🐤 Swift inspiration

🏦 Markets: Despite a mid-week hiccup, Wall Street wrapped up the week with a pretty solid record. All three major indexes registered gains on Friday, led by the 2+% increase by the Nasdaq Composite, which, along with the S&P 500, chalked up its best week since November.

For the S&P, it was the first weekly gain in three weeks. The Nasdaq hadn’t seen a positive week in more than a month.

📺 Bye-bye barfly: Cartoon characters have a uniquely immortal quality, but every once in a while a death is written into an episode, often to generate buzz about an aging series (i.e. Brian’s short-lived exit from “Family Guy”). After 35 years on the air, “The Simpsons” is making headlines for its decision to kill off a frequently seen but seldom heard character: Larry “the Barfly” Dalrymple. He keeled over in the latest episode, “Cremains of the Day,” and sparked a flurry of social media tributes from longtime fans of the groundbreaking animated comedy.

🐕 Building anticipation: A walk down the Lego aisle of your local Walmart will reveal a seemingly endless array of collaborations, and two new crossover sets are sparking some significant excitement ahead of their launch on Aug. 1. Social media posts this week teased the two “Animal Crossing” sets — a Town Hall and a Dodo Airlines airport — as well as a minifigure of the game’s ubiquitous singing dog K.K. Slider. Additional details about their size and price weren’t available, but existing Animal Crossing sets range from about $15 to $75.

🤧 It’s finally over: Widespread mask use and limited public gatherings during the pandemic correlated with a deeply reduced rate of influenza infections, but the spread came back strong last year. Although the number of cases and the severity of the strain weren’t particularly alarming, the season lasted longer than usual. More than six months after it started, experts say the reduced number of medical visits due to the virus in recent weeks indicates the lengthy flu season has come to an end after at least 34 million illnesses and 24,000 deaths.

🏈 Draft kings: The upcoming NFL season began to take shape on Thursday with draft selections in Detroit. As expected, quarterbacks dominated the early selections, led by Caleb Williams as the Chicago Bears’ #1 pick. LSU QB Jayden Davis followed — he’s going to the Washington Commanders — and the New England Patriots’ pick of North Carolina standout Drake Maye rounded out the top three. Three other quarterbacks were selected in the first dozen picks and a league-high 23 offensive players received a nod during the draft.

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Pop superstar Taylor Swift shattered even more records with her recent double album “The Tortured Poets Department,” and she’s not the only one cashing in on its success.

Piggybacking on popularity

Just as the sale of jerseys and other related items spiked after news surfaced of Swift’s relationship with Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce last year, the new album has provided an opportunity for a wide array of lucrative enterprises. So far, much of it has come in the form of vendors hawking their creations on social media.

Duane Swenk announced a line of soaps inspired by Swift’s entire career, telling his TikTok followers that there’s a new addition appropriately called “Tortured Poet.”

Describing it as having “notes of black tea, bergamot, and lemon,” he said it’s a “perfectly moody” accompaniment to the latest album. And with nearly 1.5 million views in the first week, it’s clear there’s a market for this kind of stuff.

Other examples include:

• Yarn featuring colors inspired by Swift’s library of albums
• Cookies decorated with images from the star’s career
• Friendship bracelets commemorating her latest tour

And most of these items are being sold online by small-scale creators using platforms like Etsy. Trend expert Dayna Isom Johnson remarked: “I mean, talk about bringing people together, and talk about really amplifying creativity.”

What does Taylor think?

Even though these items aren’t licensed and the profit isn’t directly benefiting her, there’s some evidence that Swift (who’s a billionaire, by the way) doesn’t mind.

More than a decade ago, she said she appreciates the way her fans are “constantly just showing [her] love in different ways.”

And law professor Jennifer Rothman noted that there’s no evidence she is challenging these unauthorized sales in court, adding: “Taylor Swift only benefits, I think, from having all this fan enthusiasm.”

The legislative effort to force Chinese-owned ByteDance to sell TikTok or face a U.S. ban on the social media app has attracted bipartisan support on Capitol Hill and received a signature from President Joe Biden. But it’s not the only company with ties to China that has been targeted by lawmakers.

What is DJI?

It might not be a household name like TikTok, but members of the House Energy and Commerce Committee are considering a bill that could similarly threaten DJI’s ability to sell its line of drones in the U.S. Like ByteDance, this company is being singled out specifically due to the fact that it is based in China.

Using the acronym for the Chinese Communist Party, the “Countering CCP Drones Act” seeks to include aircraft manufactured by DJI in a list of products and services that “pose a national security risk” and are prohibited from operating on American networks under a 2019 Federal Communications Commission law.

Chinese-owned tech companies Huawei and ZTE are among those already on the list.

A little background

The proposed legislation predates the latest effort to ban TikTok and was initially introduced in 2022 by U.S. Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY). She has maintained that DJI shares data concerning “critical infrastructure” from within the U.S. with the Chinese government.

“DJI presents an unacceptable national security risk, and it is past time that drones made by Communist China are removed from America.”

The company was on the U.S. government’s radar for years before the bill was drafted, having been the subject of action by the Departments of Commerce, Treasury, and Defense.

Like TikTok, however, DJI rejects the accusations against it, calling the latest bill “inaccurate and unsubstantiated” and declaring that its language has “amplified xenophobic narratives.”

Cigarettes, chewing tobacco, and vaping have each faced their own waves of backlash that have, to varying extents, decimated their cultural popularity. And some of the biggest companies in the tobacco industry have shifted their attention to new ways to deliver nicotine that appear to be less harmful to users.

Somewhere near the top of that list is Zyn, but there’s growing concern about how this product is marketed and who’s actually using it.

The new nicotine

Philip Morris, the company behind Marlboro and many other cigarette brands, is also responsible for Zyn. If you aren’t familiar with it (or competitors like On), here’s a brief introduction:

• It starts with a small pouch containing a nicotine powder
• Flavors include mint, citrus, and coffee
• The pouch is placed between the lips and gum
• Nicotine is absorbed directly into the bloodstream
• Unlike chewing tobacco, no spitting is required

Without the need for smoke or tobacco, it’s easy to make the argument that this is a preferable, if not exactly healthy, way to use nicotine. As such, it’s no surprise that products like Zyn represent the industry’s fastest growing segment.

Only for adults

Tobacco companies got in trouble for marketing campaigns that regulators said targeted kids, so Zyn has been clear that it’s intended for adults.

Of course, that doesn’t mean kids aren’t tempted to try it … and that has sparked mounting concerns about the widespread popularity of the product.

Stats show far more middle- and high-school students vape than use these pouches, but there’s been a spike in social media posts in which kids can be seen popping a Zyn in their mouths.

Combined with evidence that they contain low levels of potentially harmful substances, there’s plenty of investigation needed before Zyn can be seen as a “safe” smoking alternative.