Thermal cameras are so hot right now

Smile! Whenever society emerges from lockdown, the cameras will be watching.

Businesses worldwide are investing in AI-powered thermal cameras and screening stations to keep tabs on the health of their workers and customers.

The surveillance hardware could become part of a new normal as governments look for ways to reopen their economies — without un-flattening the dang curve.

The other challenge: making sure the heat-checking tech doesn’t light people’s privacy rights on fire.

Turns out you can teach an old cam new tricks

Thermal-imaging cameras — a new spin on the security cams of old — are promising for a few reasons: Companies can monitor multiple people at once. And unlike a chaperone at a middle-school dance, they can enforce keep-your-distance rules from a safe distance.

The Washington Post and Reuters found that the market for thermal-imaging tech is running hot — FLIR Systems, a major manufacturer, has seen its stock price soar by 60% in recent weeks.

But the market is also a bit of an unregulated Wild West:

• The Food and Drug Administration said it “does not intend to object” to the use of the technology for initial body-temp measurements.
• The Equal Opportunity Employment Commission said businesses can take employees’ temperatures — and send them home if they’re showing symptoms.

Is a corona diagnosis the new badge of shame?

The president of the National Workrights Institute told the Post that being sent home after showing signs of a fever would be like getting “stamped with the scarlet letter.”

Privacy advocates worry that unproven systems could cause many false positives. And once employers plug in Big Brother, they may not want to go back — there would be few incentives for companies to put their new toys away after the pandemic fades.

Businesses are turning the cams on anyway

City Farmers Market, in Atlanta, tells customers that it’s using cameras for temperature screening at its entrances, and temp-checking kiosks will be key to casinos’ plans to get the poker tables running again.

These days, there’s nothing more profitable than giving away tons of money for free.

YouTube Live’s most popular creator is MrBeast, a 21-year-old whose greatest hits include offering up dozens of cars nearly for free or leaving $30k in tips for servers. Almost all of his videos net 10m+views.

But the cash giveaway economy has grown well beyond MrBeast — and on Instagram, the pandemic is catapulting it to new heights. Influencers, Netflix stars, and… Bhad Bhabie… are all trying it. 

The real winner is social media marketing

Take, as The New York Times did, Paige Hathaway: A fitness influencer with 4m+ followers. Last month, in the heat of quarantine, Hathaway offered to give out $5k to a random follower.

The $5k came from Social Stance, one of a network of firms that promises to boost the follower counts of entrepreneurs or aspiring influencers. To enter the giveaway, all Hathaway;s fans had to do was follow accounts designated by Social Stance.

Here’s what the giveaway didn’t say: Social Stance’s clients paid big bucks — $900 apiece — to get on the list of accounts to follow. 

Some people really, really want those extra Insta followers

It’s a win-win-win, mostly: A lucky Hathaway fan gets $5k. Firms like Social Stance turn a big profit, and its clients — think of that entrepreneur on the verge of launching her company — get ~50k new followers. 

But the sub-industry’s growth is making Instagram nervous, as many cash giveaways might violate local sweepstakes laws. 

If you’ve ever wondered how plastic surgeons could amass such huge Instagram followings — now you know one of their secrets.

Yesterday, Shopify unveiled a new app that could be a lifeline for the 1m+ merchants on its ecommerce platform, some of whom are struggling in a big way.

It’s a Shop fired in the ecommerce wars

The new app, called Shop, is an update to a package-tracking tool called Arrive. If you’ve ever wanted retail therapy to feel a little more like picking out a meal on Grubhub, Shop might be for you.

The app’s buzziest feature: a “shops near you” tab that shows Shopify merchants whose brick-and-mortar outposts are close to your last delivery address. 

You can follow those merchants within the app and buy directly from their Shopify listings.

One important detail, courtesy of Fast Company: Businesses don’t pay anything to be on the Shop app, and they don’t pay commissions on sales made through it, either. So it’s also a shrewd way for Shopify to get new merchants to try out its services.

Take that, Bezos

Fast Company points out that the app might be best suited to digital-first brands that happen to have stores in a few cities. Small businesses need to be on Shopify’s platform to take advantage of the increased reach.

In Vilnius, the capital of Lithuania, restaurants are the new public square. As the city reopens this week, it’s putting in place basic social distancing rules:

• Masks are a must. 
• Only a few customers can enter a store at any time. 
• Restaurants and cafés have to keep tables at least 2 meters apart. 

But in some cramped quarters of the city, real estate is so tight that even 2 meters of separation is too big of an ask — so the city decided to welcome businesses into the outdoors.

The central square? That’s a pasta shop now

Don’t have space in your store to keep your customers at a distance? Just haul those tables outside. Soon open-air restaurants will flood the city’s public arena, taking over plazas and closed-off streets.

160+ businesses have already applied for an outdoor operating permit, making Vilnius the first major city to contort itself into a giant open-air café. 

Long may the al fresco business reign 

Turning to open-air operations in a pandemic isn’t a totally novel idea. During the Spanish flu, San Francisco held legal proceedings and church services in the outdoors to cut down on virus transmission.

In the US, NYC has already closed off 100 miles of roads to traffic for more walking space, and some municipalities are letting restaurants set up shop in empty parking lots. 

All of which suggests: This summer, in the best-case scenario, we may all find ourselves sipping rosé in folding chairs in the middle of an Applebee’s parking lot.