Pico-8 is the best retro console you’ve never heard of. Unless you have, of course. Either way, I hope you’ll enjoy my Pico-8 piece for Stuff, which is a potted history of Pico-8, insights on how best to play, and a quick overview of a dozen great games to try.

Camera Control isn’t quite enough. At least not for me, given that I constantly juggle several camera apps on my iPhone. Recently, I remembered about that other iPhone button, which I barely use. So I wrote for Amateur Photographer about how to turn the Action button into a quick launcher for photographers.

Photographic Styles have come a long way. Amateur Photographer asked me for a guide on how to get started with them, which you can read here. Or, you know, just gawp at the photos of Iceland. And a sheep.

WWDC 2026 is almost here. For TapSmart/Swipe, I outline what I want to see from iOS 27.

Gestures for music apps seem obvious. Odd, then, that after a flurry of apps that focused specifically on this at the dawn of the iPhone, most modern music apps only offer swiping across tiny playback bars. As a fan of full-screen gestural controller FluxTunes back in the day, I decided to explore how to bring it back.

Please support indie journalism! Every dollar, euro, pound or, um, other currency, counts. Our iPhone/iPad mag Swipe has a free trial. Tips & Tricks is $3/£3 to start. These are what allow us to keep the lights on over at TapSmart, where everything is freely available.

No-mow May is over. But my no-mow lawn is not. I’ve been doing the no-mow thing for years, having been inspired by RHS Gardens Wisley’s ‘meadow garden’ section. It’s been a learning process, and I’m sure not all of our neighbours approve. But the garden is alive. There are loads of pollinators and plenty of crickets. Local birds love it too.

This year, despite the recent hot and dry weather in the UK, half our garden is a sea of giant daisies. Elsewhere, sorrel is taking over a corner. There are still some barren patches that’ll soon be bombarded with clover seeds. But even in its current state, those huge daisies swaying in the breeze beats grass mown with military precision. Or, worse, nothing more than parking spaces for cars.

We need more cancel culture. But only in the sense of streaming TV services. As I write for Stuff, my ultimate TV streaming services hack is now to cancel everything and start from scratch.

Google hates the open web. We kind of knew that anyway. But much like I (and others) predicted a year ago, Google has made the move to go AI-first with its search engine. As Tracy King said on Bluesky, “Google is trying to build an agentic wall around the entire internet with the ultimate goal of users paying to access it and data owners paying to contribute to it.”

I find the ongoing rush towards AI deeply problematic. Governments are now actively supporting mass copyright infringement, because they think they’ll be left behind by the AI boom. Companies are using AI interfaces as the gateway to the internet, thereby stripping sources of traffic and credit. And with LLMs basically ‘remixing’ such sources for their answers, that leaves us in a strange place where the sources will gradually be eradicated and the AI will end up eating itself.

Still, at least a tiny handful of already rich people will make a load of cash out of this, eh?

Want to get away? Not just from AI, but to somewhere where you can relax? If so, use these iPhone apps to help.

Don’t watch a terrible movie twice. Track everything – and more besides – on Letterboxd. My guide shows how.

Support indie journalism! Every dollar, euro, pound or, um, other currency, counts. Our iPhone/iPad mag Swipe has a free trial. Tips & Tricks is $3/£3 to start. These are what allow us to keep the lights on over at TapSmart, where everything is freely available.

Play some games! Specifically two games on your iPhone: Chess Peace and Nova Drift, which are now part of my best iPhone games round-up for Stuff.

Take a breath. Because Google wants you to. And it’s also a good idea. For my Stuff column, I argue Apple should steal this feature that Google stole from someone else. (The feature in question being Pause Point.)

You’re going to die. Hopefully not soon. But you will one day, so I wrote about how to give loved ones access to your data after you pass.

Liquid Glass still sucks. Here’s how I think Apple can fix it in iOS 27.

Inbox hero? Maybe you can get there with my Gmail tips. (And, you know, maybe I’ll actually do all of these things myself and get to inbox zero before the heat death of the universe…)

The iPhone Action button finally clicked for me. It’s all about creating menus. I dig into how to do so in my article for TapSmart.

Make a noise! My latest GarageBand tutorial gets you started and walks you through making a jingle.

June + Lego = argh. At least if you’re trying to save money. Anyway, sorry if you are 1) trying to save and 2) a big Lego fan, because I updated my upcoming Lego sets feature.

Also, if you like Lego, you should be using these iPhone apps.

Jamie Smart is great. He won the inaugural graphic novel award at the British Book Awards. And his acceptance speech was a love letter to the entire British comics industry. His work appears every week in The Phoenix and there are loads of Bunny vs Monkey collections available, which are fantastic for kids and adults alike.

Will Apple increase the MacBook Neo’s price? I’m invoking Betteridge’s Law in my piece for Stuff. My take: much of the attraction of the MacBook Neo is its low price. Getting rid of that would be a massive risk and a very bad idea, unless Apple has no alternative.

Blind bags and boxes are awful. Lego sells minifigs in blind boxes, which is awful. What’s not awful: Lego minifig scanner apps that let you see what’s inside. (Speaking of Lego, I also wrote 10 of the best sets you can buy today.)

Want new Apple Watch apps? I updated my Apple Watch apps and games roundup, which now includes the shiny new Pedometer++.

Kenny Who? Is the subject of the latest 2000 AD podcast. It uses as a launchpad a Dredd story that was satirical sci-fi pushback on exploitative publishing but that now feels like an on-the-nose critique on GenAI. It then goes deep into morals, practicalities and concerns surrounding GenAI in creative industries.

Comics are great. So I was very happy to see The Times writing positively about the success of The Phoenix, which has now overtaken The Beano in terms of subscribers. However, the numbers themselves are a far cry from the heyday of comics. Moreover, the two comics I mention are the only two British anthology weeklies for kids left in the UK. (2000 AD also soldiers on, but is very much teen+ these days.)

It’s a shame. Weeklies let publishers try new things and take way more risks. And comics in general are pretty awesome for a whole range of reasons. They are imaginative. They can be good for reluctant readers (but should not be considered ONLY a stepping stone to ‘proper’ books). They can encourage creativity. Graphic novels and manga remain popular, but it seems relatively few parents buy a subscription to a weekly for their kids. In part, that’s down to changing habits and cost. But awareness also plays a part. As Jamie Smart says: “We’ve always held on, pig-headedly, to the belief that children love comics. But they need to know they exist.”

So if you’re in the UK and in the position of having a youngling with no comics and the means to buy them some, do consider a Phoenix sub (first 6 issues for a ridiculously cheap £1) and/or The Beano (first 5 issues for £5). And if you’re an adult… read some comics too.

I want more control over my smart heating. Which might sound odd when you learn I’ve got a Tado system, which provides granular control of each individual room. But you only get one schedule. And this doesn’t work well as you come out of winter and 21°C feels very different from how it did a few months back. Tado is big on automation and AI and reckons that’s enough to cope. It isn’t. My argument: give me extra manual controls.

What does a new Apple CEO mean for iPhone? After writing for Stuff about what I want to see from Apple’s new CEO, I’ve penned a piece for TapSmart about how his leadership might impact iPhone.

The C64 and Spectrum are reborn as handhelds. I honestly didn’t see this coming, but a collab between HyperMegaTech and Retro Games Ltd has resulted in a couple of DS-like clamshells. Each one looks the part, echoing its 8-bit forebear. The screen aspect ratio is odd, although you can often successfully crop borders out of games to have them fit more optimally. I like the bundled games, though, which mix old and new. And there’s a microSD slot for adding more.

Drop7 is still amazing. And it’s now joined my iPhone classics series. I really wish Zynga would bring this game back, but it’d probably stick out in their catalogue for not being infested with exploitative IAPs.

Bacon in Zane is bonkers. Having invited players to flip bacon onto everything (including Francis Bacon) in Bacon – the Game, Philipp Stollenmayer has created a follow-up. This one-thumb iPhone effort has you nudge a piece of bacon through a medically implausible human body. It’s strange and a lot of fun – and now part of my best free iPhone games roundup.