IT General

My trash day reminder is one of my favorite automations. Using an integration that pulls the information from an official website, Home Assistant always knows which trash collection is due. Even using spoken reminders, however, we still sometimes forget to put the trash out on the right day, so I decided to build something that would be harder to ignore.

Android is in a strange place right now. New phones have never been better, yet it's harder than ever to justify buying the latest one. You're better off keeping your current device until it's no longer up to the job. And when you do need to replace it, buy an older model instead.

Netflix is arguably the most popular streaming service in the world. However, it's not the only streamer that boasts great movies. HBO Max, Hulu, Paramount+, and Prime Video all have vast libraries with terrific movies in various genres. If you know where to look, you'll find plenty of certified classics.

Critical coverage usually draws an angry email or two. For Ina and David Steiner, it led to live cockroaches, a fetal pig, and a bloody Halloween mask.

On Monday, July 27, eBay and several former executives agreed to pay $55.7 million to resolve the couple's lawsuit over the 2019 corporate harassment campaign.

The Steiners are the married founders of EcommerceBytes, a news site covering eBay and the broader ecommerce industry. They filed the civil case in 2021 after members of eBay's security team sent them threats, disturbing packages, and unwanted visitors in an effort to influence the site's reporting.

Of the $55.7 million settlement, $48.7 million will go directly to the Steiners. EBay will pay $46.15 million, former CEO Devin Wenig will pay $2 million, former senior vice president Wendy Jones will pay $500,000, and former chief communications officer Steve Wymer will pay $50,000. The remaining $7 million will go to nonprofit organizations. EBay will contribute $6 million, while Wenig will donate another $1 million to a group protecting First Amendment rights in Ina Steiner's name.

The agreement also allows the Steiners to keep talking publicly about the case. It contains no confidentiality provision, a priority for the couple because they wanted the settlement to discourage other corporations from trying to intimidate journalists over critical coverage.

To understand why the Steiners considered that transparency so important, it helps to go back to how the campaign began.

From critical coverage to criminal charges

When eBay's security team began targeting the Steiners in 2019, the couple had already spent two decades covering the company and other online marketplaces, such as Amazon and Etsy. Through EcommerceBytes, they reported on the issues affecting online sellers, including fees, policy changes, and the executives making those decisions.

The internal lead-up to the campaign only became clear years later — the Steiners initially filed their civil lawsuit in July 2021 and amended it in March 2023. Ina Steiner later told Wired in July 2026 that the litigation gave the couple access to roughly 68,000 documents showing how eBay executives discussed the site behind the scenes.

Those records traced a steady escalation. According to the amended complaint, Wenig sent Wymer a link to an April 10, 2019, EcommerceBytes article about his compensation. Wymer responded, "We are going to crush this lady."

The following month, Jones allegedly asked eBay security chief Jim Baugh to address criticism of the company "off the radar" and told him she did not want to know the details. Then, on Aug. 1, 2019, EcommerceBytes published an article questioning Wenig's handling of eBay's litigation against Amazon. Within half an hour, Wenig allegedly told Wymer that if they were ever going to "take her down," referring to Ina Steiner, "now is the time."

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Four days later, the harassment campaign allegedly began. According to eBay's admissions to federal prosecutors, members of its security team targeted the Steiners between Aug. 5 and Aug. 23, 2019. Anonymous accounts on what was then Twitter criticized EcommerceBytes and threatened to show up at the couple's home in Natick, Massachusetts.

The campaign quickly reached their front door. In addition to the cockroaches, fetal pig, and bloody mask, the group allegedly sent live spiders, fly larvae, a funeral wreath, and a book about surviving the death of a spouse. Pornographic magazines addressed to David were allegedly delivered to a neighbor, while Craigslist ads allegedly invited strangers to the Steiners' home for sex, a block party, and an estate sale. One night, an emergency plumber even arrived unannounced.

As the messages and deliveries continued, the language inside eBay remained aggressive. On Aug. 11, Wymer allegedly told Baugh, "I want to see ashes. As long as it takes. Whatever it takes." The group also took the harassment offline — several members of eBay's security team allegedly traveled from California to Massachusetts, followed the Steiners in a rented van, and attempted to install a GPS tracker on their car.

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They also had an unusual plan for how the campaign would end. EBay security manager Brian Gilbert, a former police captain, was allegedly supposed to approach the Steiners and offer to stop the attacks his colleagues were secretly carrying out. EBay would then appear to have solved a problem its own employees had created.

That plan unraveled when the Steiners realized they were being followed and contacted local police. Once members of the group learned they were under investigation, they allegedly made false statements, deleted digital evidence, and falsified records in an attempt to hide eBay's involvement.

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Wenig, Wymer, and Jones were not criminally charged, and Wenig has maintained that he was requesting a communications response and knew nothing about the harassment. EBay's internal investigation found his messages inappropriate but said it uncovered no evidence that he authorized the security team's actions.

Federal prosecutors eventually charged seven former eBay employees and contractors in 2020, all of whom eventually pleaded guilty. Four received prison sentences between July 2021 and October 2022, including Baugh, who was sentenced to 57 months in September 2022. Two others received one year of home confinement later that year. The final defendant, Gilbert, was sentenced in July 2024 to time served and one year of supervised release.

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The consequences also reached eBay itself. In January 2024, federal prosecutors charged the company with six felony offenses, including stalking, witness tampering, and obstruction of justice. EBay admitted to a detailed account of the campaign, paid the maximum penalty of $3 million, and agreed to retain an independent compliance monitor for three years.

The new settlement, though, resolves the Steiners' civil claims against eBay, Wenig, Jones, and Wymer. The couple also reached separate settlements with the other former employees named in the lawsuit, although those terms were not disclosed.

EBay says it has changed

In a public statement published July 28, 2026, the company called what happened “wrong, reprehensible and should never have happened.” It condemned the employees who pleaded guilty and acknowledged the “unprofessional tone” of communications involving Wenig, Wymer, and Jones.

eBay also pointed to the changes it has made since 2019, including bringing in new leaders and strengthening its policies, internal controls, and employee training.

Wenig, meanwhile, continues to maintain that he knew nothing about the campaign. In a statement provided to Mashable, the former CEO said he was “saddened” by what the Steiners endured, “especially because it occurred during my time as CEO of eBay.” He said the harassment “was deliberately done in secret and without my knowledge.”

After the packages, threats, surveillance, criminal cases, and six years of litigation, the campaign still failed at its original goal. EcommerceBytes remains online, and Ina Steiner got to publish the news of eBay's settlement herself. Talk about closure!

Agentic AI. Claws. Vibe coding. AGI.

AI buzzwords come and go pretty quickly these days, and now there's a new AI trend to know: super apps.

What is a super app?

A super app puts a variety of AI tools into one agentic app. This means that AI chatbots (like ChatGPT) exist within the same space as AI agents, i.e. tools that execute multi-step requests with a degree of autonomy.

The idea is simple: Soon, you'll no longer be bouncing between your AI chatbot, coding assistant, and agentic tools. "Super apps" will centralize all of these tools within a single app. A super app, if you will.

Why are people talking about super apps?

In an earning call this week, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said that a new super app will be central to Microsoft's upcoming AI strategy.

"This quarter, we also introduced Autopilots, autonomous, long-running agents with full enterprise compliance, including an always-on personal agent powered by OpenClaw," Nadella said. "And this quarter we will bring these Copilot experiences together, including Code, in one 'super app' spanning both consumer and commercial experiences."

Nadella said that the super app would be released by the end of summer 2026.

Microsoft isn't leading the charge on super apps; they're just the latest company to hop on the trend. AI companies, including OpenAI and Anthropic, are also focusing efforts on super apps.

As reported by Reuters, OpenAI has already launched its super app to employees. Meanwhile, competitor Anthropic is also combining its agentic Cowork tool with its Claude chatbot, the company recently announced.

Super apps could also accomplish something else for AI companies. Because users can access apps like InstaCart, Uber, Zillow, and OpenTable directly within ChatGPT, these agentic super apps could absorb as much of your online activity as possible into a single company's app.

Elon Musk reportedly wants to turn X into an everything app as well, and with super apps, his biggest AI rivals appear to be moving in the same direction.

Disclosure: Ziff Davis, Mashable’s parent company, in April 2025 filed a lawsuit against OpenAI, alleging it infringed Ziff Davis copyrights in training and operating its AI systems.

Toyota has spent decades building a reputation for vehicles that last. From dependable powertrains to strong resale values and low running costs, the brand has become one of the most trusted names for buyers who want a vehicle they can keep for years.

The Venn diagram of Spotify Premium users and runners is in for a treat. Running Mode is now available in the Spotify mobile app, matching song tempos to the different phases of a run.

Spotify's Fitness Hub rolled out in April of this year, partnering with Peloton and digital fitness instructors to put workouts directly in the app. Running Mode is now apart of the Fitness Mode, but a more self-guided experience.

The feature is available to Premium users on iOS in the U.S., Canada, the U.K., Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, and Sweden. It lets you choose from 25 curated running presets or build a custom workout from scratch. You can tailor the playlist to match your run length, beats per minute, and preferred genre, and it generates a personalized playlist based on your selections. If you need a boost, Running Mode also has optional audio cues to provide a little motivation.

This is not Spotify’s first attempt to keep pace with runners. In 2015, the company introduced Spotify Running, which used a phone’s sensors to detect a runner’s tempo and select music that matched it. Spotify retired that feature in 2018. Unlike its predecessor, the new Running Mode does not detect when someone speeds up or slows down — runners choose their desired tempo and workout structure before taking off.

Running Mode builds on Spotify's existing AI feature, Prompted Playlist, which allows users to provide a playlist description that Spotify uses to curate music. As Spotify positions itself to be an a one-stop-shop where you can listen to music, watch podcasts, and even buy books, Running Mode is a natural next step.

Are you ready for some more fun projects to tackle with your Raspberry Pi this weekend? Well, you're in luck, and I actually have one project that's sure to bring you down the path of nostalgia before it's all over.

Tinder has paused an AI-powered Photo Enhance tool that some users said altered their appearance, NewsNation reported.

Former user Jenny Rubin told NewsNation that the tool edited her photo without her opting in. "It was extremely violating," she told NewsNation's Jesse Weber. "It felt pretty uncanny, to be honest. Those are not my teeth. That’s not what my mouth looks like." Tinder had apparently changed the photo of her from a toothless smile to one with teeth.

SEE ALSO: You can now find local events on Tinder — and match with other attendees

Rubin deleted the app and made a TikTok about it, and others told her the app did the same thing. Tinder users also told NBC News that the app changed facial features and even skin tone, and also added features that weren't previously there.

"Photo Enhance is a tool that helps improve the technical quality of your photos. It's designed to enhance overall photo quality — for example, making your profile photo clearer and better lit — not to make you look different," Tinder's page on Photo Enhance states. The feature is supposed to "sharpen blurry images, adjust brightness and exposure, and improve clarity," the page reads. "It’s not designed to add or remove people, objects, or backgrounds, apply cosmetic effects, or change facial features or skin tone appearance."

A Tinder spokesperson reiterated that the feature isn't designed to change someone's appearance. "We know that profiles with clear, well-lit first photos have a much better experience, so our goal was to help make that easier for people on Tinder. The feature is in a test phase in limited markets and is available to a subset of profiles that had a detectable technical issue on the first photo, and more than 90 percent of people who receive an enhanced photo keep it," the spokesperson told Mashable over email.

According to the page, the suggested enhancement can be disabled, and the photo can be reverted to its original.

Tinder introduced the feature in March, along with a ton of other AI-powered features, including a matchmaker called Chemistry. At the same time, Tinder launched Photo Insights, which uses AI to scan users' camera rolls to determine interests based on patterns. The app previously introduced Photo Selector, an AI tool to help pick the best photos for a user's profile, in 2024.

Photo Enhanced is now paused in the 13 U.S. states where it was available. Tinder told NBC News and Mashable that the unintended changes impacted a small number of users. "Feedback data shows less than 0.5 percent of enhanced photos were flagged as not looking like the user, though not all of that feedback reflects a change as visible as what's been reported," the spokesperson told Mashable. It's paused to investigate the causes and strengthen safeguards.

When you use CarPlay, you probably just start some music, enter a destination, and drive off. However, there is a lesser-known feature that can make your CarPlay experience a lot more personal and fun: setting a custom greeting or sound when it connects to your car.

SAVE $160: The Samsung internal SSD 990 with 2TB is on sale at Amazon for $369.99, down from the list price of $529.99. That's a 30% discount and the lowest we've ever seen at Amazon.

Opens in a new window Credit: Samsung Samsung internal SSD 990 $369.99 at Amazon
$529.99 Save $160   Get Deal

According to the experts, the memory shortage is not letting up anytime soon. It's become a challenge to find affordable SSDs, and setting up a NAS at home or the office comes with a steep price tag these days. If you're in need of storage, consider this Amazon deal.

As of July 30, the Samsung internal SSD 990 with 2TB is on sale at Amazon for $369.99, down from the list price of $529.99. That's a 30% discount and the lowest we've ever seen at Amazon.

If your PC or laptop has been asking for more storage, this Samsung deal is one to hop on. The Samsung 990 SSD offers 2TB of storage and read speeds up to 7,250 MB/s. Write speeds reach up to 6,450MB per second. Those speeds will help with downloading games quickly, installing updates, and transferring high-resolution files without waiting around.

SEE ALSO: This week's best SSD deals include a World Cup edition Sandisk and a 2TB Lexar

For gamers who are used to long loading times or even need to delete old games, upgrading to an additional 2TB could be well worth the money. Since the Samsung internal SSD 990 with 2TB is on sale for the lowest we've ever seen and RAMageddon isn't gonna end soon, jump on this deal.

Walking through the aisles of a video store used to be half the fun of a movie night. You judged films by their cover art, stumbled across forgotten classics, and often left with something you never planned to watch.

A lot of my smart home automations feel a little bit like magic. When I saw a post on Reddit, however, I realized that I might be able to bring some genuine magic to Home Assistant. I bought an official Harry Potter wand and set it up to work as a magical smart home controller for my kids.

Dodge built the original Ram 1500 Rumble Bee for only two model years, 2004 and 2005, borrowing the namesake from the now-legendary Super Bee. The 5.7-liter Hemi V8 sent 345 horsepower and 375 lb-ft. of torque to the wheels, in what is arguably the greatest configuration for a truck: a regular cab with a short bed.

For over three months, I have been running 12 speed tests per day every single day. It's added up to over 1,200 tests spanning over 100 days, using nearly 2.5TB of data. What did I learn from this endeavor? Actually, way more than I imagined I would.

Affordable hybrid SUVs are becoming increasingly popular, but most buyers still expect to pay a premium for one that delivers exceptional fuel economy. However, there is one small crossover that breaks that assumption, offering incredible efficiency without requiring a plug or a luxury-sized budget.

SAVE $151.99: Amazon has the Sony WH-1000XM5 headphones on sale for $248, down from the list price at Sony of $399.99. That's a 38% discount.

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$399.99 Save $151.99   Get Deal

When it comes to tech, it's not always necessary to have the newest model. Sometimes, the older generator has plenty of features that still hold up well, and buying the previous model can come with major savings. If you've been shopping for Sony headphones, check out this Amazon deal.

As of July 30, the Sony WH-1000XM5 headphones are on sale for $248 at Amazon, marked down from the list price at Sony of $399.99. That's a 38% discount that shaves $151.99 off the price.

When Sony launched the XM5 headphones, they earned a Mashable Choice Award for their sound quality, noise cancellation, and overall design. Mashable Deputy Shopping Editor Miller Kern wrote in her review, "As for comfort, the headphones’ ear cups and band are nice and cushiony. I didn’t feel any uncomfortable head squeezing or ear pressure."

SEE ALSO: Stay hydrated this summer with the Owala FreeSip Tumbler — get $10 off at Amazon

Last year, Sony launched the new XM6 headphones, which have slightly improved sound compared to the XM5 headphones and folding ear cups. Aside from that, there's "nothing too major over the past generation," according to Mashable Lead Shopping Reporter Bethany Allard, who compared the Sony XM6 to the older Sony XM5.

Today's sale price of $248 at Amazon applies to the black, midnight blue, smoky pink, and silver colorways. They get up to 30 hours of battery life with a single charge, and a quick three-minute charge will earn you three hours of listening time. They also come with a protective carrying case.

The Sony XM5s have convenient features like speak-to-chat, which automatically pauses music when you speak. They also pause audio when you take them off and automatically restart when they're put back on.

If you're shopping for a pair of headphones for back-to-school season, consider today's sale price on the Sony WH-1000XM5 headphones. You'll be saving over $150 while getting some of the best sound quality available and a major savings over the $459.99 price of the Sony XM6 headphones.

If you're anything like me, you're probably starting to get fed up with disorganization around your house and digital life. That's what this weekend's homelab projects will focus on—getting organized. From unifying your podcast listening setup to simplifying your 3D printing file management, here are three homelab projects to work on this weekend.

Have you ever explored around Google Earth and thought to yourself, "I wish there were some generative AI features in here?" No? Well, you're getting it anyway.

Google announced that it's integrating Nano Banana, the company's generative AI image creator, directly into Google Earth.

To be more specific, Google has added its latest AI image generation model, Nano Banana 2, to its mapping platform and has rolled out a number of ways that users can utilize AI in Google Earth as well. Nano Banana has proven to be very popular, and Google previously integrated the tool with Chrome, Photos, Search, Gemini Notebook (previously Notebook LM), and Google Messages.

According to Google, Nano Banana in Google Earth can be used for a variety of purposes. Users can ask Nano Banana to:

• Generate infographics based on specific locations or landmarks

• View what a location looked like during a certain historical period

• Generate real estate plans for a lot of land

• Visualize a project before any construction starts

• Give a location or even a specific building a makeover

However, our friends at ZDNet received early access to the feature before it launched today and found that the Nano Banana implementation in Google Earth isn't really all that useful. At least not yet.

For example, according to ZDNet, the Create Image button, which deploys Nano Banana in the Google Earth toolbar, isn't provided when in Street View. ZDNet found it was easier to just take a Street View screenshot and paste the image into Gemini for AI image generation.

Furthermore, one of Google's own recommended use cases, "Bring history to life," doesn't appear to be historically accurate. ZDNet had Nano Banana generate the area around Philadelphia's Independence Hall in different time periods. While Nano Banana generated an image with the general look and feel of the time, it didn't seem to pull from any data that would show which buildings were actually around Independence Hall at the time.

The Infographic suggested use case also didn't pan out in ZDNet's tests, either. Generated infographics changed the actual layout of a location in the image and included nonsensical, garbled AI text as well.

The real estate industry has been a fairly big adopter of generative AI imagery, as they can show prospective buyers visualizations of what can be done with a home or plot of land. Google clearly had this in mind for at least some of its suggested use cases. However, Nano Banana in Google Earth seems very much like an early experimental feature at this point.

(Disclosure: Mashable and ZDNet are both owned by the same parent company, Ziff Davis.)

Samsung has been using Android for over 15 years, but it’s always done things its own way. You know a Galaxy phone when you see one, and that includes the software. One UI doesn’t work quite the same as plain Android—sometimes that’s good, sometimes it’s very annoying.