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Big Lots has been through a wild ride since the home discount retail chain filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection last September. In December 2024, the company announced that it would hold going-out-of-business sales at its remaining store locations. The following month, however, Big Lots announced that Variety Wholesalersa retail company based in North Carolinawould acquire and operate hundreds of existing Big Lots stores. After a period of remodeling and restocking, Variety Wholesalers has since reopened 219 Big Lots stores in a handful of states. The openings took place in four waves, starting in April and ending in June. The final reopening phase concluded with the reopening of 78 Big Lots stores on June 5. While return of Big Lots is good news for fans of the brand, it may be exposing some unsuspecting bargain hunters to scamsparticularly, for shoppers who prefer to buy things online. Big Lots warns of online scams Earlier this month, Big Lots took to social media to alert customers about the presence of online scams, explaining that its current website has no e-commerce component. “BIG LOTS! no longer operates any ecommerce website,” the retailer wrote on its Facebook page. “These are scam websites using our name and logo. Any purchases made through these websites should be IMMEDIATELY reported to your bank or credit card company. Our official website is biglots.com. The post attracted hundreds of comments, with some commenters saying they’d fallen victim to the bogus offers. Scammers have been targeting consumers with online ads impersonating Big Lots. Links within these ads direct hopeful shoppers to fake websites that are not affiliated with the official retailer. Be aware that any advertisements promoting online Big Lots deals are not legitimate. Some products are still listed on the official Big Lots website A section of the retailer’s official website highlights products that Big Lots stores actually sell. Although there are no capabilities to make a purchase through the official Big Lots website, product listings include photos, descriptions, and prices. Jeff King, vice president of sales and marketing for Variety Wholesalers, told Fast Company that the products listed on the Big Lots website are meant to illustrate the deals available in-store. “We do have products listed on our website to show the great values on the large variety of products we carry in our stores,” he said. “We do this to encourage customers to visit our stores and see what deals they can find.” Bottom line: It’s essential to be vigilant against online shopping scams. If you’re hoping to shop at Big Lots, you’ll need to visit a physical store.
Category:
E-Commerce
Welcome to AI Decoded, Fast Companys weekly newsletter that breaks down the most important news in the world of AI. You can sign up to receive this newsletter every week here. Bringing AI to the doctors appointment AI in healthcare is top of mind this week, thanks to a viral story on Reddit about a man who said ChatGPT saved his wifes life. She had undergone a cyst removal and wasnt feeling well, but was on an antibiotic and decided to wait it out. After the man described her symptoms to ChatGPT, the chatbot advised him to take his wife to the ER. He didand likely saved her life. Doctors diagnosed her with sepsis. Stories like these arent new. Over the past year, weve seen a number of ChatGPT-saved-my-life anecdotes popping up online. Meanwhile, two-thirds of doctors now reportedly use ChatGPT to help them home in on a diagnosis, often with good results. The models powering ChatGPT are trained on medical textbooks, research journal articles, medical guidelines, and health websites such as WebMD. That training gives them broad knowledge of anatomy, diseases, symptoms, treatment options, and drug interactions. OpenAI also fine-tuned the models by using feedback from health professionals. While AI modelseven highly specialized onescant yet replace human doctors, researchers are working hard to improve their accuracy and reliability. AI is also having an immediate impact in clinical documentationan area thats long been a pain point for doctors. Many physiciansespecially primary care doctorsspend an extra 90 minutes to three hours per day completing patient records. Combined with the pressure to see more patients, this contributes heavily to burnout. Increasingly, health systems are deploying AI scribes to ease this burden. Such tools can record a patient encounter and generate summaries for the electronic medical record (EMR). The Cleveland Clinic, for example, implements a clinical documentation and point-of-care coding solution from San Francisco-based Ambience. Using Ambiences app (which itself is powered by OpenAI models), the clinician records a patient visit, reviews an AI-generated summary of everything discussed in the meeting (including the billing codes), then approves the notes for inclusion in the EMR. According to Cleveland Clinics chief digital officer Rohit Chandra, 4,000 of the organizations physicians are already using the tool. It makes their jobs a ton easier, and it makes the patient interactions a lot better because now patients actually engage with the doctor, he says. Looking ahead, AI scribes could go far beyond basic documentation. Future versions may be able to document a medical exam with full contextual knowledge of the patients history (past problems and conditions, treatments, tests, and medications). We believe that with some work and attention, AI will become smart enough to understand the fullness of a patient’s health journey, as opposed to just a discreet encounter, Chandra says. For example, if a new condition arises during an exam, the AI might flag connections to prior complaints or lab results. It could help a physician prescribe new medications and guard against bad interactions in patients who may already be taking multiple drugs. The AI can also prepare a pre-read for the clinician: a summary of a patients current complaintin the context of the individuals past historythat a physician (who may have already seen 10 patients that day) can read outside the door of the exam room. I’m hoping that we can keep building on the success that weve had so far to literally drive the documentation burden to zero, Chandra says. If we do that well, we should eliminate a huge handicap that currently sits around our doctors, and we can bring the joy back to caregivingthats a literal quote from a doctor. And with so much promise for easing physician burnout and improving patient care, investors are taking note. Ambience raised a $70 millionB round in February 2024, co-led by KleinerPerkins and OpenAIs Startup Fund, reportedly putting its valuation at $1 billion. Ambience competes with Abridge, which performs a similar function of transcribing physician-patient conversations. Like Ambience, it has an integration with the popular Epic electronic medical records platform. Abridge recently raised $300 million in a SeriesE funding at a $5.3billion valuation. Health AI may have a breakout star in OpenEvidence The healthcare industry moves very slowly, until it doesnt. A company called OpenEvidence is tackling clinical decision supportone of the most challenging areas in medicineand appears so far to be winning over doctors at an impressive pace. In February, the Cambridge, Massachusetts-based company reported that 250,000 U.S. doctors were already using its product, and by mid-June the number had climbed to 350,000. Some industry observers say its the fastest-growing platform for physicians in history. OpenEvidence recently closed a $75 million A round led by Sequoia Capital that pushed its valuation to $1 billion. The product functions a bit like Perplexity, but for healthcare. Its an AI-powered search tool, along with a chatbot, that lets doctors keep asking questions until they get what they need. Specifically, the tool locates evidence-based medical information from peer-reviewed journals, then summarizes it to answer a given question. The platform searches across 35 million medical publications, and recently announced a strategic partnership with The New England Journal of Medicine, giving it access to decades of premium medical content. OpenEvidence also recently signed a multiyear deal with the JAMA Network that provides its AI tool with access to content from the networks 13 medical journals. Unlike other platforms, OpenEvidence doesnt rely on random health information found on the open web. The outputs are grounded in trusted medical literature, and if the literature is inconclusive, OpenEvidence simply doesnt attempt an answer. One of the hardest things about being a doctor . . . is that theyre expected to keep up with a fire hose of medical information, said OpenEvidence CEO Daniel Nadler in a recent podcast. So this is really not appreciated by people who are not doctors, but there are two new medical papers published every minute, 24 hours per day. Hume AIs emotionally intelligent models are finding new applications in eldercare and mental health Theres growing evidence that, for many people using AI chatbots, one of the main attractions is companionshipoften even a shoulder to cry on. For this to work well, a chatbot must have a easonable amount of common sense (to help users keep their problems in perspective), but also strong emotional intelligence, especially empathy. New York-based Hume AI specializes in emotionally intelligent AI voice models. CEO Alan Cowen told me that these models enable a chatbot to detect the users emotional state and respond appropriately. The models can also speak and listen simultaneously, allowing the AI to fully process what the user is sayingand know when to stop talking and simply listen. One of the most compelling applications of Hume AIs emotionally intelligent AI voices is a smartphone app called EverFriends, which provides conversation and companionship to seniors struggling with isolation and loneliness. Grand Rapids-based EverFriends.ai, the apps developer, believes its critical that the app can detect a users mood and adapt its tone and responses accordingly. For users with dementia, the app can slow down its speech and repeat its outputs when needed. Along with companionship, EverFriends can help older users remember to take medications, attend appointments, and do home health routines such as balance exercises. And the app can automatically send out an emergency alert to caregivers or family if something goes wrong. Hume also supplies the EQ AI behind a platform called Hpy, which is used by therapists. The platform serves as a scribe by listening in on therapy sessions and generating comprehensive session notes, which cuts down on the time therapists must spend on documentation. While creating the notes, Hpy also draws on Humes Expression Measurement API to detect emotional cues in the clients wordsinsights that may shape the therapists approach. Finally, Hpy uses Humes Empathic Voice Interface (EVI) to give clients an AI companion to talk to between sessions with the human therapist. Clients can have guided sessions with the AI voice to work on specific therapeutic goals, or just have an open conversation with the AI. The AI, in turn, is able to maintain a meaningful dialogue, thanks to its awareness of the clients needs from earlier sessions. More AI coverage from Fast Company: The AI baby boom is here. But can ChatGPT really raise a child? Anthropics AI copyright win is more complicated than it looks Ive become an AI vibe coding convert Genesys wants agentic AI to make customer service less robotic Want exclusive reporting and trend analysis on technology, business innovation, future of work, and design? Sign up for Fast Company Premium.
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E-Commerce
As you scroll through your FYP, a sweet elderly man or woman appears, asking for a moment of your attention to help save their struggling animal shelter. Please stay 8 seconds so I dont have to shut down my cat shelter I poured my love into, the text on screen reads. You stay and watch. After all, its only eight seconds. Maybe you even buy the slippers theyre selling to raise additional funds. Its a scam. The man in the video is real, but he doesnt run an animal shelter. He owns a menswear and tailoring shop in Canton, Ohio. One night I was scrolling on TikTok watching videos and I see my dads face pop up, saying Stay for a few seconds and help my husband or grandpas cat shelter, And Im like, What? Daisy Yelicheck told WMBF News. Then Im getting text messages from family members across the country, saying, Do you know your dads being used in these videos? Daisys father, George Tsaftarides, 84, does post on TikTok, where he teaches his 41,000 followers how to sew. Now, bad actors have taken his content, edited it, and used it for their own gain. @georgethemastertailor Tsaftarides isnt the only target. Charles Ray, an 85-year-old retiree in Michigan, has also had videos from his TikTok account repurposed without his permission. In one instance, scammers used a clip of him rubbing his eye, making it look as if he was crying, he told The Guardian. TikTok, in a statement to the Guardian, said its community guidelines prohibit impersonation accounts and content that violates intellectual property rights. Still, both Tsaftarides and Ray have had difficulty getting the stolen videos removed, even after reporting them. Beyond stolen content, the Better Business Bureau has received reports of AI-generated scams designed to solicit fake donations. According to an FBI report, American consumers lost $12.5 billion to cybercrime last year, a 25% increase from the year before. Now, some TikTok users are stepping in to raise awareness, warning others not to fall for every cat shelter or cow farm asking for donations. The sob story, after all, is one of the oldest tricks in the book. @sesagraham wtf is going on and shame on you @MilkStep @KittyBags @LINK IN BIO TO SUPPORT #scammer #fakepages #help #scam #scammers original sound – Sesa
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E-Commerce
Israel and Iran seemed to honor the fragile ceasefire between them for a second day Wednesday and U.S. President Donald Trump asserted that American and Iranian officials will talk next week, giving rise to cautious hope for longer-term peace.Trump, who helped negotiate the ceasefire that took hold Tuesday on the 12th day of the war, told reporters at a NATO summit that he was not particularly interested in restarting negotiations with Iran, insisting that U.S. strikes had destroyed its nuclear program. Earlier in the day, an Iranian official questioned whether the United States could be trusted after its weekend attack.“We may sign an agreement, I don’t know,” Trump said. “The way I look at it, they fought, the war is done.”Iran has not acknowledged any talks taking place next week, though U.S. Mideast envoy Steve Witkoff has said there has been direct and indirect communication between the countries. A sixth round of U.S.-Iran negotiations was scheduled for earlier this month in Oman but was canceled after Israel attacked Iran.Earlier, Trump said the ceasefire was going “very well,” and added that Iran was “not going to have a bomb, and they’re not going to enrich.”Iran has insisted that it will not give up its nuclear program. In a vote underscoring the tough path ahead, its parliament agreed to fast-track a proposal that would effectively stop the country’s cooperation with the International Atomic Energy Agency, the U.N. watchdog that has monitored the program for years.Ahead of the vote, Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf criticized the IAEA for refusing “to even pretend to condemn the attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities” that the U.S. carried out Sunday.“For this reason, the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran will suspend cooperation with the IAEA until security of nuclear facilities is ensured, and Iran’s peaceful nuclear program will move forward at a faster pace,” Qalibaf told lawmakers.IAEA Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi said he wrote to Iran to discuss resuming inspections of their nuclear facilities. Among other things, Iran claims to have moved its highly enriched uranium ahead of the U.S. strikes, and Grossi said his inspectors need to reassess the country’s stockpiles.“We need to return,” he said. “We need to engage.”French President Emmanuel Macron said he hoped Tehran would come back to the table. France was part of the 2015 deal with Iran that restricted its nuclear program, but the agreement began unraveling after Trump pulled the U.S. out in his first term. Macron spoke multiple times to Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian during the war.International Atomic Energy Agency Director Rafael Grossi said Wednesday that Iran must quickly resume cooperation with international inspectors, telling French broadcaster France 2 that the IAEA had lost visibility over sensitive nuclear materials since the onset of hostilities.Grossi said Iran is legally obligated to cooperate with the IAEA under the Non-Proliferation Treaty.“During a war, inspections are not possible. But now that hostilities have ceased, and given the sensitivity of this material, I believe it is in everyone’s interest that we resume our activities as soon as possible,” he said.Iran has long maintained that its nuclear program is peaceful, and U.S. intelligence agencies have assessed that Tehran is not actively pursuing a bomb. However, Israeli leaders have argued that Iran could quickly assemble a nuclear weapon.Israel is widely believed to be the only Middle Eastern country with nuclear weapons, which it has never acknowledged. Questions over effectiveness of the US strikes The Israel Atomic Energy Commission said its assessment was that the U.S. and Israeli strikes have “set back Iran’s ability to develop nuclear weapons by many years.” It did not give evidence to back up its claim.The U.S. strikes hit three Iranian nuclear sites, which Trump said “completely and fully obliterated” the country’s nuclear program. When asked about a U.S. intelligence report that found Iran’s nuclear program has been set back only a few months, Trump scoffed and said it would at least take years to rebuild.Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesman, Esmail Baghaei, confirmed that the strikes by American B-2 bombers using bunker-buster bombs had caused significant damage.“Our nuclear installations have been badly damaged, that’s for sure,” he told Al Jazeera on Wednesday, refusing to go into detail.He seemed to suggest Iran might not shut out IAEA inspectors for good, noting that the bill before parliament only talks of suspending work with the agency, not ending it. He also insisted Iran has the right to pursue a nuclear energy program.“Iran is determined to preserve that right under any circumstances,” he said.Witkoff said late Tuesday on Fox News’ “The Ingraham Angle” that Israel and the U.S. had achieved their objective with “the total destruction of the enrichment capacity” in Iran, and Iran’s prerequisite for talks that Israel end its campaign had been fulfilled.“The proof is in the pudding,” he said. “No one’s shooting at each other. It’s over.” Hopes for a long-term peace agreement An Israeli official, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations, said the ceasefire agreement with Iran amounted to “quiet for quiet,” with no further understandings about Iran’s nuclear program going ahead.Witkoff told Fox News that Trump is now looking to land “a comprehensive peace agreement that goes beyond even the ceasefire.”“We’re already talking to each other, not just directly, but also through interlocutors,” Witkoff said, adding that the conversations were promising.However, Baghaei, the Iranian spokesman, said Washington had “torpedoed diplomacy” with its attacks on nuclear sites, and that while Iran in principle was always open to talks, national security was the priority.“We have to make sure whether the other parties are really serious when they’re talking about diplomacy, or is it again part of their tactics to make more problems for the region and for my country,” he said.Grossi said Iran and the international community should seize the opportunity of the ceasefire for a long-term diplomatic solution.“Out of the bad things that military conflict brings, there’s also now a possibility, an opening,” he said. “We shouldn’t miss that opportunity.” A rare video by Mossad Israel revealed details of the intelligence and covert operations that it said allowed the country to effectively target Iranian military commanders,nuclear scientists and key facilities.In a rare video released by Israel’s Mossad spy agency, chief David Barnea thanked the CIA for being a key partner, and his own agents for work over years to achieve what was “unimaginable at first.”“Thanks to accurate intelligence, advanced technologies and operational capabilities beyond imagination, we helped the air force strike the Iranian nuclear project, establish aerial superiority in Iranian skies and reduce the missile threat,” the agency said in a Facebook post alongside the video.Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir, the military chief of staff, asserted that commandos had operated secretly “deep inside enemy territory” during the war.Tehran on Tuesday put the death toll in Iran at 606, with 5,332 people wounded. The Washington-based Human Rights Activists group released figures Wednesday suggesting Israeli strikes on Iran had killed at least 1,054 and wounded 4,476.The group, which has provided detailed casualty figures from multiple rounds of unrest in Iran, said 417 of those killed were civilians and 318 were security forces.At least 28 people were killed in Israel and more than 1,000 wounded, according to officials.In the past two weeks, Iran has executed six prisoners accused of spying for Israel, including three on Wednesday. Associated Press writers Josef Federman and Julia Frankel in Jerusalem, Natalie Melzer in Nahariya, Israel, Chris Megerian and Sylvie Corbet in The Hague, Netherlands, and Geir Moulson in Berlin contributed to this report. Jon Gambrell, David Rising and Farnoush Amiri, Associated Press
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E-Commerce
Swedish fashion retailer H&M reported slightly stronger second-quarter profit on Thursday, an encouraging sign as CEO Daniel Erver tries to attract more shoppers with trendier clothes. H&M shares were up 4% by 1000 GMT as investors focused on the profit rather than second-quarter sales, which fell slightly more than predicted. Erver has said his focus is on profitability rather than solely sales growth. The world’s second-largest listed fashion retailer also said it expected sales in June, measured in local currencies, to rise 3%, an improvement after a 6% fall in the same period a year ago. “Our collections are more current, they are more on trend, more fashionable, and the customer reception has been strong throughout this quarter,” Erver said in a press conference. Erver said gingham and check patterned dresses, blouses and skirts have been especially popular this season, with the trend continuing into the autumn. Accessories sales have picked up, with social media also driving a craze for mini-accessories on bags, sneakers, and cellphones, he said. In the U.S., where H&M has around 500 stores, Erver said consumer sentiment has dropped significantly due to the “turbulent” tariffs situation since President Donald Trump hiked duties on imports, and competitors have started raising prices as a result. H&M, which sources its products primarily from China and Bangladesh, is focused on keeping prices competitive, Erver said, as consumers are particularly price-sensitive given uncertainty around the economy in the U.S. and globally. H&M’s sales were 56.7 billion Swedish crowns ($5.99 billion) in the March to May quarter, down from 59.6 billion a year ago. Analysts polled by LSEG had forecast revenue of 57.0 billion crowns. Zara owner Inditex earlier this month also reported disappointing sales, in a sign consumers are pulling back from spending on clothes as U.S. tariffs create risks for global economic growth. H&M’s second-quarter operating profit was 5.91 billion crowns, beating analysts’ forecast of 5.88 billion, and the operating profit margin was 10.4%, down from 11.9% a year ago but still better than analysts had feared. “The slightly better than expected margin delivery sends a positive signal to the market,” said Alphavalue analyst Jie Zhang. “The brand upgrading strategy has started to pay off.” H&M said its higher-priced brand COS had done especially well and shoppers are opting for more medium- and high-priced items across the board, helping to boost profitability. But Erver flagged more discounting in the June to August quarter as he said summer markdowns across the market were highly competitive. Even as it reduces store numbers globally, H&M is also searching for growth in new markets with a growing middle class, with plans to open its first stores in Brazil in the second half, as well as in El Salvador and Venezuela, and to launch in Paraguay next year. ($1 = 9.4635 Swedish crowns) Greta Rosen Fondahn and Helen Reid, Reuters
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E-Commerce
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