Technologies

Take Up to $100 Off Beats Earbuds With These Deals

Beats earbuds are wildly popular and some of our favorite options out there — and now you can snag a pair for less.

Looking for ‘buds with exceptional sound quality? Need earbuds for working out? Beats makes some of the best wireless earbuds out there. The company is owned by Apple, however, and that means Beats products have the same drawback as all Apple offerings: They’re expensive, and it can be hard to find discounts. But right now Amazon has slashed prices on a variety of Beats earbuds, with discounts of up to 43%. There’s no clear-cut expiration date on these deals, but discounts on ‘buds this popular rarely last for long. We’d recommend getting your order in sooner rather than later if you’re hoping to grab a pair at this price.

See at Amazon

CNET reviewer David Carnoy compared the Beats Studio Buds to a stemless version of Apple’s popular AirPods, and they’re a great pick if you want a pair of earbuds for everyday use. They have active noise canceling and a transparency mode when you need to be aware of your surroundings, an IPX4 water-resistance rating and a battery life of up to 24 hours on a single charge. Right now, you can grab several colors on sale for $100, which is 33% off the usual price.

Or if you’re looking for some earbuds that are a little more advanced, you can grab a pair of Beats Fit Pros — our overall favorite pair of earbuds for working out in. They have the same IPX4 water- and sweat-resistance as the Studio Buds above, but also feature flexible wingtips that help them fit in your ears more securely so you can use them on runs or at the gym. They also support active noise canceling and spatial audio, and are equipped with the same H1 chip as the AirPods Pro for seamless connectivity with Apple devices. They list for $200, but right now you can a variety of colors are discounted to $160, including the recently-released yellow, blue and pink options.

And if you need earbuds that can handle even your most extreme adventures, you can save up to $100 on a pair of Powerbeats Pro, dropping the price down as low as $150. They’re one of our favorite pairs of earbuds with ear hooks, which will keep them in place even during intense activities like mountain biking or trail running where you’re getting jostled around quite a bit. They don’t have noise-canceling capabilities like the two pairs above, but they do boast spatial audio support, an auto play/pause feature that can detect when you remove an earbud and built-in voice-activated Siri assistance. They also have the same H1 chip as the Beats Fit Pros, and have a battery life of up to 24 hours with the charging case.

On the cheaper end, the Beats Flex earbuds are 43% off, down to their best price of the year at $40. These neckband-style earbuds pack in a ton of great AirPods-like features, plus some unique capabilities enabled by the neckband design like in-line controls and auto-pausing when the earbuds are removed. You’ll get up to 12 hours per charge with the Beats Flex, and the built-in USB-C port allows for fast charging that can get you 90 minutes of playback from just 10 minutes on the charger.

Technologies

Google’s Canvas AI Project-Planning Tool Is Now Available to Everyone in the US

The AI workspace offers a dedicated space to organize plans and projects.

Canvas, the AI planning tool from Google Search, has rolled out across the US, the company said Wednesday. Canvas is essentially a project planning tool with a range of uses, including trip planning. You can select the tool directly from the AI Mode screen at the top of the Google Search results page.

The tool is integrated into AI Mode and can be used on both desktop and mobile devices, including smartphones and tablets. However, because Canvas opens a second screen beside the main chat window, it’s a little trickier to see on a smartphone. You’ll have to toggle between the screens.

Going anywhere? Maybe college?

Planning trips is one of Canvas’s main functions, with the ability to view and account for flights, hotels and other relevant information in real time.

«Canvas makes it easy to build travel plans customized for your specific needs — bringing together real-time Search data for flights and hotels, details from Google Maps like photos and reviews, and relevant information from sites across the web,» a Google spokesperson told CNET.

Google also notes you can use Canvas as an academic scholarship tracker, which includes dollar amounts and deadlines.

Project planning with AI

Once you’re in the AI Mode screen on Google, you can select the Canvas option from the plus sign that appears on the left side of the box where you type.

Clicking the Canvas button opens the project in a side panel. From there, you can refine the project with the standard chat prompts. You can even look at the underlying code and adjust the Canvas window’s user interface, such as switching to dark mode.

Rose Yao, vice president of product for Google Search, posted a thread on X on Wednesday, sharing a video of a summer camp project for her kids. Canvas created an interactive dashboard that sorts camp options by cost, distance and focus.

«We’re adding support for coding & creative writing tasks, so you can bring even more ideas to life with custom dashboards or interactive tools,» Yao wrote in the post.

Google first announced Canvas for AI Mode in July 2025, and later that year, expanded Canvas’s travel features.

There’s no word yet from Google on when Canvas will expand into other languages and other countries.

Technologies

McDonald’s CEO Burger Video: Ketchup With This Bizarre New Meme

The executive tentatively took a bite of his company’s new «product,» and now even McDonald’s own social media is relishing the mockery.

Corporate executives: They’re absolutely nothing like us. You might be seeing memes and jokes on social media mocking what appears to be some random man’s wimpy bite into a burger. Here’s the big-mouthed backstory.

On Tuesday, McDonald’s launched its Big Arch burger, and a month before that, McDonald’s CEO Chris Kempczinski posted an Instagram video tasting it. But instead of digging into the double-patty, sauced-up and sloppy, 1,020-calorie burger, he … well, delicately nibbles at it? Like the late Queen Elizabeth II might have genteely sampled a cucumber sandwich at afternoon tea?

Kempczinski sings the praises of the Big Arch and then takes the world’s tiniest chomp at it, insisting he took «a big bite, for a Big Arch.»

Does he know what «big» means?

Not only that, but the CEO also says, patting the burger container awkwardly, «I love this product.» As if it’s an IKEA desk. This is America, Chris, we say «burger» here.

Kempczinski’s video came out a month before the burger’s release, and some commenters started grilling the big burger boss right away. But with this week’s release of Big Arch, the internet rediscovered the video.

Comedian Cat Sullivan re-creates the CEO’s video with an even stronger reluctance to taste the food, using the word «product» constantly.

Other restaurant chains especially sank their teeth into the joke. Burger King’s official account cracked, «We couldn’t finish it either» and slammed up an Instagram of its president, Tom Curtis, eating a BK Whopper with a lot more, uh, relish.

Wendy’s created a LinkedIn video showing its president, Pete Suerken, making and enjoying a Wendy’s burger, and he even got in a dig at McDonald’s famously often-broken ice cream machines. Suerken helps himself to a Frosty dessert and announces, «Oh, wait! Our machines are always working.»

Other brands piled on the original post.

«Gonna start test driving our cars 1 metre at a time,» posted car company Mini.

«Is the big bite in the room with us?» cracked the Instagram account for WingStop Canada.

«We do love a square,» wrote Wendy’s UK.

But at least the McDonald’s social media account tried to make fun of its own big boss. The company posted a photo of the Big Arch, using the same awkward term for it that the CEO did, with the caption, «Take a bite of our new product.»

The caption from the McDonald’s Instagram account is at least gamely self-aware, reading «can’t believe this got approved.»

Technologies

Today’s NYT Connections: Sports Edition Hints and Answers for March 6, #529

Here are hints and the answers for the NYT Connections: Sports Edition puzzle for March 6, No. 529.

Looking for the most recent regular Connections answers? Click here for today’s Connections hints, as well as our daily answers and hints for The New York Times Mini Crossword, Wordle and Strands puzzles.

Today’s Connections: Sports Edition features another tricky purple category, so be ready for some word-twisting. If you’re struggling with today’s puzzle but still want to solve it, read on for hints and the answers.

Connections: Sports Edition is published by The Athletic, the subscription-based sports journalism site owned by The Times. It doesn’t appear in the NYT Games app, but it does in The Athletic’s own app. Or you can play it for free online.

Read more: NYT Connections: Sports Edition Puzzle Comes Out of Beta

Hints for today’s Connections: Sports Edition groups

Here are four hints for the groupings in today’s Connections: Sports Edition puzzle, ranked from the easiest yellow group to the tough (and sometimes bizarre) purple group.

Yellow group hint: Whack!

Green group hint: Surprise!

Blue group hint: Gooooooal!

Purple group hint: Sounds like…