Incoming “get off my grass” rant. 

This week I found out that my local pickleball courts, that are a part of our local public park, have been monopolized by the “private association” that runs our city’s pickleball club. Frankly I wouldn’t care if I wasn’t actually trying to find somewhere to try and play the sport. When they FINALLY opened this park after three years of delay (thank you Covid) I was excited to get in on the craze that every cool person in sports and entertainment seems to be investing in.

The latest cool people investing in a pickleball team being Drake and Michael B. Jordan, who invested in the Brooklyn Aces, Kevin Durant and Rich Kleiman’s team. Pickleball has become the sport that you hear so much talk about these days but honestly, I don’t know a single soul who actually plays. This sign below might have something to do with it…

When am I supposed to play?

But alas, I’m stuck with these times above on when I can play - essentially 9PM-11PM as I work during the day like most normal adults. I guess I could just join the association…and pay to play at a park my taxes already paid for.

“Get off my lawn” rant over.

This week's issue is a 3 minute read:

💰️ Suing the beast

🎵 If you can’t beat em, join em…with AI

🎴 Chief what now??

Mr. Beast v. Virtual Dining Concepts

What can’t MrBeast do? From living on a floating raft in his latest video to paying for people’s cataract surgeries so they can see again, to filling his friend’s backyard with Orbeez, Jimmy Donaldson is an idea machine that keeps pumping out viral money making hit after viral money making hit. Or so we thought. Announced recently, MrBeast claimed that Virtual Dining Concepts, the ghost kitchen behind his virtual dining restaurant, Beast Burger, had damaged his image by serving essentially inedible food to people. ( 👈️ read that like MrBeast was doing a voice over, it actually sounds cooler)

Now in their defence, anytime you get fast food delivered to you, it’s never that great. This one year in Hong Kong, before delivery apps were really a thing McDonalds offered delivery, which I thought was so cool and innovative. But my wife, a native Hong Konger, advised that it wasn’t what it was all cracked up to be. BuT i WaNt To TrY iT. She shrugged. IT WAS HORRIBLE - because of the humidity in Hong Kong, coupled with whatever the motorcycle guy put the food in, the entire order came soggy. Ever had a soggy McChicken before? Your fingers hold the bun and make soggy bread indents - I know, it ruined it for me too.

Back to MrBeast - he’s now being counter-sued for breaching his contract with Virtual Dining Concepts, who basically say, just because you’re famous, it doesn’t mean you can Tweet yourself out of a contract. The counter suit is for $100M in damages. This all said, MrBeast probably has a private island somewhere he’s been saving as a prize that he can just give to VDC and call it a day.

OH so now AI generated music is okay

When the internet said weed is cool, they went and legalized it. When the internet said downloading your own music is cool, they made it even easier to do so. And when the internet went and created a Drake song feat The Weeknd using AI, Google and Universal decided to do a deal to license artist voices to make AI-generated songs.

You might be too young for this but if you aren’t, I can guarantee you remember dying of laughter from listening to those prank phone calls where people used soundboards of people’s voices like Arnold Schwarzenegger, asking restaurant owners, “Who is your daddy, and what does he do?” In natural evolutionary fashion, we’ve gone from sound boards to AI generated music.

Google and Universal want to enable users to create AI generated music using artist’s voices, where the artist would get paid for the use of their voice. So you’re saying instead of singing Michael Bolton while I wash the dishes, I can create Michael Bolton songs instead? Sign me up! Although the deal isn’t official and there doesn’t seem to be a product roadmap leaked yet for the actual product (C’mon Twitter…X…whatever it’s called), rest assured the world was never going to stop making AI generated music because some copyright lawyers in the music industry got all huffy about people creating bangers in a new innovative way.

Job Alert: Chief Uno Player

In a previous issue I talked about a job that was going to pay you $180K to manage a Discord community for OpenAI - did you get the job?? Well how about a job playing Uno? Mattel is currently on the hunt for its Chief Uno Player and you can apply on TikTok - because why wouldn’t you apply for a job on TikTok that requires you to play Uno for 4 hours a day?

The job will pay the successful applicant $4444/week for four weeks. All you have to do is play Uno. Kind of. In reading a description of the job, you’re actually supposed to become an Uno content creator, interviewing people playing Uno, as well as be able to lift 50 lbs in order to set up tables and tents on location. So basically you’re really a generously compensated camp counsellor playing Uno everyday for four weeks straight.

Let me know when “Chief Snooze Button” becomes a job because I can hit that button with my eyes closed

Is there someone out there who loves Uno this much that they’d want the job? Possibly Jay-Z, who enjoys a good game of Uno at lunch.

Oh and the job posting expired yesterday, sorry!