¶Starting [today], citizens of the European Union must be informed when they are interacting with an AI system or viewing content generated or altered by the technology.

¶This sounds like a big deal, but apparently it’s not…yet:

¶The EU has allowed for a transitional period, until December, for AI model providers to label synthetic audio, image, video, or text in a machine-readable format so that this material can be detected as AI-generated, clearly recognizing the technical challenge of implementing this. Other compliance deadlines within the act have been delayed, as the European AI Office has taken longer than expected to produce key compliance guidelines.

¶Will December’s end of the “transitional period” bring anything? Is any “transition” actually happening right now? Will any future deadline associated with these new rules carry any weight? We’ll see.

¶With a day to go, the MLB trade deadline has failed to disappoint…and to surprise. Despite the Dodger’s feigned disinterest in Tarik Skubal, which nobody believed, the team completed a trade with the Tigers overnight to land their man:

¶The Dodgers acquired Skubal, the reigning back-to-back American League Cy Young Award winner, from the Detroit Tigers for a package of three prospects: outfielder Zyhir Hope and right-handers River Ryan and Brady Smith, sources told ESPN’s Jeff Passan.

¶Trump Media & Technology Group is now shopping to traders and investors a premium version of Truth Social delivering early access to the feeds of high-profile users, including the president.

¶Starting Saturday, for a fee of up to $100,000 a month, trading firms can access “Truth API” to get a glimpse of the president’s often market-moving announcements about economic policy and global affairs before the rest of the world.

¶Just a few days ago, I thought the now-failed Kushner family FIFA investment fund best illustrated the boundless nature of Trump’s grift.

¶What a difference a few days can make!

¶The Kushner FIFA fund seems to pale in comparison to the blatant nature of this cash grab. Starting today, you can apparently pay Trump’s company to get early access to his social posts, which means you could have been one of the first to see today’s rant about Janine Pirro dropping charges against David Hearn for lack of evidence.

¶Big deal?

¶It’s a huge deal because the fee will also provide early access to the market moving content frequently posted by Trump.

¶This is embarrassingly insane.

¶Infantino said it had become clear the project had “created divisions” that are “no longer in the interest” of its original objective.

¶The Swiss official added: “As a result, this proposal will not proceed.”

¶I didn’t need another reason to pay more attention to soccer after the fantastic World Cup, but now I’ve got one. The drama of this week has seemingly come to a sudden end as Infantino killed his proposal to sell off a portion of FIFA. Ostensibly, the reason for opposing the proposal is that investment isn’t needed. FIFA, it seems, has plenty of cash. I have to believe, though, that an underlying reason is a collective raising of the fist against the Trump connection to the investment fund.

¶European soccer governing body UEFA appears to have been the force behind the sacking of the proposal, saying “no UEFA national teams will participate in any FIFA competition for so long as these proposals remain alive, unless this proposal has been abandoned in its entirety and binding assurances have been given that FIFA will never again open its governance or competitions to private ownership.”

¶I’m definitely loving soccer right now.

¶This giant salamander lived in the broad freshwater lakes and marshes that covered parts of Kyushu several million years ago. As an adult, it may have reached approximately 1.1 meters in length.

¶This length seemed impressive for a salamander, prehistoric or not, until I realized the Japanese giant salamander(Andrias japonicus) is alive and well in Japan and can grow up to to 1.5 meters in length. These modern day giants are fully aquatic and endemic to present-day Japan. Five feet long!

¶What lead to the extinction of the newly identified prehistoric giant salamander? The linked article headlines a climate change theory (“Climate Change and Extinction”), noting that “[c]ooling temperatures, along with major changes in local habitats, may have contributed to [its] disappearance.” (emphasis added). The underlying paper cautions that the cause is still unclear, explaining:

¶[I]t remains unclear whether such sea-level changes directly affected the Ajimu region. Regardless, the loss of freshwater habitats—whether due to climate cooling, local tectonic uplift, or any marine incursion—could have been a key factor in the disappearance of the new genus.

¶The resigning Carlos Cordeiro is an ex-vice president of the U.S. Soccer Federation and represented FIFA on the White House Task Force for the 2026 World Cup. He’s got an MBA from Harvard Business School and was a vice chairman at Goldman Sachs before joining U.S. Soccer.

¶Cordeiro is no slouch, and his view on FIFA’s proposal to sell an interest in its future through a Kushner family-led fund should carry real weight, particularly considering his willingness to openly link his resignation directly to the proposal:

¶“Let me be clear: I had no involvement in this proposal ⁠and I oppose ⁠it unequivocally,” Cordeiro said in a statement.

¶“It is ⁠a bad deal for ⁠FIFA’s Member Associations, ⁠a bad deal for football and a bad deal ‌for the long-term future of the game.”

¶If that’s not enough, consider the comments by FIFA President Gianni Infantino, the public showman for the investment proposal, on Cordeiro’s appointment to the role from which he is now resigning:

¶Announcing the 2021 appointment of Cordeiro, Infantino had said: “Carlos is the right person to advise us as we modernise our regulatory framework and grow the sport in ways that advance football for men, women and youth ‌across the globe.”

¶Turns out, Infantino was right. Cordero is the “right person to advise [FIFA] as [it] modernise[s]…the sport.” He should take Cordero’s parting advice and kill the proposal before the Kushner-Trump fingerprints on the World Cup trophy become permanent. The coming vote may be more than a vote on the proposal if he doesn’t.

¶What a time to become a soccer fan!

¶Uefa’s initial condemnation of Fifa’s plan to “sell the soul” of ­football has received strong backing from Concacaf – the North, Central ­American and Caribbean ­confederation – and the Asian Football Confederation (AFC). If their members follow their leads there should be sufficient votes to block the proposal.

¶Well, it looks like I picked a fine time to become a soccer fan. The proposed FIFA “bundle and sell” plan is developing faster than any World Cup match I watched (other than the England v. France third place match, which moved more like an American football game).

¶“We’ve served two and a half million children and their families around the world, and the fact that our programs have expanded into so many different kinds of outreach, I think he would be amazed,” the younger Newman tells THR. “[But] he had a saying within our family. He’d pat you on the back and be like, ‘Honey, that’s so great! That’s a great start,’” she laughs again. “So I think he would feel the same way that I do: that there are so many children and families who still need us.”

¶Two and a half million kids and their families? That’s a great start.

¶Paul Newman is one of my favorite actors; The Hustler is, without question, my favorite movie of all time (it’s not a pool movie, btw). If you needed a reason to think more highly of Newman, this article will certainly provide it. I didn’t, but found several nevertheless. I naively believed his charity was limited to his Newman’s Own line of food products. Looks like he did so much more than that, and his daughter is ensuring those efforts will continue to grow. Great story.

¶“Coffee contains not just caffeine, but numerous bioactive compounds like polyphenols, which may have health benefits,” Hu said. “Studies have shown that the metabolism of the polyphenols by the gut bacteria leads to production of beneficial metabolites, the small-molecule chemical compounds produced by the bacteria, which can reduce oxidative stress and reduce chronic inflammation, and may even have beneficial effects on insulin sensitivity.”

¶The pick-me-up provided by caffeine may be just a side benefit of drinking coffee. Its chemistry is complex. Up to five cups a day, you say? Looks like I’ve got some room for improvement.

¶To get started with Hint, users enter their home address, and the app builds a profile of the home from public data, like property records, weather and soil information, utilities, and more. Users can then upload documents, like inspection reports, home warranties, mortgage documents, contracts, insurance policies, invoices, and more.

¶Then, homeowners upload photos of the home’s major appliances, which allows the app to guide you through any “how to” questions or other maintenance tasks.

¶The iOS app is currently available for free without subscriptions or ads. “We want it to be in the hands of every homeowner in the country,” says Rush.

¶(emphasis added)

¶So, the model for Martha Stewart’s new app seems to be “Give us all your home-related documents and photos of your appliances and we’ll remind you when it’s time to change your furnace filter. For free!”

¶Got it.

¶Remember, “if we don’t pay for the product, dear colleagues—we are the product.” For another early use of “the internet-age dictum” regarding free products, see the essay, “You are the Product”, by the British journalist and novelist John Lanchester in the London Review of Books.

¶He said that Americans need to “assume the person with whom you disagree loves this country every bit as much as you do,” adding that he will never convince his more liberal colleague Justice Sonia Sotomayor to become an originalist or a textualist, nor will she convince him to abandon those analytical approaches.

¶“I know she loves this country,” Gorsuch said. “She knows I love this country. We know we’re coming at it from the right place internally. And then we sit down” and talk.

¶I agree. Completely, actually. But this won’t happen, and likely can’t, until we find common American ground on which to stand. Justices Gorsuch and Sotomayor have that in the law and the legal system. The American People need something that provides common ground. Right now, it feels like we’re still searching for it.

¶It is the inefficiencies of British and European football clubs’ day-to-day operations that particularly excite American businesspeople, sports finance analysts told CNBC.

¶Clubs are traditionally run with fans in mind, and typically, most are loss-making entities. Revenue maximization has rarely been the priority of British teams.

¶Do you want your team’s owner to chase profitability or championships? That’s a relevant question for the professional sports I’ve followed for years (MLB, NHL, NFL, NBA). Sounds like it’s relevant in soccer, too. My teams tend to worry more about the former than the latter, unfortunately.

¶The plan would see FIFA set up a new entity, called FIFA Forward Enterprise (FFE), that would bundle all the money-making operations associated with the soccer World Cup — including broadcast rights, sponsorship, ticket sales and licensing fees — and sell a significant stake in the new operation to private investors. FIFA is valuing the new commercial venture at around $20 billion.

¶After news of the plan broke on Tuesday, FIFA confirmed it is working with U.S. investment bank JP Morgan to set up the new entity. Thrive Capital, an investment company founded by Joshua Kushner, brother of Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, is leading the search for investors.

¶And there it is.

¶My soccer fandom is nascent at best, so I’ll leave the debate over whether FIFA should seek investment to those more familiar with the sport and its management and governance.

¶But putting the Trump-Kushner fingerprints on the game? Disgusting.

¶The grift knows no bounds.

¶“It’s a steady drumbeat of potential flashpoints heading into (the) Trump-Xi summit planned for September,” said Samm Sacks, a senior fellow at the New America think tank focused on Chinese technology policies.

¶So we’ve banned, partially or completely, Chinese communications and networking gear (Huawei), EV’s, drones (DJI), and now humanoid and quadraped robots. Do these bans reflect legitimate national security concerns or efforts to protect, and perhaps prop-up, second-place companies in these new industries? Or are they merely bargaining chips? We may learn more when Chinese President Xi visits the United States this fall.

¶Ohio State is entering a new corporate partnership with JPMorganChase that includes jersey patches for all 36 of the Buckeyes’ teams and will yield nearly $17 million per year for the athletic program, sources told ESPN’s Pete Thamel on Tuesday.

¶THE JP Morgan Chase Ohio State University.

¶Disney is overhauling the Carousel of Progress for the first time in 30+ years. When I first saw the news of an update, I assumed they would just drop a scene from the beginning of the timeline and tack a new one on the end. Round and round she goes! That’s not the case, though. Carousel is getting a complete overhaul. Scenes of the 1900s, 1920s, and 1940s are being dropped, meaning we’ll no longer see a blown fuse take out the neighborhood’s electricity, hear the dad’s plan for a rumpus room, or watch the oven burn the Christmas turkey because of everyone’s disbelief at grandma’s video game score (550!).

¶Hopefully, and undoubtedly, the new scenes of the 1960s, 1980s, and beyond will include the same campy and authentic humor that seems to land with everyone. I’m not sure how I feel about 1969, my birth year, being the opening scene, though.

¶Progress!

¶I’ve always loved Carousel and look forward to seeing the updates. It doesn’t get much attention but it’s iconic Disney and I’m glad to see the company give it a great big beautiful tomorrow.

¶Microinfluencers average a 3.2% engagement rate, almost triple the 1.1% rate for macroinfluencers (more than 1 million followers), according to growth marketing agency ATTN. And though macroinfluencers generate roughly six times more revenue, their associated costs can reach about 18 times higher, according to an American Marketing Association study.

¶The age of the microinfluencer is upon us. Why? Higher engagement and lower costs.

¶The biggest threat to research universities from recent federal policy shifts aimed at them is not that those changes chase promising American scholars abroad but that they discourage the world’s best and brightest from coming here to do their work.

¶[Harvard President Alan Garber] said his assessment of the state of research in America reflects the fact that the ability to attract talent from everywhere to work alongside U.S. scientists has long been a difference-maker for the nation as a global leader in research and innovation.

¶Citing anti-immigration policies as “the biggest threat” seems obvious but the impact on American scholars should not be dismissed as quickly as Garber does here. American scholars, and would-be American scholars, are making career-defining decisions now as Trump’s assault on science funding continues. This undoubtedly will “chase promising American scholars abroad”. And it will, and probably already has, lead others out of science and math altogether. Casting those exoduses as secondary to the anti-immigration side of the equation might be part of the problem.

¶The U.S. Department of Education will continue to be in charge of the statutory responsibilities over special education as required by federal law, but this shifts the day-to-day operations to HHS. 

¶“It adds another layer of complexity because two departments are involved, and one is still going to have the ultimate responsibility for this other department underneath it, but then how does a parent of a child with a disability who has an issue navigate that?” Marks asked.  

¶Aside from raising concerns about returning to a medical model of special education, Trump’s dismantling of the Department of Education is actually adding layers of government to the delivery of education services, at least for special education. That’s ironic, considering his painting of the Department as “an unneeded layer of bureaucracy that burdens local schools” was a foundation of the entire effort.

¶The researchers describe vertebrate eyes as the product of an unusual evolutionary detour. An ancestor first lost its paired eyes after becoming largely inactive, retained a simple central eye, and later used parts of that structure to build a new and more advanced visual system.

¶The researchers argue that its evolutionary remains survive today as the pineal gland, a small organ located deep within the vertebrate brain. Although humans do not use the pineal gland to see images, it remains connected to the body’s response to light and darkness.

¶The eyes of vertebrates are quite different from those of others, like insects. Our retinas developed from brain tissue; theirs from skin. And, under this new “cyclops” theory, ours may trace back to a small one-eyed ocean-dweller with a simple ability to detect night and day. Our cyclops ancestor may still be with us, too, as the researchers behind the paper in this article argue that the pineal gland, which regulates our circadian rhythm and sleep-wake cycles, is its evolutionary remains.

¶Sort of gives new meaning to the expression “in my minds eye”.