 Plus Cordless Vacuum (Silver/Nickel)

I have loved every Dyson vacuum (and, frankly, all Dyson products) I've ever used and everyone I know with one feels the same, but before I recommended this sale confidently, I wanted to check around other parts of the internet to make sure I wasn't missing something about Amazon's markdown. I was missing something: This thing is on sale everywhere, which is great news if you have a membership or general brand loyalty to one store or another. The $349.99 price point on the Dyson V8 Plus is reflected not only on Amazon, but at the following retailers:

Basically, wherever you're most likely to shop, you can find the cordless vac on sale. Take it as a sign you should finally upgrade your hoover.

Dyson V8 Plus product details

Why upgrade to this one, though, beyond the fact that it's on sale? It runs for up to 40 minutes on a single charge but is still light enough that it's not a hassle to carry around, weighing in at 5.6 pounds. It will run for a shorter amount if you turn on MAX mode, but having access to an even more powerful suction when you're facing a major mess is worth it. Besides being a traditional stick vacuum, it also transforms into a handheld device to reach difficult spots. It docks to your wall to charge and stay out of your way, has attachments to reach high spaces, empties out with the push of a button, and makes quick work of dust, hair, and fur. Dyson really does make a quality vacuum and this one, with its low price, is a solid entry point if you've been looking into getting one.

How to Hook Grip a Barbell

Beth Skwarecki — Thu, 27 Feb 2025 18:00:00 +0000

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As we’ve discussed before, there are three ways to hold onto a barbell if you’re worried your grip is going to slip. You can use straps; you can face your palms in different directions (mixed grip); or you can hook your thumb underneath your fingers, a technique known as hook grip. A hook grip is more secure than mixed, and it's essential for lifts like snatches and cleans where mixed grip isn't an option. Yes, it hurts. Yes, you'll get used to it.

I am happy to report that, after six years of training and competing in olympic weightlifting (where hook grip is neither feared nor debated, but simply a part of life), I now believe that hook grip is not nearly as painful as it is reputed to be. And yes, I am the person who wrote in an earlier article that hook grip “hurts like hell.” This is partly because I’ve gotten used to it, but it’s also partly because I used to do it wrong. So here are some tips for learning how to get comfortable with hook grip.

Use a thinner bar

This is a tip for everyone, but especially people with small hands (including most women). You'll find a wide variety of barbells in most gyms, and they aren't all the same diameter at the handle. Some are thick and sturdy; these are hard to grip, and may be reserved for squats or bench press, where that doesn't matter as much. Bars made for deadlifts or for Olympic weightlifting will be thinner, making it easier to wrap your fingers around.

So make sure that the bar you're trying to hook grip isn't a super thick one. If you have larger hands, any normal barbell should be fine—that usually means a 28 millimeter handle. Deadlift bars tend to be a little thinner at 27 millimeters, and women's Olympic weightlifting bars are the thinnest common bar, at 25 millimeters.

If you've had trouble trying to hook grip on a regular bar, try a women's bar and see if you can get the technique to click. I used to think I "couldn't" hook grip a regular bar, but after I learned to hook grip properly with a women's bar, I found that I was able to hook a men's bar without too much trouble.

Lay your thumb so it is parallel to the bar

A common mistake—and a thing that makes hook grip hurt a lot more than it needs to—is placing your thumb on the bar incorrectly. Don’t think of your thumb as wrapping underneath the bar; it’s not like a pincer opposing your fingers. You also don't want to grip the bar with your thumb, as if your thumb's job were to squeeze the bar. The purpose of the thumb, in a hook grip, is to provide a sort of roadblock to stop things from slipping.

I took some photos of myself setting my hook grip on a bar, so you can see exactly how I do it. (I'm sure every lifter has their own idiosyncrasies, but mine should be a solid example to convey the basics.) Here's how I set my grip:

First I find my hand placement on the bar (usually by lining up my hand with the knurling or the rings).
I press the web of my thumb into the bar, which allows me to reach my thumb away from my body, and bring the side of my thumb into contact with the bar.
When I bring the rest of my hand back into place, my middle finger crosses my thumbnail perpendicularly. (If you can only remember one checkpoint for whether you're doing it right, remember this.)
I loosely wrap the rest of my fingers around the bar. I don't have to squeeze—the hook locks everything into place.

Credit: Beth Skwarecki

The exact positions will depend on the size and shape of your hands, and you may find yourself grasping the bar slightly differently for a wide grip (snatch grip) versus a closer grip. But make sure that your thumb goes more or less along the bar, parallel to its length. (It may help to think about pointing your thumb toward your pinky.) You do not want to jam your thumb under as many fingers as possible, nor should you try to wrap it deeply around the bar. If you get a pain in your thumb knuckle, where your thumb meets your palm, this is likely what you’re doing wrong.

Practice

Will it still hurt? Your first time going heavy, yeah. But you'll get used to it more quickly than you think. If you commit to making hook grip work, and using it as often as possible, the adaptation process only takes about two weeks. If any pain, bruises, or calluses develop, they should be mild, roughly parallel to the length of your thumb, and on the side of your thumb rather than in the middle of the thumb pad or on the knuckle.

During this time, hook grip everything that you can. If that means you're only hook gripping your deadlift warmups, but once there's more than 135 pounds on the bar you can't stand it, that's fine for that day. Next time you do deadlifts, you'll probably be able to hook 135 just fine, and maybe you have to switch back to your old grip at 225. You get the idea. Before long, you'll be hook gripping everything. To get more practice, hook grip every exercise you can (rows, etc) just for the sake of practice.

Once you're used to hook grip, the pain won't be an issue, but I'd be lying to say your thumbs will always feel great. If I'm doing an exercise for multiple reps, I'll use straps rather than hook grip 10 heavy reps in a row. Some lifters like to tape their thumbs. This provides a little compression, so the pressure doesn't hurt as much, and it also prevents the knurling from digging into your skin. You can use regular athletic tape if you leave a cutout for your knuckle, but it's more common these days to use a stretchy, grippy thumb tape like this over your whole thumb.

Warm Body Cold Mind Premium Lifting Thumb Tape

$15.99 at Amazon

Finally, There's a Fix for Apple Mail's Weird Archiving Behavior

Khamosh Pathak — Thu, 27 Feb 2025 17:39:00 +0000

If all you want is a simple, reliable email client, Apple's Mail app is superb choice. And over the years, it's only gotten better. But until now, it's had this one weird quirk that has users running to third-party clients like Gmail or Outlook.

It has to do with how the Archive feature works. When you archive an email that you're reading, the Mail app automatically opens the next email in your inbox. Now, that's great if you're just going through newsletters. But when this happens, the next email is marked as read automatically, something you might not want to do in every case (like if the sender is using a tracking service, or if you were saving that email to read later).

It's a small thing, but it takes some agency away from you, and that makes it quite annoying to deal with. Luckily, Apple seems to have finally realized this, and in iOS 18.4, which is currently in Developer beta, the company has provided a hidden settings option to change this behavior. Why Apple just doesn't just make the fix the default, and why this has to be an obscure settings item, is beyond me.

Either way, if you're running iOS 18.4 use the Mail app regularly, go to the Settings app. Then, go to the Mail section and choose Delete or Move Message Action. Here, switch to the Don't Select a Message option.

Boom. You're all set. Now, when you're reading a message in the Mail app and delete, archive, or move it, the app won't automatically open the next message, and instead you'll go back to the Inbox view. What a revolution!

Speaking of the Inbox, if your device is running Apple Intelligence, you might have noticed that the Mail app looks a bit different now. It has a bunch of categories up top, and AI summaries, and even Priority emails that never manage to highlight the actually important messages. If you don't like all or some of these AI features, I have some good news—you can turn that all off. Follow this guide to disable all the new AI features in the iPhone mail app and go back to how things used to be. Of course, except for the old archive thing. Because, for once, this change is actually useful.

Nine Desserts From Around the World to Celebrate Fat Tuesday

Allie Chanthorn Reinmann — Thu, 27 Feb 2025 17:00:00 +0000

Whether or not you plan on observing the Christian season of Lent, celebrating Mardi Gras (or Fat Tuesday) is a great excuse to chow down on some desserts. In the past, Lent meant abstaining from indulgent foods like butter, sugar, and eggs. As Christianity spread across different parts of the globe, during a time when food spoiled relatively quickly, there was no hope in preserving these ingredients during the 40-day period of fasting. Instead of tossing it all, there was a massive clear-out feast: Everything had to go. In the wake of this food-liquidation period, many creative and indulgent treats were born. Most of them are fried. All of them are carbs. Here are nine exquisite treats with which to celebrate the fattest days of the week.

Paczki

A Polish creation now enjoyed around the world, paczki is a fluffy fried dough that is often filled with fruit jams, much like the American jelly doughnut. Paczki might even be filled and topped with chopped fruit, as fruit would also spoil over the fasting period, along with the other primary ingredients. They are made from a rich, yeast-raised dough that usually includes a splash of alcohol. They’re fried until golden, then filled or left fantastically plain and fluffy, before being finished with powdered sugar or icing.

Fastnacht

The word “fastnacht” refers to both the celebratory snack and the time for enjoying them–just before Lenten fasting. The German variety of fastnacht are pillowy, yeast-raised, deep-fried doughnuts that you can eat with a dollop of blackstrap molasses (which sounds like a lot of intense flavor for me, but I support your choices). It’s the Pennsylvania Dutch version of fastnacht that has piqued my interest. This doughnut is made from a yeast-raised potato dough with plenty of butter and sugar. This recipe repurposes mashed potatoes. I also appreciate this recipe for the helpful tips on changing out the oil, and advice on definitely not using expired yeast.

Semlor buns

Credit: Allie Chanthorn Reinmann

I hate to present you with something un-fried, but these semlor buns are too wonderful to ignore. Eaten in Sweden during the weeks leading up to Fat Tuesday, the plush buns are cardamom-scented and baked. Carve the center out of the baked and cooled roll, and pipe it full of a sweetened almond filling, followed by a heap of whipped cream. Top it with the small bit of roll you took out of the center. This recipe uses a tangzhong mixture to keep the roll soft.

Haitian beignets

There are beignets, like the flour-based ones popular in New Orleans for Mardi Gras, and then there are beignets, like the ones made in Haiti with a banana-based dough. There’s no need to proof the dough, and they’re shaped by simply dropping the batter into the frying oil. Check out this recipe for a straightforward mixing and frying method.

King cake

In several regions of the United States (but none as iconic as New Orleans) the days leading up to Mardi Gras must include this behemoth of a bread. The king cake is a sweet, enriched, yeast-raised treat, covered in icing and yellow, purple, and green sprinkles. It’s an explosion of sugar, color, and flavor. King cakes can be left unfilled, highlighting their soft, doughnut-like texture, or the raw dough can be filled and swirled with jams, nuts, or cinnamon and sugar. The dough is then braided, or twisted and shaped into a circle before baking. Tradition requires the baker to tuck a small token, usually a plastic baby, into the bread. Whoever gets the slice with the baby brings the king cake next time. My king cake video includes a recipe and how-to tutorial.

Hornazo de jueves lardero

Getting rid of all your perishables in one dish never looked more obvious or more enticing than in the hornazo. Hornazo de jueves lardero refers to the foods in your larder being baked together and eaten on Fat Thursday. Usually made and enjoyed in different regions of Spain, the hornazo can be made with a sweet or savory bread depending on the locality. Make the bread of your choosing, proof it, and when you’re ready to bake, tuck a raw egg, some cured sausage, and a slice or two of bacon right on top. Bake as usual. By the time the bread has fully baked, the meats and eggs will have too. You can follow this how-to video to learn how to make it.

Fritole and dolci di carnevale

Italy has no shortage of dishes for celebrating the days leading up to Lent. Among them are lasagna and ravioli, but no celebration would be complete without some sweet fried carbs. Dolci di carnevale include such fancies as the zeppole and cicerchiata, and no Venetian carnevale is complete without fritole. Fritole are yeast-raised, fried dough fritters, bolstered with a splash of booze and studded with raisins. Fry until crisp and dust with a heap of powdered sugar.

All the pancakes

Credit: Natalia Van Doninck/Shutterstock

At this point, you might think “doughnut day” makes more sense as a name, but in several countries, including Great Britain and Ireland, you may hear the day before Lent referred to as Shrove Tuesday, or “pancake day.” When you think about it, if everyone’s dumping eggs, butter, sugar and flour into the bowl, then you’re getting pancakes or doughnuts, depending on the leavening agent you have remaining in your pantry. Shrove Tuesday pancakes are a bit thinner than the fluffy disks you may be accustomed to, but slightly bulkier than a French crepe. Try this recipe, which makes the batter easy to prepare with the help of a blender.

Alle belles

A traditional indulgence for Pancake Tuesday in the state of Goa, India, alle belles are crepe-like in appearance but contain no eggs. Considering the price of eggs lately, this might be the pancake for you. The filling is a stunner. Alle belles pancakes are wrapped around a filling of chopped coconut, cashews, and jaggery. The filling softens slightly as it sits in the warm pancake, delivering delicate sweetness and a harmony of textures. Try this recipe, which yields about 10 pancakes.

These Are the Best Free Email Providers for 2025

Pranay Parab — Thu, 27 Feb 2025 16:30:59 +0000

Setting up a free email account has never been easier. You now have many great options that promise lots of storage or convenient features, although there are a few things to keep in mind when picking one. The rule of thumb is that if you're getting a free email service, you're probably paying with your privacy, because the company has to make money at the end of the day. Depending on the company, it could use your emails to serve ads, track you across the web, or even use the text in your emails to train AI. However, there are exceptions to that rule, specifically when it comes to end-to-end encryption.

It's a tough balance. In general, you’ll have to pay real money to avoid compromises—services that focus on privacy might suffer elsewhere. But if you're not ready to pay or set up your own private email server yet, here are your best free alternatives. You're not even limited to one option—it’s a good idea to create multiple email accounts and use them for different purposes, so you should mix and match based on your needs.

Gmail is the best email provider for most people

Credit: Pranay Parab

Gmail is the best email service for most people, hands down. It’s reliable, filters spam well, and gives you 15GB of cloud file storage for free. Plus, it's practically unavoidable. It’s hard to be on the internet and avoid Google entirely, and at some point, you’re probably going to need a Google account. From setting up most Android phones to accessing a shared Google Doc, Gmail serves a wide range of audiences pretty well.

Your Gmail account also comes with unlimited addresses, which is a great way to check if a service sold your email ID to spammers. The biggest argument against Gmail is that it’s owned by Google, which makes money by tracking you online to help personalize the ads you see elsewhere. If you are privacy conscious, then this isn’t the right email service for you.

Pros: Ubiquitous, easy to use, feature-rich, integrates with other Google products
Cons: Lots of advertising based on mining your data

Outlook is the best Gmail alternative for most people

Credit: Pranay Parab

For those who don’t want to use Gmail, but are looking for a similar service, Microsoft’s Outlook is the best option. Just like Gmail, Outlook is backed by a tech giant and will almost certainly be around for years to come. Plus, you get up to 15GB of email storage and 5GB of additional OneDrive storage for free. It’s a reliable alternative to Gmail, but once again, it’s not the email service you want to use if privacy is your top priority.

Pros: Backed by a major tech company; a feature-rich Gmail alternative
Cons: Like Google, Microsoft doesn’t care that much about your privacy

Proton Mail is the best email service for privacy

Credit: Pranay Parab

Proton Mail is the best free email service for privacy-conscious people. It offers 1GB of storage, a limit of 150 emails per day, and up to 10 aliases for free, which is good enough to get started. My Gmail account is over a decade old and it still uses less than 1GB of storage, so it’s possible to manage with that storage limit for quite a while. Proton Mail also gives you a fair bit more than mail, too, even if you aren't spending a dime. You'll get a free VPN for one device and a free password manager as well.

Proton Mail’s biggest advantage is end-to-end encryption, which means your messages cannot be intercepted or read by Proton Mail or third parties. This is a great privacy feature as long as you’re communicating with Proton Mail users or people using other end-to-end encrypted email providers, but it’s not as effective if you’re communicating with people on ad-supported email accounts. Everything could be totally private on your end, but your friend’s email service could read the contents of your email pretty easily. If you're ready to pay, Proton Unlimited offers great value with more email addresses, more storage space, and advanced privacy features like dark web monitoring.

Pros: Great for privacy; end-to-end encryption
Cons: Only 1GB of storage and a daily sending limit

Tuta is also a great privacy-focused email provider

Credit: Pranay Parab

If you need an encrypted email service that offers open-source desktop clients, Tuta could be one to consider. It has a free tier with 1GB storage and no ads, which is also a plus. While Tuta is end-to-end encrypted, your privacy depends on the encryption status of the people you're emailing. Just as with Proton Mail, email encryption needs all parties onboard and if even one person is on an unencrypted service, your privacy is compromised. Tuta comes with one calendar in the free tier, but you'll have to pay if you want to set up multiple calendars.

One good thing is that Tuta doesn't restrict how many emails you can send or receive per day. The only limitation is storage. You also get apps for mobile use.

Pros: Encryption, privacy, and no sending limits
Cons: Just 1GB storage

Yahoo Mail is the best free email for free storage

Credit: Joel Cunningham

If you want the maximum possible storage on your free email account, believe it or not, Yahoo Mail is your best bet. The provider lets you use up to 1TB storage (yes, that’s 1,000GB) for free. The catch is that it still limits you to a maximum of 25MB of attachments per email, so you can’t start attaching 4K movies to your emails. It also comes with other useful features, such as an easy way to unsubscribe from newsletters. However, Yahoo Mail also shows you ads in your inbox and isn’t really the service you want to use if you’re concerned about privacy.

Pros: Tons of free storage
Cons: As ad-heavy and invasive as other services, plus you have to have an “@yahoo” or, worse, “@aol” email address. (Certain people will judge you, if only subconsciously.)

iCloud Mail is easiest to set up for Apple users

Credit: Pranay Parab

For anyone who already has an Apple Account, setting up an iCloud Mail account is really easy. Go to your device's settings and tap your name. Then, click or tap through to iCloud > Mail, and follow the on-screen instructions to set it up. Since you already have an Apple Account, you don't need to create a new password and you can start using the service for free. iCloud Mail's free tier offers 5GB space and it has no ads. Note that this 5GB is shared with your photos, device backups, and everything else on iCloud, so effectively, it is smaller than you might expect. However, if you're on an Apple device, you have the added advantage of not having to install any apps to use the service, because your iPhone, iPad, and Mac ship with the Mail app pre-installed.

iCloud Mail can be accessed on Windows, Android, and the web, too. The easiest way to use iCloud Mail on non-Apple devices is via the iCloud website, although there is an iCloud for Windows app for PC. Note that you'll still need an Apple Account for this, which you can create for free at https://account.apple.com/.

For Android, you can also easily add your iCloud Mail to your phone's mail app. Log in to your Apple Account here and select App-specific passwords. Create a new password and save it for later. Add a new account to your favorite email app, select the IMAP option, and type your iCloud email ID and the app-specific password. This will add the email ID to your Android phone.

Apple's Mail app gets regular updates, and you can access privacy features such as protection against email tracking even on iCloud Mail's free tier. But while this service is great for many people, it is slightly wonky at times. I've failed to receive some emails on iCloud Mail at times because they got flagged as spam and never landed in my inbox. On the plus side, you can add up to three aliases to iCloud Mail, which is good if you want to protect your actual email address from being compromised.

Pros: Easy set up, three aliases for free
Cons: Occasionally buggy, just 5GB of free space (shared with iCloud Photos and your device backups)

AOL is the best free email for unlimited storage

Credit: Daniel Oropeza

Another throwback, AOL Mail, offers a lot of the same benefits as Yahoo Mail, with a similar feature set and size limits (they're owned by the same company). AOL is user-friendly, lets you organize and personalize your inbox, and offers a spell-checker, calendar, and a to-do list feature on top of the features most email clients have. It's compatible with Android and iOS apps and you can transfer your contact list from CSV, TXT, or LDIF files.

Pros: Unlimited free storage
Cons: You're limited to 25 MB for your email attachments

Zoho Mail lets you use custom email address domains for free

Credit: Pranay Parab

The biggest problem with almost every free email provider is you have no control over the domain name associated with your email address. You’ll be stuck with email addresses that end in @gmail.com, @yahoo.com, @outlook.com, etc.

If you want to use your own domain name with your free email, check out Zoho Mail. Its free plan lets you add up to five users to your account and offers 5GB of free storage per user. There are no ads, but you won’t get IMAP or POP3 sync features for the mobile app, which means there may be delays in receiving mobile notifications for new emails. The service will still work pretty well on your desktop browser.

Pros: You can use a custom @
Cons: Only 5GB storage and no IMAP or POP3 syncing

Neo is the best free email for small business owners

Credit: Daniel Oropeza

Small business owners, freelancers, or anyone who wants to see how their emails are performing and how many people are actually reading them can see basic email analytic tools like CTR (click-through rate) and open rates with Neo. It's also a great alternative to Zoho, since it lets you choose a domain for free and has up to 100GB of storage. You can use an AI feature for writing emails, but you don't get five user accounts like on Zoho. However, if you run into trouble, be warned that Neo's support isn't known to be the best.

Pros: See CTR and Open rates
Cons: The support isn't very responsive

This Subscription-Free Security Camera Is $20 Right Now

Pradershika Sharma — Thu, 27 Feb 2025 16:00:00 +0000

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The TP-Link Tapo C402 is $19.99 on Woot for the next two days or until it sells out. If you're a Prime member, you get free shipping; otherwise, it’ll cost you an extra $6.

This camera is IP65-rated, meaning it can handle rain and dust, and has a bullet-style design that makes it easy to mount. You get a 90-day Woot Limited Warranty, which isn’t long, but at this price, it’s hard to complain. It records in 1080p with a 125-degree field of view, offering sharp, color-rich daytime footage. At night, it switches between full-color video (though the colors reportedly appear a bit washed out) using built-in spotlights and black-and-white infrared video, depending on lighting conditions.

For storage, the C402 supports microSD cards up to 512GB, but you’ll need to buy one separately if you want local storage. If you’d rather store footage online, TP-Link offers a Premium Tapo Care ($3.49 monthly or $34.99 annually) plan, which includes 30 days of video history, smart sorting for recorded clips, and rich notifications. Even if you skip the subscription, you still get free intelligent alerts for people, pets, and vehicles, privacy zone controls, two-way audio, and live view through the app, notes this PCMag review. Additional controls in the app include adjusting the spotlight brightness, formatting a microSD card, manually recording a video, and enabling or disabling the built-in 94dB siren, among others.

The C402 connects via 2.4GHz wifi and works with Alexa, Google Assistant, and IFTTT applets to integrate with other compatible smart home devices. It does not support Apple HomeKit. A 6,400mAh rechargeable battery powers the unit, which TP-Link claims can last up to 180 days per charge—though, in reality, that depends on usage. For those wanting a more hands-off power solution, the TP-Link Tapo SolarCam C402 Kit is available for $44.99 (down from $50.98), allowing the camera to run indefinitely on solar energy for a more set-it-and-forget-it experience.

Designate a 'Purgatory' Box for Less Stressful Decluttering

Lindsey Ellefson — Thu, 27 Feb 2025 15:00:00 +0000

Getting rid of stuff can be hard, even if you’re not exactly a hoarder. It’s hard enough for so many of us in our consumerist society, in fact, that scientists have studied why that is—and are always coming up with ways to overcome an aversion to decluttering our lives. Just in time for spring cleaning season, look to research published in the Journal of Consumer Psychology that suggests there’s a way to ease yourself into parting with old belongings: Instead of throwing them out all at once, banish them to purgatory first.

What it means to put clutter in “purgatory”

The researchers, Mathew S. Isaac and Poornima Vinoo, kicked off their paper by explaining that people who struggle to part with their possessions tend to jump through hoops to avoid doing it and may only manage to do so by employing “various behavioral strategies” to ease the psychological strain. One such strategy that has proven useful for some, the researchers note, is relegating unnecessary but hard-to-part-with items to “out of sight” status, in the hopes that they will then drop out of mind and can be later disposed of, minus the hand-wringing. “According to ethnographic research, one such strategy is to move products into purgatories, or temporary liminal spaces,” they write.

In other words: Before throwing out your old photos, books, receipts, mementos, or knick knacks for good, put them into a space somewhere between your everyday environment and the trash. Essentially, banish things you think you should probably get rid of to a box or a junk drawer where you won’t access them, but you’ll know they’re still around. Once you no longer have to look at them every day, you’ll hopefully realize how little you actually need them once it’s time for a major purge, and they’ll be easier to donate, sell, or trash.

Why the purgatory method helps you get rid of your junk

Isaac and Vinoo reviewed three existing studies that indicated moving items into “purgatories” helps people brace for the inevitability of disposal. However, their research uncovered a new reason it works, and it has nothing to do with a reduction of attachment. “Specifically, purgatories are shown to trigger mental simulation of the product disposal process, thereby helping product owners brace for the looming loss of their product,” they write.

In simpler terms, when you condemn an item to its purgatory, it’s a practice run for throwing it away for real. Not only will you be lessening your attachment to physical objects in a gradual way by removing them from your everyday environment, you’ll be rehearsing for the moment when you actually junk them permanently.

How to get started putting your excess stuff into purgatory

When you're decluttering, make a separate pile of things you think you could get rid of, even if you aren’t quite ready to pull the trigger yet, in addition to the clear-cut piles of things to toss, sell, donate, and keep. You don’t have to commit to throwing them all away, but this will get you thinking about the possibility. Outdated clothes you don’t wear anymore, single-use kitchen tools you haven’t picked up in ages, and toys your kids have aged out of—basically, all the stuff you hold onto for sentimental or "just in case" reasons—can go into purgatory.

Make sure “purgatory” is someplace you won’t have to look at every day. The idea is to forget what’s in there so you can see just how inconsequential it really is. Put the box deep in a closet, down in the basement, or on a shelf in the garage. For maximum efficiency, use separate boxes for things that won’t be useful to anyone else, and things that could reasonably be donated. That way, when it's time for them to go to their final resting place, you can bring one box to the donation center and throw one out without having to go through them again, which will reduce the likelihood of you reneging on anything that's in there.

Challenge yourself not to venture into purgatory except to put more stuff in there—but take heart knowing the research shows you probably won’t even want to. Set a reminder in your phone for a month from now, and on that day, transport the items to their final destination, whether that’s the trash or the donation center. In the event you find you actually need to use something from the box during that month, you can consider taking it as a sign that the item was a necessary one. (That is very unlikely, by the way.)

Other ways to part with things you're not sure about

I know better than anyone how easy it is to manufacture excuses for not getting rid of clutter. I am the reigning queen of holding on to something "just in case" I need it in the future. The thing is, though, you can make that excuse for everything you own. A purgatory box is a great way to bridge the gap between knowing something is probably trash and actually throwing it out, which is why I have a purgatory shelf for old clothes. But there are other methods designed to make it easier on you to toss things out on sight and those get even faster results than having to wait around to dispose of a box for a month.

I recommend familiarizing yourself with these decluttering questions. When you're sorting through a closet, a cabinet, a drunk drawer, or wherever else, asking objective, reasonable questions is one of the easiest ways to disentangle from any sentimentality or excuse-making. Some of the questions include, "Would I know I had this if I needed it?" and "When was the last time I used this?" Reframing how you think of a particular item and its utility can help you part with it. I used to be all about the KonMari method, which has you ask yourself if each item you pick up "sparks joy" for you, but the issue was that I could do enough mental and emotional gymnastics to claim that everything I owned sparked joy. If you're like me, switching over to a more rigid (and, admittedly, harsher) line of questioning can be the push you need.

If, after answering the questions about a certain item, you're still unsure whether you can give it up, toss it into the purgatory box. Combining methods is totally fine as long as you commit to the goal of ultimately getting rid of what isn't serving you and is, in fact, just mucking up your space.

15 Heart-Stopping Medical Dramas to Stream After ‘The Pitt’

Ross Johnson — Thu, 27 Feb 2025 14:00:00 +0000

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Noah Wiley can't seem to escape the emergency room. After spending more than a decade on NBC's '90s mega-hit E.R., he's back in scrubs for HBO's buzzy new doctor show The Pitt. If that show hasn't quite scratched your itch for medical drama, there are plenty of other shows to stream.

The genre's roots can be traced back to the early '60s, and the sexy Dr. Kildare, but it really exploded in the '70s with shows like Medical Center, Emergency!, and Quincy, M.E., all of them fairly soapy dramas with plenty of action and occasional doses of silliness. Later in the decade, M.A.S.H. became a hit by lacing the sit-com formula with medical pathos, but it was 1982's St. Elsewhere that gave us the template for the medical shows of today: dramatic, serious, and with a large cast of doctors and nurses whose personal lives are often in conflict with their work. That show set the standard, and inspired dozens of medical shows that followed—a bunch of which you can currently find on your favorite streaming service.

The Pitt (2025 – )

But first, a little about The Pitt if you have yet to check in for your appointment. Noah Wyle (ER) is back in scrubs as Dr. Michael "Robby" Rabinavitch, senior attending at the Pittsburgh Trauma Medical Hospital’s emergency room. Robby’s mentor died during the height of COVID-19, and he’s only just recovering from his traumatic experiences. It's gonna be a long day, though: Each episode is a single hour of his 15-hour shift. It’s relatively early days, but the show has already won critical acclaim and a renewal for a second season. You can stream The Pitt on Max.

The Pitt (2025 – )

Call the Midwife (2012 – )

Watson (2025 – )

Hard to say if this new Morris Chestnut-led series will go any kind of distance, but it’s looking promising, and the premise is so wacky, it's worth checking out either way. Chestnut plays a modern-day Dr. John Watson (yes, that Dr. Watson), who was sidekick to Sherlock Holmes before his detective pal took a header off of the Reichenbach Falls. Now he’s on his own in Pittsburgh, running clinic dedicated to helping people with mysterious ailments—ones requiring a doctor who’s also a bit of a detective. You can stream Watson on Paramount+.

Watson (2025 – )

Call the Midwife (2012 – )

Set at the dawn of Britain’s National Health Service, Call the Midwife explores an era when many were receiving modern healthcare for the very first time, as the nuns of London's Nonnatus House, who had been providing basic midwifery services for decades, are joined by secular nurses and given public funding. The show deals frankly with women’s health issues in a way that few other series have ever bothered, and its rotating cast of characters has helped it to remain a beloved favorite for over a decade, both in its native Britain and across the pond. You can stream Call the Midwife on Netflix and PBS.

New Amsterdam (2018 – 2023)

Even the most realistic medical dramas have soapy aspects, but New Amsterdam leans into that side of things more than most. Ryan Eggold plays Dr. Maximus "Max" Goodwin, the slightly annoying new medical director at one of the oldest public hospitals in the U.S. He looking to freshen up the outdated hospital and bring down its stodgy bureaucracy, with Doctor Who’s Freema Agyeman by his side. The show occasionally sags under the weight of its subplots, but it’s still fun to watch Max fight for public health. You can stream New Amsterdam on Peacock.

New Amsterdam (2018 – 2023)

House (2004 – 2012)

Like the much more recent Watson, House showcases investigative medicine, with Hugh Laurie’s as the titular Dr. Holmes (er, House) and Robert Sean Leonard as Watson (OK, Wilson). Not only is the show tightly paced and compact, it also has the benefit of Laurie, giving a career-defining performance as one of TV’s greatest assholes, a wonderfully acerbic curmudgeon who nonetheless gets results. You can stream House on Prime Video, Hulu, and Peacock.

House (2004 – 2012)

Getting On (2013 - 2015)

One of the few medical shows willing to tackle aging and geriatric care, Getting On considers the trials faced by the staff at an underfunded extended care facility. The fact that it’s a frequently very dark comedy doesn’t make it any less impressive in its handling of tough topics. Laurie Metcalf, Alex Borstein, Niecy Nash, and Mel Rodriguez star. You can stream Getting On on Max.

Getting On (2013 - 2015)

The Knick (2014 - 2015)

The Steven Soderbergh-directed The Knick takes us back to the glory days of American medical care—specifically, 1900 New York, and the fictional Knickerbocker Hospital, with Clive Owen’s Dr. John Thackery as the well-intentioned head of surgery who also happens to have a rather significant opium addiction. He’s joined by André Holland as Dr. Algernon C. Edwards, a Black assistant chief surgeon who runs rings around most of his colleagues but still can’t seem to get any credit for it (he’s based on a couple of real-life doctors of the era). Like the best period medical dramas, this one’s a good reminder that modern medicine ain’t so bad. You can stream The Knick on Max.

The Knick (2014 - 2015)

St. Elsewhere (1982 - 1987)

St. Elsewhere (1982 - 1987)

Beginning life as a gritty, realistic-ish hospital drama, St. Elsewhere grew into something weirder, funnier, and far more experimental, leading to that all-time memorable series finale (iykyk). In doing so, it also created a template followed by every medical show that followed it. The cast alone is wild, made up of TV and movie greats past and present, including Norman Lloyd, William Daniels, Denzel Washington, Mark Harmon, and Alfre Woodard, among many, many others. It's a little slower than the more frenetic shows that followed it, but still a deeply engrossing watch. You can stream St. Elsewhere on Hulu.

at Hulu

E.R. (1994 - 2009)

A natural successor to St. Elsewhere, E.R. is less weird but does one better in its commitment to portraying something hospital drama that at least feels like reality. With another rotating cast that kept the show fresh over an impressive 15 seasons, E.R.’s innovation was in its willingness to drag viewers along at a breakneck pace, counting on us to keep up with the fast-paced dialogue loaded with medical jargon. At its best, the show makes you feel like you’re really catching a glimpse of life in an underfunded city emergency room. You can stream ER on Hulu and Max.

ER (1994 - 2009)

Childrens Hospital (2008 - 2016)

Childrens Hospital (2008 - 2016)

A relentless, and relentlessly memeable satire of medical dramas in general, this comedy centers on the staff of the titular hospital, named for founder Arthur Childrens (motto: “I believe that Childrens is the future.”) The show can’t be bothered with continuity; instead, each episode dives into a very silly/smart brand of dark comedy defined by its commitment to randomness. The stacked cast includes creator Rob Cordry, Lake Bell, Erinn Hayes, Rob Huebel, Ken Marino, Megan Mullally, Henry Winkler, and Malin Åkerman. You can buy episodes of Childrens Hospital from Prime Video.

Scrubs (2001 - 2010)

This scrappy sitcom was resuscitated at least once during its initial run, only finally declared dead after an impressive nine seasons, though it’s due for a revival from original creator Bill Lawrence. Zach Braff plays J.D. Dorian, who begins the show as an intern at the fictional teaching hospital, Sacred Heart. While playing with slapstick and incorporating surreal dream sequences, the show earned high marks from medical professionals, who apparently found it more accurate in depicting details of hospital life than many prestige medical dramas. You can stream Scrubs on Hulu and Peacock.

Scrubs (2001 - 2010)

This is Going to Hurt (2022)

Grey’s Anatomy (2005 - )

From Grey’s Anatomy did Shonda Rhimes’ mighty TV empire spring, yet the show that started it all is somehow still going strong in its 21st season. Meredith Grey (Ellen Pompey) continues to head the team of doctors at Seattle Grace alongside Chandra Wilson and James Pickens Jr. Deft cast rotations have kept things relatively fresh for over two decades and more than 430 episodes. You can stream Grey’s Anatomy on Hulu and Netflix.

Grey’s Anatomy (2005 - )

This is Going to Hurt (2022)

This British miniseries, loosely adapted the memoir from comedian Adam Kay, chronicles Kay’s time as a trainee doctor in obstetrics and gynaecology circa 2006. Ben Whislaw stars as Kay, facing down daily challenges that range from the very funny to the shocking and horrific. The show makes clear that, while the contexts are very different, British doctors also struggle with chaotic working conditions and lack of institutional support, particularly at the intern level. You can stream This is Going to Hurt on AMC+.

Transplant (2020 – 2024)

There’s much that’s familiar in this Canadian drama, but the show stands apart because of the unique perspective of its lead character (at least as far as mainstream medical dramas go). Hamza Haq plays Bashir "Bash" Hamed, a refugee of the Syrian Civil War who comes to Toronto to rebuild his life and career as an E.R. resident. He‘s unable to get a job in his chosen field until his heroic actions during the first episode garner him the right kind of attention. Even still, he faces discrimination as a doctor, and suffers the aftereffects of wartime trauma, even as his skills and experience prove extremely valuable. You can stream Transplant on Peacock.

Transplant (2020 – 2024)