Summer Rooster-ing: It's August in Camp ToB!

Social reading in the time of social distancing! August in Camp ToB 2020 means much about writers & lovers & waitresses & orthodontia.

The Morning News

Camp ToB 2020

Week Nine: Writers & Lovers

Two months down, one to go. Welcome to August at Camp ToB 2020, where we’re discussing the first half of Writers & Lovers by Lily King.

by The Tournament of Books Staff
Australia's booming rooftop solar industry doesn't just rely on down-under sunshine—they've got the policy mix right, too.
↩︎ GreenTech Media 1d
Close-reading the Palantir founder's neo-Marxist dissertation for clues into Silicon Valley's coziness toward authoritarianism.
↩︎ Boundary2 1d

"No Black athlete in America is more afraid of ownership than the Black baseball player... It's not like in basketball or football where you have big numbers of Blacks. Here, they know they don't need you. They can play baseball without you."

A profile of Bruce Maxwell, the first MLB player to kneel, and his conflictedness about returning to a league that scorned him.
↩︎ ESPN
1d
Tasty lede: "Halloumi cheese has pushed EU trade policy into uncharted and potentially hazardous territory."
↩︎ POLITICO 1d
Experiments from the Amazon suggest "octave equivalence" is at least co-determined by culture.
↩︎ Quanta 1d
Global funding for police training from the United States has increased to about $146 million in 2019 from $4.3 million in 2001.
↩︎ The Ballot 2d

A different shot of the explosions in Beirut: "As bride Dr. Israa Seblani stood smiling in a square close to the couple's wedding venue, the blast could be heard and the bouquet and the bottom of her dress were blown away in the aftermath that saw damage to buildings and smoke in the street. Seblani quickly ran away towards a building."

Via NextDraft

2d
As a racist term, "master bedroom" is on its way out among realtors. Many home builders dropped it years ago for "primary suite."
↩︎ MarketWatch 2d
With Trump, the GOP totally abandoned its 2013 "autopsy" for short-term gains and long-term failure.
↩︎ NPR 2d
An interview with photographer Jeremy Grier about how he's made his artistic process therapeutic.
↩︎ It's Nice That 2d
Work by Boston-based painter Kseniya Galper.
↩︎ BOOOOOOOM 2d
A survey of rents during the pandemic: falling in San Francisco, Denver, New York; rising in Cleveland, Indianapolis, and Reno.
↩︎ Wolf Street 2d
In Portland, "Caesar the no drama llama" brings a calm demeanor to many protests, beloved by activists and police alike.
↩︎ The Washington Post 2d

NPR's "Code Switch" does a good video episode to explain why, until recently, it's been a lot easier in the running community to talk about safety for white women than for runners of color.

Via Drawing Links

2d

“Tarahumara runners are just as challenged as Western ultramarathoners,” the authors write, “and they too suffer from injuries, cramps, nausea, and other problems when racing long distances.”

A new study says the 2009 hit Born to Run suffered from “the fallacy of the athletic savage.”
↩︎ Outside
2d
Better than Trump's National Garden would be a monument to American nothingness, similar to Roman altars to the "Unknown God."
↩︎ The New York Times 2d
The modern radiator was invented to fight epidemics like 1918's Spanish Influenza, heating housing without sharing airflow.
↩︎ Bloomberg CityLab 2d

Why do we have so few big telecom companies? Because Robert Bork once wrote a book.

Some good podcast episodes we discovered recently, thanks to the (always good) weekly links roundup by Innovations for Poverty Action, that explain why your cable and phone bills are so high.

And, related/unrelated:

3d
For academics and business travelers: An analysis from July of methods to decarbonize conference travel after COVID-19.
↩︎ Nature 3d