What is News Du Jour? Learn more HERE and listen to the actual podcast HERE.
- Talk is louder.
So on this past Saturday night, President Trump held a rally in Tulsa Oklahoma. Which is actually, my hometown. A country-wide awakening about the race massacre that occurred in Tulsa in 1921, left many believing that Trump’s decision to hold his rally there was intentional. What’s more, he wanted to initially have his rally on Juneteenth and then changed the date after a lot of pressure.
The crazy part about this story though, is that his administration publicly said that more that a million tickets had been requested and yet… The BOK center in Tulsa can fit only 20 thousand inside…. And was only about half full for the President.
SO why?
I could have to do with covid. Trump blames the protestors. The date change could have affected it. But there’s another explanation that…. Is way more juicy.
Apparently tiktok videos that went viral on both Instagram and Tiktok encouraged people to buy tickets to the Trump rally… with no intention of going. SO that he would have to walk in to a less than packed house. And that’s exactly what happened – the scene was only half full when they had claimed over a million ticket requests. All political opinions aside, this was a huge stumble for the president in a red state that he won by 36 points in the last election.
So was it the gen Z tiktokers who caused this situation? Or did people wise up to the health hazard and stay home? Was it the date change that caused the lack of attendance? Really hard to know for sure, but it won’t stop tiktokers from taking credit!
2. Bubba Wallace.
Who is Bubba Wallace?
He is a NASCAR racer. A Black NASCAR racer. NASCAR’s only black racer.
Remember how NASCAR decided to ban the confederate flag at their establishments and events? Well, it seems someone out there was unhappy with this change and decided to take it out by threatening Bubba Wallace, a black NASCAR driver. A noose was ominously placed in the driver’s garage stall.
Fortunately, Wallace was not the one to discover the noose, a member of his team did who IMMEDIATELY reported it to the NASCAR organization who said this of the event QUOTE “Late this afternoon, NASCAR was made aware that a noose was found in the garage stall of the 43 team. We are angry and outraged and cannot state strongly enough how seriously we take his heinous act. We have launched an immediate investigation and will do everything we can do identify the persons responsible and eliminate them from the sport. As we have stated unequivocally, there is no place for racism in NASCAR, this act only strengthens our resolve to make the sport open and welcoming to all!” END QUOTE
Because the track area wasn’t accessible to the public at the time, the logical conclusion is that someone within the NASCAR organization placed the noose. But just outside the arenas have been people parking cars with the flags being flown and an airplane even flew overhead with a trailing sign that read “defund NASCAR.” So this will not likely be the end of racist behavior but fortunately, the NASCAR leadership IS standing up to correct it and protect both Bubba Wallace and Black fans.
3. A design titan emerges.
Have you ever used Canva online? Spelled C-A-N-V-A? It’s basically a website where you can design graphics for free…. Think, social media templates for every platform, slide decks, menus, invitations, worksheets, posters, and more! The tool is free to use but you have to upgrade to a paid version to unlock certain features.
Canva is actually what I use to produce the daily dish for instagram and pretty much any other graphic you see from me. So it ended up being one of those fortunately businesses that has actually thrived under covid. With the rise of changes being made to existing small businesses, info being designed to help explain medical precautions, as well as many events/ educational pieces being created on behalf of Black Lives Matter, many many more people are using the platform.
And a new estimate of the company values them at $6 BILLION DOLLARS. It’s previous evaluation this past October, put it at only $3.2 billion, according to Forbes, so it almost doubled since then. Canva announced yesterday that it had raised $60 million dollars in additional funding.
The platform boasts over 30 MILLION monthly users.
What did they do in the midst of the pandemic that might have helped them? Well, the froze hiring and took care of their existing employees. They continued to pay contractors and cleaners. They delivered boxed lunches to their staff at their homes. And while they did see a drop in initial print sales, they were able to pivot and make template after template for both COVID and Black Lives Matter usage. And it worked.
The company is Austrailian but plans to open an Austin location with their new funding, once things settle down a bit and focus on their newly announced partnership with FedEx and more physical designs. Congrats to a great company!
And that’s the news du jour!
I want to leave you with the quote: “One always measures friends on how they show up in bad weather” – so be sure to check in on your friends this week! We are all going through SOMETHING right now.