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Wait, the President Said What?
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From porn to propaganda, artificial intelligence is making it harder to distinguish between the real and unreal
Imagine you’re an acclaimed author of sultry adult contemporary romance novels. Your latest book sits freshly packaged on your editor’s desk, and all you need now is a brilliant cover to bring in the hoards of housewives yearning for your salacious prose.
You could put out a casting notice for a 6-foot-4 heavily muscled, heavily tattooed, bearded man with a giant … heart, or you could literally design the man of your dreams with just a few clicks of a mouse.
AI-generated synthetic media or deepfakes is a rapidly expanding technology that both excites and terrifies. Because this is the AI issue of Luckbox, we’re...
Fake Financial News
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Oh, No, No, Ozempic
|Ever wonder how prescription drugs got such weird names? Well, the explanation feels weirder still. Cleaning my apartment with the TV on in the background, I’m caught up in a… -
The Pawn Trade
|Do rich people pawn stuff? California-based Ideal Luxury offers clients private consultations in an office that looks more like an Edward Jones than an EZ Loan. Orange County, California: Home… -
Forecasts for Farmers
|Long-range weather predictions have helped keep the Old Farmer’s Almanac in business for centuries. The editors must be doing something right. As I sit down to write in my lavishly… -
Rage Room Raves
|With midterms approaching, our reporter relives the rapture of expressing anger—and she didn’t have to clean up her mess In the words of the great philosopher Frederick Durst from the… -
Bitcoin’s Biggest Loser
|A Welsh systems engineer is dealing with the cost of regret after carelessly discarding crypto now worth $184 million What scares me about digital assets are the clickbait headlines screaming… -
Comedy 101: A Confidence Game
|It was love at first sight when I discovered improv To this day, I still remember the first time I ever saw an improv show. It was in the basement… -
Happy Glamper
|A longtime camper ditches her rustic tent for a more luxurious take on enjoying the outdoors -
EV Rider
|Harley-Davidson is finally producing bikes that environmentally conscious younger riders could love. But is it too late for another comeback? Any list of prominent companies that have been around more… -
It’s Not Easy Going Green
|Copious torque and a clear environmental conscience can’t compensate for Tesla’s painfully high price, mediocre interior appointments and that uneasy feeling called range anxiety “When this sucker hits 88 mph,… -
The Cult of Peloton
|Devotees made a stationary bike company rich—for a while Things about me: I’ve never read Harry Potter books, I haven’t watched one second of Succession and I’ve never had a… -
You’ll Never Believe How Luckbox’s Rockhound Got This Tattoo
|Americans spend an estimated $1.65 billion annually on tattoos. Here’s how $60 was spent. It’s not super rare in these days of pandemic-induced isolation to work with someone for 11… -
Cartoon Clairvoyance
|The Simpsons displays an uncanny ability to tap into the zeitgeist and a knack for predicting the future Methods of predicting the future include old-school toys like the mystifying Magic… -
Fix the CPI or Bust
|A new century dawned a long time ago. When will the Consumer Price Index catch up to the way we actually live? I have a framed print that I found… -
Dealing With My Data Issues
|Every action I took to protect my data took too long, cost money or wasn’t user-friendly to anyone born before 1981 My favorite tale of privacy involves a lot of… -
Crypto Riche
|1.7 million new millionaires and 56 new billionaires emerged in America in 2020.Here’s a glimpse of the crypto class. Aparody Twitter account called @justsaysinmice flags clickbait health articles with headlines… -
Gambling to a 1,925% Return
|A first-time gambler hits the road for one week of mobile wagering and a +37% return—annualized to 1,925% for this clickbait headline Working for a group of traders is sometimes… -
Black Mirror Bodega
|Amazon Go stores combine the ambiance of the inside of a vending machine with mundane sandwiches As consumers shift from conspicuous consumption to experiences, they’ll find a plethora of places… -
Fame, Fortune & Finance
|Starstruck by big-name athletes and entertainers, investors stock up on special-purpose acquisition company stocks We look to celebrities for lots of things: Which vitamins will give me lustrous hair, how… -
Not the “Billions” Carl Sagan Was Referring To
|Musk and Bezos square off in a lopsided showdown to determine who can build a bigger payload for phallic-shaped rockets Amazon sold another $100 billion worth of Scrub Daddies, fitted… -
There’s More Than One Way To Be Smart
|Nature, nurture and emotional intelligence If you’re a hiring manager, talent scout or just a woman who’s dating well into her 30s, you know that sharing, interpreting and regulating emotions…