A school in the Russian town of Bolshoy Kamen has attracted a lot of criticism both from students and their parents after installing a camera surveillance system inside the girls’ toilet.

Many people view toilets as one of the few remaining places to enjoy privacy outside their homes, and even in the busiest of places. But if you are a girl studying at School no. 1 in Bolshoy Kamen, Russia, you can no longer enjoy privacy inside the toilet because of a three-camera surveillance system that feeds live footage straight to the security guard’s booth. Granted, the cameras don’t offer a view inside the toilet booths, but simply knowing that someone might be watching your every move in what is supposed to be the most private space in the school is disturbing, according to many students and their parents.

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As part of its ongoing efforts to integrate robotics into its gigantic warehouse operations, Amazon recently began experimenting with a bipedal robot called Digit that should be able the most repetitive tasks.

Amazon warehouse employees have long gotten used to working alongside robots, but staff at the company’s BFI1 experimental facility in Sumner are now getting familiarized with Digit, a new type of humanoid robot developed by Agility Robotics, a startup based in Corvallis, Oregon. Standing 5ft 9in (175cm) tall and weighing 143lb (65kg), Digit can walk forwards, backward, and sideways, and can also crouch if it needs to. Amazon’s new robot worker has two arms, two legs, a blue chest, and two square lights for eyes, and is currently tasked only with recycling the iconic yellow boxes once they have been emptied of inventory.

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Ruki, a tributary of the Congo River, has recently been dubbed the darkest river in the world, with water so dark that you can’t even see your face in front of you.

In what is considered the first-ever scientific study of the African river, scientists concluded that the dark-colored water is caused by the high levels of dissolved organic matter from the surrounding rainforest. Scientists found that the color is caused by carbon-rich compounds leached out of rotting plant matter and washed into the Ruki River by rainwater and floods. Dr Travis Drake, lead author of the recently published study, said that the Ruki is “essentially jungle tea” in which carbon-rich plant matter is brewed. The resulting coloration of the water makes the Ruki darker than the Rio Negro.

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Japanese men who carry mobile shrines known as mikoshi every year as part of important Shinto festivals are left with giant callouses on their shoulders that they display as badges of honor.

Carrying mikoshi shrines is considered a great honor among Japanese Shintoists, and while some may do it just once in their lives, the most dedicated of them actually help carry the mikoshi every year, for decades. Because these mobile shrines and the large wooden beams that support them can weigh over a ton, the pressure on the bearers’ shoulders is significant, and after years of service, the shoulders start to develop large callouses known as ‘mikoshi dako’. They are not the prettiest things in the world to look at, but mikoshi bearers wear them as badges of honor.

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A Lithuanian man has been arrested in Spain after allegedly faking heart attacks at 20 restaurants around the country in order to avoid paying the bill.

The unnamed 50-year-old man reportedly scammed at least 20 eateries, the majority of them in Spain’s Costa Blanca region, by theatrically faking a heart attack. After ordering food and drinks, he would put on an outrageous theatrical performance, clutching his chest and pretending to faint on the floor. The scam worked like a charm until one establishment owner saw right through the man’s act and started other local restaurants photos of him warning them not to fall for his heart-attack routine.

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China’s Qiantag River is famous for a unique natural phenomenon, a wavy pattern tide that was only observed for the first time in 2021 and has come to be known as fish scale tide.

The Qiantang River’s estuary in Zhejiang Province has long been famous for having the strongest tidal bores in the world. At times, they can get as tall as nine meters, which means the area regularly sees trains of large waves moving upstream against the normal current. However, in 2021, during a scientific expedition, researchers discovered another intriguing natural phenomenon unique to this estuary. When certain conditions are met, the tide comes in spiraling waves that look like fish scales on the water’s surface. The phenomenon hs become known as ‘fish scale tide’.

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A road leading to Bali’s Pandawa Beach that seems to split an entire plateau in half has sparked a heated online debate about the practicality of the project and its effect on local wildlife.

Featuring fine white sand and crystal-clear water, the picture-perfect beach of Pandawa was already one of Bali’s most beautiful seaside destinations, but the road dug into the limestone cliffs separating the beach from the rest of the island really catapulted it into the top tourist destinations on the island. Until only a decade ago, Pandawa Beach was only popular among locals, as the limestone cliffs secluded from foreigners’ eyes were notoriously hard to traverse. However, everything changed in 2012 when a road leading down to the beach was created by cutting through the cliffs. Today, that road has itself become somewhat of a tourist attraction in its own right, but also the topic of a heated debate.

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Chicago’s McCormick Place, the largest convention center in North America, was recently responsible for the deaths of at least 1,000 small birds that crashed into its thick glass walls.

According to the Chicago Bird Collision Monitors (CBCM), a volunteer conservation project dedicated to the protection of migratory birds, on October 5, the carcasses of at least 1,000 small birds, including  Tennessee warblers, hermit thrush, and American woodcocks were found around McCormick Place. They all died after colliding with the iconic building’s transparent glass walls, which birds simply cannot detect. The CBCM said that this was the highest number of crash-caused bird deaths that the group recorded from the grounds of one building in a single day. Unfortunately, the number of deaths may actually be much higher, because many birds continue to fly after suffering serious injuries only to die hours later.

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Chinese car manufacturer Chery came up with an unusual marketing pitch to promote its new eQ7 electric crossover – building a tower of cars to show how durable its aluminum body is.

China’s electric vehicle production is firing on all cylinders these days, and manufacturers are coming up with all kinds of marketing strategies to get a leg up on the competition. Take Chinese company Chery, whose new eQ7 electric car hit the local market last month. It is said to strike a good quality/price balance, has an intriguing design, and has an official driving range of 412-512 km on a fully charged battery. But the same can be said about many of its competitors, so in order to make it stand out, Chery decided to focus on the strength of its LFS aluminum body, by creating a tower of no less than seven eQ7s.

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A 27-year-old Brazilian woman tragically lost her life after experiencing poisoning symbols associated with a chocolate candy allegedly received from a gypsy woman who had allegedly predicted her early death.

Fernanda Silva Valoz da Cruz Pinto fell ill on August 3rd, experiencing severe stomach pains, vomiting, nosebleeds, and excessive salivation. She was rushed to Santa Casa de Misericórdia Hospital, but there was nothing doctors could do, and she died in the early hours of the following day. According to initial information provided by her family, Fernanda had told them that she had received a chocolate candy from a supposed gypsy fortune teller in the center of Maceió City who had also predicted that she would die very soon. She ate the candy that very same day, then fell ill and started experiencing poisoning symptoms.

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For the past five months, the people of Pravia, a town in Spain’s Asturias Region, have been under constant siege from flocks of crows who mindlessly attack their homes and vehicles.

The town of Pravia has no less than six crows proudly displayed on its historic coat of arms, so it’s safe to say that people here have been living in harmony with the birds for centuries. That is not the case anymore, however, as large flocks of blackbirds now attack the homes and vehicles of human residents for some unknown reason. The people of Pravia started reporting groups of birds mindlessly flying into their windows repeatedly until the impact caused them to bleed in May of this year, and things have been getting worse ever since. No one knows exactly why the crows are targeting people’s homes and vehicles, but they are relentless in their attacks, pecking at and flying into windows until they start to bleed.

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Gregory ‘Iron Guts’ Barlow holds the Guinness record for most Carolina reaper Peppers eaten in a single sitting, 160. The Carolina Reaper is the world’s hottest chili pepper, by far.

Melbourne-based Greg Barlow doesn’t even like eating chili peppers or hot sauce, but he loves the attention it earns him, and he’s willing to put his stomach on the line for it. After getting acquainted with the burning sensation of eating one or more Carolina Reapers, Barlow approached the League of Fire, an organization that ranks the most badass chili eaters on the planet in various categories. One of the toughest challenges any competitive hot pepper eater can undertake is eating the most Carolina Reaper peppers in one sitting, but Iron Guts Barlow went straight for it, in his quest to become world champion.

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China’s online store is becoming increasingly dominated by AI-powered clones that never tire of trying to sell you things and can literally work 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

The Chinese online shopping scene is very different than what we’re used to in the West. Live streaming is by far the most lucrative marketing channel these days, with popular influencers on platforms like Taobao and Douyin able to close massive deals in just a few hours every day. However, these crazy achievements come at a cost for businesses and brands. It takes time and money to train a great online seller, and there is nothing stopping them from reaching an agreement with competitors, leaving you no option but to restart the process. Having camera crews and assistants around during the live stream also adds to the expenditures, and last, but definitely not least, every top influencer has to sleep at some point. That’s where AI-powered avatars come in…

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Japan’s population is aging at an accelerated pace, so it’s no surprise that the country now has its own old boy band, with members aged between 65 and 87.

G-Pop, a play on the Japanese word ‘Ojii-san’ for ‘old man’, is not your average boy band. J-Pop and K-Pop groups like most other boy bands, are primarily aimed at teenagers and young adults so the usual recipe for success is finding good-looking young men who can also dance and maybe have some sort of musical talent. G-Pop, on the other hand, is targeting Japan’s older population, so they are actually old men in their 60s through 80s. The Kochi Prefecture-based music troupe made its professional debut seven years ago, it’s been busy putting a positive spin on the country’s rapidly aging population ever since.

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The aptly named Methuselah, a lungfish at the Steinhart Aquarium in San Francisco, is the oldest fish held in captivity, with an estimated age between 92 and 101 years.

Methuselah arrived on US soil in 1938, on a steamboat from Australia, along with 230 other fish. Today, she – scientists believe it’s a female, although they can’t be sure – is the only living fish out of all the ones that left the steamboat. She was only a little fish back then, but she kept growing as the years passed and the aquarium life seemed to suit her. The people peering at her through the glass wall didn’t seem to stress her out one bit, and she still enjoys peering back at visitors to this day. She was originally given the unofficial title of oldest fish in captivity back in 2017, when experts estimated her age at 84. However, more recent tests showed that Methuselah is even older than previously anticipated – at least 92 years old and up to 101.

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