🎄 A year without bonuses?

Plus: Waze’s U-turn, streamer churn, a rotating digital art gallery, and more. [View Online]( [The Hustle] It’s holiday gimmick season! So far, we’ve got Mountain Dew’s fruitcake-flavored soda, and Pilk (i.e., a mix of Pepsi and milk). In today’s email: - LinkedIn: The bots are invading. - Chart: What are bonuses looking like? - Digits: Jeans, screens, and other news numbers. - Around the web: An online art gallery, a disastrous game, a cute obstacle course, and more cool internet finds. 🎧 On the go? [Listen to today’s 10-minute podcast]( to hear about the electrification of America’s school buses, Waze’s U-turn, Avatar’s big hopes for China, and more. The big idea [robot writing]( How LinkedIn’s handling its bots Is nothing sacred? Meta and Twitter get a lot of flak about bogus profiles, but bots have invaded LinkedIn, too. LinkedIn [removed]( 21m+ fake accounts between January and June — a ~28% increase compared to the previous six months, [per]( CNBC. It also booted 87m+ scams and spam content. For reference, LinkedIn claims 875m+ real users. What do fake profiles do? Try to swindle people out of money or data. According to experts, malicious accounts: - Lure people to other websites — perhaps with fake career opportunities — where they collect info - Trick people into crypto or financial scams Why it matters Just as [romance scammers]( target people looking for love, LinkedIn scammers prey on people looking for work or opportunities — something bound to increase amid widespread layoffs. Scammers [benefit]( from LinkedIn’s professional nature and gain trust through profiles connected to respected businesses. In August, Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao [said]( of the 7k LinkedIn profiles that claimed to work for him, only ~50 did. Other fakers claimed to work for [Apple]( and [SpaceX](. What’s LinkedIn’s plan? A security expert told CNBC that verifying identities would help, but it would also make it more difficult for real people to set up accounts. Instead, LinkedIn [now](: - Uses AI to detect and remove bad content, and checks for [AI-generated]( profile pics - Shows users when profiles were created and if they have verified contact info - Warns users about suspicious messages So, stay frosty, folks — and enjoy these [tips]( for avoiding scammers. [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=How+LinkedIn%E2%80%99s+handling+its+bots%0Ahttps%3A%2F%2Fthehustle.co%2F12122023-LinkedIn-bots%3Futm_campaign%3DLinkedIn%2BBots%26utm_content%3D12122023-LinkedIn-bots%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]( TRENDING [eyeball wearing a hat] Need some used office gear? Twitter put a bunch of surplus [office supplies]( up for auction, including bicycle-powered chargers, a giant “@” symbol, and an industrial gyro broiler. SNIPPETS Toys R Us [released]( 10k NFTs, which holders can use to earn coins to exchange for toys, events, and other perks. Apple [will no longer]( ban employees from discussing harassment and discrimination in the workplace after reviewing its NDAs. OpenAI is working on [a way]( to “watermark” ChatGPT’s AI-generated text. One area that could prove critical: [homework](. Getir, the Turkish grocery deliverer, acquired German competitor Gorillas. The deal [reportedly]( valued Gorillas at $1.2B, and Getir at $10B. Twin sisters were awarded [$1.5m]( over allegations that they cheated on their med school exams. Their answers were similar, but an expert witness testified that’s usually true of twins. Microsoft [acquired]( Lumenisity, a British startup that makes high-speed cables for data centers and internet service providers. California is considering a proposal that would give some Black residents [$223.2k]( in reparations in an effort to reduce the wealth gap between Black and white Californians. Chickenflation: Chicken sandwiches are taking over the world, and getting pricey. This [one-minute clip]( breaks down why. FROM THE BLOG [laptop] You don’t have to be a natural-born leader to excel as top dog — but it takes work. We [unpacked]( 11 powerful leadership traits you can use to rise to the top. CHART [Wall Street pay]( Singdhi Sokpo What are bonuses looking like this holiday season? As the economy teeters with uncertainty, it looks like people’s chances for a generous year-end bonus are teetering with it. This year, 27% of companies across a range of sectors [will not]( be awarding bonuses, up from 23% last year, per The Wall Street Journal. Among those awarding bonuses: - Lowe’s plans to spend $200m on bonuses for hourly workers. - The Venetian Resort Las Vegas is giving $1.5k to all workers. - New York-based printing company Sticker Mule is giving employees $1k bonuses to help weather inflation, despite its modest year. On Wall Street, though, with bankers coming off [a record 2021]( that saw wildly inflated levels of activity, bonus pools could be as much as 40% lower. Notably, in 2021, New York City securities workers got their biggest bonus payouts since 2006, averaging [$257.5k](. [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=What+are+bonuses+looking+like+this+holiday+season%3F%0Ahttps%3A%2F%2Fthehustle.co%2F12122023-bonuses%3Futm_campaign%3DLinkedIn%2BBots%26utm_content%3D12122023-bonuses%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]( Free Resource ROI tracking sheets for brands, affiliates, and influencers The goal: Mutually profitable partnerships, and bountiful marketing buckets. The issue: Managing each one individually, and all of them as a whole. The fix: [Smart spreadsheets]( to keep all stakeholders aligned and crucial metrics tidy. These will help everybody make data-driven decisions. Spreadsheets for easily interpreting data: - Tracking templates for brands, affiliates, and influencers - Complete with cell functions and automatic graphs - Examples of each template in action For auditing campaigns, amplifying ROI, and exuding professionalism. [Profit-tracking templates →]( Numbers Digits: Jeans, screens, and more news numbers 1) On the off chance a pair of really old jeans wind up in your possession, don’t dispose of them — a pair recovered from a 19th-century shipwreck recently [sold for $95k](. Earlier this year, a pair found in an abandoned mine [sold for $87k](. 2) Amid covid restrictions and tense geopolitics, Disney is banking hard on Chinese moviegoers to see the upcoming Avatar sequel. Today, there are [82k+ movie screens]( in China, up from ~5.7k in 2010 when the original film earned $202.6m there. 3) An auction for wind development off the coast of California saw companies bid a combined [$757.1m on 373.3k acres](. At ~$2k per acre, the price tag was far less than New York and New Jersey’s ~$9k per-acre price. 4) Streaming has a churn problem: In Q3, while premium US streaming services including Apple TV+ and  Discovery added a combined 37.2m subscribers, [they lost 32m](. 5) Calculating a new route: Since Google’s $1.1B acquisition of Waze in 2013, the app has operated as a standalone brand. Likely in a move to drive efficiencies, Google is now moving Waze’s [500+ employees]( over to its Geo organization, which includes Maps, Earth, and Street View. [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=Digits%3A+Jeans%2C+screens%2C+and+more+news+numbers%0Ahttps%3A%2F%2Fthehustle.co%2F12122023-Digits%3Futm_campaign%3DLinkedIn%2BBots%26utm_content%3D12122023-Digits%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]( AROUND THE WEB 🖊️ On this day: In 1980, Armand Hammer [bought]( one of Leonardo da Vinci’s notebooks for $5.1m+ at auction. It contained ~300 notes and drawings from ~1508. 🎨 That’s cool: An [online art gallery]( that showcases new pieces daily. 🎧 Podcast: Join Creators Are Brands’ Tom Boyd and “side hustle king” Travis Brown to find out [how to]( validate your digital product (before you make it). 💫 Cure boredom: [A game]( that lets you simulate asteroids crashing into Earth, then calculates the impact, including crater size. 🐾 Aww: And now, an [obstacle course](. Tweet [reCAPTCHA meme] Follow [Sara]( on Twitter TELL FRIENDS → GET PRIZES Help your friends aboard our growing pirate ship. Share The Hustle Daily to start winning loot. [all prizes]( [Share The Hustle 🤠→]( Or copy this custom referral link: [ Your referral count: 0 How did you like today’s email? [Love It]( [Meh]( [Hate It]( Today's email was brought to you by [Jacob Cohen](, [Juliet Bennett Rylah](, and [Rob Litterst](. Editing by: Mark “Maybe a bot” Dent. Was this email forwarded to you? Sign up [here](. 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