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👋 Good morning, and maybe give some grace today. You can follow the lead of the judge who dismissed a $4.8k claim a Vancouver woman filed over a dog bite, saying “every dog is entitled to one bite.” While the mini Aussie Shepherd involved in the case may enjoy that sentiment, insurers probably won’t love it — in the US alone, they paid out $1.56B in dog-related liability claims last year. Still gonna side with the dogs (and the judge) on this one.

🎧 On the pod: Josh Muccio from ‘The Pitch’ podcast with advice on pitching and securing funds for your business.

NEWS FLASH

A life-sized Gundam statue. (Photo by Zhou You/VCG via Getty Images)

🚨 Act cool, the computers are watching: French security startup Veesion raised $43m to expand its IRL Minority Report operation in the shoplifting-happy US. The company has developed AI-driven software that analyzes retailers’ surveillance videos to “detect suspicious movements in real time” and help them prevent theft. Veesion isn’t just a narc; the startup’s tech could theoretically also help stores with something like identifying spills.

👀 Are you ready to be able to see in the dark? That isn’t a hypothetical question; scientists at the University of Science and Technology of China developed contact lenses they claim will help people turn infrared light into visible light. A senior researcher said their work “opens up the potential for non-invasive wearable devices to give people super-vision,” which both sounds very cool and like an eventual reckoning for the global ~$200B eyewear market. In addition to helping you not stub your damn toe on the damn bed frame again, researchers believe the lenses could help people with color blindness to see colors.

🤖 Attention anime fans: Japanese toy company Bandai is opening the Bandai Hobby Center Plamo Design Industrial Institute Museum in September in its new Shizuoka factory. Guests will be able to watch how Gunpla — plastic model kits depicting characters from the Gundam franchise — are made and design their own. Gundam kicked off in 1979 with the TV show “Mobile Suit Gundam” and Bandai has been making its kits since the 1980s, but demand has increased in recent years with 50% of sales originating outside of Japan.

MORE NEWS TO KNOW

Look what you made her do: Taylor Swift bought back the masters for her first six albums, which record label Big Machine sold to music exec Scooter Braun in 2019 and which Braun sold to private equity firm Shamrock Capital for $300m. Swift now owns all of her music whereas before, she could only rerecord her albums — hence her "(Taylor's Version)" releases.
In weirder celebrity entrepreneurship news, actress Sydney Sweeney has partnered with men’s soap brand Dr. Squatch to sell soap containing her bathwater. Sydney’s Bathwater Bliss will be available online for a limited time at $8 per bar.
Paris Saint-Germain took the UEFA Champions League crown over the weekend, which is Europe’s top soccer trophy, sure, but also its most lucrative: with the win, the team’s Champions League haul ballooned to an estimated $170m.

DO YOU COPY?

Nail your copywriting hooks

As people who rearrange words for a living, let us just say, AI wants to be us sooo bad, y’all.

But when it comes to connecting with people, no bot holds a dang candle to the things your brain can cook up.

Best advice we can give you:

Follow time-tested frameworks. Start with these tips from our founder/copywriting legend Sam Parr.
Find lanes of proven inspiration. Start a swipe file and fill it with a treasure trove of content.
Be yourself, sound natural. All that English you’ve soaked up over decades, going through school, scrolling Twitter, sitting on the train, singing along to banger albums… use all of it.

Really though, Sam’s quick-hitting playbook has the whip-smart tips you need to win. Read on for 20 proper copywriting principles, plus five books that shaped The Hustle’s voice.

Craft killer copy

THE BIG IDEA

Ready your inbox: The brands are coming to Substack

That tech bro with the inspirational quotes, your old English lit professor, and that girl from your hometown trying to make it as an influencer — they’re all on Substack.

In fact, it feels like everyone has a newsletter these days (we were here first!).

And the latest adopters aren’t individuals at all, but brands, per Digiday:

Fashion retailer American Eagle recently launched its free Substack newsletter, Off the Cuff, in order to engage with Gen Z customers.
The newsletter will include internet trends — the first edition included a section on the popularity of jorts — and will be guest edited by Casey Lewis, the writer of the After School newsletter (meaning cross-promotion with her 74k subscribers).

American Eagle joins fashion brands The RealReal and Tory Burch as well as beauty brands Saie and Rare Beauty on the newsletter platform.

So far, some are finding success: Saie saw 20% month-over-month growth in Substack subscribers this year.

Why newsletters?

Because brands will do anything to cozy up to customers. And for many beauty and fashion brands, their customers are on Substack.

On Substack, 24% of the audience falls into the age 25-34 demographic — the highest audience share by age, according to Similarweb.
Readers ages 18-24 account for 11.4% of the platform’s audience.

And while brands have already been present on the platform in the form of sponsored posts and founder accounts, this new wave of launches is mixing media with marketing.

Newsletters aren’t the only way…

… that brands are getting experimental. They’re doing just about anything to reach new customers.

Roblox is opening its Commerce APIs to creators and brands with Shopify as its first partner. The new initiative will allow Shopify merchants to sell physical products inside of gaming experiences.

And, of course, we can’t forget all the metaverse fuss. While it feels like we’re still waiting for the trend to pan out, the global metaverse market in fashion is estimated to grow by $19.8B between 2025-2029.

So keep a lookout in your inboxes for more communication from your favorite brands — just promise to never replace us.

🔗

NEWSWORTHY NUMBER

What you’d need to pony up to dig through the ditches, burn through the witches, and slam in the back of your dragula in the shared driveway of the Hollywood Hills compound musician Rob Zombie is selling.

The property consists of two midcentury-modern homes, listed individually for $5.6m and $3.4m. The larger three-bed, three-bath home has a pool that flows beneath the home, which is very cool, and a two-vehicle carport for storing said dragula.

Fun fact: Rob Zombie was born Robert Bartleh Cummings, but adopted the name Zombie — obviously much cooler — from the 1932 horror film White Zombie, after which he named his band.

AROUND THE WEB

📅 On this day: In 1886, Grover Cleveland became the first sitting US president to marry in the White House. By his presidency’s end, he had two children.

📻 That’s cool: Free online radio stations.

🤖 Heads up: HubSpot AiSummit is coming to San Francisco on June 11. You can request a spot here (please put The Hustle in the “Referred By” field so they know we sent you and can treat you like the royalty you are).

📏 Haha: Not sure why anyone needs an entire website dedicated to various celebrities’ heights, but… here you go.

🐑 Aww: Sheep zoomies.

QUOTE OF NOTE

Heading (1199 x 700 px) (1199 x 700 px) (1199 x 450 px) (1199 x 550 px) (3)-1

Fake news: Last week, ahead of a major holiday weekend, Google Maps falsely indicated that much of the German highway system was closed, displaying a map littered with red stop signs, which one social media user quipped made it look a bit pubescent.

What caused it is unclear — Google couldn’t explain the conundrum — but some speculate AI hallucinations could be behind the mess.

SHOWER THOUGHT

Raisins are just grape jerky. SOURCE

Today's email was brought to you by Juliet Bennett Rylah, Sara Friedman, and Singdhi Sokpo.
Editing by: Ben "Every dog is entitled to one smooch" Berkley.

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