Some apps on Windows have become the default choice for many of us. Many people stick to services like Microsoft Office, Google Chrome, Adobe Photoshop, and similar apps, which puts us at their mercy. These apps often come with hefty price tags simply because they are used by millions, if not billions, of users. They also lack transparency about how they handle your data and offer little flexibility.

Image: Cath Virginia / The Verge; Getty Images On Tuesday night, President Donald Trump issued a pardon to Ross Ulbricht, who ran the dark web marketplace Silk Road under the pseudonym “Dread Pirate Roberts.” Ulbricht has been serving a life sentence without parole since 2015, when he was convicted of multiple charges, including the distribution of narcotics.The Silk Road marketplace, which was only accessible through the Tor network, became one of the most prevalent early commercial uses of Bitcoin. Buyers and sellers traded in illicit drugs, forged passports, and more. In the intervening years, Ulbricht became a cause celebrè for a certain segment of the right-wing, particularly in the crypto crowd that embraced Trump last year. To his supporters, Ulbricht’s life sentence is unusually punitive. Similar offenses have garnered much more lenient sentences — for instance, Blake Benthall, who operated Silk Road 2.0, was sentenced to time served and three years of probation. Ulbricht’s lieutenant, Thomas Clark, also known as “Variety Jones,” was sentenced to 20 years in prison last year. Although the criminal offenses were nonviolent in nature, the judge who sentenced Ulbricht took into account multiple deaths attributable to drugs bought through the Silk Road. Throughout his trial, Ulbricht denied that he had committed the crimes at issue. Because law enforcement had arrested him with his laptop open, they had access to all his files, which included the code of the website, private messages between him and employees of the Silk Road, and a diary whose entries corresponded to OKCupid messages tied to Ross Ulbricht’s real identity.

Using the non-touch screen on an older Bambu P1P 3D printer. | Photo by Sean Hollister / The Verge Bambu Lab, the company behind my favorite 3D printers, has given itself one hell of a week. Now, I’ve got answers to some of my burning questions, answers which you might also hopefully appreciate. But first, some backstory.Since last Thursday, some creators have pledged not to buy Bambu printers anymore, even removed some of their 3D models from its online repository, after the company revealed it would add a new proprietary authentication mechanism that could keep you from using third-party tools to remote control your printer. While you’d still be able to stick a file on an SD card and physically put it into your printer or use Bambu’s proprietary cloud, the old way of printing remotely from a third-party slicer would be no more — unless you downloaded a new proprietary Windows and Mac “Bambu Connect” desktop app to be the middleman between your slicer and Bambu’s hardware.“Unauthorized third-party software will be prohibited from executing critical operations” — BambuWhile Bambu was clear early on that this would be an optional update, one you could simply choose not to install, the company also positioned it as a necessary one to secure printers against remote hacks.... Read the full story at The Verge.

Sure, a gaming laptop or a tablet can play games, but gaming handhelds are all the rage these days. MSI Claw's new Claws, like the 8 AI+, are some of the hottest kids on the block right now, but just getting one isn't enough. You'll need a case to keep your Claw safe and sound, too.

The last two weeks have been all about Nvidia's RTX 50 series launch — the company's performance claims, the actual rasterized gen-on-gen gains, and the "fake vs. real frames" debate. It's also been about the notable absence of AMD's RDNA 4 graphics cards from its CES keynote. The company's RX 9000 GPUs were a no-show at CES, which AMD tried to justify. Many people believe the company might not be confident in its offerings.

I want to use this feature just to side-eye Gemini. | Image: Google Google is announcing a variety of classroom and accessibility-focused ChromeOS features today, and one of the standouts is being able to control your computer with your head and facial expressions. The feature — aimed at those with motor impairments — was first announced in early December, but it’s now rolling out to more users with compatible Chromebooks (Google recommends 8GB of RAM or more).This isn’t Google’s first foray into the face-as-a-cursor space. It previously made an open-source AI accessibility tool for Windows games called Project Gameface, which was also announced for Android. Here’s a sample video from Google of the tech in action, demoed by software engineer Amanda Lin Dietz who helped develop it.Additionally, Google is also teasing a boatload of new Chromebooks for 2025, with over 20 new devices in its standard Chromebook and Chromebook Plus lines coming this year. That estimate may be a bit of a stretch, since Google seems to be counting the Samsung Galaxy Chromebook Plus that launched back in October, but it does also count the just-announced 14-inch Lenovo Chromebook Plus 2-in-1 and more to come.Along with laptops aimed at educators and students, Google’s got a new batch of classroom-focused ChromeOS features called Class Tools. These allow teachers to have real-time control of their students’ screens. Once a pairing code is shared, educators will be able to send students direct content on their Chromebook screens, flip on live captions or translations for them, remotely view their screens, and share a student’s work with the whole class. Image: Google An educator’s view of Google’s Class Tools settings. In addition to these collaborative tools, Google Classroom is also getting an integration with Figma’s FigJam, allowing teachers to assign online whiteboards to students for brainstorming and group work. Maybe the combination of FigJam with the teacher’s ability to snoop on students’ screens will reveal who’s really doing all the work for the group.

Microsoft has been making some strange decisions lately. After renaming Office on everyone's PCs (and not picking the best name), the company is continuing its trend with a major change to how you sign in to your Microsoft account.

What do you feel when you hear the TeamSpeak "user entered your channel" notification? For some, it's just a basic sound notification; for me, it sends me back to a day when my friends and I were hopping on an audio channel so we could do some 40-man Molten Core raids in World of Warcraft, back when expansions weren't even a thing yet.

There are lots of great reasons to upgrade to a mechanical keyboard. And if you're someone that's been mulling over the idea of finally making that purchase, we have the perfect one to suggest. The Keychron Q1 Pro is our top pick when it comes to mechanical keyboards. While it's normally not on sale, this rare discount brings it down to a special price that knocks $22 off.

Now that we've properly kicked off 2025, perhaps now would be a great time to check out all the new hardware hitting the market and see if you can score an upgrade for your aging hardware. If you use a laptop for work or study, Acer has a new range that you'll want to take a look at if you're in the market for something new.

Command Prompt is the most powerful Windows tool and a goldmine of hidden functionalities for a power user. From managing your network to managing installed programs to encrypting your files and folders, you can do so much using simple commands on Command Prompt.

PowerShell is a handy tool for troubleshooting network issues, automating tasks, managing configurations, or building solutions. But if you're just starting out, it might feel a bit tricky to get the hang of. We’ll discuss some tips to help you get the most out of PowerShell and write scripts that are effective and easy to tweak and reuse in different situations. Like English spelling and grammar rules, PowerShell best practices and style guidelines almost always have exceptions. Still, we’ll discuss a baseline for command design, programming, and formatting to help you avoid common problems.