The Morning News

Before the war, Iran exported an average of two million barrels a day; now, it’s storing crude in improvised containers and trying to ship it by rail to China. / The Wall Street Journal [$]

It’s unlikely and potentially illegal, but wartime efforts are certainly a way the White House might attempt to nationalize AI. / The Atlantic [$]

Paul Ford: Because AI companies will always act like companies, the only way to get them to do the good they’ve promised is through regulation. / The New York Times [$]

To solve the problem of data centers, we need smart governance, not stopgap moratoria. “We should be wary of proposals that would send burdens elsewhere.” / Jacobin

Hoping to fill its federal funding gap, a Sacramento Planned Parenthood clinic expands its services to include Botox and IV hydration for skin rejuvenation. / NPR

Comparing acetaminophen to ibuprofen and all the situations for which you might take them shows you’re probably taking the wrong painkiller. / Asterisk

The patch for the 13th crew rotation with SpaceX pays homage to Apollo 13, with a dragon replacing the original insignia’s iconic horses. / Ars Technica

Reputedly the oldest continuously operated, family-owned Chinese restaurant in America, the Pekin Noodle Parlor in Butte, Mont., has closed after 115 years. / The MSU Exponent

Three decades after Jim Harrison asked “What have we done with the thighs?” in Esquire, it’s time to ask: What have we done with the chicken breasts? / Slate

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A surprising point in this beautiful piece about the enduring magic of messages in bottles is that the trend can be traced to an 1833 short story by Edgar Allen Poe. / The New Yorker

Archaeologists have found a papyrus with a fragment of Homer’s Iliad incorporated into a Roman-era Egyptian mummy. / University of Barcelona

One of the largest known astrolabes—a Lahore-made 1612 model once owned by the last ruling king of Jaipur—is expected to break records at auction. / Artnet

Unrelated: A fiction workshop revives the Significant Objects concept, where a writer buys a thing for under $5, writes about it, then auctions it off. / Tucson Essay Club

Installation artist Nicole Nikolich crochets artworks of classic computer games and interfaces. / Lace in the Moon, Kottke

“[I] made a beeline for Brighton Beach, looking for my grandmother’s apartment, and then moved northward to find the hospital where I was born. (I found both.)” Up close with Joe Macken’s scale model of New York City. / Hyperallergic

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Chicagoans are still dealing with the trauma from Operation Midway Blitz, where only 3% of detainees were the kinds of criminals Trump said they targeted. / The New York Times [$]

“The world’s first border wall failed. It now lies buried beneath Iraq’s desert sands.” On the futility of borders. / The Guardian

The Trump administration wants to bankrupt the Southern Poverty Law Center—already, Fidelity is blocking account holders from donating stock to the charity. / A Whole Lotta Nothing

Nilay Patel explains “software brain,” where everything looks like a database, a view that frequently doesn’t match reality. / The Verge

See also: A venture capitalist vibe-coded a browser plugin that adds typos to AI-generated emails. / Futurism

“Once upon a time I thought of myself as a writer with a side hustle. Now I think of myself as a fire lookout whose income subsidizes a dilettante’s interest in scribbling.” How writers get by. / The Baffler

Outraged over a planned data center, a St. Louis suburb has removed four council members who supported the project, and now wants to recall the mayor. / The Wall Street Journal [$]

See also: Maine’s governor vetoes a state moratorium on new data center builds, citing the Town of Jay’s support of a new project in the region. / Gizmodo

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“We broke the fabric down by washing, scrubbing and even greasing the material to give it a well-worn look.” The complicated history of the coat from Withnail and I. / On the Row

A South Korean man could face up to five years in prison for posting an AI-generated image that misled authorities trying to capture a wolf that escaped from a zoo. / Ars Technica

See also: Chernobyl’s wolf population has grown seven-fold since the 1986 nuclear disaster, likely from mutations that have made them more resistant to cancer. / ScienceAlert

Unrelated: In 1692, a man in Latvia testified that locals’ suspicions were correct, and that he was a werewolf, only he was working to protect the town. / Amusing Planet

In an experiment, seeds appear to emerge from dormancy at the sound of rain. / MIT News

An illustrated visit to the American Museum of Natural History, and the crushing realization of human time, by Elena Megalos. / Longreads

Coyote v. Acme was only the latest in Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav’s killing spree of movies for tax writeoffs. / The Verge [$]

“Clicking ‘SoundCloud rap’ currently redirects to the page for ‘mumble rap,’ which he thinks is a ‘crime against humanity.’” The Wikipedians chronicling today’s music microgenres. / Pitchfork

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President Trump says the United States will destroy any vessel laying mines in the Strait of Hormuz. / Al Jazeera

Scholars say the US-Israel war on Iran is fated to be a frozen conflict: “an unresolved war that continues at a low level below the threshold of full-scale combat.” / The Conversation

Thanks to the war, officials say fully replacing our stockpile of munitions may take up to six years. / The Wall Street Journal [$]

Japan amends its postwar pacifist policy to begin exporting lethal weapons. / The Associated Press

A roundtable discussion about the evolution of war-gaming. “Is there something particularly German about that? Yeah, probably.” / Asterisk Magazine 

Unrelated: Palantir is now selling merch that rips off Virgil Abloh. / GQ

Thanks to rising sea temperatures, ancient bacteria are reemerging, increasing the risk of infection for beachgoers and shellfish. / Rhode Island Current

What’s driving the wildfires in south Georgia and northern Florida? Exceptional drought conditions worsened by climate change. / Grist

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A witness to the unsolved death of a rap star laments the case now being stuck in a loop of internet speculation. / POW

Cocaine use in the US among 18- to 25-year-olds fell from 2.1 million in 2017 to 811,000 in 2024. / The Guardian

A 24-year-old reporter attends her first party without a phone. “My conversations with strangers start to feel easier.” / USA Today

A reporter reflects on her 20 years of “ambivalently watching, practicing, loving, and hating boxing.” / Recurrent Concussion

“Real life felt too hard. In the virtual world, I felt better.” Life as an aspiring pro gamer in China. / Sixth Tone 

Related: The poem “Anyone Who Is Still Trying” by David Hernandez. / Reflections

A couple reasons why it’s not unreasonable to hope your soul “will be able to outlast your body’s death.” / aeon

Some photographs of women urinating while standing in the streets of 1990s London. / Flashbak

A round-up of hotels inside or near national parks. Also, a round-up of independent outdoors-y publications. / AFAR, Indie Outdoors

Illustrations by Daniele Castellano recall Tim Burton and Carl Jung. / It’s Nice That

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A new report finds “credible sexual harassment allegations against 162 sitting [US] state officials, in 424 incidents between 2013 and 2026.” / Mother Jones

See also: The US Constitution says it’s Congress’s job to police its members, yet time and again current leaders refuse to do anything that might diminish their margin. / The Washington Post [$]

How NASA’s Orion managed to send high-definition images back to Earth: Instead of relying solely on traditional radio waves, they used optical laser communications. / Ars Technica

More than 34 million people along the US Atlantic and Gulf coasts are at “very high” or “high” risk of flooding, according to one of the most comprehensive studies on floods. / The Associated Press

The Strait of Hormuz closure means aluminum is suffering “probably the largest single supply shock a base ⁠metals market has suffered in the post-2000 era.” / Reuters 

Since 2003, disease—and now tariffs and a historic freeze—have caused Florida’s once-mighty orange industry to decline by more than 95%. / Slate

See also: With hundreds of new varieties developed every year, America’s bioengineered potato industry is booming, and it’s all about the chips. / The Associated Press

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New evidence reveals cemeteries as thriving centers of biodiversity for insects and other wildlife—possibly due in part to the lack of human activity. / Grist

Unearthly, vibrant sculptures of marine life, by Lisa Stevens. / Colossal

People’s reverence for certain artworks can border on treating the objects like people, except what does it mean when the art refuses to reciprocate? / Hyperallergic

“In the act of becoming automatons, we bring ourselves that much closer to the thing we really fear: being left alone, without any of the care or materials we need to survive.” / A Working Library

For well over a century, empathy has played a larger role in shaping how humans approach the world, and it would be disastrous for that to end. / The Hedgehog Review

“If our enemies have no oversight then why should we?” Palantir’s manifesto, translated for humans. / The Verge [$]

Members of a North Korean hacking group who, according to one expert, “don't have the skills to write code” are now able to do significant damage thanks to AI. / WIRED

“Don’t blame books for being too expensive. Everything else is more expensive, and that’s why you can’t afford books.” / Miller’s Book Review

Cormac McCarthy’s Lotus Esprit S4 is up for auction by his brother, who says the late author was known to tear across Texas on 100 mph-plus road trips. / InsideHook

See also: A profile of opera singer, mountain climber, and race car driver Dmitri Nabokov, who was also his father’s best translator and collaborator. / The Morning News

Unrelated: McLaren has signed its youngest driver yet—an 11-year-old—to its development program. / BBC Sport

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Only four candidates are running to be the next secretary-general of the United Nations, as compared to 13 in 2016. / The Associated Press

Hezbollah fires drones and rockets in retaliation for the Israeli military’s multiple violations of the ceasefire. / Reuters

Did you know? Thanks to the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, helium prices have spiked and suppliers are declaring force majeure. / Construction Physics

Another consequence to consider in the coming months? Condoms will cost more, and we’ll see more canceled flights. / The Guardian, Semafor

Unrelated: What to know before you install a solar panel on your balcony. / Canary Media

Regarding US-China relations: “If this is a chess match, the US is taking pawns off the periphery rather than controlling ⁠the center of the ​board.” / Reuters

More than 100 former NASA astronauts start a nonprofit to advocate for constitutional limits “and bringing back civic responsibility.” / The Wall Street Journal [$]

Whistle-blowers say the National Security Agency is using Anthropic’s new Mythos edition of Claude, the one that got embargoed for being too dangerous. / Axios

Spencer Ackerman: I don’t know what sort of cybersecurity model is going to exist if Mythos is what Anthropic says it is. / Forever Wars

The McClatchy news group has been using AI to rewrite stories and run them under unwitting journalists’ bylines, fanning the flames of a nascent union fight. / Tedium, The Columbia Journalism Review

An accountant explains what it was like to do his own taxes this year with Claude. “Is this better than a human? Better than me, for sure.” / Geoffrey Doempke

Related: Zoom and Tinder are partnering with Sam Altman’s eyeball-scanning company. / Gizmodo

“Degree hacking,” “college speed runs” and “hyper-accelerated degrees” refer to students earning degrees at online colleges in mere weeks or months. / The Washington Post [$]

District governments in China offer housing incentives to marathon runners, seen as a demographic “with comparatively high purchasing power.” / Sixth Tone

Summarizing a new history of the interwar Latin American left, also yet more writing from Karl Ove Knausgaard. / Africa Is a Country, The Drift

Tejal Rao investigates the many scams—in grocery stores and restaurants—involving so-called Wagyu beef. “What are we chasing, exactly?” / The New York Times [$]

The overhauled Los Angeles County Museum of Art mostly gets raves (unless you hate the idea of “no pathways”) as the city attempts a pre-Olympics glow-up. / The New York Times [$], The Wall Street Journal [$], Torched

Some drawings of animals wandering through neighborhoods at twilight. / Colossal

“Please give me all of your money, or I will tickle you to death.” A true bank-robbing story. / Dreamland

As ever, we’d like to give a big round of thanks to all of our sustaining members who keep this newsletter running. Thank you! —Andrew & Rosecrans

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“In my view, Russia played the Americans again—played the president of the United States.” Ukraine has finally given up on Trump. / The Atlantic [$]

Trump has long cultivated a belief that he’s “fucking crazy,” only now his irrationality has gone beyond even what Kissinger would have recommended. / The New York Review

Related: “Even Trump’s most basic claims about the Iran war can’t be trusted.” / CNN

The history of the IRS’s Form 1040, which when introduced was a lot simpler, and only applied to people making more than the equivalent of $100,000 a year. / Tedium

Secret memos reveal how the Supreme Court’s “shadow docket” has been shaping presidential power since 2016, when it curbed Obama’s Clean Power Plan. / The New York Times [$]

Earth’s artificial light increased overall by 16% between 2014 and 2022, even as some areas dimmed due to regulations, economic turmoil, and the pandemic. / The Guardian

Following the death of his predecessor, Genki Katata is the new keeper of Kyoto’s cherry blossom records, a trove of climate data stretching back 1,200 years. / The New York Times [$]

Mexico will reroute a forthcoming passenger train to preserve the site of 16 pre-Hispanic artworks recently discovered in a nearby cave. / Hyperallergic

The idea that the US government would invest in private-sector companies was unthinkable just a few years ago—now, the fear of losing to China has changed all that. / The Wall Street Journal [$]

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Just outside of LA, Monterey Park becomes the first city in California to ban data centers within city limits. / Blood in the Machine

See also: When a Mac Mini server farm does the job of a cloud full of NVIDIA chips, it’s one less reason to believe all these data centers are inevitable. / Grasping Reality

More sustainable than steel and durable in an earthquake, laminated timber is the building material we need right now. / Grist

Artist Rachel Youn repurposes used household electronics, along with artificial flowers, into kinetic, almost organic sculptures. / The Verge [$]

“We are absolutely surrounded by information in the form of DNA and RNA, at all times.” How scientists are using airborne genetic material. / Nature

The music industry fosters buzz with the “underplay,” booking artists for too-small venues that are sure to sell out. / Bloomberg [$]

Beyond “wellness,” the recently shuttered Self magazine offered a beacon of hope for women suffering from chronic illness. / Mother Jones

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Details on the rift between Iran’s political leaders and its newly empowered military hard-liners. / The Wall Street Journal [$]

Iran vows retaliation after the United States seizes a cargo ship. Meanwhile, JD Vance appears to be heading to peace talks that may or may not exist. / CNN

“It may or may not come as a surprise that pretty much everything Donald Trump asserted in his extended ‘peace is upon us’ social media spree on Friday turns out to have been bullshit.” / Foreign Exchanges

Unrelated: Seeking to deter smugglers, India threatens to release crocodiles and venomous snakes on its border with Bangladesh. / The Diplomat

Analysts say the war on Iran is fundamentally boosting demand for electric vehicles. / Semafor

Even after RFK’s previous $500 million cut to mRNA vaccine research, advances are still being made—like a promising new booster against pancreatic cancer. / Johns Hopkins, NBC News

Kyla Scanlon on how the stock market no longer reckons with reality: “[Markets] have assumed that the US government will not allow them to implode, and that assumption is putting the world economy at stake.” / The New York Times [$]

All the data you’ve shared online can’t be fully recalled, but you can actively reduce what’s actively available for sale. / Card Catalog

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A political economist at Stanford explains how AI has sped up his research—and how he thinks it could go much, much faster. / The Roots of Progress

Texas Tech bans professors from mentioning or, in the future, studying gender beyond a strict norm. / Inside Higher Ed

Twenty-eight things an author tells creative writing students when asked. “‘Finding your voice’ is a red herring to prevent you from finding your voice.” / Meditations in an Emergency

A round-up of bus tickets from Milwaukee in the 1950s, old matchbooks from Southern California, dramatic moments in food media. / Present & Correct, JStor Daily, Ravenous

The National Coffee Association says Americans now prefer coffee to water. / Sprudge

Two friends attempt to eat food from every country in the world via restaurants in New York City. / YouTube

See also: Jazz performed by New York’s subway trains. / Trainjazz

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Some Gulf and European leaders (who won’t go on-record) say a US-Iran peace deal will take about six months. / Bloomberg [$]

A 10-day ceasefire takes effect between Israel and Hezbollah. / NPR

A good summary of Israel’s “one-state reality,” showing how it’s an apartheid system. / The New York Times [$]

Laura Rozen: Trump himself may not yet know what he wants to do. / Diplomatic

A report says that thanks to Trump and Israel’s war on Iran, this is the first energy shock where going green is not a moral or long‑term bet, but the cheapest way for countries to protect their economies. / The Rockefeller Foundation

Thus far, damaged energy infrastructure in the Gulf looks to cost nearly $60 billion to repair. / Oilprice

Unrelated: Investigating an award-winning photograph that depicts a murder in Bosnia. / New Lines Magazine

Connie Ballmer, wife of former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, gives NPR $80 million to upgrade its tech infrastructure. / Reliable Sources

Brokerages are developing accounts for teenagers, enabling them to buy stocks without parental approval. / The Wall Street Journal [$]

Young women report that, perhaps unsurprisingly, “looksmaxxing” leads young men to be more critical of women’s bodies. / Bustle

Gaby Del Valle says the only way to fight deepfakes is to make deepfakes. / The Verge [$]

See also: Remembering Iris Murdoch’s arguing for centering love in philosophy. / The Hedgehog Review

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Waiting for an organ donor may no longer be necessary once we have “more complex pigs” to harvest from. / The MIT Press Reader

From last month, an explainer for why school backpacks have gotten so bad: “repeat failure, repeat purchase, repeat revenue.” / Worse on Purpose

Some musings (connected to Halo) on why certain psychological phenomena continue to be studied after being debunked. / Experimental History

A right-wing press is reprinting the original 1920s Hardy Boys books because the 1950s versions were seemingly too progressive. / The New York Review of Books

One hundred years ago this week, the Book of the Month club mailed readers its first selection: “a proto-feminist witch novel.” / Today in History

Unrelated: Ten reasons to get into vaporwave now. / zensounds

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Some immigrant taxpayers subject to deportation are choosing not to file this year—a trend that would mean a loss of $479 billion in tax revenue over the next decade. / The Washington Post [$]

See also: Of the more than $65 billion in tax write-offs for charitable donations every year, nearly all of it is claimed by the ultra-wealthy. / Vox [$]

Based on how much you earned in 2025, calculate how the US government is spending your tax dollars. / USA Facts

The Pentagon is asking some American manufacturers, including GM and Ford, to help produce wartime munitions and equipment. / The Wall Street Journal [$]

“People have a need to do something, misguided as they are. And often it involves their own ego.” A son grapples with a request to drop a bomb on Iran in his father’s name. / Rolling Stone

Live Nation-Ticketmaster is a monopoly, a Manhattan jury has found, and could face a breakup, far surpassing the bizarre settlement Trump’s DoJ made with the company. / NPR, The Verge [$]

In its extreme pivot from shoe retailer to AI company, Allbirds asked shareholders to approve removing "environmental conservation” from its charter. / AP, Gizmodo

See also: “It might be most accurate to think of Quince not as a retailer or a tech company or even a supply chain company, but as a series of arbitrage opportunities.” / Bloomberg [$]

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The Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument has completed its goal of building a 3D map of the universe. / Berkeley Lab

Sperm whales have their own alphabet, and researchers have now found that the animals’ vowels work the same way as in human speech. / The Guardian

In a new study, participants using AI to perform a task quickly become dependent on it; and when access is cut off, they’re unwilling to attempt the task on their own. / Engadget

A worker at an Amazon warehouse in Oregon died on the floor; other workers say they were told to keep loading trucks while the body lay nearby for over an hour. / Yahoo! Finance

Why capitalism inherently devalues—yet depends on—free housework and care: “Without unpaid work, paid work would be impossible.” / Jacobin

A new drama in China focuses on contemporary “pickup artist” culture, where manipulation also  applies to workplace relationships. / Sixth Tone

Bystanders are less willing to perform CPR on women because they don’t want to touch their chests. / Your Local Epidemiologist

“The concept of an elegant chuck wagon buckling beneath the weight of its cargo of bread is not unique in Las Vegas to Joël Robuchon.” Caity Weaver finds America’s best free restaurant bread. / The Atlantic [$]

A pair of aquariums in Japan map their penguins’ various romances, heartbreaks, and polyamorous throuplings. / Spoon & Tamago

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European officials are assembling a “European NATO,” looking to supplement US military assets with their own. / The Wall Street Journal [$]

With oil prices so high recently, “demand destruction” is starting to unfold. / NBC News 

Vice President JD Vance finds himself roundly mocked after a weekend of failures. / The Independent

A political scientist says a clear view of the situation requires us to adopt “a more messy model of how democracies rise and fall.” / Yascha Mounk

American soldiers on #MilitaryTok “convey vulnerability, anxiety, and in many cases, snark” over the prospect of deployment. / The Guardian

See also: Reflections on the Epstein files, a child’s claims against Trump, and an expensive, unpopular, illegal war. / The London Review of Books

A cosmic odometer can determine how far you’ve traveled in space since you were born. / Cosmic Odometer

The number of cyber cafés in China rose 12.7% last year, complete with “lavish buffets, hot springs, and hotels.” / Sixth Tone

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One way to prevent the deaths of dozens of homeless people? Get rid of clothing donation bins. / The Believer

Hannah Ritchie: The fact that many cancers are caused by infections is good news: Humans have a decent track record of finding ways to beat infections. / By the Numbers

A list of 84 contemporary heresies. E.g., “Anonymity should be discouraged, and reduced to smallest amounts.” / KK

An “alpine divorce” refers to a contemporary but apparently longstanding practice of men abandoning their partners while hiking. / The New York Times [$]

English used to have multiple pronouns to refer to you and one other person—e.g., wit, unker, and git. / BBC News

Unrelated: “If Japanese fashion magazines were my gateway to clothes, Japanese fashion blogs are the reason I care about them.” / Big Pants Waste Precious Fabric

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An interactive explainer of how, despite the US blockade, Iran has geography on its side in the Strait of Hormuz. / The Washington Post [$]

Yesterday, two members of Congress—Rep. Eric Swalwell and Rep. Tony Gonzales—resigned amid sexual misconduct allegations. / The 19th

See also: If every congressman facing credible rape allegations resigned, we’d have no one left to govern the country. / McSweeney’s

“They can just pay fines forever.” An audit finds most tech companies ignore user opt-outs of cookie tracking. / 404 Media

Municipalities say all the revenue from traffic violations caught by a company operating cameras on school buses ends up paying for the service itself and isn’t mitigating dangerous driving. / Bloomberg [$]

How Trump’s now-deleted post depicting himself as Christ once again stoked GOP infighting and asked his Catholic supporters to choose between him and their faith. / Hyperallergic

A struggling NHS in Britain shows how fascism follows austerity, a worrying prospect for a US stock market fueled by AI psychosis. / Pluralistic

What can’t AI do? Spell “December,” for one. / Instagram

See also: Valuations of the top 10 tech companies have returned to pre-AI boom levels. / Apollo

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Researchers find cancer rates are higher among people who live near livestock feeding operations in three states, but the causes are still unknown. / Inside Climate News

As more people walk around with headphones, a new bicycle bell is designed to cut through noise cancellation to keep cyclists and pedestrians safe. / CarScoops

Rediscovering Picture of Nobody, a forgotten 1936 satire in which desperate poet William Shakespere navigates London publishing. / The Baffler

Starting in the 1980s, an indie and punk music fan secretly recorded more than 10,000 shows in Chicago, and volunteers are now making his trove available to all. / AP, Internet Archive

This is hilarious: From October, Matt Berry learns to use a new synthesizer. / YouTube

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Further escalating its war with Iran, the United States begins a military blockade of the Strait of Hormuz. / Politico

What makes Iran’s Lego-themed propaganda videos so effective? Because AI is trained on so much Western content, it’s the perfect tool to reach American audiences. / BBC News

See also: A history of gas station signs is also a history of America’s national mood. / The Atlantic [$]

“Optimistic people tend to be pretty happy and healthy, but they can also be a bit complacent.” Hope versus optimism. / Vox

Weekends aren’t meaningful because you have two days off, it’s because others do as well—and when workplaces try to encroach on that, they’re damaging society. / The Hustle

Traffic fatalities in the US increase on days big albums are released, apparently related to distracted driving while using streaming apps. / The New York Times [$]

Any benefits non-diabetics may get from wearing a continuous glucose monitor can be muddied by advice from influencers and a need for perfectionism. / The Verge

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The artist behind the world’s pinkest pink has made the color freely available to everyone except the artist who trademarked Vantablack. / My Modern Met

When New York diners use AI to advertise their food and atmosphere, the result is a synthetic version of the authentic experience patrons want. / The New York Groove

In a study of mosquito flight paths, student volunteers temporarily donate their bodies to research, donning mesh suits and waiting for bites. / Georgia Tech

When asked to imagine certain cognitive tasks, some vegetative patients show brain responses that match those activities. / The New York Times [$]

iPods may not be back—yet—but second-hand sales are on the rise, and growing interest in digital audio players shows it’s more than nostalgia. / Gizmodo

Vintage Pan Am luggage tags recreated by Ella Freire. / Ella Freire

Watch: Videos of skateboarding without music are a sort of ASMR. / YouTube, MetaFilter

“Nobody told me that watching competent people do a hard thing correctly would be the most therapeutic experience of my adult life.” Artemis II is competency porn. / Airplane Mode

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A survey finds consumer sentiment in the United States falling to the second-lowest level recorded in 70-plus years. / CNN

At the same time, consumer prices are up 3.3% from a year ago, hotter than February’s gain of 2.4%. / PBS

Why gas prices are still rising despite the ceasefire in the Middle East: “The physical disruption is real and people are frustrated.” / The Wall Street Journal [$]

“People in her building banned any visitors they didn’t know, and even limited deliveries, to avoid being targeted.” Recounting a month of life in Lebanon. / The Dial

Unrelated: What it’s like to live on the world’s most remote inhabited island. / NPR 

Life in Canadian cities is said to be destabilized by “the micromobility revolution,” i.e., electric bikes and scooters. / Maclean’s

Details from inside the command hub of one of Mexico’s largest surveillance networks. / rest of world

See also: How a high-tech food bank stocked with free groceries works in Shenzhen. / Sixth Tone

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If you’re wondering if artificial intelligence is going to replace your job in five years, maybe ask yourself if you are coal or horse. (You want to be coal.) / The Atlantic [$]

Nils Gilman: The most prized future workers will be those who can spot a meaningful signal “and translate it into action that others understand and trust.” / Noema

An artist used her drawing board to prevent ICE agents in Minneapolis from shooting her. / The Art Newspaper

Researchers craft an equation to predict the permeability of a given coffee. / Sprudge

Is the best, most hellish McMansion exterior of all time actually a McTuscan heaven? / McMansion Hell

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The US says the ceasefire didn’t include Lebanon, but Iran says it did, a contention that could end the agreement before it even gets started. / The New York Times [$]

Related: Did Israel attack Lebanon to spoil the ceasefire? / The Guardian

The war with Iran may wreak havoc on markets around the world, and “no matter how energy-secure the United States is, it is still part of a global economy.” / Vox [$]

For oil companies, there’s such a thing as oil prices being too high; or, everything we know about oil markets we learned from Landman. / NPR

To Iran, a Strait of Hormuz toll booth is more valuable than any deal Trump might muster, and may provide insurance against future attacks. / Foreign Policy

See also: Trump seems to think he’s going to negotiate his way into a piece of the toll booth money. / The New Republic

A record number of Israeli settlers have attempted to smuggle sacrificial animals into the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound for Passover, sparking worries of a takeover. / Al Jazeera

“The result has been something like an inverse caricature of Republican complaints about diversity, equity, and inclusion.” Pete Hegseth is trying to resegregate the military. / The Atlantic [$]

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“The shocking truth about this president that we’ve been sitting on for months is now available for preorder.” / McSweeney’s

A study finds that blocking the internet from your phone for two weeks can help reverse the cognitive and mental health damage devices are doing to our brains. / The Washington Post [$]

On Lena Dunham and the reassuring sense that just when you think there’s nothing new anymore, there are always people making things. / The Melt by Jason Diamond

Eco-friendly dupes of Lululemon’s product line—plus some light copyright infringement—show how the activewear giant could evolve to more sustainable practices. / mumumelon

Deep listening to Basil Bunting’s 1966 poem “Briggflatts” portends the danger of creating eventual “acoustic fossils.” / Literary Hub

Unrelated: Archaeologists recently unearthed more than 43,000 lists and other notes by ancient Egyptians, offering new glimpses into their daily lives. / Gizmodo

New research suggests the first dice are more than 12,000 years old, double the previous estimate. / Hyperallergic

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Pakistan announces a two-week ceasefire between Iran, Israel, and the United States, saying it applies to Israel’s attacks in Lebanon. / The Wall Street Journal

Netanyahu disagrees about the Lebanon bit. Meanwhile, Israel passes a death penalty law that only applies to Palestinians. / Reuters, Al Jazeera

Trump declares total victory, Hegseth says the same, analysts say the opposite. / Bloomberg [$], Politico, X

Prior to the war, there was deep skepticism in the White House, but unlike the previous Trump administration, no one was willing to question him. / The New York Times [$]

See also: How many people have been killed in the US-Israel war so far? Several thousand. / The Independent

Anthropic says it’s holding back its newest model for fear of cyber threats. / Platformer

See also: “Iran-Linked Hackers Are Sabotaging US Energy and Water Infrastructure.” / WIRED

Nearly half of Americans earning over $200,000 a year say you need an income of $300,000 to afford a house. / USA Today

If you care about improving the lives of the poorest of the poor, “you can be assured that GiveDirectly is a good use of funds.” / Homo Economicus

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“I was here when we turned the lights on. I might as well stick around until we turn the lights off.” A short profile of one of Apple’s most longstanding employees. / The New York Times [$]

The “best seat in town” in Paris is said to be one of its 435 self-cleaning public bathrooms. / Torched

Some post-Eaton Fire photographs of Altadena, Calif. / Analog Forever

Some “image boards” drawn by Hayao Miyazaki. / Animation Obsessive

A rundown of the “unwritten rules” of celebrity podcast interviews. / LA Material

“Somehow, my well-loved grandfather provoked the creation of an undeniably compelling yet undeniably bigoted image.” A writer grapples with her family’s steakhouse’s troubled advertisement. / n+1

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