Meta (aka Facebook) today announced the introduction of Messenger "shortcuts," a new Slack-style command system that allows users to speed up communication and get messages to their intended recipients.
Building on the @username tagging method to direct a message to a specific person in a chat, the new system introduces @everyone for grabbing everyone's attention in a group chat, and /silent to send a message to members of a chat without them being immediately notified about it during their off hours.
Messenger is also gaining additional shortcuts over the next few weeks that aim to be both practical and fun, such as /Pay to send and receive money within one-on-one Messenger chats (U.S only) and /gif to easily find and send GIFs. Users need only type /gif and then their chosen topic to see GIF options appear.
Lastly, Messenger on iOS is soon to support /shrug and /tableflip to more easily convey the old-school text-based emoticons ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ and (╯°□°）╯︵ ┻━┻. Meta says these are just the first of many more shortcuts coming to Messenger later this year.
Wednesday October 28, 2026 10:11 am PDT by Juli Clover
Apple today announced a new high-end MacBook Pro, which is available in 14-inch and 16-inch sizes. The new device has a PROLED XDR display that supports touch gestures, and a glowing rear Apple logo.
Pricing on the MacBook Pro starts at $2,899 for the 14-inch model and $3,399 for the 16-inch model.
Apple says the MacBook Pro has the "world's best display in a pro laptop." The PROLED...
Thursday October 29, 2026 1:47 pm PDT by Joe Rossignol
While the new iPad mini has an OLED display, the device does not support ProMotion, meaning the display's refresh rate is limited to 60Hz instead of 120Hz.
ProMotion support would have allowed for the iPad mini's refresh rate to automatically adjust from 10Hz to 120Hz depending on the content being displayed, but evidently Apple has kept the feature exclusive to the iPad Pro among iPad...
Wednesday October 28, 2026 2:49 am PDT by Tim Hardwick
Apple opened pre-orders for five new products on Wednesday, October 28, including its first touchscreen MacBook Pro models.
Pre-orders opened for the following new products:
iPad mini with OLED display and A20 Pro chip
iMac with M6 chip
14-inch MacBook Pro with M6 chip
14-inch MacBook Pro with OLED touchscreen
16-inch MacBook Pro with OLED touchscreen
Pre-orders for the iPad mini,...
