Live tree or die
Living near an Amazon distribution center piloting the company’s new drone deliveries is not unlike listening to an 83-pound mosquito buzz past your house all day long. / The New York Times [$]
The South has become Elon Musk’s personal playground, with states vying for whatever business project that will inevitably alter their local landscape. / The Wall Street Journal [$]
An unknown number of Texas voters’ registrations are backlogged after the state’s driver’s license agency failed to send the applications to county officials. / The New Republic
At least for now, the White House has abandoned its plan to install a board of political appointees to oversee the National Institute of Health’s grantmaking process. / Politico
UnitedHealth Group and others push back on a proposal that would direct payments for remote monitoring to only healthcare providers, effectively cutting out contractors. / Becker’s Health IT
See also: Last Week Tonight takes on UnitedHealth, the behemoth that effectively now owns every aspect of your healthcare. / YouTube
Flock is apparently considering selling itself, and potentially could find a willing buyer in competitors Axon or Motorola. / Semafor
What does it mean when we live in a world where wildfires are causing trees to emit more carbon dioxide than they consume? / The New York Times [$]
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After a firmware update bricked their refrigerators, Samsung customers in Korea mourn their spoiled food just days before a major holiday. / Ars Technica
Jaya Saxena: Instagram and Google have made it practically impossible to find out where a restaurant is actually located. / Ravenous
“There are eight billion humans on earth in reality, not 65 billion streams of Ed Sheeran.” Streaming success is a hallucination. / Dada Drummer Almanach
The growing schism at Dartmouth, where some university leaders have surrendered their writing needs to AI, while prohibiting students from “cheating” with the same technology. / Inside Higher Ed
“I couldn’t believe you wrote to me. When I saw your name pop up, I was like, ‘Oh, fuck, does he realize?’” A Slate writer interviews a hostile Slate commenter. / Slate
Choose Your Own Adventure is launching an “adult-focused” imprint later this year, with one of the forthcoming titles described as “White Lotus meets Sex and the City.” / Gizmodo
“Or maybe, don’t go into that good night at all. Todd is probably there with his deltoids.” Ways other than “gentle” you could go into that good night. / McSweeney’s