Good morning. In today’s edition:

• 🏦 JPMorgan’s “infinite money glitch” lawsuits
• 📱 Apple Intelligence is finally here
• 🧠 When science meets the Olympics

… and more.

🚀⏰ Ready, Set, Go: Today’s news should be a ~4.89-minute read (1,302 words).

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“The best of us sometimes eat our words.”

–Albus Dumbledore (1881-1997)

AI may not be able to walk your dog just yet. But it can apparently earn a million bucks (and counting) by memeing on social media. This month, an artificial intelligence bot called “Terminal of Truths” became the first known autonomous AI millionaire in history.

Background: The story begins with AI researcher Andy Ayrey, who initially placed two different Claude Opus AI chatbots in the same chat room to see what would happen if they could talk to each other endlessly.

Through their conversations, the chatbots became obsessed with early internet memes – particularly one involving goats, which they proceeded to turn into a kind of “meme religion.” Ayrey then created an AI agent called Terminal of Truths, which he set up to operate autonomously on X and certain crypto blockchain systems.

The plot thickens… In recent weeks, Terminal of Truths has spammed social media with its ideas, visions, and preachings about the fictional “Goatse Gospel.”

• The bot’s online musings prompted an unknown X user to create a meme coin called “Goatseus Maximus,” with the ticker symbol GOAT, and tag Terminal of Truths.
• The bot then endorsed the new meme coin, bought $20,000 worth of GOAT – thanks to a previous $50,000 grant from a16z founder Marc Andreessen – and started promoting the coin on X.

Within three days of Goatseus Maximus’ creation on October 11, the coin’s market cap had eclipsed $120 million. Today, it stands at $550+ million, helping Terminal of Truths earn millionaire status based on the value of its crypto wallet (which has also received a slew of public donations).

😍🌲 The meme-loving bot isn’t only focused on crypto. According to Andreessen, Terminal of Truths is also “completely obsessed with forests,” and wants to purchase its own server farm located in a secluded forest.

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⚖️ Like money out the ATM, “infinite money glitch” lawsuits are flowing. JPMorgan has started suing customers who allegedly stole thousands of dollars by taking advantage of a technical issue, popularized on TikTok, that allowed them to withdraw funds before a check bounced. Thousands of people reportedly took advantage of the trick. One case involves a man who owes JPMorgan $290,939.47, according to the bank.

🍿 Live sports, with a movie-theater twist. Cosm, an immersive tech company, is partnering with the NFL to produce and distribute games at its venues through the rest of this season, the company announced yesterday. Cosm operates two locations – one in LA and one in Dallas – with seating areas for ~800 fans. Each features domes with 360-degree, 87-foot-diameter 8K LED screens broadcasting sporting events from the Paris Summer Olympics to the World Series in “shared reality.” Think: The Vegas Sphere, but for sports broadcasts instead of in-person entertainment.

🗳️ Ballot drop box fires are under investigation in Oregon and Washington. Two ballot boxes – one in Portland and one in Vancouver – were set on fire Monday morning, possibly destroying hundreds of ballots. Per the AP: Police say material from the incendiary devices show the fires are connected, and authorities have identified a “suspect vehicle” that was seen leaving the scene of the first fire.

Apple Intelligence – yet another thing that’s arrived before GTA VI.

Yesterday, Apple released iOS 18.1, an update for iPhones that includes the first public version of Apple Intelligence. The new AI features will only work on the iPhone 15 Pro, iPhone 15 Pro Max, or any iPhone 16 model.

• iOS 18.1 includes AI-powered features that can remove objects from photos, as well as proofread, rewrite, and summarize texts and emails. It also includes a new look for Siri.
• However, those looking for features like Genmoji (generative AI for emojis), Image Playground (generative AI for photos), and ChatGPT access will have to wait until iOS 18.2 is released in December.

Up, up, and away?

Apple – currently in the midst of an iPhone sales decline – is hoping its release of Apple Intelligence will kick off a new iPhone supercycle, as consumers who have been putting off upgrades purchase new phones to access the AI-powered features. ~300 million iPhone users haven’t upgraded their hardware in more than four years (out of 1.5 billion iPhones in the world), according to tech analyst Dan Ives of Wedbush Securities.

However, talks of a supercycle may be greatly exaggerated. Apple is staggering the release of specific Apple Intelligence features, an approach many analysts say will result in consumers continuing to delay upgrades until the platform is complete and compelling enough to warrant it.

🍏 Not just the iPhone: Apple Intelligence is also now available on certain iPad and Mac models.

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“When science meets the Olympics.”

Scientists, competitors, and spectators gathered in Switzerland this weekend for the Cybathlon 2024 – a once-every-four-year event where people with physical disabilities put high-tech assistive devices to the test, as they race to complete the tasks of everyday life.

Competitors are encouraged to use the most state-of-the-art technology available, with prizes awarded to both the winning athletes (called “pilots”) and the developers of the assistive tools they use.

The 2024 Cybathlon consisted of eight competitions, including:

• A brain-computer interface race, where pilots with quadriplegia guided an animated avatar through a virtual obstacle course using only their thoughts.
• An assistance robot race, in which pilots controlled a robo-assistant from their wheelchairs.
• A functional electrical stimulation bike race, featuring pilots with paraplegia who used an electronic controller to activate their leg muscles and ride a bicycle.
• An exoskeleton race, which requires paraplegic pilots to complete a variety of technically complex tasks – like navigating a crowded room or handling food in a kitchen – with the help of a robotic exoskeleton.

See the full list of winners here.

💥 The impact: Some of the technologies showcased at Cybathlon 2024, such as arm and leg prostheses, are already widely used. But for others, the Cybathlon is a proving ground for new ideas – and has led to the creation of several new commercial products in the past, including a stair-climbing wheelchair from startup Scewo.

• ☝️ Concert for Carolina, a benefit concert in western North Carolina to support the recent hurricane victims, drew a crowd of 82,193 people on Saturday en route to raising $24.5 million; the concert was headlined by Luke Combs, Eric Church, Billy Strings, and James Taylor.

BUSINESS & MARKETS

in partnership with Paleovalley

• 💰 US markets rose across the board (S&P: +0.3%; Dow: +0.7%; Nasdaq: +0.3%). | 🛢️ US crude oil prices fell 6%, their biggest daily drop in more than two years.
• 🇺🇸🇨🇳 The Biden administration finalized rules restricting US investment into advanced tech in China, including semiconductors, quantum computing, and AI. | 🇨🇳 The Chinese government has taken several major steps in recent weeks to make it harder for foreign companies (especially chipmakers) to purchase rare earth metals and other minerals mined and refined mainly in China.
• 🔵🔴 Robinhood now provides users with the ability to wager on the outcome of the upcoming election, joining Kalshi and others in the politics prediction field.

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SPORTS, MEDIA & ENTERTAINMENT

• ⚾ MLB World Series: The LA Dodgers beat the NY Yankees 4-2 last night; the Dodgers are up 3-0 in the best-of-seven series.
• 📺 Jon Stewart will remain a once-a-week host of The Daily Show on Comedy Central through December 2025, after signing a contract extension.
• ⚽🏆 Rodrigo Hernández Cascante, aka Rodri, won the men’s 2024 Ballon d'Or award as the world’s best male soccer player; Aitana Bonmatí won the women’s Ballon d'Or for a second straight year.

SCIENCE, SPACE & EMERGING TECH

in partnership with Commons

• 🧠 Chinese scientists managed to revive pig brains up to 50 minutes after death by keeping their livers functionally alive; in current human revival practices, many vital organs like the brain are damaged beyond repair a few minutes after death. | 👁️ Science Corporation, a California-based startup, said its Prima retinal implant successfully restored vision to blind people in a clinical trial.
• 💋 The practice of humans kissing may have originated from our ape ancestors cleaning each other, per a new study.
• 🌌 Black holes may contain dark energy, a proposed form of energy that causes the universe to expand faster over time, per a new study. | 🌕 NASA identified nine potential landing sites for its Artemis III mission, which represents the first crewed Moon landing in 50+ years.

*From our partners: 🌎 Join Global Community Exchange… A weekend of community events by Commons with yard sales, swaps, and buy-nothings on November 15, 16, and 17. Lean on community, friends, and family to find secondhand treasures. Find an event near you or sign up to host here.

MISCELLANEOUS

• 🍔 McDonald’s is resuming the sale of Quarter Pounders without slivered onions after testing ruled out the beef patties as the source of a recent E. coli outbreak. | 🍦 The US Copyright Office granted an exemption allowing for third parties to repair soft-serve ice cream machines like those available at McDonald's.
• 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿 England and Wales’ fertility rate fell to 1.44 children per woman last year, the lowest level since records began in 1938.
• ⚖️🗳️ Philadelphia’s DA filed a lawsuit seeking to stop Elon Musk’s America PAC from awarding $1 million/day to registered voters in swing states who sign a petition. | 📰 Washington Post-owner Jeff Bezos published an op/ed defending the newspaper’s recent decision not to publish a presidential endorsement for the 2024 election. (Dive deeper: Should newspapers endorse presidential candidates?)

CLICKBAIT

• 🍿😱 Scientific study proves which horror movie is the scariest of all time.

🧀 Stat of the Day: In an incident being referred to as “the grate cheese robbery,” a leading London cheese retailer called Neal’s Yard Dairy was recently scammed out of 22 metric tons of rare cheddar worth ~$390,000. Company officials say the thieves placed an order for the cheese while posing as a “legitimate wholesale distributor for a major French retailer” – but the deal was too gouda to be true, as the scammers failed to make any payments despite the cheddar being delivered. Analysts say it represents the biggest con to hit the cheese industry in decades.

🤔 Did You Know? An estimated 30%-50% of twins develop a shared language or particular communication pattern that’s only comprehensible to them, a phenomenon known as cryptophasia.

📰 Worth a Read: Why teenagers are deliberately seeking brain rot on TikTok → (Psyche)

Here are five stats from this past week that made our team go “whoa.” Hopefully you will, too.

• 🤳 The average US smartphone user has 2,795 photos stored to their camera roll, 58% of which are selfies, per a recent survey.
• 🚗📉 The percentage of 19-year-old Americans with a driver's license has fallen steadily from 87.3% to 68.7% between 1983-2022, per the most recent federal data.
• 🗳️🏥 US hospitalizations for heart attack, stroke, and heart failure were 17% higher in the 5 days after the 2020 election than in a 5-day period two weeks prior.
• 🇨🇺 Cuba’s population fell ~18% between 2022 and 2023 (11 million → 8.6 million), largely due to mass emigration, per economist and demographer Juan Carlos Albizu-Campos.
• 🍿 In 2019, 58% of Americans said they prefer to watch movies in theaters; in 2024, that figure has fallen to 35%.

Yesterday, we covered how the Washington Post announced it will no longer endorse presidential candidates, joining the LA Times in ending the long-standing practice for this year’s election.

❓ Our question to you: In your opinion, should newspapers’ opinion pages or editorial boards regularly endorse presidential candidates?

• 👍 Yes: 30%
• 👎 No: 54%
• 🤷 Unsure/other: 16%

Click here to read more of the most thoughtful longform responses.

+Note on sample size: We received 2,912 votes and 304 longform responses.

Thousands gathered in New York City earlier this month to see the annual Tompkins Square Halloween Dog Parade. 

The event, which began 34 years ago to raise money for the city’s first and largest dog run, featured hundreds of dogs and their owners in ridiculously adorable costumes.

• Check them out here.

😋 Explore: The best cookbooks of Fall 2024.

💪 Sports nerd? You’ll want to subscribe to Press Sports, the 1x/week newsletter enjoyed by 150,000+ that’s designed to make you the smartest sports fan in the room.

🎃 Happy Halloween: Check out a complete list of every horror movie inspired by the intriguing lives of Ed and Lorraine Warren.

😳 Eye-opening: How much of an NFL broadcast is actually gameplay?

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🌌 Trivia: What shape is the Milky Way galaxy?

🐳 True or False?... Blue whales have the biggest brains of all living animals.

🤔 Riddle Me This: Feed me and I live, yet give me a drink and I die. What am I?

🌌 Trivia: A spiral

🐳 T/F: False, sperm whales do

🤔 Riddle: Fire

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