ReportWire

Tag: data

  • Data Confirms Cannabis Is Safer Than Alcohol

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    Cannabis is a hot topic on Capital Hill and online – but what are the facts? Data confirms a key issue about the plant.

    The medical community has come out and said cannabis has medical benefits. Despite this, some older congress members are concerned about the harmful effects of the plant. But data confirms cannabis is safer than alcohol.  The overall burden of disease and injury from alcohol far exceeds those of marijuana. For example Australia, alcohol accounted for 3.2% of the disease and injury, while marijuana accounted for only 0.2%.  The effects are clear and 88% of the public believe it should be legal in some form.

    RELATED: Science Says Medical Marijuana Improves Quality Of Life

    The debate over the safety of marijuana versus alcohol has been ongoing for years, with evidence demonstrating marijuana poses significantly fewer health and safety risks than alcohol.  Data supports the marijuana is safer as an alternative to alcohol by examining health impacts, addiction rates, and societal effects. Already Gen Z sees it has a better lifestyle choice by choice to be California sober.

    Alcohol use is strongly linked to violent crimes, with estimates suggesting that 25-30% of violent crimes in the U.S. are alcohol-related. In contrast, marijuana use is not commonly associated with violence or crime

    Here is more information about the difference between cannabis and marijuana.

    1. Mortality Rates: Alcohol use is associated with tens of thousands of deaths annually in the United States, primarily due to chronic alcohol use and alcohol-related accidents. In contrast, there have been no documented cases of fatal marijuana overdoses.
    2. Health-Related Costs: The health-related costs for alcohol consumers are substantially higher than those for marijuana users. A study found that the annual cost per alcohol user is approximately $165, compared to just $20 per marijuana user.
    3. Neurological Effects: Alcohol consumption is known to cause permanent brain damage, whereas marijuana has been found to have neuroprotective properties.This suggests marijuana may not only be less harmful but can be beneficial in certain neurological contexts.
    4. Addiction Potential: Marijuana is less addictive than alcohol. While some individuals may develop dependence on marijuana, it is less severe and less common than alcohol dependence. Alcohol use can lead to severe physical withdrawal symptoms, which are not observed with marijuana.
    5. Dependence and Tolerance: Alcohol users are more likely to develop tolerance and dependence compared to marijuana users. This indicates that alcohol poses a greater risk of long-term addiction issues.

    In addition, alcohol increases risk-taking behavior, contributing to accidents and injuries, whereas marijuana does not seem to increase such behavior. This difference is crucial in understanding the societal impact of these substances.

    Data overwhelmingly supports the conclusion that marijuana is safer than alcohol in terms of health risks, addiction potential, and societal impact. As marijuana use becomes more prevalent, understanding these differences is crucial for informed policy-making and public health strategies.

    While both substances carry risks, the evidence suggests that marijuana poses fewer dangers to both individuals and communities compared to alcohol. This understanding can help guide more rational and evidence-based approaches to substance regulation and public health initiatives.

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    Amy Hansen

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  • Why Consumers Say They’re Planning to Cut Back on Holiday Spending This Year

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    With the holiday season fast approaching, American companies are gearing up for an end-of-year spending splurge that will hopefully close out 2025 on a high note. After all, the period that covers Thanksgiving and Black Friday through to New Year’s usually brings with it a nearly trillion-dollar burst of consumer spending—which should be a welcome reprieve from a year that has seen many businesses struggling to navigate an ever-changing slate of tariffs.

    But that fourth-quarter boost may prove underwhelming this year, at least if consumers’ predictions about their own spending habits are to be trusted. In a new survey of more than 1,000 American adults—conducted in late September by the market research firm HarrisX, and including questions developed by Inc.—40 percent of respondents said they anticipate their holiday gift budget will be smaller than it was last year. That’s compared to 21 percent who expect it to grow, and another 32 percent who expect it to stay more or less the same.

    That hesitancy is more pronounced among women than men—with 44 percent of women anticipating less spending versus 35 percent of men—and grows steeper with age, rising from 27 percent in Gen Z all the way up to 51 percent in the Silent Generation, and increasing with each successive age cohort.

    “Men seem to be having the high time of it, and women seem to be really concerned about the economy,” said Mark Penn, chairman and CEO of Stagwell, the parent company behind HarrisX. “It is really kind of a tale of two cities.”

    That may partially be a reflection of partisan differences between men and women, he added, as Democrats tend to be more pessimistic about the economy than Republicans, and women are leaning increasingly liberal.

    The upshot for retailers prepping for the holiday gift season? Put the men’s items closer to the front of the stores, Penn suggests, and move the women’s clothing a bit further back.

    The HarrisX polling found that those gendered dynamics extend beyond just Christmas gifts, too. When asked whether their personal financial situation had gotten better or worse over the last six months, 42 percent of men said things have gotten better (versus 30 percent saying worse), whereas among women, the split was 20 percent better and 38 percent worse.

    Overall, though, there’s a level of ambivalence in the polling data. When asked about how their overall household spending has changed in the past six months, 29 percent of respondents said it has increased and 29 percent said it has decreased. The remaining 42 percent reported that their habits have pretty much stayed the same.

    “This poll reflects neither euphoria nor dejection,” Penn said. “It’s actually sort of in the middle of things. Americans remain somewhat pessimistic about the economy, but they’ve been that way for a very long time.”

    For those who said they’ve spent more, the leading reason why was a “desire to enjoy life/spend more in the present” (23 percent)—while more than half of those who reported decreasing their spending blamed it on inflation.

    Yet in almost every specific bucket of spending that the poll asked respondents about—restaurants, clothes, consumer tech, entertainment and travel—more respondents said their household had cut back on spending over the last six months than the number who reported having increased it. Only for groceries did more respondents raise their budgets (37 percent) rather than shrink them (20 percent)–which makes sense given that the steepest cuts of all were to dining out, which 47 percent of respondents said they’ve reduced.

    Indeed, 55 percent of survey respondents said they’ve swapped out some of their usual product purchases for cheaper alternatives over the last six months—and 31 percent anticipate reducing household spending over the next six months, versus 20 percent expecting to increase it.

    Travel is the vertical for which the largest chunk of respondents, 48 percent, said they plan to cut spending going forward, while groceries was again the only category for which more people are planning to increase spending over the next six months (30 percent) than decrease it (22 percent).

    Penn cautioned that respondents’ predictions about their future spending behavior may be a better indicator of how they feel about the current economy, rather than what they’ll actually do in the future.

    “They don’t really know how they’re going to feel six months from now,” he says. “Six months in the American economy is a long time. In six months, we could be in a recession or we could be doing 3 percent growth and [have] lower interest rates.”

    The HarrisX poll also asked respondents about a few different policy areas which Inc. has been covering in recent months. Among those were President Trump’s recent tax and domestic policy package (AKA the “Big Beautiful Bill”), which 39 percent of respondents said has made their household financially worse off, versus 24 percent saying better off; the cryptocurrency-regulating Genius Act, which 57 percent of respondents said they were unaware of; and employee stock ownership, with 65 percent of respondents saying they’d be interested in getting paid partially with equity in their employer.

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    Brian Contreras

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  • Got a store rewards card? It might not be that rewarding – WTOP News

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    If you own a rewards card to a department store or coffee shop, you might not be getting as many deals and freebies as you think.

    Washington Post’s Geoffrey A. Fowler speaks with WTOP’s Ralph Fox about surveillance pricing.

    If you own a rewards card to a department store or coffee shop, you might not be getting as many deals and freebies as you think.

    Retail loyalty cards which offer points, promotions, and freebies from stores such as Starbucks, Best Buy or GameStop can track your spending habits and find ways to charge you more, according to a recent exploration by Washington Post reporter Geoffrey Fowler.

    Utilizing California’s consumer privacy law, which allows users to obtain access to their data from companies as well as request their information to be deleted or not sold, Fowler took a look at the information Starbucks had on him from his loyalty card.

    Fowler told WTOP that the request revealed the coffee giant had information on all of his purchases and where he made them, building a dossier of his spending habits and building a profile of him.

    “Starbucks was trying to start a dossier on me and size me up, and ultimately figure out how much I would pay,” Fowler said.

    It even counted how often he opened the app.

    “It said one day last March, I tapped on the app more than 90 times,” Fowler said.

    Fowler discovered that Starbucks was also selling his information to data brokers and that he was rewarded less, even though he spent at Starbucks more often.

    “They call it personalized discounts. You might call it personalized ‘jacked up prices,’” he said.

    Fowler said it’s called “surveillance pricing,” where a company figures out what you are willing to pay and charges you exactly that, noting customers who use a company’s loyalty card or app less often are targeted with more deals to entice them back.

    “The opposite of what you thought was supposed to happen with a reward card was happening,” Fowler said.

    Get breaking news and daily headlines delivered to your email inbox by signing up here.

    © 2025 WTOP. All Rights Reserved. This website is not intended for users located within the European Economic Area.

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    Jeffery Leon

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  • The Bourbon Industry Is in Turmoil. Could Tech Provide the Shot It Needs?

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    If you’ve never toured a whiskey distillery, the experience can be uncommonly old-fashioned. While newer distilleries thrive on automation, many still tout their “by hand” operations as a defining characteristic, a heritage that gives them street cred. Many distilleries are downright smug about the lack of computers or even climate control in any facet of their operations—even if this means things don’t always go according to plan. Easily preventable errors are chalked up as a cost of doing business, perhaps adding to the romance of whiskey-making while draining the budget.

    Mandell says that while the influence of a seasoned master distiller is great, there’s a real risk in eschewing technology when it comes to the finished product. “What many of the other guys get is just inconsistent,” he says, “because they have less control over the process.” And that inconsistency, he adds, can often be felt down the line, in the quality of their whiskey.

    Contract Negotiations

    Like many industries, whiskey is very incestuous, and the distillery named on the label may not really make the liquid inside the bottle. In fact, that distillery may not exist at all. For example, you can’t visit Redemption Whiskey’s distillery, because there isn’t one; the brand sources all its stock from MGP Ingredients in Indiana.

    There are two primary ways to get whiskey without distilling it yourself. Sourcing usually involves buying barrels that have already been made by someone else. Contract distilling happens when whiskey is distilled to order for a client’s specifications. Both are commonplace.

    Mandell is a veteran of Bardstown Bourbon Company, a well regarded operation he helped to launch in 2014. Bardstown made (and still makes) its own whiskeys, but like many distillers it also produces for others on contract. These contract distilling services are where the fast money is made. Whiskey produced today won’t be sold until it’s properly aged—for years—but unlike consumers, contract customers have to pay up front. Bardstown has been able to thread the needle and do both sides successfully—though without its thriving contract production business and the hiring of Hargrove (who now leads the Whiskey House production team) to fix some quality issues, Mandell implies that Bardstown might not have been so fortunate in its early days.

    When Mandell and Hargrove departed Bardstown around the time of a private equity buyout a few years ago, they got to work on a new business almost immediately. The concept, Mandell says, was simple: “What if we could start over, take everything that we learned, and create the distillery and the system from scratch,” he says. “What’s needed out there? What problems can we solve?”

    It turns out there were a lot of problems to solve, and a lot of demand. After all, the many so-called non-distiller producer brands—including most of the “celebrity” whiskeys that now crowd the market, like Beyonce’s SirDavis—have to be made somewhere.

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    Christopher Null

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  • The DC region is becoming more diverse. Where are Latinos moving? – WTOP News

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    The D.C. region is becoming increasingly diverse, and it’s drawing a large number of Latinos because of the opportunities available, experts said.

    WTOP celebrates National Hispanic Heritage Month this Sept. 15 through Oct. 15, with stories spotlighting the contributions, culture and accomplishments of Hispanic communities across the D.C. region.

    The D.C. region is becoming increasingly diverse, and it’s drawing a large number of Latinos in because of the opportunities available, experts said.

    According to a WTOP analysis of 2024 census data released this summer, every D.C.-area suburb added to its Hispanic population. In Virginia, Fairfax County reported the largest increase of people who identify as Hispanic. In Maryland, Prince George’s County saw the biggest hike.

    Gabriel Moreno, chief executive officer of the Maryland-based immigration nonprofit Luminus Network, said census data revealed that in many cases, children are being born to at least one of two parents who identify as Hispanic.

    Part of the growth, Moreno said, can be attributed to people telling family members and friends that there’s a large Latino population in the D.C. region.

    In-state college tuition after graduating from high school is also an attractive perk, and because of the large existing population, it’s “a lot easier for folks that are trying to learn English in a space where they’re also comfortable with their native language,” Moreno said.

    Takoma Park and Silver Spring in Maryland stand out as areas with concentrated Latino growth, Moreno said. In Montgomery and Prince George’s counties, there are more politicians who identify as Hispanic or Latino, which means “if they have an issue in their community, in their neighborhoods, they feel more comfortable, likely reaching out to someone that looks like them,” he said.

    Frederick County, Maryland, added about 1,700 people to its Hispanic population last year, according to census data. Montgomery County added more than 6,500 people, and Prince George’s County added almost 10,000.

    In Virginia, Arlington added 1,323 people who identified as Hispanic. Fairfax County added more than 4,700, Loudoun County added 1,388 and Prince William County added 3,363, according to the 2024 census data.

    Terry Clower, director at George Mason University’s Center for Regional Analysis, said the region is an attractive place to settle down because of opportunity.

    The D.C. region is largely wealthy, despite the challenges it’s been experiencing, Clower said. That means many residents spend money in restaurants, for landscaping and repairing homes, “which are those occupations that are most easily accessible for recent immigrants,” he said.

    While Clower said some may consider that a downside, “in the reality, it’s a part of what we need to grow. You want to grow your economy. You want to grow things.”

    In the years after the pandemic, Clower said there was a “real surge” of international migration. It was dominated by people coming to the region from Central or South America, he said, a trend that’s been true “for a long time.”

    Most migrants are “not coming in to purchase homes,” Clower said; and therefore they’re not directly impacting the demand of houses for sale.

    Moreno, meanwhile, said many families are returning to the multifamily home model. There could be two or three generations living in a home, largely because of housing costs.

    “You’re starting to see a lot of family units kind of stay together, and it actually gives them a better position as far as, for example, buying a house,” Moreno said.

    Get breaking news and daily headlines delivered to your email inbox by signing up here.

    © 2025 WTOP. All Rights Reserved. This website is not intended for users located within the European Economic Area.

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    Scott Gelman

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  • The DC region is becoming more diverse. Where are Latinos moving? – WTOP News

    [ad_1]

    The D.C. region is becoming increasingly diverse, and it’s drawing a large number of Latinos because of the opportunities available, experts said.

    WTOP celebrates National Hispanic Heritage Month this Sept. 15 through Oct. 15, with stories spotlighting the contributions, culture and accomplishments of Hispanic communities across the D.C. region.

    The D.C. region is becoming increasingly diverse, and it’s drawing a large number of Latinos in because of the opportunities available, experts said.

    According to a WTOP analysis of 2024 census data released this summer, every D.C.-area suburb added to its Hispanic population. In Virginia, Fairfax County reported the largest increase of people who identify as Hispanic. In Maryland, Prince George’s County saw the biggest hike.

    Gabriel Moreno, chief executive officer of the Maryland-based immigration nonprofit Luminus Network, said census data revealed that in many cases, children are being born to at least one of two parents who identify as Hispanic.

    Part of the growth, Moreno said, can be attributed to people telling family members and friends that there’s a large Latino population in the D.C. region.

    In-state college tuition after graduating from high school is also an attractive perk, and because of the large existing population, it’s “a lot easier for folks that are trying to learn English in a space where they’re also comfortable with their native language,” Moreno said.

    Takoma Park and Silver Spring in Maryland stand out as areas with concentrated Latino growth, Moreno said. In Montgomery and Prince George’s counties, there are more politicians who identify as Hispanic or Latino, which means “if they have an issue in their community, in their neighborhoods, they feel more comfortable, likely reaching out to someone that looks like them,” he said.

    Frederick County, Maryland, added about 1,700 people to its Hispanic population last year, according to census data. Montgomery County added more than 6,500 people, and Prince George’s County added almost 10,000.

    In Virginia, Arlington added 1,323 people who identified as Hispanic. Fairfax County added more than 4,700, Loudoun County added 1,388 and Prince William County added 3,363, according to the 2024 census data.

    Terry Clower, director at George Mason University’s Center for Regional Analysis, said the region is an attractive place to settle down because of opportunity.

    The D.C. region is largely wealthy, despite the challenges it’s been experiencing, Clower said. That means many residents spend money in restaurants, for landscaping and repairing homes, “which are those occupations that are most easily accessible for recent immigrants,” he said.

    While Clower said some may consider that a downside, “in the reality, it’s a part of what we need to grow. You want to grow your economy. You want to grow things.”

    In the years after the pandemic, Clower said there was a “real surge” of international migration. It was dominated by people coming to the region from Central or South America, he said, a trend that’s been true “for a long time.”

    Most migrants are “not coming in to purchase homes,” Clower said; and therefore they’re not directly impacting the demand of houses for sale.

    Moreno, meanwhile, said many families are returning to the multifamily home model. There could be two or three generations living in a home, largely because of housing costs.

    “You’re starting to see a lot of family units kind of stay together, and it actually gives them a better position as far as, for example, buying a house,” Moreno said.

    Get breaking news and daily headlines delivered to your email inbox by signing up here.

    © 2025 WTOP. All Rights Reserved. This website is not intended for users located within the European Economic Area.

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    Scott Gelman

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  • K-12 districts are fighting ransomware, but IT teams pay the price

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    Key points:

    The education sector is making measurable progress in defending against ransomware, with fewer ransom payments, dramatically reduced costs, and faster recovery rates, according to the fifth annual Sophos State of Ransomware in Education report from Sophos.

    Still, these gains are accompanied by mounting pressures on IT teams, who report widespread stress, burnout, and career disruptions following attacks–nearly 40 percent of the 441 IT and cybersecurity leaders surveyed reported dealing with anxiety.

    Over the past five years, ransomware has emerged as one of the most pressing threats to education–with attacks becoming a daily occurrence. Primary and secondary institutions are seen by cybercriminals as “soft targets”–often underfunded, understaffed, and holding highly sensitive data. The consequences are severe: disrupted learning, strained budgets, and growing fears over student and staff privacy. Without stronger defenses, schools risk not only losing vital resources but also the trust of the communities they serve.

    Indicators of success against ransomware

    The new study demonstrates that the education sector is getting better at reacting and responding to ransomware, forcing cybercriminals to evolve their approach. Trending data from the study reveals an increase in attacks where adversaries attempt to extort money without encrypting data. Unfortunately, paying the ransom remains part of the solution for about half of all victims. However, the payment values are dropping significantly, and for those who have experienced data encryption in ransomware attacks, 97 percent were able to recover data in some way. The study found several key indicators of success against ransomware in education:

    • Stopping more attacks: When it comes to blocking attacks before files can be encrypted, both K-12 and higher education institutions reported their highest success rate in four years (67 percent and 38 percent of attacks, respectively).
    • Following the money: In the last year, ransom demands fell 73 percent (an average drop of $2.83M), while average payments dropped from $6M to $800K in lower education and from $4M to $463K in higher education.
    • Plummeting cost of recovery: Outside of ransom payments, average recovery costs dropped 77 percent in higher education and 39 percent in K-12 education. Despite this success, K-12 education reported the highest recovery bill across all industries surveyed.

    Gaps still need to be addressed

    While the education sector has made progress in limiting the impact of ransomware, serious gaps remain. In the Sophos study, 64 percent of victims reported missing or ineffective protection solutions; 66 percent cited a lack of people (either expertise or capacity) to stop attacks; and 67 percent admitted to having security gaps. These risks highlight the critical need for schools to focus on prevention, as cybercriminals develop new techniques, including AI-powered attacks.

    Highlights from the study that shed light on the gaps that still need to be addressed include:

    • AI-powered threats: K-12 education institutions reported that 22 percent of ransomware attacks had origins in phishing. With AI enabling more convincing emails, voice scams, and even deepfakes, schools risk becoming test grounds for emerging tactics.
    • High-value data: Higher education institutions, custodians of AI research and large language model datasets, remain a prime target, with exploited vulnerabilities (35 percent) and security gaps the provider was not aware of (45 percent) as leading weaknesses that were exploited by adversaries.
    • Human toll: Every institution with encrypted data reported impacts on IT staff. Over one in four staff members took leave after an attack, nearly 40 percent reported heightened stress, and more than one-third felt guilt they could not prevent the breach.

    “Ransomware attacks in education don’t just disrupt classrooms, they disrupt communities of students, families, and educators,” said Alexandra Rose, director of CTU Threat Research at Sophos. “While it’s encouraging to see schools strengthening their ability to respond, the real priority must be preventing these attacks in the first place. That requires strong planning and close collaboration with trusted partners, especially as adversaries adopt new tactics, including AI-driven threats.”

    Holding on to the gains

    Based on its work protecting thousands of educational institutions, Sophos experts recommend several steps to maintain momentum and prepare for evolving threats:

    • Focus on prevention: The dramatic success of lower education in stopping ransomware attacks before encryption offers a blueprint for broader public sector organizations. Organizations need to couple their detection and response efforts with preventing attacks before they compromise the organization.
    • Secure funding: Explore new avenues such as the U.S. Federal Communications Commission’s E-Rate subsidies to strengthen networks and firewalls, and the UK’s National Cyber Security Centre initiatives, including its free cyber defense service for schools, to boost overall protection. These resources help schools both prevent and withstand attacks.
    • Unify strategies: Educational institutions should adopt coordinated approaches across sprawling IT estates to close visibility gaps and reduce risks before adversaries can exploit them.
    • Relieve staff burden: Ransomware takes a heavy toll on IT teams. Schools can reduce pressure and extend their capabilities by partnering with trusted providers for managed detection and response (MDR) and other around-the-clock expertise.
    • Strengthen response: Even with stronger prevention, schools must be prepared to respond when incidents occur. They can recover more quickly by building robust incident response plans, running simulations to prepare for real-world scenarios, and enhancing readiness with 24/7/365 services like MDR.

    Data for the State of Ransomware in Education 2025 report comes from a vendor-agnostic survey of 441 IT and cybersecurity leaders – 243 from K-12 education and 198 from higher education institutions hit by ransomware in the past year. The organizations surveyed ranged from 100-5,000 employees and across 17 countries. The survey was conducted between January and March 2025, and respondents were asked about their experience of ransomware over the previous 12 months.

    This press release originally appeared online.

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    ESchool Media Contributors

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  • 5 Ways Smart Landlords Manage More Units With Less Effort

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    Growth in real estate is often painted as a double-edged sword. On one hand, more units mean more revenue and greater portfolio value. On the other hand, every new property seems to multiply the late-night calls, rent collection headaches, and maintenance requests piling up faster than they can be handled. For many landlords, the idea of doubling their doors teeters between feeling like a life-changing opportunity and burnout waiting to happen.

    But the smartest landlords are opting out of manual, fragmented systems, and choosing to manage smarter. Instead of adding more spreadsheets, sticky notes, or staff hours, forward-thinking landlords are accomplishing more with less stress using automation, centralized dashboards, and data-driven insights that reveal not just what’s happening in their business, but why.

    I’ve seen this shift firsthand in the data flowing through our RentRedi platform. Smart investors are adopting intelligent systems that not only reduce day-to-day friction, but also enable them to grow sustainably, with the ability to expand their portfolios without expanding their stress.

    Work smarter, not harder

    Here are five ways landlords are scaling their real estate portfolios without stress, by working smarter, not harder:

    1. Savvy landlords replace busywork with automation

    When rent collection, late-fee enforcement, lease renewals, and tenant screening are automated, it means fewer phone calls, fewer reminders, and more predictable cash flow. Automation reduces the friction of daily operations, freeing up time to focus on strategic work, such as evaluating potential acquisitions or investing in property improvements that boost long-term value.

    When smart landlords automate processes, it creates a foundation of predictability for their business. For instance, renters who go through our automated tenant screening process submit rent earlier—17 days faster, on average—and are more likely to pay on time, with rates seven percentage points higher than those without screening.

    Additionally, growth-minded landlords automate tenant screening and maintenance coordination to save time while scaling reliably. Automating background, credit, and rental history checks reduces administrative work, minimizes human error, and facilitates faster, more informed leasing decisions. Likewise, centralized maintenance tools track work orders and vendor schedules in real time, reducing follow-ups and preventing small issues from translating into extra hours or operational headaches.

    2. Smart landlords centralize their operations

    Savvy landlords use centralized dashboards to stay in control of their portfolios by pulling everything into one place: rent payments, lease expirations, occupancy rates, and open maintenance tickets. Instead of scrambling to react to problems, they see patterns—like a tenant who’s consistently paying late or a property where maintenance requests are piling up—and intervene early.

    The ability to delegate work to comprehensive rental management systems allows smart landlords to spend less time doing repetitive tasks (by instructing the system on how to automate processes their way) and more time looking at summaries and trends in their portfolio. That kind of oversight prevents small issues from turning into costly vacancies. Since turnover is one of the biggest expenses in the business, a clear, consolidated view directly impacts profitability.

    3. High-retention landlords focus on tenant experience

    Smart landlords understand that a smoother experience for tenants creates a smoother business for them. When renters pay rent in seconds, submit maintenance requests without hassle, and get real-time updates, they’re less frustrated and more likely to stay long term. Happier tenants generate fewer calls, fewer complaints, and fewer avoidable emergencies, freeing landlords to focus on growth instead of putting out fires.

    Rent collection tools like mobile payments, multiple payment opinions, and autopay offer renters more than convenience—they are powerful retention tools. In a broader market where on-time rent payments have slipped to 84.3 percent, landlords using autopay maintain above 95 percent on-time rates. When coupled with credit reporting, that rate climbs to over 99 percent. The easier it is for renters to handle their obligations, the more consistently they do so, creating a smoother experience for both landlords and their tenants.

    4. Growth-minded investors lean on data

    Every rental business produces valuable information through rent payments, lease timelines, maintenance requests, and tenant communication. When doing things manually, this information is scattered across emails, texts, and bank statements, making it hard to use in any meaningful way.

    That’s why having organized, accessible data is so powerful. When all this activity is pulled into a single system, it stops being fragmented noise and starts becoming usable intelligence. Smart landlords leverage this data to spot trends—like a property with rising maintenance costs, or a tenant consistently paying late—and take action before those issues erode profitability.

    Instead of relying on gut instinct, growth-minded landlords approach their portfolio the way professional investors do, by using data to guide decisions. Tracking trends in late payments, lease renewals, or maintenance costs reveals which properties are performing well and which may need attention.

    This level of insight helps scaling landlords decide where to reinvest, when to adjust rents, or how to allocate resources. The result is smarter growth by having clearer insight into where the business is headed and how to make smarter decisions at scale.

    5. Successful landlords turn growth into freedom, not stress

    Scaling shouldn’t mean doing more of everything. Rather, it should involve leveraging systems that do the heavy lifting. A landlord managing five units on spreadsheets may feel maxed out, while a landlord with 50 units and intelligent systems in place may find growth surprisingly manageable.

    Smart landlords see themselves as the CEO of a rental business. Systems make growth sustainable; insights make it strategic. When workflows are efficient, consistent, and tenant-friendly, adding new doors doesn’t have to mean adding new headaches.

    Growth without burnout

    Real estate will always bring challenges, from unexpected repairs and shifting markets, to the occasional late-night call. But landlords who embrace smarter tools are proving that growth doesn’t have to come at the expense of greater time commitment and more burnout.

    By automating workflows, centralizing data, leveraging mobile tools, and treating information as a true business asset, savvy landlords expand portfolios while reducing their day-to-day burden. Smart landlords build a business that works as intelligently as they do.

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    Ryan Barone

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  • Startup Datalinx AI joins Databricks AI Accelerator Program – FinAi News

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    Data refinery fintech Datalinx AI has been selected as one of five participants in the inaugural cohort for data intelligence platform Databricks Ventures’ Databricks AI Accelerator Program.   The invitation-only program, announced Sept. 18, was designed to help scale early-stage AI startups, according to a Databricks Ventures release.  Datalinx AI “helps data-rich companies turn fragmented […]

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    Whitney McDonald

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  • Why critical data literacy belongs in every K–12 classroom

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    Key points:

    An unexpected group of presenters–11th graders from Whitney M. Young Magnet High School in Chicago–made a splash at this year’s ACM Conference on Fairness, Accountability, and Transparency (FAccT). These students captivated seasoned researchers and professionals with their insights on how school environments shape students’ views of AI. “I wanted our project to serve as a window into the eyes of high school students,” said Autumn Moon, one of the student researchers.

    What enabled these students to contribute meaningfully to a conference dominated by PhDs and industry veterans was their critical data literacy–the ability to understand, question, and evaluate the ethics of complex systems like AI using data. They developed these skills through their school’s Data is Power program.

    Launched last year, Data is Power is a collaboration among K-12 educators, AI ethics researchers, and the Young Data Scientists League. The program includes four pilot modules that are aligned to K-12 standards and cover underexplored but essential topics in AI ethics, including labor and environmental impacts. The goal is to teach AI ethics by focusing on community-relevant topics chosen by our educators with input from students, all while fostering critical data literacy. For example, Autumn’s class in Chicago used AI ethics as a lens to help students distinguish between evidence-based research and AI propaganda. Students in Phoenix explored how conversational AI affects different neighborhoods in their city.

    Why does the Data is Power program focus on critical data literacy? In my former role leading a diverse AI team at Amazon, I saw that technical skills alone weren’t enough. We needed people who could navigate cultural nuance, question assumptions, and collaborate across disciplines. Some of the most technically proficient candidates struggled to apply their knowledge to real-world problems. In contrast, team members trained in critical data literacy–those who understood both the math and the societal context of the models–were better equipped to build responsible, practical tools. They also knew when not to build something.

    As AI becomes more embedded in our lives, and many students feel anxious about AI supplanting their job prospects, critical data literacy is a skill that is not just future-proof–it is future-necessary. Students (and all of us) need the ability to grapple with and think critically about AI and data in their lives and careers, no matter what they choose to pursue. As Milton Johnson, a physics and engineering teacher at Bioscience High School in Phoenix, told me: “AI is going to be one of those things where, as a society, we have a responsibility to make sure everyone has access in multiple ways.”

    Critical data literacy is as much about the humanities as it is about STEM. “AI is not just for computer scientists,” said Karren Boatner, who taught Autumn in her English literature class at Whitney M. Young Magnet High School. For Karren, who hadn’t considered herself a “math person” previously, one of the most surprising parts of the program was how much she and her students enjoyed a game-based module that used middle school math to explain how AI “learns.” Connecting math and literature to culturally relevant, real-world issues helps students see both subjects in a new light.

    As AI continues to reshape our world, schools must rethink how to teach about it. Critical data literacy helps students see the relevance of what they’re learning, empowering them to ask better questions and make more informed decisions. It also helps educators connect classroom content to students’ lived experiences.

    If education leaders want to prepare students for the future–not just as workers, but as informed citizens–they must invest in critical data literacy now. As Angela Nguyen, one of our undergraduate scholars from Stanford, said in her Data is Power talk: “Data is power–especially youth and data. All of us, whether qualitative or quantitative, can be great collectors of meaningful data that helps educate our own communities.”

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    Evan Shieh, Young Data Scientists League

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  • Here’s Who Can See Your Chat History When You Talk to Each AI

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    While AI tools like ChatGPT and Google Gemini can be helpful, they’re also potential privacy minefields.

    Most AI assistants save a complete record of your conversations, making them easily visible to anyone with access to your devices. Those conversations are also stored online, often indefinitely, so they could be exposed due to bugs or security breaches. In some cases, AI providers can even send your chats along to human reviewers.

    All of this should give you pause, especially if you plan to share your innermost thoughts with AI tools or use them to process personal information. To better protect your privacy, consider making some tweaks to your settings, using private conversation modes, or even turning to AI assistants that protect your privacy by default.

    [Screengrab: ChatGPT]

    To help make sense of the options, I looked through all the privacy settings and policies of every major AI assistant. Here’s what you need to know about what they do with your data, and what you can do about it:

    ChatGPT

    By default: ChatGPT uses your data to train AI, and warns that its “training data may incidentally include personal information.”
    Can humans review your chats? OpenAI’s ChatGPT FAQ says it may “review conversations” to improve its systems. The company also says it now scans conversations for threats of imminent physical harm, submitting them to human reviewers and possibly reporting them to law enforcement.
    Can you disable AI training? Yes. Go to Settings > Data controls > Improve the model for everyone.
    Is there a private chat mode? Yes. Click “Turn on temporary chat” in the top-right corner to keep a chat out of your history and avoid having it used to train AI.
    Can you share chats with others? Yes, by generating a shareable link. (OpenAI launched, then removed, a feature that let search engines index shared chats.)
    Are your chats used for targeted ads? OpenAI’s privacy policy says it does not sell or share personal data for contextual behavioral advertising, doesn’t process data for targeted ads, and doesn’t process sensitive personal data to infer characteristics about consumers.
    How long does it keep your data? Up to 30 days for temporary and deleted chats, though even some of those may be kept longer for “security and legal obligations.” All other data is stored indefinitely.

    Google Gemini

    By default: Gemini uses your data to train AI.
    Can humans review your chats? Yes. Google says not to enter “any data you wouldn’t want a reviewer to see.” Once a reviewer sees your data, Google keeps it for up to three years—even if you delete your chat history.
    Can you disable AI training? Yes. Go to myactivity.google.com/product/gemini, click the “Turn off” drop-down menu, then select either “Turn off” or “Turn off and delete activity.”
    Is there a private chat mode? Yes. In the left sidebar, hit the chat bubble with dashed lines next to the “New chat” button. (Alternatively, disabling Gemini Apps Activity will hide your chat history from the sidebar, but re-enabling it without deleting past data will bring your history back.)
    Can you share chats with others? Yes, by generating a shareable link.
    Are your chats used for targeted ads? Google says it doesn’t use Gemini chats to show you ads, but the company’s privacy policy allows for it. Google says it will communicate any changes it makes to this policy.
    How long does it keep your data? Indefinitely, unless you turn on auto-deletion in Gemini Apps Activity.

    Anthropic Claude

    By default: From September 28 onward, Anthropic will use conversations to train AI unless you opt out.
    Can humans review your chats? No, though Anthropic reviews conversations flagged as violating its usage policies.
    Can you disable AI training? Yes, Head to Settings > Privacy and disable “Help improve Claude.”
    Is there a private chat mode? No. You must delete past conversations manually to hide them from your history.
    Can you share chats with others? Yes, by generating a shareable link.
    Are your chats used for targeted ads? Anthropic doesn’t use conversations for targeted ads.
    How long does it keep your data? Up to two years, or seven years for prompts flagged for trust and safety violations.

    Microsoft Copilot

    By default: Microsoft uses your data to train AI.
    Can humans review your chats? Yes. Microsoft’s privacy policy says it uses “both automated and manual (human) methods of processing” personal data.
    Can you disable AI training? Yes, though the option is buried. Click your profile image > your name > Privacy and disable “Model training on text.”
    Is there a private chat mode? No. You must delete chats one by one or clear your history from Microsoft’s account page.
    Can you share chats with others? Yes, by generating a shareable link. Note that shared links can’t be unshared without deleting the chat.
    Are your chats used for targeted ads? Microsoft uses your data for targeted ads and has discussed integrating ads with AI. You can disable this by clicking your profile image > your name > Privacy and disabling “Personalization and memory.” A separate link disables all personalized ads for your Microsoft account.
    How long does it keep your data? Data is stored for 18 months, unless you delete it manually.

    xAI Grok

    By default: Uses your data to train AI.
    Can humans review your chats? Yes. Grok’s FAQ says a “limited number” of “authorized personnel” may review conversations for quality or safety.
    Can you disable AI training? Yes. Click your profile image and go to Settings > Data Controls, then disable “Improve the Model.”
    Is there a private chat mode? Click the “Private” button at the top right to keep a chat out of your history and avoid having it used to train AI.
    Can you share chats with others? Yes, by generating a shareable link. Note that shared links can’t be unshared without deleting the chat.
    Are your chats used for targeted ads? Grok’s privacy policy says it does not sell or share information for targeted ad purposes.
    How long does it keep your data? Private Chats and even deleted conversations are stored for 30 days. All other data is stored indefinitely.

    By default: Uses your data to train AI.
    Can humans review your chats? Yes. Meta’s privacy policy says it uses manual review to “understand and enable creation” of AI content.
    Can you disable AI training? Not directly. U.S. users can fill out this form. Users in the EU and U.K. can exercise their right to object.
    Is there a private chat mode? No.
    Can you share chats with others? Yes. Shared links automatically appear in a public feed and can show up in other Meta apps as well.
    Are your chats used for targeted ads? Meta’s privacy policy says it targets ads based on the information it collects, including interactions with AI.
    How long does it keep your data? Indefinitely.

    Perplexity

    By default: Uses your data to train AI.
    Can humans review your chats? Perplexity’s     privacy policy does not mention human review.
    Can you disable AI training? Yes. Go to Account > Preferences and disable “AI data retention.”
    Is there a private chat mode? Yes. Click your profile icon, then select “Incognito” under your account name.
    Can you share chats with others? Yes, by generating a shareable link.
    Are your chats used for targeted ads? Yes. Perplexity says it may share your information with third-party advertising partners and may collect from other sources (for instance, data brokers) to improve its ad targeting.
    How long does it keep your data? Until you delete your account.

    Duck.AI

    By default: Duck.AI doesn’t use your data to train AI, thanks to deals with major providers.
    Can humans review your chats? No.
    Can you disable AI training? Not applicable.
    Is there a private chat mode? No. You must delete previous chats individually or all at once through the sidebar.
    Can you share chats with others? No.
    Are your chats used for targeted ads? No.
    How long does it keep your data? Model providers keep anonymized data for up to 30 days, unless needed for legal or safety reasons.

    Proton Lumo

    By default: Proton Lumo doesn’t use your data to train AI.
    Can humans review your chats? No.
    Can you disable AI training? Not applicable.
    Is there a private chat mode? Yes. Click the glasses icon at the top right.
    Can you share chats with others? No.
    Are your chats used for targeted ads? No.
    How long does it keep your data? Proton does not store logs of your chats.

    By Jared Newman

    This article originally appeared in Inc.’s sister publication, Fast Company.

    Fast Company is the world’s leading business media brand, with an editorial focus on innovation in technology, leadership, world changing ideas, creativity, and design. Written for and about the most progressive business leaders, Fast Company inspires readers to think expansively, lead with purpose, embrace change, and shape the future of business.

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    Fast Company

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  • For One Glorious Morning, a Website Saved San Francisco From Parking Tickets

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    He suspected this absurd-seeming pattern was due to limitations baked into the software used by parking control officers. Whatever its reason was for existing, the pattern of sequential ticket IDs, paired with parking officers likely claiming batches of ticket numbers, meant Walz was able to track their routes by plotting each parking ticket on a map as soon as it was entered into the system. A car owner could look at the activity of the officers currently out on patrol and see if any of them were slowly descending on their neighborhood.

    Last year, parking officials in San Francisco issued over a million tickets within city limits, which amounted to over $100 million in fines for car owners. “I actually don’t have a car, but I have plenty of friends that talk about it,” says Walz. Like most costs in San Francisco, these tickets can quickly add up. For example, forgetting to move your car during the weekly street sweeping—an error my household has made more than once—will cost you $90 every time.

    Dude, Where’s My Parking Cop?

    The website’s live updates were pulled from the city government’s website and visualized on an Apple Map. “Find My Parking Cops” tracked the routes of individual parking control officers, giving them each unique visual identifiers, as well as their cadence of tickets.

    On Tuesday, for example, the site displayed one officer seemingly starting their shift around 10:30 am and handing out 35 tickets over the next few hours as they patrolled a neighborhood in Lower Pacific Heights. The citations logged were primarily for expired meters, which cost $107 per ticket, and not having a residential permit, which cost $108 per ticket. In total, the fines racked up by that one officer over a few hours amounted to almost $4,000.

    Who’s handing out the most tickets each week? Walz included a leaderboard on the website that ranked just how much in fines each officer handed out. While officers were only identified on the map by a number and their initials, their cumulative ticket cost was tracked. When WIRED was last able to check Walz’s website on Tuesday, the top fine giver had issued 157 tickets so far, handing out over $16,000 in fees for violations.

    Prior to “Find My Parking Cops,” Walz created another San Francisco-specific website. This one used a phone, placed on a street corner in the Mission district, to identify what songs people were listening to in public. He then uploaded a live feed of the songs, captured and identified through the Shazam app, onto the “Bop Spotter” website. It provided a little peek into what neighborhood residents were bumping at the time while also slyly nodding at the abundance of surveillance in the city. He’s also previously built a site, called “IMG_0001,” to surface old YouTube clips uploaded by everyday people in the platform’s early days. Those grainy, private videos stand in stark contrast to the stuff that dominates the platform today.

    The parking ticket tracker was another side project for Walz. “I worked in my free time on the weekends the last few weeks to make it happen,” he says.

    While Walz’s websites sometimes come with a dose of social commentary, he didn’t envision this project as making some kind of grand, sweeping statement about parking tickets or what it means to drive in 2025. Rather, it’s another entry in his repertoire of cool websites powered by unique data sources.

    “I’m not ‘pro’ parking cop. I’m not ‘anti’ parking cop,” says Walz. “It’s just data I was able to unearth, and I thought it would be cool to visualize it.”

    And now it’s gone. Representatives for Apple did not respond to immediate requests for comment. I reached out to Walz after the city’s data feed was cut off, but he didn’t pick up.

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    Reece Rogers

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  • Louisiana Hands Meta a Tax Break and Power for Its Biggest Data Center

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    The agreement sets out hiring timelines that the company must also hit to receive these tax incentives: Meta can receive the highest property tax exemption as long as it hires the equivalent of 300 “full-time” jobs by 2030, 450 by 2032, 475 by 2033 and 500 by December 31, 2034.

    Louisiana’s agreements ask for more than some other states’ tax subsidies. According to Good Jobs First, nearly half of state tax subsidies for data centers don’t require any new jobs to be created. But Miller has concerns that the tax breaks were not necessary at all to entice a company as large as Meta. “While everyone likes to avoid taxes, they’re not going to hire people in Richland [Parish] just because they’re going to get a tax break,” Miller says.

    Louisiana had already amended a tax rebate to create an exemption for data centers in 2024 to entice Meta; in its latest iteration, it says data centers can receive a full sales tax exemption for equipment purchases in the state as long as they hire 50 full-time jobs and invest at least $200 million by July 1, 2029. A separate contract viewed by WIRED affirms that this applies to the Richland Parish data center, in addition to the PILOT agreement.

    Good Jobs First says that at least 10 states have subsidies for data centers that are worth more than $100 million each, and “have suffered estimated losses of $100 million each in tax revenue for data centers,” according to its data. In total, these states forgo more than $3 billion in taxes annually for data centers. Texas revised the cost of its data center subsidy in 2025 from $130 million to $1 billion. In 2024, a pause on data center subsidies was passed in Georgia but vetoed by governor Brian Kemp.

    The Franklin Farms site in Holly Ridge, the area of Richland Parish where Meta’s data center is being built, was purchased by Louisiana specifically for economic development projects. In its ground lease with Meta, Louisiana offered the 1,400-acre plot to the company for $12 million, which the lease says was the cost to the state of acquiring and maintaining the land. The lease also says Meta’s $732,000 a year “rent” is “credit toward the Base Purchase Price,” meaning the company will have paid for the property by a little over 16 years into its 30-year lease.

    The price for the potential sale would be slightly higher if Meta does not reach minimum hiring and investment thresholds: As an example, the lease says if Meta only spends $4 billion in the state instead of $5 billion, the property would end up costing it $19 million. Louisiana Economic Development reserves the right to reclaim the property if Meta doesn’t invest at least $3.75 billion and hire the equivalent of 225 “full-time” jobs by 2028. When asked if Meta plans to purchase the property, Clayton said, “We’ll keep you updated on our future plans for this site.”

    Meta’s presence has already caused land values to jump. A nearby tract of 4,000 acres of land in Holly Ridge is for sale for $160 million, or $40,000 per acre—more than 4.5 times the price paid by Louisiana for the data center’s site.

    But there’s also a concern that Meta could delay or abandon the data center project. The PILOT agreement its subsidiary signed with the state says the company’s timeline will depend on “numerous factors outside of the control of the lessee, such as market orientation and demand, competition, availability of qualified laborers to construct and/or weather conditions.”

    “My general fear is that too many data centers are being built,” Miller says. “That means some of the data centers are just going to be abandoned by the owners.”

    She says in the scenario that Big Tech cuts back investments in data centers, Meta would not even be able to find another buyer. “Essentially, the state will be stuck with this warehouse full of computers,” Miller says.

    Update: 9/22/2025, 12:50 PM EDT: Wired has clarified the subhead to reflect how critics perceive the data center.

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    Roshan Abraham

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  • Districts eye proactive cyber threat protection as risks increase

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    This press release originally appeared online.

    Key points:

    Cybersecurity threats to K-12 schools are growing in frequency, sophistication, and cost, yet many school districts remain under-resourced and underprepared, according to the CoSN 2025 State of EdTech District Leadership report.

    The report highlights state-level actions to strengthen K-12 cybersecurity amid escalating threats and shrinking federal support and details recent legislative activity across five states. It also provides recommendations on governance, funding, workforce development, incident response, and data standards to help state and district leaders across the country secure the future of digital learning.

    Sixty-one percent of school districts rely on general funds rather than dedicated cybersecurity budgets to protect their networks and data, the report notes.

    Recent federal policy shifts, including the elimination of funding for the Multi-State Information Sharing and Analysis Center (MS-ISAC), have weakened national support for school districts. In response, states such as Arkansas, Massachusetts, Oregon, Pennsylvania and Texas are taking action. The 2025 legislative actions reviewed in the report provide ideas for developing and adopting policies that will help school districts and their partners address these challenges.

    “While federal support for K-12 cybersecurity is in turmoil, several states are advancing innovative, bipartisan legislation to help safeguard student data, improve incident response, expand insurance access, and build the cybersecurity workforce we urgently need,” said Keith Krueger, CEO, CoSN. “These states’ common strategies offer actionable ideas for state and district leaders across the country and underscores the importance of system-wide collaboration and strategic leadership.”

    Key findings

    • Eighteen K-12 cybersecurity bills were introduced in 2025 across the five states studied.
    • Seven bills became law–all in Arkansas and Texas–focused on insurance access, training and infrastructure support, cyberattack response, data practices, and risk assessments.
    • Sixty-one K-12-focused and broader cybersecurity bills were introduced across the five states in 2025 that would indirectly benefit K-12 cybersecurity, covering government systems, postsecondary institutions or crosscutting issues such as insurance, incident response, AI accountability and workforce development.
    • Several common policy strategies emerged across the cybersecurity legislation introduced or enacted in the tracked states:
      • Centralized cybersecurity governance and oversight
      • Cybersecurity insurance and risk management
      • Cybersecurity workforce development and education
      • Integration of cybersecurity into K-12 and higher education policy
      • Incident reporting and crisis response readiness
      • AI, privacy and cybersecurity intersection

    Policy recommendations

    • Establish or Strengthen Statewide K-12 Cybersecurity Governance: Designate a cybersecurity lead within the state education agency and ensure that school districts are included in state-level cybersecurity planning and governance bodies.
    • Fund and Require School District Cybersecurity Risk Assessments: Allocate funding for school districts to conduct risk assessments and develop mitigation strategies.
    • Align Workforce Policy with K-12 Needs: Support teacher certification in cybersecurity and create K-12 student pathways aligned with current and emerging workforce demand.
    • Mandate Incident Reporting and Create Response Protocols: Require timely reporting of cybersecurity incidents and support districts with coordinated response plans and training exercises.
    • Update Procurement and Data Governance Standards: Require that vendors meet minimum cybersecurity standards and align procurement processes with national frameworks.

    By adopting well-designed strategies–centralized oversight, insurance requirements, workforce investment, integrated planning and responsible innovation oversight–states can help their school districts move from reactive to resilient. Cross-sector collaboration and sustained investment will be critical to protecting students, educators and the integrity of public education systems.

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    ESchool Media Contributors

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  • Spotify Would Prefer You Didn’t Sell Your Own Data for Profit

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    Spotify has never been shy about the fact that the massive amount of user data it collects is a major part of its secret sauce, from its user-specific Discover Weekly playlist to the annual event that is Spotify Wrapped. But the company, which does everything it can to lock people into long listening sessions and sells ads based on user data, would really prefer it if you didn’t bottle up that sauce and resell it for your own profit. According to a report from Ars Technica, a set of users did just that to make a little profit, much to the company’s chagrin.

    More than 18,000 Spotify users joined a group called Unwrapped, which set out with the goal of allowing said users to monetize their data by selling it to a third party. They found a buyer on Vana, a startup platform that allows people to sell data to firms building AI models. The idea is that users can get some cash directly by selling sources of data that are largely untapped, including things like private messages from Twitter, Reddit, and Telegram—and, in this case, listening history data from Spotify.

    Through a decentralized autonomous organization (DAO), the users voted on whether or not to make a sale, with 99.5% of the more than 10,000 voters approving, according to Ars Technica. They ultimately sold off artist preference data pulled from their respective Spotify profiles to a company called Solo AI, which markets itself as an AI-driven music platform. The users reportedly got $55,000 for the pool of data, which was split amongst them and distributed via cryptocurrency tokens. The final profit for each person: about $5.

    If you’re factoring in whatever trouble it takes to collect the data and cash out the crypto, your mileage may vary on whether it was all worth it, but it’s interesting as a proof of concept. Now, whether that concept is good or not is a whole other question. The Electronic Frontier Foundation warns that selling your own data doesn’t actually do anything to correct the imbalance between the power held by companies that collect and cash in on user data and the users who are being constantly surveilled and monetized, and argues, “Those small checks in exchange for intimate details about you are not a fairer trade than we have now.”

    Spotify also thinks selling your user data is bad, but for totally different reasons. According to Ars, the company told the developers in charge of the Unwrapped project that they were violating Spotfiy’s developer policy, which prohibits the use of Spotify content for machine learning or AI models.  “Spotify honors our users’ privacy rights, including the right of portability,” Spotify’s spokesperson told the publication. “All of our users can receive a copy of their personal data to use as they see fit. That said, UnwrappedData.org is in violation of our Developer Terms, which prohibit the collection, aggregation, and sale of Spotify user data to third parties.”

    Maybe Spotify is just annoyed that users are monetizing their own data when the company has struggled to figure out how to do the same. Per Business Insider, just 11% of the company’s revenue currently comes from its data-driven advertising business, well short of its 20% goal, as it has apparently been unable to crack ways to turn its massive trove of user data into ad placements that ad buyers actually want.

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    AJ Dellinger

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  • Who pays to fix America’s aging dams? Cities, states and strapped owners

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    Across the United States, more than 121,000 dams quietly shape daily life by supplying water, generating hydropower and providing flood control. But according to the National Performance of Dams Program, on average about 10 dams fail each year.Sometimes these failures have devastating, even deadly consequences. Many are aging, high-hazard structures in need of costly repairs, and the Hearst Television National Investigative Unit found money is scarce and owners are often left footing the bill.Behind a locked gate and up a winding road in Santa Fe, New Mexico, is the nearly 100-year-old McClure Dam. It supplies up to half of Santa Fe’s drinking water and is owned by the city. “This is a high hazard dam,” John Del Mar said as he looked out at the dam. Del Mar is an Engineering Section Supervisor with the City of Santa Fe Water Division. “The current rated condition from the state engineer’s office is poor for this dam,” Del Mar said. “That stemmed from some analysis that was done back in 2018.”Because this dam was built 100 years ago, there’s uncertainty in how it was built, so the dam was given the rating of “poor condition.” It’s also high hazard, meaning lives and property would be at risk if it failed. “We have to manage them as a public asset, part of our utility system, and once we know of problems, we’re obligated to fix them. So that’s what sets us on the course of this kind of a repair,” Del Mar said.Del Mar said the dam could cost $20-$30 million to repair. The city of Santa Fe is already in the midst of repairing the Nichols Dam downstream as well. That project costs roughly $20 million. To fund the projects, Santa Fe is dipping into funds they have, proposing raising utility rates and tapping into state funding—options many owners don’t have.Private dam owners struggle to get repair funds Just north of Santa Fe lies Las Vegas, New Mexico. There, Storrie Lake is known to locals as a place to camp, boat and fish. But for cattle rancher Michael Quintana, the lake is more important to him.”We’re in the business of capturing as much water in our lake as we can so we can use it for agriculture purposes,” Quintana said.Quintana is one of the owners of the Storrie Lake Dam, a crucial part of the state highway.”If we were to lose our dam, it would be a huge inconvenience for people to try to get to the Northern part of the state,” Quintana said.But he recently received unfortunate news from state dam officials.”They downrated our dam. Right now, it’s in poor condition,” Quintana said.Roughly 62% of U.S. dams are privately owned, leaving many owners like Quintana responsible for repairs.”There’s a lot of fear in having that ownership for the fact that we lack a lot of ability to fund the maintenance on a dam,” Quintana said. Estimated repairs are about $75 million—far beyond what the owners can afford. Looking for outside sources, the owners are reaching out for help securing funding through sources like local lawmakers.They have sought state help and applied to FEMA’s National Dam Safety Program as well. National funding gap remains largeUsing FEMA’s online money allocation data, the Hearst Television National Investigative Unit has discovered that since 2019, New Mexico has received about $3.7 million from FEMA’s National Dam Safety Program.”Money is always limited and there is often not enough to go around,” said Sushil Chaudhary, chief of the Dam Safety Program in New Mexico.Nationwide, FEMA has allocated roughly $304 million over six years across all 50 states. The Association of State Dam Safety Officials estimated in their 2025 report that it will take $165 billion to fix the nation’s non-federal dams.Chaudhary expressed another problem he feels his department and many around the country deal with: small staff sizes. In New Mexico, 10 staff members, seven of whom are inspectors, oversee about 300 non-federal dams. They have the third-best ratio of dams to staff of any state.Nationwide, roughly 530 state dam officials monitor more than 117,000 non-federally owned dams. Inspection responsibilities fall upon the federal government for the other 3% of dams that are federally owned.Working with the Hearst Television Data Team, the National Investigative Unit found that 25% of high hazard dams have not been inspected in the past five years or do not have record of a last inspection date. A high hazard dam would cause loss of life if it were to fail.Right now, there are roughly 2,600 high hazard dams in poor or unsatisfactory condition across the country. Dams in poor condition have a safety deficiency, and dams in unsatisfactory condition require immediate or emergency repair.But that could be an undercount. The most up-to-date records gathered by the Hearst Television National Investigative Unit and Hearst Television Data Team indicate that 67% of dams don’t have a condition rating. Of those, 4,000 are high hazard dams.Chaudhary said they get behind on inspections at times because they have other responsibilities.”We also need to perform the analysis that we need for regulatory purposes,” Chaudhary said. “We cannot rely on dam owners to do the analysis all the time. So we have to do our own.”Chaudhary circled back on the statistic that about 10 dams fail every year.”If you look at that data, the failure is not slowing down. So failure will keep happening. The dams are getting older. With that, various components of the dams deteriorate. While we cannot prevent failure of the dams, we can manage risk. We can save lives. We can do things that allow us to save lives and property,” Chaudhary said.Dams near youCurious if any of these dams with late inspections are near you? The Hearst Television data team has built a tool that allows you to see all of the dams in your area and learn whether any are in unsatisfactory or poor condition. Simply search your address or town name in the box below, and the map will populate with any dams near you, their latest condition rating and when they were last inspected.This story was shot and edited by Hearst National Investigative Photojournalist Reid Bolton.PHNjcmlwdCB0eXBlPSJ0ZXh0L2phdmFzY3JpcHQiPiFmdW5jdGlvbigpeyJ1c2Ugc3RyaWN0Ijt3aW5kb3cuYWRkRXZlbnRMaXN0ZW5lcigibWVzc2FnZSIsKGZ1bmN0aW9uKGUpe2lmKHZvaWQgMCE9PWUuZGF0YVsiZGF0YXdyYXBwZXItaGVpZ2h0Il0pe3ZhciB0PWRvY3VtZW50LnF1ZXJ5U2VsZWN0b3JBbGwoImlmcmFtZSIpO2Zvcih2YXIgYSBpbiBlLmRhdGFbImRhdGF3cmFwcGVyLWhlaWdodCJdKWZvcih2YXIgcj0wO3I8dC5sZW5ndGg7cisrKXtpZih0W3JdLmNvbnRlbnRXaW5kb3c9PT1lLnNvdXJjZSl0W3JdLnN0eWxlLmhlaWdodD1lLmRhdGFbImRhdGF3cmFwcGVyLWhlaWdodCJdW2FdKyJweCJ9fX0pKX0oKTs8L3NjcmlwdD4=

    SANTA FE, N.M. —

    Across the United States, more than 121,000 dams quietly shape daily life by supplying water, generating hydropower and providing flood control. But according to the National Performance of Dams Program, on average about 10 dams fail each year.

    Sometimes these failures have devastating, even deadly consequences. Many are aging, high-hazard structures in need of costly repairs, and the Hearst Television National Investigative Unit found money is scarce and owners are often left footing the bill.

    Behind a locked gate and up a winding road in Santa Fe, New Mexico, is the nearly 100-year-old McClure Dam. It supplies up to half of Santa Fe’s drinking water and is owned by the city.

    “This is a high hazard dam,” John Del Mar said as he looked out at the dam.

    Del Mar is an Engineering Section Supervisor with the City of Santa Fe Water Division.

    “The current rated condition from the state engineer’s office is poor for this dam,” Del Mar said. “That stemmed from some analysis that was done back in 2018.”

    Because this dam was built 100 years ago, there’s uncertainty in how it was built, so the dam was given the rating of “poor condition.” It’s also high hazard, meaning lives and property would be at risk if it failed.

    “We have to manage them as a public asset, part of our utility system, and once we know of problems, we’re obligated to fix them. So that’s what sets us on the course of this kind of a repair,” Del Mar said.

    Del Mar said the dam could cost $20-$30 million to repair.

    The city of Santa Fe is already in the midst of repairing the Nichols Dam downstream as well. That project costs roughly $20 million. To fund the projects, Santa Fe is dipping into funds they have, proposing raising utility rates and tapping into state funding—options many owners don’t have.

    Private dam owners struggle to get repair funds

    Just north of Santa Fe lies Las Vegas, New Mexico. There, Storrie Lake is known to locals as a place to camp, boat and fish. But for cattle rancher Michael Quintana, the lake is more important to him.

    “We’re in the business of capturing as much water in our lake as we can so we can use it for agriculture purposes,” Quintana said.

    Quintana is one of the owners of the Storrie Lake Dam, a crucial part of the state highway.

    “If we were to lose our dam, it would be a huge inconvenience for people to try to get to the Northern part of the state,” Quintana said.

    But he recently received unfortunate news from state dam officials.

    “They downrated our dam. Right now, it’s in poor condition,” Quintana said.

    Roughly 62% of U.S. dams are privately owned, leaving many owners like Quintana responsible for repairs.

    “There’s a lot of fear in having that ownership for the fact that we lack a lot of ability to fund the maintenance on a dam,” Quintana said. Estimated repairs are about $75 million—far beyond what the owners can afford. Looking for outside sources, the owners are reaching out for help securing funding through sources like local lawmakers.

    They have sought state help and applied to FEMA’s National Dam Safety Program as well.

    National funding gap remains large

    Using FEMA’s online money allocation data, the Hearst Television National Investigative Unit has discovered that since 2019, New Mexico has received about $3.7 million from FEMA’s National Dam Safety Program.

    “Money is always limited and there is often not enough to go around,” said Sushil Chaudhary, chief of the Dam Safety Program in New Mexico.

    Nationwide, FEMA has allocated roughly $304 million over six years across all 50 states. The Association of State Dam Safety Officials estimated in their 2025 report that it will take $165 billion to fix the nation’s non-federal dams.

    Chaudhary expressed another problem he feels his department and many around the country deal with: small staff sizes. In New Mexico, 10 staff members, seven of whom are inspectors, oversee about 300 non-federal dams. They have the third-best ratio of dams to staff of any state.

    Nationwide, roughly 530 state dam officials monitor more than 117,000 non-federally owned dams. Inspection responsibilities fall upon the federal government for the other 3% of dams that are federally owned.

    Working with the Hearst Television Data Team, the National Investigative Unit found that 25% of high hazard dams have not been inspected in the past five years or do not have record of a last inspection date. A high hazard dam would cause loss of life if it were to fail.

    Right now, there are roughly 2,600 high hazard dams in poor or unsatisfactory condition across the country. Dams in poor condition have a safety deficiency, and dams in unsatisfactory condition require immediate or emergency repair.

    But that could be an undercount. The most up-to-date records gathered by the Hearst Television National Investigative Unit and Hearst Television Data Team indicate that 67% of dams don’t have a condition rating. Of those, 4,000 are high hazard dams.

    Chaudhary said they get behind on inspections at times because they have other responsibilities.

    “We also need to perform the analysis that we need for regulatory purposes,” Chaudhary said. “We cannot rely on dam owners to do the analysis all the time. So we have to do our own.”

    Chaudhary circled back on the statistic that about 10 dams fail every year.

    “If you look at that data, the failure is not slowing down. So failure will keep happening. The dams are getting older. With that, various components of the dams deteriorate. While we cannot prevent failure of the dams, we can manage risk. We can save lives. We can do things that allow us to save lives and property,” Chaudhary said.

    Dams near you

    Curious if any of these dams with late inspections are near you? The Hearst Television data team has built a tool that allows you to see all of the dams in your area and learn whether any are in unsatisfactory or poor condition.

    Simply search your address or town name in the box below, and the map will populate with any dams near you, their latest condition rating and when they were last inspected.

    This story was shot and edited by Hearst National Investigative Photojournalist Reid Bolton.

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  • In training educators to use AI, we must not outsource the foundational work of teaching

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    This story was originally published by Chalkbeat. Sign up for their newsletters at ckbe.at/newsletters.

    I was conferencing with a group of students when I heard the excitement building across my third grade classroom. A boy at the back table had been working on his catapult project for over an hour through our science lesson, into recess, and now during personalized learning time. I watched him adjust the wooden arm for what felt like the 20th time, measure another launch distance, and scribble numbers on his increasingly messy data sheet.

    “The longer arm launches farther!” he announced to no one in particular, his voice carrying the matter-of-fact tone of someone who had just uncovered a truth about the universe. I felt that familiar teacher thrill, not because I had successfully delivered a physics lesson, but because I hadn’t taught him anything at all.

    Last year, all of my students chose a topic they wanted to explore and pursued a personal learning project about it. This particular student had discovered the relationship between lever arm length and projectile distance entirely through his own experiments, which involved mathematics, physics, history, and data visualization.

    Other students drifted over to try his longer-armed design, and soon, a cluster of 8-year-olds were debating trajectory angles and comparing medieval siege engines to ancient Chinese catapults.

    They were doing exactly what I dream of as an educator: learning because they wanted to know, not because they had to perform.

    Then, just recently, I read about the American Federation of Teachers’ new $23 million partnership with Microsoft, OpenAI, and Anthropic to train educators how to use AI “wisely, safely and ethically.” The training sessions would teach them how to generate lesson plans and “microwave” routine communications with artificial intelligence.

    My heart sank.

    As an elementary teacher who also conducts independent research on the intersection of AI and education, and writes the ‘Algorithmic Mind’ column about it for Psychology Today, I live in the uncomfortable space between what technology promises and what children actually need. Yes, I use AI, but only for administrative work like drafting parent newsletters, organizing student data, and filling out required curriculum planning documents. It saves me hours on repetitive tasks that have nothing to do with teaching.

    I’m all for showing educators how to use AI to cut down on rote work. But I fear the AFT’s $23 million initiative isn’t about administrative efficiency. According to their press release, they’re training teachers to use AI for “instructional planning” and as a “thought partner” for teaching decisions. One featured teacher describes using AI tools to help her communicate “in the right voice” when she’s burned out. Another says AI can assist with “late-night lesson planning.”

    That sounds more like outsourcing the foundational work of teaching.

    Watching my student discover physics principles through intrinsic curiosity reminded me why this matters so much. When we start relying on AI to plan our lessons and find our teaching voice, we’re replacing human judgment with algorithmic thinking at the very moment students need us most. We’re prioritizing the product of teaching over the process of learning.

    Most teachers I talk to share similar concerns about AI. They focus on cheating and plagiarism. They worry about students outsourcing their thinking and how to assess learning when they can’t tell if students actually understand anything. The uncomfortable truth is that students have always found ways to avoid genuine thinking when we value products over process. I used SparkNotes. Others used Google. Now, students use ChatGPT.

    The problem is not technology; it’s that we continue prioritizing finished products over messy learning processes. And as long as education rewards predetermined answers over curiosity, students will find shortcuts.

    That’s why teachers need professional development that moves in the opposite direction. They need PD that helps them facilitate genuine inquiry and human connection; foster classrooms where confusion is valued as a precursor to understanding; and develop in students an intrinsic motivation.

    When I think about that boy measuring launch distances with handmade tools, I realize he was demonstrating the distinctly human capacity to ask questions that only he wanted to address. He didn’t need me to structure his investigation or discovery. He needed the freedom to explore, materials to experiment with, and time to pursue his curiosity wherever it led.

    The learning happened not because I efficiently delivered content, but because I stepped back and trusted his natural drive to understand.

    Children don’t need teachers who can generate lesson plans faster or give AI-generated feedback, but educators who can inspire questions, model intellectual courage, and create communities where wonder thrives and real-world problems are solved.

    The future belongs to those who can combine computational tools with human wisdom, ethics, and creativity. But this requires us to maintain the cognitive independence to guide AI systems rather than becoming dependent on them.

    Every time I watch my students make unexpected connections, I’m reminded that the most important learning happens in the spaces between subjects, in the questions that emerge from genuine curiosity, in the collaborative thinking that builds knowledge through relationships. We can’t microwave that. And we shouldn’t try.

    Chalkbeat is a nonprofit news site covering educational change in public schools.

    For more news on AI in education, visit eSN’s Digital Learning hub.

    Latest posts by eSchool Media Contributors (see all)

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    Timothy Cook, Chalkbeat

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  • Educators get new guidance for age of AI

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    STATE HOUSE, BOSTON — Artificial intelligence in classrooms is no longer a distant prospect, and Massachusetts education officials on Monday released statewide guidance urging schools to use the technology thoughtfully, with an emphasis on equity, transparency, academic integrity and human oversight.

    “AI already surrounds young people. It is baked into the devices and apps they use, and is increasingly used in nearly every system they will encounter in their lives, from health care to banking,” the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education’s new AI Literacy Module for Educators says.


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    By Sam Drysdale | State House News Service

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  • Big Business and Wall Street Need to Stand Up for Honest Data

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    To some people, the Bureau of Labor Statistics may not sound like the most thrilling place to work. But many of its two thousand-plus employees, who produce the monthly jobs report, the Consumer Price Index, and other official economic releases, are proud data nerds. In a recent podcast, Erica Groshen, a Harvard-trained economist who served as the commissioner of the bureau from 2013 to 2017, relayed an inside joke at the agency. Question: How do you spot the extrovert at the B.L.S.? Answer: The extrovert is the one who looks at your shoes in the elevator.

    Introverts or not, B.L.S. employees play a vital role in the U.S. economy, putting together statistics that policymakers, businesses, and households use to make decisions. To draw up its employment figures, the B.L.S. conducts monthly surveys of sixty thousand households and a hundred and twenty-one thousand employers. Some of the respondents take a while to reply. As more data come in, the agency updates its previous figures.

    On August 1st, the bureau released its latest jobs report, which indicated that employment growth was considerably weaker in May and June compared with the agency’s initial estimates. But then Donald Trump claimed the numbers had been “rigged,” and abruptly fired the agency’s commissioner, Erika McEntarfer, a veteran labor economist who previously worked at the Census Bureau, the Department of the Treasury, and, under the Biden Administration, the White House Council of Economic Advisers. Last week, Trump nominated a replacement for McEntarfer: E. J. Antoni, an economist at the Heritage Foundation who regularly appears on conservative media, and whose credentials have been questioned by economists across the political spectrum. On X, Dave Hebert, of the free-market American Institute for Economic Research, wrote that he had been on programs with Antoni and had been impressed by two things: “His inability to understand basic economics and the speed with which he’s gone MAGA.”

    None of this should come as a total shock. In countries run by populists, there often comes a moment when empirical reality, as reflected in official economic statistics, clashes with the regime’s rhetoric, and something gives. Argentina provides a famous example. In 2007, as the inflation rate was rising sharply, the government of Néstor Kirchner—whose wife, Cristina, was running to succeed him in an upcoming election—fired a top official at the national statistics agency and appointed a loyalist, under whom the agency reported inflation figures that were widely discredited.

    It’s perhaps surprising that something like this didn’t happen during Trump’s first term. In his view, data is only as credible as it is convenient; he has long challenged statistics that aren’t supportive of his interests. During Trump’s 2016 campaign, when Barack Obama was still in the White House, Trump claimed that the real unemployment rate was considerably higher than the official one from the B.L.S. In March, 2017, when the bureau said that the economy had added a robust two hundred and thirty-five thousand jobs in the month prior, Trump’s press secretary quoted him as saying that the numbers were “phony in the past” but “very real now.”

    The fact that job growth remained pretty strong until the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, in early 2020, meant that Trump didn’t have much to complain about. In October, 2017, he nominated William Beach, an economist of well-established conservative credentials, to become the commissioner of the B.L.S. Beach has served as a fellow at the Heritage Foundation, a vice-president of research at the Mercatus Center at George Mason University, which was founded with funding from Charles Koch, and a staff economist for Republicans on the Senate Budget Committee. Given this background, some Democratic senators expressed fears he would be a partisan commissioner, but his four-year tenure at the B.L.S., which ended in 2023, passed without any major controversies, and he has now emerged as a critic of Trump’s decision to fire McEntarfer.

    On the day of McEntarfer’s dismissal, Beach described the move as “totally groundless” and said it “sets a dangerous precedent.” In a subsequent interview with CNN, he pointed out that there was no practical way for the commissioner to rig the jobs figures, which are produced by the B.L.S.’s career staff. He explained that the commissioner doesn’t see the numbers until a couple of days before they are released; by then, the data are already locked into the bureau’s computer system. When I spoke with Beach last week, he reiterated this fact and said that, in the short term, “the ability of the commissioner to influence the monthly figures, and their trend lines, is very near to zero.” The B.L.S. staffers who prepare them are so keen to guard against the possibility of interference by a political appointee, or even the perception that such a thing could be possible, that they once locked Beach out of a room where they were working, he recalled. The professionalism and dedication to producing the most accurate figures possible displayed by B.L.S. employees impressed him throughout his time at the agency, he added.

    This is reassuring. If a new commissioner were to try to massage the monthly figures, or to change how they are calculated to make them look more favorable to Trump, they would need the concerted coöperation of B.L.S. employees. A mass walkout seems more likely. “Theoretically, you could fire all the people who work there and change the culture,” Beach said. “But then you wouldn’t be able to produce the reports without their expertise.”

    If an Argentina-style outcome seems unlikely in the short term, there is still reason to be alarmed at Trump’s latest effort to bully government agencies that have long operated without political meddling. In the vast U.S. economy, where annual G.D.P. totals about thirty trillion dollars, nobody can keep tabs on everything—so people have to rely heavily on the official statistics. Economists refer to things that everybody can use, and which serve the public interest, as public goods: think clean air, national defense, lighthouses, and so on. “Federal statistics are a very classic case of a public good,” Groshen explained on the podcast Moody’s Talks. “It’s easy to take them for granted, but when they disappear you are in trouble.”

    Although the jobs report and the Consumer Price Index are unlikely to vanish, the danger is that they could be degraded over time, with public trust in the B.L.S. and its products eroding in tandem. Beach said these concerns also extend to the Bureau of Economic Analysis, which produces the G.D.P. figures, and to the Census Bureau. He noted that, before the firing of McEntarfer, the three statistical agencies had functioned independently of the White House, which inspired confidence. “They operated in a bubble. Now that bubble has burst,” Beach told me. “That’s what happened on August 1st. We can no longer say the agencies operate with an arms-length relationship to the White House. That’s gone.”

    Another factor adding to the uncertainty surrounding the B.L.S. is that, even before Trump’s intervention, the bureau had been experiencing funding pressures, staff shortages, and declining response rates to the surveys that underpin its work. Since 2010, its budget has fallen by a fifth after adjusting for inflation, according to the Center for American Progress. Earlier this year, the Trump Administration called for a budget cut of eight per cent and imposed both a hiring freeze and an early-retirement program for personnel, which prompted the bureau to reduce its survey work in several U.S. cities. The issue of declining survey-response rate is one that other organizations, including opinion pollsters, have faced in recent years. The B.L.S. has moved to address it by, for instance, making it easier for the businesses and government agencies that it contacts each month to respond online rather than by phone or fax, and by incorporating some private sources of data into its statistics—but these efforts have been hampered by funding constraints.

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    John Cassidy

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  • U.S. Bank’s efficiency ratio trends down, clocking in at 59.2% in Q2

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    U.S. Bank is looking to manage expenses without cutting corners on technology, and its steadily decreasing efficiency ratio is proof of the effort.  Efficiency ratio is a key indicator of financial institutions’ cost effectiveness in their operations.   “We are making steady progress on our medium-term profitability and efficiency targets,” Chief Financial Officer John Stern […]

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    Whitney McDonald

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