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The World
‘A tragedy and a nightmare’: 10 people died, including Boulder police Officer Eric Talley, after a shooting at a King Soopers grocery store. Boulder police Chief Maris Herold: “My heart goes out to the victims of this incident and I’m grateful for the police officers that responded, and I am so sorry about the loss of Officer Talley.” (Boulder Daily Camera)
President Biden’s economic advisers are pulling together a sweeping $3 trillion package to boost the economy, reduce carbon emissions and narrow economic inequality, beginning with a giant infrastructure plan that may be financed in part through tax increases on corporations and the rich. After months of internal debate, Biden’s advisers are expected to present the spending proposal to the president and congressional leaders this week, as well as begin outreach to industry and labor groups. The package includes high-profile domestic policy priorities such as free community college and universal prekindergarten. (New York Times, Washington Post)
The US, EU, UK and Canada banded together to sanction Chinese officials over suspected human rights abuses in Xinjiang, a dramatic escalation in tensions with Beijing and a clear sign that the Biden administration plans to wield its alliances as a powerful tool to counter an increasingly assertive China. Travel bans and asset freezes have now been imposed on four officials and a security organization over persecution and mass internments of Uyghurs in the Xinjiang region. The EU was hit with immediate retaliation from China’s foreign ministry, which imposed travel bans on 10 EU individuals and four entities. (South China Morning Post, Financial Times)
Israelis will head to the polls for the fourth time in under two years today, hoping to end the political stalemate that began in December 2018 when Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu initiated the first election. There will be 6,578,084 Israelis eligible to vote for any of the 38 parties running in 13,685 polling stations. Exit polls will be broadcast at 10 p.m. Tuesday night. But the real results from the normal polling stations will only be available on Wednesday, and some 430,000 double ballots from the special polling stations, soldiers, emissaries and prisoners will arrive by Thursday or Friday. The final results must be in by March 31. (Jerusalem Post)
More states are opening vaccine access to all residents over the age of 16, as the race continues between vaccinations and contagious new variants of the coronavirus. Governors in at least three states — West Virginia, Tennessee and Arizona — announced plans to make the shots more widely available within the next two weeks. Two states are currently inoculating residents 16 and up, but a growing list of governors have revealed plans to expand access by May 3. (Washington Post, Charleston (WV) Gazette-Mail)
Boris Johnson has warned that a third wave of Covid-19 infections sweeping Europe will “wash up on our shores as well.” In Miami, more than 1,000 people were arrested as Miami Beach pushed its spring-break curfew into April. (The Times, The Guardian)
Evanston, IL approves housing grants as part of city’s local reparations program, believed to be first of its kind in the nation. Officials in the suburb say the initiative, which has been in the planning stages since 2019, is designed to address the discriminatory housing policies and practices faced by Black residents. (Chicago Tribune)
Bill Nelson, a former Democratic senator from Florida, is Biden's choice to lead NASA. In 1986, he flew as a payload specialist on a space shuttle — the second sitting member of Congress to do so. Nelson, a politician, initially criticized the appointment of former NASA administrator Jim Bridenstine, saying that the job should not go to a politician. (Nature)
Economy
Microsoft will begin allowing more workers back into its headquarters in Redmond, Wash., starting Monday, while also acknowledging that work life may never be the same. In this stage of reopening, which Microsoft described as Step 4 in a six-step “dial,” the Redmond campus will give some 57,000 nonessential employees the choice to work from the office, home or a combination of both. Microsoft will also continue to require employees to wear masks and maintain social distancing. (New York Times)
Big U.S. companies are discovering that “hybrid” work comes with plenty of complications. As employers firm up plans to bring white-collar workers back into offices while still allowing them to do some work at home, many are encountering obstacles. Companies are grappling with what new schedules employees should follow, where people should sit in redesigned offices and how best to prevent employees at home from feeling left out of impromptu office discussions or being passed over for opportunities, say chief executives, board directors and others. (Wall Street Journal)
Goldman Sachs CEO David Solomon praised the group of disgruntled junior investment banking analysts who presented concerns about their workload. Solomon said the bank would step up enforcement of the “Saturday rule” forbidding junior bankers from working from Friday at 9 p.m. until Sunday morning, among other measures. (Financial Times)
Professional services face losing junior staff to burnout: Junior lawyers and consultants are warning they are suffering burnout after working longer hours in isolation during the pandemic, sparking fears of an exodus from the biggest global law and advisory firms. (Financial Times)
U.S. pets startups gobble up more VC funding: U.S. venture investment in pet-focused companies rose significantly in 2020, as the pandemic left owners with more time at home to lavish attention, and money on their animal companions. Areas that peaked investor interest range from pet telehealth to insurance platforms to smart dog collars. (Crunchbase)
Green financing is private equity’s newest obsession. The industry has shifted up a gear to see heavyweight names bust open the door to ESG-linked credit lines in the last year – a trend market insiders say is set to accelerate in 2021. Throughout 2020, ESG-tied lending proliferated in the private equity space. Buyout groups inked 27 ESG-linked loans worth $23.6bn in the Emea region, a 60% increase when compared to the $9.5bn reported in 2019. (Private Equity News)
The value of collectibles — like coffee tables, whiskey, Air Jordans and Pokémon cards — has soared. (New York Times)
Technology
Journalism’s Trump bump may be giving way to a slump: After a record-setting January, traffic to the nation’s most popular mainstream news sites plummeted in February. The Washington Post, for example, saw the number of unique visitors fall 26% from January to February, and 7% from a year ago. The New York Times lost 17% compared with January and 16% over last February. The most deeply affected network is CNN. After surpassing rivals Fox News and MSNBC in January, the network has lost 45% of its prime-time audience in the past five weeks, according to Nielsen Media Research. MSNBC’s audience has dropped 26% in the same period. Fox News — the most Trump-friendly of the three networks in its prime-time opinion shows — has essentially regained its leading position by standing still; its ratings have fallen just 6% since the first weeks of the year. (Washington Post)
Discord is going through a sales process that could result in a purchase of the communications and chat platform for much more than $10 billion. Discord is exploring its options for a sale in the wake of interest from multiple parties that want to buy the company. One source said the company has signed an exclusive acquisition discussion with one party, meaning it is in final negotiations about a sale. This news comes after Discord raised $140 million in December at a $7 billion valuation. (VentureBeat)
Microsoft PowerPoint can now help you practice presentations almost anywhere — no humans required. Now you can improve your presenting skills on the go. (The Verge)
Facial recognition ID with a twist: Smiles, winks and other facial movements for access. Concurrent Two-Factor Identity Verification requires both one's facial identity and a specific facial motion to gain access. To set it up, a user faces a camera and records a short 1-2 second video of either a unique facial motion or a lip movement from reading a secret phrase. The video is then input into the device, which extracts facial features and the features of the facial motion, storing them for later ID verification. (Brigham Young University)
Smart Links
Hospitals hide pricing data from search results. (Wall Street Journal)
Vesuvius killed people of Pompeii in 15 minutes: Study. (The Guardian)
Jack Dorsey’s first tweet sells as NFT for $2.9 million. (Wall Street Journal)
6 cities where police reform is shaping the race for mayor. (Politico)
Summers could last 6 months by end of century. (Advancing Earth & Space Science)
Amazon expands efforts to “gamify” warehouse work. (The Information)