Determining the most influential pop-culture figure of the 20th century is probably a fool’s errand. But if you truly had to choose one, your best bet would be Louis Armstrong. He was one of the forefathers of modern jazz, shaping that art form as we know it today. The story of America, one of both resplendent hopefulness and inhuman oppression, was written in his bones—he turned the Star-Spangled Banner into a fractured anthem of pride and frustration long before Jimi Hendrix did. And to hear and see him—singing in his incomparably expressive purr, hitting one of his famously sweet high C’s on the trumpet, dishing the dirt with amiable savoir faire on a TV talk show—was to love him. Through a career spanning more than half a century, the world came to ador…
Meta Platforms Inc. is planning to begin layoffs that will affect thousands of workers from this week, Wall Street Journal reported, citing people with knowledge of the matter.
The job cuts could come as early as Wednesday, the newspaper said. The company has already told employees to cancel non-essential travel from this week, according to the report.
Meta shares rose 3.8% to $94.20 as trading got underway in New York on Monday. The stock has declined about 73% for the year through Friday.
Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg in September outlined plans to reorganize teams and reduce headcount for the first time, following a sharp slowdown in growth at the parent of Facebook and Instagram. Zuckerberg said then that Meta will likely be smaller in 2023 than it was th…
Silicon Valley Bank’s parent company filed for bankruptcy after worry spread among its long-established customer base of tech startups, prompting regulators to seize the firm’s banking unit.
SVB Financial Group listed assets and liabilities of as much as $10 billion each in a Chapter 11 petition filed in New York.
Because Silicon Valley Bank is a California-chartered commercial bank and part of the Federal Reserve system, it is not eligible for bankruptcy and landed in Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. receivership instead. Its parent company, however, is …
Peloton Interactive Inc. is seeking to sell a stake of about 20% as part of a push to turn around the embattled fitness company, according to a person familiar with the situation.
The hope is to find a big-name corporation or private equity firm that can help validate the business with its investment, said the person, who asked not to be identified because the deliberations are private. Peloton has been contacting potential buyers, the person said, though the process remains at any early stage.
Peloton, based in New York, declined to comment on the potential sale, which was previously reported by the Wall Street Journal.
U.S. labor officials are asking a federal court to force Starbucks Corp. to reinstate a group of activists, escalating the legal battle over the company’s response to the union campaign sweeping through its stores.In a filing Friday, the National Labor Relations Board’s Phoenix regional director sought an injunction requiring the coffee chain to bring back three employees who the agency alleged had illegally been fired, forced out, or placed on leave.Workers United, an affiliate of the Service Employees International Union that’s petitioning to represent staff at hundreds of Starbucks cafes, has filed dozens of allegations against the company with the labor board, most of which are still pending. The agency’s prosecutors have found merit in some of those claims, …
Target has stopped selling a children’s educational product celebrating Civil Rights history after a TikTok video, which has so far been viewed over 960,000 times, pointed out that some historical leaders were mislabeled.
In the TikTok posted earlier this week, U.S. history high school teacher Tierra Espy, who shares content under the handle @issatete, said she purchased the magnetic learning activity to give to her kids for Black History Month in the U.S. in February, but immediately noticed discrepancies.
She pointed out the names of three Civil Rights icons—Carter G. Woodson, W.E.B. DuBois and Booker T. Washington—did not match cartoon depictions of their photos that she found online.
For decades, multinational corporations—especially those based in the U.S.—have funneled billions of dollars in profits to tax havens, earning even more money for their shareholders.
That’s why a global agreement brokered in 2021 by the Organization for Economic Co-operations and Development (OECD) was a huge deal: it set a global minimum tax of 15% and included a few ways that countries could collect that tax even if tax havens and companies were not cooperating.
But corporations are already finding new ways to get around that agreement; a development that will end up reducing the amount of corporate taxes countries can collect by about half of what was originally expected—$135 billion annually instead of $270 billion, according to a report released by the E.U. Tax…
In about a week, one of the most significant shifts in crypto’s history will happen when the blockchain Ethereum completes a software update known as “the merge.”
The merge, which is tentatively scheduled for Sept. 15, will drastically reduce Ethereum’s energy usage, making it much more environmentally-friendly than Bitcoin. The merge could also have a slew of far-reaching effects, for better or worse: it could crash or turbocharge the price of Ether; spur mainstream adoption or reduce confidence in crypto; lessen some security risks, or exacerbate others. Here’s what a layperson should know about the transition.
Elon Musk is officially in charge of Twitter. Now, the biggest question on some people’s minds is whether Donald Trump will be allowed back on the platform. One clue that the ban won’t be imminently lifted: On Friday afternoon, Musk tweeted that he would be forming a “content moderation council with widely diverse viewpoints… No major content decisions or account reinstatements will happen before that council convenes.”
For his part, Trump has said that he would not return to Twitter even if the ban were lifted in favor of building up his own social media platform, TRUTH Social. On Friday, Trump reiterated his support for TRUTH Social in a post on the site in which he also expressed his satisfaction that “Twitter is now in sane hands.”
Samsung Electronics has decided to build an advanced U.S. chip plant in Texas, a win for the Biden administration as it prioritizes supply chain security and greater semiconductor capacity on American soil.
South Korea’s largest company has decided on the city of Taylor, roughly 30 miles from its existing giant manufacturing hub in Austin, a person familiar with the matter said. Samsung and Texas officials will announce the decision Tuesday afternoon, according to people familiar with the matter, asking not to be identified because the news hasn’t been made public. A Samsung representative said it hadn’t made a final decision and declined further comment.
Samsung is hoping to win more American clients and narrow the gap with Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturi…