The NFL schedule release used to be a quaint domestic ritual: a few million Americans arguing on sports-talk radio about whether the Patriots had been given too many prime-time slots. Now, thanks to the league’s tireless evangelism—and the unquenchable global appetite for anything loud enough to drown out the news—the 18-week fixture list is parsed…
Minimum Wage 2026: A Planet-Wide Race to the Bottom That Somehow Still Points Up By the time the Gregorian calendar flips to 2026, the phrase “minimum wage” will sound quaint—like “chivalry” or “fax machine.” Yet governments from Lagos to Ljubljana are busy pretending the concept still matters, announcing tidy round numbers that fit neatly into…
Martha’s Rule: When the World Learns to Listen—Sort Of By Dave’s Locker International Desk Geneva—Another week, another acronym. This time it’s “Martha’s Rule,” a protocol named after a 13-year-old London schoolgirl who died of sepsis in 2021 because nobody in the hospital bothered to ask the patient—or her parents—what they thought. In simpler terms, the…
Vladivostok, Russia’s red-headed stepchild on the Sea of Japan, has spent most of its life being politely ignored by Moscow until someone remembers the Pacific Fleet rusting at anchor and decides to throw a party. This week the city hosts the Eastern Economic Forum, a jamboree where oligarchs, nervous diplomats, and the occasional North Korean…
Community, Circa 2024: A Field Report from the Glorious Ruins of Togetherness By L. M. Valdez, Foreign Correspondent, presently somewhere between a WeWork in Singapore and a refugee tent in Gaziantep — The word “community” once conjured images of kindly grandmothers swapping soup recipes over white picket fences. Today, the same word is more likely…
PARIS—While the rest of the planet argued about whether World War III would begin with a submarine ping or a TikTok trend, Lizzo—flute in one hand, disco ball in the other—managed to become a one-woman diplomatic incident on three separate continents last week. If you missed it, congratulations: you were probably busy watching glaciers file…
London’s Tube Strikes Go Global: A Tale of Rust, Rage, and the Universal Art of Not Getting to Work By the time the first picket sign hit the pavement outside King’s Cross, the ripple was already lapping at distant shores. Commuters from São Paulo to Singapore glanced up from their phones to discover that London—once…
The Blackout That United—and Divided—Us All By A. M. Vance, International Correspondent, Dave’s Locker SÃO PAULO—At 09:17 GMT last Tuesday, the PlayStation Network coughed, sputtered, and finally flat-lined. Across 72 countries, 117 million registered accounts watched their digital worlds evaporate into a single, smug error code: WS-116520-5. In a heartbeat, Fortnite warriors in Jakarta found…
Today’s Weather: A Global Forecast of Mild Panic with a Chance of Existential Dread By Dave’s Locker International Desk Geneva, 07:14 UTC—If you squint at the synoptic charts long enough, the planet resembles a feverish patient whose temperature keeps spiking every time the nurse turns her back. From Anchorage to Addis Ababa, today’s weather is…
Yvette Cooper and the Empire of Small-Print Doom By our Special Correspondent in Existential Limbo LONDON, Tuesday – Somewhere between the soggy Pret sandwich and the next Brexit anniversary, Yvette Cooper has quietly become the West’s most efficient exporter of bureaucratic dread. While other politicians chase headlines the way toddlers chase soap bubbles, the Chair…
Rhode: The Lipstick Empire the World Never Knew It Needed By Dave’s Foreign Correspondent, still jet-lagged in Terminal 3 Somewhere between the collapse of the Turkish lira and the quiet implosion of another crypto exchange, the planet has paused to obsess over Rhode—an American cosmetics line whose name sounds like a mispronounced Greek island but…
The Weeknd Goes Global: How One Torontonian Made the Entire Planet Feel Like 3 A.M. on a Tuesday By the time you read this, Abel Tesfaye—known to customs officials and streaming algorithms alike as “The Weeknd”—has already soundtracked another rotation of Earth. His synth-soaked tales of after-hours heartbreak have become the unofficial dial tone for…
