“Industry figures showed that 782.7 million print books were sold last year, up 1% on 2023 although still nearly 40 million down from the peak of 2021. Growth was driven by fiction, especially fantasy, while adult nonfiction, the biggest category, fell slightly. Print editions have been challenged by both ebooks and audiobooks: The latter are… Continue Reading
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Monthly Archives: January 2025
Big 3 Pharmacy Benefit Manager charging enormous markups on dozens of lifesaving drugs
“The Federal Trade Commission today published a second interim staff report on the prescription drug middleman industry, which focuses on pharmacy benefit managers’ (PBMs) influence over specialty generic drugs, including significant price markups by PBMs for cancer, HIV, and a variety of other critical drugs. Staff’s latest report found that the ‘Big 3 PBMs’—Caremark Rx,… Continue Reading
New NOAA dataset to help improve flood mitigation tools, flood-risk assessment
“The first modeled, historical water level and wave dataset for the Atlantic, Caribbean and Gulf coasts was released today by NOAA’s National Ocean Service (NOS). This comprehensive dataset — known as Coastal Ocean Reanalysis (CORA) — advances NOAA’s ability to better serve the nation’s coastal communities and lays the foundation for future NOAA coastal flooding… Continue Reading
How to Avoid the Top Internet Scams
Wrong Numbers, Fake Invoices, and Catfishing: If you’re online, you’re at risk. “We spoke to three security experts about what you can do to protect yourself…In a video call, Bogdan Botezatu, Bitdefender’s director of threat research, warned that despite the numerous ways scammers go after their targets, spam email remains the most prevalent. Using telemetry… Continue Reading
Allstate used GasBuddy and other apps to quietly track driving behavior
Ars Technica: “Texas has sued insurance provider Allstate, alleging that the firm and its data broker subsidiary used data from apps like GasBuddy, Routely, and Life360 to quietly track drivers and adjust or cancel their policies. Allstate and Arity, a “mobility data and analytics” firm founded by Allstate in 2016, collected “trillions of miles worth… Continue Reading
How a major bank cheated its customers out of $2 billion
Popular Information: “An explosive new lawsuit filed by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) alleges that Capital One bank cheated its customers out of $2 billion. According to the lawsuit, Capital One deceived and abused its depositors, baiting them with promises of high interest rates before switching the terms and paying little interest. The CFPB… Continue Reading
‘TrueFood’ Research Database Offers Rankings for 50,000 Processed Foods
“The database, developed by researchers at Mass General Brigham and made available to the public, sheds light on the availability of processed foods at different grocery stores, highlighting the need for more understanding and regulation of the foods offered. A new study by investigators from Mass General Brigham provides information to empower consumers and policymakers… Continue Reading
How to Browse All Digitized Titles in Chronicling America
“Chronicling America is in the process of transitioning from the legacy interface to a new interface and back-end search infrastructure. Read more about it. Through its enhanced search interface, the new Chronicling America offers more options to search the collection, as well as the ability to browse newspapers through the “All Digitized Titles” list and a new… Continue Reading
The home insurance crisis can’t be fixed with money alone
Semafor: “The devastating wildfires that are sweeping Los Angeles may accelerate the flight of home insurance companies from California in spite of recent regulatory changes aimed at retaining them, the state’s previous top insurance official told Semafor. At least two major fires are still raging largely uncontained, aided by ongoing high winds, and 24 people… Continue Reading
U.S. Employee Engagement Sinks to 10-Year Low
Gallup: “Employee engagement in the U.S. fell to its lowest level in a decade in 2024, with only 31% of employees engaged. This matches the figure last seen in 2014. The percentage of actively disengaged employees, at 17%, also reflects 2014 levels. The percentage of engaged employees has declined by two percentage points since 2023,… Continue Reading
Special Counsel Report Says Trump Would Have Been Convicted in Election Case
The New York Times – gift article “…The Justice Department delivered the 137-page volume [link provided by DOJ – https://www.justice.gov/storage/Report-of-Special-Counsel-Smith-Volume-1-January-2025.pdf]— representing half of Mr. Smith’s overall final report, with the volume about Mr. Trump’s other federal case, accusing him of mishandling classified documents, still confidential — to Congress just after midnight on Tuesday. The former… Continue Reading
California wildfires map
The Los Angeles Times has this amazing interactive map, based on real-time open data provided by CalFire and the Geospatial Multi-Agency Coordination. See also Analysing satellite imagery of the Jan 2025 Southern California wildfires: “3.9 micron data from the GOES-16 East and GOES-18 West satellites on the January 2025 Southern California fires. We download the… Continue Reading
