The Daily Valet. - 8/26/21, Thursday

✔️ Returning to the Office?

August 26, 2021

Thursday, August 26th Edition

Cory Ohlendorf, Editor in Chief of Valet.

Nah he tweakin’.

Cory Ohlendorf, Editor ⋯ @coryohlendorf

Today’s edition is presented by

Today’s Big Story

Returning to the Office?

Companies are still figuring when and how to bring workers back

If you started working from home in the last 16 months, you’re in good company. Over 100 million Americans transitioned from in-person to remote work during the pandemic, according to Pew Research. And if you hope to continue working remotely, at least part time, once the office becomes relatively safe again, about 52% of people agree with you.

Of course, companies large and small are now pushing back in-person work—likely into next year—citing uncertainty as coronavirus cases rise nationwide. Just this week, both Ford and Apple delayed their timeline for coming back.

“I think we all thought six months ago that September was going to look good, but Miss Delta was like, ‘Yeah, I don't think so. You better check yourself,’” Danielle Ompad, a professor of epidemiology at New York University told CBS News.

In the meantime, companies are working on a myriad of ways to lure employees back to the office—once the coast is clear. According to the New York Times, many have hit on the idea of making the office world feel more like the natural world.

Why? Those of us who were sent home often sought refuge during the lockdown in nature—tending to houseplants, setting up bird feeders and sitting out in the sun tapping away on our laptops. So companies want to provide perks aligned with the concept of biophilia, which says humans have an innate connection with nature.

Some of the more unusual nature-themed offering include “treehouse” lounges and vegetable plots that let desk workers dig in the dirt and beekeeping programs—complete with rooftop hives. I definitely like the idea of bringing the outside in, but “come on back to the office, we have bees now” doesn't do much for me, personally.

↦ FYI: The group most enthusiastic to return to in-person work? White men, according to FiveThirthyEight. 30% want the office to be the only place where they work. Roughly half as many Black men (about 16%) feel the same.

OnlyFans Reverses Explicit Ban

The people have spoken. Keep it NSFW.

After facing enormous backlash from creators, subscribers, and the public, OnlyFans is reversing its upcoming ban on the sexually explicit content that propelled the platform to international success.

The subscription site said in a statement Wednesday that the planned ban was “no longer required due to banking partners' assurances that OnlyFans can support all genres of creators” and declined to answer further questions.

You may recall, the company announced last week that sexually explicit content will be banned beginning Oct. 1, saying it had to “comply with the requests of banking partners and payout providers.”

The announcement, of course, upset the site’s creators, many of whom threatened to move to another website. According to the Associated Press, a lot of sex workers joined OnlyFans during the pandemic when in-person venues shut down or became more dangerous because of COVID-19. The site has been tremendously lucrative for some people, allowing them to earn thousands every month. OnlyFans says it has 130 million users and 2 million creators who have collectively earned $5 billion.

↦ FYI: This former ICU nurse now makes $200k a month on OnlyFans.

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The Nirvana Baby Is Suing Nirvana

He says his guardians never consented to having his genitals on the cover of the album

Spencer Elden, who as a baby appeared on the cover of Nirvana's “Nevermind” album, embraced his role in rock history for years. He's reenacted the iconic underwater photo several times throughout his life—most recently in 2016, when he and the album turned 25—and he has “Nevermind” tattooed across his chest.

But three decades after that fateful photo was shot, Elden is now claiming the album cover is child pornography. According to the lawsuit, neither his legal guardians nor he (obviously, as he was four months old at the time) consented to his naked genitalia appearing on the album.

Elden's seeking $150,000 from the estate of Kurt Cobain, the musician's former bandmates and Geffen Records, among other parties, alleging that they failed to protect him from being sexually exploited. He also claims in the lawsuit that the band promised to cover his genitalia with a sticker that never wound up being incorporated into the cover design.

This is, obviously, something Elden has dealt with for literally his whole life. In a GQ article, Elden addressed an issue more closely tied to the lawsuit. “I've been going through it my whole life. But recently I've been thinking, ‘What if I wasn't OK with my freaking penis being shown to everybody?’ I didn't really have a choice.”

Fitbit Says Relax

Finally, a wearable that tells you it’s OK to not workout

I think we can file this under good news: On Wednesday, Fitbit unveiled its latest fitness wearable, the Charge 5. The upgraded device has a color screen and a series of new sensors including an electrocardiogram, which can detect atrial fibrillation, and an electrodermal response tracker, which detects stress through electrical signals in the skin.

According to Gizmodo, this is a huge 180 from last year's Charge 4, which was a solid but incremental upgrade. It'll be available in three colorways: white and gold, blue and silver and a stealth all-black.

Most notably, though, the Charge 5 adds a new metric to its health wearable: Daily Readiness. The scoring system and accompanying fitness recommendations emphasize recovery over working out.

“Body readiness is clever because over-exercising can be a problem and lead to injuries down the road—and under-exercising leads to being out of shape,” one researcher told CNN. “This provides proof to the user what their body is ready for or what it needs, taking the guesswork out of how a user is thinking about how their body is doing.”

↦ Dig Deeper: This short recap of the founding story of Fitbit shows how a wooden box was ultimately bought by Google for $2.1 billion.

In Other News

↦ As Aug. 31 Deadline Looms, United States, European Nations Accelerate Afghanistan Evacuation Effort

↦ xxxTITLExxx

↦ Here’s How the World’s Largest Sphere Will Transform Las Vegas Forever

Other Things We’re Talking About Today

“Vitality honey”

3-D printed guns

These green Grand Seikos

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