- โ๏ธ A Stradivarius violin โ one of ~600 in existence built by famed Italian luthier Antonio Stradivari three centuries ago โ sold for $11.3 million at auction on Friday, falling ~$5 million shy of the all-time record for a musical instrument.
BUSINESS & MARKETS
- ๐ US markets fell last week (S&P: -0.2%; Dow: -0.5%; Nasdaq: -0.5%).
- ๐ Boeing plans to lay off ~400 workers in its SLS moon rocket program amid delays with NASAโs Artemis program.
- ๐ญ Nippon Steel will invest in โ but not take over โ US Steel, President Trump and Japanโs prime minister said; President Biden blocked a takeover while in office. | ๐ฆ President Trump signed an executive order delaying his cancellation of the de minimis trade exception, which is commonly used by Chinese e-commerce companies Temu and Shein to ship products to the US duty-free. | ๐ซ The US Consumer Financial Protection Bureau was instructed to suspend virtually all activities by its new leader, Russell Vought.
SPORTS, MEDIA & ENTERTAINMENT
in partnership with NoNetz
- ๐๐ Super Bowl LIX: The __ defeated the ___ . | ๐บ See all the commercials from the Big Game. | ๐ค๐ถ Relive Kendrick Lamarโs halftime performance.
- ๐ Buffalo Bills QB Josh Allen was named the 2024-25 NFL MVP, narrowly beating out Baltimore Ravens QB Lamar Jackson; see the other NFL awards.
- ๐ฎ PlayStation Network services were restored Saturday night after a nearly 24-hour outage left many users offline.
*From our partners: ๐ซถ NoNetz hats and fingerless gloves are crafted with comfort in mindโฆ 3D-knitted on demand in NYC using no-itch, 100% merino wool โ sustainably and ethically sourced. Feel the difference of consciously designed warmth. Save 15% with code DONUT15.
SCIENCE, SPACE & EMERGING TECH
- ๐๐ฃ๏ธ Humpback whale songs follow the same basic structure as human language, including a pattern known as Zipf's law: the most frequent word in a language appears 2x as often as the second most frequent, 3x as often as the third, and so on.
- ๐ฅ๐ท Boston surgeons successfully transplanted a modified pig kidney into a 66-year-old man with kidney failure last month; itโs the fourth pig kidney transplant ever in the US, and the first of three to be done as part of a new FDA-sanctioned clinical trial. | ๐ซ๐ฉ The FDA recalled ~2 million donuts and other pastries due to potential listeria contamination.
- ๐โ๏ธ Why the odds of an asteroid striking Earth in 2032 keep going up and down.
MISCELLANEOUS
in partnership with Niphtio
- โ๏ธ A small passenger plane crashed over the Bering Sea off Alaska's western coast on Thursday, killing all 10 people on board, per authorities who recovered the wreckage.
- ๐งโโ๏ธ๐๏ธ A federal judge temporarily blocked Elon Muskโs DOGE from accessing Treasury Department records that contain sensitive personal data, like Americansโ Social Security and bank account numbers. | ๐งโโ๏ธ๐๏ธ A separate federal judge temporarily blocked the Trump administrationโs plan to place thousands of USAID employees on leave starting Saturday.
- ๐ President Trumpโs approval rating currently stands at 53%, higher than any point during his first term, per a new CBS News/YouGov poll. | ๐๏ธ A DOGE staffer who resigned over racist tweets "will be brought back. To err is human, to forgive divine," per a post from department head Elon Musk.
*From our partners: ๐๐ฒ Save your favorite Bluesky posts with Niphtioโฆ Our favorite extension for bookmarks and organization released a beta integration with Bluesky. Save posts from your feed, add them to collections, add notes, and retrieve them later with smart search. Learn more about Niphtioโs Bluesky integration here.
CLICKBAIT