The Daily Valet. - 2/3/21, Wednesday

✔️ Stepping Down, Not Stepping Away

February 03, 2021

Wednesday, February 3rd Edition

Cory Ohlendorf, Editor in Chief of Valet.

I’ve never passed a mirror that didn’t get my immediate attention.

Cory Ohlendorf , Editor ⋯ @coryohlendorf

Today's edition is presented by

Today’s Big Story

Jeff Bezos Steps Down

Amazon will have a new CEO soon

By now, you’ve likely heard that Amazon’s Jeff Bezos is stepping down as chief executive officer this summer, after more than a quarter-century at the helm of the retail, logistics and tech behemoth.

The 57-year-old Bezos said he planned to hand over the reins this summer to Andy Jassy—the chief executive of Amazon’s cloud computing division—and transition into the role of executive chairman.

According to the Wall Street Journal, the company announced his changing role as it reported revenue soaring in the fourth quarter 44% to $125.56 billion—surpassing $100 billion for the first time in a three-month span—and profit more than doubling.

In recent years, the 57-year-old had stepped back from daily operations, but he did take a more hands-on approach during the early months of the pandemic last year as demand for deliveries soared but also tested Amazon’s ability to keep up. The company has now stabilized, and Amazon’s cloud business is a huge part of the company—which is reflected in the new leadership choice.

Bezos released a letter explaining his decision, and maybe I didn’t read it carefully enough though, because I never seemed to get an explanation as to why he decided to step down now. Of course, Twitter has plenty of theories.

He did make clear that he’s not retiring. He’ll remain Amazon’s biggest shareholder—he owns 10.6% of the company—and put his substantial wealth to good use via a range of philanthropic endeavors as well as various outside projects including his rocket company Blue Origin, which recently resumed test flights at the end of 2020.

↦ Dig Deeper: Mashable examines Jeff Bezos' Amazon legacy by the numbers.

Another SpaceX Starship Explodes

Despite an otherwise successful launch

Following the crash of the SN8 starship prototype back in December, SpaceX looked to continue its quest to explore space with its latest starship, SN9. It launched on Tuesday, soaring miles above its South Texas facilities in a successful flight demonstration before exploding during the landing attempt.

The 16-story-tall stainless steel rocket lifted off from SpaceX’s Boca Chica, Texas test facilities, reaching an altitude of 6.2 miles. After that, SN9 shut down its three engines to begin a free-falling dance back to Earth, tilting on its side to test new aerodynamic flaps. If all had gone well, the rocket would have landed vertically. Instead, SN9 slammed into the ground.

Despite the failed landing, SpaceX engineers are still calling the launch of the SN9 a success. “This is a test flight, the second time we’ve launched starship in this configuration,” said Principal Integration Engineer John Insprucker. According to The Verge, the explosion sprayed debris on SN10, another Starship prototype that stood ready for SpaceX’s next test flight.

And speaking of future flights, SpaceX will launch four private individuals on a Crew Dragon capsule into orbit around the Earth later this year, dubbed “the world’s first all-civilian mission.”

↦ FYI: The SN9 got the green light to fly, but the Federal Aviation Administration revealed Tuesday that its predecessor never did. But it launched anyway.

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Vaccines Will Ship Directly to Pharmacies

The government expands how and where Americans can get inoculated

The Biden administration announced Tuesday that it's working to expand access to COVID-19 vaccines. The push comes amid new urgency to speed up vaccinations in order to prevent the spread of potentially more serious strains of the virus that have already killed more than 447,000 Americans.

Starting next week, one million doses will be distributed to some 6,500 pharmacies across the country. Drugstores have become a mainstay for flu shots and shingles vaccines, and the industry is capable of vaccinating tens of millions of people monthly, U.S. coronavirus coordinator Jeff Zients told the Associated Press.

He said that the effort would eventually scale up to cover some 40,000 retail pharmacies—including Walgreens, CVS and Rite Aid locations—each receiving doses directly from the federal government.

Biden has pledged to get 100 million vaccine doses into the arms of Americans within the first 100 days of his administration. That pace, of one million doses a day, is already being surpassed. White House officials have called Biden's goal “a floor, not a ceiling.”

↦ FYI: What's going on with all these coronavirus variants? NPR has a handy illustrated guide.

Everyone Is Buying Mirrors Right Now

But why?

It's hard to say our appearances mattered much over the last year. Many of us got comfortable working from home, in sweats and slippers. There were no parties to go to, no fancy dinners or weddings. Yet, ironically, the popularity of mirrors has skyrocketed.

CB2 reported that mirrors were their most-searched home product in 2020—with over four million inquiries. And 1stDibs saw a double digit increase in mirror searches overall as well. The Times of London says that mirrors are “magical because they add an extra sightline to a small room and act as banks for borrowed light.”

But Vogue explores the psychology of the looking glass. Are we masochists who like to gaze upon our unkempt, sweatpant-clad reflection? Are we so vain that we needed “selfie mirrors” to keep our Instagram content flowing? Turns out, we were buying mirrors not because we wanted to look at something—we bought them because we wanted to look away.

A lot of our pre-pandemic life was spent away from the home: at the office, a restaurant, in our cars and other people's houses. But once we were homebound, the confinement led us to search for more places to look at ... and that led us to mirrors.

↦ Buy: Expand your surroundings with a few of our picks.

In Other News

Other Things We’re Talking About Today

Proper workout sneakers

Yosemite’s Firefall

This wall-mounted minibar

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Prep for a Wild Valentine’s Day

Just because you’re staying home, doesn’t mean the night has to be uneventful

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What We’re Buying

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A Gentlemanly Closet Solution

Photo by @menswearmusings

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