Tip News Daily Brief

Your Daily Brief

April 27th, 2023

Good morning, and happy Thursday! As you may know, there’s an ongoing copyright trial to determine whether Ed Sheeran lifted elements of one of Marvin Gaye’s most classic songs. While a music expert yesterday testified that the two songs sound very similar, our team isn’t so sure. Take a listen to this mash-up of the two songs and let us know what you think!

In Today’s Brief

Sudan: Second U.S. citizen dies
House: Passes debt limit bill
Knicks: Going to second playoff round
Tyson Foods: Cuts 10% of corporate jobs

...and more

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Top Tips

Disney vs DeSantis

Disney filed a lawsuit against Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, accusing him of using his political standing to harm the company’s business over protected speech.

Earlier this year, Florida lawmakers passed a bill that stripped Disney of its self-governing authority in the state. Before the law took effect, Disney signed a deal with its outgoing board granting it authority over design and construction decisions in its properties near Orlando. After DeSantis’ board voted yesterday to invalidate that agreement, Disney responded with its lawsuit, accusing DeSantis and other officials of violating due process and the company’s First Amendment right, calling the action “patently retaliatory, patently anti-business, and patently unconstitutional.”

The Walt Disney Company and DeSantis have been engaged in a public feud that began more than a year ago when Disney’s former CEO Bob Chapek said he’d work to overturn a law banning discussion of sexual orientation and gender identity in the state’s schools.

UK blocks gaming merger

The United Kingdom’s antitrust watchdog has blocked Microsoft’s acquisition of video game maker Activision Blizzard over concerns that it would hinder competition in cloud gaming.

In a press release, the UK Competition and Markets Authority said it stopped the merger “over concerns the deal would alter the future of the fast-growing cloud gaming market, leading to reduced innovation and less choice for UK gamers.” It added that a solution proposed by Microsoft “had significant shortcomings and would require regulatory oversight.” At $69B, the Activision deal is the biggest technology merger that the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority has blocked.

Activision Blizzard is one of the world’s biggest video game developers, producing titles such as Call of Duty, World of Warcraft, and Diablo. Microsoft sells the Xbox gaming console, offers a video game subscription service called Xbox Game Pass, and offers a cloud-based video game streaming service. Both companies plan to appeal the decision.

Zelensky & Xi speak

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky spoke to Chinese President Xi Jinping yesterday for the first time since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022.

In a tweet, the Ukrainian president said he believes “this call, as well as the appointment of Ukraine's ambassador to China, will give a powerful impetus to the development of our bilateral relations.” The call between Xi and Zelensky comes about four weeks after Xi traveled to Russia and met with Russian President Vladimir Putin. There, the two leaders signed agreements to strengthen economic and political partnerships between the countries.

Taking a neutral stance, Beijing has not condemned Russia’s invasion of Ukraine nor called for a withdrawal of its troops, instead urging restraint by “all parties.” In a readout of the call, China quoted Xi as saying that China would “neither watch the fire from the other side nor add fuel to the fire, let alone take advantage of the crisis to profit.”

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Quick Tips

Around the Globe

A second American was killed in Sudan amid continued fighting between competing generals in Khartoum despite a ceasefire agreement, the Biden administration confirmed (More)
The yuan overtook the dollar for the first time in March to become the most widely-used currency for cross-border transactions in China, according to official data (More)
Nazi camp guard convicted of crimes committed during the Holocaust has died at the age of 102; Josef Schutz, the oldest person convicted of Holocaust-related crimes, was found guilty of aiding and abetting the murders of over 3.5K people at Sachsenhausen near Berlin between 1942 and 1945 (More)

On the Homefront

The House of Representatives voted to pass a bill raising the nation’s debt ceiling in return for spending cuts, which was proposed by House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (More)
Montana Rep. Zooey Zephyr will not be allowed to participate in debates on the Montana House floor for the remainder of the legislative session but will be allowed to vote after telling colleagues they would be subjecting transgender youth to torture by banning gender-transition care during an April 20th debate (More)
Four Seattle hospital patients died in connection to a Klebsiella pneumoniae bacteria outbreak that has reportedly developed resistance to some antibiotics; there have been 31 confirmed infections associated with the strain, per hospital officials (More)

Glitz & Games

In partnership with Bright Cellars

Netflix series ‘Black Mirror’ will return with its sixth season in June, the streamer confirmed (More)
Fugees rapper Pras Michel was found guilty of 10 criminal counts including conspiracy to defraud the U.S., witness tampering, and acting as an unregistered agent of a foreign government (More)
The New York Knicks advance to the second round of the NBA playoffs for the first time in a decade after defeating the Cleveland Cavaliers in Game 5 (More)

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Business & Markets

Stocks ended yesterday’s trading session mixed, with the Nasdaq gaining while the Dow and S&P 500 lost (Dow -0.68%, Nasdaq +0.47%, S&P 500 -0.38%)
Amazon began laying off some employees in cloud computing and human resources; the layoffs are part of the previously announced job cuts that are expected to affect 9K employees, in addition to the 18K jobs the company cut earlier this year and last November (More)
Tyson Foods will eliminate nearly 10% of corporate jobs along with 15% of senior leadership roles, according to a memo CEO Donnie King sent to employees (More)

Tips & Tricks

Feel Good: Meet Dave Urban, a Lowe’s employee in Connecticut who went above and beyond to help a family build a custom device made of PVC piping to help their young son with quadriplegic spastic cerebral palsy learn to walk
Sneak Peek: Watch worlds collide and Michael Keaton reprise his role as Batman in the new trailer for The Flash, set to speed into theaters on June 15th
Bump This: New West channels chords reminiscent of Oasis and the Beatles in the classic-sounding piano ballad “in my city” - listen on Apple Music, Spotify, and YouTube
Nerd Out: Learn how research on torch remnants proved to scientists that a cave in southern Spain is the most frequently used prehistoric cave in Europe…and has been visited by humans for over 40K years
Go Deep: Read one man’s account of riding in a driverless taxi in San Francisco, including some of the things he felt went right…and what went wrong
Hot Goss: Former skateboarder and reality TV personality Bam Margera is on the run from the police with his girlfriend and her 8-year-old child after allegedly assaulting an officer; Margera was reportedly last seen entering the woods on foot in Pennsylvania
Life Hack: If you’re on the go in the morning but want to have a quick meal, don’t discount a solid bowl of oatmeal - here are seven health benefits of oatmeal along with some out-of-the-box recipes to keep things interesting

Tip-Offs

Ranking the colleges with the biggest vocabularies.

How to earthquake-proof the Golden Gate Bridge.

Alternative social media app BeReal’s rise and fall.

Examining the ethics of resurrecting wooly mammoths.

The potential impact of french fries on our mental health.

The FBI warns Americans to rethink traveling to Haiti.

Windows users can now use iMessage on PCs.

NASA’s recent image of the colliding Antennae Galaxies.

Looking Back…

On April 27th: The steamship SS Sultana explodes on the Mississippi River, marking the worst maritime disaster in U.S. history (1865); undefeated world heavyweight champion Rocky Marciano retires from boxing (1956); Xerox PARC debuts the first personal computer mouse (1981); disc jockey Casey Kasem is born (1932).

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