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☆ Trump’s latest court loss may not hurt primary bid, but some Republicans raise alarm about 2024 viability
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-09 | by ( Stephen Collinson | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +10 min

He would not win the White House. The unanimous jury verdict was vindication for Carroll and offered a symbolic win for other women who have made assault allegations against the president. Many White House hopefuls have exited presidential races for less. Nikki Haley or prospective White House contender, Florida Gov. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy characteristically dodged commenting on the verdict after leaving debt crisis talks at the White House on Tuesday.

☆ 'We can't afford anything': Turkey's cost-of-living crisis threatens Erdogan's re-election
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-08 | by ( Ali Kucukgocmen | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +5 min

But a cost-of-living crisis sparked by Erdogan's unorthodox economic programme over the past 1-1/2 years has eroded his popularity, posing the biggest electoral challenge to his 20-year hold on power. The parliamentary race remains on a razor edge, with the opposition seen potentially clinching a narrow majority. Food prices surged 54% year-on-year in April, with headline inflation dropping to 43.7% after peaking in October at 85.5%, the highest under Erdogan's rule. It began to surge after a currency crisis in late 2021, sparked by a series of interest rate cuts, in line with Erdogan's unorthodox views. But many AKP voters still believe only Erdogan can fix the economy, or blame other factors for its current state.

☆ Turkey's Kilicdaroglu exits Erdogan's shadow in election race
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-06 | by ( Daren Butler | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +7 min

I know the cost of living and the hopelessness of young people," Kilicdaroglu told a rally last week. Many wonder whether Kilicdaroglu can defeat Erdogan, the country's longest-serving leader, whose campaigning charisma has helped deliver more than a dozen election victories. The opposition has stressed that Erdogan's drive to slash interest rates set off the inflationary crisis that devastated household budgets. HEALING OLD WOUNDSBefore entering politics, Kilicdaroglu worked in the finance ministry and then chaired Turkey's Social Insurance Institution for most of the 1990s. "I have been boycotting the elections since 2018 but I will vote for Kemal Kilicdaroglu this time.

☆ Hardcore wrestling fans are torn over the WWE-UFC merger – but they love the drama
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-06 | by ( Natasha Piñon | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +2 min

For wrestling fans, though, the story's not about those numbers. And wrestling fans aren't afraid to share their opinions. Some are worried that a return to a pay-per-view model for WWE's flagship event, WrestleMania, is on the horizon. The WWE's exclusive streaming deal with Peacock, which includes WrestleMania streaming rights, is set to expire in 2026. In late March, before the UFC deal was announced, WWE CEO Nick Khan said the company keeps fans' price sensitivity in mind.

☆ Turkey's Kilicdaroglu exits Erodogan's shadow in election race
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-06 | by ( Daren Butler | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +7 min

I know the cost of living and the hopelessness of young people," Kilicdaroglu told a rally last week. Even if he prevails, Kilicdaroglu faces challenges keeping an opposition alliance including nationalists, Islamists, secularists and liberals united. Many wonder whether Kilicdaroglu can defeat Erdogan, the country's longest-serving leader, whose campaigning charisma has helped deliver more than a dozen election victories. HEALING OLD WOUNDSBefore entering politics, Kilicdaroglu worked in the finance ministry and then chaired Turkey's Social Insurance Institution for most of the 1990s. "I have been boycotting the elections since 2018 but I will vote for Kemal Kilicdaroglu this time.

☆ Analysis: Kremlin drone incident gives Putin cover to deepen Ukraine war
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-04 | by ( Andrew Osborn | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +6 min

[1/3] The Russian flag flies on the dome of the Kremlin Senate building, while the roof shows what appears to be marks from the recent drone incident, in central Moscow, Russia, May 4, 2023. Inside Russia, it helped reinforce the Kremlin-backed narrative that its war in Ukraine is an existential one for the Russian state and people. "It's an attempt to gather all the sacred things in one statement," Alexander Baunov, a former Russian diplomat and Kremlin watcher, said of the Kremlin's response. Former president Dmitry Medvedev and Vladimir Solovyov, one of the most prominent pro-Kremlin TV commentators, both argued for precisely such action in the aftermath of the drone incident. An investigation into the drone incident is certain to uncover shortcomings in Russia's own air defences.

☆ I got to play the latest 'Legend of Zelda' game early. Here's a preview of the biggest game the year.
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-26 | by ( William Antonelli | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +7 min

"The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom," Nintendo's biggest game this year, is releasing May 12. Last week, Nintendo invited Insider to play a demo of the game. Here are my first impressions of "Tears of the Kingdom," a wonderfully creative game that delivers on its hype. There are few games that have built more hype and anticipation than the newest Zelda game, "The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom." "The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom" releases on May 12.

☆ Trying to Find Your Place in the World? Try Birding From a Different Angle.
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-18 | by ( Ty Burr | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +3 min

A waxwing slain beneath a living-room window, its biannual journey stopped dead by the sky in a pane of glass. After 40 mostly satisfying years as a film critic, I began to feel all those imagined visions closing around my head. I yearned to shake them off, to return to reality; birding has come to seem one of the more graceful ways to do that. To me, the nightly BirdCast map is a corrective to our human-centric view of the planet. In April and May, the map’s a rainbow of arrival, a feathery procession as brilliant as a pride parade.

☆ Elon Musk says Twitter was 'absurdly overstaffed' and run like a 'glorified activist organization' before his takeover
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-18 | by ( Pete Syme | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Elon Musk told Fox News that Twitter was previously "absurdly overstaffed." Elon Musk said that Twitter was "absurdly overstaffed" before he took over the company in October and laid off thousands of workers. "If you're not trying to run some sort of glorified activist organization ... then you can really let go of a lot of people, it turns out," Musk told Carlson. It also saw a partial outage during the Super Bowl halftime show, despite Musk telling staff to maximize stability for the big event. One unnamed current Twitter employee told Platformer last month that outages have become so frequent that: "I think we're all numb to it," they said.

☆ Bosses hate work from home because 'home' is for women
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-17 | by ( Aki Ito | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +10 min

And the old way was clear: The office is for work, and the home is for — well, for whatever unpaid stuff it is that women do while their men are at work. Skeptical that work — real work — could be done at home, bosses quietly penalized the women who opted for flexible schedules by sticking them with boring assignments and denying them promotions. Embracing remote work is a good start, but it comes with risks of its own. Since the pandemic hit, I've heard a few CEOs liken remote work to opening Pandora's box. Women working from home are no longer the aberration — tradition-bound executives are.

☆ Elon Musk says he sometimes sleeps on a couch in the library of Twitter's San Francisco headquarters
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-12 | by ( Cheryl Teh | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +2 min

Elon Musk says he has a sleeping spot in Twitter's San Francisco offices. "There's a couch there and I sleep there sometimes," Musk told the BBC. And, uh, there's a couch there, and I sleep there sometimes," Musk told the BBC during a live-streamed interview on Tuesday night. And in December, he turned some office space at the San Francisco headquarters into bedrooms. The topics covered included Twitter's content moderation, the company's mass layoffs, Musk's intention to turn Twitter's San Francisco office into a homeless shelter, and his dog Floki, who he jokingly calls Twitter's CEO.

☆ Elon Musk says Twitter is roughly breaking even. That looks like vindication for his haphazard management but he'll need a sharper plan to get to profitability.
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-12 | by ( Hasan Chowdhury | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

Elon Musk's reign of chaos at Twitter may have saved it from collapse, but there's a long way to go. This was better than the $1.1 billion Twitter lost in 2020, but still indicative of the firm's struggle for consistent profitability. Another, possibly terminal, issue: Musk seems not to have quite figured out what he wants Twitter to be. But if he wants Twitter to make money consistently, Musk needs users coming back for the long run. Chaos won't do that.

☆ Big Tech employees are getting culled. Their European colleagues get stronger labor laws and softer landings.
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-11 | by ( Riddhi Kanetkar | Jyoti Mann | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +11 min

European Big Tech employees have better labor protections"There are regulations in Europe that apply to collective situations, based on European law: the so-called Mass Dismissal Directive," said Dr. Jordan. But in January, Twitter employees were reported to have been paid just one month's severance, according to CNN. Twitter employees in other European hubs such as Germany, Spain, Ireland, and the UK are also pushing back, with the help of the countries' labor laws and unions. Twitter employees in Germany have also worked with the Verdi union to push Twitter into making a better severance offer, Fortune reported. The process could take months instead of weeks, Brittin added — another testament to Europe's stronger labor protections for its employees.

☆ 19-year-old golfer shares the simple mindset that helps her win—she's on track to beat Tiger Woods' college record
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-08 | by ( Rebecca Picciotto | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +4 min

Her career has been marked by record-breaking performances, a slew of championship titles, and she could surpass the college record of Tiger Woods. Most recently, she won the highly prestigious 2023 Augusta National Women's Amateur, or ANWA, tournament. "I'll be super, super busy," Zhang said in an interview with the "No Laying Up" podcast days before ANWA. But more stress doesn't often lead to better results, Zhang said, which forced her to make a simple yet significant mindset shift. It might just be a coincidence that Zhang's first-time ANWA victory happened once she adopted a lower-pressure mentality, but it could also be psychology at work.

☆ CHART: Twitter's revenue per employee crashed 60% in the years leading up to Musk's drastic firings
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-03 | by ( Hasan Chowdhury | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Twitter's revenue per employee crashed 60% in the years before Elon Musk's takeover. Twitter's revenue per employee cratered by almost 60% between 2018 and the period of 2022 before Musk's takeover of the embattled social media company, Insider analysis of the firm's SEC filings found. Revenue per employee is a simple measure of efficiency that was previously in vogue in the aftermath of the 2008 financial crash. A growing number of influential tech executives and investors say tech firms, bloated by over-hiring, should re-prioritize the metric. Since 2018, Twitter has seen a drastic fall in the revenue generated per employee.

☆ 4 reasons why a Trump indictment could be gold for Biden, and 1 reason it’s worrying
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-18 | by ( Nicole Gaudiano | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +6 min

If an indictment doesn't cost Trump the GOP primary, it would hover over his general election campaign. "Anything that's good for Trump in a Republican primary is also good for Biden," Bannon said. And it's unclear whether Trump is the weaker opponent or if he can even win enough support from GOP primary voters to become the nominee. Democrats say they also welcome a nasty Republican primary, especially when Biden is expected to run without any significant opposition. The downside: Cutting through 'noise' could be hardIt's possible that a Trump indictment would make Americans so sick of the entire political system that "they say 'Screw this,'" Bannon said.

☆ Twitter employees nicknamed a Tesla executive 'the Elon whisperer' because of his ability to read Elon Musk's mood, report says
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-17 | by ( Beatrice Nolan | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Twitter staff nicknamed a Tesla exec "the Elon whisperer" because of his ability to read Elon Musk's mood. Omead Afshar, the Tesla exec, joined Twitter late last year, according to the Financial Times. Omead Afshar, who once led Tesla's Gigafactory in Austin, joined Twitter last year and is part of Elon Musk's tight inner circle, according to the Financial Times. Afshar has been helping Musk with "the biggest, stickiest issues at the company," according to the report. According to The Information, Musk's company is at least $70 million behind on a five-year contract it signed with Amazon Web Services in 2020.

☆ As Big Tech employees get culled, their European colleagues get stronger labor laws and softer landings
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-15 | by ( Riddhi Kanetkar | Jyoti Mann | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +8 min

Big Tech layoffs at Meta, Twitter, Amazon and Snap have laid off thousands of workers globally. Until recently, tech employees haven't had to think too seriously about mass layoffs. European Big Tech employees have better labor protections"There are regulations in Europe that apply to collective situations, based on European law: the so-called Mass Dismissal Directive," said Dr. Jordan. But in January, Twitter employees were reported to have been paid just one month's severance, according to CNN. Twitter employees in Germany have also worked with the Verdi union to push Twitter into making a better severance offer, Fortune reported.

That's the question posed by certain members of the Silicon Valley elite who are attributing layoffs to a boom-time phenomenon: over-hiring and "fake" work. A particular view of 'work'This concept of fake work is rooted, at least partly, in political disagreement. Several of the tech figures pushing these ideas lean Republican, in contrast to the left-leaning tech workers they're lambasting. He and others pushing a grind culture are motivated, as tech employees commenting on the workplace app Blind noted. "I think it's a false narrative to say many people do fake work, especially when companies already deploy workplace monitoring tools."

☆ The Twitter manager who went viral for sleeping at the office is going on a vacation after Elon Musk fired her
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-14 | by ( Grace Kay | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

A former Twitter executive said she's taking a vacation just weeks after she was laid off. Esther Crawford was one of Elon Musk's top lieutenants and went viral for sleeping at the office. The Twitter executive worked at the company for over two years after it acquired her startup, Squad, in 2020, according to her LinkedIn page. Crawford isn't the only former Twitter executive to take off on vacation after the widespread layoffs. Still, it's unclear whether Twitter's severance pay is as cushy as that of other tech companies for all those laid off.

☆ An A.I. chatbot asked Bill Gates what he wishes he could tell his younger self — here’s what he said
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-12 | by ( Tom Huddleston Jr. | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +3 min

Recently, the billionaire Microsoft co-founder sat down with U.K. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak as the two answered questions generated by an AI chatbot. In past interviews, Gates has also said he'd tell his younger self to "read a lot" and "explore the developing world" as a traveler. "I never asked [Microsoft employees] to work any harder, or be tougher on their mistakes, than I was on myself," Gates told the "Armchair Expert" podcast in 2020. Eventually, Gates had to learn to lighten up, he told Sunak — especially as Microsoft grew. "For the small, early Microsoft group, that was OK," Gates said.

That's the question posed by a certain members of the Silicon Valley elite who are attributing layoffs to a boom-time phenomenon: over-hiring and "fake" work. "There's nothing for these people to do — they're really — it's all fake work," he said. A particular view of 'work'This concept of fake work is rooted, at least partly, in political disagreement. Several of the tech figures pushing these ideas lean Republican, in contrast to the left-leaning tech workers they're lambasting. "I think it's a false narrative to say many people do fake work, especially when companies already deploy workplace monitoring tools."

☆ Elon Musk is behaving 'like the local drunk,' says a former Twitter executive
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-10 | by ( Grace Dean | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

A former Twitter exec told i News that Elon Musk was behaving "like the local drunk." "The more Musk behaves like the local drunk – getting into slanging matches with disabled ex-employees – the less current employees will be proud to say they work there," Daisley told i News. Just a week after taking control of Twitter, Musk laid off around half of its workers. "It's a little bit like the character in the cartoon who runs off the cliff but doesn't fall straight away," Daisley told i News. Under Musk, Twitter has become "a pressure cooker," an employee who still works at the company and who spoke on the condition of anonymity told i News.

☆ A laid-off Twitter manager, who was one of Elon Musk's most loyal employees, tweeted 'cruelty is the worst' in an apparent dig at the tech mogul
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-08 | by ( Grace Dean | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +2 min

Ex-Twitter manager Esther Crawford tweeted "cruelty is the worst" in an apparent dig at Elon Musk. She was seen as one of Musk's most loyal workers. Musk had publicly clashed with Haraldur Thorleifsson, a former Twitter director, on Monday. After Thorleifsson tweeted that he was unsure of his employment status, noting that he had been locked out of company systems, Musk accused him of using his disability as an "excuse" to do "no actual work." Crawford tweeted on Tuesday that "cruelty is the worst," without providing further context.

☆ Elon Musk apologized after publicly accusing an employee of using their disability as an 'excuse.' An employment lawyer called the whole saga 'a bit unusual.'
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-08 | by ( Hannah Getahun | Matthew Loh | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +6 min

Elon Musk apologized on Tuesday for mocking a former Twitter employee who has muscular dystrophy. Musk had accused the employee of not doing "actual work" and told him to justify why he should keep his job. Haraldur Thorleifsson, an Iceland-based entrepreneur and former Twitter employee, ended up in a public exchange with CEO Elon Musk. But on Tuesday, Musk publicly trolled Thorleifsson in a series of tweets questioning his value at the company. Musk then said Thorleifsson used his disability as an excuse to work less.

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