Amazon reached a $2.5 billion settlement with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) on Thursday over whether the e-commerce giant used “deceptive methods” to sign up consumers for Prime subscriptions, then made it “exceedingly difficult” to cancel. The agency argued Amazon enrolled millions of customers in Prime subscriptions without their consent, and knowingly made it difficult for consumers to get out of the agreement. That settlement, which comes just three days into the civil trial in federal court in Seattle, included a whopping $1 billion civil penalty, the highest in history, and a $1.5 billion fund to refund Prime users harmed by…
Author: Staff Writer
Most people do not put New York City and golf together, nor do they consider the game to be a team sport. The 2025 Ryder Cup is challenging these views. The competition will be held just outside of the Big Apple at Bethpage State Park’s Black Course in Farmingdale, New York. From Friday, September 26, through Sunday, September 28, 12 Americans and 12 Europeans will go head-to-head. Let’s take a look at the history and format before covering how to tune in for every stroke and birdie. The history of the Ryder Cup The Ryder Cup is named after its…
A few years ago, I read an article that changed how I think about bourbon. It wasn’t about distilling or aging. It was about bread. Bread Is Broken by Ferris Jabr explores how modern industrial farming stripped grains of their flavor and nutritional value in exchange for higher yield, longer shelf life, and cost efficiency. As I read, I kept wondering if flavor has been lost in wheat; what does that mean for the wheat in our whisky? So, I called Dr. David Van Sanford, a wheat breeder at the University of Kentucky, to ask if anyone had studied how…
Reports Wednesday that Apple has held talks with Intel about a possible strategic investment sent shockwaves through the stock market. Intel shares shot up. Apple, the reports said, had begun the talks—initiated by Intel—even before the Trump administration made its controversial announcement that it would buy an $8.9 billion share in the chip maker. The government’s move had the effect of attracting more investment in Intel, however. U.S.-based Nvidia said it would invest $5 billion and Japan’s Softbank said it would invest $2 billion. Intel is a special case. The storied U.S. chip maker has fallen on hard times after…
Along the White House’s West Wing Colonnade, portraits of every U.S. president since George Washington hang side-by-side in gilded frames. Every president, that is, except Joe Biden, whose visage has been swapped for an image of an autopen. The new portrait display was unveiled on September 24, when the White House posted images of the updated West Wing to X. The post included a header image zoomed in on Biden’s spot in the lineup, which shows a black-and-white image of an autopen signing the words “Joseph R Biden Jr.” It’s in reference to a controversy, ignited earlier this year by…
ASIA: The major Asian stock markets had a mixed day today: • NIKKEI 225 increased 124.62 points or 0.27% to 45,754.93 • Shanghai decreased 0.34 points or -0.01% to 3,853.302 • Hang Seng decreased 33.97 points or -0.13% to 26,484.68 • ASX 200 increased 8.50 points or 0.10% to 8,773.00 • SENSEX decreased 555.95 points or -0.68% to 81,159.68 • Nifty50 decreased 166.05 points or -0.66% to 24,890.85 The major Asian currency markets had a mixed day today: • AUDUSD decreased 0.00401 or -0.61% to 0.65460 • NZDUSD decreased 0.00416 or -0.72% to 0.57736 • USDJPY increased 1 or 0.67%…
Despite years of congressional hearings, lawsuits, academic research, whistleblowers and testimony from parents and teenagers about the dangers of Instagram, Meta’s wildly popular app has failed to protect children from harm, with “woefully ineffective” safety measures, according to a new report from former employee and whistleblower Arturo Bejar and four nonprofit groups. Meta’s efforts at addressing teen safety and mental health on its platforms have long been met with criticism that the changes don’t go far enough. Now, the report published Thursday, from Bejar, the Cybersecurity For Democracy at New York University and Northeastern University, the Molly Rose Foundation, Fairplay and ParentsSOS, claims Meta has…
Accenture beat fourth-quarter revenue estimates and unveiled a six‑month, $865 million restructuring to realign its workforce and operations for rising demand in digital and AI services. The restructuring program highlights the broader trend of companies adapting their workforce and operations to meet growing demand for digital and AI services, while using restructuring to cut costs and funnel savings into training and operational efficiency. The plan includes severance and selected divestitures, with savings redirected to staff training and operational efficiency. The Dublin-based company expects about $250 million in charges in the November quarter, on top of $615 million recorded in the…
Sales of previously occupied U.S. homes remained sluggish in August, even as a late-summer slide in mortgage rates brought home loan borrowing costs to a 10-month low. Existing home sales slipped 0.2% last month from July to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 4 million units, the National Association of Realtors said Thursday. That’s the slowest sales pace since June. Sales rose 1.8% compared with August last year. The latest sales figure topped the 3.96 million pace economists were expecting, according to FactSet. The national median sales price increased 2% in August from a year earlier to $422,600. That’s the…
In a rural corner of Louisiana, Meta is building one of the world’s largest data centers, a $10 billion behemoth as big as 70 football fields that will consume more power in a day than the entire city of New Orleans at the peak of summer. While the colossal project is impossible to miss in Richland Parish, a farming community of 20,000 residents, not everything is visible, including how much the social media giant will pay toward the more than $3 billion in new electricity infrastructure needed to power the facility. Watchdogs have warned that in the rush to capitalize…