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3 perfect-score HBO Max documentaries to watch this weekend (July 31-August 2)
It's the final weekend of July, and while we wait for the hot new lineup from HBO Max to arrive for August (with DC's Lanterns and new docuseries Monsters of God on the way), the prestige service still has a few tricks up its sleeve for documentary lovers.
These are the last remaining sports cars you can get under $50,000
Affordable sports cars are becoming an endangered species. As prices continue to climb and automakers shift their focus toward SUVs and electrification, the number of genuinely fun performance cars that ordinary buyers can still afford has dwindled to just a handful.
3 great Netflix shows to binge-watch this weekend (July 31-August 2)
While Will Ferrell's golf comedy The Hawk, Josh Duhamel's ranch drama Ransom Canyon, and WWE's Raw float around in Netflix's top spots as we approach the end of the month this weekend, if you're a U.S. subscriber looking for something worth adding to your watchlist, I have a few suggestions you might like.
What is a "tradwife"? Nara Smith rejects the viral label.
Nara Smith would like the internet to know that she does not wash the dishes.
That detail may surprise anyone who has spent the past several years watching the 24-year-old creator get called one of TikTok’s most recognizable "tradwives" (she has over 12 million followers as of this writing). On the July 29 episode of Alex Cooper’s Call Her Daddy podcast, Smith pulled out her phone and found one definition: “a woman who embraces or promotes a traditional model of marriage and family life” by prioritizing homemaking and caregiving while supporting her husband as the primary breadwinner.
She argued that the label has never accurately described her.
SEE ALSO: Kesha, the internet's tooth fairy, wants your teethSmith’s elaborate cooking videos have made her a fixture in the tradwife conversation, even though she has repeatedly rejected the term. This time, she went through the assumptions about her work, marriage, and household one by one.
The interview quickly restarted a familiar argument. Some viewers accepted Smith’s explanation. Others maintained that even if she does not live as a tradwife, her videos helped popularize the aesthetic.
This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed.The debate raises a more basic question: What actually makes someone a tradwife, and why has the term become such a loaded label?
Nara Smith breaks down the tradwife definitionThe title of Smith’s Call Her Daddy episode, "Stop Calling Me a Tradwife," didn’t leave much room for interpretation.
"They [the internet] kind of used me as the poster child for the tradwife movement," Smith told Cooper, calling the association “very bizarre.”
The term "tradwife," as Mashable associate features editor Anna Iovine defined it in 2022, refers to a woman who "denounces feminism in turn for the ‘more fulfilling’ life of submitting to a man." The husband typically serves as the breadwinner, while the wife focuses on homemaking, childcare, cooking, and cleaning. According to Smith, that description doesn’t fit. "I don’t prioritize being a homemaker," she said. "I’m a working mom."
Smith has modeled since she was 14 and now runs a lucrative content business; Forbes estimates she earned $7.5 million over the previous year. She was featured on the 2025 "Mashable 101" creator list, dubbed as "TikTok’s reigning domestic goddess."
At home, Smith told Cooper, she and her husband, Lucky Blue Smith, divide childcare based on who is working. She cooks because she enjoys it, and because severe eczema and a lupus diagnosis after her first pregnancy prompted her to reevaluate what she ate and begin making more food from scratch. Smith also rejected the suggestion that her husband is the family’s sole breadwinner, explaining that they both work and provide for their household.
"Yeah, I like to cook. Sue me," she said.
Smith acknowledges that her videos contain many of the cues viewers associate with tradwife content. She prepares labor-intensive food from scratch, wears feminine outfits, and builds recipes around what her husband and kids want. She married Lucky when she was 18, and welcomed their first child shortly after turning 19. Her family has also spent time with Hannah Neeleman, the creator behind Ballerina Farm, who is known as the "queen of tradwives." (Neeleman inspired the 2026 novel Yesteryear, but more on that below.)
As clips from the interview circulated, critics argued that Smith’s private household arrangement doesn't erase the image she has presented online. Many find her to have profited from making that domestic fantasy part of her public persona, "selling a dangerous product that young girls are taking note of." In some commenters' views, Smith knowingly used tradwife imagery to build a profitable brand and seems to now be distancing herself from the label without addressing what that content may have communicated.
This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed. This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed. This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed.On the other hand, some defenders argue that Smith’s videos are "calming and enjoyable," and that her content aims for views rather than an accurate depiction of her household. Others point out that Smith has never publicly promoted female submission or suggested women should leave the workforce, and they see using that term to describe her as a "microaggression." As one X user put it, "The girl just wanted to make her kids candy from scratch."
This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed. This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed. This isn't the first time Smith has rejected the labelSmith has been answering versions of the tradwife question long before Call Her Daddy.
In a 2024 interview with Harper’s Bazaar, Smith described her videos as a combination of her interests in cooking and fashion. She also explained that her famously hushed voiceovers were recorded inside a closet to avoid disturbing her children.
"It’s really not that deep," she said of her cooking content.
In July 2025, Smith told Jay Shetty’s On Purpose podcast that people continued treating her as a symbol of traditional marriage despite her attempts to show that she was a full-time working mother.
She added that Lucky regularly cares for their children while she travels and handles tasks that viewers might not associate with a "traditional" husband, including doing dishes, getting the children dressed, and styling their hair.
Smith made the distinction again in April 2026 while announcing her first cookbook, Homemade. She told Vanity Fair that she considers cooking both a hobby and a job and described her marriage as modern. She also said she plans to expand her platform into a larger culinary lifestyle business.
Still, the label has persisted.
Why is the tradwife label so controversial?Choosing to cook, raise children, or leave paid employment is only one part of the debate. The controversy grows when that personal arrangement is promoted as the "natural" or "preferable" role for women, particularly when it includes a husband leading the household and a wife becoming financially dependent on him.
This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed.Those ideas are not simply being projected onto the movement by its critics. A 2025 University of Hawaiʻi study analyzing posts tagged #tradwife and #tradelife found recurring messages that portrayed feminism as incompatible with femininity, blamed feminism for women’s dissatisfaction, and promoted traditional gender roles as biologically or religiously determined. Some of the content also included exclusionary messaging about transgender and gender-fluid people.
"Life for actual 1950s housewives was lonely and boring — if you were 'lucky,'" Iovine wrote back in 2022. She noted that domestic violence was widely treated as a private family matter, marital rape was not illegal in every state until 1993, and many homemakers experienced isolation, anxiety, and depression. Those realities are considerably less soothing than the vintage dresses and homemade bread that appear online.
The rise of the tradwife online has also come in tandem with the stripping of reproductive rights for women in the U.S., like the reversal of Roe v. Wade and attacks on the birth control pill, showcasing real-life consequences to the backlash of feminism.
Supporters, however, describe the lifestyle as a freely made choice and an alternative to the strain of balancing employment with motherhood.
"I believe working is good for many women, but [working outside the home] is also the cause of burnout for mothers," self-described tradwife Estee Williams told Business Insider in 2022. Williams said she promotes homemaking to show the fulfillment she finds in it. Alena Kate Pettitt, another early tradwife creator, has similarly called traditional housewifery "a choice" that "shouldn’t be mocked."
Despite the controversy, the content still appeals to viewers who have little interest in its traditional division of power. A 2025 survey of 1,000 British women ages 18 to 34 found that 79 percent were attracted to the calm, relaxed lives depicted in tradwife videos, while 62 percent were drawn to the luxury. Only 7 percent were interested in men serving as household decision-makers, though, and fewer than 8 percent said they would adopt the lifestyle themselves.
The highly polished videos also bear little resemblance to the circumstances of many stay-at-home mothers. As The Atlantic reported, many American mothers leave the workforce because childcare would cost as much as or more than they could earn — 75 percent of surveyed families with stay-at-home mothers had household incomes below $50,000, and more than two-thirds struggled to pay their bills.
Prominent tradwife influencers occupy a different economic reality, earning money through the very content that depicts them retreating from paid work. Researchers have identified the influencer business model as one of the movement’s central paradoxes: creators monetize sponsorships, products, and audiences while promoting a lifestyle centered on women leaving the workforce.
The fascination surrounding Caro Claire Burke’s 2026 novel Yesteryear offers a clear example of how contentious the subject remains. The book follows a wealthy tradwife influencer who wakes up in 1855 and must recreate the domestic life she promoted online without her modern kitchen, nannies, or production team. It became a bestseller, and Amazon MGM acquired the film rights, with Anne Hathaway attached to star and produce.
The book divided reviewers, too. Some viewed it as a broader examination of power, while others called it a "dissatisfying take" that failed to fully examine the religion, politics, and economic conditions behind the movement.
Its success nevertheless offered another sign of the public’s continued interest in tradwives, including among readers who strongly disapprove of the movement.
Smith’s latest interview has given them one more version of the debate. For now, Smith is still cooking. Lucky, apparently, is still on dish duty.
Reminder: Dont use Google Maps for hiking
Google Maps recently launched its biggest upgrade in years, filled to the brim with Gemini-powered features like Ask Maps and immersive, 3D navigation — it can recommend the best parking spots and suggest the top spots to check out while you travel around the world.
But even with all of AI's help, the digital map still lacks in one area: Outdoor navigation.
SEE ALSO: FTC lawsuit: Hims & Hers shared customer data with Meta, SnapA group of teenagers hiking Canada's Howe Sound Crest Trail in British Columbia recently found that out the hard way. The group, made up of 17-year-old novice hikers, was evacuated by local search-and-rescue teams after trusting a five-hour walk estimate from Google Maps.
Experienced hikers would have caught the app's mistake and come more prepared than the teens — Howe Sound Crest is an 18-mile hike with a 6,000-foot elevation gain, and is considered a two-day trip for beginners. But the novice hiker, relying solely on the map estimate, may not know its limitations.
Why is Google Maps not recommended for hiking?On city roads, Google Maps combines live traffic estimates with historic averages, posted speed limits, tolls, and other street data to generate the most accurate travel time for a standard vehicle. With integrations across the transportation landscape, it's fairly accurate. For walking, the process is a little more complex — humans and natural landscapes, obviously, are hard to standardize into an algorithm. The app uses an average human walking speed that might not match your own, and while it will adjust that time based on elevation, it won't account for important things like trail terrain or type.
Satellite imagery and machine learning come in handy for urban areas, but labyrinthine trails cutting through woods and forests are often left out, and an area's topography is usually only shown with basic details and minimalist renderings.
In 2024, competitor Apple Maps launched a new hiking upgrade in iOS 18, providing access to U.S. national park hike information and topographical maps to help plan custom hiking routes. But many seasoned hikers still discourage using mainstream navigation platforms, especially if you're climbing in the mountains or traversing potentially hazardous routes.
What can I use instead of Google or Apple maps?Instead of Google or Apple, try hobby-specific apps. Users on Reddit recommend resources such as Mapy and komoot. The free Open Street Map app and AllTrails have been popular among the adventurous set for years. A recent review by The Great Outdoors named Hiiker its number one hiking app. And hikers can get topographical data directly from local surveying agencies online.
Ultimately, each map offers different information, and most hikers use a combination of them for inspiration, topography, and safety planning.
It also never hurts to have analog resources as a backup. Keep a guide to local hiking trails and a recent topographical map of the area on hand (and know how to read it). Brush up on your compass skills, and connect with fellow experienced hikers to find the safest — but still awe-inspiring — routes beyond your phone.
Regularly $599.99, this Samsung Odyssey OLED G6 monitor is $399.99 at Amazon if you act quickly
SAVE $200: As of July 31, shop the Samsung 27-inch Odyssey OLED G6 gaming monitor for just $399.99. That's a massive price cut, saving you $200 on the monitor.
Opens in a new window Credit: Samsung Samsung 27-inch Odyssey OLED G6 $399.99 at Amazon$599.99 Save $200 Get Deal
If you're treating yourself to an OLED TV, why aren't you treating yourself to an OLED gaming monitor? Organic light-emitting diodes create some of the best, high contrast pictures in the game, so you can enjoy bright, high resolution picture. Samsung has brought this technology to its gaming monitors.
The Samsung 27-inch Odyssey OLED G6 gaming monitor is an exceptional model with QHD resolution, designed for bright, wide-ranging color displays. Burn-in is a concern with OLED screens, and luckily, this monitor has safeguards that actively prevent it. It's no surprise that such an elite model carries a steep $599.99 price tag, but if you act fast, you can get it for 33% off.
Mashable Deals Be the first to know! Get editor selected deals texted right to your phone! Get editor selected deals texted right to your phone! Loading... Sign Me Up By signing up, you agree to receive recurring automated SMS marketing messages from Mashable Deals at the number provided. Msg and data rates may apply. Up to 2 messages/day. Reply STOP to opt out, HELP for help. Consent is not a condition of purchase. See our Privacy Policy and Terms of Use. Thanks for signing up!As of July 31, the Samsung 27-inch Odyssey OLED G6 gaming monitor is just $399.99. That saves $200 off its list price, and brings it just $15 away from its lowest price ever.
In addition to its high-resolution OLED display, it has a Pantone Validated screen that reproduces more than 2,100 colors and over 110 shades of skin tone. It has HDR10 and a 240Hz refresh rate, which, with AMD FreeSync Premium, reduces choppiness, screen lag, and image tearing.
Shop the Samsung 27-inch Odyssey OLED G6 gaming monitor at Amazon for $399.99 and save $200.
Google is about to launch its version of the Apple AirTag
Google's Pixel 11 event might include the company's first answer to Apple's AirTag. A leaked image (shown below) and store listings make clear that Google is close to releasing a Pixel Tag that could become Android's default item tracker.
Your phone's speaker is probably clogged with water right now—this video will fix it
Water in a phone speaker is one of those problems that's easy to miss until the audio sounds wrong, and you can't figure out why. Sometimes it happens after a swim or a rain catches you off guard, but it can also build up slowly from humidity or a splash you barely notice. The instinct is usually to shake the phone, let it dry out, or stick it in rice, but none of those actually work on water, physically wedged into the speaker mesh.
I use Excel all day—this simple Ctrl+H shortcut saves me hours of spreadsheet cleanup
Most Excel users know Ctrl+F as a quick way to find specific text or values in a spreadsheet. You might also know Ctrl+H, but probably think of it as little more than a way to replace one value with another. For years, I overlooked how much more it could do. From cleaning up messy imports to fixing formatting issues, Find and Replace is one of Excel's most underrated cleanup tools.
3 award-winning movies to watch on Netflix this weekend (July 31-August 2)
Now and then, I come across a movie that makes me wonder how I hadn't heard of it sooner. This is especially true with Netflix titles, because there's so much to choose from, what with its original library and new, licensed titles arriving every month in the U.S.
A K-pop group launched a lemon 30 kilometers above Earth. Heres how they did it.
If you thought K-pop comeback promotions had reached their limit, Hearts2Hearts would like a word.
Ahead of the release of its second mini album, Lemon Tang, the rookie SM Entertainment girl group introduced fans to Tangy, an adorable lemon mascot who quickly became the unlikely face of the comeback. What started as a series of mysterious social media posts asking fans to keep an eye out for the citrus character soon evolved into one of the strangest album promotions in recent memory: Tangy was launched more than 30 kilometers above Earth aboard a custom-built high-altitude balloon.
Yes, really.
Tangy in near space. Credit: Courtesy of Sent Into SpaceThe launch served as the grand finale of Hearts2Hearts' "Missing Tangy" campaign, a weeks-long social media mystery that treated the smiling citrus like a missing celebrity. Fans were encouraged to report sightings, piece together clues, and speculate about Tangy's whereabouts before the group finally revealed the mascot's improbable destination.
According to aerospace marketing company Sent Into Space, which partnered on the campaign, the mission required considerably more planning than simply tying a lemon to a weather balloon.
The engineering team designed a custom-molded flight seat built specifically for Tangy's "lemon-shaped posterior," complete with a concealed safety harness to keep the mascot secure during the journey. They also 3D-printed a miniature pair of heart-shaped sunglasses so Tangy could travel in style.
Tangy traveling in style. Credit: Courtesy of Sent Into SpaceOn launch day, the hydrogen-filled balloon carried Tangy into what Sent Into Space describes as near space, ascending for roughly 90 minutes to an altitude of more than 33 kilometers — above 99.5 percent of Earth's atmosphere. At that height, the curvature of the Earth becomes visible while the sky fades into the deep black associated with space.
The balloon itself expanded to nearly 30 meters in diameter — roughly the height of the White House — before bursting as planned. Tangy's spacecraft then descended beneath a parachute, completing a flight that lasted about three hours from launch to landing.
"Collaborating with Hearts2Hearts to celebrate their latest album release was an absolute pleasure, and the entire Sent Into Space team had a fantastic time launching everyone's favourite lemon to over 30km above the Earth," Dr. Chris Rose, head of project at Sent Into Space, said in a statement shared with Mashable. "Tangy did prove to be a bit of a slippery customer, though, managing to escape before we could bring him in for a post-flight debrief…"
View this post on InstagramA post shared by Hearts2Hearts H2H (@hearts2hearts)
The joke fit neatly into the campaign itself. Rather than ending with the launch, the story continued with Tangy's playful "escape," extending the mascot's narrative beyond the mission and giving fans one last chapter in the adventure.
The entire journey was documented on video, including exclusive behind-the-scenes footage shared with Mashable that shows engineers preparing Tangy's tiny spacecraft, fitting the mascot with its custom sunglasses, and completing final checks before liftoff.
It's the kind of rollout that's becoming increasingly common in K-pop, where comeback promotions have evolved into multimedia experiences designed to fuel fan conversation long before an album arrives. Whether it's alternate reality games, fictional universes, interactive websites, or elaborate real-world stunts, agencies are increasingly treating album campaigns as immersive stories rather than traditional marketing.
Sending a lemon 33 kilometers above Earth may be one of the more delightfully absurd examples.
But that's precisely why it worked. Fans weren't just anticipating "Lemon Tang" — they were following a little lemon's journey from internet mystery to near-space traveler.
Pixel Rules let me automate my phone's settings by location—and I wish Google gave me more options
Google Pixel phones have plenty of cool features, but when it comes to automations, they’re a bit lacking. Still, even with the limited options, I’m able to make my Pixel automatically change certain settings based on my location.
The discontinued 368-HP sports sedan that makes German rivals look overpriced
Badge prestige still carries a lot of weight in the sports sedan world, which is why many buyers automatically gravitate toward the usual German luxury brands. That can be an expensive habit, especially when there are overlooked alternatives offering comparable performance, premium interiors, and engaging driving dynamics for thousands less.
7 ways to repurpose an old Chromecast
Got an old Chromecast sitting in a drawer unused? It doesn't matter if you no longer need it for streaming, there are plenty of other ways to make use of it. So connect it to your TV, update the software, and try one of these ideas to repurpose your old Chromecast.
Your modem's firmware might be a privacy time bomb
Your modem is probably one of the least-checked devices in your home. After all, how often do you really need to look at it? Only if your internet goes down, I'd imagine.
3 riveting Prime Video shows to watch this weekend (July 31-August 2)
When it comes to summer binges, I prefer a riveting series over anything else. In a world where our minds are constantly focused on multiple things at a time, there's nothing better than tuning all that out with something completely engrossing that keeps me hooked.
5 Google Pixel features you probably didn’t know about
Your Google Pixel has many clever features, some tucked away in menus or introduced quietly. If you’ve updated to Android 15 or even if you’re running an older version, there’s a good chance you’re missing out on some of these hidden gems.
5 affordable SBCs that beat the Raspberry Pi 5 at homelabbing
For a long time, the Raspberry Pi was the default choice for any project that called for an SBC because it was affordable and well-supported. Unfortunately, things have changed. Memory prices have pushed the top-shelf Pi 5 from its original price of $120 to above $300. The low-memory models are still affordable, but the calculus around which board you should buy is no longer quite so cut and dry.
3 free, open-source set-it-and-forget-it apps you need to set up this weekend (July 31–Aug 2)
There's a category of apps that quietly run in the background, doing their jobs and making your life easier. You set them up once, configure them the way you want, and then forget about them as they keep working behind the scenes, quietly paying dividends. Here are three free and open source (FOSS) apps that fit that set-it-and-forget-it philosophy. You can set up all three in a single Saturday afternoon, and they'll continue working in the background for weeks and months to come.
You might be able to get some credit on your T-Mobile bill after the big outage
If your T-Mobile service was disrupted on Monday, you may be able to get some compensation for your troubles.
Multiple outlets, including KTLA in Los Angeles, have reported that some T-Mobile customers have been able to get at least $20 off their next bill because of the outage. One Reddit user said they were able to save as much as $80 (spread out over multiple billing cycles) by telling customer service that they missed out on a work opportunity because of the outage.
SEE ALSO: T-Mobile is giving away the Apple iPhone 17 for free — how to qualifyGenerally, it seems that these credits are not automatic, and you may have to personally contact T-Mobile customer service to be compensated for your troubles.
After a major Verizon mobile outage in January, Verizon offered all affected customers a $20 credit.
Millions of T-Mobile users found their phones stuck in SOS mode on Monday afternoon, which led to plenty of criticism of the brand on social media. T-Mobile did acknowledge and apologize for the outage, though it has not explained what happened.
This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed.Mashable contacted T-Mobile repeatedly to ask about the outage and its causes, but so far, the company has been silent. The most recent post at the T-Mobile news page is the company's Q2 2026 earnings report, in which the company saw growing revenue and profits, with total revenue for the quarter of $22.7 billion.


