Jonathan Silva (Massachusetts Board Game Manufacturer)
Appearances
Up First from NPR
Global Economic Forecast Dims, Ukraine Peace Talks, Pope Francis Lies In State
So we're in survival mode right now. It's really difficult overnight to be able to communicate to a consumer that what they expected to purchase at one price is now double in price or higher.
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Global Economic Forecast Dims, Ukraine Peace Talks, Pope Francis Lies In State
A 30-day hold right now, hoping that cooler heads prevail, and we come to a number that allows us to continue on with business and to bring these great items to families to enjoy.
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Ukraine's Drone Use, H-1B Visa Uncertainty, New Species In 2024
Good morning, Asma.
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Ukraine's Drone Use, H-1B Visa Uncertainty, New Species In 2024
So I want to start with clouded tiger cats.
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Ukraine's Drone Use, H-1B Visa Uncertainty, New Species In 2024
Mostly because they're really cute, but they're also just this great reminder that there are still these big charismatic species out there just waiting to be discovered. What do they look like? So they're about the size of a house cat, but they look kind of like little leopards. And scientists thought that there were only two species of them in South America, but in 2009...
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Ukraine's Drone Use, H-1B Visa Uncertainty, New Species In 2024
This biologist named Teddo de Oliveira, who's like the expert on tiger cats, got an email that piqued his interest.
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Ukraine's Drone Use, H-1B Visa Uncertainty, New Species In 2024
Yeah, so he's looked at a lot of tiger cats, and these ones seem to just be a little different because they had slightly different spots, and their fur seemed thicker. And then on the video, they looked like they were moving different. And so he had a hunch, but it took him and like 40 other scientists over a decade to actually prove that this was in fact a new species.
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Ukraine's Drone Use, H-1B Visa Uncertainty, New Species In 2024
And so it just shows it can take a really long time to go from an observation that you've got a hunch about to describing a new species and putting it on the books. Wow.
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Ukraine's Drone Use, H-1B Visa Uncertainty, New Species In 2024
Yeah, yeah. I spoke with another biologist named Hugh Gabriel, who was an undergrad when he got on the path to naming a new species of frog in Madagascar.
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Ukraine's Drone Use, H-1B Visa Uncertainty, New Species In 2024
He told me that these frogs were hidden within the leaves of these trees and they just looked a bit smaller and their color was kind of off, sort of a coppery bronze. And so he wrote to the author of that guidebook who agreed that these frogs did actually seem a little different and they collaborated.
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Ukraine's Drone Use, H-1B Visa Uncertainty, New Species In 2024
Yeah, he actually discovered three new species or described them. And all of these frogs spend their entire lives in these trees. They lay their eggs, they hatch, they eat little spiders, all within the tiny pools of water that collect between the leaves. And this kind of lifestyle is unusual for frogs and pretty cool.
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Ukraine's Drone Use, H-1B Visa Uncertainty, New Species In 2024
So I want to stay in Madagascar because it's such a richly biodiverse place. And I want to add a plant to the list, specifically an orchid. Orchids are these plants that have these nectar spurs, which are like little tubes that feed nectar to pollinators. And this new species has one that's like a foot long.
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Ukraine's Drone Use, H-1B Visa Uncertainty, New Species In 2024
And that's actually the longest nectar spur relative to the flower size of any known plant. It's called Solenangis impredicta, and it's pollinated by a moth with an equally long tongue.
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Ukraine's Drone Use, H-1B Visa Uncertainty, New Species In 2024
Yeah, there's climate change. There's deforestation. We risk losing these species just as soon as scientists are finding them. Each of these species is really an irreplaceable answer to the question of how to make a living on Earth. And scientists are racing to describe them before it's too late.
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Seesawing Tariffs, Trump's Middle East Agenda, Sean 'Diddy' Combs Trial
It's very unpredictable.
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Seesawing Tariffs, Trump's Middle East Agenda, Sean 'Diddy' Combs Trial
We need to get product back on shelves. I think that we're really getting close to the tipping point of starting to see some shortages. At 30%, it's not ideal. You know, there'll be slight price increases.
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Seesawing Tariffs, Trump's Middle East Agenda, Sean 'Diddy' Combs Trial
The past 40 days has been the hardest 40 days in all of our business's life. And I'm glad that we're going to be able to come out of it, but we don't know what's going to happen tomorrow. It's very unpredictable.
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Mining's New Frontier
You then go to nearby villages on the nearest island to where the mining operations are taking place. And people there had no idea that just over the horizon, kind of 20 miles south of where we were sitting, talking... There's a vessel that's taking the first steps in starting deep sea mining operations. And when they found out about this from us, they really were not happy.
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Mining's New Frontier
You know, people are surprised. They're shocked. This is Jonathan Masulam. He's a former teacher. He spent years trying to stop mining from happening off the coast of Papua New Guinea, and particularly this island, New Ireland. Masulam helped fight against a previous incarnation of this deep sea mining venture. And he and the communities he worked with along the island thought they'd