Good morning and welcome to your weekday morning roundup of the top stories you need to know.
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What's going on today:
- Musk moles through. Some cities think Elon Musk's tunnel could be the solution to their transportation issues but experts are skeptical. As Musk opens his first tunnel in Las Vegas, officials in Fort Lauderdale are optimistic they will soon have one, NBC
News reported. But experts doubt that the tunnel project will expand. - All that - and a vaccine too! Hong Kong is so desperate to get people vaccinated that it's auctioning off a Tesla, a year's worth of stays at a 5-star hotel, and a $1.4 million apartment. Officials are hoping the rewards - which total around $14 million in value - will entice a vaccine-hesitant population to get jabbed.
- "I did not have the right to make this decision." The Wisconsin pharmacist who sabotaged 500 vaccine doses was sentenced to 3 years in prison, says he feels "desperately sorry and ashamed." Steven Brandenburg was arrested on December 31 for taking Moderna vaccine vials out of a clinic refrigerator so the doses would be ineffective. Brandenberg said he sabotaged the vaccine because he didn't think the coronavirus was real and believed the vaccine was harmful.
- Under his eye. Chinese tech companies are using 'Third Eye' surveillance software to make sure their tech workers are pulling punishing '9-9-6' shifts. The software monitors employee activity and generates weekly efficiency reports on each worker, listing the time they spent watching videos or visiting non-work websites.
- A new big boy's in town. A species of dinosaur dubbed 'the southern titan' - a 16 foot tall dinosaur almost the length of a Boeing 737 - has been officially classified in Australia. The skeleton was discovered in 2007 and is now a new classified species called Australotitan cooperensis.
- Twitter makes strange bedfellows. Trump congratulates Nigeria, which he once called a 's---hole' country, for shutting down Twitter. Trump also suggested more countries should ban Twitter. Repressive governments like Iran and China already censor social media platforms like Twitter.
That's all for now. See you tomorrow.