Welcome back to Tidings by Seabird. If you're not on our link-sharing app, you're missing out! Sign up to try it on web or mobile. And if you find value in reading Tidings, help us keep it going by spreading the word to other interested readers. On to this week's sampling of links shared by the Seabird community...

​Seedless blackberries and cherries that grow on bushes​

On the promise of gene-editing technology to improve crops, with a focus on making better produce for consumers to avoid the backlash that has hampered GMOs.

Wired | Mike Grunwald

​Why we demand perfect machines but tolerate human carnage​

A neurosurgeon on what makers of driverless cars can learn from medicine to realize the technology's lifesaving potential.

Noema | Jonathan Slotkin

​Ordinary abundance​

A perspective-altering tour through the wonders of an ordinary modern apartment.

Ordinary Abundance | Jordan Dworkin

​The 69-year-old rookie​

A professor of journalism uses his sabbatical to spend a few months back in the newsroom.

Columbia Journalism Review | Bill Grueskin

​The case for deep conversations in a world of small talk​

Reflections from a barista-poet.

The Walrus | Jess Janz

​Why social media algorithms send you posts you don’t like​

New research that we'll take as vindicating Seabird's no algorithm, no replies design decisions. Join today!

The Conversation | Ziv Epstein, Farnaz Jahanbakhsh, and Michael Bernstein

​The accidental architect of the internet's brain​

Meet Steven Pruitt, the Wikipedia super editor responsible for more than six million edits to the public repository of knowledge.

The New Yorker | Carson Griffith

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​The end of the American Middle East​

"The 1956 Suez crisis is remembered today as the last gasp of British and French imperial power in the Middle East, but it took years to reach that inevitable end. American primacy will not disappear immediately, either, but long-building doubts about American power and purpose have passed their tipping point."

Foreign Affairs | Marc Lynch

​What's happening in Kansas should alarm us all​

A deeply reported piece on how hostile laws are affecting the lives of trans Americans in Kansas, driving some to leave the state. [Gift link.]

The New York Times | M. Gessen

​Hook and squeeze​

On Democratic "spam PACs" and the extraction of donations from vulnerable seniors.

On Data and Democracy | Adam Bonica

​Why are dead malls a thing?​

More than you thought you needed to know about anchor tenant contracts as a root cause of dying shopping malls.

Arbitrary Lines | M. Nolan Gray

​Sports: a training ground for liberal democracy​

What playing sports can teach about living in a pluralistic liberal democracy.

Liberalism.org | David Bernell

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​First test flight of largest all-electric aircraft used just $5 of electricity​

The next frontier for electrification: flying the friendly skies.

Ars Technica | Jeremy Hsu

​Notable sandwiches #143: tuna melt​

"The tuna melt does feel a bit cosmic, a bit destined: to me, it’s the most comforting sandwich in the world."

The Sword and the Sandwich | Tal Lavin and David Swanson

​What is “freshly roasted” coffee?​

On the science of what it means for coffee to be truly fresh.

Coffee Decoded | Peter Giuliano

​An interview with Queso Queso​

In Portland news, an elusive figure opens up about why he stencils the phrase "QUESO QUESO" all over the city.

Portland Monthly | Matthew Trueherz

​Are crows really our friends?​

Finally, in bird news... in investigation into whether amiable crows feel the same way about us as we feel about them.

Audubon | Elizabeth Preston

Tidings is edited by Jacob Grier. The links in our newsletter were all shared first on Seabird, our minimalist platform simply designed for recommending worthwhile links. Learn more about us here and join to discover and share articles like these every day. Your recommendations may appear in a future edition of Tidings.