Like any digital platform, TikTok is always at risk of being ephemeral. Especially now, as the US House of Representatives is expected to vote this week on a new bill that, should it become a law, would force TikTok’s owner, the Chinese company ByteDance, to sell the platform or face …
Read More »How to Open Spotify Links If You Aren’t a Spotify User
Spotify dominates the music industry. This becomes really obvious if you don't use Spotify: You end up being sent, and inevitably clicking on, Spotify links all the time. It happens on social media, yes, but also in text exchanges with friends, in emails, and in DMs. The thought is a …
Read More »These Companies Have a Plan to Kill Apps
Everyone wants to kill the app. There’s a wave of companies building so-called app-less phones and gadgets, leveraging artificial intelligence advancements to create smarter virtual assistants that can handle all kinds of tasks through one portal, bypassing the need for specific apps for a particular function. We might be witnessing …
Read More »Google Podcasts Is Gone. Here’s How to Transfer Your Subscriptions
Steve McLendon, a product manager at Google, admits he’s sad to see Google Podcasts head toward the software graveyard. He suggests that the app’s simplicity, one of its core strengths, is what led to its downfall: “Podcast experiences can be improved for users in a way that I think Google …
Read More »My Quest to Fix a Crashing Roku App Provides a Warning About AI
I don’t think I’m alone when I confess that my streaming strategy is a mess. In fact, calling it a strategy is overly kind. I pay for a number of services, all of which cost more every year, and I still keep hearing of shows I want to see on …
Read More »Apple’s Journal App Is Easy, Free, and Already on Your Phone
If you've downloaded iOS 17.2, you're probably wondering why there's a new app on your home screen. It's the Journal app, and it's exactly what it sounds like: a place to reflect and record your thoughts and memories. Before you rush to delete it, I recommend giving it a chance. …
Read More »Slack Is Turning 10 Years Old, and Wow Has It Changed Everything
At its core, Slack is a chat app. Every day, millions of people use it to communicate, share files, and gossip with coworkers or friend groups in one organized place. That style of free-flowing interaction—which Slack didn’t invent, but made mainstream—has changed the way we talk to each other online …
Read More »Apps Made the iPhone. They’re Missing on the Vision Pro
Apple’s Vision Pro mixed-reality headset is coming to the real world on February 2, and all the previews so far have shown it to be a great bundle of contradictions. It’s capable but clunky. Mobile but tethered to a battery pack. Exciting but just so, so expensive. Perhaps most importantly, …
Read More »Apple Isn’t Ready to Release Its Grip on the App Store
Politicians in Brussels have for years debated how best to loosen Big Tech companies’ grip over their closely guarded marketplaces. But it was only this week that Apple announced sweeping and drastic changes for its European users. For the first time, new EU rules have forced the company to entertain …
Read More »Use WhatsApp on Android? Be Prepared to Pay for Message Backups
For Android smartphone owners, it’s about to become a bit of a headache to save backups of your WhatsApp messages. Users have enjoyed free backups of WhatsApp messages on Android for the past five years, but soon those users will need to start paying to preserve their collections of heartfelt …
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