Author: Munzela Rizvi

The ever-evolving landscape of the music industry churns out a number of big names every decade. Be it The Beatles or Taylor Swift, there are a number of talented music artists and bands that left a lasting impression in the world of pop culture. However, there is also a big chunk of artists who remained underrated throughout their careers that deserve to be talked about. In our 17th anniversary special, we wanted to have a look back at the underdogs and celebrate their musical impact on the world. There are 17 artists from around the world who are underrated Carly…

the world is turning digital as more and more people start spending the majority of their online. Be it playing online games, social media, watching YouTube videos, or streaming films, there are a number of avenues for users now to spend their time on the internet. Not just that, platforms like LinkedIn and Indeed have even allowed people to find jobs online. While it’s all well and good when it comes to the general public using the internet, there is always a flip side to the coin where some malicious people use the internet with the intent of harming others…

In what can only be called Apple’s biggest gap between upgrades, the tech giant has now launched the HomePod (2nd Generation) While the smart home speaker market has predominantly been synonymous with Amazon’s Alexa, Apple has not been out of the race in any degree. As they say, later is better than never and with the launch of the Gen 2 HomePod Apple brings in a number of features to the smart speaker experience. Read on to know about what’s new with the latest Apple HomePod – Apple HomePod (2nd Gen) features It is no doubt that the second-gen HomePod…

Tesla has been under a lot of heat in recent days having fallen short of market expectations in quarterly deliveries and Elon Musk getting criticised for having too much on his plate with his recent Twitter takeover. The company lost 65% of its market value in 2022 which could be a matter of concern for any carmaker but continued to be the world’s most valuable automaker even after the loss. it is evident that Tesla needs to get its wind back by increasing sales at a time when demand is going down and it looks like the company might have…

While we work our way in our mundane shifts to make a survivable income, tech giants around the world pay millions of dollars to their top hires. Be it Sundar Pichai or Tim Cook, the big tech players of the globe take home a fat slack of salaries. While the current atmosphere on social media has been anti-capitalist with a huge outcry over unfair wealth distribution, we all know the 1% is going to be there not just surviving but striving. But 2022 was different, we saw many tech giants around the world having to let go of their staff…

It would be an understatement to say that Apple revolutionized the audio market with the launch of its Airpods back in 2016. It’s not like wireless Bluetooth earphones did not exist before Apple launched them but the company’s decision to get rid of the 3.5mm audio jack altogether made them mainstream. Now, there are TWS available at different price points in an oversaturated market where Apple has carved itself a place in the premium TWS segment. However, it looks like it may not be enough for the tech giant that is now working to capture the midrange TWS market with…

If you’re in the corporate working sector then escaping Microsoft Teams is something you cannot do. Whether in chats or meetings, most organizations rely on Teams to get their communication on line. While using the platform for all communication needs was pretty standard, no one thought a premium subscription model would ever be necessary for the service. Well, no one except Microsoft! Microsoft Teams premium subscription It is not like the Teams premium subscription is something that just surfaced right now as Microsoft announced it back in October 2022. The preview for the same debuted back on December 16. However,…

We have stepped into the new year over the past weekend but the horrors of 2022 do not seem to catch a break. The previous year, 2022, was a bad one for billionaires who went through a hard time. With tech billionaires having to let go of their workforce in massive layoffs, crypto moguls getting arrested, the stock market plummeting, wars, and alarming inflation, it was definitely a challenging year, to say the least. However, the total amount of wealth lost by tech giants and billionaires, in general, was a whopping $1.9 trillion dollars! According to a report by Forbes,…

In 2022, wanting a 4K gaming setup is certainly a dream for most of us. Thanks to gaming creators gaining mainstream popularity and the gaming industry itself developing some of the best immersive games, 4K content has become a norm as opposed to being a premium format limited to only a few devices. Gaming enthusiasts and content creators in general benefit from the extra details provided by a 4K display and the rise of 4K content on OTT platforms is a cherry on the check. Thus, while looking back at the amazing year in tech that was 2022, it was…

It doesn’t matter if you’re a tech enthusiast or not, having good accessories is the need of the hour in today’s world. While some people enjoy keeping up with the changing landscape of the tech industry, others merely want good accessories as they represent a part of themselves. Be it Bluetooth speakers, keyboards/mouse, or smartwatches, 2022 saw a range of products launching. Some were cool, and others were practical, but the tech accessories listed below were definitely the ones that took me by surprise!  Here are the best tech accessories launched in 2022 –  Noise IntelliBuds  Perhaps one of the…

The internet is full of controversial personalities gaining a platform to voice their opinions and forming a great fan following. it was only a few weeks back when fitness influencer ‘Liver King’ admitted using steroids all while building a $100 million empire propagating against the use of steroids and eating raw meat.  On the other hand, Logan Paul’s CryptoZoo NFT Game was exposed to be a ‘total scam’ by YouTuber CoffeeZilla. Now, another social media personality who garnered a massive following for his controversial and misogynistic takes, Andrew Tate, has been taken into custody by Romanian authorities for an alleged…

While smartphones cater to your everyday needs and laptops cover your functionality and professional needs, tablets are a different ball game altogether. Not everyone needs a tablet but can surely benefit from one. One really does not need to blow up past the 1 or 2 lakh price point in today’s age in order to get the best performance from a computing device and tablets are definitely the optimum choice. Lighter than a laptop and a larger screen as compared to your mobile devices, tablets sit at the sweet middle point between the two device categories.  The trend of work-from-home…

Since the past year, the rumour mills have been churning out details about the much anticipated foldable iPhone. However, there haven’t been any concrete leaks around the same. The world of leaks is full of bluffs and it is easy to fall prey to leakers pulling stuff out of thin air but the past few weeks have been hot for iPhone 15, the upcoming iPad series, and the inevitable foldable iPhone leaks. Several reports doing the rounds on the internet claimed that Apple would be discontinuing the iPad Mini series to fit the foldable iPhone in the lineup. Now, a…

Back in the day, music fanatics used to walk around with a boombox over their shoulders blasting music at full volume. Now, the Gen-Z equivalent of the same is walking around with palm size speakers hooked to the belt loops of people while on treks or casual outings. The point here is that speakers have been an integral part of our culture and existence. Speakers as we know them are as important as the music itself. From way back then in 1876 to the world now in 2022, we owe a big chunk of our entertainment to speakers.  So, as…

The digital world evolves at a rapid pace. Only a few decades back, connecting to the internet required a dial-up modem and took a lot of time to load even the most basic website. Now people are constantly connected to the internet and practically live there thanks to social media and other engaging applications. As of now, with the help of UPI, even a local vegetable vendor is being able to support their business by connecting to high-end technology and big businesses definitely need to keep up with it to adapt to the rapid changes and stay competitive in the…

2022 was surely a monumental year in the world of tech. While the tech industry like others is still recovering from the grappling hooks of the pandemic, it did manage to make major headlines besides the negative ones. As the year comes to a close, we wanted to look back at all the technological advancements and trends that made it mainstream in 2022. So without any further ado, let’s jump right in – Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML)  It was only in November that we dedicated an entire edition to the emerging technology of artificial intelligence with our…

It hasn’t entirely been a good year for Facebook’s parent company Meta. This year saw one of Meta’s biggest drops in share prices followed by the mass firing of employees. Now, Meta has agreed to pay $275 million to settle a class-action lawsuit claiming it inappropriately shared users’ information with Cambridge Analytica. For the unversed, Cambridge Analytica is a data analytics firm that was used by the Trump Campaign. The settlement is a result of a revelations made back in 2018 that information up to 87 million people may have been accessed by third-party firm which filed for bankruptcy back…

It will be an understatement to say that 2022 was an exciting year in the world of tech. It was definitely not all sunshine and rainbows as major tech companies fired a considerable chunk of employees in the face of a looming recession. Whereas, Elon Musk’s $44 billion acquisition of Twitter changed the face of social media as we’ve experienced it over the years. There were also the crypto bros taking major Ls thanks to the volatile nature of digital assets/currency that personally got the crypto enthusiast in me existential. Sure, there were new launches every week and new technologies…

Counterpoint Research recently posted a study which estimated that smartphone shipment in India is projected to grow by 10% in 2023. It was also reported that smartphone shipments in the country experienced a 5% dip as compared to 2021 this year. The total number of smartphone shipments in 2023 is projected to reach 175 million. Analysts listed the reason behind this decline in shipments in 2022 as component shortages, inflationary pressure and the Russia-Ukraine war. Whereas, the increase in projected shipments in 2023 will be attributed to the upgrade to 5G devices. 5G has rolled out in India all guns…

Do you remember the time when you’d drop your phone and it would break open with the back panel and battery scattering like lego pieces? If you’re old enough, you’ll surely recall a time when cell phones were not the sealed metal and glass slabs they are today. They could be easily opened up and the SIM slots were actually inside as opposed to the SIM trays we have now. But most importantly, the battery of the smartphone devices could easily be swapped out for a new one. A battery replacement for newer smartphones is actually a task as wanting…

Google might be secretly working to improve its Find My Device service as reported by SamMobile. As per reports, the new update will allow users to track their Android and WearOS devices to be tracked even when the device is not connected to the internet. As of now, the Find My Device service allows users to track their devices only when they are connected to the internet. While this update was hinted at in the Google System Update changelog for December 2022, there were no definite details about the same until now. Find My Device update for Google Currently, Google’s…

Twitter has seen a number of changes ever since Elon Musk bought the micro-blogging platform for an exorbitant price ($44 Billion to be precise) After shelling out a fortune for Twitter, it was expected that Musk would bring about massive changes to the platform which started off with his promise of ‘Freedom of Speech’ which quickly turned sour as accounts criticising Musk and many journalists started losing their accounts left and right. Then came the Twitter Blue debacle where verified accounts were offered to users at a price of $8 per month. However, the subscription model was then rolled back…

Having spent a lot of time on the internet growing up, I understand the importance of having a good personal computer. Thanks to binge-watching of hours’ worth of PC-building videos, I have inherited the dream of building my very own powerful desktop that will take care of all my computing needs. Sadly, I am still stuck working on a laptop cause it allows me to move around the city having a computer in my backpack but I indeed long for having a dedicated computer space at my home. Well, if not today then someday in the future but I am…

Who would have thought that former president Donald Trump will come up with his very own NFTs and also sell them out in under 24 hours? Not me certainly. However, truth is stranger than fiction and it looks like Trump has made a splash in the NFT market when nobody was seemingly interested in acquiring digital images. So is Donald Trump making NFTs great again? let’s find out Donald Trump’s NFT collection Trump’s NFT collection dropped at a time when the market volume of the tokens is down by 89% from its peak in January. Dune Analytics reports that the…

There hasn’t been a dull day on Twitter ever since Elon Musk took command of the platform. Only a few days back, Musk stepped on the stage with Dave Chappelle in San Francisco to get brutally booed by people in the audience. It looks like the public booing has brought about a change of heart for Elon who recently took to Twitter and started a poll asking people if he should quit the Twitter CEO position. Elon Musk’s CEO resign poll Elon Musk recently took to Twitter and started a poll asking if he should step down as the head…

While smartphones cater to your everyday needs and laptops cover your functionality and professional needs, tablets are a different ball game altogether. Not everyone needs a tablet but can surely benefit from one. One really does not need to blow up past the 1 or 2 lakh price point in today’s age in order to get the best performance from a computing device and tablets are definitely the optimum choice. Lighter than a laptop and a larger screen as compared to your mobile devices, tablets sit at the sweet middle point between the two device categories.  The trend of work-from-home…

Avatar: The Way Of Water Duration: 192 Minutes Director: James Cameron Writers: Amanda Silver, Rick Jaffa, James Cameron Cast: Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldana, Sigourney Weaver, Kate Winslet, and Joel David Moore The wondrous lands of Pandora took everyone by surprise back in 2009’s Avatar which became the highest-grossing film to date. After 13 years of anticipation and production delays, James Cameron has finally made his way to the water to deliver a sequel. There is a lot of hype and scepticism surrounding Avatar: The Way Of Water and I entered the cinemas after wrapping up work on a Friday evening…

It looks like the crypto community cannot catch a break. With news ranging from crypto billionaires dying mysteriously to the coins’ plummeting rates,  2022 was not entirely the year for crypto investors and enthusiasts. Now, another big blow to crypto bros has come from Microsoft which has decided to enforce new restrictions on cryptocurrency mining. Microsoft bans crypto mining Microsoft, one of the biggest players in the cloud computing arena has decided to take drastic measures to increase the stability of its cloud services. As a result, crypto mining has been axed from Microsoft’s cloud platform. There was no official…

2022 felt like a breeze at the movies after the gloomy pandemic times. The Indian audience especially was at a unique place as we got to enjoy films portraying different cultures, languages, and stories across the country while the big Hollywood blockbusters also made their way to the cinemas. 2022 was not perfect for films as the boycott culture took over Bollywood, but films were appreciated and celebrated nonetheless. Here is a look at the best films released in 2022.  Note – This list does not rate films thus the mentions are in no specific order Top Gun: Maverick Starting…

The demand for capable home entertainment devices is at its peak thanks to the OTT boom caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. Sony already had the premium HT-A7000 soundbar system which took care of your audio needs with flying colors and now the company has introduced the HT-A3000 which is a midrange-premium soundbar with an authentic 3.1 channel surround sound. I have been using the HT-A3000 soundbar and its accompanying sub-woofer and rear channel speakers for the past week as my primary sound system for a week. To sum up the experience – It was overwhelmingly immersive! Check out the detailed…