McDonald’s sales dented by Israel-Gaza boycotts | BBC

February 6, 2024February 5, 2024 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

McDonald’s has missed a key sales target, partly due to customers boycotting the firm for its perceived support of Israel.

The fast food chain reported its first quarterly sales miss in nearly four years due to weak growth in its international business division.

Its boss previously acknowledged the impact of the conflict, blaming “misinformation”.

Shares in McDonald’s fell about 4% after the announcement.

McDonalds is one of several Western corporations including Starbucks and Coca Cola that have seen boycotts and protests against them by anti-Israeli campaigners.

Deal Dive: It’s time for VCs to break up with fast fashion | TechCrunch

February 5, 2024February 4, 2024 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

Fast fashion is an industry ensnared in labor issues and copyright problems, and it has an immense environmental impact due to its wastewater and carbon emissions. It also happens to have the potential to make a lot of money, fast.

But despite all these issues, VCs won’t stop loving the sector.

On Wednesday, my colleague Manish Singh wrote a scoop about a potential Accel investment into Newme, a fast-fashion startup based in India. Newme is an app-based retailer that produces 500 new items a week with an average price tag of $10. This news comes just a week after the company closed a seed round.

Accel and Newme did not respond to requests for comment.

Universal Music is set to pull its songs from TikTok | Mashable

February 1, 2024January 31, 2024 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

The partnership between Universal Music Group (UMG) and TikTok has apparently soured, as the music company is set to pull its music catalog from the social media app.

The agreement between the two companies is set to expire today (Jan. 31), and negotiations appear to have come to a standstill. UMG published an impassioned open letter addressed to the artist and songwriter community, saying they must “call time on TikTok.” The letter explained that UMG has been pressing TikTok on three key issues: appropriate compensation for artists and songwriters, protecting human artists from the dangers of AI, and online safety for TikTok users.

Judge strikes down Elon Musk’s massive, multi-billion-dollar pay package | CNN Business

January 31, 2024January 30, 2024 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

A Delaware state court judge has thrown out the 2018 pay package that helped to make Tesla CEO Elon Musk one of the richest people in the world.

Delaware Chancery Court Chancellor Kathaleen McCormick, who oversaw the bench trial that concluded in November 2022, ruled Tuesday that Musk and the Tesla board “bore the burden of proving that the compensation plan was fair, and they failed to meet their burden.”

The 303 million split-adjusted stock options that Musk had received as part of the package are worth $51 billion today, when calculated using Tuesday’s closing price, less the modest exercise price of $23.34 a share.

The case was argued in Delaware, where Tesla and many other major US corporations are incorporated. While Musk did not have an immediate comment on the decision, he did tweet Tuesday, “Never incorporate your company in the state of Delaware.”

NY AG sues Citibank for failing to protect customers from fraud | CNN Business

January 31, 2024January 30, 2024 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

New York Attorney General Letitia James filed a lawsuit against Citibank on Tuesday, alleging the big bank failed to do enough to protect and reimburse victims of fraud.

The lawsuit argues that New York customers lost millions of dollars — in some cases their entire life savings — to scammers and hackers because of Citi’s weak security and anti-fraud measures.

According to the NY AG, Citi does not do enough to prevent unauthorized account takeovers, illegally refuses to reimburse fraud victims, and “misleads” customers about their rights after their accounts are hacked.

90,000-year-old human footprints found on a Moroccan beach are some of the oldest and best preserved in the world | Live Science

January 30, 2024January 29, 2024 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

Two trails of ancient human footprints pressed into a beach in Morocco form one of the largest and best-preserved trackways in the world.

Researchers happened upon the footprint site near the northern tip of North Africa in 2022 while studying boulders at a nearby pocket beach, according to a study published Jan. 23 in the journal Scientific Reports.

“Between tides, I said to my team that we should go north to explore another beach,” study lead author Mouncef Sedrati, an associate professor of coastal dynamics and geomorphology at the University of Southern Brittany in France, told Live Science. “We were surprised to find the first print. At first, we weren’t convinced it was a footprint, but then we found more of the trackway.”

The moon is shrinking, causing landslides and moonquakes exactly where NASA wants to build its 1st lunar colony | Live Science

January 30, 2024January 29, 2024 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

When plotting sites for crewed lunar landings — ranging from the forthcoming Artemis missions to eventual lasting moon settlements — mission planners must account for tons of lunar parameters. For instance, the shape of the terrain could make or break a mission and a possible high volume of buried water could make one spot much more tantalizing than its drier counterpart. But now, geologists suggest it’s also important to keep moonquakes and lunar landslides in mind.

As the scientists emphasize, this is no longer an academic question. Researchers examining the moon’s south polar region — which sits near the planned landing side of Artemis 3, set to touch down in 2026 — have identified fault lines whose slips triggered a major moonquake about 50 years ago.

US home sales see worst year since 1995 | BBC

January 22, 2024January 21, 2024 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

Home sales in the US sank to the lowest in nearly 30 years, as a sharp rise in interest rates increased costs for buyers and persuaded many potential sellers with lower rates to stay put.

Just 4.09 million homes were purchased, the fewest since 1995, as tight supply pushed prices to a new record, the National Association of Realtors said.

The organization said it expected the market to improve in 2024.

But it warned that affordability would remain an issue.

The median sale price in 2023 climbed 1% over the year, to $389,800 (£307,625), according to the NAR, which publishes the widely tracked report on sales of existing homes, which account for the bulk of purchases in the US.

The median price has jumped more than 40% since 2019, after a surge in prices during the pandemic.

Amazon takeover of iRobot to be blocked by EU | BBC

January 22, 2024January 21, 2024 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

Amazon’s takeover of vacuum cleaner maker iRobot is set to be blocked by the European Union’s competition watchdog, the BBC understands.

It’s a blow to the tech giant, which was previously given the all-clear for the purchase by the UK government’s competition watchdog.

The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) found that its place in the UK market was “modest” and that it already faced several significant rivals.

Amazon declined to comment.

The online giant moved to buy iRobot, maker of the Roomba cleaner, in August 2022 in a takeover deal set to cost $1.7bn (£1.4bn).