💼 One job is three too few

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👋 Good morning to you, and to all those colleagues out there who haven’t yet met in person. Until this weekend, they had great company: Despite running in the same circles for the last 40+ years, two of rock’s most legendary frontmen, Axl Rose of Guns N' Roses and Ozzy Osbourne of Black Sabbath, had never crossed paths. That changed backstage at a farewell show for the retiring Osbourne and both geeked out on social media afterward. May your eventual meeting with Joe from accounting end with a similar outpouring of love.

🎧 On the pod: Mark Cuban’s last “Shark Tank” investment: A restaurant that only sells deviled eggs.

NEWS FLASH

Patrons seated in a movie theater, watching a film.

🍿 It’s showtime… in 25-30 minutes: Movie studios are pissed at AMC Theatres, per Deadline, as America’s largest theater chain is extending its pre-show collection of trailers and advertisements. AMC ticket buyers now receive a more prominent notice to allow up to 30 minutes after the listed showtime for a lengthier, more ad-filled pre-film slog, putting the chain more on par with the commercial barrage from rivals Regal and Cinemark. Studios fear moviegoers will start skipping their trailers altogether, but AMC has a more pressing problem: its $4B+ debt load.

🪱 The early funder gets the worm: India’s Loopworm secured a $3.25m round to produce more silkworm-based proteins. The startup has engineered silkworms that generate complex proteins for pet food and aquaculture, and it will now broaden out to biopharma, agriculture, and hopefully not our dinner plates anytime too soon. We just need a little more time to emotionally prepare for that one.

👟 Shoes on? One of the most annoying parts about flying out of a US airport may be changing. TSA will reportedly let passengers keep their shoes on while moving through security checkpoints at select airports, with a government source telling NBC News that the new protocol could expand nationwide. Passengers have had to remove their shoes since 2006 due to concerns over explosives. In 2001, Richard Reid boarded a plane with 10 ounces of explosive materials in his shoes, but was unable to detonate them. He is now serving a life sentence in prison.

MORE NEWS TO KNOW

A big spill: Even one of the biggest names in whiskey, Macallan, can’t reverse the liquor business’s declining fortunes, as Macallan’s parent company, Edrington, reported a 26% dip in its profits over Q1.
Kraft Heinz is recalling 360k+ pounds of its turkey bacon due to possible listeria contamination. No illnesses have been reported yet. There’s been an uptick in listeria-related recalls in the US, with 65 in 2024 compared to 47 in 2023.
Moonvalley has released its AI video generation model, Marey, to the public. Users pay for credits, and can generate clips up to five seconds long. Notably, the model was trained on openly licensed data to help its users avoid future lawsuits.

SOUNDS LIKE A PLAN

AI does the planning. You get the strategy.

Feed our new AI marketing planner a few crumbs about your business, and watch it make a marketing plan that slaps.

Built for speed and personalized to your business context, with original research and data-backed insights that make it worth your time.

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Fill out a very short form.
Let the trained AI analyze your business, look into competitors, and establish your next best steps.
Take a few to reflect + have a little treat + begin to pivot.

T-minus ~3 mins until you’re nodding along to finely-tuned tactics, and flabbergasted at the fact it’s free.

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THE BIG IDEA

A man rubs his face, looking exhausted, as he sits at a desk in front of several computers.

Is it wrong to work four jobs?

Soham Parekh is the latest tech legend, but whether he’s a villain, hero, or something else is up for debate.

Parekh came to prominence after Suhail Doshi, founder of Playground AI, posted to X that his company had hired Parekh, but fired him in his first week after realizing he was juggling multiple jobs.

Doshi wrote that he told him to stop “lying” and “scamming,” but that Parekh was still at it. Sure enough, other founders began replying that they, too, had hired Parekh, with many also firing him after realizing he was moonlighting.

Parekh guested on the TBPN podcast, where he admitted that while he wasn’t proud of it, he had simultaneously worked multiple jobs due to “extremely dire financial circumstances.”

Was he at least good at it?

Not really, apparently, but what human could crush four jobs at once?

Digger CEO Igor Zalutski told Business Insider that he’d interviewed Parekh and found him to be a “genuinely brilliant engineer” in the “top 0.1%,” but employers who hired him struggled with his chaotic availability and poor performance.

Parekh admitted he was working 140 hours per week without AI or hired help, just good ol’ sleep deprivation. At this point, it sounds like winning “Squid Game” may have been easier.

But was it unethical?

Opinions are mixed, with some obviously finding it wrong to lie to employers and snatch up positions and others finding him kind of a boss.

Regardless, juggling white-collar jobs has trended upward since the pandemic and the rise of remote work:

In India, moonlighting increased by 25%-30% between 2020 and 2023, per The Times. AuthBridge, a background verification firm, found that of the 5% of applicants who were discovered to hold multiple jobs, 90% of those were in the tech sector.
The r/overemployed subreddit has 451k members, all asking for advice and sharing tips on managing and occasionally hiding multiple jobs.

But while six-figure tech workers are getting all this attention, blue-collar workers have long juggled multiple jobs across shifts to make ends meet.

As of January, 5.4% of working Americans had more than one job, a number that’s increased since the pandemic.

As for Parekh, he intends to focus on his current job exclusively though, due to his continued financial issues, may ask his employers if he can add one more.

🔗

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED

Can’t find an affordable car anywhere? You’re not the only one. The $25k car has gone extinct. Here’s why.

NEWSWORTHY NUMBER

Share of US adults who consider buying American-made goods either very or extremely important, per a Sales Factory survey of 150k US consumers.

But age and price both play a role: Gen Z cares the least, with just 35% deeming it an important factor. Fifty-one percent of respondents said they wouldn’t pay more than a 10% premium for a US-made item while 26% would refuse to pay any extra.

HOW YOU HUSTLE

Let’s check in on what you’re building. Here’s our weekly spotlight on a Hustle reader working on something big.

Who: Mikey Schumacher

What: but cute

Elevator pitch: “but cute creates high-quality and unique plush toys designed to celebrate imperfections.”

Why: “We are building a universe where emotional imperfections become superpowers, using plush toys and storytelling to turn feelings like anxiety, grumpiness, or self doubt into something kids and adults can laugh with, connect to, and proudly celebrate.”

Big win: “I entered the University of Southern California's biggest startup competition with 207 other startups and we took first place and won both fan favorite awards and walked away with $38.5k of equity-free funding.”

Advice for fellow entrepreneurs: “Be strategic about who you tell what because people don't want you to fail and they will crush your passion for an idea by over analyzing everything. I knew that if I told people I was going to build a plush toy company everyone would say ‘it's such a crowded market,’ ‘but what about all of the big players,’ etc. So I really didn't tell anyone until we had traction and then suddenly everyone thought it was a great idea.”

Want to be featured here? Tell us how you’re hustling.

AROUND THE WEB

📅 On this day: In 1962, Bob Dylan recorded “Blowin’ in the Wind,” a now iconic song he claimed to have penned in 10 minutes.

🧮 That’s cool: A crowd size estimation tool.

🗞️ Newsletter: The Daily Upside offers news for CFOs, fund managers, and power players. Sign up for free.

👆 Haha: Here are some random fingers.

🐱 Aww: Surprise.

QUOTE OF NOTE

"You should only tip if you feel you got your money's worth and then some."

Today’s tipping culture can be confusing — but for Uber riders, there might now be a little more clarity around what’s expected of them. CEO Dara Khosrowshahi recently told CBS Sunday Morning that tipping is a “personal choice” that’s “entirely optional” for the app’s users.

Currently just ~20% of Uber riders tip their drivers, per Business Insider, though Khosrowshahi says that’s increasing. And since we already knew tipping was optional (thanks for nothing), that means you’ll still have to navigate the social pressure of potentially being that one stingy jerk.

SHOWER THOUGHT

There are no nights in outer space. SOURCE

Today's email was brought to you by Juliet Bennett Rylah, Sara Friedman, and Singdhi Sokpo.
Editing by: Ben "Could crush .4 jobs at once" Berkley.

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