Last week, NASA officially announced SpaceX as their partner for the future Artemis mission, aiming to land humans on the Moon and in the future establish a colony there. NASA has funded the mission with $2.9 billion over a couple years, and will work alongside SpaceX to make lunar travel possible. SpaceX’s Starship is the spaceship of choice, which hopes to have the capability to bring humans to the Moon and perhaps later Mars. Although trials are still going on, and Starship hasn’t failed to explode during these tests, progress is obvious and it seems to have impressed NASA enough that they are willing to invest in it. This is a win for SpaceX, who has beat competitors like Blue Origin, Virgin, and Northtrop Grumman to the punch. 

Until this Saturday 17th, the day of Prince Philip’s ceremonial funeral, the United Kingdom must remain in national mourning. National flags and union jacks, which represent the continuation of monarchy, will fly at half-mast on all government buildings and certain royal edifices. The Royal family, however, will continue to manifest their grief by wearing black mourning bands on specific occasions. 

Preparations for the Duke’s private funeral ceremony are already in place. Instead of a state funeral, often carried out for monarchs, the defunct had previously requested a more private, ceremonial funeral. Following his askings, the duke of Edinburgh’s coffin was placed to rest in a private chapel inside Windsor Palace until the ceremonial day, rather than sited somewhere available to the public eye.

The event, consisting of moving the duke from the private chapel towards St George’s Chapel accompanied by a military march and a funeral service, is expected to take place during the afternoon. The ceremony will be televised and, due to Coronavirus restrictions on funeral attendance capacity, a selected crowd of 30 will be present. By the end of the service, the duke will be placed in the royal vault. 

On Saturday, Warriors rookie James Wiseman went up for a dunk against the Houston Rockets and landed awkwardly on his right knee. After an MRI, the injury was determined to be a torn meniscus. The usual recovery time for that type of injury is four to six weeks and there are five weeks left in the NBA regular season. Wiseman was the 2nd overall pick who averaged 11.5 points and 5.8 rebounds with outstanding per-36 minute numbers and less than ideal advanced statistics. The Warriors drafted the young lefty with the explicit goal of using the last years of Stephen Curry’s prime to contend for a championship, but with development slightly slower than expected, they are expected to try to trade him for a superstar.

March Madness was the very first sporting event to be cancelled in 2020, but this year, it will go forward as usual. After 68 teams started the tournament, only eight remain. Most were eliminated by losing a game, but 10th seeded VCU were knocked out because of Covid safety protocols.

The tournament is held in a bubble and there are still a small number of fans in the arena for the later round. However, the bubble isn’t quite as airtight as the NBA one last fall. Nearly 2,300 people will descend on Indianapolis and most will be tested daily. So, why is March Madness going on? The answer, of course, is money. Despite the NCAA still not paying its players, the organization lost $800 million when it cancelled last year’s “Big Dance” and clearly doesn’t want that to happen again.

The US is known for having their two major political parties, the Democrats and the Republicans, but their northern neighbours have a different approach. The New Democratic Party, also known as the NDP, is a federal political party in Canada which was founded in 1961. (Canadian Encyclopedia) The NDP joins the Liberal Party of Canada and the Conservative Party of Canada as the main political parties in the country. The NDP additionally has the first Indo-Canadian political leader in Canadian history. Led by Jagmeet Singh, the NDP seems to be amassing a following that is headstarted by the youth. This can be linked to Jagmeet Singh playing the popular video game, Among Us, on a Twitch stream with popular politician Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.  Jagmeet also makes interactive and trend-aware posts on social media accounts such as TikTok. (CTV News) While the NDP has never won a federal election, it has been involved with the provincial governments of Alberta, British Columbia, Manitoba, Ontario, Saskatchewan, and Nova Scotia. The current Premier of British Columbia, John Horgan, is the leader of the BC NDP. With analysis of the NDP in Canada, will it be possible to see a similar party in the United States?

In recent years, Venmo has exploded onto the scene as a ubiquitous utility among Millennials and Gen Z. No longer content with juggling different bills at a dinner among friends, people are splitting the check with Venmo. The platform is minimalistic and built around its simple purpose. However, Venmo has become something more than a payment platform.

Paypal, Venmo’s parent company, has seen steady growth over the past five years. Currently, the default setting for all transactions is public and many young users prefer to keep it that way. That’s because Venmo has become an under-ground social media where hangouts and inside jokes can be shared quickly. In 2017, there were 207 million public transactions, where anybody could see the amount, message, sender, and recipient. However, users may not realize that more than just their immediate Venmo friends can see any of their data, every Venmo user can.

One week ago, a green container ship with the name EVERGREEN made news around the globe when it became stuck between the two sides of the Suez Canal, a large water strait connecting the Persian Gulf and the Mediterranean. The Suez Canal accounts for more than 10% of global trade, and more than 50 ships pass through each day carrying everything from cars to animals. This unfortunate situation halted trade for more than a week, prompting many internet jokes and memes surrounding the event. Thankfully, however, with the help of dozens of tugboats, Evergreen has finally been steered in the right direction and will be heading north to its intended destination, to the relief of many.