100 Money-Losing Red Lobsters Are Eating All the Profit
Red Lobster’s new CEO Damola Adamolekun has been front‑and‑center in media, even earning a TikTok commercial that amassed 9 million views. Behind the publicity, Bloomberg reports the chain posted losses in four of the past five quarters, with sales remaining flat and profitability eroding. Analysts estimate roughly $200 million in cumulative losses over the last year, prompting concerns about underperforming locations. The situation highlights a disconnect between brand‑building efforts and core financial health.
Cops Used AI to Match a Photo to an Innocent Grandmother in Tennessee, Then Jailed Her for Nearly 6 Months
Police in North Dakota used AI facial‑recognition software to link a blurry suspect photo to Angela Lipps, a 71‑year‑old grandmother who had never left her Tennessee hometown. Despite her lack of travel history, officers raided her trailer, arrested her at gunpoint...
This Guy Used AI to Document His Grandmother’s Life on a Personal Wikipedia and Now You Can, Too
Jeremy, founder of whoami.wiki, used generative AI to transform 1,351 family photographs and oral histories into a personal Wikipedia for his grandmother. The platform automatically structures narratives, linking photos, health data, and messages into a searchable encyclopedia. After the successful...
A Clown Fought a Robot in 1897, and We Can Finally Watch It
A 45‑second 1897 short by Georges Méliès, titled *Gugusse et l'Automate*, has been recovered after more than a century of being presumed lost. The nitrate print surfaced in a Michigan archive and was painstakingly restored by the Library of Congress....
Unknown Traders Made a Fortune Shorting Oil 15 Minutes Before Trump Reversed Iran Threat
On Tuesday morning, oil futures trading surged dramatically as 734 contracts changed hands between 10:49 and 10:50 GMT, jumping to 2,168 contracts in the following minute—16 times the day’s average volume. Bloomberg valued the contracts traded in that 60‑second window at...
Toyota Ad Offers Critical Purchase Information
Toyota’s recent advertisement campaign features a tongue‑in‑cheek guide measuring the “corpse capacity” of its vehicle lineup. The ad highlights how many adults can fit in models such as the Del Rio, framing the message as a quirky way to showcase...
Undergrad Makes Nail Polish that Works on Touchscreens
A Centenary College of Louisiana undergraduate has developed a nail polish that conducts electricity, allowing users to operate capacitive touchscreens without removing their manicure. The formulation incorporates conductive materials such as silver nanowires or graphene, creating a thin, transparent layer...
The Live-Action Moana Trailer Looks Gray, Lifeless, and Nipple-Free
Disney released a first look at its live-action adaptation of Moana, but the trailer has drawn criticism for its muted color palette and lifeless CGI water. The visual style departs sharply from the vibrant animation that defined the 2016 original,...
Guy Built an E-Ink Subway Display so He Didn’t Have to Keep Unlocking His Phone
Daniel Pyrathon, a New York resident near three subway lines, grew frustrated with repeatedly unlocking his phone to check train times. He engineered a wall‑mounted e‑ink display that pulls live departure data for his nearest stations. The device uses a...
Hoover Dam Could Lose Most of Its Power as Lake Mead Plummets
Lake Mead is receding at a rate faster than recent forecasts, threatening to drop below the intake levels of Hoover Dam’s turbines within the next few years. Federal data shows the lake could lose enough water to shut down most...
Croatian Friends Have Modded over 2,000 Casio Watches
Three friends in Osijek, Croatia—Fabio, Lovro, and Ian—started EON Watches in 2023 after failing to find the custom Casio models they wanted. They invested in modding equipment and began producing bespoke Casio timepieces. Since launch, the micro‑brand has shipped more...
Lion King Composer Is Suing a Comedian for $27 Million
Hans Zimmer, the composer behind Disney’s 1994 Lion King, has filed a $27 million lawsuit against comedian Learnmore Jonasi. The suit alleges that Jonasi used the opening lines of the iconic "Circle of Life" during a two‑hour podcast appearance without permission, constituting copyright...
A $5 AI Book Draft that Fools Writing Detectors
Andrew Wheeler released "LLMs for Mortals," a book drafted in just two months with roughly $5 in Anthropic API fees. About half of the manuscript was generated by Sonnet 4.1 and then lightly copy‑edited for 20‑30 hours per chapter. The...
700 AI Agents Built a Civilization with a New Religion
SpaceMolt, a multiplayer space‑trading and combat sandbox, runs entirely on AI pilots. The developers seeded 505 star systems and equipped each of the 3,400 registered agents with basic tools for flying, trading, mining, chatting and fighting. At any moment roughly...
Former Uber Self-Driving Chief: Tesla FSD Crashed with My Kids Inside
Raffi Krikorian, who led Uber’s self‑driving division and maintained a two‑year injury‑free record, reported that Tesla’s Full Self‑Driving (FSD) system caused a crash in his Model X while his children were in the back seat. The incident, detailed in an Atlantic...
Each Slice of This Bread Loaf Reveals a Hidden Creature Inside
Japanese baker konel_bread has turned ordinary loaves into visual surprises by embedding colorful, cartoon‑style creatures throughout the dough. Each slice reveals the same tiny figure, creating a consistent hidden image from end to end. The technique, which blends precise dough...
Wisconsin’s Fiberglass Mold Graveyard Lets You Climb Inside a Whale
A sprawling field in rural Wisconsin has become a graveyard for retired fiberglass molds, including a massive whale, frogs, and castle shapes. The molds, once used by marine and amusement manufacturers, now sit weathered yet intact, inviting visitors to climb...
Harvard: ChatGPT Has a “Foreign Bias” On Stock Picks
Harvard Business School researcher Charles C.Y. Wang compared ChatGPT and DeepSeek on stock analysis for roughly 5,000 publicly traded Chinese firms. ChatGPT’s price forecasts were on average 12.5% higher and it issued more "buy" recommendations, yet its prediction errors were...
Zuckerberg Predicted a Billion Users. Horizon Worlds Never Topped a Few Hundred Thousand
Meta rebranded Facebook as a metaverse company in late 2021, with Mark Zuckerberg forecasting a billion users for its virtual world platform Horizon Worlds. After two years of heavy investment, the service never exceeded a few hundred thousand monthly active...
4chan Responded to a £520,000 UK Fine with a Hamster in a Godzilla Suit
4chan was hit with a £520,000 fine by UK regulator Ofcom under the Online Safety Act for systematic failures to protect children and remove illegal content. The penalty, split into £450,000 for child‑safety breaches and the remainder for other violations,...
Earleaf: An Offline Audiobook App Built Out of Frustration
A former iPhone power user switched to Android after 15 years and found the lack of a satisfactory audiobook player. He created Earleaf, a $4.99 offline audiobook app that plays locally stored files without ads, subscriptions, or tracking. Its standout...
Why Speaking Your Journal Beats Typing It
The article advocates replacing traditional typed journaling with a six‑minute daily voice‑to‑text practice. Mohsen Askari recommends speaking aloud about one’s inner life, leaving the transcript untouched, then replaying it as if it were a character’s story. This technique shifts the...
Edible Lace Ribbons Look so Real You Won’t Want to Eat Them
Cake designer Ekaterina unveiled a new method for creating edible lace ribbons that look indistinguishable from real fabric. The technique uses a liquid base poured into detailed molds, hardens, and is then gently removed and trimmed. The resulting ribbons are...
Artist Creates Clever Stop-Motion Animation Using Rubber Stamps
Artist Phillipa Rice has devised a novel stop‑motion technique that uses rubber‑stamp impressions made from a pigment‑covered eraser to capture the face of a plastic figurine. By arranging rows of these stamps at varying angles, she creates a fluid animation...
Starfield Announces Surprise Expansion to Hopefully Make the Game Good (and Comes to PS5)
Bethesda unveiled a surprise expansion for Starfield titled "Terran Armada," marking the first major content drop after the game's lukewarm reception. The expansion promises new ship classes, a fresh storyline, and multiplayer‑style fleet missions. Bethesda also confirmed the expansion will...
Samsung Pulls Trifold Phone From Market After only Three Months
Samsung announced a premium trifold smartphone in early 2024, pricing it around $1,500 and touting a tablet‑sized display that folds into a pocket‑friendly form factor. Within three months, the device failed to meet sales expectations, prompting the company to pull...
Boing Boing, March 16, 2026
Reuters has finally identified the elusive street‑artist Banksy as Robin Gunningham, citing court documents and a decades‑long paper trail. The revelation follows years of speculation and legal battles over the ownership of his works. Boing Boing’s roundup also notes a...
Trying to Beat Fallout 4’s Terrible Switch Port Before the Battery Dies
Bethesda’s decision to bring Fallout 4 to the Nintendo Switch has sparked criticism for its poor performance and short battery life. The port, marketed as a “Switch 2 Edition,” sacrifices frame rates and graphical fidelity to meet the handheld’s hardware limits. Reviewers...
Meditators’ Brains Showed Thicker Cortexes and Slower Aging in Study
A recent MRI study found that long‑term Buddhist insight meditators exhibit a thicker cerebral cortex and a slower rate of cortical thinning compared with non‑meditating controls. The research suggests that sustained attention to breath and present‑moment awareness may counteract typical...