I wrote two pieces for Insider this week, one on prospects who could be recalled by contenders this summer and one placing thirteen top draft picks (#1-12, plus #16 for obvious reason) within their new organizations’ prospect rankings. I was not able to chat this week due to a lengthy flight delay on Thursday and the chance to hang with a longtime reader and now friend of mine who lives here in Omaha.
Also, with travel and some other stuff, I’m behind on dish blogging, but I finished Eowyn Ivey’s The Snow Child and it was wonderful.
And now, the links…
- I’ve been a fan of and advocate for CHVRCHES since well before their first album came out, but this appears to be the year they cross fully into the mainstream of pop music. Nerdist interviewed the trio at Firefly, including observations on their pop leanings despite their indie status. Personally, I have never disdained pop music for being pop, but disdain some pop music for being vapid. Anyway, if you haven’t heard the new version of “Bury It” featuring Hayley Williams along with Lauren Mayberry, it’s one of the best singles of the year:
- The U.S. patent system has been a disaster for about twenty years now, with no sign of it abating. Popular Mechanics followed one lawsuit by an inventor against a big company that presents a balanced look at how the system just doesn’t work.
- Why is Estonia, the tiny former Soviet state on the Baltic sea where the people speak a language that isn’t even Indo-European, one of the most tech-friendly nations on the planet?
- A burger made entirely from plant materials that looks, tastes, and even smells like beef? I’d try it. I’m no vegetarian, not by a long shot, but my diet is increasingly plant-based these days.
- This was good if horrifying: Buzzfeed Canada editor Scaachi Koul wrote about two times she was roofied by men, and how would-be rapists identify potential victims.
- Deadspin goes deep on the ugly, crooked business of gambling touts, focusing in particular on RJ Bell and Pregame.com. It’s an outstanding piece of longform investigative journalism.
- The Atlantic interviewed the author of a new book, The Poverty Industry, about how private companies are looting government funds intended for foster children and the elderly poor.
- I work for a Disney subsidiary, and thus am a Disney cast member, and have some indirect stake in the future of the company – especially as my direct employer’s revenues may be affected by declining cable subscriptions. This interview with Disney CEO Robert Iger was more candid than I expected and had some welcome news about our intentions in the digital, non-cabled space.
- Why would a strawberry grown locally cost more than one grown in California? Well, it comes down to economies of scale, cheap transport costs, and, most fundamentally, a question of what we’re paying for when we pay for produce.
- The story of the Trump campaign giving $35,000 to a phantom firm called Draper Sterling is more comical than controversial, but still an entertaining read.
- A fascinating video on the mapping of Laniakea, the supercluster of galaxies that contains the Milky Way.
- A mother whose baby nearly died of pertussis has some things to say to vaccine-denying parents.
- Dr. Alice Callahan, a science researcher and instructor at Lane Community College in Oregon, penned a great, unemotional op ed against the vaccine-denier film Vaxxed. If you have (idiot) friends who saw the film, or want you to see it, well, I doubt anything will change their minds but you should send them this anyway.
- Could the Orlando shooting lead to meaningful gun control legislation? I doubt it, but this Washington Post op ed argues it might because this time, the NRA’s opponent, the LGBT community, knows how to change the culture.
- The nasal-spray flu vaccine was just not that effective in the last several seasons, and the CDC has recommended discontinuing its use in favor of traditional, injected vaccines.
- One little-reported effect of the “Brexit:” Spain now wants shared sovereignty in Gibraltar, as the British enclave (which Spain has claimed for 300 years) voted 95% to remain in the EU.
- I love this New Yorker cover about as much as I hate the UK leaving the European Union:
I almost never like New Yorker covers. But OK. pic.twitter.com/LLbR69UHHu
— Dave Itzkoff (@ditzkoff) June 24, 2016