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☆ A Huge City Polluter? Buildings. Here’s a Surprising Fix.
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-10 | by ( Brad Plumer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +14 min

Carbon dioxide from these boilers wafts up chimneys and into the air, one of the city’s biggest sources of global warming emissions. “And we expect that it won’t be the last.”The boiler releases carbon dioxide. The remaining carbon dioxide was then chilled to minus 10 degrees Fahrenheit and turned to liquid. The system currently captures about 60 percent of the carbon dioxide emitted by the Grand Tier’s boilers, Mr. Asparro said. While they’re paying for the carbon dioxide, they are not charging a premium for their blocks.

☆ Crypto's go-to bank collapsed. What now?
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-09 | by ( Allison Morrow | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +4 min

New York CNN —Yesterday, the financial world witnessed a classic run on the bank when Silvergate Capital, the go-to US lender for crypto companies, said it would wind down its operations and voluntarily liquidate. ICYMI: Silvergate was, for most of its existence, a traditional Southern California regional bank. In the same period, the global crypto industry has lost two-thirds of its value, falling from a $3 trillion market cap to $1 trillion. I’ve heard the “don’t blame crypto” argument a thousand times. And it was the same story nearly a year ago, when the Terra/Luna crash last spring wiped out billions overnight — don’t blame crypto; those were toxic algorithmic stablecoins, you can’t trust those.

☆ Corporations are keeping food expensive because they can
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-08 | by ( Allison Morrow | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +4 min

To be sure, food manufacturers have to factor in costs of labor and transportation, which remain elevated compared with a few years ago. Anyway, it isn’t just food companies taking advantage of the inflationary moment. Many food companies are forecasting that they might slow down or pause price increases — but not lower them, Danielle explains. But [companies] have, I think, taken price increases that exceed that,” said Mark Lang, an associate professor of marketing at the University of Tampa who specializes in food marketing. Lower prices could, for example, make people think food quality has gone down — or make them think they were paying too much in the first place.

In Moscow, President Vladimir Putin said Russia had been hit by what he called a terrorist attack in its southern Bryansk region bordering Ukraine. Near the front lines west of Bakhmut, in the Ukrainian-held town of Chasiv Yar, the thump of outgoing artillery fire could be heard on Thursday morning. Ukraine says the city has limited strategic value but it is exhausting Russia's invasion force in what has become the bloodiest battle of the war. [1/5] Ukrainian service members ride a self-propelled howitzer, as Russia's attack on Ukraine continues, near the frontline city of Bakhmut, Ukraine February 27, 2023. In the southern city of Zaporizhzhia, Russian missiles crashed into a five-story apartment block overnight, collapsing upper floors.

In Moscow, President Vladimir Putin said Russia had been hit by what he called a terrorist attack in its southern Bryansk region bordering Ukraine. Putin vowed to crush what he said was a Ukrainian sabotage group that had fired at civilians. Bakhmut has been reduced to a blasted wasteland, with a few thousand of its 70,000 pre-war civilian population still inside as armies battle street-by-street. [1/5] Ukrainian service members ride a self-propelled howitzer, as Russia's attack on Ukraine continues, near the frontline city of Bakhmut, Ukraine February 27, 2023. In the southern city of Zaporizhzia, Russian missiles crashed into a five-story apartment block overnight, collapsing upper floors.

[1/5] Ukrainian service members ride a self-propelled howitzer, as Russia's attack on Ukraine continues, near the frontline city of Bakhmut, Ukraine February 27, 2023. Near the front lines west of Bakhmut, in the Ukrainian-held town of Chasiv Yar, the thump of outgoing artillery fire could be heard. CROSS-BORDER RAIDThe reported cross-border raid into Russia's Bryansk province comes days after Moscow said Kyiv had attacked targets deep inside its territory with drones. Russia's RIA state news agency said several people had been taken hostage in a store in Lubechanye, less than a kilometre from Russia's border with northeastern Ukraine. Echoing wording from earlier meetings, host India said countries apart from Russia and China had condemned the war.

☆ Ukraine's top climate scientist put solar panels on her apartment roof so she could keep the lights on for her son with autism
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-23 | by ( Tim Paradis | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

In December, Svitlana Krakovska, Ukraine's top climate scientist, managed to place a solar array on the roof of her Kyiv apartment building to provide electricity for her family when the power goes out. "He was really afraid," Krakovska told Insider by phone from her office in Kyiv. The resiliency the solar panels deliver is part of what Krakovska hopes will come out of the brutal war with Russia, now one year on. She noted there are large solar installations in Ukraine where a missile might destroy some panels but the remaining ones will still work. Zasiadko pointed to a project in a village near Kyiv in which a small clinic that had been damaged by shelling was outfitted with solar panels and a groundwater heat pump.

☆ Syrian Brothers Reunite for Desperate Search After Turkey’s Quake
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-19 | by ( Daniella Cheslow | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

ANTAKYA, Turkey—Alaa Sannaa received a text message from his mother after twin earthquakes rocked Turkey and Syria, telling him to fly immediately from his home in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, to Antakya, where his brother Abdo’s wife and three children were buried under the rubble of their 12-story apartment building. Alaa, 37 years old, quickly messaged his other three brothers, who live in Germany and the U.S. They immediately booked tickets to Turkey.

☆ Crypto: Regulators are cracking down as FTX fallout casts a shadow over digital assets
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-14 | by ( Allison Morrow | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +5 min

New York CNN —When FTX collapsed in November, it was a seismic event for the crypto industry. On Monday, New York regulators ordered blockchain firm Paxos to stop issuing BUSD, aka Binance USD, citing “several unresolved issues” related to Paxos’ oversight of its relationship with crypto exchange Binance. Investors typically buy them to store money and facilitate deals within the cryptocurrency infrastructure, making them a bedrock of the crypto ecosystem. “Regulation by enforcement is puzzling for crypto enthusiasts,” said Marcus Sotiriou, market analyst at digital asset broker GlobalBlock, in a note. In January, regulators warned US banks and other market participants about the risks of fraud, volatility, and shoddy risk management in the crypto world.

A map of Turkey showing the city of Kahramanmaras in relation to the epicenter of the earthquake. A set of before and after images that show how a block in the downtown Kahramanmaras area was turned to rubble by the earthquake. For days, rescue teams and family members have been working through rubble of collapsed buildings throughout the city. Residential buildings Before Residential buildings After Google Maps Street View from November 2022; Adem Altan/Agence France-Presse, via Getty Images from Feb. 7, 2023On many blocks, only a few buildings remain. A set of before and after images that show another block of residential buildings destroyed, leaving the Clarion Hotel Kahramanmaras standing alone.

☆ Resistance is futile. Welcome to the "generative AI" era
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-08 | by ( Allison Morrow | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +5 min

This is going to be the year of “generative AI” the way 2012 was the year of Instagram. (Yes, Bing still exists and Microsoft hopes AI can make it relevant again for the first time ever.) Generative AI is the technology that underpins ChatGPT, the chatbot that’s gotten everyone in the content-generation biz (hello!) But Google, Microsoft and their rivals are still bullish. “We have even more exciting, AI-enabled innovations in the works that will change the way people search, work and play.”

☆ It's time to chill with al the recession talk
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-06 | by ( Allison Morrow | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +8 min

New York CNN —In 2021, a bunch of economists and policy makers underestimated the inflation that was taking root around the world. In 2022, as inflation hit 40-year-highs and the Fed ramped up interest rates, many of those commentators went full-on gloomy — predicting a recession was all but inevitable. And that makes it hard, if not impossible, to imagine a recession anytime soon. “Any concern the economy is in recession or close to a recession should be completely dashed by these numbers,” Moody’s Analytics chief economist Mark Zandi told CNN on Friday. “The economy is further away from recession than ever,” wrote Christopher Rupkey, chief economist at Fwdbonds.

☆ Powerful quake rocks Turkey and Syria, kills more than 3,400
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-06 | by ( ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +8 min

A man carries a girl following an earthquake, in rebel-held town of Jandaris, Syria February 6, 2023. People search through rubble following an earthquake in Diyarbakir, Turkey February 6, 2023. Rescuers carry out a girl from a collapsed building following an earthquake in Diyarbakir, Turkey February 6, 2023. He said their shared four-story building collapsed just as he, his wife and three children ran toward the exit. Rescuers stand on rubble of a collapsed building, following an earthquake, in Latakia, Syria, February 6, 2023 in this handout image.

☆ Maryland considers a bill incentivizing the 4-day workweek. Here's how the 5-day workweek became so popular in the first place.
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-01 | by ( Marguerite Ward | Shana Lebowitz | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

Here's a timeline of how the US adopted the five-day, 40-hour workweek. Indeed, the pandemic accelerated public discourse over whether the 40-hour workweek still makes sense for some employees. Here's a look back at the history of the 40-hour workweek and how we got to where we are today. 1906: The eight-hour workday was instituted at two major firms in the printing industry. September 25, 1926: Ford Motor Companies adopted a five-day, 40-hour workweek.

☆ Why a tiny American firm is taking aim at an Indian conglomerate
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-30 | by ( Allison Morrow | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +6 min

New York CNN —Asia’s richest man is in the crosshairs of a research firm whose very name evokes panic. Gautam Adani is a 60-year-old tycoon who founded the Adani Group over 30 years ago, building it into India’s largest port operator, with businesses spanning infrastructure and energy production. Hindenburg said Adani Group shares are massively overvalued, and it has taken a short position (more on that in a minute) on them, meaning Hindenburg wins when Adani shares fall. What is Hindenburg Research? Hindenburg is a short-seller that specializes in forensic financial research, founded in 2017 by Nathan Anderson.

☆ Swimming in cash, Chevron plans a $75 billion slap in the face to drivers
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-26 | by ( Allison Morrow | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +3 min

All of that helped make Chevron the top-performing Dow stock of last year, with shares surging more than 50%. To be clear: It’s not that Chevron, or any of its peers, did anything special to earn their windfall profits last year. Instead, Chevron is buying $75 billion worth of its own shares, and jacking up its quarterly shareholder dividend. Of course, Chevron and other US oil producers, including Exxon Mobil, are putting some money into new energy projects this year. That was far less than the $6.3 billion that Union Pacific spent repurchasing shares of stock.

☆ Microsoft could bring back Clippy, but make him smart
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-25 | by ( Allison Morrow | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +6 min

New York CNN —This week, Microsoft confirmed it’s planning to invest billions in OpenAI, the company behind the viral new chatbot tool ChatGPT. The prospect of Microsoft, maker of software that people mostly hate, getting involved with ChatGPT, a product people generally like, is raising a lot of eyebrows. Almost immediately, people began joking on social media that ChatGPT could be used to revive the broadly maligned, big-eyed goon known as Clippy. “There is a kernel of truth to the Clippy comparison,” David Lobina, an artificial intelligence analyst at ABI Research, told Sam. All of the above suggestions were generated by asking ChatGPT various forms of the question, “How could Microsoft integrate ChatGPT into its products?”Argh, Samantha, you scamp!

☆ Taylor Swift ticket sales debacle manages to unite bitter rivals
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-24 | by ( Allison Morrow | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +7 min

Some people may even find a kind of beauty in the way the system was designed to keep special interests in check. “To have a strong capitalist system, you have to have competition,” said Senator Amy Klobuchar, who called the hearing. “You can’t have too much consolidation — something that, unfortunately for this country, as an ode to Taylor Swift, I will say, we know all too well.”(Nice one, Ames.) ICYMI, tickets for Swift’s Eras Tour, which begins in March, went up for pre-sale on Ticketmaster in mid-November. But the bigger question of whether Live Nation is a monopoly is up to the Department of Justice.

☆ Analysis: This guy made $150,000 a day, because Corporate America is out of control
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-23 | by ( Allison Morrow | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +7 min

I’m seeing the words “recession,” “crypto,” “debt ceiling,” the “M&M’s spokescandy scandals…”And yet, I am bound my duty as a journalist not to shy away from the hard candy shell news. I know, I know, you’re all tired of the media’s relentless coverage of the M&M Spokescandy Saga, aka the Culture War Battle that is shaping social discourse in the Year of Our Lord 2023. The company claims it didn’t think anyone would notice when it released the changes to the characters’ appearance. “We definitely didn’t think it would break the internet,” it said in a press release that frankly reeked of champagne and high fives. Oh you didn’t think anyone would notice, M&M marketing wizards?

☆ You can bounce back after a job loss — here's how
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-20 | by ( Rebecca Knight | Catherine Henderson | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

And recovering from a job loss takes time, effort, and self-awareness. He said that while it's common to experience feelings of disappointment, betrayal, and shame after a job loss, "You have to remember: A layoff is something that's beyond your control." Still, recovering from a job loss takes time, effort, and self-awareness. Take a breatherIn the immediate aftermath of a job loss, Pohl recommended taking a little time off. That's why it's important to make sure that throughout your search, you're getting plenty of rest, exercise, and fresh air.

☆ Why Egypt is asking its people to eat chicken feet
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-18 | by ( Nadeen Ebrahim | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +17 min

Abu Dhabi CNN —Egypt’s economic situation is so dire that the government is asking people to eat chicken feet. In Egypt, chicken feet are seen as the cheapest of meat items, considered by most as animal waste rather than food. After the recommendation to switch to chicken feet, the price of one kilogram of the product reportedly doubled to 20 Egyptian pounds ($0.67). But those firms don’t operate like private companies, enjoying special privileges without disclosing their financial data to the public. Experts have questioned why international creditors had not leveraged their loans to drive Egypt’s military out of the economy.

☆ Crypto just had an awful week
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-05 | by ( Allison Morrow | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +5 min

It’s the kind of negative press that the crypto faithful want to either ignore completely or denounce as a fringe, one-off scandal. But crypto is a tight-knit web, and when one corner collapses it puts the whole lot at risk. And we’re not done yet…Also this week:Coinbase, a publicly traded US crypto platform, agreed to a $100 million settlement after a New York regulator found “significant failures” to comply with the state’s anti-money-laundering laws. Bottom line: I’m not here to write crypto’s obit, and I am well aware that there are plenty of legitimate crypto enterprises out there. But no one within crypto agrees on what those regulations should look like, and some dispute the need for regulation in the first place.

☆ Here are 22 of the top LGBTQ news stories of 2022
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-30 | by ( Jo Yurcaba | Jo Yurcaba Is A Reporter For Nbc Out. | ) www.nbcnews.com time to read: +12 min

Here are 22 of our top LGBTQ news stories of the year. Ron DeSantis signed the controversial Parental Rights in Education law — or what critics have dubbed the “Don’t Say Gay” bill — on March 28. 'It’s already having an impact': LGBTQ people fear abortion rights reversalA supporter of gay marriage waves a flag in front of the Supreme Court on June 25, 2015. Nicola Goode / Prime VideoAmazon’s “A League of Their Own” series, which debuted Aug. 12 and was inspired by the 1992 cult classic by director Penny Marshall, brought much-needed representation to the screen for lesbians and other queer women, who celebrated how “gay, gay, gay” it was. Biden signs same-sex marriage bill at White House ceremonyPresident Joe Biden signs the Respect for Marriage Act on the South Lawn of the White House on Dec. 13.

☆ The not-quite-redemption of South Africa's infamous ultra-marathon cheats
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-30 | by ( Ryan Brown | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +35 min

"A runner can always recognize another runner," Eugene tells me. Ryan Brown for insiderIn those days, they didn't run for South Africa, but for QwaQwa – one of ten "homelands" established for Black South Africans. Tiny, non-contiguous territories – supposedly, the original territory of different Black South African ethnic groups – dotted across the country. It didn't turn out like that, but it didn't turn out like that for most Black South Africans either. As I sat speaking to Sergio, South Africa's president, Cyril Ramaphosa, was fighting for his political life after revelations that wads of cash, potentially ill-gotten, had been stolen from inside his sofa.

Now, as the country rapidly relaxes restrictions, millions of people have been told to keep going to work — even if they’re infected. For three years, its stringent approach has kept Covid cases and deaths relatively low in the country. Covid control workers walk by a closed shop near a community with residents under health monitoring for Covid on December 4 in Beijing. Top leaders at the Central Economic Work Conference, a key annual meeting that ended Friday, said in a statement that stabilizing economic growth was the top priority for 2023. Officials nationwide had worked frantically to contain Covid cases ahead of the highly sensitive twice-a-decade leadership reshuffle, which saw Chinese leader Xi Jinping emerge more powerful than ever into his third term.

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