Many Black Friday deals went live a little (or a lot) early this year, and there are plenty of deep discounts available on mobile tech products including laptops, tablets, smartphones, mini PCs, and more. There are also some good deals on digital media, allowing you to save on PC games, video or music streaming services, […]
subscriptions
Lilbits: Alder Lake-N vs RK3588, 20 Gigabit broadband, and streaming price hikes
Gigabit broadband connections are old hat. Google Fiber says it’s turning the dial up to 20 and rolling out 20 Gigabit fiber internet in select markets by the end of the year. There’s no word on how much it will cost though… or if you’ll be able to afford it after the latest price hikes […]
Neeva’s ad-free, subscription-based search engine is shutting down
Two years ago I asked whether you’d be willing to pay a subscription fee to use an ad-free, privacy-focused search engine that doesn’t collect your data. While many respondents to my wholly unscientific poll were receptive to the idea, the search engine startup that inspired the question found that not enough people were willing to pay to […]
Kobo Plus subscription eBook & audiobook service expands to the US and UK
Nearly a decade after Amazon launched its Kindle Unlimited service that lets you pay a monthly fee for access to a library of millions of eBooks (and a smaller number of audiobooks), rival Kobo is following suit by expanding its Kobo Plus subscription service to the US and UK. At launch Kobo says that readers […]
Lilbits: PC shipments fall in Q4, 2022, Apple may release MacBook Pro with OLED touchscreen, and Imagination launches a new ray-tracing GPU for mobile
The global COVID-19 pandemic has had a weird impact on worldwide PC shipments. At the start of the pandemic, shipments fell due supply chain issues that began when Chinese factories shut down. Once production of PC components ramped up, computers flew off the shelves to meet strong demand from folks who were working from home. […]
Lilbits: Apple’s new Mac Pro could have a 48-core CPU, Lenovo Tab M9 leaked, and Linux smartphone news
This summer Apple launched the M2 processor with up to 18% faster CPU performance, 35% faster graphics, and 40% faster AI performance than the Apple M1 chip. But that’s just what you get with the entry-level chip with 8 CPU cores and up to 16 CPU cores. Apple is also rumored to be working on […]
Fairphone Easy is a different kind of smartphone subscription (pay to keep your phone longer rather than for upgrades)
Subscriptions are nothing new in the smartphone space. Wireless carriers and phone makers have long offered customers a chance to pay for phones in a series of monthly installments rather than putting down a bunch of cash up front. And many plans also include cheap or free upgrades to newer phones every few years. Fairphone’s […]
Microsoft’s Clipchamp video editor for Windows 11 doesn’t charge you to export HD video anymore
When Microsoft introduced the Clipchamp video editor for Windows 11 earlier this month, the company focused on how you could use it to record, trim, and add transitions, text, and other effects to videos. What the company didn’t mention in its blog post was that many of features were only available with a paid subscription. […]
Lilbits: Would you pay a subscription to always have the latest iPhone?
Over the past few years we’ve seen a growing number of companies move to subscription models for things you used to be able to pay just once for. Want to use Adobe Audition or Premiere? You need a subscription and if you stop paying, you lose access. QuickBooks recently went the same way. And Microsoft […]
Google is sunsetting FeedBurner email subscriptions (it’s time to update your settings if you subscribe by email)
Google-owned FeedBurner used to be a wildly popular service that websites used to customize their RSS feeds, publicize them, and offer readers a way to get updates via email. But Google has let FeedBurner languish over the years, occasionally remembering the service still exists just long enough to remove useful features. The latest update? Google […]