Check out these and other viral trends — and what experts have to say about them.
Employees are pushing back against the grueling demands of modern work through a host of workplace trends.
We've seen "rage applying." And who could forget "lazy girl jobs" or having "Bare Minimum Mondays"? Now, people are even pushing back on that nasally, passive aggressive, professional voice known as "the corporate accent."
And they're drumming up new ways to get ahead, through networking hacks like "corporate flirting."
Here's a look at the trends that have gone viral in recent months.
Young workers are making fun of the "corporate accent."
Gen Z has had enough with the nasally, passive aggressive tone used to convey authority in meetings.
JohnŽr Images/Getty Images
You probably know someone that uses a "corporate accent," that nasally, passive aggressive, professional tone of voice used to convey confidence. They likely enunciate every, single word, too.
The term itself was coined by TikToker Lisa Beasley who often plays a character called "Corporate Erin" in her videos on the platform.
Another TikToker, inspired by Beasley, explained it as a worker's "nine-to-five voice," and "by changing the speed, rhythm, and inflection points of my speech I can convey a level of confidence where otherwise none exists."
Younger workers have taken to criticizing the "corporate accent" as they struggle with the rules of office conversations — from when to use corporate jargon to mask your true opinions to how to make small talk. Almost half of Gen Zers and millennials reported feeling left out at work because they struggled to keep up with workplace jargon, and adjusted the way they spoke to fit in, a LinkedIn and Duolingo survey found in 2023.
TikToker Srinidhi Rajesh went viral for promoting a networking approach she calls "corporate flirting."
Srinidhi Rajesh is a TikToker encouraging "corporate flirting."
Srinidhi Rajesh/TikTok
In a TikTok video Rajesh describes corporate flirting as "a foolproof way to act and speak with charisma in almost every single situation, especially corporate ones." The video has racked up millions of views and over 260,000 likes.
If you want to get to know someone better at work, for example, Rajesh said to start by asking them a basic question like where they went to college. Once they answer, Rajesh said respond in way that acknowledges that you heard them and adds "some outside context," but also pokes fun at them in a nice way.
If they said they went to Northwestern University, for example, Rajesh said to respond with "Oh so you're really smart but you like freezing to death for half the year?'" This gives them an opportunity to joke back and continue the conversation.
And don't be surprised if you find a Gen Z worker using this hack on you as a growing number get tips from TikTok. Seventy percent of Gen Z said they turned to TikTok for advice on their careers, according to a report by Edubirdie, an essay-service platform for students, that 2,000 Gen Zers between the ages of 18 to 26 in the US about the influence of TikTok in their lives.
Rage applying is the mass application to jobs — fueled by feelings of unhappiness at work. And it seems it has the potential to pay off.
The tactic might not lead to long-term fulfillment though.
However, rage applying might not be the best approach for everyone.
Career coach Kelsey Wat advises against conducting a job search from an emotional place of "fear, resentment, or burnout."
"I think it's helpful for job seekers to get more clarity and be more centered and grounded in what they want … so they can develop a job search strategy that is aligned with their values," she said.
As companies cut back on hiring amid recession fears, "quiet hiring" — tapping internal talent instead of increasing head count — emerged as a new buzzy workplace term.
This particular trend can be a win-win for employers and employees alike.
Gwengoat/Getty Images
"This is a trend that's helpful for employees also," said Toni Frana, lead career expert at FlexJobs. "We know that employees like professional development opportunities … like the opportunity to upskill and increase their bandwidth and further their knowledge in terms of skills they acquire in a role."
Wat said it's important for prospective employees to gauge an employer's willingness to provide internal growth opportunities during the job interview process.
"It's really important to ask how success is measured in a role, and when you're interviewing, asking questions about what previous people in the role are doing now so that you have a sense of whether there is mobility in the company," she said.
Resenteeism, describes the act of staying in an unsatisfying job due to a perceived lack of options, even as resentment grows.
You hate your job — but you just can't quit.
Todd Warnock/Getty Images
Gallup's 2023 State of the Global Workplace report found that roughly 1 in 5 workers were "loud quitting" at their jobs, which just means they were "actively disengaged" at work, as opposed to quiet quitters, who were simply "not engaged."
"They're detached from the organization but also emotionally against the organization, and they'll be vocal about it," said Jim Harter, the lead author of the report and the chief scientist for Gallup's workplace management and well-being practices. "The loud-quitting employees are going to be much, much more likely to take another job pretty quickly if it becomes available, and they won't need as much money to do that."
Frana said in some cases, employees should try to raise workplace issues with their managers before dissatisfaction festers.
"I certainly think what a lot of things boil down to is communication and having conversations with your manager about potential opportunities or shifts in the type of work that you might be doing," she said. "You can oftentimes get to the heart of a matter, and you might be able to make some direct changes."
Think of Bare Minimum Monday as a way to ease into work at the start of the week. It took off in 2023 — and is still going strong into 2024.
Some say its a way to get rid off the "Sunday scaries," the stress people feel on Sunday evening about the start of the work week.
Getty Images
TikToker Marisa Jo popularized the term, which describes a way to resist the Sunday scaries and the pressure many people feel to hit the ground running full-speed when they return to work again on Monday.
"The second I got rid of the pressure and allowed myself to have whatever kind of day unfolded, I was able to do stuff," she said in a TikTok.
In a video documenting one of her Bare Minimum Mondays, Jo goes through activities like journaling, her skincare routine, and making progress on a creative project before beginning work, which she notes "doesn't start until noon" on Bare Minimum Mondays, though she notes she's able to finish all of her work in the shorter allotted time anyway.
Chaotic working, aka "malicious compliance," involves employees using their position at work to help customers or clients at the employer's expense.
Anti-work sentiments helped the trend grow over the past several months.
Getty Images
Though it often entails breaking some rules, workers may do it without fear of repercussion because they're simply fed up with their job, employer, or the general state of work.
Anti-work sentiments helped the trend grow over the past several months.
A TikTok from user The Speech Prof says examples of chaotic working include giving customers employee discounts or upsizing their food order for free.
Kelsey Wat, the career coach, says workers engaging in the practice should be aware that they may be jeopardizing their jobs: "I would be concerned that's not going to end well."
Some workers are dusting off their resumes and shoring up their skills to protect themselves in case they're laid off in trend called "career cushioning."
It's a backup tactic for workers that don't feel totally secure in their jobs.
Getty Images
This trend, which involves workers starting to look for other jobs while still in their current roles, is often called "career cushioning," or "recession-proofing." The term started to take off late in 2022 and has continues as many companies announced job cuts.
"Given the fact that we've had high inflation, we're potentially moving into more of a recession, I think that if you have concerns about layoffs, or you're in an industry that is affected by layoffs, I think it's really, really healthy and a good idea to make sure that you are networking, make sure that you are prepared for anything that can happen," Wat said.
"I think it's a good strategy for everybody."
Popularized by TikToker Gabrielle Judge, "lazy girl jobs" typically refer to low-stress jobs that still pay well.
Some might say it's the ideal corporate gig.
Getty/Johner Images
Judge, a self-proclaimed "anti-work girlboss," told BI of the trend: "I really want people to understand our time is so valuable and should be focused on efforts that are most aligned with their individual priorities, not a company."
While some girls with so-called lazy jobs say it's helped them establish better work-life balance and keep stress in check at work, experts warn it can put your job in jeopardy.
"The problem with having the lazy girl job is that they're the first ones to get laid off when tough times come," Marc Cenedella, a careers expert and founder of the job search site Ladders, told Insider.
Cenedella added there's a risk bosses will see if you post about your lazy girl job online and take disciplinary action accordingly, and said you may also stunt your career growth and future prospects by taking it easy.
Being in your "snail girl era" is the natural companion to "lazy girl jobs," and an inherent rejection of the girlboss lifestyle.
Being in your snail girl era means enjoying a leisurely coffee break.
Pino Pacifico/Getty Images
The TikTok-popular term was coined by Sienna Ludbey in a September article for Fashion Journal titled "'Snail girl era': Why I'm slowing down and choosing to be happy rather than busy." Ludbey designs and sells bags and accessories through her shop, Hello Sisi.
In her article, Ludbey described the snail girl ethos: "A snail girl takes her time and creates to create. The speed at which everything is put out into the world is just getting faster, but she doesn't care. She's running her own race, and maybe that race isn't going anywhere but home and back to bed."
Suzy Welch, a professor at New York University's Stern School of Business, previously told BI that embracing the snail girl lifestyle of prioritizing happiness and self-care instead of overworking could have financial repercussions.
"The jury is out," Welch said. "We can be pretty sure that it will not be a career accelerator for those who choose it, but I think most of them know that. That will, of course, have financial consequences, and we may see in five years that a whole group of self-chosen 'snails' decide to become 'roadracers' when they find their trade-offs need to be calibrated."
"Loud laborers" aren't new, but the term appears to have hit the scene in recent months. And we've probably all known at least one person who fits this mold.
All talk, no work — we all probably have a co-worker like this.
Marko Geber/Getty Images
They're the ones who spend more time talking about their work than actually doing it — the ones who readily flaunt their achievements to their bosses or on LinkedIn but are slow to get to work.
These workers can have a negative effect on morale.
"Some people are motivated by external rewards and recognition rather than the inherent satisfaction of the work itself," Nicole Price, a leadership coach and workplace expert, told CNBC. "This can lead to a focus on visibility and self-promotion in order to attract these rewards."
"The constant self-promotion may create an atmosphere of competition rather than collaboration," Price told CNBC.
While Hot Labor Summer isn't new, this year's was one to remember.
Strength in numbers is the motto for a summer of striking.
And the UPS and the Teamsters union, which represents roughly 340,000 UPS package handlers and drivers, reached a tentative agreement, averting a strike that could have had far-reaching repercussions.
Gov. Katie Hobbs of Arizona delivers her State of the State address, flanked by Arizona House Speaker Ben Toma, left, and Arizona Senate President Warren Petersen, right, at the Arizona state Capitol in Phoenix on January 9, 2023.
AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin, File
An Arizona lawmaker says GOP "extremism" has led many state voters to increasingly back Democrats.
"The Republican party has become extreme in the age of Trumpism," the state senator told Politico.
Arizona in recent years has become a hotly-contested swing state up and down the ballot.
In recent years, Arizona — after decades as a GOP bastion — has emerged as one of the most prominent electoral prizes for Democrats.
President Joe Biden won Arizona in 2020, the first time that a Democratic presidential nominee had carried the state since 1996. Democratic Sen. Mark Kelly won a special election for his seat in 2020 and then won a full term in 2022. And Katie Hobbs was elected to the governorship in 2022, the first time that a Democrat had won the post since 2006.
This November, Democrats are hopeful that Rep. Ruben Gallego can hold the seat of retiring Democrat-turned-independent Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, as he's set for a likely face-off with Republican Kari Lake.
However, despite Arizona's seemingly clear shift to the left, a Democratic lawmaker recently said that the state was not as blue as it might appear, pointing to what she said was voter distaste with GOP "extremism" as a reason why her party has found success.
"The trajectory of Arizona has been steadily trending bluer on a statewide level," state Sen. Priya Sundareshan recently told Politico. "It's not because Arizona is necessarily a blue state but it's because Arizona has rejected extremism and the Republican party has become extreme in the age of Trumpism."
Sundareshan, an environmental attorney who in 2022 was elected to the state Senate from a Tucson-area district, is one of the leading Democratic legislative leaders seeking to repeal Arizona's Civil War-era near-total abortion ban — which the state's conservative Supreme Court reinstated earlier this month.
The GOP-controlled state House of Representatives earlier this week voted to repeal the law after three Republicans joined the lower chamber's Democrats to roll back the measure. The state Senate is set to vote on the repeal next week.
Top Republicans are scrambling to contain the fallout over the abortion ban, especially given the party's precarious position in critical suburbs across the country — which includes scores of voters in Arizona's populous Maricopa County.
Despite appointing three anti-abortion associate justices to the US Supreme Court who backed the demise of Roe v. Wade, Trump earlier this month stated that the Arizona court's decision went too far. And the former president has also seemingly rejected the conservative push for a national abortion ban.
Discord banned accounts related to a service that was scraping and selling millions of user's messages.
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Discord banned accounts tied to Spy.Pet, a website known for mining and selling millions of users' messages.
Spy.Pet used bots to scrape data from 14,000 servers, affecting nearly 620 million Discord users.
Discord says it is considering legal action against the cite.
Discord banned several accounts linked to a website that was scraping and selling millions of users messages.
404 Media first reported on Spy.Pet, a website that was mining millions of Discord user's messages and selling access to the information for anyone willing to pay.
Discord is a a highly popular group-chatting app. Originally designed for gamers, the app has become a platform for all kinds of communities because of its voice chat, video-chat, and other capabilities like livestreaming.
The site used bots to scrape users messages and other data from 14,000 Discord servers. Using bot accounts, the bots would enter popular public servers for games like Minecraft and then collect information in all the server members, such as what other servers they are members of, according to 404.
In all, the bots collected data from nearly 620 million Discord users, according to Kotaku.
Following the report, Discord announced that it has banned several accounts related to the site after an investigation.
"Based on our investigation, these accounts accessed Discord servers that were open and available for anyone to join or where the accounts had easy access to a valid invite link," Discord told 404 in a statement. "Once in these spaces, these accounts could only access the same information as any other user in those servers."
Spy.Pet administrators acknowledged that Discord banned some of its bots, but claimed the removal of its website was unrelated, according to PC Gamer.
Spy.Pet administrators said on Telegram that they intend to get their website domain back and continue the site, PC Gamer reported. Discord added that it's considering "appropriate legal action," according to 404.
The crackdown follows layoffs at Discord in January for more than 170 employees. In an email to staff, CEO Jason Citron blamed the layoffs on the company's fast growth during the pandemic.
"We grew quickly and expanded our workforce even faster, increasing by 5x since 2020," Citron said in an email obtained by The Verge. "As a result, we took on more projects and became less efficient in how we operated."
Discord did not immediately return Business Insider's request for comment Saturday.
Scammers took $400,000 from a woman who thought she won a $3 million sweepstakes.
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Scammers reportedly tricked a woman into believing she won $3 million, then stole $400,000 from her.
They targeted the woman because she was elderly and showing early signs of dementia, police say.
The FTC has urged vigilance against sweepstakes scams that demand upfront payment.
Scammers in Florida tricked a woman into thinking she won $3 million, then stole $400,000 from her bank account.
Police arrested Michael Lawrence and Max Richards in connection to the scam, but were only able to recover around $40,000 of the money, Polk County Sheriff Grady Judd said in a press conference on Friday, according to Fox 13.
Lawrence and Richards face felony charges of first-degree theft and scheme to defraud, according to court records.
Judd, 70, is known online for his boisterous press conferences where he shares information about the people that the Polk County Sheriff's Office arrests.
During Friday's press conference, Judd said the scammers targeted an elderly woman with early signs of dementia. They told her she won $3 million in a Publisher's Clearing House sweepstakes, and that she needed to pay them taxes, Judd said.
By the end, she had sent Lawrence and Richards $477,000 in three separate checks, Judd said.
An attorney for Lawrence did not immediately return Business Insider's request for comment. It was unclear from court records whether Richards has retained an attorney.
The Federal Trade Commission says the best way to spot a sweepstakes scam is to look at what the party offering the money asks you to do next. If they try to get you to hand over money or send them your account information, it's likely a scam, the agency says.
"If someone tells you to pay a fee for 'taxes,' 'shipping and handling charges,' or 'processing fees' to get your prize, you're dealing with a scammer," the agency warned.
If you do pay money to a scammer, the FTC recommends asking whatever company you sent money through to help recover it if possible.
Polk said in the press conference that money lost in scams is often difficult to get back. The sheriff's office only recovered around $40,000 of the woman's money, he said.
"You go obtain subpoenas and then the bank takes their time about getting data back, the money is gone, long gone," Judd said according to Fox.
Lawrence appeared in court on Friday and does not have another hearing scheduled yet on the court docket.
Publisher's Clearing House did not immediately return Business Insider's request for comment.
A top Maine Democrat floated changes in the state's electoral laws in response to Nebraska.
Nebraska Republicans earlier in April sought to change how the state allocates its electoral votes.
The move was backed by Trump in a state where Biden was able to pick up one electoral vote in 2020.
A high-ranking Maine Democratic lawmaker on Friday warned that the state would be "compelled" to change its Electoral College delegate allocation to a "winner-take-all" system should Nebraska tweak its rules to benefit former President Donald Trump.
Maine House Majority Leader Maureen Terry in a statement said that voters in her state and in Nebraska's swing 2nd Congressional District "value their independence, but they also value fairness and playing by the rules."
"If Nebraska's Republican Governor and Republican-controlled Legislature were to change their electoral system this late in the cycle in order to unfairly award Donald Trump an additional electoral vote, I think the Maine Legislature would be compelled to act in order to restore fairness to our country's electoral system," she continued.
The remarks come weeks after Trump touted Nebraska GOP Gov. Jim Pillen's support of a bill that would change the state's system of allocating electoral votes from one determined by individual congressional districts to one that would award the state's five electoral votes to the statewide victor.
"I am steadfast in my commitment to get winner-take-all over the finish line, thereby honoring our constitutional founding, unifying our state and ending the three-decade-old mistake of allocating Nebraska's electoral votes differently than all but one other state," the governor said earlier this month.
Nebraska Democrats vehemently fought back against this electoral change before the legislative session ended earlier this month and the measure didn't advance. Pillen floated a potential special session to complete "other unfinished business," which would include the switch to a winner-take-all system. However, so far, Republicans lack the 33 votes needed to make the change, and the governor previously indicated that he wouldn't call a session unless he had the requisite support to get it through the legislature.
While Nebraska overwhelmingly backed Trump in the overall statewide vote in both 2016 and 2020 — part of a longstanding pattern for Republican presidential nominees — President Joe Biden was the victor in the Omaha-based 2nd Congressional District in 2020 and thus secured its one electoral vote.
The only other state in country that allocates its electoral votes by congressional district is Maine, where the political dynamic is flipped: Biden won the overall statewide vote by a wide margin, but Trump captured one electoral vote by carrying the state's 2nd Congressional District.
Any change in election law in either state would immediately raise the stakes in what is expected to be a close November general election between Biden and Trump.
In a scenario where Biden wins Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin but loses Arizona, Georgia, Nevada, and North Carolina — granted that he also keeps every core Democratic state in his column — he'd win the Electoral College by a bare minimum 270 to 268.
If Nebraska went through with its change, Trump would likely win the state's entire share of electoral votes, given its strong GOP orientation. In the aforementioned scenario, the Electoral College would be tied 269 to 269, which would move the selection of the president to the US House of Representatives. But if Maine also switched to a winner-take-all system before the 2024 election, Biden would be heavily favored to win all of that state's electoral votes and would thus win the Electoral College (270 to 268).
Maine Democrats — who control the state legislature — had generally not spoken of tweaking their electoral allocation system ahead of 2024.
But things are much different now.
"It is my hope and the hope of my colleagues in Maine that the Nebraska Republican Party decides not to make this desperate and ill-fated attempt to sway the 2024 election," Terry said.
Google is now the world's fourth most valuable public company, right behind Nvidia, Apple, and Microsoft, which has a market cap of just over $3 trillion and overtook Apple earlier this year for first place.
This isn't Alphabet's first brush with the $2 trillion club. The company briefly hit the threshold in November 2021 and earlier this month but closed above it for the first time on Friday, according to Bloomberg.
The news followed Alphabet's first-quarter earnings report on Thursday, where revenue beat analysts' expectations due to the success of Google's search engine. Alphabet's chief executive, Sundar Pichar, also highlighted the contributions of Google Cloud, which has been equipped with generative AI services through Google's AI model, Gemini.
"In Cloud, we have announced more than 1,000 new products and features over the past 8 months. At Google Cloud Next, more than 300 customers and partners spoke about their generative AI successes with Google Cloud, including global brands like Bayer, Cintas, Mercedes Benz, Walmart, and many more," Pichai told investors during the call.
The company also delighted investors by announcing that it would expand its stock repurchase program by $70 billion.
Alphabet has weathered some tough times over the past year despite the past week's success. It's contended growing pains with its AI offerings, including pausing its image generator after it faced criticism for being too woke.
Still, Alphabet is betting on AI as a key to its business growth and is ready to spend big to compete. Earlier this month, it announced that it would be developing its own central processing unit called Axion to facilitate the training of complex AI models.
Alphabet did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.
The Walmart heirs' combined net worth is roughly $240 billion, according to Bloomberg.
In public, the Waltons live relatively modest lifestyles despite their wealth.
Here's how they spend their fortune.
The combined wealth of the Walmart heirs — which includes founder Sam Walton's children, Rob, Jim, and Alice, as well as his late son John's wife, Christy, and their son Lukas — is roughly $240 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.
While some have worked in the family business — whether that's serving on the company board or working to manage the family's wealth — others chose to pursue areas of personal passion.
Sam Walton, the original man behind the company that now encompasses both Walmart and Sam's Club, set his family up for financial success when he divided the ownership before he died.
He wasn't a man of flashy luxury, but you can see how his children are living a slightly more lavish life now. Here's a look at how the Walton family empire spends its money:
Sam Walton opened the first Walmart store in Rogers, Arkansas, in 1962.
The original Wal-Mart name tag used to look like this one, worn here by Sam Walton.
Associated Press
He married Helen Robson on Valentine's Day in 1942.
Sam and Helen had a Valentine's Day wedding.
April L. Brown/Associated Press
Together, they had four children: Rob, John, Jim, and Alice.
By the time Sam died in 1992, he had set up the company ownership in a way that minimized the estate taxes anyone on the receiving end would have to pay.
He set up his ownership of Walmart's stock in a family partnership — each of his children held 20% of Walton Enterprises, while he and Helen each held 10%. Helen inherited Sam's 10% tax-free when he died.
The stocks were carefully divided among the family.
John served in Vietnam as a Green Beret. When he returned from the war he held a series of jobs — like the Walmart company pilot, a crop duster, and the owner a few yachting companies — before becoming a Walmart board member.
John (second from left) pictured with members of his family.
In 2013, Christy decided to sell their Jackson Hole mansion. She also sold the family's ranch for an undisclosed price in 2016 after listing it for $100 million in 2011.
The family had a mansion in Jackson Hole, Wyoming.
James "Jim" Walton is the youngest son of Walmart founder Sam Walton. He is 75 years old.
Jim Walton is now 75 years old.
Walmart
He is chairman of the board of the family's Arvest Bank Group. One of the state's largest banks today, Arvest Bank has assets totaling more than $27 billion.
One of many Arvest Bank locations in Bentonville, Arkansas.
He also served on the Walmart board, starting in 2005 to fill the vacancy after his brother John died. Jim Walton's son, Steuart, took over his father's seat on the board in 2016.
Jim served on the board for more than a decade.
Rick T. Wilking /Stringer/Getty
Now, he presides over Walton Enterprises — the private company that deals with the investments and finances of the Walton family only — from modest offices in Bentonville, Arkansas.
The youngest of founder Sam Walton's children, Alice Walton is worth $78.8 billion, according to Bloomberg. She has been divorced twice and has no children. She is 74 years old.
Alice Walton is the youngest of Walmart founder Sam Walton's children.
AP/April L. Brown
Alice has never taken an active role in running the family business.
Alice Walton with Jim Walton in 2013.
REUTERS/Rick Wilking
Instead, she became a patron of the arts, which she fell in love with at a young age.
Alice has spent millions building her art collection.
D Dipasupil/Getty Images
When she was 10, she bought her first work of art: a reproduction of Picasso's "Blue Nude" for about $2, she told The New Yorker.
She has an immense private art collection, with original works from Andy Warhol and Georgia O'Keeffe. Alice opened a museum in Bentonville called Crystal Bridges in 2011 to house her $500 million private art collection.
The museum displays both paintings and sculptures, like this one by Alexander Calder (center).
Danny Johnston/Associated Press
When it opened, Crystal Bridges had four times the endowment of the famous Whitney Museum in New York.
The collection includes a Georgia O'Keeffe painting that Alice spent $44.4 million on in 2014 — the biggest sale for a woman's piece of art in history.
Her Millsap, Texas, property, Rocking W Ranch, sold to the Three Amigos Investment Group of Kermit, Texas, in September 2017 for an undisclosed amount.
It had an initial asking price of $19.75 million, which was reduced to $16.5 million. The working ranch had over 250 acres of pasture and outbuildings for cattle and horses.
In January 2016, Alice donated 3.7 million of her Walmart shares — worth about $225 million at the time — to the family's nonprofit, the Walton Family Foundation.
The Walton Family Foundation website.
Facebook/Walton Family Foundation
Sam and Helen started the foundation as a way to teach their children how to give back and how to work together.
The Walton Family Foundation was established in 1987, when Walmart celebrated its 25th anniversary.
Walton Family Foundation/YouTube
The charity awards millions of dollars in grants to causes that align with the foundation's values.
Alice Walton.
Walton Family Foundation/YouTube
The foundation awarded $566.5 million in grants in 2022, according to its website.
The foundation has three main areas of focus:
A project put on by the Walton Family Foundation.
Walton Family Foundation/YouTube
The foundation's focus on education was led by John. His brother Jim said John was really interested in being able to give parents choices when it came to their child's schooling.
The foundation was dedicated to supporting children's education.
Rob spearheaded the foundation's venture into environmental protection. One of the first grants they gave helped develop a sustainable fisheries label.
Rob launched the environmental and sustainability branch of the foundation.
A commitment to the family's home of Arkansas is another large part of the foundation. The website says this area of focus is about "advancing our home region of Northwest Arkansas and the Arkansas-Mississippi Delta."
Walmart Inc., which owns Walmart and Sam's Club, is the largest retailer in the US in terms of revenue.
The storefront of a Walmart.
Business Insider/Jessica Tyler
In fiscal year 2023, Walmart reported $648.1 billion in revenue.
When Walmart has a good quarter, the Waltons make hundreds of millions of dollars in dividends.
The Walton siblings.
AP/April L. Brown
Even though the Walton family is raking in billions as a result of the company's success, they remain relatively under-the-radar in terms of flashing their wealth — much like their patriarch, Sam, did in the early years.
Gisele Bündchen told a police officer in Surfside, Florida, she was trying to escape the paparazzi following her.
Michael Buckner/Variety via Getty Images
Gisele Bündchen became emotional during a traffic stop in Surfside, Florida, this week.
Bündchen told a police officer she was trying to evade the paparazzi "stalking" her.
The Mayor of Surfside called out the cop's "dismissive" response, which he called "unacceptable."
A Florida mayor has criticized a police officer who pulled over Gisele Bündchen for a traffic stop, calling the behavior toward the supermodel "unacceptable."
Bodycam footage captured the interaction between the police officer and Bündchen, 45, in Surfside — a town about 30 minutes from Miami Beach — on Wednesday. Footage obtained by Fox News Digital showed Bündchen telling the officer she was attempting to escape the paparazzi following her.
The police officer acknowledged her situation but said there was "nothing" he could do about it.
"Yeah, but he's, like, stalking me," Bündchen said.
The police officer then told Bündchen she'd need to contact the Miami Beach Police Department since that's when the paparazzi began following her. After the police officer apologized, Bündchen broke down into tears.
Bodycam footage captred the moment between Gisele Bundchen and the police officer.
NDZ/Star Max/Getty Images
"I'm so tired," she said. "Everywhere I go I have these fucking guys after me. Nothing protects me. I can't do nothing. I just want to live my life."
The police officer responded that he couldn't stop the paparazzi from doing their job, which is to take photographs.
"I don't know how that's allowed," she said.
Now, Mayor Charles Burkett has lambasted the police officer in a letter addressed to Surfside Police Department's Chief of Police, according to WPLG.
"This response is wholly unacceptable and not reflective of the values, judgement and service residents expect from their police," Burkett wrote. "The dismissive posture towards a resident who is clearly in distress is everything we do not want to see in the way our police interact and serve our residents."
Surfside Mayor Charles Burkett in July 2021.
Miami Herald/Getty Images
Interim Police Chief Henry Doce echoed Mayor Burkett's sentiments in a statement to the outlet.
"I would have liked to have seen more empathy at the initial contact to what was going on," Doce said.
Still, Doce added that the police officer is "phenomenal."
"Could we have done better? I think it's a learning opportunity to understand what the dynamics of that situation is," Doce told WPLG.
Representatives for Bündchen, Burkett, and the Surfside Police Department did not immediately respond to Business Insider's request for comment.
The deadline for a sale is set for January 19, 2025.
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ByteDance would rather close down TikTok in the US than sell it, Reuters reported, citing four unnamed sources.
President Joe Biden recently signed into law legislation that could see TikTok banned in the US.
ByteDance has nine months to a year to divest itself of the company under the legislation.
ByteDance, the Chinese parent company of TikTok, would rather close down TikTok in the US than sell it if legal means to fight a proposed US ban fail, Reuters reported, citing four unnamed sources.
A sale is unlikely as the algorithms powering the short-video app are key to ByteDance's overall operations, the sources told Reuters, also noting that TikTok made up only a small part of the company's total revenues and active users.
Closing down the app would, therefore, limit the impact on ByteDance's business and allow it to retain control of its algorithm, they said.
President Joe Biden recently signed into law legislation that would see TikTok banned in the US unless ByteDance divests itself of the app over the next nine months to a year.
The move stems from fears among US lawmakers that China could use the app for surveillance activities and to gather data on US citizens.
TikTok's CEO, Shou Zi Chew, said he was confident the company would win the legal challenge, however.
"We are confident and we will keep fighting for your rights in the courts," he said. "The facts and the Constitution are on our side and we expect to prevail."
The deadline to sell the app is set for January 19, 2025, but an extension is possible if ByteDance demonstrates progress toward a sale.
It follows a report in The Information earlier this week that said ByteDance was exploring options to sell a majority stake in TikTok's US business.
The report, which cited three people with knowledge of the situation, said ByteDance would prefer to sell to a non-tech industry company and without giving up the algorithm that recommends videos to app users.
ByteDance has said that the rumors that it plans to sell TikTok "are untrue."
Business Insider has reached out to ByteDance for comment.
Brown sophomore Alex Eisler has a lucrative side hustle selling restaurant reservations.
He vends them on nascent platform Appointment Trader.
Eisler told BI his most expensive sale was $1,358 for an omakase reservation in Boston.
Need more proof that the scalper and bot-fueled restaurant reservation-selling ecosystem has intensified to new heights?
Brown University student Alex Eisler has generated $105,000 in reservation sales since November 2022, when he joined Appointment Trader — an online marketplace that allows users to buy and sell restaurant reservations using an auction model.
Eisler — a sophomore studying applied math and computer science — told Business Insider he's always been a foodie, and first stumbled upon Appointment Trader while purchasing a reservation of his own at NYC steakhouse 4 Charles Prime Rib.
He then attempted to sell a few reservations on the platform procured through American Express-owned Resy and by calling restaurants personally. He had mixed success, he said, whereupon he said he started playing around with code and developed a bot to automate the process.
Eisler told Business Insider the most expensive reservation he's ever sold was $1,358 at an omakase restaurant in Boston. Business Insider verified the approved bid with a screenshot he provided. In New York City, he also recently banked $850 for a lunch table at Maison Close and $1,050 for a spot at Carbone, The New Yorker reported.
"It has never really been about the money for me," Eisler told BI. "I just wanted to bring supply and demand together."
It's worth noting that the $105,000 figure raked in was before Appointment Trader takes its fees, ranging from 20% to 30%, according to The New Yorker, which first covered Eisler's side hustle and the increasingly elusive task of going out to eat. He told the outlet he pocketed $70,000 last year.
Appointment Trader is just one platform helping to turn reservation-selling into a cottage industry of sorts.
Members-only platform Dorsia is another — but operates on a completely different business model, working in tandem with top restaurants to offer reservations in exchange for a guaranteed minimum spend.
Business Insider's Linette Lopez previously reported on New York's freshly gilded dining scene, with the emergence of apps like Resy gamifying the reservation experience and pitting elite diners against their more tech-savvy counterparts, who are hacking the system with bots.
That said, some restaurant owners are perturbed by how the space is evolving.
Bloomberg reported in October that sites like Resy and Tock — as well as the restaurants that they service — are attempting to crack down on bots by deactivating reseller accounts and creating teams dedicated to fraud.
The New Yorker noted bots and resellers prevent restaurants from collecting valuable customer data.
"It's bad for business," Eric Ripert, chef and co-owner of famed French seafood restaurant Le Bernardin, told The New Yorker. "Every day, we spend hours trying to track down the bots and the fake reservations … If you have tables that are no-shows, the profit of the night is done."