Good morning, Quartz readers!
HERE’S WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW
Blackstone is betting $8 billion on Jersey Mike’s. The alternative investor is seeking to revive the sandwich chain’s fortunes.
Bird flu has been found in Californian raw milk. The dairy product does not undergo the pasteurization process that typically eliminates viruses.
Pretty much every Gen Z worker uses AI at their job. The technology is leveraged by 82% of the age cohort according to a poll from Google.
Thanksgiving dinner is likely to be cheaper this year. Many of the most central menu items have been dropping in price as inflation cools.
Trump’s Commerce secretary pick has ties to an under-investigation crypto firm. Howard Lutnick is CEO at Cantor Fitzgerald, the investment firm with a 5% stake in cartel-linked Tether.
They’re interrupting your irregularly scheduled program
Once upon a time, cord-cutters fled to the likes of Netflix partially because they wouldn’t have to watch all the ads they were getting with linear TV. But now that’s changing: Ads are becoming an increasingly familiar presence on many streaming platforms.
Paramount Global, Warner Bros Discovery, and even Netflix have been touting the growing revenues they’ve been deriving from advertising. After years of resistance, it looks like streaming is becoming mainstream in exactly the way that users didn’t want.
Why are commercials invading the entertainment refuge where people thought they’d be safe from them? Quartz’s Bruce Gil explains the industry’s strategic shift.
Tesla’s “mucky brown slick” and other sins
A central part of the evangelism around Tesla is that the electric carmaker will help reduce greenhouse gas emissions by replacing internal combustion engines. But the company has been embroiled in conflict with local governments in Texas and California over its own air pollution problem.
Despite CEO Elon Musk’s claims that he has “done more for the environment than any single human on Earth,” the factories that produce Teslas have racked up mountains of violations over toxic waste spewing into land, sea, and air. Musk has frequently criticized regulations aimed to prevent the environmental damage that he says is necessary for innovation.
How many dirty secrets is Tesla hiding? Quartz’s William Gavin explores the company’s trail of muck and menace.
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SURPRISING DISCOVERIES
Northwestern University is spending $850 million to build a smaller football stadium. The school is betting that it can jettison the cheap seats and make more money from home games.
Some retailers are banning customers who make too many returns. The tactic is part of a carrot-and-stick fight against over-ordering customers influenced by “haul” culture. (paywall)
Food stamps really are a hand up instead of a handout. Researchers find that young recipients go on to have higher earnings than their poor peers without access.
How now brown…fish? Indonesians are supplanting a cow-milk shortage with an alternative made from the catch of the day. (paywall)
A peculiar population of Argentinians are taking holidays in Dubai. The Patagonian mara, often illicitly brought to the U.A.E., has been turning up more often in the region’s desert oases.
Correction: The Nov. 25 edition of the Daily Brief misstated that Anthropic will use Amazon Web Services data under an Amazon investment deal. Anthropic will receive Amazon infrastructural support but not data access.
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