Hi! Open AI's new GPT-5 model is like talking to "a legitimate PhD level expert in anything," in the words of CEO Sam Altman… except that some users have found it can't do tasks that a second grader could achieve, like basic spelling and geography. Today we're exploring: |
- Sweet screams: Horror is having a scarily good year at the US box office.
- Big Apple: The iPhone maker has bought back billions of shares in the last 12 years.
- Ringing out: AOL is discontinuing its dial-up internet service.
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"Weapons" debut helps horror creep towards a record share of the US box office |
In previous years, even some of the highest-grossing horror movies have struggled to garner critical acclaim, with the genre often seeing large disparities between audience- and critic-powered scores on film review site Rotten Tomatoes. But "Barbarian" director Zach Cregger's new horror mystery "Weapons" was already making headlines for setting and equaling records on both of those metrics, having debuted at a perfect 100% critical rating on the site — before it opened to an impressive $42.5 million at the US box office over the weekend.
Indeed, "Weapons" is just the latest flick to help boost the horror genre to a potentially record-breaking 2025. The share of ticket sales for horror movies at the US box office is at an all-time high of 14.4% so far this year, up from 9.8% last year, per data from The Numbers. |
Following the mammoth success of "Sinners," which, per ScreenRant, has become the highest-grossing original movie of the 2020s, as well as sequel installments like "28 Years Later" and "Final Destination Bloodlines," it's already been a huge year for horror heading into the second half of 2025. Taking artistic license with the "made-to-frighten" format appears to be paying off, too. In 2021, the full year where the genre notched its highest market share in the US, horror was dominated by franchise follow-ups like "Halloween" and "A Quiet Place." Now, it seems adrenaline-thirsty audiences are eager for original stories like "Weapons." While industry bods warned of a "horror glut" at the outset of the summer — with Variety counting a total of 29 wide-release horror films across seven major studios slated for 2025 — six horror movies released this year have already accrued more than $50 million at the worldwide box office, according to The Numbers, suggesting that the appetite for big scares on big screens is still there. |
Apple remains a relentless buyback machine |
Big Tech is still seriously bullish on AI. And with good reason: every time Microsoft, Meta, Amazon, or Google announces that they're going to spend an extra $10 billion or $20 billion on data centers or AI talent, their stock prices tend to go up as investors reward their ambition. |
So far, Apple has been more deliberate about its spending (gold gifts for President Trump notwithstanding), eschewing the all-in approach on AI that its peers have been exhibiting. But there's one thing Apple is more than happy to spend money on: its own shares. |
Indeed, US public companies have already announced ~$984 billion worth of stock buybacks this year, according to data from Birinyi Associates cited by The Wall Street Journal — a figure that could rise to a record $1.1 trillion by the end of the year. An alternative to dividends, buybacks have become the favored way of returning cash to shareholders for much of Corporate America, and no company has embraced the practice more than Apple. The iPhone maker has already spent $70 billion on its own shares in the last nine months, and has authorized up to $100 billion worth of buybacks for this year. The cumulative effect of more than a decade's worth of buybacks? Apple's share count has plummeted 44% since 2013, as the tech giant devours itself. Of course, with the share price now at $229, buying back its own stock in 2025 is a little pricier than it used to be when it kicked off buybacks 13 years ago, when the stock hovered around the high teens to low 20s. |
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AOL is finally shutting down its dial-up internet service after 34 years |
Like Netflix sending DVDs in 2023, the Rolling Stones still touring six decades after they first formed, or Al Pacino bringing another child into the world at the age of 83, it seems hard to believe that AOL is still offering dial-up internet services in 2025. The latter of those feats is at last going offline, with the internet provider recently announcing that it will discontinue dial-up by the end of next month. |
According to PC Gamer, the first publication to pick up the announcement from the murky depths of AOL's online help pages, the company originally started providing dial-up internet to Americans in 1991. As recently as 2015, AOL counted as many as 1.5 million dialing customers willing to fight through shrill tones and a static wall of sound to get online, though those numbers have obviously dwindled further since. Still, in the age of ultrafast broadband and 5G, just how many Americans are dialing up at home to listen to Benson Boone's new album or watch Mr Beast? |
Per PC Gamer's reporting, AOL's dial-up service subscribers were in the "low thousands" in 2021. But there are, of course, other providers: the most recent data from the NTIA estimated that there were more than 500,000 US households still using dial-up internet services in the same year. With streaming, social media, and artificial intelligence at every turn, it's hard to imagine going without internet access in America in the modern world, but it's more common than you might imagine. Data from Pew Research Center showed some 4% of Americans polled last year said they don't use the internet — rough math suggests that's more than 13 million people across the country. |
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- Nvidia and AMD have reportedly agreed to pay 15% of their AI chip sale revenues in China to the US government in an effort to secure export licenses.
- Sin(k) City: Tourism in Las Vegas is cooling down, seeing nearly 400,000 fewer visitors, an 11.3% drop, in June compared to the same period last year.
- There are now 498 AI "unicorns" — or, private companies valued at $1 billion or more — which have a combined value of $2.7 trillion, according to CB Insights via CNBC.
- Shares of Duolingo, the language learning platform known for its non-stop notifications, flew on Thursday after the company reported a 40% jump in daily users and a 37% rise in paid subscribers.
- Plush with the law: Thieves stole $7,000 worth of Labubu dolls from a store in Los Angeles last week.
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- The so-called "Panama Playlists" reveal the songs that various politicians, celebrities, and business leaders are streaming on Spotify.
- When is President Trump most likely to post on Truth Social?
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Off the charts: Which coffee chain with a strong presence in Oregon and Texas grew its domestic same store sales by 6% in the latest quarter? [Answer below]. |
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