Today marks the beginning of Black History Month, a celebration of Black Americans’ achievements and contributions, and an opportunity to expand public awareness of their role in shaping our country’s history. Learn more about the month’s origins and meaning, including why it takes place in February. As we did last year, Nice News will share inspiring messages from Black Americans in our Quote of the Day section all month long. We encourage you to pass them along. — the Nice News team
Featured Story
Incarcerated at 16, This Poet Now Changes Lives Through a Prison Book Program
Matt McClain—The Washington Post/Getty Images
Reginald Dwayne Betts has always been into books. As a kid, he was once caught reading Sherlock Holmes stories in the back of class, and at home he’d watch an oft-played speed reading infomercial with fascination. Determined to become a speed reader himself but unable to afford the advertised course, he found an instructional guide on the subject at the public library. It would be the last book he’d check out before entering a correctional facility. Betts was 16 years old when he and a friend used a pistol to carjack a man in Fairfax, Virginia; he confessed shortly after his arrest and was sentenced to nine years in prison. Behind bars, reading became a lifeline. “We go to literature because we know that we can’t know enough people, because we can’t go to enough places, because we need more knowledge about literally the way things are. But also we go to literature because we want to know ourselves better,” Betts, now 45, tells Nice News, adding: “I think books offer a map to becoming that’s hard to imagine without one.” He was released in 2005, and today, Betts is an award-winning poet who holds a law degree from Yale. He’s also the founder and executive director of Freedom Reads — a nonprofit that brings handcrafted, fully stocked bookcases into prison cell blocks all over the country. Click below to see these “Freedom Libraries” and hear more from Betts.
Daily Health Digital: Why Getting Up From Chairs Gets Harder Each Year
If you’ve noticed it’s getting harder to stand up from chairs — you’re needing to rock forward, push off with your hands, or feeling that initial stiffness — the problem may not be just age or “wear and tear.” According to breakthrough research, the real culprit could be something called “joint drought.” It’s when your joints literally dry out from within, losing the lubricating fluid that once let you move freely and smoothly. Daily Health Digital has identified a remarkably simple five-second daily approach that targets this root cause directly. The natural method helps rehydrate your joints from the inside out, addressing the problem at its source rather than just masking symptoms. In the article below, a Boston wellness expert explains the science behind joint drought and shows exactly how to address it.
Real or Fake? Tips and Tools for Identifying AI-Generated Images
Finn Hafemann—E+/Getty Images
Artificial intelligence imagery is getting harder and harder to spot. In the best case scenario, we end up simply laughing at a funny moment that never actually happened. In the worst case, we buy into misinformation that warps our perception of what’s actually going on in the world. So, as technology continues moving at the speed of light, how do we keep up with the changes? Ironically, AI can help with that. As Popular Science points out, one way to determine if a photo has been produced using Google’s Gemini is to upload the image in Gemini and ask, “Was this picture created with AI?” That’s because every image Gemini creates or edits gets an invisible digital watermark called a SynthID that the AI model can detect. Remember, though, that this works specifically on Gemini with Google AI-created images. When we asked ChatGPT if an image we manipulated with Gemini was AI, the chatbot wasn’t able to detect the SynthID and reported that the picture appeared genuine. And Gemini may have difficulty detecting whether or not an image was created by another AI model. If you’re in doubt, it’s best to take a multi-pronged approach to identification. Luckily, there are other tips, tricks, and digital tools for spotting AI imagery. Read our article for a rundown.
Humanity
What Does Excellence Really Mean and How Do We Achieve It?
Richard Drury—DigitalVision/Getty Images
Brad Stulberg starts his new book, The Way of Excellence,by clarifying what his subject is not. Excellence isn’t perfectionism. It isn’t optimization. It isn’t obsession or flow or happiness. Setting that straight is important, the author tells Nice News, because hustle culture has co-opted the concept and alienated the average person. Indeed, this isn’t a status reserved for a select few genetically blessed individuals at the top of their game. As Stulberg puts it, “excellence is for everyone.” He defines the term fairly simply, and with no mention of achievement or ranking: “Excellence is involved engagement in something worthwhile that aligns with your values and goals.” Rather than a destination, it’s the journey of being intimately immersed in a pursuit that helps us become the best people we can be, he explained. But why exactly — as many of us find it hard enough just to check off our chores, exercise, and put dinner on the table after a day’s work — should we concern ourselves with being excellent? Learn more and get three tips for pursuing excellence.
Sports
Meet the Youngest and Oldest Team USA Olympians Competing in Milano Cortina
David Berding/Getty Images
The 2026 Games are just five days away, and the Team USA roster has arrived. And it’s historic: At 54, Rich Ruohonen — a curler and personal injury attorney from Minnesota — is the oldest American ever to make the Winter Olympics team. A triumph many years in the making, Ruohonen spent nearly two decades playing in Olympic trials to no avail. “I figured I’d get [to the Olympics] someday as a coach, maybe,” he told NBC last year. “But to get there, even if it is as an alternate, is just my dream.” His persistence finally paid off last month, when the U.S. men’s curling team secured its spot in Milano Cortina. At the other end of the age spectrum is 15-year-old Abby Winterberger of California. The freeskier is the youngest on Team USA’s 232-athlete lineup. Other young phenoms to watch include 17-year-old snowboarder Ollie Martin and 19-year-old ski jumper Josie Johnson. Meet more of the athletes on the roster.
Sunday Selections
Deep Dives
What a longevity researcher learned from a tiny worm — and how it transformed what we know about aging
In Gabriel Tallent’s Crux, the plot turns on the ups and downs of a friendship between two high school seniors, Dan and Tamma, who spend their free time scaling boulders in the Mojave Desert. Where Dan is brainy and quiet, Tamma is foul-mouthed and defiant, but both are obsessed with the dangers and drama of rock climbing. And though they trust each other with their lives on the rocks, their differences and painful personal circumstances are at work pulling them apart on the ground.
The 68th Grammy Awards will air on CBS tonight at 8 p.m. EST and stream live and on demand on Paramount+. The performers most likely to walk home with a statuette — based on how many categories they’re nominated in — are Kendrick Lamar (pictured above at last year’s event) and Lady Gaga, who received nine and seven nods, respectively. Two new award categories were added to the ballot this time around: best traditional country album and best album cover. See the contenders for the latter here, and check out USA Today’s predictions for who will win versus who should win.
This Week in History
The First Portion of the Oxford English Dictionary Is Published
February 1, 1884
Tessa Bunney—In Pictures Ltd.—Corbis/Getty Images
The first edition of the Oxford English Dictionary, known to logophiles and academics as the OED, debuted in 1884. But its origins date back to 1857, when a group of language scholars proposed that a comprehensive English dictionary be compiled that would cover all vocabulary from the Anglo-Saxon times onward, with definitions based on printed examples of actual word usage. The group recruited volunteer readers to peruse English works and collect quotations that illustrated usage. Some two decades later, in 1879, the Oxford University Press agreed to publish the compilation, and five years after that, the first volume of the OED — which covered the words “a” through “ant” — made its debut. That should give you an idea of what a massive tome the dictionary, which today includes over 500,000 words and phrases, really is. Its longest entry is an incredible 60,000 words, though the word being defined has only three letters. Can you guess what it is?
Why Less Makeup Can Actually Make You Look Better
MERIT is designed to help you look polished without spending hours getting ready. The brand focuses on high-performing, clean, vegan, and cruelty-free formulas that enhance your natural features instead of covering them up. The result is skin that looks good, even after makeup comes off. It’s why stars like Lauren Graham and Sarah Michelle Gellar use MERIT for their daily routines.
