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It wasn't too long ago that word of a "dark mode" for YouTube broke out. While it was technically possible to try it out before it launched, the process was a bit too involved. The new dark mode hasn't exactly formally launched yet, but YouTube is now soliciting public feedback for it. Which means you can now easily test out the upcoming changes to YouTube's design, which, it turns out, also includes a new non-dark theme.

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‘Tis the season for giving. Or so they say. Sometimes, however, it’s also the season for giving back. Yes, we’re talking about that money you owe your best bud from your last Starbucks. OK, so maybe that’s not the only reason you need to send someone money or even, gasp, ask for money, but whatever the reason, Google is making it a lot easier to do just that. The new Google Wallet web experience isn’t just snazzier, it also lets you send and request payments right then and there on your browser, no apps needed.

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The holiday season doesn’t just usher in the shopping season, it also signals the count down to a new year. Which means that, in addition to trying to work off all that holiday food, people will obsess over resolutions, plans, and goals. Yes, it’s the perfect time to be a todo list app or a productivity app. And as if warming up the engines for the holidays, a handful of such apps and services have stepped up their game to deliver just a bit more smartness to their list of features. Here are five of the best known todo apps that have just made your productivity even more productive.

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Building websites is as much an art as it is (computer) science. And, let’s face it, not everyone has what it takes to craft beautiful, not to mention engaging, websites, nor do we always have a web designer on call. Don’t worry, though, because Google has you covered, again. After a period of dormancy, the Google Sites website builder is jumping back into action, newer, fresher, and more responsive than ever before, to help you and your team make websites that are just as fresh and responsive.

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Google has had an “interesting” history with news readers. In 2013, it shut down Google Reader, perhaps the most used RSS/feed reader platforms in recent times. But while it did have something like Google Play Newsstand for both news and magazines, it hasn’t exactly been shown as much love as its other Google Play siblings. That changes today with perhaps the biggest update Google has ever announced for the service. In addition to a redesign of Newsstand’s mobile apps, Google is also bringing Newsstand to browsers at long last.

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There really is no stopping Flash's demise. Not when all the major browsers have ganged up on it. The latest to pull the plug is Google's Chrome, which is kickstarting the process to Flash's exit from the Web scene starting in September. Of course, that doesn't mean that annoying ads, especially video ones, will be going away forever, though some will undoubtedly see some downtime on Chrome browsers. It just means that, eventually, they will be taking on a more resource efficient, standards compliant form.

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The Vivaldi web browser has been updated to version 1.2 and with that update comes new features. The new features include support for mouse gestures, new shortcuts, and new tab options. The biggest new feature is support for editable mouse gestures. This feature allows users to trace the path they want to use for the gesture with the mouse pointer and save that gesture.

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At Google I/O last week, Google dumped some rather big news, at least one of them expected. Android apps are come full force to Chrome OS, with Google Play Store even. Instant Apps were quite the unexpected surprise, but in retrospect Google had already sown the seeds as far back as 2013. But in the midst of the applause and hopeful cheers, there were also some murmuring and the raising of eyebrows. Is all of these just a subtle, cunning ploy by the Web search giant to make Android tablets obsolete, or, in the long run, even phase out native Android apps?

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Once and briefly the darling of interactive Web content creators, Flash has fallen by the wayside and has become more of a liability than a feature. Even Adobe has taken steps to de-emphasize Flash content in its own tools, while still keeping backwards compatibility a thing. In its stead is HTML5, which covers almost everything Flash can do, especially videos. To hasten Flash's demise from the Web, Google will disable Flash by default in its Chrome Web browser before the year ends. That said, it will still actually ship Flash even then, just in case.

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With all the coverage lavished on "proper" VR devices like the Oculus Rift and HTC Vive, it might be too easy to forget the VR headset that was already in the market way ahead of those two. Made by Samsung in partnership with Oculus, the Gear VR is almost like a poor man's VR (though the real poor man's VR would be the original Google Cardboard), lettings users experience VR more easily. Provided they have the latest Samsung smartphone, of course. Now Samsung is expanding its headset's coverage by adopting what is to be the VR standard for the Web called, what else, WebVR.

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Late last year, Google introduced a new feature to its image search on mobile browsers. In essence, it worked pretty much like Pinterest, allowing users to "pin", (technically "star" in Google-ese) to save it for later browsing. While extremely convenient when you're browsing on your smartphone on the go, it's admittedly also a useful feature even when you're sitting comfortably in front of your desktop or laptop. Good thing, then, that Google is finally making that very same feature available on larger computers and, naturally, works well with its mobile counterpart.

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The Web is in a sort of a rat race. While Internet connections get faster, web sites are getting more and more complicated, balancing, even negating, those speed improvements. A few tech companies, particularly Google, strive to introduce technologies as well as best practices to help speed up the Web, but those solutions are usually limited to specific browsers or specific circumstances. A new project from MIT called "Polaris", however, is aiming for a browser-agnostic method that could make web pages load as much as 34% faster.

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