Results for “markets in everything” 1893 found
Interview markets in everything
Some job candidates are hiring proxies to sit in job interviews for them — and even paying up to $150 an hour for one.
In a recent Insider investigation into the “bait-and-switch” job interview that’s becoming increasingly trendy, one “professional” job interview proxy, who uses a website to book clients and keeps a Google Driver folder of past video interviews, said he charges clients $150 an hour.
The proxy was approached by Aamil Karimi, who works at cybersecurity firm Optiv as a principal intelligence analyst. Karimi, who posed as a job seeker to talk to the proxy, told Insider’s Rob Price that the “bait-and-switch” trend has been on the rise because of more work-from-home jobs and overseas hiring.
The “bait-and-switch” interview works like this: a job candidate hires someone else to pretend to be them in a job interview in hopes they will secure the job. When the job starts, the person who hired the proxy is the one to show up for work.
Here is the full story. Let someone else say what your open browser tabs are! For the pointer I thank the excellent Samir Varma.
Markets in everything
That John is on his feet at all is impressive—and probably foolish—considering that only eight months prior, he was five feet eight and a half. Back in September, he paid $75,000 for the agonizing privilege of having his legs surgically lengthened. That entailed having both his femurs broken, and adjustable metal nails inserted down their centers. Each nail is made of titanium, which is both flexible and sturdy, like bone, and about the size of a piccolo. The nails were extended one millimeter every day for about 90 days via a magnetic remote control. Once the broken bones heal, ta-da: a newer, taller John.
Here is the full story. Oh and this:
With a procedure like this, there are, of course, some caveats. All the height gain obviously comes from your legs, so your proportions can look a little weird, especially when you’re naked. Also, the recovery can be long and taxing. When we meet, the bones in John’s legs are not yet fully healed, and a small section of his right femur is still a little soft, like al dente spaghetti; the smallest stumble could snap a bone in two. And it’s especially dangerous since he’s a big guy, over 200 pounds.
Then there’s the pain, which is relentless, ambient. The extension of the nails in his legs stretched the nerves and tissue around the bones—especially the thick, meaty muscles like the hamstrings—to an almost excruciating degree. He couldn’t walk for months. “They fill you with enough painkillers that it’s bearable,” John explains, but his biggest fear was becoming addicted to the drugs, so he weaned himself off the regimen earlier than he should have.
File under: “The costs of lookism.” The technique is originally a Soviet one. Via Anecdotal.
Insurance markets in everything
Xcel confirmed to Contact Denver7 that 22,000 customers who had signed up for the Colorado AC Rewards program were locked out of their smart thermostats for hours on Tuesday.
“It’s a voluntary program. Let’s remember that this is something that customers choose to be a part of based on the incentives,” said Emmett Romine, vice president of customer solutions and innovation at Xcel.
Customers receive a $100 credit for enrolling in the program and $25 annually, but Romine said customers also agree to give up some control to save energy and money and make the system more reliable.
Basically their AC was shut off and some of the homes had temperatures as high as 88 Fahrenheit. Sounds like an OK arrangement to me! Here is the full story, via Tom Hynes.
Cat food markets in everything
Fancy Feast is expanding into feline-inspired human cuisine, with a New York City Italian restaurant designed to celebrate the company’s new line.
Gatto Bianco, which means “white cat,” is described by Fancy Feast as an “Italian-style trattoria,” and will be open for dinner reservations on August 11-12 only, according to a news release from Purina, which produces Fancy Feast.
The human-friendly dishes were inspired by Fancy Feast’s new “Medleys” cat food line, which feature options like “Beef Ragú Recipe With Tomatoes & Pasta in a Savory Sauce” for the cat with discerning taste.
Here is the full story, via Balding.
DC markets in everything
ShutDownDC, a liberal advocacy group in Washington, D.C., said on Friday that it will offer up to $250 to service industry workers in the district for every sighting of the justices who overturned Roe v. Wade.
Here is the story, and like Charles Cooke (and presumably Dan Klein) I object to the word “liberal” in this context.
And maybe they won’t get the check right away either:
- “We’ll Venmo you $50 for a confirmed sighting and $200 if they’re still there 30 mins after your message.”
Colombia markets in everything those new service sector jobs
Ex-guerrillas offer birdwatching, hiking and hearty campfire cuisine as part of Tierra Grata Ecotours in La Paz, a town near the border with Venezuela. Over a two-day hike along boggy mountain paths, Jhonni Giraldo, a former farc footsoldier, leads hardy tourists to Marquetalia, a hamlet. In 1964 the military bombed an armed commune founded by refugees here into oblivion; the survivors headed to the hills and the farc insurgency was born. There is not much to see other than the rusted remains of a downed helicopter. Mr Giraldo is mulling over reconstructing the house of Manuel Marulanda, the founder of the farc.
Here is more from The Economist, via Yana.
Markets in everything those new service sector jobs
A woman who took about 150 theory and practical tests for other drivers has been jailed for eight months.
Police said she was taking tests for people who had difficulty with English.
…Det Ch Insp Steven Maloney said Kaur’s crimes were motivated by greed.
Here is the full story, via Michael B.
Illegal markets in everything
The operator of a Colorado funeral home who was accused of stealing body parts and selling them to medical and scientific buyers, making hundreds of thousands of dollars in what the authorities called an “illegal body part scheme,” pleaded guilty to mail fraud on Tuesday, the Justice Department said.
The woman, Megan Hess, 45, the principal figure in the scheme, was assisted by her mother, Shirley Koch, who is in her late 60s, prosecutors said. As part of a plea agreement, eight other criminal charges against Ms. Hess were dropped. She could face up to 20 years in prison.
“I exceeded the scope of the consent and I’m trying to make an effort to make it right,” Ms. Hess said in United States District Court in Grand Junction, Colo., on Tuesday, according to The Daily Sentinel. “I’m taking responsibility.”
Here is more from the NYT. And this service “retrieves your dead loved ones’ tattoos and preserves them as framed mementos.” Not illegal.
Barter markets in everything
The men’s grisly work gives a stark insight into the wartime repatriation of the dead, often conducted on an exchange basis: a corpse for a corpse...
Lawyer will not say where the truck is heading, but The Sunday Times understands that two exchanges of bodies have taken place in the past week, overseen by the International Committee of the Red Cross, which acts as a neutral intermediary. Ukrainian officials said the first was made on a basis of “160 for 160”, the second “50 for 50”.
Here is more from the London Times ($), grisly throughout.
Insurance markets in everything
In many golf circles, it was (and still is) customary for the lucky golfer to buy drinks for everyone in the clubhouse after landing a hole-in-one. This often resulted in prohibitively expensive bar tabs.
And an industry sprouted up to protect these golfers.
A newspaper archive analysis by The Hustle revealed that hole-in-one insurance firms sprouted up as early as 1933.
Under this model, golfers could pay a fee — say, $1.50 (about $35 today) — to cover a $25 (~$550) bar tab. And as one paper noted in 1937: “The way some of the boys have been bagging the dodos, it might not be a bad idea.”
Though the concept largely faded away in the US, it became a big business in Japan, where golfers who landed a hole-in-one were expected to throw parties “comparable to a small wedding,” including live music, food, drinks, and commemorative tree plantings.
By the 1990s, the hole-in-one insurance industry had a total market value of $220m. An estimated 30% of all Japanese golfers shelled out $50-$70/year to insure themselves against up to $3.5k in expenses.
Here is the full story, via Mathan.
Markets in everything those new service sector jobs
You have heard my scream in Free Guy, Paranormal Activity and Scream (2022). My work often comes in at the post-production stage (after filming has taken place). I pick up additional screams and voice acting for the on-camera actors. Sometimes they don’t have the time to achieve the sound the director wants, or I can offer a different vocal quality to the performance.
As a scream artist you have to know the subtle differences between screams and determine whether they should peak at certain points, or remain steady for a very long time. I have to think: ‘OK, the character is scared here, but are they scared because their life is in danger or are they just startled?’ Those screams will sound very different. Ghost stories, for example, will often use a shrill, harsh scream because we need the audience to also experience fear.
Here is more from Ashley Peldon, via the excellent The Browser, do subscribe.
NFT markets in everything
Ukraine plans to become the first developed country to issue its own collection of non-fungible tokens, as it looks to capitalise on a flood of crypto donations to back its war against Russia.
Mykhailo Fedorov, Ukraine’s vice-prime minister, announced the plan in a tweet on Thursday and said Kyiv would reveal details of its NFTs soon.
The move is the latest sign of the Ukrainian government embracing digital assets as a way to fund its armed forces in their battle, and comes after it raised more than $270mn in “war bonds”.
One for each Russian tank destroyed? Here is the full FT story, via Natasha.
(Small) markets in everything
Ralph Nader spent a career bashing corporate executives. Now he’s written a book praising some. It’s not going down too well.
Tentatively called “Twelve CEOs I Have Known and Admired,” the book is more than a little off-brand for the man who upended the world of auto safety with the blockbuster “Unsafe at Any Speed” and then attacked corporate behavior in a number of other industries.
Based on a string of rejection letters from publishers, Mr. Nader said he fears he’s been typecast, making any accolades he might have for corporate tycoons a hard sell. His literary agent, Ronald Goldfarb, advised him to change course and go negative, he says.
“He wanted chapters on bad CEOs,” Mr. Nader said of Mr. Goldfarb.
“I didn’t tell him what to write,” Mr. Goldfarb retorts. “I told him what I could sell.” The two parted ways after working on the manuscript for three months.
Mood affiliation strikes again. Nader fans don’t want to positively affiliate with CEOs, and “love letter” types do not always wish to affiliate with Nader. (By the way, here is my 2014 chat with Nader.) Here is the rest of the Jeffrey A. Trachtenberg WSJ article.
Covid markets in everything, foreign intelligence edition
A government-approved Covid testing firm is being investigated by the UK’s data privacy watchdog after it emerged that it plans to sell customers’ DNA to third parties.
Cignpost Diagnostics, which trades as ExpressTest and offers £35 tests for holidaymakers, said it holds the right to analyse samples from seals to “learn more about human health” – and sell information on to third parties.
Individuals are required to give informed consent for their sensitive medical data to be used – but customers’ consent for their DNA to be sold now as buried in Cignpost’s online documents.
When buying tests, customers were asked to tick a box agreeing to a 4,876 privacy policy which links to a separate document outlining the research programme, The Sunday Times reported…
Cignpost was founded last year and is believed to have sold as many as three million tests. It supplies pre-departure and arrival tests for travellers, with walk-in centres at sites including Gatwick and Heathrow.
Here is the full story, via Michael J.
Crow markets in everything the labor supply-boosting culture that is Sweden
The crows turn in their collected cigarette butts for food:
Over in the Swedish city of Södertälje, about 30 km southwest of Stockholm, a pilot program is being explored which will enlist crows to clean up discarded cigarette butts. Butts account for over 60% of litter in Sweden, and the per-butt cleanup cost falls between 0.8 and 2 Swedish kronor each. The company behind the project, Corvid Cleaning, estimates the cost will be around 0.2 kronor. If the birds picked up all the butts, that would be a substantial savings, but in reality, the current manual cleaning will still be needed. Total savings to the city will depend on the ratio of bird-collected vs. people-collected butts.
Here is the link, via Chris Harges.