Tech News – by Arlin Schaffel

Pantone’s new Colour of the Year is giving me existential dread

Pantone has released its Colour of the Year for 2026, and the winner is… drumroll please… white. While it's not the most exciting shade on paper, the world's leading authority on colour claims the "lofty" white is much more than blank space. As a "symbol of calming influence in a society rediscovering the value of quiet reflection," Cloud Dancer supposedly represents a sense of serenity and retrospection. Built to encourage "true relaxation and focus," the shade allows the mind the freedom to wander, creating a perfect environment for innovation to grow.
https://www.creativebloq.com/design/pantones-new-colour-of-the-year-is-giving-me-existential-dread

Meta eyes big cuts to its metaverse budget in the AI era

According to Bloomberg News, Meta is considering slashing its metaverse spending by as much as 30% in 2026 — although no plans are final yet — after meetings at Zuckerberg’s Hawaii compound laid out a slimmer future for its namesake ambitions. For three years, the company tried to brute-force another new reality into existence: new name, new stock ticker, new keynote vocabulary about “presence” and “embodied internet.”
https://qz.com/meta-metaverse-cuts-mark-zuckerberg-reality-labs

AI finds its way into Apple’s top apps of the year

Apple’s app of the year, Tiimo, for instance, is described as a visual AI planner that turns to-dos into plans with visual timelines. The app uses AI to break down your tasks into a realistic schedule by estimating how long each step of a task could take and helping you to create a plan.
https://techcrunch.com/2025/12/04/ai-finds-its-way-into-apples-top-apps-of-the-year/

The annual app recaps for 2025: all Wrapped up

Spotify may have popularized the Wrapped user recap trend, but more companies are jumping on that bandwagon every year. From rival music streaming providers like Apple, Amazon, YouTube, and Deezer, to completely unrelated services across tech, gaming, and other industries, a huge range of companies are using fun visuals, stats, and personalization features to show how you’ve been using their platforms over the last 12 months.
https://www.theverge.com/news/837280/spotify-wrapped-2025-recap-annual-best-of-data

Apple’s new Font Book icon is upsetting designers

Font Book, macOS's built-in font manager, has seen its icon hugely simplified. Gone are the various typefaces depicting the letter, 'A', replaced with a single clean sans-serif character. Many have complained that it's no longer clear what the app does. "I get the modern take, but this is disappointing, I'd rather have it say 'Aa' than just 'a'," one Redditor comments. Another adds, "hmmm yeah this is upsetting."
https://www.creativebloq.com/design/logos-icons/apples-new-font-book-icon-is-upsetting-designers

Browser extensions pushed malware to 4.3M Chrome, Edge users

A seven-year malicious browser extension campaign infected 4.3 million Google Chrome and Microsoft Edge users with malware, including backdoors and spyware sending people's data to servers in China. The attackers, which Koi named ShadyPanda, played the long game: publishing legitimate extensions, accumulating thousands or sometimes millions of downloads over several years, and then pushing a malware-laden update that auto updates across the entire user base.
https://www.theregister.com/2025/12/01/chrome_edge_malicious_browser_extensions/?td=rt-3a

Netflix kills Google Cast support on ‘most TVs,’ still charges more for Chromecasts

In a wild turn of events, Netflix has killed support for Google Cast on the vast majority of products. Netflix says: Netflix no longer supports casting shows from a mobile device to most TVs and TV-streaming devices. You’ll need to use the remote that came with your TV or TV-streaming device to navigate Netflix.
https://9to5google.com/2025/12/01/netflix-google-cast-support-removed/