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0.963805	Mathew Knowles is a talent manager and businessman. He is best known for being the former manager of Destiny's Child. He also managed his daughters Beyoncé and Solange Knowles. He is the ex-husband of Tina Knowles and father-in-law of Jay Z. Knowles began his business career in sales of office and medical equipment. He moved to Houston in 1976 and worked for the Xerox Corporation for 10 years, primarily in the medical-systems sales division. Knowles afterward worked selling a CT/MRI diagnostic imaging equipment to hospitals and health facilities. He also worked in neurosurgical sales. In 1992 Knowles, left this career to devote himself to his music company, Music World Entertainment, which he founded that year. Knowles established several recording imprints under Music World Entertainment, including Music World Gospel, Music World Kids, and Music World Country/Compadre. Knowles also established joint ventures with Sony Music, Interscope/Geffen/A&M, Fontana/Universal, Integrity Africa, Fontana International, and Sony Brazil. In 2002, Knowles founded Spirit Rising Music, which became Music World Gospel. Its artists include Vanessa Bell Armstrong, Brian Courtney Wilson, Micah Stampley, Juanita Bynum, Le'Andria Johnson, Amber Bullock, Andrea Helms, Trinitee 5:7, and Elder Goldwire. In 2016, through Music World Music, Knowles acquired the country music catalog Compadre, which includes Johnny Cash, Billy Joe Shaver, James McMurty, Trent Willmon, and Kate Campbell. Knowles also launched the family-oriented music imprint, Music World Kids. The label has released youth projects that include Baby Jamz, Krazy Kuzins, Kid's Rap Radio, and the Music World Kids CD 5-pack. The venture also has released music from Nickelodeon's popular cartoon series "Wow! Wow! Wubbzy!". Knowles became manager of the vocal group Destiny's Child, working as either a producer or an executive producer on many of the group's projects. Under Music World Artist Management, Destiny's Child became a top-selling group, winning several awards include the Grammy Award, the American Music Award, BET Awards, and many others. Billboard magazine inducted the group into the All Time Hot 100 Artists. Following the departure of his daughter Beyoncé from the group, Knowles managed the solo careers of the other members of Destiny's Child, Michelle Williams and Kelly Rowland. In addition to his work in music, Knowles is also one of the executive producers of the 2009 movie "Obsessed", which stars Beyoncé. He is also executive producer of, and is featured in, two reality series: "The UK's Chancers" and MTV International's "Breaking From Above". In October of 2015, Knowles released his first book, "The DNA Of Achievers: 10 Traits of Highly Successful Professionals". In an interview with Madamenoire.com, he spoke about teaching entrepreneurship on the college level, and his entertainment industry seminars.
0.96791	It is common sense that if you give someone a reward for doing something, they are more likely to do it, and if you punish them, they are less likely. However, scientists have discovered that things are a little more complex than that. Indeed, if you want to shape behavior (or understand how behavior is shaped by reward or punishment contingencies already in place), there are four distinct effects an outcome can have on an actor's behavior. Positive reinforcement is the most straightforward setup. When a particular behavior (or response to something) results in the presentation of a new stimulus which causes that behavior to increase, that is positive reinforcement. Positive because a new stimulus was added (you can call it a reward), and reinforcement because the behavior in question increased. If I give a dog treats for rolling over on command, it will more often roll over on command than if I never rewarded the behavior. Positive punishment is the next most straightforward contingency to control behavior. When an action leads to the presentation of a new stimulus which causes the behavior to decrease, that is positive punishment (positive for adding a new stimulus, and punishment because the behavior went down). An example of this would be someone hitting a dog with a rolled up newspaper every time it barked at a doorbell; if that leads to decreased barking, then the bark->newspaper contingency is a form of positive punishment. Less obvious but just as important contingencies are negative reinforcement and negative punishment. These involve situations where some behavior leads to removal of a stimulus, and that in turn causes the behavior to increase (reinforcement) or decrease (punishment). So if taking a pain pill (behavior) to alleviate a headache (removal of an aversive stimulus) leads to taking pain pills for future headaches, the behavior has been negatively reinforced. On the other hand, when a misbehaving child has their favorite toy taken away by their parent in response to the misbehavior, and in turn the child acts better, then the parent has used negative punishment (removed a desirable stimulus) to decrease the behavior. All of this is well and good, and has been accepted for many decades by scientists who study behavior in humans and animals. Generally the latter three contingencies - everything except positive reinforcement - are labeled aversive control. They control behavior by dealing in some way with aversive stimuli. Yet aversive control, especially positive punishment, are known to work well only in certain restricted circumstances. For example, for punishment to be effective in the long run it must be immediate, consistent, abruptly introduced, and moderate in intensity early on. Someone could deliver a horrible blow to a child for goofing off and the child will immediately stop goofing off, but at best such fear tactics will be ineffective (the child will learn not to misbehave when the threatening parent is around, but won't change its behavior otherwise) and they almost always entail significant side effects. For example, the more punishment is used to control behavior (say, yelling at a child to stop crying), the more that punishment behavior (yelling) gets reinforced for the punisher (the parent), at the same time it may temporarily reduce the child's crying behavior. In other words, when you train another's behavior with punishment, you simultaneously are training yourself to use punishment tactics in the future. Other side effects include aggression problems (a child or dog that is beaten often develops an aggressive personality) and spread of aversion to the context (i.e. the environment where the punishment happens becomes aversive). Also, there will be a general difficulty in changing an avoidance behavior once it is learned (so if you train your puppy not to bark by hitting it for barking, it will be harder to teach the dog to bark on command later). For these reasons, some behavior analysts in recent times have been suggesting the use of only positive reinforcement to control behavior, wherever possible. Hence the rise in non-aversive, reward-only clicker training among dog trainers, a reorientation of parenting advice away from the spankings of yesteryear, time off for good behavior in prisoners, and so on. Of course, it also makes people feel better to use positive reinforcement wherever they can, due perhaps to aesthetic preferences against punishment (empathy might play a role in that). People have listened to the results presented by behavioral scientists and started changing how they go about controlling the behavior of others. Unfortunately, the picture presented above may not be so straightforward as it seems. In a 2003 peer-reviewed article ("Negative Effects of Positive Reinforcement", in Behavior Analyst v. 26), Michael Perone argues against the positive reinforcement-only paradigm, claiming that positive reinforcement has its share of problems. But more fundamentally, he says that aversive control is unavoidable, and in some cases may be conceptually indistinguishable from positive reinforcement. The first argument he makes is that environmental context is what makes a stimulus presentation aversive or not. That is, it is not the case that a given stimulus is aversive or not in and of itself (say, because it involves pain), despite popular misconceptions. He cites an experiment by Scripture in which a frog was put in an easily-escaped water chamber which was heated imperceptibly slowly until the frog was boiled alive without trying to escape. Here a stimulus was killer (certainly what commonsense would intuitively label aversive) but it was not technically aversive since it did not induce the frog to escape. On the opposite side, avoidance of an oncoming car is aversive by definition but not intuitively 'bad' or harmful. Thus Perone is initially seeking to correct the popular misconception of aversive control as involving 'bad' things, in contrast to the 'good', safe rewards of positive reinforcement. He also cites a pair of rat studies to support this. In one study, rats act to avoid shocks greater than 1 mA (negative reinforcement) but not shocks under 1 mA. However, in another experiment involving positive food reinforcement, shocks under 1 mA had an aversive effect (positive punishment - they stopped responding to the food-delivery schedule when shocks were added). So whether something is aversive or not certainly depends on the context, not just the stimulus itself. Further, though, Perone seeks to undermine the fundamental positive/negative distinction (in reinforcement specifically). Consider positive reinforcement, where a behavior leads to a stimulus which presumably makes things better (insofar as it causes the behavior to increase). In this case, the original situation before this behavior (and its reward) was relatively worse, relatively lacking. Thus the situation of positive reinforcement is at the exact same time negative reinforcement in that the behavior in question increases because it removes the relatively worse conditions of before. The target behavior is still the same. It is not a case of looking at two different behaviors and saying one is positively reinforced while another is negatively reinforced; rather, the exact same stimulus presentation for the exact same behavior can legitimately be seen under either light without any inconsistency. In addition, Perone repeats a point made by B.F. Skinner that positive reinforcement can have aversive consequences later on. The behavior of eating junk food is positively reinforced by the introduction of good-taste stimuli that make a person more likely to eat junk food again. Risky, temporally-myopic decision making (like gambling) can be positively reinforced in the short term, leading to more risky behavior in the future. These things, however, can have problematic consequences later on which are, hopefully, aversive, and at the very least what commonsense would call 'bad' (i.e. become obese or lose savings). So in the end Perone argues that people should not be so afraid of aversive control (which might have 'bad' connotations in popular conception), nor put such unassailable stock in positive reinforcement. Rather, he concludes, the focus should be on the results of a given contingency - whether the setup leads to the desired behavior in the long-run (as he puts it, "behavior in the long-term interest of the individual") - and not on the type of contingency used. Aversive control has its place, and it need not be what we think of as 'bad'; on the flip side, positive reinforcement is neither all-powerful nor devoid of its own 'bad' effects. Though certainly the warnings against certain types of aversive control stand, so in general it tends to be more effective to reward your child for good behavior (as an alternative to bad behavior, replacing it), rather than strictly punishing bad behavior, and time-outs (negative punishment) will have less side effects than beatings (positive punishment).
0.999766	Since the early 1980s there has been a surge of interest in both issues of gender and sexuality in work and organizational life, and in the founding and running of co-operatives and collectives. Since hierarchy rests on divisions which are in part gendered and sexualized, and co-operatives for the most part operate with ",flat", or non-hierarchical structures, they could be seen as places where gender and sexuality make little difference to the experiences of workers., This text takes issue with the assumption that where there is an absence of formal hierarchy in work and organizational life, there is likely to be an absence of gender inequalities. It argues that the matter is more complex than the simple equating of less hierarchy with greater gender equality.
0.992574	Another month of tax revenues released by the State of Kansas, another month of arguments on Twitter. Beyond amusement at the arguments, is there a reason I post on this type of thing? Yes-it's because the arguments present are common to other data problems, specifically in people misunderstanding, misstating, and misleading. I've posted on this before, but the short of it is this: Kansas governor Sam Brownback reduced tax rates in an attempt to grow the economy, tax revenues declined (predictably), and the government has struggled to create a workable budget and satisfy the budgetary demands of schools and other government functions. More recently, the initial Fiscal Year 2016 revenues were missing estimates, forcing a lower revision of the estimates in November 2015 (less money for government functions). This of course intensified the political argument over the tax cuts. Modified Laffers: We can cut the short term tax rate spurring economic growth, and within a couple of years, tax collections (read: potential size of government) will be greater under new lower rates than it would under lower rates (government stays the same or increases). Pure Laffers: We can cut the short term tax rate, and the size of government to what we believe is a reasonable level. This will spur economic growth, and thus an increase in tax revenues. In turn we can again reduce the rate in the future, spurring more economic growth. Keynsians: Reducing the tax rate won't necessarily improve the economy, especially when combined with short-term reduction of government spending. This reduction could lead to a death-spiral, in which government is continually underfunded, spending is reduced. General Cynics: (ok, I only know one person like this): Tax cuts will not create growth or increase spending, but we should cut taxes anyways because teachers and other government employees make too much money (read: the government is too big). Anyways, that lays out the landscape, let's look at the arguments, largely the misconceptions and what is true. I'll cover three main issues: actual revenue amounts, accuracy of estimates, and the long-term revenue growth. One of the arguments made this year is that tax revenues are actually up. This is true, but only for the last Fiscal Year (2015). Revenues are down for Fiscal Years since 2012. In fact, in FY 2015 the State took in less than it did in 2012 by more than $400 Million, or 7.6%. Since 2008 (last year prior to recession) revenues have only increased 2% in total, while averaging 5.6% annually over the past 40 years (will get to this later). FYI, FY 2016 revenues will not exceed 2008 either, with the current revenue estimate at 6.1 billion dollars. One of the criticisms leveled at the administration is that they are continually missing revenue estimates, so the estimates must be bad. I looked into this, and found that by normal statistical methods (mean absolute deviation, mean squared error), the last three years have been very accurate. In general, from 1976-2012, estimators missed by an absolute average of 5.2%, whereas the last three years, they have missed by 1.1%, 4.9%, and 1.1%. Great? Actually this is big problem. If we look at the past 25 years, the estimates are hedged low during non-recession years (actuals always end up higher, creating slack). That slack can be used as a buffer in recession years. The problem: the last three years are the first time since 1988 that a revenue estimate has been missed in a non-recession year. The chart below demonstrates that variance. If there is no slack in non-recession budgets, a recession in the next few years could create a massive budgetary problem. Population Growth: More people = more government spending. Kansas populations has increased since 1976 from about 2.3 million to 2.9 million. Inflation: In common terms things get more expensive over time, so government has to spend more on salaries, benefits, and goods in order to prove the same level of service. Though, it's not clear that CPI is a clear estimator of inflation's impact on government expenditures. Role of Government: Government provides more in terms of services than it has in prior periods of American History. This is another place where metrics get tricky. If we look at raw numbers, revenues have increased by over 800% since 1976. But this is a compound growth problem so that doesn't mean 800%/40 years = 20% growth a year. Compensating for population growth, the actual growth rate is 4.9% annually. By way of comparison CPI (which may or may not be a good measure of inflation in this case) grew by 3.7% annually over this time period. I'll likely do more in the future to parse out government expansion versus inflationary increases, but this gives you an idea for now. It appears revenue has grown 4.9% annually while inflation has grown 3.7%. 1ish% annual increase in size of government? Maybe. But there are a lot of other factors that could play into that number. A couple of charts to inform the discussion. The tax cuts, as could be expected, had an immediate negative impact on tax revenues. This is not a recession. This is a negative miss. This may mean that not enough slack exists to deal with future recessions. Historically, per capita revenues have grown at approximately 4.9% a year, over a period that averaged 3.7% CPI growth.
0.942697	Do you suffer from information silos and lack of a communication flow in your organization? As our working life is becoming a knowledge economy, sharing and gaining the right information at the right time is the key to business success. Employees may be reluctant to share their knowledge if they are unsure of the quality of their knowledge. They might be afraid that they accidentally share the wrong information or that their knowledge is outdated or irrelevant. It is possible your employees do indeed have gaps in their knowledge, and you should provide them training and up-to-date resources to make sure their information stays fresh and relevant. It is also possible that lack of confidence in one’s level of knowledge is a personal issue and related to their self-image and to their perception of themselves in the workplace. This problem cannot be fixed by simply handing in more information, but with receptive listening, support and mentoring of the employee. Mistakes often provide the best ground for learning. It is impossible to learn from mistakes if people are afraid to admit having made them. If the work culture doesn’t allow mistakes to be made, employees will always play it safe, never try new things, and will always try to cover their mistakes before anyone notices them. Management and team leaders should discuss the importance of learning from failures and mistakes and lead by example. If the workplace suffers from a lack of trust, employees might be afraid to share knowledge. Employees may be afraid that if they share their skills and knowledge, someone may take over their tasks and the employee will be replaced. Especially in knowledge organizations where many tasks are completed by one of two highly skilled professionals, the threshold to openly share expertise and specific information may be high. It is also possible employees don’t share knowledge with each other because they are afraid of giving up power and authority. For example, managers may consider themselves as the gatekeepers to key financial or business data and if this data is shared with everyone, their authority as being the sole source of this information is lost. It is possible employees don’t share their information and knowledge, because it doesn’t benefit them in any way. For example, if one person is always spending additional time and effort in explaining matters to others or showing them new things but the favor is never reciprocated, they may lose interest in sharing their knowledge altogether. Similarly, if their efforts are never recognized or appraised by their colleagues or their peers, they can lose motivation to share knowledge. This is why it is important to recognize, appraise and reward employees who actively share their knowledge with other employees. Employees won't share knowledge with each other, if they lack the correct tool for it, don't know how to use the tool, or have no motivation to use it. Instant messaging channels like Slack or Yammer are good for sharing day-to-day conversations and quick updates, but they aren’t the right forums for sharing in-depth insights, best practices or experiences. Invest in a good internal content hub that allows your employees to access relevant information as well as share it with each other. One great platform for finding and sharing information and content is called Smarp (hey, that’s us!). If knowledge sharing isn’t encouraged and recognized, employees won’t feel encouraged to share their knowledge and the lessons they have learned. Management can encourage knowledge sharing by creating and fostering a knowledge sharing culture. Management should support knowledge sharing and recognize and reward good practices. It is also important that management shows a good example by actively sharing information and relevant content. Managers can encourage peer-to-peer learning by setting up weekly or monthly peer-to-peer sessions and setting up tutorials led by employees. Employees can share their best practices and good experiences on these occasions. The organization needs to support and encourage collaboration between teams and employees and encourage an active dialogue between colleagues. Creating a knowledge management and knowledge sharing culture should be a business objective with measurable goals. To read more on knowledge sharing, check out our free guide below!
0.9991	Can you get me a source on central planning? It seems to me it was mostly the local communes that would determine what went on, with the council being used for wartime decisions. The militia also wasn't strictly like one perceives a militia, being not people joining a militia to strictly fight a war, but a group that varied in numbers as they passed through areas, peasants joined for two or three days for battle, then peasants returned to farms- it wasn't really strictly organized.
0.935463	3GPP standardization encompasses Radio Access Network, Services and Systems Aspects, and Core Network and Terminals. The project was established in December 1998 and should not be confused with 3rd Generation Partnership Project 2 (3GPP2), which specifies standards for another 3G technology based on IS-95 (CDMA), commonly known as CDMA2000. The 3GPP support team (also known as the "Mobile Competence Centre") is located at the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) headquarters in the Sophia Antipolis technology park in France. The 3rd Generation Partnership Project initiative eventually arose from a strategic initiative between Nortel Networks and AT&T Wireless. In 1998 AT&T Wireless was operating an IS-136 (TDMA) wireless network in the United States. In 1997 Nortel Networks' Wireless R&D center in Richardson, Texas, the wireless division of Bell Northern Research had developed a vision for "an all Internet Protocol (IP)" wireless network that went under the internal name "Cell Web". As the concept progressed, Nortel launched the industry vision as "Wireless Internet". AT&T Wireless, poised to evolve its network in the United States, took a strong interest in Wireless Internet and its promise of Internet Protocol (with Nortel Networks as the potential supplier). Within 12 months or so, AT&T launched a global initiative that they named "3GIP", a third generation wireless standard that was "natively" Internet Protocol based. Initially, principal participants included British Telecom, France Telecom, Telecom Italia, and Nortel Networks, but were eventually joined by NTT DoCoMo, BellSouth, Telenor, and Lucent, Ericsson, Motorola, Nokia, and others. A 3GIP standards forum was instituted and standards began to be developed. The forum progressed into the 2000 time frame, up until AT&T Wireless and British Telecom formed a strategic "partnership project" to facilitate "global roaming" between U.S. and European markets. With this business arrangement, GSM, the prevailing European standard was adopted as the basis of AT&T Wireless' network evolution for North America. Very specifically, this included the deployment of GSM data capabilities, i.e. GPRS, EDGE, and its evolution to UMTS. In telecommunication, Long-Term Evolution is a standard for high-speed wireless communication for mobile phones and data terminals, based on the GSM/EDGE and UMTS/HSPA technologies. It increases the capacity and speed using a different radio interface together with core network improvements, the standard is developed by the 3GPP and is specified in its Release 8 document series, with minor enhancements described in Release 9. LTE is the path for carriers with both GSM/UMTS networks and CDMA2000 networks. The different LTE frequencies and bands used in different countries mean that only multi-band phones are able to use LTE in all countries where it is supported. LTE is commonly marketed as 4G LTE, but it does not meet the criteria of a 4G wireless service, as specified in the 3GPP Release 8 and 9 document series. The requirements were set forth by the ITU-R organization in the IMT Advanced specification. The LTE Advanced standard formally satisfies the ITU-R requirements to be considered IMT-Advanced, to differentiate LTE Advanced and WiMAX-Advanced from current 4G technologies, ITU has defined them as True 4G. LTE stands for Long Term Evolution and is a trademark owned by ETSI for the wireless data communications technology. However, other nations and companies do play an role in the LTE project. The goal of LTE was to increase the capacity and speed of data networks using new DSP techniques. A further goal was the redesign and simplification of the architecture to an IP-based system with significantly reduced transfer latency compared to the 3G architecture. The LTE wireless interface is incompatible with 2G and 3G networks, LTE was first proposed by NTT DoCoMo of Japan in 2004, and studies on the new standard officially commenced in 2005. Initially, CDMA operators planned to upgrade to rival standards called UMB and WiMAX, the evolution of LTE is LTE Advanced, which was standardized in March 2011. Services are expected to commence in 2013, additional evolution known as LTE Advanced Pro have been approved in year 2015. The LTE specification provides downlink peak rates of 300 Mbit/s, uplink peak rates of 75 Mbit/s, LTE has the ability to manage fast-moving mobiles and supports multi-cast and broadcast streams. A further improved 3GPP standard, Evolved High Speed Packet Access, was released late in 2008 with subsequent worldwide adoption beginning in 2010. The newer standard allows bit-rates to reach as high as 337 Mbit/s in the downlink and 34 Mbit/s in the uplink, these speeds are rarely achieved in practice. The first HSPA specifications supported increased peak data rates of up to 14 Mbit/s in the downlink and 5.76 Mbit/s in the uplink. It reduced latency and provided up to five times more capacity in the downlink. HSDPA has been introduced with 3GPP Release 5, which accompanies a improvement on the uplink providing a new bearer of 384 kbit/s. The previous maximum bearer was 128 kbit/s, as well as improving data rates, HSDPA decreases latency and so the round trip time for applications. HSPA+ introduced in 3GPP Release 7 further increases data rates by adding 64QAM modulation, MIMO and Dual-Cell HSDPA operation, even higher speeds of up to 337.5 Mbit/s are possible with Release 11 of the 3GPP standards. The first phase of HSDPA has been specified in the 3GPP release 5, phase one introduces new basic functions and is aimed to achieve peak data rates of 14.0 Mbit/s with significantly reduced latency. The improvement in speed and latency reduces the cost per bit, further new features are the High Speed Downlink Shared Channels, the adaptive modulation QPSK and 16QAM and the High Speed Medium Access protocol in base station. The upgrade to HSDPA is often just an update for WCDMA networks. In general voice calls are prioritized over data transfer. The following table is derived from table 5. 1a of the release 11 of 3GPP TS25.306 and shows maximum data rates of different device classes and by what combination of features they are achieved. The per-cell per-stream data rate is limited by the Maximum number of bits of an HS-DSCH transport block received within an HS-DSCH TTI, so for example Cat 10 can decode 27952 bits/2 ms =13.976 MBit/s. Categories 1-4 and 11 have inter-TTI intervals of 2 or 3, Dual-Cell and MIMO 2x2 each multiply the maximum data rate by 2, because multiple independent transport blocks are transmitted over different carriers or spatial streams, respectively. AT&T Mobility is the second largest wireless telecommunications provider in the United States and Puerto Rico behind Verizon Wireless. Cingular became wholly owned by AT&T in December 2006 as a result of AT&Ts acquisition of BellSouth, in January 2007, Cingular confirmed it would re-brand itself under the AT&T name. The transition concluded in late June, just prior to the rollout of the Apple iPhone, on March 20,2011, AT&T Mobility announced its intention to acquire T-Mobile USA from Deutsche Telekom for $39 billion. If it had received government and regulatory approval, AT&T would have had more than 130 million subscribers, in December 2011, in the face of both governmental and widespread consumer opposition, AT&T withdrew their offer to complete the merger. Beginning in July 2007, AT&T allows its AT&T Unity plan users to have Rollover, AT&T launched video share in 2007, in which a mobile caller can stream live video from one phone to another over the 3G network with video share capable phones. This allows one mobile phone user to view video from another users camera through the phone in real time. AT&T had A-list, similar to former competitor Alltels program launched on April 20,2006 branded My Circle, AT&T rolled out the A-list program on September 20,2009. Customers with individual Nation plans of $59, FamilyTalk customers with plans of $89.99 or more could select up to ten numbers which any person in the FamilyTalk plan can call as much as they want. Effective September 1,2011, the A-List feature is no longer available to new consumer, existing customers who had A-List on their account prior to September 1,2011, are able to keep the feature as long as they stay on a qualifying rate plan. As of October 25,2013 AT&T no longer offers Nation Plans or Family Talk Plans to its new customers. New customers are now required to have one of AT&T Mobile Share Value plans which include unlimited Talk, Text, as of January 8,2016 AT&T no longer offers 2 year contracts for subsidized smart phones to its consumer customers. Customers who currently have 2 year contracts are grandfathered, until they upgrade to a new device they will have to choose from AT&Ts NEXT installment plans for smartphones, AT&T has reintroduced unlimited data plans for its customers who have either AT&T U-verse or AT&Ts newly acquired DirecTV. Unlimited data plans may be speed throttled after 22 GB of data have been used, with the inclusion of these new plans AT&T has introduced a free roaming in Mexico feature for its postpaid customers. Within AT&Ts 21-state landline footprint, other AT&T services are offered at the AT&T retail stores, including signing up for home phone, internet, a large number of AT&T Mobility employees are unionized, belonging to the Communications Workers of America. The CWA represented roughly 15,000 of the previous 20,000 formerly AT&T Wireless employees as of early 2006, as of the end of 2009, the CWA website claims roughly 40,000 workers of AT&T Mobility are represented by the union. Cingular Wireless was founded in 2000 as a joint venture of SBC Communications, the joint venture created the nations second-largest carrier. ETSI produces globally-applicable standards for Information and Communications Technologies, including fixed, radio, converged and internet technologies. ETSI was created by CEPT in 1988 and is recognized by the European Commission. Based in Sophia Antipolis, ETSI is officially responsible for standardization of Information and Communication Technologies within Europe, ETSI publishes between 2,000 and 2,500 standards every year. Since its establishment in 1988, it produced over 30,000, ETSI inspired the creation of, and is a partner in, 3GPP and oneM2M. The work of a single Technical Committee may be represented in several clusters, clusters facilitate easy identification of an area of interest based on business relevance or application domain rather than purely on specific technical work areas. In 2013, ETSIs budget exceeded €23 million, with coming from members, commercial activities like sale of documents, plug-tests and fora hosting, contract work. ETSI is a partner organization of the Global Standards Collaboration initiative. Nearly a third of ETSIs members are Small and Medium Enterprises, a list of current members can be found here. ETSI Standard, Used when the document contains normative requirements and it is necessary to submit the document to the whole ETSI membership for approval. ETSI Guide, Used when the document contains guidance on handling of technical standardization activities, special Report, Used for various purposes, including giving public availability to information not produced within a technical committee. ETSI SRs are used for documents, e. g. documents that are dynamically generated by a query to a database via the web. An SR is published by the committee in which it was produced. ETSI Technical Report, Used when the document contains mainly informative elements, ETSI Group Specification, Used by Industry Specification Groups according to the decision making procedures defined in the groups Terms of Reference. This deliverable type is approved and adopted by the Industry Specification Group that drafted it and this list is gathered from the European Telecommunications Standards Institute website. The IP Multimedia Subsystem or IP Multimedia Core Network Subsystem is an architectural framework for delivering IP multimedia services. Historically, mobile phones have provided voice call services over a switched-circuit-style network, alternative methods of delivering voice or other multimedia services over IP have become available on smartphones, but they have not become standardized across the industry. IMS is a framework to provide such standardization. IMS was originally designed by the wireless standards body 3rd Generation Partnership Project and its original formulation represented an approach to delivering Internet services over GPRS. This vision was updated by 3GPP, 3GPP2 and ETSI TISPAN by requiring support of other than GPRS, such as Wireless LAN, CDMA2000. To ease the integration with the Internet, IMS uses IETF protocols wherever possible and this is done by having a horizontal control layer that isolates the access network from the service layer. From a logical perspective, services need not have their own control functions. However, in implementation this does not necessarily map into greater reduced cost and overlapping technologies for access and provisioning of services across wired and wireless networks include combinations of Generic Access Network, soft switches and naked SIP. Since it is becoming easier to access content and contacts using mechanisms outside the control of traditional wireless/fixed operators. Examples of global standards based on IMS are MMTel which is the basis for Voice over LTE, IMS was originally defined by an industry forum called 3G. IP, formed in 1999. 3G. IP developed the initial IMS architecture, which was brought to the 3rd Generation Partnership Project and it first appeared in Release 5, when SIP-based multimedia was added. Support for the older GSM and GPRS networks was provided, 3GPP2 based their CDMA2000 Multimedia Domain on 3GPP IMS, adding support for CDMA2000. AGCF works as a bridge interconnecting the IMS networks and the Megaco/H.248 networks, Megaco/H.248 networks offers the possibility to connect terminals of the old legacy networks to the new generation of networks based on IP networks. Interim Standard 95 was the first ever CDMA-based digital cellular technology. It was developed by Qualcomm and adopted as a standard by the Telecommunications Industry Association in TIA/EIA/IS-95 release published in 1995, the proprietary name for IS-95 is cdmaOne. It is a 2G mobile telecommunications standard that uses CDMA, an access scheme for digital radio, to send voice, data. CDMA or code division multiple access is a radio system that transmits streams of bits. CDMA permits several radios to share the same frequencies, unlike TDMA time division multiple access, a competing system used in 2G GSM, all radios can be active all the time, because network capacity does not directly limit the number of active radios. In North America, the technology competed with Digital AMPS and it is now being supplanted by IS-2000, a CDMA-based standard. CdmaOnes technical history is reflective of both its birth as a Qualcomm internal project, and the world of then-unproven competing digital cellular standards under which it was developed, the term IS-95 generically applies to the earlier set of protocol revisions, namely P_REVs one through five. P_REV=1 was developed under an ANSI standards process with documentation reference J-STD-008, J-STD-008, published in 1995, was only defined for the then-new North American PCS band. The term IS-95 properly refers to P_REV=1, developed under the Telecommunications Industry Association standards process, IS-95 offered interoperation with the analog cellular network. For digital operation, IS-95 and J-STD-008 have most technical details in common, the immature style and structure of both documents are highly reflective of the standardizing of Qualcomms internal project. P_REV=2 is termed Interim Standard 95A, IS-95A was developed for Band Class 0 only, as in incremental improvement over IS-95 in the TIA standards process. P_REV=3 is termed Technical Services Bulletin 74, tSB-74 was the next incremental improvement over IS-95A in the TIA standards process. P_REV=4 is termed Interim Standard 95B Phase I, and P_REV=5 is termed Interim Standard 95B Phase II, p_REV=4 was by far the most popular variant of IS-95, with P_REV=5 only seeing minimal uptake in South Korea. P_REV=6 and beyond fall under the CDMA2000 umbrella, besides technical improvements, the IS-2000 documents are much more mature in terms of layout and content. Mobile payment generally refer to payment services operated under financial regulation and performed from or via a mobile device. Instead of paying cash, cheque, or credit cards. Although the concept of using non-coin-based currency systems has a long history, Mobile payment is being adopted all over the world in different ways. In 2008, the market for all types of mobile payments was projected to reach more than $600B globally by 2013. The mobile payment market for goods and services, excluding contactless payments using near field communication, investment on mobile money services is expected to grow by 22. 2% during the next two years across the globe. It will result in revenue share of mobile money reaching up to 9% by 2018, asia and Africa will observe significant growth for mobile money with technological innovation and focus on interoperability emerging as prominent trends by 2018. These payment networks are used for micropayments. Mobile payments are becoming a key instrument for PSPs and other participants, in order to achieve new growth opportunities. The EPC states that “new technology solutions provide an improvement to the operations efficiency, ultimately resulting in cost savings. Online companies like PayPal, Amazon Payments, and Google Wallet have mobile options and these systems can be integrated with directly or can be combined with operator and credit card payments through a unified mobile web payment platform. A simple mobile web payment system can include a credit card payment flow allowing a consumer to enter their card details to make purchases. This process is familiar but any entry of details on a phone is known to reduce the success rate of payments. The consumer uses the mobile billing option during checkout at an e-commerce site—such as an online gaming site—to make a payment, after two-factor authentication involving a PIN and One-Time-Password, the consumers mobile account is charged for the purchase. Convenience – No pre-registration and no new software is required. Easy – Its just another option during the checkout process, fast – Most transactions are completed in less than 10 seconds. In radio, multiple-input and multiple-output, or MIMO, is a method for multiplying the capacity of a radio link using multiple transmit and receive antennas to exploit multipath propagation. MIMO has become an element of wireless communication standards including IEEE802. 11n, IEEE802. 11ac, HSPA+, WiMAX. More recently, MIMO has been applied to communication for 3-wire installations as part of ITU G. hn standard. At one time, in wireless the term MIMO referred to the use of antennas at the transmitter. In modern usage, MIMO specifically refers to a technique for sending and receiving more than one data signal simultaneously over the same radio channel by exploiting multipath propagation. MIMO is fundamentally different from smart antenna techniques developed to enhance the performance of a data signal, such as beamforming. Methods were developed to improve the performance of radio networks. Space-division multiple access uses directional or smart antennas to communicate on the frequency with users in different locations within range of the same base station. An SDMA system was proposed by Richard Roy and Björn Ottersten, researchers at ArrayComm and their US patent describes a method for increasing capacity using an array of receiving antennas at the base station with a plurality of remote users. Arogyaswami Paulraj and Thomas Kailath proposed an SDMA-based inverse multiplexing technique in 1993, Paulraj was awarded the prestigious Marconi Prize in 2014 for his pioneering contributions to developing the theory and applications of MIMO antennas. The paper identified practical solutions for modulation, synchronization, that year Gerard J. Foschini submitted a paper that suggested it is possible to multiply the capacity of a wireless link using what the author described as layered space-time architecture. Greg Raleigh, V. K. Jones, and Michael Pollack founded Clarity Wireless in 1996, cisco Systems acquired Clarity Wireless in 1998. Bell Labs built a laboratory prototype demonstrating its V-BLAST technology in 1998, Arogyaswami Paulraj founded Iospan Wireless in late 1998 to develop MIMO-OFDM products. An LTE Advanced base station installed in Iraq for provisioning of broadband wireless Internet service.
0.999951	Mark Richard Shuttleworth (born 18 September 1973) is a South African entrepreneur who was the second self-funded space tourist. Shuttleworth founded Canonical Ltd. and as of 2009, provides leadership for the Ubuntu operating system. He has a net worth of over $200 million. He currently lives in London and holds dual citizenship of South Africa and the United Kingdom. Shuttleworth was born in Welkom, Free State, South Africa as a son of a surgeon and a nursery teacher. After attending school at Rondebosch Boys' High School and Diocesan College, Shuttleworth obtained a Business Science degree in Finance and Information Systems at the University of Cape Town. He lived in Smuts Hall, where he was involved in the installation of the first residential Internet connections at the university. Shuttleworth founded Thawte in 1995, which specialised in digital certificates and Internet security and then sold it to VeriSign in December 1999, earning R 3.5 billion (about US$ 575 million at the time). In September 2000, Shuttleworth formed HBD Venture Capital, a business incubator and venture capital provider. In March 2004 he formed Canonical Ltd., for the promotion and commercial support of free software projects. In December 2009, Shuttleworth stepped down as the C.E.O. of Canonical, Ltd. In the 1990s, Shuttleworth participated as one of the developers of the Debian operating system. In 2001 he formed the Shuttleworth Foundation, a non-profit organization dedicated to social innovation which also funds educational, free, and open source software projects in South Africa, such as the Freedom Toaster. In 2004 he returned to the free software world by funding the development of Ubuntu, a Linux distribution based on Debian, through his company Canonical Ltd. In 2005 he founded the Ubuntu Foundation and made an initial investment of 10 million dollars. In the Ubuntu project, Shuttleworth is often referred to with the tongue-in-cheek title Self-Appointed Benevolent Dictator for Life, abbreviated SABDFL. To come up with a list of names of people to hire for the project, Shuttleworth took six months of Debian mailing list archives with him while travelling to the Antarctic aboard the icebreaker Kapitan Khlebnikov in early 2004. In September 2005, he purchased a 65% stake of Impi Linux. On 15 October 2006 it was announced that Mark Shuttleworth became the first patron of KDE, the highest level of sponsorship available. On 17 December 2009 Mark announced that, effective March of 2010, he would step down as CEO of Canonical to focus energy on product design, partnership and customers. Jane Silber, COO at Canonical since 2004, will take on the job of CEO at Canonical. Shuttleworth gained worldwide fame on 25 April 2002 as the second self-funded spaceflight participant. Working with Space Adventures, he launched aboard the Russian Soyuz TM-34 mission, paying approximately US$ 20 million for the voyage. Two days later, the Soyuz spacecraft arrived at the International Space Station, where he spent eight days participating in experiments related to AIDS and genome research. On 5 May 2002, he returned to Earth on Soyuz TM-33. In order to participate on the flight, Shuttleworth had to undergo one year of training and preparation, including seven months spent in Star City, Russia. While in space he had a radio conversation with Nelson Mandela and a 14 year old South African girl, Michelle Foster, who asked him to marry her. He politely dodged the question, stating that he was "very honoured at the question" before changing the subject. The terminally ill Miss Foster was provided the opportunity to have a conversation with Mark Shuttleworth and Nelson Mandela by the Reach for a Dream foundation. He has a private jet, a Bombardier Global Express, which is often referred to as Canonical One but is in fact owned through his HBD Venture Capital company. The dragon depicted on the side of the plane is "Norman", the HBD Venture Capital mascot. ^ africaninspace.com (2002). "First African in Space". HBD. http://www.africaninspace.com/home/mission/logs/1/20020610.shtml. Retrieved 2007-10-04. ^ Shuttleworth is the first citizen of an independent African country to go into space. Patrick Baudry, an earlier astronaut, was also born in Africa; however, because Baudry's native Cameroon was a French colony at the time of his birth, he is considered a French citizen (although Shuttleworth also had British citizenship at the time of his flight). ^ Vance, Ashlee (2009-01-10). "A Software Populist Who Doesn't Do Windows". New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/11/business/11ubuntu.html?pagewanted=all. Retrieved 2009-01-12. "charismatic 35-year-old billionaire from South Africa ... son of a surgeon and a kindergarten teacher" ^ Mark Shuttleworth (2009-12-17). "My new focus at Canonical". http://www.markshuttleworth.com/archives/295. Retrieved 2009-12-21. ^ "Ubuntu carves niche in Linux landscape". CNET. http://news.com.com/Ubuntu+carves+niche+in+Linux+landscape/2100-7344_3-5886194.html. ^ Linux Format, Jeff Waugh (LXF 87). ^ "Shuttleworth bets on ImpiLinux". MyADSL. 29 September 2005. http://mybroadband.co.za/nephp/?m=show&id=828. Retrieved 2006-08-28. ^ "Mark Shuttleworth Becomes the First Patron of KDE". KDE. 15 October 2006. http://dot.kde.org/2006/10/15/mark-shuttleworth-becomes-first-patron-kde. Retrieved 2006-10-16. ^ "Mark Shuttleworth steps down as CEO of Canonical". Mark Shuttleworth. 17 December 2009. http://www.markshuttleworth.com/archives/295. Retrieved 2009-12-17. ^ Space.com, Nelson Mandela Chats with Shuttleworth, 2002-05-02. ^ BBC News, Afronaut mourns his 'bride', 2002-05-28. ^ Dispatch online, Mark's biggest fan dies of cancer, 2002-05-28. ^ Ask Slashdot: Mark Shuttleworth "Canonical One doesn't actually belong to Canonical" Mark Shuttleworth (born 18 September 1973) is a South African entrepreneur. As an early space tourist, he was the first African in space. He's the founder and leader of the Ubuntu linux distribution. A big part of willpower is having something to aspire to, something to live for. Computer is not a device anymore. It is an extension of your mind and your gateway to other people. There are many examples of companies and countries that have improved their competitiveness and efficiency by adopting open source strategies. The creation of skills through all levels is of fundamental importance to both companies and countries. In the early days of the DCC I preferred to let the proponents do their thing and then see how it all worked out in the end. Now we are pretty close to the end. Mark Richard Shuttleworth (born 18 September 1973) is a South African business person. He was the first African in space. He bought himself his space travel. He is also the leader of the Ubuntu project.
0.943992	noun 1. Informal. anything unpredictable, risky, or problematical; gamble. Even with advanced scouting, meticulous game-planning, and a burgeoning wealth of analytics, a NHL hockey game is a crapshoot: a collection of random events framed within the context of the rules. Indeed, the inherent randomness of a single "win or go home" contest is what allowed the "Manning-to-Tyree" New York Giants to defeat the (previously undefeated) New England Patriots, and buena fortuna enabled Rollie Massimino's Villanova to shoot an ungodly 78.6% from the floor to bounce Georgetown in the 1985 National Championship Game. Had the tournament layout given the Patriots or Hoyas six more games in a best-of-seven scenario, there's no doubt who is coming out on top: the superior, clearly better team. ...at least, that's the general premise behind the NHL's best-of-seven Stanley Cup Playoffs. The 2009 Detroit Red Wings were undoubtedly a superior team to the Penguins that year, but the Pens managed to win it all anyway. Since that 2009 dream season, the Pittsburgh Penguins have lost to a lower seed each year in the playoffs. While that stat sounds initially impressive, it loses some luster once you realize that the Penguins were a perennial top 3 seed and invariably had to play (and lose) to lower seeds. That streak will, of course, end this year, as the Pens enter the playoffs as the #8 seed out of the Eastern Conference and will face the #1 seed (and last year's vanquishers), the New York Rangers. What (if anything) can the Penguins do to avoid joining the Philadelphia Flyers with an early tee time, and will head coach Mike Johnston and staff actually employ those changes? The Penguins' power-play has become the source of much consternation: in addition to not scoring goals despite a flux of elite talent, the first unit surrendered two shorthanded goals in critical games down the stretch. What the Penguins have been trying to do all season is simple: by putting a pivot in the middle of the slot and another body in the crease, Pittsburgh is trying to force the opposing defense to collapse low in front of their own goaltender, thus allowing the Pens players on the perimeter (Crosby, Malkin, and the given point defenseman, likely Pouliot if healthy) time and space to rotate the puck for an open shot. What's been happening, unfortunately, is that no shot attempt seems good enough for the players stationed in the circles, and rather than going from circle-to-point-to-circle for another one-timer attempt, the Penguins (and in particular Crosby) are trying to thread a near-impossible pass through upwards of eight bodies to Malkin on the other side for a presumed open net scoring chance. The Rangers will likely employ a similar defense against the Penguins. Ever since the days of John Tortorella, the Rangers have made their proverbial hay by getting in front of netminder Henrik Lundqvist and blocking shots. Also, given that Marc Staal was allowed to attack Sidney Crosby's head with total impunity, it's likely that any Pittsburgh player who ventures near the crease will be similarly attacked without recourse, limiting rebound opportunities. 1) Shoot the puck from the circle anyway. This sounds like an impatient fan response, and to be fair, Pittsburgh has its own little soundtrack celebrating precisely this. If the shot is coming from either circle via the aforementioned passing tactic, the shot has a higher chance of at least reaching Lundqvist. Shooting from the high point (versus either circle) is the least effective shooting tactic because there are more players the puck has to elude on its way to the net, and a direct block off the shinguards of a defender is effectively a breakout pass going the other way for a shorthanded scoring situation. This is more or less the exact power-play the Philadelphia Flyers use, and judging by their ridiculous success, the formula works. 2) Develop plays from behind the net. Having Crosby work in Gretzky's Office accomplishes a few things immediately: with the puck behind him, Lundqvist has to guard both posts and will retreat to literally inside his own net, and defenders will be forced to vacate their shot-blocking positions to better cover pass outlets. The Penguins would likely then try a rapid cycle to entice at least one defender into pressuring the puck carrier below the goal line, which means the Penguins then have an overload situation in front. At that point, the Penguins can revert back to circle-to-point-to-circle and shoot with Crosby reappearing on the opposite side of the net for rebounds. If this sounds too good to be true, it kind of is, outside of the fact that a heinous turnover would leave the center buried deep in the other team's end and could, again, lead to the dreaded oddman shorthanded scoring chance. Dan Bylsma was mocked for his insistence that his Penguin teams "get to their game," which was Bylsma's mindset that Pittsburgh's superior individual talent would/should actively dictate the ebb and flow of each hockey game regardless of whatever defensive matchup or scheme the opposing coach employed. As history shows, either the Penguins sucked at "getting to their game" or matchups and opposing countermeasures were, in fact, better than Pittsburgh's best players. Regardless, Bylsma was a tactician in the sense that he had plays on top of plays for his stars to run, and a huge element of Bylsma's "game" was the Pens' transition and breakout game. Mike Colligan has already written the defacto bible for breaking down the Penguins' breakouts this season, and reading his work is an absolute must for Thursday night's Game 1 affair. Follow @SteveBurtch. Now. Go ahead. Do it. Suffice it to say that while the Penguins' Corsi For (attempted shots on goal) statistics in the homestretch of the season were outstanding (suggesting that Pittsburgh dominated puck possession against opponents), the Pens still kept losing game after game, and the reason is simple: terrible breakouts and turnovers in transition. Again, as Colligan's work details, if you want to create a guaranteed-to-get-you-plastered drinking game (in the safety of your own home, of course: always imbibe responsibly), just count the number of times the Penguins "get cute" and turn the puck over in their own defensive zone. These turnovers lead directly to elite scoring chances for the other team, which is in large part why the Penguins floundered so badly despite grossly outplaying their opponents. The key for Pittsburgh isn't necessarily to use "Breakout A" or "Breakout B," but to rather leave their options open and be willing to try different things should it become obvious that the Rangers have game-planned for the stock Penguin transition out of their own end. Having that level of versatility, unfortunately, requires a large measure of familiarity, and the injuries at the blue line— where transitions and breakouts are so critical— have left the Pens scrambling for bodies, which is why the pairing of two Wilkes-Barre defensemen seems like a logical event strictly for familiarity's sake. Still, given the crapshoot nature of the post-season, all bets will be off once the puck drops at center ice.
0.999993	Sold Out DISNEY ON ICE: FOLLOW YOUR HEART Tickets Online - Get Your Tickets Online In Minutes. The following events and venues match your search for "DISNEY ON ICE: FOLLOW YOUR HEART". To sort the list, click on the column header. To find tickets for the given event, date & time, click the tickets link in that row. To find events taking place at a matching venue, click that venue name.
0.951639	We really needed to read this article written by Cal Thomas, who is a most respected American conservative, an author, a syndicated columnist and commentator. It is a review of the book, "December 1941: 31 Days That Changed America and Saved the World," by Craig Shirley. Thomas and Shirley really put a finger on what we've felt all along was lacking in American society today. How best to illustrate it than to compare and contrast the generation of December 1941 to that of December 2011? Those of us who are "baby boomers" know the former generation well. They were indeed our parents and grandparents and they were wonderful role models to follow. As children and even as adults we've enjoyed hearing the stories of how they coped with a world at war, rationing at home, accepting the massive numbers of casualties who died fighting for our freedom. When Tom Brokaw wrote the book, "The Greatest Generation" he was talking about those who lived during that December of 1941. He said, "I believe it is the greatest generation any society has ever produced." Brokaw's premise was "that these men and women fought not for fame and recognition, but because it was the right thing to do. When they came back they rebuilt America into a superpower." That generation brought the country out of the Great Depression, and their work ethic, their patriotism and their drive to rebuild America is a far cry from 2011. This December we find ourselves a weakened country, facing a weak economy, a reduction of our military prowess. We have to read and hear about the "OWS Movement"- Socialists and anarchists who want to tear down America. We have the "give me generation" relying on government money and feeling that they are entitled to the use of taxpayers money. Although we are not really fans of FDR, we must observe that in December of 1941 we had an old Democrat president in the White House, who was in a wheelchair, and infirm, yet he possessed an optimistic spirit. His "Happy Days Are Here Again" campaign theme, renewed the national spirit. In contrast, in 2011 we have young, healthy American president who has apologized for the actions of the greatest generation, and has deflated our nation's spirit to unimaginable depths. As we face a threat never before known to Americans - the threat of Islamists who seek our destruction on our own soil, and the threat of Sharia law which would ignore and obliterate our Constitutional law, not all Americans have the same spirit as those who answered their country's call at a time of greatest need. Cal Thomas has written a beautiful piece for this particular time of the year. It is a thought provoking piece and it should spark the emotions of those who read it. Rather than to cause us to regret the loss of that American spirit which we once had, it should inspire us to strive to regain what with the right leadership we can once again become. Seventy years ago this month, the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor and brought America into a war that had begun in Europe in 1939. In his masterful new book "December 1941: 31 Days That Changed America and Saved the World," Craig Shirley takes readers back to a very different America. Through hundreds of stories and advertisements culled from newspapers, Shirley not only transports us back to that tumultuous time, but reminds this generation that denial about an enemy's intentions can have grave consequences. Each chapter in the book deals with a single day of December 1941. We go to the movies with Clark Gable and Betty Grable, view the "cafe society" of New York, and listen to radio stars like Jack Benny and Walter Winchell, the acerbic columnist and powerful radio gossip. The major players are all here: President Franklin D. Roosevelt, Secretary of State Cordell Hull, Winston Churchill and countless generals and admirals, as well as other military and political figures familiar to any student of history. But, depending on your age, the real stars were our parents, grandparents and great-grandparents. After the Dec. 7 attack, Americans rallied around a single patriotic cause -- the defeat of fascism and the salvation of Western democracy, an effort similar to the national unity displayed following the terrorists attacks of Sept. 11. The unity of 70 years ago, however, lasted a lot longer. Record numbers enlisted in the military. Many isolationists became interventionists. Even some conscientious objectors announced, in light of the Japanese sneak attack, that they could no longer remain apart from what was rightly cast as a fight for America's very survival. Though they refused to kill, many served vital roles in the war effort as noncombatants. Amid the deeply human and moving stories of family loss are some funny accounts of government stupidity. Shirley writes that government polltakers in the 1940 census asked American men and women how many individual articles of clothing they owned and how many they purchased each year. The Los Angeles Times reported, "Census Bureau officials declare they have found the explanation for cluttered clothing closets in the American home; people just buy more than they need." Intrusive government is not a modern phenomenon. Concerning Russia, the American left in 1941 was oblivious to the intentions of our supposed "ally." Shirley writes, "...many on the American left were quite naive about the real nature of the Soviet state. Many liberals and intellectuals, who should have known better, perceived it as a worker's paradise; it was only after the war that the true horrors of Stalin's repressive regime truly came to light. The muck-raking journalist, Lincoln Steffens, famously asserted, after visiting communist Russia: 'I have seen the future, and it works' .. To those for whom this is familiar territory, it is worth revisiting. For people younger than 70, it is worth discovering. This "greatest generation" was not necessarily braver than other generations; its men and women were simply imbued with a profound sense of duty. "Dear Dad, There is a war on and I am now in it, but that must not be a cause for you to worry. Of course there is danger and there will be more danger to come but if I am to die a soldier's death, so be it. ... You must think of me as doing my duty to God and country. Be brave and show outward pride, that the mite of humanity you helped bring into the world is now a soldier doing his part of defending our great and wonderful country. ... You must pray, not only for me and others in the Army, but for the innocent women and children who will have to endure untold suffering from this fight for freedom of religion, speech and democracy. I am not afraid to die for this. ... Until then I remain and always, Your Loving Son." December 7, 1941 may be a day that "will live in infamy," but that month, those years, that war revealed an American character still on display in our military today, though it's somewhat lacking in our civilian population. Your lead-in, and the Thomas article, excellent, and oh, so true of that generation. Fortunately, at least now,there are still some in our military like that, although patently ignored by MSM, etc. I hope it doesn't take another terrible tragedy to wake up Americans! This is an excellent piece of research held together by what are already known outcomes. In some places there is a doubling of information from earlier pages which essentially extends the month by a day or two. One can only wonder, even after more than 70 years, how this could have happened. It is a difficult book to complete though you always want to see what happened next.
0.990211	When it comes to trade shows and events, bigger isn’t always better. Sure a large 10,000 sq ft. exhibit is pretty impressive, but do you really require that much space to make your brand stand out and reach your event marketing goals? Here are a few reasons why a smaller space can make the same or better impact. Spend more on marketing: When you don’t use your entire marketing budget on your booth space and exhibit expenses, you have more opportunity to reach and market effectively to your target audience. Think of pre-show mailers, email campaigns, at show promotions, hospitality events or more. These marketing initiatives can take your message and brand beyond the show and help turn more prospects into customers. Empty space: Large exhibit space can often be intimidating. I have walked the halls of some of the largest convention centers and have seen some pretty massive exhibits. What I have also seen was wasted space, empty areas, no customers and no staff. I felt a bit lost and had to search out for employees working the exhibit to find someone, anyone to talk to. It seemed like a lot of empty, useless space on the show floor that had no reason of being there. Why pay for empty carpet you won’t use? Face-to-face intimacy: When you exhibit at a show your key goal is to generate quality leads from target consumers. Sometimes smaller space allows for a more intimate conversation, better interaction and private demonstration of what you have to show. Large group demos are often good to tell a lot of people at once what you are selling, but at the same time, how many of those people do you approach or approach you after to discuss it further? Sometimes a smaller audience is better. Projected amount of attendees: I have made the mistake of upgrading my booth space thinking the event will be as successful as the year before. I locked in my booth early to pay reduced fees and get the space I wanted. I knew the location of the next years venue so I assumed it would be a good turn out, I was wrong. I ended up paying for a larger space with not the same amount of success. I should have done my research on their estimated attendees rate and purchased my space accordingly. There is no reason to increase square footage if the same or fewer attendees are going to show up. So when you are designing your next exhibit or choosing your exhibit space, factor in the other ways you can generate success and market your brand without paying out your nose on floor space. Some of these other efforts can pay off more in the long run and allow you a more intimate engagement with your audience. Read the What Attendees Tells Us About Best Practices white paper to learn what it is attendees actually want to see when visiting your trade show booth. Learn what causes attendees to visit a booth and how you can better your trade show exhibiting experience. Click here for your free copy. Gretchen Makela was the Director of Marketing for Skyline TradeTec, located in Lombard, Illinois. Very well said Gretchen. “The best marketing does not feel like marketing.” The best brands devote a lot of resources find out what interests us before they get in touch with us. Easier said than done. Right? Very well said! I’ve also fallen victim of overestimating the number of attendees. If you absolutely can’t find any information from previous years’ shows, one little trick I’ve learned is to do a quick Flickr or Google image search of the event. If nothing turns up, see if you can find out if a custom hashtag was used and do a quick check of Twitter or Instagram. You can more often than not get a decent idea of how busy the show was.
0.99851	Add up this amazing no gym eqipment exercise to your workout routine for a healthy workout session. This exercise work so well for increasing whole body strength because they use the principle of whole body movement. And the muscles that are mostly targeted here are your shoulders and your arms. 1. Place your hands on the ground about 3 feet in front of you. Keep your buttocks high in the air. 2. Step forward with one of your hands. Then step forward with the opposite foot. Step forward with the other arm and then the other foot. Continue forward in the manner.
0.944533	Herman Goldstine at Princeton Institute for Advanced Study. Herman Heine Goldstine (September 13, 1913 – June 16, 2004) was a mathematician and computer scientist, who was one of the original developers of ENIAC, the first of the modern electronic digital computers. Herman Heine Goldstine was born in Chicago in 1913 to Jewish parents. He attended the University of Chicago, where he joined the Phi Beta Kappa fraternity, and graduated with a degree in Mathematics in 1933, a master's degree in 1934, and a PhD in 1936. For three years he was a research assistant under Gilbert Ames Bliss, an authority on the mathematical theory of external ballistics. In 1939 Goldstine began a teaching career at the University of Michigan, until the United States' entry into World War II, when he joined the U. S. Army. In 1941 he married Adele Katz, who was an ENIAC programmer and who wrote the technical description for ENIAC. He had a daughter and a son with Adele, who died in 1964. Two years later he married secondly Ellen Watson. In retirement Goldstine became executive director of the American Philosophical Society in Philadelphia between 1985 and 1997, in which capacity he was able to attract many prestigious visitors and speakers. Goldstine died on June 16, 2004 at his home in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania, after a long struggle with Parkinson's disease. His death was announced by the Thomas J. Watson Research Center in Yorktown Heights, New York, where a post-doctoral fellowship was renamed in his honor. As a result of the United States' entering World War II, Goldstine left the University of Michigan where he was a professor in July, 1942 to enlist in the Army. He was commissioned a lieutenant and worked as an ordnance mathematician calculating firing tables at the Ballistic Research Laboratory (BRL) at Aberdeen Proving Ground, Maryland. The firing tables were used in battle to find the appropriate elevation and azimuth for aiming artillery, which had a range of several miles. The firing table calculations were accomplished by about one hundred women operating mechanical desk calculators. Each combination of gun, round and geographical region required a unique set of firing tables. It took about 750 calculations to compute a single trajectory and each table had about 3,000 trajectories. It took human computer at least 7 hours to calculate one trajectory. To increase production, BRL enlisted the computing facilities of the Moore School of Electrical Engineering at the University of Pennsylvania and Goldstine was the liaison between BRL and the university. While making some adjustments to the Moore School's differential analyzer, engineer Joseph Chapline suggested Goldstine visit John Mauchly, a physics instructor at the Moore School, who had distributed a memorandum proposing that the calculations could be done thousands of times faster with an electronic computer using vacuum tubes. Mauchly wrote a proposal and in June 1943 he and Goldstine secured funding from the Army for the project. The ENIAC was built in 30 months with 200,000 man hours. The ENIAC was huge, measuring 30 by 60 feet and weighing 30 tons with 18,000 vacuum tubes. The device could only store 20 numbers and took days to program. It was completed in late 1945 as World War II was coming to an end. In spite of disappointment that ENIAC had not contributed to the war effort, interest remained strong in the Army to develop an electronic computer. Prior even to the ENIAC's completion, the Army procured a second contract from the Moore School to build a successor machine known as the EDVAC. Goldstine, Mauchly, J. Presper Eckert and Arthur Burks began to study the development of the new machine in the hopes of correcting the deficiencies of the ENIAC. Herman Goldstine at The Princeton Institute for Advanced Study. (Left to right: Julian Bigelow, Herman Goldstine, J. Robert Oppenheimer, and John von Neumann). In the summer of 1944 Goldstine had a chance encounter with the prominent mathematician John von Neumann on a railway platform in Aberdeen, Maryland, and Goldstine described his project at the University of Pennsylvania. Unknown to Goldstine, Neumann was then working on the Manhattan Project, which was aiming to build the first atomic bomb. The calculations needed for this project were also daunting. As a result of his conversations with Goldstine, Neumann joined the study group and wrote a memo called First Draft of a Report on the EDVAC. Neumann intended this to be a memo to the study group, but Goldstine typed it up into a 101-page document that named Neumann as the sole author. On June 25, 1946, Goldstine forwarded 24 copies of the document to those intimately involved in the EDVAC project; dozens or perhaps hundreds of mimeographs of the report were forwarded to Neumann's colleagues at universities in the United States and in Great Britain in the weeks that followed. While incomplete, the paper was very well received and became a blueprint for building electronic digital computers. Due to Neumann's prominence as a major American mathematician, the EDVAC architecture became known as the von Neumann architecture. One of the key ideas in the "first draft" was that the computer would store a program in its electronic memory, rather than programming the computer using mechanical switches and patch cables. This and other ideas in the paper had been discussed in the EDVAC study group before Neumann joined the group. The fact that Eckert and Mauchly, the actual inventors and designers of the ENIAC, were not named as co-authors created resentment that led to the group's dissolution at the end of the war. Eckert and Mauchly went on to form the Eckert-Mauchly Computer Corporation, a company that in part survives today as the Unisys Corporation, while Neumann, Goldstine and Burks moved on into academic life at the Institute for Advanced Study. In Summer 1946, all of them were reunited to give presentations at the first computer course, which has come to be known as the Moore School Lectures; Goldstine's presentations, given without notes, covered deeply and rigorously numerical mathematical methods useful in programs for digital computers. After World War II Goldstine joined Neumann and Burks at the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton, where they built a computer referred to as the IAS machine. Goldstine was appointed as assistant director of the project and was later its director, after 1954. The IAS machine influenced the design of IBM's early computers through Neumann, who was a consultant to IBM. When Neumann died in 1958, the IAS computer project was terminated. Goldstine went on to become the founding director of the Mathematical Sciences Department at IBM's Watson Research Center in Yorktown Heights, New York. At IBM one of Goldstine's most significant roles was in fostering relations between IBM researchers and the academic community. In 1969 he was appointed an IBM Fellow, the company's most prestigious technical honor, and a consultant to the director of research. As a fellow Goldstine developed an interest in the history of computing and mathematical sciences. He wrote three books on the topic; The Computer from Pascal to von Neumann, History of Numerical Analysis from the 16th Through the 19th Century and History of the Calculus of Variations from the Seventeenth Through the Nineteenth Century. As the title implies, in The Computer from Pascal to von Neumann, Goldstine leaves little doubt that in his opinion von Neumann played a critical role in developing modern theories of computing. Benjamin Franklin Medal for Distinguished Achievement in the Sciences of the American Philosophical Society (1997). Goldstine, Herman H.; Goldstine, A. (1982) . "The Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer (ENIAC)". The Origins of Digital Computers: Selected Papers. New York: Springer-Verlag. pp. 359–373. ISBN 3-540-11319-3. Goldstine, Herman H. (1980-10-01). The Computer from Pascal to von Neumann. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. ISBN 0-691-02367-0. Goldstine, Herman H. (1973). New and Full Moons: 1001 B.C. to A.D. 1651. Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society. ISBN 0-87169-094-2. Goldstine, Herman H. (1977). History of Numerical Analysis from the 16th Through the 19th Century (Studies in the History of Mathematics and Physical Sciences, 2). New York: Springer-Verlag. ISBN 0-387-90277-5. Goldstine, Herman H. (October 1980). History of the Calculus of Variations from the Seventeenth Through the Nineteenth Century (Studies in the History of Mathematics and the Physical Sciences). New York: Springer-Verlag. ISBN 0-387-90521-9. Bernoulli, Jakob; Bernoulli, Jean; Goldstine, Herman H.; Radelet-de Grave, P. (September 1991). Die Streitschritfen Von Jacob Und Johann Bernoulli: Variationsrechnung. Basel; Boston: Birkhäuser. ISBN 3-7643-2348-5. ISBN 0-8176-2348-5. ↑ Herman H. Goldstine, Remembrance of Things Past from "A History of Scientific Computing" Oral history interview with Herman H. Goldstine. Charles Babbage Institute, University of Minnesota. Goldstine discusses his experiences with the ENIAC computer during World War II. He mentions the EDVAC, the ENIAC's successor, and its innovation of stored programming, for which he credits John von Neumann. Kempf, Karl (1961). "Chapter 2: ENIAC". Electronic Computers Within The Ordnance Corps. Aberdeen Proving Ground, MD. O'Connor, John J.; Robertson, Edmund F., "Herman Goldstine", MacTutor History of Mathematics archive, University of St Andrews . DeAngelis, Gina; Bianco, David J. (2005). Computers: processing the data. Minneapolis: Oliver Press. ISBN 1-881508-87-0.
0.944626	pełna nazwa firmy JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A. JPMorgan Chase Bank, National Association is a wholly-owned bank subsidiary of JPMorgan Chase & Co. which is a leading global financial services firm and one of the largest banking institutions in the United States of America, with operations in more than 60 countries. JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A. is a national banking association that is chartered by the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, a bureau of the United States Department of the Treasury. JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A.’s main office is located in Columbus, Ohio, and it has branches in 23 states. JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A. offers a wide range of banking services to its customers both in the U.S. and internationally, including investment banking, financial services for consumers, small business and commercial banking, financial transaction processing and asset management. Under the J.P. Morgan and Chase brands, JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A. serves millions of customers in the U.S. and many of the world’s most prominent corporate, institutional and governmental clients.
0.99421	Imagine someone across the globe might get one USB memory stick you send out, what would you like the person to receive? What kind of possibility would you provide? USB Capsule Dispenser is a participatory project in which USB sticks were recruited from all over the world and put in a vending machine at the show for the audience to purchase. By purchasing a capsule, the buyer would get a USB stick from someone unknown, as well as a link with which he/she could reply onto a webpage anonymously. The capsule contains, too, product information including sent out location, name, gender and the age of the sender.
0.939724	Is it possible to overdose on birth control? When I was younger, I was very behind on my birth control. I took 2 in the morning, 2 around lunchtime and 2 a few hours after that. I think it was a total of about 6. I got very, very sick. Throwing up and diarrhea for several hours. I am assuming I overdosed on birth control. I am wondering if this can cause any long-term problems, i.e. infertility or birth defects. Just curious... thanks! I don't think so. But, I don't know how often any woman have ever taken 6 birth control pills in one day.
0.884155	A group of six were abducted from an upscale restaurant on Monday. The son of imprisoned Mexican drugs cartel boss Joaquin 'El Chapo' Guzman may be among a group abducted by gunmen at a restaurant in the beach resort of Puerto Vallarta, authorities have revealed. Prosecutors initially said a group of 10-12 men were abducted from the upscale restaurant on Tuesday (16 August), however they later revised their statement to say that six men had been abducted by an armed gang. Jalisco Attorney General Eduardo Almaguer told local radio that "it is presumed", though not yet certain, that Ivan Archivaldo Guzman, the son of the notorious cartel boss, was amongst the kidnapped, AP reported. However he cautioned that it was not certain that Ivan Archivaldo was among the kidnapped, adding that fake identity cards were found at the scene. Ivan Archivaldo is believed to have taken control of parts of his father's business after his arrest in January. Puerto Vallarta, in the state of Jalisco, is one of Mexico's most popular tourist destinations. The state is home of the Jalisco New Generation cartel, which in recent years has become one of the country's most powerful. Who is Joaquin 'El Chapo Guzman'? Nicknamed 'El Chapo' ('Shorty') due to his small stature, Guzman is regarded as the world's most powerful drugs trafficker. He was named one of the most powerful people in the world for several years by Forbes magazine, and his wealth is estimated to surpass $1 billion. His Sinaloa Cartel exported multi-ton shipments of drugs including cocaine, methamphetamine and heroin from Mexico to the United States, often using a sophisticated cross-border underground tunnel networks. Guzman became a folk hero in his impoverished home state of Sinaloa and his prison breaks were celebrated in music, despite his organisation being responsible for the deaths of thousands, including innocent civilians. He was first able to escape maximum security prison in 2001, after allegedly being smuggled out in a laundry basket. He was recaptured in 2014, but made his escape again in 2015, fleeing through a mile-long tunnel burrowed beneath the prison. He was recaptured following a gunfight with Mexican marines in Sinaloa in January. The boss of the Sinaloa Cartel, 'El Chapo' Guzman, was one of the world's most powerful criminals and one of Mexico's wealthiest men. He was re-arrested in January, after staging an audacious escape from a maximum security Mexican prison six months earlier. His lawyers are attempting to block his extradition to the US to face trial.
0.999989	How does this power translate to you? You can use R-MIX to easily create “minus-one” type karaoke files from existing songs by lowering the level of a pre-recorded vocal or any other instrument you select within each mix. You can also create your own remixes and mash-ups by using two pairs of stereo tracks within R-MIX. As a skill-building tool, R-MIX can be used to isolate any desired instrument within a mix, and then solo and slow down that element for study; isolate a fast guitar solo, for example, and slow it down to learn it. R-MIX can be used to clean up old recordings and master stereo mixes by adjusting individual instrument levels and applying noise reduction and effects, and all with ease and at a high level of sound quality.
0.983189	Grayston Lynch, the son of an oil driller, was born in Victoria, Texas. He joined the United States Army during the Second World War and was wounded during the D-Day landings and the Battle of the Bulge. After the war he served in the Korean War and in 1950 he was a member of the Special Forces in Laos. In 1960 Grayston Lynch joined the Central Intelligence Agency and served under Theodore Shackley. He took part in the Bay of Pigs operation and along with Rip Robertson went ashore with the first wave of Cuban exiles. Grayston Lynch, who was interviewed by Seymour Hersh for his book, The Dark Side of Camelot, blamed John F. Kennedy for the failure to overthrow Fidel Castro. Lynch was also involved in Operation Mongoose and by 1963 was paramilitary trainer at JM/WAVE. According to David Corn (Blond Ghost), Lynch "ran his own outfit of exile raiders". In 1971 Grayston Lynch retired from the CIA and became a federal drug agent. In his work he encountered narcotics traffickers who had previously worked with the agency. Lynch admitted that "a lot of drug smugglers learned their skills" at JM/WAVE under Theodore Shackley. In a letter sent to John R. Tunheim in 1994, Bradley E. Ayers claimed that nine people based at JM/WAVE "have intimate operational knowledge of the circumstances surrounding the assassination" of John F. Kennedy. Ayers named Grayston Lynch, Theodore Shackley, Felix Rodriguez, Thomas Clines, Gordon Campbell, David Morales, Rip Robertson, Edward Roderick and Tony Sforza as the men who had this information. In 2000 Grayston Lynch published Decision for Disaster: Betrayal at the Bay of Pigs. It included the following passage: "Kennedy not only failed to stand up to Castro, or to Khrushchev, but he would not stand up to his own State Department, and pliantly approved request after request from State to water down the invasion plan. The cancellation of the only remaining air strike against Castro's jets, a cancellation that doomed the 2506 Brigade, cost the lives of many good men, and one year later was to bring the world to the brink of nuclear war... The failure in 1961 was just that, a failure. But not a total failure, for it did accomplish for the New Frontier a solution to one of its problems. It got rid of the 2506 Brigade. Their 'dumping' into Cuba was flawless!" The failure in 1961 was just that, a failure. But not a total failure, for it did accomplish for the New Frontier a solution to one of its problems. It got rid of the 2506 Brigade. Their 'dumping' into Cuba was flawless! Unconventional warfare was Grayston Lynch's profession. An oil driller's son from the tiny town of Victoria in South Texas, 'Gray' had enlisted in the Army at fifteen by lying about his age.... When he retired as captain in 1960, to join the CIA with a six-month contract at ten thousand a year, the transition was 'practically no change at all'; he had just returned from Laos where he had operated in unfriendly territory wearing civilian clothes. I make reference to your letter of February 23d and my subsequent communications with your staff in preparation for our meeting which is scheduled for 10.00 CDT this morning. I appreciate the opportunity to visit with you concerning matters relating to the assassination of President Kennedy and your appointment as a member of the board that will oversee the release of documents pertaining thereto. Over the past several months I have furnished your staff with details of my background and other materials which I trust have provided you with some perspective for the information I hope to personally convey. Assuming you have read or been briefed on the essence of this history, I will not dwell upon it here. However, I take this opportunity to convey copies of two documents which I recently received that relate directly to our discussion of this date. They are self-explanatory.With the context of our meeting hopefully established, I wish to call your attention to the following specifics which I urge you and the Board to be alert for and to pursue within the framework of your mandate. These areas of interest and individual identifications are recommended as adf.rect result of my experience with the CIA/JMWAVE Miami station during the period immediately preceding and following the death of JFK and my synthesis of other information developed since that experience.I believe the following living individuals have intimate operational knowledge of the circumstances surrounding the assassination and the possible role of the persons and/or operations listed in the paragraph which follows:Theodore Shackley - Chief of Station, JMWAVE Robert Wall - Deputy Chief of Operations, JMWAVEGrayson Lynch - Contract paramilitary trainer/agent, JMWAVEFelix Rodriguez - Contract paramilitary agent (Cuban born), JMWAVEThomas Clines - CIA paramilitary case officer, JMWAVE Above named persons with reference to:Gordon Campbell (current status unknown) - Deputy Chief of Station, JMWAVEDavid Morales (deceased) - Chief of Operations, JMWAVE"Rip" Robertson (deceased) - Contract paramilitary agent JMWAVEEdward Roderick (current status unknown) - U. S. Army Major, explosives expert/Corp of Engineers, attached to JMWAVE and later CIA employee upon retirement from ArmyTony Sforza (deceased) - Contract paramilitary agent, JMWAVEOperation (code name) "Red Cross" - JMWAVE, Fall 1963Further, I invite your attention to the forthcoming issue of Vanity Fair Magazine (October issue) which I am advised will contain an article by Tony Summers, a highly credible journalist/author (CONSPIRACY) that will offer certain revelations complimenting the recommendations made in this communication.I know for a fact that Summers has been diligently pursuing lines of inquiry that may be relevant to the work of the Board and may be useful in unscrambling and evaluating the JFK related documents produced by the CIA and other government agencies.I hope the information I've provided is helpful to the Board and I remain prepared to testify under oath to any aspect of my activities should that be desired. The purpose of this memo is to give you background on who Brad Ayers is and the story he tells. His story is accepted to differing degrees, depending on who one talks to, but the basics of his story check out, according to our research. Ayers was an infantry officer in the U.S. Army during the early 1960's, specializing in paramilitary training. In early 1963, (records checks indicate it was in early April) Ayers was "loaned" by the Army to the CIA, which assigned him to the JMWAVE station. Ayers' job was to train Cuban exiles and prepare them for an invasion of Cuba. This much of his story is borne out by checks of his military and CIA files.From here, the veracity of Ayers' claims are less easy to discern. He claims to have seen many figures at JMWAVE who were not there, according to the official record; these include Johnny Roselli and William Harvey (former Task Force W /SAS chief for CIA, who was removed from that position by Kennedy after Harvey overstepped his authority after the Missile Crisis). Ayers also claims to have gone on several raiding missions with his proteges, and to have come under fire from Castro's forces in the summer of 1963. This is significant because according to the official record, all government sanctioned action against Castro had ceased by that point.Ayers says that many of his colleagues at the JMWAVE station built up a strong resentment of President Kennedy, and says that he believes several of them to have played roles in the assassination. Foremost among these, he says, was David Morales, the operations officer for CIA in Miami.The HSCA interviewed Ayers, and performed searches for his records. In doing so, they discovered five sealed envelopes in his file, which HSCA staff was not allowed access to. The envelopes have ben the source of some speculation among those in the research community who believe Ayers' story.On May 12, I interviewed Ayers at his home outside of St. Paul, Minnesota. At that point, the questions were based on information obtained from open sources only, as few of the staff had their clearances yet.
0.948618	Advances in space-based observations have provided the capacity to develop regional-to global-scale estimates of evaporation, offering insights into this key component of the hydrological cycle. However, the evaluation of large-scale evaporation retrievals is not a straightforward task. While a number of studies have intercompared a range of these evaporation products by examining the variance amongst them, or by comparison of pixel-scale retrievals against ground-based observations, there is a need to explore more appropriate techniques to comprehensively evaluate remote-sensing-based estimates. One possible approach is to establish the level of product agreement between related hydrological components: for instance, how well do evaporation patterns and response match with precipitation or water storage changes? To assess the suitability of this <q>consistency</q>-based approach for evaluating evaporation products, we focused our investigation on four globally distributed basins in arid and semi-arid environments, comprising the Colorado River basin, Niger River basin, Aral Sea basin, and Lake Eyre basin. In an effort to assess retrieval quality, three satellite-based global evaporation products based on different methodologies and input data, including CSIRO-PML, the MODIS Global Evapotranspiration product (MOD16), and Global Land Evaporation: the Amsterdam Methodology (GLEAM), were evaluated against rainfall data from the Global Precipitation Climatology Project (GPCP) along with Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) water storage anomalies. To ensure a fair comparison, we evaluated consistency using a degree correlation approach after transforming both evaporation and precipitation data into spherical harmonics. Overall we found no persistent hydrological consistency in these dryland environments. Indeed, the degree correlation showed oscillating values between periods of low and high water storage changes, with a phase difference of about 2-3 months. Interestingly, after imposing a simple lag in GRACE data to account for delayed surface runoff or baseflow components, an improved match in terms of degree correlation was observed in the Niger River basin. Significant improvements to the degree correlations (from ∼0 to about 0.6) were also found in the Colorado River basin for both the CSIRO-PML and GLEAM products, while MOD16 showed only half of that improvement. In other basins, the variability in the temporal pattern of degree correlations remained considerable and hindered any clear differentiation between the evaporation products. Even so, it was found that a constant lag of 2 months provided a better fit compared to other alternatives, including a zero lag. From a product assessment perspective, no significant or persistent advantage could be discerned across any of the three evaporation products in terms of a sustained hydrological consistency with precipitation and water storage anomaly data. As a result, our analysis has implications in terms of the confidence that can be placed in independent retrievals of the hydrological cycle, raises questions on inter-product quality, and highlights the need for additional techniques to evaluate large-scale products.
0.999181	You may choose vaccination options during checkout. Prices shown reflect current ship dates and may change depending on the ship date chosen. You will see the final price during checkout. Please enter a comma-separated list of email addresses. We have a tiny problem.
0.999999	Buenas tardes aquí. En referencia uno de tus mensajes y con la actualidad de FB espero que aquí encuentres un lugar donde tus opiniones sean, solo eso, opiniones expresadas con la libertad que tú quieras. Un buen lugar para los disidentes o discrepantes. La libertad personal ante todo. Gracias por la bienvenida. Lamentablemente no aparece en mis notificaciones este mensaje, quizá porque no me nombras en él. En todo caso así mismo espero que aquí el pensamiento sea mucho más sagrado, contrario a lo que pasa en las redes azules. A mi me llega un correo cuando alguien escribe en algun tema en el que he participado aunque solo sea con un me gusta. Tal vez en configuración se pueda activar? RGPD (GDPR). ¿Alguien me puede explicar como me puede afectar por tener un nodo de hubzilla? Como tengo un nodo hubzilla que "gestiono" y con la aparición de la nueva ley de protección de datos RGPD Regulación General de Protección de Datos, o en inglés General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), en la que "prometen" multas de cientos de miles de euros. Quisiera saber/conocer si alguien ha mirado como nos puede afectar. Quisiera iniciar un hilo sobre este tema que nos puede complicar bastante, sin comerlo ni beberlo, la supervivencia de modo no profesional y sin animo de lucro de los nodos hubzilla. Por mi parte, me estoy mamando lecturas y videos al respecto. Intentaré poner enlaces sobre los que me parezcan más interesantes. I will need to find a translation of the GDPR. I saw that Mastodon recently dropped data retention of IP addresses to a shorter period - and is probably related to this. I don't know what else might be needed for compliance. Tendré que encontrar una traducción del GDPR. Vi que Mastodon recientemente redujo la retención de datos de direcciones IP a un período más corto, y probablemente esté relacionado con esto. No sé qué más se podría necesitar para cumplir. The documentation that I found is only in english. Try to eat this in raw (261 pages in "politiqués"). Bon profit, have an alka-seltzer near you. At a high level and a quick scan I don't see very much that might concern us. I'll have a closer look as time permits. It appears to say mostly that you have to allow people to access the data which has been collected about them, not collect data without a specific reason, and let them know if somebody else has requested their data. 11/25/2016 day the domains hubzilla.es, hubzilla.cat and hubzilla.eu will be free again. If anyone is interested in having some or all of them, you should contact me, in this channel, before that date. I will proceed to transfer this/these domains to the person who wants them. FOR FREE. I have never transferred a domain. Unmindful if that has costs, but should assume the person concerned. In my ISP cdmon.com you must create an user to can transfer a domain. It seeems to be free in this way. I have only one condition. That the person who take hubzilla create a hub. It is to make them work for the HUBZILLA community. 25 November I'm assuming. Please bear me in mind. You're not abandoning us I hope Paco. @elmussol I take a look in my ISP to do the transference. The domains are inactive and you could take advantage of the period before they expire (gratis et amore). I'm happy that you take the domain/s. You don't worry, hummmm... or yes, you worry, I still in egomemei.com with a hubzilla hub. How can replicate a url? @Channel One+ hi, I try to replicate every post that appear in a blog outside hubzilla. The blog in question don't have rss or another way. I want to do automatically. I saw that in hubzilla in some channels but i don't found how do that. We need some way to get at the data. RSS is the most convenient and is supported by most blog software. If you provide an actual URL (you can PM if the contents are sensitive in some way) I'll have a look and see if there are any protocols we can attach to. If not, it would probably require an HTML "scraper" which digs content out the physical webpage. These are very touchy custom bits of code which generally require a lot of fiddling to keep them working. I try to talk with blog's owner for a rss feeder. Os informo que los dominios amistadica.es y amistadica.com que habia registrado caduca hoy el registro y no tengo intención de renovar. Si alguien esta interesado podrá a partir de mañana contratarlos o si tiene mucha prisa se lo traspaso hoy a quien quiera. De gratis!! de franc!! for free!!. English version "no debugged" from Google Translate. Have web mail server for about 30 € / year. Or as we eliminate forever centralized services. For a while after a VPS hosted on a service like so many. It basically had installed node RedMatrix and mail server. I must say I'm crazy enough with this privacy. The reason to have my own mail server is the facility that you have to create as many aliases as you like. Send emails to the account and domain of your choice and finally the privacy it gives you contyener yourself messages. If you mount a mail server for this purpose with 1GB of memory and disk capacity you consider it is more than enough (postfix, dovecot, mysql, postfixadmin). The problem is when you start to use remedies against spam. Spamassassin eats by himself nearly 1Gb memory. So if you want to have a spam filter you have to go to a VPS 2Gb price and the thing begins to be hairy. The reality is that you can not do without a spam which in practice are required to hire VPS 2Gb. Previously I had had my mail server on a real computer at home. The requirements for your emails are not considered spam and can also function is to have a fixed IP, also if the PTR DNS returns the domain of your server you waste problems. What happens is that this costs money. In its day (2012) orange 2 € / month, movistar 14 € / month in my area. What almost I forced me to be with orange. On the other hand reverse DNS resolution for home users it is impossible. At least I did not get it with orange and I guess if you get it at the expense of paying more money. The cost of owning a home server is basically the electricity and you can use any old computer you can get. Would you install a Linux distribution and running. The one I have currently spends about 50W / hour per year which represent 50 * 24 * 365 * 0.15 / 1000 = 65.70 € / year. Not electrically efficient and I'm sure most modern configurations (this takes an AMD Athlon II) have lower consumption and if using a raspberry of the new amortize within a year. Okay, we have the home server but want the freedom to hire the phone with anyone and take advantage of "big" offers made. Also you do not want to pay for the fixed IP. what I said at first I'm crazy enough to the privacy of my data or traffic I generate. In its day I logged on to several of these free VPN to test it and have a screen of anonymity. It is assumed that these servers do not look your VPN traffic. You can not trust them or the will of all colors. So once I tried this VPN I decide I do not trust me and want my own VPN in the VPS that I have rented. Openvpn install configurations look and voila, no rula. It is not possible to have a VPN on my VPS if you want a VPN have to rent a dedicated server. Of course the budget is triggered. That you will sail sailing you see that someone managed to run a VPN on a server with 128Mb of memory. Looking VPS with this configuration and in Spain there is or there is not enable TUN / TAP is what I need to install the VPN. So in spite of myself and I wanted the server was as close to have a good speed and low pings, I see a company offers VPS in Holland for 15 € / year and can enable TUN / TAP. There I go, I head shot and one-year contract. Yes, it works with a debian minimal and basic services. Lol I have my screen anonymity and all my connected devices go through the VPN. So I pay two VPS, joy !. As the oven is not for buns and I have to cut costs All I decide that my weighing the mail server and node RedMatrix not going to be renewed. But not having the mail I will assume many problems because during this time I have been creating many aliases and mailboxes that you should not miss. Could make the move to Gmail where I have one mailbox. My hobby experience and told me that this would be a mistake. Some mail aliases had already been eliminated and changed by others as by spam before it reached me massively despite the antispam installed. On the other hand the ease and elegance that allows you to delete an alias and not get emails from a place that does not send spam but become very heavy lose her. A good day fiddling the VPN I look at two details have fixed IP and reverse DNS also points to my domain. Another thing is that a VPN is like you are in a local network devices connected to it. So the VPS VPN is like a home router receives traffic and issued traffic to internet and directs it to different customers in encrypted form. How I can do to get traffic not genre when browsing, is directed to a computer (server) connected by concrete openvpn ?. In his day and I had to configure iptables for the traffic of VPN clients are redirected to them again. So I get researching online have a vague idea of what they should do. So iptables NAT came to my aid. Any new traffic and not generated by the internal IP that assigns openvpn had to be directed to this IP if you also pointed to port 80. No if there is a better way to do but this works. I drive traffic to my home server. Now this all said, node Hubzilla amount, amount redirijo mail server and equally to the different ports where they hear these services. Continued having the option to surf anonymously. That's all folks, for a small cost you can have the same services with a dedicated server. Everything depends on the bandwidth you get to your home / office / company and the computer / s that you use as a server / s. It allows you mobility and you only need to connect to the VPN and this where you do want. Server allows many computers as you want and in different places. Simply send them traffic. Tiny VPS traffic holds up well (tiny) and so far there are no problems, everything smoothly, the memory limit but smoothly.
0.944514	Alabama became the 22nd U.S. state on December 14, 1819. On January 11, 1861, however, Alabama declared its secession from the Union and joined the Confederacy. While few battles were fought in the state, Alabama contributed approximately 120,000 soldiers to the American Civil War (1861-1865). It provided a significant source of troops and leaders, military material, supplies, and food. Early in the war, cotton was exchanged in England for munitions until the port of Mobile was closed by the U.S. Navy in 1864. Alabama's slaves were freed by the 13th Amendment in 1865. Alabama is a state located in the southeastern region of the United States. It is bordered by Tennessee to the north, Georgia to the east, Florida and the Gulf of Mexico to the south, and Mississippi to the west. Alabama is unofficially nicknamed the Yellowhammer State, after the state bird. Alabama is also known as the "Heart of Dixie." The state tree is the Longleaf Pine and the state flower is the Camellia. The capital of Alabama is Montgomery. The oldest city is Mobile, founded by French colonists. Indigenous peoples of varying cultures lived in the area for thousands of years before European colonization. Among the historical tribes of Native American people living in the area of present-day Alabama at the time of European contact were Iroquoian-speaking Cherokee, and the Muskogean-speaking Alabama (Alibamu), Chickasaw, Choctaw, Creek, and Koasati. The French founded the first European settlement in the region at Old Mobile, in 1702. The city was moved to the current site of Mobile in 1711. This area was French from 1702 to 1763, part of British West Florida from 1763 to 1783, and split between the United States and Spain from 1783–1821. Thomas Bassett, a loyalist to the British monarchy, was the one of the earliest white settlers in the state outside of the Mobile area. He settled in the Tombigbee settlements, in what is now Washington County, during the early 1770s. What is now the counties of Baldwin and Mobile became part of Spanish West Florida in 1783, part of the independent Republic of West Florida in 1810, and was finally added to the Mississippi Territory in 1812. Map showing the formation of the Mississippi and Alabama territories. The area composing today's northern and central Alabama and Mississippi, then known as the Yazoo lands, had been claimed by the Province of Georgia after 1767. Following the Revolutionary War, it remained a part of Georgia, although heavily disputed. With the exception of the immediate area around Mobile and the Yazoo lands, what is now central Alabama was made part of the Mississippi Territory upon its creation in 1798. The Yazoo lands were added to the territory in 1804, following the Yazoo land scandal. Spain had kept a governmental presence in Mobile after 1812. When Andrew Jackson's forces occupied Mobile in 1814 he demonstrated the United States' de facto authority over the region, which effectively ended Spanish influence, although not its claim, while gaining an unencumbered passage to the Gulf of Mexico from the hinterlands of the territory. Prior to the admission of Mississippi as a state on December 10, 1817, the more sparsely settled eastern half of the territory was separated and named the Alabama Territory. The Alabama Territory was created by the United States Congress on March 3, 1817. St. Stephens, now a ghost town, served as the territorial capital from 1817 to 1819. Alabama was admitted to the Union in 1819 as the 22nd state. Cahaba was the first permanent state capital, from 1820 to 1825. Alabama Fever was already underway when the state was admitted to the Union, with settlers and land speculators pouring into the state to take advantage of fertile land suitable for cotton cultivation. Southeastern planters and traders from the Upper South brought slaves with them as the cotton plantations in Alabama expanded. The economy of the central Black Belt (named for its dark, productive soil) was built around large cotton plantations whose owners' wealth grew largely from slave labor. The area also drew many poor, disfranchised people who became subsistence farmers. Alabama had a population estimated at fewer than 10,000 people in 1810, but it had increased to more than 300,000 people by 1830. Most Native American tribes were completely removed from the state within a few years of the passage of the Indian Removal Act by the United States Congress in 1830. Following the War of 1812 and the defeat and expulsion of the Creek Nation, European-American settlement in Alabama was intensified, as was the presence of slavery on newly-established plantations in the territory. Like its neighbors, the Alabama Territory was fertile ground for the surging cotton crop, and soon became one of the major destinations for African-American slaves who were being shipped to the extreme Southeastern United States. Most of the settlers came from the nearby states of North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia, attracted by the prospect of fertile planting of cotton in the Tennessee Valley and Black Belt. The plantation system was solidified throughout the first half of the 19th century, and Alabama was one of the first seven states to withdraw from the Union prior to the American Civil War. However, by the eve of the Civil War, only a minute portion of the population continued to own slaves, as the state had experienced a slave-labor decline. The "Unionists" were successful in the elections of 1851 and 1852. Passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Bill and uncertainty about agitation against slavery led the State Democratic convention of 1856 to revive the "Alabama Platform". When the Democratic National Convention at Charleston, South Carolina, failed to approve the "Alabama Platform" in 1860, the Alabama delegates, followed by those of the other "cotton states", withdrew. Upon the election of Abraham Lincoln, Governor Andrew B. Moore, as previously instructed by the legislature, called a state convention. Many prominent men had opposed secession. In North Alabama, there was an attempt to organize a neutral state to be named Nickajack. With President Lincoln's call to arms in April 1861, most opposition to secession ended. On January 11, 1861, the State of Alabama adopted the ordinances of secession from the Union (by a vote of 61-39). Until February 18, 1861, Alabama was informally called the Alabama Republic. It never changed its formal name which always has been "State of Alabama". Alabama joined the Confederate States of America, whose government was organized at Montgomery, on February 4, 1861. According to the 1860 U.S. census, Alabama had a free population of 529,121 and an additional slave population of 435,080. Alabama was not the scene of many major military operations and actions, yet the state contributed approximately 120,000 men to the Confederate service, which was practically all the state's white population capable of bearing arms. Most were recruited locally and served with men they knew, which strengthened esprit de corps. A compilation made from the official rosters of the Confederate Armies as they stood at various battles, and at various dates covering the entire period of the war, shows that Alabama kept the following number of organizations in almost continuous service in the field: 55 regiments of infantry, and 11 battalions of infantry; 5 regiments of cavalry; 3 regiments of partisan rangers; and 16 batteries of light artillery. Whereas a total of 2,576 Alabama men served in the Union Army, according to statisticians Phisterer (1883), Fox (1889) and Dyer (1908), it resulted in a total of 345 deaths from all causes during the course of the four year conflict (1861-1865). Alabama was the battlefield for the following principal battles: Battle of Athens, Battle of Day's Gap, Battle of Decatur, Battle of Fort Blakely, Battle of Mobile Bay, Battle of Newton, Battle of Selma, and Battle of Spanish Fort. Alabama soldiers fought in hundreds of battles throughout numerous states. The state's losses at Gettysburg were 1,750 dead plus captured or wounded; the famed "Alabama Brigade" suffered 781 casualties. (See also 15th Alabama Infantry Regiment: HOMEPAGE.) Nealy 120,000 Alabamians served in the Confederate forces, and approximately 35,000 died and another 30,000 were seriously wounded. Medical conditions were severe; about 15% died of disease, and 10% from battle. Alabama had few well-equipped hospitals, but it had many women who volunteered to nurse the sick and wounded. Soldiers were poorly equipped, especially after 1863, and often resorted to pillaging the dead for boots, belts, canteens, blankets, hats, shirts and pants. Uncounted thousands of slaves worked with Confederate troops; they took care of horses and equipment, cooked and did laundry, hauled supplies, and helped in field hospitals. Other slaves built defensive installations, especially those around Mobile. They graded roads, repaired railroads, drove supply wagons, and labored in iron mines, iron foundries and even in the munitions factories. The service of slaves was involuntary, their unpaid labor was impressed from their unpaid masters. About 10,000 slaves escaped and joined the Union army, along with some 2,500 white men who had remained loyal to the Federal government. Antebellum Governor Andrew B. Moore energetically supported the Confederate war effort. Even before hostilities began in April 1861, he seized Federal facilities, sent agents to buy rifles in the Northeast, and scoured the state for weapons. Despite some resistance in the northern part of the state, Alabama joined the Confederate States of America. Congressman Williamson R. W. Cobb, a Unionist, pleaded for compromise. He ran for the First Confederate Congress, but was soundly defeated (he was subsequently elected in 1863 on a wave of anti-war sentiment, with war weariness growing in Alabama). The new nation brushed Cobb aside and set up its temporary capital in Montgomery and selected Jefferson Davis as president. In May, after Virginia seceded, the Confederate government abandoned Montgomery and relocated its capital to Richmond, VA. Some of the severe internal logistics problems the Confederacy faced can be seen by tracing Jefferson Davis's journey from Mississippi, an adjoining state. From his plantation on the river, he took a steamboat down the Mississippi to Vicksburg, boarded a train to Jackson, where he took another train north to Grand Junction, then a third train east to Chattanooga, Tennessee, and a fourth train to Atlanta, Georgia. Yet another train took Davis to the Alabama border, where a final train took him to Montgomery. As the war proceeded the Federals seized the Mississippi River, burned trestles and railroad bridges, and tore up track; the frail Confederate railroad system faltered and virtually collapsed for want of repairs and replacement parts. Thirty-nine Alabamians attained the rank of general or admiral, most notably Lieutenant General James Longstreet and Admiral Raphael Semmes. Josiah Gorgas, who came to Alabama from Pennsylvania, was the Chief of Ordnance for the Confederacy. He located new munitions plants in Selma that employed 10,000 workers until Federal raiders in 1865 burned down the factories. The Selma Arsenal made most of the Confederacy's ammunition. The Selma Naval Ordnance Works manufactured artillery, turning out a cannon every five days. The Confederate Naval Yard built ships and was noted for launching the CSS Tennessee in 1863 to defend Mobile Bay. Selma's Confederate Nitre Works procured niter for gunpowder from limestone caves. When supplies were low, it advertised for housewives to save the contents of their chamber pots—urine was a rich source of organic nitrogen. In 1863, Union Col. Abel Streight led a raid through northern Alabama with hopes of recruiting unionists and disrupting Confederate supply lines to the Army of Tennessee. The raid was a failure for the Union forces, and Confederate Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest gained national attention when he captured Streight and his men despite being outnumbered. A company of cavalry soldiers from Huntsville, Alabama, joined Gen. Forrest's troops in Kentucky. The Huntsville company wore fine, new uniforms with yellow cloth on the sleeves, collars and coat tails. This led to them being greeted with "Yellowhammer" and later all Alabama troops in the Confederate Army were nicknamed "Yellowhammers". In 1863 the state's losses at the Battle of Gettysburg were 1,750 dead plus captured or wounded—the famed "Alabama Brigade" sustained 781 casualties. In 1863, Federal forces also secured a foothold in northern Alabama in spite of spirited opposition from Confederate cavalry under General Nathan B. Forrest. In 1864 and 1865, Alabama, however, witnessed defeats in a series of strategic and tactical battles from Mobile Bay to Spanish Fort to Selma to Fort Blakely. In 1861 the Union blockade had closed Mobile Bay, and in 1864 the outer defenses of Mobile were taken by a Federal fleet during the Battle of Mobile Bay. On April 12, 1865, three days after the surrender of Robert E. Lee at Appomattox Courthouse, the city of Mobile surrendered to the Union army to avoid destruction following the Union victories at the Battle of Spanish Fort and the Battle of Fort Blakely. The Magee Farm, north of Mobile, was the site of preliminary arrangements for the surrender of the last Confederate States Army east of the Mississippi River. Confederate General Richard Taylor, son of former President Zachary Taylor, negotiated a ceasefire with Union General Edward Canby at the house on April 29, 1865. Taylor's forces, comprising 47,000 Confederate troops serving in Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana, were the last remaining Confederate force east of the Mississippi River. It is estimated that 20,000 veterans returned home permanently disabled, and there were 20,000 widows and 60,000 orphans. With cotton prices low, the value of farms shrank. The livestock supply shrank too, as the number of horses declined from 127,000 to 80,000, and mules 111,000 to 76.000. The overall population remained the same--the growth that might have been expected was neutralized by death and emigration. Cahaba Prison, also known as Castle Morgan or Cahaba Prisoner-of-War Camp, was a prisoner-of-war camp near Selma, Alabama, where the Confederacy held captive Union soldiers during the Civil War. The prison was located in the small Alabama town of Cahaba, at the confluence of the Alabama and Cahaba Rivers, not far from Selma. The Cahaba Prison was opened in June 1863. The commanding officer was Captain H. A. M. Henderson, a Methodist minister. The prison structure, built in 1860, was a converted brick cotton warehouse on Arch Street, above the banks of the Alabama River. This structure covered approximately 15,000 square feet and was surrounded by a larger wooden stockade when converted into a prison. The warehouse building had one fireplace and 432 bunk spaces and was built to house approximately 500 prisoners, but its population had grown to 660 by August 1864. When Union General Ulysses S. Grant suspended the practice of prisoner exchange with the Confederacy the numbers began to soar. By October 1864 the prison’s numbers had swelled to 2,151, and had grown to more than 3,000 by March 1865. R. H. Whitfield, the prison surgeon, reported unhygienic conditions at the camp, citing the lack of a sanitary water supply. The death rate, however, was considered extremely low compared to other Confederate and Union Civil War prison camps. Federal and Confederate records indicate that between 142 and 147 men died at Cahaba Prison. Alabama's economy plunged into crisis during the war. Confederate general Braxton Bragg returned home to find "all was lost, except my debts." With fields destroyed and slaves gone, the state's farms recaptured less than 40% of their pre-war value. Alabama built railroads and restarted cotton production, but the state's coal and iron industries would not develop until the 1880s. According to the Presidential plan of reorganization, a provisional governor for Alabama was appointed in June 1865. A state convention met in September of the same year, and declared the ordinance of secession null and void and slavery abolished. A legislature and a governor were elected in November, and the legislature was at once recognized by President Andrew Johnson, but not by Congress, which refused to seat the delegation. Johnson ordered the Army to allow the inauguration of the governor after the legislature ratified the Thirteenth Amendment in December, 1865. But the legislature's passage of Black Codes to control the freedmen who were flocking from the plantations to the towns, and its rejection of the Fourteenth Amendment, intensified Congressional hostility to the Presidential plan. Following the war, the state was still chiefly agricultural, with an economy tied to cotton. During Reconstruction, state legislators ratified a new state constitution in 1868 that created a public school system for the first time and expanded women's rights. Legislators funded numerous public road and railroad projects, although these were plagued with allegations of fraud and misappropriation. During this time, organized resistance groups acted to suppress freedmen and Republicans. Although the Ku Klux Klan is the most well known, also among these groups were the Pale Faces, Knights of the White Camellia, Red Shirts, and White League. Reconstruction in Alabama ended in 1874, when Democrats took control of the legislature and governor's office. They wrote a new constitution in 1875. Also in 1875, the legislature passed the Blaine Amendment, to prohibit public money from being used to finance religious affiliated schools. In that same year, legislation was approved that called for racially segregated schools. Railroad passenger cars were segregated in 1891. Additional Jim Crow laws were passed after the turn of the 19th to 20th century. Should the Alabama state capitol be allowed to fly the Confederate flag? Sources: National Park Service; National Archives; Library of Congress; Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies; US Census Bureau; Fleming, Walter Lynwood. Civil War and Reconstruction in Alabama (1905); Storey, Margaret M., Loyalty and Loss: Alabama's Unionists in the Civil War and Reconstruction. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 2004; Baldwin, Joseph Glover; Louis M. Hacker (1957). The Flush Times of Alabama and Mississippi: A Series of Sketches (1853). New York: Sagamore Press; Beidler (ed.), Philip D. (1987). The Art of Fiction in the Heart of Dixie: An Anthology of Alabama Writers. Tuscaloosa: The University of Alabama Press. ISBN 978-0-8173-0313-6; Griffith (ed.), Lucille Blanche (1972). Alabama: A Documentary History to 1900. Tuscaloosa: The University of Alabama Press. ISBN 978-0-8173-0371-6; McMillan, Malcolm Cook (1992). The Alabama Confederate Reader (1963). Tuscaloosa: The University of Alabama Press. ISBN 978-0-8173-0595-6; Alabama Department of Archives and History.
0.944404	résumé Our experimental study relates to several sandstone samples originating from a tight gas field explored by GDF/Suez. The aim of the study is to characterize experimentally the petro-physical properties of these materials, in order to improve our knowledge on their gas recovery potential. The initial characterisation of these sandstone samples is performed in the dry and in the “as received” states: porosity, initial water saturation level, gas permeability at Pc=5MPa confining pressure. Further, sandstone samples have been preserved into hermetic chambers at fixed relative humidity (RH) values, until mass (and water saturation level) stabilisation. Gas permeability is measured at stabilisation, from 5 to 40MPa confinement. This method is limited to Sw ≤ 21%. In order to reach higher water saturation levels Sw, an iterative method has been developed, which allows to reach values as high as 70%. For two different samples, we have evaluated the water saturation threshold above which no more gas passes through the porous network, due to hydraulic cut-off, under increasing Pc. At intermediate saturation level (on the order of 40%), two different sample types have been identified, depending on whether their gas relative permeability depends, or not, on Pc. For one sample of each type, poro-elastic experiments provide drained bulk modulus Kb and solid matrix bulk modulus Ks, from which Biot’s coefficient b is deduced. From these tests, we show that the closure of some portion of the connected porous network is bound to explain the sensitivity of sandstone permeability to confining pressure.
0.976369	Slang can be described as informal, nonstandard words or phrases (lexical innovations) which tend to originate in subcultures within a society. Slang often suggests that the person utilizing the words or phrases is familiar with the hearer's group or subgroup-it can be considered a distinguishing factor of in-group identity. Microsoft Encarta states: "slang expressions often embody attitudes and values of group members." In order for an expression to become slang, it must be widely accepted and adopted by members of the subculture or group. Slang has no societal boundaries or limitations as it can exist in all cultures and classes of society as well as in all languages. Slang expressions are created in basically the same way as standard speech. As stated in Microsoft Encarta, "expressions may take form as metaphors, similes, and other figures of speech." In addition, it is noted that the words used as slang may be new coinages, existing words may acquire new meanings, narrow meanings of words may become generalized, words may be abbreviated, etc. However, in order for the expression to survive, it must be widely adopted by the group who uses it. Slang is a way in which languages change and are renewed. British slang is English language slang used in Great Britain. While some slang words and phrases are used throughout all of Britain (e.g. knackered, meaning "exhausted"), others are restricted to smaller regions. London has its own varieties of slang, one of the most well-known of which is Cockney rhyming slang. Rhyming slang, chiefly associated with Cockney#Cockney speech spoken in the East End of London, replaces a word with a phrase which rhymes with the word, for example, plates of meat for "feet", or twist and twirl for "girl". Often only the first word is used, so plates and twist by themselves become the colloquialisms for "feet" and "girl". Back slang is simply the practice of using words spelled in reverse, e.g. yob for "boy" or ecilop for "police". Polari is a variety of slang used by gay men and lesbians in Britain and the United Kingdom, which has a history going back at least a hundred years. However, our present-day meaning for slang did not begin forming until the 16th or 17th century. The English Criminal Cant developed in the 16th century. The English Criminal Cant was a new kind of speech used by criminals and cheats, meaning it developed mostly in saloons and gambling houses. The English Criminal Cant was at first believed to be foreign, meaning scholars thought that it had either originated in Romania or had a relationship to French. The English Criminal Cant was slow developing. In fact, out of the four million people who spoke English, only about ten thousand spoke the English Criminal Cant. By the end of the 16th century this new style of speaking was considered to be a language “without reason or order” (Thorne 23). During the 18th century schoolmasters taught pupils to believe that the English Criminal Cant (which by this time had developed into slang) was not the correct usage of English and slang was considered to be taboo. Because most people are individuals who desire uniqueness, it stands to reason that slang has been in existence for as long as language has been in existence. Even so, the question of why slang develops within a language has been hotly debated. Most agree that the question is still unanswered, or perhaps it has many answers. Regardless, there is no doubt that we can better explain slang's existence by analyzing how and why it exists. 5) To be unmistakeably arresting, even startling.
0.981296	Having a strong background in mathematics prepares high school students for success, regardless of what they aspire to do in the future. Success in mathematics opens doors, putting high school graduates in the best position to perform well in college, trade school, employment, or the military. Mathematics is central to many scientific and technical careers and increasingly important in a wide range of areas as diverse as finance, sports journalism, and computer graphics. The Internet has catalyzed an explosion of new careers in mathematics and statistics for those who have the skills to analyze and harness the huge amount of data at people’s fingertips. Moreover, all students need a solid background in mathematics to become effective citizens who can make informed and reasoned decisions about personal finances, public policies that deserve support, and cost-effective insurance or health plans. An inadequate preparation in mathematics often rules out certain careers or forces students who want to pursue them to complete years of make-up work. Insufficient understanding may also make it easier for others to take advantage of them in their personal lives.
0.999556	If you are the owner or manager of a leisure facility, you may be considering the installation of a brand-new tennis court. The sport is becoming increasingly popular across the country and will be sure to add value to your complex. Before you begin planning the process and choosing a tennis court builder to help you, what are some of the big issues you need to avoid, when introducing a surface such as this? Firstly, it is very important to ensure that the area you choose for the tennis court is ultimately suitable. The earth that is beneath needs to be carefully prepared and compacted properly before work begins above. If not, depressions or low spots can appear on the tennis court surface, once everything is ready. Try and ensure that the entire area surrounding the tennis court is stable and not subject to drainage issues, or wastage associated with flash flooding. If the land that surrounds the court is subject to a certain amount of erosion, this can lead to the formation of hairline cracks on the surface of the court. When laying the base that will support the tennis court, ensure that proper surface drainage is installed. This will need to be maintained so that it continues to be efficient over time, or a condition known as "blistering" can result. These blisters will appear as lumps or small humps on the surface of the tennis court. If the concrete beneath is not properly sealed, then water may leak in and this can have a tendency to rust. When it comes into contact with an asphalt ingredient called pyrite, rusting can manifest and it will leak upwards into the acrylic surface of the court, causing an eyesore. When paving the surface before the acrylic is laid, ensure that this is 100% flat and smooth. If not, a phenomenon known as a "bird bath" will appear, where puddles of water tend to gather on the surface due to poor workmanship. If possible, shield the surface of the tennis court from too much direct sun exposure. If you do so, you should be able to avoid too much fading, or the need to resurface too often. Finally, it's important to use the right type of cleaning solution on the tennis surface to avoid playability issues. In particular, moulds, mildew or algae could form and you will get complaints from players due to poor traction. Have a word with the best tennis court construction firm in your neighbourhood, in order to ensure that none of these problems arise with your project.
0.859866	The National Basketball Association Most Valuable Player (MVP) is an annual National Basketball Association (NBA) award given since the 1955–56 NBA season to the best performing player of the regular season. The winner receives the Maurice Podoloff Trophy, which is named in honor of the first NBA commissioner (then president)[lower-alpha 1] of the NBA who served from 1946 until his retirement in 1963. Until the 1979–80 season, the MVP was selected by a vote of NBA players. Since the 1980–81 season, the award is decided by a panel of sportswriters and broadcasters throughout the United States and Canada, each of whom casts a vote for first to fifth place selections. Each first-place vote is worth 10 points; each second-place vote is worth seven; each third-place vote is worth five, fourth-place is worth three and fifth-place is worth one. Starting from 2010, one ballot was cast by fans through online voting. The player with the highest point total wins the award. As of May 2016, the current holder of the award is Stephen Curry, who won both the 2015 and 2016 MVP Awards. Every player who has won this award that is eligible for the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame has been inducted. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar won the award a record six times. Both Bill Russell and Michael Jordan won the award five times, while Wilt Chamberlain and LeBron James won the award four times in their respective careers. Russell and James are the only players to have won the award four times in five seasons. Moses Malone, Larry Bird and Magic Johnson each won the award three times, while Bob Pettit, Karl Malone, Tim Duncan, Steve Nash and Stephen Curry have each won it twice. Only two rookies have won the award: Wilt Chamberlain in the 1959–60 season and Wes Unseld in the 1968–69 season. Hakeem Olajuwon of Nigeria,[lower-alpha 2] Tim Duncan of the U.S. Virgin Islands,[lower-alpha 3] Steve Nash of Canada[lower-alpha 4] and Dirk Nowitzki of Germany are the only international MVP winners. Duncan is an American citizen by birth, but is considered an international player by the NBA. Of these four players, only Nowitzki was trained totally outside the United States—the other three all played U.S. college basketball (Olajuwon at Houston, Duncan at Wake Forest, and Nash at Santa Clara). Stephen Curry is the two-time reigning MVP. ↑ The official title of the position was NBA President until 1967 when it was changed to NBA Commissioner. 1 2 Hakeem Olajuwon was born in Nigeria, but became a naturalized United States citizen in 1993. He was the first ever international player to win the award. 1 2 3 Although Tim Duncan was born in the U.S. Virgin Islands and is a United States citizen, the NBA considers him an international player. 1 2 3 Steve Nash, who was born in South Africa, was raised in Canada. ↑ Allen Iverson received the only other first-place vote in 2000, while Carmelo Anthony received the only other first-place vote in 2013. ↑ Except for seasons affected by lockouts, when the schedule was shortened from the norm of 82 games. Karl Malone won in 1998–99 when Utah was 37–13 in 50 games, which projected to 60 wins in 82 games. James won in 2011–12 when the Miami Heat were 46–20 in 66 games, which projected to 57 wins. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Before the 1971–72 season, Lew Alcindor changed his name to Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. ↑ Malone, at 35 years and 284 days old at the end of the regular season, is the oldest MVP in NBA history. ↑ Rose, at 22 years and 191 days old at the end of the regular season, is the youngest MVP in NBA history. "NBA MVP – Maurice Podoloff Trophy – Marc Mellon Sculpture Studio". Retrieved January 19, 2002. ↑ Monroe, Mike. "The Commissioners". NBA.com. Turner Sports Interactive, Inc. Retrieved July 8, 2008. ↑ "LeBron receives 116 first-place votes". ESPN.com. May 2, 2010. Retrieved May 2, 2010. ↑ "Kareem Abdul-Jabbar". NBA.com. Turner Sports Interactive, Inc. Retrieved July 4, 2008. 1 2 "Most Valuable Player". NBA.com. Turner Sports Interactive, Inc. Retrieved July 4, 2008. 1 2 3 Wallace, Michael (May 5, 2013). "LeBron James wins 4th MVP award". ESPN.com. Archived from the original on May 5, 2013. ↑ "Wes Unseld". NBA.com. Turner Sports Interactive, Inc. Retrieved July 4, 2008. 1 2 "NBA Players from around the world: 2005-2006 Season". NBA.com. Turner Sports Interactive, Inc. Retrieved March 13, 2011. ↑ McPeek, Jeramie. "The Canadian Kid". NBA.com (from Fastbreak Magazine of Sept./Oct. 1996). Turner Sports Interactive, Inc. Retrieved April 22, 2009. ↑ "Who is the leading MVP candidate?". ESPN.com. March 6, 2015. Archived from the original on March 16, 2015. ↑ Hubbard, Jan (April 22, 1990). "NBA NOTES : Charles Barkley Running a Slick Campaign for MVP". Newsday. Archived from the original on March 16, 2015. ↑ "Karl Malone 1998-99 game log". basketball-reference.com. Retrieved October 2, 2016. ↑ "Derrick Rose 2010-11 game log". basketball-reference.com. Retrieved October 2, 2016.
0.999922	Download VNC Free Edition from Files32: Network & Internet : Remote Computing - Get your beta freeware and shareware downloads! Virtual Network Computing (VNC) is a remote display system that allows you to view and work on one desktop using a different computer and platform from anywhere on the Internet. For example, you can use VNC on your PC to display a Unix environment running on a large server in another room. It allows you to control the mouse and keyboard input to the remote computer as well as view its display. VNC also works as a Java-client applet in a browser.VNC is in widespread active use by many millions throughout industry, academia and privately. There are several versions to choose from, including a free version and some substantially enhanced commercial versions.VNC has a wide range of applications including system administration, IT support and helpdesks. It can also be used to support the mobile user, both for hot desking within the enterprise and also to provide remote access at home, or on the road. The system allows several connections to the same desktop, providing an invaluable tool for collaborative or shared working in the workplace or classroom. Computer support within the geographically spread family is an ever popular use.Virtual Network Computing (VNC) is a software developed at AT&T to allow users to operate other computers from their own desktops. When it was originally released, it was intended to be used on "network computers", whose main purpose was to connect to a server that would then run the user's applications as if it were their own machine. Today these machines are known as thin clients, and VNC's client-server capabilities and source code are available for free.For the individual user, one common scenario is using VNC to help troubleshoot the computer of a distant less-technically-savvy relative. In other words, sitting at your desk in Baltimore, you could use VNC to take control of your relative's PC in California and show them how to install and use some new program package by actually doing it yourself.A very common business software of VNC is in remote system administration, where it is used to allow administrators to take control of employee machines to diagnose and fix problems, or to access and administer server machines without making a trip to the console. VNC can also be used to provide a flexible hot-desking and road-warrior environment by allowing employees to access their office desktop and server machines from any machine in the company's offices or from other remote sites, regardless of the type of computers involved at either end.VNC runs on nearly every operating systemSo how does VNC shape up against Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP), the protocol used in Windows' default 'Remote Desktop Connection' software? It lacks many of the features of RDP, such as powerful encryption. Also lacking is the capability to use files on the client machine as if they were on the server. This means that programs on the server cannot access local files, which could be problematic if they are needed. On the other hand, VNC is incredibly widely used, because it is available on nearly every conceivable platform, so compatibility is not an issue. RDP is not an open source protocol and is still unavailable on some platforms, which could lead to problems. VNC Enterprise Edition Viewer is a remote control program which allows you to view and interact with one computer to another. VNC stands for Virtual Network Computing. VNC stands for Virtual Network Computing. VNC Personal Edition Viewer is a remote control program which allows you to view and interact with one computer to another. Revolutionary VPN solution - Protects online security, identity privacy.K-Secure VPN is a revolutionary network security solution that encrypts and compresses network traffic. iRAPP stand for "interactive Remote APPlication" - a remote access program that allows you to view and fully interact a remote or locally networked Mac. VNC Viewer connects your iPhone, iPad or iPod touch to a computer anywhere in the world. VNC Viewer enables you to take remote control of a computer from your iPhone, iPad or iPod touch. Queen I Album Theme is a desktop theme featuring the rock band "Queen". It includes wallpaper, icons, cursors, animated cursors, and WAV sounds. The free version of the advanced sound measurement software DSSF3 is now available. It consists of the signal generator, sound recorder and player, and the peak level meter. Best Windows Mail to Outlook Converter are both Microsoft products, but unfortunately and, most inconveniently, they do not use the same formats to store messages, contacts and other data.
0.999999	How a sensible choice of construction technology can help protect the environment? The choice of technology and design has a key significance for the environment. Good insulation means not only lower energy bills, but also reduced CO2 emissions throughout the building life. Appropriate design is also extremely important. The Izodom products are widely used in modern passive and low-energy houses, greatly reducing the consumption of fossil fuels. When you think about an environmentally-friendly design, consider the manufacturing methods of construction products, possibility of recycling construction waste and environmental impact of transporting the materials to the site.
0.96009	Animal training requires a range of different skills and qualities. In order to be a successful trainer, you'll need to form a bond with the animals in your care. That comes from a lot of hard work. It can be a very challenging and rewarding experience, regardless of what type of animal you're working with — whether it's birds, dogs or marine mammals. Marine mammal trainers use their knowledge of animal behavior to train and care for a variety of marine species. Marine mammal trainers use operant conditioning (positive reinforcement techniques) to train the animals in their care. They also are responsible for providing appropriate physical and mental exercises to keep animals healthy and happy. Other duties for marine mammal trainers may include diet preparation and feeding, keeping accurate health and behavior records, ensuring the habitat is properly maintained, and addressing the public during educational programs and demonstrations. Additionally, trainers teach the animals behaviors that make it safer and easier to collect medical samples, perform exams, and administer medications. They usually assist the veterinarian with medical procedures and exams. Marine mammal trainers must be physically fit and capable of working outdoors in changing weather conditions and extreme temperatures. It is common for trainers to be on call to work as needed on nights, weekends or holidays. They may also be called to assist with sick or injured animals. Marine mammal trainers may specialize in working with a specific type of marine mammal such as dolphins, whales, or seals and sea lions. Some trainers may spend a large portion of their time involved with public education or demonstrations, while others work primarily behind the scenes, doing research or other duties. A marine mammal trainer may advance to supervisory positions, such as facility director or curator, though an advanced degree may be necessary for consideration at some institutions. There are also marine mammal training opportunities with the U.S. Navy Marine Mammal Program. Patience: Training involving any type of animal requires a lot of patience. Animals can often pick up on your frustration and may not perform as well as expected, so it's a good idea to leave that at the door when it's training time. Commitment: You need to stay committed to the task from beginning to end. If you find certain techniques just aren't working, try something else rather than giving up altogether. After all, not every animal responds the same way to the same training techniques. Strength: Because of the demanding surroundings — of being in open water or in a pool — you'll need to be physically fit. In certain cases, you may need to do some heavy lifting of animals and/or equipment as well. While a college degree is not mandatory, it's very difficult to become a marine mammal trainer without one. Common majors for marine mammal trainers include animal science, marine biology, animal behavior, zoology, psychology, and biology. Another well known educational option is the Exotic Animal Training Management program at Moorpark College in California. This 7-day-a-week associate degree program is 22 months long and accepts about 50 students per year. Degree recipients have gone on to work at most of the major zoos, animal parks and in Hollywood. Marine mammal trainers may have prior practical experience from employment as a marine biologist or zookeeper. Aspiring trainers will usually volunteer or intern at a marine mammal facility to gain experience. Hands-on experience is essential for those seeking entrance to this field. Prior experience working as a dog trainer, veterinary assistant or in another animal-related field is beneficial for those unable to gain experience specifically related to marine mammals. In addition to having a degree and practical experience in the field, most marine mammal facilities require their trainer applicants to have strong swimming skills and proof of scuba diving certification. Once hired, successful applicants must complete an intensive training course under the direction of experienced trainers. Trainees learn the training techniques and management methods of the facility. They also have the opportunity to familiarize themselves with the facility’s animals and other members of the training team. Many marine mammal trainers are members of a professional marine animal group such as the International Marine Animal Trainers’ Association (IMATA). The group was founded in 1972. Another group is the Society for Marine Mammalogy (SMM), which was founded in 1981. It currently has more than 2,000 members from more than 56 different countries. These groups provide members-only website access, industry publications, and job postings. SimplyHired.com listed the average salary for marine mammal trainers with the U.S. Navy program as $71,035 as of November 2018, though this is generally considered on the high end of the marine mammal trainer salary range. While the U.S. Bureau of Labor and Statistics (BLS) does not separate marine mammal trainers out from the general category of animal trainers, a 2017 study found the mean annual animal trainer salary to be $28,880. The lowest 10% of animal trainers earned less than $19,610 while the highest 10% earned a salary of more than $56,000. The three states with the highest number of available animal trainer jobs were California with 2,250 jobs, Florida with 1,520 jobs and New York with 1,170 jobs. The mean annual salaries for these states were $39,700 in California, $36,710 in Florida and $36,870 in New York. There is extremely strong competition for marine mammal trainer positions nationwide. As relatively few new marine parks and aquariums open each year, the total number of marine mammal trainer positions is not expected to grow significantly. This fact, combined with the high level of interest in this career path, ensures a very high level of demand for any positions that should become available in the field. It is also important for aspiring marine mammal trainers to realize that long-distance relocation is frequently necessary to secure a position in this field.
0.982399	What can be more dream-like location for a wedding ceremony if not the site of a beach? Choosing Alabama as a wedding reception place opens a lot of opportunities to give your wedding party the touch of exotic and freedom. Alabama is a state located in the southern region of the US, being its thirtieth largest state. The climate here is described as temperate with an average annual temperature of 64 degrees F, but in the southern part the temperatures tend to be warmer. Summers though are among the hottest in the US, reaching temperatures of 90 degrees F. Alabama beach offers the couples a unique wedding experience in romantic surroundings and because of the themes popular in this place, Alabama beach became an attraction for people coming from all over the world. The scenery that displays itself as a perfect background for the wedding conveys at the same time the magical image of a dream. To organize a party down there is quite at handy, since wedding planners are to be reachable, together with the different services needed for the planning and the party itself. Organizing the wedding on the beach requires for the couple to let their guests know about the location in order for them to get dressed accordingly. Next to the invitation is good to add a weather forecast, since there are situations when the nature plays unexpected surprises, in this case you and your guests might need to be prepared. Floral decorations, wedding bouquets, bridesmaids’ bouquets, corsages, flowers for men’s boutonnieres are also an important detail of your wedding plan. Be sure you find the florist, along with your other researches, that can integrate the relevant flowers to your party. Considering that the temperature is quite high during the summer season, natural flowers may loose easily their freshness, so you might consider the option of silk made flowers. The art of the florists in this matter is exquisite, since they can replicate the natural flowers in such a manner that one can not tell the difference from a real one to the artificial one. Lately a way of preservation the fresh flowers appeared on the floral market: the real plants are treated with a glycerin mixture, thus enabling them to have the same look of freshness and the beauty is that they do not need watering to display the same freshness.
0.964318	On what basis do you assume it would? I don't. It would be an experiment. It would also be a measure of the collective generosity of society as a whole. Are we, as a people, generous enough to meet the needs of those who can't provide for their own needs plus the greed of those who want to take without contributing? If the answer is yes, then this supermarket succeeds. If not, it will fail. I think the existence of such a supermarket would have the effect of making people think about their connection to society as a whole, what kind of society we want to have, and what role we as individuals want to play in order to contribute to making that happen. I would hope that such consideration would lead people to contribute more and to be more aware of people in need. If you were a shopper at this market, what would you do? My pet system? You're the one who just made it up. Because they would be human beings with needs, wants and interests that wouldn't be satisfied by the contents of just one supermarket. Clothing, housing, entertainment and so on. Because there's no longer a reason to produce goods. One supermarket does not constitute a socio-economic system. So, status quo? No advocacy of change based on some preferred model? Or, what changes to current political and economic systems would you suggest? My question is: Is there any form of governance, or a complete absence thereof, that you do advocate? Ditto for any arrangement/non-arrangements for a working economy. Is it because you lack the ability? Is it greed? Or some other reasons? That's true. That's why previously I pointed out that just allowing people to take what they want results in the supermarket closing. It's not just a supermarket, it's the endpoint of many supply chains that involve countless unseen people. At the same time, if it works and is sustainable, it can be repeated becoming more than just one supermarket. If successful, it could encourage similar social endeavors. Because I see no need to. That's why previously I pointed out that just allowing people to take what they want results in the supermarket closing. Why would it result in that? At the same time, if it works and is sustainable, it can be repeated becoming more than just one supermarket. What if it can't "work" (define "work") because it is just one supermarket? If successful, it could encourage similar social endeavors. Not in particular. You're always free to make an argument for whatever pet system you promote though. Never, ever trust mathematicians. Always, always do a number on you. You don't see a value in the continuation of the supermarket? Why is that? That's already been discussed previously in this thread. If you don't remember, consider re-reading the thread, then seeing a doctor regarding memory issues. That it continues to function, receiving enough income to meet its expenses. I see value in the continued distribution of goods to people who need them, yes. But then, I didn't even pay for that jar of Greek olives last time, before you made these changes to your supermarket, so why should I pay for them now? That's already been discussed previously in this thread. It's been asserted previously, that's for sure. You're free to actually argue the case at some point. As an example, for-profit supermarkets would have better access to capital and advertising, and thereby be in a better position to grab market share. No, that's not what "successful" means in this system of yours, successful means profitable (rather risk-adjusted profit but let's disregard that) - that's what ultimately determines the flow of capital under capitalism. Your experiment is basically set up to fail. More importantly, before you toss the ball you should sufficiently whack it yourself. I'm not a mathematician. Either way, you seem to mostly be doing the number on yourself. I've been nice. Too nice. In fact, I was doing you a favor by consistently showing you respect you did not earn and do not deserve. Not anymore. You just lost a friend. Bye-skis! Why not fess up to not having a darn thing to contribute? You have nothing but cheap shots, and your only apparent plan is to groove on the rubble after tearing everything down. When I see substance, I'll respond, but these constant air balls will get no further respect. 3. Argument from premises to conclusion. Why not fess up to not having a darn thing to contribute? Well the OP contributed 1 point to the score and my first post was contributing over a million, defintely more than "not a darn thing", especially relatively speaking. You have nothing but cheap shots, and your only apparent plan is to groove on the rubble after tearing everything down. What's your plan? Besides, what's wrong with grooving on the rubble? When I see substance, I'll respond, but these constant air balls will get no further respect. If you consider them air balls then you should not respond indeed. You answered your own question. That you imagine you previously stole some olives in a different scenario doesn't change the value of maintaining the supermarket for it's utility. Other motivations might include a desire to contribute one's fair share and to support those who can't. Already been done. If you don't remember (and I would still encourage you to see a doctor about memory) it had to do with the supermarket being unable to resupply because it's supply lines require money. Feel free to address that, or not. Meh, business start-ups face obstacles like that all the time. It may be a problem but it's not a deal-breaker. No, that's not what "successful" means in this system of yours, successful means profitable (rather risk-adjusted profit but let's disregard that) - that's what ultimately determines the flow of capital under capitalism. Lol! You ask me for my definition of success and then tell me it's wrong when I give it to you! My definition is as I've stated it. That it continues to function, receiving enough income to meet its expenses. Does this supermarket really sound like a capitalist endeavor to you? Your experiment is basically set up to fail. Maybe so, but you haven't said why yet. If goods are free to be taken in distribution facilities, then why would supermarkets require money to resupply themselves? Consistency isn't your strong suit, is it? No it doesn't, hence why it will fail to its competition in a capitalist context. I've said so twice now. It follows from capital flow being determined by (risk-adjusted) profit under capitalism. If goods are free to be taken in distribution facilities, then why would supermarkets require money to resupply themselves? You made up the scenario. You claimed it was the "staus quo" that I defended by default. Does the "status quo" include distribution centers that deliver goods without money being expected in return? If so, where are these distribution centers? Consistency isn't your strong suit, is it? I'm not the one who is struggling with consistency. Which is why "success" is defined as continuing to operate and not winning a competition with established supermarket chains. Lot's of co-ops exist on this model, and they get along just fine. Last edited by Mycroft; 25th April 2017 at 05:29 PM. You made up the scenario. No you did. So your proposed system constitutes one distribution facility where goods are free (or with voluntary donations) with all the others still operating as they do now? You claimed it was the "staus quo" that I defended by default. You are. Your proposed system differs only in a single facility from the status quo. Lot's of co-ops exist on this model, and they get along just fine. These don't seem to be donation-based, they're just standard supermarkets where the shoppers are the shareholders. And I know things like free shops exist and get along fine, this in no way negates my argument. I disagree, but in the interest of moving forward instead of threading back and proving it, I'll just ask you if your scenario assumed a distribution center that would resupply the supermarket for free? If not, I'll ask why you would assume that, because it was never a part of my scenario? So your proposed system constitutes one distribution facility where goods are free (or with voluntary donations) with all the others still operating as they do now? I didn't specify. Do you think it matters? If so, why? They are examples of markets that exist on a non-profit business model and do so despite being in competition with capitalist for-profit supermarkets.
0.999907	I'm with You is the tenth studio album by Red Hot Chili Peppers. The album was released by Warner Bros. Records on August 26, 2011 in several countries and on August 29 in the US, a day earlier than originally planned. Produced by Rick Rubin, it is the band's first studio album to feature guitarist Josh Klinghoffer, following the departure of John Frusciante in 2009, and is their first since Stadium Arcadium in 2006, marking the longest gap, to date, between Red Hot Chili Peppers' studio albums. The album's first single, "The Adventures of Rain Dance Maggie" was released to radio on July 15, 2011, three days earlier than expected due to the single leaking. Regarding the album, vocalist Anthony Kiedis noted, "there is no question – this is a beginning," with drummer Chad Smith stating, "this is a new band. Same name, but it's a new band."
0.985363	Keep your head safe when you're out on the road with a cycle helmet. Adjustable straps and foam padding make sure your helmet is secure, whether you're scaling the north face or just learning to ride bikes. A cycle helmet needs to do two things: protect your head, and be comfortable. For a perfect fit, choose a helmet with a dial adjustment. To keep the kids safe, pick up a helmet with their favourite cartoon characters and a quick-release buckle. Vent holes help keep your head cool, so look out for a vented design if speed's your thing. A full-face helmet provides better protection for thrill seekers who like to try a jump or two. Mountain bikes and BMX bikes can take a bit of a beating, so need to be kept in good condition. Regularly check and inflate your bike tyres, and invest in some bike storage to protect them from the elements.
0.970999	Highly pathogenic H5N1 avian influenza viruses are associated with severe disease in humans and continue to be a pandemic threat. While vaccines are available, other approaches are required for patients that typically respond poorly to vaccination, such as the elderly and the immunocompromised. To produce a therapeutic agent that is highly efficacious at low doses and is broadly specific against antigenically drifted H5N1 influenza viruses, we developed two neutralizing monoclonal antibodies and combined them into a single bispecific Fc fusion protein (the Fc dual-affinity retargeting [FcDART] molecule). In mice, a single therapeutic or prophylactic dose of either monoclonal antibody at 2.5 mg/kg of body weight provided 100% protection against challenge with A/Vietnam/1203/04 (H5N1) or the antigenically drifted strain A/Whooper swan/Mongolia/244/05 (H5N1). In ferrets, a single 1-mg/kg prophylactic dose provided 100% protection against A/Vietnam/1203/04 challenge. FcDART was also effective, as a single 2.5-mg/kg therapeutic or prophylactic dose in mice provided 100% protection against A/Vietnam/1203/04 challenge. Antibodies bound to conformational epitopes in antigenic sites on the globular head of the hemagglutinin protein, on the basis of analysis of mutants with antibody escape mutations. While it was possible to generate escape mutants in vitro, they were neutralized by the antibodies in vivo, as mice infected with escape mutants were 100% protected after only a single therapeutic dose of the antibody used to generate the escape mutant in vitro. In summary, we have combined the antigen specificities of two highly efficacious anti-H5N1 influenza virus antibodies into a bispecific FcDART molecule, which represents a strategy to produce broadly neutralizing antibodies that are effective against antigenically diverse influenza viruses. IMPORTANCE Highly pathogenic H5N1 avian influenza viruses are associated with severe disease in humans and are a pandemic threat. A vaccine is available, but other approaches are required for patients that typically respond poorly to vaccination, such as the elderly and the immunocompromised. The variability of the virus means that such an approach must be broad spectrum. To achieve this, we developed two antibodies that neutralize H5N1 influenza viruses. In mice, these antibodies provided complete protection against a spectrum of H5N1 influenza viruses at a single low dose. We then combined the two antibodies into a single molecule, FcDART, which combined the broad-spectrum activity and protective efficacy of both antibodies. This treatment provides a novel and effective therapeutic agent or prophylactic with activity against highly pathogenic H5N1 avian influenza viruses. Since 2003, a series of events that many believe to be the harbinger of an incipient influenza pandemic has occurred in Asia. The virus responsible for these events, an H5N1 influenza virus, has infected and killed millions of chickens and ducks and infected in excess of 650 people (www.who.int; reviewed in reference 1). Fortunately, this virus has yet to gain the ability to transmit from human to human; however, mammalian transmissibility can be conferred experimentally with relatively few mutations (2, 3). The virulence of this virus (4, 5), its wide geographic distribution (6), and the potential for human aerosol transmission (2, 3) urge the development of targeted therapeutic and prophylactic measures. Currently, two H5N1 vaccines, one of which is available worldwide, have been licensed, and these offer the best means of mass protection (reviewed in reference 7). However, it is likely that the first line of defense against an emerging pandemic will require additional options, including antivirals. Currently, the two options for treating influenza are the M2 ion channel blockers (e.g., amantadine) and the neuraminidase inhibitors (e.g., oseltamivir). Unfortunately, many of the current H5N1 viruses are resistant to amantadine (6), and for oseltamivir a dose higher than that used previously and a treatment schedule longer than that used previously are needed for protection in murine models (8), providing proof that new therapeutic options are very much needed. Monoclonal antibodies (MAbs) against the influenza virus hemagglutinin (HA) protein have shown efficacy as therapeutic agents and prophylactics against H5N1 influenza virus infection in murine challenge models (9–13), and in mice, other antibodies have also shown efficacy against other strains of influenza viruses, including H1N1, H2N2, and H3N2 (14–19). The dosages at which these antibodies provided 100% protection against challenge in mice ranged from 5 to 50 mg/kg of body weight when delivered therapeutically and 1 to 30 mg/kg when delivered prophylactically. In ferrets, an anti-H5 antibody provided 100% protection against challenge with an H5N1 influenza virus when it was delivered at 10 mg/kg prophylactically and at 30 mg/kg therapeutically (20). The variability of the HA protein, which contains the main antigenic sites of the virus, necessitates that any broadly utilized antibody be effective against antigenically diverse influenza viruses. The most conserved regions of HA are the stalk and the receptor-binding pocket, and antibodies directed at these sites are efficacious against antigenically diverse strains of influenza virus (14, 21, 22). However, the most exposed and antibody-accessible epitopes on HA are located on the globular head, although these regions are highly variable. Due to the variability of HA, it is likely that more than one neutralizing antibody will be required to provide broad protection against different lineages of H5N1 and to protect against antibody escape mutants. However, this presents certain problems for clinical testing and product development, as cocktails of antibodies are difficult and expensive to produce and test. Therefore, in this study we have developed a bispecific Fc fusion protein, the Fc dual-affinity retargeting (FcDART) molecule, that combines the neutralizing capacity and specificities of two different neutralizing monoclonal antibodies from human and murine sources that target the globular head of HA. Individually, the two monoclonal antibodies provided 100% protection against A/Vietnam/1203/04 (H5N1) (VN1203) challenge in mice and ferrets when they were used as therapeutic agents and prophylactics at low doses (2.5 mg/kg in mice and 1 mg/kg in ferrets). They also provided in mice 100% protection against challenge with A/Whooper swan/Mongolia/244/05 (H5N1) (Mon244), which is an antigenically drifted strain. Further, antibody escape mutants generated in vitro were not lethal in mice treated with a single therapeutic dose of antibody. The FcDART molecule that combines the antigen specificities of these two antibodies also provided 100% protection against challenge in mice when it was used as a therapeutic agent or prophylactic, and the strategy used to produce the FcDART molecule may be used to produce antibody-based therapeutic agents that are effective against antigenically diverse influenza viruses. Cell lines and culture conditions.293T, Chinese hamster ovary (CHO), and Madin-Darby canine kidney (MDCK) cell lines were obtained from ATCC. 293T cells were grown in Opti-MEM medium (Invitrogen, CA) supplemented with 5% fetal calf serum (FCS; Gemini Bioproducts Inc., CA), CHO cells were grown in F12K medium (Invitrogen, CA) supplemented with 10% FCS, and MDCK cells were grown in Dulbecco's modified minimal essential medium (DMEM; Invitrogen, CA) supplemented with 10% FCS and 2 mM glutamine. For MDCK cell infections, viruses were diluted in infection medium (minimal essential medium supplemented with 5% (vol/vol) bovine serum albumin (BSA) and 2 mM glutamine (Sigma, MO). Immunofluorescence assay (IFA).MDCK cells were infected with VN1203 or Mon244 overnight. The cells were harvested by trypsinization and resuspended in phosphate-buffered saline (PBS) with 2% FCS. Aliquots containing 3 × 104 cells were spotted onto HTC Super Cured 24-spot slides (Erie Scientific Company, NH), dried, and fixed with 100% acetone for 10 min at room temperature. Fixed cells were incubated with hybridoma supernatants for 30 min at 37°C and washed for 5 min with PBS. The slides were then incubated for 30 min at 37°C with 50 ng/ml propidium iodide and fluorescein isothiocyanate (FITC)-conjugated goat anti-human IgG (Jackson ImmunoResearch Laboratories, West Grove, PA). Bound antibody was revealed by fluorescence microscopy. HI assays.Hemagglutination inhibition (HI) assays were conducted using standard methodologies. In brief, 25 μl of diluted antigen at four agglutination doses in PBS was added to wells of 96-well plates containing a 2-fold dilution series of the test antibody. After 30 min incubation at room temperature, 50 μl of 0.5% (vol/vol) chicken or horse red blood cells was added to each well and the plates were incubated at room temperature for another 30 min. Titers were recorded as the lowest dilution of antibody able to inhibit hemagglutination. MN assays.Microneutralization (MN) assays were conducted using MDCK cells according to standard methodologies. In brief, a 2-fold dilution series of each antibody was incubated with virus at 100 50% tissue culture infective doses (TCID50s)/50 μl for 1 h at 37°C. The antibody-virus solutions were then added to MDCK cells for an additional hour at 37°C and were then washed off, and the cells were incubated at 37°C for 72 h with 200 μl infection medium containing 1 μg/ml tosylsulfonyl phenylalanyl chloromethyl ketone (TPCK) trypsin. Neutralizing titers were read by incubating 50 μl of cell culture medium with 0.5% (vol/vol) chicken or horse red blood cells, followed by incubation at room temperature for another 30 min, and were expressed as the reciprocal of the serum dilution that inhibited 50% of the growth of 100 TCID50s of virus. HMAb generation.Plasma samples were obtained from individuals immunized with a recombinant, baculovirus-expressed HA protein from the A/Hong Kong/156/97 (H5N1) (HK156) virus (23), followed by the inactivated, subvirion vaccine against VN1203 (24). Approval for research involving human subjects was obtained from the Institutional Review Boards of Stanford University and St. Jude Children's Research Hospital. Samples were screened by HI or by IFA using H5N1 (VN1203) HA protein or H5N1-infected MDCK cells, respectively. In this study, a donor with a serum HI titer of 320 was used as the source of peripheral B cells for human hybridoma production, as previously described (25). Three hybridomas, designated BF1-1, BF1-10, and BF1-19, secreting neutralizing H5N1 human monoclonal antibodies (HMAbs) were identified by an HI assay. When they were tested against a panel of Southeast Asian H5N1 isolates, these three hybridomas showed reactivity to the antigenically distinct H5N1 virus HK156 but not to the clade 2.3.4 virus A/Common magpie/Hong Kong/645/06. BF1-32 was identified by IFA. Monoclonality was confirmed by sequencing the IgG genes isolated from 10 individual cell clones derived from each hybridoma cell line. Cloning and analysis of the variable light (VL) domain and the variable heavy (VH) domain of these clones were performed as previously described (26). HMAb production and purification were performed as described previously (25), and biotinylation of the antibodies was carried out according to the manufacturer's instructions (Pierce Biotechnology, Inc., Rockford, IL). The cell lines produced IgG1 antibody with the λ light chain for BF1-1 and κ light chains for BF1-10, BF1-19, and BF1-32 and secreted 10 to 40 μg human IgG per ml in the spent culture supernatant. mMAb generation.Generation of mouse monoclonal antibodies (mMAbs) was achieved via a vaccination regimen consisting of an initial 50% mouse lethal dose (MLD50) of 0.5 of a virus, generated by reverse genetics, bearing the HA and neuraminidase genes of VN1203 and the six internal genes of A/Puerto Rico/8/1934 (H1N1) (rgH5N1) delivered intranasally (i.n.), followed by two booster doses delivered intraperitoneally (i.p.) 4 weeks apart. Booster doses consisted of 10,000 hemagglutination units (HAU) of Mon244 delivered i.p., followed by 1,000 50% egg infectious doses (EID50s) of rgH5N1 delivered intravenously (i.v.). After vaccination, hybridomas were produced by Rockland Immunochemicals and were screened by the HI assay and IFA as described above. Humanization of mMAbs.mMAbs were humanized by first obtaining cDNA of the VH and VL segments from total RNA via 3′ rapid amplification of cDNA ends, followed by cloning into the pCR2.1-Topo vector (Life Technologies), which was then transformed into Escherichia coli, recovered, and sequenced. The VH and VL segments were also combined with human Cg1 and K constant region cDNA segments in the mammalian expression vectors pEE13.4 (light chain [LC]) and pEE6.4 (heavy chain [HC]) (Lonza) and then combined into a single expression vector, and the resulting chimeric HC and LC were then transfected into CHO-S cells (Life Technologies). Conditioned medium from transfected cells was assayed by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) for human IgG production and anti-H5N1 activity. Human germ line genes with the highest homology to the VH and VL segments were identified using the Ig BLAST program, and humanized VH and VL segments were then designed using complementarity-determining region (CDR) grafting; VH1-18/VH1-69 was used for VH segment frameworks and VK-O12 was used for VL segment frameworks for the humanization of 10C3. Humanized VH and VL segments were then synthesized by gene synthesis (GenScript). The resulting fragments were then cloned into the mammalian expression vector pCIneo (Promega) with the appropriate C region, and clones were sequenced. Generation of FcDART.The antigen specificities of BF1-19 and humanized 10C3 (h10C3) were combined into a bispecific Fc fusion protein, termed FcDART. This was achieved by joining the two antibody chains such that each chain of FcDART comprised the VL segment from one antibody and the VH segment of the second antibody and vice versa, with a short linker (GGGSGGG) being placed between the VL and VH segments. One of the two chains was then fused to a human IgG1 hinge-Fc region (Fig. 1A). The two chains were transfected into CHO cells, and a stable pool of producing cells was selected. The material was purified over a protein A column, followed by size exclusion chromatography (Fig. 1B). Structure and characterization of FcDART. (A) The VH and VL segments of monoclonal antibodies h10C3 and BF1-19 (yellow and blue, respectively) were combined into a single bispecific Fc fusion protein, FcDART. Shown in detail are the heterodimerization domains of FcDART, which were appended to the C terminus of each chain to promote heterodimeric assembly. These domains consisted of coiled coil-forming sequences where the hydrophobic core of the coiled coil interface is flanked by opposite charges (an E negative charge on one coil [E-coil] and a K positive charge on the other [K-coil]), which is believed to favor heterodimerization by repelling a homotypic association and preventing the initiation of zippering of the hydrophobic core. An Fc domain was also added to the C terminus of the coil with an E negative charge, causing two DART units to dimerize and form a tetravalent bispecific structure. (B) Characterization of FcDART by denaturing, reducing SDS-PAGE and size exclusion chromatography analysis. LD, load fraction on the protein A column; NB, nonbound fraction on the protein A column; NaCl, high-salt wash; Elu, material that eluted at low pH; N. Pool, material that eluted at low pH and that was neutralized. The size exclusion chromatography profiles of purified material at two concentrations (red, 2 mg/ml; blue, 24.5 mg/ml) show peak elution at about 12 ml. The slight difference in the peak elution volume is within the range of variability of manual loading and does not indicate a significant elution volume difference between the two samples. Affinity measurement.The affinity of binding of each MAb to H5N1 HA was characterized by surface plasmon resonance (SPR) analysis. The experiments described below were carried out using a BIAcore 3000 system (Biacore). Affinity-purified anti-human IgG Fcγ (Jackson ImmunoResearch) was amine coupled (10,000 relative units [RU]) to all four flow cells of a CM5 sensor chip (Biacore). MAb samples at 0.5 to 1 μg/ml in running buffer were injected into flow cells 2 to 4, while flow cell 1 was kept as a reference. Injection of MAb samples led to the capture of roughly 150 RU of MAb in each flow cell. Association kinetics were observed by injecting purified H5N1 HA (Protein Sciences) in running buffer through all four flow cells at a flow rate of 30 μl/min for a duration of 90 s. Disassociation kinetics were then measured with running buffer flowing at a rate of 30 μl/min for a duration of 10 min. Flow cells were regenerated using a 15-μl injection of 100 mM H3PO4. Kinetics were tested at HA concentrations of 800, 400, 200, 100, 50, 25, 12.5, 6.25, 3.125, and 1.56 nM. After each binding cycle, the same protocol was run with running buffer substituted for the analyte to serve as a double reference. Data were analyzed using BIAevaluation software, version 4.1 (Biacore). The data were processed by subtracting the result for the double reference and trimming out the MAb loading and H3PO4 regeneration information. Kinetic values were obtained by applying the 1:1 (Langmuir) binding, simultaneous ka (association rate)/kd (dissociation rate) fit method. Antibody binding profiles.The direct ELISA format (the antigen down format) or the capture ELISA format (the antibody down format) was used to measure antibody binding to HA from different clades of H5N1 influenza viruses. In the antigen down format, HA protein was coated on an ELISA plate at a concentration of 2 μg/ml. HA protein was obtained from eEnzyme and Protein Sciences and was produced in 293T cells and an insect cell line, respectively. HA was uncleaved or cleaved at the furin cleavage site (Δfurin HA). The concentration of antibody indicated in Fig. 3 was then added to the plate, and detection was performed using a horseradish peroxidase (HRP)-conjugated antihuman antibody, followed by chemiluminescence detection (SuperSignal; Pierce). For the assays performed in an MAb down format, an antibody specific for CH1 (MAb 4A11; Abcam) was used to coat an ELISA plate at 2 μg/ml. The concentration of antibody indicated below was then captured. His-tagged antigen (100 ng/ml) was then applied to the plate, followed by application of an HRP-conjugated anti-His antibody and chemiluminescence detection (SuperSignal; Pierce). To detect binding of h10C3, this assay was performed in an antibody down format to maximize sensitivity using antibody captured with polyclonal anti-human IgG, and antigen binding was detected with streptavidin-HRP and developed colorimetrically with 3,3′,5,5′-tetramethylbenzidine (TMB; Sigma). Prevention and therapeutic treatment in animals.All animal studies were conducted under the applicable laws and guidelines of and after approval from the St. Jude Children's Research Hospital Animal Care and Use Committee. Female 6- to 8-week old BALB/c mice were housed in cages with 5 mice per cage. Mice received the amount of antibody indicated below in a total volume of 300 μl sterile PBS by i.p. injection. At various times before and after antibody administration, the mice were lightly anesthetized with isoflurane and inoculated intranasally with 100 MLD50s of VN1203 (1,000 50% EID50s) or 100 MLD50s (5 × 105 EID50s) of Mon244 in 30 μl of PBS. Male 4- to 5-month-old ferrets were housed in cages with three animals per cage and were administered 1 mg/kg of the antibodies indicated below in 1 ml PBS intramuscularly, and on the next day the ferrets were lightly anesthetized with isoflurane and administered 3 × 104 EID50s of VN1203 in 1 ml of PBS i.n. For all animals, weight change and survival were monitored for 14 days following virus challenge. Isolation and characterization of antibody escape mutants.Antibody escape mutants were selected by inoculating 10-day-old specific-pathogen-free (SPF) embryonated chicken eggs with rgH5N1 incubated with neutralizing antibody essentially as described previously (27, 28). Eggs were screened for the presence of virus by hemagglutination assay of allantoic fluid, which was harvested from infected eggs, and viral RNA was extracted and used to generate cDNA by reverse transcription-PCR. The HA gene was then amplified and sequenced. Data analysis and statistics.The data collected were inputted and graphed using GraphPad Prism (version 5.03) software. Statistical analysis was performed using the log-rank (Mantel-Cox) test. Characterization of H5N1 HMAbs.To determine the genetic diversity of the antibodies identified, we sequenced CDRs 1, 2, and 3 of the antibody heavy chains. Sequence analysis of the 11 HI-positive hybridomas showed that they clustered into two different groups. Two HMAbs clustered into group 1, while the others clustered into the second group. One antibody representing group 1 (BF1-10) and two representing group 2 (BF1-1 and BF1-19) were chosen for further analysis. HI assays were performed with spent supernatants from human hybridomas to assess the cross-reactivity of the generated antibodies against a panel of H5N1 viruses isolated in Asia. All antibodies were reactive against VN1203, showing titers of 640 to 2,560 (Table 1). BF1-19 also showed reactivity against the antigenically drifted strain Mon244 (HI titer = 40), while BF1-1 and BF1-10 did not (Table 1). No antibodies showed reactivity against A/Japanese white eye/Hong Kong/1038/06 (HK1038), which is antigenically drifted from VN1203 to a greater degree than Mon244 (Table 1). BF1-19 showed strong reactivity against A/Hong Kong/156/97 (HK156) (HI titer = 1,280), while BF1-1 and BF1-10 showed only weak reactivity (HI titers = 10 and 20, respectively) (Table 1). All antibodies also showed strong neutralization activity in a microneutralization assay against VN1203, with titers of 640 to 10,240; however, no neutralization activity against Mon244 or HK1038 was observed (Table 2). BF1-19 showed strong microneutralization activity against HK156 (titer > 20,480), while BF1-1 and BF1-10 showed only weak activity (titers = 10 and 40, respectively) (Table 2). To determine the nature of the epitopes recognized by each HI-positive HMAb, Western blot analysis was performed using rgH5N1-infected MDCK cell lysates. None of the neutralizing HMAbs showed binding to denatured H5N1 antigens, suggesting that they recognized conformational epitopes. The one HI-negative HMAb that was included in this study, BF1-32, was Western blotting positive and was identified by IFA with VN1203-infected MDCK cells. This antibody appears to target HA1, as the most prominent bands corresponded to HA0 (82 kDa) and HA1 (58 kDa), with a less intense band being found at 78 kDa (Fig. 2). To assess the affinities of each of the HMAbs for the H5 HA protein, surface plasmon resonance studies were conducted using a BIAcore 3000 instrument. The KD values for the binding of HMAbs BF1-1, BF1-10, and BF1-19 to the VN1203 HA were 20.3 nM, 10.8 nM, and 48.2 nM, respectively, showing that each had similar affinities for their antigens. Following these studies, we selected BF1-19 for subsequent experiments. Human monoclonal antibodies bind to conformational epitopes on hemagglutinin. Antibodies were used to probe a blot of lysed Madin-Darby canine kidney cells that were infected with A/Vietnam/03/2004 (H5N1). BF1-1, BF1-10, and BF1-19, which showed reactivity by the HI assay, showed no binding, indicating that they did not recognize linear epitopes of hemagglutinin. BF1-32, which did not show reactivity by the HI assay, recognized linear epitopes on what appeared to be HA1, as the most prominent bands corresponded to HA0 (82 kDa) and HA1 (58 kDa), with a less intense band being found at 78 kDa. We next assessed the breadth of reactivity of BF1-19 to a panel of HAs from diverse H5N1 viruses via ELISA. We used antigens obtained from two commercial sources, eEnzyme and Protein Sciences, to investigate whether the antigen production system had an effect on the ability of the antibodies to bind, as the eEnzyme antigens were produced in 293T cells, while the Protein Sciences antigens were produced in insect cells. Further, we used both wild-type (wt) HA antigens and antigens from which the furin cleavage site was deleted (Δfurin antigens) to determine if cleavage had an impact on the exposure of the epitope recognized by these antibodies. All eEnzyme antigens with the exception of A/Indonesia/5/2005 (H5N1) were engineered to remove the furin cleavage site, resulting in a more homogeneous product (Fig. 3). The Protein Sciences antigens and the eEnzyme A/Indonesia/5/2005 (H5N1) antigen retained the furin cleavage site, resulting in oligomers that consisted of both cleaved and uncleaved antigens. Antigens obtained from Protein Sciences were tested in the antibody down format, where the antibody was bound to the solid phase via a capture antibody and the antigen was the soluble binding partner (Fig. 3). eEnzyme antigens contained a C-terminal His tag, which allowed them to be used as a soluble binding partner or to be immobilized on the solid phase using a His binding partner, and this format was termed the antigen down format (Fig. 3). Antibody binding to a hemagglutinin panel from diverse H5N1 influenza virus clades. Binding was assessed in an antigen down format, where HA was immobilized on a plate (A, C), or in an MAb down format, where the MAb was immobilized on a plate (B, D, E). Binding of the FcDART molecule (F) was measured in an antibody down format, with FcDART being captured with anti-human IgG Fc-specific polyclonal antibody. OD, optical density. BF1-19 bound to clade 1 antigens from both suppliers in the antigen down format (Fig. 3A) and also bound to clade 2.2.1 and 2.3.4 antigens in the antibody down format (Fig. 3B). Some binding to clade 2.1.3.2 antigen was also detected at high concentrations (Fig. 3B). Given the oligomeric structure of the antigens, the ability to detect binding in the antibody down format may be the result of binding more avid than that in the antigen down format. BF1-19 also bound to clade 1 antigens with or without the furin cleavage site (Fig. 3A). While these data are not able to definitively demonstrate a quantitative difference between cleaved and uncleaved HA, they do clearly demonstrate that the recognized epitope is available on oligomers derived from both wt and Δfurin constructs. Generation of mMAbs.We used a three-dose vaccination regimen in mice, consisting of VN1203 delivered i.n. and then i.p., followed by the delivery of Mon244 i.v., to generate antibodies broadly specific to different clades of H5 influenza viruses. One of these antibodies, 10C3, bound to clade 1 and 2.2.1 antigens from both suppliers in the antigen down format and, like BF1-19, bound to both the wt and Δfurin constructs (Fig. 3C). Similar results were also observed in the antibody down format (Fig. 3D). 10C3 was then humanized to reduce potential immunogenicity by grafting the complementarity-determining regions of the antibody onto the framework regions from closely related human VH and VL segment gene sequences. Interestingly, there were indications of h10C3 binding to clade 2.1.3.2 and 2.3.4 antigens, which was not observed for 10C3 (Fig. 3E). While these data are not conclusive, they indicate that the humanization process broadened the coverage of this antibody (Fig. 3D and E). By HI, h10C3 was strongly reactive to VN1203 (HI titer = 2,560) and showed relatively weak reactivity against Mon244 (HI titer = 40) and no reactivity against HK1038. Unlike BF1-19, h10C3 did not show reactivity against HK156 (Table 1). In microneutralization assays, h10C3 showed neutralization activity only against VN1203 (titer = 2,560); no neutralization activity was observed against HK156, Mon244, or HK1038 (Table 2). Design and development of FcDART.The FcDART molecule consisted of two polypeptide chains that heterodimerized to form a bispecific molecule. Each chain contained the VL domain of one specificity and the VH domain of the other, such that heterodimerization of the two chains resulted in the assembly of matching VL and VH domains. In order to favor heterodimeric assembly, a strong heterodimerization domain was appended to the C terminus of each chain. These domains consisted of coiled-coil-forming sequences, where the hydrophobic core of the coiled coil interface was flanked by the opposite charges (an E negative charge on one coil and a K positive charge on the other). The E/K coiled-coil consisted of two peptides, each containing unique, repeating, heptad sequences. In the E coil, this sequence was E-V-S-A-L-E-K, while in the K coil, the sequence was K-V-S-A-L-E-K. These charges are believed to favor heterodimerization by repelling homotypic association and preventing the initiation of zippering of the hydrophobic core (Fig. 1A). These DART molecules were modified further by appending an Fc domain to the C terminus of the coil with the E negative charge, causing two DART units to dimerize and form a tetravalent bispecific structure (Fig. 1A). The addition of the Fc confers a long serum half-life on the molecules and restores the avidity associated with the bivalent parental MAbs. Further, the presence of the Fc confers protein A binding and makes these molecules amenable to platform purification processes routinely used for MAbs in large-scale cyclic GMP production. Following expression in CHO cells and purification, analytical size exclusion chromatography showed that purified material predominantly consisted of one species that eluted at a volume consistent with the predicted molecular mass of FcDART. Only a small amount of higher-order aggregate was present, as indicated by the slight left shoulder on the peak. Increasing the concentration from 2 to 24.5 mg/ml did not cause a significant increase in the amount of aggregated material (Fig. 1B). These characteristics indicate that the molecule was properly assembled, homogeneously purified, and not prone to aggregation. We then tested the FcDART molecule against a panel of antigens in antibody down format and found that, with the exception of clade 2.1.3.2 antigens, the FcDART molecule was able to bind to the antigens in the panel and had a binding profile generally consistent with the binding profiles of BF1-19 and h10C3, indicating that FcDART indeed combined the binding profiles of BF1-19 and h10C3 (Fig. 3F). By HI, FcDART showed reactivity against VN1203 and HK156 (HI titer = 640), relatively weak reactivity against Mon244 (HI titer = 40), and no reactivity against HK1038, findings that are, again, consistent with a binding profile that is a combination of the binding profiles of BF1-19 and h10C3 (Table 1). The neutralization activity of FcDART was also consistent with an antibody with the combined specificities of h10C3 and BF1-19, as strong neutralization activity against both VN1203 (titer = 1,280) and HK156 (titer = 10,240) was observed (Table 2). Interestingly, FcDART also showed neutralization activity against Mon244 (titer = 80), which was not observed with any other antibody tested, suggesting an increased breadth of specificity (Table 2). Escape mutant characterization.To further characterize the epitopes recognized by these antibodies, we inoculated embryonated chicken eggs with rgH5N1 and antibody and sequenced the viruses present after incubation for 48 h. On the basis of the mutations in these viruses, MAbs primarily bound to antigenic sites on the globular head of HA (29). The L128S mutation in antigenic site C and the M265I mutation in antigenic site A were present in mutants that escaped binding to h10C3 (h10C3 escape mutants), the K139E mutation in antigenic site A was present in 10C3 escape mutants, the S140Y/F mutations in antigenic site A were present in BF1-19 escape mutants, the K188N/E mutations in antigenic site B were present in BF1-19 and FcDART escape mutants, and the T213A mutation in antigenic site D was present in FcDART escape mutants (Fig. 4). With the exception of the h10C3 escape mutants, in which the L128S and M265I mutations were present in one mutant, each escape mutant did not harbor more that one of the mutations indicated in Fig. 4. Further, escape mutants harboring the same mutation were seen in all eggs (n = 3) at the dilution of antibody that was permissive to the generation of escape mutants. Monoclonal antibody escape mutant viruses have amino acid changes located primarily in the globular head of hemagglutinin. (A) Amino acid changes shown on a cartoon of the hemagglutinin trimer of A/Vietnam/1203/04 (29). One subunit is highlighted for clarity. (B). Locations of amino acid changes. All mutations map to known antigenic sites (27). H5 numbering is used. We next performed HI assays to determine if binding of the antibodies to these escape mutants was diminished or abrogated. BF1-19 showed little activity against the BF1-19 escape mutants with the K188N and S140F mutations (HI titers < 10; Table 3). 10C3 also showed little activity against the 10C3 escape mutant with the K139E mutation (HI titer < 10; Table 3). h10C3 showed little activity against the h10C3 escape mutant with the L128S/M265I mutations (HI titer < 10; Table 3). BF1-19, 10C3, and h10C3 were all inhibitory to wt virus VN1203 and to escape mutants with mutations that prevented binding to other antibodies (HI titers = 160 to 1,280; Table 3). Therefore, these antibodies bound to different sites on HA, and the mutant viruses could escape the antibodies that were used to select for them, at least in vitro. Two escape mutants with the K188E and T213A mutations, which prevented binding to FcDART, were generated. All antibodies, including FcDART, showed activity against the T213A mutant (HI titers = 160 to 320; Table 3), indicating that this escape mutation is unlikely to be effective in vivo. The K188E mutant, which could not bind to FcDART, contained a mutation at the same location as a BF1-19 escape mutant, the K188N mutant. Binding of FcDART to the K188E mutant was detected but was relatively weak (HI titer = 20; Table 3). BF1-19 showed little activity against the K188E mutant, which is consistent with the little activity that BF1-19 showed against the K188N escape mutant (HI titer < 10; Table 3). Both 10C3 and h10C3 showed activity against the K188E mutant (HI titers = 80; Table 3). Interestingly, FcDART showed greater activity against the BF1-19 escape mutant with the K188N mutations than against the mutant with the K188E mutation, despite the fact that the same residue was altered in both mutants (HI titers = 80 and 20, respectively). FcDART showed relatively strong activity against all other mutants and the wt virus (HI titers = 160 to 1,280; Table 3). In vivo protective efficacy of antibodies against homologous challenge.To assess the potential for the isolated HMAbs to be used as prophylactics or therapeutic agents against H5N1 infection, we employed mouse infection models. To start, the prophylactic efficacy of neutralizing H5N1 MAbs was tested in conjunction with the homologous challenge virus, VN1203. Antibody was injected intraperitoneally at 2.5, 1.0, and 0.1 mg of antibody per kg of body weight 1 day prior to challenge with 103 EID50s of VN1203. A single 2.5-mg/kg dose of BF1-19 provided complete protection from the lethal effects of the virus, and the rate of survival was inversely proportional to the antibody dose. At 0.1 mg/kg, BF1-19 did not protect against challenge (Fig. 5A and B). The rates of survival of mice that received 2.5 and 1.0 mg/kg of BF1-19 were statistically significantly greater than those of mice that received PBS (100% and 80% survival, respectively, compared to 0% in the PBS group; P < 0.01; Fig. 5B). We next assessed the efficacy of h10C3 as a single 2.5-mg/kg prophylactic dose against VN1203 (Fig. 5C and D). h10C3 provided 80% protection against challenge, which was statistically significantly greater than that in mice that received PBS, which demonstrated 100% mortality (P < 0.01; Fig. 5D). FcDART also provided 100% protection against challenge as a prophylactic at a 2.5-mg/kg dose, and this protection was also statistically significantly greater than that in mice that received PBS, which demonstrated 100% mortality (P < 0.01; Fig. 5E and F). Antibodies provide 100% protection against challenge when administered prophylactically. Mice received a single intraperitoneal injection of antibody 24 h prior to challenge with 100 MLD50s of A/Vietnam/1203/04 (H5N1) administered intranasally, which caused 100% mortality in untreated mice within 10 days of infection (B, D, and F). BF1-19 provided 100%, 80%, and 0% protection against challenge when it was delivered at dosages of 2.5, 1, and 0.1 mg/kg, respectively (A and B). h10C3 provided 80% protection against challenge when it was delivered as a single 2.5-mg/kg dose (C and D), while FcDART provided 100% protection against challenge when it was delivered as a single 2.5-mg/kg dose 24 h before challenge (E and F). (A, C, and E) Data represent the mean percentage of the starting weight ± standard error of the mean for each mouse group (n = 5 mice per group). , P < 0.01. We next assessed the treatment efficacy of the antibodies against VN1203 infection at a dose of 2.5 mg/kg. When given at 24 h postchallenge, BF1-19, h10C3, and FcDART all provided 100% protection against challenge, whereas the rate of mortality was 100% in the PBS group; these differences were statistically significant (P < 0.01; Fig. 6). When administered at 2.5 mg/kg at 72 h postinfection, FcDART provided 100% protection against challenge, while BF1-19 and h10C3 provided 80% protection against challenge (Fig. 6). Compared to the 100% mortality observed in the groups treated with PBS, these differences were statistically significant (P < 0.01; Fig. 6). We next assessed the prophylactic efficacy of BF1-19 in ferrets, in which influenza virus infection is widely regarded to be more representative of influenza virus infection in humans than influenza virus infection in mice is. Three ferrets received 1 mg/kg of antibody 1 day prior to infection with 3 × 104 EID50s of VN1203, and 100% protection against challenge was observed. In contrast, 100% mortality was observed in the 2 ferrets that received PBS, which was a statistically significant difference (P < 0.05; Fig. 7). Antibodies provided 100% protection against challenge when administered at 2.5 mg/kg at 24 h postchallenge. Mice received a single intraperitoneal dose of antibody at 2.5 mg/kg 24 or 72 h after challenge with 100 MLD50s of A/Vietnam/1203/04 (H5N1) administered intranasally, which caused 100% mortality in untreated mice within 10 days of infection (B, D, and F). BF1-19 (A and B), h10C3 (C and D), and FcDART (E and F) provided 100% protection against challenge when administered at 24 h postchallenge. BF1-19 and h10C3 provided 80% protection against challenge when administered at 72 h postchallenge (B and D, respectively); however, FcDART provided 100% protection at 72 h postchallenge (F). (A, C, and E) Data represent the mean percentage of the starting weight ± standard error of the mean for each mouse group (n = 5 mice per group). hpi, hours postinfection; , P < 0.01. BF1-19 provides 100% protection against challenge by A/Vietnam/1203/04 (H5N1) in ferrets. BF1-19 was administered to ferrets as a single 1-mg/kg dose intraperitoneally at 24 h postchallenge with 3 × 104 EID50s of A/Vietnam/1203/04 (H5N1), which caused 100% mortality in ferrets injected with PBS but no mortality in ferrets that were injected with BF1-19 (A). Ferrets that were injected with BF1-19 also exhibited less weight loss and lower temperatures than ferrets injected with PBS (B and C, respectively); however, these differences were not significant. Three ferrets were administered BF1-19, and two ferrets were administered PBS. , P < 0.05. In vivo protective efficacy of antibodies against heterologous challenge.HMAbs provided protection against challenge with VN1203. We next determined if BF1-19 could provide protection against Mon244, an antigenically drifted strain of H5N1. Surprisingly, BF1-19 was equally as effective at reducing Mon244-induced mortality in mice as it was at reducing VN1203-induced mortality when given 24 h before or after viral challenge, providing 100% protection against challenge, whereas 100% mortality was observed in the PBS group; these differences were statistically significant (P < 0.01; Fig. 8). When administered at 72 h postinfection, 80% survival was observed, which was also statistically significantly different from the rate of survival for the group that received PBS (P < 0.05; Fig. 8). BF1-19 provides 100% protection against challenge from the antigenically drifted strain A/Whooper swan/Mongolia/244/05 (H5N1). A single 2.5-mg/ml intraperitoneal dose of BF1-19 administered at 24 h pre- or postchallenge provided 100% protection against challenge with 100 MLD50s of A/Whooper swan/Mongolia/244/05 (H5N1). When this dose of antibody was administered at 72 h postchallenge, 80% protection was observed (A and B). (A) Data represent the mean percentage of the starting weight ± standard error of the mean for each mouse group (n = 5 mice per group). , P < 0.05; , P < 0.01. Antibody efficacy against escape mutants in vivo.To determine if mutations that facilitate antibody escape in vitro are also effective in vivo, we used mutants that could escape binding to BF1-19 in a murine challenge model. We inoculated mice with 106 TCID50s of the S140F or K188N (H5 numbering) escape mutant in an rgH5N1 background and then administered 2.5 mg/kg of BF1-19 on the next day. All mice injected with BF1-19 were protected against challenge, while 80% of mice that did not receive antibody died following inoculation with the S140F mutant (P < 0.01; Fig. 9). Therefore, while these mutations allowed neutralization escape in vitro, they were not effective in vivo. BF1-19 provides 100% protection against challenge from A/Vietnam/1203/04 (H5N1) in vitro escape mutants. BF1-19 escape mutants were generated using a virus based on A/Puerto Rico/8/34, generated by reverse genetics, containing the hemagglutinin and neuraminidase genes from A/Vietnam/1203/04 (H5N1). Mice were administered 106 TCID50s of the S145F or K144N escape mutant (in hemagglutinin) intranasally, followed by a single 2.5-mg/ml intraperitoneal dose of BF1-19 administered at 24 h postchallenge. All mice that received BF1-19 survived the challenge, while 80% of mice that did not receive antibody died (A and B). (A) Data represent the mean percentage of the starting weight ± standard error of the mean for each mouse group (n = 5 mice per group). , P < 0.01. Despite a number of promising clinical trial results with adjuvanted H5N1 vaccines, it is likely that a matched vaccine will not be available until at least 6 months after the emergence of a pandemic. During this period a number of other interventions are likely to be employed. These alternatives include stockpiled unmatched vaccine, nonpharmaceutical interventions, and antiviral drugs. Recent modeling studies have suggested that neuraminidase inhibitors, if administered soon after the initial spread of a pandemic, can have an impact on viral spread (30). Although their impact is promising, there are concerns over both classes of currently available antiviral drugs, including the development of resistance and uncertain clinical efficacy. Antibody-based therapeutic agents can be used prophylactically to protect at-risk populations, such as the immunocompromised and patients who do not develop immunity from vaccination. If targeted to conserved regions of HA, antibody-based therapeutic agents could potentially reduce the issue of resistance associated with chemotherapeutic agents; however, this remains to be seen. Antibodies have been developed and applied as therapeutic agents against several viral infections, including respiratory syncytial virus, hepatitis B virus, and vaccinia virus infections (reviewed in reference 31–33). Studies in animal models of influenza virus infection have demonstrated the potential for monoclonal antibodies as therapeutic agents and prophylactics (9–19). A phase I study (clinical trial number NCT01390025; http://clinicaltrials.gov/) assessing the efficacy of an anti-M2 antibody is also in progress, and a subvirion H5N1 vaccine is being used in a phase II study (clinical trial number NCT00383071; http://clinicaltrials.gov/) to generate antibody-based therapeutic agents. The results of these studies have not yet been published. Perhaps the biggest theoretical issue facing a monoclonal antibody approach for treating influenza virus infection is antigenic drift. Unless well-conserved epitopes can be targeted, a cocktail approach is needed. Another strategy is the use of monoclonal antibodies specific for epitopes on the stem region of HA, which contains epitopes that are more conserved than those on the globular head (reviewed in reference 34). These antibodies can bind to the HAs of numerous influenza virus subtypes and neutralize them; however, they are not neutralizing in the classical sense, as they do not prevent cell binding of the viruses (14, 21, 22, 35). Rather, their action prevents the fusion of viral and cellular membranes, which is mediated by a conformational change in HA (17, 36). As such, the activity of these antibodies cannot be quantified by the standard hemagglutination inhibition assay. Therefore, assays that measure other inhibitory activities, such as cell-cell fusion assays and live-cell fluorescence microscopy, are required (36). As they do not prevent virus-cell interactions, antibodies directed against the HA stem are potentially not as potent as antibodies directed against the globular head. The strategy that we present here combines the specificities of two antibodies into a single molecule, which is advantageous, as a single therapeutic simplifies production and quality control and therefore reduces production costs. One caveat of this approach is that the protective dose of different FcDART molecules would not necessarily be equivalent. Therefore, individual testing of FcDART molecules is likely to be necessary to determine the optimal protective doses required. FcDART not only combined the specificities and efficacies of the monoclonal antibodies on which it was based, but also it showed a greater breadth of activity. Therefore, a therapy consisting of FcDART alone is likely to be equally as efficacious as a cocktail containing both monoclonal antibodies and may be more broadly efficacious against more antigenically diverse H5N1 viruses. The antibodies described here bind to conformational epitopes in antigenic sites located on the globular head of HA, as shown by escape mutant sequencing (Fig. 4). While the binding sites identified lie in antigenic sites of the HA and thus are subject to antigenic drift, we also show that escape mutants generated in vitro cannot produce a lethal infection in the presence of the same antibody in vivo. We demonstrated this by infecting mice with S140F and K188N (H5 numbering) escape mutants for binding to BF1-19 and then treating them with a protective dose of BF1-19. Our in vitro studies identified two amino acid changes, at positions 140 and 188 (H5 numbering), that facilitated escape from binding to BF1-19 (Fig. 4). Therefore, while a mutation at one of these sites may be sufficient for in vitro escape, multiple mutations may be required for escape in vivo. This may be a factor contributing to the activity of these antibodies against antigenically drifted H5N1 strains. We observed two mutants that escaped binding to FcDART, the K188E and T213A mutants (Fig. 4). Residue 188 was also mutated in a BF1-19 escape mutant, but a mutated residue 213 was not observed in any other escape mutants, which was unexpected. However, FcDART bound strongly to the T213A mutant (HI titer = 320), as did the other antibodies (HI titers = 160 to 320) (Table 3), suggesting that this mutation is unlikely to allow effective escape in vivo. FcDART binding to the K188E mutant was not as strong (HI titer = 20), and BF1-19 also did not bind to the K188E mutant, as determined by the HI assay. This suggests that this mutant escaped binding by the BF1-19 arm of FcDART, and, possibly, the h10C3 arm was still able to bind to the escape mutant. However, further work is required to test this hypothesis. To enhance the probability of generating cross-reactive HMAbs, we chose to use serum from a donor that had been vaccinated with vaccines derived from genetically and antigenically distinct H5N1 isolates, HK156 (23) and VN1203. Interestingly, vaccination with the VN1203 vaccine was able to boost the response to the HK156 vaccine (as determined by an enhanced response to the VN1203 vaccine in those that had received the HK156 vaccine compared with the response in those that had not), despite a period of 7 years between these vaccinations. Nevertheless, despite a good response to a number of H5N1 variants, serum from this individual was not able to react with the clade 2.3.4 virus A/Common magpie/Hong Kong/645/06 in the HI assay. The difficulty with fully extrapolating this result is that, similar to the work of Simmons et al. in 2007, we were able to show a substantial in vivo effect of an HMAb in the absence of supporting in vitro activity (13). This was particularly evident in our experiments with BF1-19 and the S140F escape mutant (H5 numbering), as the antibody showed no inhibitory activity by HI assay but could prevent mortality caused by the mutant in vivo. While we did not investigate the mechanism(s) behind this discrepancy in this study, it has been shown that components of the complement cascade, such as C1q, can enhance the in vivo activity of an antibody that is poorly reactive in vitro (37, 38). Interestingly, we found that humanization of 10C3 increased the breadth of binding of this antibody, allowing it to bind to HA from clades 2.1.3.2 and 2.3.4. We did not investigate the possible mechanisms of this increase in specificity, but humanization has previously been shown to alter antibody binding specificity, possibly due to alterations in flexibility (39). This may have been a factor in the increased breadth of binding of h10C3 observed. 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0.999875	Large ornate timber Honour Board, dedicated to the men of the 42nd Battalion who served during the First World War. The board displays two enamelled Unit badges and the Rising Sun badge of the Australian Forces. Beneath exists three panels containing names of the 42nd Bn. men and these are divided by eight column facades. The Shrine of Memories is utilised for ANZAC Day. The 42nd Battalion was raised at Enoggera, on the outskirts of Brisbane, in December 1915 and became part of the 11th Brigade of the 3rd Australian Division. Due to sharing its numeric title with the famous Scottish regiment the Black Watch, the battalion became known as the "Australian Black Watch". This association was recognised with a bagpipe band. After training in Australia and Britain, the 42nd deployed to France on 26 November 1916 and entered the frontline for the first time on 23 December. The winter of 1916-17 was horrendous, and the 42nd spent much of it in the front line, the remainder being spent alternating between training and labouring in the rear areas. Messines 1917, Ypres 1917, Polygon Wood, Broodseinde, Poelcappelle, Passchendaele, Somme 1918, Hame\|Amiens, Albert 1918, Mont St Quentin, Hindenburg Line, St Quentin Cana\|France and Flanders 1916-1918. On 4 July 1918, the 42nd took part in the battle of Hamel and captured all of its objectives with only three fatal casualties - demonstrating what a well-planned and supported attack could achieve. The Allies launched their own offensive on 8 August 1918, and the 42nd played an active role both in the initial attack and the long advance that followed. This advance, though, sapped the strength of the AIF. On 20 September 1918 the 42nd was ordered to disband to provide reinforcements for other battalions. Its men mutinied winning the Battalion a temporary reprieve. It fought its last battle - St Quentin Canal - between 29 September and 2 October. On 2 October the order to disband was once again issued. The men still disobeyed, but pressure from the AIF hierarchy eventually forced compliance. The 42nd Battalion was disbanded on 22 October 1918.
0.999998	Basmati rice is a type of rice grown in the Himalayas and Pakistan. It is a long grain rice that is characterized by a light nutty flavor. What is Basmati Rice? Basmati rice is a rice popular not only for its flavor, but for its fragrance. It is remarkably long for a rice, and becomes longer still when cooked. It can be either brown or white with the brown variety having more flavor. When cooked, the rice is lighter and more fluffy than standard white rice, and does not stick together.
0.999989	What do roofing companies in Carson, CA do? Your Carson, CA roofing contractor can install a new roof or repair an old one, as well as repair and replace gutters. Good roofers in Carson, CA should be able to promptly inspect roofs and gutters to assess damage after a natural disaster or other event, and give you an estimate for the necessary roof repair immediately. Some Carson roofing companies specialize in specific types of roofs, such as tile or metal, so make sure the one you are interested in works with the materials you have or desire. Find a Carson roofer on Houzz. Narrow your search in the Professionals section of the website to roofing companies in Carson, CA. If you’re planning a large-scale project, find other professionals on Houzz who can help get the job done. Here are some related professionals and vendors to complement the work of roofing & gutters: General Contractors, Specialty Contractors, Siding & Exteriors, Door Sales & Installation, Garage Door Sales & Installation.
0.949719	What does it mean for me, an American woman of Western European ancestry, to be studying taekwondo? Though the accounts I've read of taekwondo's origins and development vary considerably, there's no question that the art has deep roots in Korean tradition. That's a problem. If I were a traditional Korean woman, I wouldn't be studying taekwondo. If I were a traditional Korean woman, I wouldn't even have a name. By tradition, married women are nameless until they have one or more sons; then they're called "mother of so-and-so". My three daughters wouldn't count. Am I insulting taekwondo by studying it? I'm the wrong gender, the wrong religion, the wrong nationality (I guess it could be worse; I could be Japanese). I've long disliked Westerners who appropriate bits and pieces of other cultures, and especially religions, without understanding their context. I wince when I see people "signing" songs without the least understanding of ASL grammar, practicing "feng shui" without being able to pronounce it, or talking about "Native Americans" as if everyone from the Bering Strait to Tierra del Fuego shared a language and culture up till 1492. Am I doing the equivalent? Certainly my grasp of Korean history, language and culture (not to mention taekwondo technique!) is extremely tenuous. I don't even (currently) know any Koreans, though I used to work for one (as a waitress; that's how I was introduced to kimchi--which I hate). So here I am studying a martial art that, like all martial arts, was designed by and for men. I'm working on a form named for a man whose father was a god and whose mother was a woman who used to be a bear. I haven't yet learned the correct pronunciations of the few Korean terms I know, and I couldn't find Seoul on a map if my life depended on it. As a former theology student (talk about an art designed by and for men!) I should be used to the implied insult I pose to my chosen field of study. Consult Augustine of Hippo, Thomas Aquinas or Henry VIII on the subject of the equality of women. (Henry at least got his comeuppance in his daughters.) But the Episcopal Church was a product of the same culture that produced me, and taekwondo isn't. Therefore I wonder to what extent I have a right to mess with it. How do Korean women handle this problem? If I understand correctly, Korea fielded a women's Olympic taekwondo team. Did their moms all call themselves "so-and-so's mother"? If so--pretty rapid cultural change there. The boat must still be rocking pretty hard. I guess the question boils down to this: does a martial art or any other cultural construct have value completely outside its cultural context? And how much does respect for the art depend on respect for that context?
0.999831	Erotica story about the bonds of humans and Pokemons recreating an alternate universe following the guidelines of the first manga & Red/Blue/Green storyline. A Pokemon fanfic. The proper summary is the first "chapter" Ash: Who Will it Be? Come up with a suggestion plot for a quick amourshipping moment with someone of your choice. Following from Mewtwo's Origin, After Mewtwo Strikes Back and Mewtwo Returns, Showing how Mewtwo reunited with his childhood human friend, Amber, who is even older than when they met. When Riley meets her new Pokemon, she runs into a legend that changes her life, and the way people interact with Pokémon, forever. Ash doesn't want Misty to see his baby pictures, but his parents show her anyway. He figured out their mission in life was to embarrass him.
0.999995	advice for parents: How do I tell my friend that I think her child might need to see a therapist? How do I tell my friend that I think her child might need to see a therapist? Q: I babysit for a girl that shows no remorse or empathy for anything she does. Minutes after she gets in trouble, she acts like nothing happened and goes back to playing. How do I tell her mom that she may need to seek counseling without her taking offense to it? A: Good for you for wanting to be proactive and advocate for this little girl's health and well-being! Those might give you some idea about what's behind the apparent lack of remorse, as well as some ways you can interact with her that can support the development of empathy. First, let her know you'd like to talk with her for a few minutes about something important at a time when you won't be interrupted or overheard. Ask her to let you know when a good time would be. That puts her on notice so she doesn't feel blindsided, and allows her to prepare herself mentally and choose a time when she is in a relatively receptive mood. When she initiates the conversation, take a few breaths to make sure you are calm and collected. Remind yourself silently of the purpose of this conversation -- to get your concern on her mother's radar without judging her or her daughter. Begin by mentioning something positive about her daughter: I enjoy taking care of Betty so much - I love those sweet little tea parties she sets up with all her stuffed animals, and how she generously makes sure their tiny tea cups are always full. Then, mention your concern about not wanting to meddle or intrude: I hate to even bring this up because it might be something you are already aware of and I don't want to sound like I am meddling. Then, mention your concern about the child. Keep your words brief, like this: I am a bit concerned that Betty doesn't seem to react with remorse when she hurts another child or gets in trouble. Maybe it's just a phase, but I wonder if it might be worth getting the opinion of a professional in case she needs some extra support to help her develop more empathy. If there's something I can be doing differently when I am taking care of her, I would like to know so I can help her be her very best self. Then be sure to end with: What do you think? to give her the opportunity to share her reaction to what you've said, or voice her own concerns. And after her mother speaks, acknowledge her perspective: So you have noticed the same thing and have been wondering what to do about it. Or, So you have not noticed this. Or, So you think it's pretty normal and she will grow out of it. Finally, see if you can leave the door open for a future conversation: Ok, thanks for listening. Would it be okay for us to check in about this again in a couple weeks after we've both had a chance to observe the situation for a little while? In the meantime, if there's anything you'd like me to do differently when I am taking care of her, please let me know. This gives her mother time and space to allow the information to sink in, and she will most likely be watching her daughter's reaction a little more closely to see if there's a problem. Allowing people to draw their own conclusions in their own time and way is a very effective way to reduce the likelihood of a defensive reaction that could threaten your working relationship. I hope this helps -- please feel free to share your thoughts and let us know how it goes if you decide to give it a try.
0.992408	Why? Because today in 1861, the inventor of basketball, Dr. James Naismith was born. According to ESPN, Dr. James Naismith was a Canadian-born educator and coach who invented the game of basketball in 1891 while teaching physical education at the YMCA Training School in Springfield, Mass. Working at a YMCA Training School under director Luther Gulick, Naismith was asked to create an indoor activity that didn't involve much physical contact and could be played during the winter by the school's students. Using a soccer ball and two peach baskets fastened to the railings of the gallery surrounding a gym -- and incorporating strategies and objectives involved in a childhood game he played called "Duck on a Rock" -- Naismith devised thirteen rules for a new game he termed "Basket Ball." Introduced the week before Christmas in 1891, the game soon caught on at the Training School. By the following year, the sport was being introduced successfully at other YMCA sites, while an article in the association's "Triangle" magazine (titled "A New Game") helped spread the news of its growing popularity. By 1894, Naismith joined with Gulick to publish the refined set of rules for the new game through the "American Sports Publishing Company" as basketball was becoming accepted as a legitimate sport. Peach baskets as goals had been replaced by iron rims with hammock-styled netting by that time, as specific balls for the sport were being developed and the YMCA had begun introducing basketball internationally. Naismith did not finish high school until the age of 21, but went on to earn college degrees in three different fields. He served as the first basketball coach at the University of Kansas, and was an inaugural inductee into the Basketball Hall of Fame, which is named in his honor.
0.999819	For the women's tournament taking place at the same time, see 2009 ICC Women's World Twenty20. The 2009 ICC World Twenty20 was an international Twenty20 cricket tournament which took place in England in June 2009. It was the second ICC World Twenty20 tournament, following the inaugural event in South Africa in September 2007. As before, the tournament featured 12 all-male teams – nine of the ten Test-playing nations and three associate nations, which earned their places through a qualification tournament. Matches were played at three English grounds – Lord's and The Oval in London, and Trent Bridge in Nottingham. The tournament was organised in parallel with the women's tournament, with the men's semi-finals and final being preceded by the semi-finals and final from the women's event. The final took place at Lord's on Sunday 21 June with Pakistan beating Sri Lanka by eight wickets and England beating New Zealand by six wickets in the women's final. In June 2006, The Daily Telegraph reported that the Marylebone Cricket Club and Surrey CCC had put in a joint bid to host the tournament at Lord's and The Oval. In December 2007, the ICC provisionally approved a Women's World Twenty20 to run alongside the men's event which, subject to the approval of the ICC's finance and commercial affairs committee, would come into effect for the 2009 tournament in England. In early January 2008, speculation arose that the tournament could be held elsewhere as the British government have banned Zimbabwe from touring England in 2009. However, it was later confirmed that the tournament would definitely take place in the country. In April 2008, the third venue was confirmed as Nottingham's Trent Bridge; the 17,500 seater stadium was chosen to hold one of the semi-finals, among other earlier matches. Lord's and The Oval are the two other confirmed venues, with the opening match and final being played at Lord's. Old Trafford Cricket Ground had bid for the third venue, but Trent Bridge was chosen for its closer proximity to the two London grounds. Although early reports suggested the 2009 event may involve just eight teams in a nine-day event, the full twelve-team tournament was confirmed, featuring the Test-playing nations and two qualifying associate nations. However, in July 2008 Zimbabwe, under pressure from South Africa and England over political matters related to Robert Mugabe, pulled out of the tournament of their own volition, creating an additional space for an associate nation. Qualification was achieved by the finalists of an ICC World Twenty20 Qualifier held in Belfast from 2–4 August 2008, between Kenya, Scotland, Ireland, Netherlands, Canada and Bermuda. Ireland and the Netherlands, having reached the final, qualified outright, while Scotland won the third place playoff beating Kenya to also qualify. In case of a tie (i.e. both teams score exactly the same number of runs at the end of their respective innings), a super-over decides the winner. This is applicable in all stages of the tournament. If still equal, result of head to head meeting. The groups were announced on 31 October 2007, based on finishing positions at the 2007 ICC World Twenty20 and the successful qualifying associate nations. The initial four group format is the same as that used at the 2007 tournament. Team seed in brackets. All times shown are in British Summer Time (UTC+01). Bangladesh won the toss and chose to bat. Chairman's XI won the toss and chose to field. New Zealand won the toss and chose to field. Ireland won the toss and chose to bat. Scotland won the toss and chose to field. Netherlands won the toss and chose to field. PCA Masters XI won the toss and chose to field. Bangladesh won the toss and chose to field. New Zealand won the toss and chose to bat. Scotland won the toss and chose to bat. Australia won the toss and chose to bat. Netherlands won the toss and chose to bat. India won the toss and chose to field. South Africa won the toss and chose to bat. South Africa won the toss and chose to field. West Indies won the toss and chose to bat. Pakistan won the toss and chose to bat. Ireland won the toss and elected to field. Bangladesh were eliminated, India and Ireland qualified for the Super 8s as a result. Rain prior to the match delayed the start and shortened the game to 18 overs a side. Netherlands won the toss and elected to field. England go through to the Super 8 stage as a result of this match. Mohammad Amir (Pak) made his T20I debut. Netherlands were eliminated, Pakistan go through to the Super 8 stage as a result of this match. Australia won the toss and elected to bat. Sri Lanka won the toss and elected to field. Australia were eliminated, Sri Lanka and the West Indies advance to the Super 8s as a result. New Zealand won the toss and elected to field. Match reduced to 7 overs per side. Scotland won the toss and elected to field. Scotland were eliminated, South Africa and New Zealand go through to the Super 8 stage as a result. The Super 8s consisted of two groups: Group E and Group F. Group E consisted of A1, B2, C1, D2 and Group F consisted of A2, B1, C2, D1, where X1 is the first seed from Group X and X2 is the second seed from Group X. The seedings were based on performance in the last ICC T20 (2007). If a non-seeded team knocks out a seeded team, the non-seeded team inherits the seed of the team it knocked out. West Indies won the toss and elected to field. South Africa qualified for the semi-finals and India were eliminated as a result of this match. Rain revised the West Indies' target to 80 runs from 9 overs according to the Duckworth–Lewis method. West Indies qualified for the semi-finals and England were eliminated as a result of this match. Umar Gul became the first bowler to take five wickets in a Twenty20 international. Shahzaib Hasan (Pak) made his T20I debut. Ireland were eliminated as a result of this match. Pakistan qualified for the semi-finals as a result of this match. Sri Lanka qualified for the semi-finals and New Zealand were eliminated as a result of this match. Dilshan scored 60.76% of Sri Lanka's runs, which was a new Twenty20 International record. However, this only stood for a matter of hours, as Chris Gayle scored 62.38% of West Indies' total. Lasith Malinga bowling from the Nursery End in the Final at Lord's. In the final at Lord's, the home of cricket in London, Sri Lanka won the toss and elected to bat. The first over was bowled by Mohammad Amir. After failing to score off the first four balls – all short – Dilshan went for his scoop and mistimed it, resulting in him being caught at short fine-leg. Soon after this, Jehan Mubarak top edged a delivery by Abdul Razzaq which went high in the air and was caught by Shahzaib Hasan, leaving Sri Lanka at 2 for 2. Sanath Jayasuriya was able to stabilise the innings for Sri Lanka hitting 17 runs off 10 balls, however, Jayasuriya soon fell as he dragged a good length ball back on to the stumps. Mahela Jayawardene followed after edging a shot into the hands of Misbah-ul-Haq, leaving Sri Lanka on 32/4. Sangakkara and Chamara Silva added further runs, before the latter was caught by Saeed Ajmal playing a pull shot off the bowling of Umar Gul. Shahid Afridi soon after, took the wicket of Isuru Udana with a googly which drifted into the right-hander, knocking the off-stump. This brought in Angelo Mathews, who along with Sangakkara took the score from 70/6 to 138/6, with 17 runs being scored off the last over bowled by Mohammad Amir. Sri Lanka finished on 138/6 from 20 overs. Pakistan started off well with openers Kamran Akmal and Shahzaib Hasan adding 48 run for the 1st wicket, before Kamran Akmal was stumped by Kumar Sangakkara by the first delivery of Sanath Jayasuriya. Pakistan reached the target in 18.4 overs, with Shahid Afridi, who hit the winning runs, earning Man of the Match while Tillakaratne Dilshan was declared Man of the Series for his 317 runs at an average of 63.40. Pakistan's win, often cheered on by crowds of fans from England's Pakistani communities, marked its first world title since Imran Khan's "cornered tigers" had won the 1992 World Cup. ^ "T20 World Cup 2009". cricketwa. Archived from the original on 23 December 2015. Retrieved 22 December 2015. ^ "ICC events". cricinfo.com. Retrieved 25 August 2016. ^ "Pakistan power to Twenty20 glory". BBC Sport. 21 June 2009. Archived from the original on 22 June 2009. Retrieved 22 June 2009. ^ Atherton, Mike (21 June 2009). "Katherine Brunt leads England to World Twenty20 title". The Times. Times Newspapers. Retrieved 21 June 2009. ^ a b "Pakistan crowned new world Twenty20 champion, crushes Sri Lanka by 8 wickets". International Business Times. 21 June 2009. Archived from the original on 24 June 2009. Retrieved 24 June 2009. ^ "FINAL: PAK vs SL: Blow by Blow". ESPN Star. 21 June 2009. Archived from the original on 25 June 2009. Retrieved 24 June 2009. ^ "Pakistan v Sri Lanka". Teletext. 21 June 2009. Retrieved 24 June 2009. ^ "ICC World T20 Final: Sri Lanka vs Pakistan". ESPN Star. 21 June 2009. Archived from the original on 25 June 2009. Retrieved 24 June 2009. ^ "Shahid Afridi". ESPN Star. 21 June 2009. Archived from the original on 29 June 2009. Retrieved 24 June 2009. Miller, Andrew (4 June 2009). "Bringing the monster back home". CricInfo. ESPN. Archived from the original on 7 June 2009. Retrieved 18 June 2009.
0.984061	In his annual letter, Bill Gates says he's increasingly troubled by the lack of investment into new research in agriculture. The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation has devoted $2 billion to help poor farmers boost their productivity. But the annual letter is a public way to set the priorities for the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the world's largest charitable foundation with a $36 billion endowment. Most of the $25 billion the foundation has given away so far has been devoted to public health, with $6 billion focused on vaccines, including the polio effort. According to an onlinie Forbes article, America's richest man says that it is a terrible irony that most of the billion people, 15% of the world population, who live in extreme poverty and must worry about where they will get their next meal are suffering on farms. He says that the world needs to repeat the "Green Revolution" of the 1960s and 1970s, when new farming technologies, including new seed varieties of rice, wheat, and corn, increased the amount of food available and decreased its price. "The world faces a clear choice," he writes. "If we invest relatively modest amounts, many more poor farmers will be able to feed their families. If we don't, one in seven people will continue living needlessly on the edge of starvation." That's staggering considering that only $3 billion is spent on agricultural research on the seven most important crops, Gates says, including $1.5 billion from countries, $1.2 billion from private companies such as Monsanto and Syngenta, and $300 million by an agency called the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research. "Gates would do better to fund no-till farming," said one reader responding to the article. "The world's topsoil is eroding away at a fast clip. No-till would make it possible to grow crops without plowing, leaving the dead plant roots to hold the soil together."
0.999991	The previous pages cite the more relevant political and social milestones, which, I believe were directly responsible for the evolution of the hippy culture. The extreme right wing had threatened to kill him, but no one took these threats seriously. However, studies have shown that lower-income couples are currently more likely to get a divorce than higher-income couples. In September,a black man was shot dead in Alabama, four blacks were killed when a church in Birmingham, Alabama, was bombed, Medger Evers of the Advancement of Colored People was murdered, and six black children were killed when a house was burnt down. The lies will be bolder and he may manipulate with more intensity. In making an award of alimony that is fair and equitable, the Court will consider all the relevant factors necessary, including, but not limited to: When the source has more than one date, it is sufficient to use the date that is most relevant to your use of it. Stone wished to keep the subject separate, to prevent the appearance of moral laxity. The Chinese decided that the Russians were betraying Communism and set off on what they hoped would be the world revolution against capitalism. The protests were not getting any sympathy or support, and greater numbers of hippies left the protests and adopted a "peace and love" side of things. A positive effect is that one may not be committed to a spouse and may use more time doing things that better their quality of life. King had become a hero without a strategy, but a hero he undeniably was at a moment when the larger movement craved heroes and disowned them with equal passion. Mississippi, South Dakota and Tennessee are the only states that require mutual consent for no-fault divorce. Research "Myths and Facts" pages These pages, and the pages on custody evaluation and the joint custody, contain literally thousands of research citations. The alimony may be awarded if the property awarded to a spouse is insufficient to allow that spouse suitable support and maintenance. The container may also be a website, which contains articles, postings, and other works. Divorce was granted only because one party to the marriage had violated a sacred vow to the "innocent spouse. The other reason is the role change in the community. If you have not yet begun the process of divorce protect yourself by careful planning. Each element should be followed by the punctuation mark shown here. In the Vietcong area, the Communists had taken land from the few rich landowners and given it to the many poor peasants. The hippie movement was new in the early 60's, the men only beginning to grow their hair long and some of them still wearing suits, the women as yet uncertain about fitting in. It is also advisable to get feedback from neutral individuals so that other ideas can be added and the hidden errors can be rectified. Just a week before his death, his hopes for a non violence march in Memphis, in support of striking garbage workers, had been dashed by the window-smashing of a few dozen black teenagers. The International Online-Only Journal, vol.This paper documents the sources of data used in the construction of the estimates of the Levy Institute Measure of Economic Wellbeing (LIMEW) for the years,,,and The meaning of work literature is the product of a long tradition of rich inquiry spanning many disciplines. Yet, the field lacks overarching structures that would facilitate greater integration, consistency, and understanding of this body of research. A paper template sample can be many and varied. You will get such templates for research papers or newspapers or graph papers or legal papers such as separation or divorce. Q2 Best of blockchain papers. I’ve published a few summaries of the best of blockchain research earlier this year (February and March).There’s been a load more since, but Brave New Coin has curated a nice summary of all those that came out in the last agronumericus.com they publish my content sometimes, here is their list (click on the titles to see the reports). The status of women in the Victorian era was often seen as an illustration of the striking discrepancy between the United Kingdom's national power and wealth and what many, then and now, consider its appalling social conditions. During the era symbolized by the reign of British monarch Queen Victoria, women did not have the right to vote, sue, or own property. Like marriage, divorce in the United States is under the jurisdiction of state governments, not the federal government. Divorce or "dissolution of marriage" is a legal process in which a judge or other authority dissolves the bonds of matrimony existing between two persons, thus restoring them to the status of being single and permitting them to marry other individuals.
0.997352	In this blog, I’d like to talk about the differences between Apache Spark and MapReduce, why it’s easier to develop on Spark, and the top five use cases. Spark is another execution framework. Like MapReduce, it works with the filesystem to distribute your data across the cluster, and process that data in parallel. Like MapReduce, it also takes a set of instructions from an application written by a developer. MapReduce was generally coded from Java; Spark supports not only Java, but also Python and Scala, which is a newer language that contains some attractive properties for manipulating data. What are the key differences between Spark and MapReduce? Spark tries to keep things in memory, whereas MapReduce keeps shuffling things in and out of disk. MapReduce inserts barriers, and it takes a long time to write things to disk and read them back. Hence MapReduce can be slow and laborious. The elimination of this restriction makes Spark orders of magnitude faster. For things like SQL engines such as Hive, a chain of MapReduce operations is usually needed, and this requires a lot of I/O activity. On to disk, off of disk—on to disk, off of disk. When similar operations are run on Spark, Spark can keep things in memory without I/O, so you can keep operating on the same data quickly. This results in dramatic improvements in performance, and that means Spark definitely moves us into at least the interactive category. For the record, there are some benefits to MapReduce doing all that recording to disk — as recording everything to disk allows for the possibility of restarting after failure. If you’re running a multi-hour job, you don’t want to begin again from scratch. For applications on Spark that run in the seconds or minutes, restart is obviously less of an issue. It’s easier to develop for Spark. Spark is much more powerful and expressive in terms of how you give it instructions to crunch data. Spark has a Map and a Reduce function like MapReduce, but it adds others like Filter, Join and Group-by, so it’s easier to develop for Spark. In fact, Spark provides for lots of instructions that are a higher level of abstraction than what MapReduce provided. You can think more about how you want the data processed, rather than about how to cajole MapReduce into doing what you want. This might not seem that important, until you look at this: MapReduce-Wordcount. This is the code to calculate a count of words in a text file, done in MapReduce (not Spark). It’s over 100 lines of code, and fairly unintuitive. The equivalent in Spark is found on this page: Spark Examples (look for the Word Count example). It’s four lines versus over 100. If you’re trying to do risk calculations on Wall Street, which one are you going to choose? Same thing goes for someone writing a new analytics application or a new query engine. It’s a no-brainer. Related to this theme of ease of development, Spark is more intelligent about how it operates on data. Spark supports lazy evaluation. Normally we don’t like anything to be lazy, but in this case, lazy evaluation means that if you tell Spark to operate on a set of data, it listens to what you ask it to do, writes down some shorthand for it so it doesn’t forget, and then does absolutely nothing. It will continue to do nothing, until you ask it for the final answer. Why is this great? Because often work magically goes away. This is a bit like when you were in high school, and your mom came in to ask you to do a chore (“fetch me some milk for tonight’s dinner”). Your response: say that you were going to do it, then keep right on doing what you were already doing. Sometimes your mom would come back in and say she didn’t need the chore done after all (“I substituted water instead”). Magic, work saved! Sometimes the laziest finish first. Spark is the same. It waits until you’re done giving it operators, and only when you ask it to give you the final answer does it evaluate, and it always looks to limit how much work it has to do. Suppose you first ask Spark to filter a petabyte of data for something—say, find you all the point of sale records for the Chicago store—then next you ask for it to give you just the first result that comes back. This is a really common thing to do. Sometimes a data analyst just wants to see a typical record for the Chicago store. If Spark were to run things explicitly as you gave it instructions, it would load the entire file, then filter for all the Chicago records, then once it had all those, pick out just the first line for you. That’s a huge waste of time and resources. Spark will instead wait to see the full list of instructions, and understand the entire chain as a whole. If you only wanted the first line that matches the filter, then Spark will just find the first Chicago POS record, then it will emit that as the answer, and stop. It’s much easier than first filtering everything, then picking out only the first line. Now, you could write your MapReduce jobs more intelligently to similarly avoid over-using resource, but it’s much more difficult to do that. Spark makes this happen automatically for you. Normally, software like Hive goes into contortions to avoid running too many MapReduce jobs, and programmers write very complex and hard-to-read code to force as much as possible into each Map and Reduce job. This makes development hard, and makes the code hard to maintain over time. By using Spark instead, you can write code that describes how you want to process data, not how you want the execution to run, and then Spark “does the right thing” on your behalf to run it as efficiently as possible. This is the same thing a good high-level programming language does: it raises the abstraction layer, letting the developer talk more powerfully and expressively, and does the work behind the scenes to ensure it runs as fast as possible. Spark also adds libraries for doing things like machine learning, streaming, graph programming and SQL (see image below). This also makes things much easier for developers. These libraries are integrated, so improvements in Spark over time provide benefits to the additional packages as well. Most data analysts would otherwise have to resort to using lots of other unrelated packages to get their work done, which makes things complex. Spark’s libraries are designed to all work together, on the same piece of data, which is more integrated and easier to use. Spark streaming in particular provides a way to do real-time stream processing. The aforementioned Apache Storm project was designed to do this kind of work, but Spark is much easier to develop for than Storm. Spark will enable developers to do real-time analysis of everything from trading data to web clicks, in an easy to develop environment, which tremendous speed. So to summarize, Spark is promising to speed up application development by 10-100x, make applications more portable and extensible, and make the actual application run 100x faster. This should make it clear why people are excited. How does someone develop an application for Spark? Spark is a set of libraries. You can program to those libraries from three programming languages today: Java, Python, and a newer language called Scala. There aren’t a lot of Scala developers today, while there are millions of Java and Python developers. But Scala is better designed to work with Spark, and it offers the greatest reduction in the number of lines of code to stand up an application. Many complex applications that were hundreds of lines can be re-written in Scala in less than a hundred lines. The design methodology of Scala is more congruent with that of Spark than any other language. Scala also compiles down to the same bytecode that a Java Virtual Machine (JVM) executes, so any existing code you’ve got in Java can be used by Scala. This is one of Scala’s biggest wins: it gives you the best of both worlds. Scala offers first-class support for integrating Java; in fact, much of Scala is actually directly reliant on Java. All the Java code you’ve already got working can be repurposed. And the really important code that represents the critical part of the data-crunching application can be re-written in Scala in a much smaller form factor that is much easier for developers to read, repurpose and maintain. Note that with Java 8.0 supporting lambda expressions, a Java developer can become lot more productive without switching to Scala completely. The libraries provided by Spark were discussed previously. The developer community is excited about Spark because everything is integrated with Spark. If you wanted to do applications with MapReduce, you had a bunch of problems. First, MapReduce pretty much had to be done with Java. That’s not the case with Spark: Python and Scala are first-class citizens. Second, you had to marry up MapReduce with other technologies. Wanted machine learning? You’ve got to separately integrate something like Mahout, H2O, or Oryx to get things done, and you’ve got to figure out how it works, and how to bolt it on. Wanted a graph database, with inbuilt tools for graph analytics? Well, again, you’ve got to select from Giraph, TitanDB, neo4j, or some other technology. The point is that the integration of all these parts would definitely not be seamless; each of them wants to be used in its own way. Spark offers a different model. You get SQL, machine learning, graph analytics and streaming in a single set of libraries that all work together with the Spark core. You can manipulate the same datasets with all of these. And when Spark core gets improvements, all of the libraries also improve. Integration is much easier, applications are far easier to maintain, costs go down, developers are happier. Most important for the field teams to understand: If a company developing applications is going to make a bet on a single foundation for your applications, Spark is looking like the best choice right now. Spark does not replace Hadoop. You still need a single data layer, preferably one that is hyper-scalable and extremely fast, and that’s where MapR comes in. MapR makes Spark faster, more scalable, and more reliable. What are the Spark use cases? Tons of people are doing data integration and ETL on MapReduce, as well as batch computation, machine learning and batch analytics. But these things are going to be much faster on Spark. Interactive analytics and BI are possible on Spark, and the same goes for real-time stream processing. So some of the new use cases are just the old use cases, done faster, while some are totally new. There are some things that just couldn’t have been done with acceptable performance on MapReduce. In this blog post, you’ve learned about the key differences between Spark and MapReduce, why it’s easier to develop on Spark, and the top five use cases. If you have any further questions, or want to share how you are using Spark, please add your comments in the section below. This blog post was published June 23, 2015.
0.999997	roff2html transforms roff code into html mode. Print the result to standard output. groff , groffer , roff2dvi , roff2pdf , roff2ps , roff2text , roff2x , gxditview .
0.971761	Date: 2005-02-17Professor Tony Judt was a frequent contributor to The New York Review of Books, the Times Literary Supplement, the New Republic, the New York Times and many other journals in Europe and the US. His books include Ill Fares the Land, Reappraisals: Reflections on the Forgotten Twentieth Century, and Postwar: A History of Europe Since 1945, which was one of the New York Times Book Review's Ten Best Books of 2005, the winner of the Council on Foreign Relations Arthur Ross Book Award, and a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. He died in August, 2010 at the age of 62.At the time of his death, Tony Judt was the Erich Maria Remarque Professor in European Studies at New York University. In 1996 he was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and in 2007 a corresponding Fellow of the British Academy. In 2009 Judt was awarded a Special Orwell Prize for Lifetime Achievement for his contribution to British Political writing. Postwar: A History of Europe Since 1945 (2005) was a runner up for the 2006 BBC Samuel Johnson Prize for Non-Fiction and Pulitzer Prize for General Non-Fiction.
0.99925	Phrase that a martial arts teacher will say when his student is using his skills for evil. Looking for no my child, this is not my desire meaning? Delighted that you discovered the greatest determine on our web site!
0.942769	We have shown previously that overexpression of constitutively active Akt or activation of Akt caused by constitutively active Ras or human epidermal growth factor receptor-2 (HER2) confers on breast cancer cells resistance to chemotherapy or radiotherapy. As an expanded study we here report differential responses in terms of phosphorylation and activation of Akt as a result of treatment with doxorubicin in a panel of breast cancer cell lines. The levels of Akt phosphorylation and activity were measured by Western blot analysis with an anti-Ser473-phosphorylated Akt antibody and by in vitro Akt kinase assay using glycogen synthase kinase-3 as a substrate. Within 24 hours after exposure to doxorubicin, MCF7, MDA468 and T47D cells showed a drug-dose-dependent increase in the levels of phosphorylated Akt; in contrast, SKBR3 and MDA231 cells showed a decrease in the levels of phosphorylated Akt, and minimal or no changes were detected in MDA361, MDA157 and BT474 cells. The doxorubicin-induced Akt phosphorylation was correlated with increased kinase activity and was dependent on phosphoinositide 3-kinase (PI3-K). An increased baseline level of Akt was also found in MCF7 cells treated with ionizing radiation. The cellular responses to doxorubicin-induced Akt phosphorylation were potentiated after the expression of Akt upstream activators including HER2, HER3 and focal adhesion kinase. Taken together with our recent published results showing that constitutive Akt mediates resistance to chemotherapy or radiotherapy, our present data suggest that the doxorubicin-induced phosphorylation and activation of Akt might reflect a cellular defensive mechanism of cancer cells to overcome doxorubicin-induced cytotoxic effects, which further supports the current efforts of targeting PI3-K/Akt for enhancing the therapeutic responses of breast cancer cells to chemotherapy and radiotherapy. Cancer cells with an inherent or acquired capability to resist induction of apoptosis at some point(s) in the signal cascade pathway leading to cell death generally tend to be resistant to chemotherapy or radiotherapy. The serine–threonine protein kinase Akt has received much interest in recent years because it suppresses apoptosis induced by chemotherapy or radiotherapy through interaction with several critical molecules that regulate or execute apoptosis. For instance, after activation, Akt could do the following: it phosphorylates the proapoptotic protein Bcl-2 partner, Bad, which binds to and blocks the activity of Bcl-x, a factor in cell survival ; it inactivates caspase-9, which initiates the caspase cascade leading to apoptosis ; it represses the forkhead transcription factor FKHRL-1, which regulates the expression of the apoptosis-inducing Fas ligand ; and it phosphorylates IκB, thereby promoting the degradation of IκB and increasing the activity of the nuclear factor κB (NFκB) [3, 4]. The kinase activity of Akt is triggered after the interaction of its pleckstrin homology domain with the lipid second messenger phosphatidylinositol 3,4,5-trisphosphate, which is generated by phosphoinositide 3-kinase (PI3-K). This interaction recruits Akt from the cytoplasm to the inner cytoplasmic membrane, where Akt undergoes conformational changes and is phosphorylated by the phosphatidylinositol-dependent kinases. The activated Akt is then relocated to the cytoplasm and may be transported further to the nucleus, phosphorylating a wide spectrum of substrates including the molecules mentioned above that are involved in the regulation of cell survival. PI3-K itself is activated by multiple mechanisms, including the activation of growth factor receptor tyrosine kinases [5, 6] and G protein-coupled receptors [7, 8], integrin-mediated cell adhesion [7, 8], and the actions of oncogene products such as Ras [9, 10] and hormones such as estrogen [11–13]. By controlling the levels of lipid second messengers, PI3-K regulates various cellular processes, including growth, differentiation, survival, migration and metabolism [14, 15]. We have recently shown that expression of a constitutively active Akt, or an increased activity of the human epidermal growth factor receptor-2 (HER2)/PI3-K/Akt or Ras/PI3-K/Akt pathway, leads to multidrug or radiation resistance in human breast cancer cells [16–18]. In those studies we assessed the sensitivity to chemotherapy (including doxorubicin) or radiotherapy of breast cancer cells that contain a higher level of Akt activity due to the overexpression of HER2, constitutively active Ras or constitutively active Akt. To expand our previous studies, we report here a differential pattern of responses of breast cancer cell lines in terms of Akt phosphorylation and activity as a result of treatment with doxorubicin. Depending on the cell types, treatment of breast cancer cells with doxorubicin may trigger a transient phosphorylation and activation of Akt. This therapeutic intervention-triggered activation of Akt depends on an inherent activity of PI3-K, and the capability of the response is potentiated after the expression of Akt upstream regulators including HER2, HER3 or the focal adhesion kinase (FAK), but not by all the signals that are known to affect Akt activity, an example of which is the estrogen-mediated signal. Deprivation of the effect of estrogen did not alter the responsiveness of MCF7 cells to doxorubicin-induced Akt phosphorylation. Our data suggest that the therapeutic intervention-triggered activation of Akt might contribute to the resistance of breast cancer cells to doxorubicin. These results provide further experimental evidence that justifies targeting the PI3-K/Akt pathway to enhance the efficacy of breast cancer chemotherapy or radiotherapy. Eight breast cancer cell lines used in this study (MCF7, MDA468, SKBR3, MDA157, MDA231, MDA361, BT474 and T47D) were originally purchased from American Type Culture Collection (Manassas, VA, USA). The cells were grown and routinely maintained in Dulbecco's modified Eagle's medium/F12 medium supplemented with 10% fetal bovine serum (FBS), 2 mM glutamine, 100 U/ml penicillin and 100 μg/ml streptomycin. MCF7HER2 cells were described previously . All cells were grown in a 37°C incubator supplied with 5% CO2 and 95% air. Antibodies directed against Akt, Ser473-phosphorylated Akt1 (p-Akt), Ser21/9-phosphorylated glycogen synthase kinase-3 (GSK3), Ser136-phosphorylated Bad and anti-HER2 monoclonal antibody were obtained from Cell Signaling Technology (Beverly, MA, USA). Anti-HER3 antibody was purchased from Santa Cruz Biotechnology (Santa Cruz, CA, USA). Anti-His tag monoclonal antibody was ordered from Upstate Biotechnology (Charlottesville, VA, USA), as was the anti-FAK antibody that recognizes both FAK and FAK-related non-kinase (FRNK), a dominant-negative mutant of FAK [20, 21]. The humanized anti-HER2 monoclonal antibody trastuzumab (Herceptin) was made by Genentech (San Francisco, CA, USA). PI3-K-specific inhibitor LY294002 was obtained from CalBiochem (San Diego, CA, USA), and the estrogen receptor (ER) antagonist ICI 182,780 was purchased from Tocris (Ballwin, MO, USA). Doxorubicin (Adriamycin) was ordered from the pharmacy of MD Anderson Cancer Center. All other reagents were purchased from Sigma-Aldrich (St Louis, MO, USA). The pcDNA3 expression construct containing HER3 was provided by Dr Xiaofeng Le (MD Anderson Cancer Center), and the expression constructs of FAK and FRNK (pCMV-Myc) were kindly provided by Dr Thomas Parsons (University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA, USA). Transient transfection was performed with the FuGENE 6 transfection kit, in accordance with instructions provided by the manufacturer (Roche Diagnostic, Indianapolis, IN, USA). Western blot analysis and Akt kinase assay were performed as described previously [16, 19]. The method for cytoplasmic and nuclear fractionation was adopted from the literature [22, 23] with minor modifications. In brief, pellets containing 2 × 107 cells were resuspended into 800 μl of buffer A (50 mM NaCl, 10 mM HEPES pH 8.0, 500 mM sucrose, 1 mM EDTA, 0.5 mM spermidine, 0.15 mM spermine, 0.2% Triton X-100, 1 mM phenylmethylsulphonyl fluoride, 2 mM Na3VO4, 25 μg/ml leupeptin, 25 μg/ml aprotinin). After incubation on ice for 10 min, the cells were homogenized with 10 strokes in a Dounce homogenizer. A small aliquot of the cell homogenates was then examined under a microscope to confirm that more than 98% of cells were lysed. After brief centrifugation of the cell homogenates at 4°C, the supernatant (cytoplasmic fraction) was collected and the pellet was washed twice with 400 μl of buffer B (50 mM NaCl, 10 mM HEPES pH 8, 25% glycerol, 0.1 mM EDTA, 0.5 mM spermidine, 0.15 mM spermine) and then resuspended in 150 μl of buffer C (350 mM NaCl, 10 mM HEPES pH 8.0, 25% glycerol, 0.1 mM EDTA, 0.5 mM spermidine, 0.15 mM spermine) with gentle rocking for 30 min at 4°C . After centrifugation, the supernatant (nuclear fraction) was collected. The amounts of protein in the cytoplasmic and nuclear fractions were determined with the Bradford method (Bio-Rad, Hercules, CA, USA). Cells grown on Petri dishes were irradiated with γ-rays from a high-dose-rate 137Cs unit (4.5 Gy/min) at room temperature (25 – 27°C), as described previously [17, 19]. After irradiation, the cells were harvested by trypsinization. To assess the cellular responses in breast cancer cells in the baseline levels of Akt phosphorylation and activity as a result of doxorubicin treatment, we first examined the level of Akt phosphorylation and activation in MCF7 breast cancer cells after treatment with doxorubicin. Figure 1a shows a time-dependent induction in the levels of p-Akt with reference to the total levels of Akt in MCF7 cells treated with 1 μM doxorubicin, a dose that we have shown previously to induce apoptosis in the cells [16, 18]. An increase in p-Akt level was detected as early as after 1 hour of exposure of the cells to doxorubicin, and a robust increase in the level of p-Akt was observed 24 hours after treatment. Differential responses to doxorubicin-induced phosphorylation of Akt in a panel of human breast cancer cells. (a) MCF7 cells were exposed to 1 μM doxorubicin (Doxo) for the indicated periods in culture medium supplemented with 10% fetal bovine serum (FBS). The cells were then harvested and prepared for Western blot analyses with antibodies directed against Ser473-phosphorylated Akt (p-Akt) and total Akt. The densitometric levels of p-Akt at each time point were normalized to the corresponding levels of total Akt and are shown in the bar graph. (b) A panel of eight indicated breast cancer cell lines were treated with 0.125 to 1 μM doxorubicin for 24 hours in culture medium supplemented with 10% FBS. After treatment the individual cell lines were harvested, lysed and subjected to Western blot analyses with antibodies against p-Akt and total Akt. We next expanded the experiment in a panel of eight breast cancer cell lines treated with increasing concentrations (0.125 to 1 μM) of doxorubicin for 24 hours in culture medium supplemented with 10% FBS. Interestingly, it was found that the changes in the levels of p-Akt varied between the cell lines after the treatment. In comparison with control cells, which were kept untreated for 24 hours in the same type of culture medium, MCF7, MDA468 and T47D cells showed a dose-dependent increase in p-Akt levels; in contrast, SKBR3 and MDA231 cells showed a dose-dependent decrease, and no or minimal change was detected in MDA361, MDA157 and BT474 cells (Fig. 1b). As expected, no changes in total Akt expression were found in the cell lines after the treatment. These results suggest that genetic context among individual cell lines might have a role in determining the cellular responses to the treatment. To confirm that the phosphorylation of Akt induced by doxorubicin was associated with an increased Akt kinase activity, we assessed Akt activity by in vitro Akt kinase assay on two known Akt substrates, Bad and GSK3, in MCF7 cells. Figure 2a shows that, in comparison with untreated MCF7 cells and with the cells treated with type 1 insulin-like growth factor (IGF-1), the cells treated with doxorubicin contained an increased level of p-Akt, which was comparable to the increase of p-Akt level stimulated by IGF-1. Treatment of the cells with ionizing radiation induced a similar increase in the level of p-Akt. The increases in p-Akt level induced by doxorubicin or radiation were associated with increased Akt kinase activities measured by the Akt in vitro kinase assay (Fig. 2b). We found that the Akt protein immunoprecipitated from doxorubicin-treated or γ-ray-irradiated cells phosphorylated both Bad and GSK3 as strongly as the Akt protein from the IGF-1-treated cells. Functional analysis of Akt phosphorylation in human breast cancer cells after treatment with doxorubicin. (a) MCF7 cells were exposed to 1 μM doxorubicin (Doxo) for 24 hours, or irradiated (XRT) with X-rays (5 Gy) and then cultured for a further 24 hours in culture medium supplemented with 10% fetal bovine serum (FBS). MCF7 cells stimulated for 15 min with 10 nM type 1 insulin-like growth factor (IGF-1) were used as a positive control. Untreated (Untx) and the treated MCF7 cells were harvested, lysed and subjected to Western blot analyses with antibodies against Ser473-phosphorylated Akt (p-Akt) and total Akt. (b) MCF7 cells transiently transfected with a His-tagged Akt1 expression construct were left untreated or treated as in (a). Akt1 was immunoprecipitated by using an anti-His tag monoclonal antibody and then assayed for in vitro kinase activities for phosphorylation on Bad and glycogen synthase kinase-3 (GSK3). (c) Cytoplasmic and nuclear fractionations from untreated, doxorubicin-treated and γ-ray-irradiated MCF7 cells were separated as described in Materials and Methods. Equal amounts (40 μg) of cytoplasmic fraction (Cy) and nuclear fraction (Nu) from each sample were subjected to Western blot analysis to determine the distribution of Akt after treatment with doxorubicin or ionizing radiation. β-Actin and poly(ADP-ribose) polymerase (PARP) were used as markers of the cytoplasmic and nuclear fractions, respectively. (d) MCF7 or MDA468 cells were pre-exposed to 10 μM LY294002 for 2 hours before treatment with 1 μM doxorubicin for 24 hours. After treatment the cells were harvested, lysed and subjected to Western blot analyses with antibodies against p-Akt and total Akt. As another measure of the functional status of Akt after treatment with doxorubicin or ionizing radiation, we also examined the translocation of Akt from the cytoplasm to the nucleus. To allow the detection of the signals of Akt from cytoplasmic to nuclear translocation, we raised the level of Akt expression in MCF7 cells by transient transfection of the cells with a His-tagged Akt1 expression construct 48 hours before harvest. Both the doxorubicin-induced and radiation-induced increases in Akt phosphorylation were associated with increased translocation of Akt from the cytoplasm to the nucleus (Fig. 2c). To determine the extent to which the doxorubicin-induced activation of Akt is regulated by the PI3-K pathway, we explored this question with MCF7 cells, which express a relatively low baseline level of p-Akt, and MDA468 cells, which express a relatively high baseline level of p-Akt because of the mutation status of PTEN (phosphatase and tensin homolog deleted on chromosome ten) in the cells . We found that an overnight (16 hours) exposure of the cells to LY294002, a PI3-K-specific inhibitor, remarkably abolished the increase in Akt phosphorylation after treatment with doxorubicin in both MCF7 and MDA468 cells (Fig. 2d). The results indicate that the doxorubicin-induced phosphorylation and activation of Akt were mediated through a PI3-K dependent pathway. Because the doxorubicin-induced activation of Akt is dependent on PI3-K activity, we proposed that the breast cancer cells with compelling molecular components of the PI3-K pathway might show an enhanced cellular response to doxorubicin-induced activation of Akt. The HER family members are important upstream regulators of the PI3-K/Akt pathway and are known to be important in the progression of breast cancer and its resistance to chemotherapy or radiotherapy [25, 26]. To determine the extent to which HER family members might potentiate the cellular response to doxorubicin-induced activation of Akt in breast cancer cells, we assessed the effect of treatment with doxorubicin (0.5 to 1 μM) on p-Akt levels in MCF7 cells transfected with a HER2 expression construct (MCF7HER2 cells). In comparison with control vector-transfected MCF7 cells (MCF7neo), MCF7HER2 cells showed not only a higher baseline level of p-Akt (Fig. 3, compare lanes 1 and 7) but also an enhanced response to the doxorubicin-induced increase in Akt phosphorylation (Fig. 3, compare lanes 1 to 3 with lanes 7 to 9). A caveat is that it is unlikely that the enhancement was caused by an additive effect of Akt phosphorylation by doxorubicin treatment and HER2 overexpression in the cells, because treatment of MCF7neo cells with trastuzumab also decreased the level of doxorubicin-induced phosphorylation of Akt. As expected, we detected no changes in the level of total Akt. The increase in the levels of p-Akt in MCF7neo and MCF7HER2 cells by doxorubicin was markedly diminished by pretreatment with trastuzumab, which downregulates HER2 in these cells (Fig. 3, compare lanes 1 to 3 with lanes 4 to 6, and lanes 7 to 9 with lanes 10 to 12). Taken together, these results indicate that the higher level of HER2 in MCF7HER2 cells potentiates the response of the cells to doxorubicin-induced activation of Akt. Potentiation to doxorubicin-induced Akt phosphorylation in MCF7 cells after expressing high levels of HER2. Control vector-transfected MCF7 cells (MCF7neo) and MCF7 transfectants expressing high levels of human epidermal growth factor receptor-2 (MCF7HER2) were left untreated or were treated with 0.5 or 1 μM doxorubicin (Doxo) for 24 hours. Separate dishes of MCF7neo and MCF7HER2 cells were pretreated with 20 nM trastuzumab (Herceptin) 24 hours before treatment with doxorubicin. After treatment the cells were harvested, lysed and subjected to Western blot analyses with antibodies against HER2, Ser473-phosphorylated Akt (p-Akt) and total Akt. The densitometric levels of p-Akt were normalized to the respective levels of total Akt in each lane and are shown in the bar graph. Interestingly, some cell lines including SKBR3 cells showed a decline in the level of p-Akt after treatment with doxorubicin (Fig. 1), despite the fact that SKBR3 cells express an appreciable level of HER2 [27, 28]. A notable difference between MCF7 and SKBR3 cells is that the former expresses HER3 whereas the latter has no detectable level of HER3 expression . Of the HER family members, HER3 contains the most PI3-K-binding sites, but it is kinase-deficient and is mainly activated though heterodimerization with other HER members . We proposed that an insufficient level of HER3 expression might affect the response of SKBR3 cells to treatment with doxorubicin. To test this hypothesis we transiently transfected SKBR3 cells with a HER3 expression construct. Figure 4 shows that, in comparison with control vector-transfected SKBR3 cells, transient expression of HER3 prevented the decline in the level of p-Akt after doxorubicin treatment in SKBR3 cells. It is noteworthy that, in this particular experiment, HER3 was only transiently transfected into the SKBR3 cells, with an estimated 10 to 15% transfection efficiency. Given the result from the mixed (transfected and untransfected) cells, it is reasonable to speculate that selected clonal or pooled HER3-expressing SKBR3 cells would exhibit a pattern of response similar to that observed in MCF7 cells. Effect of HER3 expression on decrease in Akt phosphorylation in SKBR3 cells after doxorubicin treatment. SKBR3 cells were transiently transfected with a control vector (pcDNA3) or a HER3 expression construct for 24 hours, and then exposed to 0.125 to 1 μM doxorubicin for a further 24 hours. After treatment the cells were harvested, lysed and subjected to Western blot analyses with antibodies against HER3, Ser473-phosphorylated Akt (p-Akt) and total Akt. The densitometric levels of p-Akt were normalized to the respective levels of total Akt in each lane and are shown in the bar graph. Exposure of the transiently transfected cells to doxorubicin also led to a decrease in the level of HER3, the mechanism of which is unknown. We speculate that it might be related to a degradation of the protein after heterodimerization with HER2. Nevertheless, the transient expression of HER3 in only a small fraction of the cell population (10 to 15%; data not shown) prevented the decline in p-Akt after treatment with doxorubicin in a HER2-overexpressing cell line (SKBR3) suggests a potential cooperative role of HER2 and HER3 in the increase in Akt activity after treatment with doxorubicin. Thus, the ability of HER2 to potentiate the cellular response of Akt phosphorylation or activation after treatment with doxorubicin depends on the cell types. To broaden the implication of our findings, we sought to assess possible roles of other signal pathways that might also potentiate the cellular response of Akt phosphorylation of MCF7 cells after treatment with doxorubicin. In addition to the HER family members, the FAK pathway is also known to modulate the PI3-K pathway. The FAK pathway is regulated by the interaction between extracellular matrix receptors and integrins, and is often augmented in human breast cancer cells [30, 31]. We therefore transiently transfected MCF7 cells with an expression construct of FAK or its dominant-negative counterpart, FRNK. In comparison with control vector-transfected cells, which exhibited a LY294002-sensitive increase in the level of p-Akt over baseline, FAK-transfected cells had a higher p-Akt level both at baseline and after treatment with doxorubicin and were sensitive to LY294002 (Fig. 5). In contrast, transfection of MCF7 cells with FRNK led to a lower phosphorylation level of Akt after treatment with doxorubicin. Irrespective of the expression of FAK or FRNK, the level of total Akt remained unchanged. Taken together, these results suggest that molecular components, such as FAK and HER3, that enhance the cellular sensitivity and responsiveness for PI3-K activation might potentiate the cellular responses of Akt phosphorylation to treatment with doxorubicin. Potentiation of cellular response to doxorubicin-induced Akt phosphorylation in MCF7 cells by FAK. MCF7 cells were transiently transfected for 24 hours with a control vector (pcDNA3.1), a focal adhesion kinase (FAK) expression construct or a FAK-related non-kinase (FRNK) expression construct, followed by exposure to 1 μM doxorubicin (Doxo) for a further 24-hour of culture, with or without the addition of the phosphoinositide 3-kinase-specific inhibitor LY294002 (20 μM) 16 hours before the end of exposure to doxorubicin. After treatment the cells were harvested, lysed and subjected to Western blot analyses with antibodies against FAK, FRNK, Ser473-phosphorylated Akt (p-Akt) and total Akt. The densitometric levels of p-Akt were normalized to the respective levels of total Akt in each lane and are shown in the bar graph. To determine whether the signaling pathways known to modulate the activity of PI3-K/Akt might unanimously potentiate the cellular response of Akt phosphorylation to treatment with doxorubicin, we examined the effect of doxorubicin on the level of p-Akt in MCF7 cells cultured in medium supplemented with an ER antagonist or in estrogen-depleted medium. Estrogen is known to be involved in the regulation of Akt phosphorylation in both ER-positive and ER-negative breast cancer cells [12, 32, 33]. In comparison with vehicle-treated cells, MCF7 cells stimulated with estrogen (estradiol) showed a higher level of p-Akt, which was decreased when an ER antagonist (ICI 182,780) was present in the culture medium (Fig. 6a). In contrast with the results shown in Figs 4 and 5, we observed no difference in the levels of p-Akt after doxorubicin treatment in MCF7 cells cultured in regular 0.5% FBS medium, charcoal-stripped FBS (that is, estrogen-depleted) medium, or regular 0.5% FBS medium plus ICI 182,780 (Fig. 6b). These results suggested that at least the PI3-K signaling regulated by estrogen does not potentiate the cellular responsiveness to doxorubicin-induced phosphorylation of Akt. Potential involvement of estrogen-mediated signaling on doxorubicin-induced Akt phosphorylation. (a) MCF7 cells grown to subconfluence were exposed to 1 μM ICI 182,780 (an estrogen receptor antagonist) or the vehicles (dimethyl sulfoxide [DMSO] and ethanol [EtOH]) for 30 min, and then treated with or without 10 nM estradiol (E2) for a further 30 min. Cell lysates were prepared for Western blot analysis with antibodies against Ser473-phosphorylated Akt (p-Akt) and total Akt. (b) MCF7 cells were cultured in regular 0.5% fetal bovine serum (FBS) medium, charcoal-stripped (CS) FBS medium, or regular 0.5% FBS plus 1 μM ICI 182,780. The cells were then treated with 0.25 to 1 μM doxorubicin (Doxo) for 24 hours. After treatment the cells were harvested, lysed and subjected to Western blot analyses with antibodies against p-Akt and total Akt. In our present study we found that the activity of Akt, an important signal molecule that promotes cell survival and confers cellular resistance to chemotherapy and radiotherapy as shown by us [16, 18, 19] and others [34, 35], was transiently elevated in a subset of breast cancer cell lines as a result of exposure to doxorubicin, a chemotherapeutic agent commonly used to treat patients with breast cancers. Activation of Akt in MCF7 cells after exposure to doxorubicin was reported earlier, but the mechanism was not explored in detail [34, 35]. We noted here that, in comparison with resting (non-stimulated) cells, in which most Akt was found in the cytoplasm, exposure of the cells to doxorubicin or ionizing radiation led to a relocation of Akt to the nucleus. It is noteworthy that several antiapoptotic substrates of Akt are nuclear proteins. This subcellular translocation of Akt is important for cells to overcome the death signals initiated by treatment with doxorubicin or ionizing radiation. Taken together with our previous results [16–18], the present results suggest that doxorubicin-triggered activation of Akt has a role in the resistance of breast cancer cells to this drug and that the same might apply to radiotherapy. Because the overall cellular sensitivity of breast cancer cells to chemotherapy or radiotherapy is attributed to multiple intrinsic and extrinsic factors, such as p53 status, Bcl-2/Bax levels, expression of multiple drug resistance proteins, and hypoxic status, a caveat is that our data do not necessarily imply that one group of breast cancer cells showing increases in the level of p-Akt after chemotherapy or radiotherapy would absolutely be more chemoresistant or radioresistant than the another group of breast cancer cells without showing such a response. Rather, the data indicate that the activation and phosphorylation of Akt triggered by chemotherapy or radiotherapy contribute to the overall cellular sensitivity to these conventional therapies. Several questions remain to be fully answered. First, why was Akt activation after treatment with doxorubicin found in only some of the breast cancer cell lines we tested? Apparently, cells must be equipped with certain molecular components that enable them to react to signals induced by chemotherapy or radiotherapy. We found that the drug-triggered activation of Akt depends on the activity of PI3-K, which can be activated by several known pathways, some of which we have explored in the present study. Which pathway is activated depends on the genetic context and functional status of the signal transduction network in individual cell types. In our study, MCF7 cells transiently expressing a high level of HER2 potentiated the response of the cells to the doxorubicin-induced activation of Akt. This result is consistent with those shown recently by us [16, 19] and others [36–38] indicating that HER2 expression in breast cancer cells might render them more resistant to chemotherapy or radiotherapy. However, a high level of HER2 expression alone might not be sufficient to mediate this response. For example, we detected no change in the level of p-Akt in BT474 breast cancer cells after treatment with doxorubicin, even though they expressed a high level of HER2. SKBR3, another breast cancer cell line that expresses high levels of HER2, even showed a reduced level of p-Akt after treatment with doxorubicin. Expression of a transient transfected HER3 in the SKBR3 cells prevented this decline, indicating that heterodimerization and crosstalk between HER2 and HER3 might be important in mediating the downstream pathway that leads to Akt activation in breast cancer cells after treatment with doxorubicin. This might explain the negative findings from a recent clinical study reporting that HER2 overexpression does not seem to predispose to locoregional recurrence for breast cancer patients treated with neoadjuvant doxorubicin-based chemotherapy, mastectomy and radiotherapy . A second question is what molecular executioner leads to the activation of Akt after chemotherapy or radiotherapy. Are any soluble factors or non-secreted membrane-bound ligands involved, or is the PI3-K/Akt pathway activated directly and autonomously? In our study, we demonstrated that several different mechanisms, two of which are the expression of HER2 and of FAK, might enhance the doxorubicin-induced activation of Akt. Each mechanism activates PI3-K but does so through different ligands. Interference with these pathways by the anti-HER2 monoclonal antibody trastuzumab or by a dominant-negative mutant FAK (FRNK) abolished the drug-triggered activation of Akt mediated by HER2 and FAK, respectively. An interesting finding from our studies is that not all stimuli that lead to PI3-K activation enhance the drug-triggered activation of Akt. For example, abnormal estrogen exposure is associated with an increased risk of breast cancer, and estrogen is known to activate Akt via a non-nuclear estrogen-signaling pathway involving the direct interaction of ER with PI3-K . The ER isoform ERα binds to the p85α regulatory subunit of PI3-K in a ligand-dependent manner. Stimulation with estrogen increases ERα-associated PI3-K activity, leading to the activation of Akt. This interaction between ER and p85α is independent of gene transcription and does not involve phosphotyrosine adapter molecules or Src-homology domains of p85α . We found that the ER antagonist ICI 182,780 blocked estrogen-induced Akt activation in the ER-positive MCF7 cells but did not affect doxorubicin-induced Akt activation. Depletion of estrogen from the culture medium did not affect the doxorubicin-induced activation of Akt either. These data suggest that estrogen-induced signals, whether dependent on ER or not, are not involved in the pathway that enhances the doxorubicin-induced activation of Akt. In fact, this atypical activation of Akt seems not to be limited to doxorubicin or ionizing radiation. We have observed that treatment of MCF7 cells with several different drugs (paclitaxel, 5-flurouracil and gemcitabine) that act through different mechanisms can also induce Akt phosphorylation, although the response and the timing and dose required for this effect varied between the drugs tested (data not shown). Cellular stress such as hypoxia and ultraviolet radiation has been reported by others to induce PI3-K-dependent Akt activation [41–43]. Thus, inherent properties of individual cell types, rather than specific cell death signals, might determine whether Akt is activated after cells are exposed to stresses. Cancer cells with functional aberrations, such as overexpression of HER family members or increased cell adhesion potential, are probably more capable than noncancerous cells of activating Akt as a defensive mechanism against external detrimental stimuli, which justifies a novel approach of targeting the PI3-K/Akt for chemosensitization or radiosensitization. In summary, doxorubicin might cause a PI3-K-dependent increase of Akt activity in breast cancer cells. Together with other recent results of ours [16–18], the present observations suggest that clinical benefits in treating patients with breast cancer could be obtained with appropriate combinations of novel Akt inhibitors and conventional chemotherapeutic drugs or ionizing radiation. We found that the activities of Akt are increased in selected cell lines treated with doxorubicin, which is a PI3-K-dependent process and is potentiated after overexpression of HER2/HER3 receptor tyrosine kinases or FAK nonreceptor tyrosine kinase. This therapeutic intervention (doxorubicin)-triggered activation of Akt might have a role in affecting the overall therapeutic responses of cancer cells to the treatment. Clinical benefits in the treatment of breast cancer patients could be obtained with appropriate combinations of novel Akt inhibitors and conventional chemotherapeutic drugs or ionizing radiation. Our observations further justify the efforts of targeting PI3-K/Akt for enhancing the therapeutic responses of breast cancer cells to the conventional therapies. This study was supported in part by a research award from The Breast Cancer Research Foundation (New York). The authors' contributions to this research are reflected in the order shown, with the exception of ZF, who supervised all aspects of this research and prepared the manuscript. XL did most Western blot analyses and sample preparations; YL contributed the experiments of cell transfection and some Western blot analyses; KL performed radiation of the cells; BL participated in the overall design of experiments and data interpretation. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.
0.939217	North Korea forms the northern half of the Korean Peninsula in Asia's Far East. To its west is the Yellow Sea and to its east is, as most of the world recognizes it, the Sea of Japan. North Korea has three land borders, China and Russia to the north and South Korea to its south. North Korea is a very inhospitable place as much of the country is covered in rugged mountains. From these mountains though there are numerous river valleys. The two most notable valleys and plains are the Yalu River, which forms much of the northern border with China and the southwestern plain where Pyongyang and much of the population lives. Summers in North Korea consist of the time between about June to September, but this time is also the monsoon or rainy season. Temperatures in Pyongyang average about 75°F (25°C) during this time, while the mountains are cooler and the west receives a fair amount of humidity and rain. Winters hover right below the freezing point with the mountains remaining snowy for much of winter and the coasts typically about 15°F (-10°C) as an average. The fall (autumn) tends to be fairly warm and sunny as the leaves change color, while in the spring the Cherry Blossoms are in full color in about March-May. The wildlife in North Korea is fairly diverse due to their geographical variations. Among the mammals present are deer, weasels, tigers, bears, lynx, and many smaller species. The greater diversity comes in the sea life in the surrounding waters, which contain numerous animals including sharks, tuna, mackerel, squid, shrimp, lobster, oysters, and crab among many others. There are also numerous fresh water fish in their rivers and lakes. There are a number of birds that call North Korea home, both migratory birds and those that call the country home year round. Among the more common of these are pheasants, woodpeckers, owls, and grouse. Among the reptiles and amphibians are turtles, snakes, lizards, salamanders, frogs, and toads.
0.999134	Why bake just one cake when you can bake multiple cupcakes? Avoid the mess of large scale decorating and cake cutting and serve savory individual cupcakes. Vertical Striped Baking Cups feature a ribbed paper liner construction and an array of colors including stripes in red, orange, dark pink, purple, light blue, and lime green. In addition to dressing up your baked goods, these can be filled with snacks, candies, nuts, and other small treats at parties and special events. Indulge your sweet tooth and brighten everyone's day! Package contains 50 standard-sized baking cups.
0.999858	El Diamante Loco. The Crazy Diamond.Il Diamante Pazzo. Sabes acaso ¿quien es este personaje? Su verdadero nombre fue Roger Keith Barret, mejor conocido como “Syd Barret” , “Diamante loco”, o “El de Cambridge”. Este genio fue el fundador del legendario grupo Pink Floyd, en 1965. Obras como “Flaming”, “Emily´s play”, “Mathilda´s mother”, “Lucifer Sam” o “Feel” han marcado pautas a lo largo de la historia del rock psicodélico. A pesar que nos dejó en el 2006, sus influencias, y ese estilo propio adelantado para la época, lo han inmortalizado. El diamante loco continúa brillando. Sai chi è questo personaggio? Il suo vero nome era Roger Keith Barret, meglio conosciuto come "Syd Barret", "Diamante pazzo" o "Quello di Cambridge". Questo genio fu il fondatore del leggendario gruppo Pink Floyd, nel 1965. Brani come "Flaming", "Emily's play", "Mathilda's mother", "Lucifer Sam" o "Feel" hanno lasciato forti tracce nella storia del rock psichedelico. Anche se è deceduto nel 2006, le sue influenze ed il suo stile emancipati per l'epoca, l’hanno immortalato. Il diamante pazzo continua a brillare. Do you know who this character is? His real name was Roger Keith Barret, better known as "Syd Barret", "Crazy Diamond", or "The Cambridge´s one". This genius was the founder of the legendary group Pink Floyd, in 1965. Songs like "Flaming", "Emily's play", "Mathilda's mother", "Lucifer Sam" or "Feel", have marked patterns throughout the history of psychedelic rock. Although he past away in 2006, his influences, and that style of his own advanced for the time, have immortalized him. The crazy diamond continues to shine.
0.998243	How can I convert the following? Let me explain what I am trying to do. I have User IDs in my database that are stored as integers. Rather than having users reference their IDs I want to let them use the hex value. The main reason is because it's shorter. So not only do I need to go from integer to hex but I also need to go from hex to integer. Is there an easy way to do this in C#? int myNewInt = Convert.ToInt32(myHex, 16); // Back to int again. See How to: Convert Between Hexadecimal Strings and Numeric Types (C# Programming Guide) for more information and examples. I really question the value of this, though. You're stated goal is to make the value shorter, which it will, but that isn't a goal in itself. You really mean either make it easier to remember or easier to type. If you mean easier to remember, then you're taking a step backwards. We know it's still the same size, just encoded differently. But your users won't know that the letters are restricted to 'A-F', and so the ID will occupy the same conceptual space for them as if the letter 'A-Z' were allowed. So instead of being like memorizing a telephone number, it's more like memorizing a GUID (of equivalent length). If you mean typing, instead of being able to use the keypad the user now must use the main part of the keyboard. It's likely to be more difficult to type, because it won't be a word their fingers recognize. A much better option is to actually let them pick a real username. I created my own solution for converting int to Hex string and back before I found this answer. Not surprisingly, it's considerably faster than the .net solution since there's less code overhead. /// Convert an integer to a string of hexidecimal numbers. /// Convert a hex char to it an integer. A fashionably belated response, but have you considered some sort of Integer shortening implementation? If the only goal is to make the user ID as short as possible, I'd be interested to know if there is any other apparent reason why you specifically require hexadecimal conversion - unless I missed it of course. Is it clear and known (if so required) that user IDs are in actual fact a hexadecimal representation of the real value? Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged c# hex type-conversion or ask your own question.
0.99944	Spring season consists the month of March, April, and May, in which months are the perfect months for making Everest Base Camp trek In Nepal. Everest Base Camp Trek up to the mighty Mt. Everest offers its own astonishing, and remarkable moments in once life, which will live in the heart and minds of the trekkers. The weather of Everest Base Camp is one of the most unpredictable elements that trekkers should know before making Everest Base Camp Trek in Nepal. In the spring season, the days are quite long as compared to other seasons in Nepal. Spring season is the season of blooming, where travellers can witness a variety of flowers are blooming on the way during their trekking. The blooming surrounding will add more excitements to your trek. Due to pleasant weather and moderate temperature, many trekkers or travellers prefer this season as an ideal season to explore Everest Base Camp in Nepal. In the April season of Everest Region, the temperature is moderate and keep increasing temperature in a day. In this month, there will be a maximum of 10 degree Celsius in a day while -10 degree Celsius at night. The month May is the end of the spring season, in which the maximum temperature is 15 degree Celsius in a day and -6 degree Celsius in a night. In this month the weather is warm and a bit humid in the Everest Region of Nepal. In this month the possibilities of rainfall are quite impossible, even though sometime there might be rainfall in the ending part of the season. Is spring the best time to explore Everest Base Camp? Spring season is one of the best times to explore Everest Base Camp in Nepal. In this season, there will be relatively less precipitation in the Everest Region of Nepal, where trekkers will get a golden opportunity to have a stunning view of mountains during their trekking days. The weather is clear and the environment is so pleasing that everywhere they can witness blooming flowers along the side of trekking trail which will add more excitements and energy to trek in the higher altitude of Everest Base Camp. So, most of the trekkers make spring season as their ideal season to explore and trek in the Everest Region of Nepal. Summer seasons consists of three months of the year that include June, July, and August. Many trekkers around the world prefer to trek in the summer seasons. While talking about the weather in this season is very clear to have amazing scenery of the Himalayas from the Everest Base Camp and during the trekking days. Considering temperature in this season is too hot, even though frequent rain makes the lower part of the trail muddy, slippery and wet. In this season, days quite longer and nights are shorter as compared to other seasons of Nepal. Due to heavy downpour environment in the Everest Region of Nepal, most of the trekkers don’t desire to make their vacation trip. While talking about the weather and temperature of this season, the season is less preferred because weather is foggy and there will be greater chances of covering stunning views of the Himalayas by cloud. The visibility of the Himalayas is quite difficult in this season. In June the temperature will be 16-degree Celsius maximum in a day while -1 degree Celsius in the night. In June and August months, the temperature is slightly different, in a day there will be 15 degree Celsius while -2 degree Celsius in a night. If you are peace lover and eager to make trekking vacation towards the world highest peak (Everest Base Camp), then this season is perfect for you. Usually, the summer season is considered as an off-season to make Everest Base Camp trek in Nepal. If you are a keen lover of solitude and desire to discount for Everest Base Camp trek package then this season is the perfect time to make our vacation trip to Everest Base Camp in Nepal. In this season, sometime there may be occasional interruptions in Everest Base Camp trek in Everest Region of Nepal due to uncertain rainfall. In such a case, Frolic Adventure will extend extra days in your itinerary of Everest Base Camp Trek. In this season, early morning there will be clear whether that is why trekkers should trek early in the morning to have clear and amazing views of the Himalayas. You have to follow some instructions of your guide. Autumn seasons consists of three months of the year that include September, October, and November. Many trekkers around the world prefer to trek in the Autumn seasons. While talking about the weather in this season is very clear to have amazing scenery of the Himalayas from the Everest Base Camp and during the trekking days. Considering temperature in this season is not too cold nor too hot. Due to perfect temperature and weather, Everest Base Camp trek is mostly crowded in this season because most of the trekkers come to visit and make their trekking destination. In this season, some trekker may not prefer to trek Everest Base Camp who really loves peace and calm environment. In this season, the temperature of Everest Base Camp is 15 degree Celsius in a day and 2 degree Celsius in the night. The month of September is the beginning of the autumn and end of the summer season in Nepal. In this season, there will be unpredictable weather, wherein most of the case the temperature will be 15 degree Celsius in a day and 2 degree Celsius in a night in the Everest Region of Nepal. Most of the trekkers preferred to trek in the month of October because in this month the temperature is maximum 12 degree Celsius in a day and -9 degree Celsius at a night. The month November comes at the end of the autumn and the beginning of winter in Nepal. In this month, the temperature will be slightly moderate, where the temperature will be maximum 6 degree Celsius in a day and -15 degree Celsius in a night. So, trekkers should have proper gear such as sleeping bag and warm clothes while trekking in this month to Everest Base Camp trek in Nepal. This month, you can breathtaking views of the Himalayas and Everest Base Camp in high definition. Autumn season is best known for its stable and clear weather and not too cold and not too hot temperature. Due to great and clear-cut visibility of the stunning Himalaya ranges, most of the trekkers prefer to make their vacation trip in the autumn season to explore the world highest peak (Everest Base Camp) in the world. In this season, there will be excessive crowed due to the numbers of trekker in the Everest Region of Nepal. This season may not be ideal for those trekkers who love peace environment during their trek to Everest Base Camp. Winter season consists of the month December, January, and February, which are the coldest season of the year in Nepal. This season falls between after autumn and before spring. In this season, the days are shorter and the nights are longer as compared to another season of the year in Nepal. In this season, most of the trekking trail of Everest Base Camp is dry and the temperature is bearable in the low altitude of trekking trail. In the Everest Region, the average temperature range around 20 degree Celsius in a day and -17 degree Celsius in a night. At night, you might experience freezing cold, so you have to care about proper gear before going for trekking to Everest Region in this season. As compared to another season in Nepal, Winter season is a least preferred season because, at the higher altitude, there will be heavy snowfall which will make your trekking quite challenging as well as tough in Everest Base Camp trek in Nepal. The weathers and temperatures of the Everest Region in Nepal are varying according to the seasons. Although all seasons are perfect for Everest Base Camp trek, trekkers should know which season is the best suit for them to explore Everest Bas Camp. By looking above mention weather and temperature data, you can organize your vacation trip and pack all the essential gears according to the seasons.
0.970297	To ask the Scottish Government what (a) discussions or (b) meetings it has had in 2017 with onshore petroleum exploration and development licence owners regarding its position on unconventional oil and gas. No meetings or discussions have taken place in 2017 between the Scottish Government and onshore petroleum exploration and development licence owners regarding its position on unconventional oil and gas. No fracking or drilling for coal bed methane can take place in Scotland as a result of the moratorium this Government has put in place.
0.999998	A GOOD friend of long ago was Puskie Farrar, whose grandfather was my grandfather's tentmate in the Civil War. My grandfather thought so much of Puskie's grandfather that he named a son for him - my father was Franklin Farrar Gould. So I've known all the Farrars since my beginnings, and many were the tales of derring-do those tentmates passed along to both families. In 1925, I had an automobile, and at my grandfather's request I drove him and Frankie Farrar, with three other GAR veterans, to the last regimental reunion of the 16th Maine Volunteers - these five were the only members left. Probably no other Model T ever carried such precious cargo - at the first day of Gettysburg the 16th Maine had been reduced from a full regiment to 37 survivors. Puskie Farrar now comes to mind because of an incident in our upstate Maine town of Corinna. It seems the driver of a school bus is in trouble because she refuses to stop before taking her busload of tots over a railroad crossing. Her reason, which the authorities had not accepted at my last hearing, is that the railroad ceased to operate some years back, and there has been no train for a long time. The right-of-way has grown to weeds and bushes, and tarmac has been laid over the rails in the highway. True, the tracks run right through the heart of town, and it would be a poor place to have an incident, but the bus driver remarks that in today's situation, at that place, it is safer to keep going than to stop. The tracks through Corinna were a branch line of the Maine Central Railroad, leading into the sturdy scenery of Piscataquis County and toward Moosehead Lake, but the Maine Central Railroad, once Maine's largest, ceased to exist some time ago, and before it sold out had methodically abandoned its side-shoots. Except for moldy tracks across Corinna's village, there is nothing there today to remind of the golden era of steam choo-choos, chime whistles, and brakemen who, like Diogenes, swung lanterns in daylight and called, ``All aboard!'' There hasn't been a train since Hector was a pup, and probably no school tot in Corinna ever heard a train blow for a crossing. But drivers of school buses are required to stop before crossing any railroad tracks. That was somewhat Puskie's lament. I should interpolate, for the sake of giving this essay some class, that one of the more remote members of Puskie's family was the operatic soprano Geraldine Farrar, but since she pronounced it ``far-RAW'' rather than ``far-rer,'' Puskie didn't know she was a relative. Puskie had been driving around in the field behind his house, and had circled the high school building several hundred times, so he had no qualms about being examined. He turned right when told to do so, and left when told to do so, and he did everything right and finally got back to the place of beginning where the inspector said, ``Park!'' Puskie parked. The next day the superintendent of schools was notified that Puskie had failed to pass the test. He was not eligible for the job. The superintendent of schools at that time wasn't too hot on education, but he knew his way around in a cow trade, and he thought highly of the Farrar family, so he put up a howl, and it came out that Puskie had failed to stop before two railroad crossings. ``It's the law!'' explained the superintendent. ``Ain't got any railroad crossings,'' corrected the superintendent. After a good deal of give-and-take over this nonsense, the state authorities decided that a bus driver who didn't have any railroad crossings didn't have to stop at them, so Puskie drove his route for years and he never stopped at any railroad crossings and he never got hit by a train. Admittedly, the situation in Corinna is different, because there they still have a railroad crossing that, in bygone times, school buses recognized. The fact that no trains come is hardly an issue. But one moral might be that the same government that demands respect for obsolete law is the same government that can make an obsolete railroad take up its innocuous desuetudes. Colorado family killed in Amtrak crash: How common are railroad-crossing collisions?
0.992082	Exercise #7: "Nag, Nag, Nag" Another dialogue exercise. In the airport, standing in line for check-in, she nags him - or he nags her; whichever you prefer. Write the scene using both description and dialogue. What happens when they get to the head of the line? ....."Did you turn off the coffee pot this morning?" Melanie asked, her brow furrowed. ....."Yes," her husband, Eric, said with a roll of his eyes. ....."What? I'm just making sure that we tied all of our loose ends," she said. "I mean, if we left the coffee pot on, we could be short one house and a whole lot of other things in a matter of hours." ....."Right..." he said. The person 2 people in front of them was called up to the desk. Why are these people so damned slow? They had been standing in the line for over an hour, and they seemed to be moving at a glacial pace. So much for arriving early. ....."What about the alarm?" she asked. "Did you set it on our way out?" .....Eric stared at her incredulously. "I thought you got it." .....Melanie's eyes widen in disbelief. "No!" she practically screamed. "I didn't! I told you --" .....Eric couldn't hold a straight face anymore. A loud guffaw escaped from his lips, and he was suddenly enveloped in the throes of laughter, unable to control himself. .....Melanie looked around the airport in embarrassment, mouthing "I'm sorry" to anyone who seemed to take notice of Eric's obviously raucous and inappropriate behavior. In other news, I'm beginning to realize that the school year is creeping up on me again. No, no, no, no, no. I hate school. I'm tired of it. I'm glad I had this little respite to recharge, but I'm so afraid that I'm going to show up on the first day and immediately get bogged down with homework and responsibilities that all of the work I've done in unwinding myself this summer is going to be positively moot. Oi gewald (pronounced ge-VALT... It's yiddish. Thanks, Mo.). Let's hope it turns out to be even in the slightest way helpful. Also, I kind of had a snapping point today. I like to tell people that I'm thick-skinned, that I don't hurt easily, but the truth is that I'm terribly sensitive (Ask my boyfriend; he'll back me up 100% on this one.). I try not to take things so seriously, but I have a really hard time keeping that wall up. I had one for so long (and it was pretty amazingly thick), but it wasn't healthy. I mean, in the end, I turned up depressed and, all in all, a shell of a person. So what did all of this work this past year accomplish? The wall was destroyed, brick by brick (even though I still have some habits of self preservation... but who doesn't have a few of those up his or her sleeve?), but I feel so much more... vulnerable, so unprotected. My voice teacher brought up a good point this past semester. When I approach a situation, I throw my whole self into it. There's no middle ground for me; either all in or none at all. That got me hurt more times than I can count, but I couldn't stop myself from diving in when I got excited. So what's the next course of action that will help protect me from being hurt? Yep. A big fat wall. Goodie. Anyways, I spent the last year removing that, so now I'm just overly sensitive to everything. Every sarcastic remark, every time someone says they're going to be somewhere and then they don't show up, etc. I didn't used to be like that. I used to roll with the punches, return the sarcastic comment with a witty retort. I liked that about myself. So now... I guess I'm just trying to find that middle ground, that happy medium. Well, I have a life to live.
0.999158	iPhone music production: has it become viable for small-time musicians? In a word, "Yes!" In light of my recent post: Your phone is the key to tripling your efforts in life - I have been mulling over whether music production can be done solely on an iPhone (Android is not there yet). As a way of putting my money where my mouth is, I'm hoping to prove that it is. But why not rather consider the iPad? My theory is that we can triple our time management efforts in life by squeezing those ten minute waits before meetings, or that little walk to a shop during your business day or waiting in your car for your wife to buy new dummies for your kid (I'm doing that now!). The iPad, while very mobile, is not up for discussion here. It's the compact device like the iPhone that will make our time management more effective. But I will say that the iPad, with the new version of Auria is pretty amazing for music production. I have been using GarageBand for iPhone for a while now and it really has grown up! Audiobus: Currently there are many great effects and instrument apps available for iPhone and iPad. Audiobus allows you to connect those apps in a signal chain scenario. So you can have an instrument playing through an effects chain into GarageBand, or you can play or sing through an effects chain and record it. Unfortunately there is no way of routing your GarageBand track through effects units so you can tweak, for example, your vocal reverb after you have recorded it. But there are ways to work around that, if you want to perfect that lead vocal sound in the mix. But with a little effort, you'll do just fine the way it is. IK Multimedia: As far as specifically iPhone music is concerned, IK Multimedia is your one stop shop for hardware and software. With an excellent acoustic guitar tone app, multiple electric guitar apps, a vocal app with pitch correction and doubling, you're hard pressed to find a better selection of sounds. Also, they've developed a professional mastering preset app called the Lurssen Mastering Console. Which, after some listening, is quite spectacular, albeit a bit pricey. AUFX series: AUFX have released a series of independent effects apps to allow you to run your effects chain like you would in Logic or ProTools (although, as mentioned, you won't have them editable after you've recorded). I used their reverb app for about a year as an outboard effect at live shows, and it worked incredibly well. But their sounds really find their voice in the recording space. JamUp by BIAS Amps: BIAS amps released a basic version of their desktop modelling software called JamUp and JamUp pro. This is also a very good modelling option and rivals IK Multimedia's offering in terms of varied sounds and a great selection of stompboxes. Conclusion: It's still not able to replace a desktop studio environment, but it's getting damned close! I will still import to Logic Pro to tweak the Apple Drummer, perfect my vocals and overall mix, but essentially, you could do it all on your phone. The Lurssen Mastering Console, although "pricey" (not in comparison to sending it off to Abbey Road!) is the final nail in the "iPhone can do it all" hypothesis. The biggest limitation is not being able to tweak effects once you've used them to record an audio track (although GarageBand does have Reverb and Echo available with that capability). You could work around this by buying the mixing console feature in one of the IK Multimedia apps, import your song without the track in question, and then record it there (be it vocals or electric). Once you have a satisfactory take, you could play with the effects until you feel they're sitting well in the mix, and then save that track independently. All in all, I'd say it's fair to say you can go ahead and start all your audio projects on your phone, and you'd be surprised to see how much of it remains in the final mix. And for new comers to home recording, it's safe to say you should get an audio interface that is iPhone/iPad compatible because it's probably your best starting point.
0.940438	Star Trek Deep Space 99 space station. Deep Space Nine (DS9) is a fictional space station in the science fiction television series Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. The station serves as a base for the exploration of the Gamma Quadrant via the Bajoran wormhole, and is a hub of trade and travel for the sector's denizens. It is run by a joint crew of Starfleet and Bajoran officers, and it is the home port of a number of Starfleet runabouts and the USS Defiant. The station and its crew play a vital role to the events surrounding the Bajoran sector, the wormhole, and the Dominion War. Deep Space Nine, over a kilometer in diameter, is composed of a broad outer docking ring; an inner habitat ring containing residences; and a central core containing the promenade, the fusion reactors, and the operations center, known as "ops". Three sets of docking pylons sweep up and down equidistantly around the docking ring, defining a spherical shape. It is of identical design to Empok Nor. In its current position at the mouth of the wormhole, the station is three hours away from Bajor by shuttle. Originally a Cardassian mining and refinery station named "Terok Nor" in orbit around Bajor, it was built by slave Bajoran labor under Cardassian rule in 2351. The station was commanded by Gul Dukat, the last Cardassian prefect of Bajor. It was abandoned toward the end of the Cardassian occupation of Bajor in 2369; the Cardassians removed anything of value on their way out. In 2369, the Bajorans assumed control of the station. The Bajoran provisional government requested the assistance of the United Federation of Planets, who renamed it Deep Space Nine (DS9) and placed Commander Benjamin Sisko in command. Despite the Federation presence, the station remains subject to Bajoran law. Shortly after Sisko assumes command, his crew discovers the Bajoran wormhole. The station is moved to the mouth of the wormhole to secure Bajor's claim to it, after which the station assumes great commercial, scientific and strategic importance. After the encounter with the Dominion in 2371 and owing to other volatile conditions, the station is retrofitted and heavily armed. The station's full complement of weaponry includes 5,000 photon torpedoes, several phaser banks, and shields that extend 300 meters around the station. These upgrades are first used against the Klingons in their offensive against Cardassia in early 2372. At the beginning of the Dominion War in late 2373, the station is temporarily lost to the Dominion. In early 2374, Federation and Klingon forces retake it after the Battle of Bajor. Aside from a failed Bajoran military coup, the Dominion's occupation, and a brief leave of absence from late 2374 to early 2375, Sisko, promoted to captain in 2371, remains in command of Deep Space Nine. In late 2375, at the end of the Dominion War, Colonel Kira Nerys assumes command. 1/12, 1/18, 1/24, 1/43 scale Star Trek Deep Space 9 Diecast models from all the top manufacturers including AutoArt, Maisto, Bauer, Bburago, Minichamps, Motor Max, GMP, Road Legends, Motor City Classics, UT Models, ERTL, Kyosho, Signature Models, Precision Miniatures, Sun Star, First Gear, Exoto, Hotwheels, Welly, Highway 61,Greenlight, Jada Toys, Johnny Lightning, Ricko, Revell, Shelby Collectables.
0.999999	Translation:There is a park in the city. " The city has a park. " ? The city in your sentence is the subject, so it's grammatically different even though the meaning is the same.
0.933426	Mention the word ‘Komodo’, and dragons will probably be the first thing that springs to mind, but Komodo National Park and Marine Reserve is also an enticing hub for SCUBA divers in search of marine life, from large pelagic animals to tiny marine critters. Geographically Indonesia is at the meeting point of some of the world’s greatest seismic activity between the Eurasian-Australian continental plates and the Pacific-Philippine Sea oceanic plates. The waters here are subject to some of the strongest currents in the world as tidal changes are channeled between the Pacific Ocean and the Indian Ocean. As part of the so-called Coral Triangle, which supports three quarters of all known coral species, and several thousand species of coral reef fish, the highly nutritious water sustains some of the richest marine biodiversity on earth. In the Komodo Marine Park, the warmer Flores Sea converging with the cooler water of the Sumba Strait provides perfect conditions for growth of a rich planktonic soup, nourishing a vast variety of marine life, and it is this biodiversity that makes SCUBA diving one of the main focuses of tourism in the area. While there are plenty of sheltered dive sites for inexperienced divers, or those who just don’t like currents, most of the diving here requires a lot of experience and an Advanced Diver qualification, with more than 50 logged dives. With dive sites referred to as “Torpedo Alley”, ‘Shotgun” and “Rodeo Rock” the challenging topography and extreme currents promise some exhilarating diving. The unique Komodo dragons, found only on the Indonesian islands of Komodo, Rinca and Padar, have been declared a vulnerable species. The largest of the monitor lizard family, they can grow to over 3m in length and weigh more than 70kg. They have a fearsome reputation as hunters and killers, preying on wild buffalo, deer, goat and wild pigs, as well as making cannibalistic attacks on their own offspring, indeed newly hatched dragons spend their first few years of life hiding in trees in order to avoid being eaten by their parents. It had long been thought that animals bitten by Komodo dragons would succumb to bacterial infections of their wounds, but it now seems likely that dragon saliva contains venom and anticoagulants which eventually leads to the death of the victim. In order to protect the worlds largest lizard, Komodo and the surrounding islands Rinca and Padar were declared a national park in 1980. This was soon extended to include the surrounding marine area and part of Flores and in 1991 the National Park became a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Management of the park has encouraged Ecotourism; small scale, low impact, ecologically and socially responsible travel as a means both to educate visitors and raise sufficient funds to cover management and operational costs through entrance fees and tourism licenses. Locally however, there is still some controversy over park management from the local population who rely on fishing for their livelihood, and the illegal use of destructive fishing methods such as explosives and cyanide by local fishermen has damaged some areas of coral. Plastic debris and litter in the marine park is also a problem that needs to be addressed by the management strategy. We embarked the Indo Aggressor, a 37m, passenger yacht departing from Labuan Bajo on the island of Flores, our home for the next ten days as we explored the Park. If you’ve ever heard the expression ‘dive, eat, sleep, repeat’ that is what we did every day as we cruised around the islands in search of the best dive sites in the best conditions. Sightings of Mantas were high on everyone’s wish list and several of our dive sites were at locations where manta’s come regularly for feeding and cleaning. They are filter feeders, using the cephalic fins on the front of their head to channel water into their open mouth, sieving plankton from the water as they swim. In Indonesia, the majority of manta’s encountered are non migratory reef manatas; M.alfredi can reach 5.5m from wingtip to wingtip, but we were also lucky enough to meet one of the larger solitary oceanic species M.birostris which can have wingspans of 7m. Manta rays are both targeted by fishermen, and can also suffer injuries from fishing lines and nets as well as from boat propellers. As they take years to reach sexually maturity, an entire population can become threatened in a surprisingly short length of time. The Mantas were there from our first dive, circling around their chosen cleaning station, a retinue of butterfly fish nibbling away to remove dead skin or parasites. These enormous beasts swooped low over our heads completely disregarding our presence and allowing plenty of close up photography and video filming. We were lucky enough to find mantas on many of our dives, thanks to the detailed knowledge of the trip director and our skillful dive guides, but the first encounter with these beautiful beasts really set the scene for the whole trip. It wasn’t only the Manta’s that we were here to see, there were fish everywhere; enormous schools of yellow snappers, fusiliers and surgeon fish. Brightly coloured bannerfish, red toothed triggerfish, strikingly patterned clown triggerfish, nasty looking Titan triggerfish, midnight snappers, batfish, angelfish, lionfish to name but a few. In the open water giant trevally’s cruised by, along with barracuda, and the occasional shark. Mobula rays, blue spotted rays and eagle rays cruised the reef giving an impression of moving in slow motion, and one of the most remarkable things about all these fish was their size, all of them much larger than their counterparts elsewhere in the world. The corals were healthy, and the selection of critters impressive; nudibranchs and starfish of every colour, size and shape, mantis shrimps, harlequin shrimps, robust ghost pipefish, ornate ghost pipefish, pygmy seahorses, zebra crabs, tiny stuff to equal all the variety of the giants above. One dive brought the unexpected excitement of a pair of banded seasnakes weaving their waythrough the coral gardens. Green and hawksbill turtles were a common sight too, and inside almost any cavern you care to look in, juvenile nurse sharks and enormous lobsters. Scorpion fish, leaf scorpion fish, stonefish, Ambon scorpion fish and the rare rhinopia as well as the occasional frogfish were plentiful, although so perfectly camouflaged against the corals, not at all easy to spot. Night dives brought out even more interesting creatures, juvenile cuttlefish, squid, juvenile batfish, starry night octopus, giant molluscs emerged from their shells, while moray eels emerged from crevices to explore and crabs scuttled out from under rocks. It was an amazing expedition and we were looked after attentively by all the staff on board, from taking care of our equipment, to the luxurious accommodation and great food, the best kind of diving adventure you could ever ask for. Now, where can I see a sunfish? Posted in Photography, SCUBA, Sporty Stuff, Travel, WildlifeTagged Dragons, fantastic photos, fish, Indonesia, Komodo, Manta Ray, SCUBA, scuba diving, Travel, WildlifeBookmark the permalink. Zulfa and I just did a shorter trip through the Komodo National Park. I need to learn how to scuba dive. You shot some lovely photographs. Thanks Johan! I saw that you were in Komodo too, beautiful isn’t it?! You should definitely learn to scuba dive – cycling is great, but scuba is amazing! Take care!
0.999019	JOLIET – Two of Rich Green's illustrations are now on clocks being sold in three Chicago area Targets. Green's conceptions of Pinocchio and The Old Woman Who Lived on a Shoe are being featured on clocks made by Chicago Lighthouse Industries, which – according to its website – provides "industrial job training and continuous employment to people who are legally blind through the production of high-quality brand name consumer products." How Green's artwork wound up on these clocks is another story. After 17 years of working as a graphic designer for a company that developed software for the video editing industry, the company went through changes, leading Green to accept a severance package and focus on his true passion – illustration. A couple years ago and while taking classes at the Art Institute of Chicago, Green met Larry Broutman, a board member for Chicago Lighthouse. Broutman wanted to turn photographs of children who attended the Chicago Lighthouse preschool and other Chicago Lighthouse programs into illustrations for a children's book to benefit the organization, Green said. Long story short, Broutman approached Green about creating the illustrations, which Green was happy to do. The book is called "Chicago Treasure" and will be released in 2018. "I don't get paid to do the artwork on the books," Green said. "It all goes back to the Lighthouse." Green said he slightly modified the artwork's format to fit the round shape of the clock faces. He's hoping the clocks do well. "The idea is if they take off at those locations, they'll [Target] put them in more stores," Green said. In addition to the illustrations for Broutman, Green said he also illustrated three books for Joliet author Amy Logan. At the time Logan approached him, she already had self-published one book, but that illustrator was unavailable for the second one, Green said. "She gave me a test to see if I could draw the same characters in the same style," Green said. It's an understatement to say Green passed. In fact, his illustrations will soon be the only official illustrations in Logan's current books. Green has also illustrated the book "Niko & Kate" by author Fawn Michelle Goodman. Green also created "Hansel and Gretel," recent study into visual metaphor illustrations. He also participates in the Romeoville Art Society. Goal: "I'd love to get involved with a [traditional] publishing company through an art director. But the children's publishing industry is tough to break into. I found out about the Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators in 2014 and I joined up with the Chicago area network in 2014...I was recently asked to take over as the representative for that network. I coordinate the monthly meetings and I'll have the opportunity to be sent to the national conferences they have in New York and LA so I'll have a chance to meet the best in the industry and also book some of those people to come to our meetings." Medium: I do all my work digitally on the computer." Words of Wisdom: "What's been helpful for me is to be involved and put myself out there...take risks and share your artwork. You never know where it will lead." Read on to see where you can buy the clocks. The three Chicago area Target store locations currently carrying The Chicago Lighthouse clocks are: 1200 N. Larrabee St., Chicago; 2656 N. Elston, Chicago; and 601 S County Farm Road, Wheaton. For more information, visit chicagolighthouse.org.
0.993841	While clear water may signal an unhealthy ecosystem in some cases, it is not always the case. For example, many coral reefs are known for their clear waters and large biodiversity. However, when an external force acts to change the water clarity, either in fresh or salt water, it can hurt the environment. For example, the zebra mussel is an invasive species that is threatening many freshwater lakes and rivers. This creature filters algae and bacteria from the water for food, which can threaten the native fish population and upset the ecosystem. It is certainly true that crystal-clear water does not contain some things that are in cloudy water, and that some of those things are important for an ecosystem. On the other hand, some important components of seawater will not give it color--many solutes, such as salt, cleanly dissolve into water and become colorless. And not all things that make the water cloudy will be good for the wildlife. For example, oil spills are devastating to wildlife. In the end, it really comes down to what needs to be in the water for the local wildlife to thrive. Some of these things might give the water no color, and some of them might make it cloudy.
0.96487	The Qibla (Arabic: قِـبْـلَـة‎, "Direction", also transliterated as Qiblah, Qibleh, Kiblah, Kıble or Kibla), is the direction that should be faced when a Muslim prays during Ṣalāṫ (Arabic: صَـلَاة‎). It is fixed as the direction of the Kaaba in the Hejazi city of Mecca. Most mosques contain a wall niche that indicates the Qiblah, which is known as a miḥrâb (Arabic: مِـحْـرَاب‎). Most multifaith prayer rooms will also contain a Qibla, although usually less standardized in appearance than one would find within a mosque. Muslims all praying towards the same point is traditionally considered to symbolize the unity of the Ummah (Arabic: اُمَّـة‎, the community Muslims worldwide), under the Sharī‘ah (Arabic: شَـرِيْـعَـة‎, Law of God). The Qiblah also has importance beyond Salah, and plays a part in various ceremonies. The head of an animal that is slaughtered using Ḥalāl (Arabic: حَـلَال‎, 'Allowed') methods is usually aligned with the Qiblah. After death, Muslims are usually buried with the body at right angles to the Qibla and the face turned right towards the direction of the Qiblah. According to the traditional Muslim view, the Qiblah in the Islamic prophet Muhammad's time was originally the Noble Sanctuary in the city of Jerusalem, similar to Judaism. This Qiblah was used for over 13 years, from 610 CE until 623 CE. Seventeen months after Muhammad's 622 CE arrival in Medina – the date is given as 11 February 624 – the Qiblah became oriented towards the Kaaba in Mecca. According to traditional accounts from Muhammad's companions, the change happened very suddenly during the noon prayer in Medina, in a mosque now known as Masjid al-Qiblaṫayn (Arabic: مَـسْـجِـد الْـقِـبْـلَـتَـيْـن‎, "Mosque of the Two Qiblahs"). Muhammad was leading the prayer when he received revelations from God instructing him to take the Kaaba as the Qiblah (literally, "Turn then Thy face in the direction of the Sacred Mosque."). According to the traditional accounts contained in the hadith and sira, Muhammad, who had been facing Jerusalem, upon receiving this revelation, immediately turned around to face Mecca, and those praying behind him also did so. Some have claimed that the Qur'an does not identify or allude to Jerusalem as being the first Qiblah, and that the practice of facing Jerusalem is only mentioned in traditional biographies of Muhammad, or hadith collections. There is also disagreement as to when the practice started and for how long it lasted. Some sources say the Jerusalem Qiblah was used for a period of between sixteen and eighteen months. The Jewish custom of facing Jerusalem for prayer may have influenced the Muslim Qiblah. Others surmise that the use of Jerusalem as the direction of prayer was to either induce the Jews of Medina to convert to Islam or to "win over their hearts". When relations with the Jews soured, Muhammad changed the Qiblah towards Mecca. Another reason given why the Qiblah was changed is that Jews viewed the use of Jerusalem as signalling the Muslims' intention of joining their religion. It was changed to discredit this assumption. Others state that it was changed because Muhammad was angered by that city or its people, and not because of his conflict with the Jews. In Medieval times, Muslims travelling abroad used an astrolabe to find the Qiblah. Qibla, in addition to be compulsorily maintained while establishing salat, is also maintained by Muslims while supplicating. It is not righteousness that ye turn your faces Towards east or West; but it is righteousness- to believe in Allah and the Last Day, and the Angels, and the Book, and the Messengers; to spend of your substance, out of love for Him, for your kin, for orphans, for the needy, for the wayfarer, for those who ask, and for the ransom of slaves; to be steadfast in prayer, and practice regular charity; to fulfil the contracts which ye have made; and to be firm and patient, in pain (or suffering) and adversity, and throughout all periods of panic. Such are the people of truth, the Allah-fearing. The two moments in each year when the sun is directly overhead the Kaaba, the sun will indicate the direction of Mecca in all countries where it is visible. This happens on May 27 or May 28 at 9:18 GMT and on July 15 or July 16 at 9:27 GMT. Likewise there are two moments in each year when the Sun is directly over the antipodes of the Kaaba. This happens on January 12 or January 13 at 21:29 GMT and on November 28 at 21:09 GMT. On those dates, the direction of shadows in any sunlit place will point directly away from the Qiblah. Because the Earth is almost a sphere, this is almost the same as saying that the Qiblah from a place is the direction in which a bird would start flying in order to get to the Kaaba by the shortest possible way. The antipodes of the Kaaba is in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, in remote southern French Polynesia, some 35 mi (56 km) northeast of Tematangi atoll and 85 mi (137 km) west-northwest of Moruroa atoll. In contrast to the regular custom, there is a mosque which does not face the Qiblah. It is Cheraman Juma Masjid in the south Indian state of Kerala. Unlike other mosques in the south Indian state, it faces eastwards, instead of westwards to Mecca. Al-Ashraf's diagram of the compass and Qibla. From MS Cairo TR 105, copied in Yemen, 1293. Determining the direction of the Qiblah was a central issue and a constant generator of a scientific environment during the Islamic Golden Age, one that required both mathematics and observation. Muslim scientists who contributed works to determine the Qiblah direction from any point on the Earth's surface were: Al-Khawarizmi, Habash al-Hasib al-Marwazi, Al-Nayrizi, Al-Battani, Abū al-Wafā' Būzjānī, Ibn Yunus, Al-Sijzi, Abu Nasr Mansur, Ibn al-Haytham, Al-Biruni, Nasir al-Din al-Tusi, Ibn al-Shatir, and Al-Khalili, among others. The Yemeni Sultan al-Malik al-Ashraf described the use of the compass as a Qibla indicator in the 13th century. In a treatise about astrolabes and sundials, al-Ashraf includes several paragraphs on the construction of a compass bowl (ṭāsa). He then uses the compass to determine the north point, the meridian (khaṭṭ niṣf al-nahār), and the Qibla. This is the first mention of a compass in a medieval Islamic scientific text and its earliest known use as a Qibla indicator, although al-Ashraf did not claim to be the first to use it for this purpose. In recent years, Muslims from North America have used two rules to determine the direction of the Qiblah. According to spherical calculations, a Muslim praying from Anchorage, Alaska would pray almost due north if determining the Qiblah. However, when one looks at the world on most Mercator map projections, Mecca appears to be southwest of Anchorage. The shortest rhumb line (line of constant bearing) from most points in North America to Mecca will point toward the southeast, but the distance to Mecca along this route on the actual surface of the earth is longer than the great circle route. There are Muslim communities in North America who face toward the northeast, following the great circle route, and there are Muslim communities in North America who face toward the southeast according to traditional early Islamic methods including sighting the stars, sun, etc. Most Qiblah-calculating programs (see list below) use the great circle method and place the Qiblah northeast from most points in North America. In April 2006, Malaysian National Space Agency (Angkasa) sponsored a conference of scientists and religious scholars to address the issue of how the Qiblah should be determined when one is in orbit. The conference concluded that the astronaut should determine the location of the Qiblah "according to [their] capability". There have already been several Muslim astronauts, among them the very first being Prince Sultan bin Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud (1985), the latest being the first Muslim woman in space Anousheh Ansari (2006) and the Malaysian angkasawan (astronaut) Sheikh Muszaphar Shukor (2007). Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani has stated that one should face the direction of the Earth. This is part of the Malaysian document which recommends that the qibla should be 'based on what is possible' for the astronaut, and can be prioritized this way: 1) The Ka'aba 2) The projection of Ka'aba 3) The Earth 4) Wherever. ^ a b Hartsock, Ralph (2014-08-27). "The temple of Jerusalem: past, present, and future". Jewish Culture and History. 16 (2): 199–201. doi:10.1080/1462169X.2014.953832. ^ Hewson, Chris (March 1, 2012). "Multifaith Spaces: Objects". University of Manchester. Retrieved September 14, 2012. ^ a b c d William Montgomery Watt (7 February 1974). Muhammad: prophet and statesman. Oxford University Press. pp. 112–113. ISBN 978-0-19-881078-0. Retrieved 29 December 2011. ^ a b Tamar Mayer; Suleiman Ali Mourad (2008). Jerusalem: idea and reality. Routledge. p. 87. Retrieved 5 October 2010. ^ a b c Yohanan Friedmann (2003). Tolerance and coercion in Islam: interfaith relations in the Muslim tradition. Cambridge University Press. p. 31. Retrieved 5 October 2010. ^ a b Britannica; Dale Hoiberg; Indu Ramchandani (2000). Students' Britannica India. Popular Prakashan. p. 224. Retrieved 5 October 2010. ^ Winterburn, Emily (2005). "Using an Astrolabe". muslimheritage.com. Retrieved 6 May 2016. ^ "World's second oldest mosque is in India". Bahrain tribune. Archived from the original on 2006-07-06. ^ Moussa, Ali (2011). "Mathematical Methods in Abū al-Wafāʾ's Almagest and the Qibla Determinations". Arabic Sciences and Philosophy. Cambridge University Press. 21 (1). doi:10.1017/S095742391000007X. ^ Savage-Smith, Emilie (1988). "Gleanings from an Arabist's Workshop: Current Trends in the Study of Medieval Islamic Science and Medicine". Isis. 79 (2): 246–266 . doi:10.1086/354701. ^ "Question & Answer - Qibla" ^ Di Justo, Patrick (26 September 2007). "A Muslim Astronaut's Dilemma: How to Face Mecca From Space". Wired. Retrieved 25 May 2015. King, David (2005). "The Sacred Geography of Islam". In Koetsier, Teun; Bergmans, Luc (eds.). Mathematics and the Divine: A Historical Study (1st ed.). Amsterdam: Elsevier Science. pp. 161–178. ISBN 0-444-50328-5. King, David A. (1999). World maps for finding the direction and distance to Mecca : innovation and tradition in Islamic science. Islamic philosophy, theology, and science. Brill Academic Publishers. ISBN 90-04-11367-3. Wikimedia Commons has media related to Qibla. Wikisource has the text of the 1905 New International Encyclopedia article Kiblah. This page was last edited on 23 April 2019, at 14:40 (UTC).
0.976369	Character Customization - Bone Parenting Error? Hi, I'm trying to make character customization for my RPG. I have a character, that I deleted all parts of except the head. So they have an animated skeleton, but nothing on it. I have heads, and armor, with a matching skeleton (minus the parts that weren't needed, hair didn't need arms or legs) that I parent to the main skeleton, to have customization. So for the hair, the prefab had parts from my FBX export, like sun, camera, lamp (via blender). I deleted these, and am now receiving the following error: [mecanim]: BindSkeleton: cannot find Transform 'Sun' For every part that I deleted. I was told to set the animation type, for the hair import, to None. Number of bind poses doesn't match number of bones in skinned mesh. SkinnedMeshRenderer requires a mesh with skinning or blendshape information. I have no idea what to do. The hair seems to be "upset" about how I deleted the camera and leftovers from the blender export inside it. How can I fix this?
0.999999	On September 10th, Tencent AI Lab announced that it will open the "Tencent ML-Images" project at the end of September. The project consists of the multi-label image dataset ML-Images, and the highest precision depth residual in the industry's current deep learning model. The network ResNet-101 is composed. The image dataset ML-Images released by Tencent AI Lab contains 18 million images and more than 11,000 common object categories. The largest multi-label image dataset in the industry is large enough to meet the needs of general scientific research institutions and small and medium-sized enterprises. scenes to be used. In addition, Tencent AI Lab will provide ResNet-101, a deep residual network based on ML-Images training. The model has excellent visual representation and generalization performance, and has the highest precision in the current model in the industry. It will provide strong support for visual tasks including images, videos, etc., and help image classification, object detection, object tracking, semantics. Improvement in technical level such as segmentation. 1) A method of constructing a large-scale multi-label image data set, including an image source, an image candidate category set, a category semantic relationship, and an image annotation. During the construction of ML-Images, the team took advantage of the category semantic relationships to help accurately mark the images. 2) Training method based on ML-Images for deep neural networks. The team's well-designed loss function and training method can effectively suppress the negative impact of category imbalance in large-scale multi-label datasets on model training. 3) The ResNet-101 model based on ML-Images training has excellent visual representation and generalization performance. Through migration learning, the model achieved 80.73% top-1 classification accuracy on the ImageNet validation set, exceeding the accuracy of Google's homogeneous model (migration learning mode), and it is worth noting that ML-Images is only JFT-300M. About 1/17. This fully demonstrates the effectiveness of ML-Images' quality and training methods. Compare the table below in detail. “Tencent ML-Images”, the deep learning model of the project, has played an important role in many of Tencent's business, such as “image quality evaluation and recommendation function”. Since 2016, Tencent has released its open source project (https://github.com/Tencent) on GitHub for the first time. Currently, it has accumulated 57 projects covering the fields of artificial intelligence, mobile development, and small programs. To further contribute to the open source community, Tencent has joined Hyperledger, LF Networking and the Open Network Foundation, and has become a founding member of the LF Deep Learning Foundation and a Platinum Member of the Linux Foundation. As Tencent's “Open” strategy is reflected in the technical field, Tencent Open Source will continue to promote technology research and development to share, reuse and open source, release Tencent's research and development capabilities, provide technical support for domestic and foreign open source communities, and inject research and development. vitality.
0.964731	The band's membership has seen much turnover, including a revolving cast of drummers in the 1970s, and the temporary departure of singer Rob Halford in the early 1990s. The current line-up consists of Halford, guitarists Glenn Tipton and Richie Faulkner, bassist Ian Hill, and drummer Scott Travis. The band's best-selling album is 1982's Screaming for Vengeance with their most commercially successful line-up, featuring Halford, Tipton, Hill, guitarist K. K. Downing, and drummer Dave Holland. Tipton and Hill are the only two members of the band to appear on every album. Their influence, while mainly Halford's operatic vocal style and the twin guitar sound of Downing and Tipton, has been adopted by many bands. Their image of leather, spikes, and other taboo articles of clothing were widely influential during the glam metal era of the 1980s. The Guardian referred to British Steel as the record that defines heavy metal. Despite a decline in exposure during the mid 1990s, the band has once again seen a resurgence, including worldwide tours, being inaugural inductees into the VH1 Rock Honors in 2006, receiving a Grammy Award for Best Metal Performance in 2010, and their songs featured in video games such as Guitar Hero and the Rock Band series. K. K. Downing and bassist Ian Hill had known each other since early childhood, as they lived near one another and attended the same nursery and school in West Bromwich. They became close friends in their early teens, when they shared similar musical interests (Jimi Hendrix, The Who, Cream, The Yardbirds) and learned to play instruments. The band was founded in 1969 in Birmingham, England, United Kingdom, after a local ensemble named Judas Priest (after Bob Dylan's song "The Ballad of Frankie Lee and Judas Priest" from the John Wesley Harding album) split up. The band's singer, Al Atkins, approached Downing and Hill, who were playing as a power trio with drummer John Ellis, and asked if he could become their singer. With Atkins now in the band, Downing suggested they change their name to Judas Priest as he had been a fan of the original band. Later, in 1973, Rob Halford and drummer John Hinch joined to replace Atkins and Campbell, respectively. A second guitarist, Glenn Tipton, was also added to the line-up in 1974 as compensation for their record company's (Gull Records) suggestion to add a horn section to the first album, Rocka Rolla. Downing and Tipton's harmonised guitar lines were not particularly common at the time, but became a trademark for the group and would inspire other bands such as Metallica, Iron Maiden and Megadeth to do the same. It is now a standard feature of many heavy metal bands and appears in many of metal's sub-genres. The band featuring Halford, Downing, Tipton and Hill would go on to record 14 albums from 1974 through to 1990. Their second album, Sad Wings of Destiny (released in 1976), is considered one of the most influential metal albums along with Black Sabbath's self-titled début. Priest went through a considerable number of drummers between their formation and 1980 when Dave Holland joined and stayed until 1988's Ram It Down, and this is arguably the inspiration for Spinal Tap's misfortune with drummers. Racer X drummer Scott Travis joined the band to record 1990's Painkiller album and has been with the band ever since. 1980 saw Priest release perhaps their most famous album, British Steel, which featured a more focused and sleek approach to metal than previous efforts. This, coupled with catchy, fist-pumping riffs and memorable vocal melodies ensured the band a string of consecutive platinum selling albums. Fans were slightly disillusioned with 1986's Turbo, which featured electronic drums and synthesised guitars, but the band were still selling out arenas worldwide. Halford left the group in 1993, going in a new direction with his new, short-lived metal band, Fight and, later, 2wo. He began a successful solo career with his own self-titled band in 1999. With Halford gone, the future looked bleak for the band, but after numerous searches for a suitable replacement, they found something special in tribute band front man Tim "Ripper" Owens. This story forms the basic plot of the movie "Rock Star," which was originally to be completely about Judas Priest and the Ripper, titled "Metal God," but the script was altered after the failure to reach an agreement with the band. Judas Priest recorded 4 albums with Owens (2 studio, 2 live records) which were greeted with mixed reactions from fans. In 2003, the Judas Priest's 1990 line-up was restored when Rob Halford returned to the group after rekindling the relationship during work on Judas Priest's 4-CD career retrospective "Metalogy." In 2004 the band played Ozzfest and released a CD of new studio material entitled Angel of Retribution and an accompanying live DVD in 2005, enjoying a successful world tour that year. After an emotional reunion, extensive tour and new studio album, the band released a follow-up album in June 2008, entitled Nostradamus. Unusually for Priest, this album was a double CD and was their first conceptual album; based upon the life and predictions of Nostradamus, which instilled a mixed reaction among fans. In 2011, KK Downing announced his retirement. The band itself stated that their next world tour, Epitaph, would be their last. Downing's replacement is the former guitarist for Steve Harris's daughter, Lauren Harris. The new guitarist was born in 1980 when Judas Priest was on the British Steel tour. His name is Richie Faulkner. In July 2014, Judas Priest released album Redeemer of Souls. This was the first Judas Priest studio album not to feature KK Downing, and instead feature Richie Faulkner. The album was received with much success, and Ian Hill named it Priest's best album yet. Later in 2014, Judas Priest embarked on their Redeemer of Souls world tour, and are due to play Download Festival in June 2015. In October 2017, Judas Priest, along with 18 other artists, were announced as nominees for the 2018 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, but lost to Bon Jovi. They later announced their eighteenth album Firepower, which was released on 9 March 2018 with a world tour taking place thereafter, beginning in North America with Saxon and Black Star Riders as their support acts. On 12 February 2018, Glenn Tipton revealed that he had Parkinson's disease, with which he was first diagnosed in 2008, and would step down from touring. According to the band, the disease's progression left him unable to play the more challenging material. Tipton stated that he was still a member of the band despite his diagnosis and did not rule out future on-stage appearances. Sneap was then announced as his replacement for the tour. Faulkner later assured fans that Tipton would perform with the band "at some point in the tour."When speaking to Long Island Pulse in March 2018, Faulkner said that there had been "no discussions yet" on whether Judas Priest would continue without Tipton or not, with Halford disregarding any talks of retirement. At the 20 March 2018 show in Newark, New Jersey, Tipton joined the band on stage to perform "Metal Gods", "Breaking the Law" and "Living After Midnight". He then made more appearances thereafter. On 23 April 2018, Judas Priest were announced as co-headliners with Deep Purple as they would tour North America from late August to late September 2018.
0.980389	Carol: Uh-oh. My babysitter canceled for tonight. Dilbert: Too bad. Carol: Hey, I have an idea. Do you like kids? Dilbert: I will not watch your kids tonight. Carol: I was going to ask you to adopt them. Dilbert: Absolutely not. The best I can do is watch them tonight.
0.999995	Make the sentence negative: They've got 2 dogs and 3 cats. They HAVEN'T GOT 2 dogs and 3 cats. Make this sentence negative: My uncle is American. Make this sentence negative: I was very busy yesterday. I WASN'T very busy yesterday. Make this sentence negative: My dog loves bones. My dog DOESN'T LOVE bones. Make this sentence negative: He heard the bells. He DIDN'T HEAR the bells. Make this sentence negative: He saw a shark in the sea. He DIDN'T SEE a shark in the sea. Make this sentence negative: I'm going to see the family this weekend. I'M NOT GOING TO SEE my family next weekend. DO/DOES/DID/WAS/WERE: ....... your friend like reggaeton? DO/DOES/DID/WAS/WERE: ....... your cousins at home yesterday? DO/DOES/DID/WAS/WERE: ........ your cat happy to see you? DO/DOES/DID/WAS/WERE: ........ you at home last Friday? DO/DOES/DID/WAS/WERE: Where ....... your father yesterday? DO/DOES/DID/WAS/WERE: What ...... you do last Christmas holiday? COMPARATIVES & SUPERLATIVES: The high speed train is ........ (good) to travel from Barcelona to Madrid. COMPARATIVES & SUPERLATIVES: Mary is ........ (tall) Jane. COMPARATIVES & SUPERLATIVES: A plane is .......(fast) a high speed train.
0.990856	What in everyone's opinion is the best representation for a time-bound hierarchy in SQL? The generic nature is most important (forming just one part of a generic relational mode), combined with ease of use for driving report (for any part of the tree across any range of dates) and the ability to be updated reliably. There are several different books of relevance here - one set is for 'temporal databases', and the other for 'hierarchical structures in RDBMS'. Date, Darwen and Lorentzos "Temporal Data and the Relational Model" Celko "Joe Celko's Trees and Hierarchies in SQL for Smarties" The other items are, if not straight-forward, then manageable using the techniques outlined in the books, and along the lines suggested in other answers. Part of the problem is understanding what those two bullet points mean. In one sense, they are 'the same'; the 'whole hierarchy' is just a special case of 'whole sub-trees'. But the deeper question is 'how do you want to demonstrate - visualize, represent - the changes in the hierarchy over time?' Are you seeking to compare the states at the start and end times, or are you seeking to see the intermediate changes too? How do you want to represent the moves of an individual within a hierarchy? More questions than answers - but I hope the pointers are some help. A couple of flat tables can work here. For each row, we need columns ID, Name, ParentID, and InactivatedDatetime (which defaults to null). Set the datetime for the old Doc belonging to Joe indicating that that record is no longer valid and move it off to an archive table (for cleanliness), and then create a new row (a near copy of the original row) for a new Doc with Moe's ID as the ParentID. The drawback with this approach is that the person being moved must get a new ID, which may not be convenient. I can think of a couple of reasonable solutions, depending on how your data is being used and how it changes. Any time the hierarchy changes, you add a new row to the history table. 2) If any/all of the hierarchies are of equal importance, I'd store a base line hierarchy and then implement a hierarchy transaction table. This structure represents a network instead of a plain hierarchy but it supports moving things in a hierarchy but also look back in time. Some things need to be checked in application logic is to disallow joe being linked at different places in the hierarchy at the sametime. Other details can be related to item or even item link if it is to specify additional data on the relation.
0.940694	The Paradox of Our Age, a short but powerful essay credited to the present Dalai Lama, is widely available in Ladakh in northern India, a region known as 'Little Tibet'. The text ends with the observation that: 'These are times of fast foods but slow digestion/Tall men but short characters/Steep profits but shallow relationships/It’s a time when there is much in the window but nothing in the room'. Tibetan Buddhism is widely viewed as an appealing alternative to materialistic Western society, so, not surprisingly, The Paradox of Our Age is widely circulated on the internet and Twitter - see photo tweet below. I bought The Paradox of Our Age on an exquisitely printed little scroll in the Tibetan refugee market in the regional capital of Leh, where I had travelled overland from Delhi in July to observe the Kalachakra teachings given by the Dalai Lama. My accompanying photos capture that intensely moving spiritual event; but they also capture a great spiritual tradition that, as I discovered, has itself become a paradox of our age. Ladakh is in the disputed Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir. It borders on what has been known as the Tibet Autonomous Region of China since the 1949 invasion, and the region is politically sensitive due to its proximity to both China and Pakistan. Ladakh means 'land of high passes' and the region is bordered by the Kunlun mountains to the north and the Himalayas to the south. Summer temperatures exceed 20 degrees celsius, but in the long winter they plummet below minus 20 degrees. There is only one road into Ladakh; this is the notorious Manali to Leh route which reaches 17,400 feet as it crosses the Himalayas and is only open for four months a year. I arrived via this road and photos of my journey can be seen in an earlier post. In 1951 Christmas Humphreys described how in the Himalayas: "The great spaces... and the silence where men are scarce and wildlife is rarer still, all lend themselve to introverted thought, to the practice of the best and worst of the manifold powers of the mind". The Himalayas dominate Ladakh, and the legendary kingdom of Shambhala and the paradise of Shangri-La in James Hilton's 1933 novel Lost Horizon are both, supposedly, located in these mountains. Ladakh was only opened to tourists in 1974; it is an alpine desert with a narrow fertile belt around the course of the Indus river. The area is renown for its stunning scenery and views of the surrounding Himalayas; however, at 11,500 feet visitors are exposed to the risk of altitude sickness, and power cuts are a constant reminder that this is the very edge of the developed world. There are strong historical links to Tibet and 70% of the population are Tibetan Buddhists; but these Buddhists are indigenous Ladakhis, rather than Tibetan diaspora as is the case in Dharamsala. The region is celebrated for its monasteries; there are thirty-six active Tibetan Buddhist monasteries and many smaller ones, however the monasteries are under pressure as a declining birth rate has dramatically reduced the intake of new monks. In July 2014 the Kalachakra teachings were given in the Jiwe-tsal - ‘Peace Garden’ - adjacent to the summer palace of the Dalai Lama five miles outside Leh, and all my photos were taken at this venue. In Ladakh: Land of Magical Monasteries Bob Gibbons and Siân Pritchard-Jones describe how tantric practices came to Tibet from India in medieval times and fused with the occult elements of the indigenous Bönpo religion. Tibetan Buddhism's incorporation of earthy and intense shamanistic elements of the Bönpo religion is often overlooked, but the shamanistic heritage still survives in institutions such as Nechung, the state oracle consulted by the Dalai Lama, and in the numerous fierce protective deities portrayed in the temples. (The Dorje Shugden controversy, which in 1999 resulted in the murder of a senior member of the Dalai Lama's staff and two students, is a dispute about the status of one of these protective deities). In her pioneering book Magic & Mystery in Tibet Alexandra David-Neel describes how Tibetans do not believe in supernatural miracles, but see the exceptional happenings which occidentals consider to be miracles as the work of natural energies. These energies exert their power in exceptional circumstances, or through the skill of an adept who knows how to release them. She also describes how Tibetans believe that anything that one visualises can be realised, because, in their view, if visualised circumstances did not correspond to external reality they would be beyond the power of the imagination. The potential of these natural energies, reputedly, explains the power of the legendary Himalayan masters and yogins. My photo below shows a Tibetan Buddhist protective deity depicted in Hemis Monastery. According to the sutras (scriptures) used in non-tantric Buddhist traditions, the achievement of enlightenment takes many lifetimes. But in Tibetan Buddhism the scriptures used are tantras, and these offer an alternative fast track to fulfillment; this means that by following the tantric path a fully initiated practitioner can achieve enlightenment in a single lifetime. Tantra channels conventional energies into transforming and enlightening energies which transport the adept to higher levels of consciousness. (The very advanced practices involving transforming sexual energy has led to widespread misunderstanding of tantra in the West.) Tibetan Buddhists believe that the Buddha taught the Kalachakra tantra around 2800 years ago to an audience which included the rulers of the elusive kingdom of Shambhala, and the tantra were transmitted to Tibet between the eleventh and fifteenth centuries. Kalachakra means 'wheel of time' and the complex teaching leads practitioners from quotidian time to an alternative temporal realm where the enlightened can fuse with the Kalachakra deity in the legendary kingdom of Shambhala. Mandalas are used in tantric practices as a meditation aid, and the Kalachakra tantra uses visualisation and meditation to guide initiates through a specially constructed sand mandala. The photo below, which comes via the Dalai Lama's website, shows the Kalachakra sand mandala in the final stages of construction at the teaching ground. Tantric empowerments are usually secret and exclusive rituals, but, uniquely, the Kalachakra is taught in public to large audiences. The present Dalai Lama has a particular affinity with the Kalachakra tantra, and the 2014 empowerement was the thirty-third that he has delivered. All but two of these have been given since he was exiled from Tibet, and the initiations have attracted large audiences around the world in high-profile venues, including Madison Square Garden, New York in 1991. In recent years, at the direction of the Dalai Lama who is a Nobel Peace Prize laureate, the empowerment has been promoted as the 'Kalachakra for World Peace'. The audience for the 2014 initiation packed the 37.5 acre peace garden; there were 160,000 devotees, of which 30,000 were monks and 4000 came from outside the Indian sub-continent. Although primarily aimed at Tibetan Buddhists, the Dalai Lama stresses that non-Buddhists can achieve karmic benefits by attending the Kalachakra teachings. The 2014 empowerment was given by the Dalai Lama over six days; with the teachings lasting an uninterrupted four hours each day. All the teachings were in Tibetan, with simultaneous multi-lingual translations on FM radio frequencies. There was no seating other than the ground, and the only refreshments were Tibetan tea and dry bread, and temperature hovered around 30 degree celsius for all six days with very intense sun due to the extreme altitude. With a limited number of squat toilets available, enlightenment may come quickly at the Kalachakra, but it does not come easily. Monks were, quite understandably, given the prime positions in the peace garden complete with their own toilets; the other 120,000 people in the audience watched on giant LED TV screens and listened either to the Tibetan text over the PA or to translations on FM radios. The size of the crowd and distance from the action made the event seem like a giant rock concert without the music. I was one of the privileged few with a press pass, and this allowed me to take the photos of the Dalai Lama seen here; but for most of the audience he was no more than an image on an LED screen for the twenty-four hours of teachings. Ladakh is politically volatile, and the 1999 Kargil War in the region between India and Pakistan threatened to escalate into a full-scale nuclear conflict. In additions to the tensions with Pakistan, there were concerns about threats to the Dalai Lama from extremist Chinese groups. So, there was an armed military presence at the 'Kalachakra for World Peace', and His Holiness' heavyweight bodyguards can be seen in my header photo. Attending the Kalachakra teachings emphasised how deeply rooted Tibetan Buddhism is in this part of the world. In her definitive study Ancient Futures: Learning from Ladakh Helena Norberg-Hodge describes how at the 1976 Kalachakra in Leh: "...There was almost a carnival atmosphere. One minute the man in front of me was lost in reverence, his gaze locked on the Dalai Lama; the next minute he would be somewhere else, spinning his prayer wheel almost absentmindedly". This combination of devotion and carnival, which is unique to Eastern spirituality, also dominated the 2014 teachings and can be seen in my photos. As a minority occidental I felt as though I was not so much a participant in the empowerment as a privileged outsider who was intruding in order to catch a glimpse of something both alien and wonderful. The four thousand foreigners attending the teachings came from seventy-three countries, which is a reminder that Tibetan Buddhism has wide but shallow roots in the West. These wide but shallow roots reflect the paradoxical relationship that the Dalai Lama has with the West. In a 2006 interview he stated "I don't want to convert people to Buddhism - all major religions, when understood properly, have the same potential for good" yet he maintains a consistently high profile in the Western media that cannot be explained simply by the need to ensure that the Chinese occupation of Tibet is not forgotten. His Holiness' very slick Twitter feed has attracted 9.2 million followers, causing The Daily Beast to hail him as a "Twitter rock star", while in 1992 he guest edited the Christmas edition of Vogue - see below. This love affair with Western media is strangely at variance with the concept of ego-death - anatta - which is central to Buddhism, and the Dalai Lama is not averse to using egocentric show business personalities such as Russel Brand to front his appearances in the West. At least we were spared the despicable Brand in Ladakh; instead the headline Western celebrity was the infinitely more enlightened if over-exposed Richard Gere, as seen in my photo. In a media interview the Dalai Lama declared that 'Westerners are too self-absorbed', so it is unfortunate that the official promotional material for the Kalachakra teachings seen below resembled a poster promoting the latest album from an ageing rock star. This paradoxical preoccupation with self has also been evident in previous Dalai Lamas. The spiritual leader of all Tibetans is revered as the reincarnation of Avalokiteshvara Bodhisattva, the transcedent Buddha of infinite compassion. (Om mani padme hum is the celebrated mantra of the Buddha of compassion). But the role of reincarnation of the Buddha of compassion was, in fact, self-bestowed by the fifth Dalai Lama who, around 1650, was looking to beef-up his spiritual CV. A preoccupation with self is also found in those who surround His Holiness. Selfies have become the default tool of 21st century tantric visualisation, and so much time is spent on Facebook by some prominent rinpoches (abbots of monasteries) that it is difficult to see how they have time to fulfill their liturgical duties. During downtime at the Kalachakra teachings the talk among Western practitioners was not of how the sangha should react to the escalating Syrian humanitarian crisis, but of who would be granted an audience with His Holiness, and whether there would be a photo opportunity with 'Richard' (Gere). In India guru bhakti - adoration of the teacher - is a recognised condition, and in Ladakh there were many Westerners following enthusiastically in the footsteps of Madame Blavatsky, Annie Besant and Mary Lutyens. One of the flimsy justifications used by the Chinese for the invasion of Tibet was that pre-1950 Tibet was a feudal theocracy, and, it has to be said, there are traces of this alleged feudal theocracy in Ladakh. Tourism is now the main industry of the region, and the monasteries, which have major land holdings, are involved not only as tourist destinations, but also as infrastructure providers. Our hotel in Ladakh was wholly owned and manged by one of the largest monasteries, and, also under the control of the monastery, was a new 'glamping' (glamour camping) site. This offers accomodation in luxurious tents complete with four poster bed and 24/7 personal butler at a cost of £3428 per person for nine nights including flights from London. This glamping venture has, reportedly, some rather opaque connections with the Indian army, and the rumour in Leh was that some traditionalist monks and local people were not too happy about it. A cliché ridden folklore display was provided by our monastery owned hotel, while the pioneering ecology centre created by Helena Norberg-Hodge to help preserve the culture of Ladakh is now just a dusty relic. Although the wonders of the mountains and monasteries can never be overshadowed, there is a real risk that the area around Leh will soon become a giant Tibetan Buddhism theme park. Ironically the Gelug sect of Tibetan Buddhism, of which the Dalai Lama is the leader, started as a reformist movement aimed at restoring the purity of the Buddha’s teachings. Perhaps the time has come for the reformists to be reformed? The PR photo below shows the interior of one of the monastery 'glamping' tents. Tibetan Buddhism's paradoxical relationship with the West is reflected in the way the Dalai Lama assiduously courts the Western media, but is then remarkably naïve when dealing with it. His denouncement of the Dorje Shugden practice, although doubtless based on genuine religious convictions, was a significant PR own goal. While his views on homosexuality, again doubtless steered by conviction, are not exactly nuanced: I quote verbatim from a Telegraph interview: "Using the other two holes is wrong". That interview was given in 2006, and six years later the Telegraph was reporting, somewhat perplexingly, that His Holiness supports gay marriage. The quality of impermanence - anicca - is central to Buddhism, and it can be found in a number of the Dalai Lama's viewpoints. For instance, he is a Nobel Peace Prize laureate, and, as recounted earlier, the teachings in Ladakh were billed as 'Kalachakra for World Peace'. Which contrasts with His Holiness' close historic links with the CIA. In the 1960s the Tibetan government in exile received $1.7 million a year from the CIA; the Dalai Lama was a beneficiary of the CIA funding , reportedly receiving $15,000 a month from the late 1950s until 1974. Official US government documents confirm the reports and record that the funding was to support "political action, propaganda, paramilitary [my italics] and intelligence operations". But this alliance between the CIA and Tibet's spiritual leader was impermanent, and in his 1991 autobiography the Dalai Lama distanced himself from it, blaming the Americans for cynical exploitation of the Tibetan cause. There is also a paradox in the tantra used for the 'Kalachakra for World Peace'. As Donald Lopez points out in his refreshingly sceptical Prisoners of Shangri-La: Tibetan Buddhism and the West, the Kalachakra tells how in the year 2425, the army of the king will sweep out of Shambhala and defeat the barbarians. This Buddhist Armageddon, which legend tells will restore Buddhism to India and the world and usher in a reign of peace, has disturbing similarities to the Chinese invasion of Tibet almost exactly a century before. Many followers of the Dalai Lama, and some close to him, defend this CIA involvement with the argument that His Holiness knew nothing about it; this despite documents clearly showing that the alliance was masterminded by the Dalai Lama's brother Gyalo Thondup. This dalliance with the CIA may not be recent history, but the perplexing paradoxes remain. All too often in Ladakh when I raised the controversies over the Dalai Lama's views on important topics such as homosexuality, I was given one of two less than convincing explanations: either His Holiness' views had been mistranslated (this despite the 2006 Telegraph interview in which he expressed his views on homosexuality being given in English, a language the Dalai Lama speaks reasonably fluently, with an interpreter on hand), or he had been badly advised by his private office. Sadly, this auspicious impermanence also applies to the The Paradox of Our Age essay. As recounted earlier, I am one of many whose attention was caught by this engaging little homily. But when I returned from Ladakh, my researches show with considerable certainty that not only was the text not written by the Dalai Lama or anyone in his private office, but it was not even written by a Tibetan Buddhist. It was, apparently, written by Dr Bob Moorehead, a former Christian pastor from Seattle and appeared in an essay under the title The Paradox of Our Age in Words Aptly Spoken, a 1995 collection compiled from his sermons and radio broadcasts. The version attributed to His Holiness is a robust precis, the original text can be read here and compared with the 'Dalai Lama' version here. I have no evidence at all that the Dalai Lama or those close to him are involved in the misattribution, and a comment on an internet forum says "I seem to recall something from the Private Office of His Holiness that it was NOT the work of His Holiness". Which, however, rather begs the question as to why monasteries close to the Dalai Lama are selling The Paradox of Our Age in a version credited to His Holiness. As Swami Vivekanada told us: "God comes to earth to found a religion and everything is very beautiful, but the Devil comes right behind him and organises it". How unbelievably modest are human beings who bind themselves to only one religion! I have very many religions,and the one overriding them is only forming throughout my life. All photos, unless otherwise noted, are (c) On An Overgrown Path 2014. Any other copyrighted material is included as "fair use", for the purpose of critical analysis only, and will be removed at the request of copyright owner(s). Also on Facebook and Twitter. This post and the photos are terrific. Coming up against some of these issues myself from time to time, often think 1) life is tough in samsara with all its misapprehensions on all sides, and 2) there's a tendency to project what we want them to be on those in the red robes. That Swami Vivekananda goes to the heart of the matter. I'm going to run "the fifth Dalai Lama who, around 1650, was looking to beef-up his spiritual CV" by a lama friend to see what he says - I'll be surprised if he doesn't have a different characterization of that - but knowing for sure what was going on in 1650 seems a long shot. Dorje Shugden practicioners. (The second source above falls into the latter category, although it does contain very relevant facts). But, as I said in the post, although doubtless based on genuine religious convictions, his denouncement of the Dorje Shugden practice was a significant PR own goal. Admission to the 2014 Kalachakra in Leh was completely free, and the organisers undoubtedly incurred considerable costs presenting it. But the ticket costs for the Dalai Lama's current teachings in Hamburg, Germany are quite an eye-opener. The Hamburg organisers clearly state that the event "is non-commercial and functions only to cover costs". But the top ticket price for a single day of the four day teachings in the 12,500 seater hamburg Congress Centre is 131 euros (174 US dollars, 105 UK pounds). Which does make Lady Gaga tickets seem a bargain. The Dalai Lama's teachings may well be non-commercial and functioning only to cover costs. But the second source in the comment above reports His Holiness as staying in the presidential suite at the 5 star Steigenberger Frankfurter Hof hotel on a previous visit to Germany, accommodation that reportedly can cost $3000 a night. Is this really sending the right message? Good work. Well done for pursuing the Paradox to source.
0.999921	Around 150 climate change protesters have blocked one of the main roads into Edinburgh's city centre. Supporters of Extinction Rebellion Scotland are campaigning on North Bridge as part of the International Rebellion, which has taken place in a number of cities. The demonstration is part of a week of action planned around the world to raise awareness of climate change and encourage governments to act now. Groups of cyclists gathered at 2pm on North Bridge from Fountain Park Canal Basin, John Hope Gateway, Middle Meadow Walk and Duncan Place Leith Links. Campaign: Police were called to the protest. The entire bridge was blocked by the protesters who were joined by dozens of cyclists that gathered in the city centre, causing travel disruption and long tailbacks on either side of the train station. Setting out their demands, the group called for the Scottish Government to "tell the truth about the climate and ecological crisis and reverse any inconsistent policies", commit to reducing net carbon commissions to zero by 2025 and form a citizens' assembly to create policies. Organisers said they intended to occupy the bridge until 9pm with their peaceful demonstration. Bus services Citylink and Lothian Busses have re-routed its services due to the demonstration.
0.995116	Why pay rent to a landlord when that equity could be yours? You've probably seen the headlines touting the demise of commercial real estate--it's the next bubble due to burst. One of the trends highlighted in this news coverage is the natural increase in office and retail vacancy rates that accompanies a recession. Consumers slow spending, as a result businesses contract, and their needs for space contracts as well. It's a bad time for landlords for sure, but it's a potentially life-altering opportunity for business owners. I speak of making the change from tenant to owner. Business owners who make this fateful decision add a significant dimension to their shareholder value. It's not unlike the difference between working for someone else and working for yourself. I like to view this difference within the context of the final day on the job. Owners and employees will both make money along the course of their careers, but only owners have the final day paycheck. Most likely it'll be the biggest paycheck of their career, as they extract the shareholder value they've built up over the years. Being an owner and user of a commercial building has the same impact. On that final day, be it a new venture or retirement, there's another last paycheck coming; the sale of the building. One of the reasons commercial property ownership can lead to another payday is that successful real estate investing requires patience. Few business owners are in it for the short term--this makes them the ideal candidate for successful real estate ownership. SMB owners are less likely to jump ship during a down cycle and more likely to hold onto their real estate until the market cycle brings the value back to new highs. Another reason is the fact that occupancy expense is already a major item in the business owner's budget. There isn't a question of whether or not to take on the risk of such an obligation, the obligation already exists. The question is who to make the checks payable to; a landlord who'll use it to amortize their loan and build equity or direct to the bank, where the equity accrues to the business owner. For many the answer is a no brainer. Let me give you an example from a recent closing. A small private practice attorney ran his business out of a small, non-descript building in a quiet suburban community outside Manhattan. He often gave away his services to needy clients who couldn't pay. The way he put it, "I am a good lawyer, but a lousy business man." In the end, he didn't grow a practice with partners and associates. It was just him, the paralegal (his wife), and an administrator. There was nothing to sell once he retired. He had, however, bought the ugly ducking building 30 years earlier. Was this a life altering decision? You bet it was. On his final day of business, he received a check for $650,000 at the closing. His retirement was secured; he'd moved from a life of worry to a life of financial security. At that closing was another attorney who was making the life altering decision to buy the building and set up his private practice there. The seller handed over the keys to the buyer with a tear in his eye, and said, "take care of her and she will take care of you." Since that experience I've seen a pattern; the affection many owners have for their property runs deep. It may sound silly, but people frequently talk about their buildings like they are members of the family. They ascribe human traits to them, and this affection gives them the patience to hold, repair, improve and nurture the building's potential. That retired lawyer showed that his affection for his law practice extended to his little, non-descript piece of real estate. He loved that building and it loved him back, with $650,000 hugs and kisses.
0.938397	Cyanobacteria, also known as blue-green algae, blue-green bacteria or Cyanophyta, is a phylum of bacteria that obtain their energy through photosynthesis. The name "cyanobacteria" comes from the color of the bacteria (Greek: κυανός (kyanós) = blue). They are a significant component of the marine nitrogen cycle and an important primary producer in many areas of the ocean, but are also found in habitats other than the marine environment; in particular cyanobacteria are known to occur in both freshwater and hypersaline inland lakes. Stromatolites of fossilized oxygen-producing cyanobacteria have been found from 3.5 to 2.8 billion years ago. The ability of cyanobacteria to perform oxygenic photosynthesis is thought to have converted the early reducing atmosphere into an oxidizing one, which dramatically changed the composition of life forms on Earth by provoking an explosion of biodiversity and leading to the near-extinction of oxygen-intolerant organisms. Chloroplasts in plants and eukaryotic algae have evolved from cyanobacteria via endosymbiosis. Cyanobacteria are found in almost every conceivable environment, from oceans to fresh water to bare rock to soil. Most are found in fresh water, while others are marine, occur in damp soil, or even temporarily moistened rocks in deserts. A few are endosymbionts in lichens, plants, various protists, or sponges and provide energy for the host. Some live in the fur of sloths, providing a form of camouflage. Cyanobacteria include unicellular and colonial species. Colonies may form filaments, sheets or even hollow balls. Some filamentous colonies show the ability to differentiate into several different cell types: vegetative cells, the normal, photosynthetic cells that are formed under favorable growing conditions; akinetes, the climate-resistant spores that may form when environmental conditions become harsh; and thick-walled heterocysts, which contain the enzyme nitrogenase, vital for nitrogen fixation. Heterocysts may also form under the appropriate environmental conditions (anoxic) wherever nitrogen is necessary. Heterocyst-forming species are specialized for nitrogen fixation and are able to fix nitrogen gas, which cannot be used by plants, into ammonia (NH3), nitrites (NO3−) or nitrates (NO3−), which can be absorbed by plants and converted to protein and nucleic acids. The rice paddies of Asia, which produce about 75% of the world's rice, could not do so were it not for healthy populations of nitrogen-fixing cyanobacteria in the rice paddy fertilizer. Each individual cell of a cyanobacterium typically has a thick, gelatinous cell wall. They differ from other gram-negative bacteria in that the quorum sensing molecules autoinducer-2 and acyl-homoserine lactones are absent. They lack flagella, but hormogonia and some unicellular species may move about by gliding along surfaces. In water columns some cyanobacteria float by forming gas vesicles, like in archaea. Some of these organisms contribute significantly to global ecology and the oxygen cycle. The tiny marine cyanobacterium Prochlorococcus was discovered in 1986 and accounts for more than half of the photosynthesis of the open ocean. Cyanobacteria have an elaborate and highly organized system of internal membranes which function in photosynthesis. Photosynthesis in cyanobacteria generally uses water as an electron donor and produces oxygen as a by-product, though some may also use hydrogen sulfide as occurs among other photosynthetic bacteria. Carbon dioxide is reduced to form carbohydrates via the Calvin cycle. In most forms the photosynthetic machinery is embedded into folds of the cell membrane, called thylakoids. The large amounts of oxygen in the atmosphere are considered to have been first created by the activities of ancient cyanobacteria. Due to their ability to fix nitrogen in aerobic conditions they are often found as symbionts with a number of other groups of organisms such as fungi (lichens), corals, pteridophytes (Azolla), angiosperms (Gunnera) etc. Chloroplasts found in eukaryotes (algae and plants) likely evolved from an endosymbiotic relation with cyanobacteria. This endosymbiotic theory is supported by various structural and genetic similarities. Primary chloroplasts are found among the green plants, where they contain chlorophyll b, and among the red algae and glaucophytes, where they contain phycobilins. It now appears that these chloroplasts probably had a single origin, in an ancestor of the clade called Primoplantae. Other algae likely took their chloroplasts from these forms by secondary endosymbiosis or ingestion. The biochemical capacity to use water as the source for electrons in photosynthesis evolved once, in a common ancestor of extant cyanobacteria. The geologic record indicates that this transforming event took place early in our planet's history, at least 2450-2320 million years ago (Ma), and probably much earlier. Geobiological interpretation of Archean (>2500 Ma) sedimentary rocks remains a challenge; available evidence indicates that life existed 3500 Ma, but the question of when oxygenic photosynthesis evolved continues to engender debate and research. A clear paleontological window on cyanobacterial evolution opened about 2000 Ma, revealing an already diverse biota of blue-greens. Cyanobacteria remained principal primary producers throughout the Proterozoic Eon (2500-543 Ma), in part because the redox structure of the oceans favored photautotrophs capable of nitrogen fixation. Green algae joined blue-greens as major primary producers on continental shelves near the end of the Proterozoic, but only with the Mesozoic (251-65 Ma) radiations of dinoflagellates, coccolithophorids, and diatoms did primary production in marine shelf waters take modern form. The most common cyanobacterial structures in the fossil record include stromatolites and oncolites. Cyanobacteria remain critical to marine ecosystems as primary producers in oceanic gyres, as agents of biological nitrogen fixation, and, in modified form, as the plastids of marine algae. ⇒ The genera Halospirulina, Planktothricoides, Prochlorococcus, Prochloron, Prochlorothrix. Certain cyanobacteria produce cyanotoxins like anatoxin-a, anatoxin-as, aplysiatoxin, cylindrospermopsin, domoic acid, microcystin LR, nodularin R (from Nodularia), or saxitoxin. Sometimes a mass-reproduction of cyanobacteria results in algal blooms. These toxins can be neurotoxins, hepatotoxins, cytotoxins, and endotoxins, and can be dangerous to animals and humans. Several cases of human poisoning have been documented but a lack of knowledge prevents an accurate assessment of the risks. Ahoren Oren (2004). "A proposal for further integration of the cyanobacteria under the Bacteriological Code". Int. J. Syst. Evol. Microbiol. 54: 1895–1902. Olson JM (2006). "Photosynthesis in the Archean era". Photosyn. Res. 88 (2): 109–17. J. Sun, et al. (2004). "Is autoinducer-2 a universal signal for interspecies communication? A comparative genomic and phylogenetic analysis of the synthesis and signal transduction pathways". BMC Evol. Biol. 4: 36. E. Dittmann, et al. (2001). "Altered expression of two light-dependent genes in a microcystin-lacking mutant of Microcystis aeruginosa PCC7806". Microbiology 147: 3113–3119. Enrique Flores AH (2008). The Cyanobacteria: Molecular Biology, Genomics and Evolution. Horizon. pp. 3. Herrero A and Flores E (editor). (2008). The Cyanobacteria: Molecular Biology, Genomics and Evolution (1st ed. ed.). Caister Academic Press. T. Kaneko, et al. (1996). "Kaneko, T. et al. (1996) Sequence analysis of the genome of the unicellular cyanobacterium Synechocystis sp. strain PCC6803. II. Sequence determination of the entire genome and assignment of potential protein-coding regions". DNA Res. 3: 109–136. Tabei Y, Okada K, Tsuzuki M (2007). "Sll1330 controls the expression of glycolytic genes in Synechocystis sp. PCC 6803". Biochem. Biophys. Res. Commun. 355 (4): 1045–50. G. Rocap, et al. (2003). "Genome divergence in two Prochlorococcus ecotypes reflects oceanic niche differentiation". Nature 424: 1042–1047. doi:10.1038/nature01947. A. Dufresne, et al. (2003). "Genome sequence of the cyanobacterium Prochlorococcus marinus SS120, a nearly minimal oxyphototrophic genome.". Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 100: 10020–10025. J.C. Meeks, et al. (2001). "An overview of the genome of Nostoc punctiforme, a multicellular, symbiotic cyanobacterium". Photosynth. Res. 70: 85–106 A number of important advances have occurred in cyanobacterial biotechnology in the recent years. World wide attention is drawn towards cyanobacteria for their possible use in mariculture, food, feed, fuel, fertilizer, colourant, production of various secondary metabolites including vitamins, toxins, enzymes, pharmaceuticals, pharmacological probes and pollution abatement. Only a few cyanobacterial strains (including Spirulina) have been well-characterized or exploited commercially (Thajuddin and Subramanian. Cyanobacterial biodiversity and potential applications in biotechnology. CURRENT SCIENCE, VOL. 89, NO. 1, 10 JULY 2005). M. Herdman, et al. (1979). "Genome size of cyanobacteria". J. Gen. Microbiol. 111: 73–85. Spolaore P, Joannis-Cassan C, Duran E, Isambert A (2006). "Commercial applications of microalgae". J. Biosci. Bioeng. 101 (2): 87–96. Gillian Cribbs (1997) Nature's Superfood, the Blue-Green Algae Revolution. Newleaf. Marshall Savage, (1992, 1994) The Millennial Project: Colonizing the Galaxy in Eight Easy Steps. Little, Brown. Fogg, G.E., Stewart, W.D.P., Fay, P.and Walsby, A.E. 1973. The Blue-green Algae. Academic Press, London and New York. Whitton, B.A. Phylum Cyanophyta (Cyanobacteria). in The Freshwater Algal Flora of the British Isles. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
0.883064	this foremost pan-arab organization provides the institutional expression for the aspiration of arab unity. The League of Arab States, also known as the Arab League, is composed of twenty-two independent Arab states that have signed the Pact of the League of Arab States. Palestine, represented by the Palestinian Authority, is included as an independent state. The multipurpose League of Arab States seeks to promote Arab interests in general, but especially economic and security interests. It also works to resolve disputes among members and between member states and nonmember states. It has the image of unity in the protection of Arab independence and sovereignty. It promotes political, military, economic, social, cultural, and developmental cooperation among its members. facilities in New York and Geneva, and at the Organization of African Unity in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. It also has offices in such key cities as Washington, D.C., London, Moscow, Paris, Bonn, Beijing, Brussels, Vienna, Madrid, Rome, and New Delhi. The league has not realized the perfect Arab unity desired by some Arab nationalists. From its inception some states emphasized state sovereignty in accordance with the league's pact and rejected federalist or unionist proposals. The league not only serves the mutual interests of its members, but also reflects the differences. The league members agreed to an Arab Charter on Human Rights in 1994 and to the Arab Convention for the Suppression of Terrorism in 1998. The League of Arab States was founded on 22 March 1945 with the signing of the pact by seven Arab states. Sixteen additional states joined, but in 1990 Yemen (Aden) and Yemen (Sanʿa) merged to form the Republic of Yemen, bringing the total to twenty-two. Mustafa al-Nahhas, Iraqi prime minister Nuri alSaʿid, and Transjordan's King Abdullah I ibn Hussein are credited with being early architects of the league in the 1940s. The British initiated, in part, the preparatory talks leading to its creation. In the fall of 1944, seven Arab states met in Alexandria, Egypt, to discuss the creation of a "Commonwealth of Arab States." On 7 October 1944 Egypt, Iraq, Lebanon, Syria, and Transjordan signed the Alexandria Protocol, which envisioned a league of independent states, rather than a union or federation. The main points of the protocol were subsequently incorporated into the league, as was an appendix stressing Palestinian independence. The league's initial members were Egypt, Iraq, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Transjordan (now Jordan), and Yemen (Sanaa). The league's general structure has remained intact since its formation, but the scope of its activities has expanded dramatically, especially in nonpolitical fields. The organization consists of a council, special committees, and a secretariat-general. In addition, the league has become an umbrella organization responsible for the numerous specialized agencies, unions, and other institutions created to promote Arab interests. The pact established a council as the league's principal organ. It is composed of representatives of each member state, with each state having one vote. Unanimous decisions of the council are binding on all members. Majority decisions are binding only on those members that accepted them, except that majority decisions are enforceable on all members for certain specific matters relating to personnel, the budget, administrative regulations, and adjournment. The council implements league policies and pursues league goals. It meets twice a year, in March and September, but extraordinary meetings can be called at the request of two members. Special committees have been established to support and represent the council. The league's committees have included the Political Committee, Culture Committee, Communications Committee, Social Committee, Legal Committee, Arab Oil Experts Committee, Information Committee, Health Committee, Human Rights Committee, Permanent Committee for Administration and Financial Affairs, Permanent Committee for Meteorology, Committee of Arab Experts on Cooperation, Arab Women's Committee, Organization of Youth Welfare, and Conference of Liaison Officers. The secretariat-general consists of the secretary-general, assistant secretaries-general, and other principal officials of the league. It is responsible for administrative and financial activities. The council, with the approval of a two-thirds majority of the league's members, appoints the secretary-general to a renewable five-year term. The secretary-general has the rank of ambassador. The office of the secretary-general was held by Egyptians during the first three decades of the league: Abd al-Rahman al-Azzam (1945–1952); Abd alKhaliq Hassuna (1952–1972); and Mahmud Riyad (1972–1979). A Tunisian, Chadli Klibi, held the post from 1979 until 1990. He resigned during the controversy surrounding the Gulf Crisis. Ahmad Ismat Abd al-Majid, an Egyptian, served as secretary-general from May 1991 to 2001. He was followed in 2001 by the popular Egyptian foreign minister Amr Moussa (also Musa). In 1950 the Treaty of Joint Defense and Economic Cooperation complemented the league pact and provided for the establishment of the Joint Defense Council and the Permanent Military Commission. An Economic Council was set up under the treaty in 1953. An Arab Unified Military Command was formed in 1964. In 1976 an Arab Deterrent Force was sent to Lebanon under league auspices. The League of Arab States is financed by an assessment of charges made to each member. The secretary-general prepares a draft budget and submits it to the council for approval before the beginning of each fiscal year. The council then fixes the share of the expenses or dues to be paid by each member state. This share may be reconsidered if necessary. 1st january 1964, cairo agreed to oppose "the robbery of the waters of jordan by israel." 2nd september 1964, alexandria supported the establishment of the palestine liberation organization (plo) in its effort to liberate palestine from the zionists. 3rd september 1965, casablanca opposed "intra-arab hostile propaganda." 4th 29 august–1 september 1967, khartoum held post-1967 arab-israeli war, which ended with crushing israeli victory; declared three "no's": "no negotiation with israel, no treaty, no recognition of israel." 5th december 1969, rabat called for the mobilization of member countries against israel. 6th november 1973, algiers held in the wake of the 1973 arab-israeli war, it set strict guidelines for dialogue with israel. 7th 30 october–2 november 1974, rabat declared the plo to be "the sole and legitimate representative of the palestinian people," who had "the right to establish the independent state of palestine on any liberated territory." 8th october 1976, cairo approved the establishment of a peacekeeping force (arab deterrent force) for the lebanese civil war. 9th november 1978, baghdad condemned the camp david peace accords between egypt and israel, and threatened egypt with sanctions, including the suspension of its membership if egypt signed a treaty with israel. 10th november 1979, tunis held in the wake of israel's invasion of lebanon in 1978, it discussed israel's occupation of southern lebanon. 11th november 1980, amman formulated a strategy for economic development among league members until 2000. 12th november 1981/september 1982, fez meeting was suspended due to resistance to a peace plan drafted by saudi crown prince fahd, which implied de facto recognition of the jewish state. in september 1982 at fez, the meeting reconvened to adopt a modified version of the fahd plan, called the fez plan. 13th august 1985, casablanca failed to back a plo-jordanian agreement that envisaged talks with israel about palestinian rights. summit boycotted by five member states. 14th november 1987, amman supported un security council resolution 598 regarding cease-fire in the iran-iraq war. also declared that individual member states could decide to resume diplomatic ties with egypt. 15th june 1988, casablanca decided to financially support the plo in sustaining the intifada in the occupied territories. 16th may 1989, casablanca readmitted egypt into arab league, and set up tripartite committee to secure a cease-fire in the lebanese civil war and re-establish a constitutional government in lebanon. 17th may 1990, baghdad denounced recent increase of soviet jewish immigration to israel. 18th august 1990, cairo 12 out of 20 members present condemned iraq for invading and annexing kuwait. agreed to deploy troops to assist saudi and other gulf states' armed forces. 19th june 1995, cairo held after a hiatus of five years. iraq not invited. 20th october 2000, cairo set up funds to help the palestinians' second intifada against the israeli occupation, and called on its members to freeze their relations with israel. iraq was invited. 21st march 2001, amman held after the election of ariel sharon as israel's prime minister, it appointed egypt's amr mousa as the arab league's new secretary-general. 22nd march 2002, beirut adopted the saudi peace plan of crown prince abdullah, which offered israel total peace in exchange for total israeli withdrawal from arab territories conquered in the 1967 war. opposed the use of force against iraq. 23rd march 2003, sharm al-sheikh, egypt agreed not to participate in the u.s.-led attack on iraq, but allowed the united states to use military bases in some of their countries. The league experienced significant difficulties in the collection of member-state dues in the aftermath of the Gulf Crisis (1990–1991) and subsequently. Its 1991 budget was over $27 million, with the largest share being assessed to Saudi Arabia (14%), Kuwait (14%), Libya (12%), Iraq (10%), Egypt (8.5%), Algeria (8%), the United Arab Emi-rates (6.5%), and Morocco (5%). Bahrain, Kuwait, Libya, Morocco, and Yemen had reservations concerning their share of the league budget. The 1999 budget was set at $26.5 million, but when Amr Moussa took office in 2001, it was estimated at $50 million. Also, late dues reportedly had reached $100 million, with some states more than a decade in arrears. According to Article 15 of the league's bylaws, approved in 1973, members can be denied voting rights if their delinquent dues total more than their total assessment of the current year and the two preceding years. The League of Arab States has had a significant impact on the Middle East and on its members. Although it has not been a stepping-stone to Arab political unity, it has fostered Arab cooperation in many fields. Cooperation on political questions, however, has been difficult. In fact, political conflicts in the Arab world are frequently reflected in the league. Governmental diversity is protected in the league pact, which requires each member to respect the systems of government of other members. The pact also requires states to abstain from action calculated to change the systems of government in other members. The Cold War served to draw political lines within the league between clients of the United States and those of the Soviet Union. Despite the wealth of some of its members, the league is more closely aligned to the South in the North-South conflict, sometimes acting as a bloc for the South in the United Nations. The league has actively sought to bolster Arab security, but its efforts are limited by inter-Arab rivalries. It has facilitated the peaceful settlement of disputes between its members, as between Morocco and Mauritania; between groups within member states, as in Lebanon or Somalia; and between members and outside parties, as between Libya and the United States. The league has acted as a regional alternative to the United Nations in this regard. The league has been united in its support for Palestine vis-à-vis Israel, but has come under increasing criticism in recent years for failing to do enough for the Palestinians and for Iraq. Egypt's treaty with Israel (the 1978 Camp David Accords) resulted in its suspension from the league from 1979 to 1989. Members were also divided over the Fahd Plan (1981); over the leadership of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO); and over the Iran-Iraq War (1980–1988). Iraq's invasion of Kuwait and the first Gulf War (1991) prompted additional controversy. The U.S. move against Iraq in 2003 brought strong and united condemnation of "American-British aggression against Iraq." The league also emphasized its cooperation with the United Nations. League members are: Algeria, Bahrain, Comoros, Djibouti, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Mauritania, Morocco, Oman, Palestine, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, Tunisia, United Arab Emirates, and Yemen. In November 2002 Libya asked to withdraw its membership. Any independent Arab state is theoretically entitled to become a member, but a request for membership must be made through the permanent secretariat-general of the league and submitted to the council. Eritrea assumed an observer status in January 2003. Numerous specialized organizations and other institutions that promote Arab cooperation and protect Arab interests in a wide array of fields fall under the league umbrella. These include, among others: the Academy of Arab Music; Administrative Tribunal of the Arab League; Arab Bank for Economic Development in Africa; Arab Bureau of Narcotics; Arab Bureau for Prevention of Crime; Arab Bureau of Criminal Police; Arab Center for the Study of Arid Zones and Dry Lands; Arab Civil Aviation Council; Arab Fund for Economic and Social Development; Arab Fund for Technical Assistance to Africa and Arab Countries; Arab Industrial Development Organization; Arab Labour Organization; Arab League Educational, Cultural, and Scientific Organization; Arab Maritime Transport Academy; Arab Monetary Fund; Arab Organization for Agricultural Development; Arab Organization for Standardization and Metrology; Arab Organization of Administrative Sciences; Arab Postal Union; Arab Satellite Communications Organization; Arab States Broadcasting Union; Arab Telecommunications Union; Council of Arab Economic Unity; Council of Arab Ministers of the Interior; Inter-Arab Investment Guarantee Corporation; Organization of Arab Petroleum Exporting Countries; and the Special Bureau for Boycotting Israel. After the second Persian Gulf war in 2003, relations between member states of the league remained uncertain. Amr Moussa moved to reunify the Arab ranks and worked through the United Nations. The uncertainties unleashed in the gulf spawned new dangers aimed at regimes friendly to the United States. The crisis offers new challenges to Arab leadership that could enhance the role of the Arab League. The league's aspiration of Arab unity will be central to the creation of a new world order, as will the inevitable divisions in the Arab ranks. Arab cooperation in nonpolitical areas will continue under the league's aegis and will promote not only improved relations among Arabs, but also between Arabs and outside states and organizations. see also abdullah i ibn hussein; arab boycott; camp david accords (1978); fahd plan (1981); gulf crisis (1990–1991); nahhas, mustafa al-; organization of arab petroleum exporting countries (oapec); palestine liberation organization (plo). Arab League. Available from <http://www.arableagueonline.org/arableague>. Burdett, Anita, ed. The Arab League: British Documentary Sources, 1943–1963. Slough, U.K.: Archive Editions, 1995. Hasou, Tawfiq Y. The Struggle for the Arab World: Egypt's Nasser and the Arab League. Boston: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1985. Hassouna, Hussein A. The League of Arab States and Regional Disputes: A Study in Middle East Conflicts. Dobbs Ferry, NY: Oceana Publications, 1975. MacDonald, Robert W. The League of Arab States: A Study in the Dynamics of Regional Organization. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1965. Pogany, Istvan S. The Arab League and Peacekeeping in the Lebanon. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1988. Riad, Mahmoud. The Struggle for Peace in the Middle East. New York: Quartet Books, 1981. Zamzami, Sirag G. "The Origins of the League of Arab States and Its Activities within the Member States: 1942–1970." Ph.D. diss., Claremont Graduate School, 1978. "League of Arab States." Encyclopedia of the Modern Middle East and North Africa. . Encyclopedia.com. 19 Apr. 2019 <https://www.encyclopedia.com>. League of Arab States: see Arab League. "League of Arab States." The Columbia Encyclopedia, 6th ed.. . Encyclopedia.com. 19 Apr. 2019 <https://www.encyclopedia.com>. An international institution, the Arab League (officially the League of Arab States) was founded in Cairo on 22 March 1945. At its creation the Arab League comprised Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Iraq, Transjordan, Lebanon, Syria, and Yemen. The first secretary general of the organization was Abd al-Rahman al-Azzam, an Egyptian diplomat. The Arab League proposed strengthening ties between Arab states and coordinating regional economic and military policy, while refraining from intervening in any conflict between league members. The impulse to create a pan-Arab organization was the product of the ongoing Arab nationalist movement, but during World War II it was also encouraged by the British as a means of influencing Arab public opinion at a time when it appeared that the Germans might well conquer North Africa. With British help, an international conference was convened in Alexandria in September 1944, producing an agreement called the Alexandria Protocol on 7 October. The formal creation of the League—an association of independent Arab states rather than the pan-Arab federation its original promoters had envisioned—followed the next year. In 1958 the League was recognized by the United Nations (UN) as a regional intergovernmental organization, and it has coordinated with the UN in its various social, cultural, and scientific programs. Headquartered in Cairo, it is the most important Arab venue for official cooperation in matters of education, social, and health issues, mainly through its Education, Scientific and Cultural Organization (ALESCO), founded in 1964. In 2004, the League has twenty-two members: the original seven plus Libya (joined 1953), Sudan (1956), Tunisia (1958), Morocco (1958), Kuwait (1961), Algeria (1962), Bahrain (1971), Oman (1971), Qatar (1971), the United Arab Emirates (UAE, 1971), Mauritania (1973), Palestine (originally as the PLO, 1974), Somalia (1974), Djibouti (1977), and the Comoros Islands (1996). South Yemen was also a member from 1967 until 1990, when it united with Yemen. It is believed that the League employs some 540 staff and has a budget of around $27 million. 24th May 2004, Tunis Rejected stand taken by the U.S. and Israel in the Arab-Israeli conflict and supported a peace process founded on international legitimacy, UN resolutions and the principle of land against peace. In April 1959, at the urging of Egypt, the League adopted a resolution providing for the expulsion of any member state that negotiated a separate peace with Israel. In May 1964, at the urging of Egypt, the League supported the creation of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and the Palestine Liberation Army (PLA). The League regularly supported the PLO's efforts to achieve international recognition. In September 1967, after the June 1967 War, the League declared its continuing support for the Palestinian cause and established a policy of not recognizing or negotiating with Israel. In November 1973 the League set conditions to be met for members to engage in talks with Israel. The following November the League recognized the PLO as the only legitimate representative body of the Palestinians, recognized its right to establish a Palestinian state, and admitted it as a full member of the League. In October 1976 the League agreed to form an Arab Deterrent Force to intervene in the Lebanese Civil War. In November 1978 the League condemned the Camp David Accords and invoked sanctions against Egypt. They failed to agree on a response to the Israeli invasion of South Lebanon from March to June. In 1979, after the Israeli-Egyptian peace treaty in March, the League expelled Egypt under the terms of the 1959 resolution (member states also suspended diplomatic relations); moved the League's headquarters to Tunis. This was the beginning of a period of crisis and dissension in the Arab world, in large part over Israel and the status of Palestine, that affected the League's functioning. Some League summit meetings were boycotted by some states, at least one summit was canceled, and few accords were ratified by the Council. In September 1982 they approved the Fez Initiative, based on the Fahd Plan, disagreement over which had caused the cancellation of a League summit the previous year. It called for withdrawal of Israel from the Occupied Territories and eventual establishment of a Palestinian state in them—amounting to a tacit recognition of Israel within the pre-1967 borders. In August 1985 the League could not agree to support an agreement between the PLO and Jordan. In November 1987 the League declared that members were free to resume diplomatic relations with Egypt. In June 1988 the League agreed to assist the PLO financially in the Intifada, and in May 1989 readmitted Egypt to membership. They also agreed to mediate a truce in the Lebanese Civil War. In August 1990 the League was divided over the issue of Iraq's invasion of Kuwait. League headquarters returned to Cairo in October of the same year. In March 2000 the League passed a resolution reaffirming the right of Lebanon to fight against the Israeli occupation and demanding that the right of return of the Palestinian refugees be respected. In October, after the start of the al-Aqsa Intifada, they called on members to suspend relations with Israel and agreed to financial aid for the Palestinians. In January 2001 the League accorded its unanimous support to the position of the Palestinian Authority on peace conditions with Israel. On 24 March of that year, Amr Mousa, Egyptian minister of foreign affairs, was chosen, unanimously, as secretary general of the League. (Except for the period 1978–1990, the secretary general of the League has always been an Egyptian.) A restructuring plan was put into effect, with the principal innovation being the establishment of positions of general commissioners. These posts have been given to influential personalities of the Arab world. In July, Hanan Ashrawi, an important Palestinian political figure, became commissioner for information. The following month, the former Jordanian prime minister, Taher al-Masri, was named commissioner for civil society affairs, and the former Egyptian minister of culture, Ahmed Kamal Abul Magd, became commissioner for "dialogue among civilizations." In late May 2004, while Israeli forces were attacking the Rafah Palestinian refugee camp in the Gaza Strip, in a show of force involving rocket attacks on civilian neighborhoods and mass house demolitions, the Arab League held a summit meeting in Tunis. It was to have been held earlier but had been postponed over disagreements about the issues of democratic reform on the agenda. Some governments skipped the meeting. Although individual governments and politicians had condemned Israel's actions and American support for them, the League summit generally avoided the subject. SEE ALSO All-Palestine Government; Arab Deterrent Force; Arab Higher Committee; Fahd Plan; Intifada, al-Aqsa. "League of Arab States." Dictionary of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict. . Encyclopedia.com. 19 Apr. 2019 <https://www.encyclopedia.com>.
0.892526	Like other Baroque art historians, I love the broken pediment as an architectural feature. A broken pediment is “broken” at the apex of a triangular pediment. I usually don’t differentiate between the “open” and “broken” pediment when I teach by students about these features, but I know that many architectural historians choose to differentiate between the two. An “open” pediment refers to when the base of the pediment has been removed (or “opened,”). One of my favorite broken pediments from the Baroque period (which actually has been broken, opened, and also shifted backward) is found in the Cornaro Chapel, designed by the artist Bernini (1645-1652). But I think that it’s hard for Baroque scholars to remember sometimes that the idea of segmenting pediments was not developed during the Baroque period. In fact, the broken and/or open pediment existed in ancient Rome and Hellenistic architecture from Alexandria.2 Unfortunately, not many extant examples of architecture survive from Alexandria, so scholars need to look to Roman and/or Nabatean art that copied Alexandrian architecture, such as the Market Gate of Miletus, Treasury at Petra, and Pompeiian wall paintings (all shown below). I often teach my students about how the Greek Classical period is similar to the art of the Renaissance, and how the Hellenistic period is similar to the art of the Baroque period. The broken pediment in Hellenistic architecture is a further manifestation of this fact. It’s also interesting to see that the Romans picked up on this architectural feature that would probably have been conceived as “distorted” by Greeks who lived during what has been termed the “High Classical” period. In this light, the broken pediment is another manifestation of how Roman architecture was interested in the re-invention of Classical Greek architecture. No wonder they latched onto the Hellenistic invention of the broken pediment. Market Gate of Miletus, 2nd century CE. Currently located in the Pergamon Museum (Berlin). Image courtesy of Thorsten Hartmann via Wikipedia. Facade Al-Khazneh (The Treasury), Petra, Jordan, 2nd century BC -2nd century CE. Image courtesy of Bernard Gagnon on Wikipedia. Broken pediment from Temple of Artemis, Jerash, Jordan, c. 150 CE. Image courtesy of Jerzy Strzelecki via Wikipedia. What are your favorite examples of the broken (or open) pediment in architecture? 1 That being said, there are examples of the broken pediment that exist in Late Renaissance architecture. For example, Antonio da Sangallo the Younger employed broken pediments on the top story of the façade of the Palazzo Farnese (ca. 1530-1546). 2 See Judith McKenzie, “The Architecture of Alexandria and Egypt, 300 BC to AD 700, Volume 63″ (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2007), 105. Source available online here. See also Judith McKenzie, “Alexandra and the Origins of Baroque Architecture,” available online here. The latter citation also includes a discussion of how the earliest surviving examples of the segmental pediment (a rounded, semi-circular pediment) are found in Alexandrian architecture.
0.999959	Articles about voting issues in the Kingdom of the Netherlands. The parliamentary election in the Netherlands on March 15 is approaching rapidly. And with an incredibly fragmented field, it looks as though attempts to form a coalition government after the vote will prove a challenging task, to say the least. Despite all the hype, it’s far from certain that the populist radical right Freedom Party (PVV) of Geert Wilders will top the polls – and even more questionable whether it will end up in government. The PVV and the Liberal Party (VVD) of Prime Minister Mark Rutte have led the opinion polls for months. Behind them follow no fewer than five parties which, according to the latest figures, are predicted to win around 10% of the vote each. Given the extreme proportionality of the Dutch electoral system, such a result would generate a highly fragmented parliament. If the final results resemble the opinion polls, a minimum of four parties would need to agree to cooperate to form a majority coalition. Full Article: Fragmented field keeps voters guessing as Dutch election approaches. The animals are on the march. When traditional politics fractures, new parties come to the fore. And in the Netherlands, the Party for the Animals is in the running before the March 15 national election. While Geert Wilders’s Freedom Party and Prime Minister Mark Rutte’s Liberals fight it out for first place, the need for coalition partners means the Animal party could play a role in creating a working majority needed to form a government. The rise in nationalist sentiment, which has bolstered groups such as the U.K. Independence Party and Marine Le Pen’s National Front in France, threatens to disrupt the conventional order in the Netherlands, one of the core founding members of the European Union. A new governing coalition that successfully excludes the anti-Islam, anti-immigration Freedom Party — as the mainstream groups have promised — could require as many as six separate alliance members to reach a 76-seat majority in the Dutch lower house of Parliament. That’s where Marianne Thieme comes in. Full Article: In the Netherlands, a Party for Animals Is Winning Voters - Bloomberg. The Dutch anti-Islam politician Geert Wilders and his populist Freedom party have suspended all public campaigning for next month’s parliamentary elections following an alleged security leak. Wilders, current frontrunner for the Netherlands’ general elections, to be held on 15 March, said on Twitter: “Very alarming news. The PVV is suspending its public activities until all facts in connection with the corruption investigation are known.” Dutch media reported this week that a member of the far-right politician’s police security team had been arrested on suspicion of leaking details of his whereabouts to a Dutch-Moroccan criminal gang. The Algemeen Dagblad newspaper reported on Thursday that the officer and his brother, both previously members of the Utrecht police force, had also been investigated in the past in connection with suspected leaks of confidential information. Full Article: Geert Wilders suspends election campaign over alleged security leak \| World news \| The Guardian. One late-winter evening three years ago, Lt. Col. Mostafa Hilali switched off the light at his office in the Dutch defense department, drove home to his townhouse near the banks of the North Sea, and flipped on the TV. On the news was footage of a political rally where the leader of Holland’s far-right Freedom Party, Geert Wilders, stepped up to the microphone and asked his supporters: “Do you want more or fewer Moroccans in this country?” The mostly white, Christian crowd chanted with fervor: “Fewer, fewer, fewer!” “Well I’ll arrange for that then,” Wilders retorted with a smirk. The crowd cheered. Hilali’s heart sank. “That’s when it hit home for me,” Hilali, a Dutchman of Moroccan descent who immigrated to the Netherlands with his parents when he was a toddler, said at his home in The Hague. “I mean, a politician, somebody in our House of Representatives, is actually on television saying out loud there need to be less people of your kind. It’s pretty brutal to say, and pretty brutal to hear.” Hilali and his native Dutch wife were among more than 5,000 plaintiffs who brought a class-action lawsuit against Wilders for discrimination, for his comments at that March 2014 rally. Last December, they won. A Dutch court found Wilders guilty of inciting discrimination and insulting an ethnic group, but issued no punishment. Full Article: The far right party is leading election polls in the Netherlands: Will Geert Wilders be prime minister? - LA Times. Dutch municipalities will be allowed to use computers to count the votes cast in the 15 March elections, but only if those are not connected to the Internet, the Dutch government said on Wednesday. Officials were also banned from using USB-sticks or other devices to bring the results from municipalities to the headquarters of the 20 electoral districts, The measures are part of Plasterk’s attempt to rule out hacking, especially from Russia, and follows a report by Dutch broadcaster RTL at the end of January. RTL said the software that was used to register the votes was vulnerable to hacking because it did not contain any security requirements for computers it was used on. Plasterk then decided that the registering of votes should be done by hand. Registering votes was the only part of the electoral process that was theoretically open to hacking. Full Article: Dutch will count votes on offline PCs to prevent hacking. Harry van Bommel, a left-wing member of the Dutch Parliament, had persuasive allies in convincing voters that they should reject a trade pact with Ukraine — his special “Ukrainian team,” a gleefully contrarian group of émigrés whose sympathies lay with Russia. They attended public meetings, appeared on television and used social media to denounce Ukraine’s pro-Western government as a bloodthirsty kleptocracy, unworthy of Dutch support. As Mr. Van Bommel recalled, it “was very handy to show that not all Ukrainians were in favor.” Handy but also misleading: The most active members of the Ukrainian team were actually from Russia, or from Russian-speaking regions of Ukraine, and parroted the Kremlin line. The Dutch referendum, held last April, became a battering ram aimed at the European Union. With turnout low, Dutch voters rejected the trade agreement between the European Union and Ukraine, delighting Moscow, emboldening pro-Russia populists around Europe and leaving political elites aghast. Full Article: Fake News, Fake Ukrainians: How a Group of Russians Tilted a Dutch Vote - The New York Times. The controversial right-wing Dutch politician Geert Wilders says he intends to govern in the Netherlands after the elections, and expects the electorate to rise up if other political parties deny him that option. In a rare 40-minute interview with broadcaster WNL, the far-right leader also compared mosques to Nazi temples and the Quran to Hitler’s autobiography Mein Kampf. Mr Wilders does not often sit down for in-depth interviews with Dutch media. The founder of the one-man Party for Freedom, or PVV, prefers to control the narrative through Twitter. The “Dutch Trump” knows that the media will pick up news from his timeline. Full Article: Far-right outcast Geert Wilders vows to 'de-Islamise' the Netherlands after taking lead in Dutch polls \| The Independent. A website used by millions of Dutch voters to test their political preferences was quietly keeping a tally of how many were matched with each party, a security researcher who penetrated the site said on Tuesday. The discovery by researcher Loran Kloeze raised potential privacy concerns and sparked a debate over whether the site was biased. The leaked results showed the Labour Party, a junior party in the governing coalition, received the second most matches even though it is running sixth in opinion polls. Kloeze said he had also found a rogue data field on the site in which someone had posted an insult, suggesting he was not the only person to have discovered a flaw in its security. The leak comes at a time of heightened concern over cyber security after U.S. intelligence agencies concluded that Russia used cyberattacks last year to try to sway the outcome of the Nov. 8 election in favor of Donald Trump. Full Article: Leak raises security concerns over Dutch voter help website \| Reuters. Dutch authorities will count by hand all the votes cast in next month’s general elections, ditching “vulnerable” computer software to thwart any cyber hacking bid, a senior minister has said. “I cannot rule out that state actors may try to benefit from influencing political decisions and public opinion in the Netherlands,” interior minister Ronald Plasterk said in a letter to parliament on Wednesday. On 15 March, the Netherlands kicks off a year of crucial elections in Europe which will be closely watched amid the rise of far-right and populist parties on the continent. Dutch officials are already on alert for signs of possible cyber hacking following allegations by US intelligence agencies that Russia may have meddled in November’s US presidential polls to help secure Donald Trump’s victory. Full Article: Dutch will count all election ballots by hand to thwart hacking \| World news \| The Guardian. All ballots in the Netherlands’ election next month will be counted by hand in order to preserve confidence in the electoral system after reports suggested its automated counting systems may be vulnerable to hacking, the government said. Intelligence agencies have warned that three crucial European elections this year, in the Netherlands, France and Germany, could be vulnerable to manipulation by outside actors, including Russia. “Reports in recent days about vulnerabilities in our systems raise the question of whether the results could be manipulated,” Interior Minister Ronald Plasterk said in a statement on Wednesday. “No shadow of doubt can be permitted.” He told broadcaster RTL that possible external actors included Russia. “Now there are indications that Russians could be interested, for the following elections we must fall back on good old pen and paper,” he said. Full Article: Dutch will hand count ballots due to hacking fears \| Reuters. Dutch security researcher Sijmen Ruwhof has examined the software used at Dutch polling stations to send election results, and now claims “the average iPad is more secure than the Dutch voting system.” Local television station RTL asked the researcher to examine the security of Dutch voting systems after they heard they used weak SHA1 cryptography in certain parts of the system. Dutch elections have used paper-based voting since 2009, when the government banned electronic voting on security grounds. However, once the vote is cast, election officials will use electronic systems to send manually counted votes from each district. As the vote is counted data is transferred and shared on USB sticks, with the final tally going to the central Electoral Council in a digital file. This means that at multiple points during the result calculation, the data is shared electronically using systems that may not be so secure. The voting software can even be installed on personal devices, Windows XP, and non-current versions of web browsers, the researcher said. You can take a look at the accumulation of security weaknesses identified by the researcher here. Full Article: iPads ‘more secure than voting systems’ -- claim \| Computerworld. The software used at Dutch polling stations to send election results, is outdated and very vulnerable to hackers and there are not enough rules around where and where the software can be installed, according to security expert Sijmen Ruwhof, who investigated the software on behalf of RTL Nieuws. According to Ruwhof, “the average iPad is more secure than the Dutch voting system”. Dutch voters fill in their election ballot with a pencil. The vote count is also done by hand, but the results are forwarded to a central point with the program Ondersteunende Software Verkiezingen (OSV). The Electoral Council installes that program with a CD-ROM. According to Ruwhof, the biggest problem with this is that the program can be installed on any computer, including on old computers that are not properly protected. For example, if the program is installed on a old computer using Windows XP, for which Windows stopped security updates in 2014, and that computer is connected to the internet – the Dutch voting system is open to malicious software that can be used to change the results. Full Article: Average iPad better secured than Dutch voting system: cyber security expert \| NL Times. Peter Plasman showed up at the Netherlands’ national electoral commission’s offices Monday to register one of the more unusual parties bidding to take part in the upcoming Dutch election — a party for people who don’t vote. Plasman was hardly an exception when it came to flouting convention. A record 81 parties have expressed interest in taking part in the March 15 parliamentary election. Monday was the day they all had to hand in their paperwork. Among the eclectic roster of potential players, there also is the Colorful Cow Party, which casts itself in part as an antidote to the fierce anti-Islam rhetoric of the Party for Freedom. Its website includes a recipe for a traditional Dutch mashed potato dish, prepared with Turkish sausages and Moroccan spices. The party wound up not filing paperwork Monday because it could not find enough funds, its founder, Daan van Reenen, said in an email. Full Article: Dutch elections, anyone? 81 parties make it a quandary \| World News \| US News. Weeks before the U.K. decides whether to leave the European Union, the Netherlands will hold a referendum that could deliver a blow to the bloc. On Wednesday, the Netherlands will vote to support or reject the EU’s association agreement with Ukraine, a pact that deepens economic and political ties with the former Soviet republic and is already ratified by the EU’s 27 other member states. Although the referendum is nonbinding, EU officials fear that a rejection by Dutch voters could send ripples through the continent and represent a victory for Russia, which has long tried to scuttle the agreement. Full Article: Dutch Vote on EU-Ukraine Deal Could Send Ripples Through Europe - WSJ. The dividing lines of the referendum are clearly drawn. Supporters say a yes vote will deliver security and trade; opponents see a chance to wrest back control from the so-called undemocratic forces of Brussels. Accusations of lies and spin are batted around on both sides. Many voters are confused or indifferent. This is not Britain, but the Netherlands. On Wednesday the Dutch will take part in the other referendum that is sending shivers through the EU establishment, a vote that has exposed bitter rifts in attitudes towards Brussels – and Moscow. It is the country’s first referendum since 2005, when voters rejected the EU constitution. This time, unlike their British counterparts, the Dutch will not be voting on whether to leave or remain in the EU, but on the more obscure issue of an association agreement with Ukraine that aims to deepen trade and cooperation. Full Article: Dutch gear up for the other EU vote giving Brussels a headache \| World news \| The Guardian. Dutch voters are going to the polls on Wednesday — but the topic is Ukraine, not their own country. When Ukrainians rose up against their government in February 2014, the trigger for their anger was then-President Viktor Yanukovych’s refusal to sign an agreement fostering closer links between his country and the 28-nation European Union. After Yanukovych was toppled, his replacement, Petro Poroshenko, signed the Association Agreement with the EU, a broad free trade deal that — supporters say — also seeks to tackle corruption and improve human rights in the troubled former Soviet republic. Full Article: Netherlands to hold referendum on EU-Ukraine deal \| Business \| helenair.com. When the Netherlands introduced a new referendum law in July 2015, few expected it could one day play into the hands of the Kremlin. Or that it would be used to force a national vote on the more than 320-page-long European association agreement with Ukraine. Yet less than a year later, on April 6, the Dutch will have to answer with a Yes or No the question of whether they favor the bloc’s association deal with Kiev. Recent opinion polls suggest it will be a neck-and-neck race between the two sides. Although the vote is advisory and has no direct influence on EU policy, it has caused a scare in The Hague and Brussels. European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker has warned that a Dutch No vote will “open the door to a big continental crisis” with only one winner. “Russia would pluck the fruits of an easy victory,” he told the Dutch NRC newspaper. The dull language of the long text of the association agreement belies its explosive potential. For years, it has been the source of a tug-of-war with Moscow as Kiev tried to move out of its former Soviet ruler’s orbit into the arms of the EU. Full Article: Russian Bear Looms Over Dutch Voting Booth \| News \| The Moscow Times. What’s in a name? Last Monday, a provincial department of the Dutch Socialist Party (SP) announced that Crimea would vote No in next week’s Dutch referendum on an EU Association Agreement with Ukraine. Of course, the party was not referring to actual Crimea. Rather, it had polled inhabitants of De Krim, an eastern Dutch village that shares its name with the Ukrainian peninsula that was annexed by Russia two years ago. The SP said it had interviewed 168 people – around 10 percent of the village’s electorate. Of those who had already made up their mind, 76 percent would vote No. However, a week before the Dutch electorate could voice its opinion in its first-ever citizens-enforced referendum, a government-commissioned national poll suggested that only half of voters had made up their mind, and they were split equally between Yes and No. But while the Yes side is relatively uniform in its motivations and arguments (the EU-Ukraine is said to be good for trade for both sides and good for human rights), the No side consists of a more motley crew. Who are they? Full Article: The Dutch rooting for a No in the Ukraine referendum. The Dutch are known for their candor. This openness even extends to the ostensibly secret act of voting in national elections. Tweeting selfies while voting became something of a phenomenon during municipal elections in March. When subsequently asked to clarify the law on taking photos in the voting booth, Dutch courts gave it their blessing (link in Dutch), as long as the photo is of your own ballot and not somebody else’s. Today, Dutch voters went to the polls for the European Parliament, and a flood of selfies burst forth. (For many more “stemfies”—a mashup of selfie and the Dutch stemmen (to vote)—follow the #stemfie hashtag.) The UK is also voting in European elections today, but you won’t see many tweets of Brits beaming with their ballots. The country’s election authority warned that voting-booth selfies could endanger the secrecy of the vote, and staff have put up warnings against taking photos inside polling stations. The penalty for revealing someone else’s ballot is a £5,000 ($8,430) fine or six months in prison. Full Article: The Dutch are perfecting the controversial art of the voting-booth selfie - Quartz.
0.916249	from an engraving by John Dunstall. In the winter of 1603-1604, Antonio Neri left Italy to visit his friend Emmanuel Ximenes in Antwerp. There is no way to know the exact path he took, but based on the advice in Ximenes' letters and on well-established trade routes; a good estimation can be made. It is likely that Neri was starting from Pisa. The path suggested by his friend took the priest first back east to Florence, then perhaps through Bologna, Ferrara and Padua to Venice. Ximenes offered to make arrangements for Neri to travel from Venice with traders headed to the Frankfurt fair held at mid-lent. There would have been plenty of time for him to celebrate Advent in Florence and Christmas in Venice before his caravan headed north. The group could have left as late as the end of January. Ximenes suggested that Neri travel with the courier from Florence to Venice. He was referring to the system of coaches that delivered the mail throughout Habsburg Europe, run since the early 1500s by the De Taxis family. While the Medici and other heads of state maintained their own fast couriers for diplomatic and military messaging, the De Taxis had a monopoly on almost every other piece of correspondence, a privilege for the family that was later extended to other parts of the world by the Holy Roman Emperor. They ran an efficient system well into the eighteenth century. An elaborate series of 'posts' were set up at intervals, where tired horses were watered and swapped for fresh steeds and riders so that the journey could continue uninterrupted. Independent travelers could partake in the system for a fee based on equipment required and the weight of luggage. In Neri's time, accounts were settled at each post and travelers could elect to stay over in a town and pick up a later expedition. On well-established popular routes like between Florence and Rome, travelers could pay a flat rate that included lodging and meals. If Neri had traveled light and spoke some German, he might have completed the entire journey in as little as ten days; the time letters from Venice to Flanders took to arrive. However Ximenes advice suggests a longer excursion. I would recommend that you should go with the courier from Florence to Venice, arriving in Venice in time that you would be able to accompany the merchants who come to the fair held in Frankfurt at mid Lent; you will stay there the length of the fair for fifteen days, which will not displease you for having seen it. After that, you would go in the company of other merchants to Cologne, and then with them or others, by land or sea to Holland, ending up at this city. This sea, however, is nothing more than rivers. I recently went by land to Basel and from there by water ending here. But for Your Lordship, who does not speak the German and Flemish languages, I would consider better the way that I say, with merchants from Venice to Frankfurt and then with others by water to arrive here. On Embarking from Venice, the party of traders would head west, back to Padua, on to Verona and then north along the ancient trade route through Bolzano to the Brenner Pass. The journey from Venice to Frankfurt was about 600 miles (950 km). Traveling an average of 30 miles per day, they would be on the road for three weeks. Depending on their itinerary, the journey could have varied by a week in either direction. The start of the fair was mid-lent, the date of the traditional feast held three weeks before Easter. In 1604 mid-lent Sunday fell on 28 March. Brenner is the lowest pass across the central Alps, connecting Bolzano on one side to Innsbruck on the other and was passable year round. The distance of this, most difficult part of the journey, was about 75 miles (120 km), with a vertical climb of 4,495 ft (1,370 m), almost a full mile, but all below the tree line. Assuming a slow pace for pack animals, this segment could still be completed in less than a week, stopping in Bressanone, (Brixen), then at the alpine city of Vipiteno (Sterzing), where perhaps some extra time was taken to rest and view the nearby silver mines. Gries am Brenner was just over the pass on the Austrian side. With the majestic Wipp valley (Wipptal) at their backs, the remaining journey was down hill from there. From Innsbruck, the traders would head towards Augsburg, perhaps with an excursion through Munich, which was then the capital of Bavaria. The route from Augsburg through Wurzburg to Frankfurt was riddled with small towns accustomed to hosting traders since Roman times. After a few weeks on the road, the fair at Frankfurt would have come as a welcome diversion. At the end of the fair, a week before Easter, Neri would start the final 250 miles (400 km) of his journey. First, he would travel over land with merchants or the Ximenes family servant to the walled city of Cologne on the Rhine River. Next, he would move by water toward the sea. The northern route, along the Rhine, avoided the military conflicts between the Dutch Republic and the Hapsburg Empire. The most dangerous were between Liege and Antwerp. From Rotterdam, the inland waterways led south to Antwerp. Priest Neri may well have arrived in time for Easter Vigil. This post first appeared in a shorter form on 21 October 2013.
0.933862	Jon Favreau posted a photo of a meeting with fellow Marvel cinematic universe directors on the set of "Star Wars" streaming series "The Mandalorian." Disney released the first production photo from Jon Favreau's upcoming "Star Wars" series, "The Mandalorian," along with a list of directors. "Black Panther" and "Stranger Things" dominated the 2018 MTV Movie & TV Awards. Bryce Dallas Howard (born March 2, 1981) is an American film actress and daughter of director Ron Howard. She made her acting debut in her father's 1989 movie Parenthood and went on to have small roles in films and make stage appearances for the next several years. During this time she also attended New York University's (NYU) Tisch School of the Arts, later getting a BFA, and went to drama schools. After gaining the attention of M. Night Shyamalan, he cast her in what would be her breakout film, The Village (2004), and 2006's Lady in the Water, which was a commercial and critical failure. Her performance in As You Like It (2006) earned her a Golden Globe Award nomination in 2008. Howard became more recognizable to audiences as Gwen Stacy in 2007's Spider-Man 3 and The Twilight Saga: Eclipse (2010), playing a villainous vampire seeking revenge. Those two projects, as well as the 2009 Terminator Salvation release, are among her most financially successful movies, but all three garnered mixed reviews from the press. Aside from acting, Howard will serve as a co-producer along with her father to Gus Van Sant's coming of age feature Restless, and will make her directorial debut with The Original. She has been married to fellow actor Seth Gabel since 2006. They have one child together, a son nicknamed Theo, who was born in early 2007. The couple currently resides in Los Angeles. Conceived in Dallas, Texas – the source of her middle name – Howard was born in Los Angeles, California, the daughter of Cheryl (née Alley), a writer, and Hollywood actor-director Ron Howard on March 2, 1981. Her paternal grandparents are actors Rance Howard and the late Jean Speegle Howard; her uncle is actor Clint Howard; her godfather is actor Henry Winkler, who co-starred on Happy Days with her father. Howard and her younger sisters, twins Jocelyn Carlyle Howard and Paige Carlyle Howard (born 1985), and their younger brother, Reed Cross Howard (born 1987), were named after the places they were conceived. All of the Howard children were raised away from the world of show business. Their parents did not allow them access to television and instead encouraged outdoor activities and hobbies. At the age of 7, however, she was allowed to be an extra in her father's movies. In an appearance on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, Howard mentioned that she and her siblings were babysat by family friend Tom Cruise on several occasions. She was raised in Westchester, New York and on a farm in Greenwich, Connecticut. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Bryce Dallas Howard."
0.955742	Martin Van Buren was of Dutch descent but he was also the first President to have been born after the Declaration of Independence was signed in 1776, technically making him the first American to be the US President. Van Buren rose to national prominence as a member of Andrew Jackson's Kitchen Cabinet, his personal cadre of advisors. The Whig Party were established in the US to oppose the Jackson administration and Van Buren beat the three candidates they put up nationwide in an attempt to reduce the Democrat vote. His Presidency was largely uneventful but began with the Panic of 1837, an economic depression which ultimately led to the establishment of an independent Treasury. It also saw the second Seminole War and some more delicious ethnic cleansing of Native American tribes in the name of progress. Van Buren also blocked the admission of Texas into the Union because their stance on slavery would have upset the balance established by the Missouri Compromise. Van Buren served a single term as US President, unsuccessfully seeking re-election in both 1840 and 1844. He was the second-shortest US President, standing 5 feet 6 inches. He is the only American President to have spoken English as a second language. His first language was Dutch.
0.985943	How much is Amir Khan Worth? Amir Khan net worth: Amir Khan is a British professional boxer who has a net worth of $30 million dollars. Born in Bolton, England, Amir Khan is a descendant of the Janjua Ranjput, a royal warrior clan in Pakistan, his family's homeland. He graduated from Bolton Community College and is part of an athletic family. He focuses on boxing, but is also an accomplished athlete in cricket, football, and basketball. He began boxing competitively while in elementary school, winning multiple honors by age 11, including Gold at the 2003 Junior Olympics and multiple Junior ABA titles. He went on to represent Britain in the 2004 Summer Olympics and won the Silver medal. In 2008, he began his professional career by defeating Martin Kristjansen for the Commonwealth Lightweight title. After winning a few more bouts he sacked his longtime trainer, Oliver Harrison. He then began training with Jorge Rubio, but the combination was not a good one. Eventually, he began working with Freddie Roach and found his stride again. He has continued to win professional bouts throughout his career. As of this writing he has won 31 of his 34 career bouts. In May 2016, Amir will earn a career-high $10-15 million fighting Saul Alvarez.
0.999998	How did Peter Kropotkin come to form his life philosophy? Kropotkin’s father was a general, and Kropotkin was educated in the Corps of Pages, becoming an attendant to Tsar Alexander II. He received a commission in the Mounted Cossacks of the Amur and went to Siberia, where he investigated the penal system. What he saw turned him against the repressive form of government in place. In his twenties, Kropotkin led expeditions into unchartered areas of Siberia, which resulted in discoveries about glaciation, the deserts of eastern Asia, and mountain structure. He read Pierre-Joseph Proudhon’s (1809–1865) writings, which led him to resign his commission in protest of an execution of Polish prisoners, who had attempted to escape. After exploring the eskers of Finland, he was offered the position of secretary of the Russian Geological Society in 1872, but instead went to Switzerland to meet exiled radicals.
0.999925	Article: Treatments For Stretch Marks: Is Carboxytherapy The Solution? Treatments For Stretch Marks: Is Carboxytherapy The Solution? Interested in losing those stretch marks? Find out how you can get started fading them today with proven all natural stretch mark removal solutions. And for more tips to help you reduce stretch marks and cellulite, visit http://www.naturalwayofgettingridofcellulite.com/ Cavyl Stewart writes about health topics. Many people who suffer, or have suffered from acne are left with acne scars which can cause the skin to look pitted and unhealthy. With the development of medical technology there are now treatments for removing acne scars by subcision, which have proved to be extremely successful. Effective Cellulite Treatment: Can Endermologie Remove Cellulite? It is definitely not easy to find the most effective cellulite treatment out there, especially when there are so many options. Do you go with affordable home remedies, or are they a waste of time? What about fancy creams and lotions? What about special inpatient procedures like Endermologie? If you want information on what Endermologie is all about and, more importantly, whether it works, you've come to the right place! Stretch marks are commonly found on the abdomen but can be seen in other parts of the body. Many women find these marks unsightly and have tried all methods of treatment to get rid of them. If you are like most people, your face will make you look older before anything else does, and probably before you would like it to! If this is the case, face wrinkle treatment may be something that you have already thought about in the past. Here, we will focus on the anti aging serums that you may have heard about recently. Nobody wants to have to deal with fat on their face, and it can be very difficult indeed to lose face fat once you have got it. The simple fact is that while there are ways, including improved exercise and dietary consumption, to lose weight, but there is no guarantee that the face fat will come off right away. Do You Want to Lose Face Fat Without Surgery? Having facial fat and wanting to lose face fat always go hand in hand. After all, carrying the extra weight on your face is never something that anyone wants to do. Luckily, there are many different methods for losing this kind of fat without the use of surgery. Any person who has seen improvement with areas affected by cellulite knows that a lot of effective cellulite treatment starts with choosing the right treatment method. However, this part can be quite confusing for many, as there are a lot of choices out there! Here is some info on five of the best cellulite treatment options today to help you decide. For anyone who has acquired the annoying blemishes, stretch mark removal is an important subject. Fortunately, for every question on stretch marks and how to be rid of them, there's a good answer. Here are some answers to frequently asked questions on the topic.
0.944909	History: Bret Hart, son of wrestler and trainer Stu Hart, grew up in a large family. The competition from his many brothers made him determined to be a great wrestler like his father. Wrestling with the likes of "The British Bulldog" Davey Boy Smith and "The Crippler" Chris Benoit, among others, in his father's Dungeon, Bret soon learned his craft well. He became one of the main attractions as "The Hitman" in the Calgary Stampede Federation, as well as a few other organizations. He earned part of his mystique due to his shyness. In interview segments, since he didn't want the audience to see his eyes, he started wearing wraparound shades. With the Calgary Stampede, Bret had 2 reigns as the British Commonwealth Mid-Heavyweight Champion; was a 5-time International Tag-Team Champion; and won the North American Heavyweight Belt 6 times. In 1985, he joined the World Wrestling Federation, wrestling in a low-card status for a time. He was then recruited by Jimmy "Mouth of the South" Hart and was teamed up with Jim "The Anvil" Neidhart, his future brother-in-law, forming the rulebreakers known as the Hart Foundation. After a year together, the team finally made it to the top, defeating the British Bulldogs for the Tag-Team Titles in January '87, partially thanks to the help of Danny Davis, the referee they had paid off. They engaged in feuds with the Bulldogs for the next few months, which included making Davis wrestle with the Hart Foundation. The team went on to other feuds with various tag-teams in the WWF, holding the belts until the end of October, when they were finally defeated by Strike Force (Tito Santana & Rick Martel). Soon after, the Hart Foundation slowly turned face, eventually dropping their manager Jimmy Hart and going out on their own. They had some epic feuds with Demolition, the Rougeau Brothers, the Brain Busters, Rhythm & Blues, the Russians, Power & Glory, and the Rockers, among other teams, and spent the next two years fighting their way back up the ladder. In August '90, they finally made it, defeating Demolition in a 3 Falls match at Summerslam and becoming the Tag-Team Champions for the second time. The two wrestlers defended the belts until Wrestlemania VII, where they fell to the Nasty Boys. Soon after, Hart and Neidhart went their separate ways, with the Hitman trying out the singles waters. It didn't take long for Hart to shake up the WWF as a singles competitor. During the King of the Ring competition in '91 (which was televised), Hart defeated Pete Dougherty, Skinner, and Irwin R. Schyster to take the tournament. Because of this win, Hart was given the Intercontinental Title shot against Mr. Perfect (Curt Hennig) at Summerslam. Hart came through, defeating Perfect with his new finisher, the Sharpshooter, to become the champ. Hart held the title until the beginning of '92, when he lost the belt to the Mountie in a controversial house show match. Hart was said to have had a high fever at the time, which led to his defeat. Since his illness kept Hart from using his rematch for the title, he gave his shot over to "Rowdy" Roddy Piper. Piper used the shot well, defeating the Mountie at the '92 Royal Rumble. Hart then met Piper for the belt at Wrestlemania VIII. The two fought hard, but kept things clean, as Piper decided not to use a foreign object to win the match. This proved to be a mistake, as Hart won out in the end, winning the Intercontinental Title for the second time. Hart and Piper then parted as friends. Hart would defend the Intercontinental Championship for over four months before losing it to another family member, his brother-in-law, the British Bulldog. The two fought at Summerslam '92, with the Bulldog coming out triumphant. Afterwards, Hart congratulated the Bulldog, keeping the family ties strong. The Hitman then moved on, heading upwards towards the top of the bracket. In October '92, he completed his climb, defeating Ric Flair to become the WWF World Champion. Hart stayed the champion for almost six months, having some great matches with wrestlers like Papa Shango, Shawn Michaels, and Razor Ramon (Scott Hall). The Hitman usually employed the Sharpshooter to come out the victor and remained the World Champ. Hart's next challenger turned out to be a true heavyweight in Yokozuna. The two men met up at Wrestlemania IX, where Hart took the edge with his Sharpshooter. However, salt thrown in Hart's eyes by Yokozuna's manager, Mr. Fuji, allowed Yokozuna to escape and get the victory, taking away the World Title. When Hulk Hogan came out to protest the decision, Yokozuna challenged him, and Hogan quickly pinned the large man to get the victory and the title. Hart, meanwhile, left the ring without the gold. Bret moved away from the World Title for a time, concentrating instead on the King of the Ring '93. A former winner of the tournament, Hart was considered one of the favorites. He proved himself worthy, defeating Razor Ramon, Mr. Pefect, and Bam Bam Bigelow to once again become the King of the Ring. However, his win was tarnished when he was attacked by Jerry "The King" Lawler during his inauguration. This started a drawn-out feud between Lawler and Hart, which came together at Summerslam '93. First, because Lawler was supposedly injured, Hart fought and defeated Doink. Lawler then attacked Hart, and their match got underway. Furious, Hart got the Sharpshooter on Lawler and refused to let go, earning himself the DQ. In the next few weeks, Hart began a new feud with Shawn Michaels, who continuously insulted Hart's family. Bret brought his brothers Owen, Bruce, and Keith to the Survivor Series to fight Michaels' paid-off knights (each of whom was masked). At one point during the fight, Bret was on the apron, hurting from the attacks he had taken, while Owen fought Michaels (the only wrestler left on his team) in the ring. Owen was whipped into Bret, sending him crashing into the guardrail. It also enabled Owen to get pinned by Michaels, making him the only Hart brother eliminated. After Michaels was eliminated, Owen came back to ringside, in a rage about what had happened. He said that he was stuck in Bret's shadow. This was the start of one of Bret's longest-running, most-emotional feuds. The two wrestlers tried to reconcile in the next few months, teaming together against the Quebecers at the Royal Rumble. The Quebecers currently held the Tag-Team Titles. The odds looked good for the Hart brothers, but Bret's knee failed him during the match, and the ref decided to end the fight. Owen snapped, attacking Bret, and leaving his brother behind. All was not lost in the night, though, as Bret went on to somehow, despite the injury, co-win the Royal Rumble with Lex Luger. Both fell out at the same time, making it impossible to tell who won. Thus, both became the #1 Contender to the World Title, currently held by Yokozuna. Bret dealt with both details, feuding with his rampant brother while also contending for the title. Eventually, it was settled, as Bret would face both Owen and the winner of Luger/Yokozuna at Wrestlemania X. Bret had a mixed night. First, Owen upset him, getting the victory in their fight. Then in the main event, Bret managed to fight through Yokozuna (who had snuck past Luger with a DQ victory), getting revenge for his earlier loss and gaining the World Title for the second time. Bret then started a new feud with Diesel (Kevin Nash) & Shawn Michaels, while also continuing his rivalry with his brother Owen. At King of the Ring, Bret defended his belt against Diesel. Since Diesel had Michaels in his corner, Bret enlisted his former tag-team partner, Jim "The Anvil" Neidhart, to help even the odds. This turned out to be a mistake, though, as Neidhart turned on Bret, first attacking Diesel to cause the DQ, then hammering Bret. Neidhart's actions were later explained, as he helped Owen win the King of the Ring. This made Owen, Bret's long nemesis, the #1 Contender to Bret's Title. The odds seemed against Bret, with two family members against him. But Bret wasn't out of wrestling family yet, as he got the British Bulldog to be his partner. With the Bulldog and the Anvil on the outside, Bret and Owen met at Summerslam '94, this time in a Steel Cage match. It was a great fight, with Bret barely escaping the cage first to retain his title. The feud wasn't over, though, as Owen and Neidhart attacked the Bulldog and Bret afterwards. This led to numerous confrontations between the two teams in the coming months, with Owen and Neidhart trying repeatedly to get the World Title from Bret. The two were later joined by a new ally, the former World Champion, Bob Backlund. Backlund was uncontrollable, with his violent submission hold, and made a formidable opponent. At the '94 Survivor Series, the two wrestlers faced off in an I Quit Towel match. Owen was in Backlund's corner, while the Bulldog once again supported Bret. In the end, though, Owen turned out to be the better ally. With the British Bulldog out cold, Owen helped Backlund get Bret into the chicken-wing submission hold, then begged Bret's and Owen's mother to throw in the towel. Tearfully, she did, giving Backlund the World Title. The Hitman's war with Backlund and Owen continued for a long while afterward, even when Backlund lost the World Title to Diesel. Bret didn't forget about the World Title, though, challenging Diesel for it at the Royal Rumble '95. But interference from Owen, Backlund, Shawn Michaels, Jeff Jarrett, and others led to the match being a draw. This made the Hitman more determined to settle things with Backlund, and the two met up for a final time at Wrestlemania XI. In another brutal match between the two, Bret came out on top, forcing Backlund to submit to the Sharpshooter. This finally cooled down the Bret-Owen feud somewhat, as Bret went back to where it all started, battling with Jerry "The King" Lawler again. After battling Lawler's stooge Hakushi and defeating him at In Your House I, Hart, weakened, was taken down by Lawler. The two met again at King of the Ring '95, where Lawler, after losing, was forced to kiss Bret's foot. Hart went on to take out Lawler's paid assailant Issac Yankum (later Kane), then dispatched with a pirate named Jean Pierre Lafitte. After these battles, Hart was ready to come back to the big time, renewing his acquaintance with the World Champion, Diesel. They battled at the Survivor Series in another classic match between the two. Due to what had happened the last time they had fought, the match was made No Disqualification. There had the be a winner. In the end, Hart, using his mind, managed to roll up the big man and get the victory, becoming the 3-time World Heavyweight Champion. Hart went on to have a one-month feud with his former ally, the British Bulldog, defeating him at In Your House 5. Hart's next challenge was at the Royal Rumble '96, where the Undertaker tried to take the gold from him. Before a victor could be decided, though, Diesel came out, attacking Bret and getting him the DQ victory. This got things going between Diesel and Bret again, leading to the two fighting in a Steel Cage match at In Your House 6. This ending was also marred by interference, as the Undertaker surprisingly came through a hole in the mat and pulled Diesel under the ring. Bret got the victory, retaining the title. Hart next went back against Shawn Michaels, and the two were set up in a 60-minute Iron Man Match at Wrestlemania XII. It has been argued as being one of the greatest matches in WWF history, as both men went to their limits and beyond. At the end of the time limit, the Hitman had the Heart Break Kid in the Sharpshooter. Unfortunately, the time expired, leaving the decision undecided. This led to the powers that be announcing that the match would continue in Sudden Death. Michaels, able to recover during the short break, managed to get the pin on Bret, taking away the World Title. Hart then left the wrestling business for the next few months, taking some time off to rest and recuperate. In the later months of '96, "Stone Cold" Steve Austin began sending out challenges to Hart in his interviews. After many insults from Austin, Bret finally reappeared, to the crowd's delight. Hart faced off against Austin in a great technical match at the Survivor Series. The two fought for nearly 30 minutes, with Hart getting the pinfall victory in the end to show that he was still a major player in the WWF. Hart then went back to the top brackets, going after then-World Champion Sycho Sid. Unfortunately, interference from Hart's old nemesis Michaels cost Hart the win. Hart then became less of a fan-favorite, going after Michaels any chance he could get. He fought hard at the Royal Rumble, trying to win to become the #1 Contender to the World Title (which Michaels had won earlier over Sid). Hart managed to eliminate his other main adversary, Austin, but Austin snuck back into the ring, as his elimination wasn't seen by the referees. Austin went on to win the Rumble, tossing Hart out. Due to the oversight, a Final Four Battle Royale match was set up between Hart, Austin, and the other two individuals in the Rumble at the end, the Undertaker and Vader. The match later became a vacated World Title match, after Michaels dropped the belt. The four men fought for a long while, with no one being eliminated for the first 18 minutes. Finally, Hart got rid of Austin, throwing him out of the ring. After the Undertaker eliminated Vader, Hart finished things off by tossing the Undertaker, winning the World Title for the fourth time. Unfortunately, the reign would only last one day, as Bret lost to Sycho Sid the next night after Austin hit Hart with a chair. Bret and Austin continued to feud, with the Hitman slowly becoming a darker character to the fans. Hart continued to complain about how he always got screwed out of victories, complaining bitterly about how things worked in the WWF. Austin and Hart faced off once again at In Your House 14. This time, Austin got the victory, winning via DQ after the Hart Foundation interfered. The next night, in a Street Fight match, Hart injured his knee, after a chairshot from Austin. Hart was out of the ring for the next month, although he continued to be the voice of the Hart Foundation, leading his troops into countless battles. Hart returned to the ring in July '97, where he led the Hart Foundation against Austin and his new allies Ken Shamrock, Goldust, and the Legion of Doom. Bret's team got the victory, when Owen got the pinfall on Austin. Bret then moved on to Summerslam as the #1 Contender, to face the World Champion at the time, the Undertaker. In a surprise move by Vince McMahon, Shawn Michaels was made the special guest referee. Hart and Michaels bickered throughout the match, and in the end, Michaels tried to attack Bret. The Hitman ducked, though, and Michaels hit the Undertaker instead. Hart made the quick pin, and Michaels was forced to count the 1-2-3, giving Hart his 5th WWF World Title reign. After facing the Undertaker one more time at One Night Only, where he won via DQ, Hart went through a brief feud against the Patriot and Vader, with the British Bulldog again helping him out. The Canadians won out over the American team. Hart then went back to feuding with Michaels, who had allies of his own in Hunter Hearst Helmsley and Rick Rude (the start of Degeneration-X). The two faced off at Survivor Series '97 in a highly-anticipated match. It soon, however, became one of the most infamous moments in wrestling history. Earlier in the month, Hart had given his notice to Vince McMahon, saying that he was leaving the WWF. This was to be his final match. At one point during the fight, Michaels got Hart in a version of the Sharpshooter. Before Hart could fight his way out, McMahon came out and ended the match, making Michaels the World Champion. The screwjob completely shocked the Hitman, as it wasn't part of the expected storyline. Hart spit in McMahon's face and walked out. It was later claimed that the two fought in the backstage area, with Hart breaking McMahon's jaw. Either way, Hart was finished with the WWF. A month later, in December '97, Bret showed up in WCW, where he quickly was announced as the guest referee for the Eric Bischoff-Larry Zbysko match at the next PPV. Both WCW and the nWo factions believed that Bret was with them. Bret showed where he stood at Starrcade, stopping Scott Hall's interference for Bischoff with the Sharpshooter. Zbysko won via disqualification. Hart then made himself known in the main event, when he helped Sting win the World Title from nWo leader Hollywood Hogan. In the next few weeks, Bret was joined in WCW by his brother-in-laws Jim "The Anvil" Neidhart and the British Bulldog, both of whom left the WWF in protest of what happened. Bret then began a minor feud with Ric Flair, with both proclaiming they were the best wrestlers. Hart faced Flair at Souled Out '98, where the Sharpshooter once again went into effect, giving the Hitman the submission victory. Hart also defeated Flair at the Boston Brawl, an Internet pay-per-view. Hart and Flair then settled their differences and began teaming up against the nWo. Hart also seemed to have a new ally in Brian Adams, who came out during one of Bret's interviews and said he would be there for the Hitman. This turned out to be a trick, though, as Adams held Hart for an nWo attack by Curt Hennig. This started another feud between Hart and Hennig (who, as Mr. Perfect, faced Hart many times in the WWF). At Uncensored, Hart made Hennig submit to the Sharpshooter. However, after the match, Rick Rude entered the ring and took Hart out with the Rude Awakening, making sure that the heat stayed between the wrestlers. Rude & Hennig then started assaults on the rest of Hart's family, along with Adams. But Hart almost always made the save, beginning to call himself the "Sheriff" of WCW. Shortly thereafter, however, Bret turned on the fans once again, helping Hollywood Hogan defeat "Macho Man" Randy Savage to gain the World Title. It seemed that Hart had joined the nWo, even though he never wore the colors. Hart then started in a long-term feud with Savage, which eventually involved "Rowdy" Roddy Piper, who was the ref at their match at Slamboree '98. At the end of the match, Hart managed to trick Piper into giving him the Disqualification victory. At the next Nitro, Piper reversed his decision, giving Savage the win. Hart protested the change, but then set up another match, pitting Hart & Hollywood Hogan against Piper & Savage at the Great American Bash. It was in this time period that Bret continued to call himself "the best there is, the best there was, and the best there ever will be." Hart spent the next few weeks fanning the anger between Piper and Savage, making their team unstable. He also became the nWo's major recruiter, trying to pull in Chris Benoit and Sting, among others. He interfered in Benoit's TV Title #1 Contender's match against Booker T, but Benoit wouldn't accept the win, telling the ref instead what had happened. Hart then gave up on his fellow Canadian, concentrating instead on Piper and Savage. At the Great American Bash, Hart & Hogan won out, as Piper & Savage just couldn't work well as a team. Hart finished it off with the Sharpshooter on Savage. Hart then became even more violent, attacking many wrestlers with steel chairs, trying to put them out of wrestling. In July '98, Hart became one of the main contenders for the vacated United States Heavyweight Title. He was scheduled to fight Diamond Dallas Page for the belt at a Nitro. During the night, Page was brutally attacked by unknown individuals, most likely members of the nWo. At the end of the night, the Hitman defeated the badly-injured DDP, forcing him to submit to the Sharpshooter. This won Hart his first gold in WCW, the United States Championship. The next week, Hart began proclaiming himself the friend of Sting, saying that the two men had so much in common, including the same finishing maneuver. At a later Nitro, when Lex Luger was taken out in the back, Hart offered to be Sting's teammate in a bout against the tag-team champions, Scott Hall and the Giant. After Hart knocked out Hall with the bat (while possibly swinging at his partner), Sting got the pinfall. Unfortunately, the ref reversed the decision after seeing Hart's bat swing, and the titles stayed with the nWo. It was later revealed from Luger that the man who attacked him to keep him out of the tag-team title fight was Bret Hart. Hart and Luger met on a Nitro for the US Title, and after Hart missed a shot with brass knuckles, Luger applied his Torture Rack and got the victory, taking away Hart's belt. This lasted for three days, as Hart came back at Thunder to win the rematch with the Sharpshooter, after a chair shot on Luger. Hart was once again the United States champion. In the next few weeks, Hart began showing signs of becoming a face again, refusing to attack Sting on a number of occasions. He also aided Lex Luger by attacking his brothers-in-law, Neidhart and the Bulldog, during a handicap match. Hart then teamed with Luger to defeat the two men, apparently signaling that Hart had joined with Luger and Sting, leaving the nWo behind. Hart was still signed to join the nWo team at Fall Brawl, however, in the War Games match. Hart fought as hard as all the wrestlers, but failed to come out on top, as Diamond Dallas Page won the #1 Contenders spot. Hart was also supposedly injured in the brawl, as his old knee injury resurfaced. In the next few weeks, Hart moved further and further from the nWo, asking the fans for another chance. He fought with Sting against Buff Bagwell & Scott Steiner at one point, then entered into a match with Hogan. During the fight, Hogan concentrated on Hart's knee, apparently injuring it worse. Hart was then replaced in the match by Sting, and was carted out on a stretcher. However, as Sting and Hogan continued to fight, and as a screen showed Luger being taken out in the back, Hart limped back to the ring, then surprisingly attacked Sting, rejoining the nWo. This started weeks of brawls between an infuriated Sting and Hart. At Halloween Havoc, Hart defeated Sting in a great match, ending it by attacking Sting with a bat while the referee was down. At the next Nitro, Hart lost the US Title to Diamond Dallas Page, and savagely beat Page with a chair afterwards. Hart then went on a rampage, trying to injure other wrestlers as he did Sting and DDP. Page returned to attack Hart, saving other wrestlers from the beatings. Page and Hart then faced at World War III, in another exciting match between the two. At one point, Hart was awarded the victory by the nWo referee, after he knocked Page out with a foreign object, then applied the Sharpshooter. However, another referee came down and restarted the match, taking the place of the nWo referee. Before Bret could protest, he was rolled up and pinned by DDP. The next Nitro, Hart challenged DDP to a rematch for the US Title at a later show. The match was booked, but then Hart tried to back out, claiming 'injuries'. But Page wouldn't hear of it, and jawed at Hart long enough to get a No-Disqualification Match signed. This turned out to be another Hitman trick, though, as Hart had the Giant come out during the match and Super-Chokeslam Page from the top turnbuckle. This allowed Hart to get the Sharpshooter and become the WCW United States Champ for the 3rd time. After this, however, Hart slowly faded into the background, continuously complaining about a groin injury that kept him from wrestling. In March '99, Hart appeared on the Mad TV show, and ended up attacking one of the comedians, Will Sasso, in what was supposedly an unplanned skit. A week later, Hart was forced by Ric Flair to defend the US Title, injured or not, against "Rowdy" Roddy Piper. During the long match, Will Sasso appeared, helping Piper defeat Hart and take the title. Hart later easily defeated Sasso in a very forgetful match (where Sasso's coworker Debra Wilson turned on him, knocking him out with a chair). In April '99, the Hitman came out and started to challenge the best in the WCW to face him. He said that he could defeat Goldberg in 5 minutes. In Toronto, Canada, with the main portion of Hart's fans watching, Hart tricked Goldberg into using his Spear, knocking himself out on the Steel Plate hidden under Hart's jersy. Hart made an unofficial pin, then grabbed a mike and told Eric Bischoff that he quit. Bret then vanished from WCW for a long period of time, due to his having groin surgery. At Slamboree '99, Bret made his shocking reappearance, hitting Goldberg with a chair during his main event match with Sting. He brutally went after Goldberg's knees with the chair, making the fans hate him more than ever. After that, Kevin Nash appeared on the Tonight Show and challenged Bret to a bout. Bret accepted. Unfortunately, tragedy soon brought wrestling screeching to a heart for the Hitman. On May 23rd, 1999, Owen Hart died in a tragic wrestling accident in the WWF, falling from the ceiling when his rope gear failed to hold him. Bret, devestated, left wrestling for a long period of time. He appeared once in June on Nitro, thanking the fans for their support, but not knowing if he would wrestle again. In September '99, Bret returned to the scene and laid out a challenge, saying that he wanted to fight Hulk Hogan. Hart started to follow Hogan around, wanting his shot. In one segment, Hogan, Hart, Lex Luger, and Sting, all considered faces at the time, were in a locker room, when the lights went out. When they were turned back on, Sting was facedown in the room, and everyone accused the others for the assault. At Fall Brawl, it was learned that Sting and Luger were the ones going bad, as they took out Hogan to get the World Title. Hart soon sided with Hogan against the two heels, almost a reverse of the nWo days. Hart, Hogan, and Ric Flair fought against Sting and Luger, with Hart taking some serious bat shots, including one to the face when he had Luger in the Sharpshooter. On October 4th, 1999, Hart scheduled a match against his friend, Chris Benoit. The two men dedicated the bout to Owen. The match was technically unbelievable, with some great maneuvers from both men. Hart won the tribute match by putting Benoit in the Sharpshooter, and the two men parted friends. The next week, Hart and Benoit teamed to fight against Lex Luger and Rick Steiner. They won via DQ, as Sid Vicious interfered. Luger beat on Hart's leg, until Goldberg came to the rescue. Luger and Hart met at Halloween Havoc '99, but Hart's leg was in too bad shape, and he was forced to submit. Despite the leg injury, Hart came to Nitro determined to fight in the WCW World Title Tournament. Sting had been forced to vacate after attacking an official, setting up the tournament. Hart battled Bill Goldberg in the first round match, for the US Title. Goldberg had the advantage through most of the match, but interference from the Outsiders allowed Bret to get the win, for his 4th US Title reign. Hart, disgusted by the interference, later vacated the title. Hart and Goldberg soon started teaming against the force of Sid Vicious and the Outsiders. Hart and Goldberg, in a 4 Way US Title match, fought against Scott Hall and Vicious. Kevin Nash, the special guest referee, proved to be the deciding factor, as Hall became the new champion, after Nash took out Hart with a baseball bat. This didn't stop Hart from moving on in the tournament, as he defeated Perry Saturn and Billy Kidman to make it to the Semis at WCW Mayhem. Hart again fought his former nemesis, Sting. The duo put on a great match, despite interference from the Total Package against the Stinger. Hart took out Luger, then managed to get the Sharpshooter on Sting, getting the victory. Hart then went to the Finals against his friend, Chris Benoit. Another great match ensued, also with interference from Dean Malenko as well as the Outsiders. In the end, Hart reversed the Crippler Crossface into the Sharpshooter, getting the submission victory. Bret Hart finally was holding the WCW World Title, becoming one of only a few wrestlers to hold both the WCW and WWF Heavyweight Championships. Afterwards, Benoit and Hart shook hands once again, staying friends. The feuding between various factions soon came to a head, as Hart and Benoit found themselves fighting against the Outsiders, with Goldberg and Sid Vicious forming a third party. Hart and Jeff Jarrett also fought, with Jarrett siding with the Outsiders. Hart and Goldberg also still teamed together, though, as they won the tag-team straps from Creative Control (the Harris Brothers) in December '99. Still, there was tension between the two, as Hart and Goldberg were scheduled to fight at Starrcade for Hart's World Title. The Outsiders took advantage of the tension, challenging the two men for the Tag belts they had just won a week before. After an assault on Hart left his knee in bad shape again, Goldberg took on the Outsiders alone. Hart appeared near the end of the match to help Goldberg out, but his bad knee allowed Nash to pin him and get the victory and the titles. At Starrcade '99, Hart and Goldberg battled a long match for the World Title. During the match, "Rowdy" Roddy Piper came out to be the referee. Hart managed to get on the Sharpshooter on Goldberg, and Piper immediately called for the bell, without Goldberg submitting. It was similar to when Hart was screwed out of the WWF belt, and it was learned that Vince Russo, recently entering WCW after working with the WWF for a long time, rigged it that way to "make it even" for Bret. Hart apparently didn't like the way things had gone, and vacated the World Title the next Nitro, saying that Goldberg deserved another shot at it. Hart also confronted Piper, who seemed to feel horrible about what happened. Hart and Goldberg fought for the belt at the next Nitro, in a short-lived match, as the Outsiders and Jeff Jarrett came to ringside. In a major swerve, they attacked Goldberg, along with Hart, who made the pin to become the World Champ for a second time. Hart, Jarrett, and the Outsiders then spraypainted Goldberg and Piper, who had tried to make the save. The nWo was back. With the band back together, Hart and the rest of the nWo feuded with Goldberg, Sid Vicious, Chris Benoit, and other wrestlers for the next month or so. The nWo was being backed by Russo and "The Powers That Be", making them the strongest group in WCW. Scott Steiner soon pulled another swerve, joining the nWo as well, and Hart's group was more powerful than ever. The group feuded with Sid Vicious & Chris Benoit, among others, and had a memorable moment when they threw Sid into his car, then crushed the car with a monster truck. However, just as things were looking their best for Hart, things fell apart. A major concussion, that many assumed was caused by a stiff facekick from Goldberg, forced Hart to the sidelines, and he was forced to vacate the World Title. The concussion shook the man to his core, keeping him off television for many months. Hart next appeared during the Eric Bischoff/Vince Russo takeover in April '00. Bischoff & Russo had declared war against the more established stars, which they called the Millionaires' Club. They went on to form the New Blood, a group of the younger wrestlers. That Nitro, Hart appeared in the crowd, then confronted Bischoff & Russo at the end of the show, without saying a word. A few weeks later, when Bischoff was fighting Hulk Hogan, Hart came down to the ring with a chair. Although the show then ended, the fans found out later that Hart had clocked Hogan with the chair. Hart then started pursuing Hogan again, saying that Hogan was afraid of Hart. Hart wasn't sure he could wrestle again, but that he still wanted one more fight with Hogan. Unfortunately, with the concussion being more severe then at first known, Hart again went on the injured list. In August '00, the Hitman appeared at New Blood Rising after the Lance Storm/Mike Awesome match. Storm had won thanks to help from the special referee Jacques Rougeau. Hart then walked down the aisle and entered the ring, and the three Canadians embraced. A few weeks later, Hart appeared at a Nitro, knocking out Goldberg with a shovel after Goldberg had dug a grave for Vince Russo. Hart also interfered in the War Games 2000 match, slamming the cage door in Goldberg's face to keep him from winning the World Title (Nash won it instead). But this was one of Hart's last hurrahs in WCW, as he was later terminated from the federation due to his injury status, having not been in a wrestling match since the beginning of '00. "We are never prepared for what we expect. It is with deep regret and sadness that I officially announce that my career as a professional wrestler is over...forever. Due to the severity of numerous concussions, I received in late December 1999 and early January 2000 as the reigning WCW World Champion my Doctors have advised me that any physical return to the ring would hold serious consequences for me. So, after great deliberation it has become clear that it is best for me, my family and my fans that I say goodbye. I would like to thank every single wrestler I ever worked with. I wanted to thank my loyal fans all around the world. I owe you all for what I am. I never really worked for an honest wrestling promoter except my Dad who I especially want to thank. Wrestling has been my life forever. I have been extremely fortunate in what I have achieved and what I have attained through wrestling. Wrestling will always be in my blood. I sincerely hope that I can impart some of the lessons I have learned to those now involved and to those on the way up. I hope that by doing so, the wrestling business will be a better business for the people that make it happen. The wrestlers. The Hitman will always be known as one of the great stars of professional wrestling, and as one of the few who have won both the WCW and WWF World Titles. For many of his fans, he will always be thought of as the best there is, was, and ever will be. - Stampede International Tag-Team Title Tournament (March '82) = Bret & Bruce Hart defeated Mike Shaw & Tab Rogers and Mo Chi Lau & the Cuban Assassin, before falling to the eventual winners, Duke Myers & Kerry Brown. - WWF World Junior Heavyweight Title League '84 (January 1 - February 7, '84) = Hart competed in the League, which was won by the Dynamite Kid. - NJPW Sumo Hall (February '84) = Hart & the Black Tiger were beaten by Isamu Teranishi & Kuniaki Kobayashi. - WWF Wrestlemania II ('86) = Hart wrestled in a "Battle Royal", which was won by Andre the Giant. - WWF Saturday Night's Main Event #8 (November '86) = The Hart Foundation (Hart and Jim "The Anvil" Neidhart) lost to the Killer Bees. - WWF Saturday Night's Main Event #10 (February '87) = The Hart Foundation defended the WWF Tag Belts by defeating Tito Santana and Dan Spivey. - WWF Wrestlemania III ('87) = The Hart Foundation and Danny Davis defeated the British Bulldogs and Tito Santana. - WWF Saturday Night's Main Event #11 (April '87) = The Hart Foundation lost a "3 Falls" Match to the British Bulldogs, but, due to one of the falls being a DQ, retained the WWF Tag Belts. - WWF Saturday Night's Main Event #12 (September '87) = The Hart Foundation stayed the WWF Tag Champs by defeating the Young Stallions. - WWF Saturday Night's Main Event #13 (November '87) = Hart was defeated by "Macho Man" Randy Savage. - WWF Survivor Series '87 = The Hart Foundation, the Islanders, Demolition, the Russians and Greg "The Hammer" Valentine and Dino Bravo fought in a "Tag-Team Elimination" Match against the British Bulldogs, Young Stallions, Strike Force, the Rougeau Brothers and the Killer Bees. Hart and Neidhart were eliminated when "B" Brian Brunzell pinned Hart. The Killer Bees and the Young Stallions were the "survivors". - WWF Royal Rumble '88 = Hart competed in the "Royal Rumble", which was won by "Hacksaw" Jim Duggan. - WWF Wrestlemania IV ('88) = Hart wrestled in a "Battle Royal", which was won by Bad News Brown. - WWF Wrestlefest '88 = Hart was beat by Bad News Brown. - WWF Saturday Night's Main Event #17 (October '88) = The Hart Foundation again lost to Demolition, who retained their belts. - WWF Survivor Series '88 = The Hart Foundation, the Powers of Pain, the Rockers, the British Bulldogs and the Young Stallions fought in a "Tag-Team Elimination" Match against the Brain Busters, the Conquistadors, Demolition, the Bolsheviks and the Fabulous Rougeau Brothers. Hart and Neidhart were eliminated when Terry Blanchard pinned Hart. The Powers of Pain were the "survivors". - WWF Summerslam '89 = The Hart Foundation lost to the Brain Busters. - WWF Survivor Series '89 = Bret Hart, "Hacksaw" Jim Duggan, Hercules and "Rugged" Ronnie Garvin fought in an "Elimination" Match against "Macho King" Randy Savage, Dino Bravo, Greg "The Hammer" Valentine and the Canadian Earthquake. Hart was eliminated by Savage. Earthquake, Bravo and Savage were the "survivors". - WWF Royal Rumble '90 = Bret competed in the "Royal Rumble", which was won by Hulk Hogan. - WWF Wrestlemania VI ('90) = The Hart Foundation quickly beat Nikolia Volkoff and Boris Zuhkov. - AJPW US/Japan Wrestling Summit (April 13th, '90) = Hart fought to a draw with Tiger Mask. - WWF Saturday Night's Main Event #26 (April 23rd, '90) = The Hart Foundation and the Rockers fought to a Double Disqualification. - WWF Survivor Series '90 = The Hart Foundation, Dusty Rhodes and Koko B. Ware fought in an "Elimination" Match against Ted DiBiase, the Undertaker and Rhythm & Blues. Hart was eliminated by DiBiase, who was the sole "survivor". - WWF Royal Rumble '91 = Bret was involved in the "Royal Rumble", which was won by Hulk Hogan. - WWF Saturday Night's Main Event #29 (April '91) = Hart and Ted DiBiase fought to a Double Count-Out. - WWF Summerslam '91 = Bret won the WWF Intercontinental Title by beating Mr. Perfect. - WWF King of the Ring Tournament (September 7, '91) = Hart defeated Pete Dougherty, Skinner, and Irwin R. Schyster to win the tournament. - WWF Survivor Series '91 = Hart, "Rowdy" Roddy Piper, Davey Boy Smith and Virgil fought in an "Elimination" Match against Ric Flair, Ted DiBiase, the Warlord and the Mountie. Hart was DQ'ed. Ric Flair was the "survivor". - WWF Tuesday In Texas (December '91) = Bret stayed the I-C Champ by forcing Skinner to submit. - WWF Wrestlemania VIII ('92) = Bret won the WWF Intercontinental Belt from "Rowdy" Roddy Piper. - WWF Summerslam '92 = Bret lost the WWF I-C Title to the British Bulldog. - WWF Saturday Night's Main Event #31 (October '92) = Hart stayed the WWF World Champ by forcing Papa Shango to submit. - WWF Survivor Series '92 = Hart retained the WWF World Title by forcing Shawn Michaels to submit. - WWF Royal Rumble '93 = Hart forced Razor Ramon to submit, retaining the WWF World Title. - WWF Wrestlemania IX ('93) = Hart lost the WWF World Title to Yokozuna. - WWF King of the Ring '93 = Hart defeated Razor Ramon, Mr. Perfect and Bam Bam Bigelow to win the KOTR tournament. - WWF Summerslam '93 = Hart forced Doink to submit, then lost, via DQ, to Jerry "The King" Lawler. - WWF Survivor Series '93 = Bret, Owen, Keith and Bruce Hart fought in an "Elimination" Match against Shawn Michaels and his 3 Knights. Bret, Keith and Bruce were the "survivors". - WWF Royal Rumble '94 = Bret and Owen Hart lost to the Quebecers, who retained the WWF Tag Titles. Later in the night, Bret co-won the "Royal Rumble" with Lex Luger. - WWF Wrestlemania X ('94) = Bret was pinned by his brother, Owen Hart. Later in the night, Hart defeated Yokozuna for the WWF World Title. - WWF King of the Ring '94 = Hart retained the WWF World Title, but lost, via DQ, to Diesel. - WWF Summerslam '94 = Hart stayed the WWF World Champ by winning a "Steel Cage" Match over Owen Hart. - WWF Jacques Rougeau Retirement Show (October '94) = Hart defended the WWF World Title by beating Jim "The Anvil" Neidhart. - WWF Survivor Series '94 = Hart lost the WWF World Title in a "submission" match to Bob Backlund. - WWF Royal Rumble '95 = Bret and Diesel fought to a No-Contest, with Diesel retaining the WWF World Title. - WWF Wrestlemania XI ('95) = Bret won an "I Quit" Match over Bob Backlund. - WWF In Your House 1 (May '95) = Hart defeated Hakushi. Later in the night, Hart lost to Jerry "The King" Lawler. - WWF King of the Ring '95 = Hart won a "Kiss My Foot" Match over Jerry "The King" Lawler. - WWF In Your House 2 (July '95) = Hart beat Jean Pierre Lafite in a dark match. - WWF Summerslam '95 = Hart won, via DQ, over Issac Yankem. - WWF In Your House 3 (September '95) = Hart forced Jean Pierre Lafite to submit. - WWF In Your House 4 (October '95) = Hart defeated Issac Yankem in a dark match. - WWF Survivor Series '95 = Hart won the WWF World Title from Diesel in a "No DQ" Match. - Stu Hart Tribute Show (December 15, '95) = Hart stayed the WWF World Champ by beating Davey Boy Smith. - WWF In Your House 5 (December 17, '95) = Hart retained the WWF World Title by beating the British Bulldog. - WWF Royal Rumble '96 = Bret retained his WWF World Title by winning, via DQ, over the Undertaker. - WWF In Your House 6 (February '96) = Hart stayed the WWF World Champ by winning a "Steel Cage" Match over Diesel. - WWF Wrestlemania XII ('96) = Bret lost the WWF World Title in an "Ironman" Match with Shawn Michaels. - WWF Survivor Series '96 = Hart defeated "Stone Cold" Steve Austin. - WWF Middle East Cup Tournament (December 2, '96) = Hart beat the British Bulldog and Steve Austin to win the tournament. - WWF In Your House 12 (December '96) = Hart lost to then-WWF World Champ Psycho Sid. - WWF Royal Rumble '97 = Bret competed in the "Royal Rumble", which was won by Steve Austin. - WWF Triple Threat (January '97) = Hart lost a "Triangle" Match to WWF World Champ Shawn Michaels, with Psycho Sid as the other participant. - WWF WWF In Your House 13 (February '97) = Hart won the WWF World Title by defeating the Undertaker, Vader, and Steve Austin in a "Final Four" Match. - WWF Wrestlemania XIII ('97) = Bret "TKO"ed "Stone Cold" Steve Austin in a "Submission" Match. Ken Shamrock was the special referee. - WWF In Your House 14 (April '97) = Hart lost, via DQ, to "Stone Cold" Steve Austin. - WWF In Your House 16 (July '97) = The New Hart Foundation (Bret, Owen Hart, Jim "The Anvil" Neidhart, Davey Boy Smith and Brian Pillman) defeated Steve Austin, Ken Shamrock, Goldust and the Legion of Doom. - WWF Summerslam '97 = Bret won the WWF World Title for a 5th time, defeating the Undertaker. Shawn Michaels was the special referee. - Fifty Years of Funk (September '97) = Hart defeated Terry Funk. - WWF One Night Only (September '97) = Hart stayed the WWF World Champ by winning, via DQ, over the Undertaker. - WWF In Your House 17 (October '97) = Bret stayed the WWF World Champ by forcing the Patriot to submit. - WWF In Your House 18 (November '97) = Hart and the British Bulldog defeated Vader and the Patriot. - WWF Survivor Series '97 = Hart lost the WWF World Title to Shawn Michaels. - WCW Starrcade '97 = Hart was the special referee for the Larry Zbyzsko - Eric Bischoff match, which was won, via DQ, by Zbyzsko. - WCW/nWo Souled Out '98 = Hart forced Ric Flair to submit, winning the match. - WCW Boston Brawl (January '98) = Hart again made Ric Flair submit. - WCW Uncensored '98 = Hart used his Sharpshooter to get Curt Henning to submit. - WCW Slamboree '98 = Hart, via disqualification, won the match against "Macho Man" Randy Savage (later reversed by the Special Referee, "Rowdy" Roddy Piper). - WCW Great American Bash '98 = Hart and Hollywood Hogan defeated "Macho Man" Randy Savage and "Rowdy" Roddy Piper. - WCW Bash At The Beach '98 = Hart lost, via DQ, to then-WCW TV Champion Booker T. - WCW Fall Brawl '98 = Hart was involved in the War Games Match, along with Hollywood Hogan, Stevie Ray, Diamond Dallas Page, "Rowdy" Roddy Piper, the Warrior, Kevin Nash, Sting, and Lex Luger. DDP was the winner. - WCW Halloween Havoc '98 = Hart retained the WCW United States Title, defeating Sting. - WCW World War III '98 = Hart was defeated by the United States Champ, Diamond Dallas Page. - WCW Halloween Havoc '99 = Hart was forced to submit to the Total Package Lex Luger. - WCW Mayhem (November '99) = Hart got a submission victory over Sting, then went on to beat Chris Benoit in the finals to become the new WCW World Champion. - WCW Starrcade '99 = Hart defended the World Title by defeating Bill Goldberg. - WWE Wrestlemania XXVI (March 28, '10) = Hart won a "No Rules Lumberjack" Match over Vince McMahon. Bruce Hart was the special referee. - WWE Summerslam '10 (August 15) = Team WWE (Hart, John Cena, Daniel Bryan, Edge, Chris Jericho, John Morrison, & Edge) won an "Elimination" Match over the Nexus (Wade Barrett, Justin Gabriel, David Otunga, Skip Sheffield, Heath Slater, Michael Tarver, & Darren Young).
0.999859	Book a stay in Costa Rica at the remote Hotel Las Caletas Lodge, a gorgeous eco-friendly property located on the Osa Peninsula. Accessible only by boat, the eight-room hotel caters to a maximum of twenty guests. Numerous activities are available to experience beautiful nature that Costa Rica has to offer. Those seeking a remote vacation in Costa Rica should choose to stay at the Hotel Las Caletas Lodge, located on the Osa Peninsula in the Pacific Ocean. This stunning 8-acre property is large enough to offer privacy, but with only eight rooms, is also small enough for personalized attention to be given to all guests. With the ocean in front and the rainforest behind, incredible views abound. Accessible only by boat, this eco-friendly paradise is situated in Las Caletas, between Corcovado National Park and Drake Bay. The hotel is owner-operated, and with a maximum of twenty guests, everyone is made to feel special and welcome. After purchasing the land in 1991, the owners' mindful slow development of the property prioritized environmental choices such as a combined system of solar, water and public power to provide electricity, and tour boats that run on low-emissions motors. The lodge's private accommodations vary in size and character, but all showcase the gorgeous Costa Rican scenery from porches or balconies. A couple traveling may want to experience staying in an elevated platform tent, while a family would be well-served to choose the larger space of one of the duplex units. Swing in a hammock on your porch while smelling the ocean; read a book while hearing noises of the jungle. Delicious and healthy eating is a priority at Las Caletas Lodge, showcasing elements from both Costa Rican and European cuisines. The daily rate at the lodge includes both breakfast and dinner, served in the open-air dining room with a backdrop of the ocean and forest. Meals incorporate plenty of fresh fruits and vegetables, as well as freshly baked breads and desserts. Fish, poultry and meat are served, with vegetarian and diet meals available upon request. Lunch is available for purchase at the lodge and is often included as a picnic or boxed lunch with a tour. Fruit juice is provided at meals, and alcoholic beverages and soft drinks may be purchased. Drinking water is safe and filtered. The lodge offers an abundance of guided activities to choose from, although many guests like to set aside some time for swimming in the ocean, sunbathing and relaxing, too. Excursions range from thrilling zip lining over the rainforest to scuba diving amongst vibrant sea creatures, serene hikes in the rainforest to exhilarating humpback whale watching tours. All tours, led by experienced guides, highlight Costa Rica's treasures in an intimate setting. Experience the untouched nature at Las Caletas Lodge in Southern Pacific Costa Rica on the Osa Peninsula. The eight rooms at the lodge offer spectacular views and are close to the beach. All feature daily room service, orthopedic mattresses, window screens, ceiling fans, and 24-hour electricity. The Honeymoon Suite, Duplex, Rana and Iguana rooms have private tiled bathrooms, while the Tent Cabins share two bathrooms. All bathrooms provide hot water showers; shampoo, conditioner and soap; and towels. Honeymoon Suite – If you are looking for privacy and seclusion, you will find it in this two-story superior bungalow. There is a tranquil porch with hammock and seats. Downstairs is a lounging area and bathroom, while the upstairs hosts a bedroom with one double and one single bed. This suite sleeps three. Duplex Rooms – These two superior bungalows are located in the same duplex building, separated by a divided balcony and distinct entrances. The upstairs bedroom is furnished with one double and one single bed, and the downstairs bedroom has two single beds. These duplexes are ideal for larger parties as they can sleep between two and five guests. Room “Rana” – This standard bungalow offers privacy and has one double and one single bed. It sleeps three. Room “Iguana” – This standard room has a balcony with a hammock and is adjacent to the main building. The room is furnished with one double and one single bed and sleeps three. Tent Cabins – These three unique elevated tent cabins have two armchairs on the roomy front porch. They are set on a raised platform and have a full-sized bed, accommodating two guests. One cabin also has a twin-sized bed. Birdwatching - View many unique and diverse bird species such as macaws, toucans and parakeets as you take a morning walk on the Las Caletas property. Canopy Tour (Zip line) - Soar atop Corcovado National Park and see the trees of the largest primary rainforest in Central America beneath your feet. Dolphin & Whale Tour - Seek out dolphins and (seasonal) humpback whales on a boat journey with an experienced local guide, usually in the direction of Caño Island. Horseback Riding - Ride with a guide at your own pace through the trails of Drake Bay on horseback, stopping at a freshwater lagoon for a cooling dip in the “Rio Claro”. Mangrove Tour - Traverse rivers and canals by boat as you look for monkeys, crocodiles, birds and other creatures with a naturalist guide. Night Walk – Start on the Las Caletas grounds and then enter the jungle, learning about the Costa Rican ecosystem while spying lizards, frogs, and other nocturnal mammals. Tour Caño Island – Scuba Diving - Head 12 miles west of Drake Bay during this 45-minute boat ride for a dive that presents magnificent sea life in a spectacular setting. Tour Caño Island – Snorkeling - Leave the lodge by boat and head to one of the best locations in Costa Rica to snorkel amid amazing sea life, followed by a picnic lunch on the beach. Tour Corcovado – San Pedrillo - Journey to the ranger station via boat and then hike along park trails and the San Pedrillo River with an experienced guide, stopping to enjoy a picnic lunch. Tour Corcovado – Sirena – Enjoy a day filled with a boat ride, a mild guided hike along trails and streams, and a box lunch as you learn more about Costa Rica in this stunning rainforest. Hotel Las Caletas Lodge is located south of Drake Bay on the Osa Peninsula, with access to the lodge by boat only. "For "travelers," not tourist, looking to see the most beautiful parts of Osa and really get a feel for Tico life, this piece of heaven can not be missed. From the porch of the main house one can see Toucans and monkeys. It is one of those places that restores the soul and guests become friends. David could not be more hospitable and Eric is a wonderful nature guide. This not for someone looking for a corporate Mc-Hotel experience but it could be a delightful corporate retreat for companies looking to "get real." We loved it and as a world traveler, it will be high on the memory list.
0.999998	Popular method for calculating option prices. - Stock Price: Current stock price. - Strike Price: Option strike price. - Risk-Free Rate: Risk-free interest rate expressed as a percentage. - Volatility: Annual volatility percentage of the stock price, average movement of the stock per day over the previous year, always expressed in absolute terms (-10% would be 10% movement). - Price Date: Date of the theoretical call or put. - Expiration Date: Date the options will expire. - Call Price: Theoretical option call price as of the price date, if the expire and price dates are the same, the call price would be the difference between the stock and strike prices. - Put Price: Theoretical option put price as of the price date. You own options in a company that have a strike price of $13/option. The current stock price is $8 as of March 23, 2008. Your options expire on August 3, 2009. If Government T-Bills are trading at 4% interest and the stock's volatility is 20%, what's the put price on the options? The puts are worth $4.34.
0.999999	What if the water was so polluted that fish were forced into fishing nets and bottles to survive? While doing research on water pollution, I found out that the most common articles of trash thrown away in the ocean were cigarettes and cigarette filters. I also found out about the dangers of the fish eating trash, and it either poisoning or staying within the fish until we eat it, as well as how small pieces of microscopic trash can enter fish and into our bodies when we eat them.
0.959135	1 A person who establishes an institution or settlement. The earlier post "What's a title for a founder no longer with a company? asks for an alternative while stressing on the fact that "a founder is always a founder." I suspect most of the hits on Google search are either related to non-native speakers' writings or incidental proximity of the words rather than an intentional use of the phrase. One may dissociate oneself from something after having founded it. Can someone cease to be a "founder"? I am sorry. It does not make sense. A founder is a founder, dead or alive, even 300 years later. Right, you can’t cease being a founder of something, but you can cease your affiliation with the organization you founded, which is what is being conveyed with “co-founder (former)”. The person being referenced is a co-founder, but a former employee of the company he founded. No. What's done is done and the term "founder" is describing that sort of state. A founder could repent having founded something. An institution could repudiate the connection to a founder. Reports could change understanding of the founding and who was responsible. None of these actually undoes the founding or who the founders were, though that last one could well lead to a state where a person was formerly thought to be the/a founder and no longer is. If one of the two founders of Stack Overflow is called Jeff Atwood and chooses to describe himself as co-founder (former), it appears that the reference was meant to be tongue-in-cheek, which is in keeping with the software developer's sense of humor. One word that best describes how I work: I'm going to assume that an animated GIF counts as one word. Here you go. Dean Leffingwell is a renowned software development methodologist, author, and software team coach. He is the former founder and CEO of Requisite, Inc., makers of RequisitePro, and a former vice president at Rational Software, where he was responsible for the commercialization of RUP. It's true that a founder doesn't stop being a founder because she stops being involved in the company. However that doesn't mean the use of the past tense combined with the word 'founder' is is ungrammatical or illogical. "Romulus was the founder of Rome". and that does not say anything about whether Alice still is the CEO. TLDR: Saying somebody "was" the founder is perfectly grammatical and logical. What you quote doesn't say he's a former founder, it says he's a former "Co-Founder". The capitalised term "Founder" is frequently used as a formal title within a company (often in combination with some other job title, sometimes not). Holding that title suggests (although doesn't strictly imply) a senior and influential role in the organisation, regardless of its literal meaning. The use of titles within companies or other organisations may or may not bear any relation to their accuracy as an English description. So, once someone has jointly founded something, we can always say that they are a co-founder of it. It doesn't follow that their formal title remains "Co-Founder", and it's fairly routine that when someone leaves an organisation they disclaim any formal title within it. I don't know whether or not Jeff Atwood actually ever had StackExchange business cards with "Co-Founder" on them, but the meaning of writing "Co-Founder (Former)" is that the title "Co-Founder" is no longer appropriate, since he has no influence in the organisation. Describing him as a "co-founder", meaning someone who jointly established the organisation, isn't the relevant meaning here. Sort of yes - The body can refuse to acknowledge that someone was a founder and attempt to distance themselves from the person in question. This is more often than not because of a scandal and the group no longer wishes to be associated with that person; and they do not have enough control of the body to stop it happening. For example a child rights group might decide to distance itself from a founder who was found to have abused children. While the person will always be a founder technically, they might not be a founder officially. What's a title for a founder no longer with a company? Can food be described as “nice”? Can someone be instilled with medication? Can you “regret” someone else's action? Does “cease” express a temporary interruption or a permanent termination of an action? Can standards deem someone unworthy? I’m confused, can someone tell me which is correct?
0.999935	What is the significance of the “mark of Cain” (Gen. 4:15)? —Abel, the younger brother was killed by the elder; so too Jesus, head of the younger people, is killed by the elder people—the Jews. —Just as Abel’s blood cursed Cain, so too does the blood of Jesus accuses the Jews. —As Cain was cursed from by the earth, so too unbelieving Jews are cursed from the Holy Church. —As Cain was punished to be a mourner and an abject on the earth, so too are the Jews.
0.992944	Limited edition print hand signed by Andrew 'Freddie' Flintoff, this print celebrates England's Man of the Series, whose stunning performances with bat and ball helped England to regain the Ashes. About Andrew 'Freddie' Flintoff Andrew 'Freddie' Flintoff MBE is one of the most inspirational all-rounder's in the history of English cricket. Born in Preston, Lancashire on December 6, 1977, 'Freddie' quickly developed into a prodigious cricketing talent as a youngster, breaking through to the Lancashire first team while still a teenager. After captaining the England Under-19 team in 1997, the burly cricketer was promoted to the senior side the following summer making his Test debut for England against South Africa at Trent Bridge. A couple of indifferent campaigns followed with Flintoff struggling to keep his weight down and his batting displays suffered as a result. Recalled to the international set-up in 2002, 'Freddie' was a new man, slimmer and more dynamic with both bat and ball. Between 2003 and the Ashes series of 2005 the Lancastrian averaged 43 with the bat and 28 for each Test wicket, becoming a focal figure within the England side. Under Michael Vaughan's stewardship Flintoff continued to blossom and the highlight of his career came in the famous summer of 2005 when he inspired England to their famous Ashes victory over Australia. Magnificent in the field, when bowling, and when needed to contribute with the bat, Flintoff was England's hero from start to finish. He was named BBC Sports Personality later in the year for his efforts. Since 2005 Flintoff has struggled consistently with injuries missing many Test matches as a result. The all-rounder did captain his country during the ill-fated 2007 Ashes series in Australia and has since been in and out of the team because of a recurring problem with his knees. Although Flintoff is due to retire from Test cricket he has vowed to continue to excel in the one day game. He is currently the second highest wicket taker for England in one day internationals and the ninth highest runs scorer. 'Freddie' also holds the record for the most sixes hit for England in international cricket. Andrew Flintoff's presence in the England cricket Test side will be sorely missed. Own a piece of sporting history Andrew 'Freddie' Flintoff is one of the most inspirational and iconic cricketers of the 21st century. Each print also comes with a certificate of authenticity.
0.956855	Which is better? CTEs (common table expressions) or Subqueries? In SQL2005 and beyond, you can use CTEs or you can continue to use subqueries. I think the biggest benefit for using CTEs is readability. It makes it much easier to see what queries are being used as subqueries, and then it's easy to join them into a query, much like a view. CTEs do allow recursion, which can solve some interesting problems, or get you into trouble. The biggest pro for a CTE is that a CTE can be recursive where a subquery cannont. Also, a CTE can be referenced multiple ties in the same statement, where a subquery cannot. Personally, I think that in most cases, a CTE in is more readable than a subquery. The only disadvantage I see with CTEs is that they require the keyword WITH. This forces the previous statement to end with a semi-colon, which causes headaches for some developers. Otherwise, I see CTEs as a way of using table-expressions in a much more readable way. I wish that all sub-queries could be defined this way, including scalar subqueries, IN lists and EXISTS queries. They should be parameterisable and able to be used in a lambda-style way. I think the guys here have pretty much nailed it in terms of the key benefit being readability. However, I would just like to point out a common misconception - which is that a CTE is 'run' and then the rest of the query uses it. It doesn't work like that - a CTE will work as you would think sub-queries would, and will be materialised once for each time it is used in the query. For single materialisation, a temporary storage mechanism (temp table or table variable) can still offer efficiencies over both methods. A contrarian view: I think CTEs are evil. Sure there examples on the internet showing how they are easier to read (which I disagree with BTW...temporary tables, @tables and non-correlated subqueries I can read quite well. This spaghetti code of nested CTEs gets quite complicated). The problem is when you get into 1,000+ line stored procedures and functions. Right now I am debugging a query written by a team of CTE-believers whose cascading recursion of CTEs several nested 11 layers deep (CTE 2 calls CTE1, CTE3 calls CTE2 and CTE1, ..., CTE11 calls everything) are producing over 1,100 tuples in memory causing OOM errors. CTEs are not the sole cause; "WHERE NOT EXISTS", UNION, and correlated subqueries are also contributing. And poorly-written SQL is nothing new. But this code is every bit as complex to read and debug as if things were all in one statement. At least when views were overused, they could be corrected in one place and did not need to be edited in dozens of stored procedures. I just don't see any possible value-add of CTEs that cannot already be accomplished by views and temp tables/table variables. Views are cleaner, and temporary storage is much faster. In theory, simple CTEs make code readability great. In practice, CTEs allow for code to become even more FUBAR than in the past.
0.936378	Recent work indicates that the leak conductance (G L ) in the squid giant axon is optimal for the action potential firing frequency. Assuming a chloride leak current, the measured G L of approximately 0.3 mS/cm2 is very close to the theoretical optimal value that minimizes the absolute refractory period, or equivalently, that maximizes the highest frequency at which action potentials can be generated. These results were obtained by simulating brief, sharp current injections at one end of a Hodgkin-Huxley axon model, consistent with the standard experimental technique for measuring refractory periods. However, it is known that constant current inputs to one end of a spatially axon can also evoke repetitive firing over a relatively narrow range of input strength. We have therefore investigated the optimality of G L for constant input currents (I DC ). We find that the repetitive firing frequency is indeed maximized near biological values of G L for lower values of I DC (Figure 1). However, at higher values of I DC , the frequency-optimal G L goes to 0, and the firing frequency itself is even higher. Thus, solely from the point of view of maximizing repetitive firing frequency under constant current input, the combination of a high input current strength and little to no leak conductance would seem best. However, when one takes temperature into account, it suggests why evolution has not chosen this strategy. The ocean temperatures which a cold-blooded squid encounters can vary by as much as 10 degrees Celsius over a few months . The repetitive firing of the axon therefore must be able to function over such a range. As shown in Figure 2, the range of G L -I DC parameter space over which repetitive firing can occur shrinks dramatically with increasing temperature. Since the value of G L is presumably unchangeable, the configuration which best preserves the ability of the axon to repetitively fire over the largest range of temperature favors G L values near the biological value. Repetitive firing frequency as function of leak conductance for a specific input current strength.
0.99999	Trojans: A Trojan, as the name suggests, pretends to be something good, like virus scanning software or other useful applications. In reality they run malicious programs in the background that can perform any number of functions, like allowing an outside user to copy your files, see your browsing history, or even take remote control of your computer. Worms: A computer worm is a self-replicating computer program. It uses a network to send copies of itself to other computers on the network, and it may do so without any user intervention. Unlike a virus, it does not need to attach itself to an existing program. Worms almost always cause at least some harm to the network, if only by consuming bandwidth, whereas viruses almost always corrupt or devour files on a targeted computer. Adware: Adware or advertising-supported software is any software package which automatically plays, displays, or downloads advertisements to a computer after the software is installed on it or while the application is being used. Adware is usually seen by the developer as a way to recover development costs, and in some cases it may allow the software to be provided to the user free of charge or at a reduced price. As a result, the advertisements may be seen by the user as interruptions, annoyances or as distractions from the task at hand. How can my computer be infected? Unfortunately, there are many ways your computer can become infected. Some of the main causes to an infected computer included: illegally downloading music and movies, clicking on ads, browsing to compromised websites, and in general not being cautious when it comes to web browsing. Keep your computer's operating system up to date using Windows Update or Software Update on Mac. NEVER use file sharing programs to download games, music, movies, TV shows, etc. A large majority of the files shared on this network are infected. NEVER click advertisements on the Internet. READ all warnings very carefully. EDUCATE yourself, your friends and family about infections. Scan your computer for viruses on a regular basis, such as once per week. Create a strong password . Install the latest updates to the software you use, such as your web browser, Microsoft Office, etc. If your software does not automatically download updates for you, check the developer's website to be sure you're running the latest version. Being aware of what you are doing. Regularly updating your Anti-Virus definitions. Regularly scanning your computer for infections. Keeping your computer up to date with system updates. Makes things easier in the long run (preventive maintenance). Keeps your personal information safe and secure. May put less stress on your computer and keep it running better, longer. Look at emails before replying to them. Check the spelling and punctuation for errors. Many times phishing emails will have simple errors that are easy to see. Be aware of emails asking for personal information, generally a real organization will make you change your password/login yourself, rather than asking you for yours. If there is a program that pops up on your computer saying that you have viruses, and you did not install that program, then it is a virus. Also be cautious of web-pages that have similar pop-ups that are not part of your computer. When you visit web-pages, look for the content you intend to find, not what is flashing, or ads on the side. How can I scan and remove a virus infection? The first order of business is to get anti-virus software. It is also recommended that you download other virus scanning tools, like Malwarebytes which is available for free. After obtaining the software simply run the program and have it scan for viruses. A good habit to exercise before each scan is to double check that the software's definitions are up-to-date. In order to update the definitions there should be either a tab or button that relates to updating the software, e.g. "Check for Updates online."
0.996635	Records from organisations established to regulate craft trades and to control imports, set wages and conditions and train apprentices. The records consist of annual lists of those permitted to trade within the city as a merchant or craftsman. Many guilds operated as religious fraternities drawing members from a variety of occupations with admittance strictly controlled. The local business trade was organised and controlled by officials from the city or town corporation who also played an active part in the running of the guild system of commerce. There were generally two types of guilds, the merchant guild and the craft guild with both playing an important role in the running of the local economy, especially between the 11th and 16th centuries as they controlled the quality and prices of goods available. Only those admitted to a guild could trade as merchants or as craftsmen. Membership was much sought after as it conferred on a person the right to trade within the town and excluded others from doing so. City of London guilds which were incorporated by royal charter later became known as livery companies. Some trades groups such as the Watermen and Lightermen resembled livery companies but were never officially recognised as a livery. After the early 18th century many people joined livery companies who had no connection to the trade. Most members were granted freedom of the city with some livery company members coming from outside of the City. In Scotland it was necessary to join a guild of craftsmen or merchants and then gain a burgess ticket as a freeman of the burgh. The rolls listed those admitted as a burgess and entitled to vote in local elections. After reforms in 1884, burgess rolls and electoral rolls became indistinct from each other. The burgess system came to an end in 1975. Apprenticeship, membership (freedom) records and admission registers are the most useful records and date from the 17th century and may be found in the Guild minutes and accounts. The status of a freeman could be gained in a number of ways, firstly by inheritance from a father, husband or mother, secondly by completing an apprenticeship and thirdly by invite from an existing member and then accepted by the ruling body. Women had the right to pass on their fathers' membership to their husband and a widow could pass her husbands' membership to her sons. By the 18th century membership of a guild became possible upon payment of a fee (redemption) or through the father's membership (patrimony). Guilds also operated outside of London. Also consider looking for the women and juvenile branches of a friendly society. The name of the organisation did not necessarily indicate the occupation of its members. An apprenticeship lasted about seven years after which the person would be admitted to the guild and attain the status of a freeman. As the power of the guilds declined in the late 17th century, they were replaced by friendly societies with some evolving into secret societies along the lines of Freemasons. Many societies operated along purely fraternal social lines and as charitable institutions such as Freemasons and the Royal Antediluvian Order of Buffaloes. By law, society rulebooks had to be submitted to the Registrar and these are held by The National Archives. Earlier rulebooks were submitted to the Quarter Sessions. The annual reports produced by the Registrar from 1852 are found in the Parliamentary Papers. Name, occupation, address and father's name of freeman. Name and trade of master if status gained by apprenticeship. Date and method of admission. A number of published burgess rolls are available to download from the Internet Archive.
0.999827	Посмотрите на некоторые задания по Writing и Speaking с официальных экзаменов в марте 2017 года и используйте их для подготовки! Темами делятся люди, сдававшие IELTS. Мы даем свои комментарии на особенно интересные и каверзные, на наш взгляд, темы. Positive trend: (1) сохранение окружающей среды – это важный аспект жизни страны, и охрана природных богатств для будущих поколений должна быть приоритетом для государства. (2) инвестирование в охрану природы может быть оправдано тем, что в страну могут приезжать многочисленные экотуристы, и государство может извлекать их такого вида туризма материальную выгоду. Negative trend: (1) финансирование новых проектов в сфере экономики и общественной жизни – это ключевая задача правительства, чтобы развивать экономику и повышать уровень жизни населения. (2) новые проекты могут помочь стране улучшить свой имидж на международной арене. Иностранные туристы должны платить больше местных жителей за помещение местных достопримечательностей. Намного быстрее можно найти доводы в пользу того, чтобы иностранцы платили больше местных. Мы помним, что дается всего 40 минут на написание, поэтому пойдем по легкому пути. (1) это будет дополнительным заработком для каждой конкретной достопримечательности, потому что поддержание объекта (музей или галерея) в надлежащем состоянии требует постоянных расходов. (2) иностранные туристы, по мнению местного правительства, могут позволить себе платить больше местного населения, раз уж они уже потратились на приезд и проживание – возможно, иностранцы один раз в жизни увидят эту достопримечательность, в то время как местные могут регулярно ее посещать. Итог: Я бы согласился с этим утверждением. Тема говорит о том, что нужно больше выделять больше денег на преподавание научных дисциплин, чем на преподавание других дисциплин, чтобы обеспечить развитие страны. Стоит рассмотреть обе стороны проблемы. (1) “другие” дисциплины (логично, что имеются в виду гуманитарные) также важны, потому что развитие и сохранение культуры и истории является необходимым для любой нации, и финансирование преподавания таких предметов также должно быть в достаточном объеме. Итог: я бы согласился с тем, что нужно финансировать преподавание научных дисциплин в большем объеме, т.к. мы живем в эру динамичного технического прогресса, но и другие дисциплины не стоит забывать, потому что они также важны для ненаучных сфер жизни. Nowadays the population of the world is increasing rapidly. New homes and accommodation should be built for this additional population. Some believe that more houses should be constructed in existing towns and cities. Others believe that creating entirely new towns in the countryside to accommodate these houses is the best way. What is your opinion? Тема говорит о том, что стоит ли строить новое жилье для растущего населения в существующих городах или создавать новые города в сельской местности. Каверзная тема – боюсь, не каждый чиновник, отвечающий за развитие города, сможет сразу ответить на этот вопрос. Давайте попробуем рассмотреть обе стороны. (1) строить жилье будет проще, потому что будет более легкий доступ к квалифицированным инженерам и строительным материалам. (2) строить будет проще, потому что в городах уже развита инфраструктура и коммуникации, чтобы подключить новые жилые здания к электросетям, водопроводу и канализации, а также обеспечить население общественными услугами (образование, здравоохранение, торговля). (1) такой вариант позволит разгрузить большие города и снизить стоимость жилья, потому что земля в сельской местности значительно дешевле земли в городах. (2) появление новых городов позволит развивать малозаселенные регионы и распределять население равномерно по стране. Итог: решение зависит от страны и ее территории – если территория позволяет строить вне больших городов, то стоит выбрать этот вариант, чтобы развивать малонаселенные регионы. Some people believe that professional workers such as doctors and teachers should be paid more than sports and entertainment personalities. To what extent do you agree or disagree? Give your opinion and relevant examples. Nowadays schoolchildren and students are taught to be competitive towards their classmates and aren’t encouraged to help the weaker students. Do the disadvantages of this outweigh the advantages? Give your own opinion and support it with relevant examples. Some people say that use of mobile phones should be banned in public places or crowded areas, while others disagree. Give your own opinion and relevant examples. Nowadays children spend more time playing computer games than doing sports. Why is it happening? Does it have a positive or negative effect on their development? – What do you think is special about your home? – What indoor games do you play? – Which indoor game are you learning to play? – When you leave the house what do you take along with you? – What do you often forget when you go out? – How many types of houses are there? – What are the differences between a new house and an old house? – How are people wasting energy at home? – How can solar heaters help to save energy? – Did you like your hometown when you used to live in it? – What was your favorite place in your hometown? – What special celebrations do you have in your hometown? – Do you have a lot of pictures of you as a child? – Do you like to take pictures when you travel? – What is the movie? – When did you see it for the first time? – Why is this your favorite movie? – What kind of movies do you have in your country? – What is the difference between movies that older and younger people like to watch? – Do you think that movie industry in your country can compete with Hollywood? – Do you think a lot of money is spent on making movies? – Why do people like the old, black and white movies? – Do you go to the cinema often? – Do you think the next movie stars will be computer generated? – Did you grow up there? – Is it a good town for families with kids? – Do you like taking pictures? – What do you do when you take photos? – Do you have many childhood photos? – Where and when was it build? – Do you like to visit this place? Why? – Let’s talk about materialism and competitive world. – Do you think our behaviour these days is affected by materialism? How? – How do you expect things to change in the future? – Do you like this place? Why? – Do you think it is a good place to live in? – Would you recommend it to your friends? – How many pairs of shoes do you have? – Do you like comfortable or fashionable shoes? – Do you think people have too many shoes these days? – What do you plan? – When and why do you want to do it? – Do you think planning is important? – What do you think about routine planning? – Can you give some examples? – What could governments do to plan better? – What is the difference between those who plan and those who don’t? – Why is it so in your opinion? – How often do you look at yourself in the mirror? Why? – Do you look in the mirror after shopping? – Do you think a mirror is a good choice for decoration? – Why is this person important to you? – How did he/she influence your life? – Do you think it is easier to become famous now compared to the past? – What kind of people were becoming famous in the past? – What sorts of people become famous in your country? Why? – Do you think to be famous one needs a certain talent? – Let’s talk about handwriting. – How often do you write by hand? – Do you prefer handwriting or typing on a computer? – Let’s talk about teaching. – Do you enjoy teaching? – Have you ever taught somebody? – What country would it be? – Why do you want to go to this place? – What is so special about this country? – Why do people choose going abroad to study or work? – What are the advantages of working or studying abroad? – Will it benefit you back in your country? – Do you enjoy watching sports? – What kind of games do you play? – What kind of games did you play as a child? – When do you usually listen to music? – What kind of music did you like when you were younger? – What kind of music is popular in your country? – Do you wish you could play any musical instruments? – Which is your favourite instrument? – What can you see from your window? – Did you like this colour as a child? – What are popular colours among your friends? – What is this movie? – What is the movie about? – Explain why you like the movie. – What films are popular in your country? – What films are popular with teenagers and the elderly? – Why do some people love watching black and white movies? – Are there any black and white movies screening in your country? – People spend too much money on making movies, do you think they really need to spend that much to make a good movie? – Most of the movies have computer-generated graphics, why do you think it is so? – In the future, do you think computer generated movies will be still popular? – What do you think shoes tell about someone’s personality? – Do you like to wear formal or casual shoes? – Do you purchase shoes online? – Do you think people have too many pairs of shoes? – Do you like to spend money on shoes? – What was the name of person serving you? – How can customer service affect a person’s life? – What are the main differences of customer service provided by retail and brands’ shops? – Have you felt angry because of bad customer service? Why? – Why do people feel bad about customer service? – Do you like holidays? Why? – What do you prefer to do on holidays? – How long do you usually enjoy holidays? – Do you like celebrities? – Who is the favourite celebrity from your country? Why? – Why do you find it so relaxing? – Are there any other activities where people feel relaxed? – What should companies do for their employees’ relaxation? – Are there any changes now in relaxing activities compared to the past? – Are there any other ways for relaxation? – Do you find your job stressful? – What do you do with your friends on weekends? – Do you like to make new friends? – Do you remember your dreams after you wake up? – Do you like to hear dreams of others? Why? – Do you like to learn about dreams? Why? – How can decisions affect a person’s life? – What are the main decisions youngsters have to make nowadays? – Did you get advice from somebody before making crucial decisions? Why? – Why do people make wrong decisions sometimes? – What work do you do? – Why did you choose this kind of work? – Where do you see yourself in the next 10 years? – Would you like to become a celebrity, if you had a chance? – Did you enjoy that part of your life? – Do you like visitors? Why? – What do you do when visitors come to your place? – What do you prefer, to visit people or to invite them to your place? – Do you think children nowadays are overburdened? Why? – What can be done about it, in your opinion? – Do you think children learn more in school or during playtime? – What would be your suggestion about it? – Do you think workers should be rewarded for working overtime? Why? – How should it be done? – Do you like relatives coming to your home? – What do you usually do with your relatives? – Do you prefer visiting relatives yourself, or for them to come to your place? – Where and when would you like to go? – What would you do there? – What is your reason for choosing such a trip? – What mode of transport do you use to get to work? – What mode of transport do countryside people prefer? – Do you think we have enough footpaths for pedestrians? – What should our governments do to curb pollution? Be the first to comment on "Задания из IELTS в марте 2017"
0.999584	I really enjoyed the first of the Robert Langdon books Demons and Angels, and thought it was excellent, and The Da Vinci Code was pretty good, but this book struck me as boring and repetitive. It was too focused on Langdon's 'attractiveness'and his ignorance of it, explaining why hi is now on romance number three in as many books, and the overdone stretch that was the plot. I finished it and thought, 'Well, 2/3, not bad' and ended the series with an overall opinion that it was good, but imagine my surprise when I realized that there was, in fact, going to be another book. The series should have ended with The Da Vinci Code, I will not be continuing the series.
0.949362	"That's Someone You Never Forget" 1967 U.S. RCA Victor 45 picture sleeve, 47-9115, "Elvis sings That's Someone You Never Forget" "Long Legged Girl (With the Short Dress On)" (1967) "That's Someone You Never Forget" "That's Someone You Never Forget" is a song written by Elvis Presley in 1961 and published by Elvis Presley Music, which appeared as the closing track on his 1962 album Pot Luck and was released as a single in 1967. The song was written by Elvis Presley with his bodyguard Red West and based upon an idea and title by Presley himself. Red West recalled the songwriting collaboration with Elvis: "'That's Someone You Never Forget' was a title that came from Elvis. He said, 'How about coming up with a song with the title of "That's Someone You Never Forget"?'" Elvis and West agreed that Elvis would receive a co-writing credit because of his contributions to the creation of the song. The song was copyrighted on May 15, 1962 with words and music by Elvis Presley and Red West and published by Elvis Presley Music, Inc. It is surmised that Elvis wrote the song about his mother Gladys Love Presley, who had died in 1958. Elvis Presley gave his recording a gospel-influenced arrangement, which added to the spiritual mood of the song. Elvis also co-wrote the song "You'll Be Gone" with Red West and Charlie Hodge in 1961. These two songs were Elvis' rare song compositions. At the time, Elvis was trying his hand at songwriting. His input was mostly in providing ideas about creating new songs and choosing how they should sound. In his landmark, best-selling biography of Elvis, Elvis: A Biography (1971), Jerry Hopkins discussed this songwriting period in Elvis' career. The song was recorded on June 25, 1961 at RCA Studios in Nashville and was released as the B-Side to the 1967 single, "Long Legged Girl (With the Short Dress On)" on April 28, issued as RCA 47-9115, reaching number 92 on the Billboard Hot 100. The single was also released in the UK, Canada, Australia, Germany, France, and Italy. The song has appeared on several of Elvis Presley's compilations including the Artist of the Century career retrospective collection in 1999. The song is notable because it was co-written by Elvis Presley. The single was re-released as a red label 45 as part of the RCA Gold Standard Series as 447-0660 on July 15, 1969. 1967 45 single release on RCA Victor. Elvis Presley Music, Inc., released sheet music for the song featuring Elvis on the cover in 1961 noting that it was "Recorded on RCA Victor" with "Words and Music by Elvis Presley and Red West". "The 1999 remastering benefits from superior sound and a 17-song lineup, reaching back to March 1961 for its songs, including ... the haunting, gospel-like "That's Someone You Never Forget," which was co-authored by Presley and is one of his best non-hit songs of this era". --- Bruce Eder & Neal Umphred for Allmusic. (1967) "Long Legged Girl (With the Short Dress On)"/"That's Someone You Never Forget", RCA 47-9115, #92, Billboard Hot 100. RCA Victor also released the song on an EP picture sleeve 45 in 1967, 86574, containing the following songs: "Double Trouble"/"I Love Only One Girl"/"Long-Legged Girl"/"That's Someone You Never Forget." 1962 sheet music cover, Elvis Presley Music, Inc. ^ Bogdanov, Vladimir, Chris Woodstra, Stephen Thomas Erlewine. All Music Guide to Rock: The Definitive Guide to Rock, Pop, and Soul. Backbeat Books, 2002: "'That's Someone You Never Forget' which was co-authored by Presley." ^ Catalog of Copyright Entries, 1962. ^ Hopkins, Jerry. Elvis: A Biography. NY: Simon and Schuster, 1971. ^ "That's Someone You Never Forget". 45cat. ^ Song artist 1 - Elvis Presley. tsort.info. ^ Elvis Presley 45 RPM Record Guide (US) Gold Standard Series Matrix. Bogdanov, Vladimir, Chris Woodstra, Stephen Thomas Erlewine. All Music Guide to Rock: The Definitive Guide to Rock, Pop, and Soul. Backbeat Books, 2002: "'That's Someone You Never Forget' which was co-authored by Presley." Jorgensen, Ernst. Elvis by the Presleys. Liner Notes. BMG Heritage, 2005. Presley, Priscilla. Elvis by the Presleys. Liner Notes. BMG Heritage, 2005. Hopkins, Jerry. Elvis: A Biography. NY: Simon and Schuster, 1971.

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