👍 That thumbs-up cost $82,000

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We made it to Friday, {{first_name | friend}}. You didn’t post about it. Didn’t change your status. Haven’t even cried to your friends about it yet. But TikTok already knows. Researchers found TikTok’s algorithm can predict with uncomfortable accuracy when someone is going through a breakup. Sometimes within hours. 

💔 What does TikTok’s AI algorithm look for to detect a breakup? A) The words and emojis in your comments, B) How long you pause, rewatch and exactly when you scroll away, C) The number of sad songs you search or D) Posting less but lurking longer. Answer’s at the bottom. Buckle up.

🏷️ Type your name into Google. Right now, data brokers are selling your name, address and personal information to anyone willing to pay. You didn’t sign up for that. You can’t opt out manually. There are hundreds of these sites. I use Incogni to wipe my profile from their databases automatically. Get 60% off with code KIM60. More below.* — Kim

📬 Someone forwarded this to you? Smart friend. Want it in your own inbox instead of waiting on them? Sign up here. It’s free, and I promise not to spam you.

⚡ TL;DR

📖 Read time: 2.5 minutes

You sent a smiley face. 🙂

You meant warm. Friendly. Happy, even. Your kid read it as passive-aggressive. Maybe threatening. Definitely suspicious.

Nobody told you the rules changed. But they did. The emoji you sent may not even look like what you think you sent.

This is the part nobody talks about. When you send an emoji, your phone doesn’t send a tiny image. It sends a code number. The receiving phone then draws its own version of that emoji, using its own design system. Apple and Samsung design theirs completely differently.

Send the eye-roll emoji 🙄 from your iPhone, and it looks like pure irritation. Crisp. Unmistakable. On a Samsung, the exact same emoji looks gleeful. Some describe it as drunk. Or suggestive. Your “I can’t believe you right now” arrived as “heh, interesting.”

The anguished face looks shocked on iPhone. On Samsung, it looks deeply sad with a little dejected sigh bubble. The smirk that reads as devious on Apple looks half-asleep on Samsung.

You’ve been sending the wrong message for years. So has everyone else.

Then on top of the design problem, the meanings themselves have split by generation.

The skull 💀 means death to anyone over 40. To Gen Z, it means “I’m dead from laughing.” It’s a compliment. If a kid sends you one, you nailed it.

The plain smiley 🙂 is warm and friendly to anyone over 35. To Gen Z, it reads as passive-aggressive, cold or vaguely threatening. Use the cowboy instead. Don’t ask me why it works. 🤠

The thumbs-up 👍 means great job to most Americans over 40. Gen Z reads it as dismissive. And in a Canadian courtroom, a farmer sent one in response to a grain contract, and a judge ruled it legally binding. He owed $82,000. For a thumbs-up. In a text message.

The nail polish 💅 means sass and “I genuinely do not care.” Not beauty tips.

The crying laughing 😂 is how everyone over 40 expresses extreme laughter. Gen Z retired it. They use the skull.

A period at the end of a text. Not an emoji but worth mentioning. To anyone under 30, ending a casual text with a period means you’re angry, done or both. Punctuation has become passive aggression. We live here now.

One law professor has been tracking emoji in legal proceedings since 2004. His warning to every lawyer and judge in the country: “No matter how specialized your court, emoji evidence is coming for you.”

We are one misread eye roll away from a family feud or a lawsuit at any given moment.

Your move: Before you send that 🙂 to anyone under 30, use words. And check what your most-used emojis actually look like on Android before your next important conversation. 

📩 Send this to someone who has ever spent 20 minutes trying to figure out if a one-word text with a period meant they were in trouble.

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Google wrote a massive check for $68 million. That’s the price they’re paying to settle claims that your smart speaker was recording you without your knowledge. I break down how those false triggers sent your private conversations to third-party contractors and why Google had to pay up. I’ll show you how to dive into your settings to delete that audio history.

Then I talk to Aaron, a student from Baton Rouge who wrote his final paper with his own two hands but still got flagged for AI cheating. I explain why these detection tools are failing. Plus, how one tiny island got rich from the .ai domain boom and what you need to know about the AirTag.

Watch on YouTube →

🎧 Or search “Komando” wherever you get your podcasts. I’m everywhere.

🧯 Burn book deleted: Get this. About two weeks after a California judge said Meta and YouTube could be liable for harm to kids, Meta started yanking ads from lawyers trying to sign up under-18 social media injury clients. Meta says it won’t let lawyers profit off its apps while suing over the damage those apps allegedly caused. Terms of service, meet terms of self-preservation. I would love to see the legal department group chat on this one.

Waymo works public: Ever hit a pothole so hard you started driving in nervous silence? Imagine the car reporting it before your back does. Waymo’s autonomous fleet is scanning streets for potholes and feeding that data to cities and transportation agencies. So far, it’s found 500 in the Bay Area, Los Angeles, Phoenix, Austin and Atlanta. Useful for drivers and very convenient for a company that needs city officials to keep saying yes.

🤥 Laptop listing fiction: I get irrationally annoyed when storage starts doing sleazy used-car math. Reddit users spotted Amazon and Newegg listings for HP laptops claiming 1.1TB, but the machines had 128GB onboard plus a one-year 1TB OneDrive trial. As in a subscription. Apparently, we’re counting imaginary attic space. After that trial, it’s about $100 a year. That is not a deal, that’s a dare. Calling that a 1.1TB laptop is like saying your apartment has a pool because it rains.

It’s this close: You know that AI answer at the top of Google? The New York Times reports (paywall link) AI Overviews gets 9 out of 10 factual questions right. Progress! But Google handles 14 billion searches a day. That 10% miss rate means millions of clean, confident, completely wrong answers, no typos, no red flags, just tidy misinformation delivered with encyclopedia energy. They didn’t do their homework. 

🙊 Whoopsie: I knew Apple was making a foldable iPhone, but my bingo card didn’t have them struggling to make the thing survive. They’re hitting development snags, and May’s the make-or-break stretch to fix them before production slips. Samsung spent years learning this lesson in public, letting folks beta-test folding screens with their own money. Apple showing up late and picky feels on-brand lately. Likely out in September, priced somewhere north of $2,000.

The Artemis astronauts are coming home, the photos of Earth from the moon are breathtaking, and every cent was spent right here on this pale blue dot

Listen on Komando.com →

🎧 Or search “Komando” wherever you get your podcasts. I’m everywhere.

⚡️ 3-second tech genius: Google Maps can warn you before the chaos. Search a restaurant or store and scroll down before you leave. You can check how busy it is at the moment, see when it usually gets packed and get your ETA with live traffic built in. Very handy when you would rather not arrive at peak madness and spend 20 minutes pretending the line is “not that bad.”

💥 Your hard drive will fail: It is only a matter of time. When it does, say goodbye to your photos and files. Recovery experts charge up to $3,000 with no guarantees. Why risk it? I rely on Carbonite to back up my files automatically. If your drive dies, your data survives. Save 50% now. Don’t wait until it is too late!*

Netflix launched a new app for kids’ games: And yes, it’s included in your subscription. Netflix Playground is aimed at kiddos 8 and under. No ads, no in-app purchases, just games based on shows like Peppa Pig and Sesame Street. Show the kids tonight. They’ll leave you alone for at least an hour. 

🌞 iPhone brightness keeps changing itself? You set it perfectly in Control Center, then five minutes later, it is brighter, dimmer and doing whatever it wants again. That is Auto-Brightness, and of course, Apple hid it somewhere weird. Open Settings > Accessibility > Display & Text Size, scroll all the way down and toggle off Auto-Brightness. The screen will stop acting like it knows better than you do.

⌨️ Windows has a backup keyboard: If a key suddenly stops working, you can still finish what you were typing. Go to Settings > Personalization > Taskbar > System tray icons > Touch keyboard and turn it on. It will appear at the bottom right of the taskbar. You can also open its settings to change the layout or switch to handwriting. Add it now. Future you may need it.

Old tech does not age gracefully: That tablet that still technically works may be out of support. Search it on endoflife.date to see if updates and security fixes have dried up. No support usually means no security updates, which is a cute way of saying you’re on your own. If it is on its last legs, try Amazon’s trade-in program. They might soften the blow with a gift card toward your next upgrade.

💸Prompt your raise: LinkedIn says jobs asking for AI skills are up 7.5% while overall listings fell 11%, and workers showing those skills can pull a 56% pay bump. Same job, better framing. This week: Open ChatGPT, Claude or Gemini and paste your résumé plus this prompt: “Rewrite my résumé to highlight AI proficiency relevant to [job title]. Show specific tasks I could accomplish faster with AI tools.” Takes 10 minutes. Updates the one thing recruiters see first. Get more AI smarts on my AI newsletter SplashOfAI.com. Free, weekly. 

You know how one Pinterest idea turns into a full Amazon cart and a sudden urge to become “someone who hosts”? Add AI to the mix.

A viral AI video shows someone burying shipping containers under their backyard and turning the space into a glowing underground pool lounge, like a Bond villain spa. 

Modular steel boxes, stacked like adult LEGO, sealed into a subterranean oasis. Looks incredible, probably super unsafe. And one bad drainage day away from becoming a very expensive aquarium.

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🔜 Tomorrow: That person you're about to do a deal with? Two AI prompts and their home address tells you whether they're flush or quietly underwater. I tested it and it changed my entire negotiation. That’s in your inbox in the morning. Be sure to read it and then try it. I know you will.

The answer is B) How long you pause, rewatch and when you scroll. TikTok’s algorithm doesn’t need your words. It tracks “behavioral micropatterns.” Or how long you hover on a video before scrolling past, which videos you rewatch without liking, what time of night you’re scrolling and how your session length changes. 

Someone going through a breakup tends to pause longer on emotionally resonant content, rewatch sad or relatable videos without engaging publicly and scroll late at night in longer sessions. 

One for the road and it’s bad: Why did the girl Koala want to break up with the boy Koala? Not enough koala tea time. 🐨 (I warned ya!)

🛑 Take back your privacy. Reader Mark told me: “I’ve been using Incogni for several months, and it has made a great difference. I get no more spammy calls! Thanks, Kim!” Incogni quietly deletes your data, so you never have to lift a finger. Use code KIM60 for 60% off right now.*

We’re a week into Share The Current. People are sharing. Counts are climbing. Rewards are going out. If you haven’t started, it’s not too late. Your referral link is at the bottom of this email. It’ll be there tomorrow. And the day after that. Every single issue. The prizes don’t expire. Neither does your link. Have a good weekend, and share us with one person before Monday.

🌱 The roots are working, even when the leaves aren’t showing yet. — Kim

Kim Komando • Komando.com • 510+ radio stations • Trusted by millions daily

🏆 THE KIM CHALLENGE: Forward this to ONE person who needs to hear it today. Pick the person who popped into your head while reading. You know who it is.

Your referrals get you great rewards!

Send your unique link below to friends and family.

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They get tech-smart. You get prizes. Win-win. The more referrals, the more prizes. (Yes, even a meet and greet with me. I’d love that!)

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🎉 Keep it going! You got this! — Kim

Photo credit(s): Gemini, Linkind, @TotalBodyIQ via X

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