Good morning and Happy Singles Awareness Day.😍 Does anyone else think it’s kinda ironic that the day you’re supposed to be the most aware of being single is the day after you’re the most aware of being single?

Anyways…

• Get ready to see more Snapchat ads
• MLB spring training is officially postponed
• And how well do you know your states?

🚀⏰ Ready, Set, Go: Today’s news takes 3.99 minutes to read. Then it’s puzzle time.

"The best revenge is to be unlike them who performed the injury."

–Marcus Aurelius (121 AD – 180 AD)

☔️ When it rains, it pours. Yesterday’s Dose of Discussion button to see the 360° view was a legacy from Friday’s email and pointed to the wrong place. To see curated opinions from the Left and Right about facial recognition in society for real this time (promise), just click here.

+Reminder: If you have a Dose of Discussion suggestion, submit it here.

👻 Snapchat unveiled a new way for creators to earn money by placing mid-roll ads in their Stories.

• The feature is currently being beta-tested by a small group of US creators, but the company said it plans to include all Snap Stars – what the platform calls its biggest creators – in the coming months.
• Snap said its payout to creators is determined by a formula that weighs factors like posting frequency and audience engagement. The company shelled out $250 million for creators last year through its TikTok clone, Spotlight.

📱 Zoom out: Longtime YouTuber and Vidcon co-founder Hank Green last month pointed out that some creator funds, like the one operated by TikTok, don’t grow at the same rate as the company. This means that as these platforms become increasingly successful – with more creators and users joining the platform and contributing to more views – the existing creators see their portion of the funds shrink. (Put simply, more people and views chasing a finite amount of money.)

The lone exception is YouTube, where creators receive ~50% of the ad revenue tied to their individual videos. The platform has paid out $10 billion to creators over the past three years.

+For example: Jimmy Donaldson, the streamer known as MrBeast, said he earned $15,000 from TikTok last year despite attracting “prob over a billion views” on the app. He made $54 million from YouTube over that same period, garnering 10 billion total views.

⚾🌴 MLB spring training is officially delayed. Pitchers and catchers were supposed to report today to team sites in Arizona and Florida to gear up for the new season, but the ongoing lockout means players are still sitting at home.

• Representatives from the league and its Players Union met for the fifth time on Saturday to discuss a new collective bargaining agreement, though both sides are still in dispute over many key issues.
• The MLB is proposing an expansion of the playoffs from 10 teams to 14, while the union is offering 12.
• The league is also proposing a lottery draft system for the bottom three teams each season, while the players want it to include the bottom eight.
• Both sides have already agreed in principle to expand the designated hitter (DH) to the National League for this season and all future seasons.

👀 Looking ahead… Players need roughly four weeks to fully prepare for the upcoming season. If the two sides can’t reach a deal by early next month, then Opening Day (March 31) will almost certainly be postponed.

🏜️ There’s a new ‘Meg’ in town. The drought enveloping the southwestern US over the past two decades is the region’s driest ‘megadrought’ in more than 1,200 years, according to a new study published in the peer-reviewed journal Nature Climate Change.

• The researchers studied the area from southern Montana to northern Mexico, ranging from the Pacific Ocean to the Rocky Mountains. Their work focused on droughts that lasted 20 years or longer.
• They calculated the intensity of historical droughts by analyzing tree ring patterns, which provide insights about soil moisture levels for each individual year over long timespans. The scientists also checked their findings against historical climate data.
• The study found the current megadrought surpassed the previous record holder – which occurred in the late 1500s – due to the region’s record low precipitation and near-record high temps from summer 2020 to summer 2021.
• “Without [human-caused] climate change, the past 22 years would have probably still been the driest period in 300 years,” said UCLA geographer Park Williams, the study’s lead author. “But it wouldn’t be holding a candle to the megadroughts of the 1500s, 1200s or 1100s.”

+Present day: More than 90% of the Western US is currently experiencing drought conditions, according to the US Drought Monitor.

We all know the struggle. Spending hour after hour mindlessly scrolling in search of something, anything, worth reading.

It’s a predicament comparable to browsing Netflix endlessly to find our next series to binge.

🤯 Did you know?... A 2016 study revealed that Americans spend an average of 23 minutes a day trying to find something to watch on Netflix. This equates to 1.3 years over a lifetime!

That’s exactly why our friends at Refind are working hard to help you save precious time.

🤖 They’ve developed an algorithm that zeros in on your interests and preferences to deliver only the best and most relevant articles to your inbox every morning.

⚙ How it works:

• Go to refind.com
• Select 5 topics of interest
• Rate a couple of the sample links
• Done.

Then every morning at 6:30 you will receive 7 curated links. You can then rate them, which will help the algorithm further hone in on your preferences. All for free.

Click here to join the thousands of others saving time with Refind.

🙅‍♀️🥑 The US suspended all avocado imports from Mexico “until further notice” after a Department of Agriculture safety inspector received a threatening phone call over the weekend.

• The move was confirmed late Saturday on the eve of the Super Bowl – aka the biggest sales opportunity of the year for Mexican growers. Thankfully, avocados for this year’s event had already been distributed.
• Per the AP, the phone call is likely tied to drug cartel violence in Michoacan, which is the only Mexican state approved to ship avocados to the US.
• A USDA team of officials stationed there were reportedly robbed at gunpoint by a local gang in 2019. At the time, the agency threatened to suspend all Mexican activities in the event of a similar situation.

📸 The big picture: Many avocado growers in Michoacan say they and their family members are threatened with kidnapping by local drug gangs unless they pay up to thousands of dollars per acre in protection money.

+By the numbers: Mexican avocados represented 87% of the US market share in 2018, per USDA figures.

💬 Quoted… “The panel considered that preventing the athlete to compete at the Olympic Games would cause her irreparable harm in the circumstances.”

15-year-old figure skater Kamila Valieva of Russia was deemed eligible to compete in the individual portion of the Winter Games – despite failing a pre-Olympic drug test – while her case is being investigated.

• No medal ceremony will be held if she places in the top three. The team skating medal ceremony is also postponed. (The US would go from silver to gold if Valieva is eventually DQ’d.)

🔢 Stats of the day: In January of 2021, 2.8% of all car buyers paid above the manufacturer's suggested retail price (MSRP). In January of this year, that number was 82%.

• The average price of a used car hit $28,500 last month, up 31% year-over-year.
• The number of 16- to 25-year-olds purchasing used cars has fallen 35% over the past two years.

🤯 Did you know?… A Canadian hockey team hasn’t won the Stanley Cup since 1993.

📖 Worth a read… Your Food Could Be Better If You Salted It at the Right Time → (Popular Science)

• 👆 Russia has reportedly increased the number of troops surrounding Ukraine to 130,000 and moved dozens of rockets and missiles into position along the border; the US is temporarily relocating its embassy from the capital of Kyiv to the city of Lviv in western Ukraine. | BREAKING: Russia said earlier this morning that some units participating in military exercises would begin returning back to their bases.
• 🚀 Billionaire Jacob Isaacman, founder of payments company Shift4, purchased at least three private SpaceX missions in the coming years.
• ⚖️ A federal judge said he’ll dismiss Sarah Palin’s defamation lawsuit against the New York Times once the jury returns from deliberations. (From the Left | From the Right | Background from the DONUT)
• 👥 Texas’ attorney general filed a lawsuit against Facebook parent Meta seeking hundreds of billions of dollars in damages over its now-defunct facial recognition program; FB settled a similar suit filed in Illinois in 2015 for $650 million. (Read more | The 360º View)

+Good news: Rams WR and new Super Bowl champ Van Jefferson rushed to the hospital immediately after his team's victory to meet his healthy newborn son; his wife had entered labor about halfway through the game.

The Lawrence Family in Essex, UK, was heartbroken when their sweet cat, Barnaby, went missing eight months ago.  

• They looked for their fur baby for weeks, eventually accepting that they might never see the black cat again. 

🐱 All right meow... One day, mom Rachael called the vet for another one of the family's pets and heard a familiar "meow" coming through the phone.

• Recognizing Barnaby's distinct meow, she immediately asked the vet if the cat fit her description. It was an exact match. 

"I’m so happy, and the kids are thrilled to have him home," Rachael shared with GNN.

It’s called Positive DONUT, and we think you should check it out.

This 100% free newsletter hits inboxes each Tuesday around lunchtime with nothing but non-cheesy good news that’ll make you cheese. Not to toot our own horn or anything, but today’s edition is especially 🔥 – you don’t wanna miss it.

Subscribe here for free.

Can you name the following US states from just their outline?

1.👆

2.👆

3.👆

4.👆

(answers at the bottom of the email)

How many US presidents have been assassinated? Bonus points if you can name them.

A) 2

B) 3

C) 4

D) 5

(keep scrolling for the answer)

Check out our referral prizes you can get just for introducing people you know to this newsletter. 👇

Here’s your unique link to copy & send to anyone you think would like the DONUT:

Dose of Knowledge:

C) 4

Abraham Lincoln, James Garfield, William McKinley, and John Kennedy.

Today's Puzzle:

1. Nebraska
2. Virginia
3. Indiana
4. Utah