These Guys Can Kick-Start any Side Hustle

Two side-hustle gurus side hustled their way into the full-time side-hustle business. Chris Guillebeau began by blogging part-time about money-making sidelines for travelers, and Nick Loper started with a part-time comparison-shopping website for shoes. After those humble beginnings, both went on to learn the nuances of side hustles and then began sharing that wisdom. Now, … Continued

Futurism’s Fat Tails

Confronting the grim but reasonable probability that humankind has only a limited future Author and mathematician Nicholas Taleb popularized the phrase “fat tail” in his seminal book The Black Swan. When a bell curve has a fat tail, there’s a greater likelihood of having a difficult-to-predict event like 1987’s Black Monday, the burst of the … Continued

The Great Hack

Technology’s shocking invasion of privacy gained momentum in the early 1970s when supermarkets began installing closed circuit television cameras to monitor the aisles for shoplifting. Not many customers complained, and management seemed indifferent to the philosophical implications. So from there, tech’s invasive powers continued to grow. By the mid-1980s, supermarket chains were compiling vast stores … Continued

Managing the Menace of Internet Powerhouses

A diverse panel plumbs the excesses of Google, Amazon and Facebook The ravenous rulers of the internet aren’t satiated by the tasty data that innocent users willingly feed them. They augment that information with the voluminous intelligence bought and sold by financial institutions, healthcare providers, location trackers and just about any other imaginable entity that … Continued

Amazon’s Fires

The tech behemoth is taking a lot of heat. Here’s a contrarian analyst’s perspective. Amazon (AMZN) has had a tumultuous year. The stock traded as low as $1,500 the first week of January before breaking the $2,000 level in July and settling back into the $1,700s. The company’s top managers, like many other Americans, are … Continued

This CBD Manufacturer Welcomes Oversight but with a Caveat

Regulators should not limit the public’s access to the THC-free cannabinoid, a CBD entrepreneur says  Federal regulation could ensure the purity, potency and effectiveness of CBD products while curbing the industry’s unfounded medical claims, overzealous marketing and false advertising. But regulators should stop short of imposing requirements that limit the public’s access to the relaxing … Continued

Regulation, please! An advocacy group’s unique perspective

As in any unregulated but promising market, some unscrupulous CBD merchants are making false claims and selling substandard products Seeking someone who understands CBD and can talk about it objectively, luckbox contacted Paul Armentano, deputy director of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML) and the NORML Foundation in Washington. Armentano has … Continued

The Next Generation of Gamers

The old guard of pro gamers (the 20-somethings) have enjoyed big paydays, but a crop of young talent is rising up behind them The timing must have been right for the High School Esports League. In a few short years it’s grown into a national movement with 50,000 players in clubs at more than 1,800 … Continued

Young Money

With esports prize pools in the millions, where does the money flow? Meet a past and present pro This Med Student spent his gap year as an esports pro After devoting a gap year between high school and college to playing StarCraft II professionally, Conan “Suppy” Liu, aka “Superiorwolf,” went back to the books, completing a … Continued

LOVE DEATH + ROBOTS

Some of the 18 short animated films in a new Netflix series called Love Death + Robots end with unexpected twists—like latter-day episodes of the venerable Twilight Zone shows. But the new adult-oriented anthology beats the old one for weirdness. Part of the enhanced bizarreness on LDR probably accrues from Hollywood’s additional decades of working … Continued