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Billionaire investor Chamath Palihapitiya recently explained why the thinks New York Democratic Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is both interesting and spectacular.

In a series of Twitter posts last month, the CEO and founder of tech holding company Social Capital lashed out at President Donald Trump while vowing to send money to Democrats an amount he pegged at over $750,000.

At that time, he also endorsed the polarizing freshman Congresswoman from Queens, also known as AOC.

Over the weekend, Ocasio-Cortez waded into a new controversy by describing New York Citys spiking crime rate as a consequence of unemployed workers trying to feed their families. In a recent interview with Yahoo Finance, Palihapitiya explained his thinking on the evolution of the major parties, and why he considers AOC a wonderful politician.

"I spend a lot of time trying to understand where the parties are going. And I think what's happening is that the Republican Party is going to get torn apart because of people's affiliation or lack of affiliation with Donald Trump, said the 43-year-old investor, who grew up in Canada in an immigrant family on welfare.

Similarly, I think the Democrats are too beholden to a, you know, a gerontocracy class that's, frankly, fading away. It's the reason they lost the election. And I think people are very perceptive of that," the billionaire added.

The reason AOC is interesting is that "she represents a standard-bearer of the movement in the left." He also thinks there will be "standard-bearers, young, dynamic leaders, in the right that do the same thing."

And what that's going to do is actually create a movement among centrists, he added.

Palihapitiya, who has no party affiliation and prides himself on independence, believes what's happening currently is a disintegration of both the Democratic and Republican parties, and "broadly speaking, that disintegration is a really good thing."

When these standard-bearers, like Ocasio-Cortez, emerge from within both the Democratic and Republican parties, and "those two poles exist at scale," it creates "an opportunity for somebody down the middle to unify the country."

Meanwhile, what AOC represents is something really unique and special. I also think I would say the same thing about a Republican, a young, dynamic personality who has a modern view of economic theory and social programs, which is sorely needed," Palihapitiya added.

At the moment, he explained, the pendulum is "swinging toward progressives, and then it'll swing back to centrism."

The latter is where most of the good will be done. But I think AOC is spectacular," he added.

SAN FRANCISCO, CA - OCTOBER 19: Founder/CEO of Social Capital, Chamath Palihapitiya, speaks onstage during "The State of the Valley: Wheres the Juice?" at the Vanity Fair New Establishment Summit at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts on October 19, 2016 in San Francisco, California. (Photo by Michael Kovac/Getty Images for Vanity Fair)

According to Palihapitiya, "politicians at their best are 'do no harm' because the real things that move society forward are incentives. And incentives are best designed by people who are experts of policy, not experts of politics."

What that means is the U.S. is in need of a bipartisan political class who just get out of the way, and who don't make things worse, and who allow us to do what we're all capable of doing, which is taking care of ourselves and fending for ourselves and, at the edges... design incentives so that we can take care of ourselves in a more humane and thoughtful way," he added.

In the midst of a heated debate over what capitalism needs to do to better society, Palihapitiya made a case for the need to create incentives for a more accountable form of capitalism, more progressive form of capitalism can actually make money for shareholders but return more value to people.

Julia La Roche is a Correspondent for Yahoo Finance. Follow her onTwitter.

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Billionaire Palihapitiya on phenomenon of 'spectacular' AOC, and 'swinging pendulum' of politics - Yahoo Finance

Yahoo Mail takes an interesting approach to contacts. The email service actually adds contacts to your address book automatically for each person you email.

So when you open a new email message and start typing the name of a recipient, Yahoo Mail is able to suggest email addresses from the messages you've sent and received.

But if you want to manually add contacts to Yahoo Mail, you can do that as well. Here's how.

1. Open Yahoo Mail in a web browser and then click the Contacts icon near the top of the page, to the right of the inbox.

The contacts icon in the pane on the right-hand side of the page opens the contacts tab. Dave Johnson/Business Insider

2. Click "Add a new contact" at the bottom of the pane.

Click "Add a new contact" to create a new entry in the contact list. Dave Johnson/Business Insider

3. Fill in the details and then click "Save." You don't need to add all the information aside from the contact's name. All the other fields are optional.

If you have an email message from the person you want to add, you can do it with just a click.

1. Open an email message from the person you want to add.

2. Move the mouse over their name at the top of the message. You should see a pop-up window with details about the person or company.

3. Click "Add to contacts."

You can add people from your inbox to your contacts list by hovering over the name in the email. Dave Johnson/Business Insider

4. Add any additional information you have for your contact, and then click "Save."

The Yahoo Mail app doesn't have a tool for adding new contacts from scratch. If you want to add contacts manually, you need to use Yahoo Mail on a desktop.

But if you want to see your contacts, open the app and tap "More" at the bottom right of the screen and then tap "Contacts." The contact list is pre-populated with all the people with whom you've exchanged messages in your inbox.

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President Donald Trump said on Thursday night that he thinks New Orleans Saints quarterback Drew Brees will regret apologizing after his comments about protesting during the national anthem.

Brees apologized multiple times following his initial statement to Yahoo Finance earlier this month, in which he said he would never agree with anybody disrespecting the flag while protesting during the national anthem. He even addressed an Instagram post directly to Trump, insisting that the issue had nothing to do with respecting the flag something he seemed to finally realize after receiving immense backlash from all corners of the sports world, even from his own locker room.

Trump tweeted shortly after his initial apology, saying that he thinks Brees shouldnt have apologized at all. In a video with his son, Donald Trump Jr., on the Team Trump YouTube page on Thursday night, Trump doubled down.

I was shocked, because I consider him a great football player, but I consider him a champion and a star and I didnt understand what was going on, and he took it back and Ive never seen anything like it and I think he hurt himself very badly, Trump said.

I was going to put out that hell regret that in the future years because you stand for the flag. You have to stand for the flag and the anthem. Our national anthem, you have to stand. I think the NFLs gonna have a lot of problems if they dont.

Trump, who said he thought Brees initial statement to Yahoo Finance was beautiful, thinks that Brees caved under the pressure.

He also thinks that Brees doesnt actually believe his apologies.

A lot of warriors, they cave under PR pressure because his manager said, Oh this isnt right, and his teammates said, This isnt right, and all of a sudden hes out there disclaiming about the flag and the country, Trump said. I dont believe he believes his second statement. By the way, he may believe it, but what he should be doing is not talking about the second, he should have stuck with his first.

Trump again slammed NFL commissioner Roger Goodell while speaking with his son on Thursday night.

Goodell released a statement earlier this month, admitting that he and the league were wrong for not listening to past protests regarding racial injustice in the United States.

I like Roger Goodell. I was very shocked that he made that statement, Trump said on Thursday. It didnt even look like there was any pressure on him. He made it out of nowhere in summertime. Whats he doing? Why is he doing that? I was disappointed with Roger Goodell.

Trumps comments echoed ones he made on Fox News on Wednesday night, in which he falsely claimed that nobody was asking for Goodells statement. A powerful video of several NFL stars was released one day before Goodells statement in which they specifically asked for it.

Several players from across the league have already committed to kneeling during the anthem again this season. If that happens, Trump said, the league is going to have a tremendous problem.

I think the NFL is going to have a lot of problems if they dont [stand for the national anthem], Trump said. And I think the same thing with U.S. Soccer, they said theyre not going to have to stand. Well if they dont stand, nobodys going to want to watch it. I think the NFL, itll be a tremendous problem.

Drew Brees, Donald Trump said on Thursday night, caved under pressure after his initial comments about protests during the national anthem. (AP/Butch Dill)

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Donald Trump: Drew Brees will 'regret' apologizing after comments on national anthem protests - Yahoo Sports

A Connecticut fourth grade social studies textbook falsely claimed that slaves were treated just like family. A Texas geography textbook referred to enslaved Africans as workers. In Alabama, up until the 1970s, fourth graders learned in a textbook called "Know Alabama" that slave life on a plantation was "one of the happiest ways of life."

In contrast, historians and educators point out, many children in the U.S. education system are not taught about major Black historical events, such as the Tulsa Race Massacre or Juneteenth, the June 19 commemoration of the end of slavery in the United States.

As the country grapples with a racial reckoning following the killing of George Floyd in police custody, educators said that what has and what has not been taught in school have been part of erasing the history of systemic racism in America and the contributions of Black people and other minority groups.

Theres a long legacy of institutional racism that is barely covered in the mainstream corporate curriculum, said Jesse Hagopian, an ethnic studies teacher in Seattle and co-editor of the book Teaching for Black Lives.

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Its really astounding how little the contributions of Black people are included in much of the mainstream curriculum and how much of that institutional racism is disguised, he said.

Historians said curriculums are about identity and learning about ourselves and others.

The curriculum was never designed to be anything other than white supremacist," Julian Hayter, a historian and an associate professor at the University of Richmond in Virginia, said, "and it has been very difficult to convince people that other versions of history are not only worth telling. Theyre absolutely essential for us as a country to move closer to something that might reflect reconciliation but even more importantly, the truth."

LaGarrett King, an associate professor of social studies education at the University of Missouri, said the history curriculums in schools are meant to tell a story and, in the U.S., that has been one of a progressive history of the country.

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Really the overarching theme is, Yes, we made mistakes, but we overcame because we are the United States of America,' said King, who is also the founding director of the Carter Center for K-12 Black History Education at the university.

What that has done is it has erased tons of history that would combat that progressive narrative, he said.

King said the experiences and oppression of Black people, Latino people, indigenous people, Asian people and other minority groups in the U.S. are largely ignored or sidelined to fit those narratives.

So, of course youre not going to have crucial information such as what happened in Tulsa, youre not going to have information such as the bombing of a Philadelphia black neighborhood, he said.

In 1921 in Oklahoma, whites looted and destroyed Tulsa's Greenwood District, known for its affluent Black community. Historians believe that as many as 300 Black people were killed.

In May 1985, Philadelphia police dropped a bomb onto the compound of MOVE, a black liberation group, killing six members, five of their children and destroying 65 homes in the neighborhood.

Another often-omitted period of U.S. Black history is the Red Summer, a period of time through 1919 when white mobs incited a wave of anti-Black violence in dozens of cities.

As for the protests against racial inequality and police brutality after the killing of Floyd and other Black people at the hands of police, King emphasized that these movements were not new.

Black people have been saying this for the past 400 years, this is not a new movement, he said. Each generation has had their point in time where theyre trying to say through protest, through rebellion, listen to us, listen to us, he said.

Part of the problem is that society has never listened to that history, he said.

In many ways we wouldnt have a Black Lives Matter movement if Black lives mattered in the classroom, he said.

In many ways we wouldnt have a Black Lives Matter movement if Black lives mattered in the classroom."

The current moment has also put increased national attention on Juneteenth, which is Friday this year.

President Donald Trump said in an interview with The Wall Street Journal on Thursday that he moved a rally in Tulsa set for Friday to Saturday out of respect for two African American friends and supporters.

I did something good. I made it famous. I made Juneteenth very famous. Its actually an important event, its an important time. But nobody had heard of it, he said, although his office has previously put out statements marking the occasion.

Historians note that Juneteenth has been celebrated in Black communities across the country for 155 years.

And even after the Confederate surrender and Juneteenth, slavery still existed in parts of the country until Congress passed the 13th Amendment, which was ratified in Dec. 1865, formally abolishing slavery in the United States.

Hayter said that the history of Black people and other minority communities has already been completely whitewashed and erased" when it is taught in American classrooms.

He pointed to the argument made by some that removing Confederate statues and iconography is tantamount to erasing history.

So when people say you cant erase history, it's like, what are you talking about? he said. If you crack open a textbook from the mid-20th century, there are no minorities in those textbooks.

The contributions they made to the American democratic experience are completely ignored, he said.

Hayter said those histories have been seen as a footnote to a larger narrative and not an important and integral portion of the history more largely.

As long as we continue to treat these as addendums to a larger American narrative, were failing these kids in large part because weve reduced these histories to second-class status, he said.

Hagopian said Teaching for Black Lives seeks to uncover some of these really important periods of Black history and give educators access points to teach students about them, including a whole lesson on the Tulsa Race Massacre.

He said another historical period that was glaringly absent from the mainstream curriculum was Reconstruction, the era following the Civil War that sought to address the inequalities of slavery.

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Reconstruction is one of the most fascinating and revolutionary periods in American history, he said.

Hagopian said it was a remarkable period of time, although short, when the country undertook a conscious effort to tear down institutionally racist structures.

Black people built the public school system across the South, and there were integrated schools in the 1860s. They were more integrated than today, just incredible examples of Black empowerment, he said, adding that there were more Black elected officials than at anytime until recently.

Its such an important era to examine," Hagopian said. "If were going to escape the intense level of racism that we have today, were going to need to look at what it looked like when there was a movement toward institutional anti-racism."

It is also important, Hagopian said, to teach students that the civil rights movement went beyond a few famous figures commonly featured in history books or during Black History Month, such as Martin Luther King Jr. and Rosa Parks.

I think one of the most important things for students to learn about is the way young people have helped shape American history in profound ways and to help understand the contributions especially of Black youth to this nation, he said.

Theyre so often erased, but when students learn that it was young people who were the leaders of the civil rights movement, they can then see themselves as potential actors to transform the world today."

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'Whitewashed and erased': There's a reason Juneteenth isn't taught in schools, educators say - Yahoo News

The owners of a controversially named ice cream have pledged to change its name, joining a list of other companies that have vowed to rebrand and retire racist stereotypes.

Eskimo Pie, a chocolate-covered ice cream sold in the US and invented 99 years ago, has vowed to change its name and branding, while the parent company, Dreyers Grand Ice Cream, has pledged to be part of the solution in striving for racial equality.

Nestle, the worlds biggest packaged food maker, agreed to sell its US ice cream business, which included Eskimo Pie, to Dreyers Grand in December 2019.

Eskimo Pie will be rebranded, omitting the name and character seen on the packaging. Source: Twitter

In a statement to Rolling Stone, Elizabell Marquez, head of marketingat Dreyers Grand Ice Cream, said the business had been reviewing the brand for some time.

We are committed to being a part of the solution on racial equality, and recognise the term is derogatory, Ms Marquez told Rolling Stone.

This move is part of a larger review to ensure our company and brands reflect our people values.

Dreyers Grand Ice Cream will reportedly discontinue using the character seen on the ice creams packaging and the dessert will have a new name by the end of the year.

Although the name Eskimo is commonly used in Alaska to refer to all Inuit and Yupik people of the world, this name is considered derogatory in many other places because it was given by non-Inuit people and was said to mean eater of raw meat, the Alaskan Native Language Centre says on their website.

On Wednesday, Quaker Oats announced that it will retire the Aunt Jemima brand, saying the company recognises the characters origins are based on a racial stereotype.

Indeed, the logo was inspired by 19th century minstrel celebrating the mammy, a black woman content to serve her white masters. A former slave, Nancy Green, became the first face of the pancake product in 1890.

An ice cream company has said they will retire the 'racist' branding of one of their products. Source: Getty Images

Aunt Jemimas downfall is the latest signal of the powerful cultural moment unleashed by the Black Lives Matter protests, which have spread around the world and prompted companies to rethink their policies, fromhiring practicestogiving employees time off for Juneteenth, the anniversary of the end of the slavery in the US.

Other companies said they are reconsidering racial imagery in their branding, including Uncle Bens rice.

The owner of the Uncle Bens rice says the brand will evolve in response to concerns about racial stereotyping.

Caroline Sherman, a spokeswoman for parent company Mars, said the company is listening to the voices of consumers, especially in the black community.

With AP and Reuters

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Negotiations between Major League Baseball and the Major League Baseball Players Association reached possibly their bleakest point on Monday after three months of coronavirus-induced hiatus.

Almost simultaneously, MLB commissioner Rob Manfred said he no longer believes the odds of a 2020 season happening are 100 percent, while word got out that the MLBPA received a message from the league saying there would be no season unless players agreed to not file a grievance. Player reactions ranged from perplexed to livid to suspicious of an MLB ploy.

Then on Tuesday, Manfred flew to Arizona to meet with union chief Tony Clark, and by Wednesday the league had delivered a new 60-game proposal that included prorated salaries. The union countered with a 70-game proposal that the league rejected.

How did we get to this point?

Heres a timeline on a contentious few months of negotiations and soundbites between the league and union.

Plenty more has happened with MLB and the coronavirus, like the leagues avaricious handling of minor-league player pay and cutting down the 2020 MLB draft. We will be focusing on the major events of the leagues negotiations with the MLBPA and how we reached a point where both sides appeared to exit the table, then returned.

Following the shutdown of the NBA and NHL seasons, MLB put spring training on hiatus and announced the beginning of the season would be delayed by at least two weeks. Its safe to say that was an understatement.

With much of the season still up in the air, MLB and the MLBPA came to an agreement that seemed to figure all of this out at the time. In exchange for a salary advance and assurances about service time, the MLBPA agreed to not sue for full salaries in the event of a canceled season. It also agreed on prorated salaries in the event the season would have to be shortened, so an 81-game season would supposedly pay out 50 percent of the usual salaries to players.

MLB has since contended that agreement was just a starting point, and insisted the players take lower pay on a per-game basis. MLBPA has held firm that such an idea is a non-starter, and that standoff is essentially the foundation for where baseball finds itself now.

With coronavirus cases still rising across the country, MLB held off on making any real plans for pretty much all of April. There were some test balloons floated about playing the season in an isolated area like the NBA is about to do with Disney World, but nothing that was really taken seriously in the end.

First, the season could be held in total isolation in Arizona. No, wait, Arizona and Florida. What if we threw Texas in there? None of this went anywhere, and both the league and the union have since appeared to agree that any season would be held in each teams home stadium with no fans in attendance.

After two months of hiatus, MLB appeared to take its first step toward reviving the season when owners approved a plan for an 82-game season that would begin around July 4. However, that plan included a revenue-sharing proposal that leaked in the media before it was ever officially proposed, and turned out to be a non-starter for the players.

Simply put, the MLBPA didnt trust MLB to give it its full share of the pie, so it requested the league open up its books if it wanted a revenue-sharing plan. Teams have long cried poor and insisted that they arent as profitable as people say, but have always been loath to present any real evidence of that fact. That request was also a non-starter.

No formal proposal ever came out of MLBs revenue-sharing plan.

An actual offer came two-and-a-half months after the season shut down, and it took about two-and-a-half minutes for the players to start saying no.

The plan was built on a sliding-scale model in which higher-paid players saw a larger pay cut. For 82 games, players making the league minimum would receive 72.5 percent of their original salary on a per-game basis while players with salaries above $20 million would get 20 percent.

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Many saw the plan as an attempt to turn lower-paid players against their more well-paid colleagues, which did not appear to happen.

Details of the plan:

Season length: 82-game regular season, postseason expanded to 14 teams

Payment: sliding scale salaries between 72.5 percent and 20 percent of per-game pay

Actual proposal: 23.9 percent of original 2020 salaries, according toBeyond the Box Scores calculations.

The MLBPA responded five days later with a plan that saw similar reception from the league. Standing firm on full prorated salaries, the players called for 114 games with full per-game pay between June and Oct. 31.

Details of the plan:

Season length: 114-game regular season, postseason expanded to 14 teams for two years

Payment: full prorated salaries

Actual proposal: 70.4 percent of original 2020 salaries

After a strong reaction from the MLBPA, MLB looked at its first official proposal and offered not much more, and even less if the postseason cant be played.

Details of the plan:

Season length: 76-game regular season, postseason expanded to 16 teams

Payment: up to 75 percent of per-game pay if postseason is played, 50 percent if not

Actual proposal: 35.2 percentof original 2020 salaries with postseason and23.4 percentwithout postseason

The MLBPAs second counterproposal moved a step in MLBs favor by going from 114 games to 89, but still did little to move MLB off its insistence that players must take further pay cuts.

Details of the plan:

Season length: 89-game regular season, postseason expanded to 16 teams for two years

Payment: full prorated salaries

Actual proposal: 54.9 percentof original 2020 salaries

So far, four official proposals and four immediate rejections from the other side.

With both sides seeming to make some progress, Manfred appeared on MLB Network and made a proclamation that would not last long.

Were going to play baseball in 2020, 100 percent, Manfred said.

That belief was likely rooted in the idea that in the worst-case scenario, Manfred could unilaterally impose a shorter season at fully prorated salaries, said to be around 48 games. In that case, owners would be able to keep costs down while still reaping a decent chunk of television money, and players wouldnt have to cave on prorated salaries. Of course, it would still be a mockery of a season.

In the event of a 48-game regular season at full pay, youre looking at 29.6 percent of original 2020 salaries. It wasnt a formal proposal, but it seemed to be a theoretical baseline. However, the idea also seemed to raise the possibility of the MLBPA filing a grievance against the league.

Two days later, MLB delivered another proposal. It again asked players to take another pay cut, and threw out a Sunday deadline that unsurprisingly passed without an agreement. Like its previous offer, the league tied salaries to the postseason with slightly better terms.

Details of the plan:

Season length: 72-game regular season, postseason expanded to 16 teams

Payment: up to 83 percent of per-game pay if postseason is played, 70 percent if not

Actual proposal: 36.9 percentof original 2020 salaries with postseason and31.1 percentwithout postseason

Fed up with MLB insisting on pay cuts, the MLBPA stopped negotiating and released a statement requesting MLB simply tell them how many games they will pay (at prorated salaries) and when/where to report.

That has become the players official position, putting the ball in MLBs court. Previous reports of Manfred considering a shortened season with full per-game pay seemed to indicate there was a minimum that would work, but MLB decided to go in a different direction.

Whatever optimism remained in negotiations seemed to leave the room on Monday, as Manfred told ESPN he no longer believes there is a 100 percent chance of the season happening:

"I'm not confident. I think there's real risk; and as long as there's no dialogue, that real risk is gonna continue," Manfred told Mike Greenberg for ESPN's "The Return of Sports" special.

"It's just a disaster for our game, absolutely no question about it. It shouldn't be happening, and it's important that we find a way to get past it and get the game back on the field for the benefit of our fans."

At the same time, it was reported that MLB said there would be no season unless the MLBPA promised not to file a grievance alleging bad faith, a move that seems questionable unless MLB believes it would lose such a grievance, or wants to burn time on a still-ticking clock.

The players reacted how you would expect, but one of the more intriguing reactions came from always outspoken Cincinnati Reds pitcher Trevor Bauer. In an extended Twitter thread, Bauer explained his belief that MLB is stalling so it can implement a shorter season, since a 50-game season would end far earlier than the usual late October if put in place now.

True or not, it was clear that all trust had gone completely out the window on both sides.

June 17: MLB makes new proposal after Manfred-Clark meeting

And just like that, optimism again. Major League Baseball sent the players union a new proposal for restarting the 2020 season after a face-to-face meeting between commissioner Rob Manfred and union chief Tony Clark in Arizona.

Reports indicate the proposal involves a 60-game season with the fully prorated salaries players agreed upon in March, and that the season could start by July 19. The Athletics Ken Rosenthal also reported the union may counter seeking more games, but it was widely viewed as a significant step toward ending the protracted fight.

Details of the plan:

Season length: 60-game regular season, postseason expanded to 16 teams

Payment: full prorated salaries

Actual proposal: 37.0 percentof original 2020 salaries

June 18: Union responds with 70-game proposal

The players associations counterproposal asked for only 10 more games, but also reportedly sought an increase in playoff money $50M in bonuses in 2020 and a 50/50 split of new postseason TV revenues in 2021. The total cost difference was estimated at about $300 million.

Regardless, owners were reportedly infuriated by the union countering at all, saying they believed Manfred and Clark had worked out a deal.

The unions proposal set off another war of statements and barbed quotes through the media.

June 19: MLB says it will not counter with new offer

Friday night, The Athletics Ken Rosenthal reported the league wont counter the players associations proposal, that there will be no 64 or 66 game compromise.

On a day where positive coronavirus tests surfaced across the sport, the move puts MLB owners back in position to impose a shorter season while running the risk of facing a grievance from the players association over the negotiation.

The union issued a statement saying the league will not play more than 60 games and saying the players were committed to getting back to work as soon as possible.

Every day is a day lost in the MLB season. (AP Photo/John Raoux)

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From '100 percent' to 'a disaster': A timeline on how MLB's season has been pushed to the brink - Yahoo Sports

The last time our nation lived through a cataclysm, it changed our sports forever. But 9/11 didnt just change the way sports feel and sound, it also altered the places where our sports are played and watched. Stadiums added perimeters and several layers of security, the nationalism and militarism were dialed up, and the in-person experience was fundamentally different.

This coronavirus pandemic, likewise, will change our arenas and stadiums in ways both temporary and lasting. Because there are really two separate and distinct pieces to getting fans back into the venues: They have to be safe from the threat of a pandemic, and they have to feel safe. And its in the overlap between those two things that designers are seeking to find solutions to safeguard the stadiums of the future.

This pandemic will end. A vaccine will be made. Perhaps other pandemics will follow. Maybe we live in an age of pandemics now. Social distancing could come and go and come back again. But even if that is not the case, a new social awareness of the risks of large crowds will linger. Thats part of the equation in designing a stadium now, because its also in the calculus of buying a ticket to a game.

Part of getting people to return is making sure that people feel safe and that all the things operators are doing are evident and communicated to their clientele, says Bruce Miller, the managing director of Populous, a firm that has designed more than 1,300 sports venues, including 21 new or remodeled NFL stadiums. Fans wont just want to hear what stadium operators are doing to keep the venue as clean as possible, theyll want to see it too. The optics matter. And there will be some degree of theater involved in convincing the paying customer that their health is a priority.

Yet theres a danger in overcommitting to the appearance of a safe environment. Gil Fried, chair of the sport management department at the University of New Haven, likens it to Israels airports. If the average American is greeted by so much security, they think, Hey, maybe this isnt where I want to go, Fried says. Maybe this isnt safe.

We dont want our buildings to look like a hospital, echoes Miller. We still want people to feel comfortable, have a great time coming together around a sporting event.

(Amber Matsumoto / Yahoo Sports)

Managing a highly communicable disease in a large stadium is a complex process. To that end, Populous commissioned a study of touch-points, working out which surfaces in stadiums are touched the most by customers. All of those touch-points can be changed and streamlined, Miller says, so that we minimize the touch-points that are required to attend an event.

You cant remove every surface thats frequently touched. You can, however, clean them more often, and you can change the materials, switching to copper, which appears to be less hospitable to viruses than other metals.

Yet theres only so much planning you can do for large crowds of sentient people, who tend to stand in clusters and move around a lot inside stadiums.

We can draw on our computer screen a professional layout where everyone is social distanced, says Nate Appleman, director of sports, recreation and entertainment at the HOK design firm, which designed the Atlanta Falcons Mercedes-Benz Stadium, among others. And then the minute that you introduce humans into the equation it all goes completely haywire because theres free will and choice. Its really a challenging problem to solve. Without a vaccine, its only mitigation of risk; its not safe.

Yet some teams are already drawing up elaborate plans for how to reopen, like the San Jose Sharks. Some states, like Texas, have already allowed the reopening of stadiums at 25 percent capacity but offer guidance no more specific than staying out of groups larger than 10, trying to keep 6 feet apart and wearing face masks. Other states, like Massachusetts, have said stadiums wont reopen at least not fully until a vaccine is available. As in all other aspects of this pandemic, there is little national coordination.

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The pandemic accelerated trends that were already in motion. The way we were designing and building stadiums was changing in significant ways.

Were in the middle of a time where I think we were already seeing fan expectations change for the live event before the pandemic actually occurred, says Bill Johnson, the design principal at HOK, where hes working on remodeling the Phoenix Suns arena right now, one of myriad arenas downsizing their capacity in favor of a more intimate feel. A lot of these buildings were at a point where it was time to change them anyway. Now weve had to take a hard look at it. If were going to decrease capacity, how do we create that social experience when were trying to stay 6 feet away from each other?

(Amber Matsumoto / Yahoo Sports)

Some of those changes might actually be helpful in a pandemic scenario, like the growing prevalence of wearable tech in stadiums and arenas which could be made to beep or vibrate when too many people occupy the same space, for instance. Stadium and arena apps that allow you to order food and drink from pickup spots seem tailor-made for this time as a sort of pedestrian curbside pickup.

On the other hand, trends like the reduction of suites in favor of more social spaces might have to be reconsidered.

But the big, universal tendency is for sports venues to reduce seating capacity. The last six Major League Baseball stadiums to open were all significantly smaller, capacity-wise, than their predecessors all decreasing by a fifth or so.

The Texas Rangers went from 48,114 to 40,300.

The Miami Marlins from 47,662 which was already capped in its gargantuan facility to 36,742.

The Atlanta Braves downsized from 49,586 to 41,084.

The Minnesota Twins from 46,584 to 38,544.

Even the New York teams cut down significantly when they opened new stadiums opposite their old ones in 2009. The Mets went from 57,333 to 41,992; the Yankees from 56,936 to 47,309.

The Tampa Bay Rays Tropicana Field can hold 42,735 but tarps cover almost half of those seats to reduce them to just 25,000, the lowest in the league by 10,000.

Helpfully, while capacities are going down, the size of stadiums and arenas isnt necessarily following suit. Because the space saved on those seats is often used on upgraded amenities, increasing food options and other forms of entertainment on the grounds. And many venues now have more flexibility than ever in moving seats around.

These facilities are, in other words, more suited to a pandemic than ever before. Its hardly inconceivable that seats will be spaced out further and that the room this opens up will be used to ramp up the experience further with things like TV monitors to watch replays or mini-fridges, saving you the trip to the beer concourse.

(Amber Matsumoto / Yahoo Sports)

In the NBA, the emphasis has been on getting the quality of the consumer experience right, even if its at the expense of quantity. In those arenas, some three-quarters of ticket revenue comes from the first 20 rows or so, according to the Sports Business Journal.

The younger generations of fans growing into enough disposable income to afford those premium seats dont actually like to be tethered to them. They like to get up and walk around and see the game from different perspectives, Johnson says. They like to capture and be in the moment when sports are happening and be able to broadcast that out.

The trick is to create enough room for those roving fans not to bunch up, yet to feel like theyre having a social experience.

Like 9/11, the coronavirus will add crush points to sports venues as new layers of security are added on. Except this time around, the congestion is problematic in and of itself. Because long lines for temperature scans, for instance, have to be spaced out. As do potential queues for security, ticket-scanning, concessions and bathrooms. Footprints of stadiums may have to increase.

But here, too, an existing development might help. Fewer people are driving to stadiums and parking there. Between rideshares and improved public transportation alternatives when the latter become safe again parking lots can be reduced. Some form of tailgating will likely survive as a means of gathering with friends before the doors open, but it may not necessarily take place in parking lots anymore, but rather in areas designated for just that purpose.

(Amber Matsumoto / Yahoo Sports)

The evolution of virtual reality may also reduce the physical crush of people in stadiums. VR has grown so sophisticated that it can place fans inside the stadium from their couch and has excited stadium designers for some time.

Only a fraction of most major teams fans actually regularly go to games in person, for reasons that are usually financial or geographical. Trying to create an experience for those fans that makes them feel like theyre there, in person, is the next frontier for the sports industry and potentially fertile ground for new revenue. It also softens the blow of not being able to be there personally while still allowing for the existing business model to survive.

You could physically sell one of those 60,000 seats, says Mark Williams, business development director and sports principal of HKS, which designs sports venues around the world, including SoFi Stadium, the new NFL stadium under construction in Los Angeles. And you may have another 100 people paying to have access to the offerings in that same seat that somebody is actually sitting in. They would see that perspective, look around, see the event. Thats limitless.

In other words, if our new normal forces us to build 20,000-seat stadiums instead of 80,000 ones, putting people in the stadiums virtually can perhaps salvage the lost revenue and save the product weve grown accustomed to.

The revenue model in big-time sports was already changing from maximizing capacity to improving the experience and extracting more dollars out of fewer fans.

Because sports broadcasts have become so sophisticated and accessible pay enough and you can see any pro team and just about any Division I college team from anywhere in the world it takes more to get fans to shell out for tickets, sit in traffic, park and push through the throngs of people to watch a game in person.

Thats been the battle for the last 20 years, Appleman says. How do we create an experience beyond just having the players on the field or court, that lures people out to come to the venues?

Should caps on attendance be imposed on teams in existing facilities, financing issues will follow. When fewer people come through the door, you have to make up that revenue someplace else in order to service whatever debt you took on to build the place. Stadiums are designed to be full as are the neighborhood developments that tend to follow. And the plan to pay for those stadiums, and whatever surrounds them, needs seats to be filled too. To avoid defaulting on payments, making the most money from the people that do come, as well as monetizing tech, will become ever more important.

But, as Fried points out, that will only worsen the gentrification in our sports stadiums. In a nation where almost half the population reportedly cant cope with a $400 emergency, the cost of taking a family to a professional game is often prohibitive.

Will this provide a different dynamic for facilities moving forward? I would think so, Fried says. I think we already have the haves and the have-nots in sports. A lot of the Average Joes have been priced out. With the quality of the broadcast, going is just too expensive. This pandemic is just moving that along.

Even if the pool of people who can afford to go gets even smaller and the onset of a deep recession doesnt help any the stadiums will eventually reopen and people will return. Stadiums and arenas form part of the social nucleus of our cities, going back to the Roman Coliseum, and leave an outsized footprint on our imagination.

Its just that when they do, those buildings will have changed as much as the times have. And soon, theyll change further still.

Leander Schaerlaeckens is a Yahoo Sports soccer columnist and a sports communication lecturer at Marist College. Follow him on Twitter @LeanderAlphabet.

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The Future of Stadiums: How will America's sports venues be transformed by the pandemic? - Yahoo Sports

The bus became a tourist attraction after featuring in a film

An abandoned bus in Alaska featured in the film Into The Wild has been removed after increasing numbers of tourists got into difficulties visiting it.

A US army helicopter lifted it from a trail outside Denali National Park. The local mayor said it was "a big relief".

Two people have drowned in rivers on their way to or from the bus and many more have had to be rescued.

In 1992 the bus was inhabited by 24-year-old adventurer Chris McCandless, who eventually died of starvation.

His story was told by author Jon Krakauer in the 1996 book Into The Wild. In 2007 the book was adapted into a film directed by Sean Penn.

Alaska's Natural Resources Commissioner Corri Feige said officials understood "the hold this bus has had on the popular imagination".

"However, this is an abandoned and deteriorating vehicle that was requiring dangerous and costly rescue efforts. More importantly, it was costing some visitors their lives," he said.

The bus was deep in central Alaska, 30 miles (50km) from the nearest town. To reach it, visitors had to cross the Teklanika River.

Last year a newlywed woman from Belarus drowned trying to cross the swollen river. The other drowning took place in 2010.

In April a stranded Brazilian had to be evacuated and in February five Italians were rescued, with one suffering severe frostbite.

The state carried out 15 bus-related search and rescue operations between 2009 and 2017, authorities say.

Denali Borough Mayor Clay Walker told Reuters that the bus had become a "perilous attraction" that needed to be dealt with.

"At the same time, it is part of our history and it does feel a little bittersweet to see a piece of our history go down the road," he said.

The 1940s bus was brought to the remote trail about 60 years ago by a road crew, Mr Walker said.

It is not clear what will now happen to the bus. Alaskan authorities said it would be kept in a "secure location" until a decision is made.

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'Into The Wild' bus removed from Alaska wilderness - Yahoo News

The coronavirus outbreak was first seen in Wuhan - but was it circulating earlier than thought?

There's been criticism of a study from the US suggesting that the coronavirus could have been present in the Chinese city of Wuhan as early as August last year.

The study by Harvard University, which gained significant publicity when it was released earlier this month, has been dismissed by China and had its methodology challenged by independent scientists.

The research is based on satellite imagery of traffic movements around hospitals in Wuhan and the tracking of online searches for specific medical symptoms.

It says there was a noticeable rise in vehicles parking outside six hospitals in the city from late August to 1 December 2019.

This coincided, says the Harvard report, with an increase in searches for possible coronavirus symptoms such as "cough" and "diarrhoea".

This would be an important finding because the earliest reported case in Wuhan wasn't until the beginning of December.

The academics write: "While we cannot confirm if the increased volume was directly related to the new virus, our evidence supports other recent work showing that emergence happened before identification at the Huanan Seafood market."

The Harvard study has gained a lot of traction in the media, with President Trump, who has been highly critical of China's pandemic response, tweeting a Fox News item highlighting the researchers' findings. The tweet has been viewed more than three million times.

The study, which hasn't been peer-reviewed - the process by which academic papers get checked by other scientists - claims there was an increase in online queries for coronavirus symptoms, particularly "diarrhoea", on popular Chinese search engine Baidu.

However, Baidu company officials have disputed their findings, saying there was in fact a decrease in searches for "diarrhoea" over this period.

So, what's going on?

The term used in the Harvard University paper actually translates from Chinese as "symptom of diarrhoea".

Story continues

We checked this on Baidu's tool that allows users to analyse the popularity of search queries, like Google Trends.

The search-term "symptom of diarrhoea" does indeed show an increase in queries from August 2019.

However, we also ran the term "diarrhoea", a more common search-term in Wuhan, and it actually showed a decrease from August 2019 until the outbreak began.

A lead author of the Harvard paper, Benjamin Rader, told the BBC that "the search term we chose for 'diarrhoea' was chosen because it was the best match for confirmed cases of Covid-19 and was suggested as a related search term to coronavirus".

We also looked at the popularity of searches for "fever" and "difficulty in breathing", two other common symptoms of coronavirus.

Searches for "fever" increased a small amount after August at a similar rate to "cough", and queries for "difficulty in breathing" decreased in the same period.

There have also been questions raised about the study using diarrhoea as an indicator of the disease.

A large-scale UK study of nearly 17,000 coronavirus patients found that diarrhoea was the seventh most common symptom, well below the top three: cough, fever and shortness of breath.

Across the six hospitals, the Harvard study reported a rise in cars in hospital parking lots from August to December 2019.

However, we've found some serious flaws in their analysis.

The report states that images with tree cover and building shadows were excluded to avoid over or under-counting of vehicles.

However, satellite images released to the media show large areas of hospital car parks blocked by tall buildings which means that it's not possible to accurately assess the number of cars present.

To show this, we've selected two of these images taken at different times of the Hubei Women and Children Hospital.

The first is of the healthcare centre in October 2018 - and we've marked with white boxes the parking area obscured by buildings.

This second image below - taken in October 2019 - shows the same hospital at a different angle. In this image there's a full view of the spaces previously hidden by the buildings.

Looking at other satellite images used in the Harvard report, we found car parks in other hospitals obscured in a similar way.

There's also an underground car park at Tianyou Hospital, which is visible on Baidu's street view function, but only the entrance is in view on satellite imagery - not the cars underneath the ground. Report author Benjamin Rader said "we definitely can't account for underground parking in any time period of the study and this is one of the limitations of this type of research."

The researchers could have compared their data with other Chinese cities to see if the rises in hospital traffic and search queries were specific to Wuhan, where the outbreak first came to light, or whether similar patterns where observed elsewhere.

The shortcomings we've highlighted in the satellite imagery, in addition to the questions we've raised about online searches for medical symptoms, raise strong doubts about the findings of the Harvard study.

There is, however, still much we don't know about the early spread of the virus in Wuhan.

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Coronavirus: Fact-checking claims it might have started in August 2019 - Yahoo News

Tucker Carlson continued his attack on the Black Lives Matter movement on Mondays Tucker Carlson Tonight, this time lamenting the groups recent surge in popularity. A new poll by Rasmussen, which Carlson pointed out is a right-leaning pollster, showed 62 percent of likely voters have a favorable opinion of BLM, while at the same time they found that President Trumps approval rating is only 43 percent.

Heres some breaking news we never expected to report: Black Lives Matter is now more popular than the president of the United States, Carlson announced, and not slightly more popular than the president, much more popular.

But Carlson was also quick to point out that Trump is not alone.

Black Lives Matter is far more popular than Joe Biden is, too, Carlson said. Its more popular than Americas religious institutions, all of them. Its more popular than the media, the Congress and big business. Black [Lives] Matter is more popular by double digits than both the Democratic and Republican Party. Its almost as popular as the U.S. military. Its much more popular than the pope.

At one point, Carlson seemed to allude to the fact that advertisers quickly abandoned his show last week after he claimed that Black Lives Matter and the protests following the killing of George Floyd were definitely not about black lives, and he railed against a Sesame Street special meant to educate children about racism.

Imagine a world where you are punished for questioning the behavior of the president or for insulting your local mayor. You probably cant imagine that, its too bizarre. Its un-American, Carlson said. But thats where we are right now. Black Lives Matter has changed the rules, and heres their first new rule: No criticizing Black Lives Matter.

Carlson also conflated the largely peaceful Black Lives Matter protests, which have been going on for weeks, with the riots and looting that took place soon after Floyds death. Carlson chastised local governments and police departments for how theyre dealing with protesters. He even tried to convince his audience that Black Lives Matter is more powerful than the Department of Justice.

Is there a reason the DOJ hasnt filed federal conspiracy charges against the people who organized and led these riots? Carlson asked. Its not as if we dont know who they are, their crimes are on YouTube. You know the reason: Black Lives Matter was involved.

And Carlson made it clear what he thinks of supporters of the Black Lives Matter movement: Theyre animals.

Black Lives Matter becomes more powerful and popular with the public. Why is that happening exactly? Carlson asked. Heres why: Because Black Lives Matter is getting exactly what they want, and that is the most basic sign of strength. Strength is the most appealing quality to voters, and to people, and to animals.

Tucker Carlson Tonight airs weeknights at 8 p.m. on Fox News Channel.

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