Italy, Canned Tuna & Tariffs
This Week in Rewiew: Meta Might Drop $10 Billion on this company | Venice, Tuscany, Portofino, Bellagio and Capri | Your campbell soup might get a lot more expensive | US and China meet in London
Quick Bites:
Big Tech: Meta Might Drop $10 Billion on Scale AI- Here’s Why Everyone’s Watching.
Meta is reportedly eyeing a $10 billion investment into Scale AI, the startup that quietly powers the brains behind AI giants like OpenAI, Bloomberg reports.
If this deal closes, it would be Meta’s biggest AI splurge ever- and one of the largest private company investments in tech history.
🧠 What’s Scale AI?
Basically the data wizard behind the scenes. They label and train the massive datasets that teach AI to see, read, and think.
i.e They're the reason your chatbot doesn’t confuse a cat with a croissant
👀 Why is Meta doing this?
Internal delays on its flagship AI model (yes, it’s called Behemoth)
Top AI talent walking out faster than interns post-summer
Rival open-source models like Mistral and LLaMA-2 are catching up
TL;DR: Zuck's like, “Fiine, I’ll buy the damn cheat code”
Our Thoughts:
📈 What this means: Meta isn’t just chasing GPT-level fame guys- it’s literally straight up BUYING the infrastructure to catch up fast.
This move could reshape who holds the power in AI, and yeah… it’s giving Big Tech Hunger Games. Do or DIE.
Travel: Venice, Tuscany, Portofino, Bellagio, Capri.. Italy braces for record tourists this year, CNBC reports.
Italy.. the only country where doing nothing, or as they call it, "Dolce far niente" is not laziness; it's an effing lifestyle.
Sitting in a piazza, sipping an Aperol Spritz, and eating pasta is a national pastime. Stress? NOT HERE
Italians: We may not have the luck of the Irish but we do have delicious food, excellent wine and extreme sexiness. And that's all that really matters.
Meanwhile, dudes on Instagram after eating 1 garlic breadstick from Dominoes:
"Honey, I think I'm Italian"
Key Highlights:
-In 2024, Italy welcomed a record-breaking 68.5 million international tourists
-This surge helped Italy surpass pre‑pandemic levels and reach its most attractive hospitality investment profile in Europe
-Venice has implemented a €5 entrance fee for day-trippers on peak days since April 2024; places like Florence and Lake Como are also introducing visitor caps and tourist taxes to protect locals
-Summer 2025 is already in full swing with national tourism $17 billion in travel-related spending this year
The Jubilee Year is expected to draw an additional 35 million visitors between June and September
Rome alone may see 32 million to 35 million pilgrims throughout 2025 due to Jubilee pilgrimages
-A 2025 Cultural Tourism analysis showed Italy boasts the most UNESCO World Heritage sites globally, with 58 sites attracting over half a million online reviews
-Foreign tourist spending in 2023 hit a record €51.4 billion, up 19% year-over-year, signaling strong economic impact
Our Thoughts:
Italian People Cliches that are actually true:
-Casual Fridays? No such thing in Italy. Italians are born wearing Gucci and Prada
-The only country where pasta is considered a suitable breakfast. The only debate more heated than politics is whether Spaghetti Carbonara should have cream (PS. It should NOT, according to locals)
-Expresso is the equivalent of water. They drink it like it's a prescription.
-Nonna's opinion is gospel: If you date an Italian dude, prepare to be interrogated by the entire family. No pressure ladies
-Italian men are NOT mafia. We are currently in Italy and in no part is it anything like a Sopranos episode!
Food: Your canned soup might get more expensive, thanks to new tariffs.
Canned goods: long-time MVP of lazy dinners, last-minute prep, and “I’ll cook tomorrow” promises. But now, even they aren't safe from inflation and geopolitics.
The US just slapped a 50% tariff on a specific kind of sheet steel- the kind that's mostly imported and, you guessed it, used to make food cans.
i.e Your tuna, beans, and Campbell’s comfort food just got a whole lot pricier
📈 What’s the damage?
Prices of canned goods could jump up to 15%, according to industry estimates.
Around 20,000 domestic manufacturing jobs in the canned food sector could be on the chopping block if consumers cut back.
🛒 Your grocery cart after tariffs hit: Avocados: $3, Canned chickpeas: $4.50… Financial anxiety: PRICLESS
🛠️ Why this is happening:
The steel in question is called tinplate, a super-thin, corrosion-resistant steel used in everything from soup cans to tomato paste tins. The US doesn’t make enough of it domestically, so most of it is imported.
It's part of a broader “protect American industry” push.. Except the American food can industry is saying: “we’re literally the industry you're protecting, and this hurts us.”
It’s a classic case of economic whiplash: a policy meant to help US steel producers might unintentionally tank American food manufacturers- and your pantry.
Our Thoughts: This is how we see it guys:
That 89¢ can of corn may soon cost $1.05
Canned food = no longer the budget hack it used to be
20,000 jobs = hanging in the balance like a lone bean in a half-empty can
Overall: If your dinner plans involve “just opening a tomato can and heating it up,” now might be the time to stock up like it’s March 2020 guys 🧃💀
Tech: Apple shows “Liquid Glass” at WWDC, The Verge reports.
New UI drop: Liquid Glass
Think “see-through visuals” for a more seamless, futuristic feel across your Apple devices.
What does this Liquid Glass do? :
Real-time language translation for calls + messages
Seamless ChatGPT integrations
Enter: Genmoji + Image Playground
(Yes, AI is now designing your emoji vibe.)New Games App launched
Casual gamers, your home screen just got an upgrade.
It also showed other innovations, including leveraging Apple Intelligence for live language translations on messages and calls, Genmoji and Image Playground integrations with ChatGPT, and a new Games app.
Preceding the event, Apple dropped an AI study that found that large reasoning models' accuracy declined as complexity increased, The Verge reports.
Quicker Bites:
U.S. & China meet in London: Top officials, including US Treasury Secretary Bessent and China's Vice Premier He met,
📈 Global markets rebound: Equity indices in the U.S., Asia, and Europe pulled higher this week after two days of positive trade talk sentiment.
🧱 G7’s 50th anniversary: Leaders are gathering in Alberta this week to tackle issues spanning Ukraine, global tariffs, and climate.
🎭 Trump-Musk drama hits Wall Street: Elon Musk’s call for Trump’s impeachment triggered a 14% tumble in Tesla’s stock, highlighting the ongoing volatility between politics and markets.
🛂 LA protests escalate: In response to aggressive federal immigration sweeps, police in downtown Los Angeles declared an unlawful assembly amid fires, tear gas, and National Guard deployment.