Researched by: Aarthi Ramnath, Anannya Parekh & Aakriti Anand
What the F*** Happened Here: The latest edition
ICYMI: We now have a twice-weekly newsmagazine show—hosted by our editor Lakshmi Chaudhry. This episode is all about Cannes, the kinda racist backstory of Lakme’s brand name—and boisterous orcas.
The show is a great option when you don’t have time to read us every day. You get a video version of our best stories twice a week. Do check it out and—most importantly—share it with your friends, fam, colleagues, and more. It’s a great cost-free way to introduce someone to splainer—especially if they are text-averse.
Jaw-dropping temperatures in Delhi
Mungeshpur in Delhi recorded a temperature of 52.9°C—the highest ever recorded in India. It is only 3.8°C lower than the highest temperature ever recorded on Earth—in Death Valley, California. To be clear, the Mungeshpur data is an outlier. The Safdarjung weather observatory—which represents Delhi as a whole—registered a maximum temperature of 46.8C. There are questions as to whether the Mungeshpur recording is an error. In any case, much to the relief and surprise of Delhi-walas, it started to rain in the afternoon. As of publishing time, the city is a far more tolerable 36°C. (Indian Express)
What’s next: The meteorological department has issued a “red alert" for a “severe heatwave" in most parts of Haryana, Chandigarh-Delhi, Punjab, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh, and Rajasthan. We’re not sure if this remains true—since it was blindsided by the rain.
The bigger picture: Records aside, great parts of India are struggling with extreme weather for the past two months. The heatwaves are not just hotter but also longer. So wtf is going on? Part of it has to do with El Nino—which always raises temperatures in India. Also this:
The second is the presence of high-pressure systems over the Southern peninsula and South-Eastern coastal areas. These high-push warm air close to the Earth’s surface, adding to the heat. They also prevent incoming sea breeze that cools the land. This explains why night-time cooling has been to a lower scale than before.
There are also other factors—like climate change and urbanisation.
Point to note: Delhi most certainly set a record in power demand—clocking in at 8302 MW—beating the record set on May 22 of 8000 MW. Of course, power consumption is a privilege in India: 53% of air conditioners in this country are owned by only the top 5% of the population. (Mint)
Black box data on Singapore Airlines says…
Singaporean investigators have looked at data stored in the flight data recorder and cockpit voice recorder. The early report indicates the plane rapidly went up—and then dropped within a period of 4.6 seconds:
At 07:49:40 GMT, after a period of upward acceleration, it quickly accelerated downwards over 0.6 seconds, which presumably "resulted in the occupants who were not belted up to become airborne". Then the plane accelerated up again for four seconds, meaning those who were airborne fell back down. The effect can be likened to "putting an egg inside a metal box, then shaking the box up and down", aviation expert Dr Guy Gratton told the BBC.
And yes, it was caused by turbulence—not any kind of pilot error. Associated Press has a far more detailed explanation of the wild swing in gravity. (BBC News)
Meanwhile, over at IndiGo: There is a new feature for women passengers. You can now see which seats have been booked by other women—when you select your seat. (Mint)
‘Silent layoffs’ for 20,000 IT professionals
According to a leading IT employee union, at least 20,000 jobs were cut in “silent layoffs” in 2023—the actual number could even be higher. Here’s what that term means:
The most common way to do a silent layoff is to give an employee 30 days to find a new role within the same company. If the employee can't, then s/he is asked to leave. Silent layoffs have been a common practice among many firms to let go of employees, wherein they are compelled to resign in a discreet manner.
If the employee resists the pressure to leave, they receive a ‘termination notice’—which hurts their job prospects. They are also forced to sign NDAs to qualify for a full payout. The quiet downsizing also hurts those who still have a job: “[E]xisting employees are now being made to work for 14-16 hours each day, compared to 10-12 hours a couple of years back.” According to the unions, silent layoffs are still underway in 2024. Moneycontrol has a long read on the new normal.
The backstory on the Sam Altman drama
The context: Back in November, Sam Altman—founder and CEO of OpenAI—was fired from the board without warning. The board’s cryptic announcement said he was “not consistently candid in his communications” and that they “no longer had confidence in his ability to lead”. Just five days after the ouster, Altman was reinstated as CEO—and three of the four board members who fired him were pushed out. This Big Story has more on the move.
What happened now: Those board members are now spilling the tea on why they kicked out Altman—and it’s pretty damning. In the Economist, two of them—Helen Toner and Tasha McCauley—write:
Multiple senior leaders had privately shared grave concerns with the board, saying they believed that Mr Altman cultivated “a toxic culture of lying” and engaged in “behaviour [that] can be characterised as psychological abuse”.
Toner also appeared on a podcast—where she shared more damning details. She also says that Altman was brought back by blackmailing the employees:
She claims employees were presented with only two options about how things could go (ditching the board to restore Altman or seeing the company destroyed), and since people didn’t want the company to fall apart, they supported the other one. She also says many people were scared of going against Altman after watching him retaliate against others.
The Verge has details of the podcast interview—or you can hear it here.
In terrible news for financial analysts: A new study shows that Large Language Models (LLMs)—the type of AI that powers chatbots—can outperform financial analysts in “predicting the direction of future earnings”:
According to the working paper, AI is able to produce a 60% rate of accuracy in predictive financial performance. Human experts’ accuracy tends to fall between 53% and 57%.
That’s a significant improvement—especially since all they gave the machine was the balance sheet and income statement of a company. The researchers are pretty blunt about what this means:
The study found that AI’s score was “remarkably higher than that achieved by the [human] analysts,” suggesting the technology could soon be part of the professional analysis process.
Quartz has lots more on the study.
Four things to see
One: This is Gertrude—a 70-year-old flamingo in England—who laid her first-ever egg with her hot 37-year-old “boyfriend” Gil. The sad bit: It is unlikely that the egg will hatch—but Gertrude will have plenty of opportunities to play doting aunty to the others. Why the egg is an especially huge achievement: “Flamingos might live 40 years and Gertrude is 70, so [at] that ripe old age to be able to display [maternal] characteristics is amazing.” (BBC News)
Two: It’s bumper cicada season in the US (see: this Big Story)—with two broods out in full strength at the same time. That’s rare enough—but rarer still: an ‘ocean eye’ cicada. They usually have red eyes. (Associated Press)
Three: Between 2006 and 2013, the iconic rap group Wu-Tang Clan secretly recorded an album titled ‘Once Upon a Time in Shaolin’. It was intended as a piece of art—placed inside a hand-carved box with a leather-bound book of parchment paper containing lyrics. It was sold to the highest bidder—with the stipulation that it could only be played in private listening sessions. Long story short: It has finally made its way to an Australian museum—and can be heard by fans for the very first time. We love the pretty pretty box. (CNN)
Four: Behold the trailer for director Yorgos Lanthimos' very dark—and funny—film ‘Kinds of Kindness’. It’s got a massive cast including Emma Stone, Willem Dafoe, and Jesse Plemons—who won the award for best actor at the Cannes Film Festival for his turn. It is slated to release on June 28. (The Guardian)
