Betty Boop, Excel Olympics, Penny-isms: Our 2026 Valentines

So, Jennifer, you got what I sent you? Yes. I did!

“It's the greatest mystery of the year so far.”

This is Jennifer Jenkins, lawyer, professor. You may have heard her before. She's become sort of our unofficial trademark and copyright attorney here at Planet Money. And what I sent her is inside a large yellow envelope. You want me to guess?

You want me to just open? No, just go ahead and open. I love surprises. I'm kidding. So, this is like, this is locked.

Every year, we at Planet Money send Valentine's to the things we love this year to innovate of reporting on ice, to the sport of competitive spread sheeting, to perhaps the only beloved self-checkout system and more. And typically, these are not physical Valentine's, they're shoutouts in a Valentine's episode, such as this, chock full of big ideas and recommendations that we want to share with

you all.

But, for my first Valentine to Jennifer Jenkins, we had, in fact, made a bespoke physical

Valentine. Yeah! Do you want to just scribe it? I need a moment. Oh, yeah.

Okay, fine. I'll describe it.

“Red and black font that's a little tattoo motorcycle style.”

It says official Planet Money Valentine. And then, a famous cartoon character that, for reasons, we are not going to get sued for using. And that character also happens to be one of Jennifer's favorites, Betty Boop. Happy Valentine's.

Oh, okay. No, I know you love Betty. Okay. Oh, my god. So much.

Explain why you have an affinity for Betty Boop.

Because she is one of the first comic book characters who was not defined by her relationship

to a male character. The Minnie Mouse has Mickey Mouse's girl, all of a well as Popeyes's girl. Betty Boop's just her own woman. She's fiercely independent. She's unapologetically sexy.

She dances around. She sings Boop Boop. Oh, I have to go to bed and be down. Mommy. Mommy.

Mommy. Mommy. Mommy. Betty Boop debuted in this cartoon in 1930, 95 years ago. Which means, as of January 1st, the copyright has expired.

Anyone is allowed to use this version of Betty Boop for anything. This version, by the way, literally a dog person hybrid, which is very weird and would not always be this way. But like, yes, this version from 1930 is now in the public domain. And the reason I knew this is because every year, Jennifer Jenkins helps put out a list

of all the famous books and songs and cartoons entering the public domain.

And that, that is my first Valentine to Jennifer's annual list of newly liberated intellectual

property, the public domain day list, where you will learn that the copyright has now expired on the book, the Maltese Falcon, the song, Georgia, on my mind, the Academy award-winning film all quiet on the Western Front. And yes, Betty Boop, enter iconic catchphrase, although Jennifer has noted something odd about what we've written on her Valentine.

It says Boop Boop, a question mark? Yes, we're going to get to that in a second. Because first, the reason I wanted to give a Valentine to this list is because it feels like all of these works are now flooding into the public domain in a somewhat novel way. And that is because for 20 years, leading up to 2019, basically nothing entered the public

domain, legislators with lobbying from Disney, kept extending the length of copyright. Right, literally the public domain was frozen for two decades. And so all of the material that was set to go into the public domain from 1923, we had to wait 20 years to finally start entering the public domain in 2019.

“And that's why you're hearing about it so much, because now the goalposts are where they”

are in every single year you can expect a trove of material to enter the public domain. And you can find out about it from my Valentine, the public domain day list from Jennifer Jenkins. I can't tell you how tickled, I'm trying to find the right word. That's what my grandma is saying.

I've just tickled about this Valentine, oh my god, you haven't explained the question mark yet. Ah, yes, the Boop Boop, a question mark. Happy Valentine's Day and welcome to Planet Money. I'm Kenny Malone.

The day on the show, the things that we love and that we think you will love. Nick Fountain brings us investigative reporting that you can do at home as well. Erica Barris makes a case for the love of her life, the one that got away, the US petty. And along the way, together, we will all design the first ever official Planet Money

We're going to finish our Betty Boop Boop, a question mark Valentine by coming up with

a pun to make the economist in your life swoon, although it turns out it will be a bit of one. Boop Boop Boop, but do we, I don't actually know how to say it, but it's a French economist who was like, no, let's not do that one, right? Okay, now that.

Welcome back to a very special Valentine's Day episode at Planet Money. Lots to do here. Jennifer Jenkins and I, we're kicking around ideas for how to take the newly public domain Betty Boop, tweak her catchphrase and make the official planet money economics themed Valentine.

Boop Boop, but dumping, dumping is something good. That's an international trade thing, right? Yeah, it's an international trade. It's when you sell a whole bunch of stuff cheaper. Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, yeah. I do feel like dumping is maybe the wrong. No, no. It's like not the right. Okay, okay.

And while my colleagues have their own traditional planet money Valentine's to hand out to the things that they love and want to share with you all at home. Hey, Kenny. Hi, Jess. Jess Jeng, senior supervising editor at Planet Money, and if you love an episode of our show,

it's probably because of the notes that Jess gave. If you hate an episode, it's probably because we ignored notes that Jess gave. And Jess has brought a Valentine very near and dear to my heart.

“I think you and I have a special love for spreadsheets.”

Love spreadsheets. And it's so particular to us that I feel like sometimes I don't even want to talk about it in a meeting because I'm like everyone else is going to be bored by whatever love for spreadsheets we have. Yeah, Jess, I couldn't be more excited.

Yes, okay. So this Valentine is actually to a Washington Post article that I saw recently. And it's all about Microsoft Excel. That article was written by reporter, Jesse Dockerty, the headline made me blush a little bit between the sheets at the college Excel championships, a little too naughty for my taste,

but very clever. I thought we were going to skip over that. No. I haven't thought about that. People need to find it so they can search for it.

That's fair. Okay. So I saw this article and it's all about Microsoft Excel. In particular, something called the Microsoft Excel Collegiate Competition. And so it's an annual competition that happens around Christmas time.

This year it took place in Las Vegas, and basically there's two parts of the competition.

It has semi-finals, finals, it has the whole rigmarole, and looking at the photos and pictures of it and videos of it, it looks like what I imagine eSports video game competitions to be like.

“So, like, by the time it wants eSports competitions to be like quite honestly, sells, glasses,”

yeah, it's amazing. Yeah. So by the time you get to the semi-finals and finals, there are people on a stage and their screens are projected in the background, so everyone watch. And it's basically a series of puzzles that people have to go through.

Yeah. Yeah. And so I saw one puzzle was like planning a group trip with 500 of your closest friends. That's very good. And so I think there are all sorts of things where it's sort of like, how do you

use Excel to do these things? And I think for me, what I loved about it so much was like, oh, Excel is like a language. Yeah.

It's a really powerful tool if you can understand the language.

And this is maybe the most extreme kind of highest form of this language is watching these people use it. And I think this article got that to a large degree. I did do a little background research in anticipation of this. Now, a lot of these competitors are finance majors.

It says makes sense.

“Those are often very complex formulas you need to learn.”

And so it would attract that kind of person. But do you want to guess in what industry Excel is reportedly used the most? Oh, and it's not finance. Nope. Oh, my God.

Not a, it's not something mundane like accounting. It's manufacturing. Man, you're factory. I can see that. I can see that.

And you know, it makes sense. It's a very intuitive program. It's very user friendly. So you don't have to have a master's degree to use this, which is like, it's the best. One of the great things about reading this piece in particular is it treats these Excel

experts with a sort of elevated regard that you and I are just all in for. It's not a joke. It's like truly in awe of these people's skills, which I am as well. And it's so good. Yeah, I looked into the reporter who went his coverage is mostly of college sports.

And so I really liked that he took the same like excitement, vigor, all of the things,

as seriously as everything else.

“And so I think that really comes through in the article that he wrote.”

Yep. Sports coverage is useful in many, many disciplines. Hi, thank you. Yes. It's true.

And I guess we should say that that kind of excellent sports coverage is the kind of thing that the Washington Post has just decided to eliminate all of this entirely.

But yes, our first Valentine to Jesse Dockerty has story between the sheets of the

college Excel Championships and its extraordinary work by Jesse. Check out the article. Check out his sub-stack, which we will link to in the show notes and thank you, Jesse. Thank you, Kenny. Thank you, Jesse.

We begin this next Valentine with a quote from Forbes magazine, quote, "I can't wait to use that self-checkout machine," said no one ever. Retail stores have increasingly scaled down on hiring and paying human beings to scan our purchases. And instead, our forcing us to do it as customers, slowly with constant machine problems that

require an overworked human to come over and scan some card. Anyway, Forbes describes an exception to this, though. The clothing store, Uniclo, Uniclo, has developed a cult following for its self-checkout. Quote, you just toss all the apparel you're buying into the self-checkout machines container bin and miraculously, all of your items are automatically scanned.

Apparently, this is because each item has a little radio transponder.

“Anyway, that is the background you need to know.”

For this next Valentine, our own Lexi Horowitz-Gazi was walking through New York with a friend,

I remember how much he loved Uniclo's self-checkout and hated other self-checkouts and recorded this audio Valentine on his phone. It's a rainy January day at the Broadway Uniclo store. Looking for that heat tag. It's cold outside.

I found a turtleneck. It's a full turtleneck. There is driving techno. Where are the self-checkouts here? Okay.

Thank you, self-checkout. What's your name? No, Ray. Ah, wait, sorry. Now Ray, say your full name.

Oh, my full name is Melissa Ray, Bailey Gill.

How do you feel about these machines?

How do I feel about the machines? Do you like them? Are they going to know it?

“I think the people are knowing about them.”

They ask questions all the time. They're like, "Where are the bags?" Really? Okay. And it tells you that right here.

I see. They're okay, I guess. I mean, I like that a too fast. So I work for an economics radio show and we have to give our Valentine's to things in the world.

Yeah, you're around. So this is one that I've kind of thought about giving my Valentine to you for a long time. My little self-checkout is my trick in your Valentine's Day, too, to technology nowhere. Is there something a little sad about that? Yes, very much so to technology that's crazy.

This one I see every day. This one that gives me problems, you want to give it to me. Hey, okay. You can try to elevate that daily things in life. What would your Valentine go out to?

It would go out to me getting a promotion. If you're all here this unique, I'm promoting the technology. Give me a promotion. Excellent, it's true. We've moved a lot of these products, but thank you so much.

Oh, self-checkout, there it is. All right, we're in line of this self-checkout. Wonderful. Look at this, it's just silent. You just see rows maybe like two dozen people in a silent row commuting with these plastic

tubs that immediately extract their money from them. Okay, so we've got a sort of like monolithic plastic bin thing. It's just like a big tub, press start, okay. Heat tech ultra warm, so it's just kind of like intuitive magically just by standing next to this machine, what we have.

It's just so confident, there's just zero hesitation. Do you need any shopping bag, sure, I hate to admit it? Something about it just screams love, you know? There's nothing more romantic than partying with your hard-earned cash. Unicles self-checkout, will you be my valentine?

It's a big deal, I don't think it was standing there, on your right foot, on your right right foot. I'm going to check that as a yes. Bye, uni-clou, happy valentine's day. Alexey Horowitz-Gazi there, who did ask me to clarify that he is "not some sociopath

who wants all humans replaced by machines. It's more like if there has to be self-checkout, you know, here's one that doesn't create more of a mess at the checkout. That's his point. And I will add that Alexey's valentine did prompt a whole lot of frantic research for some

of us at planet money, wondering why isn't every self-checkout this good? And why isn't my grocery store this good? And is Alexey paying extra for his uniclou turtle neck because of this? And the answer seems to be that each item at Uniclou has this little RFID chip, a tiny little

And those have become cheaper and cheaper.

“One McKinsey report says that RFID tags have come down from 20 cents about a decade”

ago to four cents a tag in recent years. And yeah, I mean, if you sell clothes like Uniclou, like what's an extra four cents to make your fancy self-checkout work, especially if Uniclou doesn't have to pay cash share and customers move through it faster. But if you're a grocery store and you sell green peppers, an extra four cents on each

pepper really cuts into the margins. So I wouldn't count on seeing this valentines were the technology at the grocery store anytime soon. Meanwhile, back with my valentine's day, co-pilot today, and Betty Boops, Stan, Jennifer Jenkins.

We'll let me go back to my list. All right, those are top one. We are building the official planet money valentine's day card. Our task at the moment, find a nerdy twist on Betty Boops iconic catchphrase, something economic that isn't also, how do you say, horribly unromantic?

Boop, boop, boop, boop, doom loop, which is, do you know how to doom loop is? No, no, doom loop is a self-fulfilling disaster tornado cyclone.

How grease had its credit rating downgraded, which scared investors, which caused all kinds

of new problems for Greek finances, which made grease and even riskier investment, et cetera, et cetera. So, you know, boop, boop, boop, doom loop, I guess. That's brilliant, and it also really captures the spirit of valentines day. Well, yeah, no, okay, okay.

This one is, it doesn't rhyme as well. I'm going to warn you. Okay, ready? I can do.

“But I think when you start to think about it, it's actually quite beautiful, ready?”

Okay, boop, boop, boop, but doopily. Oh, that's nice. Oh, you got it, you got it, that's the one. A doopily is where two companies control a market, a monopoly for two, if you will. And I think that's kind of, like, I don't know, something lovely.

Well, I mean, maybe not as a consumer, but like metaphorically, because it's two together. It's not a monopoly. It's a doopily. Yes. It's like honey.

Will you be mine and we'll own everything.

Yes, okay, well, that's hot. After the break, we finish off our boop, boop, boop, but doopily, valentine, so you can give it to the market, dominate, or in your life. Plus, a valentine to serious data journalism that you can do at home right now. For our next valentine, I was simply sent a zoom link and told show up here.

So, I did. Train them for a package, uh, hello. Hello. Hey, Kenny. Sorry, I was just jamming out to my favorite song.

Music's playing. I forgot you were coming in. Happy Valentine's Day, Kenny. This is just the music you were playing when they showed up. This is incredible.

Yeah. Great. Yeah. Pan is from heaven. For you and me.

I come over here, but it's, uh, it's very loud in my ears. Sorry. Sorry. It's hard to down for you. Uh, well, it's funny that you mentioned pennies from heaven.

America, uh, because this is a phrase I only recently learned. Oh, do you want to explain what it means? Um, it's just kind of like your good fortune is going to come reigning down from the sky. Yeah. And it can only come in what is quite possibly one of the greatest currencies that we've

ever all had the fortune of knowing. Clearly, uh, we are now here with, uh, plenty of many co-hosts, Erica Barris, who is about to present her valentine. I feel like we've walked right up to it. Just go ahead and say it.

My valentine is for the one that got away. My one true love. Uh-huh. The penny. Your one true love.

Yes. Why? Why, Erica? We are living in this like increasingly digital, bubbly, cloudy world. And the penny is one of the few things we have that is a link to the past that we can

hold and it makes noise and it is just like, it's a, it's just a small, tiny little thing. It's just so nice. You get a hundred of them.

“You have a whole dollar, who doesn't love a dollar?”

I mean. All right. You love the penny. Yeah. Last year, it was announced that the Federal Reserve will, well, it's the treasure, right?

It's the month. It's going to stop minting pennies. So no new pennies. Yeah. Okay.

So it's not like they're going away permanently. They're, they're, they're not gathering pennies and burning them in a bond fund. No, no, no, no, no. They're good. They're good.

If you have pennies, they're still tender. Yeah. Yes. Forever indefinitely. But it's not just that you love the penny.

My understanding is, I think you love the culture around the penny, perhaps more than the penny. Yeah. I mean, you know, the penny is just a coin, like, let's be real. But I love language, right?

And there's all these, like, words and, like, phrases and expressions in our language that are built around the penny, like, you know, penny for your thoughts.

Yeah. Good luck. I do like the luck part of the penny. You have a penny. It's a lucky penny.

I like the lucky penny. A penny saved is a penny earned.

“Have you ever heard the cost of pretty penny?”

Yeah. Yeah, that cost of pretty penny. Yeah. In for a penny. In for a pound.

And then this one is, I love this one, penny-wise and pound-full-ish. That is my favorite one. I love that one. That's my favorite, too. It's really beautiful.

It's true. So we spent, I guess, 250 years with the penny as our smallest denomination. And so the entire vernacular, actually, that's actually true, because we used to have a half penny. We used to have a half thing.

But we've had pennies for a very long time as our smallest denomination. That's our smallest denomination. And therefore, whenever we reached for or created some kind of saying that needed to emphasize the smallest denomination, it's true. It's all built around the penny.

So I guess you're sad we're losing that. We're not losing that. You can still say you're old sayings, if you want it. I guess, but who's going to appreciate them? We stopped making the penny for two main reasons.

One is, apparently, they cost a little bit more to make than they're actually worth.

The US Mint is saying that this is going to be a savings of $56 million a year.

So they cost more than three cents to make one cent. So they are literally penny-pinching, I guess is what's happening.

“And then our other reason, do you want to hear the other reason?”

Please. The reason we got rid of the penny is because people pay for everything with credit cards and like, you know, foam payments and whatever now. Here's my question. Yeah.

Will we run out of pennies before the sun extinguishes? Probably not. And I'll tell you why. It was tough and-- Yes! It's a metal.

It's not going anywhere. Okay, yes. I mean, yes. So metaphysically, they will-- What's they're going to be?

But I'm just saying they'll be like lost in the proverbial couch cushions for eternity. That's what I'm saying. When will they fully be like sort of down sewer grates and buried in people's backyards in a way that they're unused? I can guarantee that I will actually become an 85-year-old woman and pennies will still

be in service. We'll still be there. Yeah. Hopefully I may find that. Oh, yeah.

Thank you. All right, for our final Valentine, I had a little bit of spare time on my hands. I will say I'd been spending a lot of that time on the list of public domain things newly available to mess around with and I decided to make another special little Valentine to tee up this final segment.

Nick Fountain. Hi. Plenty of money co-host. I need to give you something. Are you ready?

Yes. They've been more ready. My Valentine for a unique is Tadda. Nancy Drew mystery stories. The secret of Planet Money Valentine.

The very first Nancy Drew novel is in the public domain this year.

So that's very exciting. And so as you can see, Nancy, this is actually a book about some sort of clock, but I've replaced the clock with a laptop computer. She's carrying a laptop computer. There's a lot of ones in zero in the background data because I know that your Valentine

has to do with our love for the kind of reporting that is about following the data, following the money. It's the kind of stuff that we really, really get into. And so with that, Nick, I'll throw to you. Amazing.

You're Valentine. Yes. Amazing segue. My Valentine goes out to the journalists at 404 media for their coverage of immigration and customs enforcement, and in particular, the technology that ICE has been using in

this past year. Yeah, 404 media is the name of the outlet, and I feel like they're probably, they should be, but they're not yet a household name, perhaps. And so it's probably useful. You want to talk a little bit more about them.

Yeah. They're at this new-ish outlet. Pretty small.

“They are owned by their reporters, which I think is pretty cool.”

Have sort of a retro internet vibe kind of, not unlike Nancy Drew. So you're new. You just think of Nancy Drew retro internet vibe, yes, yeah, pro-to internet. Yeah. Their design choices are not what I want to shout out, though.

It just seems like these folks have been training for this, like their entire lives. And because of that, they are firing on all cylinders, like, they're tech reporters, largely. They're tech reporters. And so what I want to shout out are their scoops, which are many, and I am very

jealous of.

It's been really incredible.

And do you want to shout out a specific scoop? Yeah. It's probably their reporting on Palantir, the data mining software company, and this app Palantir developed, which seems like it's sort of the Google Maps for ice. According to their reporting, it compiles federal data and shows ice neighborhoods that

might be hotspots where lots of non-citizens are suspected to live.

And, like, if an agent clicks on one, it'll show a dossier about that target. By the way, we reached out to Palantir. They disputed this description of the software. They said it's a tool used to reconcile address data data that's not theirs. They wanted to be clear, but they're customers.

And while 404 is really secretive about their sourcing, they are very open about their techniques. So like a year ago, they had this little online training for their subscribers, of which I am one. Hello, there.

Can you let us know if you can see us about how they use public records to generate scoops? So this is a very old school system for searching government, a federal government, became a records.

“Nick, do you want to describe what's happening in this video here?”

Yeah. So, right, this is reporter Joseph Cox directing people to the federal procurement website, which is just a public site, basically listing all the contracts, the federal government enters into. Just go to that search bar and just type in immigration customs enforcement.

So Joseph is showing how an enterprising reporter can learn a lot about how a federal entity like ice operates just by looking at the contracts, it's science. From, you know, it's janitorial services to its technological project. There you go. So click on that.

Click this. Yeah, click on that. Then these are all the contracts for ice. In other words, they are peering into this government database and then following where that leads them.

I guess one of the most basic things that journalists do, which is just a kind of accountability, like where's our tax money going and why? Exactly.

And I watched that training and I was like, that's amazing.

We need to do that. I need to do that. And then like many things in life, I did not do it. And they did it. And they did a great job.

And I am jealous. And I am grateful. You don't need to be hard on yourself. Yeah. Because now we've heard video of them doing it.

So perhaps someone listening. We'll also just be a part of this. Because look, we're all the public and the public has a right to lots of information.

“And you should take advantage of that Nick or anybody listening if necessary.”

Let's just be an inspiration to us all. And check out their work. Where can you find that 4044media.co. Thank you, Nick. Thanks, Ben.

We will make sure to post a picture of the Nancy Drew Valentine. I made for Nick. And a few others. You can find those on our Instagram. All right, that leaves us with one final task before we're done today.

To finish up the official Betty Boop, Planet Money Economics Valentine's Day card so that

you listener can print it out and give it to the most important person in your life.

So remember, picture. We've got a kind of like tattoo style red on black font that says the official Planet Money Valentine, which we feel okay writing because we're not going to get sued. Because we are using the picture of Betty Boop from 1930, which is now in the public domain.

And it says Boop, Boop, Doop, we just needed one last touch, a little tagline to pull it all together and make this Valentine about love and market dominance. I brought our Betty Boop, loving friend Jennifer Jenkins, a few options to choose from. Is this the tagline?

“Is it just going to be the tagline for Boop, Boop, Doop?”

Yeah, that's clear. Okay. So, here we go, Boop, Boop, Doop, Doop. Subline. You dominate the market for my heart.

It doesn't quite work because it doesn't, you dominate, that's one player. It's not quite there. Okay. I anti-trust you. That's clear.

And who doesn't love a double magnet, right? Okay, exactly. All right, ready? Together, we are everything. Oh, that's much better.

Okay, all right, ready? Boop, Doop, Doop, Doop, Doop, Doop.

I'll never bust your trust.

Ooh, this is good. Okay, and then here's the last one. Boo, boop, boop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, doop, do Happy Valentine's Day.

Happy Valentine's Day. We will post the official planet money Valentine as a downloadable file at planetmoney.com and on our Instagram. If you give this to someone, please, please let me know how this goes over. I am very curious. Email us that story, a planet money at npr.org.

That's planet money at npr.org. And if I may sneak one final Valentine, it is to you all to our listeners. And I would like to say that I'd love to deliver personally one of our official planet money

We are staging live, never before seen planet money stories.

“We've got Q&A. We've got a bonkers lineup of guests for live on stage interviews.”

And I will personally be at the stops in Seattle, Portland and San Francisco.

And at least one of us co-hosts will be at every single stop putting on a show, taking your questions.

“There's 12 cities in total, each stop a little different.”

And you can find out the details who's coming where and to what city at a link in the show notes.

Or you can go to planetmoneybook.com where you will have to scroll down a little bit to find that information. Fair warning.

“At the live events only, you will get a specially designed tote bag with your ticket purchase.”

Well, supplies last. That is, again, planetmoneybook.com for more details scroll down to find those details. Today's episode of Planet Money was produced by James Sneed with help from Sam Yellowhorse Kessler. It was fact checked by Sierra Juarez engineered by Cena LaFrato and Quasile and edited by our executive producer, Alex Goldmark. I'm Kenny Malone. This is NPR. Bye. Thanks for listening.