Fun The lighter side of life; and more great PQ giveaways

Welcome to the metaverse!

Facebook will now be known as ‘Meta’, as the tech giant tries to shift the focus away from its controversial social media platform and onto ‘future technologies’. CEO Mark Zuckerberg explained the company’s move into the ‘metaverse’ would help it combine social media, video calls, gaming, entertaining and working from home into an immersive virtual reality world. He said: “From now on we are going to be metaverse-first, not Facebook first… we believe the metaverse will be the successor to the mobile internet.”

The new Meta logo has raised a few eyebrows. It looks very similar to the infinity symbol, and some have even likened it to a thigh exerciser. Another worry might be that in Hebrew ‘Meta’ means ‘dead’! This in turn led to #FacebookDead going viral.

Who wants to be a trillionaire? Musk does

Analysts at Morgan Stanley are predicting that the founder of Tesla, Elon Musk, will become the world’s first trillionaire. Tesla’s results have hit new records with revenues jumping 57% to just under $14 billion. Operating income hit $2 billion and the automotive gross margin was 30%. Shares doubled on the news. The company said: “The third quarter of 2021 was a record quarter in many respects. We achieved our best-ever net income, operating profit and gross profit.” Immediately following its result announcement, Tesla received its biggest-ever order for electric cars from Hertz. The car rental giant said it was buying 100,000 vehicles at the cost of $4 billion.

Business parks in space

Amazon founder Jeff Bezos has announced new plans to launch a “mixeduse business park” with a twist – it will be in space! Blue Origin, his space tourism company, has unveiled plans for a commercial space station. It is being marketed as a business park in space, hosting up to 10 guests at a time. The 32,000 sq ft station, called Orbital Reef, would be ideal for conducting cutting-edge research and even includes a space hotel.

New sustainability business game launched

To coincide with COP26, Scottish business simulation games specialist GingerTech has launched a new sustainability-focused game, called Go Green.

Played in teams of between five and 15, the Go Green game focuses on decisions that affect emissions in areas such as supply chain, procurement, business travel, buying patterns and investment. Its main marketplace will be the enterprise sector, but the game is applicable across public, charitable, and commercial sectors, including SMEs.

The aim of the game is to bring environmental and social impact decisionmaking into every level of the business and drive development of practical solutions to emissions reduction. Tim Dew, Chief Executive of GingrTech, said: “Many people are already committed to the need for environmental change in their personal lives and it is time to give them the opportunity to make a positive difference in their workplaces as well.”

Take your socks off

Indian police recently issued an edict that students wanting to sit the exams for coveted government teaching jobs could not wear flip flops, shoes or even socks into the exam hall. Over 1.5 million people sit the exams at 4,000 centres in Rajasthan. Up for grabs are 31,000 jobs, offering security and rising salaries. To prevent cheating the internet was switched off in half of the state for around 12 hours. Despite these new restrictions, five candidates still manged to get inside one of the exam halls with mobile phones or a bluetooth ear device. ’

Time to get the ‘polluter elites’

Climate experts have said that luxury yachts, private jets and other carbon-intensive goods used by the ‘polluter elite’ need to be banned or massively taxed. The new report from the Hot or Cool Institute think tank found that the richest 10% of the world’s population was responsible for 50% of manmade greenhouse gasses (between 1990 and 2015). The richest 1% accounted for 15% of emissions. The scientist say these polluter elites cannot carry on what they are doing expecting everyone else to pay the environmental price.

Just so you know, in 2019 each person in the UK produced 8.5 tonnes of carbon dioxide. This needs to drop to 0.7 tonnes by 2050 to fall in line with the Paris Agreement of limiting global warming to 1.5C.

W E V E G O T T H E L O T

The richest man in Babylon

There are seven lesson you can take from the book we are giving away this month, among them is ‘pay yourself first’ and ‘save 10% of everything you earn’. You will have to read ‘The Richest Man in Babylon’ to find out the other five! This book by George S. Clason is described as a timeless classic and a bit outside our comfort zone. However, there are some timeless lessons in there. Check out a great YouTube review of the book at https://tinyurl.com/d486m9u9 To win one of the three books on offer email your name and address details to giveaways@pqmagazine.com. Head up this email ‘Babylon’ and you will be entered for this month’s prize draw.

Happiness journal

We are told expressing gratitude for the things that make you happy has been proven to make you feel more positive, so you will thank us if you win this ‘Happiness Journal’. The journal provides creative activities to bring joy to your day, so what’s not to like! To win this great prize just send us an email with your name and address to giveaways@ pqmagazine.com. Head up that email ‘Happiness’ and we will do the rest.

Terms and conditions: One entry per giveaway please. You must send your name and address to be entered for the draw. All giveaway entries must be received by Friday 17 December. The main draw will take place on Monday 20 December 2021. TO ENTER THESE GIVEAWAYS EMAIL GIVEAWAYS@PQMAGAZINE.COM