🎶 Don’t stop the music: Download your jams for your road trip so they don’t cut out mid-sing-along when your phone has no signal. On Spotify, look for download (down arrow icon) next to one of your playlists. FYI, only Premium subscribers can download music, and you can’t grab individual songs. On Apple Music, click the + (plus icon on the right) to add to your library, then hit download (down arrow) to listen offline.
Sick of being online? This guy ditched the internet for year
Just imagine! No more checking email, logging in, authentication codes, memes and seeing photos of your best friend’s meals. You might yearn for some disconnection, but it’s really difficult. Most of everyone’s work is on the computer.
Well, one dude in Canada tried it out. Aron Rosenberg spent a whole year not going online. He taught English and theater at a high school and saw how his students always had a phone glued to their bodies.
He set out to explore what life would be like sans gadgets and Wi-Fi.
How’d it go?
He paid his bills by check and answered texts through SMS on his old-school flip phone. He wrote letters — 250 letters a month.
He did his doctoral research the old-school way by looking through books and printed work. He also had more phone conversations. Sounds relaxing, right?
Since it’s still 2023, he’s back online, but (you guessed it), he wrote a book about it. It’s called “Jacking Out: A Journal of a Year Spent Offline.” I couldn’t find a link to the book. Maybe it’s only available offline?
✅ OK, maybe you can’t pull off a whole year without the internet, but I bet you can stop using your dang phone so much.
Cellphone and tech clues that your partner is cheating on you
People underestimate intuition. If your gut tells you something is off, don’t ignore it.
Stalkerware is surprisingly easy to plant on someone’s phone, and trackers follow you online and offline. Tap or click for signs whether you’re being watched or just paranoid.
A grieving mom forced off social media: A judge said “to protect minors,” the posts about her 13-year-old daughter’s suicide must be removed. Internet sleuths located the four teens accused of bullying the girl offline and online, and now their families are receiving threats. This happened in a Mississippi town of 20,000 people, but it’s getting national attention.
Must-dos BEFORE your phone goes missing
There are built-in tools to help you locate it using another phone or computer. Here’s the caveat: You have to make sure the feature is enabled ahead of time for it to work. Do it now!
Turn on Find My for your iPhone
- Go to Settings > [your name] > Find My.
- Tap Find My iPhone, then turn on Find My iPhone.
- To see your device even when it’s offline, turn on Find My network.
- To have the location of your device sent to Apple when the battery is low, turn on Send Last Location.
Turn on Find My Device for your Android
- Go to Settings > Security > Find My Device. Or try Security & location or Google > Security.
- Make sure Find My Device is turned on.
✏️ You can even erase your phone remotely if it’s really gone. Here’s how.
3 map apps that are better than Google if you have multiple stops
When you get in the car for a trip, work meeting, or run an errand, it’s never as simple as traveling from Point A to Point B. Sometimes, there are also points C, D, E, F, and G. To make matters more complicated, the route you take could mean a massive difference in time and money.
Google Drive could start blocking files it says are against its terms of service
Google Drive is a cloud-based storage system that lets you store files, which you can access by logging into your account from any phone, tablet or computer. It’s useful for keeping files organized and sharing them with others.
Binge-watch at 30,000 feet: Just download a movie or show while you’re at home. For Netflix, click the title > Download (down arrow icon). For kiddos watching Disney+, open the app and hit download below the title. You’ll see a checkmark when it’s done. Heads-up: Not all content is downloadable.
🛣️ Hitting the road? Download a map of where you’re going in case you hit a no-service zone. Make sure you’re connected to the internet and not in Incognito mode. Then, open the Google Maps app and search for your destination or city. Tap the name or address > the three dots > select Download offline map > Download.
Is LinkedIn the new love connection? Relationship counselors say it gives you a more authentic look into someone’s life, work and social contacts. The real trick is figuring out when to take things offline. But heck, at least you know they have a job.
Chromebook pros and cons + 3 models we recommend
Thanks to the cloud, most of the apps we use for work, school and fun are actually running in tabs in our web browsers. When you think about it, isn’t a traditional PC kind of overkill? That’s where Chromebooks come in. Designed by Google and manufactured by premium brands like Samsung, Chromebooks offer a simpler take on portable computing.
How to download and watch streaming movies and TV offline
Watch anywhere on any device, that’s the promise of streaming services these days. But what can you stream when your Wi-Fi goes down or your data runs out? The answer might surprise you, as many streaming services offer users the option to download content for later viewing.