👋 Feel like you’re dragging yourself to the holidays? Perhaps you need an 11-foot-tall Dunkin’ iced coffee. Social media personality Nick DiGiovanni teamed up with the brand to break the Guinness World Record for the largest iced latte by mixing up 276 gallons of ice, milk, and espresso. The giant drink didn’t go to waste: It was served to 300+ employees at Dunkin’s corporate headquarters.
🎧 On the pod:Not every LinkedInfluencer is a human.
NEWS FLASH
🎳 Bowling over the competition: Bowlero is rebranding to Lucky Strike Entertainment this month after buying the brand last year, renaming 75+ locations nationwide. With the name change, the brand hopes to move beyond strictly bowling and into location-based entertainment — theme parks, arcades, escape rooms — a ~$100B US market. Bowlero has already acquired the Raging Waves Waterpark in Illinois and Boomers Parks, a chain of family entertainment centers in California and Florida. And the company’s still opening bowling locations and serving up refreshments: Food and beverage sales spiked 17%+ in the latest quarter and made up ~33% of Bowlero’s $260m in quarterly revenue.
🍸 Stoli Vodka has filed for bankruptcy in the US, though its products will still be sold in US stores. The company was founded by billionaire Yuri Shefler, who was exiled from Russia in 2000 after opposing President Vladimir Putin. It has since struggled with legal battles with the Russian government, cyberattacks, and a decreased demand for alcohol. Stoli was sold as Stolichnaya — meaning “capital city” in Russia — in the US until 2022, but changed its name following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
🍗 Perhaps the nostalgia has gotten out of hand: Or perhaps you desire Eduardochi, a new Tamagotchi from — we’re serious here — KFC Spain. Much like the OG Tamagotchi of the ‘90s, players must keep a virtual pet alive — except this one is a fried chicken drumstick. The toy, which sold out in two days at a popup in Madrid, is only available at Spanish KFCs for ~$4.20. You may be wondering why: Well, “Eduardo the Drumstuck” was apparently a viral meme that KFC Spain has used in its marketing before, including Eau D’uardo, a perfume meant to evoke KFC’s 11 herbs and spices.
MORE NEWS TO KNOW
Elon Muskfiled for a preliminary injunction against OpenAI and Microsoft, accusing the companies of anticompetitive practices. While it’s not the first time Musk has sued OpenAI, the newest motion also looks to ban the AI behemoth from becoming a for-profit company.
Disney’s Moana 2broke Thanksgiving box office records with $221m in ticket sales over the weekend. Combined with Wicked and Gladiator II, the films generated $420m in ticket sales — $100m more than 2018’s previous record.
Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger has resigned after failing to turn the chip company around. Intel slept on the AI wave, and has struggled with missed deadlines and tech issues. Gelsinger worked at Intel for 40+ years, leaving in 2009 and rejoining as CEO in February 2021.
TOOLBOX
It’s the final push for 2024. Make the most of it by tuning up your skill sets and learning something new:
Want AI to boost your marketing efforts? Here’s an exhaustive list of tips and tricks for implementing it in your tech stack.
Get in on the TikTok gold rush with five business ideas to start before 2025.
Make the jump: If you’re looking to transition from a nontechnical background to a tech role, tune in to learn how to navigate the shift.
THE BIG IDEA
There’s no accounting for virtual taste
Ever put on a VR headset and wish you could do more than see, hear, and interact with the digital world around you?
Well, researchers from the City University of Hong Kong have found a way to make VR tastier than ever: by actually letting you taste it, per Ars Technica.
Virtual taste…
… is not a new concept, but previous attempts were impractical.
Chemicals could be applied directly to the tongue, but that requires storage.
Electrical stimulation can trigger flavor responses, but requires putting electrode patches on your tongue, which sounds unpleasant.
The new method uses a lollipop-shaped device that contains flavored hydrogels.
The user wears a VR headset and a Bluetooth signal tells the lollipop how it should taste.
A process called iontophoresis sends a current through the gel to trigger a specific flavor, enhanced by seven odor chemicals.
The user licks, safely tasting the wonders of the virtual world.
There are limits…
… to virtual taste.
The system can only produce nine preloaded flavors, including cherry, milk, green tea, and durian.
The gel dries out after about an hour.
But why though?
While only marginally more practical than the other solutions, it offers some applications.
Researchers suggest the system could be used in virtual standardized taste tests to diagnose “gustatory disorders.” (Imagine sitting down for a hearing test and they also check to see if you can differentiate between milk and grapefruit.)
It could also be used in online shopping, which seems both inordinately silly and very fun. You wouldn’t buy shoes without trying them on, so why buy salt without taking it for a test drive?
Don’t let the end of Q4 get the best of you. See six expert-backed strategies for crushing quota as the holidays approach.
Make work… fun? Here are 50+ team-building activities. Break the ice, boost morale, and bond over nonprofessional topics.
DATA POINT
Big spenders: Consumers worldwide were busy swiping their cards for Black Friday and Cyber Monday, according to new data from Block, the fintech parent company of Square, Cash App, and Afterpay/Clearpay.
As of Dec. 2, Block logged 116.2m+ consumer transactions — a 17% increase from the year prior. Saturday, Nov. 30, was the most popular shopping day, while 3:10 am on Sunday, Dec. 1, won out as the peak minute for online shopping across the world.
While online shopping saw a significant bump with a 23% YoY increase, in-person shopping also grew 17%. But customers splurged more from the privacy of their homes: Shopping carts were 1.99x larger online than in person.
AROUND THE WEB
📅 On this day: In 1967, surgeon Christiaan Barnard performed the first human heart transplant on 53-year-old Louis Washkansky in Cape Town, South Africa. Though the heart functioned normally, Washkansky died of pneumonia 18 days later. He’d been given drugs to suppress his immune system to prevent his body from rejecting the new organ.
