Day: January 21, 2023
Michael Novakhov retweeted:
Кремль поручил готовить Москву к атаке украинских дронов
Решение разместить ПВО в столице было принято из-за страха перед беспилотниками ВСУ, рассказали источники Bloomberg.
Michael Novakhov retweeted:
All three of us, one Republican and two Democrats, share the same goal – for Ukraine to drive the Russians out of Ukraine.
To achieve that goal, the Ukrainian military needs tanks.
Reddit; iStock; Rachel Mendelson/Insider
- A Reddit user took out $76,672 in loans to trade meme stocks and lost nearly all of it.
- Aaron says he felt addicted to trading after using the subreddit, styled as r/wallstreetbets.
- He’s now left with monthly repayments that eat up more than half his income.
A member of the Reddit group that fueled the Gamestop stock chaos took out $75,000 in loans and says he was addicted to trading meme stocks — even losing $6,000 lent to him by his girlfriend.
Aaron, a software engineer from Munich, took out tens of thousands of dollars in loans to trade stocks. He said was driven by chatter on the Wall Street Bets subreddit, styled as r/wallstreetbets and also known as WSB, which pushed him into investing sums he couldn’t afford for fear of missing out on big returns.
Aaron, 29, is using a pseudonym as he doesn’t want his family to find out about his losses.
“It was like an addiction because you have this community and they always post,” he told Insider.
“And then you see ‘Oh, there’s a next big thing,’ and then you are like, ‘I have to get money and I have to invest it or else I will miss out on this big chance.'”
Despite making $4,000 at the start, Aaron quickly saw his finances fall into a black hole.
He took out five loans for a total of 71,000 euros ($76,672) between December 2020 and September 2021 to help him invest in meme stocks — stocks with low value that gain hype through social media, driving up their value — like Bed Bath & Beyond. His biggest one-off loan was for 20,000 euros, or about $21,488.
Insider verified this information with documents shared by Aaron.
He would also bet thousands at a time on companies like Tesla and trade options, which allow traders to supercharge their investment via leverage, putting in more than they can afford.
WallStreetBets and meme stocks
Aaron is one of millions of members of Wall Street Bets. The subreddit shot to fame in 2021 when it made some retail traders into millionaires while bankrupting others, often through trading meme stocks in “short squeezes.”
Aaron was attracted by the forum’s jokey atmosphere and cartoon avatar.
WSB’s traders use the term “tendies” to refer to financial gains made from the stock market.
A screenshot of the r/wallstreetbets home page.
“I was always interested in the stock market,” Aaron told Insider. “So then I saw the cool avatar, like the cool profile picture. I was like, ‘Wow, that should be my thing.'”
“It was not too serious,” he added. “It was fun, a funny community and I was like, ‘Yeah, I want to be in this community.'”
Aaron said WSB posts were the catalyst to his trades. He would read a discussion around a particular stock, request a loan for thousands of dollars, and pile the money into leveraged bets. He feels he was pushed into increasingly risky trades — though he admitted he didn’t do much research himself before putting money in.
But last year was a dire one for the stock market. Bed Bath & Beyond, Aaron’s meme stock of choice, has lost 88% of its value since January 2021. It would be more if not for another short-squeeze driven rally last week.
‘I was ashamed’
When losses from loans piled up, he convinced his girlfriend to let him invest her money in August last year.
She initially suggested putting 100 euros in a brokerage account that Aaron had access to.
“I said, ‘What am I gonna do with 100 euros?’ You cannot get a lot of money off of it. I was like, ‘I will invest your money with no risk,'” he told Insider. He eventually convinced his girlfriend to put $10,000 into her account. He acknowledged he misled her on the level of risk in the investments.
Within two months of accessing his girlfriend’s money, he lost $6,000 of it betting on meme stocks. She found out by viewing her brokerage account before Aaron could break the news to her, he said.
“I was ashamed, and I still am ashamed,” he said. “I could have went to the casino and played a slot machine and it would be the same thing.”
The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA), a self-regulatory organization that monitors broker behavior, warns that all investing carries risk and suggests using strategies like asset allocation and diversification can reduce the risk of investing.
“The bottom line is that all investments carry some degree of risk,” FINRA said on its website. “By better understanding the nature of risk, and taking steps to manage those risks, you put yourself in a better position to meet your financial goals.”
Losing the money didn’t end Aaron’s relationship, and he said he even went on holiday to Portugal in December with his girlfriend — a trip she paid for. “She’s really the dream girl,” Aaron said, adding that she does get angry when the subject of his trading comes up.
But it’s causing other strains. Aaron said he can only go out for food or drinks when his girlfriend pays. He would like to propose to her but said he can’t afford an engagement ring.
He estimates that he pays $1,500 in debt repayments every month — a sizable chunk of his monthly income of around $2,800 after taxes, which Insider verified with documents. With an estimate of between $50,000 and $60,000 left to pay off, he says he’ll probably be paying off his debt through 2028.
“Then I have to pay rent, I have to pay for food. I’m only living to pay this stuff,” Aaron said.
In an email to Insider, a spokesperson for Reddit directed Insider to WSB’s site rules, which include warnings against market manipulation as well as short squeezes or “scams.”
The Reddit spokesperson said: “Users should engage with communities at their own discretion, follow Reddit’s sitewide policies and the community’s rules.”
Aaron told Insider he had barely gambled before getting into the stock market, which he sees as gambling.
“If there was no Wall Street Bets, it wouldn’t ever happen,” he said. He’s not currently trading, but despite his losses, he said he’ll probably get back to trading at some point.
“I will check out the subreddit, and I will probably gamble my money again,” he said. He doesn’t know how much, “but I will definitely do it because it’s fun.”
Have you got a story about using the WSB subreddit alongside investing? Email rhogg@insider.com
Read the original article on Business Insider
Kirillm/ Getty Images
- Apple has launched new audiobooks narrated by AI-generated voices.
- Some critics argue they’re not what customers want.
- I listened to a mix of human narrators and AI voices in a blind test to guess which ones were real.
Apple has launched a new line of audiobooks narrated by AI-generated voices that now read dozens of its titles.
The tech giant says the digital voices are “natural sounding” and “based on a human narrator,” but some critics argue they’re not what customers want and are no replacement for the passionate performances human readers can give.
I decided to challenge myself to spot the difference in a blind test.
My editor recorded one-minute snippets of five audiobooks on her phone and sent them to me without more information, so I wouldn’t know which were read by humans and which by AI voices.
They were all from the free preview extracts on Apple’s Books app.
I tried to guess which were which and wrote my reviews before finding out.
We added the recordings to the article so you can also pass judgment. You can find out which were AI and which were human at the bottom of this article.
Extract one: ‘Shelter From the Storm’ by Kristen Ethridge
I wasn’t immediately sure about this one.
The voice sounded vaguely familiar to some more neutral voice actors I had listened to before. The tone also shifted a few times, and I was sure she said the word “Becca” differently the second time.
However, on further listening, I concluded the voice was a bit too perfect. The words sounded robotic and the sentences ended quite abruptly. The intonation of each sentence was also a bit repetitive.
I concluded it was most likely AI.
Extract two: ‘Food for Life’ by Tim Spector
I was sure this one was read by a human.
The voice sounded a bit rougher and more natural than the one in the previous clip. The tone was quite rhythmic and didn’t follow a noticeable pattern. The questions also sounded genuine throughout the clip and there were some prominent pauses of varying lengths.
Extract three: ‘Defending a Serial Killer’ by Jim Potts
This voice struggled with the word “abuse” early on and gave the game away.
The narration gets going quicker than the others and was a bit fast for my liking. There weren’t as many pauses as in the clip before, and most of the emotion and rhythm was also missing.
Overall the voice sounded stiff and robotic. Definitely AI-generated.
Extract four: ‘The Distant Shore’ by Linda Hale Bucklin
I thought this one sounded stiff and lacked emotion. However, the pauses and inflection were much better than in the previous clip.
I thought this was AI too, but my colleague who also heard it was insistent it was a human voice.
Extract five: ‘Dear Justyce’ by Nic Stone
This extract had much more of a flow than the last two, and the emphasis fell on different and unusual words. The speed of the narration changed and the pauses were varied and natural.
The voice also did impressions of different people that spoke with different accents and speeds.
I was sure this one was a human narrator.
Results
Extract one was read by Apple’s AI voice “Madison.”
Extract two was read by the human narrator Leighton Pugh.
Extract three was read by AI voice “Jackson.”
Extract four was read by AI voice “Helena.”
Extract five was read by the human narrator Dion Graham.
My conclusion
I got them all correct, though it surprised me that I was unsure about extract one initially.
Overall, it was relatively easy to tell which ones were narrated by an AI voice, but I didn’t find the synthesized voices off-putting.
Although the human voices were nicer to listen to, I’d also be happy opting for an AI audiobook if there wasn’t another option.
Read the original article on Business Insider
Tom Williams-Pool/Getty Images
- A new documentary about misconduct allegations against Justice Brett Kavanaugh premiered on Friday.
- The film was a last-minute addition to Sundance and was kept under wraps until Thursday.
- The filmmakers said they started getting new tips about Kavanaugh right after the film was announced.
After a surprise announcement that a documentary focusing on sexual misconduct allegations against Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh would premiere at the Sundance Film Festival, more tips started to roll in, according to the filmmakers.
Programmers of the indie film fest, held annually in Park City, Utah, revealed Thursday that the film “Justice” from director Doug Liman would screen on Friday evening. The film centers on accusations initially made against Kavanaugh in 2018, when he was nominated to the Supreme Court by President Donald Trump.
The film revealed additional details about accusations made against Kavanaugh. It covers incidents alleged by accusers including Christine Blasey Ford, who testified before Congress in 2018, and Deborah Ramirez, a former classmate of Kavanaugh’s at Yale.
The film also includes new details of allegations about a separate incident at Yale that involved a different woman who is not named and declined to be part of the film. Those allegations were provided to the FBI by another Yale alumnus, Max Stier, during its investigation of Kavanaugh — there were more than 4,500 tips provided to the FBI, according to the film, with the most credible tips being passed on to the White House.
The filmmakers acquired a recording of Stier sharing his recollection of the incident, which provides one of the documentary’s most gripping segments. “That material like that was just shielded and sent to the White House and never pursued, for me that was the most shocking” discovery of the film, Liman said during a Q&A after the screening.
Liman, who is best known for directing movies like “Swingers” and “The Bourne Identity,” answered questions about the film alongside Amy Herdy, his coproducer who led the film’s investigative team.
“I thought the film was done but it looks like… we’re not going home,” Liman said. “The team is staying on it.”
Asked what he originally hoped would result from the film — further investigations or other impacts — Liman said what happens after the film is “so beyond my control,” adding, “We live in a climate where, no matter what we put in this movie, it is likely that the people that support the status quo are going to keep supporting it, and I sort of came to the answer for myself: Maybe the truth matters. It matters now, it’ll matter in the future, and maybe that’s it.”
For Herdy, that’s not enough, she said. “I do hope that this triggers outrage, I do hope that this triggers action, I do hope that this triggers additional investigation with real subpoena powers.”
The filmmakers also said they kept the film a secret because they thought word getting out could jeopardize their work. Liman cited “the machinery that was put into place to prevent anyone from who would dare to speak up.” If word had leaked out, he added, “There would’ve been some kind of injunction. This film wouldn’t have been showing here.”
Herdy said that code names were even used for the subjects and that everyone who worked on the film or was interviewed by the filmmakers signed a non-disclosure agreement.
The filmmakers interviewed about 20 people, including friends of Blasey Ford from her current circle and from her teen years, friends of Ramirez, journalists, and psychologists who described the features and impact of traumatic memories. Blasey Ford speaks with Liman briefly in the opening of the film and there are extensive, emotional interviews with Ramirez.
Liman’s interest in making his first documentary arose, he said, in 2018 during the Congressional hearings ahead of Kavanaugh’s confirmation. He previously told the Hollywood Reporter that “the Supreme Court, which is sacred for all of us, holds special meaning for me.” His father, Arthur L. Liman, was a prominent lawyer and activist, and his brother, Lewis, once clerked for the Supreme Court and is now a federal judge in the Southern District of New York.
The film is seeking a distributor but, as Liman and Herdy noted Saturday, it may still be expanded as they continue to investigate the new tips they’ve received.
Read the original article on Business Insider
Officials tried to play down the rift. But Germany is still insisting it will not be the country to take the first step alone, for fear of incurring Moscow’s wrath.
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A Leopard 2 tank at a military training area in Munster, northern Germany.Credit…Patrik Stollarz/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
BERLIN — Western defense officials meeting in Germany said on Friday that they had failed to reach an agreement for sending battle tanks to Ukraine, in a setback to Kyiv’s hopes to quickly receive weapons that President Volodymyr Zelensky has called crucial to the next phase of the war.
The officials had hoped to reach agreement on sending advanced, German-made Leopard 2 tanks, which are stocked by many European countries. But Germany has refused to send its own Leopards to Ukraine or to give its approval to other countries to export them, not wanting to be the first to take the step and asking that the United States send its best tank, the M1 Abrams, as well.
The failure to strike a deal was quickly criticized by some Ukrainians as well as the Polish and Latvian governments, who have argued that tanks are critical to claw back territory seized by Russia early in its invasion and to defend against an expected Russian offensive in the spring.
“Arming Ukraine in order to repel the Russian aggression is not some kind of decision-making exercise. Ukrainian blood is shed for real,” Poland’s foreign minister, Zbigniew Rau, said on Twitter. “This is the price of hesitation over Leopard deliveries. We need action, now.”
Still, American and German officials sought to play down the disagreements, emphasizing that Germany might yet approve sending Leopards to Ukraine. The U.S. defense secretary, Lloyd J. Austin III, told reporters at Ramstein Air Base that Germany was “a reliable ally, and they’ve been that way for a very, very long time.”
His German counterpart, Boris Pistorius, said his country would begin an inventory of its vehicles, in case of a future deal, and would begin training Ukrainians on how to use the tanks.
“This is not to prejudice the outcome,” he said. “It’s to prepare for a day that will possibly come, at which point we would be able to act immediately and deliver the support within a very short period of time.”
The U.S. defense secretary, Lloyd J. Austin III, center, with the German defense minister, Boris Pistorius, left, and the Ukrainian defense minister, Oleksii Reznikov, at Ramstein Air Base on Friday.Credit…Andre Pain/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
From the beginning of the war, the Biden administration has carefully calibrated weapons deliveries to Ukraine, holding back more powerful weapons to avoid provoking a Russian escalation.
But after a string of battlefield successes, Ukraine has convinced the White House and its Western supporters to drop a series of taboos and provide more powerful offensive weapons, including infantry fighting vehicles and, this week, American Stryker armored vehicles. Yet, the provision of main battle tanks remained a step that many countries were reluctant to take.
That began to change in recent weeks, as Britain announced a shipment of tanks to Ukraine and pressure rose on Germany from Eastern European and Baltic countries to at least allow them to send their Leopard 2 tanks, which number about 2,000 in 14 countries across Europe. But even that step has been ruled out, for now, creating widespread frustrations, particularly as time is running short to ship the tanks to Ukraine and train its soldiers in their use.
“Many countries, including Latvia, are stepping up military assistance to Ukraine, but it is not enough,” said Latvia’s foreign minister, Edgars Rinkevics. “Leopard tanks must be provided to Ukraine now!”
The pressure on Germany reached new heights when Britain announced it would send 14 of its Challenger 2 tanks to Ukraine.Credit…Pavel Golovkin/Associated Press
German officials insist Berlin is not standing in the way, and have hinted that perhaps other countries, too, have concerns about making that move without a broader coalition.
“There is no unified consensus,” Mr. Pistorius said. “The impression that has occasionally been created that there is a united coalition and that Germany is standing in the way is wrong.”
Chancellor Olaf Scholz of Germany has insisted in recent months that he will not let Germany “go it alone” on weapons deliveries to Ukraine, and Germany has requested that the U.S. contribute some of its M1 Abrams tanks as part of the package. But the Pentagon has resisted, pointing to the logistical hurdles posed by a fuel-guzzling vehicle that requires continuous maintenance.
The German government has tried to soften the impression that it has demanded the United States provide Abrams tanks. At a news conference on Friday, the chancellor’s spokesman, Steffen Hebestreit, said that Germany was following three principles: “The first is to back Ukraine as much as possible. The second is to prevent NATO and Germany from becoming warring parties. The third thing is that we are not going it alone nationally, but are coordinating very closely with our international partners — above all the U.S.A.”
Germany’s reluctance to send tanks is likely to stem from fears about the risks of escalation and potential retaliation by Russia, said Thorsten Benner, the director of the Global Public Policy Institute in Berlin.
“It would be a significant step for this main battle tank, the Leopard system, to go into Ukraine, and they want maximum reassurance from the U.S.,” he said. “There must be something in their heads about Germany being targeted in retaliation for sending this kind of signature German main battle tank — what that is, Scholz hasn’t spelled it out.”
American M1 Abrams tanks during a NATO military exercise in Adazi, Latvia.Credit…Ints Kalnins/Reuters
For all the efforts to play down the divisions among the Western allies, the failure to reach a deal showed there were still major rifts among Ukraine’s supporters, especially between Eastern European nations demanding speedy action and the countries that have called for caution.
“Every day is worth its weight in gold, Ukraine needs to be supported, so we continue this diplomatic pressure together,” Poland’s deputy foreign minister, Pawel Jablonski, said after the meeting. “We will use different methods of direct and indirect persuasion, and we hope that this attitude will change — as it was with the Patriots.”
But aides to Germany’s chancellor argue that Mr. Scholz’s position is very close to that of President Biden, who has only gradually provided Ukraine with advanced weapons such as HIMARS rocket systems and Patriot missile air defenses.
Mr. Austin and Mr. Pistorius denied there were demands connecting U.S. and German tanks, though they provided no explanation for what was stalling a deal.
“There is no linkage between providing M1s and providing Leopards,” said Mr. Austin, adding that officials at the meeting were “pushing hard” to meet Ukraine’s needs for tanks and armored vehicles. The defense chiefs said that the United States and Germany would both step up training for Ukrainian troops, including on Leopard 2 tanks.
Some German lawmakers said privately this week that even countries calling to send Leopards want to present a united front, and are reluctant to request re-export licenses until all European partners — including Germany — agree to send tanks.
President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine attended the meeting at Ramstein via video conference. He has said that receiving the battle tanks is crucial to the next phase of the war.Credit…Thomas Lohnes/Getty Images
The German defense minister’s remarks made clear that other countries were also hesitating to deliver tanks, said Marie-Agnes Strack-Zimmerman, the head of the Defense Committee in the German Parliament and a member of the governing coalition, though she added it was unclear which nations or what their concerns are.
“Ultimately, however, this should not be the issue,” she said. “The countries who want to do it should do it, and Germany should take a lead.”
Mr. Pistorius said there was no timeline for a deal on tanks, suggesting it could take days or weeks. Mr. Austin, on the other hand, said the clock was ticking.
“We have a window of opportunity here, between now and the spring, whenever they commence their counteroffensive,” he said, referring to the expected Russian campaign. “That’s not a lot of time.”
The lack of agreement was certain to disappoint many in Ukraine, including President Zelensky, who had appealed directly to the officials before the talks began. “Hundreds of thank-yous are not hundreds of tanks,” he said in a video address. “All of us can use thousands of words in discussions, but I cannot use words instead of guns.”
Steven Erlanger contributed reporting from Brussels, Lara Jakes from Rome, Christopher F. Schuetze from Berlin and Anatol Magdziarz from Warsaw.
