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Since 1994, this is the 1607th issue of Randy Cassingham’s...
| 30 March 2025: Family Business | Copyright ©2025 https://thisistrue.com |
Other Good Reading: If you have a 23andMe (DNA ancestry) account, I suggest you delete it. They have gone bankrupt to “facilitate a sale process to maximize the value of its business.” While the company says any buyers will have to respect privacy preferences, note that in 2023, hackers were able to download information from around 14,000 customers “that appeared to target Jewish and Chinese users.” So much for privacy preferences.
California’s Attorney General “reminds” 23andMe customers that you may request the destruction of your sample (if you’ve allowed them to keep it), and to delete your data, and I suggest you do both. While press reports seem to suggest urgency, it’s probably not “that” urgent: the bankruptcy court review of bids is apparently set for June 17. That said, I am not delaying. The only hitch might be if you want to download your raw data: the company says it takes a “few days” to compile it fordownload. Well, I requested mine March 24, and only got notice today (April 4) that it’s ready. I immediately downloaded the report, moved it to offline storage, and deleted my account, which happens instantly once you get an email confirmation and click a confirmation link.
The “how” for all of this is in the California A.G.’s message. Go through each part carefully, revoking consents for research, for retaining your sample (if you did consent), download your data if you wish (knowing it might take some time to get it) and, when everything is complete, close and delete your account. That’s what I did, anyway. If you have no foreseeableneed for your data, you can do it without waiting: just go straight for deletion.
The Cameras Are Rolling: In 2015, Ruby Franke startedthe Youtube channel “8 Passengers” featuring her home life: the Utah family had 6 children. It was a hit: by mid-2020 the channel had around 2.5 million subscribers and her 5-day-a-week videos combined had over 1 billion views. But viewers became concerned with her disciplinary methods; husband Kevin moved out, and authorities moved in, charging Franke and her business partner, Jodi Hildebrandt, a therapist, with aggravated child abuse. The women eventually pleaded guilty to four counts each,and in February 2024 they were sentenced to 4-30 years in prison. “The novelty of the Mormon religion makes Utah and mom influencers ... that much more interesting,” explains Michigan State Univ. Prof. Mariah Wellman, who studied Mormon influencers for her Ph.D. Now in college, Shari Franke, Ruby’s eldest daughter, has written a memoir describing her childhood, where her awkward moments were televised by her mother. The “constant surveillance was excruciating,” she wrote. “All I wanted was togrow up in peace.” She is backing legislation to protect children from mommy vloggers. When a reporter asked Utah-based “influencers” to comment, all refused. (RC/Wall Street Journal) ...On the grounds it may incriminate them.
Forget Something? A United Airlines flight from Los Angeles, Calif., to Shanghai, China, wasdiverted to San Francisco. Passengers got a notification: “Your flight diverted to San Francisco due to an unexpected crew-related issue requiring a new crew.” United gave more details in a statement later: “On Saturday, United flight 198 from Los Angeles to Shanghai landed at San Francisco International Airport as the pilot did not have their passport onboard.” It took around 3 hours to get a new crew in so the flight could continue. This has happened before: a flight from Los Angeles wasdelayed for hours because the pilot didn’t have their passport. It was the same United Airlines route, less than a week earlier. (MS/San Francisco Chronicle) ...They left it on the other plane.
Xero Shoes’ Latest is Perfect for Court Appearances.
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More Than Triple the Stories in the full edition this week, including another Brain Drain story. A shyster funeral director has been in prison before, and is likely going again. A big oops in a city’s annual report. A man waited HOW long for a speedy trial?! Buying an established retailer for nearly $100 million doesn’t necessarily mean the buyer gets to use their established name. The proclaimed “miracle” wasn’t as miraculous as hoped.A piano with a parking ticket...?! How to embarrass a public transit system. Man figures out what’s wrong with his house ...and asks for it to be made a historic landmark. Yes you can ask for your upgrade to start with the full edition #1607, and you get to decide how much to pay. See your options and thanks!
What’s a Paddle For? Georgett McCarty got a phone call from The New William J. Berry Elementary Schoolin Heidelberg, Miss. Her son, she was told, had argued with another student. “He asked for my permission to paddle my son,” she said. “I told him yes.” In a subsequent call, the man she had permitted to hit her son told her he had hit him on the arm, but the boy was “OK.” When the third-grader arrived at home, his grandmother noticed that his arm was swollen, and took him to the emergency room. His ulna was broken. Two weeks later McCarty remained angry. “I just want the community to be aware ofthe people that we send our kids to, hoping that they’ll be safe,” she told a journalist. (AC/WDAM Laurel) ...He would have been safe if she had just said no.
Who’s a Good Boy? Matt Nelson was in college in North Carolina, but wanted to be a comedian. To that end he started posting onTwitter in 2015 to try out his material. “I noticed that all of my jokes that had to do with dogs just did way better than my other jokes,” he said, so he created a new account, WeRateDogs, for photos of dogs with amusing one-liner captions. The first, with a photo of a friend’s dog: “Here we have a Japanese Irish Setter. Lost eye in Vietnam (?). Big fan of relaxing on stair. 8/10 would pet.” His fans loved it, and immediately started sending photos of their dogs. “It was a nonstop torrent ofpotential content,” Nelson said. That, and followers: within a week he broke 100,000. Today that account has 9 million followers (plus 8 million spread across Instagram, TikTok, and Facebook). When he posted about sick or injured dogs, fans would help pay for vet care, so he created a nonprofit to make contributions tax-deductible, and he dropped out of college to manage it all. Heroic dogs such as Jacob, who comforted families and survivors of the Pulse Nightclub shooting, get a rating of15/10; the name of the nonprofit: the 15/10 Foundation, which has so far brought in $3 million to help dogs. (RC/Washington Post) ...15/10: would click again.
Second Only to Canadians in the U.S.
Albertans Second Most Likely in Canada to Be Abducted by Aliens
CTV headline
Did You Find an Error? Check the Errata Page for updates.
This Week’s Contributors: MS-Mike Straw, AC-Alexander Cohen, RC-Randy Cassingham.
Stories This Week were Written/Edited at sea, traveling between French Guiana and St. George’s, Grenada. The latest post in our blog is The Mystery of the Traveling Shoes, which I really enjoyed doing.
This Week Has Another ‘Brain Drain’ story, which isn’t in the lineup above, but has been added to the Brain Drain blog page.
One Must Assume that the wording of United’s statement, “On Saturday...the pilot did not have their passport,” means that the statement was made on Sunday, or even Monday. In other words, they didn’t admit it in public until the passengers got to China, or at the very least were well underway.
I searched the phrase and found it at numerous news sites, but not one of them gave a date for the statement (“when” is one of the key “5 Ws” in newsgathering; it’s J-school 101). You can bet every passenger had their passport: gate agents check before allowing them on the plane. But dunderheaded pilots? Naw! They’re professionals! At least one news source pointed out that there are no regulations in place requiring compensation for passengers in an idiotic situation like this.
Ten Years Ago in True: Freak of Nomenclature, Social Justice Division.
This Week’s Story of the Week (you’re welcome to share it), about the forgetful pilot, is posted on Telegram, Mastodon, Instagram, Threads, Bluesky, and/or Facebook, or grab from any of those to post elsewhere.
This Week’s Sunday Reading: A paying subscriber leaves TRUE because it has grown from ‘a bare-knuckles spare bedroom experiment’ to ‘a media business’(?!!?) This is my response. A Bare-Knuckles Experiment.
No Honorary Unsubscribe this week: in 90 minutes of research I didn’t find anyone who qualifies, even going back two weeks.
- But So Long to actor Richard Chamberlain. From Dr. Kildare to the king of the miniseries, he died on March 29 after a stroke. He would have turned 91 today.
- Honorary Unsubscribe Archive.
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