🍺 Beer Revolut-ion

Author

Crown Crew
August 18, 2023

☕ Good Morning and Happy Friday.

This is TC, the UK biz newsletter that's as satisfying as hitting a hole-in-one on the mini-golf course. Today’s reading time is 3½ minutes.

We’ll see you back here on Monday!

TECH

AI getting into therapy game

Driving the news: Google is hustling to make sure its presence remains indispensable in the AI world...

First, it acquired DeepMind (a research lab out of London, UK) to roll out its Microsoft-backed ChatGPT rival: Bard.

Now, the search titan is testing new tools that could turn its Bard bot into a life coach that advises on everything from dating to career and help you plan a brunch spot.

The reason? 40% of Gen-Zers prefer searching on TikTok when looking for a lunch spot (authentic 60s vids from peers > walls of sponsored blue links from corporate).

  • To protect its profit-puppy search biz — the tech giant's making Bard more intimate, personal and authentic + potentially integrating it into search.

Why it matters: Back in December, Google's own AI experts waved red-flags about people getting too attached to chatbots. So Google cozying up and trusting AI systems with sensitive tasks could be a slippery slope...

But... the new features are still in the test-drive phase and Google may decide not to roll them out.

BIG PICTURE

Tour de headlines

Oink: A genetically modified pig kidney was implanted into a human and is still going strong after a month. This marks the longest a pig organ has survived inside a person and is a big step toward using animals to help with the shortage of donated human organs.

Bingo: For a wild few hours on Tuesday, a bizarre Bank of Ireland glitch allowed customers to withdraw up to €1K from their bank accounts, even if their accounts didn't have that much cash to begin with. The bank warned customers that any withdrawals made during the time of the glitch would later be posted to their accounts.

Currencies currently: The Russian ruble, Chinese yuan, and Argentine peso all slid in value this week. The ruble dropped to its lowest level since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. China’s yuan neared the record low it set in October as its economy struggles to bounce back from zero-Covid policies. Meanwhile, the Argentine gov’t intentionally knocked down its peso’s value by ~18% to get ahead of its downward spiral.

TAX

Beer just got cheaper. Thanks, Sunak.

Something to sip on: The gov't has announced the biggest shakeup in alcohol taxes in 100 years last week. Now drinks are taxed based on alcohol percentage, not type. The stronger the brew, the higher the tax.

  • This means weaker beers (~3.5% ABV) are taxed less than stronger ones (~8.5% ABV).

Why it matters: Between inflation making everything way pricier and more people drinking at home, over 500 pubs tapped out last year.

  • Lower taxes = cheaper pints = more people bellied up to the bars.

The goal: Lure people back to pubs with cheaper pints. Mission accomplished? Well, kinda...

Yes: Draft beer tax dropped 11-14 pence per pint.

But: Many tipples (aka wine and spirits) got more expensive. And not everyone's cheering. Scotch makers called the higher this a "hammer blow." And some drinkers say the 11 pence discount isn't steep enough to get them back to over-priced pubs...

BY THE NUMBERS

☕ 3bn. Cups of coffee drunk around the world every day — a number expected to double by 2050 if current trends continue.

🤯 36%. Population in Northern Ireland awaiting NHS treatment.

💸 $900,000. The annual salary offered for a machine learning position at Netflix, according to a recent job posting.

CROWN RECS

GAMES

Friday Puzzle

The year 2023 is special for the four members of the Smith family who are aged 11, 13, 41, and 47. What will be the next special year for the Smith family?

Answer Monday.

Answers for yesterday

  1. Possession

  2. A gummy bear

  3. Terrible

  4. Because they just wash up on shore

  5. It was Chewie

  6. Nothing—it was on the house

LET US HEAR IT

What did you think of today's edition?