SCOTUS Rules That US Government Can Continue Talking to Social Media Companies

The Supreme Court ruling overturns an earlier injunction that prevented platforms from communicating with the government for more than a year.

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Spotify Has a Cheaper Membership Plan It Doesn't Want You to Know About

Spotify has stealthily launched a new membership plan for its individual users. I say stealthily because despite posting an announcement about it, the company is hardly going out of its way to let current subscribers know about the plan changes—probably because a lot of them would choose to siwtch if they knew they had the option. What's more, new users can't even sign up for the plan; you can only get it by joining and then "downgrading."

The new plan is a spin-off of the service’s Premium Individual membership, and is aptly named “Basic.” It's $1 cheaper than the typical Premium plan, $10.99 versus $11.99. (A dollar a month is not much, I know, but I’ll get to that). While the plan’s name might suggest an offering similar to the “free” version of the music streaming service, which features ads while you listen, Spotify says Basic grants you all the benefits of a standard Premium plan, minus only the option to listen to 15 hours of audiobooks per month.

For most people, losing that privilege honestly makes “downgrading” to the Basic plan worth it, even if only to save $12 a year. Here's why.

Spotify Premium

Free at Google Play

Free at Google Play

Streaming is experiencing price creep across the board

Spotify is just one of many streaming services that has continued to raise prices regularly—with its most recent bump coming earlier this month, when the company increased the cost of Premium from $10.99 to $11.99, and raised the price of Premium Duo and Premium Family. Despite the steady increases, though, Spotify hasn’t really added any new features to Premium in years.

In fact, the company even took a strange backward step with its first hardware release, Car Thing, which was discontinued earlier this year—and even shutting down its functionality, so even people who had bought and paid for it couldn't keep using it (though the company did offer refunds). Given that, the introduction of a cheaper paid plan that won’t necessarily deprive you of any useful features is a nice change of pace in today's increasingly expensive, ad-choked streaming landscape.

Most Spotify users don't listen to audiobooks

Now, you’ll notice I said “useful features.” Spotify made a big deal out of supporting audiobooks when it brought them to its service last year, and while I do love audiobooks—they’re a great way to read when you don’t have the time to sit down with an actual book (or ebook)—Spotify’s inclusion of audiobooks in its service isn’t exactly anything to write home about.

Yes, there are more than 250,000 titles in the catalog, but you’re only granted 15 hours of listening per month. If you listen to books of average length (around 10 hours, depending on the word count of the original work and the reading speed of the narrator), then you’ll be limited to listening to one book per month. If you listen to longer books, though—for the record, a book in the Game of Thrones series can run to as long as 47 hours—you won’t be able to complete the entire thing in a single month, which isn't the best user experience.

Moreover, Spotify's own reports indicate that only 25 percent of Spotify’s subscribers are taking advantage of its audiobook content at all. That means a good chunk of you reading this—myself included—are paying for something you don’t actively use. (Note that it isn't clear if Spotify’s reported figure accounts for active monthly listeners, or just the percentage of users who listened to audiobook content at least once.)

Basic gives you everything Premium, except audiobooks

At $10.99, Spotify’s new Basic plan costs as much as Premium used to, before the price hike earlier this month. That means if you don't mind sacrificing audiobooks (which you probably aren't listening to anyway, based on the numbers), you can effectively bypass the price hike. This also keeps the monthly cost of Spotify on par with Apple Music.

Once Spotify finally starts adding features like lossless audio, the price and feature difference between the plans may expand further. I could see Spotify introducing a completely new pricing tier for lossless audio, for example. But that's all in the hazy future. If you’re an active Spotify subscriber right now and you don’t listen to audiobooks on the platform, you have no reason not to downgrade to Basic—over the course of a year, it's like getting a month of the service for free, and then some.

How to sign up for Spotify Basic

As noted, you can't choose to sign up for Basic directly—it's not even listed on the site's "View all plans" info page. No, you have to either be an existing Premium member, or sign up for Premium and then downgrade your membership.

Once that requirement has been satisfied, to downgrade to the new Basic plan, you'll need to open Spotify on the web, then click on your profile image in the top-right hand corner of the page. Select Account, and then click on the Your Subscription section at the top. Next, click the Change plan button, then select Basic.

You'll need to go through a few confirmation screens—including a few where Spotify will try to sell you on the idea of paying $1 more each month to keep getting 15 hours of audiobook content. Once confirmed, though, your plan will change and you'll be on the cheaper option. 

If you're subscribed on Android, you can make the change directly in the app, but a Spotify rep confirmed to TechRadar that you'll need to use a browser to make the change if you're subscribed on iOS, as Spotify's iOS app doesn't support the option directly in the app.

Additionally, it appears Spotify is also offering new Basic versions of its Duo and Family plans (the Family Basic plan is $16.99 versus the regular $19.99, while pricing for the Duo plan isn't widely available yet). Spotify didn't cover either of those options in its official announcement, nor did it reveal that the feature is also apparently available to U.K. and Australian subscribers, at least according to what the representative told TechRadar.

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How to Change Lock Screen Shortcuts in iOS 18 (or Remove Them Entirely)

With iOS 18, Apple is adding a number of new customization options for the iPhone's various menus. Along with the Control Center, you will be able to change the shortcuts that appear on the lock screen of your iPhone, meaning you can swap out those camera and flashlight shortcuts to something else.

How to change lock screen shortcuts in iOS 18

To change the shortcuts on your iPhone's lock screen, you need to lock the device and wake its display. Next, hold the screen and hit Customize. Tap Lock Screen and you'll now see the lock screen customization screen. You can tap the minus button next to the two shortcuts near the bottom of the display, and then tap the plus button. 

This will open a pop-up that lets you search for shortcuts to add to your iPhone's lock screen. I've added Recognize Music and Alarm since I use those functions regularly. However, you're free to go through the list and choose whatever works best for you. There are two very useful options—Open App and Shortcuts—that let you place any app or shortcut from your phone directly on the lock screen. 

In case you're unsure about removing the Camera app from the lock screen, you can still access it by swiping left on the lock screen, which tends to be faster than holding the lock screen camera shortcut anyway.

You don't have to use any shortcuts on the lock screen

While it may be tempting to place custom shortcuts on your iPhone's lock screen in iOS 18, you also have the choice to remove the old shortcuts entirely and not replace them. This is great for people who keep accidentally firing up the flashlight, camera, or other actions mapped to the lock screen buttons—or for those who simply like a more minimalist aesthetic.

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Motorola Razr and Razr+ (2024): Specs, Features, Price, Release Date

Celebrating the 20th anniversary of the original Razr, Motorola has two new folding flip phones—and Paris Hilton is back to hype 'em up.

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Use Final Cut Camera for Better iPhone Videos

Apple has a free new app for professional videographers that goes a step above the normal camera app. It's called Final Cut Camera, and not only does it offer more advanced controls for recording video, but it also pairs well with Final Cut Pro for iPad to let you record a multi-camera session. Final Cut Camera supports up to four cameras for the Live Multicam feature in Final Cut Pro for iPad, and you can record using any iPhones or iPads that support the app, as long as they're logged into the same iCloud account.

The advanced controls in Final Cut Camera

Credit: Pranay Parab

Final Cut Camera is targeted specifically at those who record videos for a living, and gives you advanced features such as finer control over zooming in, an overexposure indicator, and controls to let you adjust exposure, white balance, and focus.

You can adjust all of these settings easily with the viewfinder enabled, and you'll even get live feedback on all of your changes. Final Cut Camera makes it quite easy to get your exposure and white balance just right, which isn't always possible with the default Camera app. 

Put your old iOS devices to good use

Credit: Pranay Parab

Your latest iPhone is probably getting a lot of use, but you may have older iPhones and iPads lying around unused. If you record lots of videos, you can use use Final Cut Camera and your older iOS devices to set up a Live Multicam session with Final Cut Pro for iPad. Most people probably don't have all the devices needed to make this setup work, but videographers are highly likely to be able to use this to their advantage. 

Why Final Cut Camera is worth checking out

Credit: Pranay Parab

When you're recording videos and want more control over your iPhone's camera, Final Cut Camera is a great option. The stock Camera app does allow you a lot of freedom to control your video recordings, but Final Cut Camera takes it a notch further. It's highly configurable and has been designed to let you make more precise adjustments to each element of video recording. Even if you're not a professional videographer, I suggest trying out Final Cut Camera once to see what it can do. Perhaps it could be a great tool when you're recording clips for your next TikTok or Instagram Reels video.

It's great that this app is available for free, which makes it very accessible to a large audience. Of course, the real differentiating feature—Live Multicam—requires you to have an active subscription to Final Cut Pro for iPad. That costs $49 per year and requires a powerful M-series iPad, too.

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How to Use the New iPhone Control Center in iOS 18

The Control Center has been totally revamped in iOS 18. You can now move pretty much every control around, add more controls than ever before, and have access to multiple pages of controls. My only complaint is that it's still a bit too hard to launch Control Center from the top-right corner of the iPhone's display. That gripe aside, it's a great time to start with Control Center customization, and here's how to do it.

Download the iOS 18 beta

At time of writing, iOS 18 isn't generally available. The good news is that there's a free developer beta you can already sign up for. Follow the instructions here to install the iOS 18 beta on your iPhone, but be careful: you're risking instability and bugs by doing so. I suggest using a secondary phone until the official launch, if you can.

How to add controls to the Control Center in iOS 18

Credit: Pranay Parab

Through iOS 17, you had to go through the Control Center page in your iPhone's Settings app to add or remove controls. Things have changed in a big way with iOS 18, and you can now make a lot of tweaks directly in the Control Center. To get started, open the Control Center by swiping downwards from the top-right corner of the screen and hit the + button in the top-left corner. Alternatively, long press on any empty space in the Control Center, then tap the Add a Control button near the base of your iPhone.

You'll now see lots of options and a search bar up top. Go through these shortcuts and add whatever appeals to you. My favorite controls are automation routines from the Shortcuts app and the Vehicle Motion Cues feature.

Removing controls from the Control Center

To clean up the Control Center in iOS 18, open it and hold down any empty space until borders appear around the controls. Now hit the - button next to any control and it'll be gone. It's as simple as that.

Explore other pages in the Control Center

Credit: Pranay Parab

There are now three full pages in iOS 18's Control Center, but don't worry, all of the most useful controls are on the first page. Explore these pages by swiping upwards with the Control Center open.

The second page shows you music playback controls. Instead of swiping vertically, you can also open it by holding the media controls widget in the first Control Center page. You'll need this page to control other speakers connected to your iPhone, such as your HomePod.

Swipe upwards once more in the Control Center to see connectivity options. Alternatively, you can see the same options from the first page of the Control Center. Just hold the connectivity widget and you'll get the same features. This lets you quickly toggle airplane mode, AirDrop, wifi, cellular data, Bluetooth, hotspot settings, and VPNs.

Move controls around to make them easier to access

iOS 18 lets you swap the positions of all controls in the Control Center. This means that previously immovable controls such as connectivity options, media playback, and rotation lock can now be moved. The best thing is that you don't have to place all controls next to each other. I like to leave large gaps in between controls to make them easier to access. 

To do this, open the Control Center in iOS 18 and hold any empty space on the screen. When borders appear on your controls, start dragging any button or widget to any place you like. I've moved connectivity and media options to the bottom of the screen, where they're far easier for me to access. 

Your iPhone has a new shut down button

Credit: Pranay Parab

The days of a complicated shut down ritual are over. iOS 18's Control Center has a power button in the top-right corner. You can tap this button and slide the power off switch on the screen to turn off your iPhone.

Access the Control Center easily

Most of my Control Center changes involve making it more ergonomic. There's no reason to keep reaching for the top-right of the screen to launch the Control Center when a better option is available. Back Tap is that option. It allows me to tap the back of my iPhone to fire up the Control Center. You can set this up by going to Settings > Accessibility > Touch > Back Tap. I've mapped Triple Tap to launch Control Center to avoid accidental activations, but you can use the Double Tap option too.

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It’s Not Too Late to Plant These Summer Fruits and Vegetables

Late June means “summer” everywhere across America, and for most of us, summer gardens are in full swing already. In fact, most farmers have moved onto starting seed for fall and winter gardens. But if you’ve yet to get everything into the ground for whatever reason (and I’m frequently besieged by such reasons) it’s not too late. There are still lots of crops you can plant right now to yield a decent summer harvest. As a general rule, you’ll be skipping spring crops like peas, strawberries, bok choy, and spinach—it’s too hot for them. Instead, focus on buying really good-sized, established starts and succession planting. 

Tomatoes, peppers, and eggplants

Luckily, it’s not too late to get these crown jewels into the ground, but that time is fast approaching. Peppers, in particular, need a long time to fruit, so only purchase well-established, good-sized plants, such as those in gallon-sized pots. While tomatoes don’t need as much time, I’d still focus on gallon-sized starts, and make sure plant them deep on a cloudy day or at sunset, so they have a little time to recover before being blasted by the full sun. If you can protect them from the sun with some shade for the first day, that’s even better. Eggplants, which tend to fruit later in summer, are fine to purchase in four-inch pots. 

Lettuce, radishes, scallions, beets, and kohlrabi

These are succession crops and as such, they are fine to plant all summer long, as they are harvestable quickly (in under sixty days). When planting lettuce, look for packages that say “bolt resistant” or “heat resistant.” Also consider shadier spots for your lettuce. 

Carrots

It’s not too late to plant carrots, but they’ll be hard to germinate, since they require constant moisture to do so. It may be worth getting starts at the garden center so you’ll have some to harvest come fall. If you do pick up starts, remember to separate them by hand before planting them a few inches apart. 

Beans, pumpkins, squash, melon and cucumbers

Do not be deceived, this is actually the perfect, peak time to plant all of these vegetables. Beans can still be direct sowed (seeded directly in your garden), but pumpkins, squash, melon, and cucumbers should be purchased as starts. 

Corn

It’s last call for corn, and if you’re going to plant it, buy starts. Even though corn is easy to germinate (and it grows quickly), you’re running out of roadway. The long-held saying, “knee high by Fourth of July” remains because if the corn hasn’t grown that much by early July, it simply won’t grow tall and husky enough by the time it needs to form ears, resulting in tiny, underdeveloped corn ears.

Flowers

It’s a great idea to think about late-season flowers. You can still direct seed zinnias, sunflowers, and other sturdy, tall flowers. There's still time to plant cosmos and salvia starts for this summer. It’s a great time to get perennials at the garden center and plant them. 

Focus on fall

It’s a hard transition to make, but soon, you’ll be planting fall succession crops like broccoli and cauliflower again, and perhaps a fall succession of peas. So even if you’ve missed out on summer, look ahead instead and get seeds started in trays outside for planting out come late summer.  

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Post-Pandemic Recovery Isn’t Guaranteed

The aftermath of a disaster like Covid can be divided into roughly three stages: the honeymoon, the slump, and the uptick. The aim is always to build back better—but in some cases that never happens.

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Starliner Faces an Indefinite Wait in Space While NASA Investigates Its Faults

The space agency has pushed back the spacecraft’s return to an unspecified date in July, to give it more time to look into the problems that beset the vehicle on its journey into orbit.

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Asus Vivobook S 15 Copilot+ PC Review: Promising Battery Life

The first wave of Copilot+ PCs is here, and while graphics performance is lackluster, battery life is getting a boost on this Asus machine.

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What Came Before the Big Bang?

By studying the geometry of model space-times, researchers offer alternative views of the universe’s first moments.

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Today’s Wordle Hints (and Answer) for Sunday, June 23, 2024

If you’re looking for the Wordle answer for June 23, 2024 read on. We’ll share some clues, tips, and strategies, and finally the solution. Today’s puzzle is medium difficult; I got it in five. Beware, there are spoilers below for June 23, Wordle #1,100! Keep scrolling if you want some hints (and then the answer) to today’s Wordle game.

How to play Wordle

Wordle lives here on the New York Times website. A new puzzle goes live every day at midnight, your local time.

Start by guessing a five-letter word. The letters of the word will turn green if they’re correct, yellow if you have the right letter in the wrong place, or gray if the letter isn’t in the day’s secret word at all. For more, check out our guide to playing Wordle here, and my strategy guide here for more advanced tips. (We also have more information at the bottom of this post, after the hints and answers.)

Ready for the hints? Let’s go!

---

Does today’s Wordle have any unusual letters?

We’ll define common letters as those that appear in the old typesetters’ phrase ETAOIN SHRDLU. (Memorize this! Pronounce it “Edwin Shirdloo,” like a name, and pretend he’s a friend of yours.)

Three of today's letters are from our mnemonic! The other two are fairly common.

Can you give me a hint for today’s Wordle?

A common sound at summer camp.

Does today’s Wordle have any double or repeated letters?

There are no repeated letters today. 

How many vowels are in today’s Wordle?

There are two vowels.

What letter does today’s Wordle start with?

Today’s word starts with B. 

What letter does today’s Wordle end with?

Today’s word ends with E. 

What is the solution to today’s Wordle?

Ready? Today’s word is BUGLE.

How I solved today’s Wordle

I started with RAISE and TOUCH, followed by GLAND to eliminate likely consonants. This left only two likely solutions: BULGE and BUGLE, and I guessed the former before landing on the latter.

Wordle 1,100 5/6

⬛⬛⬛⬛🟩
⬛⬛🟨⬛⬛
🟨🟨⬛⬛⬛
🟩🟩🟨🟨🟩
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

---

Yesterday’s Wordle answer

Yesterday’s Wordle was easier. The hint was “a proclamation” and the answer contained four common letters and one pretty common letter.

The answer to yesterday’s Wordle was EDICT.

A primer on Wordle basics

The idea of Wordle is to guess the day’s secret word. When you first open the Wordle game, you’ll see an empty grid of letters. It’s up to you to make the first move: type in any five-letter word. 

Now, you can use the colors that are revealed to get clues about the word: Green means you correctly guessed a letter, and it’s in the correct position. (For example, if you guess PARTY, and the word is actually PURSE, the P and R will be green.)

• Yellow means the letter is somewhere in the word, but not in the position you guessed it. (For example, if you guessed PARTY, but the word is actually ROAST, the R, A and T will all be yellow.)

• Gray means the letter is not in the solution word at all. (If you guessed PARTY and everything is gray, then the solution cannot be PURSE or ROAST.)

With all that in mind, guess another word, and then another, trying to land on the correct word before you run out of chances. You get six guesses, and then it’s game over.

The best starter words for Wordle

What should you play for that first guess? The best starters tend to contain common letters, to increase the chances of getting yellow and green squares to guide your guessing. (And if you get all grays when guessing common letters, that’s still excellent information to help you rule out possibilities.) There isn’t a single “best” starting word, but the New York Times’s Wordle analysis bot has suggested starting with one of these:

• CRANE

• TRACE

• SLANT

• CRATE

• CARTE

Meanwhile, an MIT analysis found that you’ll eliminate the most possibilities in the first round by starting with one of these:

• SALET

• REAST

• TRACE

• CRATE

• SLATE

Other good picks might be ARISE or ROUND. Words like ADIEU and AUDIO get more vowels in play, but you could argue that it’s better to start with an emphasis on consonants, using a starter like RENTS or CLAMP. Choose your strategy, and see how it plays out.

How to win at Wordle

We have a few guides to Wordle strategy, which you might like to read over if you’re a serious student of the game. This one covers how to use consonants to your advantage, while this one focuses on a strategy that uses the most common letters. In this advanced guide, we detail a three-pronged approach for fishing for hints while maximizing your chances of winning quickly.

The biggest thing that separates Wordle winners from Wordle losers is that winners use their guesses to gather information about what letters are in the word. If you know that the word must end in -OUND, don’t waste four guesses on MOUND, ROUND, SOUND, and HOUND; combine those consonants and guess MARSH. If the H lights up in yellow, you know the solution.

One more note on strategy: the original Wordle used a list of about 2,300 solution words, but after the game was bought by the NYT, the game now has an editor who hand-picks the solutions. Sometimes they are slightly tricky words that wouldn’t have made the original list, and sometimes they are topical. For example, FEAST was the solution one Thanksgiving. So keep in mind that there may be a theme.

Wordle alternatives

If you can’t get enough of five-letter guessing games and their kin, the best Wordle alternatives, ranked by difficulty, include:

• Wheeldle, which lets you play one puzzle after another

• Dordle and Quordle, which ask you to play two (Dordle) or four (Quordle) puzzles at the same time, with the same guesses. There is also Octordle, with eight puzzles, and Sedecordle, with 16.

• Waffle, which shows you several five-letter words, scrambled in a grid; you play by swapping the letters around until you solve.

• Absurdle, which changes the solution after each guess, but needs to stay consistent with its previous feedback. You have to strategically back it into a corner until there is only one possible word left; then you guess it, and win.

• Squabble, in which you play Wordle against other people with a timer running. You take damage if you spend too much time between guesses; winner is the last one standing.

• Antiwordle, in which you are trying not to guess the day’s solution. You’re required to reuse any letters that you (oops) guessed correctly, so the longer it takes you, the better you are at the game.

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Recluse Spider Season Is a Myth

The venom of recluse spiders can be dangerous, but the idea of there being a “season” when these arachnids invade homes and bite is unhelpful and wrong.

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These Numbers Will Convince Your Teen to Start Saving for Retirement

It’s never too late to start saving for retirement, but how early should you start? Whether your teen is lifeguarding at the local pool, scooping ice cream, or mowing lawns, summer gigs offer more than just spending money—they present a golden opportunity to kickstart a lifetime of financial security. The reason for this is compound interest, which we’ll run the numbers on below. If you’ve been waiting to invest in your retirement until you check off other financial goals (cough cough, students loans), let’s breakdown why you should consider setting aside at least some savings. And if you have a teenager who rolls their eyes at the idea of contributing part of their very first paycheck to their far-off retirement, here’s how you can explain to them why it’s so important to start saving as early as possible.

Why saving early is so important

Simply put, compound interest means the interest on an investment grows exponentially—rather than linearly—over time. What this means for a retirement account like a 401(k) or Roth IRA is that every little bit you contribute goes a long way, especially compared to a traditional savings account. The key is that with compound interest, how early you start saving usually outweighs how much you contribute. Even an investment left untouched for decades can keep growing.

Let’s take a look at some specific scenarios that show how compound interest works for you. These all assume a moderate 6.5% annual investment return on their retirement funds, which is around what most return on investment calculators will be set to automatically, and a retirement age of 66.

Scenario 1: Starting at age 35

• You save $1,500 per year from age 35 to 55

• Total amount invested: $30,000

• By age 66 (31 years after starting), your investment grows to: $186,138

• Compound interest earned: $156,138

Scenario 2: Starting at age 25

• You save $1,500 per year from age 25 to 45

• Total amount invested: $30,000

• By age 66 (41 years after starting), your investment grows to: $373,569

• Compound interest earned: $343,569

Scenario 3: Starting at age 15

• You save $1,500 per year from age 15 to 35

• Total amount invested: $30,000

• By age 66 (51 years after starting), your investment grows to: $749,029

• Compound interest earned: $719,029

These scenarios clearly demonstrate the incredible advantage of starting to save early:

1. Starting at 35: Your $30,000 investment grows about 6.2 times.

2. Starting at 25: Your $30,000 investment grows about 12.5 times.

3. Starting at 15: Your $30,000 investment grows about 25 times.

By starting just 10 years earlier (at 25 instead of 35), you more than double your retirement savings. Starting at 15 instead of 35 results in four times the retirement savings.

The teen summer job advantage

Now, let's put this into the context of summer jobs. If your teen saves $1,500 from summer jobs each year from age 15 to 19 (just five years):

• Total invested: $7,500

• By age 66, this grows to: $190,893

• That's over 25 times the initial investment.

If they save $750 (half of the previous amount) each summer from age 15 to 19:

• Total invested: $3,750

• By age 66, this grows to: $95,446

• Still over 25 times the initial investment!

Even small amounts saved from summer jobs during the teen years can grow into substantial sums by retirement age. The key is to start early and let compound interest work its magic over many decades.

Of course, the best-case scenario is that you start saving early and never stop investing. But the scenarios above demonstrate how important time is as a factor, and how any savings at all—even if left untouched for years—can go a long way.

Motivating your teen

While retirement may seem like a distant concern to a teenager, these numbers can help illustrate the incredible opportunity at hand. Here are some tips to encourage your teen to start saving:

1. Show them the math: Use an online compound interest calculator to demonstrate how their money could grow. To run the numbers yourself, Investor.gov has a calculator that allows you to test out different saving scenarios that work for your financial situation.

2. Make it relatable: Discuss future goals like buying a house or traveling the world, and how early saving can help achieve these dreams.

3. Start small: Encourage them to invest even a small percentage of their earnings.

4. Lead by example: Share your own retirement saving strategies and experiences.

The bottom line

Encourage your teenagers and young adult children to contribute to a Roth IRA or 401(k) from their very first paycheck—and they’ll thank you later as they watch those numbers grow and grow. And remember that no matter your age, you can still take advantage of compound interest, too, even with a small initial investment. What matters is that you start to save and invest ASAP. Check out our guide to how much you should have saved at every age.

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How to Watch Euro 2024 for Free Using a VPN

EURO 2024 is underway, with some titans clashing this week. You can watch all of the matches of the UEFA tournament if you have the right broadcast or streaming subscriptions. If you don't, fret not. There are still ways to watch all of the European soccer games for free—you just have to pay for a VPN service. If you're a soccer fan, make sure also to catch all of the Copa America matches happening at the same time as the EURO 2024.

What is EURO 2024?

The UEFA EURO 2024 is an international soccer tournament that happens every four years. This year the tournament is held in Germany. The 2022 champions, Italy, will try to hold their position against another 23 European men's national teams.

The tournament starts with group stages, then it will go into the round of 16 from June 29 to July 2, followed by the quarterfinals on July 5 and 6, the semifinal matches on July 9 and 10, and the Euro 2024 final will be played on July 14.

How to watch Euro 2024 for free

Many parts of the world, mainly in Europe, stream the games for free on certain websites. But unless you live there, you'll have geo-restrictions from watching the matches. Here are some free streaming platforms that are covering EURO 2024, according to Mashable:

• Austria — ORF and ServusTV

• Belgium — RTBF and VRT

• France — 6play and TF1

• Germany — ARD, RTL, and ZDF

• Italy — RAI and TV8

• Norway — NRK

• Netherlands — NOS

• Spain — RTVE

• UK — BBC iPlayer and ITVX

The broadcasts will be in the language of each respective country, so if you're looking for coverage in English, try the UK ones. ITVX, in particular, was easy to navigate and stream the match. All you need to do is register with an email, choose any UK postal code, and start streaming. Of course, you'll be geo-restricted from watching the game since you're not in the UK, but that's where using a VPN comes in handy.

Express VPN is our favorite VPN for bypassing geo-blocking restrictions. It will run you $12.95 per month, $9.99 per month for six months, or they also offer an annual plan for $8.32. You can see our comparison of ExpressVPN with NordVPN (another top VPN provider) here. Once you have ExpressVPN, open the app and connect to the server from the UK, open ITVX on the same device, and you'll be able to watch the EURO matches for free.

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This Chrome Extension Can Get You the Best Deal on Home Furniture

A common practice in the home furnishings market is "white labeling," in which the same item is rebranded and sold under different names by different companies (and at different price points). This means you may be able to find the dining table or bar cabinet you love at a lower cost, but you have to know where to look, and that can take time. Spoken.io can help you find the home furnishings you want at the cheapest price by showing you comparisons across different retailers, including both big box and lesser-known stores.

How to use Spoken to find furniture deals

You can head to Spoken.io simply to browse home items, which you can further sort by price range, design style, item type, and more. You can also navigate to the list of stores that Spoken searches if you found a piece of furniture at a specific retailer and want to see where else that item is sold and for how much. The service pulls from major retailers like Pottery Barn, West Elm, and Target as well as more niche and local stores.

Once you select an item, you'll see a description as well as a list of retailers that stock that item and how much it is listed for, which allows you to select the one with the best deal. You can also create an account and save items to a wishlist.

Credit: Emily Long

Spoken also has a Chrome browser extension, which will alert you when there's a better deal on the item you're currently browsing. If Spoken can find the item, the extension logo will pop up in the toolbar with a badge showing how many stores stock it, and you can click through to see the price comparisons. Note that the extension didn't activate for every item we searched, even those that are listed on Spoken's website.

Credit: Emily Long

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7 Best Mechanical Keyboards (2024): Tested and Reviewed

We've typed thousands of words to help you find the ideal clacky—or thocky—mechanical keyboard for your refined taste.

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Use 'Folder Peek' to Turn Your Mac's Menu Into an App Launcher

Your Mac's menu bar can be home to a host of nifty utilities. From managing your calendar to adding a virtual sticky note, there's a great menu bar tool for almost everything. I recently discovered another useful app called Folder Peek, which lets you place any folder from your Mac on the menu bar. You can use this in many different ways, but my favorite is using it as an app launcher.

Using Folder Peek as an app launcher

Credit: Pranay Parab

Once you've installed Folder Peek on your Mac (simply click "Get" while viewing it in the App Store), choose which folder you want to add to your menu bar. Here's a fun trick: if you choose the Applications folder, clicking on it will display all the apps installed on your Mac, which you can click again to launch. This is perfect if you want to declutter your dock, and it can also be faster than launching an app via Spotlight (or a better alternative).

It takes a little bit of configuration to make the most of this setup, though. To customize how your folder looks in the Menu bar, click the Folder Peek icon and press Command-Shift-, (the last key is comma). This will open a settings window. Choose an icon for your folder, give it a title, and head over to the Menu section. I like the Date Accessed sort order and Large file icon size. I also limit the maximum number of icons to 15. You can play around with these options until you land on something that serves you best.

Other features worth trying

Credit: Pranay Parab

Since you can add any folder to your menu bar, there's plenty else you can do with this app. If you add a folder that has some photos in it, you can quickly preview them using Folder Peek. I noticed that this process is faster than using the Spacebar key to preview photos and hitting the arrow keys to scroll through, at least on my M1 MacBook Air. Similarly, you can also preview text files, PDF files, and view what's inside various sub-folders. With sub-folders open in Folder Peek, press Shift to see more options, such as Get Info or Copy Path.

You can also always click the folder title, located at the top of the drop-down menu, to open the folder in Finder. Interestingly, you can use Folder Peek as a way to quickly open bookmarked webpages. To do this, open any webpage in Safari and drag the URL to a folder on your Mac. Now put this folder in the menu bar using Folder Peek and you'll notice that all the pages you saved to it will be listed when you click on it. Clicking these pages will open them in your default web browser.

The app has a few more tricks up its sleeve, which you can explore by opening folders in it and pressing the Option key.

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More Android Phones Are Getting Gemini in Messages

Google is finally expanding the number of Android phones that can access Gemini through Google Messages. Previously, the feature was only available on certain Pixel devices, as well as Samsung Galaxy devices including foldables and the Galaxy S22 and beyond.

Now, Google has updated its help pages to indicate that the feature is finally available on a wider selection of Android phones, though there are still a few important requirements that you’ll need to meet first.

Most importantly, you’ll need to have an Android device with 6GB or more RAM. This, unfortunately, rules out some of the cheaper options out there. However, considering that many mid-range devices have 6GB to 8GB of RAM these days, it should hopefully put Gemini in a lot more hands. Additionally, Google says that you will need to be 18 or older and have RCS messaging turned on.

You’ll also need to be logged into the latest version of Messages with a personal account that isn’t managed by Family Link or a Google Workspace account, and be in one of the 165 countries that Gemini supports.

If you meet these requirements, you should then be able to take advantage of Google-powered AI directly in your Android phone’s messaging app.

How to use Gemini in Google Messages

Using Gemini in Messages is a lot like talking to your friends. If this is your first time talking to Gemini in Messages, just open the Messages app, tap Start Chat, and choose Gemini as the recipient. If you have started a chat before, simply tap on the chat to continue it.

With the chat open, you can begin sending requests and asking questions of the AI-powered chat bot. Gemini in Messages works very similarly to how it does on the web, so don’t be afraid to experiment with its various capabilities.

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Habo Is a Simple (and Free) Habit Tracking App

We've talked a lot about the "don't break the chain" method of building habits over the years, where you visually mark the completion of a habit every day to help you build it. The classic method is to put an "X" on a paper calendar every day. The longer your streak goes on, the more motivated you are to keep it going—as anyone with Snapchat streak with a friend knows.

Paper is fantastic for this, granted, but some people prefer digital tools. That's why I like Habo, an open-source habit tracking app for Android and iPhone that couldn't be simpler. There are no ads and no upselling—it's just a way to help build habits. Once you've downloaded and opened the app, add as many habits as you like. The idea is that you will check things off as you do them.

Credit: Justin Pot

There's an indicator on the top of each habit that lets you know how many days your streak has lasted. And you can configure the settings to do things no paper calendar can, like reminding you about your habit every day at a particular time. For example: You want to start doing 20 pushups before lunch every day. You can set the application to send you a notification right at 11:55. You can also add specific details about your routine and the reward you'll give yourself after completing it.

What I really appreciate about this app is its simplicity—and the fact that it's completely free. Too many productivity tools become needlessly complicated as they pursue monetization. Habo does what you need it to do and nothing else.

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Far Right Militias Are Back

As the US election approaches, one armed militia organized by a January 6 rioter is spreading its message across the country.

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Adobe Says It Won't Train AI Using Artists' Work. Creatives Aren't Convinced

Adobe has issued new wording to explain how users' content will be treated, after a backlash earlier this month from artists who believed their work will be used to train AI.

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You Can Rename Siri in iOS 18 (but Should You?)

It's taken nearly 13 years, but you can finally rename Siri on your iPhone or iPad. iOS 18 will allow you to set up a custom phrase and use it to invoke Siri. Renaming Siri is possible through an accessibility feature called Vocal Shortcuts, which has been introduced with iOS 18. Before you get too excited, though,you should know that even though you can call Siri by any name, the fastest way to launch and use Siri is still by referring to it as "Siri."

A word of caution: iOS 18 is in a pre-release stage at the time of writing. This means that you should avoid installing it on your primary iPhone. Doing this may lead to major issues with your phone such as basic apps including Phone or Messages not working as expected, network problems, or your banking apps being out of commission for months. With that out of the way, let's take a look at Vocal Shortcuts and how it helps you rename Siri.

What is Vocal Shortcuts?

Credit: Pranay Parab

Lots of tech companies are investing in accessibility, which is a great thing. When a company thinks about and designs features for people who find it hardest to use their technology, the whole world benefits—and Vocal Shortcuts is a great example of that. Apple has designed this feature for people who find it hard to operate touchscreens, such as those who suffer from motor control challenges. 

Vocal Shortcuts allows you to configure a custom phrase and map it to a number of actions within iOS 18, such as AirDrop, any of your automation routines, Control Center, and even launching Siri. If you want to see the full extent of supported actions on your iOS 18 device, go to Settings > Accessibility > Vocal Shortcuts > Add Action.

How to rename Siri on an iPhone

Credit: Pranay Parab

One of the most interesting uses of Vocal Shortcuts is renaming Siri. To do this on your iOS 18 iPhone, head over to Settings > Accessibility > Vocal Shortcuts and enable Vocal Shortcuts. Next, tap Add Action on this page and hit Continue. Use the search box up top to locate Siri and select Siri from the list of results. Your iPhone will ask you to type a custom phrase and you're free to choose whatever you wish. Yes, it's totally okay to choose "Alexa," or even "OK, Google."

Once you've chosen your phrase, your iPhone will ask you to speak it three times, and confirm your new name for Siri. 

Why you shouldn't rename Siri

Credit: Pranay Parab

Vocal Shortcuts works great. Whenever you speak the custom phrase you set for Siri, it'll launch the voice assistant for you. However, there's a catch—this method adds a significant delay in launching Siri. It takes your iPhone a second or two to understand the custom phrase and fire up Siri.

This means that you'll find yourself waiting after speaking your custom phrase, confirming that Siri has indeed launched, and then using a voice command. This makes the process significantly slower. It's far from ideal.

A workaround that lets you use a different Siri name

Credit: Pranay Parab

There is a hack that lets you get the best of both worlds—renaming Siri and having access to a reasonably fast voice assistant. You can set up a custom phrase for a specific Siri command. This is great for repetitive commands that you use often, such as, "Siri, turn off the lights." You can set up a custom phrase such as: "Alexa, lights," or simply, "Lights off." This way, you'll be able to use a custom name for certain Siri actions. 

To do this, go to Settings > Accessibility > Vocal Shortcuts > Add Action > Siri Request. Now type the voice command that you use with Siri, such as, "Close the garage door," or "Play some music." After this, choose the custom phrase you wish to use to trigger the voice command. You can then speak the command three times and confirm the Vocal Shortcut. From this moment on, you can use the custom phrase and it'll automatically make Siri execute the voice command you've chosen.

Feel free to add as many custom phrases as you like, but know that this exposes you to more accidental activations. When you're having an unrelated conversation around your iPhone, it may execute commands if it hears you speak any of the custom phrases you've chosen. It would be wise to choose phrases that you're unlikely to use much in regular conversation in order to avoid unhelpful scenarios such as turning off the lights when everyone's awake.

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17 Management and City-Building Games for Armchair Tycoons

These building- and resource-based simulations are perfect for single-player fun and relaxation.

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A Brief History of AI

This post is part of Lifehacker’s “Living With AI” series: We investigate the current state of AI, walk through how it can be useful (and how it can’t), and evaluate where this revolutionary tech is heading next. Read more here.

You wouldn’t be blamed for thinking AI really kicked off in the past couple years. But AI has been a long time in the making, including most of the 20th century. It's difficult to pick up a phone or laptop today without seeing some type of AI feature, but that's only because of working going back nearly one hundred years.

AI’s conceptual beginnings

Of course, people have been wondering if we could make machines that think for as long as we’ve had machines. The modern concept came from Alan Turing, a renowned mathematician well known for his work in deciphering Nazi Germany’s “unbreakable” code produced by their Enigma machine during World War II. As the New York Times highlights, Turing essentially predicted what the computer could—and would—become, imagining it as “one machine for all possible tasks.”

But it was what Turing wrote in “Computing Machinery and Intelligence” that changed things forever: The computer scientist posed the question, “Can machines think?” but also argued this framing was the wrong approach to take. Instead, he proposed a thought-experiment called “The Imitation Game.” Imagine you have three people: a man (A), a woman (B), and an interrogator, separated into three rooms. The interrogator’s goal is to determine which player is the man and which is the woman using only text-based communication. If both players were truthful in their answers, it’s not such a difficult task. But if one or both decides to lie, it becomes much more challenging.

But the point of the Imitation Game isn’t to test a human’s deduction ability. Rather, Turing asks you to imagine a machine taking the place of player A or B. Could the machine effectively trick the interrogator into thinking it was human?

Kick-starting the idea of neural networks

Turing was the most influential spark for the concept of AI, but it was Frank Rosenblatt who actually kick-started the technology’s practice, even if he never saw it come to fruition. Rosenblatt created the “Perceptron,” a computer modeled after how neurons work in the brain, with the ability to teach itself new skills. The computer has a single layer neural network, and it works like this: You have the machine make a prediction about something—say, whether a punch card is marked on the left or the right. If the computer is wrong, it adjusts to be more accurate. Over thousands or even millions of attempts, it “learns” the right answers instead of having to predict them.

That design is based on neurons: You have an input, such as a piece of information you want the computer to recognize. The neuron takes the data and, based on its previous knowledge, produces a corresponding output. If that output is wrong, you tell the computer, and adjust the “weight” of the neuron to produce an outcome you hope is closer to the desired output. Over time, you find the right weight, and the computer will have successfully “learned.”

Unfortunately, despite some promising attempts, the Perceptron simply couldn’t follow through on Rosenblatt’s theories and claims, and interest in both it and the practice of artificial intelligence dried up. As we know today, however, Rosenblatt wasn’t wrong: His machine was just too simple. The perceptron’s neural network had only one layer, which isn’t enough to enable machine learning on any meaningful level.

Many layers makes machine learning work

That’s what Geoffrey Hinton discovered in the 1980s: Where Turing posited the idea, and Rosenblatt created the first machines, Hinton pushed AI into its current iteration by theorizing that nature had cracked neural network-based AI already in the human brain. He and other researchers, like Yann LeCun and Yoshua Bengio, proved that neural networks built upon multiple layers and a huge number of connections can enable machine learning.

Through the 1990s and 2000s, researchers would slowly prove neural networks’ potential. LeCun, for example, created a neural net that could recognize handwritten characters. But it was still slow going: While the theories were right on the money, computers weren’t powerful enough to handle the amount of data necessary to see AI’s full potential. Moore’s Law finds a way, of course, and around 2012, both hardware and data sets had advanced to the point that machine learning took off: Suddenly, researchers could train neural nets to do things they never could before, and we started to see AI in action in everything from smart assistants to self-driving cars.

And then, in late 2022, ChatGPT blew up, showing both professionals, enthusiasts, and the general public what AI could really do, and we’ve been on a wild ride ever since. We don’t know what the future of AI actually has in store: All we can do is look at how far the tech has come, what we can do with it now, and imagine where we go from here.

Living with AI

To that end, take a look through our collection of articles all about living with AI. We define AI terms you need to know, walk you through building AI tools without needing to know how to code, talk about how to use AI responsibly for work, and discuss the ethics of generating AI art.

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'The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom' Finally Gives Zelda Her Own Game

Princess Zelda is getting her own adventure on September 26.

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Use the ‘Calendar Method’ to Finally Declutter Your House

While being surrounded by clutter in your home can feel chaotic and overwhelming, much of it can probably simply be discarded. How much of your kid’s old artwork really needs to be kept forever? There’s nothing of value in that stack of junk mail. And what do all the cords in that drawer even do? I’m not saying it’s easy to part with all of it, but you can make it easier. All of that junk is overwhelming in volume, but when you break it down, it can be totally manageable. You didn't accumulate it all at once, so don't try to get rid of it that way. Just use a calendar.

How the "calendar method" of decluttering works

The calendar method is pretty simple, when you get down to it: On the first day of the month, set out to declutter your house—but with the intention of it taking the full month. You start slow: On the first day, you find one item to throw away (or donate). On the second day, you throw away or donate two. Add another item each day, so you’re slowly building your decluttering muscle over the course of the month.

On a day with 31 months, you’ll end up parting with nearly 500 pieces of junk—and yet, you'll still be pacing yourself. On the first few days, don’t throw away anything too hard to part with. You’ll have plenty of time to get rid of every receipt, every unused appliance, and every expired container of food. Try to focus on one room at a time and make sure you stay on track with the numbering system. In fact, consider dedicating a month to one room, the next month to another, and so on, so you wind your way through the whole house at a pace that doesn't feel burdensome.

The best way to do this is by getting a big day planner and using that as your calendar, since it will tell you not only the numerical day of the month, but give you some space to write. At the end of each day, jot down everything you tossed out or donated. Try one like this, with big pages for each day:

Simplified Daily Planner And Notebook With Hourly Schedule

$13.99

$13.99

If there is a day when you feel like tossing more pieces of junk than the date's number dictates, go for it, but use some caution. You know that toward the end of the month, you'll be getting rid of a bunch, so don't burn out. That's exactly what this technique is trying to avoid. In the event you work through this method for a while and find it's a little too slow, there are other decluttering techniques that take a stricter and more intense approach, so once you've gotten used to the feeling of getting rid of what you don't need, consider switching to one of those.

Why the calendar method is so effective

This method helps you get in the habit of tossing out a predetermined number of things, so that by the time you’re up to the teens and 20s, it’s much easier to part with stuff. (That's why I suggest saving more sentimental items until later in the month, when you've built up the mental muscle and are more used to tossing things out.) You see the progress and gain momentum along the way, especially if you take time to write down what you parted with every day. Getting rid of hundreds of pieces of clutter at once is an overwhelming task but chunking it up so you get a little thrill of accomplishment every day is much more sustainable. Plus, you'll see the progress through the month. By the third week or so, the space will look different—and that's motivating, too.

And at the end of the month, if you still have a bunch of clutter around, start back over at one.

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The 5th Generation iPad Air Is $200 Off Right Now

Apple released a new iPad Pro and iPad Air, among other products and announcements, during its May 7 "Let Loose" event. As is normally the case when newer versions are released, the older ones have gone down in price. Best Buy also happens to be having an Apple Sales Event right now, which includes the 5th generation 64GB iPad Air for $399.99 (originally $599) and the 256GB version for $549.99 (originally $749.99). Best Buy hit these prices earlier this month for just three days, but now they're back to their lowest prices for another round.

M1 chip, 10.9-inch Liquid Retina Display, Wi-Fi 6, 12MP front/12MP Back Camera, Touch ID.

Apple iPad Air (5th Generation) 256GB

$549.00 at Best Buy

$749.00 Save $200.00

$549.00 at Best Buy

$749.00 Save $200.00

M1 chip, 10.9-inch Liquid Retina Display, Wi-Fi 6, 12MP front/12MP Back Camera, Touch ID.

Apple iPad Air (5th Generation) 64GB

$399.99 at Best Buy

$599.99 Save $200.00

$399.99 at Best Buy

$599.99 Save $200.00

This iPad Air is the thinnest—and still one of the best—tablets Apple has to offer right now. This wifi-enabled iPad Air, which PCMag said is "outstanding," was released in 2022. It comes with an M1 system-on-a-chip (SoC), a 10.9-inch Liquid Retina display, a 12MP front and back camera, as well as Touch ID through the tablet’s power button. It's just a tenth of an inch thinner than the iPad Mini (and matching the 6th generation in thickness) but about twice as heavy as the Mini. Unlike previous iPad Airs, this one offers many of the same features as the 2021 iPad Pro, like the M1 processor and second-generation Apple Pencil support. The iPad Air does fall short compared to the Pro lineup when it comes to the camera, audio, and graphics, but considering it is almost half the price, it may be worth the tradeoff.

These other iPads are also discounted on Amazon right now:

• Apple iPad Mini (6th Generation) $399.99 (originally $499)

• Apple iPad (9th Generation) $379 (originally $479)

• Apple iPad (10th Generation) $329 (originally $349)

• Apple iPad Air 11-inch (M2) $569 (originally $599)

• Apple iPad Air 13-inch (M2) $754 (originally $799)

• Apple iPad Pro 11-Inch (M4) $949.99 (originally $999)

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