Month: February 2024

He’s Lost His Marriage, His Followers and His Lamborghini

He’s Lost His Marriage, His Followers and His Lamborghini

With its streamlined curves and glow-in-the-dark sound system, the silver Lamborghini Huracán Performante was the stuff of teenage fantasy: $350,000 of aerodynamic metals and lightweight upholstery, packed into a taut and powerful body. Ben Armstrong loved it dearly.When he started shopping for a Lamborghini, Mr. Armstrong, a cryptocurrency evangelist with more than one million YouTube subscribers, worried that he’d have to spend months searching. “I think I have to go to Italy to get the Lambo I want,” he texted a business partner. “I don’t want to compromise.” But fate smiled on him. In the fall of 2021, a car…
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Anxiety, Mood Swings and Sleepless Nights: Life Near a Bitcoin Mine

Anxiety, Mood Swings and Sleepless Nights: Life Near a Bitcoin Mine

On a sweltering July evening, the din from thousands of computers mining for Bitcoins pierced the night. Nearby, Matt Brown, a member of the Arkansas legislature, monitored the noise alongside a local magistrate.As the two men investigated complaints about the operation, Mr. Brown said, a security guard for the mine loaded rounds into an AR-15-style assault rifle that had been stored in a car.“He wanted to make sure that we knew he had his gun — that we knew it was loaded,” Mr. Brown, a Republican, said in an interview.The Bitcoin outfit here, 45 minutes north of Little Rock, is…
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Malaysia Halves Sentence of Najib Razak, Fallen Ex-Prime Minister

Malaysia Halves Sentence of Najib Razak, Fallen Ex-Prime Minister

The authorities in Malaysia have halved the sentence of Najib Razak, a former prime minister convicted of stealing millions of dollars from a government fund, a move that has triggered outrage in the country.The leniency for Mr. Najib comes after weeks of speculation in Malaysia that he might be pardoned by King Sultan Abdullah, whose tenure under Malaysia’s unique rotational monarchy ended on Tuesday. But many analysts had said it was unlikely that Mr. Najib, who has served only 17 months of his term, would receive any form of clemency because he is still facing three continuing criminal cases related…
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6 Reasons That It’s Hard to Get Your Wegovy and Other Weight-Loss Prescriptions

6 Reasons That It’s Hard to Get Your Wegovy and Other Weight-Loss Prescriptions

About 3.8 million people in the United States — four times the number two years ago — are now taking the most popular weight-loss drugs, according to the IQVIA Institute for Human Data Science, an industry data provider.Some of these prescriptions are for diabetes. The medicines are Novo Nordisk’s Ozempic and Wegovy (the same drug sold under different brand names), and Eli Lilly’s Mounjaro and Zepbound (also the same drug).Pent-up demand is even higher, because many people who want the drugs cannot find or afford them. Without insurance coverage, people have to pay out of their own pockets. If they…
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Hey NBA, Knicks’ Jalen Brunson is damn good and proving the naysayers wrong

Hey NBA, Knicks’ Jalen Brunson is damn good and proving the naysayers wrong

After yet another disappointing, early-season loss, Jalen Brunson stood at his locker, ready to speak with the media in Milwaukee.As the point guard turned around, straight-faced as usual following the Knicks’ fourth defeat in six games, he donned a homemade T-shirt, all black and with white lettering on it, that appeared as if it were straight off the Vistaprint presses.Across Brunson’s chest read a familiar idiom: The magic is in the work.“This is a Sandra Brunson production,” Brunson said, referencing his mother, who stamped the family’s longtime motto onto the crewneck. Of course, “The magic is in the work” is…
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How to Quit Your Smartphone

How to Quit Your Smartphone

Last May, Fabuwood, a kitchen cabinet manufacturer in Newark, instituted a new company policy: No phones allowed during meetings.To enforce it, the company installed “device shelves” outside each of its six glass-walled conference rooms. On a recent Wednesday morning, there were animated meetings in three of the conference rooms, and the shelves outside were full of smartphones, tablets and ’90s-style flip phones. The 1,200-person company pays the cost of a flip phone for employees who give up their smartphone, and 80 people have acted on the offer.Surprisingly, employees say they like it. Rena Stoff, a project manager, said that while…
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