Weekly Update: December 07, 2020 - December 11, 2020

The way i see it,
if you want the rainbow, you gotta put up with the rain.
-Dolly Parton
(January 19, 1946; American Singer-Songwriter)

Let's start!

Did you know that Barbie doll actually has a full name? Her full name is Barbara Millicent Roberts.

Image Credit: https://www.business-standard.com/

Her birth place is Willows, a fictional city in the US state of Wisconsin, and she celebrates her birthday on March 09, 1959 - the date when she was first displayed at the New York Toy Fair.

December 07, 2020 (Monday)
:::The number of Corona Cases were as follows:
Confirmed - 96,77,203
Recovered - 91,39,901
Deceased - 1,40,573

:::Bolo Indya, a Gurugram-based short infotainment videos platform, raised a fund of around $4,00,000. The funding round was led by Inflection Point Ventures and it saw the participation of their current investors from Eagle10 Ventures too. Bolo Indya has raised a total funding of around $1 million  till now and it plans to use these funds for three purposes, namely: to enhance personalization & recommendation engine; to further expand its product Bolo Meets; and, to strengthen the team. Bolo Meets is a platform where content creators can have the followers do micro-payments, by leveraging their social capital, to avail one-to-one or one-to-many live video sessions with them.

Image Credit: Bolo Indya | Google Play

Varun Saxena, founder of Bolo Indya, said in a statement that the concept of short videos in local languages is expected to see the demand of over 80 million users by 2022, just fourth to YouTube, payments and e-commerce.

:::Steve Wozniak, co-founder of Apple, started his second company, 'Efforce' - a marketplace where corporate or industrial building owners can get their 'green' projects funded. The company has been started with a goal to democratize the $250 billion market for energy-efficiency projects. Steve Wozniak said in a statement that the platform allows everyone to participate & benefit financially from worldwide energy efficiency projects and create a meaningful environmental change.

Image Credit: https://www.theweek.in/

Steve Wozniak has created a cryptocurrency token called WOZX, and he aims to use it along with the blockchain technology to make it economical & easier for companies to fund 'green projects'.

December 08, 2020 (Tuesday)
:::The number of Corona Cases as reported on Aarogya Setu App were as follows:
Confirmed - 97,03,770
Recovered - 91,78,946
Deceased - 1,40,958

:::According to the data published by Bloomberg, the total value of all the listed stocks in the world crossed $100 trillion. The rise in the value is majorly backed by the contribution of the tech market of the United States of Ameria that comprises of Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Netflix, Google and Microsoft. The United States of America now has a share of 41.6% in global market cap, followed by China with a share of 10.7%.

Image Credit: https://www.bloomberg.com/

Canada replaced Saudi Arabia and Canada now ranks 7th, while India is placed 10th with a market cap of $2.4 trillion.

:::The WHO Foundation appointed Anil Soni as its first Chief Executive Officer. He will occupy the position on January 01, 2021. He will be responsible to accelerate the Foundation's work to invest in innovative, evidence-based initiatives that support WHO in delivering on its mission to ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all. Anil Soni is an Indian origin health expert with a good track record of mobilising resources and advocating for global health priorities. He has previously worked as a senior advisor to Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

Image Credit: https://www.aajtak.in/

WHO Foundation was launched in May, 2020, to work alongside the WHO and the global health community to address the most pressing global health challenges.

December 09, 2020 (Wednesday)
:::The number of Corona Cases were as follows:
Confirmed - 97,35,850
Recovered - 92,15,581
Deceased - 1,41,360

:::Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) announced that Land Rover Defender 110 achieved a five-star Euro NCAP safety rating and scored 85% for child occupant safety, 79% for safety assist & 71% for vulnerable road users in the simulated crash test. Nick Rogers, Executive Director of Product Engineering at JLR, said that the company was honoured to receive this recognition from Euro NCAP.

Image Credit: Autocar India

Defender 110 starts from ₹79.94 lakh (ex-showroom) and it is powered by a 6-cylinder Ingenium diesel engine with mild-hybrid tech. The car features emergency braking system, lane keep assist system, rear collision monitor, six airbags, traffic sign recognition, adaptive speed limiter and rear traffic monitor.

:::SpaceX's Starship SN8 rocket was automatically aborted one second before its lift-off time. It was scheduled to launch from SpaceX's facility located in Boca China, Texas, and the plan was to reach an altitude of forty-thousand feet before it could attempt to land on a concrete slab near the launch site. SpaceX wrote on its website that the success of such tests is not measured by the completion of a specific objective but rather how much one can learn from it.

Image Credit: Business Insider

SpaceX's Startship SN8 is expected to carry humans to the Moon and Mars.

December 10, 2020 (Thursday)
:::The number of Corona Cases as reported on Aarogya Setu App were as follows:
Confirmed - 97,67,371
Recovered - 92,53,306
Deceased - 1,41,772


:::Traces of lead and nickel were found by the authorities of All India Institute of Medical Science (AIIMS), Delhi, in twenty-five out of forty-five blood samples of Eluru mystery ailment in Andhra Pradesh. The cases reported are from Eluru rural mandal and Denduluru mandal where water supply is not through municipal corporation. People consuming mineral water have also been affected.

Image Credit: https://www.newindianexpress.com/

Andhra Pradesh health ministry issued a statement saying that pesticides along with other probable sources were being looked at for the cause of illness that has left nearly six hundred people sick and one dead. Investigators are also looking for dump sites of batteries which are possibly the sources of lead.

:::Raja Chari, an Indian-American astronaut, has been selected to be in the Artemis Team by NASA. The team will soon begin to train for an upcoming mission to the moon. He is among the eighteen astronauts (nine men + nine women) selected who will land on moon by the year 2024 to establish a sustainable human lunar presence by the end of this decade. Raja Chari reacted to the news of his selection by saying that he was proud to be a part of the team that is working to take humans to the moon to stay.

Image Credit: NASA | YouTube

Every astronaut on the Artemis Team comes from a diverse range of background, expertise and experience.

December 11, 2020 (Friday)
:::The number of Corona Cases were as follows:
Confirmed - 97,96,769
Recovered - 92,90,834
Deceased - 1,42,186

:::According to the latest data released by National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB), thirty-four cases of theft, burglary, robbery and dacoit were registered in Mumbai on an average in a single day. The cumulative figure for 'all property stealing case' stood at 37,713 and 'theft of everything from motor vehicles to electronic gadgets' stood at 27,500. NCRB also released data for recovery rate of the stolen property. The national average stood at 26%. Tamil Nadu reported the best recovery rate of 77.8% while Mizoram reported the worst recovery rate of 7.3%. Maharashtra and Delhi reported the recovery rate of 13.7% and 10.3% respectively. The recovery rate of Telangana, Uttarakhand and Rajasthan stood at 50% each.

Image Credit: https://www.sentinelassam.com/

D. Sivanandhan, former IPS Officer, said that the police only register a case and issue an acknowledgement so that the complainant can claim insurance. He added by saying that there is no liability or pressure on the police for recovery and one should not judge the efficiency of police based on numbers.

:::As greenhouse gas emissions reached a new high last year, the World Economic Forum (WEF) issued a warning by saying that up to two billion people would face Sixty Degree Celsius temperature for more than a tenth of the year in 2050s. WEF also said that climate-related illnesses would kill around 2,50,000 people each year by 2030 as some of the extreme weather events like heat-waves & cold-waves, intense precipitation events and regional droughts have become more frequent & intense.

Image Credit: https://www.weforum.org/

Green investment, however, under the stimulus packages by governments may cut up to 25% off emissions predicted in 2030.

In this week's Special Section, i will talk about 'Exobles', Vadodara's first outdoor hydroponic farm by Jaykumar Vora.

Image Credit: Exobles | Facebook

The team at Exobles sells freshly grown vegetables to its customers within two hours of harvest. These vegetables are residue free and pesticides free.

Image Credit: Exobles | Facebook

One can also rent a part of their farm to grow a vegetable of his/her own choice. All the efforts and care to grow that vegetable are handled by Exobles.

Image Credit: Exobles | Facebook

The team also helps people to turn their idle spaces like terrace, backyard or balcony into a small farm with their hydroponic systems. The team visits the place to fit its system and once a customer has grown the vegetables, the team purchases back its system while a customer gets to enjoy the vegetable grown.

Image Credit: Exobles | Facebook

You may read more about Exobles on Facebook @ExoblesFarm and on Instagram @_exobles_.

That is all for this week.

Do follow my blog to get the updates. You can connect with me on Instagram @sachdev_ankur.

I hope that the blog was useful and it helped you in catching up with what happened. If you have anything to contribute, then please feel free to comment. Do share this blog with everyone you know and help them too.

*Disclaimer: The information has been presented in this blog after reviewing various news articles. In case you find any article, or if you have any article, that states some facts differently, then share them in the comment section. Please keep the publishing date of the article in mind as it may be an update on the article which was published previously, or it may contain outdated information if it was published before the date mentioned in this blog. The blogger is not responsible for any transaction that happens between the reader and the brand.