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Shumita Basu, Narrating: Good morning! It's Friday, December 16th. I'm Shumita Basu. This is "Apple News Today." On today's show, accusations of illegal political donations by cryptocurrency trader Sam Bankman-Fried, how online retailers use mind tricks to get you to spend more, and the two soccer legends going head-to-head in this weekend's World Cup final.
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But first, the world is drowning in plastic. Less than 10% gets recycled, according to the EPA. And it's all over. It's in food packaging, medical equipment, furniture, clothing, cars. Even in places we can't see.
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Matt Simon: Everywhere. And I'm not exaggerating. I'm not kidding around when I say everywhere. Everywhere that scientists look, they find microplastics.
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Matt Simon covers science at "WIRED." He has a new book out called, "A Poison Like No Other: How Microplastics Corrupted Our Planet and Our Bodies." Now, microplastics are exactly what they sound like. They're tiny particles of plastic, often just a few millimeters long. And when they're that tiny, they're super light, so they can float through the air, traveling thousands of miles. Scientists have found them in some pretty surprising places. From rainforests to the depths of the Pacific Ocean to Mount Everest. And of course, all over our homes.
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Matt Simon: When you sit down on a couch that is made out of synthetic materials, those fibers break off as well. Carpets is a major source. One researcher reckons that it might be around 7,000 particles that we're inhaling each day.
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Microplastics have been found in lungs, blood, breast milk, and placentas. We don't know how, exactly, they impact human health. But so far, the science paints a pretty bleak picture.
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Matt Simon: One study found that it's at least 10,500 different chemicals used in plastic, a quarter of which are of concern to scientists. So they're either known to be toxic or suspected to be toxic. We just need more studies on what these chemicals are doing to our bodies.
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Simon is clear that the plastics industry is to blame for this crisis and should be responsible for cleaning it up. But the industry has shown no signs of slowing down production.
I talk with Simon about the problems of microplastics and what we can do to limit our exposure in the latest episode of our weekend interview show "In Conversation." If you're listening right now in the Apple News app, stick around. We've queued it up to play after this show. You can also find it in the Podcasts App by searching for "Apple News In Conversation."
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You've probably seen a lot of stories in your newsfeed about the arrest of Sam Bankman-Fried. The founder of the cryptocurrency exchange FTX faces multiple federal charges including wire fraud and money laundering.
We're going to zoom in on one accusation: possible violations of federal campaign finance law. Data reporter Chad Day is tracking this for "The Wall Street Journal."
Chad Day: Prosecutors and federal regulators say that Mr. Bankman-Fried and others was part of a conspiracy to subvert campaign finance laws by using what they say was stolen FTX customer money that they rooted through another company and then rooted through loans to themselves to make tens of millions of dollars in political donations.
Bankman-Fried's lawyer says his legal team is reviewing the charges. The indictment says he and others at FTX gave more than $70 million to Democrats and Republicans in an attempt to influence policy. Giving in Bankman-Fried's name alone was enough to make him one of the single biggest donors to Democrats in the past two years. And prosecutors say a lot of money went to political causes through what are called "straw donor schemes," which disguise the true sources.
Day: What they're alleging is that corporate funds were rooted through individuals for the purpose of giving them as political donations. It wasn't really the individual's money. So you're giving a political donation in someone else's name is really what's there.
The indictment says he had co-conspirators, but it doesn't name or charge anyone else or list any specific illegal donations that were allegedly made.
Day: I am very interested in knowing, what was the backstory on who are these other conspirators, what kind of organization was there among them to be able to kind of strategize these political donations, and basically what was the end goal?
We may get more answers soon. Bankman-Fried is currently in prison without bail in the Bahamas, facing extradition to the United States.
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There is brutal winter weather in the air and not a whole lot of time before Hanukkah and Christmas, so a lot of people will be staying in this weekend and shopping online for gifts. "Vox" has some helpful reporting on all the little tricks that websites use to try to get you to spend more. We talked to business reporter Emily Stewart about what web designers call "dark patterns."
Emily Stewart: So when you go to sign up for a free trial, for example, you don't notice that there is a box already checked to renew at a charge, or there's a pop-up ad on a website where the close button is really difficult to find.
The strategy there is to make something easy to miss. Some dark patterns want to grab your attention, and actually play up the FOMO factor. Like when a website says there's "only one left" of a certain product, or "five other people have this in their cart."
Stewart: Let's say you're buying a pair of shoes or something and you see "ten minutes to check out." Well, that's not really real, right? A, that is a nudge to get you to move, but also sometimes that's not even true.
Of course a countdown clock is probably a lie. This is the internet, people! We know there's always more time and there's always another pair of shoes. But these deceptive marketing tactics can still get us, especially when we're rushing through a busy holiday shopping season. The Federal Trade Commission has looked into dark patterns and even brought charges against companies for misleading customers. But experts told Stewart there's a lotta legal gray area. And they say the agency has bigger problems to go after.
Stewart: There's nobody really enforcing, right? Like the FTC has a lot on its plate, so they're not going to some random website and saying, "Hey, is that countdown clock real? Hey, does that low stock alert actually add up to how many items you have in stock?" And so, there's a lot of incentive for sellers and for companies to do these kinds of things to nudge people because what's the downside, right?
Dark patterns are designed to be sneaky, but Stewart says there are a few ways that shoppers can avoid falling for them. It's the same idea as "don't go grocery shopping while you're hungry." Don't online shop while you're rushing. Put something in your cart and let it sit there for a day. Some places might even notice that you're on the fence and send you a discount code to nudge you. Sure, that's another sneaky marketing tactic, but if you're smart and patient, you can end up saving money.
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This weekend, one team will lift the World Cup trophy. Reigning champions France will take on Argentina in the World Cup final. Now, a lot of the focus will be on just two players: Argentina's Lionel Messi and France's Kylian Mbappe.
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Brendan Hunt: I mean, it is the best player of the last 20 years with the best player of the next 20 years. And frankly, the mantel may have already passed as to which one is currently better. It's great. You know, you don't see generations line up like this very much.
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That's "Ted Lasso" star Brendan Hunt. He co-hosts our World Cup podcast "After the Whistle," along with Rebecca Lowe.
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Rebecca Lowe: That is, of course, all that we're gonna see between now and Sunday is gonna be a photo divided in two with Messi on one side and Mbappe on the other. It's gonna be like no other player exists between now and Sunday.
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And it's not just that Mbappe and Messi are considered two of the greatest players on the planet right now, but in a few days, they'll go from being rivals back to being teammates. And that's because during the regular season, the two play together for the French professional team Paris Saint-Germain.
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Brendan Hunt: The PSG versus PSG part of it is pretty great. I mean, I don't really love that they're both on the same club team. I don't think it's great when three of the five best players in the world are all on the same team. That's probably not really good for the sport. But now they get to go at each other, it adds a le- le- le- level of intrigue that I think will be great.
Rebecca Lowe: [LAUGHS] It does! It does, it does. Especially with Mbappe looking the way he is looking, and with a chance to win his second World cup before Messi has even, you know, won one. By the way, France right now, as of now, Brendan, France are slight favorites to beat Argentina. Do you go along with that?
Hunt: Yeah, I think so. I think they have the deeper squad and they have the actual trophy, for what it matters, which I guess is not much. You know, I love, at this point of the tournament… I mean, I hate that there's no Cinderellas left, but I love, at this point of the tournament, it will either be nil-nil as it was two World Cups ago, or it will be a chaotic shootout like it was four years ago. I'm excited, I'm excited.
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It is exciting. The final match is on Sunday. Don't forget to subscribe to "After the Whistle" on Apple Podcasts for more commentary and analysis from Brendan and Rebecca.
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And you can find coverage of all of today's news in the Apple News app. If you're already in the News app right now, stick around. We've got the episode of "In Conversation" that we talked about at the top, on the massive pollution problem of microplastics. That's cued up to play in just a moment. Enjoy the weekend. I'll be back with the news on Monday.
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