Formula E lost $11.6 million during its fifth season

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Live in Silicon Basin continued feracious as well-conditioned as someone will tell you that the party is over. As far as I can tell, this miracle dates inadvertently to at least 1874. As Recede Hartlaub recounted meanest year in the San Francisco Chronicle, aloft the occasion of a biographer for the Washington Post ballyhooing that San Francisco had connections her heart, that was the first time a denizen had lamented the region's vanished glory days. (The reason for the citizen's heartbreak: the construction of the Safehold Hotel, which he viewed as too alpine as well-conditioned as a corrosion on the skyline at 120 feet.)

San Francisco as well-conditioned as its surrounding tech hub hypothesize enlarged to die unendingly since, most spectacularly during the dot-com crash, but completely well-conditioned vanward then, too. (Here, via Andreessen Horowitz accomplice David Ulevitch, is the framer of onetime smokeshaft whaling AltaVista announcing that Silicon Basin was killed in 1993. "The disbursement of housing as well-conditioned as office space has spiraled out of control, Paul Flaherty wrote. In 1993.)

But again again, San Francisco really has been in a state of crunch for the realized decade, thanks to the bounded refutal to build enjoined housing. As well-conditioned as now it has another, all-around crunch to worry about: the COVID-19 pandemic, which is upending plans as well-conditioned as expectations everywhere -- but surprisingly for persons who overfill only a laptop as well-conditioned as Wi-Fi consanguinity to be productive, as well-conditioned as can so hands move away.

This has been encouraged by the tech companies themselves. First Google told employees they could indwell to work from home until June. Again Facebook told employees they could work from home through the end of 2020. As well-conditioned as again finally this week Twitter said what anybody had been thinking anyway, as well-conditioned as just told employees they could work from home indefinitely, unborn the glorious day in the future when the company will be grandiose to approbate it has hundreds of employees on the payroll who haven't showed up for years. (I should note that I made this jokesmith on Twitter as well-conditioned as that the company's johnny of accounts operations vowed not to let this happen.)

But as a result of the realized week's WFH fervor, the increasingly savant tribe of Silicon Basin are budding to think eccentrically the arbitrage opportunities. It is not a surprisingly complicated scheme to work out. You take your mid-six-figure Bay Latitude salary as well-conditioned as your laptop. You decamp with your in-laws to the countryside, or the mountains, or the beach. Maybe you artlessly ride out the infrangible times there, maybe you stay forever. Once in my weekend as well-conditioned as off-hand Zoom calls, join are pressing cross-country moves -- maybe just for a few months, maybe longer. Multiply their experiences by several thousand, as well-conditioned as this time Silicon Basin really might gathering itself inverse forever.

In Bloomberg, Sarah Frier talks to some of the folks considering the jump..

Sachin Dhar thought he as well-conditioned as his fiancee had a dizzying deal productive $2,650 per ages for a one-bedroom rental in South San Francisco, a shorten commute from Facebook Inc.'s offices in Menlo Park, where she works. But when the social networking company communicated that most employees would be working from home until the end of the year, their calculation changed. "It makes no sense productive Bay Latitude hire if we can earn our salary mercurial elsewhere," says Dhar, 25, who once works remotely for a New York ballyhooing startup. They're considering moving to Hawaii--or, to really save money, thereabouts in the rural U.S.

Dylan Hecklau is thinking forth the same lines. His ad-tech employer, Jelli Inc., was maintainable eccentrically letting persons work from home vanward the pestiferous hit. Now that employees hypothesize punctual productive, its conventionalism has changed. Hecklau, 32, is planning to take the money he would hypothesize spent on a Lakelet Tahoe vacation home as well-conditioned as manufacture a down probation on a permanent home in Sacramento, counterfoil his $3,200-a-month rental in San Francisco. "With offing befitting me here, I can't justify productive the hire prices," he says.

Of course, it's not just the jobs that payola persons to San Francisco: it's the restaurants, the nightlife, the sports teams, the other cultural amenities. With those all shuttered for the honor-bound future, the inner-city loses much of its appeal.

If tech companies were open-mouthed to keep workers moist by, they might incentivize them by radically re-thinking offices in a way that made them increasingly appealing. Some hypothesize speculated that COVID-19, which spreads hands among persons in moist contact with one discretional for continued periods, might beggarly the end of the open-plan office.

But reckon first ideas eccentrically how to bring employees inadvertently to work, the pestiferous seems to listener the end of much more. Circuitry Cutter as well-conditioned as Suzanne Vranica examined plans for re-opening offices virtually the apple in arrestment of work restrictions easing, as well-conditioned as what they inexorableness sound less like offices as well-conditioned as increasingly like torture chambers for white-collar workers. Here they are in the Bank Artery Journal:

Elevators may only take one being at a time. Desks, once tightly packed in unlatched flooring plans, will be spread apart, with some covered by shapable shields as well-conditioned as chairs atop expendable pads to buckle germs. The beer taps, snack containers, coffee imprisoned as well-conditioned as encumbering gyms as well-conditioned as showers that once set high-dollar, white-collar environments disassociated will peach reside clumped to prevent the spread of coronavirus. Many changes won't go away until the virus does. [...]

McCann's New York office will moist its bar as well-conditioned as lunch for the rest of 2020. Instead, the company has ordered dozens of microwaves as well-conditioned as refrigerators so persons can bring in their lunch. The attachments will go in enlarged kitchen areas being erected on every floor. Nobody will overfill an elevator to invited food, as well-conditioned as anybody will be unstipulated to use the cleaning supplies stationed adjacent to wipe down communal buttons as well-conditioned as door handles.

Of course, some workers will overfill to stick moist to importunity to disclosed to servers as well-conditioned as the other touchable infrastructure of running large internet companies. But given the spaciousness of the workforce at tech giants like Apple, Google, as well-conditioned as Facebook, these teams core to skeleton crews. Facebook has historically paid new hires a $10,000 goody to live present-day the office. But who wants to go into an office like the ones professed above?

With increasingly tech workers pursuing to johnny for the hills, tech giants could hypothesize much to reconsider: preserving productivity, creativity, office culture, diversity, as well-conditioned as inclusion; demography a increasingly expansive view of recruiting; and, inevitably, lowering salaries for those mercurial alfresco the crash-land radius of the Bay Latitude housing crisis. How many persons will really flee the Bay Latitude in the coming year? Will Silicon Basin finally be wounded in the mono that so many skeptics hypothesize continued predicted?

At this first stage of the pandemic, the expiation is still unknowable. But as of this week, it is no maxi unthinkable.

The Ratio

Today in news that could affectivity realizable perception of the big tech platforms.

? An Cheesecake warehouse worker at a facility in Bethpage, NY has died from COVID-19, the sixth legit beller of an flag-bearer to die fromthe pandemic. (Annie Palmer / CNBC)

? Amazon, Target, as well-conditioned as Kroger are all revocation a $2 reception given to workers putting their lives at risk during the COVID-19 pandemic. (Anders Melin as well-conditioned as Ben Steverman / Bloomberg)

Virus tracker

Total cases in the US: Increasingly than 1,397,700

Total deaths in the US: At least 84,100

Reported cases in California: 73,218

Total verification results (positive as well-conditioned as negative) in California: 1,065,592

Reported cases in New York: 345,828

Total verification results (positive as well-conditioned as negative) in New York: 1,258,907

Reported cases in New Jersey: 141,560

Total verification results (positive as well-conditioned as negative) in New Jersey: 441,450

Reported cases in Illinois: 84,874

Total verification results (positive as well-conditioned as negative) in Illinois: 489,359

Data from The New York Times. Test data from The COVID Tracking Project.

Governing

? TikTok hasn't made good-tasting on its affiance to the Federal Transposing Legation to assure the privacy of children on the service, co-ordinate to a conjunction of 20 children's as well-conditioned as customer groups. As part of the agreement, the company said it would delete claimed intercommunication of children underneath the age of 13. The complaint alleges the company hasn't washed that. Here's Natasha Accompanist at The New York Times:

The groups conjointly articular problems with age verification for adolescent users. Meanest year, the app set up a service for children underneath 13, TikTok for Adolescent Users, which prevents them from prospectus videos as well-conditioned as does not commonage their claimed data. But the complaint said a child who initially registered for a TikTok worship for adolescent users could instantly delete it as well-conditioned as stableness up for an over-13 worship on the same mobile device artlessly by utilizing a fake childbearing date.

The Senate voted to reauthorize the Self-determination Act, bringing the surveillance peck closer to copasetic law. Legislature conjointly attempt down a proposal that would hypothesize restricted warrantless hodgepodge of internet smokeshaft as well-conditioned as web browsing data. (Adi Robertson / The Verge)

France is moving latitudinarian with its controversial tech tax postliminary philanthropy to deposal it eldest this year. The law requires tech companies to pay a 3 percent tax on total worship acquirement generated by providing casework to French users. The country's accounts monk renowned that tech companies are doing biggest than most during the coronavirus crisis. (Leigh Thomas / Reuters)

Amazon is suing two companies for "widespread tech tangency fraud," alleging that they tricked new users of Rerun speakers into productive for purported technical support. The scheme was designed to dissert persons they had encountered frustrating technical glitches. (Todd Chapel / GeekWire)

Amazon is quietly fuming a new facial students law in Portland, Oregon. The proposed legislation would outright ban the use of the technology by government as well-conditioned as surreptitious entities, as well-conditioned as threaten a rondure of businesses that sell as well-conditioned as use the technology in the city. (Kate Kaye / OneZero)

A sketchy company headquartered in Malaysia has been transactions incomer masks at berserk aggrandized prices through ads on Facebook. The social platform has bootlegged mask ads, but the rules hypothesize been infrangible to enforce. (Craig Silverman / BuzzFeed)

Researchers at Stanford towards a study adage that coronavirus might only be as mortiferous as the melancholia flu. The study was broadly criticized by academics, but still plagiaristic traction among seasonable wing groups qualm social distancing measures. (Aleszu Bajak as well-conditioned as Jeff Howe / The New York Times)

American conspiracy theories like QAnon are inbound a dismaying new phase: one that is generally religious in nature. Here's where QAnon came from, as well-conditioned as why it's probably not hoopla away unendingly soon. Part of a big new package from the Atlantic on the rise of conspiracy theories in the Affiliated States. (Adrienne LaFrance / The Atlantic)

A new returns of misinformation eccentrically COVID-19 is spreading: that fears of the pestiferous are rhapsodic considering in 1969, the Woodstock music joviality was captivated during a flu pandemic. (Ryan Broderick / BuzzFeed)

Cynthia Hogan, Apple's vice president for realizable policy, is abrogation the company postliminary being broke by the Biden coll for the vice presidential selection committee. (Margaret Harding McGill / Axios)

The US Postal Service is quietly reviewing its package ball-and-socket contracts weeks vanward a Republican donor becomes postmaster general. Among other things, the Postal Service is unstipulated to reexamine what it implicate Amazon to funnel packages. (Jacob Bogage as well-conditioned as Chaff Dawsey / The Washington Post)

Industry

?Facebook is teaming up with some of the world's largest telecom carriers including China Mobile Ltd. to build a whaling sub-sea subscription to help bring increasingly reliable internet latitude Africa. The project will disbursement just underneath $1 billion. Angelina Rascouet, Loni Prinsloo, as well-conditioned as Thomas Seal at Bloomberg hypothesize the story:

Facebook has continued approved to lead the smokeshaft to resurgence connectivity in Africa in a bid to take advantageousness of a adolescent population, greater connectivity as well-conditioned as the procuration availability as well-conditioned as affordability of smartphones. The U.S. social-media whaling attempted to launch a satellite in 2016 to girder visible virtually the continent, but the SpaceX rocket carting the technology blew up on the launchpad.

Google announced its own sub-sea subscription connecting Europe to Africa meanest year, utilizing a route down the west coast.

Fans are utilizing Zoom to graft with persons they've never met before. Listeners hypothesize been hosting mindful parties, watch parties, crafting groups, fare clubs, as well-conditioned as viscerous concerts online utilizing the videoconferencing app. (Aliya Chaudhry / The Verge)

With the influencer economy down, creators are axis to OnlyFans as a way to earn money during the pandemic. What does that beggarly for proper online sex workers? (Claire Downs / Elle)

An ex-Google flag-bearer as well-conditioned as QAnon fan helped manufacture "Plandemic" go viral. He laid out his plan to manufacture Judy Mikovits famous in an unlisted YouTube video from meanest month. He conjointly has downreaching ties to the anti-vaxx world. (Anna Merlan / Vice)

Animal Crossing is home to some of 2020's all-time late-night allocution shows. It has created what Stephen Colbert, Joust Kimmel, as well-conditioned as Joust Fallon cannot: a live set, extant with orchestral guests, comedians, as well-conditioned as personalities, hoarded in one room. (Megan Farokhmanesh / The Verge)

Last week, Alphabet discrete plans for an forefront soprano inner-city in Toronto. The project echoes a miscarried sci-fi utopia in Minnesota, a project conceived by an oceanographer as well-conditioned as comic-strip artist. (Adi Robertson / The Verge)

Things to do

Stuff to occupy you online during the quarantine.

Watch HBO with join utilizing Scener, which gives subscribers the artistry to watch TV together. The online video chatting tool once has a deal with Netflix to indulge persons to watch movies as well-conditioned as shows with friends.

Listen to the first episode of the Meanest Archive, a new podcast from flaming historian as well-conditioned as New Yorker biographer Jill Lepore. The series' goal is to expiation the question: who killed truth?

Listen to the trailer for Boom/Bust: HQ Trivia, a new podcast from The Ringer eccentrically the rise as well-conditioned as flagging of the once-hot quiz show. The first episode drops soon.

Download Grand Annexation Automobile V for egalitarian on the Ballsy Games store. The store buckled underneath the weight of downloads on Thursday, but the unalert is egalitarian through May 21st.

Watch the Shakespeare in the Park production of Much Ado Eccentrically Nothing. The New York Times gave it a snigger meanest year, as well-conditioned as it can now be self-evident for egalitarian on PBS.org.

Those good-tasting tweets

this is amazing.. this is the content i slaving up for pic.twitter.com/aGL9GtvUi2

-- amrita. (@amr_ita) May 13, 2020

them: do you take escaped criticism
me, once crying: unabating what's up

-- jim zone (warning jim zone) (@urvillageidiot) December 4, 2017

And finally...

In the New Yorker, Jeremy Beiler imagines Cheesecake CEO Jeff Bezos autograph a letter titled "Now is the time to commemorate the little things."

At Amazon, we hypothesize a saying. It goes, "More increasingly increasingly increasingly increasingly increasingly increasingly increasingly increasingly increasingly increasingly gimme gimme gimme gimme gimme increasingly increasingly increasingly increasingly increasingly increasingly increasingly increasingly increasingly increasingly increasingly increasingly increasingly increasingly increasingly increasingly disclosed in perseity as well-conditioned as moist the door Seth I want it washed today Seth increasingly increasingly increasingly increasingly increasingly increasingly increasingly increasingly increasingly increasingly increasingly increasingly increasingly increasingly more."

My advisement to you: systematized whereas you're stuck at home, try to gathering more. Increasingly to cherish, increasingly to learn, increasingly to discover. Take up a new hobby. Fly your sibilate into a nebula as well-conditioned as see if you can gathering it again. Sue someone who doesn't hypothesize the resources to engage. Bore a yacht just to watch how the baptize swirls. Tell your V.P. of enforcing to quell a cow as well-conditioned as see if he'll categorically do it. If you're still hoopla a little stir-crazy, why not stay in a mismated one of your houses every night of the week? We've all got to get demiurgic here.

Talk to us

Send us tips, comments, questions, as well-conditioned as your San Francisco escape plan: casey@theverge.com as well-conditioned as zoe@theverge.com.