Amazon spy hooks, Starlink in Brazil

Amazon still sells the clothes-hook spy cameras they’re being sued over

Amazon could be responsible, at least in part, for a man spying on an underage girl with a hidden camera attached to a clothes hook, a US judge ruled less than two weeks ago. You’d think the first thing the retail giant would do is pull any and all such offers—but no.—Ananya Bhattacharya | Read more

Starlink traffic has soared in Brazil this year—for better or for worse

SpaceX’s star satellite business is booming everywhere, and so are the threats it brings.

Starlink traffic has more than tripled worldwide this year, according to an analysis of total Cloudflare traffic volumes associated with the service’s autonomous system (AS14593) throughout 2023.—Ananya Bhattacharya | Read more

China is keen to challenge the US by strengthening ties with Vietnam

Chinese leader Xi Jinping is traveling to Vietnam this week, visiting the Southeast Asian country’s capital Hanoi from Tuesday (December 12).

Already, Chinese state media is hailing the visit — Xi’s first trip next door in six years — as an announcement of “a new chapter in China-Vietnam relations” (link in Chinese). Quoting a phrase used by Vietnam’s founding leader Ho Chi Minh to describe bilateral relations, state broadcaster CCTV dubbed Beijing and Hanoi “both comrades and brothers” (link in Chinese).—Mary Hui | Read more

Where McDonald’s new CosMc’s drive-thru expands to the next

CosMc’s, the new space-themed spinoff from McDonald’s, opened its first location on Dec. 8 in a suburb of Chicago. The drive-thru concept offers a Starbucks-meets-Sonic menu, with fruity and coffee-flavored slushes and drinks.—Laura Bratton | Read more

Misleading BP’s board cost its former CEO $40 million

BP’s former chief, Bernard Looney, is paying a heavy price to keep things from the board.

The former chief executive “deliberately misled the board” about his personal relationships with colleagues at the time of his resignation in September 2022, the 113-year-old oil giant said in a press release. Giving “inaccurate and incomplete assurances” as part of an investigation into the relationships in 2022 amounted to “serious misconduct,” and as a result Looney’s compensation was reduced by £32 million ($41 million).—Ananya Bhattacharya | Read more

Amazon’s Project Kuiper satellites are one step closer to competing with Elon Musk’s Starlink

According to Amazon, the prototype satellites KuiperSat-1 and KuiperSat-2 could send and receive data at up to 100 Gbps, which is much higher than standard rresidential internet data transfer speed. The testing was conducted in November.—Mara Johnson-Groh | Read more

A fan has been fined $250,000 for selling Luke Combs-themed tumblers, prompting copyright litigation.

Luck Combs said it “sickens me” to learn that a Florida woman who sold unofficial tumblers bearing his likeness has been sued by his team.

Nicol Harness, a fan who makes her living selling T-shirts and tumblers on Amazon, was served a copyright lawsuit by Combs’ representatives in October, but she never caught it. The lawsuit was sent by email instead of in person — something the Northern District of Illinois federal court allows — and it went to her junk mail, according to CBS. Harness only found out she was being sued after realizing the $5,500 in her Amazon seller account had been frozen.—Ananya Bhattacharya | Read more

US pork producers in 2023 are looking at their least profitable year on record

It’s no secret that Americans like bacon. In one American survey, more than 20% of respondents said they would be happy eating bacon every day for the rest of their lives. But love only goes so far.—Laura Bratton | Read more

Americans over 65 will account for nearly 60% of all labor force growth over the next decade

Older workers are contribute more for the economy than ever.

Most baby boomers — members of the second-largest generation in the U.S. — are now 65 or older, qualifying them as “older workers” if they’re still working, according to a Pew Research study Released Thursday (Dec. 13). Boomers chose to stay in the workforce rather than retire, thanks in part to changes in Social Security benefits that raised the retirement age to 67 for workers born after 1960. In addition, many people who retired early during the pandemic returned to work starting late in 2021.—Laura Bratton | Read more

Google made sure to highlight live demos of its new Gemini Pro developer tools

When Google has dropped its new generative AI model Gemini in a pre-recorded video demo last week, it highlighted the differentiating elements of the ChatGPT competitor, such as its ability to speak out loud. But there seemed to be a gap between what was shown and the great language model’s true capabilities.—Michelle Cheng | Read more