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Connections: Sports Edition is a new version of the popular New York Times word game that seeks to test the knowledge of sports fans.

Like the original Connections, the game is all about finding the "common threads between words." And just like Wordle, Connections resets after midnight and each new set of words gets trickier and trickier—so we've served up some hints and tips to get you over the hurdle.

If you just want to be told today's puzzle, you can jump to the end of this article for the latest Connections solution. But if you'd rather solve it yourself, keep reading for some clues, tips, and strategies to assist you.

SEE ALSO: Mahjong, Sudoku, free crossword, and more: Play games on Mashable What is Connections Sports Edition?

The NYT's latest daily word game has launched in association with The Athletic, the New York Times property that provides the publication's sports coverage. Connections can be played on both web browsers and mobile devices and require players to group four words that share something in common.

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Each puzzle features 16 words and each grouping of words is split into four categories. These sets could comprise of anything from book titles, software, country names, etc. Even though multiple words will seem like they fit together, there's only one correct answer.

If a player gets all four words in a set correct, those words are removed from the board. Guess wrong and it counts as a mistake—players get up to four mistakes until the game ends.

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Players can also rearrange and shuffle the board to make spotting connections easier. Additionally, each group is color-coded with yellow being the easiest, followed by green, blue, and purple. Like Wordle, you can share the results with your friends on social media.

SEE ALSO: NYT Mini crossword answers, hints for August 15, 2025 Here's a hint for today's Connections Sports Edition categories

Want a hint about the categories without being told the categories? Then give these a try:

• Yellow: Team grouping

• Green: Tony Hawk lingo

• Blue: Same team

• Purple: Same first word

Featured Video For You Connections: How to play and how to win Here are today's Connections Sports Edition categories

Need a little extra help? Today's connections fall into the following categories:

• Yellow: AFC East teams

• Green: Skateboarding terms

• Blue: Members of the L.A. Sparks

• Purple: Boston ____

Looking for Wordle today? Here's the answer to today's Wordle.

Ready for the answers? This is your last chance to turn back and solve today's puzzle before we reveal the solutions.

Drumroll, please!

The solution to today's Connections Sports Edition #326 is...

What is the answer to Connections Sports Edition today

• AFC East teams - BILLS, DOLPHINS, JETS, PATRIOTS

• Skateboarding terms - GOOFY, GRIND, KICKFLIP, OLLIE

• Members of the L.A. Sparks - BRINK, HAMBY, JACKSON, PLUM

• Boston ____ - BRUINS, COLLEGE, MARATHON, RED SOX

Don't feel down if you didn't manage to guess it this time. There will be new Connections for you to stretch your brain with tomorrow, and we'll be back again to guide you with more helpful hints.

Are you also playing NYT Strands? See hints and answers for today's Strands.

If you're looking for more puzzles, Mashable's got games now! Check out our games hub for Mahjong, Sudoku, free crossword, and more.

Not the day you're after? Here's the solution to today's Connections.

The Mini is a bite-sized version of The New York Times' revered daily crossword. While the crossword is a lengthier experience that requires both knowledge and patience to complete, The Mini is an entirely different vibe.

With only a handful of clues to answer, the daily puzzle doubles as a speed-running test for many who play it.

So, when a tricky clue disrupts a player's flow, it can be frustrating! If you find yourself stumped playing The Mini — much like with Wordle and Connections — we have you covered.

SEE ALSO: Mahjong, Sudoku, free crossword, and more: Play games on Mashable

Here are the clues and answers to NYT's The Mini for Friday, August 15, 2025:

AcrossAnswer to a party invitation

• The answer is RSVP.

Bring to a bubble

• The answer is Boil.

With 8-Across, tree that produces nearly two-foot-long cones

• The answer is Sugar.

See 6-Across

• The answer is Pine.

Enjoy a hill in chilly weather, say

• The answer is Sled.

DownN.F.L. ball carriers, for short

• The answer is RBS.

Campbell's products

• The answer is Soups.

Candlelight ___

• The answer is Vigil.

It travels the high way

• The answer is Plane.

Like the maple leaf on Canada's flag

• The answer is Red.

If you're looking for more puzzles, Mashable's got games now! Check out our games hub for Mahjong, Sudoku, free crossword, and more.

Featured Video For You The Wordle Strategy used by the New York Times' Head of Games

Are you also playing NYT Strands? See hints and answers for today's Strands.

Not the day you're after? Here's the solution to today's Mini Crossword.

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Considering how much space a short video takes up, it’s kind of hard to go without cloud storage now. The problem is that most services, like Dropbox or Google Drive, require ongoing monthly or annual payments that add up quickly. Koofr has a different approach with its 1TB lifetime cloud storage plan. You only pay once for a lifetime of cloud storage, and right now it’s on sale for $159.99 (reg. $810).

Cloud storage without the monthly fees

Koofr’s works across iOS, Android, desktop, and WebDAV, so you can access files from nearly any device. It also integrates with existing accounts like Dropbox, Google Drive, Amazon, and OneDrive, so you can manage all your cloud files in one place instead of constantly switching between apps.

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The fact that the company formerly known as America Online will discontinue its Dial-up service next month has prompted two kinds of reactions on the internet that it pioneered.

First: Wait, AOL Dial-up service still exists? Second: A wave of nostalgia for everything 1990s, from the dial-up sound to the unrealistically spam-free romcom You've Got Mail to the ubiquitous CDs to the formerly AOL-owned CompuServe homepage (which, amazingly, still carries today's news in soothing low-image form).

But there's a reaction we're missing, and it's not about the cautionary tale of AOL's rise and fall (trust me, I know; I was there for the pivot between rise and fall, and a purchase that arguably caused the dotcom collapse).

AOL wasn't defined by dial-up, a technology always destined for the dogs, but by all the tech it pioneered. AOL isn't our nostalgic tech past; it is in many ways our present. The features it pioneered dominate our tech lives in 2025.

Indeed, the company was unlucky to have arrived in the era of the CD, and to not last into the era of the smartphone. Had it not gone on a fatal get-big-fast acquisition romp, it's easy to imagine AOL could have become an extra A in the FAANG group, aka today's tech titans. Consider:

1. AOL Instant Messenger was basically Messenger, WhatsApp and Slack, in one.

Ah, good old AIM. How many hours did I waste on it in the 1990s and 2000s? More than on iChat and GChat, my subsequent obsessions. Many, many more than I did on Internet Relay Chat and ICQ — two earlier, less user-friendly forms of the same Instant Messaging idea. ICQ was bought by AOL in 1998, an early example of the buying spree approach to competition. This was, it turned out, unnecessary; AIM was simply the better product.

AIM was where Instant Messaging found the fun and friendly form we're still using today in a dozen apps, from WhatsApp to WeChat. The Buddy list and buddy icons made it feel like Facebook Messenger, decades before that was a thing (Meta, ironically, now holds the original AIM patent for a friends list). AIM had group messaging (not the same as the wild west of Chat Rooms, we'll get to those).

Messages on AIM looked like every message you send today. The service pioneered emoticons (nobody called them emoji yet). Years before you could so much as text a photo, AIM had multimedia messaging. It also had file-sharing, enabling dubious trading of MP3s before anyone heard about Napster.

And AIM pioneered the Away status, one that my workmates would pay attention to, long before Slack. AIM's skill at routing messages around blocked ports made it the bane of corporate IT departments, and a delight for plugged-in workers who needed to talk quickly.

"AIM became how Wall Street communicated," one of AIM's founders told Mashable in 2014.

But AIM was for pleasure as much as for work. It had all the spontaneous evening-spent-chatting joy that today I find in iMessage form. It also had the agony and anxiety of being left on read by a crush — only this version came with a brutal door-closing noise.

AOL smartly decided to give AIM away for free. It was open-source enough that you could message AIM users on its main rival, MSN Messenger. You didn't need to be inside AOL's walled garden internet to use AIM, so millions more did. Dial-up AOL maxed out at 30 million users. At its height in 2001, 61 million people used AIM; it didn't really start to decline until GMail exploded in popularity, bringing GChat with it.

Arguably, if AOL had focused on AIM as the internet's killer app instead of seeing it as a way to convert people into dial-up subscribers, it could have become the one messaging standard that all other apps must use. And we as users would have a much more open-source messaging landscape, instead of using multiple siloed services.

2. SmarterChild was an early AI chatbot.

AIM was large enough as a platform that third-party companies developed groundbreaking services for it. Case in point: A startup called ActiveBuddy and SmarterChild, a chatbot that was on 30 million Buddy lists six months after its birth.

Without knowing what it was doing, in other words, AOL gave as many people access to early AI as it did to dial-up. This has a direct impact on Apple's AI assistant: one early investor in Siri said he was inspired by the potential of SmarterChild.

It wasn't exactly GPT-5, but SmarterChild had access to vast databases: IMdB, the Weather Channel, Elias Sports Bureau. It could chat endlessly about baseball stats, movies, and the rain in Cleveland; for some users, that was enough to replicate an interesting human being.

For others, especially its younger buddies, SmarterChild came alive with its library of sassy responses (the work of one sardonic copywriter). It would, for example, browbeat you into an apology if you dared swear — something today's humor-free AIs could learn a thing or two from.

3. AOL Chat Rooms was proto-Twitter.

The infamous AOL Chat Rooms, where you could chat to dozens of strangers at once, predate even AIM, though they quickly became part of it. Usage exploded in 1996, when AOL switched from hourly billing to monthly, meaning you could spend as much time in them as you like. (That's right, you can also thank AOL for the modern innovation of monthly internet billing.)

The result was ... well, every bit as toxic as the worst of social media today. Anonymous handles yelled all-caps insults at each other, and not just in the political rooms. Creeps looking to "cyber" invaded every room, asking for the a(ge)/s(ex)/l(ocation) of the unsuspecting. We may have had to wait until the 21st century for the phrase "slide into your DMs," but that's what was happening everywhere in AOL Chat Rooms.

As for moderators? Well, Chat Rooms made Elon Musk's hellscape version of Twitter look like a well-moderated town square debate. AOL relied entirely on volunteers to police up to 60 million users. Contemporary reports described the effort as a "cyber sweat shop."

4. Usenet was basically Reddit.

Even before AIM and Chat Rooms, in 1993, AOL was the first consumer internet company to offer access to Usenet. This was a once sleepy set of forums, known as newsgroups, from earlier decades of computing. Newsgroup veterans would complain about the influx of newbies, usually university computer department freshmen, every September. The arrival of AOL's horde of users was such an ongoing catastrophe that the old-timers called it Eternal September.

We might call it something else: the beginnings of Reddit and other infamous message boards, such as 4Chan. The result was arguably worse; some Redditors miss the old Usenet. Then came AOL Chat, hosted on AIM but not a regular Chat Room. It was a moderated Q&A with experts, journalists and celebrities, where the questions were all user-generated —a Reddit AMA, basically.

And there were more AOL innovations. There was AOL Hometown, a GeoCities-style place for building websites without HTML knowledge; with its inventory of user interests it had started to look a little like MySpace, or LinkedIn, by the time it shuttered in 2009. On the operations side, AOL had to build up its data center infrastructure so fast that the area of Virgina it grew up in is now known as Data Center Alley; much of the world's internet traffic flows through it.

Next time you click on a fast-loading site, then, spare a thought for the dial-up people.

If you’ve chatted with literally any single friend lately — or scrolled through social media for five minutes — you know the general consensus on dating apps in 2025. People are...tired.

So, what are the best dating apps to cure app fatigue? As someone who’s been testing and reviewing dating apps for years, I get this question a lot.

Here's a better question: What do you want from your online dating experience? People with similar interests, values, and goals tend to flock to the same places both IRL and online. Someone on eharmony probably doesn’t want to hear, “I’m not looking for anything serious,” and someone on Tinder probably doesn’t want to talk about how many kids they want on the first date. That's why choosing the best dating app for your needs is the only "hack" that actually works.

No matter how you feel about dating apps, you can't deny that many couples now owe their relationship to online dating. A 2023 report from the Pew Research Center found that out of nearly 6,000 respondents, one in 10 partnered adults (those who were married, in a long-term relationship, or living together) met through a dating app. For adults under 30 and members of the LGBTQ+ community, 20 to 24 percent found their partner on the apps.

The dating apps worth downloading in 2025

To help you find dating apps that actually work, I've put in the hours, the swipes, and the subscription fees.

To find the best options for every kind of single — whether you're a hopeless romantic looking for love, a college student on a budget, or a busy professional — I created profiles, swiped (and swiped, and swiped), and even paid for premium features. I also consulted Mashable's dating and relationship experts, reviewed privacy policies, and considered overall ease of use.

The best type of late night interviews are the ones that go a little bit off the rails.

In The Tonight Show clip above, Honey Don't! star Margaret Qualley randomly challenges Jimmy Fallon to a game of Truth or Dare, which ultimately leads to him conducting part of the interview while lying horizontal on his desk.

It's not quite up there with the famously chaotic Bradley Cooper interview, but it gives Fallon's pillow fight with Dwayne Johnson and "behind the curtain" fight with Martin Short a run for their money.

TL;DR: Put all your AI tools like ChatGPT, Gemini Pro, and Leonardo.AI in one place with a lifetime subscription to 1minAI, an all-in-one AI app, on sale for just $39.99 (reg. $234). 

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The free version of some AI models like ChatGPT can get the job done, but if you want the good stuff, you should consider opting for a paid subscription.  

1minAI consolidates many of the most popular AI models — like ChatGPT, Gemini, and Meta AI — into one platform where you can use them all seamlessly, whether you need to generate text, images, or even full videos. A lifetime subscription to 1minAI usually costs $234, but you can get one on sale now for $39.99. 

What can you do with 1minAI

1minAI gives you one platform where you can access AI models like ChatGPT, Gemini, Meta AI, Mistral AI, and more. You don't just get the baseline version, either — 1minAI users can chat with GPT-4, GPT-4 Turbo, Gemini Pro 1.5, and Llama 2 or Llama 3. 

Like a ton of other AI platforms, 1minAI has a limit to how much you can generate every month. Unlike other platforms, the limit is incredibly high. Here's what your lifetime subscription gets you every month. 

First, you get a baseline of 1,000,000 credits per month. Then, every day you log in, you get an additional 15,000 free credits. These will roll over if you don't use them all, too. 

In practice, those huge numbers mean you could generate up to 362,500 words, research nearly 2,000 SEO keywords, generate 386 images, upscale 241 images, remove 24 backgrounds, convert text to speech for over 120,000 characters, and generate up to 12 videos. 

Your AI Swiss Army Knife

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If you like playing daily word games like Wordle, then Hurdle is a great game to add to your routine.

There are five rounds to the game. The first round sees you trying to guess the word, with correct, misplaced, and incorrect letters shown in each guess. If you guess the correct answer, it'll take you to the next hurdle, providing the answer to the last hurdle as your first guess. This can give you several clues or none, depending on the words. For the final hurdle, every correct answer from previous hurdles is shown, with correct and misplaced letters clearly shown.

An important note is that the number of times a letter is highlighted from previous guesses does necessarily indicate the number of times that letter appears in the final hurdle.

If you find yourself stuck at any step of today's Hurdle, don't worry! We have you covered.

SEE ALSO: Hurdle: Everything you need to know to find the answers Hurdle Word 1 hint

Intact.

SEE ALSO: Apple’s new M3 MacBook Air is $300 off at Amazon. And yes, I’m tempted. Hurdle Word 1 answer

UNCUT

Hurdle Word 2 hint

A mess.

SEE ALSO: Wordle today: Answer, hints for August 4, 2025 Hurdle Word 2 Answer

SNAFU

Hurdle Word 3 hint

Mass communication.

SEE ALSO: NYT Connections Sports Edition today: Hints and answers for August 4 SEE ALSO: NYT Connections hints today: Clues, answers for August 4, 2025 Hurdle Word 3 answer

MEDIA

Hurdle Word 4 hint

To snap.

SEE ALSO: NYT Strands hints, answers for August 4 Hurdle Word 4 answer

BREAK

Final Hurdle hint

An apartment complex.

SEE ALSO: Mahjong, Sudoku, free crossword, and more: Games available on Mashable Hurdle Word 5 answer

CONDO

If you're looking for more puzzles, Mashable's got games now! Check out our games hub for Mahjong, Sudoku, free crossword, and more.

The moon goes through a repeating cycle of phases each month, changing what we see every night. This is called the lunar cycle.

The lunar cycle is a series of eight unique phases of the moon's visibility. The whole cycle takes about 29.5 days, according to NASA, and these different phases happen as the Sun lights up different parts of the moon whilst it orbits Earth. 

So, what's happening with the moon tonight, Aug. 15?

What is today’s moon phase?

As of Friday, Aug. 15, the moon phase is Waning Gibbous, and it is 58% lit up to us on Earth, according to NASA's Daily Moon Observation.

Alongside this, with no visual aids on the moon, you can spot the Mare Imbrium, Copernicus Crater, and the Oceanus Procellarum, an "Ocean of Storms" that covers more than 10% of the moon's surface.

With binoculars, enjoy glimpses of the Gassendi Crater, Alphonsus Crater, and the Alps Mountains. If you have a telescope, the Apollo 12, Caucasus Mountains, and the Schiller Crater will all be in view too.

When is the next full moon?

The next full moon will be on Sept. 7. The last full moon was on Aug. 9.

What are moon phases?

According to NASA, moon phases are caused by the 29.5-day cycle of the moon’s orbit, which changes the angles between the Sun, Moon, and Earth. Moon phases are how the moon looks from Earth as it goes around us. We always see the same side of the moon, but how much of it is lit up by the Sun changes depending on where it is in its orbit. This is how we get full moons, half moons, and moons that appear completely invisible. There are eight main moon phases, and they follow a repeating cycle:

New Moon - The moon is between Earth and the sun, so the side we see is dark (in other words, it's invisible to the eye).

Waxing Crescent - A small sliver of light appears on the right side (Northern Hemisphere).

First Quarter - Half of the moon is lit on the right side. It looks like a half-moon.

Waxing Gibbous - More than half is lit up, but it’s not quite full yet.

Full Moon - The whole face of the moon is illuminated and fully visible.

Waning Gibbous - The moon starts losing light on the right side.

Last Quarter (or Third Quarter) - Another half-moon, but now the left side is lit.

Waning Crescent - A thin sliver of light remains on the left side before going dark again.

FREE BOOKS: The latest Stuff Your Kindle Day takes place on Aug. 12-16. Stepping Through Time, hosted by Indie Author Central, is offering free (or heavily discounted) historical fiction and contemporary books for Kindle e-readers.

Stuff Your Kindle Day is back once again, and this time fans of historical fiction and contemporary books have their moment to shine. Stepping Through Time, hosted by Indie Author Central, is offering books from these popular genres for free or just $0.99. And even better, the books that you download are yours to keep forever.

Does your library need a boost? It doesn't matter. These books are free to download, so you may as well indulge.

SEE ALSO: I tested the best Kindles to help you find the perfect e-reader

Looking to make the most of the latest Stuff Your Kindle Day? We've lined up everything you need to know about this popular event.

When is Stuff Your Kindle Day?

Stepping Through Time takes place from Aug. 12-16. Unlike a lot of Stuff Your Kindle Days that take place over 24 hours, this event runs for five days. That gives you plenty of time to consider your options and find exactly what you want to read. Relax, you've got time.

Who can take part in Stuff Your Kindle Day?

The beautiful thing about Stuff Your Kindle Day is that anyone can participate. Kindle, Kobo, and Nook readers can download these books for free. You can even download these books on your preferred app and read them straight from your phone.

Which e-books are free?

Finding all of these free historical fiction and contemporary books is straightforward thanks to the helpful hub page on Indie Author Central. Everything is nicely presented with filters so you can head directly to the books you actually want to download.

Is Stuff Your Kindle Day the same as Amazon Kindle Unlimited?

Everything you download on Stuff Your Kindle Day is yours to keep, and there's no limit on the number of books you can download. Stuff Your Kindle Day downloads don't count towards the 20 books that Amazon Kindle Unlimited subscribers can borrow at the same time, so don't hold back.

The best Stuff Your Kindle Day deal Opens in a new window Credit: Amazon Kindle (16GB) + 3 Months of Kindle Unlimited $109.99 at Amazon
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These popular e-readers help you take your entire library on the go. With weeks of battery life and an anti-glare display, you can read anywhere and anytime with the Kindle. Prices start at $109.99, but if you want to secure a better deal, you can get three months of Kindle Unlimited for free during Stuff Your Kindle Day.

Kindle Unlimited costs $11.99 per month and allows you to borrow up to 20 books at a time. For a limited time, you can get three months of Kindle Unlimited for free, saving you $35.97.

Listen up: Your whole life is packed inside your phone. And if listening to music — as well as podcasts and audiobooks — is one of life's greatest pleasures, you need a good set of headphones or earbuds to connect to your phone.

That's particularly true for iPhone users. As Apple fans know, Apple iOS is a uniquely designed system, built for syncing Apple products together. That means only certain headphones will do, though the best ones aren't always Apple-produced.

If you’re serious about your sounds — and we know you are — you need a pair that both suit the capabilities of your iPhone and your lifestyle. It's important to know what you're looking for, so we've gone ahead and done the research for you.

Do you need wireless headphones for your iPhone?

To put it simply, yes. If you have an iPhone, it's probably time to go wireless. You have to go back several generations to find an iPhone that has a regular 3.5mm audio jack input. Apple has insisted on equipping its phones with a Lightning port for several years now. Apple headphones also use Lightning connections so they can plug straight into your phone. And if you have a pair of wired non-Apple headphones, Apple also sells an adaptor which connects a regular audio jack to the Lightning connection. But these adaptors are unreliable and break all-too easily. The best option is to connect your iPhone to the headphones. It's much easier and means fewer cables.

Are AirPods the best headphones for the iPhone?

Yes and no. AirPods are great — especially AirPods Pro and AirPods Pro Max (as you’ll see below) — but they're also expensive. They're definitely a good one-stop solution as they're so convenient to set up with your iPhone and they fit the Apple aesthetic perfectly. However, if you're keen to search around and spend a little longer setting things up (or spend a little less), there are other good options out there.

Should you buy the cheapest pair of headphones?

You can spend a few pounds on the cheapest pair of headphones, but you might as well just use the buds that come free with your iPhone. Going cheap is a false economy and you'll sacrifice quality and function. If you regularly listen to music, it's worth investing a little more. The sound quality is going to be much better.

What is noise cancellation?

Noise cancellation blocks out ambient noise, allowing you to fully immerse yourself in your music. It's usually a mark of the best, most advanced headphones.

There are two kinds of noise cancellation: Passive and active noise cancellation. Passive noise cancellation is achieved by the design and build of the headphones, which physically block out noise by having oversized ear cups that create a seal. Active noise cancellation (ANC) uses a system of small microphones that pick up incoming sounds and create anti-noise sound waves to cancel them out. Also, look out for advanced ANC modes such as "transparency mode". This allows a certain level of ambient noise to seep in, such as other people's voices. It's handy for listening out for train platform announcements or having conversations with pals and colleagues.

What are Bluetooth codecs?

Wireless sound quality can be affected by factors such as distance and obstructions between your headphones and device, but also the codec software that your headphones support. Codecs are algorithms that encode and decode digital audio signals. Look out for headphones with low latency that support Qaulcomm’s aptX codecs, which are usually rated as the best codecs — particularly for streaming video on your phone and ensuring the picture and audio stay in sync. The latest versions to look (and listen) out for are aptX Lossless and aptX Adaptive.

What is spatial audio?

This is another term you'll see when shopping for high-spec headphones. It essentially means 3D audio, which separates the sounds and places them in different locations around the room. If you're watching a film, for instance, you'll feel like you're in the middle of the action. Apple and other brands have their own versions of the technology but it's all essentially the same thing. Some spatial audio headphones have head tracking, which anticipates the movements of your head and adapts the sound.

What are the best headphones for the iPhone?

Think about the main reasons that you need new headphones: Are you going to be using them while you travel? Will you be listening to music mainly at home? Or while exercising? We’ve looked at a number of different scenarios and figured out the best headphones or earbuds for you and your lifestyle. In other words, we’ve done the hard work for you. There should be something for everyone and every budget in this list.

These are the best headphones for your iPhone in 2025.

An in-depth new report from Politico determined that the Department of Government Efficiency (aka DOGE) has actually saved far less than it's claimed. So, despite spending the last six months cancelling research grants, federal contracts, and firing federal employees across the country, DOGE has fallen far behind the savings promised by Elon Musk.

So far, DOGE has claimed $205 billion in total savings since President Donald Trump's inauguration, according to its public "wall of receipts."

However, Politico reports that the wall of receipts is sorely lacking in, well, some important receipts.

DOGE claims it has saved taxpayers $52.8 billion from canceled contracts, but Politico could only verify $32.7 billion worth of contracts. What's worse is that, per Politico, the actual, tangible savings from those cancellations are closer to $1.4 billion. That's because DOGE uses some creative accounting to "exaggerate" the total savings. We'll get to that in a minute.

In other words, Politico reported that DOGE only saved about 2.6 percent of its claimed savings from cancelled contracts. Crucially, as Politico pointed out, none of that money can be taken off the federal deficit (which DOGE is supposed to be reducing) without Congressional intervention, as those dollars just get returned to the agencies.

Politico's lengthy report is worth digging into, as it has all the technical details of how DOGE is using "faulty math" to come up with these numbers. When calculating savings, DOGE reports the maximum possible spending amount of each contract, not the actual or planned spending.

This has actually been a known problem with DOGE's accounting since February. Often, experts use the analogy of a credit card limit to explain the limits of this approach. If you cancel a credit card with a $1 million limit, that doesn't mean you've saved $1 million.

Politico's report said that DOGE's claimed savings are "drastically exaggerated," and that "the magnitude of DOGE’s inflated savings claims has not been clear until now."

The Trump administration told Politico in response to their story that the agency produced "historic savings for the American people,” and that DOGE's public list of claimed savings is accurate and "updated in real time based on current information."

These questions about DOGE's exaggerated numbers may not surprise anyone who has been following along with Musk's shenanigans since January. Musk, who officially left his post at DOGE earlier this year, initially claimed that the agency would save the government $2 trillion before quickly revising that goal down to $150 billion in April.

DOGE's cuts have undoubtedly been effective in shuttering some government services, slashing foreign aid, and cutting $125 million in funding to support LGBTQ health initiatives.

Out of all the kitchen products we've put to the test, these 12 are the ones we'll always recommend — over and over again. Here's why we love them.

TL;DR: Scan anything, anywhere, with this lifetime subscription to iScanner, now A$38 (reg. A$307) with code SCAN through 7 September.

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Raise your hand if you've ever had to rush to the library to print something. If most of us don't have the space for clunky printers, chances are we also don't keep a scanner at home. That's what iScanner is for.

This iOS app transforms your iPhone or iPad into a handy little scanner that works for basically any document type. It's also only A$38 (reg. A$307) for a lifetime subscription.

No more wasted desk space

Even if you're one of the few with a physical scanner still in your presence, you can now clear some counter space thanks to iScanner. And while you're at it, you can throw away that dusty old filing cabinet, too. 

iScanner is the number one US-based scanning and document management tool, letting you knock items off your to-do list from anywhere. Need to save a receipt for taxes? Do you have a contract you need to digitize? You can scan any document using just the phone on your iOS device. 

Students, entrepreneurs, educators, and stay-at-home moms alike will all find endless uses for a scanner in your pocket. The AI-powered tools ensure your documents' borders are detected and automatically adjusted while also straightening scan pages and ditching curves and skews. 

Thanks to AI, you can also use iScanner to help you solve complicated math problems.  Or put its OCR technology to the test and let it help you decipher text in up to 20 languages.

Once things are scanned, the app becomes a full PDF editor and file manager. Edit your scans, including signing them, adding text, or autofilling them with custom templates. Then, use the file manager's folder via drag and drop to keep them safe and organized. 

Scanning something confidential? You can also protect files and folders by locking them with a PIN. 

Use code SCAN by 7 September at 11:59 p.m. PT to get an iScanner lifetime subscription on sale for A$38. 

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Horror movies have conditioned us to know that we should never, ever head into a spooky basement. The upcoming psychological thriller The Man in My Basement introduces a new basement-focused rule for us to abide by: Never rent your basement to a shady man.

Directed by Nadia Latif and based on the novel of the same name by Walter Mosley, The Man in My Basement introduces down-on-his-luck Charles Blakey (Corey Hawkins). He's recently lost his mother and his job, and now his ancestral home in the African American neighborhood of Sag Harbor, New York, is about to be foreclosed on.

Enter mysterious businessman Anniston Bennet (Willem Dafoe), who brings Charles an offer he can't refuse. Anniston wants to rent Charles' basement for the summer, and in return, he'll pay Charles enough money to clear his debts for good. Sounds sweet, right? But why is Anniston so hell-bent on renting Charles' basement in particular? What nefarious deeds is he actually plotting? Based on the trailer, it looks like a cage is involved, and that can never be good.

The Man in My Basement was co-written by Latif and Mosley, and is set to make its premiere at the 2025 Toronto International Film Festival. It's distributed by Andscape, formerly known as The Undefeated, a Black content studio that is part of the ESPN portfolio and also creates content for the Walt Disney Company.

In addition to Hawkins and Dafoe, The Man in My Basement also stars Anna Diop, Jonathan Ajayi, Gershwyn Eustache Jr., Pamela Nomvete, and Tamara Lawrance.

Following its premiere at TIFF, The Man in My Basement comes to select theaters Sept. 12. It hits Hulu and Disney+ this fall.

Meta's AI rules have reportedly allowed children to have potentially troubling interactions, including so-called "sensual" chats.

The news comes from a detailed feature from Reuters, which cited an internal Meta document it obtained. Reuters reported, per the internal document, that Meta's chatbot policies had allowed it to "engage a child in conversations that are romantic or sensual."

SEE ALSO: Lawsuit says Meta pirated and distributed porn to train its AI

The Reuters report details the document's contents. Its purpose was to detail what was and was not allowed to be said by chatbots — not necessarily what was preferable. According to Reuters, the rules stated that a bot could tell a shirtless eight-year-old, "Every inch of you is a masterpiece."

A Meta spokesperson told Reuters that such examples were wrong and were being removed from their policies.

Still, the document allowed for other troubling examples, such as bots creating false medical info or helping users argue that Black people are "dumber than white people."

How folks interact with AI can prove troubling — especially considering how AI may respond. We here at Mashable have covered just how troubling it is for adults to flirt with or "date" AI characters. The fact that we've seen reports of children having suggestive conversations with AI — and that at least one major tech company permitted such conversations — is especially troubling.

Elon Musk's site X and AI tool Grok both appeared to go down Thursday afternoon, according to user reports. While X appears to have recovered, there may still be issues with Grok.

Down Detector showed a spike in user-reported issues for both services starting around 11 a.m. ET. (Disclosure: Down Detector is owned by Ziff Davis, the same company that owns Mashable.)

X appeared to be back up-and-running by about 1 p.m. ET — it worked fine for this writer — but user reports for issues with Grok appeared to continue. It's worth noting that X may have been mostly stable the entire time, but users reported issues with X because Grok is so heavily integrated into the site.

People posted about the issues they were having online.

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Users on X posted that they got error messages saying Grok was under a heavy load. This comes just after Grok 4 was made free for a limited time.

This story is developing and will be updated as necessary...