Hi, friends! Welcome to Installer<\/em> No. 22, your guide to the best and Verge<\/em>-iest stuff in the world. (If you\u2019re new here, welcome, so psyched you found us, and also, you can read all the old editions at the Installer<\/em> homepage<\/a>.)\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n This week, I\u2019ve been reading about the unbearable sameness of coffee shops<\/strong><\/a> and what happened to Twitch<\/strong><\/a>, testing out the Funnel iOS app<\/strong><\/a> for quick-capturing everything, marveling over Federico Viticci\u2019s truly wild iPad setup<\/strong><\/a>, setting up my Flipboard all over again now that Artifact is dead<\/strong><\/a>, filling my cabinets thanks to this list of great new snacks<\/strong><\/a>, adding all the Emmy winners to my Sofa<\/strong><\/a> queue, and watching every behind-the-scenes Jon Bellion video<\/strong><\/a> that exists on the internet.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n I also have for you a huge new Samsung phone, a couple of nifty calendar apps, a new riff on an old game, some more cool AI tools, and much more. Even a new late-night show! In 2024!<\/p>\n<\/div>\n And I have a question: what\u2019s your go-to news app?<\/strong> I mean \u201cnews\u201d in the broadest way possible \u2014 when you\u2019re like, \u201cWhat\u2019s new and interesting and happening,\u201d do you turn to a social platform? A specific publisher\u2019s app? Reddit? Flipboard? SmartNews? A bunch of browser bookmarks you cycle through? Something else I\u2019ve never heard of? I know a lot of us were hoping Artifact might be the future of Finding The Good Links, but alas, it won\u2019t. So I want to know all your favorite places to go!<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Alright, lots to do this week. Let\u2019s go.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n (As always, the best part of Installer<\/em> is your ideas and tips. What apps are you into right now? What are you watching, reading, listening to, crocheting, cooking, or learning about this week? Tell me everything: installer@theverge.com<\/a>. And if you want to get Installer <\/em>in your inbox a day before it appears here, you can subscribe here<\/a>.)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Vjeran Pavic<\/a> is always taking pictures. Pictures for The Verge, <\/em>where he\u2019s our supervising producer for video and also a gadget-photo wizard. Pictures for Instagram<\/a>. Pictures of his dog, his sick ski tricks, his cat, his travels, everything. Pictures, pictures, pictures. He\u2019s always testing new cameras, too, from drones to GoPros to DSLRs.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n I asked Vjeran to share his homescreen thinking he might have a hundred camera apps for a hundred different things. Turns out, not really! It\u2019s just good old-fashioned Camera in there. But he makes really clever use of his photos on his phone, which I\u2019ll let him explain.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Here\u2019s Vjeran\u2019s homescreen, plus five of his many lock screen options, plus some info on the apps he uses and why:<\/p>\n<\/div>\n The phone: <\/strong>iPhone 13 Pro Max (with probably better battery health than all y\u2019all\u2019s 15 Pros).\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n The wallpaper: <\/strong>I like to keep it fresh, so I set up a few different ones that change each time I look at my phone. I picked about 10 different ones, and I swap them out every few months. All of the photos are taken by me and \/ or of things or people (animals) that are close or meaningful to me \u2014 or are simply photos that I think would look good as wallpaper. You\u2019ll see photos of San Francisco and my home country, but the ones that make me the happiest are of my pets.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Once the phone is unlocked, I prefer a very clean look, so my wallpaper is just one very blurred, colorful background. It\u2019s easier on the eyes and has better separation between the apps, text, and the background.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n The apps: <\/strong>Messages, Threads (the app with both the most unpredictable and predictable algo out there), Apple Podcasts, Artifact (recently made it onto my first screen but looks like it won\u2019t be there for too long<\/a>), Apple News, Airmail, Safari, Camera (gotta have that quick access to the camera app, but I still prefer double-clicking the power button to access it like most Android phones do).<\/p>\n<\/div>\n I\u2019m not sure if people are utilizing iOS \/ iPad Focus modes, but I made a few different ones based on time of day, location, or activity. That means my homescreen changes based on a mode, but let\u2019s look at this one, which is part of my most-used Focus mode.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n It mostly consists of widgets, which I don\u2019t need to interact with; rather, they give me some info at a quick glance. Things like my fitness rings, weather, battery info. The only one I might swap out soon is the activity one since I also have an Apple Watch. Most of my Focus modes also have just one page of apps \/ widgets. I used to put everything in folders across multiple pages, but 99 percent of my input comes from just using Spotlight or App Library.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n I also asked Vjeran to share a few things he\u2019s into right now. Here\u2019s what he said:<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Here\u2019s what the <\/em>Installer community is into this week. I want to know what you\u2019re into right now as well! Email <\/em>installer@theverge.com<\/em><\/a> or message +1 203-570-8663 with your recommendations for anything and everything, and we\u2019ll feature some of our favorites here every week. <\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u201cIf you\u2019re into romcoms, musicals, cringe, and honest portrayals of mental health issues, you probably want to see Crazy Ex-Girlfriend<\/strong><\/em><\/a>. The only show where I\u2019ve screamed \u201cNooooooo!\u201d \u201cThat\u2019s not trueeee!\u201d or \u201cDon\u2019t do itttt!\u201d multiple times in each episode.\u201d \u2013\u00a0Xyan<\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u201cMr Bates vs The Post Office<\/strong><\/em><\/a>! A fantastic show that has brought attention to a great injustice that was done to postal workers in the UK in the early 2000s!\u201d \u2013\u00a0Jason<\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u201cPlayPilot<\/strong><\/a> is pretty much my go-to site for finding out where movies are streaming (or not). We save the stuff we want to see in there and then roll through the services over the year. I just wish they were integrated with LG TVs\u2026\u201d \u2013\u00a0Robert<\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u201cI\u2019ve been digging into The Pale Beyond<\/strong><\/em><\/a> on Steam, and it\u2019s a really evocative, desperate little narrative resource management game.\u201d \u2013\u00a0Jordan<\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u201cDisclosure: Vox Media is a parent company of The Verge<\/em>. That said, Unexplainable<\/strong><\/em><\/a> is such a great podcast. Huge variety of topics. Each episode is short enough to keep me from losing interest yet still manages to pack in a ton of info and be interesting. I learn so much!\u201d \u2013 Kelly (Disclosure: I didn\u2019t add this disclosure, I left it in because it\u2019s hilarious.)\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u201cI tried adding Structured<\/strong><\/a> to my productivity stack for the new semester, and even though it didn\u2019t stick for me (I\u2019ve got too much structured time that lives in GCal, it turns out), it\u2019s very pretty and fairly full-featured. I liked that it is a lot more forgiving of to-dos that take a nonstandard amount of time, and it builds in space to breathe between blocks without leaving white space begging to be filled.\u201d \u2013\u00a0Ainslee<\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u201cI\u2019m always looking out for iOS games I can play while listening to podcasts. They should be \u2018mindless\u2019 and preferably playable in bits while stuck in traffic. The game Holedown<\/strong><\/em><\/a> always filled that hole for me (no pun intended). But now I learned about the game Finity<\/strong><\/em><\/a> on Apple Arcade, and I can\u2019t get enough of it.\u201d \u2013\u00a0Mustapha<\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u201cClear<\/strong><\/a> is back, and it looks stunning. And for those at home, there are collectibles: themes, icons, sounds, etc.\u201d \u2013\u00a0Austin (Austin also sent their referral link<\/strong><\/a>, which gets everybody free stuff. Yay, free stuff!)\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u201cBlue Eye Samurai<\/strong><\/em><\/a> on Netflix is a great show. It\u2019s about an outcast in feudal Japan after they closed themselves off from the rest of the world. Four white men remain in Japan in secret, and the outcast vows to kill them in revenge because being mixed race is a problem in their society. Extra twist: she\u2019s a girl hiding her gender. Commentary on being a woman in that society ensues. Great show, story, characters, setting, and commentary. Comparisons to Mulan<\/em> be damned.\u201d \u2013 Joseph<\/p>\n<\/div>\n There are two genres of video I will always watch no matter the subject: videos about people who are really good at something explaining how they do it, and videos about super-niche competitions that people care deeply about. My latest discovery in the latter category: the World Jigsaw Puzzle Championship, in which a bunch of puzzlers pull a puzzle out of a bag and try to put it together as quickly as they can. Here\u2019s a great video from a competitor<\/strong><\/a>, and the full five-hour livestream of the event<\/strong><\/a>. I love learning about the different solving strategies (start with the sky!), I love the drama, and I also want to puzzle competitively now. But I definitely couldn\u2019t hang. I don\u2019t puzzle like these folks puzzle.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\nThe Drop<\/h3>\n<\/p>\n
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Screen share<\/h3>\n<\/p>\n
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Crowdsourced<\/h3>\n<\/p>\n
Signing off<\/h3>\n<\/p>\n