Hallucinations

Good morning, you glorious beasts.

A British tourist has vowed never to go to Greece again after being served Greek food instead of an English breakfast.

Susan Edwards was "horrified" to find no bacon or sausages at her Corfu hotel, describing the holiday as a "nightmare".

She's turned down a £100 compensation offer, presumably holding out for a sausage roll and bucket of gravy.

ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
High Court tells UK lawyers to stop using AI

British lawyers are submitting AI-generated case-law citations that are completely fictitious, and the High Court is a tad concerned, friends. 

What happened?

Dozens of court cases have experienced this already. Most notably: 

• Haringey Law Centre cited hallucinated case-law five times against the Borough of Haringey. 

• 40% of case-law citations made against Qatari National Bank were hallucinated (and many other quotes were made-up). The claimant admitted to using AI. 

It’s a big problem

Because: 

• The case against Qatari National Bank was worth £89 million - and now the fools have flunked it. 

• Plus, submitting false material as if it were authentic could be considered contempt of court or even perverting the course of justice

• That means life in prison, friends. 

Now the AI Slop Lawyers could face criminal charges

Haringey Law Centre were sued for wasted legal costs and found “negligent” (how embarrassing).

But Dame Victoria Sharp came down hard. She said lawyers found misusing AI could face sanctions or police action. 

It’s time to start checking your lawyer’s work for EM dashes and words like “turbocharge”.

BUSINESS
Doc Martens profits slump as Brits can’t afford cool

The beloved hipster shoemaker favoured by the Sex Pistols, the papal guard, and the Dalai Lama, recorded a 90% decline in profits. 

What happened? 

• They only made a £8.8 million pre-tax profit

• That’s down from £93 million the year before

• They blamed it on a “challenging” UK market.

Oh yes, my friends, they’re enjoying increased revenue in the US - but not old Blighty. 

Dr Martens went public in 2021, but the timing couldn't have been worse.

• COVID decimated their manufacturing bases in Laos (31%) and Vietnam (62%). They're still making some boots in their original Northamptonshire factory, but at much higher costs.

• Then the rising cost of living priced people out of the market. In short, cool is much too expensive for the end times.

• And fast fashion offers a cheaper and equally fashionable alternative to 90 quid boots.

Their CEO has launched a new turnaround strategy focusing on “product over marketing” - basically admitting they lost their way a bit.

We'll see if he gets the boot before that strategy pays off.

CONSUMER TRENDS
Brits splurge on luxuries more than essentials (and lockdown might have made it worse)

According to the Barclays 10-year study of consumer spending habits, Brits think entertainment, travel and beauty are “non-negotiables”.

Are you not entertained?

• We spend more money on live entertainment than we did 10 years ago - a 17.3% increase since 2020.

• Spending on streaming services has also jumped 47.5% since 2020, with the average Brit dishing out £50.60 a month.

We all want a holiday

• 49% value holidays more than they did pre-pandemic

• 33% spend more money on travel than they did before.

Spain and France remain our go-to destinations (shocker), while Turkey has climbed to 5th from 8th in 2019. Probably because it’s still relatively cheap.

Meanwhile, we’re feeling incredibly skint

Two-thirds of Brits are budgeting more than ever, nearly half don't feel better off than a decade ago, and 82% are worried about shrinkflation.

Yet we're still prioritising fun over frugality - creating what economists are calling "seesaw spending," where we'll eat beans on toast all week to afford that weekend city break.

NEWS BITES
This just in…

•  🇬🇧 💻️ UK tech companies are on a hiring spree, with a 21% increase in job openings. Now they’re at pre-pandemic levels. This was largely driven by a rise in demand for people with AI skills - a 200% increase in just a year. The same research found that revenue per employee grew 27% since 2018, all because of LLMs. 

• 🇺🇸 🇨🇳 London is now the arena of world affairs, thanks to it hosting trade talks between the US and China today. This comes after trade talks in Geneva fell apart, with Trump claiming China weren’t playing fair. “So much for being Mr. NICE GUY!” he wrote, calmly. Let’s see how this plays out. Bring popcorn. 

• 🏦 📱 The NatWest app stopped working, with some businesses unable to pay staff or send money. This comes after a report found that major banks lost 33 days to banking outages since 2023. It’s an expensive technical problem for banks, because they have to fork out millions in compensation to affected customers.

• ⚽️ 👕 Vintage football shirts are booming. One company, subtly named Classic Football Shirts, recorded a 25% growth in sales despite a cost of living crisis. This might be because they’re part of urban cool streetwear, with everyone from Albanian nationalist Dua Lipa to my friend Dave sporting a cool vintage shirt. 

• 🤖 ⌛️ The UK government has delayed AI regulations for at least a year, so they can iron out some controversies, including copyright issues and child safety stuff. There’s a lot to do. The government are currently at loggerheads with the House of Lords over letting LLMs drink the blood of artists’ work. 

• 👮‍♂️ 🚧 Tech leaders are worried about harsh immigration laws. They say the increased skilled visa thresholds and regulations surrounding them make it harder to source real talent. If we don’t fix this, they say, companies will just move elsewhere. Which is exactly what’s already happening.