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Last month, Elon Musks social media platform X announced it was launching a digital wallet service. Users would be able to transfer money from their bank accounts to a wallet on X, bringing the platform one step closer to its much-promised Everything App destiny. The announcement was met on Bluesky and X with a torrent of jokes on a similar theme: the wallet inspector. Congrats to Elon on his long-awaited move into the wallet inspector business, wrote Edward Niedermeyer, author of a book on Tesla. And that was before Musks Department of Government Efficiency started poking around inside the national treasury. Its early still, but the wallet inspector is already the frontrunner for the defining meme of 2025. It comes from a 1993 Simpsons episode called Homer Goes to College, written by Conan OBrien. In the pivotal scene, Homer has just gotten a trio of nerds expelled from their university, and he feels remorseful about it. No sooner does one of the geeks assure him they can take care of themselves, though, then they are confronted by the town thief, who introduces himself as the wallet inspector, and holds out his hand in solicitation. The group doesnt hesitate for a second, leaving the thief stunned that his dumb plan succeeded. Its funny to contemplate a thief lazy enough to give the wallet inspector gambit a go. Its also funny to imagine a squad of marks so sheltered and credulous, they believe this is standard procedure. And it may be funniest of all to think about a third party like Homer observing this exchange and, in the scenes final beat, despairing: Thats not the wallet inspector. That the same versatile term can be deployed to evoke three separate sets of behaviors may be why it already seeped into cultural vernacular years ago. But the convergence of so much openly shady behavior and corresponding gullibility in recent months has made the wallet inspector especially relevant in 2025. Its an ideal flourish for a moment when the mere suggestion of legitimacy, and a lack of shame, can take you seemingly anywhere. The day-to-day experience of life in 2025when our institutions are crumbling, the barbarians are no longer even at the gates but within them, and no wretched outcome seems off the tableis pushing those with the capacity to take it all in toward a mindset of total distrust. Anyone steeped in that worldview can only look upon their neighbors who still have faith in anythinglaws, public safety, basic decencyas grade-A suckers. When a legal scholar thinks the constitution is inherently inviolable, even after daily evidence of Musk and his minions openly flouting it, they are ready for the wallet inspector. When a Republican Senator who lived through the past decade is still surprised Donald Trump did not stick to his word, its inspection time. And when DraftKings offers its gambling-addled user base a premium subscription tier with increased odds, that wallet is gone. People lob plenty of inspection allegations at the saps of the tech realmthose lured in to recent memecoin rug pulls by the Hawk Tuah Girl or the president, for instance, along with anyone who ever invested in NFTs. They use the meme to describe the U.S. government handing over untold billions to AI companies, based on the adorable belief that a Chinese company could never in a million years undercut themand they deploy it to shrug at everyone fooled by all the visual slop coming down the pike in the AI boom. And there was only one way to frame it when one of Xs lesser-known advertisers turned out to be, fittingly enough, a literal wallet inspection operation. All the wallet inspector talk seemed to hit a crescendo when X announced its digital wallet service; then, Musks team obtained access to the U.S. Treasury. The DOGE crew reportedly now has at their inexperienced fingertips data on Social Security numbers and banking information. They are effectively inspecting Americas walletand Americas top officials are just handing it over. The wallet inspector meme makes for a devastating way to describe anyone too trusting of plainly false assurances, the people making those assurances, and the Homer-like observers who dont quite seem to understand what is happening, much less mount any meaningful opposition. Its the rhetorical embodiment of a free-fall era where so many people in positions of authority seem to be openly running scams, and the people meant to protect evryone else are either also running scams or are getting scammed themselves. Its wallet inspectors all the way down.
Category:
E-Commerce
Ever wondered what life is like for an astronaut? Now you can ask during NASAs first Twitch event, where astronauts will be broadcasting live from the International Space Station (ISS). The stream is set to take place on Wednesday, February 12, at 11:45 a.m. ET on NASA’s official Twitch channel. The event will feature flight engineer Don Pettit, currently in space as part of the Expedition 72 launch which began on September 23, 2024, and ends in Spring 2025. He’ll be joined by NASA astronaut Matt Dominick, who returned to Earth in October 2024 after conducting scientific research for 232 days aboard the ISS. The NASA astronauts will answer questions about daily life up in orbit, as well as the research conducted in microgravity. They will also talk about how ordinary citizens can get involved with NASA, including via citizen science projects and programs across the STEM field. This Twitch event from space is the first of many, says Brittany Brown, director of NASAs communications office. We spoke with digital creators at TwitchCon about their desire for streams designed with their communities in mind, and we listened. In addition to our spacewalks, launches, and landings, well host more Twitch-exclusive streams like this one. Twitch is one of the many digital platforms we use to reach new audiences and get them excited about all things space. The agency has previously streamed spacewalks and liftoffs on Twitch and its own NASA+ streaming platform, with Earthbound viewers following along. But this will be the first stream where those in the chat have a chance to send their questions up into space. No pressure.
Category:
E-Commerce
To understand President Donald Trump’s media strategy around the biggest television show of the year, it’s helpful to think of his actions as a brand activation. To command and control as much of the nation’s attention as he could around the Super Bowl, Trump simply took a page out of the advertising playbooks for consumer products. Even as Americans cut their cords and watch fewer hours of live TV every year, the Super Bowl remains a tentpole event that people tune in to see. Rather than zipping past commercials on their DVR or YouTube TV, the splashy ads are considered part of the programming. Brands pay big bucks to get their ads on during the gamethe cost of 30 seconds of airtime is now as high as $8 millionthough the true cost is much higher. Brands often tee up their ads by prereleasing them online before the game and they follow through with brand activations afterwards to milk their 30 seconds for as long as possible. Trump did something similar. The Super Bowl is already a big day for the president since the network that airs the game traditionally gets a newsy pregame interview. Had Trump relied solely on his pregame interview with Fox News host Bret Baier, though, the headlines would have been out of his hands and might have focused on some of his most unpopular policies. Even sitting down with a friendly network (Fox will become the first network in U.S. history to air a show hosted by a president’s family member), poses its risks to a president’s narrative. Trump was asked questions about his actions, like putting the world’s richest man, Elon Musk, in charge of cutting government spending (a judge recently put restrictions on Musk’s powers, and polling shows Musk is becoming increasingly unpopular); his threats of tariffs on Canada and Mexico, which spooked the stock market before Trump reversed course and pressed pause; and stubbornly high consumer prices that haven’t gone down since he took office despite campaign promises to do so. But rather than rely on the pregame interview alone, Trump attempted to design his own news cycle around the game. Trump was the first sitting president to attend the Super Bowl, grabbing precious airtime showing him saluting the flag during the National Anthem, and like a consumer brand seeking to maximize its ad time, he teed up his appearance and made time for some follow-through. En route to New Orleans for the game, Air Force One’s path crossed over the recently renamed Gulf of America. With an oversize map as his prop, Trump signed a proclamation making Sunday Gulf of America Day. The rename and proclamation, of course, does nothing to lower prices or make the U.S. safer, but it does have an awful lot in common with brand stunt naming, like IHOP temporarily calling itself IHOb to promote its burgers, or Coors Light, which released limited-edition Mondays Light beers to promote its product on the day after the Super Bowl. Trump left the game early after incorrectly predicting the Kansas City Chiefs would win, but on his way home he looked to make more news, picking a fight with Taylor Swift on his social network and announcing a plan to stop minting pennies. The penny idea is one that’s been floated before, not to mention the fact that Trump’s authority to unilaterally do so is unclear. Still, it has all the hallmarks of his favored form of governance: showy, visceral, and easy to understand. Trump also announced 25% tariffs on aluminum and steel Monday, which may not be as simple or popular, but considering the bread and circuses of his Gulf of America Sunday, the news may well be drowned out by his preferred narratives.
Category:
E-Commerce
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