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The northern lights could light up the skies above several northern states this weekend. The aurora borealis will be visible Friday and Saturday nights over North America, and most prevalent for those states on the northern border of the mainland, according to a forecast from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Space Weather Prediction Center. Friday offers the highest odds of visibility for most Americans, with the northern lights potentially visible in those states stretching from Washington to Maine, and as far south as Iowa. And Fridays aurora could be brighter, with a score of 5 out of 9 on an index measuring the three-day geomagnetic forecast. For the aurora borealis fanatics, NOAA even offers a more detailed 30-to-90 minute forecast of the location and intensity of the lights. This weekend will mark the first in 2026 when the northern lights are predicted to be visible in the U.S. WHEN AND WHERE TO SEE THE NORTHERN LIGHTS Northern lights can bring vibrant greens and purples to the night sky, and the best aurora is typically in the 10 p.m. to 2 a.m. period. NOAA recommends facing north, in a spot away from light pollution for the best viewing. According to NOAA, the aurora borealis could be visible in up to 15 states on Friday: Alaska, Washington, Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, North Dakota, South Dakota, Minnesota, Iowa, Wisconsin, Michigan, New York, Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine. If you seem to be seeing the northern lights more frequently than you recall in the pastor, at the very least, hearing about themits true: Theyve become a more common sighting in recent years. Thats because the sun is at the maximum of its 11-year solar cycle, according to astronomers. During solar maximum, the sun blazes with bright flares and solar eruptions, according to information from NASA about the current solar cycle that began in 2019. LOOK TO THE SKY The northern lights wont be the only highlight of the night sky this weekend: If you missed the optimal naked-eye viewing of Jupiter last weekend, when it was its biggest and brightest for the year, the largest planet in our solar system will also light up this sky this weekend with a bright orange color. With small binoculars, you may even be able to view Jupiters four moons. Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune will also be visible this weekend, according to The Sky Live. And while far fewer people will get to see this, SpaceX has a rocket launch planned for Friday evening from the Vandenberg Space Force Base, a military base near Santa Barbara, California. The launch will send the twelfth batch of satellites into orbit as part of a reconnaissance satellite constellation built by SpaceX and Northrop Grumman.
Category:
E-Commerce
Meet the new CEO of Sam’s Club: Latriece Watkins. As you’ll hear from my interview with Watkins this week’s episode of Fast Company’s Most Innovative Companies podcast, she is a Walmart veteran, who began her career in the real estate division in 2006. Over the next two decades, she rose up through the ranks to become Walmart’s chief merchant in 2023, making her one of the most powerful people in the retail industry, responsible for choosing the $500 billion worth of products the retailer sells every year. In recent years, Watkins has made a deliberate attempt to woo higher income consumers into stores by introducing higher-end brands, like Sonos and LaRoche Posay, as well as elevating its fashion, home and food private labels. Her team’s product curation appears to be working: In recent quarters, Walmart’s has been gaining market share among households that make upwards of $100,000 a year. Now, Watkins has been tasked with running Walmart’s membership club, which generated $90.2 billion in net sales across its 600 stores in 2024 making up roughly 13% of Walmart’s total revenue. In many ways, her promotion makes sense, since Sam’s Club customers tend to be more affluent than those from Walmart. Watkins has proven she’s skilled at meeting these needs of these customers. Watkins is now tasked with stealing market share from CostCo, the biggest player in the membership warehouse club industry, which generated $269.9 billion last year, an 8.1% increase over the year before. Part of CostCo’s success has come from its private label, Kirkland, which now drives roughly a third of its total revenue. Watkins is skilled at developed successful private labels. It was under her leadership that Walmart launched its first new private label grocery brand in two decades, called Bettergoods. Every aspect of the brand from its chic, colorful packaging to its focus on global flavors was carefully designed to win over today’s consumers. And yet 90% of products in the line cost under $5. Sam’s Club has its own private label called Member’s Mark, which also generates about a third of its revenue. Part of Watkins’ mission will no doubt be to ensure that Member’s Mark grows as a business, and continues to evolve to keep pace with changing consumer tastes. In some ways, Watkins has the opportunity to be more experimental at Sam’s Club than she was at Walmart. As a smaller, nimbler brand, Sam’s Club has become something of an innovation lab to test out retail concepts that, if successful, may be adopted by Walmart. For instance, in 2024, Sam’s Club unveiled cashierless checkouts in a few stores: Customers simply scan products themselves on their Sam’s Club app, pay for them using their credit card, then walk out the door. (Entrances now have arches equipped with computer vision to check what’s in a person’s cart, avoiding manual receipt checking.) Sam’s Club also tries things out with its private labels. In 2022, it set out to remove 40 potentially harmful ingredients in the Member’s Mark line a goal it achieved last week. Walmart used learnings from this process to make Bettergoods products without these ingredients as well. Watkins has helped Walmart navigate through difficult times, from a volatile economy to new tariffs to inflation. She’s well-equipped to steer Sam’s Club through these choppy waters.
Category:
E-Commerce
During the Hollywood strikes of 2023, a major sticking point for members of the Writers Guild of America and SAG-AFTRA was artificial intelligence. When the unions ultimately came to an agreement with Hollywood studios, they won key protections for actors regarding digital replicas and guardrails for how generative AI could be used in writers rooms. The stipulation that studios could not create digital replicas of actorsat least not without their consentreflects growing concerns over how AI might compromise the livelihoods of artists and creatives. Now it seems some performers may be looking for new ways to protect themselves against more general misuse: A January 13 Wall Street Journal report revealed that actor Matthew McConaughey filed eight trademark applications that are intended to deter unauthorized AI-generated simulations of his voice or likeness. The trademarks, which have been approved by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, include several video clips of McConaughey, along with one of his most iconic moments: audio of him saying, Alright, alright, alright, a line from the 1993 movie Dazed and Confused that has since become a catchphrase. My team and I want to know that when my voice or likeness is ever used, its because I approved and signed off on it, McConaughey told The Journal. We want to create a clear perimeter around ownership with consent and attribution the norm in an AI world. McConaughey has reason to take preemptive action. AI has already enabled fraudulent ads that used the likeness of actors like Tom Hanks to promote wonder drugs. Just this week, there was a deepfake video circulating on the internet that featured eerily realistic face swaps with the cast of Stranger Thingsan example of how easily AI can be exploited by virtually anyone. The video has more than 15 million views (and counting) on X. Another creator shared a similar video using the likeness of Leonardo DiCaprio in The Wolf of Wall Street. By trademarking himself, McConaughey is looking to prevent this kind of content from being monetized. From a legal perspective, Orly Lobela law professor and the director of the Center for Employment and Labor Policy at the University of San Diegosays this is a novel way to combat deepfakes. The traditional name and likeness protections under state law, otherwise known as publicity rights, are meant to protect against the unauthorized use of an actors image to sell products. But those laws are inadequate in the new era of generative AI, according to Lobel, since AI content can be monetized on the internet; there is less clarity on what constitutes commercial use on those platforms. McConaugheys decision to trademark his voice and likeness is a hybrid approach and it elevates the protections to federal claims, Lobel says. Even McConaugheys lawyersamong them prominent entertainment attorney Kevin Yornhave noted that theyre not entirely sure whether this measure of protection would hold up in court. I dont know what a court will say in the end, Yorn told the Journal. But we have to at least test this. A trademark also primarily protects commercial use, though McConaugheys lawyers seem to think the risk of federal claims may act as a deterrent and discourage people from creating any kind of AI-generated content with his likeness. Still, this could set a precedent for other actors and performers to take similar action at a time when creatives are fighting an uphill battle against the use of AIand gearing up for another contract negotiation that will likely revive a number of AI-related concerns. I think [this] is a signal that actors and others want attribution and consent and are ready to fight back, Lobel says.
Category:
E-Commerce
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