Thursday Thoughts, April 22, 2021

Happy Earth Day! For the first time in a few years, I feel that we can actually be somewhat optimistic on Earth Day. There's lots of news on the fight to stem climate change--see below--and I also wanted to share some ways you can easily look after Mother Earth today and every day.

In other news, it's been quite a week. The justice system worked in Minnesota. Progress is being made against covid, with the U.S. reaching 200 million shots in arms. Calls for tech regulation are heating up. Outdoors athletes are setting records on trails and on mountains. And California is entering a tough drought period. Lots to digest.

Tech:

• Audio is huge in the pandemic, and everyone's getting in on it. Axios has a good run-down on the state of play. One thing that's interesting is how Clubhouse app downloads plummeted in March, suggesting that there may be a smaller cap to the market than some expected.
• Axios also has a good rundown on how different states are courting (or aiming to regulate) tech companies.
• The U.S. Senate may be digging into the Apple App Store and its arguably anticompetitive rules. Related: Congressional Republicans struggle to understand (or propose policies suggesting a failure to understand) the workings of the modern Internet.
• Facebook's Oversight Board is about to rule on the Trump ban. Amazing how much attention this has gathered (and how important the outcome may be).
• Lots of leaders leaving Shopify. Have to wonder why.
• Sign of a bubble? NFT startup Dapper Labs (the people behind NBA Top Shot) is raising money at a $7.5+ billion valuation.
• Squarespace has filed for a direct listing on the NYSE. Interesting to note: the CEO controls 68.2% of voting power, so investors won't get much of a say in how the company runs things.
• Speaking of IPOs, AppLovin went public and share prices dropped.
• Heard of IRL? If not, you're not the only one. But the social messaging app is raising at a $1 billion valuation.
• UK regulators are digging into the Nvidia purchase of ARM.
• Meanwhile, China is considering going forward with a state-backed digital currency. Seems to be the opposite of the decentralization that most crypto fans like. Also: Latin America is having a fintech boom.
• How Microsoft AI is helping preserve indigenous cultures.
• Recent research suggests that a sizable portion of QAnon-related disinformation on social media platforms originates from outside of the U.S.
• As he leaves his CEO post, Jeff Bezos says that Amazon should probably start treating its workers better. Would've been cooler if he'd said that (and acted on it) a bit earlier.
• The Information digs into how Andreessen Horowitz is finally living up to its hype.
• Want the best broadband in the U.S.? Skip SF, San Jose, NYC, Boston, etc. and head to Chattanooga, Tennessee. We might want to learn from their approach. Related: how consolidation in ISPs has hindered us.
• Epic Games has raised $1 billion to create a 'metaverse' alternative utopian reality. Maybe the money would be better spent on improving our own, current reality?
• Some people think they're UFOs. What if they're actually demonstrations that other countries have developed advanced drone technologies?
• China has an electric car manufacturer that is worth $87 billion and hasn't even sold a car yet.
• Google, PayPal, and Microsoft are the three most trusted brands globally, but local businesses are often the most trusted.
• They say that Apple pays 2x what Spotify pays per stream, but that's not entirely accurate.
• Whoa: one investor, Garry Tan, turned $1.3 million into $680 million through investing in Coinbase.
• Africans are taking to Wikipedia to improve accuracy and to better represent topics relating to the continent.

Privacy:

• The U.S. Supreme Court has invalidated one of the FTC's strongest mechanisms for seeking remedy of consumer protection wrongs.
• Tired: data brokers are unaccountable shadowy actors that significantly undermine individual privacy. Wired: data brokers are unaccountable shadowy actors that significantly undermine democracy.
• Cybersecurity companies have raised gobs of money during the pandemic. So have privacy-oriented companies. (Then again, the entire tech startup ecosystem is raking in cash at a record pace.)
• People keep waiting on Congress to pass privacy legislation. It's hard to see that happening unless something big forces Congress to act. In the interim, the FTC is suggesting it'll start beefing up enforcement.
• Meanwhile, the EU has proposed a regulation to govern AI. (For fun: a tongue-in-cheek AI ethics guide from MIT Technology Review.) All joking aside, it's good to get ahead of the regulation on AI, since AI improvements may quickly outstrip the progress seen with Moore's Law.
• The MarkUp is skeptical of many state privacy law proposals.
• More on the privacy vs. competition struggle I mentioned last week.
• PC Magazine hits on one of the greatest challenges for privacy right now: everyone wants data privacy but no one takes the time to read privacy policies or terms of service.
• Wired digs into how the FBI finally got access to the San Bernardino shooters' phones.

Sports/Outdoors:

• Coinciding with Earth Day, Salomon has released a recyclable running shoe. Very, very cool - the price even includes the cost of recycling the shoe. And also, apparently, a decent training shoe.
• The LA Times has a great read on how a GPS expert helped find a missing hiker in the Angeles National Forest. In case you're interested in the details, here's how to do it (from the expert himself).
• Some of the most popular national parks will (again) require reservations for the summer. Here's a guide to how it works.
• So there was going to be a football (soccer) Super League? Or not, since the teams backed out? Or isn't this what the Champions League is really all about? Unsurprisingly, it's a bit of a political and sporting mess, with allegations of inequality. Why would they want this?
• Theoretically, the Tokyo Olympics will happen this summer. But with new outbreaks in Japan, it's far from a done deal.
• In case you haven't been looking, yes, it's hard to find new bikes for sale right now.
• Canadian Running Magazine has a set of profiles of runners and brands that are working to fight the climate crisis.
• Last week I highlighted Des Linden's WR in the 50K. At the same race, Nicholas Thompson (EIC of The Atlantic) set an American men's age group record for the 50K.
• Eliud Kipchoge wants to remind everyone that he's the top marathoner in the world at the moment (and probably the greatest ever), running a casual 2:04:30 in the Netherlands.
• Clever idea: a teams marathon for elite runners, to be held in Prague in May.
• Speaking of marathons, Kenyan athletes have lost tens of millions of dollars in winnings and appearance fees as a result of covid. Runners are still concerned (rightly so) about races in 2021.
• If you have kids or pets, you may want to keep them away from your Peloton treadmill.
• Don't want to root for the Dodgers, but they are doing something pretty cool: vaccinated-only sections of the stands.
• Climbers are setting records in the Himalayas, on Annapurna of all places.
• Hypebeast digs into Salomon's success (personal view: in the trail running space, they succeed because their shoes--especially the S/Lab models--are really, really good, and they sponsor good runners and brand ambassadors).
• Alex Hutchinson dives into some of the secrets of endurance in a recent interview. Speaking of endurance, Joe McConaughy ran for nearly two weeks to set an FKT on the 800-mile Arizona Trail.
• Runner's World asks: What Is the Minimum Amount of Exercise Necessary to Maintain Your Fitness? And Outside Magazine digs into the latest studies on the connection (or not) between sleep and injury risk.
• ICYMI: Steph Curry is obliterating NBA defenses and making a good case for MVP.

Covid:

• As expected, some vaccinated people are getting covid. This is normal. The vaccines are highly effective but not perfect. And ~5,800 cases out of 66 million vaccinated people (a 0.008 infection rate) is pretty darn good and odds are that it'll get even lower as more people become vaccinated. In the meantime, evidence is piling up that the shots help curb the spread of the disease.
• There are real concerns about the blood clots that affect a very small percentage of vaccinated persons. The Atlantic does a good job of digging into the theories as to why these clots occur. (NB: Keep in mind that these are exceedingly rare occurrences, whereas a sizable percentage of covid patients develop blood clots as a result of the infection.) One thing that's been detected: non-Type O blood apparently increases risk.
• Also, on the topic of vaccines, time to start thinking about booster shots: according to Pfizer, it may be an annual thing.
• CureVac may have developed (results are being assessed) a successful mRNA vaccine that keeps stable at refrigerator temperatures. It'd be a game changer for mRNA vaccines.
• Axios has a good chart showing how the top countries for vaccine manufacturing are distributing their shots. And they also have a good chart on which states did well (and which didn't--in particular, New York) with regard to covid's impact on health and economies.
• Europe is turning the corner on vaccine administration.
• Offices are going to start reopening soon. Lots of people aren't ready for it, and don't want to go back in.
• That feeling of 'meh' you might be experiencing? There's a word for that: languishing, and it's potentially 'the' emotion of 2021.
• The pandemic and lockdowns are having the effect of blunting memories and causing what has been referred to (in this context and others) as 'brain fog.' The Guardian digs into why this is happening.
• Stanford is now testing the covid vaccines on children.
• Covid is hitting Brazil far harder than India (the case/fatality ratio in Brazil is 2x that of India). No one has figured out why.
• Another new variant has shown up. Sheesh.
• Unused vaccines are piling up in parts of the U.S., with some states/areas seeing 1/3 of doses going unused.
• The lockdown is having a huge impact on working parents, including lawyers who happen to be moms.
• Why we're still so afraid of covid, even after vaccinations. Related: Do we still need to wear masks outdoors?
• People will go back to the office (eventually). What will they wear?

Climate Change:

• Ariana Huffington has a really good essay on the relationship between the personal burnout that many feel and the looming climate change catastrophe.
• Biden wants the U.S. to lead on combatting climate change. The rest of the world wants to see proof that the U.S. can be relied upon to help out. Meanwhile, the U.S. and China are claiming to put aside differences to help combat carbon emissions (though some have suggested that U.S./China competition could actually result in better measures to save the planet).
• On a related note, could greed be...green?
• Google Earth has some powerful visualizations of the impact of climate change, showing glacial retreat and deforestation over time through satellite imagery.
• Apple is launching a $200m fund to focus on combatting climate change. The "Restore Fund" will "make investments in forestry projects to remove carbon from the atmosphere while generating a financial return for investors."
• Microplastic is the new acid rain.
• Interesting finding: as forests burn, new ecosystems can take root. And if conifer forests are replaced by deciduous trees, that could have the effect of reducing future fire risks to some degree.
• Carbon vacuums: California's new weapon against climate change? Other cool California tech: using satellites to spot greenhouse gas emitters.
• Nanoblack is the darkest paint available. Now, Purdue University has developed the whitest paint, which reflects up to 98.1% of light. This could be very helpful for combatting global warming (imagine using this in roofing) as it can cool beyond the ambient temperature.
• New Belgium just released a beer featuring ingredients that brewers may need to use in a climate-changed world. It's apparently awful so, if you like beer, there's another reason to press for meaningful action to combat climate change.

California:

• California is bone dry, which isn't good for fire risk. And since we're back in drought conditions, water restrictions are coming (as they should), and Sonoma/Mendo are now in official drought emergencies.
• The SF Chronicle did a look into why Bay Area grocery prices remain high (even as supply chains have stabilized in the pandemic).
• Some people are still trying hard to mine gold in California.
• The Bay Area has continued to hold strong on locking down, which is probably part of the reason why it's outperforming in terms of lives saved during the pandemic.
• The Bay Area is on the front line of California's efforts to understand the impact of (and address) invasive species.
• The battle over dairy farms versus tule elk in Point Reyes may be coming to a close.
• The SF Chronicle has a good analysis on the pandemic's impact on crime in the City.
• There is more and more data coming out about who moved in 2020. The answer is: it wasn't too different from 2019, except that more people left NYC and SF (and most of the SF people stayed pretty local, or went to Tahoe (which has created its own problems)).
• California (and the rest of the U.S.) is running out of boba.
• Burning Man is selling reservations to buy tickets, they're $2500 a pop (and don't even include actual tickets), and they've basically sold out. Not exactly egalitarian--as the author points out, it's more in line with professional sports teams' 'personal seat licenses'--and a further sign of the absurdity of the whole thing. (It of course could be a play to ensure a continual stream of funding for the non-profit during the uncertainty of covid but, if that's the case, a better approach would be transparency and community support...which seems more in line with Burning Man's original values.)
• One way to help address the homeless situation in California would be to buy hotels to house the homeless.

Everything else:

• The New Yorker has a really fascinating story about how a self-taught linguist came to preserve and shape the Penobscot language.
• You may have seen a viral video involving a bobcat last week. Here's a good read on the video from a biologist who studies bobcats.
• The Chinese economy grew at an insane pace in Q1.
• At some point, Tenzin Gyatso will pass away. And then the geopolitics of selecting the next Dalai Lama will play out amongst China, India, the U.S. and others.
• Spock may have seemed logical but, it turns out, he really wasn't.
• Yikes: 2.5 billion T. Rex may have roamed Earth.
• Big music labels are doing a better job of noticing African musicians. Good!
• Cage-free eggs are one of the bigger successes of the animal anti-cruelty movement.
• A major study has shown that psilocybin (the active ingredient in magic mushrooms) can have significant anti-depressant effects.
• Azeem Azhar has another great set of charts to help contextualize interesting topics.
• What you should watch instead of Seaspiracy.