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Few media brands scream straight quite like Playboy. Since the 1950s, the mens lifestyle magazine has been best known for its photos of nude and scantily clad women (aka Playmates)and, of course, for its iconic bunny mascot. But those whove been paying attention, Playboy has quietly undergone an editorial transformation. Since November, the magazine has relaunched its print edition (previously halted in 2020), started a Substack newsletter blending archival material with original writing, and introduced new Playmates to the world. Its all been under the advice of Phillip Picardi, who was announced on March 11 as Playboys new chief brand officer and editor-in-chief, making him the first openly gay man to lead the brand. Picardi is a media veteran with more than a decade of experience shaping the magazine industry. As the digital editorial director of Teen Vogue, Picardi more than doubled the sites online viewership and gave the brand a new politically progressive direction (a move that landed him on Fast Company‘s list of the 100 most creative people in business in 2017). From there, he founded Condé Nasts queer-focused outlet them and served as editor-in-chief of Out Magazine. What does it mean for a queer man to take the helm of a stereotypically straight institution? Its not as antithetical as it first sounds, considering how far Playboy has come from its primarily pornographic roots. Per its website, the brands mission is to create a culture where all people can pursue pleasure via core values of equality, freedom of expression and the idea that pleasure is a fundamental human right. In an interview with ADWEEK, Picardi shared how his own queer identity fits into that inclusive Playboy ethos. Queer rights dont exist without womens rights, Picardi said. These things are connected, and Playboy has always been very engaged with that. Picardis appointment comes shortly after that of David Miller, who left a role at National Geographic to become Playboys president of media and brand. The shake-up in leadership reflects a new era for Playboy, one that still centers sex, but not without acknowledging the culture surrounding it. Just in the past week, the magazine has published deep dives on the hypocrisy surrounding trans pornography, platforming Playmates eager to reclaim their sexuality, and honoring the legacy of Playboys past. Picardi also shared his vision for Playboys future, particularly given the rising conservatism of American culture. Our moment right now is both extremely prudish and extremely pornographic, he told ADWEEK. The idea that we need a publication that is able to explain sexuality as a cultural force, especially as our younger folks are facing a sex recession and loneliness epidemicit felt like the right challenge.
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E-Commerce
Do you know who Jessica Foster is? Neither did I until last week, which is surprising because 1) she has amassed 1 million followers on Instagram after starting her account just a few months ago 2) she is a U.S. Army soldier with a look as wholesome and American as apple pie, and 3) she is a huge Trump supporter. With that trifecta, you could assume she would be a star on Fox News, NewsMax, or the Joe Rogan Experience. But no, she is nowhere to be found on those platformsor any major U.S. media outlet for that matter. And that’s because she is a computer-generated mirage designed by an anonymous operator to funnel conservative men toward an OnlyFans page where “she” sells foot fetish pics. [Images: Jessica Foster/Instagram] I came across Foster while reading the Spanish sports media, who covered the AI character after her account posted fake images of her attending an Inter Miami Major League Soccer White House reception alongside Donald Trump and Lionel Messi (she also has appeared in the oval office alongside Cristiano Ronaldo). The stunt triggered a massive wave of coverage across sports outlets in fútbol-obsessed Spain and Latinamerica, which then expanded to TV, other online publications and national newspapers with huge readership like 20 Minutos. Who, or what, is Jessica Foster? The Instagram profile @jessicaa.foster went live on December 14, 2025. In just three months, the account reached more than a million followers. The recipe for this success was fairly simple: The puppet master behind the screen pumped out a constant stream of content around this fictitious, Trump-loving female soldier and built an entire digital lore by letting followers peek into her daily life. We see Jessica posing in army bunks, frolicking with female soldiers, shoeless at the office, and behind an F-22 Raptor. The feed is packed with high-resolution, completely forged photos of her posing with Trump and politicians like Putin and Zelensky; in one, she’s speaking at the Board of Peace ConferenceDonald Trump’s international body created to mediate the Gaza conflict. She even invaded Greenland, because of course all it takes to conquer a country is a Colgate smile. [Screenshot: courtesy of the author] But all this is just bait to pick up right-leaning men straight into adult subscription sites. Under the username @jessicanextdoor, her OnlyFans bio unironically reads: “public servant by day, troublemaker by night i’m new to this don’t be rude please btw i respond to every message but be patient since I’m not a robot haha.” The account pulls in cash primarily by peddling fetish content, specifically foot photography, while farming direct tips from subscribers that can hit over $100 on a single post. View this post on Instagram A post shared by Jessica (@jessicaa.foster) This entire grift operates in direct violation of OnlyFans’ terms of service. The platform’s rules demand that every account must be linked to a verified human being. Any AI generated content, it says, must actually resemble that specific real person and be explicitly tagged with a #AI label. Because of these restrictions, many of these faceless operators are packing up their fake influencers and moving to looser competitor sites like Fanvue. (We sent a request for comment to OnlyFans and will update this article if we hear back.) Over on Instagram, Meta’s policies require that any paid political advertisements prominently disclose the use of AI. For unpaid, organic posts like Foster’s grid, Meta outsources the problem to third-party fact-checkers who can blur, label, or yank the content if they consider it deceptive misinformation. It appears that filtering is not working. Despite successfully duping thousands of users who seemingly left genuine comments of support and affection in her post, the digital illusion wasn’t flawless. Military veterans and commenters in conservative forums like Free Republic spotted the glitches in the rendering. The smoking gun used to debunk her was the name tape on her combat uniform, which displayed her first name (“JESSICA”) instead of the standard military last name. “She acts as a military advisor to the Trump administration on Instagram, but she operates as a foot model on OnlyFans,” says journalist Kat Tenbarge on the left-leaning Courier Youtube channel. [She is] pushing sort of propaganda not just in support of Trump, not just in support of the US military, but it’s also objectifying women in the military.” Tenbarge believes that the Foster account softens and glamorizes and sexualizes this vision of the U.S. military. On the other side of the political spectrum, conservative commentator Ara Rubyan seems to basically agree with Tenbarge. “She was every MAGA bumper sticker rendered in human form, and for her audience, the ‘human’ part was entirely optional […] The Soldier of the Lord was, in the end, just a clever way to sell foot content.” Both are correct in their diagnostic, but they miss the most important point about Jessica Foster. She marks the last national election as the end of reality-anchored campaign news cycles, if such a thing ever existed. Fosters one-million-follower army is the ultimate demonstration that we have reached a predicted and very dangerous era, as the latest generative photo and video AIs have finally shattered our ground truths with perfect synthetic reality indistinguishable from real life. You can even argue that, even without those, we are cooked: Jessica had visible imperfections that were caught by some, but her army of followers didn’t really care much. As Rubyan puts it, “The most dangerous thing about Jessica Foster isnt that shes fake; its how badly a million people needed her to be real.” Indeed. We are not in the post-truth era anymore. This is the “I want to believe” era, and anything that satisfies humans’ existing beliefs and desires will automatically get our brains’ stamp of approval even after learning it is not real. Good night, and good luck, everyone.
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E-Commerce
A group representing many of the world’s wealthiest countries agreed Wednesday to release the largest volume of emergency oil reserves in its history, in a bid to counter the effects of the Iran war on energy markets and the halt of cargo shipping through the Strait of Hormuz. The International Energy Agency said it will make 400 million barrels of oil available from its members emergency reserves, which is more than double the 182.7 million barrels that the IEA’s 32 member countries released in 2022 in response to Russias full-scale invasion of Ukraine. This is a major action aiming to alleviate the immediate impacts of the disruption in markets, said Fatih Birol, executive director of the Paris-based IEA. But, to be clear, the most important thing for a return to stable flows of oil and gas is the resumption of transit through the Strait of Hormuz. Iran has attacked commercial ships across the Persian Gulf in response to U.S. and Israeli strikes, escalating a campaign of squeezing the oil-rich region as global energy concerns mount and effectively stopping cargo traffic in the narrow Strait of Hormuz, through which about a fifth of all oil is shipped from the Persian Gulf toward the Indian Ocean. Iran has also targeted oil fields and refineries in Gulf Arab nations, aiming to generate enough global economic pain to pressure the U.S. and Israel to end their strikes. According to the IEA, export volumes of crude and refined products are currently at less than 10% of prewar levels. Birol noted that the situation in natural gas markets is also very challenging, with Asia the most severely affected region. There are few options to replace the missing LNG cargoes from Qatar and the Emirates, he said. Global energy supply has been reduced by around 20%.” A push to lower the price at the pumps The IEA’s announcement came a day after energy ministers from the Group of Seven the leading industrialized nations of Canada, the United States, France, Italy, Japan, Germany and Britain met in Paris to look at ways to bring down prices. It also came just before G7 leaders, including U.S. President Donald Trump, met Wednesday via videoconference. During his introductory remarks during Wednesday’s video call, French President Emmanuel Macron praised the IEA decision to release emergency oil stocks, saying it is very important to do everything possible to increase global production and that the 400 million barrels amounted to the equivalent of 20 days of the volume being exported through the Strait of Hormuz. The amount pledged by the G7 nations alone comprises 70% of the total, including 14.5 million barrels France will contribute, Macron said, noting that the IEA decision was prepared at the G7 level. Maksim Sonin, an energy executive who works with Stanford Universitys Hydrogen Initiative, said the release would have a short-term stabilizing effect, but that it would diminish if the war persists and the Strait of Hormuz remains essentially at a standstill. Its not a silver bullet to solve everything, Sonin said. You have to solve the underlying problem. Neil Crosby, a vice president of oil analytics at Sparta, which tracks oil trading, said as big as the release is, it amounts to a little Band-Aid. This scenario was always written off by large parts of the industry: In case we get to the scenario of where theres a war with Iran, the U.S. Navy will ensure that Hormuz doesnt stay closed, Crosby said. And then we got there, and its closed. … Its a complete disaster. Oil follows snaking journeys that can take weeks to go from drill sites to gas pumps. It must pass through refineries, where it is turned to fuel, before it is shipped off via pipelines and tankers to terminals, and then on to gas stations. Because of this, no single decision has an immediate impact. But Kenneth Medlock, senior director of the Center for Energy Studies at Rice University, said the release of reserves will calm markets and prevent wild price swings and could lead to lower prices at the pump in the next week or so. Still, a trade-off is involved by tapping reserves. Youre depleting stocks now. Thats always the catch-22, Medlock said. Youre selling them today but that means you cant sell them tomorrow because theyre gone. Member countries pledge help Germany, Austria and Japan said earlier Wednesday that they would release parts of their oil reserves in response to the IEA’s request for members to release 400 million barrels. The IEA reserves were established in 1974 following the Arab oil embargo, and IEA member countries currently hold more than 1.2 billion barrels of public emergency oil stocks, with a further 600 million barrels of industry stocks held under government obligation. Germanys economy ministry, Katherina Reiche, said the IEA asked Germany to release 2.64 million tons roughly 19.7 million barrels of its oil reserves. She said it would take a couple of days before the delivery of the first quantities. Germany stands behind the IEAs most important principle of mutual solidarity, Reiche said. The German government also said it will introduce a measure to allow gas stations in Germany to raise fuel prices no more than once a day. The federal government wants to introduce this as quickly as possible, Reiche said. It wasnt immediately clear how much oil Austria was releasing. Starting Monday in Austria, price increases at gas stations will be allowed only three times a week, said the countrys economy minister, Wolfgang Hattmannsdorfer. He said Austria was releasing part of its emergency oil reserve and extending the national strategic gas reserve, adding: One thing is clear: in a crisis, there must be no crisis winners at the expense of commuters and businesses. IEA nations have released emergency stocks on five previous occasions: During the 1990-1991 Gulf War, after Hurricane Katrina in 2005, during the Libyan civil war in 2011, and twice after the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Samuel Petrequin and Kirsten Grieshaber, Associated Press Associated Press reporters Matt Sedensky, Cathy Bussewitz, John Leicester, and Sylvie Corbet contributed to this report.
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E-Commerce
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