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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...

A former shopping plaza site in Buffalo, NY, could be the next spot for remediation and cleanup, according to the New York Department of Environmental Conservation. The project, located at the old Southtowns shopping plaza at 3021 Orchard Park Road, would cost more than $600,000 as the area is redeveloped into a "multi-disciplinary world class cancer center." The environmental remediation efforts will be paid for by 3021-3041 Orchard Park Road LLC and Comprehensive Cancer Services Oncology, P.C., and will be overseen by the DEC. Once home to the Orchard Park Antique Mall, a Tops Market, and a CVS Pharmacy, the location also housed other businesses, including a dry cleaning service. Dry cleaners are often responsible for the release of volatile organic compounds and other pollutants int...

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...

Victoria Siegel, the 18-year-old featured in 2012 documentary The Queen of Versailles, was found dead of a drug overdose June 6. Now, a representative for the family has released a statement saying that she had been battling a prescription drug addiction prior to her death. “Victoria had a history of seizures and was prescribed medication for this condition,” family spokesman Michael Marder’s said in a statement given to Us Weekly June 8. “Unfortunately she became dependent and struggled with this condition. She voluntarily underwent rehabilitation and was working hard to address this problem.” Her parents, David and Jackie Siegel, have been attempting for several years to build a 90,000-foot home in Florida, the subject of the documentary by Lauren Greenfield. The house is still under c...

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...

Recess might be all fun and games, but a new study reveals that it's having an important impact on children. Between 2006 and 2012, 281 California schools took part in the Alliance for a Healthier Generation's Healthy Schools Program. Researchers from UC Berkeley's School of Public Health took the data from the program, and used it to compare the participating schools to 709 other schools in the state. Recently, the findings were published in one of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's journals, Preventing Chronic Disease. The researchers found that the more schools made an effort, the healthier the kids were. There were greater reductions in the prevalence of student obesity amongst schools that engaged with the Alliance for a Healthier Generation's Healthy Schools Program,...

Everyone wants brighter, whiter teeth. Over the last five years, the number of teeth whitening procedures being performed has risen an astronomical 300% -- and that's not even including at-home treatments and kits. As teeth whitening has become more popular and accessible, the use of at-home whitening kits -- which are both more convenient and more affordable than getting the same procedure from a dentist -- has become one of the go-to ways to do so. But are at-home whitening kits as safe as you think they are? Over growing concerns over these kits, the British Dental Association recently issued a warning to people, especially teenagers, to steer clear of at-home whitening kits. The BDA claims that some kits -- particularly those purchased online -- may contain harmful ingredients and ...

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...

Colloquially known as the "City of Love," Paris removed a contemporary landmark of sorts that attracted thousands of star-crossed (and other) lovers. The New York Times reports that on June 1st, city workers removed thousands of padlocks attached to the wire mesh panels on the side of the Pont des Arts bridge across the Seine River. For about five years, couples from around the world expressed their affection for each other by attaching a padlock to the side of the Pont des Arts (typically with the couple's initials etched onto it) and then throwing the key down to the river below. Paris's deputy mayor in charge of culture, Bruno Julliard (a Parisian name if there ever was one), insisted that the city will still remain "the capital of love, the capital of romance." Despite the affectiona...