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On February 15, protestors swarmed in front of Tesla stores and charging stations in dozens of cities across the U.S., armed with posters reading, No one voted for Musk, Go steal data on Mars, and more. Today, federal workers will head to Tesla storesalong with other locations, including a SpaceX site and federal buildingsto protest cuts to vital services and mass layoffs. More protests at Tesla will follow this weekend, all aimed at Musks work to control swaths of the government with the so-called Department of Government Efficiency. Its one way to target Elon Musk where hes most vulnerable: Teslas car sales are dropping, and his political work is pushing consumers away from the brand. Meanwhile, most of Musks wealth is tied up in Tesla stock. We need to hold Elon Musk accountable, says Saqib Bhatti, cofounder and executive director of the Action Center on Race and the Economy (ACRE), a nonprofit that is helping support the national protests. We think if Musk is going to wreak havoc on our communities, then he cant expect business as usual in showrooms. People participate in a “Tesla Takedown” protest against Elon Musk outside a Tesla showroom in Seattle, on February 15, 2025. [Photo: Jason Redmond/AFP/Getty Images] DOGE, led by Musk, has helped push thousands of federal workers out of critical jobs, from the FDA and the CDC to the FAA. (The layoffs also included workers responsible for the country’s arsenal of nuclear weapons, though the government then scrambled to attempt to rehire them.) Musk also deleted the humanitarian agency USAID, stopping lifesaving medicine en route and abandoning aid workers in chaos. DOGE paralyzed the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), which has saved consumers roughly $21 billion since it was founded in 2011; the agency also had a plan to save consumers another $15 billion a year in overdraft fees. DOGE workers reportedly accessed sensitive taxpayer data at the Treasury Department, and the team now wants to get even more from the IRS. The list goes on. All this work likely breaks multiple laws, and lawsuits are underway. But protestors say that citizens need to do more now. I think its been disheartening to see the sense of resignation and despair from the people who are supposed to be leading the resistancethe Democrats in Congress, says Bhatti. Were getting out there and saying, Heres whats happening, heres what this means, heres what you can do about it. Because we know that people can fight back. We know from other countries that when people take on fascist, corporate takeover of the government, they can turn the tide back. A Tesla drives past protesters gathering in front of City Hall in Long Beach, California, on Monday, February 17, for the nationwide “Not My President’s Day” protest. [Photo: Juliana Yamada/Los Angeles Times/Getty Images] On the website TeslaTakedown, citizens keep planning new demonstrations. For protesters, standing in front of Tesla stores is partly a way to bring more attention to the havoc that DOGE is wreaking in D.C. But if it meaningfully pushes Tesla sales down even further, it’s also a logical way to put more pressure on Musk. Musk has already damaged Tesla’s brandand the company’s EV sales were already dropping as other automakers keep rolling out new electric models, giving consumers have more options. In Norway, where Teslas have been incredibly popular in the past, sales dropped nearly 38% the past month. In Spain, they fell 75%. Even Tesla fans who run Tesla-focused websites have started selling off their own cars. Sales are slumping in California. And though Tesla stock shot up after the election, it’s down by a third since then. A Motley Fool analyst suggests that it could potentially drop by another 50%, or more.
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E-Commerce
While Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin decide the future of Ukraine in Saudi Arabia, the war keeps raging on in Europe. Kiev doesnt give up and continues to unleash a seemingly endless swarms of drones against Moscows assets, from heavy bombers to light first-person view (FPV) drones, explosive-loaded kamikaze flying vehicles controlled with gamepads and AR goggles designed to eliminate armored vehicles, trucks, and infantry units. The drones have had a devastating impact on the much larger Russian forces, so effective that Ukraines Unmanned Systems Forcesthe first of its kind in the worldhas inaugurated a new era of warfare and jump-started a novel arms race. On the ground, the relentless barrage of ultrafast FPVs has forced Russian forces in the Bakhmut sectorin Eastern Ukraineto resort to a low-tech, desperate measure: a mile-long tunnel constructed of netting designed to intercept the tiny, explosive wasps. In theory, this constructionwhich stretches along a critical supply route between Bakhmut and the city of Chasiv Yarstops the FPVs before they reach their targets, too far from the troops on the ground to do any damage. The Russians claim it works, though requires constant maintenance because the FPVs keep piercing the improvised structure. According to Ukrainian drone operators, however, it is not as effective as the Russians had hoped. Old trick, new enemies Similar low-tech solutions have been employed throughout history, often arising from a need to counter a technologically superior or novel threat with readily available materials. During World War II, for example, barrage balloons were deployed extensively by the British and also the United States, with the 320th Barrage Balloon Battalion deploying them after the Normandy landings to protect the Allies beachheads. These large, tethered balloons were intended to deter enemy aircraft from dive-bombing and strafing ground positions and cities, forcing airplanes to fly higher to avoid colliding with the tethering cables, thus making bombing less accurate. Barrage balloons protect ships unloading cargo at Omaha Beach in Normandy, France, in June 1944. [Photo: United States Coast Guard] Instead of dive bombers, the Ukrainians are using FPV drones. Instead of balloons and cables, Russians are using nets. Ukrainian drones so effective that the Russians now refer to open roads in battle areas as roads of death. X and Telegram are full of videos that highlight this big problem for Moscows forces, showing long stretches of roads littered with the charred remains of countless vehicles destroyed by FPV drones. Anton Gerashchenkoformer adviser to the Minister of Internal Affairs of Ukrainecounts here a whopping 90 destroyed Russian vehicles: a mix of trucks, vans, and what appears to be a tank, all piled up along a short stretch of road in the Donetsk region. Another video posted by war analyst Special Kherson Cat depicts a seemingly endless column of destroyed Russian supply vehicles on the Pokrovsk front. Developing countermeasures for drones Before these nets, the Russian military experimented with various countermeasures against drone attacks. Initially, they attempted to use electronic warfare systems to jam drone signals. However, the rapid evolution of drone technology, including the use of varied frequencies to control them, fiber optic cables, and artificial intelligence to avoid remote control, has rendered these jamming efforts largely ineffective. And while tank crews have been building improvised anti-drone armors around themmaking them look like grotesque steampunkish turtlessoldiers dont have that luxury. So they had to improvise and build the netted tunnel. [Photo: Ukraine Ministry of Defense/Wiki Commons] The news about the tunnel was picked up from Russian TV for Western media by WarTranslated, a Estonian military analyst who has been reporting on news on the war. The video shows the skeletal framework of this unusual defense. Russian soldiers in the video explain that the netting is intended to protect vehicles and personnel from drone attacks on this exposed stretch of road. Our group maintains more than two kilometers of anti-drone nets. We constantly improve the technology, one of the soldiers who is working on these contraptions says in the video. The nets are placed in the most exposed sections of the road to ensure the safe movement of our equipment. We strive to continuously expand the coverage area, enhancing the installation technology to set them up more quickly. The installation technology looks like nothing more than patches of plastic netting of different sizes and colors, which are hung using existing and improvised posts along the road. Parts of the road have nets covering both the sides and the top. Sometimes they don’t build the “roof” and instead install banners of the material connecting posts across the road. The Russians believe that these banners will acts as obstacles, makin it difficult for Ukrainian drone operators to maneuver into the road, and hopefully stopping the FPVs from diving in for a bombing run. https://twitter.com/wartranslated/status/1888536416008729027 The Ukrainians are not impressed The Ukrainian pilots disagree. While netting can indeed capture drones, preventing them from detonating on impact, they remain unimpressed. They point out that fragmentation munitions, effectively flying claymore mines, can be detonated remotely, showering shrapnel through the netting. Even more concerning for the Russians is that the netting itself can become a trap. Ukrainian forces are exploring the use of incendiary dragon drones known as Dracarys, maneuvering inside the tunnels to spray thermite (a mixture of metal powder and metal oxide that burns at 4,000 degrees Fahrenheit). This substance produces intense heat on contact thanks to a chemical reaction where the metal powder steals oxygen from the metal oxide, releasing a tremendous amount of energy in the process. It can burn through any armor and, according to the Pentagon, kill anyone in under 10 seconds. Another possibility is that they will use anti-tank mines to destroy sections of the netting, creating openings for other FPVs to exploit. Once inside the tunnel, the Russian vehicles and personnel cant disperse easily, becoming an easier target for the FPVs. So despite these nets, Russians could easily find themselves back at square one. But in any case, the construction of these tunnels is a testament to the effectiveness of Ukrainian drone attacks and the desperation of the Russian military to protect its supply lines. They highlight the ongoing cat-and-mouse game of military innovation in Ukraine, with each side constantly developing new tactics and countermeasures. The roads of death are likely to remain a feature of this conflict until Trump and Putin strike a deal reported to erase Ukraine’s effort and sacrifice for their benefit.
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E-Commerce
A new startup is leaning on the power of recommendations to spread the word about indie films. Olyn offers a direct-to-consumer platform for film and video distribution, enabling filmmakers to retain up to 90% of their revenue. Billed as Shopify for filmmakers, Olyn removes the platform as a middleman, eliminating ads and algorithm-driven recommendations. This allows movies to shine based on their own merits and be monetized directly through viewership. Ana Maria Jipa, cofounder and CEO of Olyn, told TechCrunch that the filmmakers are responsible for the movies promotion, while Olyn handles the rest. We provide all the tech that implies: from DRM, 4K streaming, casting, a full landing page that presents the film in the same way that it might appear on Netflix or Apple TV, plus all the other tools such as geo-targeting, analytics, and audience data, she said. They promote their movie with PR, journalists, bloggers, film critics, etc. The idea is that while filmmakers may not have access to the big marketing budgets of streaming giants, a recommendation from someone a user knows and trusts carries far more weight than a suggestion by a platform algorithm. On Olyn, filmmakers can rely on influencers, film critics, and content creators as distribution partners with purchase links appearing across their content, blogs, and social media. Olyn also provides filmmakers with detailed analytics on viewership, including the locations where their movie is performing well, total minutes watched, and a database of users who have viewed the film. This allows filmmakers to better understand their audience and use that information to inform and improve future projects. Jipa says Olyns global reach can also help battle piracysomething thats been an issue for film studios since the advent of the internet. If someone can pay for a movie and watch it instantly without the hassle of trawling the internet just to settle for a sketchy stream littered with ads, theyre much more likely to do so. And if you’re after a recommendation, the recent Brian Epstein biopic Midas Man, a film about the manager of the Beatles, just dropped on the platform.
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