He built landmark New York hotels like the Astoria Hotel and the St. Regis.
Astor's wife, who was 30 years younger than him, was pregnant aboard the Titanic and survived.
John Jacob Astor IV was one of the wealthiest people in the world when he perished in the Titanic sinking.
His life was marked by amazing innovations and wealth, but scandal as well. Astor's wife, who was 30 years younger than him when they married, was pregnant aboard the Titanic and survived. Astor reportedly planned to make their child his heir, but his fortune ended up being left to Vincent Astor, his son from his first marriage.
Here's a look at the life of John Jacob Astor IV, one of the most famous Titanic victims.
John Jacob Astor IV was born on July 13, 1864, in New York into one of the most affluent families in the world.
The first John Jacob Astor.
Stock Montage/ Getty
The Astor family dates back to the early 1700s when the original John Jacob Astor (pictured) came to the Americas from a small village in Germany to make a name for himself. According to Biography, he started making money in the fur-trading businesses, but his real fortune began when he entered the world of real estate.
One of his first big purchases was a plot of land in the middle of Manhattan, modern-day Times Square. Quickly, Astor bought land all around Manhattan, becoming one of the richest men in the world and creating a dynasty.
When John Jacob Astor IV was born to William Astor and Caroline Webster Schermerhorn in 1864, the Astor name was already well-respected in high society, and the family's fortune was one of the world's largest.
As an heir to the family fortune, John Jacob Astor IV received an education at the finest schools in the US.
John Jacob Astor IV in 1890.
Bettmann/ Getty
According to the New Netherland Institute, he first attended St. Paul's School in Concord and then went on to Harvard University, but there is no official record of him graduating from the college. After schooling, Astor went abroad for a few years before returning to New York to take up the family business: real estate.
In 1897, Astor used his fortune to build the Astoria Hotel in New York.
Waldorf Astoria Hotel in 1907.
ullstein bild Dtl./ Getty
In 1893, William Waldorf Astor built the Waldorf Hotel on the corner of Fifth Avenue and 33rd Street. Reportedly, he built the hotel to spite his cousin, John Jacob Astor IV. In retaliation, Astor built a competing hotel in 1897 on the adjacent corner and named it the Astoria Hotel.
When the cousins were finally convinced that joining both hotels would be a smart business decision, a 300-foot marble corridor was built between them, according to Architectural Digest. The famous Waldorf-Astoria Hotel was born.
For the next few decades, the hotel became a symbol of luxury, wealth, and class in New York. It was considered one of the best hotels in the country and even in the world.
The Waldorf-Astoria Hotel closed in 1928 and was demolished, making room for the Empire State Building. The new Waldorf-Astoria Hotel was built farther uptown in 1931, long after Astor's death.
Astor also built another New York landmark hotel: the St. Regis.
The St. Regis.
Bettmann/ Getty
In 1904, Astor opened the St. Regis Hotel, which The New York Times called "the finest hotel in America" at the time.
According to the St. Regis Hotel, Astor aimed to make the hotel technologically advanced and ensured that each room had a telephone, making the hotel's rooms as practical as they were glamorous. Some historians call the hotel Astor's "greatest achievement," according to Biography.
While developing some of New York's finest hotels, Astor still had time for his hobbies, like writing.
"Journey in Other Worlds."
Amazon
In 1894, Astor published his first and only science-fiction novel, "Journey in Other Worlds."
"A 'Journey in Other Worlds' races far ahead of the nineteenth century to imagine what life would be like in the year 2000," the Amazon synopsis reads. "At the beginning of the twenty-first century, Earth is effectively a corporate technocracy, with big businesses using incredible advances in science to improve life on the planet as a whole. Seeking other planets habitable for the growing human population, the spaceship Callisto, powered by an antigravitational force known as apergy, embarks on a momentous tour of the solar system."
Astor was also an accomplished inventor.
John Jacob Astor IV.
Library of Congress/ Getty
In 1898, he patented a brake for the bicycle, invented a vibratory disintegrator, and created a pneumatic road-improver. He also helped invent a turbine engine.
Astor married Ava Lowle Willing in 1891, but they divorced in 1909.
Ava Lowle Willing.
Universal History Archive/ Getty
Ava Lowle Willing and Astor had two children together, Vincent and Alice.
Although they seemed like the perfect, upper-class family, the marriage was largely unhappy. The couple got divorced in 1909, setting Astor up for one of the family's biggest scandals.
At 47 years old, Astor met Madeleine Talmage Force, who was 18.
John Jacob Astor IV and Madeleine Talmage Force.
George Rinhart/Corbis/Getty Images
When Astor and Madeleine Talmage Force married in 1911, it became a scandal — at the time, divorce was rare and remarrying was even more so.
"His little wifey there Madeleine is my age and in delicate condition. See how she's trying to hide it? Quite the scandal," she says.
When Madeleine fell pregnant in 1912, they decided to return to New York from Europe. Astor booked them a room on the Titanic.
John Jacob Astor IV.
Bettmann/ Getty
At the time, Astor was one of the world's richest men, and he certainly was the wealthiest aboard the Titanic.
He had a fortune worth somewhere between $90 and $150 million, CNBC reported, when he boarded the fateful ship. Today, he would be worth between $2.9 and $4.8 billion when adjusted for inflation.
After the Titanic hit an iceberg on April 14, 1912, Astor calmly brought his wife, Madeleine, to the second-to-last lifeboat.
The Titanic.
AP
According to Biography, Astor was among the first few people who knew the ship was sinking.
He woke his sleeping, pregnant wife and told her to get dressed in her warmest clothes. He then put all of the couple's jewelry on her, took her to the deck, and placed her in a lifeboat.
She clung to her husband and wanted to stay with him, but he reportedly said, "The sea is calm. You'll be alright. You're in good hands. I'll see you in the morning."
The New York Times reported that Astor was last seen smoking a cigarette on the deck. He was wearing a dinner suit and holding a personalized pocket watch.
Nearly two weeks after the Titanic sank, The New York Times reported that Astor's body had been recovered by a search team from Halifax, Canada.
A grave at the Fairview Lawn cemetery in Halifax, Canada, where 121 Titanic victims are buried. Astor's body was sent back to New York.
AP Photo/Lefteris Pitarakis
Astor was among the 306 bodies found by the crew of the Mackay-Bennett in the weeks after the tragedy, according to the Nova Scotia Archives, but only one of 59 bodies that were claimed by victims' relatives and returned home.
He was reportedly identified by the initials sewn into his jacket. His pocket also contained a solid gold watch engraved with the initials JJA, according to The New York Times.
Many of the Titanic's victims were buried in a cemetery (pictured) in Halifax, but Astor's son, Vincent, traveled there to claim his father's body and bring it home to New York.
Astor's wife, Madeleine, survived the shipwreck and gave birth to their son, naming him John Jacob. But most of his fortune went to his son from his first marriage, Vincent.
John Jacob Astor's first son, Vincent.
Library of Congress/ Getty
If Astor made it to the US, it's reported that he would have made his and Madeleine's unborn child the heir to his fortune, according to Biography. However, most of his money went to his first son, Vincent (pictured), from his first marriage.
John Jacob Astor VI received only a small portion of his father's fortune, but Vincent went on to donate a large sum of his father's money and became a philanthropist in New York City.
John Jacob Astor IV's legacy has lasted long after his death.
Eric Braeden as John Jacob Astor IV.
Paramount Pictures
As the most famous person to die in the tragedy, Astor's name and reputation have survived through the years.
In fact, he has been portrayed in a number of TV shows and movies. Most notably, Eric Braeden played Astor in "Titanic."
MosaicML Co-founder Naveen Rao and Databricks CEO Ali Ghodsi speaking to journalist Eric Newcomer at the Cerebral Valley AI Summit
Darius Rafieyan/Business Insider
The conference is a gathering place for influential investors and founders across generative AI.
The 2023 conference in San Francisco became famous for producing one of the biggest AI deals.
Cerebral Valley New York will be Newcomer's first east coast event.
The Cerebral Valley AI Summit, the generative AI conference created by tech journalist Eric Newcomer and AI startup Volley, will be hosting its first New York event on June 27th. Cerebral Valley New York as the event is being called, will bring together investors and founders for a one day conference to discuss the future of this booming industry.
The original Cerebral Valley Summit, held in the Hayes Valley neighborhood of San Francisco in 2023, made headlines for producing one of the largest generative AI acquisitions ever and effectively firing the starting gun on the AI arms race. Now Newcomer tells Business Insider he thinks the time is right for an eastward expansion.
"I definitely think San Francisco is the heart of the generative AI world," he said, "but I live in New York, I believe in the New York tech ecosystem."
He says Cerebral Valley will continue to host its San Francisco-based conference but with Cerebral Valley New York, the hope is to attract New York financial muscle as well as more attendees from Europe, which now boasts major AI research labs from both Google and Meta, as well as the headquarters of OpenAI rival Mistral.
"We're trying to bring together the actual people making the news and so if you're in the middle of AI, this is where it is, so that's where you should be," he said.
Newcomer anticipates that the conference will be dominated by questions of what AI investing looks like beyond foundation models, who's going to crack the killer app for generative AI, and what's in store for the 800 pound gorilla in the room.
"I think there'll be a lot of reckoning around OpenAI's position," Newcomer said. At the last Cerebral Valley Summit in November, 2023, it was a given that OpenAI had already won the AI battle. Just two days late of course, CEO Sam Altman would be out of a job and the company's future looked uncertain.
Today with Altman back at the helm OpenAI continues to outpace competitors in LLM research, and the company will likely be top of mind for most of the attendees at the conference.
Cerebral Valley will be announcing this year's lineup of speakers over the coming weeks. Past speakers have included Databricks CEO Ali Ghodsi, legendary investors such as Reid Hoffman and Vinod Khosla, and Anthropic co-founder Daniela Amodei.
At the very first Cerebral Valley AI Summit, Newcomer half-jokingly challenged someone to raise $100 million at the conference. What he got instead was the $1.3 billion acquisition by Databricks of MosaicML, negotiated over dinner at the summit.
"Clearly I thought too small," said Newcomer, who hopes to outdo himself this year. "I'm cheering for a multi-billion dollar deal now, and you know the activity level could certainly justify it," he said.
Ballistic missiles fired at al-Asad Air Base where the US soldiers are located in the Anbar province of Iraq displayed at Imam Khomeini Mosalla in Tehran, Iran on January 07, 2022
Fatemeh Bahrami/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images
Despite the failed attack on Israel, experts warn of Iran's potential for a more effective strike.
Iran's retaliatory attack consisted of over 300 missiles and drones.
Analysts say that Iran's strategy mirrors Russian tactics in Ukraine.
Israel thwarted Iran's retaliatory missile attack, but experts said Iran can use this loss to learn and plan a more effective strike. Israel and its allies can't afford to get complacent they say.
"The attack probably helped Iran identify the relative strengths and the weaknesses of the Israeli air defense system," analysts at the Washington-based Institute for the Study of War said in an April 14 report.
ISW analysts Brian Carter and Frederick Kagan argued that "the Iranians will learn lessons from this strike and work to improve their abilities to penetrate Israeli defenses over time as the Russians have done in repeated strike series against Ukraine."
On April 13, Iran launched a barrage of roughly 150 missiles and 170 drones at Israel in response to Israel's attack on an Iranian consulate building in Syria earlier this month that killed several officials, escalating a years-long shadow war.
Iran's missiles and drones were overwhelminglyintercepted by Israel, its neighboring countries and allied forces, however, experts say this attack could offer Iran lessons for its next big hit.
While many of Iran's missiles and drones were intercepted, the number of weapons that were able to break through Israel's defenses is notable enough for concern. In the future, if Iran learns from its wins and losses in this exchange, these weapons "could cause significant civilian casualties and damage to civilian infrastructure, including ports and energy."
"Russian strikes on Ukraine have demonstrated that even a small number of precise strikes against key nodes in energy or other infrastructure can cause disproportionate effects. Israel and its partners should not emerge from this successful defense with any sense of complacency," ISW said.
ISW analysts explained that Iran's strategy is in some ways similar to Russia's tactics targeting Ukraine. Iran's drones and cruise missiles were launched earlier in order to hit Israel's defense air system at the same time as ballistic missiles.
"The Russians have used such an approach against Ukraine repeatedly," the ISW report said. "The purpose of such a package is to have the slower cruise missiles and drones distract and overwhelm air defenses in order to allow the ballistic missiles, which are much harder to shoot down, to reach their targets."
With Iran mirroring its partner's strategy, experts said that it could report its findings from the attack back to Russia and help inform Russia's military as to how it can better challenge defense systems that NATO and the US have provided Ukraine.
That said, the worsening conflict between Iran and Israel could also hurt Russia's relationship with Iran as Moscow may not be able to adequately support Tehran, which also would be unable to offer the same level of support it has been were it to find itself in a wider war.
This picture released by the official website of the Iranian Defense Ministry on Sunday, Oct. 11, 2015, claims to show the launching of an Emad long-range ballistic surface-to-surface missile in an undisclosed location.
Iranian Defense Ministry via AP
At least one ballistic missile hit an Israeli airbase during Iran's attack on Israel last weekend.
There was minimal damage to the facility, which hosts F-35 fighter jets, according to the IDF.
Weeks before the attack, Iran practiced hitting a mock Israeli airbase with ballistic missiles.
Just weeks before Iran launched an unprecedented attack on Israel, it practiced blowing up an Israeli airbase housing F-35 fighter jets with ballistic missiles.
Iran and its proxy militias attacked Israel on Saturday with more than 300 one-way attack drones, cruise missiles, and ballistic missiles. Nearly all the enemy threats were intercepted by Israeli and partner forces, including the US military, across the Middle East, marking a resounding air-defense success.
A few of the 120 ballistic missiles that were launched did manage to bypass the air defenses, including Israel's sophisticated Arrow 2 and 3 systems, and cross into Israeli territory.
At least one munition impacted at the Nevatim Airbase, which hosts F-35 stealth fighters, causing minor damage to infrastructure near the base's runway, according to the Israel Defense Forces, which said the functionality of the base had not been affected.
Israeli Air Force F-35 Lightning 'Adir' fighter jet lands at a location given as Nevatim Airbase after an aerial defense mission, in Israel, in this screen grab taken from a handout video released on April 14, 2024.
Israel Defense Forces/Handout via REUTERS
"Iran hoped to incapacitate the base and thus impair our aerial capabilities, but it failed," Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari, an IDF spokesperson, said on Sunday, adding that "AF aircraft continue to take off and land from the base and depart for offensive and defensive missions."
Iran made no secret of its intention to attack an Israeli F-35 base prior to Saturday's barrage.
The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps in mid-February fired two extended-range ballistic missiles at a target that "mirrored the features and conditions" of Israel's Palmachim airbase, according to the semi-official Tasnim News Agency, which is affiliated with the IRGC.
The report claimed that Palmachim, which is just south of Tel Aviv, was selected as the simulated target because it's the main base housing Israel's F-35s and also because of prior remarks delivered by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu from the airfield.
An Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) military personnel walks next to an Iranian Emad Surface-to-Surface missile in downtown Tehran during a rally commemorating the International Quds Day, also known as the Jerusalem day, on April 29, 2022.
Photo by Morteza Nikoubazl/NurPhoto via Getty Images
Iranian state media said that the mock airbase, which was built in the Iranian desert, was three times smaller than the actual size of the facility. It claimed that the IRGC "successfully" hit the mock targets with "Emad" and "Qadr" ballistic missiles that had modified structures and improved warheads.
While Iran's mock strike on the Israeli airbase failed to translate during the actual attack last weekend, it has been presented domestically as a success, according to an expert report.
"What was an abject military failure — and the first time that Israel's phenomenal air defenses have been proven at this scale — is being communicated in Iran as a success, and misinformation is being deliberately spread," Urban Coningham, a research fellow at the Royal United Services Institute think tank, said on Monday.
Damage from a missile impact at an Israeli airbase.
IDF
"Indeed, reports and images on social media have been circulating in both Farsi and Arabic which fabricate a version of events of Sunday morning in which the Israeli Air Force base is completely reduced to rubble," Coningham wrote in an analysis.
Videos and photos from Nevatim, however, reveal minimal damage to the airbase as fighter jets continue to conduct operations there.
Saturday's massive barrage was historic, in that it marked the first-ever direct attack on Israel from Iranian soil. Prior to this, Tehran had facilitated military action against Israel through its robust network of proxy forces across the Middle East.
The attack came less than two weeks after an Israeli strike on an Iranian diplomatic facility in Syria earlier this month killed several military officials, including two IRGC generals. Tehran vowed revenge, stirring fears across the region as it braced for a potential retaliation. Its response on Saturday was met with widespread international condemnation.
Meanwhile, the Middle East continues to be on edge as it remains to be seen whether Israel will retaliate over the Iranian attack.
Former President Donald Trump appears with his legal team at the start of jury selection in his first criminal trial.
Jabin Botsford-Pool/Getty Images
The judge in Trump's criminal trial has barred certain testimony around his alleged affair with an ex-Playboy model.
Prosecutors cannot introduce that Melania was pregnant at the time the alleged affair began.
Trump's lead attorney called this detail "literally just salacious with no value."
The judge presiding over Donald Trump's historic criminal trial has barred testimony that the former president's wife, Melania Trump, was pregnant at the time a former Playboy model says she had an affair with Donald Trump.
Prosecutor Joshua Steinglass asked New York Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan to allow evidence related to the ex-Playboy model, Karen McDougal, as Trump's hush-money trial kicked off Monday in a Manhattan courtroom.
McDougal has said that she had a nearly year-long sexual relationship with Trump beginning in 2006. Steinglass said he hoped to introduce evidence showing the then-"Apprentice" star believed that her story going public would threaten his 2016 presidential campaign.
Additionally, Steinglass explained that during the trial, he planned to bring into evidence how McDougal claims she had the affair with Trump while Melania Trump was pregnant with their now-18-year-old son Barron.
The McDougal-Trump narrative includes "that Karen McDougal was a former Playboy model," and that the affair began "when his wife, Melania, was pregnant with his child," Steinglass said.
Trump's alleged affairs with McDougal and Stormy Daniels were both part of "catch and kill" deals with American Media Inc., the publisher of the National Enquirer. Those deals allowed AMI to buy the rights to those stories and keep them out of the public eye ahead of the 2016 presidential election — which prosecutors say is the driving force behind those deals.
Steinglass said that he didn't want to get too into the racy details of the affair "unless, of course, the defendant opens the door."
Steinglass said he would not solicit "salacious details of the affair" like "the positions and locales," but that it was important to inform the juries about it to explain that AMI believed the affair really happened, and that disclosing it to the public would have an impact on the election.
Donald Trump's lead attorney, Todd Blanche, argued strenuously against any evidence concerning a "literally just salacious with no value."
Steinglass countered that jurors in the hush money trial needed to know about the alleged affair and cover-up because "it speaks directly to the extent to which" Donald Trump "believed this story would be damaging to his campaign … and the lengths they would be willing to go."
"The only value is to embarrass President Trump, right?" Blanche shot back, adding, "This is just to embarrass President Trump. It's literally just salacious."
Merchan ruled that he would allow prosecutors to talk about Trump's alleged affair with McDougal during the trial — but that he would not permit them to mention that Melania Trump was pregnant at the time.
The Manhattan district attorney's office has charged Trump with 34 felony counts of falsifying business records, alleging that he lied on documents to disguise payments to Daniels, an adult film actress.
Prosecutors allege Trump's ex-personal attorney and former fixer, Michael Cohen, facilitated $130,000 in payments to Daniels just days before the 2016 presidential election to buy her silence over a 2006 sexual encounter with Donald Trump.
Trump has denied the charges and having affairs with McDougal and Daniels.
But also: Sometimes tech reminds you that tech can be awesome, in the golly-gee-can-you-believe-it sense some of us used to have about this stuff.
Which is exactly how I felt after my last trip to San Francisco, when I took several rides in Waymo's robotaxis.
That's partly because the tech is … amazing. You really are in a car, driving around the city, with no one in the driver's seat. Software and sensors take care of everything.
And partly because the tech already seems so … normal. You order a Waymo via an app, just like an Uber or Lyft. It shows up, you get in, it takes you where you want to go, and you get out.
Yes, my 13-year-old son and I spent the first few minutes in our first Waymo texting our friends and family: OMG IM IN A SELF DRIVING TAXI. We also documented it on social, of course.
We also felt a bit of the trepidatious rush you get when you first sit down in a roller coaster and have that internal debate: Is this safe? It must be safe because otherwise, they wouldn't let you do it, right? But seriously, is this safe?
But after those first few minutes of novelty, we went back to doing what we always do in an Uber or a Lyft: zoning out on our phones, staring out the window, and spending next-to-no time thinking about who, or what, was driving us.
Which, to me, is really the most amazing part: This stuff is here, now, and you can … just use it.
At least some people can. Waymo, which is owned by Google parent company Alphabet, has a couple hundred self-driving cars roaming around San Francisco, and access is still limited there via a waiting list, as well as geography. You can't get a Waymo to pick you up at the San Francisco International Airport, for instance, or take you across the Bay Bridge to Oakland.
Self-driving tech is also an obvious problem for humans who depend on ride-hailing services to make a living. (On my previous trip to San Francisco, one of my Uber drivers told me he had previously been a recruiter at Amazon who had lost his job during one of Amazon's recent layoff rounds.)
And to be honest, I'm not even sure that I would always order a Waymo if I had a chance. Right now, beyond the novelty, the big upside for me is that the fleet's cars — electric Jaguars — are comfortable and clean. And that the per-trip cost is about the same as an Uber Comfort (one level up from the base Uber X fare) — but really a bit cheaper, since you're not tipping your robot driver.
Waymo self-driving taxis are kitted out with cameras and other sensors, like this Jaguar model crossing an intersection in San Francisco.
JASON HENRY/Getty Images
But there's no reason to believe the cars will remain pristine, and that pricing will stay low, as this stuff rolls out more broadly. (Waymo doesn't disclose financials, and the company wouldn't tell me if it's making money on each trip. I assume it does not, for now; we do know Waymo has invested billions in this project since it started out as a Google project in 2009.)
Or maybe it's simply for people who would rather not interact with another human when they're in a taxi. Which is what David Margines, Waymo's director of product management, says is the service's chief appeal for customers right now. "It's their own space," he says.
Waymo's self-driving cars aren't perfect
Yes, there are still some issues with Waymo, at least in the rides I took recently. One is simply figuring out how to get in the thing: When your Waymo arrives, you unlock its doors with your phone — but only once it has driven to a very precise location that Waymo knows, and you don't.
Which led, a couple different times, to some awkward slow dancing between myself and the robot car. It would stop when I got near but wouldn't let me in because it wasn't exactly where it was supposed to be. Then I'd step away, and then it would lurch forward toward its still-unknown-to-me target spot. Then I'd step forward and it would stop — but still wouldn't let me in.
On one of my trips, this happened on a particularly tight, winding San Francisco street. And as my Waymo and I negotiated with each other we ended up blocking multiple cars, including a minivan driver who started honking at us in frustration.
"You can't honk at a robot," I told her, not very helpfully. "It doesn't care."
Meanwhile, a guy walking by stopped and took out his phone to record the scene. "You can put a cone on it to disable it," he told me, unprompted. Apparently, he's right?
A self-driving Waymo taxi makes its way through Los Angeles.
Mario Tama/Getty Images
More worrisome to me was that on one of my trips — to a Warriors game at the Chase Center arena — at a busy intersection, a Waymo in front of us wouldn't respond to a traffic cop trying to wave it through a red light. Then another Waymo pulled up beside it and also didn't respond to the cop. So now three Waymos were sitting there, blocking traffic and waiting for the light. The traffic cop stopped trying to move us and just held his hands over his head in disgust.
I figured this was a well-known and understandable problem for Waymos — of course, their software and sensors won't respond to humans telling them to override traffic signals! Think of the problems that could cause!
But Margines told me that Waymos are, in fact, supposed to understand human signals like a traffic cop. A Waymo PR person sent me this clip from Waymo CEO Dmitri Dolgov, showing a Waymo doing just that:
Leveraging AI for semantic understanding of complex driving scenes is a key capability of the #WaymoDriver. Check out this example of it autonomously interpreting and adhering to a police officer directing traffic in Los Angeles. pic.twitter.com/PyPqVaOc6B
But unlike other Big New Tech innovations I've seen in the past — anyone still have a 3D TV in their living room? — I don't think self-driving tech is going away. I think the people behind the tech will figure out its possibilities, its limitations, and the places it does and doesn't make sense.
Meanwhile Cruise is starting up again, but this time with humans in the driver's seat. Elon Musk promises to unveil his robotaxi this summer, and while your doubt about anything Musk says is well-warranted, you never know. So I think that one way or another, we are going to make some version of this standard for many of us in the not-far-off future.
Is that great? I don't know. But it really is amazing.
Snap has offered salaries from about $45,000 to over $1.95 million for various roles.
Snap, the company behind Snapchat, is still hiring in the US as its user base grows and some analysts forecast a revenue bounceback in 2024.
After laying off 500 employees, or almost 10% of its workforce, earlier this year, the tech company looks to be staffing in key areas like engineering, product, and sales. On April 12, its jobs board listed more than 142 openings, including 88 listings in US cities.
The hiring comes after a lukewarm 2023, in which Snap grew daily active users by 10% year over year but its annual revenue was flat. Some analysts predict a boost in political advertising in 2024 could help grow Snap's revenue this year.
We combed through public data to get a picture of Snap's salary levels. The data, released by the US Department of Labor's Office of Foreign Labor Certification, shows how much Snap offered to pay employees it wanted to hire in the US through work visas.
According to the data, Snap offered certain US staffers between October 2021 and December 2023 annual salaries ranging from $45,282 to $1.95 million for various roles. The median salary range was $148,013 to $180,000 a year, by Business Insider's analysis.
Those rates are base salaries and do not include other forms of compensation like stock options or bonuses.
Our full analysis breaks down salaries for jobs including product, research, engineering, and sales roles.
Hogan has made $52,000 from paid speeches since announcing his campaign for US Senate.
William B. Plowman/NBC via Getty Images
Larry Hogan has made $157,000 from paid speeches since the end of his term as Maryland governor.
Some of that money came after he announced his Senate campaign in February.
His campaign says he doesn't plan to give any more paid speeches while he runs for Senate.
Larry Hogan has made $157,000 from paid speeches since the end of his term as Governor of Maryland, according to financial disclosure documents filed on Sunday.
One of those speeches — a $28,000 appearance alongside former Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe at the Self Storage Association's National Spring Conference — came after he launched his GOP Senate campaign on February 9.
"Governor Hogan was committed to doing a bipartisan event with his friend Terry McAuliffe that brings hundreds of visitors to Maryland, and felt it important to keep that commitment," Hogan spokesman Michael Ricci told Business Insider.
Hogan was also paid $24,000 for a speech he gave to a gathering of Canadian CEOs on January 23, though he didn't receive the payment until February 14, after his campaign launch.
Ricci told Business Insider on Monday that Hogan does not plan to give any more paid speeches while campaigning for Maryland's US Senate seat.
"It's not uncommon to cash in on speeches between leaving government and running for a higher office," said Jordan Libowitz, communication director for Citizens for Responsibility & Ethics in Washington (CREW). "It is uncommon to do it as a candidate."
Indeed, plenty of figures in both parties have given — and faced scrutiny — for paid speeches in the past, the most famous case being Hillary Clinton. But politicians typically stop giving those speeches after they become active candidates in order to avoid the appearance of being influenced by special interests.
Business Insider has previously reported on members of both parties, including GOP Michigan Senate candidate Mike Rogers and Democratic Rep. Tom Suozzi, enriching themselves via the so-called "revolving door" between the public and private sectors.
Here are the six speech payments Hogan has received in the last two years:
July 10, 2023 – $34,000 from the American Property Casualty Insurance Association
July 10, 2023 – $37,000 from Jobs for the Future,
September 25, 2023 – $24,000 from the National Multifamily Housing Council
November 30, 2023 – $10,000 from LG Ad Solutions
February 14, 2024 – $24,000 from the Business Council of Canada
March 13, 2024 – $28,000 from the Self-Storage Association
Hogan, a moderate Republican who served as Governor of Maryland from 2015 to 2023, is already quite wealthy. According to the disclosure filed Sunday, he's worth somewhere between $12.3 million and $34 million, much of which comes from real estate holdings across Maryland.
As governor, his official salary ranged between $165,000 and $180,000, though he continued to make millions from his real estate holdings while in office.
Hogan's surprise entry into the Senate race, which came after years of dismissing the idea of serving in the upper chamber, was a win for Senate Republicans.
Though he faces an uphill climb in the deep-blue state of Maryland, Hogan was a popular governor, and Democrats will have to spend more resources to defend the state's Senate seat in a year where they already face a tough fight to retain control of the upper chamber.
Tesla's SVP of powertrain and energy engineering reportedly stepped down.
John Keeble/Getty Images
Drew Baglino, Tesla's SVP of powertrain and electrical engineering, resigned from Tesla on Sunday.
Baglino's departure came shortly before Tesla laid off 10% of its workforce.
The executive had worked at Tesla for over 18 years.
Drew Baglino, Tesla's senior vice president of powertrain and electrical engineering, announced he'd left the company, becoming the latest major executive to depart Elon Musk's EV giant after the CFO stepped down in August last year. The move came as Tesla announced sweeping job cuts.
"I made the difficult decision to move on from Tesla after 18 years yesterday," Baglino wrote on X on Monday. "I am so thankful to have worked with and learned from the countless incredibly talented people at Tesla over the years. I loved tackling nearly every problem we solved as a team and feel gratified to have contributed to the mission of accelerating the transition to sustainable energy, a mission that I am quite passionate about."
I made the difficult decision to move on from Tesla after 18 years yesterday. I am so thankful to have worked with and learned from the countless incredibly talented people at Tesla over the years.
I loved tackling nearly 🤣 every problem we solved as a team and feel gratified…
Tesla's vice president of public policy and business development, Rohan Patel, also said on Monday he'd left. Patel told TechCrunch that he departed due to "[b]ig overall changes" at Tesla.
Baglino and Patel did not immediately respond to a request from Business Insider for comment, nor did a spokesperson from Tesla. However, CEO Musk responded to X posts from both execs thanking them for everything they'd done.
Baglino joined the company in 2006 — only two years after Tesla CEO Elon Musk first began investing in the automaker — and started out as an electrical engineer working on the company's very first car, the Roadster.
By the time he left, he had become one of only four execs named as "leadership" on Tesla's investor relations page, alongside Musk himself, CFO Vaibhav Taneja, and Tom Zhu, senior vice-president of automotive. Baglino was in charge of the technology behind the company's energy products, including batteries and motors for the cars.
EV blog Electrek noted on Monday morning that Baglino had already lost his Tesla company badge — a red symbol next to his name — on X shortly before he announced his departure on the platform. X is also owned by Musk.
Baglino appears to have resigned less than 24 hours before Tesla announced a round of job cuts impacting about 10% of its workforce. Multiple Tesla employees told Business Insider there had been concerns of impending layoffs going into the weekend as rumors spread throughout the company that some managers had been told to provide upper management with a list of names.
Earlier this month, Tesla delivery numbers appeared to show a slow in EV demand. The company's stock is down about 33% year-to-date.
Tesla saw another key executive depart last year. CFO Zachary Kirkhorn, who was rumored to be under consideration for the role of successor to Musk, left the company in August after 13 years.
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But Corradi said people need to change too in order to cut the rat population down.
One way people can help is to stop scattering food on the ground for pigeons to eat. Leftover crumbs end up becoming impromptu meals for nearby rats, Corradi told New York Magazine.
Instead, bird lovers in the big city should place pieces of bread on the ground and make sure the birds eat it all up.
Another method is the city's new pilot program requiring trash to be stored in containers, not thrown out in bags on the street where rats can gnaw their way inside and feast.
"We're a big part of the problem when it comes to sustaining rat populations in the city," Corradi told the magazine.
Those suggestions are in line with what rat researchers previously told Business Insider.
Michael Parsons, an urban-rat expert, said after Corradi's appointment last year that she'll need to focus on changing human behavior to tackle the root of the rat problem.
Parsons suggested picking up trash earlier in the day when rats aren't as active and sticking to data-proven techniques.
"Understand that rat control begins by changing people's habits, hygiene, and expectations," he told BI.