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A company turns shipping containers into tiny one bedroom homes built on trailers for $98,500 — see inside

<ul class="summary-list"><li>A record-breaking number of <keyword id="12062561" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="shipping-containers" source="Orion">shipping containers</keyword> <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/dock-workers-explain-record-shipping-container-cargo-backlog-california-ports-2021-10">are backlogged at LA ports</a> as supply-chain woes continue. </li><li>But after 15 to 20 years of carrying freight, some containers "retire" into a second life. </li></ul>After nearly two decades of carrying freight across the ocean, the colorful steel containers are scooped up by specialty <keyword id="11964300" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="construction" source="Orion">construction</keyword> companies to enter "retirement" as <keyword id="11949093" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="pools" source="Orion">pools</keyword>, coffee shops, apartment buildings, and <keyword id="12425612" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="tiny-homes" source="Orion">tiny homes</keyword>. Demand for structures made from the converted containers has soared in recent years, Loni Greff, a managing partner at Tangle Pools, told Insider. Since the pandemic, container pools and backyard offices have proven especially popular, he said. While the supply-chain crisis has made it difficult for Tangle Pools to stock up on container inventory, Greff said the public's current fascination with shipping containers has prompted consumer intrigue in the industry. "I think partially it's their aesthetic, how simple they are, and how influential they are in our world," Greff said. "The idea that these can be used to ship cargo and have such a rough life sometimes and then can be repurposed into something else definitely draws attention." <div type="image" title="Tangle Pools shipping container pool" height="1331" width="2000" msid="87399161" hostid="261"></div>Demand for backyard pools has exploded across the country as more and more people continued working from home.The process of turning a shipping container into a pool can take six to eight weeks depending on the size, Greff said, as it includes cutting, welding, sandblasting, painting, plumbing, and installing automated tech. In addition to recycling "retired" containers, single-use containers that are only shipped one way due to trade deficits can also be repurposed. <div type="image" title="Office made from a shipping container" height="1430" width="1907" msid="87399162" hostid="261"></div>The rise of remote work has also led to a surge in demand for at-home offices, Greff told Insider. He said containers are particularly great for modular construction due to the innate strength of the structure designed to hold "75,000 pounds of cargo." <div type="image" title="ALT One Bedroom. 1" height="1665" width="2220" msid="87399163" hostid="261"></div>Companies like Nevada-based <a href="https://alternativelivingspaces.com/">Alternative Living Spaces</a> specialize in turning shipping containers into livable spaces, such as one-bedroom homes, as Insider's Brittany Chang <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/alternative-living-spaces-shipping-containers-tiny-homes-2020-6">reported</a> last year. The company's <a href="https://alternativelivingspaces.com/models/alt-one-bedroom/">ALT One Bedroom</a> builds are created on 40-foot long by eight-foot wide by 9.5-foot tall shipping containers. And to make the homes mobile, the units are installed on 53-foot long by eight-foot wide by 3-foot tall trailers.<div type="image" title="Roadside cafe made from a shipping container" height="3348" width="4464" msid="87399166" hostid="261"></div>The simple structure is also popular among small coffee shops or food vendors.Boxman Studios, a container-construction company that has worked with big-name clients including Nike, Redbull, BMW, and Oreo, says restaurants made from containers take "half the time it takes to build typical stick-and-brick structures."

See the creative ways shipping containers are being converted into pools, coffee shops, and tiny homes

<ul class="summary-list"><li><keyword id="11908908" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="twitch" source="Orion">Twitch</keyword> streamer <keyword id="11931388" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="hasan-piker" source="Orion">Hasan Piker</keyword> recently purchased a nearly $3 million Los Angeles home.</li><li>Some are criticizing the self-described leftist for purchasing the expensive commodity. </li><li>Piker has shrugged off the criticism, tweeting that "everyone needs to calm down." </li></ul>Hasan Piker, one of Twitch's leading political commentators, is facing a wave of criticism after purchasing a home in West <keyword id="11895191" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="hollywood" source="Orion">Hollywood</keyword>, as followers accuse the self-described "leftist" of being hypocritical. The 3,800-square-foot home with five bedrooms and 5.5 bathrooms located in the Beverly Grove neighborhood cost $2.74 million, according to the real estate news website <a href="https://www.dirt.com/gallery/entertainers/influencers/hasanabi-hasan-piker-west-hollywood-house-1203418281/hasanpiker_weho9/">Dirt</a>. Piker's <a href="https://www.twitch.tv/hasanabi">Twitch channel</a>, which is called HasanAbi, has accumulated over 1.5 million followers since he started streaming in 2018. He's made a name for himself as one of Twitch's most popular pundits and in <a href="https://kotaku.com/people-are-losing-their-shit-because-a-socialist-stream-1847527197">2020 streamed "Among Us"</a> with New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.Piker has promoted socialist views and publicly supported Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, who has called himself a "democratic socialist," in his presidential primary bids. In a 2020 interview with <a href="https://melmagazine.com/en-us/story/hasan-piker-young-turks-interview">Mel Magazine,</a> Piker answered affirmatively when asked whether he was trying to "create the persona of the hyper-masculine socialist" in his streams. On August 13, <a href="https://www.dirt.com/gallery/entertainers/influencers/hasanabi-hasan-piker-west-hollywood-house-1203418281/">Dirt</a> broke the news that Piker had purchased the mansion in Los Angeles County. Four days later, it was picked up by the conservative news site <a href="https://www.breitbart.com/tech/2021/08/17/socialist-who-said-usa-deserved-9-11-buys-2-7m-west-hollywood-home/">Breitbart</a>, which is <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/facebook-includes-breitbart-news-high-quality-journalism-section-on-app-2019-10">known for spreading right-wing misinformation</a>. Creator Steve Bannon described the site in a 2016 interview with <a href="https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2016/08/stephen-bannon-donald-trump-alt-right-breitbart-news/">Mother Jones</a> as "the platform for the alt-right." Social media users started to criticize Piker for the purchase, alleging that his purchase put him at odds with the socialist movement. The streamer's name began trending on Friday afternoon.Alexis Isabel, a socialist activist, <a href="https://twitter.com/lexi4prez/status/1428440928516194312">tweeted, </a>"it's just flat out unethical to be profiting off of socialism and buying yourself a 3 million dollar home in a state that has one of the highest homelessness rates in the country." California has 28% of the entire US homeless population according to a report by <a href="https://www.huduser.gov/portal/sites/default/files/pdf/2020-AHAR-Part-1.pdf">the U.S. Department of </a><a href="https://www.huduser.gov/portal/sites/default/files/pdf/2020-AHAR-Part-1.pdf">Housing and Urban Development.</a> The median home price for Los Angeles County is $775,000 according to the <a href="https://www.latimes.com/business/story/2021-06-22/southern-california-may-home-prices-hit-record-is-a-slowdown-coming">LA Times.</a>Conservative commentators like <a href="https://twitter.com/Timcast/status/1428695100335476739">Tim Pool</a> and <a href="https://twitter.com/Lauren_Southern/status/1428797315091939328">Lauren Southern</a> criticized Piker for identifying with socialism and owning an expensive piece of property. Others like <a href="https://twitter.com/theneedledrop/status/1428550950256525320">music critic Anthony Fantano</a>, <a href="https://twitter.com/thenoelmiller/status/1428832397777195013">commentator Noel Miller</a>, and <a href="https://twitter.com/h3h3productions/status/1428532452088156161">podcaster Ethan Klein</a>, defended Piker and his purchase on Twitter. Over the weekend, tens of thousands of people tweeted about Piker's house, as memes also flooded Twitter.Piker tweeted about the situation on <a href="https://twitter.com/hasanthehun/status/1428599600676425728">Friday, saying that</a> "everyone collectively needs to calm down" and calling the housing market in Los Angeles "f-----." Piker also posted a <a href="https://twitter.com/hasanthehun/status/1428858505927163907">few memes</a> on the situation, as well as <a href="https://twitter.com/hasanthehun/status/1428783265163272193">tweeting,</a> "ONCE IM DONE BEING STUNLOCKED BY THE DUMBEST TAKES WE'LL GET BACK TO THE REAL NEWS." A representative for Piker did not respond to an inquiry regarding the controversy. Kieran Press-Reynolds contributed reporting. <a href="https://www.insider.com/culture">Read more stories from Insider's Digital Culture team.</a>

Leftist political commentator Hasan Piker faces criticism for buying a nearly $3 million home in Los Angeles County

<ul class="summary-list"><li>Ty Wilson, 32, moved to <keyword id="12847639" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="telluride" source="Orion">Telluride</keyword>, <keyword id="11918419" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="colorado" source="Orion">Colorado</keyword>, from Boston, where his custom jewelry company is based.</li><li>He intended to stay for just a few months, but fell in love with the community and natural beauty.</li></ul><ul><li style="list-style-type: none;"> </li></ul>This as-told-to <keyword id="11898458" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="essay" source="Orion">essay</keyword> is based on a conversation with Ty Wilson, 32, who recently moved to Telluride, Colorado, from Boston. His story is part of "<a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/category/moving-truck">Moving Truck Diaries</a>," an Insider series sharing the stories of Americans who have moved states since the start of the pandemic. It has been edited for length and clarity.When the pandemic hit, I was experiencing some of the antsiness that a lot of people were. Ultimately, the right thing for me was to get more time in nature and more time outside.I moved to Telluride from Boston in October 2020 for what was meant to be a few months to ski and work remotely. I fell in love with the lifestyle and am making the move permanent. I grew up in Acton, Massachusetts, which is a Boston suburb. I went to Amherst College in western Massachusetts. After that, I moved to Boston. I spent probably 10 years in Boston, between the North End, Central Square in Cambridge, and Back Bay. <div type="image" title="Boston's Back Bay neighborhood along the Charles River" height="2838" width="3785" msid="88597214" hostid="261"></div><h2>Boston is wonderful — but not known for its outdoors.</h2>I kind of had this idea that at least at once in my life, I should spend the winter in a ski town. It's something I've had in my head since I was about 12. With a few other people, I started a company in 2015 called <a href="https://www.custommade.com/">CustomMade</a>, and I'm now the chief operating officer. We sell custom engagement rings and other fine jewelry online. We had a lot of people working remotely even pre-pandemic, but the management team was centered around the Boston area.<h2>If you can do it, why not winter in a mountain town? </h2>That was the initial plan. I knew there was a chance that I might get hooked, but I still had my apartment in Boston when I moved out there. I've been coming to Colorado basically every year for about 15 years. I've skied most of the mountains in the state and had a magical experience in Telluride — the nature, but also how friendly people were. <div type="image" title="A view overlooking Telluride at sunset" height="4896" width="6528" msid="88597216" hostid="261"></div><h2>Housing in Telluride is hard to find. </h2>I ended up connecting with a friend of a friend on Facebook who had an open room in a place that he'd rented. We both moved at about the same time, in October 2020.I'm now in my third rental here. It's an eight-month winter rental, and the owner comes back during the summer. It's a beautiful and charming old house, probably from the late 1800s. We've got great mountain views from the front porch. It has three bedrooms and one bath, which I share with two roommates.It's different from some of the amenities I had in Boston, but the location is great.<div type="image" title="The view of a sunset from the front porch of Ty Wilson's rental home in Telluride" height="3024" width="4032" msid="88597218" hostid="261"></div><h2>The natural beauty of Telluride lives up to the hype.</h2>We were still in the heart of the pandemic when I arrived, and soon after I got here, cases started to surge in the area. So there was this balance of wanting to be social and meet people, but also trying to stay safe, be responsible, and not spread COVID. It was a little bit of a slow start in terms of making new friends.But once ski season started, it was great. It's an incredible community, and I made some amazing friends. But it took a little bit. During the summer, one of the appeals of being in Telluride is riding a mountain bike before or after work, or going for a hike or a trail run. During the ski season, I try to figure out how to get a little bit of <keyword id="12847640" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="skiing" source="Orion">skiing</keyword> in if it's a powder day.There's definitely some flexibility with my work schedule — that's something we believe in as a company. <div type="image" title="Ty Wilson on a mountain trail near Telluride" height="2316" width="3088" msid="88597220" hostid="261"></div>In Telluride, most people have a story similar to mine: They came here and didn't plan to stay, but then they fell in love with it. So I think in a lot of ways, it's a new version of the classic mountain-town story.That said, I had friends who moved from New York and didn't feel comfortable being remote workers, and they moved back after about a year. Not everyone felt like they could totally integrate.<h2>Like many mountain towns, Telluride is going through major changes. </h2>With the rise of remote work, you have more people looking for monthlong Airbnb rentals; you have more second-home owners wanting to spend a lot of time here; you have people working remotely wanting to come to these towns — that has caused a housing crunch. And in these places, there was already a crunch on housing. With the real-estate boom, a lot of houses that had been long-term rentals turned into second homes or short-term rentals, and people lost their housing. It's definitely a stress point for folks. It's important for anyone thinking about this type of move to be aware of that. I was coming in as a new member of the community. I needed to be humble and learn and respect the traditions of the town and the way that people operate. I also needed to find ways to get involved, give back, and be conscious of this difficult period of change that the town's going through.<div type="image" title="telluride colorado" height="1414" width="1885" msid="88597222" hostid="261"></div><h2>There are definite tradeoffs — but the slopes are worth it.</h2>The cost of living is expensive. Housing is hard to find. Personally, I miss being near my family on the East Coast and being able to pop out and have dinner with my parents.I miss going into the office, but I go into Alt Space, a coworking space in Telluride, almost every day. It's great to meet people here and hear what they're doing.I was cautiously optimistic that in a small town there would be a strong community. But that's been 100% true.I would love to stay. I'm putting down roots with that intention. But like a lot of folks here, I think about it season to season — finding a rental and making sure that everything is functioning in terms of work.Have you moved during the pandemic? Do you have a story to share? Let us know! <a href="https://tinyurl.com/MyMovingStory">Fill out this brief survey</a> and an Insider reporter will get back to you.

I moved to Telluride, Colorado, to work remotely for a few months. I fell in love with the ski town and making the move permanent.

<ul class="summary-list"><li>Sen. <keyword id="6656369" type="PERSON" weightage="60" keywordseo="Bernie-Sanders">Bernie Sanders</keyword> wore <keyword id="1599093" type="PERSON" weightage="60" keywordseo="mittens">mittens</keyword> to today's <keyword id="6363817" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="Inauguration">inauguration</keyword>.</li><li>The mittens were made in <keyword id="85680" type="ENTERTAINMENT" weightage="60" keywordseo="Vermont">Vermont</keyword> out of recycled materials.</li><li>They were a gift to Sanders from a Vermont teacher. </li></ul>While much of the <a href="https://www.insider.com/bidens-harris-wear-us-designers-on-inauguration-melania-wears-chanel-2021-1">Inauguration Day fashion</a> chatter has centered on the memorable outfits worn by <a href="https://www.insider.com/kamala-harris-and-jill-biden-sent-messages-with-outfits-2021-1">Vice President Kamala Harris</a>, first lady Jill Biden, and former first lady Michelle Obama, Sen. Bernie Sanders made a <keyword id="6" type="ENTERTAINMENT" weightage="60" keywordseo="fashion">fashion</keyword> statement of his own with his adorable, sustainably-made mittens.When Sen. Sanders walked to his seat at this morning's inauguration ceremony, viewers at home noticed (and loved) his weather-appropriate, classic brown-and-white mittens. But Sanders has had the now-famous winter accessory for quite a while.The mittens have made several appearances in recent years. They were <a href="https://www.sevendaysvt.com/vermont/those-mittens-bernie-sanders-wears-campaigning-are-made-in-vermont/Content?oid=29469937">spotted on Sanders' hands</a> as he campaigned for president himself. They even generated enough buzz in January 2020 to warrant a Twitter account of their own: <a href="https://twitter.com/BerniesMittens">@BerniesMittens</a>.While many social media users simply appreciated how on-brand the functional and unfancy mittens were for the Vermont senator's casual <keyword id="7" type="CITY" weightage="100" keywordseo="style">style</keyword>, there's a more personal story behind how he got them. <h2>A Vermont teacher gave Sanders the homemade mittens</h2>Buzzfeed News political reporter Ruby Cramer pointed out on Twitter that Jen Ellis, a teacher from Essex Junction, Vermont, gifted Sanders a pair of her sustainably-made mittens several years ago.Ellis <a href="https://www.sevendaysvt.com/vermont/those-mittens-bernie-sanders-wears-campaigning-are-made-in-vermont/Content?oid=29469937">told Vermont alt-weekly newspaper Seven Days</a> in January 2020 that Sanders' daughter-in-law, Liza Driscoll, ran her daughter's daycare. The craftswoman had made mittens as a gift to all the teachers one year and added in an extra pair for Sanders. She first spotted Sanders wearing them publicly in December 2019."I just put in a little note that was like, 'I believe in you, I've always believed in you and I hope you run again,'" Ellis told Seven Days. "And now he is running again, and he apparently is wearing the mittens that I made for him!"When she saw Sanders wearing her mittens, Ellis tweeted out a message explaining where they came from and how she made them.According to Ellis, the mittens are made with repurposed wool sweaters and an inner layer of fleece lining made from recycled plastic bottles.Ellis didn't immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.<h2>Inauguration Day watchers tweeted their love for the mittens</h2>Back in 2020 when people first started tweeting about the mittens, Ellis tweeted her thanks for the words of support she received.<ul class="read-more-links"><li>Read more:</li><li><a href="https://www.insider.com/chrissy-teigen-shabbat-dinner-menu-trader-joes-babka-headscarf-controversey-2021-1">Chrissy Teigen made her first Shabbat dinner with chicken soup, challah, and a babka from Trader Joe's</a></li><li><a href="https://www.insider.com/harry-styles-vogue-cover-controversy-style-icon-non-binary-fashion-2020-12">Why are people acting like Harry Styles is the first man to wear a dress?</a></li><li><a href="https://www.insider.com/man-repeller-shutdown-controversy-leandra-medine-why-it-was-time-2020-10">I was an obsessive Man Repeller fan for years. Here's why I'm not mourning the fashion site's demise.</a></li><li><a href="https://www.insider.com/gordon-ramsay-has-gym-inside-bedroom-la-home-2021-1">Gordon Ramsay has a full gym in his bedroom at his LA mansion and just gave fans a peek inside</a></li></ul>

On a day filled with designer clothes, Bernie Sanders wore mittens made out of old sweaters - and people loved it

<ul class="summary-list"><li>On April 25, 2021, a $16 million Montreal mansion belonging to the CEO of <keyword id="11897492" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="pornhub" source="Orion">Pornhub</keyword> went up in flames.</li><li>The fire remains under investigation, and no one has been charged. </li></ul>Last April 25, just before midnight, beneath a nearly full moon, two figures were spotted on the construction site of a massive, nearly-completed mansion on the edge of a suburban Montreal nature park.The hulking structure, two grinding years of construction in the making, was so large that a local newspaper called it "pharaonic." Plans called for eight bedrooms, seven baths, multiple elevators, a piano suite, an art gallery, a spa, and a sports complex that doubled as a grand ballroom.In minutes, the mansion was ablaze. Neighboring homes in the affluent Ahuntsic-Cartierville community were evacuated, their occupants hustled away in pajamas. Eighty firefighters battled the three-alarm blaze well into dawn. Investigators quickly determined the fire's source and within hours the incident was designated a criminal arson, according to a Montreal Police spokesperson. A year later, no one has been charged, and investigators say, in all likelihood, that no one ever will be. ("The investigation into this criminal arson is still ongoing," a spokesman said last week.) Fingers have been pointed in all directions and nearly every element of the crime remains shrouded in mystery. One reason for this comes down to the dizzying array of possible motives. That's because the mansion's owner, Feras Antoon, the CEO of Pornhub, was one of the most despised men in <keyword id="6356687" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="canada" source="Orion">Canada</keyword>, and beyond. Complicating things further is the fact that arson is a notoriously difficult crime to prosecute: because fire often destroys the evidence necessary to prove an ignition source and tie a suspect to the crime. Between 2016 and 2020, only<a href="https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/t1/tbl1/en/tv.action?pid=3510017701&amp;pickMembers%5B0%5D=1.1&amp;pickMembers%5B1%5D=2.84&amp;cubeTimeFrame.startYear=2016&amp;cubeTimeFrame.endYear=2020&amp;referencePeriods=20160101%2C20200101"> 10.1%</a> of arson investigations in Canada resulted in arrests, according to government statistics. "At the end of the day, this is one of the easiest crimes you can commit," said Glenn Corbett, associate professor of fire science at John Jay College in New York. <h2>Sudden scrutiny </h2>At the time of the fire, Antoon—who co-founded Pornhub's parent company, Mindgeek, in 2007—was tumbling through a bruising season of public relations disasters, investigations, lawsuits, and death threats. "I can't even count how many comments I saw from people saying to burn the company or my house down,"Antoon told Vanity Fair earlier this year. "For a while, it was easy to dismiss the tweets as just people on the <keyword id="11897865" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="internet" source="Orion">internet</keyword> talking. Then my house burned down."For nearly two years, victims of child <keyword id="11898869" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="porn" source="Orion">porn</keyword>, revenge porn, rape and <keyword id="11897683" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="sexual-assault" source="Orion">sexual assault</keyword> had been coming forward to say that Pornhub had ruined their lives. Many described the same harrowing one-two punch: First, learning that their sexual assault (or in some cases their private, consensual sexual encounters) was streaming on Pornhub. Then, being repeatedly ignored or rebuffed when they demanded the videos be taken down. Months of social media campaigns, <keyword id="11893589" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="100" keywordseo="news" source="Orion">news</keyword> probes, and civil lawsuits against Pornhub had reached a fever pitch by December 2020, when New York Times <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/04/opinion/sunday/pornhub-rape-trafficking.html?searchResultPosition=1">columnist</a> Nicholas Kristof published a scathing portrait of the company. Kristof charged that Pornhub was "infested with rape videos [and] monetizes child rape, revenge pornography, spy cam videos of women showering, racist and misogynist content, and footage of women being asphyxiated in plastic bags." In a statement released in response to the Kristof's reporting, the company said that "Pornhub is unequivocally committed to combating child <keyword id="11910913" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="sexual-abuse" source="Orion">sexual abuse</keyword> material, and has instituted a comprehensive, industry-leading trust and safety policy to identify and eradicate illegal material from our community." The company added that any assertion that the company allows child videos on the site "is irresponsible and flagrantly untrue."<div type="image" title="A firefighter is seen from the back and facing a large burning house." height="798" width="1428" msid="91084142" hostid="261"></div>Mastercard, Visa and Discover all cut ties, and under enormous public pressure, Pornhub deleted all non-verified user-uploaded content—80% of its library. It also promised it had significantly improved its<a href="https://help.pornhub.com/hc/en-us/categories/360002934613"> auditing and moderation</a> software and staffing levels. (Pornhub no longer allows unverified users to upload X-rated content, according to company news releases.) In February 2021, Antoon and Pornhub's COO were summoned to testify before the <keyword id="13383673" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="canadian" source="Orion">Canadian</keyword> House of Commons' ethics committee, part of five months of hearings into the business practices of Pornhub and its parent company, MindGeek.For all Antoon's notoriety and wealth—he<a href="https://www.theglobeandmail.com/business/article-mindgeeks-business-practices-under-srutiny-as-political-pressure/"> reportedly</a> tools around Montreal in a bright yellow Lamborghini with vanity plates—the controversial porn king has gone to great lengths to protect his own privacy. He rarely speaks in public, instead communicating through press releases. The hearings marked the first time many longtime critics of Pornhub had ever seen Antoon's face. "We are very proud that we built a product that gets 170 million people visiting a day, four million Canadians, 30% of them women," Antoon <a href="https://www.ourcommons.ca/DocumentViewer/en/43-2/ETHI/meeting-19/evidence">said</a>, referring to Pornhub. "Don't you believe if those four million Canadians who come to our site every day saw something so heinous and criminal, they would be calling the police?" Antoon <a href="https://www.ourcommons.ca/DocumentViewer/en/43-2/ETHI/meeting-19/evidence">continued</a>, according to a transcript of his testimony. "We created a very good product that I and our 1,800 employees who have families and children are proud of. It is not perfect."Two weeks before the fire, with the Pornhub hearings dominating Canadian headlines, Vice published a piece focused on far-right extremists' calls on alt social platforms like Gab for violence against company executives. The piece was headlined, "The Crusade Against Pornhub is Going to Get Somebody Killed."On April 22—three days before the fire—the mansion went up for sale for close to $16 million.Repeated attempts to reach Antoon and other Pornhub executives through Pornhub's public relations liaisons were unsuccessful. A company official who identified himself only as Ian and used a Gmail account did not respond to written questions about the fire or claims made about the company. <h2>A 'Tube' site revolution</h2>But where did Pornhub come from, and why was it so loved but also so hated? Almost immediately after YouTube debuted in 2005, a flurry of knock-offs—then known as "Tube" sites—began popping up. Along with a few friends, Antoon and a few college friends at Montreal's Concordia University launched a series of X-rated Tube sites that encouraged users to upload and share videos. "Suddenly porn went from being something people would happily pay an inflated price for to something that people would not pay anything for," said Lux Alptraum, a veteran writer and podcaster on the porn industry. As the deluge of pirated porn flooded to Pornhub and other Tube sites, traditional porn sites saw their revenue streams dry up. Once they began to fail, MindGeek eventually became the dominant player, Alptraum said. Pornhub, the most successful of the Tube sites, became the crown jewel. "It cannot be stressed enough that these [other tube] sites were built on pirated content," Alptraum said. "It wasn't that they were creating their own content or relying on amateur content. They were allowing users to steal content from other sites and upload it."<div type="image" title="A hand is seen holding a phone, which shows the logo of the company Pornhub." height="3264" width="4896" msid="91084143" hostid="261"></div>While critics contend that Antoon and fellow MindGeek executives built their empire on aggressive tactics, they were also seen, even grudgingly by some, as innovators. In 2019, a pair of prominent U.S. law professors published a paper in the New York University Law Review contending that MindGeek was on "the leading edge of data-driven creativity," and had grown more adept at data crunching and fine-tuning user experience algorithms than even Netflix.<h2>'Sick to my stomach'</h2>Around the time construction began on Antoon's mansion in 2018, strange things had begun happening to Vicky Galy, a 34-year-old paralegal more than 11,000 miles away in Hendersonville, Tennessee.People she met on the street would insist they knew her from somewhere, but from precisely where they could never recall. Strange men sat in parked cars outside her home. A new male friend on Facebook made sudden, indiscreet sexual overtures.A single mom raising a teenage son and a daughter with Down syndrome, Galy said she had made some bad decisions regarding men she met online. One of them, she said, would often record their sexual encounters, with or without her consent."There were three kinds of videos he made of me," she recalled with a sigh when we spoke. "At first, he would pull out his phone on me" during sexual encounters. "The second kind were hidden camera video during our consensual sex. The third kind were made on a trip to Vegas where I was either drugged or intoxicated." As she would later <a href="https://www.ourcommons.ca/DocumentViewer/en/43-2/ETHI/meeting-20/evidence">testify</a> in February, during the Pornhub hearings, Galy told me she was floored one day to learn that at least 30 of those videos were circulating on Pornhub under some variation of her name "Vicky." (Galy was one of numerous Pornhub victims who <a href="https://www.ourcommons.ca/DocumentViewer/en/43-2/ETHI/meeting-20/evidence">testified</a> before Canadian lawmakers earlier this year.) "To think of the amount of money that Pornhub has made off my trauma, date rape and sexual exploitation," Galy <a href="https://www.ourcommons.ca/DocumentViewer/en/43-2/ETHI/meeting-20/evidence">told lawmakers</a>, "makes me sick to my stomach."Another was Serena Fleites, who brought several lawmakers to tears when she told them about how she had developed a crush on an older boy in eighth grade and how he begged her to send him a nude video of herself and she ultimately complied, only to learn the boy had uploaded it to Pornhub and shared it with his classmates.Victim testimony from Fleites, Galy and several women identified as "Jane Does" directly contradicted Pornhub executives' claims that the site responds swiftly to takedown requests and works diligently to remove child pornography. For some victims, like Galy, feelings of frustration and embarrassment were compounded by outrage upon learning that both her alleged abuser and Pornhub were profiting from the scheme. She said she went to the police, but that they didn't believe her. She contacted local law firms to help her sue, but each wanted a $10,000 retainer, she said, and besides, she said, "no one wanted to sue him because he was worth nothing anyway." She cut five inches from her hair and dyed it brown so she wouldn't look like the woman people recognized from the Pornhub videos, took a leave of absence from work, and she and her children moved in with her mother. 'Not having people believe me was the hardest part of this whole thing," she said. "I had a sergeant tell me, 'I'm not going to have my detectives sit and watch porn all day.'"Galy was also contacting Pornhub's legal department to get the videos taken down. "They mostly ignored me, and then kept insisting it wasn't me," she said. Two days before the Canadian hearings began, Galy said, she received an email from Pornhub's legal director saying they would delete the account."That was the happiest day of my life," Galy said. "I didn't know then that there were hundreds more videos on other sites. With some of them there's not even a way to report [an unauthorized] video like this, so I'll really never be able to get these videos down completely." <div type="image" title="A masked man, face obscured, holds up a sign that reads &quot;Free Pornhub&quot;" height="3008" width="4512" msid="91084144" hostid="261"></div><h2>Mafia Row</h2>During the same two years leading up to the hearings, Antoon had been quietly overseeing the construction of a massive mansion for himself and his wife and two children on a prime tract of land that bordered a cherished nature park. According to Vanity Fair, the property was within walking distance from where Antoon grew up. Located on the northern edge of Montreal, the spot had a fraught history even before Antoon became involved—first as the site of a notorious Gangland assassination, and then as a front line between environmentalists and developers. The Mafia had moved into the neighborhood in the 1970s. Antoine Berthelet Avenue, the road just behind where Antoon would later build his mansion, became known as "Mafia Row." It was there that the Sicilian crime family led by Nicolo Rizzuto would run their operations for the next few decades. On November 10, 2010, an assassin crept onto what would later be Antoon's property, and fired a single shot through the double-reinforced pane glass windows of Nicolo Rizzuto's solarium, killing Rizzuto in his kitchen, according to mob author Peter Edwards. "This was an extremely good sniper shot," Edwards said, noting that investigators long-suspected the triggerman to be Calabrian soldier Salvatore Calautti, who himself was assassinated in 2013.The fatal shot effectively ended the Rizzuto family's three-decade long reign. (The hit series 'Bad Blood' was based on a book about Rizzuto's son and successor, Vito Rizzuto.)The assassination, like the arson fire, remains unsolved to this day—though a source told Insider that while Montreal Police are exploring theories related to Pornhub and Antoon's spectrum of critics, Mafia involvement is not suspected. <h2>An 'eco-corridor' vs. a development </h2>Four years after Rizzuto's shooting, a different kind of war broke out on the same spot over a plan to clear 200 trees on the border of the Bois-de-Saraguay nature park.The community had been trying to create an "eco-corridor" between the river and Bois de Saraguay nature park so that boaters could dock on the riverside and then hike through trails to the nature park. While the park itself was protected from development as a national heritage site, sections of the border woodlands remained in private hands. The local government didn't have the funding to purchase and preserve the land, according to Simon Van Vliet, a reporter for Ahuntsic-Cartierville's Neighborhood Journal newspaper, which produced a<a href="https://journaldesvoisins.com/?s=Feras+Antoon"> three-part series</a> on the controversy during the months leading up to the arson fire. <div type="image" title="Lush greenery is seen along a narrow residential alley." height="3024" width="4032" msid="91084145" hostid="261"></div>Local property owner Francesco Lapara had other plans – to cut down the trees and subdivide his land into residential lots. Van Vliet said local officials repeatedly rejected Lapara's development applications, but he went to court and won. Antoon and his sister, Dana Antoon, a local real estate agent, purchased all four lots, according to Van Vliet's reporting. Construction began in 2018. Reached by Business Insider, Dana Antoon declined any comment on the land deals. Van Vliet described Antoon's compound as a "castle" among mansions."People were just kind of baffled by the lavishness of the place, and obviously upset about the ecological loss and the setback to the project of building this eco corridor." Jacques LeBlue, a spokesman for Environmental Mobilization Ahuntsic-Cartierville which fought the clearing of trees on Antoon's property, seemed to echo this frustration when he said "the subject of Mr. Antoon has been a tragicomic distraction from our core activities, every time his name gets associated with ours. This only got worse with the fire." LeBleu declined further comment.Sylvia Oljemark, 81, a neighborhood resident since her birth, said local residents watched in disbelief as the structure rose up over the neighborhood."It was enormous," she said. "Enormous.""To think [local officials] could permit somebody to purchase land and build a huge structure [and] take down all the trees," she said, "it was personally reprehensible to me."<h2>No resolution </h2>The hearings neither shut Pornhub down nor rehabilitated the public image of Antoon and Pornhub COO David Tassillo, who also testified. Arnold Viersen, a conservative MP from Alberta, said the executives' defense, which he saw as "Hey, we're just doing business here, we're just making money," was "very frustrating to us as members of Parliament.""The Canadian public was outraged at the smugness," he said. Viersen said that he has been investigating <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=allePSwZmko">Pornhub</a> for five years, and noted that lawmakers on both sides of the aisle were equally frustrated in questioning Pornhub executives during the hearing. "It's a fairly non-partisan thing," he said. "While [Liberal MP] <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l3yszvkMSPs">Charlie Angus</a> and I don't agree on much we were both fighting on the same side of the war."Personally, Viersen said he was "incredulous that the fire happened to come in the middle of the ethics committee hearings." "I've just got a feeling it's just a masterful sympathy play," he said, though he offered no evidence that Antoon, or anyone Angus has knowledge of, had a hand in torching the mansion. "That's my intuition on it, given what I know about them. They are very good at changing people's perceptions." Last week, a Toronto personal injury law firm <a href="https://www.blogto.com/city/2022/04/toronto-law-firm-500-million-lawsuit-pornhub/">announced</a> it had filed a $500 million class action lawsuit against Pornhub.

Will the Pornhub mansion fire ever be solved?

<ul class="summary-list"><li>A few years ago, I had an intruder in my apartment, and after he had gone I suffered hypervigilance — a symptom of <keyword id="140064" type="ORGANIZATION" weightage="60" keywordseo="PTSD">PTSD</keyword>.</li><li>For months, I felt a sense of real and immediate danger any time I was indoors alone, even though I knew I was safe.</li><li>Because I lived alone, I ended up couch-surfing for several months, but adapting my life to never being alone was extremely difficult.</li><li>I never sought a formal diagnosis of PTSD, but I asked an expert to talk me through what happens in the brain during an encounter that causes it.</li><li>Trigger warning: This story contains descriptions of violence and trauma.</li></ul>One day about three years ago, I found an intruder in my apartment. The encounter was shocking, but brief — so I never thought it would affect my life the way it did. I had believed I was alone and safe at home, but within thirty seconds a man had pushed me to the floor, and I thought I would be raped or killed.Being nervous after a shock is natural and normal. What is not normal was the hypervigilance I experienced for months afterward — a sense of immediate danger even when I knew I was safe. It's one of the numerous symptoms of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), and it turned my life upside down.I'm mostly ok now. Years after the incident I talked to Prof. Neil Greenberg, a defense mental <keyword id="6354750" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="100" keywordseo="health">health</keyword> specialist at King's College London, about how the brain works in situations like this, and why some people live with trauma afterward. We commonly assume that PTSD is just the result of a scary encounter, and mainly affects people in military service. But as Greenberg told me it can affect people in numerous situations — from reporters working in war zones to healthcare workers — and much more specific factors dictate whether or not you'll experience PTSD.Here's what happened to me.<h2>An intruder was there the whole time I thought I was alone</h2>I came home from work and locked the door behind me. I lived alone, and I'm the type to exploit that luxury to the max — which means peeing with the bathroom door open, shedding my bra, and repeatedly asking the cat why she's so fluffy. I cooked dinner and relaxed into a lazy evening.I'd just started an HBO drama when I paused it to get something from my bedroom.On the way there, I heard an unmistakably human sound. I can't remember what it was — a cough, a shuffle, clothes rustling? — but it was right there with me. I stood there a beat. A dark shape entered the hallway.Both of us ran for the front door, but he got there first. He pulled a coat from the hook, threw it over my head, and muzzled me with his hand. I crumpled like a leaf. Pressed to the floor with the coat over my head, next to my own front door, was the exact moment I expected to be raped or killed. The next moments would define whether I lived or died, and I can still feel the place at my waist where I anticipated a knife's point.I didn't realize it, but I was screaming. I also didn't realize that he was asking me to stop. In fact, he was shushing me. And was telling me he was leaving, but he needed me to stop screaming first. To this day, it remains the best deal I have been offered in my entire life. I formed my hands into a prayer, stopped screaming, and he was gone. <h2>I was safe. But I wouldn't feel that way for a long time</h2>The whole thing took less than 30 seconds. Aside from a slight bruise on my lip, I was uninjured. Nothing had been stolen. I began to think I had escaped unscathed.Piecing it together, I worked out that he had already been in the apartment when I came home. It was likely an opportunist would-be thief who found himself in too deep, and I caught him trying to sneak out. It was at that moment hearing the noise in the hall that a very ancient part of the brain was activated, Greenberg explained to me. "There's a bit of your brain called the amygdala, which is all to do with threat control," he said. The amygdala assesses threats without needing conscious thought. This means that even without knowing why, you are "instantly put on alert" by an unexpected noise, as he put it. That alert is sent to the ventromedial prefrontal cortex — which deals with emotional processing — and the hippocampus, which is broadly to do with memory. Both of those parts rifle through your past experiences to figure out if this threat is actually something explainable. And normally, it is. "You look over, and it's a twig, or there's a rabbit, or whatever," said Greenberg.But in my case, there was no good explanation. "That bit of 'how the world should be' was strongly challenged, because there was a person there when there shouldn't have been," said Greenberg. In many cases of PTSD, the way these parts of the brain interact is altered by the incident, meaning they don't function normally for some time after. PTSD UK — a charity set up to help sufferers — <a href="https://www.ptsduk.org/what-is-ptsd/the-science-and-biology-of-ptsd/">emphasizes</a> that the condition isn't a mental illness, but a psychological injury. While people can go through a scary situation and emerge with nothing more than a healthy sense of caution, some events tip people over the edge into PTSD. The difference, Greenberg explained, can be in two factors. "One of the key aspects about traumatic situations is you perceive them as being both threatening and out of control at the same time," he said. If the front door had been wide open when I got home, I'd have had the chance to investigate the danger from a safe distance — so it would have felt scary but somehow within my control, he explained. And if the uninvited person had actually been part of a surprise birthday party, it might have made me jump, but it wouldn't have been threatening. It's the combination of the two that often causes the injury, said Greenberg.(Note to friends: Do not organize me surprise birthday parties.)<h2>After that, I didn't know how to feel safe</h2>In the days and weeks that followed, I never felt safe alone. It didn't matter how many new locks I added, or how often my friends helped me check every nook and cranny. As soon as my back was turned, the guarantee expired, to be replaced by an overwhelming sense of immediate danger. It was like playing whack-a-mole with my psyche. I desperately wished for X-ray vision, so I could see through the walls of my apartment and into every room all at once. Then, I thought, maybe I could relax. (As long as I didn't sleep.)Yes, I understood that in a technical point of fact it was impossible for someone to be hiding there. But the nearest analogy I can give you is this.I don't know if you've ever thrashed in frustration at the cliche of the teen horror movie, where the characters insist on exploring a haunted house when it's obviously dangerous.Watching, you want to yell at the oblivious teens, because in reality, nobody in their right mind would press on, and they're only doing it because it's a stupid movie and the plot depends on it.That was my amygdala, which was yelling at me in totally ordinary situations, all the damn time.<h2>This is because what happened made no sense</h2>An intruder had appeared when I felt assured I was alone. The "impossible" had happened, and I could no longer trust the evidence of my senses. The fact that he was already there, when I assumed the apartment was empty, set up what Greenberg called "cognitive dissonance."Ordinarily, after a dangerous situation, people have an adaptive response, he said. The body has been alerted to danger, it's prepared a fight-or-flight response, and you win or lose that encounter.We then adapt our belief system to account for it. Dogs sometimes bite, soup can burn your tongue. But for me, the new belief system was: your apartment sometimes has an intruder hidden in it. "In this situation, you couldn't make sense of it," he said."The brain tries to set up two things: 'This is how the world is, which is safe and I'm in control of it,' versus 'this is actually what happened. It wasn't safe.'"And when you can't reconcile your view of how the world should work with the facts in front of you, you enter cognitive dissonance." <h2>I was withdrawn, jumpy, and craved to be alone. But I couldn't.</h2>The only way to feel at ease was being around other people, but I wasn't exactly feeling sociable.Normal life disappeared. Several friends with spare rooms gave me keys to their apartments, and were amazingly supportive and patient. But when they weren't home, I would have to grab my things and move on.I organized my entire life around where other people would be. As an introvert who hates planning, this is basically my personal Bad Place. I was usually too proud to ask people to stay home so I could feel safe in their apartment, and when they did, I felt like a parasite. I usually just retreated to the spare room, pretending I was getting the alone time I craved, but feeling like a ghost in someone else's life. I had no space to cook a meal or choose what to watch on TV. Doing laundry, getting my work wardrobe together, and feeding my cat were a logistical nightmare. I felt vulnerable getting to sleep, and was always in different beds, so I was tired and disorientated at work.Seeking nonexistent relaxation and the company of strangers, I inevitably spent more time in bars. Wine, supposed to relax me, didn't. Although I gave it a good try. If I really felt like I'd outworn my welcome, I would walk the streets in the middle of the night.Exhausted, I'd often try to go into my apartment, and would stand outside the door to build up the courage. But it was as though an invisible intruder had moved in, and we couldn't cohabit. I'd startle easily, and at times I'd be scared even with company. One time, I had to stop a boyfriend from slicing a watermelon for us, because I couldn't let him handle a knife near me. We had to leave the flat and go for a walk so I could calm down. <h2>Being 'triggered' is not what most people take it to be</h2>After months of this, I slowly, slowly regained my independence. The morning I woke up after a whole night alone in my flat was a victory. But even much later, triggers remain. I still startle at a strange noise, and during the coronavirus lockdown in the UK I've been checking my apartment several times a day. One night, some weeks after I felt better and I was staying with my parents, I woke in the night to an inexplicable noise. While one part of my brain knew it was the cat trying to get out, another part had me convinced: It was happening again. An intruder was in the house. Before I was even awake I had thrown myself out of the bedroom window. Thankfully, there was a roof below. It was 4 am on a freezing night before New Years' Eve, and my mum was on the point of calling the fire brigade before we figured out how to get me down.Believe me, I didn't want to be there: but that's how triggers work. "Triggered" has become a catch-all term in people's lives: a reference for experiencing a strong memory, or an alt-right term in the ongoing culture wars. It crops up in the title of Donald Trump Jr's book "Triggered: How the Left Thrives on Hate and Wants to Silence Us" as well as a popular conservative podcast. It's long been used — along with the term "snowflakes" — to mock people calling for warnings on material that could potentially set off a trauma response. While I get that not every potentially triggering stimulus can be accounted for, people who get genuinely triggered are dealing with something far tougher than a matter of their personal attitude to the world. And they have absolutely no choice in the matter. If anything, the person with PTSD is the opposite of a snowflake: They're actively facing down an uncontrollable reaction at all times. As a form of psychological injury, PTSD can't be chosen, or persuaded not to happen, or toughed out. "A trigger is something that turns you into a bag of jelly, because you can't stop your anxiety symptoms," said Greenberg. "You can't stop your body reacting, or your heart pounding like that. That's what a trigger is. It takes you back. It may actually bring flashbacks."For Greenberg, the main misuse of the term is when it's used to describe sensory associations, such as when we say memories are "triggered" by smell.But in the medical sense, a trigger "makes you unable to function," he said. It causes physical symptoms such as a racing heart, diarrhea, and sweating over which you have no control. "The key thing about a trigger is it causes you to be psychologically disturbed by whatever it is that you're experiencing at that time."<h2>PTSD throws a lot at you — but one thing is crucial</h2>Many of the things I went through — withdrawal, numbness, jumpiness, emotional unpredictability, having a bleak sense of the future, poor sleep, and of course, the fear of being alone — are among the symptoms of PTSD. I don't know if they were a result of my ridiculous new lifestyle, or PTSD, because I never sought a formal diagnosis — like many others, I tried to cope without addressing it. (My conversation with Greenberg did not constitute a diagnosis.)A primary symptom, Greenberg said, is "re-experiencing" the event through flashbacks or nightmares — which thankfully, rarely happened to me. This isn't just remembering the event, but genuinely feeling like you're going through it again. You can find <a href="https://www.rcpsych.ac.uk/mental-health/problems-disorders/post-traumatic-stress-disorder">a lot more symptoms here</a>. What Greenberg recommends is addressing it sooner rather than later. "The real unfortunate stupidity of the situation is that actually most people do only come and get help once they reach a crisis point — once they've lost their job, or they've lost their relationship, or they've had a loss of self-esteem because of the trauma," he said. The lesson here is: Be a "snowflake." Don't tough it out.

An intruder in my apartment gave me PTSD symptoms for months. Here's what people get wrong about being 'triggered.'

<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"></div></div></div><ul><li>Last week, Canadian rap artist Lil Windex released a video called "Bitcoin Ca$h," which criticized the bitcoin core and praised bitcoin cash.</li><li>In an interview with Business Insider, Lil Windex explained his commitment to bitcoin cash over bitcoin, his favorite cryptocurrency trading platforms, and why he thinks the bitcoin core are "a buncha lames."</li></ul>Lil Windex, the mysterious Canadian cleaning-product themed rapper best known for his 2017 single "Cleanin Up," released another music video last week - and this time, his lyrical focus was centered on one of the most heated debates within the cryptocurrency community.&#xa0;The rapper's single, called "Bitcoin Ca$h" focuses on bitcoin cash, the cryptocurrency that was created as the result of a "hard fork" within the bitcoin blockchain in August 2017 that allows for increased scalability for bitcoin transactions. Whereas bitcoin, or the "bitcoin core" (a nickname derived from the "bitcoin core developers"), conceives of the cryptocurrency as digital gold, bitcoin cash envisions the cryptocurrency in terms of digital cash, a currency that accelerates the transactional verification process.&#xa0;<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_left"><div><div class="image on-image"></div></div></div>Lil Windex, who has never before ventured into<a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/j-pop-virtual-currency-girls-cryptocurrency-band-2018-1"> the burgeoning arena of cryptocurrency-themed music</a>, expressed his allegiance to bitcoin cash, and harshly denigrated the bitcoin core at the song's close:&#xa0;"Hey, f--- bitcoin core," Lil Windex raps.The song tells the rags-to-riches story entailing the life of Lil Windex before he was the flaxen-haired, gold-tooth-plated lyrical genius that he is today.&#xa0;As Slate pointed out, it's unclear whether or not the song is sponsored - after all, it wouldn't be the first time a cryptocurrency was <a href="https://bitnewstoday.com/news/ethereum/prodeum-fake-ico-paid-people-to-write-on-their-bodies-for-advertising/">the subject of a bizarro marketing scheme in recent months</a>.In an effort to learn more, Business Insider reached out to Lil Windex in an email interview. Here's what Lil Windex had to say:&#xa0;ZOË BERNARD: Do you think that bitcoin cash is better than all other forms of currency?LIL WINDEX: Yo, I think it has potential to be better. I like the principles it stands for, would be nice to be able to have money without giving it all to the bank to control, just so they can tax me with fees anytime I want to do something with my own loot. It's also nice to send cash to people without buying the boys at Western Union a steak dinner.BERNARD: In the video, you throw around cash - do you think this is confusing to viewers who don't know that bitcoin cash is a decentralized digital currency that exists devoid of physical form, and therefore cannot be represented by traditional fiat currencies, such as the Canadian dollar?LIL WINDEX:&#xa0;I'm pretty sure half the people watchin' this ish don't even know what decentralized means, so I'm not trippin' about it. It's a rap video, so it's got money in it. What's confusing about that? Nothing. Are people confused when Bitcoin millionaires cash-in for fiat so they can buy Lambo's? I don't think so. It's called flexing.&#xa0;BERNARD: Do you have that bitcoin cash?&#xa0;LIL WINDEX: B----, you know I go that bitcoin cash. What kind of question is that? I say it like 20 times in the song.&#xa0;BERNARD:&#xa0;How much of that bitcoin cash do you have?LIL WINDEX: Trying to get personal with me? Here, let me explain how much I got in the language of my people: Rikiki!*[*Editor's note: "Rikiki" is a sound that Lil Windex frequently makes within his music.]BERNARD: What is your bitcoin cash investment strategy?LIL WINDEX: It's simple. Get as much bitcoin cash as possible, and then just ball out everyday. I'll use it to improve my image as your grandma's favorite rapper.&#xa0;BERNARD: What cryptocurrency exchanges do you prefer?LIL WINDEX: I'm from Vancouver, so I mess with Quadrigacx. The good people over there always get my racks to me on time for fair fees.&#xa0;BERNARD: Are there any alt-coins that you're particularly inspired to write songs about?LIL WINDEX:&#xa0;No, I just did this for fun because I think it's cool s--t, and got my feet wet with bitcoin cash, it's my ride or die. Lil Windex is loyal, I don't f--k with the ops. Don't pin me as some kind of crypto rapper, that's not even a thing, I'm not out here trying to invent genres.&#xa0;BERNARD: Are you bullish or bearish?LIL WINDEX: Depends what day it is. When it's tanking, I'm a bear. Rawr. When it's peaking, I'm tweaking. Then I get on my bulls--t.BERNARD: Bitcoin cash has recently plummeted in value. How do you feel about this?LIL WINDEX: Lil Windex never stresses about nothing. I got money to blow all over the place. Maybe I feel a bit sad sometimes, but then I just go ball out and I feel a lot better.&#xa0;BERNARD: What inspired you to write this song?LIL WINDEX: I was checking my app on an "up day," and got excited thinking about the future. I started daydreaming about Lambo's, and how many bedrooms would be in my mansion if this stuff went to the moon. Then I thought, why not write a song about it? The rest is history.&#xa0;<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"></div></div></div>BERNARD: Do you believe that bitcoin cash is more closely aligned to Satoshi Nakamoto's original vision for bitcoin rather than bitcoin core?LIL WINDEX: I guess I believe that, because that's what people told me, and that's what I've read, but I mean, Donald Trump tells people a lot of things... so who knows what's real anymore. Could all be fake news.&#xa0;BERNARD: At the end of your song, you say, "F--- bitcoin core/ You're just a buncha names." Why do you feel that the bitcoin core are just a "buncha names?" [<a href="https://gizmodo.com/tag/lil-windex">Translation per Gizmodo</a>]LIL WINDEX: Lames, I said they were a bunch of lames. How do people be a buncha names? It doesn't make any sense. Again, sounds like they're being all weird about Bitcoin and censoring people for having opinions. There's a lotta peeps pissed off about things like LN and F--kwit. Sounds lame, so if they're doing that, then yeah, they're a bunch of lames. Satoshi is a G. Respect your elders. RIKIKI!<a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/intelligence/bitcoin-101?IR=T&amp;utm_source=businessinsider&amp;utm_medium=ctgr&amp;utm_term=ctgr_leadgen&amp;utm_content=fintech_ctgr_leadgen&amp;utm_campaign=fintech_ctgr_leadgen_bitcoin-101"></a><div></div> <div class="margin-top"> <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/why-bluetooth-sucks-bad-problems-issues-disconnects-2018-2">Why does Bluetooth still suck?</a></h3> <div> </div> </div>

Here's what's wrong with bitcoin, according to 25-year-old Canadian rap artist Lil Windex

<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image">Leanna Garfield/Business InsiderMountain Scout Survival School founder Shane Hobel addresses the New York City Preppers Network during its monthly meeting inside a church in Hudson Heights, a neighborhood in far north Manhattan on February 5, 2017.</div></div></div>Inside a church on 189th Street, the New York City Preppers Network gathers for its monthly meeting. Around two dozen men and women sit on plastic chairs facing a whiteboard.Jason Charles a 39-year-old firefighter who serves as the chapter president, introduces the meeting's speaker, Shane Hobel. He's the founder of <a href="http://mtnscoutsurvival.com/">Mountain Scout Survival School</a>, which teaches wilderness survival skills.Before beginning his three-hour talk - which will cover the city's optimal escape routes and what to put in a portable, 72-hour survival bag - Hobel mandates that Trump talk is off-limits."I don't care about your political status," he says. "Do you think mother nature cares about your <keyword id="6358883" type="PERSON" weightage="60" keywordseo="Politics">politics</keyword>? If you've never made a fire, you are going to die." In the back, a toddler shrieks.<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_left"><div><div class="image on-image">Leanna Garfield/Business InsiderMountain Scout Survival School founder Shane Hobel's supplies at the New York City Preppers Network meeting, February 5, 2017.</div></div></div>The group Hobel is addressing is a local chapter of the American Preppers Network, a national organization that promotes self-reliance in case a natural disaster, terrorist attack, or other unforeseen catastrophe strikes.Once perceived as a reactionary, conservative trend, the prepper movement has been portrayed by the TV show "<a href="http://channel.nationalgeographic.com/doomsday-preppers/">Doomsday Preppers</a>" and the 1981 film "<a href="https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/1006717_escape_from_new_york">Escape from New York</a>" as full of conspiracy theorists that wear tin-foil hats and build personal bunkers. But the community actually includes people of many backgrounds, economic statuses, races, ages, and political affiliations. It's even recently evolved to include <a href="http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/01/30/doomsday-prep-for-the-super-rich">Silicon Valley's ultra-wealthy</a>. Preppers simply share a desire to prepare for the worst, whether that's a nuclear bomb, modern civil war, or hurricane that destroys their home.Devoted preppers, like Hobel and Charles, say the movement is growing rapidly and is poised to become more mainstream over the next few years."It's getting bigger because people are panicking," Charles says. "If Trump keeps up his shit, it's going to grow. Once he starts talking about wars, we're screwed."A handful of American prepping supply companies have seen <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/doomsday-prepper-supply-companies-trump-election-2017-2">spikes in sales since the election</a>. Idaho-based company <a href="http://www.mypatriotsupply.com/">My Patriot Supply</a> reported double year-over-year sales during the week of Inauguration. And <a href="https://www.doomsdayprep.com/">Doomsday Prep</a>, which has a storefront in Georgia, has seen more than 15% year-over-year growth since Election Day, according to owner David Sanders.Colin Waugh, a 31-year-old resident of Independence, Missouri, launched a Facebook group called <a href="https://www.facebook.com/groups/1206158592808501">the Liberal Prepper</a> the afternoon after Trump's election, and invited 38 of his friends. It now boasts nearly 1,700 members. The page, which gets updated every half-hour, is littered with posts on everything from how to jar and store vegetables to instructions for building homemade canoes."If you were to ask us what cataclysm is most likely now, we'd say some Trump-related accident that causes the dishevelment of society," he says, adding, "My goal is to either prevent tyranny in America or be prepared for it if we can."Waugh says he never considered buying a gun before the 2016 campaign cycle, but purchased a 12-gauge shotgun right before the election and a 9-millimeter handgun after. He recounts watching a pair of Trump supporters interviewed on CNN in October 2016."We saw a gentleman, jumping up and down, telling the reporter, 'Whether he wins or loses, we are taking our country back.' I couldn't believe it," Waugh says.<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image">The Liberal Prepper/FacebookA screenshot of "The Liberal Prepper" Facebook group.</div></div></div>After seeing that report, Waugh and his wife started stockpiling protein bars, rice, peanut butter, first-aid supplies, batteries, toilet paper, cat food, trash bags, medical handbooks, and as many canned goods as they could fit in the pantry of their one-bedroom apartment. Waugh's worst fears are that the US could get attacked or that the white nationalist alt-right could incite a civil war."It's not like it was in 1865," he says. "If we had another civil war, the media and social media would fuel its combustion."Waugh plans to launch a Liberal Prepper website, which will feature a forum, marketplace, and newsfeed, on March 1. He says he'll manage it full-time, and has <a href="https://www.gofundme.com/the-liberal-prepper-needs-a-website">crowd-funded</a> $1,480 for it as of writing.Jason Charles, on the other hand, doesn't have any political affiliation (he wrote his own name on the ballot in November). Charles says the White House responded too slowly when Hurricane Katrina hit the US in 2005, which is when he lost faith in the government's ability to support citizens during emergencies."You don't want to be dependent on the establishment. You want to be ready to rock 'n' roll," he says.<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image">Leanna Garfield/Business InsiderJason Charles, president of the New York City Preppers Network, inside his Harlem apartment, February 2017.</div></div></div>Charles lives in an apartment with his wife, two sons, and daughter in Harlem. He doesn't own any guns because it's difficult and expensive to obtain a firearm permit in New York City. Instead, Charles has 100 knives and three Samurai swords. He shows me one $300 handmade knife - the most expensive piece of equipment he owns.Charles started prepping in 2010, after he read William Forstchen's "<a href="https://www.amazon.com/Second-After-John-Matherson-Novel/dp/0765356864">One Second After</a>," a novel that describes a man's efforts to save his family in post-apocalyptic North Carolina."There was one part when he says, 'I should've gotten more. I should've gotten more food,' and it got me thinking, I never want that to happen to my kids," he says.Over the past seven years, Charles has amassed nearly $20,000 worth of supplies and gear, including three vests, a bullet-proof breast plate, dozens of Ramen packets, nylon-silk tarps, two water filtration systems, extra clothing, an ax, a crossbow, a dehydrator, a hammock, a dozen military-grade backpacks, a few first aid kits and blankets, two radios, and "canteens out the ass." <div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image">Leanna Garfield/Business InsiderJason Charles, president of the New York City Preppers Network, inside his family's apartment in Harlem, February 2017.</div></div></div>He stores most of this in what he calls his "end-of-the-world closet." In 2013, he also got a 100-square-foot storage unit in the Bronx to hold first-aid supplies, backpacks, gas masks, a raft, detergent, boxes of latex gloves, a generator, and a year's worth of food with a 20-year shelf life. (The unit also stores his family's Christmas decorations.)Not all members of the NYC Preppers Network have this much stuff, however. And Shane Hobel of the Mountain Scout Survival School says he has plenty of students that don't consider themselves preppers at all. But Hobel says he's noticed more of his students "are waking up and realizing that no one is going to save them, so they better figure out how to do it themselves."This spring, he plans to open a second, larger school, the "Mountain Scout Earth School," in East Fishkill, New York.Charles, meanwhile, is planning to practice the kinds of skills Hobel teaches on an upcoming solo overnight trip. He's only bringing a tarp, wool blanket, and supplies to make fire.I ask him to name his worst fear."Nothing," Charles says. "We're ready for anything and all of it." <div class="margin-top"> <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/tech-millionaires-prepare-end-world-2017-2">Here's what tech millionaires are doing to prepare for the end of the world</a></h3> <div> <div> <div class="ooyala-video-player" data-video-autoplay="false" data-video-id="1wcDNlOTE69jAElQV0-f5bnPrdwjXDOY" data-player-variable="ooyalapopvideo" id="ooyalaplayer_popvideo" style="width:1280px;height:720px"></div> </div> </div> </div>

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