Tag: News

• Sabrina Philipp split from her husband after nearly three years of marriage.
• She celebrated her divorce by hosting a $30,000 "divorce party" for 18 family and friends.
• In a mock freedom ceremony, Philipp used a slingshot to fire her wedding ring into the ocean.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Sabrina Philipp. It has been edited for length and clarity.

I hadn't expected it to be so emotional, but the high point of my divorce party was taking a slingshot and launching my wedding ring into the ocean.

A friend played "Goodbye Girl" by The Chicks as the band hit the water. It was out with the old, in with the new. My life was over as a married woman. The next adventure had begun.

My guests — including my parents — clapped and cheered. I had never felt so relieved and happy. It might have cost $30,000, but my divorce party was worth every cent.

I met my ex-husband in Bali in June 2017, when I was a 23-year-old graduate from the University of Florida. He was an Australian who was about to turn 29 and traveling simultaneously.

He was my first serious boyfriend — certainly the only one I'd lived with. We had a great time exploring Bali and then Europe. A couple of years later, we moved to Scotland.

My ex and I were the only people at our wedding

The relationship had its ups and downs. We shared many interests, such as food, travel, and animals — but spent a lot of time apart, particularly when he flew to Australia to visit his child from his first marriage.

Still, I quickly said "yes" when he proposed in January 2020. We began to plan a destination wedding in Bali in July 2021. However, the pandemic shut everything down, and we had no idea when it would end.

An immigration attorney suggested that we move the wedding forward. We ended up getting married in Denmark in August 2020. Restrictions were still in place, and we had to take COVID tests before and after the trip. Only the two of us were there, but my family watched the ceremony via Zoom.

I cried when I said my vows. Everyone thought it was because I was so happy. The truth is, I was thinking, "Oh, my God, I just got married, and my mom and my dad aren't here." But, in my young mind, I thought it was the right decision.

We settled in Edinburgh, where I ran my business coaching company. We got two dogs — Bonnie and Clyde — and considered starting a family. But there were issues behind the scenes, such as him declaring his love and ghosting me. We had couples therapy.

After a while, my ex stopped going to therapy. I went on my own. Things weren't working out. I was growing older and wiser as I approached the age of 30. We argued about money, and there were other fights. We separated in the summer of 2023.

It was extremely traumatic. I felt emotionally lost. Then there was a drama about finances. Luckily, he didn't object to me keeping our pets.

I focused on health and wellness after the split

I'm an influencer and shared the details of our break-up on Instagram. It struck a chord, especially with women. They commented on my posts, messaged me, and asked for advice. I realized I had a platform to talk about the reality of divorce and how to survive it.

Meanwhile, I became focused on health and wellness. I wanted to feel good and look good — purely for myself. I got Botox and plastic surgery, including rhinoplasty and blepharoplasty, in New York City.

My friends and I jokingly coined the phrase "Hottest Ex-Wife Ever." It was one of the reasons I decided to celebrate my new look and new-found freedom with the divorce party.

I wanted to challenge the negativity around divorce. Many people see it as a failure. If your marriage ended, that doesn't mean it failed, or you should regret it.

We live our lives in chapters. It's OK if one chapter is marriage and the next is being single again.

The party happened in April in my home city of Miami, just before my 30th birthday. Eighteen people flew in from Canada, California, Texas, North Carolina, and all over Florida. It meant the world that Mom and Dad were there. They hadn't attended my wedding, so it was fitting that they came to my divorce celebration.

I felt the opposite of ugly, rejected or unwanted

I micromanaged the guests' outfits — everyone had to wear black because it was a funeral for my marriage.

We started with a sexy lingerie shoot in my hotel suite with my girlfriends. I posed in lacy underwear with my divorce cake in the shape of a black heart. It was great because, when you go through a divorce, you can feel so ugly, rejected, or unwanted. I felt the opposite.

Then, we had a four-course dinner at a waterside restaurant in Miami Beach. We ate caviar and seafood and drank bottles of Dom Perignon. The ambiance was perfect. I couldn't have wished for better company or a better time.

As for my wedding ring — a platinum piece from Cartier that I'd bought for myself in Copenhagen for $1,000— we had a mock ceremony when I pitched it into the sea.

A jeweler told me I could have melted it down and gotten around $70 for the weight of the metal. "That's not very fun," I thought. "Do I want $70, or do I want photos and videos of me slingshotting my wedding band into the ocean?" The symbolism was everything. I took the slingshot.

Do you have a powerful story about a good or bad relationship you'd like to share with Business Insider? Please send details to jridley@businessinsider.com

• Japan's Olympic teams will wear infrared-proof uniforms at the Paris Olympics.
• Mizuno designed the uniforms to combat illicit photography of athletes.
• Complaints about revealing photos led to the development of this specialized fabric.

A brand-new innovation is coming to the Paris Olympics this summer: uniforms that creeps can't see through with infrared cameras.

Japan's volleyball, track and field, table tennis, and other teams will wear uniforms made of a cutting-edge new fabric that absorbs infrared light, preventing infrared cameras from seeing through to athletes' underwear or bodies underneath, Le Monde first reported.

Japanese sports equipment company Mizuno designed the outfits specifically to combat the rising trend of voyeurs producing and circulating compromising photos of athletes on pornographic websites, Mizuno said in a press release.

Kazuya Tajima, who works on Mizuno's development team, told Le Monde he hopes that the "use of this fabric by top athletes will make society aware that voyeurism is unacceptable," adding that "cameras are becomingly increasingly sophisticated."

The fabric uses specialized material that absorbs light from the infrared range into the composition of the textile itself, making the fabric "nearly wholly opaque" under both visible and infrared light, Mizuno explains. And that, Mizuno says, "can help reduce the number of athletes that fall victim to illicit infrared photography."

Development on the technology began after athletes complained to the Japanese Olympic Committee in 2020 about revealing photos of themselves shared on social media with sexually explicit captions, The Japan Times reported.

Though the trend may be getting more attention lately, it's nothing new.

A member of Japan's badminton team, Reiko Shiota, who competed in the 2008 Beijing Games and 2012 London Games, has been a victim of photos of her breasts and lower body circulating online, Le Monde reported.

And Japanese gymnast Airi Hatakeyama has also been targeted by people sexualizing suggestive photos of her, even when she was a minor, according to Le Monde.

Some of the voyeurs have even been caught in the act. In 2023, a man was charged for filming female athletes' lower bodies during a running match in Kyoto, and ahead of the 2021 Tokyo Games, another man was arrested for selling infrared photos of a female volleyball player on a porn website, Le Monde reported.

• A Tesla owner said he crashed his new Cybertruck after the brakes stopped working.
• Bruce Freshwater said now he can't drive the car and a repair could cost up to $30,000.
• He said Tesla was investigating, but hasn't gotten back to him. The company didn't respond to BI.

A Tesla owner said he crashed his new Cybertruck into a neighbor's yard within the first few hours of driving it — and he said it's because the vehicle's brakes didn't work.

The owner, Bruce Freshwater, told BI that the crash happened on April 27 after he picked up the Cybertruck. He said he pumped the accelerator when his daughter asked him to, but that nothing happened when he hit the brakes.

"I held the brakes down, and the vehicle really wasn't slowing down," Freshwater said.

Freshwater said he went to make a turn and "the back wheels locked up." According to a report from the North Fayette Township Police Department in Pennsylvania, Freshwater stated that his vehicle went forward 50 feet and crashed into his neighbor's yard. The Cybetruck then barreled into one of his neighbor's cars. That car then ran into a second vehicle, Freshwater told the police in the report, which BI has viewed.

Freshwater's Cybertruck, along with one of the neighbor's vehicles, sustained "disabling damage," according to the police report. The second vehicle had "moderate damage," the report said.

Freshwater said no one was hurt in the crash, but also said a fuse was blown when the airbags deployed, so the Cybertruck can't be driven.

Freshwater said a Tesla-recommended body shop gave him an estimate of between $16,000 and $30,000 to repair the vehicle. He paid around $109,000 after taxes for the Cybertruck, which he bought new from Tesla. He said he's now working with his insurance company to determine what happens next.

Meanwhile, Freshwater said he called Tesla's service line after the incident and heard back on April 29, two days after the crash, and again a week later.

He said a Tesla manager told him that due to the terrain, the accelerator may or may not disengage, and they're looking into the braking issue. He said that was the last he heard from Tesla.

Tesla didn't respond to BI's request to verify Freshwater's account or to comment on the situation.

The Tesla owner posted about the incident on X and said Tesla "needs to take some responsibility." Freshwater told BI that he still makes car payments every month on a vehicle he isn't using.

He said no other Tesla owners have contacted him regarding a similar experience, but the issue he experienced may not be an isolated case.

Tesla voluntarily recalled 2024 Cybertrucks in April for an "unintended acceleration from trapped pedal." The situation may occur when the accelerator pedal pad dislodges and causes the pedal to become trapped by the interior trim, increasing risk of crashing, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

The report said the issue occurred because of an "unapproved change" during the vehicle's production in which soap had been added to the assembly. Residual soap "reduced the retention of the pad to the pedal," it said.

The recall covered 3,878 Cybertrucks, the NHTSA recall report said. As of April 15, there were no known related injuries, and by April 17, the vehicles in production were apparently equipped with a new accelerator pedal component, the report said.

Freshwater said he was initially a big fan of Cybertruck and ordered it the first day it became available. But while he initially wanted a Cybertruck replacement, he now isn't sure what he hopes will come out of the situation.

"With the wife and the kids, I'm not sure they would ever get in it with me," Freshwater said. "So it comes down to that, too."

• Artechouse is an art firm that displays digital exhibitions in US cities.
• It showcases works that use extended reality and AI to push the boundaries of immersive art.
• This article is part of "Build IT," a series about digital-tech trends disrupting industries.

When the husband-and-wife duo Sandro Kereselidze and Tatiana Pastukhova came up with the idea for Artechouse, the experiential-art firm they cofounded in 2015, it was hard to explain what they were doing. "Immersive art" wasn't a catchphrase.

Today, immersive art — which uses technology to engage the viewer in an exhibition — is everywhere. Around the world, there have been several immersive-art exhibitions dedicated to the work of Vincent van Gogh. Glimpse, a market-research and trend-tracking company, said in February that search interest in immersive art had increased by 27% over the past year.

Artechouse, which has permanent locations in Miami, New York, Houston, and Washington, DC, has a 14-person creative and production team, including contractors and full-time employees, to transform artists' work into digital and experiential art. The company's exhibitions feature extended reality, which merges physical and virtual worlds.

Among the 40 immersive shows Artechouse has done so far is "Isekai: Blooming Parallel Worlds" in Washington, DC. The exhibition involves a gallery surrounding visitors with digital cherry blossoms and a separate room with an interactive music installation. It uses 360-degree projection mapping, at a resolution of 18K, to create panoramic images.

Pastukhova said Artechouse aims to showcase digital exhibitions that challenge artists and use "new technologies and new methods."

Bringing the future to the present

One of the artists who has partnered with Artechouse is Vince Fraser, an Afro-surrealist in London known for embracing tech.

"I was looking for how I could create my digital artwork and then put it within an actual physical space," Fraser said. In 2014, he started researching immersive spaces. "Back then, it wasn't really a big thing," he said. "There were only a few people doing it."

In 2021, Fraser teamed up with Artechouse for an audiovisual exhibition, narrated by the poet Ursula Rucker, that celebrates the Black experience. The show, which opened in Miami and has since traveled, features an immersive room and an interactive area with augmented-reality technology.

A highlight of the exhibit for Fraser is the auxiliary gallery, called "Thousand Masks," which speaks to African kings' and queens' power, identity, and culture.

Fraser credits Artechouse's big production team with executing his vision in a short time. "It usually takes about six months to produce a show, but we only had three months to produce this," Fraser said. "We were working day and night to get it finished. So I was super proud to have been able to do it in such a short period."

The exhibition is in New York until November.

AI enters the picture

Last year, Artechouse ventured into generative AI with the launch of "World of AI•magination," housed in the company's main gallery in New York. The multidisciplinary project creates experimental scenes using Stable Diffusion, a text-to-image model, and a generative adversarial network, a machine-learning model that generates data.

Riki Kim, Artechouse's executive creative director, said the models used to generate the visuals were trained on images "designed specifically for each scene."

AI art isn't without controversy. Fraser, who uses generative AI in his work, acknowledged other creators' concerns. "I've had conversations with other artists, and they're not very keen on the whole AI stuff," he said. "I kind of get it, because obviously a lot of these models are trained on data, and a lot of the data which they've used are from existing artists. A lot of artists feel very uncomfortable about that."

Kereselidze said people should stay creative and use AI "as a tool and not vice versa."

"AI in the next two to three years can create pretty much anything that you desire. Anything that artists can do as humans," he continued. "It is kind of a questionable dark side that we need to be aware of. We need to be conscious about what we teach these tools."

Fraser predicted that AI would play a major role in the near future of immersive art. "I personally never thought I would be alive to see what's happening now with what is capable in terms of creativity," said Fraser, who's 52. "For me, it's just endless possibilities now."

Kereselidze is looking forward to those possibilities. "In this field, we learn as we go," he said. "It's exciting, it's nerve-racking, but it's something that is rewarding, because when the final project comes to life, it's just a beautiful experience to watch audiences interacting and engaging with the artwork."

• A doctor accused of purposely driving his family off a cliff in a Tesla can now avoid trial.
• A judge granted Dharmesh Patel's request for mental health diversion. 
• The DA whose office brought attempted murder charges against Patel told BI he was "disappointed."

The California doctor who was accused of purposely driving his Tesla off a cliff with his family inside has been handed the chance to get the charges against him dismissed.

A San Mateo County judge on June 20 granted Dharmesh Patel's request to participate in a mental health diversion program, which would allow him to avoid a trial on charges of attempted murder.

San Mateo County District Attorney Steve Wagstaffe, whose office brought charges against Patel, panned Judge Susan Jakubowski's order, telling Business Insider on Wednesday that he was "disappointed with the court's decision."

"Judge Jakubowski carefully weighed the evidence and the facts and went the other way," Wagstaffe said. "If I were judge, I would definitely have ruled the opposite, but that is how our criminal justice system works. We do not get to win them all."

The ability to participate in diversion programs — for juveniles, veterans, or defendants struggling with mental health diagnoses or substance abuse struggles — is an increasingly popular alternative to jail sentences across the US.

When defendants who have been charged with crimes are allowed to participate in these specialized programs, which vary by state, they are generally required to participate in therapy or medical services tailored to their needs. When defendants complete the programming successfully, they often avoid a harsher sentence, or trial — and sometimes prevent an arraignment on the charges completely.

Patel was charged last year with three counts of attempted murder after he drove his wife and two young kids off a notorious 250-foot cliff in Northern California on January 2, 2023. He later pleaded not guilty.

The family miraculously survived the plunge off the cliff known as Devil's Slide.

Patel's wife screamed to rescuers at the scene that her husband, a radiologist, "tried to kill us" and that "he intentionally drove the car over" the edge, Wagstaffe previously told BI.

Still, the wife said she did not want her husband prosecuted and previously asked the court to release him from jail.

During last Thursday's hearing, Jakubowski determined that Patel was eligible for the state's mental health diversion program and "concluded the proper diagnosis for the defendant's mental illness was major depressive disorder, which is a qualifying mental disorder under the statute," according to the district attorney's office.

Patel has been locked up in the county jail since last year and will remain there for several more weeks for what was called a "bridging period" before officially being released, the DA's office said.

The judge ordered that Patel return to court once a week for progress reports, be monitored by GPS, reside in San Mateo County at his parents home, and, for the first two months, he can only leave his residence to go to court or mental health treatment sessions, according to the DA's office.

Under the court order, Patel must also test twice a week to show medication compliance, not use alcohol or drugs, possess no weapons, and surrender his driver's license and passport.

Wagstaffe told BI the charges against Patel have now been suspended and if he successfully completes the two years of the diversion program, the charges would be automatically dismissed.

"If during the two years he violates any of the requirements for diversion that Judge Jakubowski will impose, he can have his diversion revoked and the charges of attempted murder will go forward," said Wagstaffe.

Patel's attorney did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Meanwhile, Wagstaffe told BI that though he was upset by the judge's ruling, his "pique" was with the California Legislature and the state's governor, Gavin Newsom, "who feel that including violent crimes like attempted murder within the mental health diversion law does not endanger public safety."

Under California law, defendants are ineligible for the diversion program if they have been charged with other offenses, including murder, involuntary manslaughter, and rape.

" I disagree fervently with their conclusion," the DA said.

The governor's office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

• Sam's Club uses a system of floor-scrubbing robots that have AI inventory scanners.
• These devices do the work that once required an employee to walk every aisle to check inventory.
• A worker tells BI this automation has made his job more enjoyable, and eased his concerns about AI.

When it comes to the impact of AI and automation on the workplace, there's no one-size-fits-all verdict yet.

For warehouse workers, a global study by Accenture in 2022 found that more than 40% expressed "negative sentiment" about automation potentially leading to their replacement.

"I had general sense of fear of losing my job to robots," a Sam's Club forklift operator told Business Insider. "But after seeing the company's approach to it, I don't think I'm losing my job specifically in the near future."

The worker, who requested anonymity as he was not authorized to speak to the media, said his attitude shifted after the Walmart-owned warehouse club rolled out a new fleet of floor-scrubbing robots at US locations starting in 2022.

Not only do these robots clean the warehouse floors autonomously, Sam's Club CEO Chris Nicholas says they're also equipped with AI-enabled cameras, which "do 23 million scans a day in our clubs of all of the inventory all around the club, including what's on the floor."

The forklift driver told BI that before these machines arrived, one of his tasks at the end of each shift was to walk through every aisle of the warehouse making note of which items he needed to prioritize when he clocked in at 4 a.m. the next morning.

Thanks to computer vision and artificial intelligence, the robot floor scrubbers now generate that list automatically, giving him more time to do more enjoyable parts of his job.

And the more he sees what these automated systems can do, the more he understands what they can't.

"They're gonna need me to work on the freight anyway," he said, referring to unloading pallets of merchandise from trucks. "They need a human — a robot cannot work on the freight."

Sam's Club's CEO also said in a recent interview with Jefferies that he wants these tools to free up workers' time to help customers.

"It's a very human thing," Nicholas said. "By them doing fewer things that they don't want to do, they get to spend time with the people that we should be spending time with."

• On a recent long-haul, round-trip flight, I sat in the front and back of Lufthansa's economy cabin. 
• Each seat had perks. People at the front had food options, but the back had a galley for stretching. 
• I'm still partial to the back, but I understand why people prefer the front. 

It's a hot take, but I love the back of a plane — especially on a long-haul flight.

But after a handful of long-haul flights tucked away in the rear of economy, I decided to see if my preference remained strong.

On a recent round-trip, long-haul Lufthansa flight between Denver and Germany, I decided to compare the two areas of economy. For my outbound flight, I sat in row 42, the third to last economy row. For my return trip, I was seated in row 11, the first economy row.

Each seat had its perks, but I'm sticking with the back of the plane.

When it came to food service, the front wins

A few hours into my return flight to Denver, flight attendants came around with carts full of meals. Each passenger was asked a simple question: chicken or pasta?

This wasn't the case when I was seated in the back. When flight attendants reached the second-to-last row of economy, they had run out of options. Each passenger was handed a tray of beef and mashed potatoes.

This isn't the first time that's happened to me while seated in the back. Last year, a similar situation occurred on a flight to Tokyo.

If I was a picky eater, this reason alone could sway me to opt for a front-row seat. Instead, I typically request a vegetarian meal for long-haul flights, so my meal is already picked before boarding the plane.

My main focus — regardless of whether it's the front or back — is to avoid the bathrooms

When I'm cramped in a tight space, the last thing I want to worry about is a bathroom smell wafting around me for more than 10 hours.

So, my No. 1 priority when picking a long-haul seat is sitting far from the bathrooms. On many larger aircraft, the economy bathrooms are stationed in the middle of the cabin.

For my 10-hour flight to Germany, I was in the back of economy, and there wasn't a bathroom directly behind me. Instead, a galley was just a few feet away, ideal for a quick stretch break.

I also didn't have a bathroom nearby for my return flight at the front. If I opt for the front on a future flight, I'll double-check that the premium economy cabin has no bathrooms in the back.

A few days before each flight, open seats remained in the back of the plane

I've been lucky enough to have one or two long-haul flights without a middle-seat passenger. I've celebrated every bit of extra room and tried hard to recreate that luck.

I'm convinced your best chance of having an empty seat is if you're in the back of a cabin. Since most people avoid the rear, those seats are chosen last, or hopefully not chosen at all.

A few days before each flight, I checked the seat map and noticed my theory was correct. The majority of the empty seats remaining were toward the back of economy.

Unfortunately, that wasn't the case when I boarded the plane. Both flights were fully booked, meaning I would've been sitting next to someone no matter where I was on the plane.

On one flight, sitting in the rear helped me disembark faster

One of the main arguments for sitting in the front of economy is that you get off the plane faster.

While that's been the case on most long-haul flights, it wasn't when we landed at the Munich airport. Instead, flight attendants informed the passengers that we'd use both the front and back doors for disembarking. Since I was seated in the back, I was off the plane in no time.

However, had I been sitting in the back on my return flight, I would've been one of the last people off the plane. This would have also meant a much longer line when I reached customs.

Ultimately, no economy seat on a long-haul flight is ideal, but I'm sticking with the back

No matter the seat, a 10-hour flight isn't fun. I've learned to be patient and celebrate small wins, like getting a window seat or having an empty seat nearby.

Ultimately, everyone has their preferences. Mine just happens to be at the back of the plane, where I have a galley for stretching and a better chance at an empty seat.

• I took a red-eye flight from NYC to Berlin to start a two-week trip to Europe in October 2022.
• For $180, I flew through the night with Norse Atlantic Airways and had a row of seats to myself. 
• Although I thought the flight itself was ideal for a red-eye, I started my trip feeling exhausted.

In October 2022, I flew from my home in NYC to Berlin for a two-week train trip through Europe.

When booking air travel, I usually choose the cheapest nonstop flight leaving from my local airport, John F. Kennedy International Airport (JFK). For this trip, that option was an eight-hour red-eye flight on an airline I'd never heard of, Norse Atlantic Airways.

Norse Atlantic Airways is a new budget airline that started flying in 2022 with nonstop trips from the US to Germany, Norway, the UK, France, and Italy, according to its website.

I booked the lowest tier of ticket — economy light, which included a seat and space to store a personal item for $88. I also paid $75 to select my window seat in advance and a $20 check-in fee at the airport, for a grand total of $183.

I like how domestic red-eye flights give me an extra day at my destination, but I'd never taken one internationally. And I found that the long-haul flight through the night left me exhausted at the beginning of my trip. To me, it wasn't worth the day I saved.

I arrived at JFK at 9:30 p.m. for my 12:30 a.m. flight.

I could have checked in online for free, but I wanted to print my boarding pass at the airport.

On a late Sunday evening, the terminal at JFK felt quite empty.

Aside from people in line to board an aircraft, I hardly saw anyone.

My flight began boarding at 11:30 p.m.

I was among the last to board and got situated in my seat right around midnight.

The flight's seating arrangement was three columns with three seats in each row.

I paid extra to select a window seat before the flight so that I could lean against the window to rest.

A representative from Norse told BI that economy light seats are 17.2 inches wide with a 3-inch recline.

It felt like a standard plane seat to me.

I thought I had enough legroom even with my backpack shoved underneath the seat.

The seat pitch was between 27 and 32 inches, according to the representative.

There was an entertainment screen with movies, TV shows, and information about my flight in front of me.

Although I spent most of the time trying to sleep, I appreciated having the screen.

As the plane prepared for takeoff, I was thrilled that I had a whole row to myself.

In fact, I noticed many of the seats were empty.

My seat back pocket contained a menu of amenities, including earbuds, blankets, neck pillows, and sleep masks, although I didn't buy any.

Amenity prices ranged from $3.50 to $6.50.

After takeoff, the plane was quiet and dimly lit. But I hardly ever sleep well on planes, and this was no exception.

I woke several times through the night.

At one point in the night, I went to the bathroom and found it cleaner than most aircraft bathrooms I've been in.

Unlike most economy aircraft bathrooms I've used, the floor wasn't sticky and the trash can wasn't overflowing. 

In the morning, flight attendants came around with food and beverage service. So I looked at the menu in my seat back pocket.

I found that food and beverages weren't included in the price of my ticket, so I decided to skip it.

I landed in Berlin nearly an hour earlier than scheduled, so I was only in the air for seven hours.

Still, when I got off the plane, I felt completely exhausted due to a lack of sleep.

Despite feeling tired, as I would after any red-eye flight, I was impressed by the budget airline and would definitely book with Norse again.

The flight was comfortable and clean, and landing early was a nice bonus.

Once in Berlin, I still had a two-hour train journey to my Airbnb outside the city, and I could barely keep my eyes open.

Even after a night of sleep, I found that the exhaustion from the overnight flight — combined with jet lag — lasted for days. This wasn't ideal at the start of a two-week adventure.

My exhaustion wore off within a couple of days of my trip, but I had a lingering thought — next time I fly internationally, I won't mind spending a little more money and a little less time at my destination for a day flight.

• The "Perfect Match" season two finale aired last week, but the drama has continued on social media.
• Contestants are accusing each other of inappropriate behavior and forming secret pacts.
• This is not a new phenomenon, but "Perfect Match" stars seem to be taking post-show drama to a new level.

Warning: spoilers ahead for "Perfect Match" season two.

"Perfect Match" season two may have ended last week, but the drama is just getting started.

Last week, Netflix aired the season two finale, where Christine Obanor and Nigel Jones were voted the winners and Harry Jowsey was exposed for lying about kissing another contestant behind his partner's back.

Fans may have thought the season's biggest controversies would have been solved during the finale. But, now its stars have turned to social media, accusing contestants of secret pacts, homophobic and misogynistic behavior, and lying to their partners.

The stars claim these incidents were cut from the final episodes to fit the series' narrative.

This could be a tactic for the stars to boost their brands after the season ended. For example, Harry is bringing new fans to his podcast, "Boyfriend Material" by using this platform to comment on the show.

Some cast members may also want to use their new fame to criticize costars they feel were protected by the show's final cut.

Since last Friday, multiple contestants have released videos telling their side of the story, including a 27-minute YouTube video from Christine. She accuses Kaz Bishop of being a gaslighter, says Micah Lussier is a "mean girl," and claims Alara Taneri tried to DM her boyfriend Nigel while they were still together.

Meanwhile, Chris Hahn stirred up an argument among cast members last week after he said on TikTok that some contestants formed a pact to vote for Christine and Nigel would win.

Christine and Brittan Byrd hit back on social media, saying that the main couples in the show made their own secret agreement to keep new singles out of the main house so they couldn't take part in the competition.

Christine, Brittan, Dominique Defoe, and Xanthi Perdikomatis are meanwhile calling out men on the series, especially Stevan Ditter, Kaz Bishop, Bryton Constantin, and Chris.

They said Stevan, Kaz, and Chris complained that they weren't with the right partner and hit on other women during the boys' day out and the whole cast mixer the following day. Christine said Stevan sucked Melinda Berry's toes during the boy's day out, and Brittan said Chris tried to match with her during the mixer.

Christine and Brittan also said Kaz tried to match with Brittan immediately after coupling up with Christine at the mixer but was rejected.

Chris responded to the women's videos on Wednesday, saying on TikTok that they are making "a whole bunch of bullshit" and calling them fake. He said the women were civil with him when they attended a party he hosted two weeks ago.

Brittan and Dominique have also come for Bryton on TikTok over the last month, accusing him of making homophobic and misogynistic comments on and off-camera.

Bryton denied Dominique's claims about being homophobic and misogynistic on TikTok earlier this month, claiming that Dominique lied about him and just "hates men." He has not commented on Brittan's TikTok, published on Monday.

This is not the first time reality show drama has continued past a series finale, and even the "Perfect Match" season one cast, which was less scandalous than season two, had a few public arguments.

But these videos are starting to make fans question whether the narrative Netflix is presenting them is genuine.

The series' integrity was already being questioned after season two contestant Dom Gabriel shared a deleted scene on social media last week that highlighted that the producers edited a conversation with Tolú Ekundare to make him seem like a villain. The video was first shared by Kinetic Content, the production team behind the show.

With no end in sight for the "Perfect Match" drama, perhaps the series should take a leaf out of "Love Is Blind" and organize a live cast reunion to address everything.

A representative for Netflix did not immediately respond to a comment request from Business Insider.

Alara, Brittan, Bryton, Chris, Christine, Dominique, Kaz, Micah Stevan, and Xanthi have also been contacted for comment.

• Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky said AI hasn't changed most people's lives yet.
• Despite ChatGPT's 2022 introduction, apps have still remained largely the same, he said.
• Chesky expects apps to look very different within two to three years.

There have been a lot of predictions about how AI will change the world — but you're not alone if it hasn't impacted your life yet.

Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky thinks that will manifest in the next two to three years.

Chesky spoke to CNBC during the Aspen Ideas Festival about how, despite AI's grand expectations spurred by ChatGPT's introduction in 2022, people's everyday apps and products they use have yet to truly change or transform.

"You pick up your phone, look at every app in your home screen, and they're almost exactly the same," Chesky said. "So AI hasn't actually changed our daily life. It's captured our imagination, a little bit of our fear, but it hasn't changed our app."

The Airbnb cofounder said that AI features have yet to reach "that last 10%" where "all the gains are."

With most tech companies still in the midst of unveiling future projects — Airbnb itself has plans to leverage AI after recently acquiring an AI startup from Siri's cofounder — actual product development is still nascent.

For now, AI rollouts have introduced milder improvements, like dedicated chatbots or customer service tools. But system-level integrations are on the way, such as Apple Intelligence, which begins rolling out later this year and promises to proofread your emails and quickly do the math on when you'll need to leave the house in order to pick up your friend from the airport.

But Chesky said he expects apps across the board to look very different within two to three years.

"I think next year you're going to see a bit of a step forward, and I think within 2026, you'll see a giant leap," Chesky said.

The Airbnb cofounder has made similar statements in the past.

"Take your phone and look at all the icons on your phone. Most of those apps have not fundamentally changed since the advent of generative AI," he told investors during Airbnb's Q4 earnings call.

Just don't expect it to stay that way.