“There is always that one country on our collective conscious, and I wanted to know how that has changed over time… After looking at 741,681 section front headlines, I found out which countries around the world have preoccupied Americans the most each month since 1900.” | learn more
Jamaican phone scammer picked the wrong 90-year-old: A former FBI director.
Although some of his other targets were sadly more cooperative, this business venture did not end well for the scammer. Oops. | learn more
When kids learn to use chopsticks.
While eating some Chinese food this week, I realized that it’s probably harder for kids to learn how to use chopsticks than forks. So I wondered how old kids in Asia typically are when they learn. Thankfully, there was a study. The answer: on average by 4.6 years. | learn more
The lonely life of a yacht influencer.
“Alex Jimenez (aka TheYachtGuy) might look like he’s comfortably residing in the lap of luxury on Instagram, but the truth is, he’s kinda lost at sea”. For context, this account has 800k followers on Instagram. | learn more
Prepaying $500k in rent is maybe a bad idea.
The son of the now-jailed former prime minister of Moldova pre-paid a lot of rent, catching the UK government’s attention. Once they looked into it, they seized a bunch more of his illicit cash. | learn more
United CEO fined for stealing sand from a public beach.
Last year Oscar Munoz’ $6M house in Florida tragically lost its sand dunes because of the hurricanes. Rather than pay to buy replacement sand, they just took some from a nearby public beach. And then they were caught and fined $24k by the state. | learn more
Too Many Poops, a neat game about cats.
This Kickstarter campaign by Miguel Martinez is already 10x its goal with 17 days remaining. Miguel and I collaborated on GlanceBox, the now-defunct tinder-for-dresses startup, a few years back. This new project is clearly on a better track! Check it out if you like cats, card games, or supporting Chicago entrepreneurs. | learn more
The fast and the furious and the data.
Bloomberg put a lot of manhours into analyzing all sorts of interest data from the Fast and the Furious series of movies. For example, are you curious how the 311 gear shifts break down between the 7 movies? | learn more
Tour of an architect’s $10MM home.
“Architect Malika Junaid gives a tour of her $10 million home, which was designed with her family’s science-fiction interests in mind. It’s full of automations, an elevator and what she calls an abstract Starship Enterprise.” | learn more
Microsoft’s fonts catch a fraudster in Canada.
Document forgers be forewarned: pay attention to font selection, or else. | learn more