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Hopefully you never find yourself left behind by a partner while hiking a mountain or abandoned in the woods. If you do, you might be a victim of an alpine divorce. The phrase has gained traction on social media in recent weeks following news of a climbers guilty verdict after he left his girlfriend behind on a hike, where she froze to death on Austrias highest mountain. The phrase is said to have originated from the 1893 short story An Alpine Divorce by Robert Barr, in which an unhappy husband plots to kill his wife by pushing her off a mountain during a trip to the Swiss Alps. Across platforms like TikTok and X, women have started sharing their own stories of times they were allegedly left behind to fend for themselves by partners during hikes. @lillystuffle #fyp #xyzbca original sound – WavingCandle461 One TikTok creator posted a short clip of herself walking along a mountain trail earlier this month. In the clip, she is audibly upset. POV: you go on a hike with him in the mountains but he leaves you alone by yourself and you realize he never liked you to begin with, she wrote in the videos text overlay. Her video has since gone viral, with over 19 million views. @everafteriya #venting levitation – Aaron Hibell & Felsmann + Tiley The comments section is filled with similar stories from other users. My boyfriend did this to me. I found another hiker to show me how to get back then I went home and blocked his number, one wrote. “This happened to me in Joshua tree on a day when it was 100+ degrees outside,” another wrote. “My ex husband left me and took the backpack with water and snacks. I thought hed come back but nope. Finally found my way back to the car and he was chilling in the front seat with the AC on. Needless to say were divorced.” While many of the stories are unverified personal accounts, the recent surge in attention has also served as a grim reminder of the real-life case that echoes the tropes dark origins. Thomas Plamberger, 37, was found guilty of gross negligent manslaughter over the death of his 33-year-old girlfriend, Kerstin Gurtner. He was given a suspended sentence of five months in prison and fined 9,600 euros (about $11,300). In January 2025, the two hiked up Grossglockner, Austrias highest mountain. After Gurtner became exhausted, Plamberger abandoned her roughly 50 meters from the summit in freezing, high-wind conditions and without an emergency blanket. She later died of hypothermia. During the course of the trial, an ex-girlfriend of Plambergers came forward and testified that he had also left her alone on a night hike on Grossglockner a few years earlier. “Once we descended the Glockner at night, and suddenly he was gone,” she reportedly said. “I felt dizzy, I screamed, and I was completely alone. From then on, we didnt go on any more hikes together.”
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E-Commerce
On Thursday, Block CEO Jack Dorsey announced that his fintech company, which owns Square and Cash App, would be laying off a whopping 40% of its workforce, slashing over 4,000 jobs. Despite a strong year in 2025, Dorseylike many of his tech executive peersbelieves AI will enable greater efficiency with far fewer workers. Intelligence tools have changed what it means to build and run a company, he wrote in a letter to shareholders. We’re already seeing it internally. A significantly smaller team, using the tools we’re building, can do more and do it better. A number of business leaders have seemingly used AI as a smokescreen for layoffs, but Dorsey has explicitly attributed the job cuts at Block to intelligence, which he claims will be at the core of how the entire company works. Dorsey attempted to explain his decision in a memo to employees, which he shared publicly on X (also known as Twitter, the company Dorsey once cofounded). I had two options: cut gradually over months or years as this shift plays out, or be honest about where we are and act on it now, he wrote. I chose the latter. Repeated rounds of cuts are destructive to morale, to focus, and to the trust that customers and shareholders place in our ability to lead. (Block has, in fact, been laying off employees in waves this month, according to multiple reports.) Dorsey insisted the company would not just disappear people from slack and email and pretend they were never here, and that he would host a live video session to thank employees for their work. I know doing it this way might feel awkward, he wrote. I’d rather it feel awkward and human than efficient and cold. Read Dorseys post in full below: today we’re making one of the hardest decisions in the history of our company: we’re reducing our organization by nearly half, from over 10,000 people to just under 6,000. that means over 4,000 of you are being asked to leave or entering into consultation. i’ll be straight about what’s happening, why, and what it means for everyone. first off, if you’re one of the people affected, you’ll receive your salary for 20 weeks + 1 week per year of tenure, equity vested through the end of may, 6 months of health care, your corporate devices, and $5,000 to put toward whatever you need to help you in this transition (if youre outside the U.S. youll receive similar support but exact details are going to vary based on local requirements). i want you to know that before anything else. everyone will be notified today, whether you’re being asked to leave, entering consultation, or asked to stay. we’re not making this decision because we’re in trouble. our business is strong. gross profit continues to grow, we continue to serve more and more customers, and profitability is improving. but something has changed. we’re already seeing that the intelligence tools were creating and using, paired with smaller and flatter teams, are enabling a new way of working which fundamentally changes what it means to build and run a company. and that’s accelerating rapidly. i had two options: cut gradually over months or years as this shift plays out, or be honest about where we are and act on it now. i chose the latter. repeated rounds of cuts are destructive to morale, to focus, and to the trust that customers and shareholders place in our ability to lead. i’d rather take a hard, clear action now and build from a position we believe in than manage a slow reduction of people toward the same outcome. a smaller company also gives us the space to grow our business the right way, on our own terms, instead of constantly reacting to market pressures. a decision at this scale carries risk. but so does standing still. we’ve done a full review to determine the roles and people we require to reliably grow the business from here, and we’ve pressure-tested those decisions from multiple angles. i accept that we may have gotten some of them wrong, and we’ve built in flexibility to account for that, and do the right thing for our customers. we’re not going to just disappear people from slack and email and pretend they were never here. communication channels will stay open through thursday evening (pacific) so everyone can say goodbye properly, and share whatever you wish. i’ll also be hosting a live video session to thank everyone at 3:35pm pacific. i know doing it this way might feel awkward. i’d rather it feel awkward and human than efficient and cold. to those of you leavingim grateful for you, and im sorry to put you through this. you built what this company is today. that’s a fact that i’ll honor forever. this decision is not a reflection of what you contributed. you will be a great contributor to any organization going forward. to those stayingi made this decision, and i’ll own it. what i’m asking of you is to build with me. we’re going to build this company with intelligence at the core of everything we do. how we work, how we create, how we serve our customers. our customers will feel this shift too, and we’re going to help them navigate it: towards a future where they can build their own features directly, composed of our capabilities and served through our interfaces. that’s what i’m focused on now. expect a note from me tomorrow. jack
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E-Commerce
In recent months, fans of Burger King appear to have fallen out of love with the chains signature sandwich, the Whopper. Social media has been full of complaints about the quality of ingredients and even completely deformed burgers. In response, the burger chain said this week that it is rolling out a revamped Whopper. Heres whats changing, and where and when you can get yours. Why is Burger King revamping the Whopper? In short, customers became unhappy with the quality of the chains flagship burger in recent years. Criticisms range from the lackluster quality of ingredients in the burger to soggy buns to even smashed burgers (no, not in a good way). That last complaintburgers that were physically deformed when they reached the customers handsis something even the companys U.S. and Canadian president, Tom Curtis, admitted to. So the Whopper being smushed, literally, Ive heard it . . . and weve seen it, Curtis told CNN. And while no one expects a fast food burger to be the gold standard for hamburgers around the world, lately, customers seem to have lost patience with the Whoppers problemsespecially as prices have risen in recent years and once affordable fast food has become increasingly out of reach for many Americans. That growing unhappiness is something the burger chain has taken seriously. This week, it announced that, based on customer complaints and feedback, it was making the first changes to the Whopper in nearly a decade. What are the Burger King Whopper changes? On Thursday, Burger King announced it was revamping the Whopperbut it wasnt starting over from scratch. The Whopper is an icon, so we didnt set out to reinvent it, Curtis said in a statement announcing the move. Instead, we elevated it based on direct Guest feedback. That elevated Whopper consists of three new elements, according to the company: a more premium, better-tasting bun better-tasting mayo served in a box to protect the burger from getting smashed Other elements of the burger will remain the same, including its beef patty, and topping of onions, tomatoes, lettuce, and pickles. When and where will the revamped Whopper be available? Burger King says the new Whopper will be available this week, where it will roll out across the chains 7,000 locations, according to CNN. Will the new Whopper cost more? That depends on whos paying the bill. Curtis told CNN that the revamped Whopper is estimated to increase costs for Burger King franchisees by about $4,000 per year per store. But Burger King is recommending to franchisees that they do not pass these increased costs onto customers, who are already reducing their discretionary spending due to inflationary pressures. The price of a Whopper can vary by location. In New York City, a standard Whopper currently costs around $6.99. In the Midwest, Whoppers go for around $6.19, and in San Francisco they can go for as high as around $8.19, according to data from the companys online ordering system. If franchisees abide by Burger Kings advice, customers should not see any price increase when ordering the revamped Whopper.
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E-Commerce
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