An embarrassing T20 wipeout

The losing streak continued for the boys in blue who chalked up the lowest ever ‘batting first’ score in the history of the T20 World Cup. Adding to the horror: The batsmen played 54 dot balls—and didn’t score a single run in nine of the 20 overs. And we were the first team not to score a boundary between the 7-15 overs. The result: New Zealand easily won by eight wickets. Indian Express blames the debacle on “poor team selection, not relying on form players and the failure to have any flexibility in the side, which lacked proper multi-skilled cricketers.” Expect a lot of hand-wringing over the inclusion of Hardik Pandya—whose selection was already controversial in the lead up to the game. Scroll rounds up the reactions on Twitter.

Point to note: This means our chances of making the semi-final are extremely slim. Afghanistan will have to beat New Zealand, and then we will have to defeat Afghanistan by a huge margin.

Climate talks look grim

The COP26 summit (explained here) kicked off yesterday in Glasgow, but hopes of a significant breakthrough already look dim. The G20 meeting of the world’s biggest economies—which account for 75% of global emissions—failed to produce any concrete timelines or targets. The final statement vaguely spoke of the “key relevance of achieving global net zero” on carbon emissions “by or around mid-century.” None of this bodes well for COP26. UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres said: “I leave Rome with my hopes unfulfilled, but at least they are not buried.” Wall Street Journal (behind paywall) and The Hindu have the most details about the G20 summit.

In related news: Britain has named a melting Antarctic glacier the Glasgow glacier—after the venue of the COP26 meeting. UK PM Boris Johnson said: “[B]y naming this glittering giant of nature after the city where next week humankind will gather to fight for the future of the planet, we have a stark reminder of what we are working to preserve.” (The Guardian) 

On a lighter note: The NRIs in Scotland appear to be a musical lot:

Covid killed a flu strain

One of four strains of influenza has likely gone extinct due to limited human movement, vaccine coverage and quarantine measures. The influenza B/Yamagata virus has not been detected across the world since April 2020. Also this: It’s possible that a large part of the human population has already built up immunity to this lineage—making it easier to drive it to extinction. (Cosmos)

In other Covid-related news: Doctors in India have opposed any move to recommend booster shots for healthy people—and the health ministry agrees. Point to note: The United States has approved booster shots for all those who are 65-plus—or are between the ages of 18-64 and at a high risk of getting Covid. (Hindu)

Meanwhile in Europe: PM Modi made headlines as he schmoozed world leaders at the G20 summit in Rome—which included a quick pop-in to say hello to the Pope. 

But on Twitter, they primarily made news for the glaring absence of face masks.

Related good read: BJP leaders say the meeting with the Pope—and even a possible papal visit—will strengthen the party’s appeal to Catholic-dominated states like Goa and Manipur, which are coincidentally headed for elections. (Indian Express)

Facebook scam targets social media marketers

Con artists are hacking accounts of digital marketers—and using them to pay for ad campaigns worth thousands of dollars. How it works:

“A scammer will reach out to a digital marketer via Facebook Messenger posing as someone looking to hire a Facebook ad campaign manager. After their pitch, they'll send over a project proposal with all the details about the company, budget, and what they're looking to do. This proposal is cover for a .exe file download, disguised as an innocent PDF, which gives the scammer access to the target's Facebook Business Manager.”

The other big hack: Russian criminals hacked the database of the jewellery company Graff—and leaked the personal details on the dark web of 600 customers, including celebrities and world leaders. Daily Mail claims these include David Beckham, Oprah Winfrey and Donald Trump.(Telegraph UK)

A festival of Hindutva outrage

One: The Madhya Pradesh home minister has warned designer Sabyasachi Mukherjee that he will take legal action if he doesn’t pull his Mangalsutra ad campaign—which shows same-sex couples and women in bras wearing the jewellery. The brand surrendered and withdrew the campaign last evening. FYI: Dabur pulled its ad due to a threat from the same minister. (Indian Express)

Two: Hindutva folks are now upset about Diwali ads featuring women in traditional clothes without a bindi—all which has spawned the hashtag #NoBindiNoBusiness. Hindu and The News Minute have details if you need it. 

Three: Still being punished: Comedian Munawar Faruqui who spent a month in jail after being accused of insulting Hindu gods (explained here). His three shows in Mumbai were recently canceled after Bajrang Dal threatened to burn down the venues. And this is what his daily life looks like: “I get 50 threat calls daily, I had to change my SIM card thrice. When my number gets leaked, people call up and abuse me.” (NDTV)

Two animal studies of note

One: New research shows that pet dogs can identify new words just like human babies:

“Imagine the infant brain is confronted with the phrase ‘scary dragon’ for the first time. It could decide that there are three words: sca—rydra—gon. Or it can decide there are two: scary and dragon. Roughly speaking, the brain recognises that it is highly probable that the ‘scar’ and ‘y’ sounds form one unit, and that so do ‘dra’ and ‘gon’. Babies spontaneously do this at about eight months old, despite being oblivious to what the words scary and dragon mean.”

And dogs are able to do something similar using “exactly the kind of complex statistics human infants use to extract words from continuous speech.” Hmm, and yet you can yell ‘bad boy’ a million times to very little effect. (Times UK)

Two: We’ve all heard of truffle pigs and dogs—used by farmers to locate the delicious, high-priced mushrooms. A new study has now identified ‘truffle birds’: the black-throated huet-huet and the chucao tapaculo in South America which eat truffles too. (Popular Science)

Four art things

One: A villa in Rome is up for auction, and the starting bid is an eye-watering €471 million (roughly $547 million). The reason: The mansion comes with a ceiling mural painted by the great master Caravaggio—which is called ‘Jupiter, Neptune and Pluto’. Most experts agree the sale price is a steal considering the Carvaggio is itself valued at  €310 million. (Robb Report)

Two: Paintings by eight trans Indians have been selected to be part of an exhibit titled Visibility and Remembrance in University of South Florida. The one below appears to be inspired by Frida Kahlo. (New Indian Express)

Three: This month, the work of 65 Indian artists will be exhibited as part of a groundbreaking project called ‘Hub India’ in Turin, Italy—in collaboration with the city’s annual contemporary art fair, Artissima. The Hindu has all the details you could possibly need on the project.

Four: Ok, this isn’t exactly an art thing, but still in the general vicinity. Back in the 1990s, archeologists discovered a 1000-year old gold mask in Peru that was coloured red—and assumed the pigment was cinnabar. What was baffling: How the paint had remained on the mask for all these years. A DNA analysis has now offered an answer: The pigment is human blood. And the reason this is not surprising: The Sicán people performed human sacrifices using a method of cutting into the neck and chest designed to maximize bleeding. Yikes. See it below. (Smithsonian Magazine)