Author: Michele Debczak

The M6B2 Biodiversity Tower on the southern bank of the river Seine is hard to miss. At 165 feet tall, its shimmering titanium facade helps make the Parisian block greener in more ways than one. That’s because the M6B2 disperses seeds across the city, Dezeen reports.

The French firm Edouard François designed the high-rise structure with the Earth in mind. The outside of the building has been wrapped with stainless steel netting that acts as a trellis so vines can climb the 16-story structure. When a breeze hits the tower, seeds are shaken from the vines and dispersed across the city below.

Behind the steel lattice, titanium panels reflect the sun in brilliant, mossy hues. The metal produces different shades in different lighting, transitioning from yellow to deep green throughout the day.

Green urbanism is gaining traction in the French capital: Over the summer Parisian lawmakers passed an ordinance allowing residents to grow gardens on fences, walls, and rooftops. But some proponents of the movement are still skeptical of the role high-rises can play in an environmentally friendly city. Edouard François’s tower shows it’s possible to think big when designing the green buildings of tomorrow.

[h/t Dezeen]

Header/banner images courtesy of iStock.

For some flyers, price is the only thing that matters when choosing an airline. This is where travel comparison sites come in handy: When legroom, food quality, and seating assignments aren’t deciding factors, customers can arrange flights by cost and choose the cheapest option available. But as a recent story from The Economist points out, at least one airline has found a way to game the system so that those cheap flights can end up costing more later on.

Delta, United, and American Airlines all offer something called “basic economy” (or “last class,” as it’s more commonly known among flyers). By forfeiting the ability to choose their seats, passengers can snag tickets for cheaper than what they’d find in regular economy. For frugal flyers that may sound like a sweet deal, but United just revealed another condition that may cause some customers to reconsider it. By agreeing to fly in basic economy, passengers lose their privilege to store bags in the overhead bin. The only luggage they’re allowed to bring on board is a carry-on bag small enough to fit beneath the seat in front of them.

Customers who always travel light would likely be happy to have the option to pay less than those who bring on heavier loads that require more fuel. But if you aren’t aware of the bag stipulation beforehand, you could end up losing the money saved on the ticket when it comes time to check your baggage. The Economist suggests that the basic economy price tag may be a sneaky way for United to climb to the top of flight searches on sites like Kayak and Expedia. Customers buy the cheap ticket assuming they’ll have access to the overhead bin. But depending on how many bags need to be checked (United charges $25 for the first and $35 for the second), a regular economy ticket may have been the savvier choice.

United is the only airline to include luggage restrictions in their basic economy offers at this time, but if it proves to be a money-maker for the company, Delta and American could soon follow suit. When selecting a flight, always read the fine print to make sure you’re getting the most for your money. If that $200 flight across the country turns out to be too good to be true, there are other strategies, like shopping in the middle of the week, you can use to score the best deal possible.

[h/t The Economist]

Scotland may soon take a major step toward narrowing the country’s hunger gap. As the Independent reports, the government is considering a “right to food” law that would make substantial and affordable meals accessible to everyone.

The proposal comes after the release of a report by the Independent Working Group on Food Poverty [PDF]. According to the publication, the number of requests for emergency food supplies in Scotland rose from around 14,000 in 2012 and 2013 to nearly 134,000 in 2015 and 2016. Legislating the right to food wouldn’t abolish hunger in the country completely, but the group hopes it would reduce the dependence on emergency rations to stay fed.

With the right to food protected by law, the Scottish government would have a legal obligation to implement policies and distribute resources as well as its powers allow. As the group writes in the report, “Underpinning policy with law makes policy more resilient and durable as governments change […] Tackling food insecurity in Scotland, like tackling homelessness, is a challenge which will outlast several parliaments.” They also recommend introducing a uniform system that could be used to measure food security.

Poverty is a pervasive issue in Scotland, and it hits children especially hard. A 2015 survey saw a 51 percent increase in the number of students going to school hungry. It’s such a common problem that teachers are trained to identify malnourished kids. If the new provision passes through, that would make Scotland the second European country to enshrine the right to food into law, the first being Ukraine. 

[h/t Independent]

In space, completing simple actions like clipping your nails, washing your hair, and crying can be a challenge. Pooping presents an especially pesky hurdle for astronauts to overcome. When they aren’t doing their business on suction-based toilets that shoot waste into space, astronauts are forced to relieve themselves in the adult diapers they wear in their suits. NASA believes there’s a better way, and they’re asking for your help to find it.

As Fast Company reports, NASA’s Space Poop Challenge is calling on citizens to submit their ideas for collecting human waste inside space suits and routing away it away from the body hands-free. The crew aboard a spacecraft can be stuck inside their space suits for up to 10 hours at a time during launch and landing, and up to six days in the case of a disaster. To prepare for such emergencies, NASA asks that the system be capable of collecting urine, feces, and menstrual fluid for 144 hours straight.

In addition to devising a mechanism that’s safe and sanitary, inventors will also need to account for the conditions in space. As you can imagine, microgravity, unwanted waste, and a cramped suit don’t mix well together. Anyone who’s up for the challenge has until December 20 to send in their proposals. The winner will be rewarded for their dirty work with a $30,000 prize.

[h/t Fast Company]

Goods news for fans of robots and piping hot pizza: Domino’s announced their first successful drone delivery on Wednesday, November 16, ushering in a new era for the global chain.

As Quartz reports, the delivery took place in the town of Whangaparaoa in New Zealand, where drone regulations are relaxed compared to those of other countries. The GPS-guided DRU Drone transported the two pizzas—peri-peri chicken and chicken cranberry—inside their regular boxes, which were carried inside a bulkier box affixed to the bottom of the craft. When the drone arrived at its destination, it lowered the box down to the customers via a detachable tow cable (you can watch the scene play out below). According to Domino’s, the mission marked “the first commercial delivery of food by drone to a customer, anywhere in the world.”

Three months ago Domino’s partnered with the drone company Flirtey to make their delivery system a reality. For now it’s only available to customers who live within a mile of the Whangaparaoa Domino’s, and who have enough yard space for take off and landing. The company plans to launch the service in more locations across New Zealand down the road, and is currently in touch with various government agencies about expanding worldwide.

Unfortunately for U.S. pizza lovers, FAA regulations forbid drones from flying beyond the pilot’s field of vision, so drone deliveries likely won’t be taking off stateside any time soon. In the meantime, American customers can hold out hope for the arrival of Domino’s ground-based delivery droids.

[h/t Quartz]

Video games can transport players to historic war zones, fantastical realms, and alien planets in far-off galaxies. They can also recreate mundane activities from life without any of the real-world responsibilities that go with them. Such is the case with Farming Simulator 17, a new game that allows players to experience the relaxing aspects of farming, all from the comfort of home.

According to New Scientist, the game is the latest installment in a series from Swiss developer Giants Software. Players progress by planting and harvesting crops, raising livestock, and buying new land and equipment with the money they earn. There is some strategy required, but the real appeal is in the soothing activities like driving your tractor up and down a field for an hour at a time (for harvesting, of course).

The Farming Simulator series isn’t just popular among city-slickers with idyllic visions of farm life: Even professionals are known to play. Mason, an employee on a dairy farm in Pennsylvania, told New Scientist, “At work my boss tells me what he needs me to do and I do it. In the game I am the boss, I decide what to buy when I need it.”

Farming Simulator is one of several trendy video games that forgo action for monotony. In Virdi, for instance, players are tasked with the sole responsibility of taking care of succulents. Playing as a farmer is slightly more high-stakes—you do get to operate heavy machinery, after all. The game is now available through a variety of platforms, starting at $5 for mobile.

[h/t New Scientist]

If you’re like 62 percent of Americans, you get the bulk of your news from social media. Facebook has done a great job at getting your attention, but when it comes to filtering out fiction from fact they haven’t been so successful. Headlines like “Pope Francis Shocks the World, Endorses Donald Trump” and “Britain Threatens to Invade Switzerland Over Toblerone Shape Row” (both of which are flat-out false) pop up alongside stories from respectable news sources. What’s worse, fake stories can rack up thousands of likes and shares, making it difficult for readers to spot a hoax when it’s in front of them.

Programmer Daniel Sieradski has taken this problem into his own hands by creating a Chrome extension called the “B.S. Detector,” Mashable reports. After installing the plug-in, Facebook users will see a red warning appear over any posts that lead back to dubious sources. The outlets Sieradski has flagged include fake news sites, satire sites, and untrustworthy sources from all political leanings.

The extension isn’t a perfect B.S. filter—it detects the sites, not the content of the articles themselves, and is only limited to the sources Sieradski programmed into the code. But it’s a good start for Facebook users looking to navigate their feed with a more skeptical eye. Facebook is just now beginning to crack down on false content, announcing recently that fake news sites were banned from using their advertising network. Still, experts remain pessimistic about the company taking more drastic action against the problem anytime soon.

In the meantime, there are plenty of steps web users can take to avoid getting duped. When reading an article, keep an eye out for things like detailed author biographies, citations and references, and original reporting to judge whether the piece is legitimate. Fake-sounding author names and headlines that seem too outrageous to be true are possible indicators that a story is a hoax. If you still aren’t sure if what you just read should be taken at face value, do a quick Google search to see if other outlets have covered it. If it’s nowhere else to be seen, there’s likely a reason for that.

[h/t Mashable]

Whether you get your news from television, social media, or the mouths of politicians, the line separating fact and fiction is sometimes hard to pin down. This feels especially accurate in 2016, a year when fake news stories rose to the top of Facebook’s trending feed and presidential candidates were fact-checked mid-debate. It’s fitting then that post-truth, defined as “relating to or denoting circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief,” was recently named Word of the Year by Oxford English Dictionaries.

The word isn’t a new invention—according to Oxford, the concept has been around for the past decade or so. But this year the word skyrocketed to prominence in light of Britain’s break from the European Union and the presidential election in the U.S. The word is commonly seen coupled with the word politics in headlines like: “Why the post-truth political era might be around for a while” and “U.S. election campaign marks low in post-truth politics.”

Stephen Colbert touched on a similar concept when he coined the word truthiness in 2005. That word, which means “believing something is true from the gut, or inside; using life experiences of learnings to make something seem true,” earned the title of Merriam-Webster’s Word of the Year in 2006.

Post-truth was chosen from a shortlist of nine other terms considered for the distinction. As you might expect, the pool featured several politically themed entries, including alt-right (an ideological grouping associated with extreme conservative viewpoints), woke (alert to injustice in society), and Brexiteer (a person who is in favor of the UK withdrawing from the European Union). A few of the contenders, like adulting, hygge, and coulrophobia (fear of clowns), fell on the lighter side.

Bike shares are a common sight on the streets of Cleveland, Portland, New York City, and various European cities, but the transportation trend has been slow to take off in any African metropolises. As City Lab reports, Marrakech, Morocco, is now home to the continent’s first: Medina Bike rolled out 10 docking stations comprising 300 bikes across the city’s center earlier this month.

The program is a collaboration between the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO), the French bike-sharing company Smoove, and the Moroccan business Estates Vision. The launch of the bike share coincides with the United Nations COP22 climate change conference currently being held in Marrakech. The focus of the event is the realization of the 2015 Paris Agreement between close to 200 nations to limit their use of greenhouse gas-producing fossil fuels. Cars are one of the biggest culprits behind climate change, and the Medina Bike share is meant to offer an earth-friendly transportation alternative.

The program was conceived with the conference in mind: Participants even had a docking station built just for them. But the bikes, along with Morocco’s commitment to responsible energy usage, are there to stay.

[h/t City Lab]

Shakespeare wrote that “all the world’s a stage,” but the performances of his own plays were limited to a handful of venues. Before the construction of the iconic Globe theater in 1599, a couple of his works were put on at the Curtain in the Shoreditch neighborhood of London. All that’s left of the structure today are foundations that have laid buried for centuries. Thanks to recent archaeological findings, experts now have a better sense of what the building looked like and how it may have influenced the writing of plays like Henry V.

As Smithsonian.com reports, the remains of the Curtain were rediscovered in 2011. Since then, archaeologists from the Museum of London Archaeology have made some surprising revelations, notably that the stage was long and rectangular rather than circular like the Globe. The stage directions of Henry V, which debuted at the Curtain in the late 16th century, describe the venue as a “wooden O.” That line had long led scholars to believe that the theater was round. This recent finding, however, suggests that a change was made to the text after Shakespeare moved to the Globe.

The dig also revealed evidence of a tunnel that would have let actors move discreetly from one side of the stage to the other. Heather Knight, a senior archaeologist for the Museum of London Archaeology, told The Guardian:

“The question now is whether Shakespeare and other playwrights were writing plays specifically for this kind of stage—which would have required a completely different style of interaction compared to a thrust stage with the audience on three sides … Did it mean that it needed a different style of acting, for instance, or that you could get more people on the stage, and so you could put in many more characters?”

Questions about how character interactions may have been written to suit the venue, while fun, are highly speculative. But the idea that Shakespeare wrote Henry V with the Curtain in mind isn’t too farfetched—scholars believe he did the same thing for the Globe. The theater’s large standing room section meant that lengthy plays were more likely to encourage the audience to “hiss and pelt the unfortunate actors with oranges,” according to the University of Nottingham [PDF]. This may be why one version (the Q1) of Hamlet is lighter on soliloquies and features no intervals or breaks in the action. The Globe was also open-air, so performances could only last as long as the sun was out.

[h/t Smithsonian]