TSA gets it right: Gold Star families now have free PreCheck, plus a discount for military spouses, and TSA is adding expedited lanes in 10 cities. It’s part of their July 4th rollout that finally makes airport lines suck a little less to thank families for their service to our country.
37 out of 50
That’s how many top news sites saw traffic drop after Google’s AI took the wheel. Despite wild headlines covering assassination attempts, election chaos and tariff wars, users stayed on the search page. Why? Google’s Gemini bot summarizes the news, grabs the eyeballs and leaves publishers ghosted like a bad Tinder date.
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🧲 Battery boy: A mom demanded an X-ray for her screaming toddler. Good move, because he’d swallowed a button battery, which was frying his throat from the inside. He was originally misdiagnosed with a stomach virus. He’s recovering after several procedures, and Mom basically saved his life by refusing to be gaslit by triage.
Free TV isn’t free: Amazon is torching the Freevee app. It’s dead by August 2025. All that “Watch Free with Ads” content is getting absorbed into Prime Video. Jeff needs the money.
🩸 The FBI’s waving red flags: Scammers have a new angle. They’re impersonating health fraud investigators to steal sensitive data. They’ll slide into your texts or inbox asking for health info or fake reimbursements. Watch out for phone calls, too. Don’t bite, it’s all phishing designed to use your medical ID for something or someone else, along with stealing your cash. Have an older family member? Warn them about this one.
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🍿 Movie theater ad bloat: I saw F1 last night. It was pretty good but 70 minutes longer than it should have been, courtesy of 25 minutes of commercials. AMC is stuffing up to 30 minutes of ads to plug revenue holes, and movies will start later than the listed time. Order dessert, your seat’s not going anywhere.
Microsoft Authenticator changes: It’s ditching password management. At the end of this month, the autofill password feature bites the dust. And by August? Say goodbye to accessing saved passwords in the app at all. I use NordProtect for my password manager.
💔 Trouble in swipe city: Dating apps are seeing a drop in love … and users. Case in point: Bumble just laid off about a third of its staff to cut costs. Why? People are fed up with ghosting, pay-to-play matches and the lack of real connection. Looks like it’s back to making eye contact at the grocery store while squeezing the melons.
$1 billion
That’s Rivian’s latest cash infusion from Volkswagen. It’s the second billion in a $5.8B tech JV, paid out after Rivian hit gross profit (finally). The deal: VW gets EV software; Rivian gets a lifeline. Think of it as funding your roommate’s startup in exchange for their Wi-Fi password.
DJI’s power play: DJI’s new Power 2000 is part battery beast, part road trip buddy. It’s a 2kWh LFP unit expandable up to 22kWh, thanks to 10(!) daisy-chained expansion batteries. It hits 3000W output and doubles as a noise-conscious “Uninterruptible Power Supply,” meaning it can keep devices powered during blackouts. Cost? $10,000.
🔞 TikTok trouble, again: This is really bad. A viral TikTok trend is using motivational clips to camouflage grooming tactics. Teens, mostly girls, lip-synch “Yes you can” while text implies dating younger kids or sneaking out. Experts say it plays on empowerment language to nudge kids into risky behavior. Predators are watching and commenting. TikTok, of course, does nothing.
Over 1 million
That’s how many robots are working in Amazon warehouses. They do everything from moving packages to sorting items. The scary part? Robots already help with 75% of deliveries and are on track to outnumber human workers soon. First they take our jobs, then it’s the world. Better be nice to your Roomba.
👂🏻 Gene therapy restores hearing: I love this. Scientists helped people with lifelong deafness hear for the first time using an experimental treatment. They injected the OTOF gene (needed to send sound signals to the brain) into patients born with a mutation. The outcome? After six months, everyone tested gained some level of hearing. Amazing.
22%
Share of food-triggered nightmares blamed on dairy. Milk, yogurt and late-night queso ranked second only to sweets (30%) in dream-ruining potential. Especially if you’re lactose intolerant, that midnight mac ’n’ cheese might come back to haunt you in REM. Turns out the boogeyman under your bed is just the burrata in your belly.
🤡 Alienating your customers is bad for your brand: Jaguar’s sales plummeted 97.5% after it released that super weird ad last November with nonbinary models wearing a rainbow of colors with slogans like “Copy Nothing” and “Live Vivid” but excluded any images of its new electric cars. In April, they only sold 49 cars in all of Europe. Wow.
Crypto wallet trapdoor: Just do yourself a favor and don’t download any crypto extensions. Why? Over 40 sketchy extensions spoofing legit crypto wallets flooded Firefox’s store, all rigged to steal seed phrases and passwords. Thieves copied open-source code from Coinbase, MetaMask and co., then slid in exfil tools hiding behind glossy logos and fake reviews.
9,000
That’s how many employees Microsoft just let go, to kick off the new fiscal year with vibes. Less than 4% of its workforce but still a pretty loud “happy Q3” to thousands from one of the S&P’s most profitable companies. Microsoft’s cuts span roles, regions and seniority as execs trim middle management and chase “agility.”