Assorted Links Sunday

Tip: Having Zoom cameras off reduces exhaustion & increases engagement, especially for women. Let people have their cameras off — they will focus more on the conversation.

Today's BBA Digest from Dean Barber is free to read.

Demography is not destiny: New numbers provide a reminder of the fluidity of American identity.

Higher education in a world of singles: Universities differ from music labels, but they, too, rely on an economic model that exerts control over talent and forces consumers into a narrow set of choices.

How the US made affordable homes illegal: The rules that keep American housing expensive.

People keep moving to the worst places for climate risk: Lots of people are flocking to Arizona, Florida, and Texas -- but no one is moving to Duluth, Minnesota.

Offices dangle beehives and garden plots to coax workers back: The latest perks include harvesting honey and digging in the dirt, part of a growing effort to give employees access to fresh air, sunlight and plants.

🚀 Why optimistic science fiction is still possible and important:

Sci-fi has an important role in helping us remember that we are pioneers and our exploring is far from finished. How many Silicon Valley technologists and founders were inspired by the various incarnations of Star Trek, after all? And this isn’t just my opinion. Plenty of sci-fi creators have publicly bemoaned their genre’s overly dark turn and its impact on our societal ambition, including Neal Stephenson, author of Snow Crash and other sci-fi classics. His concern even prompted him to partner with Arizona State University’s Center for Science and the Imagination to create Project Hieroglyph, which produced Hieroglyph: Stories and Visions for a Better Future, an anthology of tech-solutionist, hard sci-fi stories. (Stephenson’s contribution, which is outstanding, is about a space elevator.)

The true size of the continents: