OpenAI has new thoughts on user safety and Oura's valuation just doubled

Oura’s raising some eyebrows with their government partnership and $11 billion valuation; Amazon is in court with the FTC; and I fit both a wedding and my mama’s sixtieth into a busy weekend! Let’s get into it.

Oura is raising a Series E; people have questions

Oura, which makes rings that track sleep, periods, fitness, and more, will soon be worth $11 billion, which will DOUBLE its (already whopping) $5 billion valuation. They’ve received plenty of criticism for their government alliances; two of their biggest clients are the Department of Defense and analytics firm Palantir (which works closely with law enforcement). They’re claiming they never share personal data with the government, but people are skeptical.

OpenAI is rolling out new safety features for minors

OpenAI has caught some (warranted) heat for ChatGPT’s role in encouraging self-harm in its underage users. In response, new users will have to prove their age before they start using the platform. Users under 18 will have a specific experience with more safeguards (OpenAI does formally state that their platform is intended for teens as young as 13). OpenAI continues to emphasize the importance of privacy and freedom of speech; in a statement about privacy, they claimed that “The same level of protection needs to apply to conversations with AI which people increasingly turn to for sensitive questions and private concerns. We are advocating for this with policymakers.” TL;DR: they’re adding safeguards, but still mostly focused on freedom of speech and privacy. So… will be hard to enforce those safeguards.

Amazon allegedly tricked people into signing up for Prime (riddle me tricked)

Amazon, which made $44 billion off Prime subscriptions last year, allegedly buried its $139 yearly price tag for Prime. And they’re getting some heat for it. The FTC says Amazon purposefully obfuscated the cost; Amazon claims they didn’t do anything illegal. I know I pay for Prime, but I can’t say I realized it was that much…but at least I save on shipping when I order Hamilton costumes / rogue wigs (IYKYK)!

Big weekend for milestones. 1) First face shot of my fiancé in my newsletter—we were at a wedding in Sun Valley, which also marks the highest altitude wedding I’ve attended! And 2) celebrated my mom’s sixtieth (luckily Sun Valley to SFO is a quick Sunday flight, but yes, I was definitely not…feeling…my best post-wedding).

Strapless + drop waist is my current obsession. Something about this dress just hits the exact trifecta of formal without feeling too mature, classic without being boring, and timeless while still feeling special. It’s Aje (my current obsession). It’s on the pricier side, but I’ve linked some dupes and similar options!

If you’re staring at a spreadsheet with first names in one column, last names in another, and addresses in a third—and dreading the copy/paste marathon—meet your new bestie: =CONCATENATE.

Instead of typing “John Smith, 123 Main Street, Chicago, IL” a hundred times, just drop this formula in a new column:

=CONCATENATE(A2," ",B2,", ",C2,", ",D2)

Where:

• Column A = First Name

• Column B = Last Name

• Column C = Street

• Column D = City/State/Zip

Drag the formula down, and boom!! You’ve got perfectly formatted mailing addresses in seconds! Copy/paste those into a doc, format your envelopes, and skip the hours of manual formatting. My consulting background is coming in so hot in wedding planning season.

Thanks for reading!