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Want This Hearing Aid? Well, Who Do You Know?

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Want This Hearing Aid? Well, Who Do You Know?


“I’ve tried different brands of hearing aids, and they’re good, but they’re not this good,” says Martin in a Zoom interview. He visited the team in Soho, did the street test, and was delighted when he tried it with his wife and daughter at their favorite restaurant, with de Jonge sitting with the laptop several tables away. But the clincher for Martin was a cocktail party.

“I was here in our building, and I was at a party upstairs, and I had my old hearing aids in,” he says. “I’m sitting talking to four people, and I realized I can’t understand any of them, and I go, wait, I have these new hearing aids. I went downstairs, put them in, came back, and I could hear everyone.” Now he wears them all the time, and even made a joke about hearing aids on Saturday Night Live’s 50th anniversary special. “I don’t really think about the way it used to be,” he says. “I used to dread going to a restaurant, and now I don’t.” His friend Balaban, once he got into the beta test, is similarly smitten. “This is a significant improvement over the absurdly pricey devices I’d been using,” Balaban says.

Other machers aren’t public, but de Jonge assures me they are mostly names invoked in boldface type. Since there are only a few dozen beta units, this means that some powerful people have been shuttled to a waiting list. Balaban’s wife, Lynn Grossman, recounts attending a Labor Day dinner with over 100 people, generally of a certain age, in a private room in a restaurant, thinking that her husband and another guy—a famous CEO in the fashion world—were the only ones who could hear, because of Fortell. “After, I think Bob got 12 or 14 emails saying, ‘How do I get those hearing aids?’”

Now that the product is launched, Fortell will sell hearing aids in a single clinic on Manhattan’s Park Avenue. It’s decked out like a posh lounge, with the devices on display in a tasteful presentation that’s straight out of the Apple retail playbook. Hanging on the wall is a silicon wafer with the circuitry of the custom chips. In the early stages, his staff of four audiologists will serve only a couple of dozen customers a week, to make sure everything goes smoothly. In any case, while ramping up production, the supply will be limited.

The chips used inside the hearing aids, on display in the lobby of Fortell.

Photograph: Ali Cherkis

This is great for Fortell, but it seems de Jonge’s initial impulse to usher everyone’s grandparents into the land of the hearing is in danger of being limited to the one percent, which doesn’t exactly qualify him for a Salk medal. When I ask de Jonge how his invention can scale to change life for the masses, his replies, whether due to secrecy on future plans or just not having a good answer, seem hand-wavy. In his defense, Fortell has resisted the temptation to jack up the traditional price of premium hearing aids—the $6,800 is actually a bit less than some other medically prescribed hearing aids. (As with other high-end hearing aids, the price is part of a package that includes fitting and support from professional audiologists.) Still, even that defensible price tag limits adoption; it’s a sad fact that some Medicare and many health insurance plans do not cover hearing aids, a policy that dooms millions to an aural bardo of conversational exclusion, isolating them from loved ones and hastening dementia.

It’s unclear whether Fortell technology might find its way into the less expensive over-the-counter hearing aids available today, which became possible via a Biden-era shift in regulation. These include Apple’s AirPods Pro 2 devices and entries from other consumer electronics brands, which are generally known to help those with hearing loss but not as much as high-end devices that are paired with professional support. The Fortell proposition requires careful testing and tuning, continuing for some time as wearers get used to the devices. In any case, that white-glove approach will consume Fortell’s efforts for the next year and more. Expansion will come by opening clinics in a few select cities, and only later will Fortell consider scaling to allow others to sell the technology.



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Save 30% With VistaPrint Coupons for December 2025

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Save 30% With VistaPrint Coupons for December 2025


VistaPrint specializes in custom physical and digital marketing products for small businesses, like brochures and promotional products, along with personal products like invitations, t-shirts, business cards, or even posters to meet any print and online personalization needs you may have. Fortunately, you don’t have to pay an arm and a leg to shop for these trending products, thanks to our selection of deals for both new and returning customers.

Use Top VistaPrint Promo Codes for up to 20% Off

We have a VistaPrint coupon to help you save big on those personalized gifts for yourself or your loved ones. Right now, new customers get 20% off their first order of $100 or more with VistaPrint promo code at checkout. Once you’ve personalized whatever you want—from greeting cards to full on canvas-sized pictures and pillows—paste the code into the box at checkout to save major coin on your purchase.

Discover More Verified VistaPrint Coupons and Discounts for 2025

There are other VistaPrint promos, like $10 off purchases of $100 or more, $20 off $150 or more, and $50 off $250 or more with code SAVEBIG through December 31.

Besides using one of our hand picked VistaPrint voucher codes, you can get 15% off your next order when you sign up for texts. VistaPrint also offers premium memberships which renew annually and are ideal for small businesses and people who use services frequently. Members get up to 40% off products, 30% off Deposit photo subscriptions, unbranded products and packaging, and global discounts. Best of all, you can try these services free for 30 days. Be sure to check out our VistaPrint promo codes and discounts page to see the rotating available discounts.

Save on Vistaprint Holiday and Vistaprint Christmas Cards for December 2025

One of the best services Vistaprint offers are Holiday and Christmas Card templates to make customizing your holiday cards easier than ever. Browse the various templates, styles, and colors available for every type of family vibe. Holiday cards start at less than $1 each for 100 or more, and they even offer complimentary backside printing, free addressing on custom envelopes, and design assistance.

Discover the Latest Vistaprint Postcards With Up to 30% Off

Forget the old holiday or business card and instead upgrade for contemporary times with Vistaprint postcards. They have tons of styles of postcards to fit your business, ideas, and budget. They have a huge range of styles and sizes, from coupons to mailers, in various price points, with classic designs to contemporary styles.

Redeem Your VistaPrint Promo Code in a Few Easy Steps

Whether you’re looking for the best deal on custom VistaPrint business cards for your small business or you’re looking to order custom t-shirts for your family reunion, it’s simple and easy to apply a coupon for your next VistaPrint order. All you have to do is copy the code and paste it in the allotted area at checkout. Be sure to also look out for other trending VistaPrint deals that don’t require a code to redeem your savings on your purchase. In the case of a limited-time promotion, just add the promo item to your cart to instantly save.

Find Everything You Need With VistaPrint Custom Items

VistaPrint has been with me through the years—for thank you cards, holiday gifts, mugs of my friends’ faces as gifts, calendars to make myself a centerfold, family photo books, wedding invitations and subsequent divorce party invites. What can I say, I live a charmed life—and VistaPrint has been there through it all. It has been my consistent go-to for personalized products for the past decade, offering good prices on all my odd-ball creations. So stock up and discover discounts on a selection of marketing must-haves like vinyl banners, business cards, posters, custom mugs, and more. Go ahead, check it out, you know you’ve always wanted to eat off a plate or sleep on a pillow with your loved one’s face on it.

Customize Your Vistaprint Wedding Invitations This Month

Vistaprint makes it easier (and cheaper) than ever to get big printing jobs done for less, with the ability to personalize things as much as you want. You can save big on Vistaprint wedding invitations, with 100 starting at just $90 (half off!); Letterpress Wedding Invitations, with 80 starting at $260 (25% off); and Wedding Party Invitations, with 100 starting at just $90 (50% off). Be sure to check out their expansive, customizable line of wedding invitations to see if they’re the right fit for you.



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Russia Wants This Mega Missile to Intimidate the West, but It Keeps Crashing

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Russia Wants This Mega Missile to Intimidate the West, but It Keeps Crashing


A Russian intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) fired from an underground silo on the country’s southern steppe Friday on a scheduled test to deliver a dummy warhead to a remote impact zone nearly 4,000 miles away. The missile didn’t even make it 4,000 feet.

Russia’s military has been silent on the accident, but the missile’s crash was seen and heard for miles around the Dombarovsky air base in Orenburg Oblast near the Russian-Kazakh border.

A video posted by the Russian blog site MilitaryRussia.ru on Telegram and widely shared on other social media platforms showed the missile veering off course immediately after launch before cartwheeling upside down, losing power, and then crashing a short distance from the launch site. The missile ejected a component before it hit the ground, perhaps as part of a payload salvage sequence, according to Pavel Podvig, a senior researcher at the United Nations Institute for Disarmament Research in Geneva.

The crash was accompanied by a fireball and a noxious reddish-brown cloud, the telltale sign of a toxic mix of hydrazine and nitrogen tetroxide used to fuel Russia’s most powerful ICBMs. Satellite images taken since Friday show a crater and burn scar near the missile silo.

Analysts say the circumstances of the launch suggest it was likely a test of Russia’s RS-28 Sarmat missile, a weapon designed to reach targets more than 11,000 miles (18,000 kilometers) away, making it the world’s longest-range missile.

An Unusable Weapon

The Sarmat missile is Russia’s next-generation heavy-duty ICBM, capable of carrying a payload of up to 10 large nuclear warheads, a combination of warheads and countermeasures, or hypersonic boost-glide vehicles, according to the Center for Strategic and International Studies. Simply put, the Sarmat is a doomsday weapon designed for use in an all-out nuclear war between Russia and the United States.

Therefore, it’s no wonder Russian officials like to talk up Sarmat’s capabilities. Russian president Vladimir Putin has called Sarmat a “truly unique weapon” that will “provide food for thought for those who, in the heat of frenzied aggressive rhetoric, try to threaten our country.” Dmitry Rogozin, then the head of Russia’s space agency, called the Sarmat missile a “superweapon” after its first test flight in 2022.

So far, what’s unique about the Sarmat missile is its propensity for failure. The missile’s first full-scale test flight in 2022 apparently went well, but the program has suffered a string of consecutive failures since then, most notably a catastrophic explosion last year that destroyed the Sarmat missile’s underground silo in northern Russia.



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Bryan Johnson Has Discovered Shrooms, and He Really Wants You to Know It

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Bryan Johnson Has Discovered Shrooms, and He Really Wants You to Know It


“Come watch me trip balls,” declared Bryan Johnson, the “Don’t Die” longevity entrepreneur, on X a couple of days before he livestreamed himself consuming a high dose of psychedelic mushrooms at a psilocybin center in Oregon on Sunday.

It marked the second act of his stunty new investigation into whether using psilocybin can improve almost 250 wellness biomarkers, including various measures of brain connectivity, cortisol levels, and testosterone.

“There’s a potential for psychedelics to play a more important role in all of our lives, and wouldn’t it be amazing if it was also a longevity therapy,” Johnson proclaimed on the stream. Prior to consuming the shrooms Sunday—which has been legal at licensed facilities in Oregon since 2023—Johnson measured his brain activity with a $50,000 helmet produced by Kernel, a neuroimaging company founded by the 48-year-old. He also took saliva samples and temperature readings. (After his November trip, he shared a lot of information about the state of his erections, but more on that later.)

Then he drank more than five grams of powdered mushrooms mixed with lemon juice, for extra potency. Johnson grimaced, and a bizarre new era of live celebrity psychedelic exhibitionism was born—one that is arguably counter to the introspective nature of the drug. The five-and-a-half-hour livestream, which has been viewed more than 1.1 million times, also featured Johnson’s 20-year-old son Talmage, whose blood he has injected in his efforts to stay young, journalist Ashlee Vance, a DJ set from Grimes, and Salesforce CEO Mark Benioff. YouTuber MrBeast, while pictured on a cartoonish poster advertising the event, did not show up, which most extremely high people would probably count as a blessing.

Observers noted that livestreaming an intense psychedelic trip might not be beneficial, since it can lead to fragmented attention and performance stress. Johnson appeared to acknowledge this before taking the mushrooms, saying, “I guess the biggest question is, can I not go off the rails?”

“Having the whole world being able to watch you may not facilitate the best outcome,” says Rayyan Zafar, a postdoctoral fellow at the Centre for Psychedelic Research and Neuropsychopharmacology at Imperial College London. “Bryan’s setup speaks more to ego enrichment than ego dissolution and is characteristic of many of his pseudoscientific pursuits. These sorts of experiences are often best held with an introspective and internal focus.” (Ego death, where one’s sense of self dissolves, is an experience some people seek when taking various psychedelics.) Jamie Wheal, the author of Recapture the Rapture: Rethinking God, Sex, and Death in a World That’s Lost Its Mind, was more brutal in his assessment, telling WIRED the project is “a circus of self-indulgence” and an exercise in “digital narcissism.” He asked: “Is this the psychedelic renaissance that all the supposed freedom fighters and prisoners of conscience have been stumping for?” (Asked if he would like to respond to critiques of his methods, Johnson told WIRED: “Whoever said this, I wish them well.”)

But while someone tripping balls on camera might seem performative and not particularly riveting—at one point Johnson plays with a slinky after declaring “everything is alive”—his broadcast could also help reduce stigma around drug use. “I think it’s fine and good to show people what the experience [of taking psychedelics] looks like, to demystify it to some extent, to show that it can be beneficial,” said journalist and psychedelics industry consultant Hamilton Morris on the livestream; Morris hosted the Vice show Hamilton’s Pharmacopoeia, which depicted him doing drugs on camera.



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