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A good VPN works like a bouncer for your internet traffic, keeping snoops out while letting you move freely. AdGuard VPN is one of those solid, no-nonsense choices that does exactly what it promises. Right now, StackSocial is offering a five-year AdGuard VPN subscription for just $39.97, a steep drop from its regular price. That’s five years of private browsing, streaming, and secure connections across most major platforms, including Windows, macOS, iOS, and Android, and up to 10 simultaneous connections (making it great for multi-device users without juggling logins). If you like the idea of browsing without trackers and being able to access geo-restricted content without hassle, this deal makes sense. Just a heads-up, though—this offer is only for new users, and you’ll need to redeem it within 30 days of buying.

Performance-wise, AdGuard VPN uses AES-256 and its proprietary protocol, which is supposed to be faster and harder to detect than the usual VPN options. That means fewer annoying speed drops, which is a win if you stream a lot or hate buffering. It also offers over 60 server locations, covering key regions without overwhelming you with choices, so finding a decent connection shouldn’t be an issue. More importantly, AdGuard sticks to a strict no-logs policy, meaning it won’t track your browsing or sell your data to advertisers, unlike some other VPNs.

AdGuard VPN is best suited for anyone looking for a low-maintenance, long-term privacy solution without monthly bills. It’s easy to set up, has a clean interface, and works well for everyday browsing and security. Five years of coverage for under forty bucks is hard to beat, and if you don’t like it, at least you won’t be locked into another high-priced subscription.

If your child has their own Android device, you no longer need to worry about loaning them your credit card or keeping cash on hand for purchases when you’re not present. Kids can now use Google Wallet for tap-to-pay—with some parental oversight, of course, so they can’t get into too much financial trouble without you knowing.

Google teased this feature last fall and in February announced its inclusion in an anticipated update to Google Family Link. Google Wallet and tap-to-pay for kids is now live and available to families in the United State, United Kingdom, Australia, Spain, and Poland.

How Google Wallet works for kids

Kids can use tap to pay when checking out in stores that accept Google Pay or contactless payments. They must have a supervised Google Account and an NFC-enabled Android device (or a tethered Wear OS watch) with the Google Wallet app and screen lock enabled.

Importantly, kids cannot use Google Wallet for online or in-app purchases or for Google services, such as Play and YouTube. While there are no additional spending controls, you’ll get an email every time there’s a successful transaction, so you can keep an eye on payments. Transaction history is also available in the Family Link app.

Kids can also store passes, such as loyalty cards, gift cards, boarding passes, and event tickets, in Google Wallet. These can be added without parental approval, and you won’t be notified if and when they are used.

How to set your child up with tap-to-pay

To add a payment card to your child’s Google Wallet, open the Wallet app on their phone and tap Add to Wallet > New credit or debit card, then hit More > Next after reading the prompt. You’ll need sign into your Google account, after which you can snap a photo of the card or enter the information manually. You’ll also need to accept both Google’s and the card issuer’s terms to proceed, and you may be prompted to verify the payment method with a code sent via email or text or by calling or logging into your bank app.

Parents can also remove cards from Google Wallet, either from a specific device or via Family Link. Open Family Link, select your child’s account, and go to Controls > Wallet > Payment methods and transactions. Then select the card and tap Remove > Remove. You cannot remove other types of passes from your child’s wallet unless you block access to passes entirely in your Family Link settings.

Note that your child must be the cardholder or an authorized user for cards added to Google Wallet.

There was a time when we all had dedicated alarm clocks on our nightstands to wake us up in the morning. Now, I’d wager a smartphone does the job for most of us (whether we like it or not).

The thing about alarms, though: They kind of need to work every time they’re scheduled to go off. There’s no acceptable percentage of failure, as, presumably, you’re setting that alarm at a specific time for a good reason. You might have work, an interview, an appointment, any number of other important obligations, and not all of them are going to tolerate “my alarm didn’t go off” as an excuse. So, alarms need to work, and right now, alarms set on a Google Pixel can’t be trusted.

Alarms aren’t reliable on Pixel at the moment

Something screwy is going on with Pixel alarms, as evidenced by this Reddit thread on r/GooglePixel. One user shared that their alarm on their Pixel 9 did not go off that morning, which caused them to be late to work. This wasn’t a one-off alarm, either (not that it would make the situation any better if it was); rather, this was the user’s prescheduled Monday-through-Friday alarm that had been working for years, according to the poster.

Scrolling through the thread, you’ll find posts from other users experiencing similar alarm issues. Some actually received notifications from Android saying the alarm failed to sound, which is at least a bit helpful. (You don’t have to spending the day wondering if it was your phone that messed up, or if you turned off the alarm in your sleep.) However, not all affected users were so lucky: Another user claims they have five alarms set each morning and none of them went off, with zero notification about a failure on Android’s end. Curiously, one user says they woke up late, but their Pixel said there was an upcoming alarm for a time that was already in the past—as if the phone thought it was currently earlier than it actually was.

It’s possible this isn’t just affecting Pixel phones, either. One commenter believes this is an issue with the alarms in Google’s Clock app on Android 15, which the user experienced on their OnePlus device. All that said, Android Authority hasn’t been able to replicate the issue on their end, so it’s possible this isn’t an issue affecting all Pixel phones or all Google Clock users. Still, there are enough reports to warrant some concern.

Why is the alarm not working on Pixel?

It’s not clear what’s causing this specific issue, but it’s not the first time smartphones have had trouble with alarms. Last year, Google acknowledged a bug was deleting saved alarms on Android, causing a similar issue. You may have also experienced problems with Google Assistant being too quick to turn off an alarm too, or your Pixel Watch sounding the alarm too early—or, worse, too late.

Before any Apple fans get too smug, the same complications are present over on iOS. Last year, Apple confirmed there were issues with its iPhone’s alarms, as users reported their alarms weren’t going off. Some even say issues are still occurring.

The short answer is there’s likely a bug that’s causing Pixel or Google Clock to not sound the alarms you set. Google hasn’t publicly commented on this issue as of this writing, but the Reddit poster did say Google Support has reached out to them. If this is a bug, hopefully Google patches it fast.

How to get around a broken Pixel alarm

While we wait for a potential fix from Google, it seems safe to say the Google Clock app isn’t the best option at the moment for anyone who wants to be sure they’ll wake up on time. Luckily, there are a surprising number of alarm clock apps out there for you to switch to if you don’t trust Google’s built-in solution. Give one a shot, at least until we get some more clarity from Google about the situation.

Alternatively, you could rely on a different device entirely for your morning alarms. If you don’t have a true alarm clock these days, you might have another piece of tech that isn’t running Google Clock to rely on, like, say, a smart speaker. It’s definitely a pain though, seeing as setting alarms are a basic feature you expect a smartphone to be able to handle.

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The kitchen tends to be the heart of the home—it’s where we gather to share meals, nibble on snacks, and talk about our day. It’s also a pretty dangerous place. Aside from open flames, slippery floors, and flammable gas that is literally pumped into our homes, the innocuous little appliances that crowd our countertops can also represent real dangers.

More than 150,000 people head to their local emergency room every year after an accident involving a household appliance of some sort. Small appliances might seem safe enough sitting on your kitchen counters, but they can be extremely dangerous if defective, misused, or placed in the wrong spot. Aside from the danger of hurting yourself, a misplaced countertop appliance can actually damage your home, as well. Here’s what you need to think about when you’re deciding where to place everything in your kitchen.

General rules to keep in mind

If you want your kitchen to be as safe as possible, there are a few basic safety rules that apply to any countertop appliance:

• Keep stuff away from water. Don’t operate any electric appliances near sinks, pot-fillers, or any other sources of running water. This protects against electrical dangers and keeps the dangerous bacteria growing in your average sink from infiltrating your food.

• Plug into ground-fault circuit interrupters (GFCIs). All your kitchen appliances should be plugged into GFCIs. Before 2023 only appliances located near water sources were required to be plugged into GFCIs, but the National Electrical Code was changed to include any kitchen appliance. These special outlets are designed to cut off to prevent electric shock, and using them reduces the chances that your countertop appliance will hurt you or damage your home.

• Never use extension cords. Even if the cord is plugged into a GFCI outlet, it’s a bad idea. Many countertop appliances like air fryers or microwaves pull a lot of juice, and can melt most standard home-use extension cords, leading to serious fire danger.

• Keep away from the stove. You shouldn’t place any countertop appliance near (or, lord help us, on) your stove. The heat and open flames can melt power cords, increasing the risk of a fire or other accident.

• Keep away from the edge. If your countertop is crowded and something has to sit right on the outer edge, it’s time for a reorganization. Having any appliance right near the edge of the counter is just an invitation to disaster.

While these rules apply to any appliance, there are specific placement considerations for several countertop appliances.

Toasters and toaster ovens

The heating element in a toaster oven can reach 1,000 degrees Fahrenheit, and some toaster ovens can heat up to 600 degrees under specific settings. That’s pretty hot, and while even the cheapest toaster has some built-in safety features, placement matters. Never place a toaster or toaster oven on anything flammable, like a towel. If you’re concerned about your countertop being damaged from the heat (though most toasters and toaster ovens are designed to be placed safely on standard countertop materials, even wood), you can place it on a nonflammable surface like a silicone mat or even a piece of stone tile.

You should also never put anything on top of your toaster oven (or toaster). Yes, it’s taking up valuable counter space, but whatever you put on top could potentially be damaged from the heat, or even catch fire.

Coffee maker

You might think that your humble coffee maker is pretty safe, but it might be doing long-term damage to your kitchen cabinets and walls because of one by-product of the coffee-making process: Steam. That hot, moist stuff drifts up and if it regularly interacts with your cabinets, it can cause a lot of damage, warping and staining wood and discoloring other materials. Since the most affected area will be under the cabinets, you can cause a lot of damage before it’s easily noticeable.

Always place your coffee maker away from the upper cabinets when you use it, and make sure your kitchen always has robust ventilation, especially when using any heat- or moisture-producing appliances.

Pressure cookers

Aside from being a time bomb if misused, pressure cookers pose the same steam threat as coffee makers: As they work, they emit steam, and continuous exposure to that steam can damage your cabinetry and walls. You can try aiming the pressure valve away from the cabinets, and you can buy steam diverters that redirect the steam. But your best bet is to operate the pressure cooker away from your cabinets.

Air fryers

Air fryers are very popular, and just like the other appliances on this list, they can damage your walls or cabinets with superheated fumes. Aside from the damage that steam can do, they can also scorch walls and cabinets if placed too close or with insufficient ventilation, so always place them with plenty of space around them.

Air fryers also get pretty hot, so just like toaster ovens, you shouldn’t place them on top of towels or anything else that could conceivably catch fire.

Slow cookers

Slow cookers pose the same steam dangers as pressure cookers, but can be even more damaging because of the “slow” part. While occasional use of a pressure cooker or other steamy appliance probably won’t destroy a cabinet or stain a wall, occasional use of a slow cooker is more likely to because of the duration of operation.

It’s best to place your slow cooker away from the walls and cabinets, and never place it on or near anything flammable. And because of the duration of use, you should place your slow cooker on a metal trivet or heat-resistant mat to protect the surface underneath.

Your iPhone’s camera is smart—perhaps too smart. It’s smart enough to relight your selfies and remove distracting background objects from your photos. It’s the kind of reality-altering power that normally requires an Infinity Stone. It can also make it much harder to get photos that are accurate representations of the real world. Fortunately, there are alternatives.

It’s worth noting that it’s difficult to get absolutely zero processing on any smartphone camera. There’s always some amount of interpretation of raw data in order to display it. What we want to minimize here is how much your phone makes decisions about the “right” way your photos should look—decisions like how saturated colors should be, what parts of the image should be in or out of focus, and how your subject should be lit. Sometimes it’s better to let your phone make these decisions for you, but if you want more control, these are the options that are best for you.

Get more flexibility with Apple ProRAW

Normally, when you take a photo, your phone compresses the image to save space and tosses data that’s not necessary to display it. But that data can be useful if you want to do your own photo editing. That’s where Apple ProRAW comes in. This format (which takes up more storage space) saves almost all of the data from your camera’s sensor when the photo was taken.

This lets you adjust things like exposure, contrast, saturation, white balance, and other basic aspects of an image. There’s still some unavoidable image processing done to these photos, but ProRAW gives you a lot more flexibility to make changes than you normally would have.

To enable ProRAW images, tap the RAW button while you’re using your camera to use it for the current session. If you’d rather permanently switch your default settings, go to Settings > Camera > Preserve Settings and enable ProRAW & Resolution control. With this enabled, the camera will be in ProRAW mode unless you specifically disable it each time.

Use ZeroCam, the anti-AI camera app

ZeroCam makes the pitch that less is more, especially when it comes to camera features. In fact it only has one: a shutter button. There’s no post-processing, no filters or effects, and the only optional toggle is which of your phone’s lenses to use. It literally can’t be easier—for better or worse.

In my experience, images taken with ZeroCam in low-light settings had noticeably more noise, which is to be expected without a lot of post-processing. However, photos that were properly lit looked a bit more natural than with the stock camera app.

The main downside to the ZeroCam app is the cost: A subscription will run you $2/month, or $13 if you pay for a year up front. You can get a free three-day trial (for the monthly plan, bumped up to a week if you opt for the annual plan), at which point you’ll probably know for sure whether it’s worth the expense to you.

Use Halide for more control over AI-free photos

Unlike ZeroCam, Halide Mark II provides extensive manual controls over your camera. You can precisely adjust focus, ISO, shutter speed, and white balance before capturing the image. Some of these controls are available in the default camera app, but Halide adds other useful tools like focus peaking and live histograms.

Halide also has a dedicated Process Zero mode, which touts zero post-processing AI. This is as close as you can get to photos that are straight from the sensor with only the minimum processing required to create a viewable image. 

Like ZeroCam, this app isn’t free, although you can get a seven-day free trial to see if it serves your needs. After that, monthly subscriptions start at $10, or you can get a year for $20. If you know for certain you love the app and will be using it for a long time, a lifetime license will set you back $60.

Try the Blackmagic Camera app for filterless video

Blackmagic makes the free video editing suite Davinci Resolve, as well as a line of cinema cameras that tie deeply into the software. More recently, the company has released an app for the iPhone that leverages its expertise for the camera you always have with you. The Blackmagic Camera app is primarily focused on video, but you can use it to grab stills from your clips as well.

If you only want still photos, one of the other options on this list is probably better for you, but this app is perfect for videographers. It offers pro-level camera controls like ISO, shutter speed, and white balance, as well as features like an RGB histogram to see which parts of your image are clipping, and image stabilization to reduce the camera shake from holding it in your hand.