Setting Up Your Home Office

As someone who's planning to buy the Nintendo Switch 2, I've had my eye on the accessories I'd need to get with the console. Since Super Mario Party Jamboree, which is getting some new mini-games in its Switch 2 port, is one of the games I'm very interested in, the Switch 2 Camera accessory caught my eye. After all, who doesn't want to make dramatic faces while playing with their friends? You can even use it for chat, too. However, I'm not sure I can justify spending $50 on an accessory that'll probably gather dust after I'm done with Mario Party. Fortunately, it looks like the Switch 2 Camera is not the only way to play camera-based games or video chat with your friends …

If you've ever wished the text-to-speech feature on your Mac worked better, Spokenly might be the solution for you. It's a free Mac application that lets you use modern AI transcription right on your Mac for free—just trigger the application with a keyboard shortcut, say what you want to type, and watch as it appears on the screen. Whatever you feel about modern AI, it's hard to deny that it's good at turning the spoken word into text. Whether it's real-time transcription or creating a transcript for a video or audio file, the open source Whisper engine is accurate and fast. Spokenly is a free application that lets you use this technology on your Mac. Install the applicat…

Alongside a couple of new Surface devices, Microsoft has also announced a number of notable upgrades on the way for Windows 11, covering the Start menu, Copilot AI, and core Windows utilities such as Paint and the Snipping Tool. The Start menu changes are significant, and I wrote about them last month when they were first spotted in hidden code. The menu is becoming bigger, more customizable, and more usable, with the option to see all apps immediately—and several options for how those apps are arranged on screen. If you don't want to see recommended shortcuts (to recent files, for example), these can be hidden. You can also increase the size of the pinned apps p…

There’s the egg price problem for sure, but whether you’re trying to save grocery money or you have an aversion to eggs for dietary or health restrictions—you too deserve cake. Cake for a birthday or cake on a whim, there should be nothing holding you back from achieving your sugary dreams of the moment, least of all a lack of eggless cake recipes. I tested out five common and accessible egg replacement options to see which one produced the best eggless cake. The batterI decided to test a basic yellow cake recipe I’ve used before. It uses a combination of butter and oil, sugar, milk, flour, baking powder, salt, vanilla extract, and usually eggs. It’s a good layering cake …

We may earn a commission from links on this page. Deal pricing and availability subject to change after time of publication. If you’ve ever tried dragging a too-large speaker—or worse, relied on your phone’s tiny audio for sound projection—you should appreciate this sale on the Skullcandy Terrain Mini: It's palm-sized, no-frills, and currently on sale for $34.99 down from $39.99 on StackSocial, with free shipping in the U.S. That price drop isn’t jaw-dropping, but for under $35, you’re looking at a IPX7-rated waterproof speaker that won’t be damaged if it's dropped in the pool this summer. The Skullcandy Terrain Mini has Bluetooth 5.3, so the connection holds steady withi…

As much as Apple keeps hyping them up, those 4K 60fps videos will chew through your iPhone's storage space like you wouldn't believe. When you get to the point where you have to choose between keeping videos of your kids and clips from that beloved once-in-a-lifetime vacation, you have a problem. But I've got a solution—not all videos need to be stored at full quality, at all times. There are many ways to go about compressing your iPhone videos, but like most things in life, the simplest option is often the best. Kompresso is a free to use, native iPhone app that uses the powerful processor on your smartphone to compress files. This means there's no need to upload or shar…

Letterboxd is the best thing to happen to film nerds since IMDb, which is almost surprising given how straightforward it is. Like the Film Twitter answer to Goodreads, it is a social network/online catalogue where you can rate or review movies, pick a few of your favorites to highlight on your profile, and follow your friends and favorite critics. Yet, Letterboxd is more than just "what if social media, but for movies?" Dig a little deeper and you'll find some useful tools for managing your cinema obsession. If you haven't used Letterboxd before, it's available for Android, iOS, or on the web. Anyone can access it to browse movies, read reviews, and see user ratings, but …

YouTube is an amazing tool. If there's anything you want to do, from playing an instrument to fixing household appliances, there is a video on the site somewhere outlining exactly how to do it. The problem: YouTube doesn't always act like a tool. It's easy to get sucked down a rabbit hole of related videos, comments, and other distractions (mostly because the site it designed to make sure you do exactly that). If you wish YouTube behaved more like a tool and less like a dopamine factory, I recommend Untrap. This browser extension, available for Chrome, Edge, Firefox, Safari, and Opera, lets you make almost 300 tweaks to the YouTube website, allowing you to remove the dis…

Hallucinations have always been an issue for generative AI models: The same structure that enables them to be creative and produce text and images also makes them prone to making stuff up. And the hallucination problem isn't getting better as AI models progress—in fact, it's getting worse. In a new technical report from OpenAI (via The New York Times), the company details how its latest o3 and o4-mini models hallucinate 51 percent and 79 percent, respectively, on an AI benchmark known as SimpleQA. For the earlier o1 model, the SimpleQA hallucination rate stands at 44 percent. Those are surprisingly high figures, and heading in the wrong direction. These models are known a…

We may earn a commission from links on this page. Deal pricing and availability subject to change after time of publication. If you’re looking to breathe new life into an older HD television—or even just want an affordable way to stream your favorite shows—the Amazon Fire TV Stick HD makes a strong case for itself. It's going for $19.99 on Amazon right now. Amazon Fire TV Stick HD $19.99 at Amazon $…

Summer brings sunshine, vacations, outdoor concerts—and the inability to leave your house without accidentally spending 20 bucks. Your budget is never a truly fixed thing. It changes with the state of the economy (hello, tariffs), your paycheck, and even the changing of the seasons. With a bit of planning, you can enjoy all the summer season has to offer without the financial stress. Here are my hacks to create a practical summer budget that lets you make the most of these warmer months without breaking the bank. Plan around events, not calendar datesOne of the biggest summer budgeting mistakes is thinking in terms of months rather than specific activities. Instead of cre…

We may earn a commission from links on this page. Google started rolling out Android 15 back in October, adding a number of interesting and useful new features to compatible devices. Six months later, the company has decided to increase the minimum spec requirements manufacturers must meet in order for their devices to be eligible for the latest Google software. The good news? It's not that strict. This week, Android Authority reported that to update to Android 15, Google is now requiring devices to have at least 32GB of storage. That isn't 32GB of free space; rather, the storage unit itself needs to be 32GB or larger. With Android 14 (and Android 13 before it) that req…

We may earn a commission from links on this page. Samsung just announced a new live stream for the upcoming Galaxy S25 Edge. The company initially teased the phone at Samsung's Galaxy Unpacked event back in January, but details are still slim on the upcoming device. How to stream Samsung 'Beyond Slim' (and reserve your phone)Samsung's "Beyond Slim" live stream for the "slimmest Galaxy S Series ever" will air on May 12 at 8 p.m. ET (May 13 at 9 a.m. KST). You'll be able to watch the event via Samsung's website or on the company's YouTube channel, which you can find below: If you are excited to get your hands on the new Galaxy S25 Edge, you can reserve the new pho…

Apple has been under fire for several years after it was discovered that Siri violated user privacy, and the company earlier this year agreed to a $95 million settlement to resolve a class action lawsuit, which includes compensation for affected users. Eligible individuals can now apply for their share of the total. The dispute centered on Siri-enabled devices, including iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch, Mac, HomePod, iPod touch, and Apple TV, which may have activated and recorded and shared private conversations without user knowledge. If you qualify for the settlement class, you'll receive $20 for each device claimed—up to five devices per individual for a total of $100—thou…

You might be having a bad week, but AI is having a worse one. First there was the "racism glitch" that beset Grok, and now music platform SoundCloud is facing some serious criticism for a clause buried in its terms of service. The imbroglio began in February 2024, when SoundCloud quietly changed its TOS to include: In the absence of a separate agreement that states otherwise, You explicitly agree that your Content may be used to inform, train, develop or serve as input to artificial intelligence or machine intelligence technologies or services as part of and for providing the services. That quietly sat there in the TOS for more than a year, but this week, Ed Newton notice…

We may earn a commission from links on this page. Garmin watches like my beloved Forerunner 265S have so many features buried in their menus that you may not have discovered some of the best ones. Here are some of the best underrated features of Garmin watches (available on Forerunners and other models), as well as convenient shortcuts you’ll find yourself using all the time. Shortcuts for getting around your Garmin watch Left is the flashlight (it's brighter in the dark, I promise). Right is what you get when you long press on the sunset time complication. …

Dark mode has saved many of us from eye pain when using our smartphones at night. The difference between a black display with white text and a blinding white screen with black text is immeasurable when your phone is the only light source in the room—especially when you're opening your eyes for the first time in a while. While many Android users prefer to use dark mode all the time, others prefer it exclusively in the evening and night. That's where the "sunset to sunrise" schedule comes into play: On many devices, such as Google's Pixel phones, you can choose to schedule dark mode from sunset to sunrise. After the sun rises, your phone stays in light mode, so your content…

We may earn a commission from links on this page. Welcome to “Cookbook of the Week.” This is a series where I highlight cookbooks that are unique, easy to use, or just special to me. While finding a particular recipe online serves a quick purpose, flipping through a truly excellent cookbook has a magic all its own. My sweet tooth has been nagging me lately. I expect this is because I’ve been trying to eat more vegetables and my dopamine hormones find this to be disrespectful. I like veggies, but I'm only so powerful to resist the call of sweets. In one of my bookstore browsings, I came upon a cookbook with hefty slices of lemony-looking pie with a chocolate crust scatter…

We may earn a commission from links on this page. Deal pricing and availability subject to change after time of publication. Beats headphones are well known for their style and better compatibility with Apple devices. Both of these hold true with their flagship headphones, the Beats Studio Pro, currently $169.95 (originally $349.99), the second-lowest price it has been after a 51% discount, according to price-tracking tools. While it is compatible with Android users, Apple users will get the most out of these premium headphones. Beats Studio Pro …

Sleep can be a mysterious process even under ideal conditions, but when you’re in a completely alien environment like a hotel room or other temporary lodging it can become seemingly impossible. But if you take a little control over your environment, you can get more—and better—sleep no matter where you find yourself at night. Make the space feel more like homeStudies have shown that aspects of our home environment like sound and smell can help us be more relaxed and and happy when we’re away, so replicating those aspects of your life in an unfamiliar spot can help you sleep: Sound. If you normally sleep with a white noise machine, bring it with you when you travel, or fin…

If you've got a Samsung phone, you've got an alternative, lightweight option for computing on the go: Galaxy handsets come with a desktop interface called DeX built right in, and depending on what you need to do, you might be able to use this mode in place of a laptop while on your travels. Essentially, you plug your Samsung phone into a TV or monitor, and Android shifts to look more like Windows or macOS. You're still using the same software and the same apps, but you get floating windows and easier multitasking. While a lot of the apps will stick to their mobile views, you can make use of apps such as Google Docs or Google Chrome to get work done while you're away from …

Like many AI chatbots, ChatGPT has offered image generation for some time now. You might be well acquainted with it, seeing as its latest image generation tools have recently gone viral. Putting both the ethics of AI art as well as its errors, quirks, and inconsistencies aside for a moment, you may have noticed some issues with ChatGPT's image generation, especially if you've been using a lot. Since each image is contained to the ChatGPT conversation in which it was generated, it's quite difficult to keep tabs on all your images, unless you're exporting and cataloging them somewhere else manually. OpenAI might not be able to solve the other issues with AI art yet, but it …

Full-screen message effects are among the most fun-to-use features in iMessage, and now they're becoming a lot easier to use in Google Messages for Android, too. In the latest Google Messages beta, these full-screen effects will now automatically play for you (and your texting partner, if they're also on the beta) when you send them certain emoji in Google Messages for Android. That makes them a bit easier to use than Apple's version of this feature, which can only be triggered by certain phrases (eg: "Happy New Year"), or by long-pressing the send button and selecting the effect manually. Google had previously rolled out full-screen effects for certain phrases, but this …

It's that time again, for Google to announce that real-time translation has come to one of its communication apps. This time, it's Google Meet, which can translate between English and Spanish as you speak in a video call. If that sounds familiar, it's because it's not the first time Google has announced something like this. Google Translate has had features that let you speak to someone in another language in real time for a while. For example, back in 2019, there was a real-time translation feature called Interpreter Mode built into Google Assistant. It's also been possible on Pixel phones for a while (and even Samsung phones). Most of these, however, have been either te…

I try to write about emerging trends in this column, but this week I'm flipping the script, as they say, and taking a look at the end of four popular things: Neo-medievalism, Kendrick Lamar, memes, and movies are all in the process of being thrown into the garbage heap by young people. Lady Gaga and the death of neo-medievalism If you watched Lady Gaga's appearance on Saturday Night Live on March 8, you might not have known you were witnessing the end of a youth trend, the moment when neo-medievalism went from cool to commodity. Along with hosting, Gaga played her new single "Abracadabra" for the SNL audience, and she was doing a lot. The song's pure pop hooks mi…