NEW BERLIN, NY—Taking the rookie employee aside to offer him “a word to the wise,” Chobani CEO Hamdi Ulukaya warned new hire Austin Cook that he was in the yogurt game now, company sources confirmed Friday. “I don’t know what they taught you back in the boonies of the almond milk world, but you better be ready to step up, because you’re doing bacterial fermentation now, playboy,” Ulukaya said as he firmly jabbed a finger into Cook’s chest, adding that if the new hire couldn’t hack it in the yogurt game’s cutthroat climate of competition and live cultures, he should do them both a favor and resign on the spot. “You’re running with the big dogs here, and I need you to eat, sleep, and breathe yogurt. You see that portrait hanging above my desk? That’s the guy who invented Go-Gurt. You work hard, you can end up like him. You don’t, this industry will grind you up like the fruit on the bottom of a cup of Dannon. And don’t just tell me we should make kefir. I know about kefir. What I want to know is: What’s seven steps beyond kefir?” At press time, Ulukaya had quietly told the new hire to get the fuck out of his building after the man proposed branching out into skyr.

The post Chobani CEO Warns New Hire They In The Yogurt Game Now appeared first on The Onion.

Sinners, the new movie from Ryan Coogler starring Michael B. Jordan, has received widespread praise from critics and audiences. The Onion shares everything you need to know about the film.

Q: What is Sinners about?

A: America’s inability to discuss its complex racial history without bringing the Irish into things.

Q: Has Sinners broken any box office records?

A: It is the highest-grossing Black Southern gothic vampire horror musical fantasia of 2025.

Q: What are the vampires in the film meant to represent?

A: Werewolves.

Q: Who is the movie for?

A: Anyone who doesn’t want to be left out of conversations for the next three months.

Q: Will Sinners have a sequel?

A: If they can figure out how to get a third Michael B. Jordan on screen, sure.

Q: Are the vampires in the movie real?

A: We’re almost positive they aren’t.

Q: When will Sinners be streaming?

A: It will likely be available on Max in July, you lazy, cheap son of a bitch. 

The post What To Know About ‘Sinners’ appeared first on The Onion.

#Kento #RoninWarriors

According to the company, Joann Fabrics will wrap up its liquidation sales and cease operations by the end of May. The company is down to seven locations in Houston, with the closing of the Copperfield location at 15520 FM 529, Houston, TX 77095, about two weeks ago. The original plan was for Joann to close four Houston stores in February while seeking a buyer. However, when a buyer was not found, Joann chose to close ...

In an executive order, President Trump directs the Corporation for Public Broadcasting to stop funding NPR and PBS, the nation's primary public broadcasters.

In brief: Strong to severe thunderstorms are likely this afternoon and evening in the Houston area, especially north of I-10. Hail and strong wind gusts are the main concerns. Heavy rain is also likely in spots, so a stage 1 flood alert has been posted. After today, we get some quiet, if not absolutely beautiful weather this weekend.

Today/tonight

So, let’s get this out of the way first: This morning looks fine. No issues.

Starting this afternoon, probably not long after lunchtime, numerous showers and thunderstorms are likely to begin developing north of I-10. The environment over Houston looks conducive for virtually any storm to become strong to severe today. As such, we are now in an enhanced risk (3/5) of severe weather this afternoon and evening.

The two main threats today will be pockets of strong wind gusts in excess of 40-50 mph and the potential for hail. An isolated tornado cannot be entirely ruled out, but the bigger risks are damaging wind and hail today. The evolution of storms today will probably be individual cells eventually congealing into a line that lingers for a bit over much of the Houston area, again focused near or north of I-10. The severe storm threat should begin to wane after sunset, but additional thunderstorms are likely, especially south of I-10 overnight. So, almost everyone should get a chance to participate today with the nastier storms north this afternoon and evening and less intense storms south this evening and overnight.

In addition to the hail and wind, these storms could produce torrential rainfall, with totals of up to 3 or 4 inches possible in isolated pockets. Street flooding could easily crop up with storms like this. So, with that in mind, we are issuing a stage 1 flood alert for this afternoon and evening across the area, mainly north of I-10.

There are always fail modes on days like this, and it could be that we end up with heavy rain and generic thunderstorms more so than severe weather. But the environment today is definitely primed for some strong to severe storms, so particularly between about 1 PM and 8 PM, you’ll want to remain tuned into what’s happening.

Eric will have the latest for you around midday with a fresh update. We will follow with further updates as needed thereafter.

Saturday and Sunday

After some lingering showers well south of Houston or near the coast in the morning, Saturday itself looks like a fine day. Actually, it may end up being an absolutely spectacular day, but I want to keep expectations a little in check. But expect a return of some sunshine, noticeably lower humidity, and highs into the low 80s. Morning lows should be in the lower 60s. Look for much the same on Sunday without the morning shower chance.

You never know when you’re going to get your last really, really nice day before summer sinks in, so take advantage of tomorrow and Sunday if you’re able!

Next week

After another decent day Monday (albeit a bit warmer), we will re-emerge into an unsettled weather pattern for much of next week. Day by day details are tough to pin down right now, but look for at least a chance of thunderstorms on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. Some of the storms could be strong, and some of the rain could be heavy.

More data!

I generally abide by a separation of church and state when it comes to my day job and my work with Space City Weather. However, I am going to make a minor exception in this case. For those that do not know, I was hired in November to be CenterPoint Energy’s new manager of meteorology. Among the many things I was tasked with out of the gate was siting and launching a network of 100 weather sensors across the Houston area, as part of the company’s commitments in the Greater Houston Resiliency Initiative. In case you had not seen earlier this week, that process is now underway, and you can see the data from over 60 new weather sensors across the area here!

You may ask, “Well aren’t there already a lot of weather sensors reporting here?” The answer is yes. There are. But even when you plot virtually every network of weather stations, there are still some data gaps, there are periodically reliability issues, and most of you know how the weather goes in Houston where it rains at your neighbor’s house but not yours.

I’m hoping we can fill some of those gaps, assist with improving weather forecasting in the Houston area, and add additional data to be used by the NWS, flood control agencies, etc. to assist in understanding or researching weather in the Houston area. More data is good for everyone. So this project has excited me, I’m glad we can share this data with the weather community, and I look forward to seeing it grow further.

It’s four answers to four questions. Here we go…

1. Know-it-all coworker talks over everyone (and is often wrong)

We have a new employee, “Sam,” who thinks she knows everything. She has lots of experience in a closely related field, but has never done this specific job, nor has she worked in our region (the details of our work are location-specific.)

Whenever someone speaks, Sam jumps into the conversation. It does not matter if the speaker was clearly addressing someone else. Sam talks over people, interrupts, and answers questions that were not directed toward her. When she does this, she is condescending and rude, and very confidently dispenses wrong information. She offers incorrect advice and tells people how to do their jobs unsolicited. For example, a colleague told a funny story about a customer’s response to some written communication. Sam interjected to (wrongly) admonish the colleague for sending written correspondence rather than placing a phone call. She does this to people at all levels, above and below her. It happens, without exaggeration, multiple times an hour. We work in tight quarters, and Sam’s interjections are so grating that I now avoid conversations in our workspace because I know she will interrupt.

Any advice on how to handle this? When she talks over me, I continue speaking and attempt to ignore her, but she’s not getting the hint. You’ve given past examples of using language like, “I’m not looking for input on that,” but I don’t think I can say that dozens of times a day. Our supervisor is no help, and is leaving the office soon. Other management is dazzled by Sam’s resume and unwilling to hear that there are any issues with her. I am senior to her and have a supervisory component to my job title, but we both work under the same manager. It’s taking every ounce of composure not to burst out with, “Stop it, I wasn’t talking to you!” Help!

Are you up for having a private conversation with her where you say, “You’ve been interrupting my conversations with others and providing advice that actually isn’t correct. Please don’t interrupt if I’m talking with someone else. I’ll of course let you know if it’s something where we want to ask for input.”

Or if you want a less blunt version: “I know being in an open office means we can all overhear each other’s conversations, but when I’m talking with someone else, please let me handle the conversation on my own — it’s too disruptive otherwise, and sometimes you haven’t had the full context so you’ve offered advice that wasn’t correct for the situation.”

You might also consider having a more blunt reaction in the moment — “No, that’s not correct.” … “That’s not correct, let me finish talking to Jane and then I can explain it if you want me to.” … “I have this covered, thank you.” … “I’m going to handle this differently.” … “Please don’t tell Jane to do it that way; that’s not correct in this case.” … “Please let me finish — you interrupted me.” You might feel like you’re being rude, but she’s forcing that response by what she’s doing.

However, a big caveat: if management is dazzled by her, there may be less room to be that blunt, or at least to be that blunt as frequently as it’s warranted. But does your manager leaving soon mean that a new one is coming in? If so, is there any hope that that person will be more willing to intervene?

Related:
my coworker interrupts everyone’s conversations

2. Should students be told not to use AI during job interviews?

I had dinner last night with a friend who works at a large Fortune 100 company that works with a wide range of university career centers to recruit interns and entry-level staff. He was recently part of a team interviewing for summer internships that are likely to lead to full-time offers for after graduation.

He told me their team encountered multiple candidates this year who seemed to be using AI tools during their interview to give them answers to interview questions. My friend suspects they used AI to transcribe the questions in real time and then read back ChatGPT’s answer to the question. Typical signs for this were an overreliance on jargon, eyes darting back and forth like they’re reading an answer, and generally unnatural speech patterns and an inability to think on their feet to answer quick follow-ups.

They even did a case interview where a candidate took zero time to process/jot down notes and almost immediately launched into an answer that included perfect math, which a senior colleague told my friend he had never seen anyone do before. Of course, it’s possible that student is a genius, but in the debrief they all noted how bizarre this interview was and how they were certain she was using AI. They did not move this candidate forward.

I’ve encountered students using canned answers and reading them off during the interview, even before AI tools existed to do it in real time. In fact, a few years ago, a couple times I paused mid-interview to say to a young candidate, “It seems like you might be reading from prepared answers. While interview notes are often a useful tool, I encourage you to engage with us in more of a conversation.” This generally worked in getting the candidate to stop reading off answers, and though I ultimately did not hire them, I hoped it helped them learn an important lesson.

I asked my friend if they ever give students feedback, or if they would consider pausing an interview to say something like that, or if they have considered including a disclaimer in their interview invitations that students suspected of using AI during their interviews will not move forward, and he said no, they just rejected all of these candidates and do not provide feedback as a rule.

This behavior certainly shows a lack of critical thinking and interview skills, but as these are 19- and 20-year-olds who are possibly doing their first-ever corporate interview, I’m wondering if companies are doing students a disservice by rejecting them without any feedback that this is a bad interview strategy. Should they be reporting this back to the career centers so they can try to discourage their students from doing this?

They should definitely tell the career centers they work with that they’re seeing this in interviews and have rejected candidates for it, and suggest that the career centers better educate students about why they shouldn’t do it. The career centers may have no idea it’s happening, and they absolutely should be talking to students about it.

I don’t know that I’d go so far as to mention it in interview invitations if it’s just been a few candidates … but if it’s been more widespread then that, then yeah, it could be part of setting students up for success to let them know it’s something they’ve been seeing and it will get them rejected. The ones who do it after that are really telling you something about their judgment.

3. How do I respond to outreach from the people who laid me off?

I was recently laid off from my job after nine years with the company. It was a small layoff — just me and one other colleague, who had only been with the organization for eight months. In the weeks since, a few senior leaders and partners from the firm have reached out to me via text, asking how I’m doing, offering support in my job search, or saying they’re happy to be a reference.

Here’s the thing: these are the same people who were directly involved in the layoff decision or, at the very least, had a seat at the table when it was made. And while I understand that they probably mean well, the outreach feels incredibly misguided — sometimes even hurtful. It’s difficult to reconcile being deemed expendable by these individuals while also receiving warm offers of help from them.

To complicate things further, I’m not sure their support would even be helpful. Some are unreliable communicators; others aren’t especially well-regarded in our industry and community. And, frankly, I’m trying to move on from these relationships, not keep them active in my life or career.

That said, I don’t want to burn bridges, especially while I’m in the midst of a job search. I know people talk, and I don’t want to come across as bitter or ungracious. But I’m also not sure how to respond when the outreach itself feels tone-deaf at best, and in some cases, disingenuous. Is there a tactful way to navigate this? Should I just say thank you and let it go, or is there a way to communicate how their messages are landing?

The message in a layoff isn’t that you as a person are expendable! I understand why it feels that way, but layoffs are about cutting positions because the company can no longer afford (or in some cases justify) the expense of that particular role. They could think you were the greatest person ever, but it still might not make financial sense for the organization to keep the position you happen to be in. I know it feels really personal, but layoff decisions aren’t (usually) made for personal reasons; they’re made for financial ones.

On a much smaller scale, think of if you had to stop using a service you liked but which no longer made sense financially — for example, if you had to let a nanny go because of money or because your kid didn’t need as much care anymore, but you thought she was great and wanted to help her find a new job.

That said, you’re certainly not obligated to accept help, especially if you don’t think their help would actually be useful to you. In that case, you can simply reply with something like, “Thanks, I appreciate it — I’ll let you know if I think of anything.” But unless you genuinely think they’d hurt more than help, I’d instead respond with, “Thanks, I appreciate it. If you know anyone who’s hiring for X type of work, I’d really appreciate being connected to them.”

4. Can my employer ban coffee from home while selling coffee?

In the U.S., is it legal for an employer to ban employees from bringing coffee from home at the same time they’re selling coffee? It’s an office job that just happens to sell coffee to employees, but not to the public. It sounds to me like a conflict of interest. Could I get fired for defying that ban?

Yes, it’s legal. That’s not to say it’s not a conflict of interest, but not all conflicts of interest are illegal.

So they can indeed make that rule and they could indeed fire you for violating it … although it would be pretty ridiculous for them to do that unless there’s some context I don’t know, like that you work in a high-security environment where employees could smuggle in spy devices via their outside coffee or something like that. Assuming there’s no reason like that, though, you should feel free to ask about the rationale and to push back with other coworkers if you feel strongly about it.

Related:
we’re not allowed to bring coffee to work

The post know-it-all coworker talks over everyone, students using AI during job interviews, and more appeared first on Ask a Manager.

“As long as I don’t leave, you can’t kick me out. And fortunately I don’t have a job to go to anymore!” It’s our regularly scheduled election special. Brought to you by Henderson’s Trail Mix. Henderson’s Trail Mix: less candy, more trail! Luke and the Panel (Ian MacIntyre and Megan MacKay) recap the highlights of […]

The post Poilievre declares Squatter’s Rights over Stornoway House appeared first on The Beaverton.

Alejandro Hernandez, 31, is accused of operating an online store used to advertise custom boots made from sea turtle skin. He allegedly conspired to smuggle the boots from Mexico to the United States and sold them to at least one customer in Houston.

Remember the person whose company accountant was nitpicking his travel expenses to the point of responding to a $12 Chipotle tab with,”Ordering extra guacamole is wasteful of member dues”? Or the weeks-long battle about the purchase of a $10 calculator? Or the admin who wouldn’t give anyone a new pen unless you turned in your old, used-up pen first?

And then there were these:

•     •     •     •

I have had two different colleagues in two different jobs repeatedly change their signature blocks within hours of their boss being out of the office.

One of them would change his signature block to “Acting Deputy Spokesperson” every time his boss took even an afternoon off to go to the dentist or was out of the physical premises of the office for a conference.

The other changed hers to read “Acting Deputy Director” within an *hour* of her boss sending around a message that he had to go into five day quarantine because his son got Covid.

•     •     •     •

In my old neighborhood in Chicago, there was an incredibly dramatic crossing guard. She was an older woman, who would halt traffic for every single person crossing at a four way stop, yelling, “PEDESTRIAN CROSSING” at the top of her lungs. She worked every morning and every afternoon on weekdays. It was always a slightly eccentric, but harmless part of the neighborhood’s local color.

We later found out that she was NOT a crossing guard, and had just bought a crossing guard vest at Goodwill.

•     •     •     •

I worked with someone who would not read messages if he was cc’d rather than included in the “to” field of emails.

•     •     •     •

Many years ago I was a senior executive at a Fortune 100 company. I learned that the mother of a professional colleague — a colleague who was also a vendor to the company and someone with whom we worked closely — had died. I wrote a condolence note to the colleague and put it in outgoing mail. The admin for the department refused to send it unless I personally paid for the postage because it was handwritten, so it couldn’t be business correspondence. When I explained that it was business-related because it was to a vendor, she demanded that I “prove” that sending the note furthered the business interests of the company before she would send it.

•     •     •     •

Clearly, there is no amount of power too small for someone somewhere to want to abuse it. In the comments, let’s hear your stories about about the smallest amount of power you’ve ever seen someone abuse at work.

The post what’s the smallest amount of power you’ve seen someone abuse? appeared first on Ask a Manager.

One of my favourite things about the Skelottie design is the Jack Kirby chin, which is meant to represent skull teeth. When I drew the lines on for the first time and she looked a bit like Thanos, it quite tickled me. This is the high level decision-making I am responsible for almost every day.

The post It is nice to share appeared first on Bad Machinery.

KSAT 12 San Antonio broadcasted the Texas Cavaliers River Parade in Spanish on KSAT+, with Spanish parade broadcasts set for the upcoming Battle of Flowers, Fiesta Flambeau Parade. “KSAT en Español and our effort to produce an all-Spanish parade broadcast wasn’t just about taking the next step ahead in innovation, but serving each and every viewer in our community,” said Ashley Parker, Vice

A runaway kangaroo named Sheila managed to shut down a stretch of interstate in Alabama before state troopers and the animal’s owner were able to wrangle the wayward marsupial. What do you think?

The post Runaway Kangaroo Shuts Down Alabama Highway appeared first on The Onion.

Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick has called banning THC products a top priority. The latest draft of the lower chamber’s THC regulation bill would allow retailers to continue selling edibles and drinks.

Glasstire counts down the top five art events in Texas.

For last week’s picks, please go here.

1. Breath(e): Toward Climate and Social Justice
Moody Center for the Arts at Rice University (Houston)
January 24 – May 10, 2025

From Moody Center for the Arts:

“This timely exhibition considers art practices that address the climate crisis and its inevitable intersection with issues of equity and social justice. The Moody’s iteration of Breath(e): Toward Climate and Social Justice will feature a selection of local and international artists, as well as new and modified works responding directly to Houston and the Gulf Coast. Exhibiting artists are Brandon Ballengée, Mel Chin, Tiffany Chung, LaToya Ruby Frazier, Michael Joo, Xin Liu, Cannupa Hanska Luger, Yoshitomo Nara, Roxy Paine, Garnett Puett, Sandy Rodriguez, Sarah Rosalena, Clarissa Tossin, and Jin-me Yoon.”

2. Iris Kwon: Beyond Every Door: A Portal to Memories
Georgetown Art Center
April 25 – May 25, 2025

From the Georgetown Art Center:

“Born in California and raised in Singapore and South Korea, Iris Kwon’s (Child Appetite) multicultural upbringing profoundly influences her work. She studied Fine Arts at the Rhode Island School of Design before transferring to the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, where she earned a degree in Fine Arts with a minor in Illustration. After graduating, she spent previous years as a brand illustrator and designer while simultaneously cultivating her artistic practice.

In 2020, Iris introduced her artistic persona, Child Appetite, as a means to explore themes of belonging and the complex emotions tied to feeling like an outsider. Her work has been showcased in multiple art fairs, culminating in her first solo exhibition in Seoul, South Korea, in 2024. Now based in Georgetown, Texas, Iris is a resident artist with Future Front in Austin, where she continues to create deeply personal works that reflect her ongoing journey of self-discovery and connection.”

3. Ariel Davis: A Humble Gift
Artspace111 (Fort Worth)
May 2 – June 7, 2025

From Artspace111:

“Artspace111 is proud to present the latest exhibition, A Humble Gift, by Ariel Davis, a deeply personal reflection on family, tradition, and the timeless connections between generations. Fort Worth-based artist Davis explores the symbolic weight of generational values and humble traditions through painting and sculpture. The exhibition is inspired by a family Christmas tradition of gifting oranges — a simple yet profound gesture that represents both humility and abundance. In a family of modest means, the orange symbolized a rare treat amidst everyday necessities, and Davis’ work reflects on this memory, transforming it into a visual language that speaks to the passing of wisdom, resilience, and continuity.”

4. Calvin Pressley: Only People Know Me
Sala Diaz (San Antonio)
May 3 – June 27, 2025

From Sala Diaz:

“Sala Diaz is pleased to present Only People Know Me, a solo exhibition by Calvin Pressley. This deeply introspective presentation marks a critical moment in the artist’s career, a confrontation with the past, a reflection on the present, and an urgent push toward the unknown future.

Spanning 15 years of relentless creation, this exhibition unfolds as both a retrospective and a transition point. Pressley, once defined by prolific output and unrelenting artistic momentum, now stands at a crossroads, grappling with the weight of past work and the challenge of what comes next. The show brings together a selection of paintings and drawings that chart the evolution of an artist who, despite the feeling of diminished productivity, remains fiercely committed to reinvention.”

5. Makenzie Bierma: Heirloom
Center for Contemporary Arts Abilene
April 24 – June 7, 2025

From the Center for Contemporary Arts:

“This exhibition showcases Makenzie Bierma-Wheeler’s latest work, exploring heritage, craft, women’s work, and memory. Through abstracted diary-like pieces, she engages with functional art and craft in contemporary discourse. Featured works include kaleidoscopes symbolizing the fragmentation of memory and pieces reflecting her mental and physical health challenges. Together, they offer a layered exploration of identity, history, and personal struggle.”

The post Top Five: May 1, 2025 appeared first on Glasstire.

WASHINGTON—Growing increasingly frustrated by the protracted diplomatic talks, President Donald Trump asserted Thursday that Russia must be allowed to keep fighting as part of any ceasefire deal. “It’s time for Ukraine to come to the negotiating table and accept being attacked,” said Trump, who accused Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky of acting as a barrier to peace by objecting to drone and missile strikes. “It’s a shame Zelensky has been so stubborn about it. It’s a fantastic deal for both sides. Any scenarios that do not allow for the Ukrainian death toll to rise is a nonstarter.” Trump added the agreement was essential for stopping the prevention of World War III.

The post Trump: Russia Must Be Allowed To Keep Fighting As Part Of Any Ceasefire Deal appeared first on The Onion.

“Trump, who has argued that China will bear the brunt of his tariffs, acknowledged during a Cabinet meeting on April 30 that the duties may mean fewer—and more expensive—products available for American families. ‘You know, somebody said, “Oh, the shelves are going to be open,” Trump said. ‘Well, maybe the children will have two dolls instead of thirty dolls. And maybe the two dolls will cost a couple bucks more than they would normally.’” — MSN

In our pursuit of economic freedom, the Trump administration’s position remains that income caps are essentially anticapitalist and discourage the pursuit of the American Dream, which, in simple terms, is to own more property and possessions than anyone else on the planet.

Imposing caps that punish hard work is un-American. What is American is telling children they can have only a grand total of two dolls—no more—and they will have to work to earn the money to pay for them.

Radical leftists will argue that limiting dolls per household is cruel and pointless, but what other way is there to teach children the value of cheap goods made in China that no one here is really interested in working in a factory to produce?

Anyone opposing the doll limit should consider how it could lead to a surge in innovation: children making their own dolls out of popsicle sticks and tissue paper, or forgoing dolls altogether, and becoming so bored that they start a coal mining company or investment firm.

We’ve heard the argument that “No one needs to make millions of dollars while others struggle to afford education, health care, and food. By simply taxing the ultra-rich, we can create a more equal society where our roads and bridges aren’t crumbling into dust.” Besides this being a blatant socialist wealth grab, we would like to remind you that this kind of policy will be difficult or impossible to enforce, mainly because we’ve handed over control of the IRS to someone named “Big Balls” who isn’t going to reveal how much anyone makes unless our desire for revenge makes it politically expedient.

What makes the most sense is that we continue to let the rich get richer, while the children have fewer dolls.

How many dolls can you play with at once anyway? You only have two hands. Obviously, two dolls should be the limit. How we let our society go wild and accumulate as many dolls as it wants is truly remarkable when you think about it. Playing with dolls has been shown to cause a wide range of dangerous health outcomes, such as encouraging imagination and creativity, developing problem-solving, social, and language skills, and fostering an understanding of real-world roles.

It could be safely argued that dolls allow children to create scenarios where they explore their feelings and emotions and become adults who would never think of voting against their own interests. No matter how many tears are shed, no matter how loud the cries of protest, we can no longer afford to let this continue.

If Democrats really wanted to help people, they’d stop crushing the dreams of honest, everyday millionaires by forcing them to pay more taxes, and instead focus on crushing the doll-owning aspirations of boys and girls who, let’s face it, pay no taxes whatsoever.

Click here to go see the bonus panel!

Hovertext:
Fortunately it later finds some ants engaging in a simple form of market exchanges.

Today's News:

Today's links

• Republicans want to force students to pay off scam college loans: Incredibly, they've found a way to make student debt WORSE.
• Hey look at this: Delights to delectate.
• Object permanence: 2005, 2010, 2015, 2020, 2024
• Upcoming appearances: Where to find me.
• Recent appearances: Where I've been.
• Latest books: You keep readin' em, I'll keep writin' 'em.
• Upcoming books: Like I said, I'll keep writin' 'em.
• Colophon: All the rest.

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Republicans want to force students to pay off scam college loans (permalink)

House Republicans have a great plan to pay for Trump's tax-cuts for the rich: jacking up the cost of federal student loans, while eliminating protections for students who are scammed by fake universities:

https://prospect.org/education/2025-04-30-republicans-education-upper-class-privilege-student-loans/

Every GOP legislator and especially Congressional committee chairs are scrambling to find cuts that can offset Trump's plans to make his 2017 tax cuts permanent and then add more cuts on top of that. The failure of Doge to make any appreciable savings has left Trump high and dry, with unfunded tax cuts that will flunk even the most compliant, ass-kissing Congressional Budget Office analysis:

https://www.msnbc.com/opinion/msnbc-opinion/elon-musk-doge-savings-trump-rcna203051

Enter the House Education and Workforce Committee, whose Republican members have found a way to save $330b over the next decade, through the simple expedient of making working families choose between foregoing education for their kids, or burdening those kids with brutal, crushing debts for the rest of their lives – debts that can't be discharged in bankruptcy, even if the student becomes totally, permanently disabled – not even if the "university" that charged them all that tuition is later shut down for running a scam.

Trump knows a lot about scams in higher ed, of course. His own ill-fated "Trump 'University,'" a fraudulent, non-accredited institution that stole millions of dollars from unsuspecting students:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trump_University

Trump U isn't the only scam college out there, not by a damn sight. The Department of Education's "Borrower Defense to Repayment" system allows students who've been scammed by fraudulent institutions to have their debts canceled. That's the clause that the GOP members of the House Education and Workforce Committee plan to kill. This will not only leave fraud victims on the hook for a lifetime of debt – it will also make it easier for scam institutions to re-open and prey upon even more students. The Republicans' giveaway to scam universities kills the "gainful employment" rule that requires that universities prove that their grads can actually get work in the fields they graduate in.

The GOP plan will kill all subsidized undergrad loans, meaning that interest will be piled on student loans while students are still at school, so a grad with a four-year degree will also owe four years worth of compounded interest on their freshman year loans. Undergrad loans are capped at $50k, less than half the price of a degree at most state colleges. The GOP members say that the $50k cap covers the "median tuition" – meaning that it is lower than tuition at half the country's institutions.

GOP members have also called for changes to "income based repayment," with sharply rising payments that will shoot up every time a graduate's income crosses a line. Under this plan, a student grad earning $10k-$20k would have to pay 1% of their income to service their loans. For each $10k increase in graduate pay, repayment goes up by 1% – so if a grad earning $99.9k gets a raise to $100k, their repayments will shoot up from 9% of their annual income to 10%. That means a $100 raise could leave a graduate $850 poorer.

This proposal will roll back Biden-era changes to the interest charged to borrowers on income-based repayment. Under the new rules, interest will continue to compound on your loan even if you're earning peanuts, meaning that the poorest grads will have the highest lifetime interest charges and likely die with unpaid student loans that exceed the principle several times over (remember, the only debt that can be charged against your Social Security is student loans).

The Republican proposal also screws grads working through a Public Service Loan Forgiveness plan, which cancels your student debt after ten years of work in public service. The Republicans want to increase the payments due from grads during that decade of public service. Also, med-school grads would no longer receive credit towards PSLF debt cancellation for the years they spend in residencies, which will drain the supply of freshly minted doctors who staff community health clinics.

They also want to gut Pell grants, changing eligibility to limits grants to "full time" students (30+ hours/week of courses), which will strike hardest at the poorest students, who often attend school part time while working.

Raising the price of a good education and lowering protections against receiving a bad education is an attack on the very idea of education as a source of social mobility. After all, the students most likely to be trapped by a scam college are students from families without a lot of college grads, who lack the means of assessing educational quality.

During the New Deal, America created two parallel paths to social mobility: labor protections and subsidized home ownership. As with every American social initiative, the New Deal was undermined by racism, sexism and xenophobia, and excluded many of America's most disfavored minorities from its benefits. After WWII, two groups of Americans fought to change the New Deal. The wealthy fought to roll back its protections, while the rest of us fought to extend those benefits to Black people, indigenous people, Latino people, women, queers, and others who were left out from the start:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/02/26/horsehoe-crab/#substantive-disagreement

They made a lot of progress, but then came the Reagan revolution, which wiped out labor protections (including defined benefit pensions) and doubled down on home ownership as the only means of securing a comfortable and dignified life. Over the next quarter-century, this turned a lucky group of workers into real-estate millionaires, even as their wages stagnated and the cost of education and health care skyrocketed:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/06/06/the-rents-too-damned-high/

Housing prices also skyrocketed. Of course they did: the only way that owning a house could be an "investment" (as opposed to a way to fulfill the human need for shelter) is if the price of keeping a roof over your head went up. But owning an expensive house in a world of stagnant wages and rising health and education costs is a recipe for not owning a house anymore, because you'll have to liquidate that home to cover your bills or get your kids through school. This century hasn't just been a time in which housing grew more valuable (and thus more expensive) – it's been an era in which its easier than ever to be forced out of your home:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/11/06/the-end-of-the-road-to-serfdom/

Trading labor protection for real-estate speculation was always going to end badly for workers. The retreat of organized labor has paved the way for a rollback of all the post-war prosperity, allowing America's oligarchs to create a new Gilded Age where education is reserved for failsons of wealthy families, which is fine, because the rest of us won't need a degree to shine their shoes, clean their toilets, and screw the little screws in on iPhones:

https://www.theverge.com/news/644320/us-commerce-secretary-howard-lutnick-says-well-be-making-iphones-in-the-us

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Hey look at this (permalink)

• Car Subscription Features Raise Your Risk of Government Surveillance, Police Records Show https://www.wired.com/story/police-records-car-subscription-features-surveillance/

• Who Pays the Price When Cochlear Implants Go Obsolete? https://www.sapiens.org/culture/planned-obsolescence-cochlear-implants/

• The Tech Companies Fighting To Sell Your Data https://www.levernews.com/the-tech-companies-fighting-to-sell-your-data/

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Object permanence (permalink)

#20yrsago Danny O’Brien goes to work at EFF! https://web.archive.org/web/20050507123924/https://www.oblomovka.com/entries/2005/04/29#1114782180

#15yrsago 1939 World’s Fair: the future’s cradle, in pictures https://web.archive.org/web/20100501170616/http://www.wired.com/thisdayintech/2010/04/gallery-1939-worlds-fair/

#10yrsago British austerity: a failed experiment abandoned by the rest of the world https://www.theguardian.com/business/ng-interactive/2015/apr/29/the-austerity-delusion

#10yrsago Translation: once they learn the truth, techies hate and fear us https://www.wired.com/2015/04/us-defense-secretary-snowden-caused-tensions-techies/

#10yrsago FBI’s crypto backdoor plans require them to win the war on general purpose computing http://webpolicy.org/2015/04/28/you-cant-backdoor-a-platform/

#10yrsago Anyone can open a Master Lock padlock in under two minutes https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=09UgmwtL12c

#10yrsago Couples counsellor who assigns Ikea furniture assembly calls Liatorp “The Divorcemaker” https://web.archive.org/web/20150430183654/https://laist.com/2015/04/28/santa_monica_therapist_uses_ikea_as.php

#10yrsago UK Tories forged letter of support in the Telegraph from “5,000 small businesses” https://sturdyblog.wordpress.com/2015/04/27/small-business-letter-to-the-telegraph-an-attempt-to-defraud-the-electorate/

#5yrsago How monopolism crashed the US food supply https://pluralistic.net/2020/04/29/banjo-nazis/#butchery

#5yrsago Legendary troubleshooting stories https://pluralistic.net/2020/04/29/banjo-nazis/#cuckoos-egg

#5yrsago Medical debt collection during the pandemic https://pluralistic.net/2020/04/29/banjo-nazis/#armbreakers

#5yrsago British Library releases 1.9m images https://pluralistic.net/2020/04/29/banjo-nazis/#it-belongs-in-a-museum

#5yrsago NSO Group employee used Pegasus cyberweapon to stalk a woman https://pluralistic.net/2020/04/29/banjo-nazis/#loveint

#5yrsago Founder of AI surveillance company was a Nazi who helped shoot up a synagogue https://pluralistic.net/2020/04/29/banjo-nazis/#damien-patton-nazi

#5yrsago Talking Radicalized with the CBC https://pluralistic.net/2020/04/29/banjo-nazis/#zuckervegans

#5yrsago Bayesian reasoning and covid-19 https://pluralistic.net/2020/04/29/banjo-nazis/#uncertainty

#5yrsago Cigna claims to be rolling in dough and on the verge of bankruptcy https://pluralistic.net/2020/04/29/banjo-nazis/#someones-lying

#1yrago Cigna's nopeinator https://pluralistic.net/2024/04/29/what-part-of-no/#dont-you-understand

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Upcoming appearances (permalink)

• Auckland: Unity Books, May 2, 6PM
  https://www.eventbrite.co.nz/e/an-evening-with-cory-doctorow-tickets-1320740102199

• Wellingon: Unity Books, May 3, 3PM
  https://www.unitybooks.co.nz/news-and-events/author-talk-picks-and-shovels-by-cory-doctorow

• Pittsburgh: Picks and Shovels at White Whale Books, May 15
  https://whitewhalebookstore.com/events/20250515

• Pittsburgh: PyCon, May 16
  https://us.pycon.org/2025/schedule/

• Virtual: Writing to Resist (California Writers Club Berkeley):
  https://cwc-berkeley.org/writing-to-resist-5-18-25/

• PDX: Teardown 2025, Jun 20-22
  https://www.crowdsupply.com/teardown/portland-2025

• PDX: Picks and Shovels with bunnie Huang at Barnes and Noble, Jun 20
  https://stores.barnesandnoble.com/event/9780062183697-0

• London: How To Academy with Riley Quinn, Jul 1
  https://howtoacademy.com/events/cory-doctorow-the-fight-against-the-big-tech-oligarchy/

• Manchester: Picks and Shovels at Blackwell's Bookshop, Jul 2
  https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/an-evening-with-cory-doctorow-tickets-1308451968059

• Manchester: Co-operatives UK Co-op Congress keynote, Jul 3
  https://www.uk.coop/events-and-training/events-calendar/co-op-congress-2025-book-your-place

• New Orleans: DeepSouthCon63, Oct 10-12, 2025
  http://www.contraflowscifi.org/

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Recent appearances (permalink)

• How Enshittification Conquered the 21st Century and How We Can Overthrow It (Cloudfest)
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Ai-fC-2Bpo

• Move Fast and Break Kings
  https://flipboard.video/w/2aH2AFNTPjcdWCMqjPB5N3?start=2s

• Beyond the Web (Ostrom Workshop)
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-WfO-9G4EgQ

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Latest books (permalink)

• • Picks and Shovels: a sequel to "Red Team Blues," about the heroic era of the PC, Tor Books (US), Head of Zeus (UK), February 2025 (https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250865908/picksandshovels).
• The Bezzle: a sequel to "Red Team Blues," about prison-tech and other grifts, Tor Books (US), Head of Zeus (UK), February 2024 (the-bezzle.org). Signed, personalized copies at Dark Delicacies (https://www.darkdel.com/store/p3062/Available_Feb_20th%3A_The_Bezzle_HB.html#/).

• "The Lost Cause:" a solarpunk novel of hope in the climate emergency, Tor Books (US), Head of Zeus (UK), November 2023 (http://lost-cause.org). Signed, personalized copies at Dark Delicacies (https://www.darkdel.com/store/p3007/Pre-Order_Signed_Copies%3A_The_Lost_Cause_HB.html#/)

• "The Internet Con": A nonfiction book about interoperability and Big Tech (Verso) September 2023 (http://seizethemeansofcomputation.org). Signed copies at Book Soup (https://www.booksoup.com/book/9781804291245).

• "Red Team Blues": "A grabby, compulsive thriller that will leave you knowing more about how the world works than you did before." Tor Books http://redteamblues.com. Signed copies at Dark Delicacies (US): and Forbidden Planet (UK): https://forbiddenplanet.com/385004-red-team-blues-signed-edition-hardcover/.

• "Chokepoint Capitalism: How to Beat Big Tech, Tame Big Content, and Get Artists Paid, with Rebecca Giblin", on how to unrig the markets for creative labor, Beacon Press/Scribe 2022 https://chokepointcapitalism.com

• "Attack Surface": The third Little Brother novel, a standalone technothriller for adults. The Washington Post called it "a political cyberthriller, vigorous, bold and savvy about the limits of revolution and resistance." Order signed, personalized copies from Dark Delicacies https://www.darkdel.com/store/p1840/Available_Now%3A_Attack_Surface.html

• "How to Destroy Surveillance Capitalism": an anti-monopoly pamphlet analyzing the true harms of surveillance capitalism and proposing a solution. https://onezero.medium.com/how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism-8135e6744d59?sk=f6cd10e54e20a07d4c6d0f3ac011af6b) (signed copies: https://www.darkdel.com/store/p2024/Available_Now%3A__How_to_Destroy_Surveillance_Capitalism.html)

• "Little Brother/Homeland": A reissue omnibus edition with a new introduction by Edward Snowden: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250774583; personalized/signed copies here: https://www.darkdel.com/store/p1750/July%3A__Little_Brother_%26_Homeland.html

• "Poesy the Monster Slayer" a picture book about monsters, bedtime, gender, and kicking ass. Order here: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781626723627. Get a personalized, signed copy here: https://www.darkdel.com/store/p2682/Corey_Doctorow%3A_Poesy_the_Monster_Slayer_HB.html#/.

---

Upcoming books (permalink)

• Enshittification: Why Everything Suddenly Got Worse and What to Do About It, Farrar, Straus, Giroux, October 7 2025
  https://us.macmillan.com/books/9780374619329/enshittification/

• Unauthorized Bread: a middle-grades graphic novel adapted from my novella about refugees, toasters and DRM, FirstSecond, 2026

• Enshittification, Why Everything Suddenly Got Worse and What to Do About It (the graphic novel), Firstsecond, 2026

• The Memex Method, Farrar, Straus, Giroux, 2026

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Colophon (permalink)

Today's top sources:

Currently writing:

• Enshittification: a nonfiction book about platform decay for Farrar, Straus, Giroux. Status: second pass edit underway (readaloud)

• A Little Brother short story about DIY insulin PLANNING

• Picks and Shovels, a Martin Hench noir thriller about the heroic era of the PC. FORTHCOMING TOR BOOKS FEB 2025

Latest podcast: Nimby and the D-Hoppers CONCLUSION https://craphound.com/stories/2025/04/13/nimby-and-the-d-hoppers-conclusion/

---

This work – excluding any serialized fiction – is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license. That means you can use it any way you like, including commercially, provided that you attribute it to me, Cory Doctorow, and include a link to pluralistic.net.

https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Quotations and images are not included in this license; they are included either under a limitation or exception to copyright, or on the basis of a separate license. Please exercise caution.

---

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"When life gives you SARS, you make sarsaparilla" -Joey "Accordion Guy" DeVilla

READ CAREFULLY: By reading this, you agree, on behalf of your employer, to release me from all obligations and waivers arising from any and all NON-NEGOTIATED agreements, licenses, terms-of-service, shrinkwrap, clickwrap, browsewrap, confidentiality, non-disclosure, non-compete and acceptable use policies ("BOGUS AGREEMENTS") that I have entered into with your employer, its partners, licensors, agents and assigns, in perpetuity, without prejudice to my ongoing rights and privileges. You further represent that you have the authority to release me from any BOGUS AGREEMENTS on behalf of your employer.

ISSN: 3066-764X

Dozens of people who signed up to speak were ready at 4 a.m. to debate whether public school classrooms should have to display the Ten Commandments.

In the deadly summer of 2020, Hispanics in Texas were half of all COVID-19 deaths, spurring many to vaccinate. Today, in a startling flip, Hispanics make up less than a quarter of deaths from the disease.

It’s five answers to five questions. Here we go…

1. My remote team does annoying ice-breakers in all our meetings

My fully remote team has a habit of arranging quite annoying ice breakers/team building exercises for our meetings. In the past these have included: draw your mood on the whiteboard, guess the song and sing a few bars, and others which I find too intrusive and infantile for a work context (they honestly seem like activities you would do with small children). These activities are arranged by the team admin, but seem to have the approval of the team manager.

Other team members look uncomfortable during these activities, but because of our relationship (we mostly just communicate over Slack, are not friends outside of work, and have never met in person), I don’t feel I can raise it with any of them. Is there any way out of these activities? Is it worth raising in a one-to-one with my manager? I really do find these situations excruciating.

Are you comfortable speaking up in a meeting the next time one of these is announced? In your shoes, I’d say something like, “Before we do the music game, can I ask if everyone else likes doing these activities? I don’t really find them useful and would love to just jump into our agenda, and I wondered if others might feel the same.” It takes some capital to do that but not a ton; you wouldn’t say it on your second week on the job, obviously, or if you were currently putting all your capital into some other battle, but most people are reasonably well positioned to say something like that. Since you said others have been looking uncomfortable too, the hope is that a few of them would chime in and agree.

If you’re not comfortable with that, you can raise it with your manager instead. Sample wording: “I’ve been really uncomfortable with some of the ice-breakers we’ve been doing at the start of meetings, and I wondered if you might get feedback from the rest of the team about whether they like them or find them useful. My sense is that a lot of us would prefer just to jump into the agenda and don’t love being asked to sing or draw and so forth, so I wanted to see if it’s something we could revisit.”

Also: you can develop your relationships with your coworkers even though you’re all remote! It does take more deliberate effort, but you can joke around on Slack and be a warm, friendly person in writing and develop the kind of relationship where you feel comfortable messaging each other to say, “Does this feel like too much to you? Do you think it’s worth raising with Jane?” and so forth — and it helps so much in situations like this to have that. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if you already have the kind of relationship where you could send one of them that message; you don’t need to have a full-on friendship to talk about stuff like that with colleagues, even when your communications been totally work-based. In fact, that kind of exchange is sometimes how those relationships deepen.

(Ironically, your manager is probably hoping all these ice-breakers will facilitate relationships like that.)

Related:
the magic mushrooms, the underwear scavenger hunt, and other awful workplace ice-breakers

2. My horrible old coworker is a customer at my new job (and keeps lying about me)

I left a job in 2021 for various reasons, but a big cause was my former coworker, “K.” K loved spreading lies and exaggerating the truth, and even though the manager was fully aware of it, she did nothing to stop her.

I started my current job (banker) toward the end of 2023 and I absolutely love it, not because of the job itself, but because of the team and my manager. My team has my back, even if I mess up, and my manager will argue for me if it ever comes down to it. The trouble is, K is a customer at my bank.

It’s unrealistic to think that everyone is going to love me, but what shocks me is how much K tries to lie about me and damage me professionally. We record all of our phone calls for legal purposes, and she persists in calling me a very offensive word. I found out about this after branch services reviewed a few calls. She also has tried numerous times to convince my manager that I lie about chronic illnesses to get away with being lazy. Every time she speaks to my manager, she tells her that I have a history of attendance issues (I don’t) and that I have horrible customer service skills (we have several customers who’ve listed my name in their positive reviews).

My manager assured me that she doesn’t believe K and the entire team can’t stand her, but we have to play nice with her because she’s been a customer for several years. I avoid interacting with K and try to think of her as little as possible, but I’m getting very tired of hearing about her latest attempts to cause trouble for me. I’m also concerned that she could damage my professional reputation with her pettiness. Is there anything I can do to protect myself?

I don’t love that your manager apparently keeps telling you all the complaints K is making about you. If your manager knows she’s a liar with a vendetta against you, couldn’t she just … stop telling you? And is that something you’d want to ask her for — framed as, “It’s rough to keep hearing about the things K is saying about me. You sound confident that her complaints are untrue and so, assuming that remains the case, would it be an option not to loop me in on what she says? Obviously I understand you need to raise anything you need a response from me about, but when that’s not needed, it would be a lot less stressful not to be looped in each time.”

You could also ask your manager what you asked me: “I appreciate how clear you’ve made it that you have my back, but I’m concerned that K will damage my professional reputation. Can you help me figure out whether there are things I can do to protect myself?”

3. Giving feedback to candidates on the spot

I have a question about interview style. At the company where I work, we have a presentation stage as part of the interview process, where the candidate presents to a panel of 3-5 people. We assess technical skills as well as communication, objection handling, and other key presentation abilities.

After the presentation, one of my colleagues provides live feedback directly to the candidate, highlighting strengths and areas for improvement. In my experience, it is not typical to give live feedback during interviews — and usually for good reason.

My personal style when conducting interviews is to be polite, interested, and direct. However, I try to avoid any statement that implies we are continuing with this candidate. I avoid statements of praise (e.g., “That was a great answer,” “good job”). I even try to avoid statements like, “In this role, you will be doing XYZ.” These types of statements can lead to an expectation that we are proceeding with the candidate and disappointment if we don’t.

Curious what you thought about this. Is providing live feedback during interviews considered normal or advisable?

I’m curious to know the reason for doing it. If it’s to see how the candidate responds to and incorporates feedback, it can be valuable (like if there’s any sort of further work simulation or presentation after that, it could be hugely useful to see what they do with your feedback, if anything). Or if it’s a role where the person will need to handle feedback gracefully from a variety of stakeholders (or the public), it could be valuable for that reason.

But if it’s not for any evaluation purpose like that, it’s … unusual. Not necessarily wrong; some candidates would probably appreciate hearing feedback on the spot. But others really won’t, and you also get into the whole slew of legal issues why employers are often wary of giving feedback in hiring, like that if you tell Candidate X they need more expertise in Y and then hire Candidate Z who has even less, you risk Candidate X concluding that your real reason for not hiring them was something discriminatory. It’s also pretty hard to deliver nuanced, helpful feedback on the spot in ways that will land exactly as you intend it with someone you don’t have an existing relationship with, and for all of them to handle it well in the moment. So if you’re doing it just because you think it’s helpful to candidates, I’d rethink when you’re providing it, and maybe provide it afterwards rather than right there in-person.

4. Missing work due to an arrest at a protest

Due to *gestures at everything* I’ve been attending a lot of protests recently. After the most recent protest in my city, two people were arrested, despite the protest being non-violent. This makes me nervous for obvious reasons.

The dumbest thing I’m worried about is that I have a shift that starts a few hours after the next protest ends. I know this is unlikely, but if I were arrested, what would I do about work? I figure when I’m allowed to make a phone call, I’d ask my person to call into work for me. But we get “points” for calling in, coming in late, etc. A certain number of points gets a write-up, enough is a firing. If I were to get arrested for no reason and missed a shift, would there be anything I could do to challenge it?

Again, I realize this is highly unlikely to happen to me personally. But there is a decent chance that someone will face this problem.

It’s not a dumb thing to think about! Employers are allowed to discipline or fire you for missing a scheduled shift, even if the reason you missed it was because of a wrongful arrest. You could explain what happened and that your absence wasn’t deliberate and was out of your control … but some employers will hold it against you regardless, and legally they’re permitted to do that.

5. Encouraged to apply for internal jobs, but always passed over

This question is for my husband. He’s worked at the same company through various iterations for over 20 years. Let’s say they do product distribution — he went from driver, to warehouse, to CSR, and then a position on the procurement team. At that time it was owned by an American company (we’re in Canada) and they decided after a couple of years that they were moving those positions to the U.S. Most of the team was let go, but due to his long history with the company, he was offered to return to the CSR position (but no loss in pay) and they would keep him in mind for positions as they opened up.

The company has since been sold back to another Canadian company, but many of the decision-makers are the same. After many years of being asked to apply for various positions and being passed over, he has become very frustrated. The most recent time was a few weeks ago. The person who got the job has more recent experience than my husband (due to my husband being stuck in the CSR position for the last few years). He understands why they went with this person but in every instance, they are approaching him for a position, only to go with someone else.

He is widely respected, does an excellent job, is completely professional, and his direct supervisor seemed shocked that he didn’t get this position. Other than looking for another job, what would you recommend he do here? He has become quite demoralized.

He should do two things simultaneously: He should talk to his manager and ask for a realistic assessment of what might be going on, and why he keeps getting encouraged to apply for positions that he never seems to get. He could say something like, “If there’s something you think I might be doing or not doing that’s holding me back, I’d be really grateful for candid feedback — please don’t hold back if there’s something that you think might explain it.” But at the same time, he should also start actively job-searching. For whatever reason, he hasn’t been able to advance in the way he wants at this company — maybe there’s a reason for that or maybe there isn’t, but what he does know is that so far it’s not happening. So it makes sense to look outside the company too.

The post my horrible old coworker is a customer at my new job, annoying ice-breakers, and more appeared first on Ask a Manager.

According to border czar Tom Homan, the Trump administration deported about 139,000 people in its first 100 days. Here is a breakdown of the U.S. deportation process:

STEP 1: Authorities confirm suspects’ illegal status by arresting them.

STEP 2: “But I’m a citizen!” repeated back to detainees in nasal sing-song voice.

STEP 3: Deportees blindfolded so they don’t remember how to find America.

STEP 4 Immigrant’s name cross-checked with lists from Ellis Island.

STEP 5: Human rights violation.

STEP 6: Cabin crew offers voucher for anyone willing to give up seat and be deported on next flight.

STEP 7: Average wait time for a DoorDash order goes up by 12 minutes.

STEP 8:  Send immigrant post-deportation satisfaction survey to receive honest feedback.

The post How Deportation Works appeared first on The Onion.

A team of scientists claims to have discovered a new color that humans cannot see without the help of technology, with researchers saying they were able to “experience” the color, which they named “olo”, by firing laser pulses into their eyes. What do you think?

The post Scientists Discover New Color That Can Only Be Seen Using Laser appeared first on The Onion.

#RoninWarriors

So what are we going to do on the show today Cowboy Slim?
I think we're going to change hats right now. This is a cool hat.Alright, there we go. Ok, and ah ... Now ah ... I know! Let's change the name of the show!
Change the name of the show? We can't just change the name of the show! We'd have to change everything! We'd have to change the sign ... and the whole opening! #CowboyWho

A blackout brought much of Spain and Portugal to a standstill, halting subway and railway trains, cutting phone service, and shutting down traffic lights and ATMs for millions of people across the Iberian Peninsula. What do you think?

The post Major Power Outage Knocks Out Electricity For Spain, Portugal appeared first on The Onion.

Mark Wilson, writing for Fast Company:

Pope Francis’s tomb is simple by design. Francis — a modest man who opted to live in humble quarters alongside his peers rather than in the Vatican’s official housing for the leader of the church — requested nothing more than his name and a cross to adorn regional marble (“the stone of Liguria, the land of his grandparents”). Vatican News goes as far as to position this stone, not the most premium, as “the people’s stone.”

It really is quietly beautiful. But atop that marble is a tomb inscribed with the name “Franciscus.” Or what — due to terrible spacing between letters, known as kerning — reads something more like “F R A NCIS VS.”

Fast Company’s headline reads “The Kerning on the Pope’s Tomb Is a Travesty”, but travesty is not the right word. The right word is sin.