Asher Burke built his company, Ads Inc, on the back of one of the internet’s most persistent, lucrative, and sophisticated scams — the subscription trap. And then it all fell apart. In late November 2018 , Asher Burke gathered his employees in their San Diego office and laid out a vision for how Ads…

In 2018, there was a lot to read about Fortnite , and even more to learn from it. And to point, “the game” is indeed the future of entertainment (as well as the greatest threat to today’s media giants). But probably not in the way you think. Fortnite ’s real opportunity is much bigger and more…

It is, among other things, bad news for movie theaters that depend on repertory screenings to shore up increasingly shaky bottom lines. Photo: Twentieth Century Fox Joe Neff knew there was trouble when the horror films started vanishing. Neff is the director of the 24-Hour Science Fiction and Horror…

Nearly 30 years ago, a handful of smart people set out with one mission: to make some silly movies. What followed was a true golden age of Hollywood comedy that saw the arrival of megastars still with us today, a commercial explosion, and then, an eventual splintering that changed the genre forever.…

Many in the European press believe UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson will not be able to keep his promise of leaving the EU by 31 October following Parliament's rejection of his plan to pass his Brexit bill in three days. The deadline is "hardly possible" , says Germany's Bild. It will "definitely…

Obsidian Entertainment/Private Division I I knew I’d love The Outer Worlds as soon as I stumbled into a cave and met a bleeding, dying gentleman. I offered to help, but he hesitated. Was I using Spacer’s Choice health care products? His contract clearly states that he can’t use a competing product.…

[ Ed. note: Out today, Boss Fight Books’ latest, NBA Jam , looks back at the ‘90s arcade phenomenon known for bringing in over a billion dollars in quarters. In talking to the development team and many others affected by the game, author Reyan Ali has pieced together one of the most significant…

NordVPN, a virtual private network provider that promises to “protect your privacy online,” has confirmed it was hacked. The admission comes following rumors that the company had been breached. It first emerged that NordVPN had an expired internal private keys exposed , potentially allowing anyone…

Adam Neumann Photographer: Cindy Ord/Getty Images Photographer: Cindy Ord/Getty Images SoftBank Group Corp. is taking control of beleaguered WeWork, part of a rescue financing plan that will see former Chief Executive Officer Adam Neumann sever most of his remaining ties with the company he…

Opinion: Uber, Facebook, and Google are increasingly behaving like the law-flouting financial empires of the 1920s. We know how that turned out. Last month, after a fierce lobbying battle, California passed a law that will likely end up mandating that companies in the “gig economy,” such as Uber,…

A screenshot from an Unbox Therapy video showing selfies taken under identical lighting conditions with different generations of Apple phones. (Lewis Hilsenteger) When a prominent YouTuber named Lewis Hilsenteger (aka “ Unbox Therapy ”) was testing out this fall’s new iPhone model, the XS, he…

1/ #Fortnite has now been down for 20 hours, during a national holiday, seemingly by design + with no explanation. Even though it is the paragon of an always-on, live service. To answer why, important to consider what was (A) necessary; (B) decided by Epic; and (C) leaned into 2/ Necessary: Changing…

Some older Teslas are spontaneously bricking because their embedded flash memory is wearing out, according to three independent Tesla repair professionals who have studied the issue. The issue is with a flash storage chip called the eMMC that is embedded on a board called the MCU1. According to…

Features The indie rap star breaks down the comedy, clothing, characters, and isolation tanks that informed his new album. Photos by Getty Images. “People Just Do Nothing” photo by Vicky Grout. Danny Brown photo by Tom Keelan. To keep his freewheeling raps about personal demons and debauchery…

Netflix/Getty Images/Ringer illustration As a bit of world-building, which Netfllix’s Rhythm + Flow spends more time on than most other music competition shows, the main hosts—Cardi B, T.I., and Chance the Rapper—cruise down L.A.’s Fairfax Avenue in a two-tone Wraith. Chance is driving. T.I., who’s…

Getty Images/Ringer illustration LeBron James didn’t have to step in front of a microphone on Monday night. He’d already been ruled out of the Lakers’ preseason game against the Warriors, so he could have waltzed into Staples Center in street clothes, carrying another glass of wine , and sat on the…

At the back of Costco's stores, past the televisions, jewelry, jumbo-sized ketchup jugs and tubs of mixed nuts, is one of the retailer's most prized items: The rotisserie chicken that costs just $4.99. Cheap Kirkland Signature rotisserie chickens aren't only a quick way for families to get dinner on…

Continue reading the main story The Pentagon will have to disassemble combat bases that were built to stay for a mission that was supposed to last, and protect the troops as they withdraw amid a chaotic battlefield. American Special Forces troops outside the northern Syrian city of Manbij in…

Carlos Jasso / Reuters Several weeks ago, I met up with a friend in New York who suggested we grab a bite at a Scottish bar in the West Village. He had booked the table through something called Seated, a restaurant app that pays users who make reservations on the platform. We ordered two cocktails…

Netflix/Ringer illustration The arrival of the first official update on the fate of Breaking Bad ’s core cast—unless you count the Cinnabon Gene scenes from Better Call Saul —occasions plenty of reflection on the show and its influence. It’s a time to think about how Breaking Bad changed visual…

The power of Hemingway’s famous 6-word fiction miniature “For sale: baby shoes, never worn” lies in the unspoken parts, the gaps that the reader is left to fill in. Detroit rapper Danny Brown one-ups Hemingway at his own game on his fifth studio album uknowhatimsayin¿ , a 33-minute slideshow of tiny…

“ Rope was an interesting technical experiment that I was lucky and happy to be a part of, but I don’t think it was one of Hitchcock’s better films.” So wrote Farley Granger, one of its two stars, in his memoir Include Me Out . The actor was in his early twenties when the Master of Suspense plucked…

A WeWork location in New York’s Financial District; the company’s CEO stepped down last week and it temporarily halted new leases. Photo: Drew Angerer/Getty Images By Peter Grant and Keiko Morris Keiko Morris The Wall Street Journal Biography Updated Sept. 29, 2019 7:44 pm ET Turmoil at WeWork is…

Exclusive WeWork Plans to Shed One-Third of Technology Employees By Oct. 8, 2019 2:32 PM PDT · Comment by Gautam Banerjee WeWork expects to shed about 500 of the roughly 1,500 software engineers, product managers and data scientists employed in the company’s technology division, a person familiar…

Edmon de Haro Just under a century ago, the Soviet Union embarked on one of the strangest attempts to reshape the common calendar that has ever been undertaken. As Joseph Stalin raced to turn an agricultural backwater into an industrialized nation, his government downsized the week from seven to…

Facebook is intent on staying out of the moderation of political speech, despite the use of the social network to spread discord and disinformation in the 2016 presidential campaign. Credit Jim Wilson/The New York Times WASHINGTON — The 30-second video ad released by the Trump campaign last week is…

Share Tweet Submit Pin NoiseTradeVideoPodcastsDaytrotter Music Movies TV Comedy Games Books Drink Politics Travel Tech NoiseTrade Video Podcasts Daytrotter Netflix Merch Advertise Music Movies TV Comedy Games Books Drink Politics Travel Tech Featured Games The 100 Best Videogames of the 2010s By…

Justin Sullivan/Getty Images On Friday, several advertising agencies revealed the details of a proposed settlement with Facebook that would end a class action alleging the social media giant overstated the average time its users spent watching video. According to a brief in support of the…

Image: Facebook When Libra launched on June 18th , it seemed like an alarming new front in Facebook’s megalomaniacal expansion. Having captured billions of users and tens of billions of dollars in annual profits, the company would now be taking over currency itself. The company’s head of blockchain,…

Influencers are taken scuba diving in the Red Sea, put up in grand hotels and taken on trips to the ancient Al Ula tomb, pictured here in a stock image.Photograph: Hassan Ammar/AP A year on from the brutal murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi , the kingdom of Saudi Arabia is using social media…

Start-up investors are warning of a reckoning after the stumbles of some high-profile “unicorns.” Now turning a profit is in. Credit Doug Chayka SAN FRANCISCO — Fred Wilson, a venture capitalist at Union Square Ventures, recently published a blog post titled “ The Great Public Market Reckoning .” In…

MusicQ+A Text Thomas Hobbs 4 October 2019 With his crooked teeth, mischievous laugh, and a reputation for living life to the absolute extreme, Detroit rapper Danny Brown is often considered somewhat of a provocateur. Like Ol’ Dirty Bastard for the internet era, he’s a hip hop iconoclast not afraid…

AMC/Ringer illustration Whether or not you think that Breaking Bad has a claim to being the best television show of the post- Sopranos era, a case can certainly be made that it’s the best looking . For five seasons, creator Vince Gilligan and cinematographer Michael Slovis cultivated an expressive,…

The Sterile, Efficient Life of a Millennial I’d love a dining car on the train. Or any chance to slow down. Ms. Stauffer is a writer. Credit Giacomo Bagnara I was covered in a layer of sweat, and my iPhone charger was dangling out of a bag that contained the after-hours work I still needed to do…

BBC Pictures Every episode of BBC Two’s darkly humorous State of the Union begins in the same way. A crumbling relationship between Louise and Tom plays out inside a London pub. The two examine their marriage, trade witty barbs about their gnarly imperfections, then pop across the street to their…

In August 2018, Instagram followers of the New York Public Library were tapping through their Insta Stories when something unexpected showed up: the full text of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland , designed for a small screen, with small animations that brought the story to life as you flipped. The…

‘His storytelling is as witty as ever’: Danny Brown.Photograph: Tom Keelan N earing 40, pathologically indiscreet, drug-guzzling Detroit rapper Danny Brown has grown up and started taking his career seriously. Sensible haircut, straightened teeth and his own chat show , albeit one on which A$AP…

The roughly one thousand people who still used pagers in Japan might have shed a tear this week when they were finally discontinued . Wait, you may say... pagers are still a thing? Even though you won't find them in Japan any more, pagers are still used elsewhere. And they're not the only "outdated"…

On tour celebrating the 1998 LP, the group is creating “arguments about where we’ve been and where we are now,” its leader, Robert Del Naja, said. Massive Attack's “Mezzanine” tour includes guest singers and video footage in collaboration with the documentarian and essayist Adam Curtis. Credit Kyle…

The trip-hop classic was an unexpected success in 1994. Geoff Barrow and Adrian Utley look back at its creation and explain how they think it should be heard. Beth Gibbons onstage with Portishead after the band’s debut, “Dummy,” was released. In the summer of 1994, when American alternative rock…