What seemed like a too-good-to-be-true opportunity in micromobility has turned into a cautionary tale. The Lightning Shared Scooter Company (LSSC) lured investors with promises of leasing scooters in Asia, offering hefty daily returns to Western investors – often average folks instead of seasoned investors. But now regulators and watchdogs warn it was all a well‑orchestrated scam, leaving victims robbed of millions.

The pitch: Easy money, powered by scooters?

From the start, LSSC presented itself as a legitimate shared-scooter rental company with high demand and even higher returns. Investors were told they’d lease scooters, watch them get deployed in bustling Asian cities, and collect reliable daily pay‑outs. The company sold a dream of passive income from a booming market of micromobility. But in reality, it was all smoke and mirrors.

In theory, as the e-scooters were rented and ridden, the investors would earn money from those scooters. In practice, fake revenue stacked up in the app but couldn’t actually be withdrawn. Making matters worse, the scam relied on its victims also roping in friends, family, or other potential “investors”, functioning much like a pyramid scheme.

To appear legitimate, the company circulated an official-looking SEC certificate, though NBC News reported that upon inspection, the document was riddled with typos, grammatical errors, and other flaws that any due diligence process should have caught.

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Countless Americans fell for it, along with the company’s shiny marketing materials and supposed celebrity endorsements. According to the Better Business Bureau (BBB), LSSC’s victims often invested anywhere between $1,000 to a staggering $55,000. And this devastation wasn’t isolated; claims span at least 17 US states.

With mounting complaints piling up, the BBB has issued public warnings to anyone who might be approached by LSSC or similar schemes masquerading as shared-mobility ventures.

The scooter industry has been both glorified and maligned in recent years, from legitimate startups redefining urban transit to watchdogs cracking down on mismanagement and faulty batteries. What’s particularly concerning here is that LSSC weaponized well-known industry tropes: scooter popularity, micromobility returns, and a “global venture” to build credibility.

Ultimately, the Lightning Shared Scooter fiasco reads like a modern-day cautionary fable for investors: brand new names, global promises, and passive-income allure can be the perfect ingredients for fraud.

Micromobility is a bright, evolving industry, and one worth supporting, innovating, and investing in. But as this shadowy tale shows, even in our electric future, scams still require old-fashioned skepticism. So if you’re ever asked to “invest in scooters” – especially in far-off markets – pause, ask tough questions, and remember: not every opportunity is what it seems. And if a “business opportunity” requires signing up your friends and family, run for the hills. Or better yet, scoot there!

The Anthbot Genie 3000 brings automated mowing tech to your backyard without the need for old-fashioned perimeter wires. It has GPS-grade precision and AI-powered vision, and I got to check out how well it works. With a mix of impressive strengths and a few growing pains, it’s a compelling entrant in the smart‑lawn space worth a closer look.

Setup and specs

There are a few models in the lineup, ranging from $699 to $1,399. I was testing the larger battery version since my parents have some land, and the extra battery makes quicker work of larger plots.

Unboxing the Genie, you’ll find the mower, charging base, RTK GPS station with pole (the mushroom-looking thing), power cables, spare blades, tools, and a quick‑start guide. Unlike some electronics I’ve set up, the quick start guide was actually really well laid out and useful.

The three models in the Genie line:

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• 600 – up to ~600 m² (0.22 acres)
• 1000 – up to ~2,000 m² (0.49 acres)
• 3000 – up to ~3,600 m² (0.89 acres) 

The 3000 bumps up the battery to 10 Ah, but they all share the same core specs: a 20 cm (7.9 “) cutting width, adjustable electric deck height (30–70 mm or 1.25 to 2.75 inches), IPX6 waterproofing, and the ability to handle steep slopes, though my Florida testing didn’t exactly put the hill-climbing claims to the test.

Navigation and mapping

This is where the Genie shines. The combo of full‑band RTK GPS plus four AI‑driven cameras enables wire‑free navigation. That means no boundary cables, freeing the mower from the biggest problem with old-fashioned alternatives. Instead, GPS-based boundaries set the limits and your mower is free to do its thing without worrying about a boundary wire breaking one day and your mower making a run for the county line.

Mowing occurs in mostly clean, straight lines, avoiding the chaotic randomness older robot mowers often exhibited. It did seem to have a few areas where it missed on the first run, though it actually went back and got them (mostly), and that got better on subsequent mowing sessions.

Obstacle avoidance is solid. Within its 300° camera field, it claims to detect upwards of 1,000 common objects, sidestepping everything from garden hoses to pets. For me, the occasional potted plant or other obstruction in the yard was pretty easy for the robot to spot.

There are even headlights that seemed quite bright at night (and the very quiet electric mowing meant that it doesn’t disturb anyone when mowing at night).

App and smart features

The Genie app is used for setup and lets you define many different mowing zones, draw no‑go zones, tweak cutting height, schedule operations, and monitor battery and progress live, even when you’re away. During setup, I did find that I had to move the mower closer to my router for it to successfully update its firmware, but afterwards it was fine just stealing some signal that leaked out the walls of the house. I guess for the bigger download, it wanted the stronger signal closer to the router.

There are also anti‑theft features, including device‑binding to your Wi‑Fi and account, and a PIN lock so that someone else can’t just take and use your robot. That may be a concern if you live in an area with lots of neighbors, but out in the boonies, I don’t think anyone is looking for robo-mowers.

Performance and real-world use

The first thing that impressed me about the Genie is how quiet it is. They say it runs at about 58–66 dB, whisper-quiet under normal conditions. You can literally hear the individual grass blades being cut – something I’ve never heard before in all my gasoline-powered mowing years.

The battery seems to last for around 450 to 500 m² of mowing, or around 3-4 hours, depending on how thick the grass is in that section. Then it returns home to recharge and starts up again where it left off. The mowing width might seem hilariously narrow, just 7.9 inches. But since you’re not actually the one mowing, it doesn’t really matter. My robotic vacuum also has a very narrow vacuum width, but I’m not the one walking around vacuuming, so what do I care? The passes all seem straight and good-looking, so you still get the nice lawn stripes look, though they’re a bit narrower.

The robot performs quite well, and it fulfills my goal which was to make it easier on my 70-year-old parents. It’s not perfect at edging, but if my dad can do 3 minutes of cleaning up along the fence line once in a while instead of an hour of lawn mowing, that’s a major improvement for him.

I don’t know how long these little razor-style blades will last, though they’re pretty cheap and easy to swap out. And I do wish the company made the cable longer between the RTK mushroom and the mower’s base station, so you can get the RTK out a bit further if you need it, but I found a spot that seemed to work for optimal signal for me.

I would say that the Genie 3000 is great for anyone who wants an easy setup process and wire-free operation. There’s no boundary wire to install or to check for breaks. It just works (as long as you have a clear view to the sky for the satellites). But if you’re trying to mow several acres, this little guy probably isn’t the one for you. Anything up to around 3/4 of an acre is where it will shine.

Now I just need to find something that can handle several acres in the pasture behind the backyard…

A new review of US Energy Information Administration (EIA) data by the SUN DAY Campaign reveals that solar delivered almost 9% of US electricity in the first half of 2025. Wind and solar combined produced just over one-fifth of the country’s electricity, while renewables as a whole hit nearly 28%.

Solar’s record-breaking growth

EIA’s latest monthly Electric Power Monthly report (with data through June 30, 2025) confirms that solar kept its streak as the fastest-growing major source of US electricity. In June 2025 alone, solar soared. Utility-scale solar power plants cranked out 30.1% more electricity than in June 2024, while rooftop and other small-scale solar systems grew by 10.5%. Combined, solar generation jumped 25% year-over-year and made up 10.2% of US electricity that month.

Looking at the first six months of 2025, utility-scale solar expanded by 37.6%, and small-scale systems rose 10.7%. Together, they grew nearly one-third (29.7%) compared to the same period in 2024. That meant solar provided 8.7% of all US electricity in January-June, up from 6.9% the year before.

That’s a milestone: Solar is now producing almost 45% more electricity than hydropower (6.0%), and it’s generating more than hydropower, biomass, and geothermal combined.

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Wind is still a front-runner

Wind turbines supplied 11.6% of US electricity in the first half of 2025 — a 2.4% boost compared to the same time in 2024. Wind’s output was almost double hydropower’s contribution.

Wind + solar are beating coal and nuclear

Together, wind and solar accounted for 20.3% of total US electricity in the first half of 2025, up from 18.6% last year. That’s a bigger share than coal or nuclear. In fact, wind and solar generated 25% more electricity than coal and 15.6% more than nuclear over the same period.

Renewables overall are surging

All renewable sources combined – wind, solar, hydropower, biomass, and geothermal – generated 27.7% of US electricity from January through June 2025, up from 26.1% a year ago. Their output grew three times faster than total US electricity generation overall (9.2% vs. 3.0%). Renewables are now second only to natural gas, whose generation actually dropped 3.7% in the first half of the year.

Ken Bossong, executive director of the SUN DAY Campaign, added that this growth happened before the passage of the Trump/Republican “megabill,” which could slow future renewable expansion. “Nonetheless, EIA notes that US developers expect half of new electric generating capacity to come from solar in 2025 and another 13% from wind.”

Read more: EIA: Solar outproduced wind for the first time ever in May

The 30% federal solar tax credit is ending this year. If you’ve ever considered going solar, now’s the time to act. To make sure you find a trusted, reliable solar installer near you that offers competitive pricing, check out EnergySage, a free service that makes it easy for you to go solar. It has hundreds of pre-vetted solar installers competing for your business, ensuring you get high-quality solutions and save 20-30% compared to going it alone. Plus, it’s free to use, and you won’t get sales calls until you select an installer and share your phone number with them. 

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