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TPA WellNet Healthcare Selects EHVAhealth Voice AI to Automate Health Plan Provider Calls

EHVAhealth, the health payer platform of EHVA.ai, today announced that WellNet Healthcare, a third-party administrator (TPA), has selected EHVAhealth's conversational voice AI to automate its inbound provider calls. EHVAhealth is purpose-built for health plans, TPAs, payers, and benefit administrators that need to answer high volumes of provider calls without adding headcount.

Nov 4 • 9:30 AM EST • Health • finance.yahoo.com

Titans’ biggest problem to fix during 2026 bye week

The Tennessee Titans are approaching their 2026 bye week with more questions than answers. Sure, Cam Ward’s development remains central to the franchise’s long-term ambitions. However, Tennessee’s struggles extend well beyond the quarterback position. The offense has shown occasional flashes of explosiveness. The defense, though, has repeatedly […] The post Titans’ biggest problem to fix during 2026 bye week appeared first on ClutchPoints.

Nov 4 • 2:47 AM EST • Sports • sports.yahoo.com

Connections: Sports Edition today: Hints and answers for Nov. 4, 2026, puzzle No. 772

Welcome to Connections: Sports Edition Coach — a spot to gather clues and discuss (and share) scores.

Nov 4 • 12:00 AM EST • Sports • nytimes.com

AFGHS co-signatory countries ask health care users to help fill the financing gap

Hundreds of thousands of Ugandans living with HIV on antiretrovirals could be targeted for user fees or community health insurance schemes requiring modest premium payments, according to the April 2026 version of the country’s America First Global Health Strategy implementation narrative.1 As part of the “sustainable financing for the private not for profit sector” strategy, 491 facilities will be targeted for a phased introduction of user fees and scale up of community health insurance programs.2 In the Ugandan context, PNFP facilities include faith-based hospitals and other health facilities, US missionary organizations and centers of excellence—services that are often co-located at government facilities but run with additional financial and technical resources. 402,000 people—or about 28 percent of the total Ugandan adult PLHIV population on treatment—get ART from the private not for profit sector. The selected facilities provide the majority of ART and prevention of mother to child transmission (PMTCT) services. The plan doesn’t give the total number of clients served by the 491 facilities, so it is not possible to give a precise number. But the majority of 402,000 is a figure in the hundreds of thousands—hence the estimate I’m using.3 The April draft of the Ugandan implementation plan narrative is the only one I’ve been able to review. But the government of Uganda is not alone in turning to health care users to help fill the financing gaps caused by the abrupt withdrawal of US funds. In July 2025, the Government of Liberia introduced user fees for previously free services including “registration, accommodation, patient feeding, hospitalization, and a wide range of surgical and diagnostic procedures.”4 Earlier that year, Liberia rolled out a revolving drug fund designed to stabilize drug supplies by “allowing patients to pay a small fee for standardized, quality medications,” according to a Ministry of Health press release.5 (Both of these approaches had been proposed in the National Health Policy 2022-2031; media coverage explicitly connects the launch with the US foreign aid cuts.) The health financing strategies proposed by Uganda and established in Liberia are qualitatively different from user fees officially adopted by specific health facilities to cover funding shortfalls caused by the new US approach.6 The latter is a stopgap, adhoc change. The former is a national governmental adoption of policies that pass costs on to health care users, despite evidence that such approaches can exacerbate inequities and leave deficits unfilled. Two countries does not make a pattern, but they do point to urgent questions: Have other countries, including Liberia, included user fees or community health insurance schemes in their implementation plans? If so, do any of these narratives have what Uganda’s lacks: a fall-back plan in place in case these strategies for sustainable health systems fail to deliver—as they have before? I wonder if you think about it Subscribe Predictable pitfalls Both community-based health insurance and user fees are as old as the hills. And after decades of people climbing up these hills, duking it out, climbing back down—neither strategy has shown the results the Ugandan implementation plan is counting on. This is, in fact, a hill some folks are willing to die on. (You knew I’d get there, right?) In November 2025, an African-led team of health system experts published a paper directed at low- and middle income country governments trying to figure out how to create self-sustaining health systems. The money wasn’t coming back. It had been more than nine months since the season of freezing, waivering and wood-chippering; two months since AFGHS tumbled into the world touting co-financing requirements and reductions in future US government health aid. Governments were looking for strategies for sustainable, self-financed health systems, the authors wrote. For countries considering user fees and community health insurance to fill the financing gaps, they had a simple message: Don’t. On user fees, the paper states: “Reliance on user fees is ultimately a regressive and inequitable approach. It places a disproportionate burden on the poor and undermines health system goals of equity and financial protection. […] There is overwhelming evidence that user fees mobilise very limited resources for the public health sector, making it an inefficient mechanism for revenue mobilisation.” On community health insurance: “Attempting to shift the burden of funding previously donor-funded services, such as HIV care and management, and TB treatment, onto contributory schemes would exacerbate their fragility and fail to protect the population.”7 The WHO says that community-based health insurance “cannot be expected to provide a major source of funding or coverage,” and noted that most schemes offer only moderate benefit to individuals paying into them, and exclude the poorest segment of the population.8 And yet, the US-Ugandan implementation plan says that community health insurance is “the central pillar of this [PNFP] sustainability strategy” and that this approach that will generate “pre-paid pooled funding at facility and community level [that] improves financial risk protection for households, reduces catastrophic out-of-pocket expenditure, and generates structured, transparent revenue streams that can progressively absorb recurrent costs including health worker salaries.” Unfortunately, Uganda’s own history suggests the pillar might not be able to bear this weight. Ugandans Have Been to this Rodeo Before—and Some Want Their Money Back Uganda introduced its first community health insurance scheme in 1996 with support from international donors.9 Thirty years later, somewhere between 0.2 and 0.3 percent of the population is covered by CHI; just over 1 percent has any kind of health insurance.10 User fees were universally introduced in 1993 as a condition of a World Bank loan.11 They were abandoned in 2001, and in 2004—the year I moved to Uganda to watch the free HIV program get underway—a definitive study found that the fees did not improve health systems and outcomes.12 In 2004, most clinics and hospitals had ‘free’ and ‘fee for service’ options for getting care.13 The fee for service, or “cash and carry” programs had often been established in the years prior to PEPFAR and the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. People who could afford to paid for the drugs, often at facilities in the private-not-for-profit (PNFP) sector. When free drugs arrived, some people who’d been paying kept on doing so, perhaps because of shorter wait times, greater confidentiality, convenience or other factors. But in the year that I spent visiting the same clinics around the country week after week—including a “center of excellence” that maintained separate days for cash and carry clients and those accessing free ARVs—lots of people who had been paying tried to switch to the free option. They’d paid because they had no other choice. They’d sold pieces of family land, begged family members for loans, bought pills by the week, and sometimes by the day. Or they were just cash-strapped, like most of us, and wanted the funds for other things. 14 Twenty-two years later, this hasn’t changed. Ugandans pay out of pocket for 30-40 percent of their health care costs, leading one paper to declare that “falling ill is more than a health crisis. It is a financial emergency.”15 One recent study found that up to 48.5 percent of households dealing with tuberculosis sold something, took out a loan or dug into savings to defray the costs of TB care—which is supposed to be universally free.16 The Ugandan implementation plan does anticipate challenges. It proposes a phased approach, with 187 facilities introducing user contribution systems in Year 1, 152 in Year 2, and 153 in Year 3. Willingness to pay and feasibility studies will precede roll out; fees will be tiered by region, and a waiver system is proposed to ensure that no one has to pay who is unable to. Moreover, the plan provides for quarterly reviews of epidemiological data to “ensure that user contributions do not compromise epidemic control gains, ART continuity for the client cohort, TB case management, or PMTCT services.” Alt text: A screenshot of a table included in the implementation plan narrative that is the subject of this stack. It’s got a fetching pink bar at the top. It uses the abbreviation “CHI” which is Community Health Insurance, and FBO which is Faith Based Organizations, and it details the number of facilities that will implement user fees with waivers and community health insurance schemes over the five years of the agreement. As I said in the footnote, this is a super interesting document with a lot of other rich material. Tell me what you see—and what you would have focused on. And if you’ve seen something like this, or anything else that strikes you, in another implementation plan, tell me that too. You can use the Substack message platform or try me on Signal at @endaplague_again.25 (because @mercoonfan was, weirdly, taken). But the plan doesn’t fully explain what will happen if this approach doesn’t work out. Yes, progress will be monitored, and corrective action triggered. However, there is no specified funding replacement if premium and fee revenue prove inadequate. Instead, the authors write, “Currently, COEs serve a total client cohort of over 180,000 across 28 facilities. In the initial years, the U.S. Government (USG) will provide financial support for clients; over time, user fees generated by COEs will become the primary source of funding for sustaining their services.” Failure does not really seem to be an option. Health insurance schemes are more acceptable to the Ugandan population than user fees. Members of Parliament and civil society traveled to Ethiopia to see how that country’s scheme worked. In a follow up report, a veteran civil society group recommended allowing the “health insurance ecosystem to grow organically and [to] keep reviewing the law and regulations as this growth takes root.”17 One study found that more than three-quarters of Ugandans were willing to join a health insurance program.18 However, coverage of community-based health insurance is minimal, as is coverage of any kind of insurance—including private plans.19 A national health insurance scheme bill has been stalled for several years and presently sits with President Yoweri Museveni.20 Community-based health insurance scheme that do exist are expanding in number, but losing enrollees. Between 2022 and 2026, the number of community-based health financing schemes across the country increased by 42 percent, while the number of people enrolled decreased by nearly 11 percent.21 None of this means that community-based health insurance should not happen in Uganda—or that people do not want insurance. It doesn’t even mean that user fees and waivers won’t ever work. But there is highly relevant evidence from Uganda and the surrounding region that it is quite optimistic to describe community health insurance and user fees as central supports for sustainable financing in any sector of the health system. And now for the best-case scenario In the best-case scenario22, the Ugandan approach does exactly what it sets out to do, and so does the Liberian fee structure and revolving pharmacy fund—though I’ve not confirmed that these are in the MoU. In one best-case scenario, Uganda is an outlier, and user fees and community health insurance are not recurrent pillars of self-sustaining financing in other countries’ implementation plans. In another best-case scenario, all countries that include these strategies enjoy success beyond anyone’s evidence-informed wildest dreams: reliable funding generated by health care users fees, great health care outcomes for everyone, no exacerbation of inequities, no crippling household debt. No sold land, repurposed school tuition or high-interest loans. In the best-case scenario, not one of the hundreds of thousands of Ugandans living with HIV receiving antiretrovirals from 491 PNFP facilities misses a refill or leaves care because of user fees or community health insurance premiums. This is the best-case scenario for these people for their own health, and for their families. It is also the best-case scenario if Uganda wants to stay on the path to eliminating HIV as a public health threat. According to the country’s most recent data, 96.5 percent of people living with HIV on antiretrovirals are virologically suppressed. Epidemic control depends ensuring that 95% of people living with HIV know their status, 95 percent of those individuals are on ART, and 95% of those individuals are virologically suppressed. Uganda is still struggling with the first “95"—a frankly abysmal 85.3 percent. If HIV epidemic control and the attendant prevention of new infections, avoidable suffering and premature death matter, the country cannot afford to lose any clients who are currently in care.23 As I write this a couple hours before the polls close for the US elections in the city I live in, I say with soul-deep sincerity: I am rooting for the best-case scenario. I think it’s safe to say that we all are.24 I think it’s also safe to say that if the US and co-signatory governments have inked plans that lead to successful expansion of community health insurance and strategic use of user fees, we all would like to know, now, so that we don’t miss the opportunity to celebrate when success happens. The implementation plan narratives have to enter the public domain. They are the fullest expression of a strategy co-created by two governments. There are assumptions and details that people living in the US and co-signatory countries need to understand that are not available in the MoUs or, to date, in the Congressional Notifications. Some of these details can help other countries that are, as I write this, still working on implementation plans. Others, like a solid count of how many other countries have plans for expanding user fees or health insurance, are important for regional and global health architecture reform initiatives. No matter how this election night turns out, there will be a slew of new Congressional member orientations, briefings and talking points papers in the next few months. Release of implementation narratives should be a bullet point in every context that AFGHS is discussed. These documents can be redacted so that procurement sensitive information isn’t disclosed. There is much more historical precedent for sharing such documents than there is for relying on user fees to fill health financing gaps. Let’s look at the information together so we can hope for the best and prepare for, you know, the other thing. Alt text: A substack first: a bicep selfie! It’s my arm - peachy-white skin, black shirt (flannel, notch neck, too hot for this appallingly balmy November weather, if you’re wondering) and a sticker that says I VOTED 2026. Beige letters on red for I voted. Beige on blue for 2026. You bet I did.25 In your wildest dreams. Subscribe 1 This is a really, really rich 95 page document. There are fascinating ideas and detailed plans in it. It is all worth reading AND I have, in this post, highlighted an instance of content that could pose challenges and certainly posits success of strategies that haven’t worked before. I would love to hear what readers’ see that’s interesting and should be lifted up as something to check for in other implementation plans. I will also shortly be adding a static page to the substack site where implementation plan documents will live. I will put the url into this footnote and it will also be there on emilybass.substack.com by the end of the week. Uganda Implementation Narrative Section 4 April 22 2026 Draft 1.51MB ∙ PDF file Download Download 2 User fees are costs charged for visits, labs, medicines or other health services, usually at the time they are provided. Community health insurance, or community-based health insurance, is what the World Health Organization calls “micro insurance,” which is health insurance targeted at low-income people. 3 As usual (by which I mean always), please prove me wrong. 4 https://smartnewsliberia.com/liberias-ministry-of-health-announces-2025-hospital-service-fees-for-public-facilities/?utm 5 https://moh.gov.lr/news/2025/grand-cape-mount-leaders-residents-embrace-new-community-pharmacy-program/?utm 6 https://www.christianitytoday.com/2026/09/hiv-usaid-pepfar-africa-foreign-aid-cuts-mission-hospitals/?utm 7 https://gh.bmj.com/content/10/11/e021270 8 https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/community-based-health-insurance-CBHI 9 https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC2827475/ 10 https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10861328/#b3-jpmph-23-110 11 https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC527704/ 12 Same citation as the footnote 2 - the article is called “Learning from failed health care reform in Uganda.” To which I say: If only. If. Only. 13 There is a whole taxonomy of user fees to be aware of, if not commit to memory. Out of pocket costs are everything that someone pays for themselves. In this Stack, user fees are planned and policy-supported out of pocket costs. There are also out of pocket costs that people pay to buy drugs or receive tests or health care assessments that would be free if the drugs were on the shelves, or the machines or kits were available, or the staff were on site. A user fee is usually designed to be modest, pegged to willingness to pay, and may be waiveable at the point of care for anyone who is unable to do so. The costs for things that would otherwise be free are whatever the market will bear and people either have to pay them or go without. Out of pocket costs for services and stuff that aren’t available in public facilities are different again from bribes or unofficial fees that some health workers may impose, even though most are indefatigable, tireless and tired, and devoted to their clients. 14 For the record—which really is these footnotes—I would give a whole stack of fridge magnets for a systematic analysis of the economic and social impact of the Mass Unemployment Event in AFGHS countries among the very people who used to be able to afford and cover user fees, both for themselves and vast family networks. Locally employed USAID technical staff, house cleaners, caregivers, drivers and technicians were financial anchors for cousins, friends, friends’ children, friends’ childrens’ cousins, teachers, pastors, neighbors and so many other kinds of kin. Aid recipients lost direct funding; many other people who had not been aid recipients, but parts of the elaborate care webs that function as safety nets for so many people, lost crucial support too. And that’s even before we get to the people who worked at the hotels and restaurants and bars where people employed by the US and its implementing partners used to spend disposable income. Those businesses have lost revenue; those folks have lost jobs. It will be some time coming—and someone will have to fund this work—but I do hope it happens. And I hope, as usual, to be proven wrong. 15 https://eprcug.org/blog/how-out-of-pocket-healthcare-costs-keep-driving-ugandans-into-poverty/ 16 Another straight-to-the-point journal article title. Households experiencing catastrophic costs due to tuberculosis in Uganda: magnitude and cost drivers. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32938411 17 https://www.cehurd.org/download/technical-policy-brief-on-community-health-insurance-scheme/?wpdmdl=13661&refresh=6ae9122f5d4ed1793659439 18 https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10125197/ 19 https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10861328/#b3-jpmph-23-110 20 https://ugandapost.news/uganda-to-make-health-insurance-mandatory-by-2026/ 21 https://shu.org.ug/download/235 22 With a nod, tip of the stack hat, and wag of the Mercoon tail to a deeply valued reader who told me that I have a tendency to speculate about the worst-case scenarios a little too much of the time. 23 https://news.mak.ac.ug/2026/10/uphia-2025-shows-ugandas-hiv-status-awareness-gap-despite-strong-treatment-outcomes/ As you’ll see in the next footnote, I’ve already written a subSubstack on another topic, so I will be brief with regard to the study referenced in this article. The Uganda Population-Based HIV Impact Assessment, or UPHIA, will never happen in this way again. For more than a decade, PHIAs have been supported by the US government as a way to generate accurate estimates of country progress on key HIV indicators. They are a holdover from the PEPFAR program that was laser focused on ensuring US taxpayer dollars subsidized progress in pandemic control. There may be other population-level surveys and the data may even be publicly released, as the entire set of FY2026 MER data have not. But PHIAs will never happen again. If you’re wondering whether the estimates of HIV progress at country level might get less reliable….you’re not alone. 24 Ooh baby, I hate “we” in almost all forms. But sometimes I go there, when I am looking for company, which I am. Because this Stack moves into the somewhat-uncharted territory of assessing what the implementation plan narratives may suggest about co-signatory countries’ roles and responsibilities to the people living within their borders. The MoUs, specimen and data sharing agreements were templates. Countries’ answers fit into pre-specified questions that did not include, “how are you going to fill financing gaps and stabilize your health system as this plan unfolds?” In contrast, the implementation narratives are open form—the product of co-creation between the two governments. Co-creation can mean lots of things, but nothing leads me to believe that implementation plans are ghost-written by the US government, or that contents were imposed by the US counterparts. Instead, I think the parts of the plans that read like country government initiatives are endorsed, if not initiated by, those governments. For instance, the Ugandan implementation plan narrative describes plans for revenue-generation through fees charged for equipment calibration, repair and maintenance provided through Uganda’s National Equipment Calibration Laboratory, and laboratory accreditation through the Uganda National Accreditation Service (UGANAS), targeting private sector, PNFP, research and academic clients. That’s super specific and also quite ambitious. It doesn’t read like an American idea. There’s also a provision for solar panels, and other stuff that feels country owned and driven. This is where it gets interesting. If co-creation is the case, then both the US and co-signatory governments are accountable for the contents and the outcomes. Most discourse about AFGHS to date has focused on the decisions that America has made, or demanded that other countries make. The AFGHS architects have monopolized the hot seat. As they should, in so many ways. America absolutely created the conditions under which countries needed to come up with health financing strategies to fill unanticipated, catastrophic funding gaps. And with not-too-long a lens, we can look back and see that America is also on the hook for its role in the Bretton Woods institutions that made user fees and health system fiscal austerity conditions of loans during the era of structural adjustment. But in the here and now, it is not at all clear to me that the US is requiring Uganda or any other country to implement specific approaches to sustainable financing. Instead, it is as the authors of that paper up in footnote 6 suggest: African governments have agency. As implementation plans roll out—whether or not the narratives are shared—it will be important to understand what this agency looks like and what it means for people, including the poorest of the poor. And it will be important to figure out how to talk about it safely, respectfully and critically in places other than the literal and metaphorical footnotes. 25 This week’s song is “Once upon a time” by the Moody Blues. (I know, this is gonna be a weird, largely banger-free end of 2026 playlist. HMU with requests.) AND please do watch the video and appreciate the truly amazing opening sequence—a drum kit wasteland, a coupla plastic bags, a bit of sand. Sort of like the hill where fiscal austerity policies that put costs on health care users might go to perish. But then there’s a lady with amazing hair. It’s worth it.

Nov 3 • 11:57 PM EST • Health • emilysbass.substack.com

NYT Strands hints, answers for November 4, 2026

Every hint, nudge and outright answer you need to complete today's NYT Strands puzzle.

Nov 3 • 10:00 PM EST • Technology • mashable.com

Elizabeth Holmes’ partner denies ‘You Can See Everything’ director’s story about full-frontal nudity: ‘False narrative’

Elizabeth Holmes’ partner Billy Evans answered numerous questions about ‘You Can See Everything,’ including claims about how his full-frontal nudity scene came about.

Nov 3 • 3:58 PM EST • Entertainment • ew.com

He helped put a rover on Mars. Now he pranks porch pirates — and Gen Alpha can't get enough.

From farts on Mars to CrunchLab secrets, Mark Rober answers kids' questions and tells Yahoo why he sees Gen Alpha as curious, not screen-obsessed.

Nov 3 • 2:06 PM EST • Entertainment • yahoo.com

Christina Applegate details new medical testing after MS misdiagnosis

Christina Applegate is continuing to search for answers in her ongoing health battle.

Nov 3 • 12:07 PM EST • Entertainment • centraloregondaily.com

WATCH LIVE: Takeaways from the 2026 midterms and answers to your election questions

Nov 3 • 10:49 AM EST • Politics • pbs.org

OpenAI: ChatGPT Search Is About 20% of Google’s, 250 Million People Speak With ChatGPT, and Chat Is Merging With Work

OpenAI says ChatGPT growth is accelerating. The company added 200 million users over just the past two months, jumping from 1 billion to 1.2 billion weekly active users in 60 days. Its search volume, it says, is approximately 20% of Google’s. Its users create 1.5 billion images with it per week. And its voice mode, between dictation and speaking with ChatGPT, now has 250 million combined weekly active users. ChatGPT consumer product lead Adam Fry told me this during a brief fireside chat at an OpenAI-hosted dinner in New York City on Monday night. “The growth is just going big,” he said. During our conversation, Fry also revealed plans to merge ChatGPT’s Chat and Work modes (so that confusing toggle up top will soon go away), agreed with feedback that ChatGPT-created restaurant signage looks too uniform, and addressed the cost to serve its personal assistant Dots. Here’s a look at our full conversation, lightly edited for clarity and length. We also cover image generation, interactive interfaces, advertising, education, and public unease about AI: Alex Kantrowitz: OpenAI has analyzed ChatGPT’s search volume and compared it with Google’s. What did you find? Adam Fry: ChatGPT has been growing quite quickly. ChatGPT’s volume of search-like queries is now roughly one-fifth the volume of queries of Google. It’s a pretty amazing statistic when you think about it, mainly because we started just about a year and a half ago. It’s hard to remember this, but ChatGPT at a time didn’t have any up-to-date information. You’d ask a question, it would say something like, “It’s past my training date,” and nobody had any idea what that meant. You’re saying ChatGPT’s search volume is one-fifth of Google’s. Bing’s share of the search market is around 5%. Does that make you multiple times larger than Bing? To say that more directly, ChatGPT has gone from one billion to 1.2 in just the last two months. That’s roughly 100 million users in 30 days, and another 100 million in another 30 days. The growth is just going big, and we’re staying very focused on how fast ChatGPT is growing. What counts as a search? I might have 20 prompts back and forth in a ChatGPT conversation. Does each one count as a query? Story continues below… A MESSAGE FROM OUR SPONSOR Move upmarket without a rebuild Moving upmarket means saying yes to what enterprise buyers ask for first: SSO, directory sync, and audit logs. WorkOS gives you all three, so your team keeps building the product instead of the checklist. Get enterprise-ready. Continued from above…. Adam Fry: What people came to ChatGPT for to start, if you go back about two years, is really writing help and coding help. Those wouldn’t be things that you really search for. What we’ve seen over the last year is people have grown into all these other topics. Things like you’re looking up a person or people or a place or a thing, and it requires up-to-date information. That’s a key element. Another big part is finance questions or health questions, where you really want to make sure it’s up-to-date information that’s quite factual, and we’ll do a web search for those questions. It’s basically anything that a user would have traditionally gone to a traditional search engine for, but is now deciding to go to ChatGPT for. Does each conversation with a search embedded count as one search, or does every question that requires a web search count? Every time you ask a question and go search the web, that’s a search. You used to work at Google. How would you say the nature of search is changing? One of the things that people really love about ChatGPT is this personalization and this understanding of the broader journey. If you look in the past, people would go for a Q&A box, and you’d ask a one-off question, like how tall is the Eiffel Tower. But there’s so much context in our lives around, “Maybe I’m taking a trip to Paris.” It’s actually helpful for ChatGPT to respond, “Here’s how tall the Eiffel Tower is, but I know you’re going on a trip to Paris.” It’s that ability for people to actually maintain context over time that has led them to start using ChatGPT in this way. You’ve also announced 250 million weekly active users of voice input, including dictation and conversations with voice mode. We are at 250 million weekly active users. What’s amazing about this is, if you look at those 250 million, what we’re seeing is it’s actually also incremental to the product. It’s no longer just a novelty. People aren’t just trying out voice. We’re seeing them use voice input day to day in their daily life, and it’s grown so quickly. Those 250 million users are using voice input, and that could just be a quick question or a long conversation. We’re seeing both behaviors. We’re seeing people just not want to type. You just hold it and start talking to it, or it turns into a longer conversation where people just sit with it. The big reason for this is the frontier capabilities of our models that we’ve shipped. We shipped what we call GPT Live 1, and then we shipped GPT Live 1.1. The big change with this is that it’s much more natural to speak with. It’s something we call backchanneling and interruptibility. Mhhhm… What you just did there is what the model does, because it’s really good at having a bidirectional conversation. That push to the frontier—we were the first to really release this at scale—has made it so much more natural for people to chat. That’s still only about 20% of the user base. From the outside, that looks small. Why is it exciting from the inside? It’s very exciting for a few reasons. We see from the data that when people start using voice, they stay around using voice. One of the things, transparently, we can do a better job of is bringing more people into discovering it. We see that the number of people who discover it could be a lot higher. But once they do, it’s a really new way for people to interact with AI. We’ve made a lot of improvements to it too, where we’re just going to see the number go up. You have background mode, so now by default, if you close the app, it’ll show, “Hey, the conversation’s still going.” If you want to walk around the house or you’re putting away the groceries, you can still have a chat. That kind of continuity has also changed how much people use it. Dots launched on September 29 and is about a month old. How’s it doing? It’s doing great. We talk to people about their Dot, and the first thing that everyone says is, “I love my Dot.” One of the reasons we’re seeing this is the proactivity, its ability to reach out to you and figure out things. The biggest use case I see all the time is, “Did I forget something today that I was supposed to do?” You can just say to your Dot, “Remind me of things at the end of the day that I may have forgotten. Somebody emailed me or messaged me,” and it’ll do that. This Dot changes the paradigm of the relationship with AI, where it’s actually helping you and giving you time back. You’re more conservative with permissions than some competitors. I tried to give my Dot my credit card, and it wouldn’t take it. With the creator of OpenClaw in-house, why are Dots’ permissions more limited? This is a space where we want to be very thoughtful and conservative because it’s a new space where you’re entrusting your Dot to take care of things on behalf of you that matter and are meaningful. We’ve just talked about how you go to this 1.2 billion user growth and asking questions. Now we’re asking people, “Can you ask ChatGPT or your Dot to help get things done?” But when you ask it to help get things done, it’s a whole new level of trust. We’ve built up a tremendous amount of trust in giving the right answers to your questions, and we want to make sure that when we build this new product, it has a high degree of trust. It’s a long game. We think this is going to be a new market for a very long time, and we want to make sure that we’re being this trusted player in the market to start. I initially thought Dots would be available on my $20 plan, then realized I had to spend $100 a month to get it. I upgraded, but I’d like to downgrade at some point…. We hope to keep earning your business and make the value good enough. It’s a really good point. ChatGPT’s goal more broadly, which I think is unique for us in the market, is we are focused on bringing intelligence to everyone safely across the entire world. For Dots in particular, there’s no difference. We don’t have anything to share tonight about the date of when Dots will go to a broader set of users. But you can rest assured we’re working very hard, and there are a couple things we have to get right. Over time we’re going to work on more efficient, agentic models that are able and capable of doing things for you. The first one is, right now we wanted to make sure that your Dot is actually really helpful. We started with some of our best models, but over time we’re going to work on more efficient, agentic models that are able and capable of doing things for you. The second thing is around proactivity. We’re still dialing in: How much do I message you to help you get things done? We can always play around with that to understand how much usage should a user use to have a successful Dot. We’re going to work on both, and our goal and ambition is to bring it out to all users. How much background computing does a Dot require? I’ve read estimates that serving a $100 subscriber might cost OpenAI $3,000 in compute, and mine seems to read every email that arrives. How often is it checking connected data sources? Right now, Dots are on the compute-heavier side, and this is one of the things we want to make sure that we can dial back over time. But the goal is to give you the best product. This is our premium, always-on personal assistant. Once we nail that, we’ll figure out how to dial back the compute needs. The thing we’re seeing also from our models, as we train frontier models, is just how—I can’t even keep up with how quickly we have a new model, and each new model is more efficient. If you looked at 6.1 Sol when it came out relative to Astra, much more efficient. I’m very excited about the next set of models we have coming too that’ll be even more efficient that we can use. Elon Musk said the cost of serving Grok Bot was unsustainably high relative to revenue. Is efficiency the key to winning against competitors, or is there more to it? There are a couple of factors that go into it. One is the cost side, but the other is the revenue side. On ChatGPT and on our consumer business, we’ve been extremely proud of our ability to diversify different revenue streams in a way that’s growing really fast. To give you another stat, we announced several months back that we had passed 50 million subscriptions, and the number has grown considerably since then. On ads, within 200 days, we reached more than a billion in ARR, and that business is growing extremely quickly. We also have credits. Rather than paying for subscriptions, users can buy more credits. Between credits, subscriptions, and ads, I’m confident that the value of a Dot is going to be able to pay for itself. Elon has subscriptions too. This is clearly an expensive product to serve. One thing we continue to bet on at OpenAI and ChatGPT more broadly is that the models will continue to get much better and much cheaper, way faster than any of us think. If you look back at the historicals on it, it continues to be true. From what I’ve seen, I see no slowing down of that. What is Meta doing right with Muse? It has spent a lot of time atop the App Store charts. There are a couple of things they’ve done well. The first is people have been craving simplicity in their products. One of the things we have stated publicly as well is, at times AI products can be too complex. We’ve announced we’re merging ChatGPT’s Chat and Work. We’re making it much more simple in the products. You don’t have as many toggles or sliders between efforts and different model pickers. One of the things they’ve done well is this simplicity. You just go in and you can ask a question. You don’t have to think too much about what you’re doing. That’s one thing that seems to have resonated with users, which we also believe in. Second, there’s something really nice about being able to access your agent across many different channels. We just announced and launched Dots on iMessage. Whether you talk to your Dot on email or iMessage or within the ChatGPT app, the ubiquity in getting your assistant out there is going to be key. Those are two things that, if I had to be nice to our competitors, I would say were two big ones. So Alexandr Wang’s meme-tweeting strategy isn’t something you’re going to emulate? I have a different tweeting style. ChatGPT still asks me to choose between Chat and Work, even though some people call this technology AGI. Will that distinction go away? Couldn’t agree more. We have to solve this. Asking users to choose — we’ve heard repeatedly from all of our users it’s too much to understand. When should you go to Chat? When should you go to Work? It’s solvable. There’s real research to solve to make sure the models can understand what your intent is. Are you asking for a fast, quick reply? Are you asking me to go do a long agentic task? We’re going to solve it, and the plan is to bring Chat and Work together. So one interface will work out whether I’m asking for a conversation or a task. When? Coming soon. You told me the majority of ChatGPT’s 1.2 billion users are using image functionality. What are they doing? Today, 1.5 billion images are created per week. It’s hard to even wrap my head around that number. They’re doing a wide range of things. One of the most interesting things they’ve started to do is really use it for productivity use cases. The first thing it started with—I don’t know if you saw the ’80s trend, but it was quite fun. You could take a photo of yourself and say, “Put me and my family in ’80s outfits.” I did this for my family, and it was a really fun poster. But what we’re also seeing is businesses for their menus, or posters for birthdays. People are using it almost in a productivity-like fashion to create visual diagrams of what they would like to see. We’ve actually brought the latency down on images as well, so it’s gotten a lot faster. It went from a very high number of seconds to getting much faster. As it comes down even further, the number of images people are creating and the number of use cases is going to grow a lot. My feature request: When a restaurant makes a menu or sign, prompt it for more specificity so it doesn’t look like every other AI-generated restaurant sign. Or offer a shuffle button for a different style. I agree with the feedback, and we’ll take it to the team. I’m seeing ChatGPT generate little interactive interfaces within its answers. What’s the direction for Intelligent UI, and how are people using it? I am extremely excited about Intelligent UI. If you go back a couple years, these chat apps were all text, and now that’s changing. They’re going to be visuals. Intelligent UI and our first attempt at this with GPT-6 Intelligent UI is really just the beginning. As you go to the extreme, what you can imagine is, let’s say you’re using voice mode, and you just say, “Show me how offside works.” Immediately it should show you a visual diagram, and you say, “No, I don’t quite understand it.” It should just repopulate. That’s where the future of this technology goes. It’s almost like you’re talking to a canvas that will update and change. People are finding it helpful for a lot of things. My favorite one is—it’s hard to admit that I had no idea how hearts work. The last biology course I took was in high school. I just asked it, “How does the heart work?” and it instantly gave me a beautiful interactive diagram of where blood flows and how it goes through. I’m really, really bullish on this for learning in particular. You’ve described useful applications in finance, health, and learning, and ChatGPT has 1.2 billion users. If people are getting so much value, why is public polling on AI so negative? The reality with AI is it is going to change the nature of how work gets done. For a lot of people, that is something that can feel scary at times, and we’ve all felt that. But I remain confident that when people actually use the product and they use AI, it very quickly changes how they perceive it. We’re at 1.2 billion, but there are still a lot of people who haven’t used it. The more people use it, get familiar with it, how it can actually help you in your life, it’s going to feel a lot less scary. Big Technology is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support our work, please consider becoming a paid subscriber. Thanks!! Subscribe

Nov 3 • 10:00 AM EST • Technology • bigtechnology.com

Who Controls Enterprise AI Agents? Data Platform Vendors Race to Provide the Answer

AI agents are everywhere. Every other news story is related somehow to AI agents. As more companies are starting to use AI agents, keeping track of what they’re doing isn’t so straightforward. Dataiku launched Agent Management in September, and Oracle spent part of its AI World conference in October talking about how businesses can keep […]

Nov 3 • 9:56 AM EST • Science • hpcwire.com

How Old Is Interstellar Comet 3I/ATLAS? Scientists Think They Finally Might Know the Answer.

New James Webb observations suggest interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS contains ancient ice that may have formed up to 12 billion years ago.

Nov 3 • 9:42 AM EST • Science • vice.com

Snowflake Helps Enterprises Deploy AI Agents with Trusted Business Context and Built-In Controls

Business Ontology, a part of Snowflake Horizon Catalog, grounds enterprise AI agents in trusted, pre-approved definitions, so every answer is consistent...

Nov 3 • 9:20 AM EST • Business • snowflake.com

Should Men Pee Sitting Down or Standing Up? Science Has an Answer

For healthy men, posture barely changes urine flow. But the physics of splashback tells another story.

Nov 3 • 7:50 AM EST • Science • zmescience.com

Worried about uncertainty? Science has answers.

It’s not clear why blood pressure medicine works. Don’t let that stop you from taking it.

Nov 3 • 7:30 AM EST • Science • washingtonpost.com

Connections: Sports Edition today: Hints and answers for Nov. 3, 2026, puzzle No. 771

Welcome to Connections: Sports Edition Coach — a spot to gather clues and discuss (and share) scores.

Nov 3 • 12:00 AM EST • Sports • nytimes.com

Bears answer Seahawks, up lead to 27-17

Nov 2 • 11:01 PM EST • Sports • sports.yahoo.com

Yankees’ perfect trade offer for Dodgers’ Teoscar Hernandez

The New York Yankees do not need to chase every available bat. They do need to ask whether their offense is too dependent on left-handed hitters after being swept by Tampa Bay Rays in the ALDS. Teoscar Hernandez could answer part of that question. The Dodgers may move him this winter, and one speculative trade proposal has already connected him to […] The post Yankees’ perfect trade offer for Dodgers’ Teoscar Hernandez appeared first on ClutchPoints.

Nov 2 • 6:51 PM EST • Sports • sports.yahoo.com

Vote Smart Empowers Human Judgment as AI Influences Politics

Elise Blum and Dr. Kyle Dell examine who selects the information behind AI-generated political answers and why citizens must retain the final judgmentDES MOINES, Iowa, Nov. 02, 2026 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- As voters turn to artificial intelligence to research politics, Vote Smart board member and educator Elise Blum and Executive Director Dr. Kyle Dell are urging citizens to examine the sources, standards, and incentives behind the answers they receive. In their opinion essay, “Preserving Human Agen

Nov 2 • 5:01 PM EST • Politics • finance.yahoo.com

According to science, you may be more likely to gain respect and status by helping others

Human intelligence is still a bit of an enigma. Researchers have some ideas about why advanced intelligence evolved in humans, but they have not come to a conclusive answer. One prominent idea is that ...

Nov 2 • 4:10 PM EST • Science • phys.org

Too embarrassed to ask a doctor? Jacksonville-area physician answers viewers’ health questions

Is This Normal- Questions viewers sent me to ask a doctor for them

Nov 2 • 2:36 PM EST • Health • news4jax.com

COD Modern Warfare 4 has seemingly answered DMZ players' PvE calls with new Story Mission changes - but there are major caveats

COD Modern Warfare 4's DMZ doesn't have a PvE mode, but it seems Infinity Ward may have made a small compromise.

Nov 2 • 11:19 AM EST • Technology • eurogamer.net

Voter Guide: Healthcare in PA’s 15th Congressional District

Democrat Ray Bilger and Republican Glenn Thompson, who are running to represent Pennsylvania’s 15th Congressional District, answer questions from the News Lab at Penn State about healthcare.

Nov 2 • 10:30 AM EST • Health • spotlightpa.org

Kansas City Chiefs loss to Denver Broncos will come back to haunt them as Bo Nix answers critics again

The Kansas City Chiefs suffer their second straight defeat after a dramatic finish to Sundays game against the Denver Broncos; listen to Sky Sports NFLs Neil Reynolds and Jeff Reinebold as they reflect on Week Eight in the NFL on Inside the Huddle podcast

Nov 2 • 9:30 AM EST • Sports • skysports.com

Smile Zemi Adds Science, with Writing Coach, to Teach Kids to Back Up Their Answers

New NGSS-aligned curriculum for Grades 1-5 uses hands-on simulations and the Claim-Evidence-Reasoning method to build scientific thinking

Nov 2 • 9:00 AM EST • Science • einnews.com

Athenahealth launches tool to bring patient health records into Anthropic's Claude

Electronic health record company athenahealth is opening up patient health records to outside AI assistants, starting with Anthropic’s Claude, through a new connection designed to give patients per | Athenahealth is opening up patient health records to outside AI assistants, starting with Anthropic’s Claude, through a new MCP connection designed to give patients personalized answers based on their clinical data.

Nov 2 • 9:00 AM EST • Health • fiercehealthcare.com

Sunderland Must Find Answers Fast

Petulance, tactical confusion and a worrying lack of fight have left Sunderland in trouble. Can Régis Le Bris turn things around, or has his time on Wearside run its course?

Nov 2 • 1:00 AM EST • Sports • sports.yahoo.com

Connections: Sports Edition today: Hints and answers for Nov. 2, 2026, puzzle No. 770

Welcome to Connections: Sports Edition Coach — a spot to gather clues and discuss (and share) scores.

Nov 2 • 12:00 AM EST • Sports • nytimes.com

Today's Hurdle hints and answers for November 2, 2026

Everything you need to win.

Nov 2 • 12:00 AM EST • Entertainment • mashable.com

Angela Russo's Family Launches Their Own Search for Answers

Nov 1 • 11:00 PM EST • Entertainment • yahoo.com

Abdul El-Sayed ‘left a lot of calls unanswered’ after primary win, says former Michigan lawmaker

Nov 1 • 6:12 PM EST • Politics • cnn.com

Who is TWS? The group answers in heartfelt letters sent to fans and 'To Us.'

The six-member Pledis boy band reflects on its growth, fan bond and ambitions for bigger stages through its new single album.

Nov 1 • 6:00 PM EST • Entertainment • koreajoongangdaily.com

Parents don’t need all the answers to talk politics with kids, Extension educator says

Parents can help children make sense of elections by listening first and teaching them to check information and form their own opinions, a University of Illinois Extension educator says.

Nov 1 • 4:22 PM EST • Politics • shawlocal.com

RBL answer the call with back-to-back away wins

Things can change quickly in football. Just a week ago, RB Leipzig were still searching for their first points away from home in the Bundesliga. Since then, the Red Bulls have followed up their home w...

Nov 1 • 9:17 AM EST • Sports • sports.yahoo.com

Georgia’s Kirby Smart Raises Major Concern After Win Over Florida

Kirby Smart was asked in his postgame news conference at Mercedes-Benz Stadium on Saturday if the injury toll across the SEC this season feels different, and his answer reached well past the injury report. The question followed the No. 3 Georgia Bulldogs’ 27-8 win over the No. 17 Florida Gators, a rivalry game played in […] The post Georgia’s Kirby Smart Raises Major Concern After Win Over Florida appeared first on Gridiron Heroics.

Nov 1 • 9:15 AM EST • Sports • sports.yahoo.com

Which party cares about passing down their politics? New survey finds answer

An American Family Survey of over 2,000 people revealed Republicans are twice as likely as Democrats to say passing on political beliefs is important.

Nov 1 • 6:00 AM EST • Politics • yahoo.com

All your bond-market questions answered as rising rates roil markets

"I can't see long rates materially lower from here with inflation where it is, how sticky it is," says bond investor John Sheehan.

Nov 1 • 5:15 AM EST • Business • businessinsider.com

Meet the people 'vibe manufacturing' their ideas to life

These techies are using AI to prototype answering machines, toys, and jewelry. They call it "vibe manufacturing," a play on the term vibe coding.

Nov 1 • 5:14 AM EST • Business • businessinsider.com

Fortnite Players Can Get Item Shop Skins For Free with the Pirate Shop Token

Fortnite's answer to competing with Grand Theft Auto 6 is to give players the entire Item Shop for free with the Pirate Shop Access Token.

Nov 1 • 5:07 AM EST • Technology • gamerant.com

Connections: Sports Edition today: Hints and answers for Nov. 1, 2026, puzzle No. 769

Welcome to Connections: Sports Edition Coach — a spot to gather clues and discuss (and share) scores.

Nov 1 • 12:00 AM EDT • Sports • nytimes.com

Ashley Walters Reveals Mystery Shooter in ‘Top Boy’ Finale

The answer to the question that has been asked by every fan of the series is here.

Oct 31 • 11:26 PM EDT • Entertainment • yahoo.com

Reus, Roberto star as LA Galaxy regain postseason foothold

By Alex RuizCARSON, Calif. – Legendary German star Marco Reus answered the call when his team needed it most on Saturday afternoon, leading the LA Galaxy to a much-needed 4-1 home win over Austin FC...

Oct 31 • 9:05 PM EDT • Sports • sports.yahoo.com

Nikola Jokic Has Simple Answer After Nuggets' Win Over Suns

Denver's star center did not need big numbers to run the show in Phoenix, and his teammates made the most of the looks he created.

Oct 31 • 8:37 PM EDT • Sports • sports.yahoo.com

Business Owners Have a Window. Most Aren't Ready to Use It. by Tully Ryan

I spend my working life on both sides of a business sale. As an M&A advisor based in Wilmington, I help lower middle market owners across North Carolina, South Carolina and Virginia sell what they've built. As the founder and CEO of IQExit, I work with the bankers, wealth advisors, CPAs and attorneys who sit beside those owners for years before a sale ever comes up. From both seats, I keep seeing the same thing. The market is ready for our owners. Too many of our owners aren't ready for the market. Start with our own backyard. Wilmington's metro area added more than 12,000 residents between July 2024 and July 2025, a 2.6% jump that ranked seventh in the country. It also posted the highest job growth rate of any metro in North Carolina. I see the same pattern in the growth markets I work in across the Southeast. New residents mean new customers and new workers. They also mean new buyers: people who moved here from corporate jobs and want to own something, private equity groups looking for add-ons in HVAC, electrical, landscaping and other trade services, and younger entrepreneurs who would rather buy a running business than start one from scratch. The ownership numbers are hard to ignore. About half of North Carolina's small businesses have an owner who is 55 or older, and roughly 85% of those owners have no succession plan, according to the North Carolina Employee Ownership Center. Nationally, more than half of Baby Boomer business owners have no documented transition plan. That isn't a crisis yet. It's a timing problem. A lot of businesses will change hands over the next decade, and the prepared ones will get the better buyers and the better terms. Buyers have money and they're using it. But an active market doesn't mean a fast one. The IBBA's latest Market Pulse survey found that Main Street deals took six to 10 months from engagement to close in the second quarter, and lower middle market deals took 11 to 12 months. That clock starts after the owner decides to sell. In my experience, the real preparation has to start years before. Two clocks, two playbooks When I sit down with an owner or their advisor, my first question isn't “What's it worth?” It's “When?” The answer puts the owner in one of two groups. If the owner wants out within 24 months, we're in execution mode. There's no time to rebuild the business. The work is cleaning up what a buyer will test: three years of financials that tie to the tax returns, an add-back schedule you can prove, customer and vendor contracts in writing, a lease that can be assigned, and a price the market will actually pay. The goal is certainty to close. If the exit is two to five years away, the owner has something worth more than time. They have choices. That window is where most value gets built, and most owners waste it by waiting. What kills deals In the lower middle market, deals rarely die over the headline price. They die in diligence, or they get retraded late in the process. I see the same causes again and again. The owner is the business. If every key customer relationship runs through the owner's cell phone, a buyer sees risk and a lender sees more of it. The books don't hold up. Buyers spot weak accounting fast. Statements that get revised mid-process, a revolving door in the bookkeeper's chair, revenue tracked on a side spreadsheet, and margins that slip while sales climb with no clear reason all make a buyer nervous. So does an owner who pushes back when asked for documents. And plenty of private owners run personal expenses through the company. Add-backs are normal. Add-backs you can't document turn into a lower offer. The real estate isn't sorted out. Many owners hold their building in a separate LLC. That's fine, but the lease terms or the property sale should be settled before a buyer shows up, not halfway through diligence. Revenue sits in too few hands. Picture a contractor with 40% of its work coming from one builder, or a service company running on handshake deals. Buyers will still look, but the terms shift toward more seller financing, an earnout, or less cash at closing. Owners and advisors: if your exit is three to five years out • Get a baseline now. Find out where the business really stands today: what a buyer would pay, who that buyer is likely to be, and which gaps would hurt you in diligence. You can't fix what you haven't measured, and the answer is often different from what the owner expects. • Make yourself less necessary. Spend the next few years building a manager or small team that can run daily operations and own customer relationships. Put handshake deals into written contracts. A business that runs without its owner is worth more and is far easier to finance. • Clean the books for three straight years. Buyers and lenders look back at least three years. Separate personal expenses, keep the financials tied to the tax returns, track every add-back as you go, and settle the real estate plan early. A word to CPAs CPAs often see a sale coming before anyone else, and you're usually the most trusted voice an owner has. Year-end meetings are the right time to start this conversation. Here's what I'd ask every CPA to do this season with business owner clients over 55: • Ask the timing question. “Do you see yourself owning this business in five years? If not, who takes it over?” Write down the answer and bring it up again at next year's meeting. • Run a proof of cash and review revenue recognition. Make sure the cash in the bank ties to the revenue on the books. Pay close attention to contractors with work in progress and to companies selling memberships or service plans. These issues are easy to fix with years of lead time and painful to fix a month before closing. • Pair the tax return with an exit readiness review. Invite clients to complete IQExit's Exit Readiness Intelligence (ERI) process as part of year-end planning. It gives you and the client a shared picture of readiness gaps and an indicative value range, and the results come back to you as the advisor. That turns a tax meeting into a planning relationship, and it puts you in position to bring in tax and M&A help early, when choices like purchase price allocation can still save the client real money. Changing the conversation For bankers, wealth advisors and attorneys, the hard part is raising the subject without seeming to nudge a client toward the door. I understand that. Nobody wants to tell a 60-year-old owner it's time to sell. So don't. Ask a different question: “If a buyer called tomorrow, what would they find?” That's a planning question, not a pitch, and it's useful whether the exit is two years out or 15. It's the question we built IQExit to help advisors answer. Whether you're in Wilmington, Raleigh, Charleston, Richmond or anywhere else, owners have a real opening right now. The buyers are out there and so is the capital. The owners who come out ahead will be the ones who start getting ready before they're ready to sell.

Oct 31 • 8:00 PM EDT • Business • wilmingtonbiz.com

The Best Time to Fix Your Business Is When Things Are Going Well by Nathan Tayloe

There's a pattern I've noticed working with growing businesses over the years. Conversations about what needs to change rarely happen when things are going well. They tend to happen when growth slows, a competitor starts winning business, or something that used to work stops producing the same results. By then, the decisions are often harder, more expensive, and more urgent than they needed to be. It's understandable. When revenue is growing, customers are coming in, and employees are busy, there's little incentive to question what's working. Leaders have plenty to manage without creating new challenges for themselves. Running my own business has taught me that it's easy to get caught up in what's happening today and put off improvements you know will matter tomorrow. Those periods of success may actually be the best opportunity a business has to make meaningful improvements. When Success Makes Change Less Urgent Most businesses have things they know could be better. The challenge is finding a compelling reason to address them when everything appears to be working. Maybe the company has outgrown its original positioning. Perhaps internal processes haven't kept pace with growth, or the customer experience has become inconsistent as the organization has expanded. These issues don't necessarily prevent a business from growing. Strong demand can make them easier to overlook, especially when teams are focused on keeping up with the work already coming in. Over time, small inefficiencies become accepted ways of operating. Outdated processes remain in place because they've always worked well enough, and opportunities to improve get pushed aside in favor of more immediate demands. The business continues moving forward, but some of the things supporting that growth aren't getting stronger along with it. The Advantage of Acting Early When a business is performing well, leadership has something valuable: options. There's more flexibility to invest, experiment, develop people, and make thoughtful decisions without the pressure of an immediate problem that needs solving. Compare that with trying to make the same changes when revenue is declining, or the market has shifted. Investments become harder to justify, timelines get compressed, and decisions that could have been made strategically become urgent responses to circumstances. I've seen businesses postpone improvements for years because there was never a particularly good time to address them. Eventually, circumstances decide for them, often when they have fewer resources and less flexibility to respond. Growth Changes What a Business Needs This is especially relevant in a growing market like Wilmington, where new businesses, new residents, and continued investment are creating opportunities across the region. As organizations grow, the expectations placed on them change. Customers expect greater consistency, employees need clearer processes and opportunities, and leadership has to make decisions that support a larger, more complex business. What worked when a company was smaller may still work today, but that doesn't necessarily mean it will support where the organization wants to go next. Sometimes the most valuable improvements are the ones that prepare a business for demands it hasn't experienced yet. That might mean: Strengthening internal processes before they become bottlenecks Developing leaders before the organization depends on them Improving the customer experience before inconsistencies affect retention Revisiting positioning before the market outgrows the company's story None of these changes requires a crisis. They require recognizing that a growing business needs to keep evolving, even when current performance gives leadership little reason to worry. Use the Good Years Wisely Successful businesses don't need to constantly reinvent themselves. There's value in knowing what works and having the discipline to build on it. There's also value in occasionally asking whether the business is as strong as its current performance suggests. Are there problems we've learned to work around instead of solving? Are we still operating the way we did several years ago, even though the business has changed? What would we improve today if we weren't waiting for something to go wrong? Success creates the freedom to ask those questions and act on the answers. The businesses that make the most of that opportunity are often better prepared for whatever comes next. The strongest businesses don't need a crisis to recognize an opportunity to improve. They use the good years to prepare for the years ahead. — Learn more about how we help organizations strengthen their positioning, align their strategy, and prepare for what's next at tayloegray.com, or reach out directly at nathan@tayloegray.com.

Oct 31 • 8:00 PM EDT • Business • wilmingtonbiz.com

Suns May Be Delaying an Inevitable Starting Lineup Change

Jalen Green is an exceptionally talented player. However, his inconsistent play is creating more questions than answering them.

Oct 31 • 4:00 PM EDT • Sports • sports.yahoo.com

Bitcoin's white paper turns 18, and small businesses are still paying for the bailouts it answered

Eighteen years after Satoshi published the Bitcoin white paper, business owners are still covering the cost of a system built on bailouts, and they can protect part of their surplus by keeping it in bitcoin, argues Onramp CEO Michael Tanguma.

Oct 31 • 2:00 PM EDT • Business • coindesk.com

Astronomers may have been wrong about what ended the 'Cosmic Dark Age,' new study hints

How did the universe transition from an impenetrable fog of hydrogen into the bright and starlit cosmos we see today? Astronomers think they're onto the answer.

Oct 31 • 11:00 AM EDT • Science • livescience.com

The big questions we get answered by today’s Alonso selection

Injuries have forced Xabi Alonso into changes today, creating opportunities for some players to shine.If you enjoy Talk Chelsea coverage and want to see more of it, add us as a preferred source on Goo...

Oct 31 • 8:45 AM EDT • Sports • sports.yahoo.com

From gold rush to cosmic questions: a South Dakota mine and the search for the secrets of the universe

A mile beneath the Black Hills, scientists are building giant detectors to analyse neutrino particles – and possibly find the answer to existence

Oct 31 • 7:00 AM EDT • Science • theguardian.com

Help! I Made a Simple Request of a Mom on a Plane. But Her Answer Has Me Questioning My Own Character.

Is it wrong to ask a 3-year-old to turn the iPad volume down?

Oct 31 • 6:00 AM EDT • Technology • slate.com

Born to a science dynasty, he broke away and made a photosynthesis breakthrough

French biologist Pierre Joliot helped answer how photosynthetic organisms split water to produce the oxygen that sustains life on Earth. He died Oct. 10 at 94.

Oct 31 • 6:00 AM EDT • Science • washingtonpost.com

Today's Hurdle hints and answers for October 31, 2026

Everything you need to win.

Oct 31 • 12:00 AM EDT • Entertainment • mashable.com

Fresno nonprofit criticizes AI-generated political mailers tied to PAC with similar name

Action News is tracking down answers surrounding the source of that AI-generated political mailer featuring Fresno City Council District 1 candidate Naindeep Singh.

Oct 30 • 9:40 PM EDT • Politics • abc30.com

Top federal prosecutor in Alaska says criminal probe underway over would-be spoiler Senate candidate

The Department of Justice also filed with the court a list of proposed questions it seeks to compel the Peltola campaign and the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee to answer about their reported role in recruiting the challenger Dan. J. Sullivan.

Oct 30 • 6:12 PM EDT • Politics • pbs.org

Scaring Up Customers for Halloween Streaming

(Welcome to the Entertainment Strategy Guy, a newsletter on the entertainment industry and business strategy. I write a weekly Streaming Ratings Report and a bi-weekly strategy column, along with occasional deep dives into other topics, like today’s article. Please subscribe.) Way back in 2022, I did a deep dive into each streamer’s horror offerings, looking at the top horror film and TV shows, and which streamers had the best library titles and best Halloween landing pages. If you’d like to check out those articles... Way back in 2022, I ranked all the streamers’ Halloween landing pages. I updated my thoughts in 2023... ...and 2024. After taking last year off, I’m back at it again this year. My theory—then and now—is that Halloween landing pages provide a subtle but surprisingly valuable insight into how the streamers position themselves, and what they do well and what they don’t. They show who relies on libraries, whose libraries across TV and film have the most value, who understands how customers want to access those libraries, and, being blunt, which product teams actually put the time in to make a quality holiday user experience. Plus, three “horror” TV shows had big debuts this month! So today, I’ll answer the questions... What are the all-time biggest horror shows and films on streaming? What streamer has the best library? What streamer has the best landing page? And what does this say about the streaming wars today? But first, let’s look at three big new horror shows on streaming... Subscribe Horror TV Has Dominated October So Far In a fun twist this month, three different streamers released three different horror TV shows. Many scary stories come out every October, but the twist is that all three did well: Two of the shows got over 20 million hours, which is just good. You can see that Below is helping Netflix start October/Q4 off well: And that Carrie is a top seven show for Amazon through two weeks: But here’s the crazier note: even though it doesn’t look huge, Crystal Lake is Peacock’s biggest debut yet: Let’s discuss the streaming elephant in the room: two of these shows are based off classic horror IP: Jason and Carrie. So once again, IP works, in theaters and on streaming. It just does. Oddly enough, horror IP doesn’t draw a tenth of the ire that other IP does, even though, arguably, horror films are the original franchise films, starting in the 1930s and continuing on through the slasher film 80s. So horror TV shows are off to a great start. While I’ve written before that horror films do NOT over-perform on streaming, TV shows are a different story. The Top Horror Films and TV Shows on Streaming All Time To start, here are the top first seasons for all streaming TV shows since 2020 (the start of the Streaming Ratings Era): First take: yep, that’s some power laws at work right there. The biggest TV show hits aren’t just bigger than other hit shows, they’re orders of magnitude bigger. Wednesday dwarfs The Last of Us (a big hit!) and is ten times bigger than the next six most popular horror shows. Wow! So yes, horror or horror-adjacent shows can do as well as the top shows on streaming. Wednesday is proof of this. (Though, even Wednesday is more horror-adjacent than proper horror.) Also, note that Below, Carrie and _Crystal Lake_could/should keep moving up the charts. That said, there is some weakness in these numbers. Only eighteen horror first seasons made the charts, which is low. For context, 541 season ones have made the Nielsen originals charts since 2020. Eighteen out of 541 isn’t great! Plus, again, the IP issue. Wednesday and The Last of Us came from popular IP, and It: Welcome to Derry and Goosebumps are spinoffs. Next up, every horror show from season two on: The bad news here? Besides one iconic example, horror shows don’t last long i.e. generate very many seasons. While many straight-to-streaming horror shows were limited series, many weren’t and only four horror shows got to a second season or beyond. That’s a bad hit rate. And yeah, only one horror show made it to a fifth season! This genre is just not elite (on streaming). Okay, on to the top horror films all time (er, since 2020): We’re just getting started with this issue, but the rest is for paid subscribers of the Entertainment Strategy Guy, so if you’d like to find out… ...What streamers have the most horror films... ...And how FASTs have embraced horror films... ...How many elite horror films are on linear TV or aren’t on TV at all… ...How streamers make it very, very hard to find horror films… …And a lot more... ...please subscribe! We can only keep doing this great work with your support. If you’d like to read more about why you should subscribe, please read this article about the Streaming Ratings Report, why it matters, why you need it, and why we cover streaming ratings best.

Oct 30 • 5:58 PM EDT • Entertainment • entertainment.substack.com

The Galaxy S27 Ultra chipset saga continues, here's the latest twist

Europe might finally have its answer. Which chipset the Galaxy S27 Ultra will use has turned into quite the saga over the past few months. Back in July,...

Oct 30 • 5:31 PM EDT • Technology • gsmarena.com

Questions About Run Defense Remain Unanswered

The Las Vegas Raiders' run defense has been awful, and no one seems to know what the answer is.

Oct 30 • 5:30 PM EDT • Sports • sports.yahoo.com

Sun coach’s fate revealed amid move to Houston

The Connecticut Sun have played their final season at the Mohegan Sun Arena in Uncasville as the team is moving to Houston and rebranding as the former Comets for the 2027 WNBA season. One of the biggest questions surrounding the team amid the move was the future of head coach Rachid Meziane. That question has now been answered as Meziane will […] The post Sun coach’s fate revealed amid move to Houston appeared first on ClutchPoints.

Oct 30 • 4:59 PM EDT • Sports • sports.yahoo.com

Why we love a good Halloween scare: the science behind the thrill

Getting your Trinity Audio player ready... Why do so many of us love a good scare — from haunted houses and horror movies to roller coasters that make our hearts race? According to FIU psychology researcher Matthew Sutherland, the answer lies deep in the brain, where our alarm, control and reward systems work together to […]

Oct 30 • 4:54 PM EDT • Science • communitynewspapers.com

SLOPAGANDA! How to combat MAGA’s AI manipulation POISONING politics

Slopaganda has spread far and wide in the midterm elections, and there’s only one question: Can it be stopped? Brandy Zadrozny, a senior enterprise reporter for MS NOW, provides answers in the latest episode of The Deep End, a digital video series about how disinformation is changing your world — from politics to health to culture. Her investigation covers the rise of AI-generated propaganda and President Trump’s enthusiastic embrace of it, the shadowy operatives who used it to swing an election in Florida, and Brandy’s own slopaganda experiment that shows why AI technology is in desperate need of guardrails that protect voters and democracy itself.

Oct 30 • 9:23 AM EDT • Politics • ms.now

Science Begins With Wonder and Sometimes With a Salamander.

The Bar Harbor Story is generously sponsored by the Don & Beth Straus Center at Birch Bay Village. BAR HARBOR—The children had come to see the axolotls, those odd little salamanders with pink frills around their heads and the remarkable ability to grow back what they lose. But also there were stickers. There were crafts. There was the kind of excitement that makes a roomful of kindergarteners forget, for a little while, that sitting still is ever a requirement. And then there were the animals themselves, alive in their clear cases at the MDI Biological Laboratory, where 12 children from Pemetic Elementary School got to meet the creatures they had been learning about in class. “Do you love them?” their teacher, Carol Null, asked. The answer came back in a chorus. “I do!” “I do!” “I do too,” Null said, smiling. “I love them even more now.” That was the thing about a day at the lab. Science was no longer a picture in a book, or a word on a classroom wall. It had a face, a tail, and a set of extraordinary powers. And for a child, sometimes that is where wonder begins. Sometimes learning about science is about stickers. Sometimes it’s about bright pink feathers and getting super excited about that glow in the dark. Sometimes learning about science is joy—pure and simple joy. That’s how it was October 28 at the MDI Bio Lab as Miss Hannah (known in the lab as Dr. Hannah Lust, director of STEM, undergraduate and graduate Training), other scientists, graduate students, and MDI Bio Lab staff, hosted 12 students from Carol Null’s Pemetic Elementary School’s kindergarten class. The 2.5-hour program created by Dr. Lust focused on axolotls, a species of mole salamanders, a superhero in the animal world: a superhero with some scientific-study worthy superpowers. One of those superpowers come from the axolotls’ ability to regenerate body parts, including entire limbs. But also, they’re cute. This fall, before coming to the internationally renowned lab nestled in Salsbury Cove, Null has been integrating axolotls into her class. They’ve been part of the kids’ vocabulary and their storytelling. They’ve been part of science. They’ve been part of the children’s learning about facts vs opinions. The Pemetic Elementary kindergarten students learn about invasive species and the impact on the ecology and one student related it to their dad, who lobsters, and his worries about green craps, an invasive species in Maine. “Are they bigger or smaller than you thought they’d be?” the children are asked after the scientists show them multiple see-through cases of axolotls, lined up on a table that they’re told not to jiggle. “Bigger!” “I think they’re bigger.” “Smaller!” The bio lab opening its doors to the collaborations and to students and families is a norm, but this is the first program of this kind. It’s meant to encourage kindergarten students about axolotls. But when the students come to the bio lab something else happens too—something beyond Null’s child-focused teaching—the students see science—and the regenerating creatures in real life. They do crafts. They speak with them. They meet people who know all about them: scientists and educators who talk to the kids like they’re equals. That’s a superhero power, too. Null speaks about meeting the kids where they’re at in her classroom, letting their interest and hearts lead her in their learning. That requires recognition of interests, of individuality, of empathy. Some would argue that’s a super power, too, but it’s also in those 12 students as they listen to the storybook, encounter those live axolotls, and hear about how axolotls might help advance society’s understanding of human health. As Eddie Seckeler (comparative animal models, CORE facility manager), carefully puts the axolotls on a cart and rolls them away, some of the children stop what they’re doing to watch. “Bye axolotls.” “Bye!” “Bye!” The axolotls are not just images in a book, Hello, I’m an axolotl by Hayley and John Rocco; they are real and cool. MDI Biological Laboratory scientists Dr. Prayag Murawala and Dr. James Godwin who both feature in the Roccos’ book. The kindergarteners get to meet them in real life, off the page, in the world, doing science. They learn from them, laugh with them. “The visit is about more than meeting an unusual animal. By introducing children to scientists working in their own community, the experience helps make science tangible and accessible. Students can see that science is not just something they read about in books or learn about at school. It is something real people do every day by asking questions, making observations and working to understand how the world works,” explains MDI Biological Laboratory Director of Communications Rebecca Woods. While the students make axolotl-related crafts around tables, graduate students and staff help out. Ryan holds up his construction paper setting and axolotl to show Omar Maged, a graduate student. “Do you like it?” Ryan asks, eyes wide, turning from his axolotl to look up at Omar. Omar studies the construction paper for a moment, smiles and says definitively, each word important. “It is beautiful.” Null says that she’s so thankful for all the “amazing” community partners that her school and her students get to interact with as they learn and grow and live, but emphasized how the MDI Bio Lab goes out of its way to create something meaningful, something that allows her young students to build their own agency, to know that they can be impactful in their community, to show them how how things they learn about in text is connected to themselves and their community. Woods explains, “Axolotls have an extraordinary ability to regenerate, or regrow, certain body parts, including limbs. Scientists study these animals to understand how regeneration works and what their biology might teach us about tissue repair and healing in humans.” The children enter the space for “a memorable introduction to a big scientific question,” Woods said. “How can some animals regrow body parts? The encounter encourages children to look closely, wonder about what they see and begin to understand how scientists use observations and experiments to investigate questions.” “For the students, the visit is an opportunity to explore a fascinating animal and meet scientists in their own community,” Woods explains. “For MDI Biological Laboratory, it is a chance to share the excitement of research, nurture curiosity, and help young learners discover that science begins with asking questions.“ At the beginning of the school year, Pemetic kindergarteners didn’t know what the axolotl was—at least not exactly—now they know all about the axolotl’s life cycle. “It’s different than a butterfly,” one student told Mrs. Null. It is. The change and knowledge might seem small**,** but it offers a glimpse of what happens when a subject moves beyond the pages of a book and into a child’s world. The children have been learning about butterflies at the Charlotte Rhoades Park and Butterfly Garden. At both the garden and the MDI Bio Lab, the children see the animals, meet the scientists who study them and at the lab encounter a question that researchers are still working to answer: how can some creatures regenerate body parts, and what might that teach us about healing in humans? They leave with gift bags, paper-plate salamanders, new things to wonder about and a connection between the science they learn in school and the work happening in their own community. The axolotls may be remarkable for their ability to grow back what they have lost. For these young students, the day offers something different: a chance to discover how much there is to ask, observe, and imagine. When Null’s students had time to use chalk and draw whatever they want, in the beginning of the year, they drew rainbows. Now? They’re using that chalk and choosing to draw axolotls instead. About MDI Bio Laboratory For more than 125 years, MDI Bio Lab has been a center for training and research in comparative biology. In the last two decades its biomedical research has focused on aging, regeneration, and environmental toxins. The Laboratory houses 11 research groups staffed by an international team of world-class scientists and graduate students. It also leads a statewide network of colleges, universities and research institutions that collaborate to provide training, research experiences and financial support to help young Mainers play a bigger role in today’s biomedical revolution. Located on Maine’s rugged coast, the Laboratory’s 100+ acre campus houses research facilities, cottages and dorms that house visiting scientists and students. It is also home to MDI Bioscience, a subsidiary working to design innovative techniques to speed the drug discovery process. The Bar Harbor Story is generously sponsored by Rick Osann Art. LINKS TO LEARN MORE NIH INBRE MDI BIOLOGICAL LABORATORY Pemetic Elementary School Hello, I’m an Axolotl Photos: Carrie Jones/Bar Harbor Story HELP SUPPORT THE BAR HARBOR STORY When we started The Bar Harbor Story, we didn’t know if anyone would read it. But you showed up. You shared. You sent tips. Now—over 400,000 views every month later—it’s clear: people here care about their community and each other. We’ve kept everything free because news should never be out of reach, but every one of our stories takes time to write, and your support keeps The Bar Harbor Story going. If you value our work, please consider a paid subscription, a founding membership, or a sponsorship. It truly helps us cover one more meeting, tell one more story, shine one more light. Even $5 a month makes a difference. Click here to become a one-time supporter now. Thank you so much for being here. Founding member information can be found here. Have questions about sponsorships? Just send Shaun an email at sfarrar86@gmail.com, he’d love to hear from you. Subscribe Share Bar Harbor Story Share Leave a comment

Oct 30 • 9:07 AM EDT • Science • barharborstory.substack.com

Why science has a rational explanation for most hauntings

Haunted houses seem unexplainable but like everything else out there, science has some answers to this mysery.

Oct 30 • 7:00 AM EDT • Science • sciencefocus.com

The politics of war

Israel went to the polls last Tuesday and it is the turn of the United States next Tuesday. The differences in the two elections are self-evident. Compared with the US, which has favourable geography and does everything at scale, Israel is tiny and part of an unstable region. For its elections, it has adopted an almost pure form of proportional representation based on lists. This encourages multiple parties and can make it almost impossible to form a government, as we can now see. The US system is complex in its own way but discourages third parties. Yet for all the differences in size, geography, and political systems, the fates of the two countries are closely connected. Israel has come to depend on the US to sustain its military strength, and over the past few tumultuous years that dependence has created resentment in the United States. The Biden administration was punished for appearing to give Netanyahu a blank check after the Hamas attacks of 7 October 2023, and not holding Israel back as it employed ruthless tactics in Gaza. Because of the treatment of Palestinians, American views of Israel have grown progressively more negative over the past few years. Only a third now support the Israeli government. While on the left, this is largely because of how Israeli forces have operated in Gaza and, more recently, how the settler movement has behaved in the West Bank, for the American right the issue has been about how Benjamin Netanyahu persuaded Donald Trump to forget his wariness about more Middle Eastern wars and agree to a joint attack on Iran, which has gone badly wrong. The Palestine question was not a big issue for the two large Jewish blocs in last Tuesday’s election. Both supported a tough response to Hamas after October 2023 and neither accepts a two-state solution. It was, however, the threat posed by the ethno-nationalist policies of Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich, the two extreme members of Netanyahu’s coalition, and their tolerance, even encouragement, of settler violence, that brought out the Arab voters. (In principle this should strengthen their position though to turn into real power would require the ‘Change Bloc’ overcoming their opposition to involving Arab parties. The alternatives are a National Unity government, defection from the Change Bloc to Netanyahu, or deadlock and another round of elections in the new year.) There was also broad support for the war against Iran among the Jewish parties. The difficulty here is that the objectives behind the war have yet to be met, and that continuing with military operations depends on the United States. In this way the two elections have come together at a crucial moment. If Netanyahu hoped that a victory over Iran would help him retain his majority, cementing his legacy as an Israeli war leader, it did not work out that way. Trump also expected a great victory about which he could boast. He promised at most the end of a hateful and aggressive regime, with a record of hostility to both the United States and Israel, or at least the elimination of Iran’s military capabilities and the end of its nuclear programme. Eight months on, there is not much to boast about; vital objectives remain elusive: the Iranian regime is even more hardline than before; the international economy is barely coping with the closure of the Strait of Hormuz; and Saudi Arabia is struggling with an unwanted conflict with the Yemeni Houthis. For all these reasons, the Iran War has been a dark cloud hanging over both elections. Yet the issue has been approached in different ways. Netanyahu sought to push the issue before the election while Trump has been more cautious. Trump’s essential claim is that there is nothing to worry about and he’s still working out what final steps need to be taken to provide a definitive conclusion to the conflict. Netanyahu’s final pitch was that there was lots to worry about. He focused on Israel’s dire security situation, with the Iran War unfinished and the prospect of imminent economic isolation because of international sanctions. For him it is imperative to defeat Iran decisively, and without delay. Why this different response to the same war? Part of the answer lies in how public opinion in the two countries responded to the war. In this post, I show how this came about. We await the outcome of the US midterms but know the result, at least in terms of the share of the vote if not yet the shape of the new government, of the Israeli election. With the elections out of the way Netanyahu is pressing for another round in the war. Trump is less sure. I conclude with thoughts on the importance of how he decides.

Oct 30 • 5:22 AM EDT • Politics • samf.substack.com

For Californians Drowning in Healthcare Costs, Governor’s Race Offers Few Answers

In California, healthcare costs are rising faster than income and inflation, and 4 in 10 adults in the state say they’re paying down medical debt. With the governor’s race in full swing, it’s still not clear what the candidates would do to fix it.

Oct 30 • 5:00 AM EDT • Health • kffhealthnews.org

Connections: Sports Edition today: Hints and answers for Oct. 30, 2026, puzzle No. 767

Welcome to Connections: Sports Edition Coach — a spot to gather clues and discuss (and share) scores.

Oct 30 • 12:00 AM EDT • Sports • nytimes.com

Sudoku Answers

Click here to view this article from TheDerrick.com.

Oct 30 • 12:00 AM EDT • Entertainment • thederrick.com

What sets high-end chocolate apart? This business has an answer you can eat

40 years ago, a school custodian got curious about premium sweets. Then he founded Chocolate Necessities

Oct 30 • 12:00 AM EDT • Business • cascadiadaily.com

Cramer's lightning round: Sell AMC

"Mad Money" host Jim Cramer rings the lightning round bell, which means he's giving his answers to callers' stock questions at rapid speed.

Oct 29 • 6:55 PM EDT • Technology • cnbc.com

Measles and respiratory virus vaccines: Expert answers to common questions

Experts discuss measles, COVID-19 and flu vaccines, and how journalists can counter vaccine misinformation.

Oct 29 • 4:36 PM EDT • Health • healthjournalism.org

The ‘Pain in the Ass’ Math That Could Save Vibe Coding From Itself

A new startup called &Truth is joining the race to automate formal verification, a painstaking process that uses math to prove software works as intended.

Oct 29 • 11:00 AM EDT • Technology • wired.com

Missouri marijuana businesses await IRS rules on promised federal tax relief

A federal change could save cannabis companies millions, but businesses that sell both medical and recreational marijuana face unanswered questions.

Oct 29 • 10:00 AM EDT • Business • missouriindependent.com

‘Business Is Good At Providing A Solution … But We Don’t Have The Only Solution’: Wharton’s Dean Answers Chris Marquis

On NPR, Erika James calls Chris Marquis’ essay an oversimplification – but agrees business schools must evolve.

Oct 29 • 9:11 AM EDT • Business • poetsandquants.com

Television Q&A: Why do dogs get barking mad at 'The Traitors'?

You have questions. I have some answers. Q: My wife and I started watching “The Traitors” but had to stop after two episodes. There is a whistle during the show

Oct 29 • 6:00 AM EDT • Entertainment • thederrick.com

Television Q&A: Why do dogs get barking mad at 'The Traitors'?

You have questions. I have some answers. Q: My wife and I started watching “The Traitors” but had to stop after two episodes. There is a whistle during the show

Oct 29 • 6:00 AM EDT • Entertainment • recorderonline.com

Do You Still Need Your Antidepressant? What to Know Before You Stop

Do you have to take antidepressants forever? The answer isn’t the same for everyone, explains psychiatric medication expert Jane Sundberg, PharmD, BCPP of University of Rochester Medicine.

Oct 29 • 6:00 AM EDT • Health • urmc.rochester.edu

Michigan vs. Rutgers Over/Under: Predictions for the Wolverines

Michigan has plenty of questions to answer heading into its matchup against Rutgers. Here are some Over/Under predictions involving the Wolverines' quarterbacks, rushing attack, defense and more.

Oct 29 • 1:18 AM EDT • Sports • sports.yahoo.com

Connections: Sports Edition today: Hints and answers for Oct. 29, 2026, puzzle No. 766

Welcome to Connections: Sports Edition Coach — a spot to gather clues and discuss (and share) scores.

Oct 29 • 12:00 AM EDT • Sports • nytimes.com

Sudoku Answers

Click here to view this article from TheDerrick.com.

Oct 29 • 12:00 AM EDT • Entertainment • thederrick.com

Why Corridor businesses should care about the arts

Have you attended a concert or visited a museum this year? If your answer is no, you’re not alone. Iowa ranked near the bottom in the most recent Survey of Public Participation in the Arts, which the National Endowment for the Arts conducts to track activities such as attending concerts, visiting museums or engaging in […]

Oct 28 • 10:14 PM EDT • Business • corridorbusiness.com

The midterms will decide who holds power. But who will answer for the broken promises?

Voters are demanding more than partisan rhetoric as they head to the polls to decide the future of the economy.

Oct 28 • 8:26 PM EDT • Politics • detroitnews.com

Most teens who used AI for mental health support wanted more help

Researchers surveyed 24,132 students in England and found that 2.7% had used general-purpose AI for mental health support during the previous year. Among users who answered the relevant questions, 55.9% rated the support helpful, yet 63.2% wanted additional assistance, with greater unmet needs reported among adolescents experiencing mental health difficulties and social adversity.

Oct 28 • 7:35 PM EDT • Health • news-medical.net

In the Age of AI, Business Still Happens in the Room

If you ask an AI tool how to write a business plan or price a new service, you’ll have a pretty good answer before your coffee cools. Three-quarters of

Oct 28 • 4:02 PM EDT • Business • pittsburghmagazine.com

Even Chicago’s top cop is in the dark on gunshot detection pilot

Chicago's interim police chief says he knows little about the mayor's new gunshot detection pilot, frustrating aldermen seeking answers.

Oct 28 • 3:56 PM EDT • Business • chicagobusiness.com

Scientists Detected a Particle So Powerful, They’re Looking to a Fifth Dimension for Answers

A 220-PeV neutrino detected in the Mediterranean dwarfs any prior record by 30 times, yet its cosmic origin remains unconfirmed.

Oct 28 • 2:26 PM EDT • Science • yahoo.com

Mike's Mid-Week Chat: Can the Packers take care of business at home?

Editor Mike Spofford answered fan questions in his live chat

Oct 28 • 2:00 PM EDT • Business • packers.com

McCullough’s Silence On Norvell Leaves FSU Fans Hanging

Florida State president skips coach Mike Norvell's name in new letter. With a $46.7M buyout and no AD, fans deserve answers now.

Oct 28 • 1:04 PM EDT • Sports • sports.yahoo.com

Answering Week 8's biggest fantasy football questions with 7 predictions

Oct 28 • 12:05 PM EDT • Sports • sports.yahoo.com

Dr. Jen Ashton Answers TODAY Viewers' Top Health Questions

Dr. Jen Ashton, board-certified in OBGYN and obesity medicine and host of the popular “Dear Dr. Jen” podcast, joins TODAY to share her professional opinions on top health questions from viewers.

Oct 28 • 8:22 AM EDT • Health • today.com

Why Angel Reese wraps her leg for every WNBA game

It’s become one of the most recogniSable looks in basketball, but Angel Reese’s full-leg wrap is far more than a style statement. There were plenty of questions about how Angel Reese’s game would hold up in the Finals, but she answered every single one by putting the Atlanta Dream on her shoulders.

Oct 28 • 7:40 AM EDT • Sports • sports.yahoo.com

Could aliens have visited Earth before humans developed civilization? Some scientific clues keep the question alive

Earth’s deep past leaves plenty of unanswered questions. None currently proves an alien visit, but scientists know the geological record does not preserve everything.

Oct 28 • 7:17 AM EDT • Science • yahoo.com

Kings Continue Winless Start After Road Loss at San Antonio

Victor Wembanyama’s dominant double-double and a barrage of Spurs three-pointers buried Sacramento in San Antonio, leaving the cold-shooting Kings desperate for answers during a winless four-game slide.

Oct 28 • 6:28 AM EDT • Sports • sports.yahoo.com

Annual Kansas Speaks survey shows distrust in politics but support for Gov. Laura Kelly

Gov. Laura Kelly answers a reporter’s questions during a Feb. 24, 2026, interview in her

Oct 28 • 5:15 AM EDT • Politics • hayspost.com

Connections: Sports Edition today: Hints and answers for Oct. 28, 2026, puzzle No. 765

Welcome to Connections: Sports Edition Coach — a spot to gather clues and discuss (and share) scores.

Oct 28 • 12:00 AM EDT • Sports • nytimes.com

Animals Starves while the Kardashians Miss the Charts Again

(Welcome to my weekly streaming ratings report, the single best guide to what’s popular in streaming TV and what isn’t. I’m the Entertainment Strategy Guy, a former streaming executive who now analyzes business strategy in the entertainment industry. If you were forwarded this email, please subscribe to get these insights each week.) Before we get going, I’d like to offer congratulations to Jonathan Funke, whose suggestion “midflicks” won the poll for what I should call straight-to-streaming films which aren’t big or cinematic enough to go to theaters but seem too expensive for a TV movie. It’s so useful a term, I just used it last week! Now I just need to add this term to my data dictionary! Okay, on to this week’s issue. We’re starting out looking at Netflix/Ben Affleck’s latest crime thriller, Animals. I’ll also look at Disclosure Day heading to Peacock (it did better than you’d remember in theaters...) and a new movie based on toys. Plus, a long-time streaming flop returns for its eighth season...will it finally chart? (No.) Will anyone at Disney care? Probably not. All that, plus another look at new shows landing on streaming on 1-Oct from Reelgood, what streamer hasn’t had a film make the Luminate charts since August, Reacher’s long run on the charts, M_onster: The Lizzie Borden Story’s_ short run, the top shows in 2026 according to Samba TV, all the flops, bombs and misses, and a whole lot more. And I mean that last part: putting this week’s issue together, I assembled OVER 25 images, most of which are bespoke looks I made just for this report. Really, publishing articles like this takes the work of writing two articles: one is the narrative and the other is making charts/graphs. Let’s dive right in! (Reminder: The streaming ratings report focuses on the U.S. market and compiles data from Nielsen’s weekly top ten viewership ranks, Luminate’s Top Ten Data, JustWatch and Reelgood interest data, Samba TV household viewership, company datecdotes, Netflix hours viewed data, Google Trends, and IMDb to determine the most popular content. While most data points are current, Nielsen’s data covers the week of October 5th to October 11th, 2026. You can find a link to my terminology here.) Subscribe Film - Netflix’s Latest Star-Studded Thriller Goes For Glory The tempting angle for anyone writing about streaming film this month, like yours truly, is to ask, “Is this why Dan Lin lost his job at Netflix?” Take Animals, the Ben Affleck-starring-and-directing, Artists Equity-produced crime thriller that opened on 9-Oct. (Kerry Washington and Gillian Anderson are also in it.) If it did really well, then one could argue that Lin has another success on his resume. If it underperformed, then it’s another example of a Netflix underperformance this year. So where did Animals fall? Kinda in the middle, but that means it’s more “not a hit” than “big hit”. On Nielsen, it opened to 12.0 million hours, and here’s how that stacks up for 2026 films so far this year: Obviously, that’s not great. It’s both under my 15 million opening bar for “fine” for a Netflix film and 20 million bar for “great” opening. It did a bit better on Samba TV, getting to first place. That’s very, very good, though again, looking at the Nielsen data, it probably means that it was a light week overall. Luminate’s data is a bit closer to Samba TV’s, tied for 17th all time for single weeks since May of 2024: To top it off, no one seemed to like it. It has a 33 on Metacritic and only a 5.7 on IMDb. Both of these numbers could have been impacted by the stories about Affleck’s comments about using AI to make the film. Given the controversy, the film might not have been as bad as the ratings suggest, but it’s also not a bullish sign. All to say…yeah, on net this film isn’t a point in Dan Lin’s favor. At this point, Netflix’s slide has been long enough—going on since February—that I’m almost tempted to lower the bar for what a “hit” is on streaming. Post-February of 2026 or so, it seems like straight-to-streaming films just haven’t hit the same heights as they did from 2022 to 2025. Before we head onto the “Quick Hits” for film, I want to shout out a fellow newsletter whose articles I’ve been loving this year, LA Material, a new LA-based news outlet. For just a highlight of my favorite articles since July... I loved this article on Ghost Town, a group on Venice that clears homeless encampments. As a Los Angeleno, obviously I adore their articles on LA parking issues. Their article on illegal parking tickets got the City Council to address the issue! Also check out their article on people parking in medians. Check out their deep dive on what went wrong with the LA Jazz Festival and how it fell apart, or what’s wrong with USC’s finances. Finally, they wrote up a voter guide on voter guides for the LA General Election. So meta! In search of a city? L.A. Material is an independent news outlet covering the people, politics, culture and glorious chaos shaping Los Angeles. L.A. Material brings you intel on the city you can’t get anywhere else. From exploring how Reddit short stories became Hollywood’s hottest commodity to reporting on the survival jobs keeping entertainment workers afloat. And answering, once and for all, why the AMC Burbank escalator is always broken. Through their newsletters, podcast, videos, events, and member community, L.A. Material is designed to help Angelenos connect to Los Angeles and each other. Sign up now for the free weekday newsletter. Quick Notes on Film Steven Spielberg’s latest film, Disclosure Day, came to Peacock on 9-Oct, and I’ll admit that, after pulling its stats, I did a pinch of a double take. As I wrote throughout my deep, deep, deep dive on summer box office/Obsession/Backrooms/IP/superheroes, oftentimes the film media discusses films as “flops” or “misses” or “hits” without clarifying what they specifically mean. Since Disclosure Day didn’t make $250 million in the US or $500 million globally, it was definitely a disappointment by Spielbergian standards, who is the highest-grossing director of all time, and arguably even more ahead in adjusted grosses. But it did make $245 million globally on a $115 million budget, so it isn’t as big of a miss as I remember. That’s still probably not enough to break even in the theatrical window, when you factor in marketing costs…but it’s close. And it grossed a lot more even in the US than some titles with about ten times more coverage. Anyways, lots of preamble to say this one only did 4.5 million hours according to Nielsen, so it did make the charts, but on the low end. Here’s how it stacks up to other Peacock titles: Apple TV (née +) followed up their “success for them” Mayday with Matchbox The Movie. This one doesn’t look like a success even for them, but at least it’s not a miss. Apple/Skydance clearly tried to take advantage of the success of Barbie at the box office—let’s greenlight all the toy properties!!!—but of course, this didn’t make it to theaters. And it stars John Cena, who, as I argued earlier this summer, NEEDS to get his movies back in theaters. Anyways, this one has mixed-to-bad numbers. It missed the Samba TV and Nielsen charts in its first week, but did make Luminate with 7.1 million hours. That’s just enough to not be an outright miss, and about half what Mayday did earlier this summer. Speaking of Apple Studio’s Mayday, it ended up lasting five weeks on Luminate, which isn’t bad for Apple TV. On Nielsen, it had a three-week run, racking up 13.5 million hours total. Again, like Matchbox, the issue is the budget; I doubt that this viewership earned enough to justify that budget. Also, to be clear, neither of these films are “midflicks”; both should have gone to theaters. Toy Story 5 is not hanging around on the streaming charts on Disney+, so it’s not as leggy as either Zootopia 2 or Moana 2, and definitely not in the same class as Encanto. (It did make all the money at the box office, so Disney is going to be fine…) The Breadwinner on Netflix (from Sony) is down to 3.9 million hours in its third week. It only lasted for one week on the Samba TV charts. Netflix’s Doing Life had a smaller-than-normal binge release curve bounce, only going to 7.1 million hours from 6.0 to start, but it made Samba TV at fifth place in its second week. The Netflix documentary, The Widower: Til’ Death Do Us Part, also had a small binge release curve bounce to 6.5 million hours, but did make a second week on Samba TV. Meanwhile, Netflix’s Unabomber fell off after two weeks on Nielsen—which is not great at all—and Demon Slayer fell off after just one week. Over on Luminate, the two smaller titles The Swan: Behind the Mirror and Kill. Bury. Print both fell out of the Luminate top ten charts. The story of library film at the first of the month is the arrival of the Ice Age films on Netflix. Now, here’s a small example of optimizing your library that even Netflix could do better. Say you want to rent/license a new film series from Disney**.** A streamer could pay a big paycheck and then drop each Ice Age film on the exact same day of the month, the fourth of October. That’s one choice. In contrast, the streamer could have released each film one week apart, and make each one a mini-event for folks watching Ice Age films. Or even roll them out monthly. Netflix opted for the former strategy, and as a result, only three of the films made the Nielsen charts this week. The “Miss of the Week” goes to Tubi’s YA-ish horror film_, R.L. Stine’s Pumpkinhead 2_, which didn’t even make the Luminate charts like Tubi films usually do, or, should I say, “used to”? Tubi films, most of which are straight-to-streaming, used to reliably make the Luminate film charts (which only covers straight-to-streaming films), but a Tubi film hasn’t made it since August. The first Pumpkinhead got 1.4 million hours last year according to Luminate. As I wrote about this film before, it seems to be a bit muddled in terms of age: too scary for young kids but probably not scary enough for older kids. Speaking of Luminate, Netflix’s latest doc about a comic (expect more docs about comedians all month), Who Is Martin Mull?, flopped, getting just 200K and 700K hours according to Luminate. Three other film/special misses belonged to Hulu, including a standup special, Jamie Foxx: Take Care of Yourself, Neon’s latest horror film, Hokum, which made $17 million in the US, and a Family Guy Halloween special. (That last one was only 22 minutes, so it’s not a surprise it missed.) Finally, another Netflix standup special missed the charts, Mojo Brookzz: I Know You Lying missed too. I can confirm last week’s misses, most notably Paramount+’s Jackass: Best and Last, MUBI’s Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma and HBO Max’s Evil Dead Burn. Television - I Can’t Visualize Nothing: The Kardashians Story Normally, in the mini-dive essays that open the Streaming Ratings Report, I focus on shows that do well or, at the very least, make the charts. Why? Because as I’ve said time and again, I can’t visualize nothing like, say, the Kardashians’ TV shows. Here’s the TV debuts chart for this week with a missing spot for The Kardashians, whose eighth season just landed on Hulu:

Oct 27 • 6:17 PM EDT • Entertainment • entertainment.substack.com

Canada's particle accelerator ambitions gather pace as TRIUMF advances rare isotope science

As Canada's particle accelerator centre enters this next phase of development, researchers will continue pursuing answers to some of the most fundamental questions in science while simultaneously generating knowledge with practical value for society.

Oct 27 • 6:08 PM EDT • Science • digitaljournal.com

McLellan Says the Red Wings Answered His Calgary Callout

Two nights after calling his group out, Todd McLellan had a very different message in Edmonton. #RedWings

Oct 27 • 10:45 AM EDT • Sports • sports.yahoo.com