Hi, friends! Welcome to Installer No. 74, your guide to the best and Verge-iest stuff in the world. (If you’re new here, welcome, sorry in advance for my terrible TV taste, and also you can read all the old editions at the Installer homepage.)
This week, I’ve been reading about Bybit, Walmart, and sports analytics; devouring the first season of Running Point and the seventh season of Drive to Survive; listening to Scam Inc and Tested; obsessing over my progress in Fantasy Hike; getting the hang of Tiny Wings again; and making a lot of pancakes for a toddler who suddenly won’t eat anything else.
I also have for you a couple of exciting new Apple products, some fun stuff to watch this weekend, the return of a legendary social media platform, and much more. Plus, I’m an idiot. More on that in a minute. Let’s dig in.
(As always, the best part of Installer is your ideas and tips. What are you into right now? What are you playing / reading / watching / downloading / building / eating with toast this week? Tell me everything: installer@theverge.com. And if you know someone else who might enjoy Installer, tell them to subscribe here.)
- The new MacBook Air. The MacBook Air is probably my longest-running default recommendation. If you just want a laptop, no follow-up questions, get an Air. This one’s faster and has a better webcam, and I even like the pale blue here. And it’s cheaper! A miracle!
- The new iPad. The new iPad Air got all of Apple’s attention this week, but I think the new base model is the bigger deal. This is the iPad I’d tell most people to buy — I wish it had gotten a bigger chip bump, but this’ll still do iPad things nicely. And $349 is the right price.
- Split Fiction. I need more gamer friends, because wow does this game look like a fun co-op. It looks like Blade Runner and Tron. There’s a company called Radar. There are puzzles and fights and — seriously, who wants to play a lot of this with me? Like, right now.
- Daredevil: Born Again. I always liked the old Daredevil series and Charlie Cox as Matt Murdock. As ever with Marvel TV, this one sounds a little uneven in its execution and requires an annoying amount of lore knowledge, but I still enjoy watching some kickass crime fighting. And there’s plenty of it.
- The Nothing Phone 3A. Nothing might be the most interesting company in smartphones right now. It’s doing really cool, unique stuff, and it seems to be really starting to dial in its cameras. I particularly like the new Essential Space feature that collects and organizes all the photos, screenshots, and other stuff your phone accumulates all day.
- “Technology isn’t fun anymore.” In this video, Drew Gooden puts words to what I think a lot of people are feeling about the state of technology right now. I don’t agree with all of it, but it’s a pretty solid argument — and raises a lot of questions about why we feel so disillusioned with the state of things and what better would even look like.
- Twitter: Breaking the Bird. A four-part CNN series, starting on Sunday, about how Twitter got big, changed the world, and screwed up a million ways along the journey. I know this story pretty well, but I’m still fascinated to see how this series tries to make sense of it all.
- Deli Boys. I swear I’ve been seeing ads for this show in my feeds for, like, a decade. But it seems to be funny and timely — a comedy, a crime show, and a critique of capitalism? As ever, give me more fun half-hour shows. I’m in on this one.
- Palworld for Mac. Pokémon with guns continues to be a thing, and it’s now available on any Mac with at least an M1 chip. It sounds like crossplay doesn’t work, though, so make sure you have Mac friends to play with.
- Digg. Right now, the new Digg is just a landing page and a signup list. But having spent some time with the folks bringing it back (including original creator Kevin Rose), I’m excited to see what new ideas about online community might turn into over time.
This week is Installer 74. Until about six minutes ago, I thought it was Installer 75, which meant it would have been time for me to share my own homescreen, as I do every 25 issues here. Since I am terrible at counting, I neglected to find someone else to share their homescreen in this space. (This is the kind of week I’m having. Send good vibes.)
Anyway! It turns out there are no actual rules around here, so we’re jumping the gun a week — and since so many of you liked seeing Charlie Harding’s computer screen a couple of weeks ago, I’m going to show you mine. So here is a (mostly) unfiltered look at what’s happening on my computer right now:
The computer: a base model M4 Mac Mini, which I bought last fall. It does not have enough USB-C ports, but I love it nonetheless.
The wallpaper: The 1984-era Macintosh wallpaper that comes with MacOS Sequoia. I have it in gray — I like it better in other colors, but then the screen reflection gives my face a sort of sickly hue. So it’s gray.
The apps: Mimestream, Messages, Fission, Downie, Signal, WhatsApp, FaceTime, Spotify, Things, Calendar, 1Password, Notion Calendar, Notion, Anybox, Arc, MyMind, Craft, Slack, NotePlan, App Store, Loopback, Settings, iPhone Mirroring, VLC, Apple Frames, Vocaster Hub, Quicktime, Chrome, TextEdit.
I use most of these apps on a daily basis. (I have no idea why Calendar is here. I never use Calendar.) A bunch of them — Fission, Downie, VLC, Loopback — are for various podcasting-related things. I use Notion for all my project management stuff and NotePlan for my day-to-day tasks and notes. Once a week or so, I debate switching everything into Craft just because the app is so lovely (but still just a feature or two away from what I need).
MyMind and Anybox are for storing links, images, and other stuff I might want or need later, and everything else is pretty self-explanatory. I really recommend downloading desktop versions of all your messaging apps; I am now the world’s fastest texter because I’m hardly ever texting from my phone.
I go through phases with my computer. I’ll let the desktop and downloads folder get really messy, then spend an hour organizing and deleting things. I’ll let my dock get unwieldy and then organize it all at once. Sometimes I’m a religious one-app-at-a-time person, and other times I open so many windows on my 27-inch screen that I can barely read them all.
But mostly, honestly, I live in the browser. I’ve been using Arc for years (I use Chrome because our podcast-recording software likes it better, but for nothing else) and perpetually have between three and eight windows full of tabs. It’s bonkers, but it’s the only way I know.
My most important recent upgrade has been going all-in on Raycast. I use it for opening apps, managing windows, changing settings, accessing apps, and much more. It took me a while to really start using it like a power user, and it’s still not the most user-friendly tool out there, but it has made a huge difference in how efficiently I use my computer.
Here’s what the Installer community is into this week. I want to know what you’re into right now, as well! Email installer@theverge.com or message me on Signal — @davidpierce.11 — with your recommendations for anything and everything, and we’ll feature some of our favorites here every week. For more great recommendations, check out this post on Threads and this post on Bluesky. (But I think I’m about done with Threads, so pretty soon it’ll just be Bluesky.)
“You should check out the Feeeed app. Probably the best representation of a timeline app I’ve seen to date.” — Daniel
“Fountain pens. Who knew?! In a world full of Notions — which I use and love — I wanted an analog outlet for my brain dumps and light journaling. That led me to this TWSBI pen and this ink. The pen has a piston mechanism that makes it super easy to suck up ink. Love the feeling of the nib on paper. And don’t get me started on how cool ink bottles can be. Good times.” — Austin
“Moonbound by Robin Sloan. Highly recommend it. It’s like Ursula K. Le Guin writing about Thundarr the barbarian crossed with Narnia.” — Joe
“Working at a computer all day and reading on my phone all evening really strains my eyes. I’ve downloaded the LookAway app for Mac to actually enforce my optician’s advice of resting my eyes, and it’s worth every penny. My eyes feel a lot more comfortable at work now. For my reading, I’ve bought a Boox Palma with the FeedMe app using Feedbin as an RSS service — the verdict is still out on how much it’ll help my eyes, but it’s a really interesting device.” — Tom
“I’ve found CheapCharts, a great app to track when Apple movie prices are discounted. I’ve got myself some real bargains and reduced the low-level stress of switching streaming services off and on.” — Chris
“Five Books, if you want some non-obvious books on a subject for serious reading.” — Astrid
“I started using Bend 26 days ago after it was mentioned in The New York Times. The streak nature has me hooked, and the five-minute wake up routine is a low hurdle with a defined time limit so I know when to get on with my day. Good luck on getting more flexible!” — Sean
“I wanted to put a quick shout out for the series Six Nations: Full Contact on Netflix. Think DTS but for rugby. And for the uninitiated, rugby is often described as the NFL without pads.” — Alex
“To cope with the US’ continued descent into unitary religious authoritarianism, I’m doing what any sane person would and starting the Horus Heresy series of Warhammer 40k books!” — Luis
“I can’t believe y’all haven’t posted anything about Pantheon, the animated series on Netflix! I actually just discovered it myself, but it’s in its third season, and it’s an amazing futuristic techy thriller. Check it out!” — Erik
A weird thing about TikTok is that the algorithm is so diverse and so specific that there aren’t a lot of shared experiences on the platform. That means that when I say the sentence, “I can’t believe how invested I got in the Zach vs. Danny cup game battle,” a few of you are going to get really excited and the vast majority are going to have absolutely no idea what I’m talking about.
The short version: it’s two brothers competing to see who can win a TikTok game, in which you toss a ball into a line of cups the fastest. (This link is a complete and total spoiler of the whole thing.) It’s both incredibly boring and absolutely riveting, and I have checked TikTok for updates every single day for nearly six weeks. And now I’m wondering how many equally awesome things are happening on other corners of the internet. If there’s something online that you’re outrageously, unnecessarily, and embarrassingly invested in, I want to know about it. And good news: Zach and Danny are back at it again. And you’ve barely missed anything.
