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Water world. Welcome back, FutureParty people. Here’s some fun fodder for your Monday morning meeting: NASA recently discovered the possibility of life 120 light years away on an exoplanet called K2-18 b, and we’re already packing our bags. With the help of the James Webb Telescope, researchers were able to detect a molecule (dimethyl sulfide) that only living organisms on Earth can produce — suggesting the distant world could be home to a massive body of water.
It looks like we just found our next vacay spot. 🚀🌴
In other news… Gen Z rethinks college, NFTs enter the Dark Ages, and MGM Resorts go vishing.
Top Trends
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CULTURE
Throwing college to the winds // Illustration by Kate Walker
Gen Z’s got qualms with college
The Future. In the past decade, college tuition costs have dramatically risen, while graduates’ ability to pay for them hasn’t. As a result, many college-age Americans are rethinking college or even skipping it entirely. The decision may save students from mountains of debt, but it could doom many universities.
All work and no play
Exorbitant costs and a job market threatened by AI have forced Gen Z to re-evaluate the college experience.
While college tuition rose an average of 12% per year from 2010 to 2022, financial prospects for graduates have hardly changed in the past fifty years, with a third of recent grads earning less than their high school-educated peers.
To afford school, students are flocking to “practical degrees” that reliably lead to high-paying jobs like computer science, engineering, and business.
Some are also skipping college altogether. College enrollment dropped by four million in 2022 compared to 2012, with many preferring cheaper MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses).
School’s out, forever
As enrollment lowers, schools will suffer. While the most prestigious are probably safe, hundreds of private universities will be more susceptible to closure over the next few years.
But hey, that’s just business.
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CRYPTO
An NFT in the hand is worth… nothing
NFTs are falling off a cliff
The Future. While the most popular cryptocurrencies have stabilized in value since their crash in 2022, NFTs have plummeted in value ever since. Supporters of the technology argue NFTs can help creators support themselves, but so far, their value has mostly depended on hype. If no one can prove they’re worth more than that, NFTs may soon be gone for good.
Now Faring Terribly
NFTs (and all things related to them) are facing hard times.
In the past 18 months, NFTs’ monthly trading volume dropped 81%, and monthly sales declined 61%.
NFT marketplaces and media platforms are dying, too. Recur, the marketplace backed by billionaire Steve Cohen, and the NFT social media platform, Nifty, have both closed, while Blur, a popular NFT marketplace, has lost 96% of its sales volume since June.
Even the most successful creators have struggled ever since OpenSea made the payment of royalties on secondary sales optional.
The long way down
This slump could become death. The SEC just took its first action against NFT vendors, claiming NFTs are really unregistered securities. That crackdown could crash the party for good. Even auction houses and NFT vendors are abandoning the term “NFTs” in favor of “digital art” because that label isn’t contaminated by association with scams.
Bye bye, Bored Apes.
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How can everyday investors benefit from Banksy’s market soaring 63%?
For the last 20 years (2003 to 2023), record prices for Banksy’s paintings have grown at a compounded rate of 63.8% annually, according to publicly available auction data. In plain English, that means Banksy’s market has been historically impressive. And nowadays, it’s not just the ultra-wealthy benefiting from this phenomenal growth…
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Shares of offerings are limited and can sell out in minutes. Luckily, FutureParty readers skip the waitlist here.*
*Past performance is not indicative of future returns. Investing involves risk. Important Regulation A disclosures at masterworks.com/cd.
BUSINESS
Hackers gamble on vishing // Illustration by Kate Walker
The MGM casino hack may have started with a phone call
The Future. Last week, MGM Resorts, whose portfolio encompasses 31 hotel and gaming destinations around the world, reported a “cybersecurity issue” that wreaked havoc on its systems, forcing the company to downshift into manual mode to stay operational (think hand-written receipts). While there’s been no official confirmation of who hacked MGM or how, the supposed method, “vishing,” or gaining access to a system through a phone call, is a social engineering technique that many companies fall prey to. If the MGM hack has exposed the most vulnerable area of cybersecurity, it may be human nature... in other words, our gullibility.
Big con artist energy
Apparently, all it took was one convincing phone call to MGM’s IT help desk for hackers to obtain access to the company’s systems, according to Vox.
Hackers can learn a lot about a system, company, or employee just from what’s publicly available online. They don’t need more than LinkedIn profile information to pull off a believable impersonation.
A vishing attack can be as simple as picking up the phone and making a request (like a password reset) with a sense of authority or urgency. Companies without verification processes to prove a caller is who they say they are might be the most vulnerable.
Rather than phishing, which is done through email, vishing appears to be the easier and more effective way to breach an organization. A 2022 IBM report discovered phishing attacks that included phone calls were three times more successful than those that didn’t.
Sneak attack
Most industries are no strangers to ransomware attacks, but many companies still overlook vishing in their employee cybersecurity training and fail to check for vulnerabilities in their systems.
Once they realize one good social engineering technique is enough to crush even the best defenses, they can better protect themselves... and we, the consumers.
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Buy a really fancy panini press
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Highlights
The best curated daily stories from around the web
Media, Music, & Entertainment
Advance ticket sales for the Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour concert movie have passed the $65 million mark, eclipsing the US-Canada advance ticket sales for superhero movies like Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness and The Batman. Read More → deadline
Some TV shows are returning to production after feeling pressure from staff who’ve been sidelined due to the writers strike (which is approaching its fifth month). Read More → axios
NSYNC will release a song from Dreamworks’ Trolls Band Together soundtrack on Friday, September 29th — their first new music in over 20 years. Read More → hypebeast
Fashion & E-Commerce
US retail sales were up 0.6% in August as consumers shelled out for cat accessories, wellness services, and Halloween products despite lingering recession fears. Read More → forbes
Roots will launch an exclusive apparel and doll collection with Barbie to celebrate the Canadian lifestyle brand’s 50th anniversary. Read More → hypebeast
The pandemic impacted US alcohol consumption in some unusual ways, from the meteoric rise of the ready-to-drink cocktail to the demise of the downtown happy hour. Read More → fastcompany
Tech, Web3, & AI
Mark Zuckerberg might now be the world’s tenth-richest person (a demotion from third place), but he’s still worth $108 billion, almost all of which comes from Meta stock. Read More → insider
X’s rebrand isn’t catching on, as Louis Vuitton, Jimmy Choo, and Warner Bros. Entertainment are among the many users who can’t (or won’t?) stop calling the newly renamed platform “Twitter.” Read More → adage
Elon Musk, Walter Isaacson’s first biography of a tech giant since Steve Jobs, reports Hollywood super-agent Ari Emanuel told Musk he would run Twitter for $100 million — an idea Musk quickly dismissed. Read More → theverge
Creator Economy
Neutrogena is taking an educational approach to its TikTok videos, with a mix of paid and organic content and using influencers, dermatologists, and scientists. Read More → digiday
On the other side of the pond, TikTok has been found in breach of the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and fined €345 million (about $379 million) for mishandling children’s data. Read More → techcrunch
General Mills’ Monsters Cereal brand hopes its new zombie DJ Carmella Creeper will go viral on TikTok with “Monster Mash Remix.” Read More → digiday
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Today’s email was written by Luke Perrotta and Kait Cunniff.
Edited by Nick Comney.
Published by Darline Salazar.