How K-pop fans are shaping elections around the globe
Back in the early ‘90s, Korean pop music, known as K-pop, was largely conserved to its native South Korea. It’s since exploded around the globe into an international phenomenon, emphasizing choreography and elaborate performance.
It’s made bands like Girls Generation, EXO, BTS, and Blackpink into household names, and inspired a special brand of particularly fierce devotion in their fans.
Now, those same fandoms have learned how to use their digital skills to advocate for social change and pursue political goals—organizing acts of civil resistance, donating generously to charity, and even foiling white supremacist attempts to spread hate speech. Read the full story.
—Soo Youn
The ChatGPT-fueled battle for search is bigger than Microsoft or Google
Search is suddenly cool again. Last week, Microsoft and Google staked out their respective claims to the future of search, showing off chatbots that can respond to queries with sentences rather than lists of links.
But while these announcements gave a glimpse of what’s next for search, to get the full picture we need to look beyond these companies. Search is set to become more crowded and varied. That’s because, under the radar, a new wave of startups have been playing with many of the same chatbot-enhanced search tools for months. Read the full story.
—Will Douglas Heaven
If you want to learn more about this topic, read this piece from Melissa Heikkilä about why you shouldn’t trust AI search engines.
Huge EVs are far from perfect, but they could still help fight climate change.
A handful of electric-vehicle commercials aired during the Super Bowl on Sunday, and all of them had one thing in common: the vehicles featured were massive.
In the US, cars are already big, and they’re getting bigger. Now, in the name of addressing climate change, companies are catering to America’s obsession with giant vehicles, advertising the same trucks and SUVs we know and love—but electrified.
Giving people what they want could be key to boosting EV adoption. But big EVs could come with a climate cost. Read the full story.
—Casey Crownhart
