7.12.2023

Microsoft-Activision Deal

A US judge yesterday ruled Microsoft can proceed with its planned $69B purchase of video game giant Activision Blizzard. The deal would be Microsoft's largest-ever and the overall biggest in the video game industry should the deal close by a July 18 deadline. 

The Federal Trade Commission had sought an injunction to temporarily block the two companies from merging ahead of the agency's separate in-house challenge to the transaction in August. The federal judge rejected the injunction, ruling the FTC was unable to show how the deal would cause harm to competition in the cloud gaming market. The judge also ruled the FTC wouldn't likely prevail if it took the challenge to a full trial. 

In related news, British regulators, who blocked the deal in April, announced they are considering Microsoft's proposals to address antitrust concerns. The latest developments in Microsoft's year-and-a-half-long bid to acquire Activision Blizzard come after European regulators cleared the deal in May. 

Activision Blizzard shares closed up 10% after reaching a 52-week high of $92.91.

Ex-Manson Follower Released

Leslie Van Houten, who was convicted for her role in a 1969 double murder directed by cult leader Charles Manson, was released on parole yesterday after serving 53 years of her life sentence in prison. 

Van Houten, then-19, was found guilty in 1971 for helping other members of the so-called Manson family murder a Los Angeles grocer and his wife, Leno and Rosemary LaBianca, in their home. The murders of the LaBiancas took place a day after members of the Manson family—excluding Van Houten—killed actress Sharon Tate and four others at the home of movie director Roman Polanski. Read about the LaBianca murder here and the other murders here.

Van Houten was originally sentenced to death, but her sentence was later reduced to life in prison with the possibility of parole after the death penalty was abolished in California the following year. The 73-year-old is expected to spend a year at a halfway house as she learns basic skills, including how to drive and use a debit card.

Charles Manson died in 2017 at the age of 83 while in prison. 

An Epoch Proposal

Mud cores from a lake in Canada hold the geochemical markers proving a distinct geological epoch began in 1950, according to a group of scientists yesterday. The announcement is the latest step in a decadelong process seeking to delineate humanity's impact on Earth, an era dubbed the Anthropocene, or human age. 

Geologists designate eras in our planet based on demonstrable shifts over time in the makeup of rocks, ice, and sediments (see interactive timeline). A special working group of geologists proposed Crawford Lake outside Toronto as the site with the clearest material signature of the shift from the Holocene epoch (which started about 11,000 years ago) to the Anthropocene in the mid-20th century.

The small, 78-feet deep meromictic lake—where upper water layers don't mix with the lower—has preserved a millennium of particulate in its sediment, including markers of nuclear tests, fossil fuels, and more. Final approval of the designation requires several more levels of votes over the next year.

Learn more about the scientific debate over the designation here.

Science & Technology

Business & Markets

Politics & World Affairs

The 100 best books of all time. 

Scientists find a planet with metal clouds.

Humans really can hear silence. 

Nearly 90% of retro games are critically endangered.

AMC sells over 20,000 tickets for "Barbenheimer" double feature.

Texas officials warn of the blue button jellyfish.

Kentucky farmer unearths over 700 Civil War-era coins. 

Big Mama, a 15-foot python, is on the loose in Los Angeles. 

Clickbait: US government debuts "Speak Now (FBI's version)." 

Historybook: US Founding Father Alexander Hamilton dies (1804); The Rolling Stones perform first concert (1962); Geraldine Ferraro is first American female major-party VP candidate (1984); Activist and Nobel Peace Prize recipient Malala Yousafzai born (1997).