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PICKS are stories from many sources, selected by our editors or recommended by our readers because they are important, surprising, troubling, enlightening, inspiring, or amusing. They appear on our site and in our daily newsletter. Please send suggested articles, videos, podcasts, etc. to picks@whowhatwhy.org.
Long Popular in Asia, Floating Solar Catches On in US (Maria)
The author writes, “When Joe Seaman-Graves, the city planner for the working class town of Cohoes, New York, Googled the term ‘floating solar,’ he didn’t even know it was a thing. What he did know is that his tiny town needed an affordable way to get electricity and had no extra land. But looking at a map, one feature stood out. ‘We have this 14-acre water reservoir,’ he said. Seaman-Graves soon found the reservoir could hold enough solar panels to power all the municipal buildings and streetlights. … He had stumbled upon a form of clean energy that is steeply ramping up. Floating solar panel systems are beginning to boom in the United States after rapid growth in Asia.”
‘My Daughter’s Murder Wasn’t Enough’: In Uvalde, a Grieving Mother Fights Back (Dana)
From Texas Monthly: “One year ago, before the school shooting in Uvalde, Kimberly Mata-Rubio had never been on a plane or given a public speech or scolded a U.S. senator right there in his office. A year in the life of a grieving mother.”
After Tucker Carlson Exits Fox News, Advertisers Start to Return to 8 p.m. Slot (Mili)
From Variety: “Tucker Carlson is out at 8 p.m. on Fox News Channel, and the network hopes that a host of blue-chip advertisers that for years avoided his controversial hour will soon come back in. Since Carlson’s stunning exit last month, a time slot that has been shunned by many Madison Avenue stalwarts seems as if it is being embraced. … ‘We have had over 40 new advertisers come into the hour since we launched the new program, including some of the largest in the country and, really, across all major categories,’ says Jeff Collins, executive vice president of ad sales at Fox News Media, in an interview. ‘We have seen new advertisers come in, and new demand.’”
Why BuzzFeed and Vice Couldn’t Make News Work (Roshni)
From Vanity Fair: “Reversals of fortune are nothing unusual in the news business. But in the last few weeks it’s been gobsmacking to see Vice facing bankruptcy and BuzzFeed shuttering its news division. The [New York] Times, meanwhile, hit its goal of 10 million paying subscribers a year ago and aims to have 15 million by the end of 2027 — more than enough to sustain its large news-gathering operations. It wasn’t that long ago that The Atlantic (in 2009), predicted that it would be the Times that would soon go bankrupt. What happened?”
‘Witness Harassment’: St. Luke’s Filings Show What Led to Ammon Bundy Arrest Warrant (DonkeyHotey)
From the Idaho Statesman: “At least three witnesses are unwilling to testify in St. Luke’s Health System’s defamation lawsuit against [Ammon] Bundy, associate Diego Rodriguez and related entities because they fear the tactics used by the former gubernatorial candidate and his followers, according to St. Luke’s attorney Erik Stidham. It is those alleged actions, and not Bundy’s refusal to respond to the lawsuit in state court, that led to an arrest warrant being issued by a judge. … Stidham said the warrant is the result of Bundy’s failure to follow a court order barring the defendants from ‘witness harassment’ and intimidation.”
MLK’s Famous Criticism of Malcolm X Was a ‘Fraud,’ Author Finds (Gerry)
The author writes, “Jonathan Eig was deep in the Duke University archives researching his new biography of Martin Luther King Jr. when he made an alarming discovery: King’s harshest and most famous criticism of Malcolm X, in which he accused his fellow civil rights leader of ‘fiery, demagogic oratory,’ appears to have been fabricated.”
Unsound Climate Studies Sneak Into Print: Scientists (Laura)
The author writes, “Misleading studies sowing doubt about climate change are getting into peer-reviewed journals, scientists warn, citing recent papers linked to a lawsuit in Germany whose authors denied conflicts of interest. Observers have long questioned the growing number of research journals that take fees from eager academics but often publish their work without rigorous review.”
Some of the First Humans in the Americas Came From China, Study Finds (Michaela)
The author writes, “Some of the first humans to arrive in the Americas included people from what is now China, who arrived in two distinct migrations during and after the last ice age, a new genetics study has found. ‘Our findings indicate that besides the previously indicated ancestral sources of Native Americans in Siberia, the northern coastal China also served as a genetic reservoir contributing to the gene pool,’ said Yu-Chun Li, one of the report authors. Li added that during the second migration, the same lineage of people settled in Japan, which could help explain similarities in prehistoric arrowheads and spears found in the Americas, China and Japan.”
