Good morning, it's Thursday, April 30, and we're covering the movie that popularized the word "cerulean" and a new lawsuit over the death of Tupac Shakur.
Also in today's Digest: the revival of short-form video app Vine (Sports, Ent., & Cult.), shrinking dog brains (Sci. & Tech.), tickets for driverless cars (Etc.), and much more.
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🇺🇸 Civics Thursday—Before modern sanitation, around 20,000 pigs roamed New York City's streets, feeding on garbage the city had no way to collect. This week, we explore how American cities went from that to the sanitation systems that now process over 290 million tons of waste every year. |
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Voting Rights Act Curtailed |
The Supreme Court yesterday limited the Voting Rights Act, a Civil Rights-era law intended to protect minority voting power. Several states are expected to use the ruling to redraw their maps; within an hour of the decision, Florida lawmakers passed a map possibly eliminating up to four Democrat-held districts, including one that is heavily Puerto Rican.
In a 6-3 decision, the conservative majority struck down Louisiana’s second majority-Black electoral district, which stretches diagonally across the state (see map). Black voters had advocated for the district, arguing the previous map diluted their influence by concentrating them into one of six districts despite making up about one-third of the population. The majority, however, cited increased minority voter registration and turnout as evidence that majority-minority districts are no longer necessary. They outlined an updated framework that interprets the Voting Rights Act as only barring maps that intentionally limit minority voting power.
Separately, the court yesterday weighed the Trump administration's effort to remove legal protections from hundreds of thousands of Haitian and Syrian immigrants. A ruling is expected this summer.
How did the Supreme Court become so powerful? "1440 Explores" found out. |
The sequel to 2006’s “The Devil Wears Prada” debuts this weekend, projected to bring in $73M-$80M domestically and $180M globally in its opening weekend. The first trailer was 20th Century Studios’ most-watched in history within 24 hours, reaching 222 million views across platforms; watch the final trailer here.
The original movie was based on the 2003 bestselling novel by Lauren Weisberger, itself allegedly informed by Weisberger’s experience working as an assistant for Vogue’s long-term editor in chief Anna Wintour. (Wintour stepped down from the role last year after 37 years; see previous write-up.) Meryl Streep earned an Oscar nomination for her portrayal of Miranda Priestly, with lines including “that’s all” and a monologue on the fashion cycle that produced a mass-market cerulean sweater (see outfits from the first film, including the sweater, here.)
Media outlets like Vogue have been repositioning print magazines as collectibles amid a decadeslong decline in readers’ print consumption. Explore data here. |
🫶 Humankind: California prison inmates learn to raise service dogs as part of a rehabilitation program. (w/video) |
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Tupac Shakur’s stepbrother filed a wrongful death lawsuit this week against Duane “Keefe D” Davis and dozens of unnamed co-conspirators.
Davis was charged in 2023 with first-degree murder in the rapper's death. He was one of four people allegedly present in the vehicle during the 1996 drive-by shooting in Las Vegas. Police say he planned the hit alongside his since-deceased nephew after a fight with Shakur in a casino. Davis has pleaded not guilty despite previously claiming to have been in the passenger seat; his criminal trial is set to begin in August.
The new lawsuit claims Davis was part of a broader conspiracy and cites statements in a Netflix documentary suggesting Sean “Diddy” Combs offered Davis $1M to kill Shakur. Combs denies involvement and is not named in the lawsuit.
Tupac Shakur was a six-time Grammy nominee with five No. 1 albums, including three released posthumously. Explore his legacy here. |
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In partnership with Doroni |
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A Drone Expert Is Making Flying Cars Real |
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In 2016, after years working on military drones, Doron Merdinger began sketching a flying car. He saw how quickly the tech had advanced. Soon, people would fly from driveways. So he built Doroni.
It’s great timing, too. The urban air mobility market is worth $4B today. By 2040, Morgan Stanley puts it at $1 trillion. By 2050, $9 trillion. And with 600+ reservations for Doroni’s aircraft and $240M+ in potential revenue already, the demand for this innovation is undeniable.
When FOX Business saw the showroom model get unveiled in March, they called it “the ‘flying car’ set to revolutionize personal air travel.” With commercial deliveries planned for 2028 and $1.4B+ in annual revenue targeted by 2032, Doroni’s scaling fast. Share in their growth as an early-stage Doroni investor today.* |
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Sports, Entertainment, & Culture |
> DiVine, a Jack Dorsey-backed reboot of 2010s short-form video app Vine, launches to the public (More) | See a compilation of some of the most popular Vines (More) |
> Silent Tactic is the first horse to scratch from Saturday's Kentucky Derby, citing a foot injury (More) | Get up to speed on the horse replacing him, Great White (More) |
> PGA Cadillac Championship begins today, marking the $20M, 72-player event's first time at Miami's Trump National Doral since 2016 (More) |
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> Nerve fibers within skin cancer melanoma can slow tumor growth, challenging the conventional view that nervous system drives cancer growth; finding may inspire future anticancer therapies (More) |
> Study finds dog brains began shrinking about 5,000 years ago, even though evidence shows they have lived alongside humans for over 15,000 years, suggesting domestication was a more gradual process than previously believed (More) |
> Virtual violin uses physics to let violin makers—or luthiers—adjust design and sound before carving; luthiers previously had to wait for the finished product to hear the results of their hard work (More) | Watch how a violin is made (More) |
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> US stock markets close near flatline (S&P 500 -0.0%, Dow -0.6%, Nasdaq +0.0%) (More) | Federal Reserve holds rates steady, with most dissenting votes since 1992; Chair Jerome Powell to stay as governor after chairmanship ends next month (More) |
> Bill Ackman's Pershing Square USA sinks 18% in stock market debut after the combined initial public offering for the closed-end fund and Ackman's alternative asset manager, Pershing Square Inc., raises $5B (More) |
> Finnish elevator maker Kone acquires German rival TK Elevator in roughly $34B deal, creating the world’s largest lift maker (More) | Uber to add hotel bookings to its app through new Expedia partnership (More) |
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In partnership with The Motley Fool |
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48-Year-Old CEO Invests $2.6B in One Stock |
When a CEO bets a personal fortune on one stock, it's worth paying attention.
The Total Conviction Buy Alert flashed for NVIDIA in 2009, yet most people ignored it. But those who took action turned $5,000 into $2,579,210. This signal is flashing again for a company 1/100th the size of NVIDIA. The window to get in early won't stay open long.
Get the name and ticker now. |
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> Former FBI Director James Comey appears in court after being indicted on charges of making threats against President Donald Trump last year (More) |
> Pentagon official says the Iran war has cost $25B in testimony before Congress (More) | See war updates (More) |
> Man stabs two Jewish men in London in what police are calling a terrorist incident; one suspect is in custody (More) |
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In partnership with Doroni |
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Tesla and NVIDIA Are Late to This $1T Market |
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Tech’s biggest names move toward markets that matter. So with the flying car market expected to reach $1T by 2040, Tesla’s hinting at Roadsters with lift-off capabilities and NVIDIA’s helping power eVTOL aircraft.
But Doroni’s been ahead of this shift for years. They just unveiled a showroom model of a personal aircraft FOX Business called “the ‘flying car’ set to revolutionize personal air travel.” With $240M+ in potential revenue already, they’re just getting started. Invest in Doroni today.* |
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1440 Topics: Civics Thursday |
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This week, we took a deep dive into how cities manage trash and recycling—and what happens after you throw something away. Here is what we found:
> When Charles Dickens visited New York in 1842, he was amused by the thousands of trash-eating pigs roaming the city. The story of how the city got rid of them touches on gentrification, class, and the birth of the urban working class. (Read)
> Learn about the system of landfills, recycling plants, and sanitation workers that shape our lives in ways most of us never see. In this podcast, 1440 explores the hidden life of trash. (Listen)
> Explore the rest of the resources we discovered on our topic page about trash and waste management.
What is 1440 Topics? A continuously updated ecosystem where we curate the best evergreen resources we've found on thousands of topics for you to explore. Have a suggestion for our Civics section? Let us know here. |
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Historybook: George Washington inaugurated (1789); Aviator Bessie Coleman, first African American woman and first Native American to hold a pilot license, dies in a plane crash (1926); Blues musician Muddy Waters dies (1983); World Wide Web launches into public domain by computer scientist Tim Berners-Lee (1993).
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"Happiness depends more upon the internal frame of a person's own mind—than on the externals in the world." |
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*Disclosure: This is a paid advertisement for Doroni Regulation A offering. Please read the offering circular at https://invest.doroni.io/. |
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