Saturdays are the day we catch up with all the non-finance related stuff we didn’t get to during the week. You can check out last week’s edition here.
Quote of the Day
"It’s natural that people are struggling with formulating, enforcing and abiding by new social norms. There are villains here, but they’re not the ones desperate to escape this awful new half-life we’re all living. They’re the ones whose job it was to chart a way out, and just gave up."
(Michelle Goldberg)
Autos
- Manufacturers are lining up to produce electric pickup trucks. (nytimes.com)
- Why the pandemic increases the need for autonomous vehicles. (axios.com)
Energy
- Self-storage sites are a perfect place to put solar panels. (ibj.com)
- Higher output from renewables is sidelining some nuclear power plants. (business.financialpost.com)
- The pandemic is interrupting plans to build new renewable projects. (washingtonpost.com)
- A visualization of how America uses energy, pre-coronavirus. (visualcapitalist.com)
Air travel
- This is the largest crisis facing aviation in its history. (hbr.org)
- Why airlines keep flying empty airplanes around the country. (wsj.com)
- Why don't airplane companies compete on safety claims? (slate.com)
Science
- The pandemic has changed the nature of scientific communication and review. (bloomberg.com)
- The global health emergency has shut down scientific research labs across the country. (statnews.com)
- SpaceX is moving to reduce the light pollution from its Starlink satellites. (nytimes.com)
- The Pentagon has disclosed video of "unidentified aerial phenomena." They're not aliens though. (syfy.com)
- Nobody really knows why the universe is expanding faster than expected. (quantamagazine.org)
- What Pangea looks like with modern state borders. (visualcapitalist.com)
Technology
- Many Americans are being forced to sit in parking lots to get decent wifi. (nytimes.com)
- The next generation Apple ($AAPL) Watch could have a pulse oximeter in it. (fastcompany.com)
- There is still some stuff that humans do really easily that computers just can't handle yet. (theatlantic.com)
- Why password practices are still so bad. (fastcompany.com)
- Quantum computing, 101. (wired.co.uk)
Behavior
- Observers fear a wave of mental health problems is coming in the wake of the coronavirus. (washingtonpost.com)
- On the power of digesting bad news alongside the joyful. (blogs.scientificamerican.com)
- A quick exercise to help you reset your emotional state. (elemental.medium.com)
- Middle-age stress seems to be getting worse over time. (sciencedaily.com)
Medicine
- The pandemic has disrupted medical practices. (washingtonpost.com)
- More evidence that Americans are delaying routine medical care. (wsj.com)
- Annual flu death counts from the CDC are estimates, not actual counts. (blogs.scientificamerican.com)
- Telemedicine requires some different skills and language. (nytimes.com)
- The opioid epidemic has not disappeared during the pandemic. (thedailybeast.com)
- What it's like to have a baby in the midst of a pandemic. (theringer.com)
Covid-19 treatments
- A cocktail of drugs, including interferon, seems to reduce the severity of Covid-19 in patients with mild to moderate disease. (nytimes.com)
- Hydroxychloroquine has failed another clinical trial. (fortune.com)
Covid-19
- There are a lot of things we can do to mitigate risk all the while hoping for a vaccine. (hbr.org)
- The government missed a great opportunity to normalize mask wearing. (rationalwalk.com)
- Why any return to normalcy will require phases. (nber.org)
- What Minnesota has gotten right about testing. (bloomberg.com)
- What makes meat packing plans likely coronavirus hot spots? (wired.com)
- What the world learned in eradicating smallpox. (statnews.com)
- SARS-CoV-2 has likely been hiding in animals for years. (kottke.org)
Fitness
- Don't let the lockdown keep you from going outside. (nytimes.com)
- Spaniards are exercising outside in shifts. (washingtonpost.com)
- Short, intense bursts of activity could help offset a sedentary lifestyle. (nytimes.com)
- The benefits of hanging for strength and shoulder mobility. (artofmanliness.com)
Drink
- Craft brewers are focusing on canned beer with keg sales on pause. (cnbc.com)
- For liquor companies, home sales have not offset the loss of bar sales. (ft.com)
- Americans are drinking more canned cocktails in quarantine. (qz.com)
Food
- Due to shutdowns, France has a cheese problem. In short, too much of it. (politico.com)
- A guide to buying, eating, and cooking with tinned fish. (eater.com)
- Why you should choose canned salmon over tuna. (wsj.com)
- Why you can't just use color to decide when chicken is safely cooked. (nytimes.com)
- Seven grapefruit sparkling water ranked. (pastemagazine.com)
- Four tips for freezing food. (mentalfloss.com)
Media
- YouTube is going to allow creators to sell subscriptions to off-platform services. (digiday.com)
- What Quibi got wrong. (techdirt.com)
Sports
- The Premier Lacrosse League is replacing its already delayed regular season with a 16-day tournament that’ll require the players to be quarantined. (variety.com)
- Coaches, not athletes, are most at-risk of sports reopening. (wsj.com)
- The sports betting industry in the US is holding its breath waiting for the return of sports. (si.com)
- How shutdowns have affected Americans playing pro basketball overseas. (theringer.com)
- Interest in Taiwan's pro baseball league is up. (ft.com)
- How opening up new packs of baseball cards online became a thing. (si.com)
- A not-so-great history of all of the 'next Michael Jordans.' (theringer.com)
Children
- The fate of many summer camps are very much still up in the air. (wsj.com)
- With school cancelled, so are after-school activities. (npr.org)
- Families are falling behind in their children's vaccination schedules in the pandemic. (wsj.com)
MBA
- Some MBA programs are still deciding whether to allow candidates to defer their enrollments this Fall. (wsj.com)
- Most MBA programs expect a drop in enrollment this Fall. (wsj.com)
College
- The coronavirus is forcing discussions about the value of college that institutions don't want to have. (bloomberg.com)
- Why it's time to put the 'public' back into public universities. (newyorker.com)
- Six ways college could look different this Fall including staggered classes. (npr.org)
- Why universities are loathe to give tuition rebates. (nytimes.com)
- The case for skipping college this Fall. (perell.com)
Earlier on Abnormal Returns
- Longform links: missed signals. (abnormalreturns.com)
- What you missed in our Friday linkfest. (abnormalreturns.com)
- Podcast links: effective coaching. (abnormalreturns.com)
- Having no plan is just as bad as not the following the plan you have. (abnormalreturns.com)
- Monthly ESG links: the nature of the pandemic. (abnormalreturns.com)
Mixed media
- Facebook ($FB) and Google ($GOOGL) are telling workers to work from home for all of 2020. (finance.yahoo.com)
- America's beauty routines are getting upended in quarantine. (nytimes.com)
- Some random lockdown observations including "The secret to a good Zoom meeting is 30 minutes or less." (ritholtz.com)
