🌍 What’s an earthship?

PLUS: Shower thoughts, Musk + Twitter, Wikishirts, and more. [The Hustle] Crypto entrepreneur Sina Estavi bought an NFT of Jack Dorsey’s 1st tweet for $3m. He’s now auctioning it for $48m, comparing its potential value to that of Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa. Unfortunately for Estavi, the highest bid as of Thursday morning was ~$6.8k. In today’s email: - Earthship: The true off-grid house. - Chart: Elon Musk offered to buy Twitter. Why? - Forever online: Startups want us to live on as AI. - Around the web: Wiki fashion, analyzing Wordle, a public Google Docs search tool, and more cool internet finds. 🎧 On the go? [Listen to today’s podcast]( to hear our analyst’s thoughts on 2 potential use cases for NFTs — one good, and one bad. The big idea [earthship]( An earthship is a house that powers itself An earthship-style home in Santa Fe could be yours for [$3.4m+](. But… What’s an earthship? Architect Michael Reynolds, founder of eco-construction company Earthship Biotecture, came up with the concept in the 1970s. He saw 2 problems — lack of affordable housing and too much trash — and figured he could build homes out of discarded materials. This idea evolved into the “earthship,” a self-sufficient, eco-friendly house with [6 basic design principles](: - Natural or repurposed building materials (e.g., used tires, mud, reclaimed wood or metal) - Thermal or solar heating and cooling (not electricity or gas) - Solar- and wind-powered - Water collected from rain and snowmelt - Contained sewage treatment (i.e., gray water is used and treated by plants, then collected in a well and pumped to toilets for flushing) - Interior, in-home farming Essentially, live in one of these babies as intended, and you’re pretty much set for off-the-grid life. Why so expensive? This particular home, known as Desert Flower, wasn’t built by Reynolds, but designer [John McGowan](. And it’s huge, with 5 bedrooms and [amenities]( including a hot tub, pool, sauna, and art and music studios spread across 2 dwellings. Earthships are also rare, with less than 10 on the US market now, per Realtor.com. Several are located in the [Greater World Earthship Community](, an off-grid subdivision near Taos, New Mexico, where 3 are on the market. Those are all asking under $1m and are much smaller. For the earthship-curious… … you can [book a stay]( in one through Earthship Biotecture, including one called the [Hobbit House]( for $150 per night. The Desert Flower is also listed on Airbnb for [$1k+]( per night. BTW: Here’s Reynolds [discussing]( his designs at TEDxCaboPolonio. [Share on Facebook]( [Share on Twitter]( [Send as email to a friend](mailto:?subject=The%20Hustle%20wrote%20something%20I%20think%20you%27ll%20like...%0A&body=An+earthship+is+a+house+that+powers+itself%0Ahttps%3A%2F%2Fthehustle.co%2F04152022-earthship%3Futm_campaign%3Dearthship%26utm_content%3D04152022-earthship%26utm_medium%3Demail%26utm_source%3Ddaily%0A%0AYou%20can%20subscribe%20with%20my%20link%20here%20to%20get%20the%20latest%20in%20tech%20and%20business%20daily:%0A [View on our website]( SNIPPETS Cash only: After much debate, Wikipedia has [decided]( it will no longer accept crypto donations due to environmental concerns. Sky surge: Airfare is up [20%]( compared to pre-pandemic prices thanks to inflation and increased demand. Long game: Peloton’s latest [strategy]( is to reduce the price of its bikes and treadmill by up to $500. But its subscription fees are going up by $5-$6. Meta-averse: Creators [aren’t super into]( Meta’s metaverse monetization plans, mostly due to fees that could take up to ~50% when factoring in Meta’s cut and other costs. No I in team: Tired of flying solo and ready to expand your team? Hiring the 1st employee for your business can be a daunting task. The Hustle rounded up [tips]( to guide you through the process. --------------------------------------------------------------- Hey — enjoy getting quick updates on what you care about? Take [20 seconds]( to personalize your Snippets. Pick your preferences👇 and we’ll send you more of what you love. Boom. [Personalize my Email →]( Chart [Musk net worth and Twitter market cap]( Selina Lee Elon Musk just offered to buy Twitter. Why? On Thursday, Elon Musk offered to buy Twitter outright for $54.20/share in a deal valued at ~[$43B](. Naturally, he shared the SEC filing — which outlines his “best and final offer” — in [a tweet](. The news is the latest in an ongoing Musk-Twitter saga: - April 4: Musk bought a [9.2% stake]( in Twitter, making him the company’s largest shareholder. - April 5: Twitter [announced]( Musk would join the board. - April 10: Musk [rejected]( the offer to join the board. Now, Musk says he wants to take Twitter private, which he believes would enable the platform to better serve the “societal imperative” of free speech through alternative policies and an open-sourced algorithm. Musk is a prolific tweeter himself, known for crude jabs at the [SEC]( and sitting [senators](, and esteemed jokes about [toilets]( and the [number 69](. Over the years, Twitter has struggled to grow its business meaningfully, with its stock nearly flat to where it was in 2013. The company is now worth ~$35B. Musk’s net worth has ballooned to ~$259B during the pandemic. In an interview following the news, he [said]( he doesn’t “care about the economics” of Twitter. A Twitter insider [told]( The Information the company’s board plans to fight the bid. [Share on Facebook]( [Share on Twitter]( [Send as email to a friend](mailto:?subject=The%20Hustle%20wrote%20something%20I%20think%20you%27ll%20like...%0A&body=Elon+Musk+just+offered+to+buy+Twitter.+Why%3F%0Ahttps%3A%2F%2Fthehustle.co%2F04152022-Musk-offers-to-buy-Twitter%3Futm_campaign%3Dearthship%26utm_content%3D04152022-Musk-offers-to-buy-Twitter%26utm_medium%3Demail%26utm_source%3Ddaily%0A%0AYou%20can%20subscribe%20with%20my%20link%20here%20to%20get%20the%20latest%20in%20tech%20and%20business%20daily:%0A [View on our website]( AI Ever After [VR goggles]( Can you live forever on a computer? Sci-fi loves a good brain upload plot. - A 1998 [episode]( of “The X-Files” features a computer genius who uploads herself to cyberspace. - “[San Junipero](,” a 2016 episode of “Black Mirror,” follows 2 women falling in love in a digital afterlife. But is it possible IRL? Artur Sychov, founder of metaverse company [Somnium Space](, has created a feature called “Live Forever” mode. It essentially collects data while you’re in VR — how you move and speak — and builds an AI avatar of you. Your avatar can interact with others, even after you’ve died. Sychov [told]( Vice he was inspired by his ailing father and the realization that his children would never get to know their grandfather. And he’s not the only one to try to replicate a loved one via AI: - You, Only Virtual (YOV) founder Justin Harrison modeled a [chatbot]( after his mother, based on data including 2.8k pages of text messages. To build your own, it’s $499 upfront, then ~$40/mo. - Artist Gabriel Barcia-Colombo’s 2015 [Hereafter Institute]( exhibit in LA contemplated digital afterlives and included a VR simulation of his late grandfather. - A clip of a South Korean woman [reuniting](with her daughter in VR went viral — and provoked intense debate. These avatars are mostly made for the living, serving as a way to hold on to those we’ve lost. But could we ever really live in computers? For The Atlantic, neuroscientist Michael Graziano [wrote]( that it may be possible to achieve that kind of brain scan, but the tech would take decades to develop. And the same question would remain: Is that you, or a copy? [Share on Facebook]( [Share on Twitter]( [Send as email to a friend](mailto:?subject=The%20Hustle%20wrote%20something%20I%20think%20you%27ll%20like...%0A&body=Can+you+live+forever+on+a+computer%3F%0Ahttps%3A%2F%2Fthehustle.co%2F04152022-digital-afterlives%3Futm_campaign%3Dearthship%26utm_content%3D04152022-digital-afterlives%26utm_medium%3Demail%26utm_source%3Ddaily%0A%0AYou%20can%20subscribe%20with%20my%20link%20here%20to%20get%20the%20latest%20in%20tech%20and%20business%20daily:%0A [View on our website]( TRENDS Capitalizing on the cozy lifestyle trend It’s deeper than no-shave and sweatpants. You see the incline on this chart? That’s 300k folks who want to be catered to. If you’re not a loafer, we’ve brainstormed some novel opportunities. - [Emotional escape rooms](: Like [rage, music, and crystal rooms](. Searches for “tiny library room” on Pinterest are up 1.1k%. - [$112 portable massage bed](: Garners $2.1m per month, per Jungle Scout. - [$60 back and neck massager](: Y-y-you g-g-gotta see this. We detail more swank product concepts [like curvy furniture and “flexercise”]( in our weekly flares report. We’re the premium research extension of The Hustle. [Get Trends access]( for rolling industry insights and an unrivaled community of 17k+ builders. [Try Trends For a Buck →]( AROUND THE WEB ⚾ On this day: In 1947, Jackie Robinson [became]( the 1st Black player in MLB, playing for the Brooklyn Dodgers. 📊 That’s interesting: An [in-depth analysis]( of Wordle and the ~15m tweets we’ve all made about it, including what makes the puzzle harder. 📃 Useful: [De digger]( is a search engine for public files in Google Drive. A similar search engine, Heystack, compiles the [best ones](. 👕 Haha: [Wikishirt]( sells only one product. T-shirts with Wikipedia articles printed on them. Yes, any article you want. 🐕 Aww: And now, [a dog]( to help you park. IN CASE YOU MISSED IT (A roundup of our best reads from the last couple weeks…) 🧠Why thinking about inflation leads to inflation [LINK]( 🏀 The guy who quit med school to become an NBA ref [LINK]( 🎥 The economics of Netflix’s buttons [LINK]( 🧹 As Airbnb grows, so do cleaning fees [LINK]( 🎨 The craziest art project in internet history [LINK]( Shower Thoughts - “Unfucking your life in your 30s feels like debugging horrible legacy code.” [SOURCE]( - “Billions of neurons fire in your brain just for you to get something wrong.” [SOURCE]( - “Before 1903, any human that was traveling at 120mph was likely falling to their death.” [SOURCE]( - “The main character of an action movie is more likely to win a 1v10 fight than they are a 1v1 fight.” [SOURCE]( - “If we had planted trees instead of carving gravestones, we may have avoided some climate issues.” [SOURCE](  [via Reddit]( SHARE THE HUSTLE Hey. Stop keeping us a secret. Refer just 3 people and we’ll start to send some goodies as a thank you. 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