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It's unfortunately a familiar story for many homeowners: they hire a contractor to make home improvements and pay a deposit, but then the contractor never shows. Such was the case for customers in Atlantic County, NJ, who hired ShorePro Contractors. At the beginning of June, a judge ordered the company to pay back $940,000 to customers who paid for work that was never completed. Owner Christopher Molosso, Sr., allegedly demanded $2,000 from one customer for a home renovation permit, even though the fee for the permit had been waived because the home had suffered damage during Hurricane Sandy. In all, ShorePro had violated New Jersey's Consumer Fraud Act, the Home Improvement Contractor’s Registration Act, and other regulations a total of 84 times. Many victims, like the homeowner who wa...

It's the middle of the growing season for many farmers, but "click farmers" operate best in the dark. In the sketchier corners of the internet, anyone looking to artificially boost their social media stats can purchase Facebook Likes, YouTube views, and Twitter followers by the thousands. Desperate business owners will purchase all manner of counterfeit data to rack up phony metrics. The Week gained access to one of these black market click farms. In a barbed-wire-rimmed pink apartment complex in the Philippines, a group of social media harvesters plant fake profiles all over the Web. "Casipong inserts earbuds, queues up dance music, and checks her client's' instructions. Their specifications are often quite pointed. A São Paulo gym might request 75 female Brazilian fitness fanatics, or...

Although carpet still covers nearly 70% of the flooring in the United States, renewed interest in hard floors has propelled discount wood and laminate flooring sellers to new heights in recent years. That doesn’t mean all these sellers are doing well. Lumber Liquidators saw its shares tumble even lower this week after the Environmental Protection Agency questioned the effectiveness of home safety tests the flooring company had sent out to soothe consumer fears that its products emitted high levels of carcinogens. That news came just a week after the retailer’s chief compliance officer left. The company is also facing more than 100 lawsuits regarding harvesting and safety compliance. In response to consumer concerns regarding one of those compliance issues -- the emission of potentially t...

Homeowners don't have to do much searching to find out that energy efficiency can save a ton of money. According to the Department of Energy, a family can save up to 30% on energy bills after making energy efficient home improvements. ENERGY STAR also reports that in 2013 alone, American families and businesses saved a whopping $30 billion on utility bills and prevented greenhouse gas emissions equal to the annual electricity use of more than 38 million homes. A Vermont-based yogurt maker is now also seeing the huge returns energy efficiency can yield, a case which can serve as a testament to the cost-efficiency of sustainable practices. Efficiency Vermont is helping Ehrmann Commonwealth Dairy attain about $2.1 million in lifetime savings through ongoing energy efficiency efforts, accord...

A U.S. Army Corps of Engineers soldier recently became the first person to graduate from the Marine Corps's new court reporter course. Sgt. First Class Jason Trumbull will be assigned to the Middle East District following his successful completion of his studies at the Naval Justice School. Trumbull originally planned to attend the Army's program, but instead accelerated through the Marine Corps program. In the past, the military hired contractors for overseas court reporting, but Trumbull's assignment will save the government at least $100,000 annually. Although many Americans imagine court reporters diligently typing away on old-fashioned typewriters, that technique is quickly being replaced by high-tech options. Sgt. Trumbull was trained with the "voice writing" method, which utilizes...

Emojis are quickly becoming a new form of language, and can now be used to actually order food -- thanks to a new app called Fooji. Emojis are smileys and ideograms that smartphone users can text to one another. As a picture is worth 1,000 words, emojis can be used to succinctly articulate complex ideas and emotions easily. For example, the gaping mouth emoji can be used to show just how hungry a smartphone user is. Consequently, smartphone users have started using emojis as pseudo-hieroglyphics, and have innovated their usage. Now, there are emoji art exhibitions, and emoji music videos. The Library of Congress even accepted Emoji Dick in 2013, a translation of Herman Melville's classic into emoji. Linguistic scholars, however, would hesitate to call emoji a language. Sure, there are o...