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About the Speaker:
Kim Walsh Phillips is a self-made MBA free millionaire and the founder of Powerful Professionals, one of the fastest growing companies in America. In less than one year, she went from 32 clients to over 11,000 and has generated over a billion dollars online.
Named “a must to read by those in business” she is the bestselling author of multiple books including “The Shift: How to Grow Your Business with Multiply Your Wealth Without Sacrificing You” and “The No B.S. Guide To Direct Response Social Media Marketing,” co-authored by Dan Kennedy.
She continued to make plans after 2017, yet, one by one, they’ve sputtered, conked out. There’s a Reddit thread created by SMOLBEANSNARK dedicated to tracking and annotating her Instagram posts about Scammer. She’s blamed holdups variously on the return of her mother’s cancer, excessive partying, solidarity with Black Lives Matter. Shipping dates have come and gone many times. On November 8, 2020, she vowed that Scammer would be “AT LEAST 400 pages, more likely 450.” (Flash forward: One month after my Sarasota visit, I receive a text. “Scammer update: It’s taking shape before my eyes into more a book of 65 prose poems than a ‘memoir.’ ” Second flash forward: As of the printing of this issue, Scammer has not yet shipped. Neither has I Am Caroline Calloway, nor Cambridge Captions.)
Calloway is still talking, and as I watch her mouth move, the realization dawns: Natalie Beach, c’est moi.
Beach isn’t who I want to be. That, though, is who Calloway has turned me into. First of all, she makes disinterested journalism impossible. You can’t stay detached. She simply won’t allow it.
For example, a few weeks ago, over Zoom, I was listening to her read out loud a paragraph she’d written: “For months, I let a pool boy who is also a plumber fuck me without a condom. I haven’t used a condom in years.”
Unable to help myself, I interrupt. “You should stop having sex without a condom.”
She looks up at me, looks down, then gives a small shake of her head. “Oh,” she says. “No.”
I sigh.
For another example, over a different Zoom, I notice that she keeps pausing to suck on a lemon wedge. I ask her what she’s doing. She’s just taken mushrooms, she explains, and the lemon enhances the mushroom’s potency. I express irritation because I’d blocked out two hours for this interview, and now she was going to be too high to answer questions. No, no, she assures me, she won’t be too high to answer questions. Five minutes later she whispers, “I’m too high to answer questions.” I sigh.
She can be sweet and funny and charming, yet she has no respect for boundaries, personal or professional. In the middle of a conversation, she’ll fasten her eyes on mine, say breathily, “I’ve always thought I’d meet a journalist that I’d be friends with. I really hope it’s you.” Last March, she randomly sent me a video of herself getting ready to go out for the night. She was wearing a minidress and kept flipping it up, flashing her Red Scare thong, and doing this obscene darting thing with her tongue. My sons, then nine and seven, were constantly stealing my phone to watch.
If I continue talking to her, researching her, writing this piece on her, I’ll end up scrubbing the period blood out of her comforter, same as Beach. (Well, Beach didn’t scrub the blood-stained comforter, but she did stash it.)
Really, though, Natalie Beach, c’est moi because Calloway makes me her collaborator. She needs one more than anybody I’ve ever met. There’s an air of purgatory about her. She’s been locked in a moment for six years, the moment she broke the contract with Flatiron. She’s doomed to try to write the book and fail to write the book over and over. She gives the book different titles—And We Were Like,Scammer,I Am Caroline Calloway—but it’s all, I’m convinced, the same book because it’s all the same story, the only story she has to tell: hers. And yet, for some mysterious reason, she can’t tell it. Not by herself, anyway.
Mark Zuckerberg, chief executive officer of Meta Platforms Inc., left, arrives at federal court in San Jose, California, US, on Tuesday, Dec. 20, 2022.
David Paul Morris | Bloomberg | Getty Images
Toward the end of 2022, engineers on Meta’s team combating misinformation were ready to debut a key fact-checking tool that had taken half a year to build. The company needed all the reputational help it could get after a string of crises had badly damaged the credibility of Facebook and Instagram and given regulators additional ammunition to bear down on the platforms.
The new product would let third-party fact-checkers like The Associated Press and Reuters, as well as credible experts, add comments at the top of questionable articles on Facebook as a way to verify their trustworthiness.
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But CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s commitment to make 2023 the “year of efficiency” spelled the end of the ambitious effort, according to three people familiar with the matter who asked not to be named due to confidentiality agreements.
Over multiple rounds of layoffs, Meta announced plans to eliminate roughly 21,000 jobs, a mass downsizing that had an outsized effect on the company’s trust and safety work. The fact-checking tool, which had initial buy-in from executives and was still in a testing phase early this year, was completely dissolved, the sources said.
A Meta spokesperson did not respond to questions related to job cuts in specific areas and said in an emailed statement that “we remain focused on advancing our industry-leading integrity efforts and continue to invest in teams and technologies to protect our community.”
Across the tech industry, as companies tighten their belts and impose hefty layoffs to address macroeconomic pressures and slowing revenue growth, wide swaths of people tasked with protecting the internet’s most-populous playgrounds are being shown the exits. The cuts come at a time of increased cyberbullying, which has been linked to higher rates of adolescent self-harm, and as the spread of misinformation and violent content collides with the exploding use of artificial intelligence.
In their most recent earnings calls, tech executives highlighted their commitment to “do more with less,” boosting productivity with fewer resources. Meta, Alphabet, Amazon and Microsoft have all cut thousands of jobs after staffing up rapidly before and during the Covid pandemic. Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella recently said his company would suspend salary increases for full-time employees.
The slashing of teams tasked with trust and safety and AI ethics is a sign of how far companies are willing to go to meet Wall Street demands for efficiency, even with the 2024 U.S. election season — and the online chaos that’s expected to ensue — just months away from kickoff. AI ethics and trust and safety are different departments within tech companies but are aligned on goals related to limiting real-life harm that can stem from use of their companies’ products and services.
“Abuse actors are usually ahead of the game; it’s cat and mouse,” said Arjun Narayan, who previously served as a trust and safety lead at Google and TikTok parent ByteDance, and is now head of trust and safety at news aggregator app Smart News. “You’re always playing catch-up.”
For now, tech companies seem to view both trust and safety and AI ethics as cost centers.
Twitter effectively disbanded its ethical AI team in November and laid off all but one of its members, along with 15% of its trust and safety department, according to reports. In February, Google cut about one-third of a unit that aims to protect society from misinformation, radicalization, toxicity and censorship. Meta reportedly ended the contracts of about 200 content moderators in early January. It also laid off at least 16 members of Instagram’s well-being group and more than 100 positions related to trust, integrity and responsibility, according to documents filed with the U.S. Department of Labor.
Andy Jassy, chief executive officer of Amazon.Com Inc., during the GeekWire Summit in Seattle, Washington, U.S., on Tuesday, Oct. 5, 2021.
David Ryder | Bloomberg | Getty Images
In March, Amazon downsized its responsible AI team and Microsoft laid off its entire ethics and society team – the second of two layoff rounds that reportedly took the team from 30 members to zero. Amazon didn’t respond to a request for comment, and Microsoft pointed to a blog post regarding its job cuts.
At Amazon’s game streaming unit Twitch, staffers learned of their fate in March from an ill-timed internal post from Amazon CEO Andy Jassy.
Jassy’s announcement that 9,000 jobs would be cut companywide included 400 employees at Twitch. Of those, about 50 were part of the team responsible for monitoring abusive, illegal or harmful behavior, according to people familiar with the matter who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the details were private.
The trust and safety team, or T&S as it’s known internally, was losing about 15% of its staff just as content moderation was seemingly more important than ever.
In an email to employees, Twitch CEO Dan Clancy didn’t call out the T&S department specifically, but he confirmed the broader cuts among his staffers, who had just learned about the layoffs from Jassy’s post on a message board.
“I’m disappointed to share the news this way before we’re able to communicate directly to those who will be impacted,” Clancy wrote in the email, which was viewed by CNBC.
A current member of Twitch’s T&S team said the remaining employees in the unit are feeling “whiplash” and worry about a potential second round of layoffs. The person said the cuts caused a big hit to institutional knowledge, adding that there was a significant reduction in Twitch’s law enforcement response team, which deals with physical threats, violence, terrorism groups and self-harm.
A Twitch spokesperson did not provide a comment for this story, instead directing CNBC to a blog post from March announcing the layoffs. The post didn’t include any mention of trust and safety or content moderation.
Narayan of Smart News said that with a lack of investment in safety at the major platforms, companies lose their ability to scale in a way that keeps pace with malicious activity. As more problematic content spreads, there’s an “erosion of trust,” he said.
“In the long run, it’s really hard to win back consumer trust,” Narayan added.
While layoffs at Meta and Amazon followed demands from investors and a dramatic slump in ad revenue and share prices, Twitter’s cuts resulted from a change in ownership.
Almost immediately after Elon Musk closed his $44 billion purchase of Twitter in October, he began eliminating thousands of jobs. That included all but one member of the company’s 17-person AI ethics team, according to Rumman Chowdhury, who served as director of Twitter’s machine learning ethics, transparency and accountability team. The last remaining person ended up quitting.
The team members learned of their status when their laptops were turned off remotely, Chowdhury said. Hours later, they received email notifications.
“I had just recently gotten head count to build out my AI red team, so these would be the people who would adversarially hack our models from an ethical perspective and try to do that work,” Chowdhury told CNBC. She added, “It really just felt like the rug was pulled as my team was getting into our stride.”
Part of that stride involved working on “algorithmic amplification monitoring,” Chowdhury said, or tracking elections and political parties to see if “content was being amplified in a way that it shouldn’t.”
Chowdhury referenced an initiative in July 2021, when Twitter’s AI ethics team led what was billed as the industry’s first-ever algorithmic bias bounty competition. The company invited outsiders to audit the platform for bias, and made the results public.
Chowdhury said she worries that now Musk “is actively seeking to undo all the work we have done.”
“There is no internal accountability,” she said. “We served two of the product teams to make sure that what’s happening behind the scenes was serving the people on the platform equitably.”
Twitter did not provide a comment for this story.
Advertisers are pulling back in places where they see increased reputational risk.
According to Sensor Tower, six of the top 10 categories of U.S. advertisers on Twitter spent much less in the first quarter of this year compared with a year earlier, with that group collectively slashing its spending by 53%. The site has recently come under fire for allowing the spread of violent images and videos.
The rapid rise in popularity of chatbots is only complicating matters. The types of AI models created by OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, and others make it easier to populate fake accounts with content. Researchers from the Allen Institute for AI, Princeton University and Georgia Tech ran tests in ChatGPT’s application programming interface (API), and found up to a sixfold increase in toxicity, depending on which type of functional identity, such as a customer service agent or virtual assistant, a company assigned to the chatbot.
Regulators are paying close attention to AI’s growing influence and the simultaneous downsizing of groups dedicated to AI ethics and trust and safety. Michael Atleson, an attorney at the Federal Trade Commission’s division of advertising practices, called out the paradox in a blog post earlier this month.
“Given these many concerns about the use of new AI tools, it’s perhaps not the best time for firms building or deploying them to remove or fire personnel devoted to ethics and responsibility for AI and engineering,” Atleson wrote. “If the FTC comes calling and you want to convince us that you adequately assessed risks and mitigated harms, these reductions might not be a good look.”
For years, as the tech industry was enjoying an extended bull market and the top internet platforms were flush with cash, Meta was viewed by many experts as a leader in prioritizing ethics and safety.
The company spent years hiring trust and safety workers, including many with academic backgrounds in the social sciences, to help avoid a repeat of the 2016 presidential election cycle, when disinformation campaigns, often operated by foreign actors, ran rampant on Facebook. The embarrassment culminated in the 2018 Cambridge Analytica scandal, which exposed how a third party was illicitly using personal data from Facebook.
But following a brutal 2022 for Meta’s ad business — and its stock price — Zuckerberg went into cutting mode, winning plaudits along the way from investors who had complained of the company’s bloat.
Beyond the fact-checking project, the layoffs hit researchers, engineers, user design experts and others who worked on issues pertaining to societal concerns. The company’s dedicated team focused on combating misinformation suffered numerous losses, four former Meta employees said.
Prior to Meta’s first round of layoffs in November, the company had already taken steps to consolidate members of its integrity team into a single unit. In September, Meta merged its central integrity team, which handles social matters, with its business integrity group tasked with addressing ads and business-related issues like spam and fake accounts, ex-employees said.
In the ensuing months, as broader cuts swept across the company, former trust and safety employees described working under the fear of looming layoffs and for managers who sometimes failed to see how their work affected Meta’s bottom line.
For example, things like improving spam filters that required fewer resources could get clearance over long-term safety projects that would entail policy changes, such as initiatives involving misinformation. Employees felt incentivized to take on more manageable tasks because they could show their results in their six-month performance reviews, ex-staffers said.
Ravi Iyer, a former Meta project manager who left the company before the layoffs, said that the cuts across content moderation are less bothersome than the fact that many of the people he knows who lost their jobs were performing critical roles on design and policy changes.
“I don’t think we should reflexively think that having fewer trust and safety workers means platforms will necessarily be worse,” said Iyer, who’s now the managing director of the Psychology of Technology Institute at University of Southern California’s Neely Center. “However, many of the people I’ve seen laid off are amongst the most thoughtful in rethinking the fundamental designs of these platforms, and if platforms are not going to invest in reconsidering design choices that have been proven to be harmful — then yes, we should all be worried.”
A Meta spokesperson previously downplayed the significance of the job cuts in the misinformation unit, tweeting that the “team has been integrated into the broader content integrity team, which is substantially larger and focused on integrity work across the company.”
Still, sources familiar with the matter said that following the layoffs, the company has fewer people working on misinformation issues.
For those who’ve gained expertise in AI ethics, trust and safety and related content moderation, the employment picture looks grim.
Newly unemployed workers in those fields from across the social media landscape told CNBC that there aren’t many job openings in their area of specialization as companies continue to trim costs. One former Meta employee said that after interviewing for trust and safety roles at Microsoft and Google, those positions were suddenly axed.
An ex-Meta staffer said the company’s retreat from trust and safety is likely to filter down to smaller peers and startups that appear to be “following Meta in terms of their layoff strategy.”
Chowdhury, Twitter’s former AI ethics lead, said these types of jobs are a natural place for cuts because “they’re not seen as driving profit in product.”
“My perspective is that it’s completely the wrong framing,” she said. “But it’s hard to demonstrate value when your value is that you’re not being sued or someone is not being harmed. We don’t have a shiny widget or a fancy model at the end of what we do; what we have is a community that’s safe and protected. That is a long-term financial benefit, but in the quarter over quarter, it’s really hard to measure what that means.”
At Twitch, the T&S team included people who knew where to look to spot dangerous activity, according to a former employee in the group. That’s particularly important in gaming, which is “its own unique beast,” the person said.
Now, there are fewer people checking in on the “dark, scary places” where offenders hide and abusive activity gets groomed, the ex-employee added.
More importantly, nobody knows how bad it can get.
U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy is calling for stronger guidelines for social media use among children and teens, pointing to a growing body of research that the platforms may pose what he described as a “profound risk” to young people’s mental health.
In a report issued on Tuesday, Murthy urged technology companies and lawmakers to take “immediate action” by formulating policies to protect young people from “addictive apps and extreme and inappropriate content” on platforms such as Instagram, TikTok and Snapchat. Current guidelines on social media use have been shaped by media platforms and are inadequate, he added.
“Our children and adolescents don’t have the luxury of waiting years until we know the full extent of social media’s impact,” Murthy said in the 25-page advisory. “Their childhoods and development are happening now.”
Tech-free zone
The Surgeon General advised parents to create “tech-free zones” for their children and to model healthy relationships with their devices as more definitive research about social media usage comes out. It also urged young people to refrain from sharing deeply personal information online and to reach out for help from trusted adults if they are harassed or bullied.
Social media also can have a positive impact, such as helping teens “develop social connections” and creating “spaces for self-expression,” according to the Surgeon General.
While the research on the mental health impacts of social media usage isn’t conclusive, many parents have expressed concern about the impact of tech on teens. For example, nearly three-quarters of U.S. parents of children under age 18 think social media imaging tools and filters are detrimental to young peoples’ body image, according to a national survey conducted by the The Harris Poll.
Their intuition may not be wrong. In one study, teens and young adults who halved their social media consumption reported improvements in how they felt about their weight and general appearances, research published by the American Psychological Association found.
Create a family media plan: A family media plan can promote open family discussion and rules about media use and include topics such as balancing screen/online time, content boundaries, and not disclosing personal information
Create tech-free zones: Restrict the use of electronics at least one hour before bedtime and through the night. Keep meal times and other in-person gatherings tech-free.
Model responsible behavior: Parents can set a good example of what responsible and healthy social media use looks like by limiting their own use, being mindful of social media habits (including when and how parents share information or content about their child), and modeling positive behavior on your social media accounts.
Empower kids: Have conversations with children about who they are connecting with, their privacy settings, their online experiences, and how they are spending their time online.
Concerns about young people’s use of social media and their overall wellness come at a time when mental health issues are on the rise in young women. More than half of teen girls — an all-time high — reported feeling “persistently sad or hopeless,” a 2021 survey from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention showed.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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Según informes de Bloomberg,Instagram está “probando en secreto” una aplicación basada en texto para competir con Twitter, y el debut podría ocurrir tan pronto como el próximo mes.
Según los informes, la nueva plataforma ha estado disponible durante meses para ciertas celebridades y creadores de contenido, y es una aplicación separada de Instagram, aunque tendría una opción para vincular cuentas.
Bloomberg reportó que Lia Haberman, profesora adjunta de UCLA en marketing social e influyente, tuiteó una captura de pantalla de la nueva plataforma.
“Basado en un ejemplo (algo borroso) que obtuve, la nueva aplicación de Meta se parece mucho a Twitter. Entonces, ¿podría esto reemplazar todas las capturas de pantalla de Twitter que hemos estado viendo en el Feed últimamente? Tal vez. Es imposible predecir cómo responderá el público, pero esta podría ser una alternativa”, escribió.
Elon Musk compró Twitter por $44,000 millones de dólares en octubre de 2022, muchos usuarios se han frustrado con los cambios, desde la restauración de cuentas controvertidas hasta la adopción de Twitter Blue.
Los datos muestran que incluso los tuiteros más dedicados están perdiendo interés. Según una encuesta del Pew Research Center, la actividad de los usuarios “más activos” de Twitter disminuyó en un 25% desde la adquisición de la plataforma por parte de Musk.
Instagram is “secretly testing” a text-based app to compete with Twitter, and the debut may happen as soon as next month, Bloomberg reported.
The new platform has reportedly already been available to select celebrities and creators for months and is a separate app from Instagram, but there will be an option to link accounts.
Lia Haberman, an adjunct professor at UCLA in social and influencer marketing, tweeted a screenshot of the new platform, per Bloomberg.
“It’s impossible to predict how audiences will respond but this could be an alternative,” she wrote.
Based on a (somewhat blurry) example I got, Meta’s new app looks a lot like Twitter.
So, could this take over all the Twitter screenshots we’ve been seeing on the Feed lately? Maybe.
It’s impossible to predict how audiences will respond but this could be an alternative. pic.twitter.com/xgQa1kUjCl
Since Elon Musk purchasedTwitter for $44 billion in October 2022, many users have grown frustrated with the changes — from reinstating controversial accounts to the adoption of Twitter Blue.
Data shows that even the most dedicated tweeters are losing interest. According to a survey from Pew Research Center, activity for Twitter’s “most active” users declined by 25% since Musk’s acquisition of the platform.
Following our favourite celebrities on Instagram is strangely satisfying, from the family photos to the outfit inspirations. While some stars share relatable tales after a long day at work, others post sneak peeks of their vacations, Instagram also gives celebs an opportunity to showcase other interests—like fashion, photography and comedy.
From sweet Mother’s day wishes to debut Cannes looks, here is your weekly dose of the best Instagram posts of your favourite celebrities in case you missed them. So, let go of all your blues and enjoy the action from the week gone by…
Embattled Twitter may soon have a serious rival: Facebook’s Instagram is planning to release a text-based app as a competitor.
Instagram, a property of Meta Platforms Inc. META, -0.49%,
has been testing the service with creators, celebrities and influencers for months, according to people familiar with Meta’s strategy.
“We’re exploring a standalone decentralized social network for sharing text updates. We believe there’s an opportunity for a separate space where creators and public figures can share timely updates about their interests,” a Meta spokesperson told MarketWatch.
The app could debut as early as June, according to Lia Haberman, an adjunct professor at the University of California, Los Angeles, who teaches social and influencer marketing. She published a screenshot of an early description of the app, which may eventually be compatible with rival Twitter apps like Mastodon.
Twitter has hemorrhaged users since Tesla Inc. TSLA, +1.84%
Chief Executive Elon Musk began his chaotic leadership of the company late last year, prompting an exodus by disgruntled customers to alternative services like Mastodon and Bluesky.
Jasmine Enberg, an analyst at Insider Intelligence, said the text-based service has been in the works for months alternately code-named P92 or Barcelona.
“The big picture here is that there is clearly an appetite for Twitter-like services,” Enberg said in an interview. “With Twitter’s problems and so many alternatives, Meta’s new service looks like a mashup of Instagram and Twitter. Meta sees an opportunity to tap into this market, and it has a history of copying other popular apps [like Snap].”
Meta’s stock was flat in Friday’s regular trading session.
Florence Pugh has recently been the subject of much media buzz thanks to the age gap between her and her partner, Zach Braff.
Pugh, who is 24-years-old, has been dating Scrubs star Zach Braff, who just turned 45, for nearly four years. As Pugh’s star has risen thanks to hit films like Little Women and Midsommar, media and fans alike have begun to question Braff and Pugh’s age gap. Finally, tired of all the abuse, Pugh posted the following video to her Instagram account on April 9th. Watch the video here.
In the video, she firmly warns fans against commenting about her relationship on her posts. “I will not allow that behaviour on my page. I’m not about that. It makes me upset and sad that during this time when we really all need to be together and supporting and loving one another… a few of you decided to bully for no reason,” the star said candidly. She goes on to say that she has been working and earning money since the age of 17 and paying taxes from the age of 18 and can make her own decisions when it comes to relationships.
“I’ll underline this fact,’ Pugh said. “I do not need you to tell me who I should and should not love and I would never in my life who they can and cannot love. It is not your place and really it has nothing to do with you. I don’t want this on my page, it’s embarrassing, it’s sad and I don’t know when cyberbullying became trendy or a points system. I don’t know why it’s a cool thing.”
More recently, in an interview for Elle UK, the actress spoke out about the online abuse again, saying “I know that part of being in the spotlight is that people might invade your privacy and have opinions on it, but it’s bizarre that normal folk are allowed to display such hate and opinions on a part of my life that I’m not putting out there,” she said. “It’s a strange side of fame that you’re allowed to be torn apart by thousands of people even though you didn’t put that piece of you out there.” She went on to say, “I don’t want to talk about it because it’s not something I want to highlight, but my point to all this is that isn’t it odd that a stranger can totally tear apart someone’s relationship and it’s allowed?”
While Pugh’s rebuff of cyberbullies was inspiring, the question still remains: Why do people have such an issue with Pugh and Braff’s relationship? Older male celebrities dating younger women is a tale as old as time. Think of Leonardo DiCaprio, known for dating women as much 20 years his junior, or Dennis Quaid (65) and girlfriend Laura Savoie (26). These couples don’t receive the kind of abuse Braff and Pugh have weathered, so what sets them apart? Perhaps the answer lies with Pugh’s fame. She is unquestionably the bigger star in the couple, so maybe fans’ image of who a beautiful young star should date isn’t compatible with Braff, who is cute in a non-threatening way and in no way the traditional Hollywood heart throb.
But then why don’t people have issues with Leonardo Dicaprio dating little-known models and actresses? Well, sexism, of course. We expect a big star like Leo to date young beautiful women, and we have no issue with the age gap because we don’t feel like we know the women in the relationship; they’re just unknown, beautiful faces. Not only that, but we expect famous women to date men who are even more famous than them, in order to increase their own star power. Meanwhile, famous men can exist in their own orbit of stardom and date who they choose.
We expect young female starlets like Pugh to date hunky heartthrobs while she’s in her prime, before she ages out of the narrow window in which women are valued in Hollywood. It makes us uncomfortable that Pugh is dating an older man who is not a massive star and not sexy in a traditional way, because it doesn’t fit with the narrative we’ve come to expect from the people we choose to bestow fame upon.
Our response to Pugh’s relationship also reflects the way society views a woman’s personal autonomy. When Ashton Kutcher was dating much older Demi Moore, no one questioned his decision-making. But people seem to think that Pugh needs to be warned against making a mistake in dating Braff, that she isn’t capable of making her own relationship choices. Why? You guessed it: sexism. Culturally, we don’t trust women to make decisions in the same way we trust men. Not only that, but in the case of Leo and his semi-anonymous young lovers, in our eyes, the women in the relationship don’t possess the kind of personal autonomy Pugh does; we don’t know them, they’re just pieces of eye candy. Pugh, on the other hand, has become a human being in our eyes, something that isn’t automatic when we perceive women the way it is for men. But that doesn’t mean she’s free from the unfair expectations we place on all women, famous or not.
On some level, we feel that Florence Pugh owes us a sexy, tumultuous relationship with some hot young Hollywood star. We feel that since we have decided to make her famous, to watch her movies and invest in her personal life, it is her duty to entertain us. Having a stable relationship with a 45-year-old nice-guy who doesn’t have a six pack and is known for a funny sitcom—not hit action movies—isn’t entertaining. That isn’t what we want to read about in the tabloids.
So, summarily, while you may think that it’s anti-feminist that Pugh is dating a much older man, and you may think that commenting on her relationship is in some way proving your devotion to her, you couldn’t be more wrong. If you have a problem with Pugh dating Braff, you’re essentially saying that she can’t be trusted to make her own choices, and you’re making her relationship about you and your own prejudice, not her and her happiness.
Just let Florence Pugh and Zach Braff be happy, okay?
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
If you have an Instagram account, you’ve probably always dreamed of having a blue checkmark next to your name. There’s just something about it that lets people know that you’re important.
I recently got verified on Instagram, and to be honest, the chase was more exciting than the catch. But over the past four weeks, I’ve noticed some amazing benefits from being verified on Instagram that I was not expecting.
Here are the top five benefits I noticed and gained from being verified on Instagram.
Benefit #1: It makes it easier to hold up/increase prices
I always encourage business prospects to follow me on social media within my sales process. I specifically like sending people to LinkedIn and Instagram. I love sending prospects to my social media accounts because my personal branding does all of the heavy lifting for me. I set up those accounts so it will leave people eager to attend future meetings and buy.
Prospects being more eager to purchase from me made it easier to increase my prices and charge exactly what I’m worth.
I could still do this without being verified, but the blue badge beside my name made me feel more confident asking for what I’m worth.
Benefit #2: High-profile accounts follow you back
I follow a couple of well-known public figures on social media. This includes athletes, entrepreneurs, journalists and everything else in between. I specifically like reading people’s posts and watching their stories. When a verified account likes a post or watches someone’s stories, it stands out significantly.
This is enough to cause the high-profile account I’m following to check out my page and eventually follow me back. I noticed this benefit by accident after four high-profile verified accounts followed me back out of the blue within the span of a week.
I already had enough credibility on my Instagram account without having the blue checkmark next to my name. I built this credibility through the accumulated press, showcasing my accomplishments and customer case studies. However, having the blue check next to my name was the icing on the cake and helped put everything together. The blue check has a way of causing others to perceive you as someone with both credibility and authority.
Benefit #4: It’s easier to close on high-profile individuals
I recently attended an event where a high-profile, motivational speaker was talking on stage. Halfway through his talk, I got the idea to approach him afterward and offered to help him write his book. At the end of the event, I managed to cross paths with him and speak with him for a bit. At the right moment, I presented my offer of helping him write his book. He was slightly interested, but his interest took off once I showed him my Instagram account and the book I was writing.
Once he saw my page, his excitement went through the roof, and I got a meeting booked through his assistant the next day.
Not only have I noticed this within business, but I have also noticed it within dating — the amount of flakes and no-shows I receive has gone down. I’m unsure if this directly correlates to getting verified on Instagram, but I have noticed that people have started to value me and my time more seriously.
It is a great way to decrease your flakes and no-shows dramatically. Being verified is just the icing on the cake that indicates that you’re in demand.
In reality, being verified on Instagram means nothing. When I first got the blue checkmark, I honestly felt so empty. But when you combine the blue badge with your purpose, it does something to your self-esteem. It can make you feel like you’re already a rockstar or you already have a million or billion-dollar business.
Now, you don’t want this to go to your head to where you’re living delusionally, but I noticed it helps with pushing harder to reach your dreams and reassuring you that you can do hard things.
If you think getting verified on Instagram will be worth it, I’d highly recommend attempting it. You’d be surprised at the opportunities it brings and the doors it opens up.
I love TikTok as much as the next person, but for anything fashion related, Instagram will forever remain my primary source. There, if you follow the right people, you’re never more than a scroll away from discovering the next viral brand, trend, or, my personal favorite, item. And unlike on TikTok, where anyone can claim to be an expert on anything, everyone on your Instagram feed’s already been vetted (by you) and therefore tenfold more trustworthy.
As someone who’s been consistently obsessed with the platform since it first came out, I’ve spent years curating a following list that I know can provide me with guaranteed winners in the fashion department, whether its a high-end buy like Bottega Veneta’s internet-famous drop earrings or the $98 Gap jeans that nobody can stop talking about. And since gate-keeping’s never really been my thing, I’m sharing my latest viral-Instagram finds so you don’t have to spend hours scrolling like I do. Shop 19 of them below.
Washington — Seventeen-year-old Julienne Pagulayan started using social media when she was in the fifth grade.
“It was getting on and it was, like, seeing what other people are doing,” Pagulayan told CBS News.
However, under a bipartisan bill introduced this week, children under the age of 13 would be barred from using social media, while those between the ages of 13 and 17 would need parental consent to create an account. Social media companies would also be prohibited from recommending content using algorithms to users under 18.
The Protecting Kids on Social Media Act is co-sponsored by Republican Sen. Tom Cotton of Arkansas and Democratic Sen. Brian Schatz of Hawaii, both of whom are parents.
“My kids are young enough that it’s not a concern yet, but I do worry very much about it,” Cotton told CBS News.
Both Cotton and Schatz believe such a bill could be successfully enforced.
“There are lots of mechanisms for a more robust age verification system,” Cotton said. “The age verification that they’re doing now is essentially asking a 12-year-old to say, ‘Are you 18?’ And they click, ‘I’m 18,’ and now they’re online.”
Schatz argues that the bill would give the Federal Trade Commission and individual states attorney generals the authority to enforce the age limit.
“We’ve made a decision, as a society, that you should have to wait to a certain age to say, buy alcohol or buy tobacco,” Schatz said. “We’re not so naive that we don’t think teenagers have never smoked a cigarette or never drank a beer. But that doesn’t mean you should just throw up your hands, that there’s no solution at all.”
The two senators point to several studies that suggest a potential link between social media and mental health, including a survey released in February by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention which found that 57% of high school girls, and 29% of high school boys, feel persistently sad. The survey also found that 22% of all high schoolers reporting they had seriously considered suicide.
Pagulayan believes kids her age should be able to make their own decision about social media usage.
“It’s so relevant now,” Pagulayan said. “And if a parent doesn’t see that, I feel like them not permitting their child kind of becomes a block in that opportunity for them.”
Some social media platforms told CBS News they are reviewing the legislation, and note they already have safeguards in place.
Antigone Davis, global head of safety for Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, told CBS News in a statement that the company has “developed more than 30 tools to support teens and families.”
When teens create an Instagram account, according to Davis, it is automatically set to private, and teens receive “notifications encouraging them to take regular breaks.”
“We don’t allow content that promotes suicide, self-harm or eating disorders, and of the content we remove or take action on, we identify over 99% of it before it’s reported to us,” Davis said. We’ll continue to work closely with experts, policymakers and parents on these important issues.”
A spokesperson for Snap, the parent company of Snapchat, told CBS news in a statement that it has “built safety and privacy into the architecture of our platform and have extra protections for 13-17-year-olds.”
“We are already working with industry peers, regulators, and third-party technology providers on possible solutions and look forward to continuing these productive conversations with the cosponsors of this legislation,” the spokesperson said.
TikTok pointed to its privacy and parental controls, including restrictions to features such as direct messaging for younger teens, and restricting accounts for those under 18 from sending or receiving virtual gifts or livestreams.
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
In today’s digital age, having a professional Instagram profile is essential for businesses to establish a strong online presence. With over 1 billion active users, Instagram offers businesses a powerful platform to engage with their target audience, increase brand awareness and drive sales.
Instagram is one of the most popular platforms for businesses to showcase their products and services. However, with so much competition on the platform, it’s important to make sure your profile stands out.
As a social media agency owner who tracks the progress of over 30 professional profiles of business owners, I have noticed current trends and tips that can help businesses improve their Instagram presence. Here are my insights on the latest trends and provide tips on how to make your Instagram profile the best it can be, so you can not only improve your image but also increase your revenue.
The blue verification mark on Instagram is a sign of authenticity and credibility. It helps users identify legitimate accounts and distinguishes them from imitators or fan accounts. Instagram has now made it available through a subscription to get the blue mark. For $15 per month, you can enjoy the benefits of being a verified account.
Not only is it prestigious, but having a blue checkmark on your account will also help you to secure it. Recently, many scammers have created duplicates of people’s accounts and sent messages to all the people they follow, asking for money or sending links with dangerous content. A blue checkmark will make you feel safe knowing that everyone knows it’s actually you.
2. Optimize your bio
Your bio is your chance to make a great first impression on your audience. It should be informative, engaging, and reflect your brand’s personality. Don’t forget to add keywords to your profile name, location and link to your business. This will make it easier for users to find and connect with you.
If you’re using Instagram to sell products or services, make sure your profile is easy to understand. Your audience should be able to identify who you are and what you offer at first glance. Use clear and concise language in your bio, and don’t hesitate to highlight your unique selling proposition.
3. Organize your highlights
Highlights are a great way to showcase your best content and provide quick access to information about your brand. Make sure the content in your highlights is relevant and up-to-date.
If you’re using Instagram for business purposes, it’s worth considering adding a list of your services, testimonials, before-and-after content, media coverage, education and frequently asked questions (FAQs) to your highlights. This can help potential customers or clients quickly understand what you offer, see the results you can achieve, and find answers to common questions.
Reels are a popular feature on Instagram that allows users to create short videos that can be shared with their followers. You can use Reels to showcase your products, share industry tips or give your audience a behind-the-scenes look at your business. Don’t be afraid to get creative with your content and experiment with different styles.
If you consistently post Reels related to your business with catchy titles and well-made content, don’t be surprised if they bring you both new followers and new customers. Reels are a source of free traffic, and if the algorithm understands what your account is about, it can organically attract people who are interested in your type of services to your page.
5. Talk to people
The tone of voice you use on Instagram is important, so be sure to be nice to people and they’ll pay you back. If you sell directly from your page, use chatbots for autofunnels — this could increase your ROI significantly.
And don’t be afraid being funny – jokes and memes are a great way to add a bit of humor to your Instagram profile and engage with your followers. Many industry leaders, such as Elon Musk, use memes to connect with their audience.
6. Use relevant hashtags
Research and use relevant hashtags to increase the visibility of your posts. This will help you reach a wider audience and attract new followers to your Instagram account. Be sure to use only relevant and specific hashtags — generic ones like #love or #fun are not likely to attract your target audience.
Here’s a secret tip: when you’re about to make a post on Instagram, go to the advanced settings and add relevant hashtags to the ‘Alt text’ section. This can help to promote your content to a relevant audience.
7. Quality over quantity
Always prioritize quality over quantity when posting on Instagram. Be sure to never post random content. Something that you might think is funny after a couple of glasses of champagne may not seem like a good idea afterward. Your followers may consider you to be less professional than you would like to appear. Unless you want to have a rockstar image, in which case, go for it — trashy is great then.
Talk to your followers from the perspective of the meaning and value that your service or product brings to the world. Inspire and show what is possible to achieve with your input. Some people may follow you for years before they decide to buy, so be persistent and your social media will pay off!
In conclusion, creating a professional-looking Instagram profile can greatly benefit your business in terms of brand awareness and sales. As a social media agency owner, I have seen firsthand the impact that a well-curated Instagram profile can have on a business’s success.
By following these 10 tips, you can elevate your Instagram profile and make it stand out among the millions of other accounts on the platform. From adding a blue mark to your profile to using relevant hashtags, every little detail can make a big difference in how your profile is perceived by potential customers.
Remember to always put quality over quantity when it comes to your content and engage with your audience in a friendly and approachable tone. By warming up your audience and sharing the value of your product or service, you can build a loyal following that will eventually convert into paying customers.
While the world of social media is constantly evolving, these tips will help you stay ahead of the curve and create a professional-looking Instagram profile that will help you achieve your business goals. With dedication and persistence, you can use Instagram to grow your brand, connect with your audience and ultimately drive sales.
Inspiration is in abundance on Instagram, especially when it comes to fashion, but if you don’t know where to look, you could easily never find it, at least not the sort that fits your ideal aesthetic. With over a billion users, there’s simply too much to sort through and not enough time in the day. I, however, have spent the last decade or so dedicating an unhealthy amount of time to the app, slowly but surely curating a following list that fills my feed on a daily basis with the type of outfit inspiration the most elite magazines make you pay for—and then some.
Of course, I follow over 3,000 accounts—including editors, brands, designers, stylists, photographers, and on and on—and I, in no way, expect you to do the same. That’s why I went through every last one of them and handpicked the 10 that most epitomize the word chic. Copy their looks, sure, but if you ask me, the real way to embody their unique senses of style and sartorial confidence is to let it sink in by studying their feeds and then figure out how you can do the same in a way that feels personal to you. Sometimes, all you need is a little inspiration to get there, and these 10 fashion people supply that in spades.
Editor’s Note: Evan Greer is an activist, writer and musician based in Boston. She’s the director of the digital rights group Fight for the Future, and a regular commentator on issues related to technology policy, LGBTQ communities and human rights. Follow her on Twitter @evan_greer or Mastodon @evangreer@mastodon.online. Read more opinion on CNN.
CNN
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The US government is racing ahead with proposals aimed at banning TikTok, the viral video platform used by more than 150 million Americans. Officials say it’s a matter of national security, gesturing urgently toward TikTok’s parent company ByteDance and its ties to China.
While some might be motivated by thinly-veiled xenophobia, lawmakers also rightly point to concerns about TikTok’s surveillance and capitalist business model, which vacuums up as much personal information about users as possible and then uses it to serve content that keeps us clicking, scrolling, and generating ad revenue. TikTok “spies” on us for profit. That’s not in question.
The problem is that – while they might not be owned by a Chinese company – Instagram, YouTube, Facebook, Snapchat and Twitter all do it too, as privacy advocates have been warning for more than a decade. Banning TikTok won’t make us safer from China’s surveillance operations. Nor will it protect children, or anyone else, from getting addicted to Big Tech’s manipulative products. It’s just an ineffective solution that sounds good on TV.
While many governments engage in internet censorship and surveillance, China certainly has one of the most sophisticated and draconian systems. A core characteristic of China’s censorship regime is the “Great Firewall,” which blocks foreign social media apps, news sites and even educational resources like Wikipedia, under the guise of protecting national security.
As they hyperventilate about TikTok, US politicians are so eager to appear “tough on China” that they’re suggesting we build our very own Great Firewall here at home. There is a small but growing number of countries in the world so authoritarian that they block popular apps and websites entirely. It’s regrettable that so many US lawmakers want to add us to that list.
Several of the proposals wending their way through Congress would grant the federal government unprecedented new powers to control what technology we can use and how we can express ourselves – authority that goes far beyond TikTok. The bipartisan RESTRICT Act (S. 686), for example, would enable the Commerce Department to engage in extraordinary acts of policing, criminalizing a wide range of activities with companies from “hostile” countries and potentially even banning entire apps simply by declaring them a threat to national security.
The law is vague enough that some experts have raised concerns that it could threaten individual internet users with lengthy prison sentences for taking steps to “evade” a ban, like side-loading an app (i.e., bypassing approved app distribution channels such as the Apple store) or using a virtual private network (VPN).
But banning TikTok isn’t just foolish and dangerous, it’s also unconstitutional. The strong free speech protections enshrined in the First Amendment bar the government from extreme actions like criminalizing an app that millions of people use to express their opinions and ideas. The US government can’t ban you from posting or watching TikTok videos any more than they can stop you from reading a foreign newspaper like the Times of India or writing an opinion piece for The Guardian.
The Washington Post, the New York Times and CNN all have their own official TikTok accounts, as do numerous candidates for office, elected officials, academics, journalists, religious leaders and political figures. Any proposal that results in TikTok’s effective ban in the US would almost certainly fall apart under a legal challenge, as the American Civil Liberties Union and other experts have asserted. Even conservative Republican Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky agrees that banning the app would violate Americans’ right to free speech.
A ban on TikTok wouldn’t even be effective: The Chinese government could purchase much of the same information from data brokers, which are largely unregulated in the US.
The rush to ban TikTok – or force its sale to a US company – is a convenient distraction from what our elected officials should be doing to protect us from government manipulation and commercial surveillance: passing some basic data privacy legislation. It’s a matter of common knowledge that Instagram, YouTube, Venmo, Snapchat and most of the other apps on your phone engage in similar data harvesting business practices to TikTok. Some are even worse.
Many companies sell the data they harvest to third parties, who sell it to fourth and fifth and sixth parties. While companies collect this data for the purpose of extracting profit and getting users hooked on their products, governments have long taken an interest.
The only way to stop governments from weaponizing data that private companies like TikTok collect and store about us is to stop those companies from collecting and storing so much information in the first place. You can’t do that with censorship. You do that by passing a strong national data privacy law that bans companies from collecting more data about us than they need to provide us with the service we’ve requested.
Instead of helping Big Tech get bigger by banning a major competitor, Congress should also pass antitrust legislation to crack down on anti-competitive practices. That would give concerned parents and internet users who want to ditch TikTok and Instagram better options to choose from, and reduce the power of the largest platforms, making them harder for governments to exploit and manipulate. It’s much harder for bad actors, whether they’re corporate trolls or government agents, to control information across a constellation of smaller platforms, each with their own rules and algorithms, than it is for them to poison the well when there are a tiny handful of companies controlling access to information.
A separate concern that lawmakers and US officials have raised is the idea that the Chinese government could pressure TikTok to amplify propaganda, or otherwise change its algorithm to advance the government’s interests. It’s an argument that’s not entirely without merit.
We know the Russian government was effective in manipulating information on Facebook during the 2016 elections. The US has historically engaged in similar conduct overseas. Consider, for example, the US history in influencing the outcomes of elections in Latin America or disinformation campaigns by US allies after the Arab Spring. State-backed disinformation campaigns are happening at a mass scale and on every major platform. We fight that by demanding more transparency and accountability, not more censorship.
It’s a national embarrassment that we have no basic data privacy law in the United States. And it’s a travesty that we continue to allow unregulated tech monopolies to trample our rights. Every day that our elected officials spend wringing their hands and spreading moral panic about what the kids are doing on TikTok is another day we’re left vulnerable and unprotected.
With any luck, Washington’s TikTok hysteria will fade quickly. Let’s hope the next hot new trend in the nation’s capital is passing actual laws that protect people, starting with strong privacy and antitrust legislation.
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
In recent years, Instagram has become one of the most popular social media platforms, with over 1 billion active users. For many individuals and businesses, being verified on Instagram has become a coveted status symbol, as it signifies credibility and authenticity. In the past, verification was only available to high-profile accounts, but now anyone can pay to be verified on Instagram.
Meta (formerly known as Facebook) recently introduced Meta Verified, a new paid subscription that offers a streamlined and expedited process for users looking to gain the blue checkmark on their Instagram and Facebook accounts. The move has left many users wondering whether the blue checkmark, once seen as a symbol of notability, has lost its standing due to the availability of paid verification.
While verification is a step in the right direction, it is not enough to build a strong presence on the platform. Optimizing your account by developing a clear brand identity, utilizing Instagram’s features and creating a high-quality content plan is crucial.
In this article, we will dive deeper into these strategies and provide actionable tips to help you optimize your Instagram account after paying for verification.
Meta Verified was first introduced to the public on February 19, 2023 but has just become available to users in the U.S. as of March 17, 2023. According to Meta’s latest announcement, this feature is currently only available to users with personal accounts. Therefore, businesses and other creators whose account names and profile pictures do not match that on their government-issued ID are not eligible for paid verification at this time.
Aside from the blue check mark, Meta Verified offers protection against impersonators, additional account support and increased reach and visibility. Traditional verification on Instagram requires a significant presence and influence in your industry or field. One can demonstrate this through various factors, including:
Media presence:Being featured in multiple news sources or media outlets for your work or achievements.
Brand presence: You have a strong and established brand presence online, with a large following and engagement on your social media platforms.
Industry recognition: You have received awards, accolades or credit for your work or contributions to your industry.
Public figure: You are a well-known public figure, such as a celebrity, politician or athlete.
Business presence: You have a successful business with a robust online presence and influence in your industry.
Develop a clear brand identity
Developing a clear brand identity is crucial for optimizing your Instagram account. Your brand identity is your unique personality and what sets you apart from your competitors. Therefore, all aspects of your profile should reflect your brand identity, from your profile picture to your content, clearly communicating who you are, what you do and what sets you apart from the competition.
When it comes to your content, consistency is key. Consider the aesthetic you want to convey, and use consistent colors, fonts and filters in your posts. This will help your brand stand out and make it easy for your followers to recognize your content.
In addition to the visual aspects, it is also essential to have consistency in the type of content you post. Your content should align with your brand identity and communicate what sets you apart. Also, include any relevant keywords so people can easily find your account when searching for specific topics.
Simply being verified is not enough to build a strong presence across your social media platforms. In today’s digital landscape, creating high-quality content is crucial for businesses to attract, engage and retain customers. However, with so much online content and access to verification, standing out from the crowd can be challenging. That’s where a well-crafted content strategy comes in.
The first step in creating a content strategy is identifying your target audience. Who are they, what are their interests, what are their pain points, and what kind of content do they consume? Then, conduct market research to identify your ideal customer and create buyer personas to help you understand their needs and preferences.
Next, you need to establish your goals and determine what you want to achieve with your content. For example, do you want to increase brand awareness, generate leads, drive traffic to your website or establish thought leadership in your industry? Setting clear goals will help you create content that aligns with your business objectives and measures the success of your content strategy.
Identify gaps in your existing content based on your target audience and goals. Look for topics others aren’t covering or new angles to approach a subject. Use keyword research to identify topics your target audience is searching for, and create content that addresses their needs.
Utilize Instagram’s features
According to Meta’s latest blog post, its verified users will have increased visibility and reach with prominence in some platform areas — like search, comments and recommendations. With this enhanced discoverability, it’s important to utilize all of Instagram’s features to get the best possible results for your account.
Instagram offers a range of features that can help you connect with your audience and showcase your brand. These include Instagram Stories, Reels and live videos. Each of these features offers a unique way to engage with your audience and showcase your brand in different ways.
Instagram Stories are a great way to share behind-the-scenes content, highlight special promotions or events or simply connect with your followers more personally. Reels, on the other hand, are short-form videos perfect for showcasing your brand’s personality and creativity. And live video is a great way to engage with your audience in real-time and build a sense of community around your brand.
Experiment with different formats to see what works best for your audience. Pay attention to which types of content get the most engagement, and adjust your strategy accordingly.
In conclusion, being verified on Instagram has become a symbol of credibility and authenticity, with many individuals and businesses seeking this coveted status. While the availability of paid verification through Meta Verified may have raised concerns about the value of the blue check mark, it is essential to remember that verification is a starting point for building a solid presence on the platform.
To optimize your account, you must develop a clear brand identity, create a high-quality content plan and utilize Instagram’s features. By following these strategies and staying true to your brand identity, you can build a strong presence on Instagram, achieve your business goals and stand out amongst the flooded crowd of blue check marks.
Here’s the thing: I could google how the poet laureate is chosen, but instead, I’ll give Instagram a quick scroll and acknowledge what in my heart of hearts I know to be true: Britney Spears is the voice we as a society need right now.
In a recent grid post on her personal page, the—singer? Guru? Icon? Life coach?—captioned a video of herself dancing to Paula Cole’s “Feelin’ Love” with an original Beat poem that can best be summarized as “lotion good; paparazzi bad; mean-ass gym girlie made me cry extra bad; let’s dance, bitches.” Taken on its face as a prose update, sure, it feels like perhaps it could use a few edits for clarity, but the flow can’t be denied.
This isn’t Instagram. This is poetry.
“Woke up this morning and my skin is so dry!!!” her caption begins. It reads like a text I might send to one of my friends while I brush my teeth, the ones in the tier where they receive updates throughout the day on my snacks and what streaming TV I have on in the background, and, hey, does my earlobe look weird, or is this just what earlobes look like? The same friends who might get a two-minute voice note describing the weird dream I had last night, and I know they’ll listen to the whole thing.
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But after mentioning visiting vague “exotic locations,” coating her body in lotion, and commenting on the weather, Spears’s monologue takes a turn: “I want to get out more.” Given her history—a 13-year conservatorship, childhood fame, public scrutiny for decades—this simple phrase, considered, becomes just a little devastating. Spears’s post goes on to detail the saga of getting pap-snapped recently when her car broke down on a drive with husband Sam Asghari. “I looked like an idiot!!!” she writes, lamenting her “facial expression, the way I was leaning over, the pooch in my stomach!!!” It was a “helpless situation,” and she is not pleased with the resulting photos. “It didn’t look like my body,” she writes of that and another recent pap incident. She then drifts back to a personal trainer she met with two months ago. “The first thing she did to me was literally…and I’m not even lying…pinch the skin on my stomach and legs and [tell] me I need to get my younger body back…Why the hell did she do that??? It made me cry.”
Spears, 41, has lived a lot of life, both in mundane and extraordinary ways, and ways that are mundanely extraordinary. (She’s given birth to two children, for example, something that a lot of people do, but is not acknowledged for the extremely metal act that it is until someone goes through it themself: mundanely extraordinary.) World tours, courtroom dramas, marriages and divorces, multiplatinum albums, Vegas residencies, extremely memorable moments with Teletubbies—Spears has a lot to unpack, and her no-comments-taken approach (literally; she has the comments turned off on her grid posts) is reminiscent of some favorite contemporary poets like Kate Baer and Janet McNally, who confront aging and motherhood and the ordinary, extraordinary, everyday snapshots of living in a female-shaped body. Take, for example, McNally’s “The Wicked One Goes to the Makeup Counter”:
Beauty stays, then goes; / it fades, we say, something about years and sun, the nights we slept / in makeup and left mascara like ashes on the pillowcase. We burned / through every one of our dreams. I wasn’t always a stepmother, you know. / There were whole years when I was a girl.
A few weeks ago, I found myself hanging out with fellow fashion editors after work. For most, any after-hours activity with colleagues may be conducted over cocktails, but for us, it was spent doing what we know best—shopping. We spent the evening shuffling through the sparkling marble floors of Nordstrom’s flagship store in New York City. While I hate to be biased because there are so many good Nordstrom locations worldwide, I have to say there’s something particularly magical about the Manhattan store. Maybe it’s because it has seven floors and six restaurants, or maybe it’s because there’s an entire floor dedicated to what I love most: designer shoes.
Arriving on this floor in Nordstrom for a shoe fanatic is akin to arriving in paradise. Everywhere you look, there’s something divine—just so many pairs of Fendi, Gucci, Prada, and Christian Louboutin shoes. While I only managed to stare at the shoes that evening, I did convince myself that I had to return and actually try on a few. So I decided to reach out to Nordstrom’s team to ask them if I could document trying on some of the buzziest designer shoes of the moment in-store, and luckily for me, they obliged. Ahead, you’ll find my full review of eight designer shoes, plus a roundup of the best affordable options at Nordstrom. But first, a little bit about why I chose the pairs I did…
Gen Z may have claimed the center part as their own, but it’s always been a timeless way to style hair. If you’re indecisive about which way you’d like to part your braided hair, ask your braider to leave the part optional. That way, you can go from a middle to a side part depending on your vibe for the day.
