Author: openjargon

• The Regeneron ISEF is a huge science fair that attracts top talent from all over the world.
• This year, the competition awarded $9 million in prizes. It has a history of prestigious winners.
• That can make for a stressful competition, but parents shouldn't add to it, CEO Maya Ajmera said.

What's been called the "granddaddy" of science fairs took place last week.

With over $9 million in prizes and heaps of prestige, the Regeneron International Science and Engineering Fair (ISEF) attracts some of the best and brightest students from around the world, like Hawaii and California as well as Kildare, Ireland and Shanghai, China.

Past winners include Nobel Prize recipients, Rhodes Scholars, and MacArthur Foundation genius grant awardees.

With that kind of money and acclaim on the line, it's not surprising that the atmosphere surrounding the competition is intense.

"I think a lot of kids who are here actually — I don't think I'm reading it wrong — are truly excited to be here," said Maya Ajmera, the president and CEO of the Society for Science, which coordinates ISEF. "But they also feel the pressure of wanting to win and the pressure of going to college," she told Business Insider last week.

The biggest mistake that parents with ambitious, curious kids can make is adding to that pressure, she said.

Besides, between addictive social media, the climate crisis, growing up during the pandemic, and feeling lonelier than ever, Gen Z already has more than enough sources of anxiety.

Stepping back and letting the kids do the work

While it can be useful to have a parent invested in helping their kid meet deadlines and make a nice-looking poster, some adults take it too far. Ajmera advises parents to "stand back and let your kid do it."

"Get out of their way," she said, "and don't pressure them too much."

If competing at ISEF is any indication of success, then Ajmera's advice certainly seems to work. Parents of ISEF competitors who spoke with Business Insider shared her philosophy.

"We never pressure them," Maria Estrada, whose two children have both competed and won awards at ISEF, told Business Insider. Estrada said she's never expected her children to have 5.0 GPAs, and that she's even asked her daughter to slow down and be a kid.

"I accepted my kids for who they are," she added. "I think it's important for parents to know their kids' abilities."

Another parent, Alexa Groff, has a daughter, Taylor, who competes in science fairs and is a competitive dancer. She said that a friend recently told her she'd expected Groff to be an intense "dance mom" who showed up early to everything.

In reality, the friend told her she was "super-duper chill."

"I think it's important for Taylor to explore her passions without my hand in it," Groff said. When her daughter wanted to quit volleyball, for example, she said she let it happen and supported the decision."I want her to figure things out on her own, but know that I'm there for whatever she needs me for," Groff said.

Combining passion and hard work to solve problems

As part of the ISEF competition, nearly 2,000 students from 49 states and 70 countries gathered in Los Angeles to showcase their research to judges. ISEF pulls the finalists from 400 smaller science fairs from around the world, taking the winners from a pool of 175,000 competitors.

While not typically at the same level as peer-reviewed scientific research, ISEF students' topics can be as sophisticated as microbial genetics, bone tumors, and microplastic filtration.

Far from overly involving themselves, parents are often surprised at what their children accomplish with their projects. "They're kind of amazed, actually," Ajmera said.

Students are often inspired to pursue these difficult subjects because of real-world issues and not by their parents' insistence to compete, Ajmera said.

"A lot of kids have their own personal stories to share of something that's affected their families or their communities, and they want to go in and solve it," Ajmera said of the Gen Z competitors.

For example, 18-year-old Maddux Alexander Springer received this year's $10,000 Peggy Scripps Award for Science Communication for his studies on a tumor-causing disease in green sea turtles near his home in Hawaii.

That kind of interest and enthusiasm can carry a student far, which is important since most winning projects are often complex and time-consuming.

For example, 16-year-old Grace Sun won this year's top prize, the $75,000 George D. Yancopoulos Innovator Award, for her project on organic electronic devices. Sun told Business Insider she had to miss hours of school to work in a university lab for her project.

For some kids, though, it's all worth it because the time and effort are investments in what they hope will be their future careers.

"A lot of these kids are going to either land in academia doing research, or they're going to be entrepreneurs and start new companies on the new cutting-edge technologies," Ajmera said.

• Vivek Ramaswamy ran a failed campaign for the Republican presidential nomination.
• Now he owns 7.7% of BuzzFeed, the struggling digital media publisher.
• What's going on? We don't know. So we're guessing here.

Why is Vivek Ramaswamy buying up shares of BuzzFeed?

Let's start by stating the obvious: It is very funny to type the sentence "Why is Vivek Ramaswamy buying up shares of BuzzFeed?"

Ramaswamy, as you may recall, was a fringe candidate in the most recent Republican presidential primary, where his platform consisted of praising Donald Trump and promising to "Take America First further than Trump." He dropped out of the race in January, after spending a reported $30 million of his own money on the campaign and coming in fourth in the Iowa caucuses.

And BuzzFeed is BuzzFeed — the cheeky digital publisher that sprouted up alongside Facebook and, at one point, seemed poised to become the future of media. At its peak, it sported a valuation of nearly $2 billion and had a knack for commanding the attention of millennials, advertisers, and old media giants like The New York Times, which worried that BuzzFeed would displace it.

By the time BuzzFeed went public in 2021, however, almost all of the air had left the digital publishing bubble. Since then BuzzFeed has gone through multiple layoff rounds, unwound a big M&A deal that was the supposed reason for its IPO in the first place, and its stock sank so low it risked getting kicked off the Nasdaq.

And now Ramaswamy has bought up 7.7% of BuzzFeed — for a little less than $4 million — and announced that he will be an activist investor — someone who thinks the company's shares are undervalued and that he can convince BuzzFeed's management to make changes that will make the shares worth more.

One issue complicating any of Ramaswamy's plans is that BuzzFeed founder and CEO Jonah Peretti controls the company, even though he owns a minority of its shares, due to a dual-class stock structure.

But that doesn't mean Peretti is immune to shareholder pressure. Just this month, he announced a new plan that ties his compensation to the company's stock performance in an attempt to convince investors that he's really serious about turning things around.

So, again: What's Ramaswamy's actual plan?

Ramaswamy has yet to talk to BuzzFeed's board or management, says a person familiar with the company. And neither BuzzFeed nor Ramaswamy has responded to requests for comment, so we're just going to have to guess here. A few theories from the peanut gallery:

• It's the money! This is the most obvious answer because it's why any activist shareholder invests in a company. They may say they have better strategy, or that management is incompetent, or whatever. What they really want is for shares in the company to be worth more than what they paid for them, and it doesn't really matter how they get there.
• It's the clicks! Ramaswamy likes attention — he spent $30 million of his own money getting himself onto the national stage last year. So why not spend a few million more and buy his very own media platform? BuzzFeed no longer commands the same kind of media spotlight it used to, but it's still pretty big and includes not just BuzzFeed.com, but also The Huffington Post as well as First We Feast — better known as the company that makes the "Hot Ones" viral chicken wing/celebrity interview show. ("Viral chicken wing/celebrity interview show" is also fun to type.)

• It's a troll! $4 million is a lot for a practical joke, but Ramaswamy (apparently) has cash to burn. Maybe he's getting a kick out of the idea that a Trump-loving Republican can cause chaos at a media company famous for publishing the infamous Trump "dossier".
• It's the wings! Again: BuzzFeed owns Hot Ones, the show that most recently helped Conan O'Brien take over the internet again. And again: Ramaswamy likes attention. There are probably cheaper ways to secure a booking with Sean Evans. But this could speed things up.

• Nicole Shanahan reportedly received over $1 billion from her divorce from Google founder Sergey Brin.
• Brin, one of the wealthiest persons in the world, is worth over $139.5 billion.
• Shanahan has used her wealth to buck up RFK Jr.'s long-shot presidential campaign.

Attorney Nicole Shanahan, Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s running mate, has a staggering wealth that would make her one of the wealthiest vice presidents in history if their long shot campaign were successful this November.

According to The New York Times, Shanahan's largess is largely due to her divorce settlement with Google founder Sergey Brin. Shanahan received more than $1 billion from the divorce, three people with knowledge of her finances told The Times. Brin, one of the wealthiest people in the world, is worth an estimated $139.5 billion, according to Forbes.

Forbes previously estimated in March that Shanahan received roughly $390 million in Alphabet shares from Brin based on the then-estimated value of shares that were likely transferred to her. Their divorce records are not public. Forbes tried to piece together what Shanahan may have received from her husband of three years based on Brin's public disclosures about his stake in Alphabet.

The Wall Street Journal reported last year on rumors that Shanahan had an affair with Tesla CEO Elon Musk, a claim both have denied. The Times, citing three sources, reported that the affair happened after both of them took ketamine at a Miami party in late 2021 and that she told Brin about it.

Brin and Shanahan reportedly separated weeks later, and Brin filed for divorce in early 2022.

Shanahan has used her wealth to help Kennedy's campaign, donating $10 million to a pro-Kennedy super PAC. Her $2 million donation helped the group, American Values 2024, secure a Super Bowl ad that compared Kennedy to his father, RFK, and his presidential uncle, JFK. Other Kennedys did not appreciate his allies blatantly using the family's image to boost his campaign.

Kennedy, according to The Times, initially eyed Jets Quarterback Aaron Rodgers and former Minnesota Gov. Jesse Ventura before settling on Shanahan as his running mate. Former Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard has also claimed to have had conversations with Kennedy about being his vice president but has said to shift her focus to trying to join former President Donald Trump's ticket.

Rodgers told reporters on Tuesday that he wasn't quite ready to retire from the NFL to enter politics.

"I love Bobby," Rodgers said. "We had a couple of really nice conversations. But there were really two options: It was retire and be his VP or keep playing."

Kennedy's largest focus at the moment is trying to make next month's debate between President Joe Biden and Trump. The unprecedented early debate does offer him a narrow path to get on the stage, but it's unclear if he can meet both the polling and ballot access thresholds in time. A third-party presidential candidate hasn't debated alongside the two major nominees since Texas businessman Ross Perot in 1992.

• American Airlines is facing backlash for blaming a 9-year-old girl in a hidden camera lawsuit.
• The airline's defense claimed the girl should have seen the phone filming her in the bathroom, court document show.
• Lawyers amended the court record after criticism; American Airlines says it does not blame the child.

American Airlines is facing backlash after saying that a 9-year-old girl should have seen the cellphone filming her in the bathroom in its initial lawsuit defense.

Paul Llewellyn, an attorney for the girl's family, told Business Insider that the airline placing blame on the 9-year-old was "shocking." Llewellyn is representing several families who claim Estes Carter Thompson filmed their children on American Airlines flights in separate civil lawsuits against the airline.

Lawyers for the airline amended the court record to remove the claims of fault placed on the girl.

Thompson, a former flight attendant for the airline, is also facing federal charges of attempted sexual exploitation of children and possession of images of child sexual abuse.

Federal authorities charged Thompson after police say he taped his phone to a toilet seat during a flight from Charlotte, North Carolina, to Boston to film a 14-year-old girl in September 2023. Thompson pleaded not guilty on Monday.

Llewellyn is representing that girl's family in a civil lawsuit against the airline. The lawsuit alleged Thompson used "psychological tricks" to make her think the filming wasn't strange. He is also representing the family of a 9-year-old girl, who says Thompson filmed her in the bathroom during a flight from Texas to Los Angeles in January 2023.

The family of the 9-year-old became aware of the incident after FBI agents informed them that images of their child were found on Thompson's iCloud account, according to the lawsuit.

In a response to the family's complaint, lawyers for America Airlines denied negligence on the part of the airline, claiming that the girl "knew or should have known" that the bathroom was "compromised" because it "contained a visible and illuminated recording device."

The 9-year-old girl's mother said in a statement that the family was both "shocked and angered" by the defense.

"How in good conscience could they even make such a suggestion?" the family said. "American Airlines has no shame."

American Airlines told Business Insider in a statement that it does "not believe this child is at fault, and we take the allegations involving a former team member very seriously."

"Our outside legal counsel retained with our insurance company made an error in this filing," American said in the statement. "The included defense is not representative of our airline and we have directed it be amended this morning."

Llewellyn said that the airline's defense is "not credible" and that "the bell can't be unrung."

"They should never have taken such a position in the first," Llewellyn said.

• Nicole Shanahan took ketamine with Elon Musk and had a sexual encounter in 2021, NYT reported, citing multiple sources.
• Shanahan, a lawyer and RFK Jr.'s running mate, was married to Brin from 2018 to 2023.
• Shanahan and Musk both previously denied having an affair. 

Nicole Shanahan took ketamine with Elon Musk at a private party in 2021 and later told her husband at the time, Google cofounder Sergey Brin, that she had sex with the Tesla CEO, The New York Times reported, citing multiple sources.

The New York Times published an article on Wednesday about Shanahan, a lawyer campaigning as Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s running mate for the 2024 presidential election.

The article discussed details of her relationship with Brin, whom she married in 2018 before the pair finalized their divorce in May 2023, and sheds new light on a past allegation that she had an affair with Musk in 2021, which both Shanahan and Musk have denied.

During Shanahan's marriage to Brin, the Times reported that Shanahan partied with Silicon Valley's upper echelon and engaged in recreational drug use that included ketamine and cocaine, citing eight sources as well as documents the publication viewed. Ketamine is a "dissociative anesthetic" that can have some hallucinogenic effects, according to The Drug Enforcement Administration. Ketamine can be legally prescribed under federal law and recent research indicates it could be used to treat depression, but it's also a popular party drug.

Stressors like the COVID-19 pandemic and their daughter's autism diagnosis began weighing on the former couple's marriage, prompting Shanahan to start going out and attending events without Brin, according to the report.

"At a party in early 2021 in Miami, Ms. Shanahan was so intoxicated by drugs and alcohol that she required an IV infusion," the outlet reported.

Three sources told the Times that Shanahan and Musk had an affair in December 2021 during a private party in Miami. They both took ketamine and "disappeared together for several hours," the Times reported, citing four people who had been briefed on the matter and related documents.

Musk said in March 2024 that he takes a "small amount" of ketamine weekly and that he has a prescription.

"Ms. Shanahan later told Mr. Brin that she had had sex with Mr. Musk, three of the people said. She also relayed the details to friends, family and advisers," the Times reported.

Brin filed for divorce from Shanahan one month later in January 2022, citing "irreconcilable differences."

Representatives for Shanahan, Musk, and Brin did not immediately respond to Business Insider's request for comment ahead of publication.

The Wall Street Journal first reported in July 2022 that an "alleged affair" between Shanahan and Musk had created a rift between the Tesla CEO and Brin, whom many considered to have a close and amicable friendship.

Musk denied the affair with Shanahan that July, calling the WSJ report "total bs" in an X post. At the time, Musk's relationship with singer Grimes, with whom he shares three children, had ended.

"This is total bs. Sergey and I are friends and were at a party together last night!" Musk wrote. "I've only seen Nicole twice in three years, both times with many other people around. Nothing romantic."

He added in another post: "Haven't even had sex in ages (sigh)."

Musk also posted a photo of himself with Brin, which he said had been taken at the party the previous day (his biographer Walter Isaacson later said that Brin had "tried to avoid" the selfie).

"We are confident in our sourcing, and we stand by our reporting," The Wall Street Journal said in a statement at the time.

Shanahan also denied any affair, telling People that the speculation was "utterly debilitating."

"To be known because of a sexual act is one of the most humiliating things . . . it was utterly debilitating," she told the outlet. "I remember feeling like everything I had ever worked for was under siege by a press cycle that had no idea what was going on in my life and who I was."

In response to questions from a The New York Times reporter, Shanahan said she was "shocked the NYT is letting you run something like this."

• The US Air Force just released more photos of the B-21 Raider, its newest stealth bomber.
• The long-range aircraft is working through flight testing in California. 
• Pentagon leadership has said it will form the "backbone" of America's future bomber fleet.

The US Air Force on Wednesday published more photos of its newest stealth bomber, the B-21 Raider, as the penetrating strike aircraft continues to work through flight testing.

The photos, captured in January and April, show the sleek-looking new bomber in the middle of its testing — consisting of ground testing, taxiing, and flight operations — at California's Edwards Air Force Base. The new images come as the long-range aircraft inches closer to entering service later this decade.

Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for Acquisition, Technology, and Logistics Andrew Hunter said earlier this month that the B-21's flight test program is "proceeding well" and is on schedule to meet timelines and delivery schedules.

"It is doing what flight test programs are designed to do, which is helping us learn about the unique characteristics of this platform, but in a very, very effective way," Hunter said during testimony to the Senate Armed Services Committee on May 8.

The B-21 is the US military's first strategic bomber in more than 30 years. Development began in 2015, and the Pentagon unveiled the Raider to the public in December 2022. Nearly a year later, in November 2023, the aircraft finally embarked on its much-anticipated first flight. Following the success of ground and flight tests, it was cleared to enter low-rate initial production.

The US Air Force Rapid Capabilities Office manages the acquisition program with a strategy of building test bombers "as production-representative as possible," the 412th Test Wing said in a Wednesday statement.

"Rather than a traditional flight prototype approach, B-21 test aircraft are built including mission systems using the same manufacturing processes and tooling for production aircraft," the Wing said, adding that "this approach in development laid the groundwork for production to start more quickly."

The B-21 is expected to enter service in the latter half of the decade. The military has a goal of producing at least 100 of these aircraft. The Raider, US officials say, is slated to incrementally replace the B-1B Lancer and B-2 Spirit bombers.

Pentagon leadership has stressed that the B-21 will form the "backbone" of America's future bomber fleet. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin has praised the aircraft's stealth capabilities, saying that decades of advances in low-observable technology have gone into the bomber's development.

"Even the most sophisticated air-defense systems will struggle to detect a B-21 in the sky," Austin said at the aircraft's unveiling.

Northrop Grumman, which manufactures the bomber, has touted the plane as the "world's first sixth-generation aircraft." It can be armed with standoff and direct-attack munitions and will be able to conduct both conventional and nuclear strikes.