Author: Editor-In-Chief
new york — Quillen Blackwell, whose nonprofit transforms vacant lots on Chicago’s South Side into flower farms that employ at-risk youth to grow, arrange and sell flowers, has been named a 2025 CNN Hero of the Year. Online voters selected him from this year’s top five CNN Heroes, ordinary people recognized for taking action to solve problems in their communities. Following the news, he praised his wife Hannah, his Christian faith and the young people who work at his social enterprise Southside Blooms, calling them “stars”. “To tell you the truth, I don’t know how to make a centerpiece. I…
The Kansas City Chiefs are 6-7 on the season and face the realistic prospect of missing the playoffs for the first time since the 2014 season.And this has led to a number of think pieces, like this one, asking, “What’s wrong with the teams that have been to the last three Super Bowls?” The Chiefs have already conceded the AFC West title with Sunday’s loss to the Houston Texans. As a result, the team’s nine-year streak of winning district championships will come to an end. They also stand to keep their streak of consecutive appearances in the AFC Championship Game…
Amazon has long had to deal with the reality that owners of Echo smart speakers aren’t using Alexa, the voice-controlled assistant, to make purchases, as the company had hoped. The tech giant hasn’t given up on that dream yet. The company’s AI assistant Alexa+ is available in the U.S. and Canada starting today with new shopping-enabled features, including a shopping hub, tools to add items to recent orders, and personalized recommendations. The company is already working on features that would allow Alexa+ to act as a shopping assistant, with features such as automated transaction tracking and automated purchases. The former…
The Federal Reserve is poised to cut interest rates for the third time in a row on Wednesday, while also warning of what’s to come.After a period of significant uncertainty over which direction central bank policymakers would lean, markets settled on a quarter-point cut. That would lower the Fed’s key interest rate to a range of 3.5% to 3.75%.However, there are complications.The Federal Open Market Committee, which sets interest rates, is divided between members who support rate cuts as a way to prevent a further slump in the labor market and those who believe easing has gone far enough and…
(The stream is scheduled to start at 6:10 PM ET. If you don’t see the player above at that time, please refresh the page.)President Donald Trump will speak out about the U.S. economy in a bid to send a message of economic success to a country increasingly concerned about the cost of living.The speech in Mount Pocono, Pennsylvania, came as data shows Americans are feeling squeezed by creeping increases in prices, even though President Trump claims he has largely defeated inflation.The latest consumer confidence survey for November found that business confidence had fallen to its lowest level in seven months.…
The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) announced that it is in the process of filing a lawsuit against Florida Governor Ron DeSantis for designating a civil rights group as a “foreign terrorist” organization.Hiba Rahim, interim executive director of the state chapter of CAIR, told Al Jazeera on Tuesday that DeSantis’ decision would not have an immediate impact on the group, but could fuel Islamophobia in Florida and across the United States.Recommended stories list of 3 itemsend of list”We will continue the work we do every day to protect civil liberties, protect American Muslims, protect our communities as a whole, and…
Jair Bolsonaro goes to the movies. Not literally, as Brazil’s former president is still serving a 27-year prison sentence for plotting a coup to maintain power after losing re-election in 2022. But social media posts by Bolsonaro’s son and other political allies say a new film about his career is in the works. The film, titled “Dark Horse,” stars American actor and conservative activist Jim Caviezel, best known for playing Jesus in Mel Gibson’s 2004 film “The Passion of the Christ.” Production images recently posted to the film’s official Instagram account show Caviezel dressed up as Bolsonaro, including a post…
Chelsea’s hopes of finishing in the last eight of the Champions League ended as they lost 2-1 to Atalanta thanks to a late goal from Charles de Quetelaere.The Serie A team has only lost once at home this season, but Enzo Maresca’s side are yet to win away from home, with two losses and one draw. They are currently winless in their last four games in all competitions. Atalanta got off to a bright start and would have gone through had it not been for a sensational block from Josh Achiampong to deny Ademola Lookman his first start in the…
As AI moves beyond chatbots to systems that can take action, the Linux Foundation is launching a new group dedicated to preventing AI agents from splintering into a mess of incompatible, locked-down products. The group, called the Agentic AI Foundation (AAIF), serves as a neutral hub for open source projects related to AI agents. AAIF’s launch is supported by donations from Anthropic, Block, and OpenAI. Anthropic is contributing MCP (Model Context Protocol), a standard way to connect models and agents to tools and data. Block is contributing to its open source agent framework, Goose. OpenAI is introducing AGENTS.md, a simple…
File photo: Instacart shopper Loralyn Gegat delivers to a customer’s home in Falmouth, Massachusetts, on April 7, 2020.David L. Ryan | Boston Globe | Getty Imagesgrocery delivery app instacart The company uses artificial intelligence-powered pricing tools that show more U.S. shoppers are paying higher or lower prices for identical products in the same stores, according to a new study. The study, released Tuesday by progressive advocacy groups Groundwork Collaborative, Consumer Reports and news organization More Perfect Union, asked 437 shoppers in four cities to help add identical items to their carts within the same store’s Instacart app. Researchers conducted an…