đ Stay humble today, folks. Just like Mark Zuckerberg, who, despite being worth $200B, still wants a sensible car. Kinda. Zuckerberg commissioned a custom Porsche Cayenne Turbo GT minivan for his wife Priscilla. Donât cry for poor little Zuck â he threw in a sports car for himself, too.
đ§ On the pod: Tennis courts have a major pickleball problem.
NEWS FLASH
đ¸ FTX was⌠not the worst investment? Customers of failed crypto exchange FTX will soon get their money back, plus a little extra for interest, with a judge approving creditors to claim 119% of the amount they put in. The full tab will be ~$14B. Meanwhile, founder Sam Bankman-Fried, who is serving 25 years for fraud and previously bunked with a former Honduran president, is now sharing a Brooklyn jail cell with Diddy. Wild world.
đ Big news for the empty strip mall in your hometown: Spirit Halloween isnât just for spooky season anymore. The pop-up retailer will open 10 Spirit Christmas stores this fall, trading in the usual costumes and cauldrons for holiday decorations, âlife-sizedâ gingerbread villages, and even a selfie-ready Santa. The business of holiday cheer is just the latest in Spirit Halloweenâs domination: It opened a record 1.5k+ stores in the US and Canada this year.
đ Does grocery shopping need to be gamified? Instacart thinks so. Its AI-enabled Caper Carts, which can identify and track items and includes a display screen for line-free self-checkout, will now also allow customers to earn rewards through âquests,â like in-store âtreasure huntsâ or shopping streaks. Weâd rather play Dungeons & Dragons, but in this economy, perhaps a discount is worth the cheesiness.
MORE NEWS TO KNOW
Walmart, which shuttered its health centers for human patients earlier this year, will open five more pet care centers in the next month. Itâs not just because dogs are cuter than humans: Annual household spending on pets is projected to top $1.7k by 2030.
Home Depot will require corporate employees to work one eight-hour retail shift per quarter so they get what itâs actually like on the floor. The chainâs sales have dipped post-pandemic, with fewer people remodeling now that they can leave home.
The Nobel Prize in Physics was awarded to AI research pioneers John Hopfield and Geoffrey Hinton, which seems like a special moment for AI â until you remember âgodfather of AIâ Hinton quit Google last year warning of the techâs dangers and expressing some regret over his lifeâs work.
A BRAND-AID SOLUTION
Take your brand from averagely bland to absolutely grand
To build a brand that your grandkids will hear about (and dare we say their grandkids, too), itâs best if you begin with a few core things.
Genetic testing company 23andMe has been in a doom spiral, leaving customers wondering what will happen to their genetic data.
After 23andMe IPOâd in 2021, it was worth $6B. Now, its market cap is just ~$150m, and revenue was down 34% YoY in Q1, perWired.
But 23andMe has never been profitable â most customers take its standard DNA test once, view their results, and thatâs it. The companyâs efforts to push expensive subscription services and premium reports, which range from $268 to $999 for the first year, havenât paid off either.
Other struggles:
Last year, 23andMe suffered a data breach affecting ~50% of its customers, or 6.9m people. It agreed to a $30m settlement in September.
In August, 23andMe shut down its in-house drug discovery unit.
Last month, the companyâs board resigned after CEO Anne Wojcicki suggested taking the company private.
Some analysts speculate it could be out of business by 2025, unless a bankruptcy process occurs.
What happens to all the data theyâve collected?
Unclear. The company has been fairly ambiguous about the future of its data.
Law professor Anya Prince toldNPR that HIPAA doesnât apply to 23andMe because it isnât a health care company, while a 23andMe spokesperson toldThe New York Times that it is subject to its own similar protocols, as well as state and federal regulations.
It also claims all genetic data shared with research companies is anonymized, and that it doesnât allow law enforcement access.
In the event of a merger or acquisition, new ownership would receive access to 23andMeâs data, though Wojcicki said she is no longer considering selling the company.
Whatâs the risk?
The Atlanticdetailed a few potential alarming scenarios â insurers using genetic info to deny coverage to people with preexisting conditions, drugmakers using it to target ads â but itâs unclear how likely that is.
It could potentially be used for doxing. Hackers behind last yearâs data breach seemingly targeted Jewish and Chinese customers, leaking their personal info including names, addresses, and birth dates.
Concerned customers can delete their data, though 23andMe claims it is legally required to keep some.
Are domain names dying? The internet keeps adding users â ~97m new global users came online in 2023 â but what happens when they stop typing in domain names and hitting enter?
Preparing for takeoff: Even in a billion-dollar industry with sky-high stakes, there are opportunities for the average entrepreneur. Our friends at Trends have some ideas.
NEWSWORTHY NUMBER
How long it took for Tizi Hodson, now 70, to hear back about a job. Hodson applied to be a motorcycle stunt rider in 1976 and waited days for a reply to arrive at her London apartment.
When none came, she did what any of us dead set on living our best lives would have done: She moved to Africa and enjoyed a whirlwind career as a snake handler, horse whisperer, pilot, and flight instructor. Then, despite ~50 moves across multiple countries, she received a handwritten letter explaining that her application had gotten stuck in a post office drawer where it sat for nearly half a century.
Hodson has no regrets, saying sheâd tell her younger self to do everything she did, âeven if I have broken a few bones.â
AROUND THE WEB
⥠On this day: In 1936, the Hoover Dam began sending electricity to Los Angeles, 266 miles away.
đ Thatâs cool: An archive of nonfiction book summaries.
As you read above, Spirit Halloween is on a nationwide tear, and an estimated $11.6B will be spent on halloween costumes, decorations, and other items this year.
We want to know what youâre getting up to: How hard do you go on Halloween?
