- REGALIER
- Posts
- Relax, you're not stupid
Relax, you're not stupid
+ Adidas cancelled? Nope.
034
OVERWORLD:
-Adidas is bigger than ever, which might be a bad thing.-
ONE BETWEEN:
-No, you’re not stupid. Captcha tests are getting harder.-
THE DEPTHS:
-Is the Chinese Terracotta Army a result of mental illness? Probably.-
 | O |  |
Fashion
Adidas is bigger than ever, which might be a bad thing.
Despite Kanye’s … thing, Adidas is fucking killing it.
Adidas’ expected full-year operating profit jumped from €500 million to €700 million ($745.4 million).
Only €50-ish million is from shedding Yeezy inventory.
Sales growth (excluding Yeezy) is estimated at about 5% from December to February.
Meanwhile, Nike's butthole is hurting from oversaturating the market with Dunks, resulting in 2% growth in the same period.
All of this is reflected in Adidas stock, which is at its highest level in two years.
❓Question: How could a nearly canceled company whip up €650 million?
❗️Answer: Old-school models like Gazelle, Campus, Handball Spezial, and Samba are selling like bomb manuals on the dark web.
But hype is a double-edged sword. Adidas is rolling in money right now, but simply making more of these shoes could backfire as trend-sensitive consumers develop an ick.
It’s already happening. Samba stock increased by 354% on U.S. and UK sites this year, but their sell-out rates have dropped.
They used to have a sell-out rate of 67%, but it dumped down to 51% - probably because they’re losing their cool factor.
Corny humans in Sambas.
✦”Let us not ruin this”✦
The name of the game becomes to not fall into the one-style trap.
Adidas is trying to outbalance the Samba craze with the Handball Spezial - with releases of the model up 300% so far this year.
It's not perfect, the Handball Spezial is essentially the Samba’s uglier sibling. Compare this with Yeezy's truer diversification: hightops, runners, boots, slides, etc.
Still, numbers don't lie: Sellouts of Handball Spezial rose by 6% to 56%. The question is just how long Adidas can keep that up.
Handball Spezial
Other ways of diversifying would be figuring out how the classic trend could mutate.
For example, Blake Lively’s full Adidas Originals tracksuit at the Superbowl made Adidas start pushing their classic trackies.
✦Natural order✦
Historically, Nike and Adidas are in a cyclical dance of dominating the market every 3 - 5 years.
That means that if Adidas overtakes Nike for the first time in 5 years - it's expected to stay up for another 3 - 5 years.
It all comes down to how Adidas handles the new spotlight. The same way Nike is coming down from overselling Dunks and Jordans is how Adidas could fumble their bag.
THE KING NEEDS YOU
Human, you are a mere . Do you not seek grander ventures? A greater title? Honor? Take up arms, and help me expand my kingdom!
{{rp_personalized_text}}
Refer a friend with this link.
{{rp_refer_url}}
✦QUICK HITS✦
✦Business & Tech✦
Meta is upping AI efforts with the new Llama 3 model, aiming right at the skull of ChatGPT. By integrating it across Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, and its standalone site, Meta.ai, they're expanding global access and innovating in real-time image generation and search integrations.
Tesla has slashed prices globally. That includes significant cuts in China and Germany as it faces decreasing sales and a competitive EV market. Bad news, especially following the 10% workforce reduction and reported 40.8% drop in share prices this year.
Apple's iPhone sales in China fell 19.1% in Q1 as Huawei's sales surged 69.7%, driven by its new Mate 60 smartphone with advanced 5G capabilities, intensifying competition in the premium segment.
Microsoft is betting small; their new Phi-3 A.I. models are smaller and cheaper than the GPT-3.5, but deliver comparable performance at lower costs. Here’s a technical report for nerds.
The U.S. House has passed a bill mandating TikTok's sale or ban within a year over national security concerns, potentially snatching 170 million American users off the platform.
✦Culture✦
Tremaine Emory and Arthur Jafa’s Denim Tears collab is a Supreme diss. Using Supreme’s Futura font they’re flipping Supreme’s iconic "Illegal business controls America” into "Systemic racism controls America" - fitting, as Emory left Supreme as Creative Director, citing systemic racism as his reason.
Balenciaga’s deputy CEO, Laura du Rusquec is the new CEO of Danish fashion brand Ganni. Her mission will be developing upscale growth and innovation to trump challenging market conditions.
Here’s what went wrong at Grimes Coachella set. If you didn’t see it, here’s a very funny video of Grimes screaming in agony at Coachella.
Fortnite's latest update introduces a filter to block "confrontational" emotes, allowing players to replace them with still images or hide them completely, which is the most pussy shit ever.
✦Interesting✦
Silent orgasms: A Swedish researcher at Lund University analyzed 3,528 audio recordings of orgasm sounds (34 hours) and found that moaning/screaming/gasping out loud is pretty rare.
Nice place, man: An idyllic Illuminati-core home in Toronto, for $12 million
Play: Fallout-style RPG made in Excel
Read: No one buys books
ONE
BETWEEN
🤖 No, you’re not stupid. Captcha tests are getting harder.
Computers are getting damn smart. It’s not just about losing a cushy accounting gig to AI - these Captcha tests are beating our asses.
Automated scripts are getting so smart that proving that you’re not a robot is becoming more and more of a nuisance.
Gone are the days of simply identifying blurry text or clicking on street signs. Today, we’re forced to do bizarre tasks like identifying a bow-tie on a raccoon or finding apples in what looks like AI-generated Dali paintings.
Kinda funny, kinda annoying. Here are some sickening Captchas:
These captcha’s are getting out of hand. What is this
— Vahe Ouzounian (@vao96)
6:19 PM • Dec 12, 2023
THE DEPTHS
History
Is the Chinese Terracotta Army a result of mental illness? Probably.
When he was 13, Qin Shi Huang took the throne of the Chinese Qin state in 246 B.C. It was much thanks to his mother, a concubine who through schemes and connections with the elite made sure her son could inherit the kingdom.
While he did do cool shit, like unify China under one ruler, build the Great Wall, and standardized the one Chinese writing system across the empire - he was also fucking bonkers.
Qin Shi Huang was terrified of death, and so, he was obsessed with immortality.
One way this manifested was by consuming mercury, which court alchemists had promised would grant immortality. If you didn’t know, mercury is very toxic and it led to Qin Shi Huang’s early death at 49.
✦Preparing for the worst✦
But paranoia refused him to go into death unprepared. Qin Shi Huang built the Terracotta Army - an army of 8000 soldiers surrounding Qin Shi Huang’s tomb. The emperor believed would help secure his rule and safety in the afterlife.
For 2000-ish years, we had never seen the army of death. That’s til 1974, when some local farmers digging a well accidentally found them.
The Terracotta Army is just one part of a vast necropolis city designed to mirror the urban plan of the capital city. It’s more so a giant palace.
The site covers an estimated area of 60 to 100 square kilometers and includes not just soldiers, but animals, chariots, horses, acrobats, musicians, and state officials.
It seems like Qin Shi Huang didn’t only want protection, but also entertainment, beauty, and bureaucracy in the afterlife. He was preparing a full empire in the death realm.
Interestingly, there are no women in the palace. This wouldn’t be so strange if it only consisted of soldiers, but the entertainers and animals tell us that Qin Shi Huang didn’t only prepare for war.
It’s hard to make sure of Qin Shi Huangs exact spiritual beliefs, but perhaps he believed that there was no childbirth in the death realm.
So yeah… here’s a cute link to 99.99% pure mercury you can buy for $6 per gram - in case you want to tap into the underworld.