The Stack: what we’d actually install on a new machine in 2026
First edition of our working-tools column: browser, editor, terminal, AI assistant, notes, passwords. Six picks, every one linked and falsifiable, and exactly…
David Mensah
9 stories
Meta’s Instagram AI remix died in three days. The license didn’t.
CAA and SAG-AFTRA got the opt-out @-mention feature killed in a news cycle. The derivative-works terms that made it possible are untouched,…
Cloudflare’s cure for bots is watching everyone, all the time
Precursor scraps the visible checkpoint: injected JavaScript scores your mouse, scroll, and typing rhythm for the whole visit. It's also the enforcement…
Google’s Android choice screen now stops at the Swiss border
The search-engine picker still appears across the EEA, where EU law requires it. Google switched it off for Swiss users, and the…
PS Plus adds Avatar and Rise of the Ronin, quietly drops eight games
Sony's July catalog post names nine arrivals and zero departures. The eight games leaving July 21 live only in the store's "Last…
Palworld hits 1.0 — early access ends where it started, on top
Pocketpair's full release landed July 10 as a free update with the World Tree endgame and an 855,000-player Steam weekend. On Xbox,…
Apple’s rebuilt Siri finally meets the public — iOS 27 and macOS ‘Golden Gate’ betas are live
The first public builds of Apple's 2026 operating systems put the twice-delayed assistant on ordinary iPhones — behind a waitlist, in English…
The Stack: five self-hosted services that actually pay rent
Most self-hosting advice is a hobby in a trench coat. This is the shortlist that survives a cost-benefit test — with the…
Apple’s gatekeeper era is permanent now: EU court tosses the DMA challenge
The General Court dismissed all three of Apple's actions against its Digital Markets Act designation on July 8 — no fine, no…