GREAT WHITE OR GO HOME

of critters in clover

The European Union already forced Apple to abandon its proprietary charging port and adopt USB-C across its entire iPhone lineup. It just did something bigger. A new EU mandate requires every smartphone sold in Europe including Apple devices to feature a battery that can be replaced by the user without specialist tools, without voiding a warranty, and without sending the device to a manufacturer approved service center. Batteries must maintain a minimum capacity threshold after a set number of charge cycles and replacement parts must remain available for up to ten years after a model goes on sale.

The consumer electronics industry built its current business model around batteries that degrade, cannot be replaced at home, and create a natural upgrade cycle every two to three years. The EU just legislated that model out of existence in the world's largest regulatory market.

Apple, Samsung, and every other manufacturer now faces a choice between redesigning their devices for the European market or accepting that their current hardware architecture is no longer legally sellable there.

Dutch longsword fencer Tosca Beuming

Forget the sale of the century. The auction house Sotheby’s is gearing up for the sale of the epoch. On July 14 it will open live bidding on assorted fossils, but the pièce de résistance is lot 20, a rare 67-million-year-old Tyrannosaurus rex skeleton.

The specimen—dubbed Gus—is billed as one of the largest, most complete T. rexes ever found. Gus is expected to fetch up to $30 million and will go to the highest bidder, whether public museum or private collector. The latter have played an increasingly prominent role in buying fossils, with auction houses, according to paleontologists, contributing to the trend by building hype. But when private collectors swoop in and buy fossils at auction as luxury assets, those pieces of history are effectively lost to science.

By nearly all accounts, Gus is a big deal. In its description, Sotheby’s boasts that the specimen, which was discovered on a ranch in South Dakota, comprises “an incredible 183 fossil bone elements” making it “approximately 61% complete by bone count.” The fossil remains have been mounted in a custom steel armature along with replicas of the missing bones. The result is a reconstructed skeleton posed as if in hot pursuit, its mouth full of dagger teeth ready to tear into prey.

“It does seem to be a spectacular specimen,” says Thomas Holtz, a tyrannosaur specialist at the University of Maryland. The completeness of the skeleton and the high quality of the bone make Gus “scientifically significant,” he says.

Gus is the latest major dinosaur fossil to go up for sale at auction in the US. That trend began in earnest in 1997 when Sotheby’s auctioned Sue, the most complete T. rex on record. That specimen sold for roughly $8.4 million—the most money ever paid for a fossil at auction at the time.

“Before Sue was sold, there were no laws about who owned fossils. There was no value truly ascribed to them,” says Cassandra Hatton, vice chairman and head of the science and natural history department at Sotheby’s. In many other countries the state owns the fossils. But court cases around Sue clarified that in the US, whoever owns the land also owns whatever fossils are on it, Hatton explains. The market has been booming ever since.

But whereas Sue went to a scientific institution—the Field Museum in Chicago—in recent years ultrarich individuals have been snapping up dinosaur fossils at auctions for their private collections, prompting paleontologists to be concerned about the fate of rare specimens. Tech entrepreneur Dan O’Dowd owns a T. rex called Samson. And he’s not the only private collector to own a tyrant lizard king. A study published in 2025 found that there are more fossils of T. rex in private collections than there are in public trusts.

It’s not just T. rex that’s ending up in personal coffers. In 2024, Sotheby’s sold a Stegosaurus named Apex to hedge fund billionaire Ken Griffin for the record-setting sum of $44.6 million. And last year the auction house sold the only known juvenile Ceratosaurus in the world to an anonymous buyer for $30.5 million. These examples highlight another trend: As prices soar, museums simply cannot compete at auction.

Auction houses say the sales help science by rescuing fossils from the erosion that occurs when they are exposed to the elements, and by helping to get them expertly excavated, prepared, and assessed.

“If a fossil is not excavated, it’s lost to everyone,” Hatton says.

Sources: Translation of the Iliad, Full Humanitarian Law, Summary Humanitarian Law

Disclaimer: I did not read every commentary of the Geniva Conventions since 1949 so forgive me if I missed anything. Also I am aware that 800bc did not follow humanitarian law if anyone goes ‘☝️um akshually it would have been perfectly legal back then’ I am going to beat you with a stick. This is not a serious moral judgement of these characters but a play on the ‘Pick your favourite war criminal’ running joke in this fandom and an excuse to reread the Iliad.

One Teague Martin for the Dunwall Days fanzine project @10yearsofdishonoredzine

The Beginner's Guide to Medieval Arthuriana is now live at the Arthurian Preservation Project website!

Just starting out and don't know where to begin?

Anyone new to Arthurian Legends will here find guidance on introductory Medieval texts (and some more recently written). The stories are grouped into sections to help you decide where to begin.