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It's the holidays. You're on the couch. Or in an Uber. Or walking while looking at your phone. And you're scrolling. You're bored and you're looking on Instagram and Twitter for something to click on.Well, stop all that and bring your aching thumbs over here. Rather than see other people open presents and drink eggnog, read some of Mashable's best longform content of the year. 
The poison and the tombThe first in a three-part series, this is the story of one family's journey back to their c

'Twas the night before Christmas and as the fire roared and the Christmas tree lights sparkled, Trump started talking to children about Santa.
It didn't go over well.
As the president took a phone call from a 7-year-old named Coleman, he insinuated that Santa wasn't real.
With a chuckle, the president said: "Are you still a believer in Santa Claus? 'Cuz at 7 it's marginal, right?" 
Coleman was patched through to a White House line after calling a government-run Santa tracker, presumably bec

You’ve just unwrapped a new Android phone, logged in, typed in a hundred passwords, downloaded all the big social apps, and synced all the things that need syncing. Now it’s time to fill your phone up with everything else: the apps for reading, for getting things done, and for having fun. You probably have some ideas of your own, but we’ve got a bunch of suggestions, too. Here are 10 great Android apps that are definitely worth installing.
We’ve rounded up our favorite a

The holidays are here, and if you’re lucky, you might be unwrapping a brand-new iPhone. But whether it’s a fancy iPhone XS Max or an older iPhone 7, chances are you’re going to need a few apps for that phone. And while a lot of your choices are pretty straightforward — odds are you already know that you’ll want things like Instagram or YouTube — here are recommendations for some interesting apps that you might not know about.We’ve rounded up our favorit

Feeling jolly is overrated anyway. 
Forget the preps — this holiday season, get in touch with your inner emo kid and jam out to some sad Christmas songs. What's more festive than mourning a lost love or getting angry over not going home to spend time with family? 
SEE ALSO: Kensington Palace released the royal Christmas cards and we'll be staring at them all day
Here are 11 angsty Christmas songs for you to mope over. 
1. Blink-182 — "I Won't Be Home For Christmas"2. W

Sure, family trips can get uncomfortable even under the best of circumstances. But have you ever seen one turn this terrifying?
The first trailer for Jordan Peele's Us follows a family (led by Black Panther's Lupita Nyong'o and Winston Duke) on a beach vacation interrupted by the unexpected arrival of four visitors.
Even more shocking and more disturbing is that those visitors turn out to be themselves. 
It's a literal manifestation of what Peele, during a trailer presentation in Los Angele

If you’re new to the Switch, don’t sweat it: Nintendo’s latest device has only gotten better with time. The Switch is closing in on two years on the market, and over that period it’s accumulated a solid lineup of games, from familiar Nintendo franchises to creative indie inventions. And every single one is made better by the tablet’s hybrid nature, letting you play wherever you want. If you just unwrapped a new Switch and are looking for some things to play, here&r

It’s safe to say Sony has unequivocally won over this console generation. Just last month, the company announced that the PlayStation 4 had sold more than 86 million units in its lifetime, surpassing the PlayStation 3 and far outpacing Microsoft’s Xbox One.Part of the success involved Sony’s early lead back in 2013, when the device came out with a price tag $100 lower than Microsoft’s competing console and a honed focus on a core game-playing audience. Then Sony kept the

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is finding its way into more and more aspects of our daily lives. It powers the smart assistants on our mobile phones and virtual “home assistants.” It’s in the algorithms designed to improve our health diagnostics. And it’s used in the predictive policing tools used by the police to fight crime. Each of these examples throws up potential problems when it comes to the protection of our human rights. Predictive policing, if not correctly desig

At a time when cryptocurrency was synonymous with blockchain technology, IOTA proposed a modification. IOTA, as its name would suggest, aspired to be a cryptocurrency for the future of Internet of Things (IoT). But its founders thought that the blockchain had “too sluggish transaction times and skyrocketing fees” to be able to power the world of connected devices. Instead, they introduced a new distributed ledger technology based on Directed Acyclic Graph (DAG) &mdash

New year, new deals... well, almost.
The thing is, we're still hung up on a handful of bargains on apps in the Mashable Shop from the past 12 months — so much so that we're offering them once again for an additional 19% off their sale prices, provided you enter the coupon code NEWYEAR2019 at checkout. Hope that's OK with you.
Check 'em out:
1. Private Internet Access VPN
Protect your online privacy while surfing the web at mind-blowingly fast speeds using this industry-leading VPN service

When the news is so jam-packed with chaos, uncertainty, and just generally a lot of quite miserable stuff, it's always nice to find something reliably capable of lifting the spirits.
Carpool Karaoke does a pretty decent job of ticking this box — and 2018 was no exception.
SEE ALSO: The definitive countdown of the best 'Carpool Karaoke' episodes of 2017
From random celebrity cameos to important discussions about Justin Bieber's underpants, here are some of the highlights...
1. Melissa McCar

This holiday period, Plugged is running a very special advent calendar. Over the course of 12 days, we’ll be sharing a selection of sweet, sweet deals. You can thank us later. We wanted to do something special for our final day of TNW’s advent. It is Christmas after all. So, on this magical day, we’re giving away five one-year licenses to NordVPN! All you have to do is sign-up to our amazing, brilliant, and hilarious newsletter, Big Spam. When you click this link, make su

Monday was a tough day for the U.S. stock market, but Tesla shares were hit especially hard. The stock fell by 7.6 percent after Tesla cut the Model 3’s price in China and CEO Elon Musk promised to reimburse U.S. customers if they miss a tax credit deadline due to Model 3 shipment delays.
Reuters reported this weekend that the Model 3’s prices on Tesla’s China website had been reduced by up to 7.6 percent, with the starting price now at 499,000 RMB (about $72,000). This is the

The good times kept on rolling this year for Salesforce with all of the requisite ingredients of a highly successful cloud company — the steady revenue growth, the expanding product set and the splashy acquisitions. The company also opened the doors of its shiny new headquarters, Salesforce Tower in San Francisco, a testament to its sheer economic power in the city.
Salesforce,which set a revenue goal of $10 billion a few years ago is already on its way to $20 billion. Yet Salesforce

When those first fat drops of summer rain fall to the hot, dry ground, have you ever noticed a distinctive odor? I have childhood memories of family members who were farmers describing how they could always “smell rain” right before a storm. Of course rain itself has no scent. But moments before a rain event, an “earthy” smell known as petrichor does permeate the air. People call it musky, fresh – generally pleasant. This smell actually comes from the moistening of

‘Twas the night before Xmas, and all through the house, not a feature was stirring from the designer’s mouse . . . Not Twitter!Not Uber, Not Apple or Pinterest! On Facebook! On Snapchat! On Lyft or on Insta! . . . From the sidelines I ask you to flex your code’s might. Happy Xmas to all if you make these apps right.
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