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The climate crisis upends life in countless ways large and small, including potentially ending one beloved 1,000-year-old tradition. Peated whiskies, flavored with decaying organic matter from bogs, could soon be a casualty of new regulations designed to protect peatlandsamong the Earths most potent carbon sinks. In the U.K., the government is moving aggressively to end commercial uses of peat and protect peatlands. Long used in gardening as a rich source of compost, the practice is being abandoned as national bans on peat use take shape. When those gardening-focused bans are fully implemented, peats role in the whisky industrywhich historically accounted for just a sliver of peat usewill make up a much larger percentage of commercial peat usage. This week, a cluster of 10,000-year-old peatlands in England were designated as national nature reserves. New legislation proposed earlier this year aims to extend bans on burning across peatlands, a last-ditch effort to restore the 80% of Englands peat bogs that are currently considered degraded. The U.K. is home to 13% of the worlds peat bogs, which comprise only 3% of the Earths surface area but store nearly one-third of its carbon. Our peatlands are this countrys Amazon rainforesthome to our most precious wildlife, storing carbon and reducing flooding risk, Mary Creagh, the U.K.s nature minister, said. Whisky beyond peat While plenty of whiskies are peat-free, peat is the signature ingredient that creates the smoky, complex flavors that many Scotch whisky drinkers seek out. Peated whisky has a reputation as an acquired taste, but it commands special respect in the industry for its depth of flavor and its link to traditional production methods in Scotland and Ireland. Peat comes into play when malted barley is dried with a kiln. Peat added to the flames produces thick smoke that then envelopes the grains, infusing them with layers of flavor drawn out of the earth itself. Pulling peat out of the peated whisky process would be a break with tradition, but one that would leave the industry much better adapted to a changing climate long term. As other industries have moved away from peat, the search for alternatives is on. In gardening, coconut coir (made from the fibrous husks of coconuts) is a popular choice. Wood shavings, rice hulls, leaf litter, and kitchen waste compost are other options, though some you might prefer to not make themselves known to your palate at your next whisky tasting.
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E-Commerce
For the first time, A hit Netflix show used something unusual to craft a final scene: AI. On its quarterly earnings call, the companys co-CEO Ted Sarandos highlighted the use of generative AI in the sci-fi series El Eternauta (The Eternaut), which debuted on April 30. The post-apocalyptic series adapts an Argentinian comic of the same name, following survivors of a toxic snowfall that blankets Buenos Aires. The scene in question shows a building collapsing dramatically, a feat that Sarandos argues wouldnt have been in budget without leaning on AI. Sarandos says that Netflixs Eyeline Studios partnered with the shows creative team to incorporate virtual production and AI-powered VFX into a final scene. Using AI powered tools, they were able to achieve an amazing result with remarkable speed and in fact, that VFX sequence was completed 10x faster than it could have been completed with traditional VFX tools and workflows, Sarandos said. While El Eternauta might be Netflixs first foray into using AI to generate final footage, the tech-forward company likely already incorporates AI into other workflows. Netflix doesnt share Hollywoods AI worries Even as companies like Netflix embrace AI, many workers in Hollywood have major qualms with the technology. Concerns about AI in film and TV surfaced during the monthslong Writers Guild of America (WGA) strike in 2023, which sought to block AI from impacting writers pay and training on their work. The actors union SAG-AFTRA, which joined the WGA, also sought to protect actors from having their likenesses used without compensation. In spite of those misgivings, AI is already popping up in film and television including at this years Oscars. Both Emilia Perez and The Brutalist used AI to finesse actors voices a boon that boosted Adrian Brodys Hungarian accent and may have contributed to his best actor win. AIs detractors in Hollywood are as concerned as ever, but given its tech industry mindset and Silicon Valley DNA, Netflix isnt squeamish. We remain convinced that AI represents an incredible opportunity to help creators make films and series better, not just cheaper, Sarandos said. They’re AI-powered creator tools. So this is real people doing real work with better tools.
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E-Commerce
Convenience stores often have signs that read, Smile, youre on camera, to discourage all who enter from engaging in transgressive behavior. Perhaps those signs should go everywhere now. On Thursday, the CEO of tech company Astronomer was captured on the Jumbotron at a Coldplay concert, seemingly committing marital infidelity with an employee. A TikTok of the incident went mega-viral, racking up 56 million views in 24 hours on that platform alone, while also exploding across every other social media site, not to mention countless group chats. Theres something eerie, though, about how quickly and completely an apparent personal indiscretion became universal content. Its a cautionary tale for a new era of public shaming. The Jumbotron Moment Heard round the World blew up at such an incendiary level, on a bustling news day, for many reasons. The clumsy, deeply human way that the CEO and his employee seemed to realize they were suddenly visible, and then struggled to teleport out of sight, is almost objectively funny. Its also a cross-cultural story, encompassing the worlds of tech, music, and general human interest. Few current events, after all, get an equal amount of coverage at both PopCrave and Business Insider. The story also seemed to resonate because Coldplay might be the most memeable band that couldve been involved in such a situation, inspiring countless jokes on social media about not wanting to be caught dead at a Coldplay concert. But the reason the Jumbotron moment has not only captured so much attention but sustained it is because, after becoming a matter of public consumption, the story metastasized into a saga. The more people found out what happened, the more unresolved variables they unearthed, including how the spouses of both the CEO and the employee reacted, what the board at Astronomer thinks of the incident, and how the CEO will address all of this. What we do in the shadows Jumbotrongate is now more than just a viral momentto many online observers, its become an irresistibly spicy parasocial true-crime drama, one unfolding in real time, rather than in a Netflix docuseries. The apparently grueling wait for a statement from the CEO has inspired chaos agents to release multiple bogus apologies online. A Facebook posting of one of the fakes late on Thursday night has already garnered 55,000 reactions and 14,000 comments. This impatience to hear directly from the person at the center of a massively viral, still-developing saga recalls one of the earliest, broadest, and most notorious examples of online shamingthe Justine Sacco incident. Just before Christmas in 2013, Sacco, a senior PR executive, sent an ill-advised tweet as she boarded an 11-hour flight to South Africa. Going to Africa, the tweet began, before taking a turn for the controversial: Hope I dont get AIDS. Just kidding. Im white! Although Sacco had a relatively paltry following of less than 200 people at the time, the tone-deaf tweet came to the attention of a writer at Gawker, who helped it go tremendously, globally viral. The hashtag #HasJustineLandedYet quickly became inescapable on Twitter, driving more communal anticipation to find out what would happen next than arguably any public event since O.J. Simpsons white Bronco chase 20 years earlier. The incident sparked both a wave of public shaming and an awareness of how it changing peoples lives. (Sacco was let go from her job at InterActive Corp., though she was later rehired in a different role.) In the years to come, people would be shamed for killing a beloved lion during a hunting trip, for threatening to call the police on a Black man under false pretenses, and for appearing to masturbate during a work Zoom. What is now happening with the CEO of Astronomer, however, is a completely different beast. What he did may be perceived as morally objectionable and sleazy but its ultimately a private matter that managed to break containment and reach a global audience. Who deserves anonymity? Sacco may not have deserved the level of attention wrought by her tweet in 2013, but unlike the Astronomer CEOs conduct, her offensive joke was something that she felt comfortable broadcasting to the world. Meanwhile, as an American abroad, being in a crowd of thousands in an Australian arena during a Coldplay concert must have felt like the most anonymous place in the world. If the lesson from #HasJustineLanded was “Be careful what you tweet,” the one from this saga is more like, “Be careful what you do anywhere at any time.” Theres certainly something satisfying about seeing an apparent cheater get his comeuppance, but those celebrating it might be a little too comfortable living in a surveillance state. Most people have an implicit understanding that Nest camera footage or Alexa recordings might come up in court, and that we each leave a gigantic breadcrumb trail of data behind us wherever we go online, but its easy to convince ourselves that the Saurons eye-like panopticon will never turn on us personally. The Astronomer CEOs turn in the barrel should be seen as a warnin that no matter who or where you are, a camera is never far away, and its probably aimed in your direction.
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E-Commerce
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