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Retail signs along Duff Ave in Ames, IA, April 2022. Credit: Christopher Gannon/Iowa State University From McDonalds to Marriott, 7-Eleven to Ace Hardware, we're surrounded by franchises. They are the dominant retail model in the U.S., and underpinning their success are franchisors who grow a network of franchisees who use their own resources to open and run brick-and-mortar stores.…

Unionization efforts in two large American employers demonstrate some of the broader trends playing out in the U.S. labor movement.There are two key differences between unionization campaigns at Amazon.com Inc. AMZN 0.06% and Starbucks SBUX -2.22% : Starbucks petitions have been more frequent and much smaller in bargaining size compared with Amazon. As of May 5, more than 240 Starbucks locations have filed election…

MacBook Pro (2021) users are complaining about hearing a crackling and popping noise when they play music or any sound. The issue seems to have impacted a number of users as there are multiple complaints detailing the problem on the Apple Community forum as well as on Reddit. It is also not limited a particular MacBook Pro (2021) model as while some users are facing it on the 14-inch version, the others have reported it on the 16-inch option. Apple has not yet publicly acknowledged the issue, though.The user complaints on…

Tom Felton wasn’t always a heartthrob, despite the fame. Felton starred as Draco Malfoy, the blonde-haired, villainous Slytherin student, in all eight Harry Potter movies, based on the novels by J.K. Rowling. And recently, the Harry Potter alum revealed in an interview with The Guardian that despite his rise to fame in the Wizarding World franchise, he wasn’t scoring many dates at school. Felton shared to the outlet, “Some people really struggle with the idea that I wasn’t this special, popular kid, but I was walking…

The natural world around us is endlessly inspiring, and fascinating, and often very odd too: like when researchers snapped a photo of Bolivian river dolphins swimming around with a Beni anaconda snake in their mouths, for example.  These river dolphins are relatively rarely seen creatures, as it's unusual for them to have their heads above water for very long – let alone to be juggling a predatory snake between their jaws at the same time.While it's not clear exactly what was going on here, dolphins and cetaceans more…

In the experimental study published in the Creativity Research Journal, the researchers analysed 352 participants. They compared the effects of playing Minecraft, with or without instruction, to watching a TV show or playing a race car video game. After 40 minutes of play or watching TV, the participants completed several creativity tasks. To measure creative production, they were asked to draw a creature from a world much different than Earth. More human-like creatures scored low for creativity and those less human-like…

Wordle, the online word-guessing game that has been bought by The New York Times, has become a daily routine for thousands of people. The New York Times has now unveiled WordleBot, an optional feature that reveals at each turn what, if anything, the players could have done to play more efficiently, and breaks down the completed game in the meantime. Players will also receive an overall score for luck and skill on a scale from 0 to 99. Wordle was developed by Josh Wardle.How to use WordleBotFirst, play Wordle. Then head…