This week, Cherlynn and Devindra recap the year's greatest winners and losers in tech. From the expected companies like Apple, Facebook (sorry, Meta) and Google, to the ones we begrudgingly acknowledge, like NFTs and the Metaverse, our hosts look back on 2021's highlights. We'd love to find out what your picks for the best and worst in tech this year might be, too, so feel free to send them our way! Tech’s biggest winners of 2021 – 2:04 Tech’s biggest losers of 2021 – 28:57 Twitter’s privacy changes get weaponized immediately – 50:28 Working on – 53:14 Pop Culture Picks – 54:37

This week, Cherlynn and Devindra discuss the significance of Jack Dorsey leaving Twitter. Will the social network thrive, or stumble, after losing its co-founder for a second time? Also, Cherlynn explains what’s up with all of Qualcomm’s new Snapdragon chips for phones, computers and… portable gaming consoles? Is it enough to take on Apple’s M1 chips? Or will Windows once again hold Snapdragon PCs back? What is Twitter without founder Jack Dorsey? – 1:21 Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 chip – 22:38 Updates from the Theranos / Elizabeth Holmes trial – 45:44 Spotify’s Wrapped feature is available this week – 51:41 Working on – 56:18 Pop culture picks – 59:20

This week, Cherlynn and Devindra are joined by Engadget’s Jessica Conditt to dive into the latest controversy around Activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick. According to a recent Wall Street Journal report, he was well aware of sexual misconduct allegations at the company, and he deliberately kept Activision’s board in the dark. Also, we chat about what Apple’s self service program means for you, as well as a new accessibility gadget that brings eye tracking to the iPad. New report says Activision/Blizzard CEO protected abusers at the studio – 1:20 Apple announces new program to repair products at home – 19:20 Google Cloud outage takes down Spotify, Snapchat, Etsy, and other sites – 24:40 TD Pilot will let people with disabilities control an iPad with their eyes – 30:02 Halo Infinite free multiplayer beta is available now – 36:13 Paramount+ Pulls Star Trek: Discovery from Netflix before new season – 37:37 StreamLabs was accused of plagiarism, drops “OBS” from its name – 41:15 Rep. Paul Gosar retweets Attack on Titan edit about killing AOC right after being censured for doing it the first time – 44:19 LA’s Staples Center is now the Crypto.com arena – 45:59 Gucci made a $10K Xbox + case – 49:02 Working on – 52:57 Picks – 55:57

It’s that time of the year again: Figuring out all of the best gifts to buy from our Holiday Gift Guide. This week, Commerce Editor Valentina Palladino joins Cherlynn and Devindra to chat about our latest batch of product suggestions, as well as some tips on snagging deals ahead of Black Friday. Also, they chat about Microsoft’s intriguing new $249 Surface Laptop SE, a low-spec, kid-focused notebook for schools. And Devindra chats with Ethan Zuckerman, a UMASS Amherst professor and technology researcher, about Facebook/Meta’s vision of the metaverse and ways we can combat corporate control of the internet. (Check out Ethan’s article at The Atlantic: Hey Facebook, I Built a Metaverse 27 Years Ago.) Microsoft goes after Chromebooks with the $249 Surface Laptop SE – 1:50 Holiday Gift Guide with Commerce Editor Valentina Palladino – 17:06 Google Project Relate brings voice recognition to people with speech impairments – 36:12 Peloton is making a $495 smart camera to detect your workout form – 42:11 Twitter Blue expands Twitter functionality for $3 a month – 46:16 Apple will make it easier to replace an iPhone 13 screen without breaking FaceID – 52:45 Roombas are about to get much smarter Alexa voice commands – 54:47 Peter Jackson sells most of WETA to Unity – 55:55 Pop Culture Picks – 58:36 Metaverse interview with Ethan Zuckerman – 1:07:26

This week, Devindra and Engadget’s Jessica Conditt dive into Facebook’s big metaverse moves. Is it more than a name change? Is Meta a smart bet on where the future of computing is going? Also, Devindra and producer Ben chat about the Google Wave-like additions to Microsoft Office, and Samsung’s jeans for the Z Flip 3. Facebook / Meta’s big metaverse moment – 1:19 Microsoft announces Loop collaboration tool at Ignite – 33:29 In-browser video editing and audio recording for Office – 42:17 Ford electrified its classic F-100 as a concept car – 46:02 Samsung releases jeans with a pocket specifically for the Galaxy Z Flip 3 – 51:26 Working on – 56:28 Picks – 58:06

It’s been a busy week! For our special 100th episode, Cherlynn and Devindra dive into their MacBook Pro and Pixel 6 reviews, answer audience questions, and they chat with Engadget’s Karissa Bell about what we’ve learned from the Facebook Papers. (Unfortunately, this episode was recorded before Facebook renamed itself to Meta, but we’ll be chatting about all of that next week!) 100 Episodes! Livestream Q&A – 1:30 MacBook Pro 14” and 16” Review – 16:20 AirPods Gen 3 review – 25:20 Pixel 6 review – 26:31 The Facebook Papers continue the fiasco – 43:14 iOS 15.1 with SharePlay is out – 58:22 Android releases version 12L for tablets – 1:02:29 Intel’s Alder Lake hybrid chips are a big strike against AMD – 1:07:46 Sony's Xperia Pro-I – 1:14:36 Dune Part II was confirmed – 1:19:40 Working on – 1:22:04 Pop culture picks – 1:24:15

Techtober continues with a deep dive into Apple’s latest MacBook Pros, powered by the new M1 Pro and M1 Max chips. Cherlynn and Devindra also chat about what’s new with the Pixel 6, and Mr. Mobile himself (Michael Fisher) joins to break down the Surface Duo 2. It turns out Microsoft needed more than a year to fix all of the problems with its dual-screen phone. Apple’s new MacBooks with M1 Pro and M1 Pro Max – 1:37 Google finally details Pixel 6 and Pixel 6 Pro’s specs – 23:22 Microsoft’s Surface Duo 2 is inconsistent and buggy – 38:41 Facebook may be changing its name – 1:04:05 Facebook Portal Go Review – 1:05:05 Finally, you can post to Instagram from desktop – 1:06:02 Samsung had yet another Unpacked event – 1:06:23 Also in events: Razer, DJI – 1:07:35 We have a trailer for the Uncharted movie – 1:07:56 Mel Brooks is doing History of the World: Part II for Hulu – 1:09:19 Fisher Price made a version of its toy phone that actually makes calls – 1:10:14 Working on – 1:11:25 Pop culture picks – 1:12:26

This week, Cherlynn and Devindra chat about what to expect from Apple’s upcoming event (new MacBooks, baby!), as well as all of the other launch shindigs from Google, Samsung and Sony. Cherlynn also tells all about her Apple Watch Series 7 review, and why she hates testing sleep tracking gadgets. And to catch up on some big news from last week, Manda Farough from the Virtual Economy Podcast joins to dive into the massive Twitch hack. There’s a new Apple event on October 18, will there be MacBooks? – 1:25 Apple Watch Series 7 review – 9:09 The Apple Watch still doesn’t do sleep tracking well – 13:17 The Twitch hack: what we know a week later – 29:43 Too many tech events next week: Apple, Google, and Samsung all in 3 days – 52:29 What’s expected at the Google event? – 56:04 Motorola brought back the Edge for 2021 – 57:48 Acer announced a glasses-free 3D laptop – 1:00:35 Someone leaked HTC Vive’s new bug eye VR setup – 1:03:04 Working on – 1:05:59 Pop culture picks – 1:07:50

It’s not too often we get a new version of Windows and a new Android release! This week, Engadget Editor-in-Chief Dana Wollman joins Cherlynn and Devindra to chat about her Surface Pro 8 review, Windows 11, as well as the Surface Laptop Studio and Go. Also, Senior Editor Karissa Bell joins to talk about the latest news from Facebook whistleblower Frances Haugen. Windows 11 review – 1:15 Surface Pro 8 review – 14:57 Surface Laptop Studio review – 22:21 Surface Go 3 review – 32:00 Sustainability data is going to be a bigger thing in Google products soon – 36:17 Android 12 release / Pixel event announced for October 19 – 47:06 Twitch was hacked revealing lots of information – 48:57 OLED Switch review is up! – 50:03 Canon made a huge VR fish eye lens – 52:15 Catching up on the fallout from the Facebook whistleblower interview – 55:10 Picks – 1:18:23

This week, we go over the news from Amazon’s devices and services event, especially its intriguing Astro robot for the home. With the company’s history with data collection and security cameras in mind, we discuss the questionable merits of such a device. Then, we delve into the news from Google’s Search On event (also this week) and Facebook’s own slides about research that said Instagram is detrimental to teens. Here’s what was announced at Amazon’s Fall hardware event – 1:31 Meet Astro, a camera robot that wanders around your house – 2:32 Echo Show 15 – 10:33 Amazon Halo View – 13:30 Amazon Glow – 17:04 A summary of Google’s Search On event– 28:30 Facebook responds to whistleblower leaks that it knew Instagram was bad for teen mental health –39:07 Fitbit Charge 5 full review is up – 45:29 Chris Pratt is Mario – 46:46 Working on – 51:00 Picks – 54:06