Numlock News: January 20, 2021 • Argo, Eve, Hippopotamuses
By Walt HickeyWattpadWattpad, originally an e-reading app that’s since become an incredibly popular platform for original works, was recently acquired by Korean conglomerate Naver, best known as the owners of the Webtoon comics platform for $600 million. The tie-up forms a company operating hugely popular platforms for amateur but incredibly popular stories, a body of work that is promising in terms of adaptations and intellectual property. Wattpad has 90 million people visit per month, hosts a billion stories and has users who spend 22 billion minutes per month reading it. By the same count, Webtoons averaged 67 million monthly users as of last summer. Connie Loizos, TechCrunch and Julia Alexander, The Verge Heat Of The MomentInvestments in geothermal energy companies hit $675 million last year, which was six times the investments in 2019. The one major geothermal energy company on public markets — Ormat — saw its market cap pop 80 percent since last March, one indication that investors, and most notably petroleum companies, are testing out geothermal as a promising energy source. In previous geothermal experiments in the ‘70s and ‘80s, oil and gas companies had difficulty making the economics work, with most wells turning up nothing. Decades later, nobody is better at drilling holes in the ground and finding what they’re looking for than the modern shale oil sector, as seen by the fact that while one in 10 shale wells were profitable in the ‘90s, today over 90 percent are. Now, traditional oil and gas companies are kicking the tires on geothermal startups, with substantial investment announcements reportedly coming up later this month. HipposFamous cocaine salesman Pablo Escobar’s legacy in Colombia extends to a thriving population of hippopotamuses that have made the Magdalena river basin their home. Escobar brought one male and three females to a private zoo at his ranch — in blatant violation of every lesson of Jurassic Park I might add — and needless to say they’ve adapted incredibly well to the climate according to a new study published in the journal Biological Conservation. The researchers believe there are over 80 hippos in the region today, up from 35 in 2012, a distressing statistic for the local government that is attempting to castrate and sterilize some of the megafauna. One solution, to just cull them, is attractive to some, but the problem there is that the survival of the species is under threat in Africa, and so it’s never an easy conversation to have about slaughtering a vulnerable species just because it’s on the wrong continent. SATThe College Board announced it’s phasing out both the essay portion of the SAT and SAT subject tests, and will encourage people who want to take a standardized test about a specific topic to just bite the bullet and take an AP test. The College Board has long been detested by students and parents, but it seems admissions officials are finally catching on that maybe they’re a bit of a menace. The SAT represents a considerable chunk of the College Board’s $1 billion annual revenue, and tweaks to the product — including a rollout of a digital version to come sometime — are a big deal for the Big Test. On the other hand, over 1,000 colleges and universities have dropped testing requirements, and many are using the pandemic to assess for themselves whether the SAT isn’t making the grade. Making this timing more interesting is the incredibly influential University of California Board of Regents meeting this week, when they will weigh a recommendation to eliminate standardized testing permanently from admissions requirements to the largest university system in the country. Teresa Watanabe, The Los Angeles Times, and Kate Taylor, The New York Times BuoysThe data-gathering devices that fuel weather forecasts have been bit-by-bit going off-line, as the technicians who replace or fix them have been unable to embark on the voyages necessary to keep the devices online. A regional network of 12 instruments off the coast of Great Britain had, by June, fallen to seven remaining in service. The team managed to drop eight buoys out to sea over the summer to bolster the network, but around the world the systems that power weather models are faltering. Argo is a sensor array of thousands of floating devices that can submerge themselves to get measurements at various depths, reporting millions of observations a year to the World Meteorological Organization to be disseminated worldwide. The number of Argo devices in operation is down 10 percent, and the decline in research vessels at sea means that they can’t replace the 60 per month they typically do. Chris Baraniuk, Hakai Magazine DigitalChina’s digital economy generated 35.8 trillion yuan ($5.52 trillion) of revenue in 2019, which was roughly 36 percent of the country’s GDP. Now, China is looking for ways to tax its colossal online e-commerce industry, kicking the tires on a number of digital taxes. Keeping up with the rapidly evolving digital scene — for instance, in 2019 the amount of merchandise volume sold by livestreaming events tripled to $56.5 billion — is poised to be a challenge. Currently, tax in China is based on place of business registration or operations, and there are 18 different types of taxes. Cheng Siwei, Yu Hairong, Zhang Erchi, and Denise Jia, Caixin EveEve Online is an enormous space-faring massive multiplayer online game with legendary mass battles. One previous battle gathered 5,000 individual players attempting to fight, and another one saw a record 6,500 fighters in a large, costly space battle. A week ago, another one of those enormous space battles began, and attracted so much interest from players that the game began to break down: with 35,000 people online that day, about 35 percent, or 12,000 players, were trying to enter a single system, a space armada that the heretofore undefeated Eve server racks was unable to handle. What that looks like in-game means that what would have been a pitched naval fight turned into something like a siege, with a glitch trapping half of a fleet inside the battlefield and an uneasy standoff resulting. Thanks to the paid subscribers to Numlock News who make this possible. Subscribers guarantee this stays ad-free, and get a special Sunday edition. Consider becoming a full subscriber today. The best way to reach new readers is word of mouth. If you click THIS LINK in your inbox, it’ll create an easy-to-send pre-written email you can just fire off to some friends. Go to swag.numlock.news to claim some free merch when you invite someone. Send links to me on Twitter at @WaltHickey or email me with numbers, tips, or feedback at walt@numlock.news. Send corrections or typos to the copy desk at copy@numlock.news. Check out the Numlock Book Club and Numlock award season supplement. 2021 Sunday subscriber editions: The Nib · Driven 2020 Sunday editions: 2020 · Sibling Rivalries · Crosswords · Bleak Friday · Prop 22 · NCAA · Guitars Fumble Dimension · Parametric Press · The Mouse · Subprime Attention Crisis · Factory Farms · Streaming Summer · Dynamite · One Billion Americans · Defector · Seams of the Grid · Bodies of Work · Working in Public · Rest of WorldWorst Quarter ·Larger Than Life · Streaming · Wildlife Crime · Climate Solutions · Blue Skies · UV2020 Sunday Edition Archive2019 Sunday Edition Archive2018 Sunday Edition ArchiveYou’re on the free list for Numlock News. For the full experience, become a paying subscriber. |
Older messages
Numlock News: January 19, 2021 • E-Cigs, E-Books, Ecology
Tuesday, January 19, 2021
By Walt Hickey Welcome back! Soul A random Liam Neeson movie has bumped off Wonder Woman 1984 from the top of the box office, with The Marksman bringing in $3.7 million over a seriously quiet weekend
Numlock News: January 15, 2021 • Manhattan, Disneyland, Pokemon Go
Friday, January 15, 2021
By Walt Hickey Have a great weekend! Numlock is off on Monday in observation of Martin Luther King Jr. Day. See you next on Tuesday. I Choose You, Porygon Pokémon Go creator Niantic has reached a
Numlock News: January 13, 2021 • Pancakes, Narcs, Manga
Friday, January 15, 2021
By Walt Hickey Whistle The US Securities and Exchange Commission said it received 6900 tips alleging white collar crimes in the fiscal year that ended in September. That is a 31 percent jump over the
Numlock News: January 14, 2021 • Dire Wolves, Fighter Jets, Hydrogen
Friday, January 15, 2021
By Walt Hickey F-35 The Pentagon's testing office reports that the F-35 fighter jet currently has 871 software and hardware deficiencies, which is down from the 873 flaws inventoried last year.
Numlock News: January 12, 2021 • Spacecraft, Whiskey, Disaster
Tuesday, January 12, 2021
By Walt Hickey Disastrous The year 2020 will go down as a rough one on a couple of different levels, and a new report from NOAA bolsters that rep as a disastrous year even further: per the agency, 2020
You Might Also Like
Nature's Penalty
Tuesday, May 7, 2024
What do the cicadas find to sing about for so many hours? Nature's Penalty By Kaamya Sharma • 7 May 2024 View in browser View in browser Philosophy Of The Death Penalty Peter Salmon | New Humanist
Will you donate $5 to expose the humanitarian catastrophe in Rafah?
Tuesday, May 7, 2024
Palestinians are fleeing in terror in advance of an imminent Israeli ground invasion of Rafah, the massively overcrowded city in southern Gaza where 1.4 million people had sought refuge. Palestinians
⚡️ New Tesla DLC Just Dropped
Tuesday, May 7, 2024
Plus: Putting ChatGPT in your wireless earbuds is infuriating and occasionally magical.
How to detect lung cancer early
Tuesday, May 7, 2024
+ pandemic past is pandemic prologue
Rafah Strike, Pulitzer Prizes, and Peregrine Falcons
Tuesday, May 7, 2024
Facts, without motives.
CEOs Got Raises As They Cut Workers’ Pay
Tuesday, May 7, 2024
New data show the corporate pay gap is widening — now lawmakers are proposing a crackdown. Read below to learn how the pay gap between executives and their workers is growing wider and how a CEO tax
What does divesting from Israel really mean?
Tuesday, May 7, 2024
Plus: FAA opens Boeing investigation, Israel conducts strikes on Rafah, and more. May 7, 2024 View in browser Good morning. As a potential Israeli offensive in Rafah looms and Israel tells Palestinians
The right-wing uproar about Title IX
Tuesday, May 7, 2024
For the last 50 years, Title IX has had an extraordinary impact on the nature of higher education in the United States. Passed in 1972 as an amendment to the Higher Education Act, Title IX prohibits
Numlock News: May 7, 2024 • Broods, Blades, Black Lotus
Tuesday, May 7, 2024
By Walt Hickey Supercomputing The US government's Cheyenne supercomputer auction has ended, with all 313 TB of ram and 8064 Intel processors selling for $480085 after attracting 27 bidders. The 32
☕ Soccer & scandal
Tuesday, May 7, 2024
Why Americans don't think they'll stop renting... May 07, 2024 View Online | Sign Up | Shop Morning Brew PRESENTED BY Masterworks Good morning and Happy Height Day to everyone who is 5'7