Did any good news happen in April 2026?
Hey fam,
Welcome to the 18th Friday of 2026! It’s officially May, and I’m on my way to Mexico City for a friend’s wedding. I’m taking the next week off, so no newsletter next Friday (or videos throughout the week), but I’ll be back before you know it!
Our lives are busy and full of noise, so it can be tough to hear and remember the good stuff. Here’s your reminder that it’s still happening all over:
10 stories of progress from April, 2026 (recap)
🎤 The last surviving speaker of a First Nations language called Thiinma started a band at 92 years old to help his culture live on after he’s gone.
🎟️ The parent company of Ticketmaster was ruled to be an illegal monopoly that might have to break up.
🦎 Many species were discovered including a crocodile newt that looks like it can firebend, a flowering herb sticking out a golden tongue, and a spider that uses biomimicry to look like a fungus.
🚫 A surveillance pricing ban on groceries is coming to Maryland as the first US state to block personal data from changing prices.
🌞 A roof tile with flexible solar cells built into it was invented.
🚀 The NASA Artemis II mission successfully sent four astronauts further into space than anyone has gone before.
🚌 Vietnam’s Ho Chi Minh City is set to make buses free for all 10 million residents.
✈️ A fully electric airplane that recharges in half an hour started flying along Scottish mail routes.
📚 A new nature library is opening in Colorado letting people rent gear to get outside like fishing poles, tents, and night vision goggles.
🤝 And our community made a one-of-a-kind bag out of old buttons and their grandma’s dress, started growing their own food to share, learned how to repair their clothes with a tailor.
What was your favorite story from April?
Crash Bandicoot’s real life animal is bouncing back
Yes, Crash Bandicoot, the popular video game character, is a real animal called an eastern barred bandicoot. I also didn’t know this until now. But after being declared extinct in the wild in 1991, 100 are now being released back into the wild.
Here’s how:
Conservationists had a handful of survivors in captivity, but previous attempts to release them failed because of genetic inbreeding, causing something called an “undershot jaw” which makes it harder for them to dig, grasp, and chew food.
So they began a selective breeding program with some from mainland Australia and others from Tasmania, since the populations had been isolated for over 10,000 years, creating far more genetic diversity to strengthen the gene pool.
As the team built up a healthier population of the animals, they developed a new goal for a population of 500 living across five different locations, which increases their resilience and makes it much less likely they’ll be wiped out by their common threats of invasive predators, habitat loss, or climate disaster.
And this huge release is helping more than just the bandicoots, as they naturally dig through 3 tonnes of soil every year which spreads seeds and makes the ground more resistant to floods.
So the next time you play the video game, remember to thank these folks for ensuring the little species is recovering in real life.
+ Bonus stories!
🪧 Amsterdam is officially the world’s first capital city to ban the ads that are the worst for the planet (fossil fuels and meat) starting May 1.
🏷️ Etsy has decided to ban the sale of animal fur on its site starting in August.
💨 The largest clean energy project in the US is officially online and generating power for more than 1 million homes in Arizona and California.
Have a win or good story to share? Join our community chat and let us know!
This newsletter was written by Jacob Simon. Over 1 million people are in our community across Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube. You can say hi on LinkedIn, or by hitting reply. Brand illustration by Andrea Miralles. Thanks for helping spread some positivity!