I took a $249 round-trip Amtrak from New York City to Rochester. Here are 9 things that surprised me.

Tech Insider
A side-by-side of a selfie of a woman in a seat and an Amtrak train.
I was surprised by some elements of my Amtrak journey from NYC to Rochester.

Samantha Pettyjohn/Business Insider

  • I traveled from New York City to Rochester via Amtrak in May.
  • I spent $249 for the round trip, riding in coach there and business class for the return.
  • Nine aspects of my trip took me by surprise.

From babies crying on planes to meet-cutes on the subway, I thought I'd seen it all on public

Travel, Travel, Business

Stephen Colbert mocks Ghislaine Maxwell reportedly vouching for Trump

Mashable
A man in a suit stands in a talk show stage. At the bottom is the caption,

Donald Trump may be receiving increasing scrutiny about his friendship with Jeffrey Epstein, but he apparently does have some defenders.

A recent high profile name who's apparently came out to bat for him is convicted sex trafficker and Epstein accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell, who reportedly told the DOJ that Trump "never did anything concerning around her."

"Well, then he's in the clear!" says Stephen Colbert in the Late Show clip above. "Good work, gentlemen. I know we all had our suspicions, but the convicted sex trafficker of underage girls didn't see anything that concerned her. No red flags for Ghislaine during her decade-long career of sex trafficking. She said right here in the transcript, 'What was Donald Trump doing with Jeffrey Epstein? Nothing that concerned me Ghislaine Maxwell, sex trafficker! I would have done what he did. Well, back to my normal non-concerning working day grindstone of sex trafficking.'"

There's a spending split between Americans, and it's popping up from McDonald's to Uber

Tech Insider
People walk in a shopping district along 5th Avenue in Manhattan.
Despite better-than-expected sales in the first half of 2025, some retail companies are still being cautious going forward.

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  • Consumer brands are reporting strong sales from the first half of the year in spite of economic warning signs.
  • Even with better-than-expected results, some executives recommend caution going forward.
  • The mood reflects a widening split as wealthy
Economy, Business, Environment

AI agents are broken. Is GPT-5 really the answer?

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An

As 2025 dawned, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman was promoting two developments he insisted would transform our lives. One, of course, was GPT-5 — a long-anticipated major upgrade to the Large Language Model (LLM) that powered ChatGPT's rise to tech world superstardom.

The other? AI Agents that don't just answer your queries like ChatGPT, but actually get stuff done for you. "We believe that, in 2025, we may