🔢 The great “six seven” uprising: Middle schoolers are possessed by a two-number demon. Say “six seven,” and the room explodes (paywall link). Kids shriek, wave their hands, total meltdown. It started as a TikTok meme tied to rapper Skrilla’s song “Doot Doot (6 7),” and now teachers avoid even saying the numbers, though they must be happy it’s not 69.
The day the cloud caught a cold
Bing Image Creator
If Zoom wouldn’t connect, YouTube froze or your smart home went dumb yesterday morning, it wasn’t just you. Over 11 million people reported issues with more than 2,500 big name apps and services.
The reason? A huge outage at Amazon Web Services, better known as AWS. Let me explain what all this means in plain English.
📦 So what is AWS?
Think of AWS like the engine under the hood of your favorite apps. You don’t see it, but it’s running everything.
When a company like Netflix, Zoom, Snapchat, Fortnite, Coinbase, Ring, Signal, your smart fridge or even Alexa herself needs a place to store data or run software, they don’t build a bunch of servers in their basement. That’s expensive and complicated.
Instead, they rent computing power from AWS, Amazon’s cloud. It’s kind of like how we don’t all own water wells anymore. We simply turn on the tap, and water flows. AWS is the tap for the internet.
💥 What went wrong?
One of Amazon Web Services’ major data centers on the East Coast had a meltdown. Because AWS is the backbone of so much of the internet with $80 billion in annual revenue and 23 million big-name customers, that one failure set off a domino effect.
The root cause? It came down to a glitch in the system that checks whether AWS’s internal tools are running smoothly. Major hiccup.
On top of that, add a DNS problem. DNS is the internet’s phone book. It translates web addresses into the behind-the-scenes numbers that tell your browser where to go. When that breaks, your device can’t find anything, even if it’s still there.
So with AWS’s tools out of sync and DNS stumbling, thousands of apps and websites went down or slowed to a crawl. Talk about a full-on cloud migraine.
🧺 Why this matters
Your camera roll deserves a cleanse
Kim Komando
I remember my parents saying, “Kim, stop wasting the film.” Oh, yes, this was back when we’d put film in a camera, take up to 36 pictures, then wait for the roll to get developed to see if any of the shots were good. Those days are long gone, fortunately.
⚡️ 3-second tech genius: Annoyed by the Fire Stick’s clicking sound when you scroll? Go to Settings > Display & Sounds > Audio > Navigation Sounds and switch it OFF. Silence at last.
Know the best times to post: On LinkedIn, you want to post Tuesday through Thursday between 8 a.m. and 11 a.m., when people are active but not overwhelmed. Avoid late nights, weekends and Friday afternoons. Your post deserves better than getting buried in scroll fatigue. You can post a job for free using this link.
👁️ Bionic book buddies: Get this, a paper-thin electronic implant is helping people with macular degeneration see again. It’s called the Prima implant, and they tuck it under your retina, then pair it with fancy AR glasses that beam images straight to your brain. The sight of 84% of people was restored after being fitted with the device. Wild. Blink to accept terms and conditions.
Sky’s getting crowded: SpaceX has launched over 10,000 Starlink satellites, and Elon’s only a third of the way done. Around 8,600 are still in orbit, beaming internet from space while the rest burn up in the atmosphere. Good news for internet in the sticks, but terrible for astronomers.
🚔 Porchlight confidential: It’s gotten easier for over 5,000 police departments to request your Amazon Ring doorbell footage. It’s “voluntary,” but yeah, expect more “Hey, neighbor, mind if we peek at your porch?” alerts. Btw, your Ring doorbell isn’t limited to recording a little area. Depending on the model, it can capture about 155° to 160° horizontally and up to 90° vertically. That means the camera sees a big chunk of your porch, sidewalk and part of the street. Welcome to suburbia, surveillance edition.
🏎️ Apple enters the pit lane: Apple just dropped $750 million for exclusive U.S. rights to stream Formula 1. For the next five years, every race, practice and crash will be on Apple TV. They’re borrowing commentary from F1 TV or Sky Sports, at least for now. If you’re a zoom-zoom fan, better find your Apple ID fast. Speaking of… What is the best liquor for watching Formula 1? Rrrrruuummmmm!
🎥 AI’s next film class: Google’s new Veo 3.1 can generate eerily realistic videos complete with audio, edits and, this is a big one, TikTok-ready vertical frames. It’s rolling out across Gemini and YouTube Shorts, which means spotting what’s real online just got harder. If you blink, you might miss the line between “content” and “AI slop.”
Prosper got popped: Your identity might be someone else’s new side hustle. If you ever applied for a loan with Prosper, your name, SSN and income are probably on the dark web. They say no money was touched, but that’s not the part thieves want … yet. You know the drill, watch out for phishing scams. I’d be remiss if I did not remind you of the affordable identity theft protection offered by my radio sponsor, NordProtect. Hit this link to save up to 71%.
🕵️ Legal stalking: Well, this is creepy. A Nebraska woman thought she’d lost her AirPods, but it turns out, she found four tracking devices hidden under her car. Four! Investigators say her ex used them to stalk her. Get this, it’s not technically illegal in Nebraska to plant trackers. What? Lawmakers are now pushing to close that terrifying loophole.
Swipe right on surveillance: Apparently, anyone can upload your face in a special app and find your Tinder dating profile, past locations included. 404 Media confirmed the viral TikToks are real (and paid). These apps are sold as “relationship tools,” but feel more like CSI: Breakup Edition.
📸 Caught by her own camera roll: OK, this one’s wild. A Maryland woman allegedly used AI‑generated photos to fake a home invasion, then called 911. When officers showed up (eight cruisers strong), she was chilling inside her own house with a phone on a tripod. That “prank” has her facing serious charges. Dummy.
🪦 RIP Wikipedia: When’s the last time you actually used it? Me neither. Now it’s losing traffic fast because of AI. Good riddance. Years ago, we canceled a ’50s and ’60s music show, and some editor there twisted that into “The Kim Komando Show is going out of business.” It took countless emails and phone calls before he finally changed it. Karma’s digital.
🧮 Ralph’s saving $75 a month with Consumer Cellular: That’s nearly $1,000 a year. What would you do with that? Two unlimited lines for $30/month per line, solid coverage, no contracts. Use KIM25 and save another $25.
🔥 “Feel the burn” going too far: If your rowing machine’s smoking, that’s not your workout. NordicTrack just recalled thousands of $1,700 RW900 rowers after reports of consoles overheating, melting and even catching fire. Six incidents, two fires, $6,000 in damage, but thankfully no injuries yet. If you’ve got one, unplug it and call iFIT for a free fix before your cardio turns into arson. Lucky me, I have one.
Deepfake disaster: Imagine your teen’s photo, just a regular selfie, turned into a fake nude by some classmate with an app. That’s exactly what happened to a New Jersey teen. Now she’s suing the software’s creator (paywall link) with help from Yale Law. It’s one of the first big fights against AI tools that can strip away someone’s clothes, and their dignity, with one click.
📞 Saved in the nick of FaceTime: Woah. A 3-year-old Michigan boy saved his mom after she collapsed from a seizure by unlocking her phone with Face ID and FaceTiming a family friend, who called 911. Little Cody’s now an honorary junior deputy, complete with badge and swag. The sheriff joked that “we’re hiring,” but maybe let him finish preschool first. Love this.
💸 Starlink wants you back: If you dumped Starlink, SpaceX is sliding back into your inbox with a “We’d love to have you back ❤️” and a 50% off deal. That’s $60 a month instead of $120, for two years. Basically the Wi-Fi version of “I’ve changed.” Loyal customers like me, meanwhile, are getting nothing but billing reminders.