The new Audacity logo Rebrands rarely get much love. That backlash can be especially strong if you’re giving a facelift to a decades-old piece of software beloved by nerds around the globe. So, it was no surprise that when Audacity revealed its new logo people on the internet got a little worked up. And look, there’s no two ways about it, the logo is pretty bad. The font it quite nice, but the bewildering take on its traditional headphone icon is rough. Reactions around The Verge newsroom included “looks like someone stepped on the apple music icon,” and “trying to decide if their new logo looks like a sperm, and am mostly coming up with yes.” But if you can get past the branding, Audacity 4 actually looks like it’s going to be a much needed upgrade.Martin Keary, VP of product at Muse, posted a nearly hour long video to YouTube detailing the challenges facing Audacity, the logic behind the design changes, and updates on the development of version 4 (slated for release in early 2026). One of the biggest improvements is in minimizing what Keary calls “Audacity says ‘no’”. These are things that Audacity simply won’t let you do, often with no explanation other than a simple pop up (if you’re lucky). He lists off a number of examples:If you want to drag a clip past another clip, it hits it like a brick wall. No. If you copy a clip and try to paste it where there’s not enough blank runway, no. You don’t have enough room. If you wanted to select multiple clips… no.Cleaning this up involved changing the behavior of the UI, like automatically trimming a clip if you paste something over it, and getting rid of a bunch of “modes” that limited how you could interact with audio. The team also added meters for individual tracks, made trimming and time stretching easier to find (just click and drag the edge of the clip), and added a split tool that makes cleaning up audio a bit easier. Some users might be upset that the Sync Lock feature is going away but, as a long time user of Audacity, I can confirm it’s a confusing mess. Working with and keeping multiple audio tracks in sync is a difficult challenge to tackle, but the approached laid out in version 4 makes a lot more sense (to me at least). Add to this a more customizable, modern interface that’s much easier to read and Audacity 4 looks like it’s actually shaping up to be major step forward for the stalwart audio editor. Lets just hope they revisit the branding before the proper release in 2026.

The Roland TR-1000 rhythm generator. If the only thing Roland ever released was the TR-808, the company would still deserve a place in the music gear hall of fame. The 808 is arguably the most important instrument since the creation of the electric guitar. It's been a cornerstone of hip-hop, electronic, and pop music for 45 years now, used by everyone from Rihanna and Whitney Houston, to Outkast, Talking Heads and RP Boo. Roland was undeniably one of the most innovative companies in music technology during the 1980s and '90s, releasing iconic analog synths and pioneering drum machines.But for much of the 2000s the company seemed lost, pumping out forgettable all-digital produ …Read the full story at The Verge.

I love playing tabletop roleplaying games (TTRPGs), but virtual games just aren’t the same for me, especially when it comes to dice. There’s just something so satisfying about watching your d20 clatter around on the table (before probably landing on a nat one) that you usually miss out on with digital dice rolls in virtual games.

Every successful game franchise has something that makes it unique: a style, a story, or a gameplay mechanic that players fall in love with. But when a series strays too far from its roots, that identity starts to fade. Here are four big franchises that lost touch with what made them special.

Fans have been wanting to see anything from Insomniac Games' upcoming Wolverine for PlayStation 5. Following the massive leak for the company that revealed most of the planned game releases and concepts for their titles, many fans were wondering if they would have to wait longer before catching an official glimpse at what was coming next. But during the State of Play showcase for PlayStation in September, everyone was surprised by the official reveal of Marvel's Wolverine. What was immediately clear from the start was just how mature and different overall this game would feel from their previous work on PlayStation 5.

If you are like me, you love the idea of self-hosting, but hate the thought of endless configuration and maintenance. The truth is, self-hosting doesn’t have to be a major time sink – it can actually be a massive time saver. I have spent months testing and refining my setup, and in the process, I have found tiny set-it-and-forget-it tools that work tirelessly in the background.

Google Workspace is the industry default productivity suite, and rightly so — it’s fast, reliable, has excellent integrations, and offers handy collaboration features. However, it is just another subscription added to your credit card, which starts to bother you, especially if your team size is growing.

Contrary to what you may believe, home labs don’t require a lot of monetary investment. Depending on your requirements, you can put together a reliable containerization server using budget-friendly SBCs. Heck, if you’ve got a spare PC gathering dust, you can even arm it with a virtualization platform and turn it into a powerful home server.

For the last several years Netflix has been quietly banking episodes of a new show called Famous Last Words, interviews with famous people entering their twilight years. The catch is that episodes will only air after the subject passes away. The full list of interviewees is a closely guarded secret, but last week Netflix quietly posted the premiere episode featuring Jane Goodall.The show is an adaptation of the Danish television series Det Sidste Ord (The Last Word). In the Netflix version Brad Falchuk, best known as the co-creator of American Horror Story and Glee, conducts interviews on an empty soundstage with remotely operated cameras. In this intimate setting Falchuk often frames his questions in the past tense and he reminds subjects that “they are dead.”If Goodall’s episode is any indicator, we can expect future episodes to include candid opinions from famous people no longer worried about potential public backlash. Goodall was never particular shy about speaking her mind, but she minces no words in what appears to be her final interview:“Absolutely there are people I don’t like, and I would like to put them on one of Musk’s spaceships and send them all off to the planet he’s sure he’s going to discover … He’d be the host … Along with Musk would be Trump … And then I would put Putin in there. And I would put President Xi. I’d certainly put Netanyahu in there, and his far-right government. Put them all on that spaceship and send them off.” – Jane Goodall

When was the last time you were deeply, truly keen to check out a new build of Windows? For me, I think the last time I was really wowed by a Windows build was with Windows 7. 8.1 wasn't too much of a jump, and Windows 10 was cozy, but not too exciting. Windows 11 went in the wrong direction for me; it didn't so much as innovate as it did remove key features from Windows without much rhyme or reason. And you still can't do some things like resizing the Start menu without additional aid.

We use peripherals like keyboards and mice nearly every minute our PCs are awake, yet they seem to draw the short straw in terms of innovation. We’ve had a solid run with mechanical keyboards, where a vibrant community has pushed the industry from soldered, inaccessible boards to hot-swappable, endlessly customizable typing instruments. We’ve seen PC cases evolve with modularity and ease-of-access in mind. Yet, our pointing devices have been dead in the water for 15 years now. They're treated like disposable lighters when they inevitably fail, and the solution from manufacturers and customers alike is just a wasteful cycle of RMA requests and free replacements.

PlayStation has been building up the catalog of classics and new titles available to players through the PlayStation Plus game catalog. With the September 2025 State of Play presentation, that catalog of titles for PS5 owners is continuing to get larger, offering a variety of games to play on the console. Unlike previous showings of State of Play, some highly requested and classic games are making their way to the catalog, along with a few major titles to celebrate the legacy of PlayStation. Anyone with an active subscription to PlayStation Plus Premium or Extra is going to have a lot of options in between all the newer releases for the latter part of the year.