List of All Articles with Tag 'viral'

People have been left bewildered after viewing an optical illusion of a spinning lady, as they try to figure out which way she is turning. Optical illusions have long been a favourite of the internet, sparking numerous online debates in the past from the 'Yanny or Laurel' audio, to the black/blue and white/gold dress. The reason we're often so interested in optical illusions is because what we see or hear challenges or disagrees with physical reality. Aude Oliva, a cognitive scientist from MIT, told Popular Mechanics that "the human brain is really tuned to learning new things. Anything that is new and surprising is something we naturally like because it mean we may learn something from it." The 'spinning lady' illusion was first posted to YouTube in 2018, asking viewers, "Which way is the lady spying? Left or right? Or both?" Many left comments sharing what they could see: "I had to watch it multiple times to see both," one user wrote. "My brain naturally sees her turn clockwise. But after watching it enough, if I change my focus it can change her direction." "At first I thought both, but when I focus on the eyes, nose and mouth as she spins, I just see her spinning left (clockwise)", wrote another. One user even said that the lady is "NOT SPINNING at all!" But rather "SWINGS like a pendulum!" Take a look at the spinning lady yourself: NEW Spinning Lady Optical Illusion (Left or Right?) www.youtube.com So, what do you see? Is she spinning left, right, or both? Sign up to our free Indy100 weekly newsletter Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.

The sports star says his rumoured love interest's appearance at his game on Sunday was "awesome".

An Australian man has been exposed for faking his own kidnapping as an extreme excuse to cheat on his girlfriend. Paul Iera from New South Wales almost faced jail for his lies after sending a text message to his then-partner saying he was being held hostage by "unknown Middle Eastern males" over a $7,000 dirt bike. The text read: "Thank you for sending Paul to me, now payback is a b**** bye bye." It continued: "But I'm going to be fare [sic] OK, we will keep him with us until the morning wen [sic] he gives us his bike we call it square, no one's touching him my word I'll give you hun OK." Like most concerned people, Iera's partner called the police, who launched a "high-risk vehicle stop" and spent 200 hours trying to locate the man. They later found him in his own vehicle and obtained footage of him with a sex worker. According to 9 News, Magistrate Michael Ong said: "You chose to send alarming, frightening messages to your partner so you could get some extra time with another partner. "You thought that would be a great way to do it. Any reasonable person would have gone to the police and that is exactly what happened." "You are at a point where you need to make a choice. You either take a step back, look at yourself and your circumstances and move towards furthering yourself, or alternatively you will move into a situation where imprisonment will be a very realistic option." Iera was fined AU $16,000 (£8,400) for wasting police time and an additional AU $550 (£280) for firearm offences. He was also reportedly sentenced to a concurrent 18-month Community Correction Order (CCO) for possessing an unauthorised firearm, possessing a prohibited weapon without a permit and possessing ammunition without a licence. Sign up for our free Indy100 weekly newsletter Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.

'Plane drama' has become the centre of attention in recent months since Tiffany Gomas was harshly branded the 'crazy plane lady' following her outburst on an American Airlines flight. In July, the marketing executive became an internet sensation for claiming "that motherf**ker back there is not real," while pointing towards her seat. The footage went on to birth TikTok trends, merch and conspiracies. Gomas has since apologised for the incident and her "use of profanity," and shared plans to raise awareness on "mental health and standing up against cyberbullying" going forward. Her outburst was later followed by a British boxer who made headlines for trying to get off the plane mid-flight. Then, a third encounter saw influencer and former Bad Girls Club star Morgan Osman go viral for telling a fellow passenger, "Film me, I’m Instagram famous, you f**king bum." Well now, a safety representative for the Federal Aviation Administration has urged people to not record such incidents on flights, as it may create more harm than good. "If someone's got a cellphone in your face, it could make the situation worse," Trey Walters told Insider. "If a flight attendant, for example, is trying to attend to a passenger that's having an issue, having people reaching their hands out in front of that person's face, trying to record the situation definitely creates added risk." The former pilot went on to suggest that attempts to get footage could distract flight attendants from calming down situations. Walters also emphasised it is always "inappropriate" to film passengers with medical conditions, including the recent "biohazard issue" from a passenger who "had diarrhoea all the way through." Some X/Twitter users have said that while the story was initially funny, it could be seen as ridiculing someone for being ill. Sign up for our free Indy100 weekly newsletter Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.

A group of Gen-Zers have managed to fool over 100 fine diners by creating a highly exclusive steakhouse that doesn't actually exist. On Saturday evening 140 diners were invited to Mehran's Steakhouse, thinking they had finally managed to get a spot at the most exclusive restaurant in Manhattan. In reality, it was an elaborate prank pulled off by a 21-year-old, and over 60 of his friends. Mehran's Steakhouse was a joke created in 2021, when Mehran Jahali's 16 housemates decided to commemorate the biweekly steak dinners he'd cook them by marking their Upper East Side Home as Mehran's Steakhouse on Google Maps. His friends and roommates left glowing reviews, resulting intrigued strangers showing up at their door trying to get a table. Taking it one step further, Mehran made a website for their solidly booked, "revolutionary steak experience". By the end of 2022 Mehran's Steakhouse had accumulated a 2,600-person waitlist. Mehran eventually decided to make the steakhouse a reality, recruiting friends to be volunteer staff, choosing a public-bathhouse-turned-event-space for the night, getting a one-day liquor license, food handling permits, and a 212 number to invite select wait listers to a one night dining experience at the restaurant's 'Lower East Side location'. Whilst it was not immediately obvious that the restaurant was in fact one big joke, guests began to notice something was off as the night went on. From the sommelier being unable to open bottles of wine, to the venue being surrounded by photos of Mehran with celebrities such as Albert Einstein, Marilyn Monroe, and JFK. As part of the elaborate act, two waiters paraded around a gallon of whole milk, telling diners it was "intended to represent the bovine life cycle", according to New York Post reporter Hannah Frishberg. There was also a staged crowd outside the restaurant screaming for Drake, as well as a fake proposal. When diners got wind that the restaurant was not what it seemed many were amused, although one couple threatened Mehran with legal action after founding out Merhan's Steakhouse was "fake." Sign up to our free Indy100 weekly newsletter Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.

People think a “Scandivanivan sleep method” might hold the key to a successful marriage after trying it out. No matter how much you love someone, sleeping in a bed next to them has the ability to be rage-inducing if they have a tendency to steal most of the duvet for themselves. Now, a phenomenon popular in Scandinavian countries, such as Denmark, Norway, and Sweden, is offering up a solution as couples sleep with two twin-sized duvets rather than one large one. The sleeping method is sweeping social media and has seen many hailing themselves as new fans of the system TikToker Erica Stolman Dowdy has gone viral on the platform, suggesting that it “could save marriages”. In the video, she explained she and her husband love visiting Copenhagen and she wanted to give their own home a Scandinavian-inspired makeover. This included getting two twin duvets, as Stolman Dowdy explained: “In Copenhagen, not once have I slept with one duvet. It is always two twins and we sleep so good. “No one’s fighting over blankets. Nobody’s too hot or too cold. It’s absolutely amazing.” @ericastolmandowdy the Scandinavian sleep method is an absolute game changer. 10/10 recommend ☁️ #scandinaviansleepmethod #danishdesign #danishinterior She continued: “This is just absolutely the comfiest way to sleep. I 10 out of 10 recommend it. It could save marriages.” In the comments, someone wrote: “Not me realizing I sleep with the Copenhagen method already and my husband and I LOVE it.” Someone else said: “Once you sleep with two comforters…you will NEVER go back to only one!!!” “Ohhh that’s such a great idea!” another person wrote. One TikToker wrote: “Legit started doing this last year and it is a GAME CHANGER. No more ‘empty space’ of cold air creeping in the middle of the bed.” Sign up to our free Indy100 weekly newsletter Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.

An influencer was left in tears after her offer to pay for someone’s food shopping was rejected on camera. TikToker Amelia Goldsmith wanted to do a good deed and filmed herself in a supermarket approaching shoppers and offering to pay for their groceries to “cheer someone up”. But, things did not turn out as she had expected after she was shut down by multiple customers. Goldsmith was in a branch of Sainsbury’s when the incident occurred. In a TikTok video, she could be seen approaching a shopper with the offer. The man told her: “No, no, no. I really don't need it.” Another woman told her, “There's a lot more deserving people in the world but thank you,” adding, “I feel too guilty for taking it.” Instead, Goldsmith resorted to buying some dried pasta, rice and sauces and putting them in the store's food bank collection. Tearfully speaking to the camera, she said: “That was stressful, guys. That was really stressful.” @millyg_fit in hindsight i can see why people can react differently to this, but my intentions were purely to brighten up someones day💕 i’m still super happy with what I ended up doing and i’ll do more of it for sure #storytime #vlog #makesomeonesday #foodshop She continued: “I was expecting the first person to be, like, overjoyed and grateful and happy for me to pay for their shopping, but obviously that didn't go down well. “He was a little bit angry. I was a little bit taken aback and then - I'm gonna cry, to be honest - the second person, she just sort of looked at me like I was some absolute idiot weirdo.” She went on, explaining that it was a “challenge” for her to approach people because she finds social situations “really quite hard”. In the comments, other TikTokers suggested that next time she should try it in a different supermarket. Someone argued: “You need to go to a cheaper supermarket like Aldi or Lidl. People who shop in Sainsbury’s can afford it.” Sign up to our free Indy100 weekly newsletter Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.

A man has gone viral on X/Twitter after detailing his harrowing journey from London to Edinburgh after his train was cancelled halfway into the trip. Stand-up comedian James Nokise revealed in a thread how his nightmare trip to Scotland went from bad to worse. He started, explaining that he initially got on the train in London at 4:40pm. Then, around three hours into the train journey, he received an email saying that the train had been cancelled – a confusing message as the train was still moving and there had been no announcement. Nokise wrote: “About 10mins later the train manager came on the speaker to say they ‘heard from passengers’ (!) that the train had been cancelled and was going to investigate because everything looked fine to them.” Passengers onboard were later informed that the “rumours were true” and the train would be terminating at the next station, which was Preston. Nokise explained that hundreds of passengers disembarked at Preston to catch a connecting train the Glasgow that left without them because it was already full. “It was around 8pm, and we were told to wait for the next train.. at 9:42,” he wrote, adding that it was also cancelled. He continued: “It turned out there were no more trains ‘North’ after that and, excitingly, no forthcoming information. “Some people stood staring at the screens. Some people queued to ask the one ticket booth worker the same question everyone else was. No one knew anything.” The hundreds of stranded passengers were then informed that alternative travel arrangements had been made. This, it was revealed, was in the form of taxis to Scotland, 3 and a half hours away. Nokise said, “all of us queued to be taken away 3-7 people at a time. And if that sounds slow and ridiculous, it was”. In his cab, Nokise was in a taxi with 3 other strangers when the taxi almost collided with another vehicle on the motorway. After several other “incidents” on the way, the cab passengers eventually made it to their intended destination after 3:00am – over five hours later than their scheduled arrival time and 11 hours after they boarded the train. The nightmare-ish journey had seen the X/Twitter thread go viral, with more than 25,000 likes. One teacher also revealed that a class of 12-year-old children were left effectively stranded in Preston as they were unable to send children unaccompanied in taxis. They tweeted: “Hi @AvantiWestCoast we’ve been stuck at Preston since around 630pm with 50 12 year olds. It’s now 10.08pm. “We've just been informed that there is no way of getting us home to Glasgow, as we can't send kids alone on taxis. A staff member has said we are effectively stuck here.” indy100 has contacted Avanti West Coast for comment. Sign up to our free Indy100 weekly newsletter Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.

YouTube star Ethan Payne has split opinion online after he said he wants his girlfriend to take his surname if they get married. Payne and his co-star girlfriend, Faith Kelly, present the podcast “Growing Paynes”, after getting together since 2021 and having a child a year after. In a recent episode, Kelly said: “Ethan won't propose to me because I want to be Kelly-Payne.” Payne responded: “Faith doesn't want to take my name and that irks me.” Kelly explained that she does not want to “lose my association with my family,” while Payne again responded that she would just be taking a name. @dailypaynes Ethan being a red flag 🚩 FULL CLIP 🚩 Growing Paynes: Ep 11 #growingpaynes #faithkelly #marriage #fyp #ethanpayne #proposal #redflag Payne is part of the YouTube group The Sidemen, which also includes social media star KSI. He said he thinks Kelly taking his name is “how it should be done”. “You're bottling it, that's what it is,” he joked. But online commenters didn’t see it that way. One person wrote on TikTok: “Naaah, that’s a big red flag. Thought more of him.” Another said: “This is the brightest and biggest red flag I’ve ever seen like there should be no problem cus she’s taking his name as well so.” A further commenter added: “It’s her name…. She’s including his name in it??? I don’t understand his point here.” Some people said they understood where Payne was coming from. One person said: “Sounds like she wants one foot out the door already. You’re either all in or all out.” Another said: “Wants a traditional marriage with ut the tradition. You can’t make this sh*t up.” Deed Poll data from 2021 shows that women combining both their husband’s and their own surname was up by nearly one-third compared to 2020. Looks like, in wider society at least, the traditionalists are growing few and farther between. Sign up to our free Indy100 weekly newsletter Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.

A woman has explained how she discovered her husband's double-life all while scrolling on Facebook. Posting on Reddit, she explained that she has been married to her husband for ten years and that they have two children together. One day she was scrolling on a Facebook meme page and when reading comments "I saw a profile that had a photo of a woman with my husband," she said. Upon further investigation, she found out that her husband was married to the other woman, had another profile with a different name and even had a child with the other woman. So, she got in touch with the woman and found out she "did know that he was married." "They have been married for two years and their baby is approximately 14 months old," she explained. "Although they are not technically married, their marriage is not valid." "I hired a lawyer, I took all the evidence and I am in the divorce process, since when I complained he preferred her, he left the house to live with her. Besides, he refuses to give alimony, claiming that he has another child to support, and that if he has to give alimony to my children, he will seek the minimum payment even if he has to quit his job." Some people... Sign up to our free Indy100 weekly newsletter Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.

Stranger Things star Millie Bobby Brown has come under fire for her novel, Nineteen Steps, after working with a ghostwriter on the book. The novel was inspired by Brown’s grandmother’s experience of the 1943 Bethnal Green tube disaster, and was ghostwritten by Kathleen McGurl. Only Brown’s name is on the cover of the book, prompting social media users to criticise Brown after the book’s release. One X/Twitter user said: “You should be ashamed. “Ghostwritten celebrity novels have ruined children’s literature and now they’re doing the same thing to adult fiction.” When Nineteen Steps was published earlier this month, Brown posted a photo on Instagram of herself standing next to McGurl. The caption reads: “I couldn’t have done this without you!” Nonetheless, that has done little to silence her critics. One person wrote on Instagram: “So you can become an author and not actually write it yourself these days. What’s the point?” Another said: “You mean she wrote it for you and you’re taking the credit.” Others jumped to the 19-year-old’s aid, pointing out that scores of celebrities have faced criticism for using ghostwriters in the past. Media personality Zoella (real name Zoë Sugg) was slammed for doing the same thing with her memoir Girl Online in 2014. Katie Price and Naomi Campbell have also used ghostwriters for fiction books released under their name. And more recently, Prince Harry’s memoir, Spare, was written by JR Moehringer. That book broke the record for the fastest-selling nonfiction book of all time, with 1.43m copies sold on its first day. One commenter wrote on Instagram: “This author will be paid a s***tone more because Millie’s name is on it. “Ghostwriting is not new, and by sharing this post she is literally acknowledging the author, whose name will also be in the book. “The author will be very happy, and Millie supplied the whole story and all her family’s research. Everyone seriously needs to get off their high horse.” In a March blog post, McGurl said she was sent “a lot of research that had already been pulled together by Millie and her family, and plenty of ideas”. McGurl then interviewed Brown several times over Zoom before she wrote the first draft, she said. Sign up to our free Indy100 weekly newsletter Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.

Two hungry bears have raided a Krispy Kreme van and helped themselves to 20 packs of doughnuts. The delivery driver had arrived at a store when he momentarily left his van unattended to drop off some boxes. At that moment, a mummy bear and her cub hopped inside the van and started munching on the sweet treats. Store manager, Shelly Deano said the bears often frequent the area in Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, Alaska, US, in search of leftovers. Sally told local media: “You could hear them breaking open the packages. “We were trying to beat on the van, but they just kept eating all the doughnuts.” She added: “They ate 20 packages of the doughnut holes and I believe six packages of the three-pack chocolate doughnuts.” She said security staff managed to drive the bears away by blasting their sirens on Tuesday (19 Sept). The bears then ambled off into the nearby woods after spending around 20 minutes scoffing down the doughnuts. Krispy Kreme spokesperson Candice Sargeant said it was a learning experience for staff members. She said: “We'll definitely be learning to slide up our ramp, and close the doors, to ensure that bears don't get back in there again.” One local resident joked: “It's cute when they do it, but when I raided a doughnut truck, it was ‘illegal’ and ‘disturbing’...” Sue wrote: “Good for them. “I’m glad they got to enjoy them, but they must’ve had such a belly ache! We all love those things.” Nikki said: “Looks like they're storing up for the long winter ahead! It takes a lot of calories to hibernate for a few months.” Stan Hunt remarked: “Only in Alaska.” Sign up for our free Indy100 weekly newsletter Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.