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As the pornography platform has exploded in popularity, a side industry has emerged: middlemen who encourage young women into the industry, then take a large cut of their earnings
Markuss Hussle wants his online students to understand one thing: he knows how to make money. There is no subtlety involved. He gives an hour-long presentation in one video, sitting next to his silver Lamborghini. In another, he splices his money-making tips with footage of a ski weekend with his friends in Courchevel, in the French Alps, including shots of private jets, helicopters and a girlfriend in a fur coat. He claims the trip cost $100,000 (£75,000). He shows off his watches and his swimming pool and talks about how his mother worked three jobs as a cleaner until he “retired her” and bought her a home by the sea.
If you were not paying close attention to the spreadsheets and presentations interspersed with the motivational lifestyle content, you might guess he was offering guidance on how to trade shares or invest in cryptocurrency. There are a lot of performance graphs and much discussion of account management, optimisation, scaling, working smart and tripling profits.
Continue reading...Thu, 18 Jun 2026 04:00:00 GMT
Goal against Croatia in his side’s World Cup opener was an angry one with a rising sense of inevitability
And breathe again. For the opening 45 minutes under the giant Victorian train station roof at the Dallas Stadium, England produced a performance that was a bit like watching one of those YouTube videos where an awkward and frightening Chinese robot has learned how to dance like Michael Jackson.
Dogged and occasionally convincing, but the kind of spectacle that does generally end with the robot falling off the stage. England didn’t just play like machines in that first half. They played like faulty machines, scared machines, contributing almost zero free-form football to a 2-2 half-time score that included two Harry Kane set-piece goals; the first a set piece from a set piece, a penalty after a corner, set piece squared.
Continue reading...Wed, 17 Jun 2026 22:56:20 GMT
Starmer’s EU reset is aimed at the conference room. Meanwhile Farage and the hard right mine ethnic resentment on the streets
What story does Britain tell itself about Brexit, 10 years after the vote that transformed the country? Watch TV or read the papers and you find one of two viewpoints: from the common room or the conference room.
The common room story is about chums and how they fall out. Friendships forged on hallowed playing fields and over Cotswold kitchen suppers, then dashed on the rocks of ambition. The new BBC documentary Brexit: A Very British Civil War is the latest in the genre, recounting what Dave said to Boris said to Michael said to Dom. It oohs at the deals struck over sets of tennis, and aahs at the then prime minister threatening dissenters with: “I will fuck you up for ever.” This is David Cameron as box office: the Scarface of the Bullingdon Club. And Brexit, you understand, was simply an Oxford fracas that got out of hand.
Aditya Chakrabortty is a Guardian columnist
Continue reading...Thu, 18 Jun 2026 05:00:01 GMT
We are told the natural world is ‘breaking down’. But forests don’t work like aeroplanes or human hearts
A version of this piece was originally published on Aeon as Why we need to think again about ecosystem failure
The Amazon rainforest, according to a 2021 study, is losing its capacity as a carbon sink and now emits more than it absorbs. In the tropics, marine scientists are reporting that coral reefs are in decline, threatening fish stocks. Equally concerning is research into the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (Amoc), a vast system of ocean currents that helps regulate the climate and is at risk of collapsing this century. The entire global ecosystem appears to be losing its ability to function.
We find this view in newspapers, magazines, technical reports and the journals of learned societies. But thinking about the environment in terms of its functions is also how many of us tend to understand the world. We may think that forests exist to produce oxygen, wetlands to filter water and bees to pollinate our crops.
Of special interest to humanity is the relationship of biodiversity to the variety of services provided by ecosystems and, in particular, to the stability of the flow of those services, such as the maintenance of the gaseous composition of the atmosphere, preservation of soils, recycling of nutrients and provision of food from the sea.
Continue reading...Thu, 18 Jun 2026 04:00:01 GMT
The Britart mavericks have now teamed up with an unlikely artist. Is their odd throuple an elaborate prank – or are the duo passing down their legacy?
‘Hello girls,” greets 82-year-old Gilbert Prousch, one half of art duo Gilbert & George, as he shakes my hand when I arrive at his house with a very important guest in tow. He kisses his other guest on the cheek. Gilbert is Italian after all.
“This way,” he says, ushering us into the four-storey, 18th-century Georgian townhouse in Fournier Street, Spitalfields, east London, where he and the other half of his duo, George Passmore, 84, have lived since the late 1960s. Back then, they rented the ground floor for £16 a month. Now, they own the whole house. I bet it costs a bit more now.
Continue reading...Thu, 18 Jun 2026 07:00:04 GMT
Veteran interviewees are forever trotting out the same anecdotes in response to unoriginal questions – until one fearless disruptor dared ask if ET had moist skin
For the most part, Steven Spielberg has avoided most of the indignities of the modern day press tour. He hasn’t had to subject himself to any spicy chicken wings, or summon any witticisms when presented with a cloche-covered sausage roll. Unlike many other celebrities, he hasn’t chosen to promote Disclosure Day by answering softball questions while simultaneously fashioning a Lionel Richie-style clay approximation of himself for YouTube. For this he should be applauded.
Instead, Spielberg has spent this promotional cycle on something more suited to his stature. A maestro tour, if you will, on which he gets to position Disclosure Day against a body of work that is second to none. Publications have run long oral histories about his entire career. He was a guest during the prestigious final week of Stephen Colbert’s talkshow. He was interviewed by the New York Times about the exact texture of ET’s skin.
Continue reading...Thu, 18 Jun 2026 06:00:05 GMT
Details of the 14-point agreement revealed as senior US officials claim ‘major win’ despite significant concessions to Tehran
Reaction: Donald Trump’s Iran deal met with anger, relief and incredulity
Analysis: Trump’s Iran deal is result of unrealistic ambitions for an untenable war
Donald Trump has signed a 14-point agreement with Iran, claiming it delivered a “major win” for the United States – even as it made significant political and financial concessions to Iran to reopen the strait of Hormuz and prevent a “worldwide depression”.
In extraordinary remarks on Wednesday, Donald Trump went from threatening Iran with a new wave of attacks to suggesting the country had basic rights to enrich uranium for civilian use, that he would not pressure Tehran to abandon its ballistic missiles programme and the US was “going to have to give back” billions of dollars in frozen Iranian assets.
Continue reading...Thu, 18 Jun 2026 00:36:22 GMT
Up to 3,000 activists – including cabinet ministers and other MPs – descending on constituency to back Andy Burnham
Up to 3,000 Labour campaigners are expected to descend on Makerfield for Andy Burnham, prompting fears among organisers that the hordes of activists may end up overwhelming voters during Thursday’s byelection.
Local hotels are fully booked and party members are expected to be dispatched to polling stations, and to leaflet people waiting at bus stops and school gates to avoid swamping residents on their doorsteps.
Continue reading...Thu, 18 Jun 2026 05:00:02 GMT
Filming in Las Vegas was suspended and Cain replaced as presenter after he appeared to be drunk, sources say
BBC presenter Ashley Cain called women ‘slags’, ‘sluts’ and ‘bitches’
Warning: this article contains sexually explicit, offensive language
The BBC made a second documentary series fronted by the presenter Ashley Cain just months after it was informed about an incident of alleged misconduct on a separate production in Las Vegas, which caused filming to be suspended and another presenter flown out at short notice to replace him.
The BBC’s decision to hire Cain, and promote him as a rare talent who could appeal to young men, is under scrutiny after the Guardian revealed his history of highly offensive and misogynistic social media posts, including jokes about hitting women and degrading sexual practices.
Continue reading...Thu, 18 Jun 2026 05:00:01 GMT
Drop will put pressure on Bank of England to raise interest rates despite peace deal in Iran war
Unemployment fell and wages increased in April, official figures showed, putting pressure on the Bank of England to raise interest rates despite a peace deal in the Middle East.
The latest figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) showed unemployment slipped to 4.9% in the three months to April from 5% in the three months to March.
Continue reading...Thu, 18 Jun 2026 06:33:26 GMT