Author: NY TIMES

For some people, it wasn’t easy being single during the early days of the pandemic. Many rushed into relationships, seeking company and comfort in another person — even if the match wasn’t quite right.People moved in with their significant others far too early. Cooking and watching movies with a partner while cloistered indoors helped relieve loneliness.Others developed online relationships from dating apps, and upon meeting in real life, they discovered that the people they had fallen for were not who they thought they were.Four years after Covid-19 lockdowns were implemented worldwide, many people have been processing their early pandemic experiences…

When investors talk about “zombie” companies, they’re usually referring to distressed start-ups that are hobbling along, unable to grow and unlikely to ever return the money they’ve raised.But as deal makers feverishly debated efforts this week by lawmakers to force TikTok’s Chinese parent company, ByteDance, to sell the app, they talked about a new version: China zombies.China zombies may have booming businesses, but they’re unlikely to provide investors with any immediate return because they’re stuck in geopolitical cross hairs.It’s not just the investors in ByteDance who, after handing it more than $8 billion, are stuck. What looked like a mammoth…

Edward Silva grew up wanting to be a chief executive.In 2018, Mr. Silva enrolled at the Stanford Graduate School of Business with the goal of starting his own company. “I was going to live the Stanford dream,” he said. “I was going to find an engineer — we were going to find a venture capital firm and found a technology start-up.”Then a classmate told him about another path for budding entrepreneurs. Instead of starting a company from scratch — Mr. Silva had co-founded one before business school and even been its chief executive — he could buy one and run…

For a comedy set piece, different lines can be stitched together digitally to make sure the film keeps the funniest material from each take. “One guy’s line might be funny, but the other guy’s response isn’t,” Grasmere said. “If they touch each other during the shot, we might have to rebuild a hand, or an entire arm. Or we’ll repaint the background from one shot, blend two faces from two other moments, or superimpose something into the foreground to match two different performances together. There are a million ways to make it work.”A lot of invisible effects work concentrates on…

Hamas is no longer demanding that Israel immediately agree to a permanent cease-fire in return for beginning a hostage and prisoner exchange, according to people familiar with the negotiations.Hamas’s new proposal would allow the release of hostages in exchange for a phased pullback of Israeli troops from parts of the Gaza Strip as well as prisoner releases. By modifying demands for an outright end of hostilities, the new proposal could possibly restart negotiations.The White House welcomed the new Hamas proposal and confirmed that talks would resume soon in Doha, Qatar, although without an American delegation present. “We’re cautiously optimistic that…

The United Nations human rights office has documented more than two dozen attacks on Gazans waiting for desperately needed aid since January, with hunger spreading as a result of Israel’s near complete siege, preventing most food and water from entering the tiny enclave.The office has not blamed any side for the spate of attacks as people wait for aid. In a number of U.N. reports and statements, the office has documented at least 26 such attacks since mid-January.They include Thursday night’s attack on hundreds of Palestinians who were waiting at the Kuwait traffic circle in Gaza City for an expected…

Impelled in large part by TikTok to seek beauty products meant for adults, younger customers — teenagers and even preadolescents — are proving to be a mixed blessing for retailers like Sephora and Ulta.Retail analysts say that as the beauty stores attract a new generation of shoppers, they will need to make sure that the experience remains fulfilling for their older, core customers — including some who may not enjoy stores full of tweens and teens.“So much of luxury and prestige is the experience,” said Simeon Siegel, a retail analyst at BMO Capital Markets. “Making an adult feel special is…

When millions of AT&T customers across the country briefly lost their cellphone service last month, Francella Jackson, 61, of Fairview Heights, Ill., said she picked up her well-worn Southwestern Bell push-button landline phone and called her friends “just so we could laugh at the people who could not use their phones.”“Why, isn’t it great that we can talk and have a great conversation?” she recalled saying. “We had a good laugh.”Derek Shaw, 68, of York, Pa., said he has an Android mobile phone, but prefers talking on his black cordless landline at home. The sound quality is better, he said,…

Uber and Lyft are threatening to pull out of Minneapolis after a City Council vote there guaranteed a minimum hourly wage to drivers.The council voted 10 to 3 on Thursday to override a mayoral veto of an ordinance that requires ride-hailing services to pay drivers a minimum rate of $1.40 per mile and 51 cents per minute to ensure that they earn the equivalent of local minimum wage of $15.57 per hour.The wage ordinance was first approved last week, but was vetoed by Minneapolis’s mayor, Jacob Frey.Both Uber and Lyft said they would stop operating in the city when the…

The letter came from the state department of human services in July 2021. It expressed condolences for the loss of the recipient’s mother, who had died a few weeks earlier at 88.Then it explained that the deceased had incurred a Medicaid debt of more than $77,000 and provided instructions on how to repay the money. “I was stunned,” said the woman’s 62-year-old daughter.At first, she thought the letter might be some sort of scam. It wasn’t.She asked not to be identified, because the case is unresolved and she doesn’t want to jeopardize her chances of getting the bill reduced. The…