Corporate Transition, Rogers Share Structure, and Victoria Housing Affordability

Tuesday morning news drop

• Corporate Transition When presenting as a man, this “tech bro” entrepreneur was the toast of Silicon Valley—until she stepped into boardrooms as a woman. (Elle)

• Rogers’ family feud spotlights dual-class share structures A type of corporate equity structure used by several of Canada’s most prominent companies is once again under fire from critics in light of the current chaos at Rogers Communications Inc. (Global)

• The Revolt of the American Worker The labor situation, by contrast, looks like a genuine reduction in supply. Total employment is still five million below its prepandemic peak. Employment in the leisure and hospitality sector is still down more than 9 percent. Yet everything we see suggests a very tight labor market. (New York Times)

• CityLab University: Understanding Homelessness in America As economic disruption threatens to trigger a spike in housing instability, here’s an essential primer on the causes and consequences of a thorny urban problem. (CityLab)

• A Secretive Hedge Fund Is Gutting Newsrooms Alden Global Capital, a secretive hedge fund that has quickly, and with remarkable ease, become one of the largest newspaper operators in the country. The new owners did not fly to Chicago to address the staff, nor did they bother with paeans to the vital civic role of journalism. Instead, they gutted the place. (The Atlantic)

• Let It Be? No, Let’s Remix The Beatles Let It Be is a complicated album, initially intended as a simple way for the band to get back to its rock ‘n’ roll roots. Paul McCartney’s idea was to have the four Beatles document the process of writing songs, culminating in a live concert as part of a television special. The Beatles hadn’t performed live in three years, and with Ringo scheduled to do a film shoot, they had just about a month to make this all happen. (NPR)

• After ‘Grand Theft Auto III,’ Open-World Games Were Never (and Always) the Same Twenty years ago, ‘Grand Theft Auto III’ set a new standard for open-world video games. The titles it inspired have grown bigger and busier, but it takes more than massive maps to give gamers the freedom they felt on their first trip to 3-D Liberty City. (Ringer)

• How sensitive are we to rising rates Interest rates have been in the news again lately, with Scotiabank making an agressive forecast that inflation will stick around and the Bank of Canada will raise rates 8 times to 2.25% by the end of 2023. Others think we will likely see low rates for longer, or even get into negative rates like we’ve seen in much of Europe. The first thing to realize is that there’s no reason to believe that anyone has any information about where rates are going. Predictions of interest rates by experts (and non-experts) have been fantastically wrong for decades. (House Hunt Victoria)

• Is Victoria overpriced? The CMHC says it isn’t—but we have no reason to believe them (Capital Daily)

Rogers Communications, Worker Resignations, and the Pandemic Era

Monday morning news drop

• Board votes, backroom deals and betrayal: The battle for control at Rogers The turmoil engulfing Canada’s largest wireless carrier has turned to near chaos as Edward Rogers fights to cement control over Rogers Communications Inc. after being ousted as chair, and CEO Joe Natale and top executives consider a mass exodus from the company. (Globe and Mail)

• Edward Rogers fought plans to keep Raptors’ Masai Ujiri, but was thwarted by MLSE head, sources say Edward Rogers actively fought plans to keep Masai Ujiri as head of the Toronto Raptors this summer — saying that he was not worth the amount offered — and then tried to extract an extraordinary benefit for his own company, the Star has learned. (Toronto Star)

• ‘Bring It On’: Mom Fights Son for Control of Canada Mobile Giant There has perhaps never been a boardroom fight in Canadian financial history quite like the one that’s raging inside Rogers Communications Inc. Pitting son against mother and brother against sisters, it’s pulled out into broad daylight a nasty, internecine feud that had been brewing behind closed doors ever since the patriarch of the family, Ted Rogers, died in 2008. (Bloomberg)

• Workers Are Quitting These 4 Kinds of Jobs in Droves The high levels of quitting seems to be a good indication that people are not happy with their jobs — often due to low pay and difficult working conditions — and also that they see better opportunities elsewhere, which is unsurprising given that companies must compete for employees due to a much-heralded labor shortage. The number of job openings in America fell slightly in the most recent report, but it’s still near an all-time high. (Money)

• People Aren’t Meant to Talk This Much Breaking up social-media companies is one way to fix them. Shutting their users up is a better one. (The Atlantic)

• Past Pandemics Remind Us Covid Will Be an Era, Not a Crisis That Fades We are living in the Covid-19 era, not the Covid-19 crisis. There will be a lot of changes that are substantial and persistent. We won’t look back and say, ‘That was a terrible time, but it’s over.’ We will be dealing with many of the ramifications of Covid-19 for decades, for decades.” (New York Times)

• Unfreezing the ice age: the truth about humanity’s deep past Archaeological discoveries are shattering scholars’ long-held beliefs about how the earliest humans organised their societies – and hint at possibilities for our own (Guardian)

• When the Culture Wars Came to Liberty City ‘Grand Theft Auto III’ was far from the first controversial video game, but it became one of the most significant ones in the fights over content, ratings, and free speech. Twenty years later, is a similar backlash even possible? (Ringer)

• 25 great rockumentaries every music (and movie) fan should see From “Woodstock” to “Amy,” here are the best documentaries that every music — and movie — fan should watch (Salon)

Videos of the Week and the Cost of Upgrading Your Phone

Friday morning news drop and videos of the week

• The True Cost of Upgrading Your Phone Buying a $1,000 iPhone can be equivalent to giving up $17,000 in retirement savings or 2,500 cups of coffee. (New York Times)

• From Friends to Squid Game – why Netflix viewing figures matter Up for discussion in the Guardian tech newsletter: the problem with the streaming company’s outlandish claims (The Guardian)

• Remote work is bringing the city to the suburbs How working from home is changing the suburbs as we know them. (Recode)

• The new Fear and Greed The type of fear that now drives most market activity (because it drives most market participants) is something different than the fear we’ve been accustomed to from reading about history. I would label this type of fear Insecurity. (Reformed Broker)

• 4 Things That Will Never Change For Young Investors If you wanted to put your money to work in the financial markets, you most likely had to drive to a brick-and-mortar office to meet with a broker. You would then have to fill out some paperwork to buy a severely limited number of tax-inefficient mutual funds or individual stocks. Those securities would often require an upfront fee in the 5% to 10% range for you to buy them. The entire process could take days for all of the paperwork to go through.(A Wealth of Common Sense)

• Untethered: There’s a Potential Grenade at the Center of the Crypto Economy It’s time to get very worried about Tether, the “stablecoin” at the center of the crypto economy. (Slate)

• Steph Curry’s Repeatable Magic The Warriors star is off to a red-hot start this season, conducting Steve Kerr’s beautiful music on the court. Here’s how he’s doing it. (Ringer)

• Paul McCartney Doesn’t Really Want to Stop the Show Half a century after the Beatles broke up, he’s still correcting the record—and making new ones. (New Yorker)

Videos of the Week

Top 10 Goals from Week 1 of the 2021-22 NHL Season

Top 10 Saves from Week 1 of the 2021-22 NHL Season

Brandon Semenuk Makes Red Bull Rampage History Once Again | Winning Run 2021 The first tail-whips, the first back-to-back win and the first 4-time winner - Brandon Semenuk has done it again! After an unfortunate crash on run 1, Semenuk returned to the top for redemption and put down the run of a lifetime in front of the Utah freeride fans.

Jaxson Riddle's Stylish POV From Red Bull Rampage 2021 Jump on board with Jaxson Riddle as he hammers his mountain bike down the crazy cliffs and jumps of Red Bull Rampage, and joins the elite crew of freeriders to take home the Best Style Award 🤘

The Rise Of Hodgy | Sam Hodgson The small British island of the Isle of Wight hosts this jaw-dropping edit instalment from Sam Hodgson on his home turf of the Isle of Wight Mountain Bike Centre.

STREET RIDER OF THE YEAR NOMINEES - NORA CUP 2021

CULTCREW/ DAKOTA ROCHE/ FOR WHAT IT'S WORTH

Brotherly Love - Steve & Mark Vanderhoek I have always been super close with my brother Mark. From biking, skiing, motorcycles, cliff jumping ect we have always done it together. Growing up in North Vancouver BC gave us the perfect backyard to pursue what we love. Fortunately we also share a passion for the same line of work. Starting out ski patrolling on the local hills we moved into forest fire fighting and Paramedic schooling and eventually landing our careers both working for the City of North Vancouver Fire Department. Unfortunately we share a mutual attraction to injuries. I was able to find a day when we were both somewhat healthy and coming off injury to get out to Pemberton to enjoy a nice fall day with Kelsey Toevs behind the lens.

STREET vs PURE TRIALS - Tomomi Nishikubo

"Freehand" - Jake Mageau

Mark Suciu's "Blue Dog" Adidas Part Mark and his Verso co-collaborator Justin Albert get the band back together to bang out another insane part. Firing off at Pier 7 and going absolutely nuts in New York, Suciu leaves no doubt that he’s one of the best.

Kristin Ebeling's "Guitar" Meow Part - The women are killing it these days and one of our favorite Skate Witches sweeps across the cuts of the West Coast, earning a pro broom in the process.

Nice To See You - Vans Skate - Featuring Victoria BC’s own Una Farrar: Vans proudly presents Nice To See You, our first-ever globally collaborative skateboarding film that was created with help from the Vans skate team and talented filmmakers around the world. Nice To See You expresses the shared feeling of solidarity and commonality amongst skateboarders everywhere, regardless of location, background or identity. The film was produced under the guidance of Los Angeles-based renowned filmmaker and photographer Greg Hunt, with support from creative talents including Tommy Zhao, Shari White (who directed Vans’ Credits), Paul Labadie and Max Pack (who directed Vans Europe’s Tom’s Tales), George Kousoulis, Daniel Dent, and Kyota Kamei. Nice To See You stars: Adelaide Norris, Alexey Krasniy, Breana Geering, Chima Ferguson, Daiki Hoshino, Diego Todd, Digby Luxton, Dustin Henry, Etienne Gagne, Nick Michel, Notis Aggelis, Pedro Delfino, Rio Morishige, Ronnie Sandoval, Shogo Zama, Simon Zuzic, Wang Guohua, and Una Farrar,

Climate Change, China's Bitcoin Exodus, and the Dark Side of the RCMP

Thursday morning news drop

• Climate change: Fossil fuel production set to soar over next decade Despite the flurry of net zero emission goals and the increased pledges of many countries, some of the biggest oil, gas and coal producers have not set out plans for the rapid reductions in fossil fuels that scientists say are necessary to limit temperatures in coming years. (BBC)

• This is the true scale of China’s bitcoin exodus The total percentage of bitcoin mining taking place in China has dropped to almost zero following a recent crackdown (Wired)

• The Dark Side of the RCMP The mystique that has helped cement the RCMP as a national symbol is also what renders it particularly, stubbornly difficult to reform (Walrus)

• What the International Energy Agency’s path to net-zero means for Canada’s oil and gas industry Looking at different policy scenarios around climate change, agency report lays out path for holding warming to 1.5 C (Narwhal)

• The 40-Hour Work Week Is, in Fact, Life There is no magical way to earn a full-time salary without working full-time. (New York Times)

• Economic Side Effects From the Pandemic Following the Great Financial Crisis, economic growth was below trend, inflation was low and wage growth was slow. Since the pandemic, economic growth is higher, inflation is finally taking off and wage growth is accelerating. Each scenario has its own unique challenges and trade-offs. (A Wealth of Common Sense)

• Paying the Covid Bill The death and disruption were bound to create real economic losses, even if things are better now than what one might have feared in the spring of 2020. Modest inflation is the least worst outcome. (The Overshoot)

• Where the Suburbs End A single-family home from the 1950s is now a rental complex and a vision of California’s future. (New York Times)

• How Donald Trump, Elon Musk, and Gwyneth Paltrow Short-Circuit Your Ability to Think Rationally The sketchy rhetorical tricks of politicians, celebs, and con men—and how they work. (Businessweek)

• Dune Is the Sci-Fi Epic Commodities Traders Have Always Wanted Director Denis Villeneuve’s new science fiction film Dune, out on Oct. 22 in the U.S., takes inspiration from an unlikely, unsexy corner of capitalism: commodities trading. By spinning a complex tale about family, revenge, and destiny, it has the drag-on effect of making markets compelling and approachable to a slightly wider audience than usual. (Bloomberg)

Inflation at 4.4% a 16 Year High, The New Meth, and Eleanor Rigby

Wednesday morning news drop

• The New Meth ‘I don’t even know that I would call it meth anymore’ Different chemically than it was a decade ago, the drug is creating a wave of severe mental illness and worsening America’s homelessness problem. (Atlantic)

• Writing “Eleanor Rigby” How one of the Beatles’ greatest songs came to be. My life is full of these happy accidents, and, coming back to where the name Eleanor Rigby comes from, my memory has me visiting Bristol, where Jane Asher was playing at the Old Vic. I was wandering around, waiting for the play to finish, and saw a shop sign that read “Rigby,” and I thought, That’s it! It really was as happenstance as that. When I got back to London, I wrote the song in Mrs. Asher’s music room in the basement of 57 Wimpole Street, where I was living at the time. (New Yorker)

• England's pubs look for post-pandemic rally British pubs were on the decline before COVID-19 and the pandemic looked to be last call for these cornerstones of British community life. But as the pandemic winds down and England reopens, the British are realizing just how much they missed their locals. (60 Minutes)

• Ignore the Price, Remember the Dividends For most of history, the price you paid would have had far less of an impact on your long-term returns than something you might have not even noticed. What am I referring to? Dividends. Reinvested dividends. (Of Dollars And Data)

• It's been nearly 20 years since inflation has been this high in Canada Canada's inflation rate rose to a new 18-year high of 4.4 per cent in September, with higher prices for transportation, shelter and food contributing the most to the jump in the cost of living. (CBC)

• Inflation at almost two-decade high complicates Bank of Canada rate plan Kevin Carmichael: The cost of just about everything that Statistics Canada measures was more expensive in September (Financial Post)

• Fed Staff Says Wall Street Is Getting Inflation Call All Wrong Chair Jerome Powell and his colleagues expect elevated inflation to abate next year. Noteworthy: The Fed’s staff forecasts for inflation have been historically more accurate than consensus forecasts, and by a significant amount. (Bloomberg)

• Most Housing Units Under Construction Since 1974 Currently there are 712,000 single family units under construction, the highest level since 2007. There are 714,000 multi-family units under construction, the highest level since 1974 (Calculated Risk)

• Will 4% Mortgage Rates “Halt the Housing Market”? Some comments on an interview with Ivy Zelman, who has a solid track record, and is focused primarily on new housing (single and multi-family). (Calculated Risk)

The Great Resignation, Inflation, and Buying a New Car

Tuesday morning news drop

• Why is everyone quitting, and how do I know whether it’s time to leave my job? Waves of Americans are leaving their jobs as part of the ‘Great Resignation.’ Here’s why: A record number of workers are quitting their jobs, empowered by new leverage (Washington Post)

• Who Is Driving the Great Resignation? The last several months have seen a tidal wave of resignations, in the U.S. and around the world. What can employers do to combat what’s being called the Great Resignation? The author shares several key insights from an in-depth analysis of more than 9 million employee records at 4,000 global companies, and offers a three-step plan to help employers take a more data-driven approach to retention: First, employers should quantify both the problem and its impact on key business metrics. Next, they should identify the root causes that are driving workers to resign. Finally, organizations should implement targeted retention campaigns designed to address the specific issues that they struggle with the most. (HBR)

• The Great Resignation Is Accelerating A lasting effect of this pandemic will be a revolution in worker expectations. (Atlantic)

  Americans Are Overworked And Over Work “As I've gotten older, work is definitely [still] really important, but I think I've started to see it less as my identity.” (Buzzfeed)

• Don’t Blame Workers for Inflation It shouldn’t come as a surprise that labor productivity remains strong. The U.S. gross domestic product has bounced back to above its prepandemic peak, while the number of workers employed remains millions below the prepandemic level. That simply says that output per worker has grown. Which is great for employers. It means that they don’t need to raise prices to cover higher labor costs.(New York Times)

• What Happens When Airbnb Swallows Your Neighborhood The McMansions and large parties are possible because houses that used to be rented for a year by people who live in Austin are now rented for a weekend by people who just visit Austin (Slate)

• How to Buy or Lease a New Car: Select the right vehicle, decide between leasing or buying, and prepare to negotiate with the dealer using this handy guide. (Car and Driver)

• Red Covid: Covid’s partisan pattern is growing more extreme. The political divide over vaccinations is so large that almost every reliably blue state now has a higher vaccination rate than almost every reliably red state: (New York Times)

• The Republican anti-vax delusion America’s vaccination programme is stalling. Populist conservatives are to blame (Economist)

• Paul McCartney Doesn’t Really Want to Stop the Show: Half a century after the Beatles broke up, he’s still correcting the record—and making new ones. (New Yorker)

• Will the remastered Grand Theft Autos’ American satire hold up? The world’s bestselling video game series combined reverence of US cinema with satire of nihilistic capitalism. But in a post-Trump world, what does GTA have left to say? (Guardian)

• Growth Bubble: Making Money on Companies that Make No Money More than half of U.S. Growth stocks* have negative earnings, yet Growth stocks have dramatically outperformed in the past few years (GMO)

Inflation, Investing, Amazon, Sneakers, the Suburbs, and Greg LeMond

Monday morning news drop

• Inflation in the 21st Century Taking Down the Inflationary Straw Man of the 1970s Four decades of relative fiscal austerity in the United States, coupled with accelerating globalization and technological development, have produced a disinflationary-to-deflationary tendency – extending from prices to labor incomes – that only substantial amounts of targeted federal spending can restore to equilibrium. With sustained levels of accelerating inflation being very unlikely. (Cornell Research Academy of Development, Law, and Economics)

• Five Traders Tell Us How to Survive a World of Disrupted Markets Trading requires constant vigilance and the ability to adapt and profit from disruptions. But what happens when the act of trading itself is disrupted? To get a glimpse of the life of a trader in 2021, Bloomberg Markets interviewed traders, quizzed them about how they got into the business, what their typical day is like, how their market and investing strategy is changing, and what advice they’d give to budding traders. (Bloomberg)

• Amazon copied products and rigged search results to promote its own brands, documents show A trove of internal Amazon documents reveals how the e-commerce giant ran a systematic campaign of creating knockoff goods and manipulating search results to boost its own product lines in India – practices it has denied engaging in. And at least two top Amazon executives reviewed the strategy. (Reuters)

• When Nike released this shoe last year, it sold out online within minutes. How did it get so hard to buy sneakers? Welcome to the bot wars. The sneaker craze began nearly four decades ago, with the debut of the first Air Jordan. Back then, sneakerheads who wanted to get their hands on the latest styles had to do so in person. Limited-edition shoes, many of them designed in collaboration with statusy street wear brands, would command long lines outside shops.As the value of these rare sneakers rose, high-profile releases became more chaotic at stores, and sales began to move online. (New York Times)

• Homeopathy Doesn’t Work. So Why Do So Many Germans Believe in It? How Natalie Grams, who once abandoned her medical education to study alternative therapies, became Germany’s most prominent homeopathy skeptic. (Businessweek)

• Slackers of the World, Unite! Why employees love the software, and bosses don’t Thanks in large part to the coronavirus pandemic, Slack has now seeped out of start-up land and into all corners of corporate America, with more than 169,000 organizations—including 65 of the Fortune 100—paying for its services. It has spawned competitors from Facebook, Microsoft, and Google; all told, chat is now the second-most-common computer activity, after email, according to RescueTime, productivity software that tracks users’ screen time. (The Atlantic)

• An Empire of Dying Wells: Old oil and gas sites are a climate menace. Meet the company that owns more of America’s decaying wells than any other. We found methane leaks at most of the places we visited. Some sites showed signs of maintenance in recent months, but others looked more or less abandoned. We saw access roads choked by vegetation, machinery buried under vines and weeds, oil dripping onto the ground, and steel doors rusted off their hinges. That’s not to say the wells were unattended. Mud wasps, spiders, mice, snails, and bees made their homes in them, and a porcupine napped under a brine tank. (Bloomberg Green)

• A half-mile installation just took 20,000 pounds of plastic out of the Pacific — proof that ocean garbage can be cleaned The installation is essentially an artificial floating coastline that catches plastic in its fold like a giant arm, then funnels the garbage into a woven funnel-shaped net. Two vessels tow it through the water at about 1.5 knots (slower than normal walking speed), and the ocean current pushes floating garbage toward the giant net. (Business Insider)

• Life in the New American Suburbs: A vision of how we’ll live in an age of moderately higher density The suburban model we created was fundamentally unsustainable. The upkeep on the vast sprawl of roads and other infrastructure was hellishly expensive, especially given the country’s excessive construction costs. New knowledge industries created clustering economies that made density more important for productivity, even as social media and a decline in crime made urban life more enjoyable. These pressures have created both a rental crisis for renters and an affordability crisis for first-time homebuyers. (Noahpinion)

• Greg LeMond and the Amazing Candy-Colored Dream Bike: The Tour de France legend and anti-doping crusader is building an ultralight ebike that he hopes will be fun as hell to ride—and jumpstart a US carbon-fiber boom. CRAAAACK. The supercore snaps in two. I stare wide-eyed at him before he laughs, gamely. In fairness to the supercore, LeMond does have enormous hands. It occurs to me then that, of all the bike materials that LeMond has chosen to become obsessed with, it’s not surprising he has fixated on carbon fiber. It’s a high-performance material, strong and versatile, but it can be surprisingly vulnerable. A lot like LeMond himself, actually. (Wired)

• 12 Predictions for the Future of Music Let me peer into my crystal ball, and predict the next decade in music. I’m brave (or foolhardy) enough to tell you what I see—but you may want to sit down first. If you earn your living from music, some of these changes might come as a shock. (Ted Gioia)

• New Bond Can’t Take On Beijing’s Supervillains A whole genre of geopolitical spy thrillers is now off limits. (Foreign Policy)

Undercharging For Work, Online Clothing Logistics, and Vancouver City Planning for Skateboarding

Friday morning news drop

• Why so many people undercharge for their work Setting a rate can be a minefield for folks navigating an industry alone. (Vox)

• Many House Hunters Are Choosing Diverse Neighborhoods That Reflect a Changing Population Buyers say they want to avoid ‘cookie-cutter’ areas, but the focus exposes challenges to preserving communities and blending residents (Wall Street Journal)

• The Nasty Logistics of Returning Your Too-Small Pants: What happens to the stuff you order online after you send it back? (The Atlantic)

• The problem with America’s semi-rich America’s upper-middle class works more, optimizes their kids, and is miserable (Vox)

• ‘Ueck’ carrying legacy into Crew’s playoff run Uecker, 87 going on 27, emerged from the clubhouse with his checkered dress shirt soaked in champagne and Miller Lite. He has been calling Brewers games on the radio since some of the current players’ parents were toddlers, and yet there he was, being dragged to the pitcher’s mound at American Family Field with confetti still falling as the Brewers celebrated clinching the 2021 National League Central title. Players wanted Uecker in the middle of their group photo. There’s no other broadcaster on the planet who is more a part of their team. (MLB)

• Why Vancouver Changed its Mind About Skateboards I had the pleasure of making this video for the Vancouver Park Board who's currently asking for public input on a new skateboarding strategy for the city

Videos of the Week

Surviving the Horror of Residential Schools by Skateboarding | The New Yorker Documentary In “Joe Buffalo,” directed by Amar Chebib and executive produced by Tony Hawk, an Indigenous skateboarding legend overcomes addiction and trauma stemming from his years in Canada's Church-run school system.

Former's "Audible Refuge" Video Austyn and Jake annihilate everything in their paths, tag teaming on crusty bumps and iconic stone spots. You’re gonna wanna play that Pulaski clip back.

Chima Ferguson's "Nice to See You" Vans Part Chima’s resume had him in the top tier, but this new part elevates him into the pantheon of all-timer greats. Those Martin’s Place hammers carry major weight.

Cutting Corners - Episode 1 - Tom K kicks off a new series for the spot enthusiasts of the world, scoping cutty locales and skating the unskateable. Take a ride along and stay tuned for who hops in next…

JOERI VEUL "MEMORIES" // WETHEPEOPLE BMX One of our favourite guys out there, Wethepeople rider Joeri Veul filmed this video shortly before he suffered a brain haemorrhage last year. Joeri is taking some time away from riding whilst he recovers but managed to put together this video with a few clips of his homies in The Netherlands to finish it off. Much love and respect to Joeri for pushing through the tough times and staying motivated. We cant wait to see you back on a bike soon Joeri!

FRONTOCEAN BMX - Italy: Vans ’The Circle’ 2021 | DIG BMX

Danny MacAskill and Drop & Roll - Cruising Vol.1

Course Preview of Carson Storch's Gnarly Line at Red Bull Rampage 2021 Less than 48 hours left till the showdown of the most infamous MTB Freeride event in the world of Mountain Biking. Just about time to hop on a GoPro run with Freerider Carson Storch who previews his very own line down the cliffs of Virgin, Utah.

Surfing Portugal | Ericeira Reef Mason Ho makes his way North East across the globe to Europe. Ericeira Portugal to be exact. A small cool surf town with incredible seafood and waves.

Earthquakes, Strata Insurance, the QAnon Conspiracy Toll, and Questlove

Thursday morning news drop

• The Big One: Getting Ready for North America’s Next Major Quake We know we need to prepare for natural disasters. So why do we shrug off the threat? (Walrus)

• QAnon's Deadly Price Church-loving surf instructor Matthew Taylor Coleman fell into online conspiracy theories, then allegedly admitted to killing his kids to save the world. How did no one see it coming? (Rolling Stone)

• Canada has biodiversity targets. Now it needs accountability As the UN Convention on Biological Diversity creates new targets, the federal government must take action or risk another dismal report card (Narwhal)

• How a team of musicologists and computer scientists completed Beethoven’s unfinished 10th Symphony When Ludwig van Beethoven died in 1827, he had started work on his 10th Symphony but, due to deteriorating health, wasn’t able to make much headway: All he left behind were some musical sketches. His notes teased at some magnificent reward. Now, thanks to the work of a team of music historians, musicologists, composers and computer scientists, Beethoven’s vision will come to life. (The Conversation)

• The Passion of Questlove The drummer, D.J. and producer is everywhere and loved by everyone. But few understand what drives him: an obsession with spreading the joys of Black music. (NY Times)

• The thorny truth about socially responsible investing Think you’re investing ethically? You might be surprised. It’s good that investors are trying to pay attention to where money flows. What isn’t so good: Plenty of people think they’re investing in ways that match their values when in reality, they aren’t. It’s really easy to slap the ESG label onto an investment product, likely increase fees on it a little bit, and call it a day. (Vox)

• S&P 500: Pay to Play? A new working paper attempts to figure out why some companies make it into the blue-chip stock market index. (Financial Times)

• Strata insurance hikes: nothingburger or crisis? Strata insurance hikes have been in the news for a couple years now, with stories of devastating insurance hikes causing individual projects to rapidly hike strata fees. The cause of the crisis have been speculated on for just as long. Is it badly maintained buildings? Irresponsible owners? Shoddy construction? Climate change? Greedy insurance companies? There’ve been lots of theories and speculation but little evidence in most of the coverage of this issue. (House Hunt Victoria)

• What’s wrong with America’s consumer-price index? Experts underestimated inflation last year. Now they seem to be overstating it (Economist)

The Rock, Frances Haugen, Kyrie Earvin, and Hockey Season

Wednesday morning news drop

• Constructions workers in Western Canada heavily represented in overdose deaths An analysis of 872 overdose deaths carried out by the BC Coroners Service showed that 44% of the individuals were employed at the time of death and of those, 55% were employed in the trades and transport industry. (ATAC)

• There Is Shadow Inflation Taking Place All Around Us Some companies haven’t been raising prices. Instead, they’ve been cutting back customer services and conveniences, but how should that be measured?(Upshot)

• What Does Frances Haugen Want From Facebook? I don’t think she loves the product in the current form. I think she considers it to be a threat to democracy and human life. But in terms of the general idea that this technology doesn’t have to be this way and that a company that is committed to Facebook’s stated mission of connecting the world and bringing people closer together, that that is a possible thing. If people just ended up being angrier at Facebook as a result of what she’d done, it was kind of a waste. (Slate)

• Al Gore’s $36 Billion Fund Sees New Urgency to Cut Off Oil Money Five years. That’s roughly how much time the investment universe has left to stop feeding capital to greenhouse-gas emitters before it’s too late. “The urgency of the challenge will require us to think differently around capital allocation,” Blood said in an interview. “And we don’t have 15 years or 18 years to get there. We have probably five years.” (Bloomberg Green)

• Kyrie Irving facing justified consequences isn’t a moment to gloat The Brooklyn Nets have called Kyrie Irving’s bluff. Following weeks of cajoling and coddling and respectful nodding about the all-star point guard’s “personal views” when it comes to refusing to be vaccinated against COVID-19, the organization that is on the hook for his $35.3 million salary — only to be faced with prospect of having him work part-time — finally said “enough.” (Sportsnet)

• The best- and worst-case scenarios for Covid-19 this winter Last year, almost nobody was vaccinated against Covid-19. 56% of the US population is fully vaccinated as of October 7. That includes 84% of people over 65, who are generally the most vulnerable to dying from the virus. FDA will soon consider whether to authorize a vaccine for children as young as 5, which would push vaccination rates higher. More than half the population being vaccinated is the primary reason for optimism about the coming months. (Vox)

• On B.C.’s Sunshine Coast, some of Canada’s oldest living trees escape the chopping block The treasured high-elevation Dakota Bowl has been slated for auction with BC Timber Sales every year for the last five years. Determined to protect the old-growth forest, home to culturally modified trees, hanging lakes and ancient cedar bear dens, a local conservation group brought new tactics and independent science to the table (Narwhal)

• Dwayne Johnson Lets Down His Guard A no-holds-barred talk with the megastar and entrepreneur about his volatile childhood, his heartbreaking relationship with his dad, and Vin Diesel’s “bullshit.” (Vanity Fair)

• Will a Canadian Team Ever Win the Stanley Cup Again? An expert explains what it would take to end the nearly three-decade dry spell (Walrus)